The rest is legalese and logistics.
Aidan Kelly signs where instructed, then passes the pen to me.
I take it, press it to the paper, and for the first time since the funeral, my hand trembles—not from fear or anger, but from the intimacy of writing my own death warrant.
I initial each page.
I return the pen.
There is no applause, no sigh of relief.
Just a rustle as the folder is filed away in a satchel that has probably carried worse.
The meeting dissolves.
The men stand, shake hands, exchange looks that are more binding than any contract.
I pull my coat tight and watch as they disperse, their footfalls merging with the ancient pulse of the gaol.
I head outside to find that the rain has stopped.
The city is scrubbed raw and gleaming, every streetlamp caught in the brine of fresh drizzle.
I walk the perimeter, following the old walls, and for the first time notice how many scars the stone has collected.
I stop at one, a crude DONNELLY gouged into the limestone by some ancestor with a chip of glass or a coin, and rest my palm against it.
The chill seeps through the wool, and for a second I imagine it as a pulse, a heartbeat left over from another era.
The car is waiting where I left it, the driver standing sentinel with the same blank patience as before.
I pause at the curb, listening to the slow ticking of the engine cooling, the city recalibrating itself for another round of history.
It occurs to me, suddenly and with more clarity than I have felt in months, that my father's murder was less an act of vengeance than an act of administration.
A necessary excision.
Someone needed me in play, but only if I could be moved without resistance.
They didn't care if I was a daughter or an orphan, only that I could be shaped to fit thehollow left behind.
I set my mouth into a grim line and make a phone call to Niamh, my father's go-between.
"Keira, I'm so sorry."
"Don't be, we all knew it was coming," I reply, though my voice trembles.
"Niamh, I'm being married off to Ruairí Crowley."
A pause, then I hear her exhale audibly.
"What do you need from me?"
"Eyes," I reply immediately.
"On the bakery van. If I need help, I'll find a way to ask for it."
"You got it."
