“Oy! Oy, you women—halt!”
Halt?
“What now, leader?” Kirsten whispered.
Chapter 14
Finley fell onto her hands and knees, belting out a high-pitched shriek of laughter, and then an oof, as Kirsten fell atop her, crushing her into the soft dirt and rolling across her spine in hysterical squeals.
The footfalls of the approaching men sounded near their heads, heavy-soled shoes, the jangle of metal.
“What are the pair of you about?” one demanded in a nasally accent. “Why aren’t you at the green with the others?”
Finley burst out in forced laughter again, and Kirsten howled as if it was the funniest thing she’d ever heard. “Fairies! We’ve found ’em at last!” And she dissolved again into convincing giggles.
They don’t recognize us, Finley realized.They think we’re Blairs.
Finley took a chance.
“Wait a minute,” she slurred and turned her body onto her flank toward the men, dumping Kirsten to the dirt behind her with another yelp. “Just who are you now, to be askin’ us such a thing? Yer nae Blairs.”
“Aye,” Kirsten added indignantly, popping up over Finley’s shoulder. “We doona know you. Mind yero-o-ownbusiness.”
“Get ’em on their feet,” the first man said and stepped forward.
Finley’s struggle against the hands that gripped her upper arms painfully was real, and Kirsten gave a sharp screech.
“Sure, you’d better mind what yer grabbin’, ye bastard.”
“I’d nae jostle her too much,” Finley warned as she was yanked about to face the man. He was wearing a strange leather vest, with plate armor draping his shoulders, and a smooth metal helm outfitted with small round rivets along the brow and nose piece.
English armor…
Finley shook herself. “I’ve just spent the past hour in the brush with Miss while she puked up her guts and half a barrel o’ mead.”
Kirsten gave a loud, dramatichurkand brought her hand to her mouth. She leaned into the man holding her, her shoulders hunched.
All in all, Finley thought her show very impressive.
The man shoved Kirsten away, and Finley jerked free of her captor to go to her side. She ducked beneath her arm and pretended to support Kirsten’s sagging, spasming frame.
“She just needs her bed,” Finley said, sidestepping toward the house. “Beddy-bed for Miss; nae more feasting for you this night. Here we go.” She turned toward the narrow space between the houses.
“Oy, where do you think you’re going?”
“Good night, fairy man,” Kirsten called, flopping her head back onto her shoulder.
“Just here. This is our own place, right here,” Finley said, slapping the wall of the dwelling on her right as she kept walking, praying it was actually a longhouse and not one of the many animal shelters she’d seen when last she was in Town Blair. “Misses to bed.”
“Straight to bed!” Kirsten called out in a singsong.
“Wait just a—”
“Let ’em go,” the other man said. “They’re too pissed to be any threat. Too stupid as well, likely. Scotch whores.”
Finley stiffened.
“Shh,” Kirsten warned against her neck.
