That is, until she took a sip of whatever it was that Finny had prepared, at which point her mouth twitched in disgusted surprise.
From her own, less-padded chair nearby, clutching a mug of hot, watery wine, Fern couldn’t help but note how thoroughly the tavern had been transformed.
With the windows unboarded, the fire roaring, and lanterns and candles scattered throughout, it was downright cheerful when compared to the dour, hopeless ruin it had seemed earlier in the day.
The tables had been drawn back from the walls, and the chairs and stools replaced in a semblance of order. The goats were also now outside, and the floor had been swept, which improved the smell tremendously.
Staysha chattered animatedly with the three gnome sisters, while Booth fussed with a round of cheese, summer preserves, and cured meat that he’d retrieved from one of the other buildings. He was determined to assemble something resembling a feast, even if they didn’t really have the stores to support it after the past weeks of privation.
The stone-fey couple sat quietly and watchfully with their daughter. The man and woman looked just as gaunt and underfed as before but, every once in a while, evinced the ghost of a smile. Their daughter stared with open wonder at Zyll, who was parked in a corner murmuring to a bunch of forks she had appropriated from somewhere. Nobody seemed inclined to ask for them to be returned.
The bustle and noise continued, and Fern sipped her wine dreamily. Every muscle in her body ached, and all she’d done was dash around and throw things. She couldn’t imagine how Astryx must feel. Still, those aches were sublimating into something like peace.
Finny cleared her throat, raising her hands for silence. She stared around the room, or appeared to. Her eyes never really seemed to open behind her cracked spectacles. The silver knitting needles in her bun flashed in the firelight.
“Oathmaiden,” she addressed Astryx, with great solemnity. “We owe ya a great debt. Can’t pay it, leastwise because we sent all that silver with Lem, Eight rest him, but t’wouldn’t be enough even if we had it.”
Astryx listened, but didn’t speak. Which was all right, because Finny wasn’t done, anyway.
“Our lives are little things in the Territory,” she continued in her reedy, wavering voice. “We know that. But you’ve made us feel a touch bigger. Didn’t have to stop for us. Didn’t have tobleedfor us. We thank ya, and though these words feel as little as we are, we’ll remember ya. And we hope that knowin’ it makes ya feel a touch bigger, too.”
Astryx went to drink from the cup again, to give herself time to marshal a response, but thought better of it at the last moment. Fern saw her struggling and realized that this was territory the elf was uncomfortable with.
She never sticks around for this part,it dawned on her.
“I . . . Thank you for the kind words, mother,” said Astryx, despite the fact that she was the old woman’s senior by centuries upon centuries. Then she looked from one face to the next, appearing to mark them in some way. Fern thought the elf’s eyes were shining with something other than lamp-glow, but couldn’t be positive.
Finny approached and patted Fern on the shoulder, whispering, “You picked a good’un to squire for.”
Then Fern was lost for words, too.
Staysha wasn’t, though. The dwarf stepped away from the gnome sisters, already slinging her lute over her shoulder as Booth laid out a meager spread on the table beside her.
“I knew I chose the right star to follow,” said the Silver Sparrow. She grinned brightly at all of them. “What’s a celebration without music, eh? Hearing about great deeds is all well and good, but seeing them? Well, the words have never come easier.”
“Oh, geez,” muttered Breadlee.
“Hear, hear!” cried Nigel.
Then Staysha burst into song, strumming up a storm, while Astryx did her best to disappear into all the blankets.
“Oathmaiden, Oathmaiden, silver and true,
Forged in the shadow and—”
The bard broke off with a discordant chord as the door banged open, and all eyes turned to the man framed within it.
He was strong-chinned and clean-shaven, hair cropped close. He wore stained quilted armor, with a shortsword belted at his waist and a white ferret curled around his neck. The creature regarded them all with beady eyes.
“That’s a dead verdigaunt,” said the man, eyes wide as he cocked a thumb at the road behind him. “I’m Haber. Sorry we’re late, but we—”
He started, and his mouth flattened into a suspicious line. “Staysha?”
Fern glanced back to the dwarf, who laughed nervously and seemed to want to hide behind her lute. “Oh. Um. Hi?”
34
What followed was something remarkably like a family dinner involving a lot of estranged relatives. Haber and his crew shuffled awkwardly indoors—a pair of narrow-faced sea-fey, the shortest orc Fern had ever seen in her life, and a gnome illusionist who couldn’t seem to find a color besides black to clothe herself in.
