The movements were almost comically gentle, given his massive hands and the comparatively tiny eggs, as if he shouldn’t be dexterous enough not to shatter the little things as opposed to neatly cracking them one by one.
“I would give me left—” He hesitated and glanced toward Violet. “Arm for that to be true,” he finished lamely.
Hannah finally stepped away from the door and approached the pair.
Violet saw her immediately and smiled. “Good morning. There’s more porridge.” She added in a stage whisper, “He forgot to stir the cream back into the milk, so it’s extra creamy.”
“Forgot? I meant it that way!” Aiden protested, glancing toward Hannah without turning from the hearth as he cracked a fourth egg.
Putting the bowl down, he picked up another and spooned a generous helping of cooked oats into it after pulling the pot crane from the flames, mixing to blend it with the milk and honey she assumed had already been waiting in the bowl.
“Here, lass.” He held it out.
After another moment of trying to process the sight of the man who had to keep his head bent so as not to smack it against the beams of the ceiling offering her breakfast, Hannah approached and took the bowl from his hand with both of hers. “Thank ye.”
“Aye.”
He turned back to his bowl of eggs, and she watched him add a splash of milk, a generous pinch of salt, and break the yolks with the wooden spoon in his hand with practiced ease. He gave them a quick stir and then crouched at the hearth and poured them into the waiting buttered cast-iron pan. They sputtered and hissed instantly, dismayed by the searing heat. Aiden ignored their plight and began to stir.
After putting the bowl down, Hannah crossed to where the cordial sat in its bottle, poured a spoonful into a dram, and handed it to Violet. Her sister sighed, but downed it without complaint. They both knew full well it had helped, as evidenced by the fact that Violet felt well enough to harass Aiden and actually try to eat. Just a spoonful three times a day had changed everything in the last week.
Satisfied, Hannah sat and watched Aiden stir his eggs as if it were the most normal thing in the world to cook porridge for a pair of near-strangers in their small cottage just past dawn. As she took a bite of the oats, she glanced toward the shutters, able to see early light through them. She trusted her apprentices were either awake or would be shortly when the rooster began to serenade them.
She was pleasantly surprised to discover the porridge was cooked to a good consistency with a pleasant tang of honey. She’d need to replenish her stores soon; honey seemed to be sneaking into everything lately.
Violet spoke up again, breaking the silence. “They say ye killed a man who spoke back to ye in front of others.”
“Do they?” Aiden didn’t look up.
Hannah shot her sister a stern look and mouthedStop, but Violet absolutely ignored her.
“Ye filled a horn with his blood, and ye drank it.”
“Oh?” Aiden looked up for a moment and raised an eyebrow, pulling the hot pan from the coals and continuing to stir as he approached the table. “They finally got one right.”
Violet’s eyes widened, and her mouth dropped open.
Aiden spooned the eggs onto a waiting plate and then returned the pan to the hearth, using it to push the coals back toward the main blaze and then setting it to the side to cool. He returned after making a third bowl of porridge and took a seat, grinning at her as he stirred his eggs.
“How do ye think I got so big, lassie?” He leaned forward a little. “Better than the finest whiskey yer sister can offer.” He snapped his teeth at her and then took a bite of eggs.
Hannah snorted into her porridge.
Violet quickly gathered her bowl and pushed to her feet. “I think I hear the cow lowing. Best make sure the boys milk her before ye fill their day. I’ll let them ken breakfast is ready.” She shot Aiden another wide-eyed look and then hustled out of the cottage, clinging to her bowl for dear life.
The two sat in silence for a moment, before Aiden let out a chuckle and took another bite of his eggs.
“Ye shouldnae tease her like that!” Hannah chided him in a tone as stern as she could manage, fighting to suppress her own smile.
“Tease her about what? It was delicious,” Aiden replied with a solemn face, which only served to coax her laughter. He smirked at the sound of it and shrugged his shoulders. “The lassie hadnae let up on me since she heard me moving around and came to see what I was up to. Ye came in at the very end of it. Did ye ken I also apparently raise taxes out of spite, demand infant sacrifice, set the blight on the MacEnty wheat, and kill the entire families of merchants who overcharge me? For one thing, I daenae have that amount of free time.”
Hannah choked on her porridge and coughed a few times, looking up at him in horror. “She didnae saythat.”
“Aye, she did. I’m honestly unsure how many of the rumors she told me were actual rumors and how many she just wanted to see me respond to.” Aiden grinned at her, mercifully seeming more entertained than irate at her sister’s loose tongue.
His smile lifted more on the right than the left, more a wry smirk. However, when he widened it, her breath caught, and she busied herself very quickly with stirring her porridge to make sure there were absolutely no lumps whatsoever. This was suddenly a very important and critical task upon which she needed to focus her entire attention lest the heat that had suddenly crept up her face be visible to him.
Hannah couldn’t help wishing that Violet’s sudden interest in conversation had waited another few days to return to life. Though she hadn’t had the energy or interest in being a menace in so long, Hannah had begun to worry her little sister wouldnever regain her spirit. Still, it would have been nice if she had delayed regaining it by another night or two.
