Chapter Twenty-Five
Waerington
“You and the others were supposed to be watching them,” Jerrold frowned at his son, who was stuffing breakfast in his mouth as fast as he could.“Now I come to find out you have been training with them.”
“Da, I know,” Cirda’s mouth was full as he protested.“But—”
“Don’t talk with your mouth full,” Mother Bercie chided.
Cirda, freshly washed and hair still damp, closed his mouth to chew with all the concentration he could bring to bear.
“And why did I have to learn this from Roth?”Jerrold grumbled.“He thought I knew.From you.”
“Daaa,” Cirda sputtered.
Mother Bercie tapped her fork against the plate.Cirda hunched and chewed,
Jerrold did not let his mouth curve into a smile.He just enjoyed the quiet, which was brief and fleeting.Had he really ever had this much energy, even when he was young?
It wasn’t like anything had changed here in his mother’s kitchen.Crammed to the rafters with jars, crocks, bowls, and plates, all piled haphazardly on the various shelves.Dried herbs, mushrooms and fruits hung from the rafters on old twine, each in a place so familiar he knew when and how low to duck his head when he moved about.Some things never changed.
But some things did.Jerrold drew a tired breath and took another bite.It wasn’t that he was really angry, but the Blood seemed to be worming its way into his life like mold or dry rot.
Cirda swallowed, took a huge gulp of his drink, and wiped his mouth with his sleeve.“Da, it was a free afternoon,” he protested, ignoring his grandmother’s sigh.“The Lord didn’t show for his battle lesson, so we got out of his history lesson.”
“He uses a sword?”Jerrold asked.
“Nah, a knife,” Cirda took another bite, chewed, then spoke.“He’s got that gimpy leg an’ sometimes it cramps on him and the Lady comes out and scolds him.”
“That’s not their full title,” Bercie said slowly.
Cirda nodded as he took a breath.“He said Lord High Baron was too many words for anyone to say, but that lady, Rosalind, she fussed and said we had to be respectful, so they settled on Lord and Lady.Capt’n Roth said it was ‘disrespectful enough to be respectful.’”Cirda shrugged.“They’re nice and all, and the Lord does make history kinda interesting, but fishing is better.”
“Since when do you get covered in muck while fishing?”Bercie passed him more bread.
Cirda tore off a hunk and slathered it with butter.“We heard some sheep, and thought they were from Old Petro’s, so we chased them but—” he launched into the tale, like he and his friends had been on a grand adventure, not just running through the woods.Words spilled out like water as Cirda ate and talked, rattling the table with his enthusiasm as he waved his fork and knife in the air.
Jerrold shot a glance at his mother, but she seemed amused enough to give up scolding him.Jerrold didn’t have the heart either.Rare enough to see the lad act like a lad.But Lord of Light, it made him feel tired.
“Still.You are supposed to be learning what you can and reporting back,” Jerrold said, sounding grouchier than he intended.“What about these new people?”
Cirda’s face dropped but he nodded, growing serious.“They’s nice enough,” he said.“Leeda is fun, but she doesn’t know anything.Yfin had to bait her hook.And that Rye guy is a scribe.Are all scribes that scary looking?He scowls at everyone.Aramal is from Athelbryght.Said he’d teach us to make fish hooks at the forge, when he’s done fixin’ things.”
“Did the others get quite so mucky?”Bercie asked.
“Oh, yeah,” Cirda grinned.“Except prissy Moreta, more worried about her hair than anything.Girls.”He rolled his eyes as if appealing to the Gods.“But I got her in the back of the head with a big heap of mud, so—”
“Cirda,” his grandmother scolded.
“But Gran, she’d got me with some pine sap!”Cirda was clearly mortally offended.
“You and the others were supposed to be keeping an eye on the Blood, from hiding, and learning what you could.”Jerrold said.He tore off more bread.
“We did, until they spotted us,” Cirda squirmed in his chair as he defended himself.“We take sword class with Capt’n, and then we eat, and then Hisself teaches us our letters and tells us history, only it’s more like stories.”Cirda picked up his knife.“Yfin is teaching us knife fighting.”He grinned.“Da, did you know?‘Always bring a scarf to a knife fight.’”He pronounced it dramatically, raising his knife in the air and jostling the table.
“And you are learning your letters?”Bercie asked calmly.
“Aye,” Cirda slumped a bit.“Writing’s hard.So’s figuring.”
