“’ Twas a mistake,” he said. “My eyesight isn’t what it was a millennia ago, but perhaps that is to be expected.”
He continued to spew out a lengthy bit of nonsensical excuses for his bad behavior, but she had long since stopped listening to him. She found a marginally sturdy chair, dusted it off, then sat down and looked at him expectantly.
His hands fluttered like nervous butterflies up and down the front of his tunic, finally coming to rest briefly on his cheeks before he seemed to gain some measure of control over himself. He took a deep breath, then put his hands down. They continued to twitch nervously, but perhaps that couldn’t be helped.
“How may I serve you?” he asked, only half sounding as if he were choking to death.
“You can tell me why you’ve been following me,” she said sternly. “It’s been three days now.”
“You noticed.”
“I’ve become accustomed to looking for things in the shadows.”
He looked as if the very thought might have induced a bout of terror he wouldn’t soon have recovered from. He sank down on a tall stool behind his table, wrapping his arms around himself. “I see.”
“And I’ve seen as well—you, following me. I want to know why.”
“I mistook you for someone else,” he said promptly. “My apologies.”
She had no reason not to take him at his word, but she had to admit it was a little unsettling to find a king’s bard following her. Then again, the entire journey had been unsettling so perhaps this was just another in a long series of things that would unbalance her.
Or perhaps he was lying through his teeth.
She decided that since she was so comfortable, perhaps she would take a few more minutes and determine which it was.
“You were prepared to favor the king with an heroic tale or two,” she said smoothly. “I am a very sympathetic listener, should you care to relate those tales just to me.”
He looked at her suspiciously for a moment or two. “In truth?”
“In truth,” she promised. “I am always interested in a good tale.”
Especially if those tales might lead to the odd bit of truth slipping out unnoticed. Perhaps during the course of the afternoon she might even manage to pry from him a detail or two about Soilléir’s kin. Finding someone to undo what he’d done to her eyes might be very useful.
Eachdraidh eyed her suspiciously for another moment or two, then sidled around his table and took up a chair a goodly distance away from her.
“I’m not sure you’ll find them interesting,” he said slowly.
“I don’t know many dwarvish tales,” she said, which was mostly true. Franciscus had only told her a handful, and she hadn’t paid the attention to them she likely should have, having been more interested in torturing herself with tales of elves. “I would hear yours quite happily.”
That seemed to put him at ease. He settled a bit more comfortably into his chair, looking quite a bit like a hen settling onto her roost, then he began spinning a tale that featured several dwarves in the thick of heroic deeds. She nodded in what she hoped were the right places, made the appropriate noises of shock, horror, and appreciation, then waited a bit longer whilst he was about the happy labor of providing refreshments for them. She accepted a small square of cake, a cup of tea, and the invitation to direct him to other things she might be interested in.
“What do you know of Cothromaiche?” she asked.
He spewed out a mouthful of cake all over his finely embroidered robe. He looked at her, a few crumbs clinging to his chin.
“What?” he asked, his eyes darting about nervously as if he looked for an escape.
“Cothromaiche,” she said. “The country, if that’s what one calls it. I met someone from there recently, but I couldn’t seem to pry anything interesting out of him besides a book of poetry and a lexicon.”
Eachdraidh’s ears perked up. “A lexicon?”
“It isn’t mine, or I would give you a peep at it. I might anyway, if the inducement is sufficient.”
He looked horribly torn, over what she couldn’t imagine. She waited, then waited awhile longer as he struggled to apparently overcome his aversion to telling her what she wanted to know. He leaned closer.
“What do you want to know?” he whispered.
“Everything.”
He looked as if she’d just handed him a bag of gold—or manuscripts, rather. Before she could catch her breath, or finish her tea, he had launched into