Nobody's Lady (9 page)

Master Tailor stared at Siofra as he lifted his fork to his mouth and chewed slowly. You could practically hear every movement of his jaw between the crackling of the fire.

Siofra’s face darkened as she snatched the plate. “Of course. I can do it myself,” she said quietly. “I didn’t mean anything by it.”

As she stood to refill her plate herself, I cleared my throat, my gaze drifting to the large gaps between us I’d left for Jurij, Sindri, and whatever other Baker boy felt like joining us. My hand dug into Bow’s fur. I’d been looking forward to seeing the look on Jurij’s face when he saw our surprise canine guest, but now I wanted to grab him by the shoulders and shake him until the whiny, selfish man who’d moved in with me was replaced by the kind and caring boy who’d never spared a thought for himself.

But you were the one who felt it only right to give men their freedom.

“I like this ale,” said Master Tailor, taking a swig from the mug I’d served Alvilda’s and Siofra’s gift in. “Alvilda, did you get this from Vena?”

Alvilda slammed her plate so hard on the ground beside her, I thought for a minute I’d served her meal on glass instead of wood. “All right. We’ve waited long enough.” She bolted upright. “I’m going to search the entire village, I’m going to knock down doors, I’m going to find that lazy, ungrateful—”

“Alvilda!” Both Siofra and her former husband spoke the name at once, one pleading, even angry, the other so surprised, it was a wonder he was able to keep a grip on his mug.

Alvilda whipped around, first to face her wife and then to face her brother. She didn’t seem to notice Luuk slinking down beside her as if hoping he could vanish entirely into the ground.

“No. This is ridiculous. I thought last week, when he dined at our house, that his plan to join the quarry workers would snap some sense into him, but that was just at Noll’s urging, wasn’t it? Leaving this entire meal to Noll, continuing to encroach upon her hospitality.”

Despite my own irritation at the man who was the topic of her tirade, I started to feel protective, even defensive in the face of Alvilda’s overreaction. “He hasn’t been encroaching. He’s been going to work every day.”

Alvilda’s boiling hot gaze fell on me. “Don’t tell me he’s been doing the minimum of what’s expected of him like it’s some accomplishment.”

“It
is
an accomplishment.” I jumped to my feet, staring her down across the fire. “Alvilda, don’t you think you’re being too hard on him? You didn’t say a word against him for doing nothing with his days before the curse broke.”

Alvilda thrust her arms across her chest. “Things are different.”

“Things
are
different. You can’t just expect men to pick up their lives like nothing’s changed.” My gaze fell on Master Tailor and Luuk. “Tell her,” I said, as if my experiences put me in the position of acting like some translator between men and women. “Tell her things are different.”

Siofra set her plate on the ground. “She knows that, Noll. She just wants what’s best for our sons.”

“
Our
sons?” The clatter of the plate on the ground beside me was enough to rival a dozen glass plates smashing. Master Tailor stood, his finger pointed at Alvilda. I’d never seen the man so angry. Granted, I’d never seen his face before the curse had broken, but I never imagined the features behind the owl mask he so often wore could contort so wildly. “Jurij and Luuk are
my
sons. Mine and Siofra’s.” He patted his chest with his fist. “And the two of you might have tried to forget I existed all of those years—”

Siofra gasped, standing. “We never!”

Alvilda put a hand out to stop her from crossing around the fire to get nearer to him.

“You
always
.” Master Tailor’s voice grew so deep and troubled, Bow woke from her nap emitting a low growl. Master Tailor paused, the lump on his throat shaking visibly as he swallowed. “It was always the two of you, from the start. I had my uses, but I was nothing to you.”

“That’s not true.” I’d never heard Siofra’s voice so unsure.

“No, it
is
true.” Master Tailor shook his head. “I may have been too stupid to be hurt by it then, but it hurts thinking about it now.” He sighed, his eyes darting between Alvilda and Siofra. Siofra couldn’t meet his gaze, but Alvilda stared, daring him to say more. Master Tailor waved a defeated hand, dismissing them. “I don’t mean I want Siofra back. I didn’t have a choice to love her, you know.” He tapped his fingers across his forehead as he paced back and forth before the fire. “But I can remember things. My
own sister
, Siofra, like I wanted to know what was going on between you. Like I was nothing but a messenger without a brain. But I remember what you had me say to her.”

I clapped my hands together. “Okay, Nissa, why don’t you help me clean up?” I looked across the fire. “Luuk?”

Luuk practically jumped up but stopped himself, his eyes wandering between Nissa, his mother and aunt, and his father, clearly trying to figure out who was least likely to cause him discomfort. And he wasn’t having an easy time deciding.

Master Tailor seemed to notice the pause, and his attention drifted between Luuk and Nissa. He grabbed Luuk by the arm and pulled him upright. “No, Luuk’s had enough of that. We’re leaving.” He looked at me. “Thank you for the dinner, Noll. It was great. Thank you for opening your home to Jurij, who is
a grown man
and can do as he damn well pleases.” His extra emphasis was clearly not meant for me. “Tell him he can come home to me if he gets tired of the quarry.” He looked back at Alvilda and Siofra. “Or of women in general.”

I decided to let that last comment slide, given the situation, but some women couldn’t.

“Coll!” Some of Siofra’s usual stubbornness came through.

“No, let him go.” Alvilda slipped an arm around Siofra and pulled her to her chest, roughly, more boldly than I’d ever seen her do before. “Let the man whine and see what good it does when the work still needs doing. Let him see that it’s not so easy to think for himself and take on responsibility when someone isn’t commanding him.”

“So, Nissa,” I spoke quietly, turning to see how the poor girl was handling it. She was clinging to Bow and trying to peer around my legs at the path Master Tailor and Luuk were cutting through the grasses, the shortcut that would take them to the Tailor Shop at the edge of the village.

“Oh, for—” Alvilda peered at the northern road to the village, tossing a hand in the air and then cradling her forehead.

Four figures ambled toward us, still some distance away. They were dancing. No, they stumbled every few steps, their arms swinging wildly up and down, their hands clutching mugs. In the quiet, all I heard was the crackling of the fire, Bow’s heavy snoring, and the unskilled warbling of the four men.

Alvilda moved around the fire to grab Nissa by the forearm, much as her brother had done to Luuk a moment beforehand. She looked at me. “Thank you for the dinner, Noll. It was great.”
Wow, two barely-contained-rage-filled compliments for my cooking
. She peered over her shoulder. “Siofra?”

Siofra looked down the path, worry hidden behind the deep creases in her forehead. “He’s drunk.”

“He’s a fool. And we’ll have no part of it.” Alvilda tugged Nissa along after her, and Siofra shuffled behind. “Tell him he can come home to us if he gets tired of acting like an idiot,” Alvilda called to me over her shoulder. “Or like a man in general.”

The three of them passed right by the dancing group, not even turning their heads to greet them.

The young man I wasn’t too familiar with—the one with lips that seemed permanently puckered—poked Sindri in the chest, again and again. “Have I told you about my wife’s mornings?” He had his arm around Sindri and was practically dragging him to the ground beside the fire.

“Former—
former
wives,” slurred Sindri. His eyes were glazed, his attention focused on the ground.

“Former,” repeated puckered-lips. “Every morning, she tooled me—”

“
Told
,” interrupted Jurij beside him. He turned to Darwyn and started sniggering.

“Told me, Tayton, make the breakfast. Tayton, clean the house. Tayton, it’s cold, chop more wool for the fire.”

Darwyn and Jurij burst into laughter. “Wood!” shouted Darwyn.

“Wood.” Tayton didn’t seem to care that he couldn’t get through a sentence without being corrected. He poked Sindri again and flailed his hand around. “Then
I had to work in the quarry. And she just lay there, sleeping ’til lunchtime.” He reached forward for the mug he’d set down on the ground beside him, completely oblivious to the fact that Sindri was now about a nose’s length from the ground beneath Tayton’s arm. Tayton let Sindri go and sat back up, taking a swig from his mug. He wiped his mouth. “And
I
had to go home. Make her lunch.” He made a spitting sound and widened his eyes, flicking his free hand before his face. “Whatta bibch.”

“
Bitch
,” said Jurij and Darwyn as one, their arms tight across their abdomens to keep themselves from falling over.

My fingers clutched Bow’s fur as I regarded my new set of dinner guests around the fire, not a one of them interested in eating. Bow’s head raised at the sound of Sindri’s snoring. The baker’s son lay there, face down, on the blanket where Tayton had dropped him. He was uncomfortably close to the fire.

I patted Bow to calm her and made my way toward Sindri to pull him back.

“Them’s my wife’s mornings. A whole lot of nothing.” Tayton peered over the top of his mug at me as I rolled Sindri over.

Sindri’s eyelids flittered open. “Wha? No, Marden, I’m too tired.” He curled his legs against his abdomen and reached a hand out to grab my ankle, snuggling against my feet.

Tayton chuckled and spit back into his mug, swinging it side to side. “He thinks you’re his wife.”

“
Farmer
wife!” sang Darwyn and Jurij at once—a correction in need of correction—and they found them to be the funniest words ever spoken.

I ignored the cackling and reached down to peel Sindri’s fingers from my leg. They proved harder to unfurl than expected, and I hesitated, concerned I might hurt him. In the end, I gave up and used my full strength to tear them away.

Tayton found the sight amusing, but his laughter suddenly stopped. “Hey! I know you.”

I looked up only briefly to meet Tayton’s eyes and turned back to the task at hand, grabbing Sindri by the upper arms and dragging him back a safe distance from the fire.

“’Course you know her, genius.” Darwyn swayed a little where he sat. “She’s Noll. Lord’s goddess.”

“No.” Jurij slapped at Darwyn’s shoulder lamely. “No goddess.”

Darwyn and Jurij exchanged a glance, and they both grinned. “
Farmer goddess
.” They snickered. I couldn’t guess if they knew what they were saying or not.

Tayton shook his head and brought his mug to his lips. “No. I know that. I know her ’fore that.” He stared inside the mug with one eye open and one eye shut, tossing it onto the ground when he found nothing left in there.

I dropped Sindri and exhaled, wiping my brow with my arm. The fire was hot, which made dragging his heft all the more exhausting. I’d managed to get him rolled onto his back, but a terrible thought squeezed at my throat, an image of my father after one of his visits to Vena’s, coughing and choking in his sleep.

“The elf queen!” Darwyn and Jurij shouted my
farmer
title, laughing as the sound echoed into the evening sky. They picked up forgotten mugs and toasted them into the air. “To our queen!” They clinked them together and choked down the contents, stopping to giggle between breaths.

Holding Sindri on his side, I grabbed the picnic basket full of rolls I’d brought out for the half-finished feast. I slid it against his back for support. He kept on snoring.

Tayton leaned over to grab his fallen mug, rolling it farther out of reach with his fingertips. At last he grabbed it and lifted it into the air for the “toast,” too late, completely forgetting it was empty as he tried to slurp it again. He seemed puzzled as he tore the mug from his lips. “What’s the elf queen?”

Darwyn and Jurij found the question hilarious, just like everything else that evening. I stood with a sigh, my hands on my hips. “All right, enough. I guess you can all sleep here tonight.”
As long as I don’t have to drag all four of them inside by their arms.
I looked at the cottage, calculating how tired I’d get dragging just Sindri over there. It wasn’t too cold out. Maybe I could just toss some blankets over the lot of them and put out the fire so none of the idiots rolled into it.

“That’s it!” Tayton dropped the mug back onto the ground. This time it rolled until it knocked against Sindri’s fingers, but he barely stirred, murmuring something about being tired before drifting back into snoring. “You’re the crone!”

Darwyn and Jurij’s laughter was not something that should have surprised me, but it made my cheeks burn nonetheless.

“The little one,” Tayton added, pointing at me.
“The pretty one.”

I tore my eyes from him and felt my cheeks grow even hotter. This bumbling drunk’s compliment made me about as happy as any of his insults, and I could do without the leering that accompanied it.