He tossed it across the table at her. “A good Midwinter-night to you, and Avarra guard you, son.”
Romilly untied the strings; took out a green cloak, spun of rabbithorn-wool, finely embroidered and trimmed with clasps of good leather. It must have been very old, for it had sleeves cut in one with the cape, in a fashion she had seen in portraits of her great-grandsire in the Great Hall at Falconsward; but it was richly lined and comfortable. She flung aside the shabby old cloak she had taken when she fled from Rory’s house in the woods, and put on the new one, saying after a moment, embarrassed, “I have no gift for you, Master Orain.”
He put his arm round her shoulders. “I want nothing from you, son; but give me the hug and kiss you’d give your father if he were here today,”
Blushing, Romilly embraced him, and touched her lips gingerly to his cheek. “You are very good to me, sir. Thank you.”
“Not at all – now you are dressed as befits your red hair and the manner you have of a nobleman’s son,” he said. There was just enough irony in the words that Romilly wondered; did he know she was a woman? She had been sure, at one time, that Dom Carlo knew.
“That old thing, you can make into a horse-blanket,” said Orain, motioning the tapster’s boy to make it up into a bundle. Romilly would rather have thrown it away where she need never touch it again, but in this weather horses could not go unblanketed, and the horse-blanket she had, had been meant for warmer climates. Her horse would be grateful for the extra warmth, with this midwinter storm.
There were but few patrons in the tavern this evening; the approaching storm, and the morrow’s holiday, contrived to keep most of the men at home, Romilly supposed, by their own hearths.
Orain asked, when she had finished her meal, “Will we have a game of darts, then?”
“I am not a good enough player to make it worth your trouble,” she said, and Orain laughed. “Who cares? Come along, then.”
They stood, alternately flinging the darts and sipping from their tankards, as the evening passed. Suddenly Orain stiffened, went silent.
“Your turn,” Romilly said.
“You throw – I’ll be back in a moment,” Orain said, his speech slurred, and Romilly thought, he cannot possibly be drunk so early. Yet as he walked away he reeled drunkenly, and one of the sparse patrons of the tavern yelled jovially, “Drunk so early on midwinter-night? You’ll not hold your wine on the holiday, then, man!”
She wondered; is he sick? Should I go and help him? One of the things Romilly had carefully avoided, during her weeks in the town, was going inside the common latrine behind any of the taverns – it was the one place where she might possibly be discovered. Yet Orain had been good to her, if he was in trouble, surely he deserved help.
A small voice in her mind said; No. Stay where you are. Act as if everything were normal. Since Romilly was not yet accustomed to the use of her own laran – and it was rare for her to be so much in touch with the feelings of any human, though she now took rapport with her birds for granted – she was not sure whether this were actually a message reaching her, or her own projected feelings; but she obeyed it. She called out, recklessly drawing attention to herself, “Who’d like a game, then, since my friend’s overcome with drink?” And when two townsmen came up to her, she challenged them, and played so badly that she soon lost and had to pay the forfeit of buying them a round of drinks. It seemed that at the very edge of the room she could see movement in the shadows – had Orain not left the room after all, but only withdrawn? Who was he talking to? She kept the game going, and by a great effort did not turn to try and see the other figure, tall and graceful, a hood shrouding face and head, moving softly near Orain. But as if she had eyes in the back of her head, it seemed that she could see it, hear whispers .. . her spine prickled and at every moment she thought she would hear an outcry, voices, shouts. Holy Bearer of Burdens, whose day this is, tell me, how did I become entangled in this intrigue, as if it mattered to me which king sat on the throne of the Hali’imyr? Damn them both, outcast king and usurper king. Why should a good man like Orain risk a noose for his neck because one king or another holds the throne of the Hasturs?