Arianne looked at him closely. “Can you be sure it is aimed at Moira?”
“I don’t like the way it looked at her.”
“You said it seemed to be surveying the crowd.”
“Yeah, but…” Wiz lapsed into an unhappy silence.
“Oh, don’t brood love,” Moira said. “It is perfectly safe and I will have Jerry with me should need arise.”
“Plus two kids,” Wiz added. There was an insistent whuff over his shoulder. “And a dragon.”
“Shauna and June will be along as well,” Moira countered.
That carried some weight, Wiz had to admit. Shauna could keep the lads under control and June was likely to be at least some help. Danny’s wife was strange and half wild from growing up in an elf hill, but she was no one to trifle with. On one memorable occasion Wiz had seen her take out three fully armed hobgoblins with the knife she always carried.
“Well, I still don’t like it.”
Moira reached out and put her hand on his arm. “Pooh. You heard Arianne. There is no danger now. But the townsfolk must be reassured, so it needs to be done.”
“We’ve got to do something about this Calvinist sense of duty of yours,” Wiz said as Moira picked up her cloak
“Who is Calvin?”
“He designed genes,” Wiz said absently, “and he gave you the heavy-duty kind.”
Moira did what she usually did when she didn’t understand her husband, which was to change the subject.
“You’re a fine one to talk about duty. All a dragon has to do is show up and make some threats and you go off with him and we don’t hear from you for weeks.”
“That was different,” Wiz said with some dignity— hoping reverently Moira wouldn’t ask him how it was different. She settled for cocking a coppery eyebrow and fastening the cloak at her throat.
Then, seeing his expression, Moira reached out and took his hand. “Please, Wiz.”
Wiz hesitated and then relented. “As long as it’s safe.”
She kissed him on the cheek. “Oh, we’ll be fine,” she told him. “You worry too much.”
Far and far away, in a place below the earth, a thing considered.
It was enough. It had found what it needed. Now there was only the harvest.
Danny and Wiz stood at a window and watched the group cross the courtyard and pass out the castle gate.
“I guess they’re right,” Wiz said, as much for his own reassurance as Danny’s. “It’s perfectly safe.” He sighed. “I wonder if I’m getting paranoid in my old age.”
“I know I’m paranoid,” Danny said grimly. “I just don’t know if I’m paranoid enough.”
THREE – THE FAIR AGAIN
The fair was very different in the afternoon than it had been that morning. Intermittent clouds hid the sun and the air that had been crisp and invigorating in the morning was now chill and damp. Even the mud seemed deeper.
All of which could have been her imagination, Moira admitted, but there were other changes which clearly were not.
The crowds of gawkers were gone, leaving only the fair workers, merchants and here and there a knot of guardsmen, armed and alert. There was less shouting and no laughter as people struggled to get their goods unloaded and their tents up.
None of which mattered to the children. Ian and Caitlin went whooping and shouting among the booths, avoiding most of the uninteresting mud puddles and seeming to be everywhere at once. Fluffy trotted along with them, head high like a show dog in the ring. Shauna puffed along behind, calling out admonishments and generally trying to keep them under control. June floated along near Ian, close and silent as always.
It would have been a perfectly normal scene, Moira thought, if June didn’t keep one hand always on her knife.
She dug Jerry in the ribs with her elbow. “Smile,” she commanded out of the side of her mouth. Then, putting on her best beauty-pageant smile, she and Jerry began to stroll among the booths.
Moira paused frequently to admire goods on display or to chat with someone she knew. Jerry contented himself with smiling until his jaw ached and responding to any pleasantries directed to him.