The Irish Warrior

“I will,” she said in her throaty voice. “And what name shall I mention, Irishman?”

He lifted her hand to his mouth, his eyes on hers. “I think ye know that.”

He pressed a kiss to the back of her hand, then followed Senna out the door.

Chapter 37

Their dour-faced wagon driver took them much farther than they’d have hoped, in a straw-filled, two-wheeled contraption that clattered and clumped and drew less attention than a bat. Then he dumped them on the side of the track and drove off without a backward glance.

Finian hurried them deep into the woods, where no Plantagenet soldier would dare to go. For an hour they walked, then Finian let them stop beside a river, where they rested and allowed Senna to wash off the mud he’d streaked over her face earlier in the day. He sat down as she knelt beside the bubbling creek.

“Tell me about yer wool, Senna.”

She looked up quickly. Her face gleamed with wetness. “My little bleaters?”

He smiled a little. “Is that what ye call them?”

“I call them hope.” She dried her face on her tunic. It left a smudge, visible even through moonlight. Beckoning with curled fingers, he had her bend low so he could wipe the dirt away with the bottom of his tunic.

“They are a very certain kind of wool?” he asked.

She sat back. “Very certain.”

He felt colder than the air around them should warrant. He lowered his tunic and sat back. “And why did yer particular wool matter so much?”

She looked affronted. “I created it. I spent years breeding for this strain. Its softness, its ability to absorb dyes, the way it melts apart for weaving. There is nothing like it in all the world.”

“Nothing in all the world,” Finian echoed. “That’s just what I thought.”

Rardove knew.

He forced himself to breathe slowly. Rardove could know as many truths as his cunning, corrupted mind could withstand. Without the means to create, he was as helpless as a lamb. Finian now possessed the last remaining dye manual. And…did he have a dye-witch, too?

“And you, Senna? Ye said Rardove wanted to dye yer wools.” She nodded. “Did he just want the wool, or did he want yerself to do the dyeing?”

She looked away sharply. “He is mad.”

“Aye. But can you make the Wishmés bleed blue?”

She shook her head vehemently. “No. I will never make them.”

Interesting. “No?”

“No.”

“Ye never will?”

“Never.”

“But can ye?”

She opened her mouth—to protest, likely—but to his surprise, she shut it again, then looked at him for a long time. Long enough for him to start feeling a kind of discomfort he was unused to. Usually he was the one questioning others, making them squirm under his

suspicious gaze. Just now, he felt like he was being assessed, appraised.

“I doubt it,” she finally said in a low voice.

“But that is why Rardove brought ye here,” he pressed.