‘I was thinking about having him eat you,’ I said as I walked over and gave Tuan a rub on the snout, ‘but then I had a better idea.’
I whispered into Tuan’s earhole and stepped back. He gave a shrug that meant, ‘If that’s what you want’, and puffed a perfect little ball of fire directly at Agent Murano’s precious Porsche. The car exploded and as the radiator ruptured it gave out a little squeal like a dying mouse. The look on Murano’s face almost made this whole debacle seem worthwhile.
Ruby stood in the centre of the Hall of Spells. She tilted her head and spun, dragging her stick on the tiles that represented all of the major runes. ‘We’re not in Scranton any more.’
‘How can you tell that?’ I asked.
‘I’m blind, not stupid.’
‘Ruby!’ her father and grandmother shouted simultaneously.
The young girl shrugged, turned to me and said sorry, but it didn’t seem like her heart was in it. I laughed.
‘Don’t encourage her,’ Brendan said. ‘We are working on Ruby’s rudeness.’
‘Well,’ I said, ‘it sounds like frankness to me. If I need an honest opinion I will know who to ask.’
‘See?’ Ruby said to her father.
‘Ruby’s opinions tend to be too honest.’
I looked up to see Mom and Dad standing waiting for our discussion to end. I cleared my throat and pointed to Brendan’s mother and daughter.
‘Nora and Ruby, may I present to you Lord Oisin of Duir and Princess Deirdre of Cull – my mom and dad.’
Nora bowed then whispered to Ruby who bowed too. As she did, Ruby’s huge sunglasses dropped from her face. Her eyes were dark blue and seemingly unharmed but scars were still visible high on her cheeks where the shards of glass had entered her face and ruined her optic nerve.
Mom stepped up and took Brendan’s mother by the shoulders. ‘It is I who should be bowing to you,’ she said with a nod of the head. ‘You risked your lives today in aid of my son.’
‘I would hardly say our lives were at risk, Your Highness,’ Nora said.
‘You went toe to toe with the FBI and the Scranton cops,’ Dad piped in, ‘I’d say you were risking something. Welcome to Castle Duir. This is our home and for as long as we live here, it is your home as well.’
I leaned in to Nora and whispered, ‘And people live a long time around here.’
‘Daddy promised me a huge bedroom,’ Ruby announced. ‘I’d like to see it now.’
‘Ruby,’ Nora and Brendan again admonished in unison, but Mom, Dad and Nieve just laughed.
‘Of course,’ Mom said. ‘You must be tired. Let me show you to your rooms.’
As Mom and Nieve escorted the Fallons to the west wing, I looked about for Essa and Tuan but they had left.
‘I think she is off with Tuan getting a dragon blood youth tonic,’ Dad said.
‘Who?’ I said nonchalantly.
‘Who?’ Dad scoffed. ‘Essa, the princess that you are looking for.’
‘Who said I was looking for Essa?’
‘Oh, my mistake,’ Dad said sarcastically, ‘maybe you were looking for Graysea? By the way, how are the princess and the mermaid getting along?’
‘You’re enjoying this, aren’t you Dad?’
‘Oh yes,’ Dad said over his shoulder as he ran to catch up with Mom.
Dad came into my room as I was practising my knife throwing. He gingerly pulled the dagger from the wall and inspected the woodwork. ‘Don’t do that.’
‘Mom and Aein told me that you used to do it.’
‘Yes and I got in trouble with my father for it too. I’ll get you a dart board or something. Just go easy on the walls. It probably took an elf fifty years to carve this little section.’
‘OK,’ I said, ‘sorry.’
Dad laid the knife across his palm, feeling its balance. ‘You’re not using one of Dahy’s gold-tipped specials?’
‘No, it’s too easy. Also I don’t like seeing the way the knife swerves in the air. It … it reminds me of how Spideog died.’
‘Oh, of course,’ he said, handing me back the knife, ‘I was sorry to hear about that. You really liked him, didn’t you?’
‘Yeah, I did. You didn’t though, did you?’
‘Oh, I wouldn’t say I didn’t like Spideog, it was just … well, now that I think about it, I really didn’t know him very well. You have to realise that I was Dahy’s student from a young age so I just took my master’s side. I never really knew what those two guys were feuding over until you told me. It makes sense now. Dad never talked about my mother much. Most of the things I know about her are from what Dahy told me.’
‘Don’t you remember Macha at all?’
‘Oh, I have a memory of smiling eyes, but maybe it’s just a false memory that my child mind conjured up while looking at her portrait.’
‘Is there a picture of her in the castle?’
‘Sure – in the north wing.’
‘Can we go see it?’
‘Now?’
‘Why not?’
We walked through the castle together. Jeez, I thought the bowing and scraping was bad with me but for Dad it was just short of grovelling. He didn’t try to discourage it. It was the way I was dealing with it too. You just can’t spend all day saying ‘Stop that.’
Even though Dad looked like my fraternal twin he was starting to regain the grown-up manner that I remembered. When he first regained his youth by drinking Tuan’s dragon blood he acted exactly as he looked – like a teenager. He still drags Mom giggling into private corners of the castle but he doesn’t do it all the time and he has stopped challenging me to wrestling matches.
‘So how’s the kinging going?’ I asked as we walked.
‘To be honest, it’s a lot of paperwork,’ he said. ‘All of the kingdoms are kicking up a fuss about the volatility in Duir and especially how unreliable the gold stipends have been. Mom’s been a huge help. She has been holding them off while I was … resting – but now everybody is looking for stability. I’d like a little stability myself but I think pretty soon my brother is going to do some serious destabilising.’
‘He told me he wants the throne.’
‘Not surprising. Once a guy like Cialtie gets a taste of power – it’s hard to let it go.’
‘I don’t think it’s that,’ I said. ‘I mean it’s not just that. He told me that if he became