Page 17

Sixteen

Lira stepped gingerly through the windowsill of her bedroom, shooting a final glance behind her. Sass hadn’t come up yet and Durn hadn’t approached their room since he’d shown them to it that first night, so there was no one to witness her sneaking onto the tavern’s roof.

She sat on the rough thatch and exhaled loudly into the stillness of the night, her warm breath puffing from her lips before the cloud vanished in the cold. Smoke curled from the chimney at the far end of the tavern, the sharp aroma of peat faint as it dissipated into the cool air.

For their first night serving food, it hadn’t gone too badly but now that she’d stopped moving, Lira could feel the exhaustion seep into her bones. Not only that, but she was a mess. Her feet ached, her hair was a nest of frizz, and her left thumb boasted an angry red spot from where she’d touched it on one of the scorching pans. On top of it all, she was certain her hair reeked of charred pastry.

This was not at all how she’d imagined returning to Wayside.

Lira bent her knees and circled her arms around them as she shifted her weight to a less prickly spot on the thatch. She’d always heard folks say you could never go home again, and now she knew what they meant.

So much of the village was how she’d remembered it, but the one part that wasn’t there, that would never be there, was her gran. Lira was doing her best to recreate those moments in the kitchen that had been the core of her happiness, but without her gran it just meant blackened pies, burned skin, and sore feet. Not to mention the wyvern who threatened to ruin everything.

Had she made a mistake coming back? Should she have forgotten what she’d hidden away and just kept moving? She could have found another crew. She could have gotten more work.

She shook her head hard. No, that life was done for her. She knew that now. As skilled as she’d become, questing hadn’t been where her heart lay. Even as she’d deftly gotten her crew into impenetrable fortresses and gathered secrets that led them to hidden treasure, she’d known that it wasn’t the path she was meant to traverse.

Lira scanned the rooftops of the village that now slumbered peacefully, with only the sleepy whinny of a horse or distant hoot of an owl to ripple the quiet. She’d never thought that this crumb of a village would be her destiny either, but despite a bumpy start, she didn’t feel the urge to leave she thought she would.

She unwrapped her arms and propped them behind her, closing her eyes and breathing in the crisp cool air that was so unlike the night air in Elmshire with its aroma of roasting meat seeping from every chimney, so unlike the evening air in Lananore with its heady perfume from blossoms that only flowered at night, nothing like the frigid air in Frostmoor where the smell of snow was ever-present. Lira would know the woodsy, watery, smoky scent of Wayside with a single breath.

Then her breath caught in her chest, and her eyes flared open. There was something here aside from the quiet slumber of the village. The fine hairs on her arm prickled as she scanned the village and peered beyond it into the tree line.

She wasn’t sure if it was her elven blood or her years working as a rogue, but she could sense when she was being watched. And the shiver that skated down her spine told her that someone was watching her right now.

Was it Rygor? No, the wyvern was too arrogant to bother watching her in the dark. He seemed to be cunning, but she didn’t get the sense that he would bother with subterfuge. Not when he’d been empowered by the laird himself.

It wasn’t the wyvern, but there was someone out there. She’d bet her life on it.

“There you are.”

Sass’s voice ripped her from her focused scan of the hushed village, and she turned her head to find the dwarf climbing out to join her. Lira’s heart hammered recklessly, and she cursed herself for thinking she was being stalked when it was just Sass. Who would be after her here?

“What are you doing on the roof?” Sass crawled on her hands and knees across the bristly thatch, wincing as she plopped herself next to Lira.

“Just getting some air. I’ve always been partial to rooftops for contemplation.”

“Is this an elf thing?” Sass’s tone told her that she considered this habit to be quite odd.

Lira smiled and shook her head. “Not that I’m aware of, but I wasn’t raised by elves.”

“Right.” Sass snapped her fingers. “Half-elf. Human gran.”

“Human gran. ”

Silence settled between them, and Lira thought that Sass might be absorbing the magic of perching above the world and watching it sleep.

“Smells better up here,” Sass said. “You can still smell burned pie crust inside.” Then she held up her hands. “Not that it was a big deal, burning one batch. The rest were enough to feed the crowd we had tonight, and not a single patron complained. Not a bad start, if you ask me.”

“I’m still a bit rusty,” Lira admitted. “I’m just glad they turned out at all.”

Sass patted Lira’s knee brusquely then pulled her small hand away. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. It’s a miracle you even found the oven under all that mess.”

Lira laughed. “And I, for one, didn’t think you’d be able to rid the place of the troll smell.”

Sass shuddered. “Don’t remind me.”

“There’s still work to do to get this place back to the way it was,” Lira told her. “We only had a handful of diners tonight. The Tusk & Tail used to be packed to the rafters.”

“Aye, give it time,” Sass said, her northern accent thickening as she stifled a yawn behind her hand.

“You’ve got time?” Lira asked. “You’re not eager to go find a mercenary crew?”

Sass shifted, crossing her legs in front of her. “Getting caught by you was the best spot of luck I’ve had since I left home.”

“And you don’t miss home?” Lira pressed. “You aren’t ready to pack it in and go back?”

Sass gave a curt shake of her head. “That’s not home anymore. Not for me. I was never going to be happy mining.”

“So you truly don’t mind staying for a while and trying your hand at running a tavern? Because you don’t have to stay if you don’t want. I have no intention of telling anyone what you were really doing here.”

Sass gave Lira’s shoulder a bump. “Not even the wyvern?”

“Especially not him.” Lira bumped her back. “I know I got you into this, but I wouldn’t hold it against you if you needed to move on. ”

Sass considered this for a moment. “You knowing I’d tried to rob the place was never the reason I stayed. Not really.”

“Well, I know it wasn’t the cushy accommodations.” Lira cast a glance through the open window at their small room.

Sass laughed but not as loud. “It wasn’t that, for sure. But there’s something about this place, this village. Even if I’m sleeping an arm’s length away from an elf—sorry, half-elf—this has been the best I’ve slept in ages.”

Lira knew what she meant, even if neither of them could put it into the right words.

“My mum used to say that home isn't where your axe hangs, but where your heart feels light enough to set it down."

Lira tilted her head toward the dwarf. “Your mum was a poet?”

Sass barked out a laugh that startled a pair of house sparrows into taking flight from the eaves. “More like she was particular about where she hung her axe.”

Lira smiled at this and rubbed her arms to rid them of chill. She glanced at the village through the darkness but didn’t sense anyone watching her. Then she stretched her legs, unfolding them as she stood. “I suppose I’d better get some sleep if we’re going to do this all again tomorrow.”

Sass joined her, taking a step toward the window and then dropping suddenly. Lira caught her by the arm before her leg went entirely through the rotted thatch.

“Thanks for that,” Sass said as Lira hoisted her back to standing.

Lira sighed and prodded the soft spot of the roof, feeling the sodden straw give. “I guess we added one more thing to our list of things to fix around here.”

“As long as we didn’t add ‘extract dwarf from roof’ to tomorrow’s list, I can live with it.”

As Lira followed Sass back into their room, she thought about what the dwarf had said. Could Wayside, with its crumbling tavern, make her heart feel light enough to set down all her troubles and put her past aside?