“Iris!”
The roared greeting hit her as soon as she stepped into the tavern. She smiled at all the familiar faces as she crossed the room to the bar and the innkeeper, Mr. Tumes. “Good evening, everybody.”
There were a lot of strangers tonight, most of them soldiers, some of them red-faced and openly leering at her. That was often the case as of late. She scanned the room as she put on the apron Mr. Tumes handed her, noting their locations, and then her eyes landed on the man in black sitting alone in a corner by the fireplace, nursing a mug of ale. His sharp green eyes flicked to hers, and she suddenly felt intensely uncomfortable.
“Iris, I swear, you’re the prettiest thin’ in the whole worl’!”
Good old Mr. Jones.
The discomfort evaporated as she threaded between the tables toward him, but she didn’t make it in time to save his drink from sloshing down his shirt when he tipped his mug back too far.
“And that means you’ve had enough,” she said, taking the half-empty mug from him and setting it firmly on the table.
“Aw, Iris—”
“You know the rule, Jones,” Mr. Tumes interrupted in his booming voice, his gray eyes twinkling as the nightly routine played out before him. “If Iris says you’ve had enough, then you’ve had enough.”
“Why don’t you go home to your pretty little wife?” Iris suggested, wiping up the mess on the table.
Mr. Jones stumbled to his feet and threw his arms around her. His table mates’ laughter caught and echoed around the room, and Iris rolled her eyes. This usually happened later in the night. He’d started drinking early today.
“Alright, come on,” she said, easily slipping free from his clumsy embrace and taking his thick arm in hers. “Time for you to go.”
“Mollie is a pretty thin’, isn’t she?” he slurred thoughtfully as Iris led him to the door.
Maybe in his drunken eyes, or maybe when Mrs. Jones was younger. But Iris went along with it, as she did every night. “Yes, Mr. Jones, she is. Better not keep her waiting.”
Someone opened the door for Iris, and she gave Mr. Jones a good push from the threshold. He stumbled, regained his balance before he hit the dirt, and began to belt out a drunken song about his fair maiden as his portly frame wove a broken path down the street. She dusted her hands off and turned back to the crowd.
“Alright. Who needs a refill?”
This was how she’d spent her nights for the past year. The regulars were easy enough to handle; they teased and flirted, but none of them actually meant anything by it. The strangers were the ones she had to watch. Mr. Tumes kept a close eye on her, but avoiding trouble was always easier than solving it. So, Iris danced in and out of the tables, serving food and ale to one group while being ever mindful of the table just behind her.
“Iris, take this up to the last room on the right,” Mr. Tumes said, depositing a plate of freshly cooked food and a mug of ale onto the bar top. “But be careful. He’s a mage.”
She froze with her hand on the edge of the plate, her brown eyes wide. “A mage? Are you sure it’s safe?”
“I wouldn’t send you if it wasn’t. Besides, I can see the door from here.”
She looked up at the railing surrounding the balcony above, and that door was, indeed, in plain sight of the bar. That and Mr. Tumes’ reassuring smile bolstered her courage.
“Then I’ll be right back.”
She picked up the plate and mug and headed for the stairs, neatly avoiding a man with bloodshot eyes and grabbing hands. There was no break in the raucous laughter and loud chatter filling the room, which meant nobody had noticed. A small success on her part.
The first stair greeted her with a creak of old wood she could barely hear over the tavern noise, and every consecutive one creaked as well. Last door on the right. That was the best room in the inn and was reserved for special guests. A mage was certainly special. She couldn’t remember the last time one had come through town.
She shuffled her load around as she approached the door to free a hand for knocking, but she froze mid-step. There was a strange snapping and crackling in the air. It almost felt like static electricity in the winter.
A chill ran down her spine for the second time today. She glanced down at the fireplace to ensure the stranger was still there, and her stomach dropped when his sharp green eyes met hers. She averted her eyes to the door and knocked.
“Hello, I’m Iris, and I’ve brought your dinner.”
“Come in.”
She let herself in quickly, glad to get out of the green-eyed stranger’s sightline, but her relief was short-lived. The room was almost completely dark, and the odd sensation of something stinging her exposed skin was even stronger here. A single flickering candle on the table and a handful of stars visible through the window provided the only light, and it was just barely enough for her to see a black silhouette sitting in a chair before the empty fireplace.
Suddenly, she wanted to drop everything and run.
She swallowed hard and forced a smile to her face instead. “I hope it’s to your liking,” she said with a false cheer as she hurried toward the table.
“I didn’t order ale.”
The door shut behind her. She jumped and scanned the darkness for movement, but the black form was still sitting by the fireplace. Was there somebody else in the room? No, Mr. Tumes would have told her that.
“It’s complimentary,” she said, somehow keeping her voice steady. “The best in town.”
The mage stood and walked toward her, finally stepping into the candlelight. It danced across him, illuminating cold blue eyes and a lean build that didn’t quite fit her idea of a man who spent his entire day sitting around fiddling with potions and spells. He wasn’t wearing a robe, either; just a normal shirt and a pair of pants. She wasn’t sure what she’d expected a mage to look like, but he wasn’t it.
“Then you drink it,” he said coolly.
“What?”
He approached the table, picked up the mug, and sniffed its contents. “If it’s the best in town, you drink it.”
She shook her head and took a step back. “There’s nothing wrong with it, if that’s what you’re thinking. Everybody downstairs—”
He shoved the mug in her face. “Then you shouldn’t have a problem.”
“You think it’s poisoned?” Her heart was pounding out of her chest, her skin crawling from the stinging vibrations attacking her on every side. The feeling only got worse when she looked into his frigid blue eyes, but she couldn’t look away, even as he backed her across the room.
“You tell me.”
“No, Mr. Tumes would never—”
Her back hit the wall. They were too far from the candlelight now for her to see his face anymore. He grabbed her wrist roughly and shoved the mug into her hand.
“Drink it,” he hissed.
Her protest died on her lips. He wouldn’t care that she didn’t drink, or that she’d seen Mr. Tumes draw this ale from the same keg half the men down in the tavern were drinking, so she brought the mug to her trembling lips and took a sip. The bitter liquid burned her throat only slightly less than the air burned her skin. She coughed and held the mug out to the mage.
“There,” she said, her voice a little hoarse. “Although I don’t drink, so I wouldn’t know if it tasted off.”
He took the mug and turned away, heading back to the table. She swallowed hard and forced her feet to move.
“Will there be anything else?” she asked when she was halfway out the door.
She immediately wished she hadn’t spoken. His cold blue eyes flicked to hers, and it took everything in her not to wince from the fire wrapping around her skin.
“No.”
She made a quick escape onto the balcony. The air outside the room was still painful, but it didn’t hurt as badly once the door shut behind her, and the pain faded more with each step away. She took a deep breath and pasted a smile on her face again, hoping she’d masked her discomfort before anybody had noticed it.
There hadn’t been another person in the room. The mage had closed the door himself with magic. He had been doing something else with magic, too, something with her, to her, and she didn’t want to know what it was.
She didn’t want to go up those stairs again.
“Everything okay?” Mr. Tumes asked, frowning as he searched her face.
“Of course,” she said brightly.
She wouldn’t say a word about this to him, or to Father John. He didn’t like her working at the inn, but he allowed it because he knew and trusted Mr. Tumes, and the pay was too good for her to risk the job by telling him whenever she ran into trouble. An occasional lecherous drunk wasn't that hard to handle, especially compared to that mage.
She avoided even looking at the stairs for the rest of the night.
The tavern emptied gradually. Townspeople stumbled outside to wind their way through the dark and back to their homes; soldiers left arm in arm, singing bawdy songs as they headed to their camp west of town. Iris had to ascend the stairs again, but not for the mage, thank goodness. She had to prepare a few more rooms on the left side of the balcony for officers and travelers, and she couldn’t feel the strange sensation in the air when she was that far from the mage’s door.
The green-eyed stranger didn’t seem as frightening anymore.
She knew he would occupy the room furthest from the mage’s, but she still didn't know his name. He had waved her over once for a refill, and he was still sitting by the fireplace when Mr. Tumes told her she could go for the night.
She took a deep breath of the cool night air as soon as she stepped outside. It caressed her face with the refreshing scent of rain. She reached back to untie her thick brown hair, shaking her head to loosen the waves. This would be the first rain of the summer. There were no clouds that she could see, but she could smell the moisture on the breeze, and she appreciated it. She wouldn’t have to haul water from the river for Mrs. Jones’ garden tomorrow.
Not tomorrow; today. It had to be after midnight.
She trudged through the streets alone, stifling a yawn with a hand over her mouth. The church was a straight shot down Main Street, all the way on the northern end of town. Father John had probably fallen asleep waiting for her. She was ready to fall asleep, too.
Maybe she had just been tired. Maybe that was what everything had been today. Her mind had been playing tricks on her. It was understandable, what with all the talk of war and rumors of dragons bandied about in the tavern every night. Everybody was on edge. Everybody was suspicious. She just needed a good night’s sleep, and then she’d be fine.
The rusty hinges announced her when she slipped into the church foyer, but Father John was sound asleep, sitting in the chair just inside the door with his head leaning against the wall. She smiled and shook his shoulder lightly.
“I’m back.”
He yawned and opened his tired eyes. “I don’t like you working this late.”
“You worry too much.” She pulled the full coin purse from her pocket and placed it in his hand. “Now go to bed,” she added, bending over to place a kiss on top of his bald head.
Down in the basement, Kayla and Ginger were asleep, as was Fred, judging by the snores emanating from his bed. Ginger’s wild red curls and Kayla’s fine blonde hair made a tangled mess on their shared pillow, and Iris smiled to herself, thinking about how funny it would be if they woke up knotted together. She changed into her nightgown and slipped into bed beside Kayla, prying her own pillow carefully from the little girl’s fingers. Kayla snuggled into her side, and she closed her eyes contentedly.
Morning would come too soon.9Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4GOVhG4Piz
