Had Donal ever broken a real sword?
Had Lady Aingeal ever stabbed anyone?
Could a goose defeat a knight?
Was Seamus older than the castle?
Seamus left at that point.
Aingeal laughed before she could stop herself. The sound surprised her. Not because she never laughed, but because this laugh came easily. No bitterness beneath it. No sharpness meant to keep the world at its proper distance.
Donal looked at her then with pleasure. As if her laughter had given him something.
“There,” she said, tying off the leather. “Try it now.”
The boy took the wooden sword as if receiving a king’s blade. He swung once, better this time. Donal adjusted his elbow. Aingeal corrected his feet.
“Not so wide,” she said. “You are not a gate.”
“And not so narrow,” Donal added. “You are not a fence post.”
The boy corrected himself with enormous concentration.
“Good,” Aingeal said.
The boy glowed.
Donal stepped back. “Now defend yourself from Liam.”
Across the yard, Liam paled. “Me?”
“You called him a goose,” Aingeal said. “Surely you do not fear poultry.”
The entire yard heard that. Unfortunately for Liam, the entire yard also laughed.
The two boys squared off with great seriousness. The smaller one lost twice, then won once, because Liam slipped in the mud. He crowed in triumph anyway, and Aingeal let him have it.
When the boys ran off, wooden sword raised high, Aingeal remained near the woodpile with Donal.
The yard had gone back to work around them. Steel rang. Horses stamped. Men shouted. Ordinary life resumed, but something in her felt different inside it.
Donal turned the broken sword half over in his hand. “He will outgrow the new one quickly.”
“Children do that.”
“So I am told.”
She studied him. “You have not been around many?”
“Not in places where they were allowed to remain children.” The words were quiet.
Aingeal looked toward the boys, now arguing over whether geese could be trained for war. “Then perhaps this place will be good for you.”
He was silent long enough that she wondered whether she had gone too far.
Then he said, “Perhaps.” The word held no promise. Only possibility.
Aingeal tossed the broken sword half onto the scrap pile. “A crisis resolved.”
