Page 129 of The Pirate Queen

“You aren’t the only one who pays attention,” he says with a wink.

It is well after midnight when Grace is finally escorted to her room. It feels like there is sand behind her eyelids and moss on her tongue. Her scalp itches and her back aches from sitting straight all evening. A single candle burns on the stone lip of the low window and her trunk rests at the foot of the narrow bed—brought up by some servant while they were all at dinner. Once more she has the smallest room at the top of the garret, but it is hers alone. Walter and Richard will share their room on the floor below with Donal and the young O’Flaherty.

Grace sits on the bed, struggling to reach the laces at the back of her gown, when she hears a soft knock at the door.

“I’ve come to help.” The door swings open to reveal the serving girl. She’s carrying a pitcher of steaming water in one hand and a candle in the other. “You do need help?”

“Tá,” Grace admits.

The girl sets everything down on Grace’s trunk and motions her to turn around, then nimbly unties the laces.

The bodice loosens and Grace heaves a sigh of relief. “Thank you.”

“I’ve a message for you,” the girl says, and a mischievous smile plays at the corner of her mouth.

“From whom?”

“Richard says that the castle often sleeps late the morning after these feasts, and that the cellars are half empty just now. He says he’ll be there before dawn if you would like that lesson he promised you.”

Grace’s cheeks flare with color. She cannot imagine what this girl thinks Richard has promised to teach her.

“Ah, you have no reason to blush. I know my brother well enough. He’ll mind his manners.”

“Your…what? Richard is your brother?”

“Tá. Walter too. Though he’d never deign to admit as much. I’m a bachelor’s daughter, as they say. Different mams, of course, but we all share a father—easy enough to see when we’re standing near each other—which is why I take pains not to. Our da doesn’t acknowledge me, so I’m in the kitchens. And lucky to be there, I’m told. There’s other bastard Bourkes in this county and none of them are let close enough to throw a stone at this tower. But my mam is long dead and Cook is my granny and no one tells her no. So it’s me you’ve got for help. And company. If you want either.” She grins, bright and seemingly unbothered by her plight.

“What’s your name?”

“Nora.”

A pretty name that Donal will want to learn, Grace thinks.

She is curious now and too tired to bother with propriety. “And The MacWilliam’s wife? Finola. Does she know that you and Walter and Richard…?”

“Oh. Tá. She knows. I came after Walter but before Richard. I was born before The MacWilliam married Finola. And since my mam died in the process, Finola lets me alone. She has her husband and her son. And I keep out of the way. I’m no threat.”

“Does she have no other child with The MacWilliam?”

Nora shakes her head.

“Then she and my mother have that in common as well.”

“So your brother…?”

Grace laughs. “A bachelor’s son, as you say.”

“You and I have much in common as well, then. Only our roles are reversed.” Nora nods politely and turns to go.

“I would be delighted to have your help. And your company,” Grace says. She hesitates long enough that Nora is through the door before adding, “And tell Richard that I will be there in the morning.”

“He will be pleased.” Mischief dances in her eyes.

The door does not catch all the way when Nora slips through, her own candle in hand once more. Grace pulls it open a few inches and watches the warm glow descend the spiral staircase to the floor below. Then she hears whispers. Laughter. The click of a door latch. A moment later silence, and the light of Nora’s candle fades away.

Grace washes her face and lets her blue gown drop to the floor, then she flops back onto the feather mattress. She stares at the gray slate tiles a few feet above her head. Her hand drifts to her thigh and Cook’s old knife. She is asleep before she has time to cry.

Grace wakes at first light and pulls one of the fine wool day dresses over her leine. It is a soft gray—dove, they call it—softer than her eyes, and cut in close to her waist. She adds an apron so she has somewhere to hide her knife. It isn’t until she is halfway to the cellars when she wonders if Richard will be there. Or if he will be alone. If, perhaps, he and Walter are in their room laughing at the idea of her—just a girl—wanting to learn how to use a knife. By the time she tiptoes through the kitchen, Grace is certain he is still tucked in bed, warm and snoring and chuckling in his dreams at her silly ambitions. She is certain she has been tricked.