Page 192 of The Pirate Queen

“So much for a warm welcome,” she says. “The entire household greeted us last time.”

“It’s the rain. He’ll be just inside. And I’ll only be a moment longer.”

Eóin sets his palm to the hilt of his cutlass and waits for O’Flaherty to join him on the broad stone landing outside the tower house.

“A word before we go in?” O’Flaherty asks.

“I assumed that was your purpose.”

“Then you’ll forgive me for getting to the point.”

“I’d expect nothing less from the man who named his ship Battle Knife,” Eóin says.

O’Flaherty is not one to smile, but there is a splash of good humor in his eyes. “My son has grown fond of Gráinne. He’s written numerous times to tell me as much.”

“Odd. She’s made no mention of him at all.”

“He wishes to marry her.”

“Surely you know that he is not alone in that?”

O’Flaherty wipes the rain away from his face with the back of his hand. “Have you and The MacWilliam come to an arrangement, then?”

“That remains between him and me.”

A grunt. “I have a better offer.”

“I very much doubt that.”

“It has nothing to do with her dowry. I do not care about your cattle, O’Malley.”

“What do you mean?”

“How many ships does The MacWilliam have?” O’Flaherty asks.

“You would have to ask him,” Eóin says, though he knows the answer perfectly well.

David Bourke is in possession of two fine galleys. Neither so big as Niamh, nor as sleek as Scian Catha, but the Bourke clan isn’t known for their enterprises at sea. With vast land holdings and five thousand head of cattle, they do not need to conquer the water—only traverse it on occasion.

O’Flaherty grins. “You are the only man in western Ireland who has more ships than I.”

“Do you mean to offer me a ship in exchange for my daughter?” he asks.

“No. I mean to offer all of them.”

Eóin turns to glance at the tower house and the open door. It yawns at them like a missing tooth in a wide mouth, but no one is standing there listening to this conversation. Or at least none that Eóin can see. And he thinks it would be hard to hear them over the rain regardless.

“Speak plainly, O’Flaherty.”

“If our families unite, we can create the first real seafaring dynasty in Ireland. A fleet of ships—and lands that cover the entire western coast. I do not think The MacWilliam can offer you both land and sea.”

Eóin considers this point. “That would leave him only two points of entry to the Atlantic.”

A wicked grin splits O’Flaherty’s face. “Just so. He would have Rockfleet, but it goes through Clew Bay, which you control—”

“And Portacloy in the North Atlantic,” Eóin finishes.

“And together we would control half the land in Connaught, instead of only a quarter each.”