Page 83 of The Pirate Queen

“And the others.”

“Da, I—”

“Every sloop and ketch and yawl. Every rowboat. You are to take possession of them all, do you understand?”

“No. Why?”

“Because you have the Sense.”

He thinks that Gráinne is going to lie and say she doesn’t know what he’s talking about. But the decision forms in her eyes, like the fluttering of a moth’s wing. Gráinne knows that he is dying—she sees it now—and she does not want to lie to him.

“You know what I mean,” he urges.

She nods.

“You hear them, don’t you? The horses?”

“Usually there is only one.”

The gentle stroking of his thumb against her hand stills. “They have always come to me in a herd.”

“Because you are stronger, Da. Because you are chieftain.”

“No. Hearing just the one is the truest sign of the gift.”

“It doesn’t feel like a gift.”

“ ’Tis meant to save your life, bird. Do not despise it.”

A sob breaks from her chest and she leans forward until her brow rests on his shoulder. “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

“Because I was afraid.”

“Of Manannán?” she asks, and he can hear the bitterness in her voice.

He shakes his head. “No. Of you.”

Gráinne pulls away and looks at him.

“I have always been afraid of you,” he says.

“ ’Tis true,” Maeve agrees. “The damnedest thing I’ve ever seen, a big man like that, terrified of a sprite like you.”

Eóin has rarely seen his daughter cry, and then only in rage. But there is no anger in the tears that slide down her face now. These are tracks made by grief, and he is devastated to be the cause of them.

“I knew you had the Sense that day I took you and Donal on the water. You could feel the storm coming and he could not. But I was still fool enough to believe that I could spare you this calling. I was wrong. About so much. I cannot change the choices I made on your behalf, bird, but I can do this one thing. I can ensure that the O’Malley legacy does not die with me. The fleet must go to you. You will keep us powerful by land and sea.”

She recites the motto emblazoned on the family crest. “ ‘Terra marique potens.’ ”

“Think of me, bird,” Eóin whispers, “when you hear Manannán’s steed.”

Grace falls asleep in a chair beside her father’s big canopied bed, her head resting on the mattress, her hand gripping his. She wakes to the sound of a chair being dragged across the floor. Then a thump, and a groan as someone settles into it.

It takes a moment to remember where she is, to blink the cobwebs from her eyes, but when she does, she finds her brother watching quietly. Donal looks older now. Not old like their father, but certainly no longer young. And that means she must look the same to him. Does she also have lines around her eyes? Silver streaks at her temples?

“You knew?” Grace asks.

He nods.