Page 77 of Dragon Cursed
He was silent a long moment.
Then, very low: "She is going to be free."
"Yes, dear."
"Mairin is going to be free."
"Yes."
Whatever emotions he was processing, he turned away to do it.Poppy let him.Niamh — who had also seen — looked very deliberately down at her book and pretended not to see.
After a long while he straightened his posture.He drew a long breath."Thank you, Niamh."
"Oh, child.Thank me when it is done."
There had been a moment, somewhere in the reading.
Poppy was almost sure of it.
A pause when her aunt had laid her finger flat on the page and looked up at the wall and not said the thing she had read.Poppy had been watching too closely to miss it.
She didn’t say anything about it now.She was watching her aunt now too.
Niamh closed the book.
"Right.You will both want sleep.There is nothing else to be done tonight.Alsander, dear — the second room at the top of the stairs.The bed is made.The towels are on the chair.There is a very old robe on the back of the door if anything fits you, which I doubt."
She turned.
"Poppy.The small room next to it.Or —"
Her sharp blue eyes came up.
"Wherever you end up.I am eighty-three.I don’t police the hallways at night."
Alsander gave Niamh a small careful bow she would never forget.
He turned for the stairs.
"Poppy, my love."Niamh's voice was soft."Would you stay a moment?Just to help me with the dishes."
Alsander paused on the bottom step."I can do dishes."
"Go to bed, dear."Niamh's voice was firmer now."You will need your strength tomorrow, and I haven’t seen my great-niece in too many years to let her go to bed without a bit of catching up first."
He looked at Poppy.
Poppy nodded.
He hesitated one beat longer — he had heard the same thing she had heard, the something Niamh wasn’t saying with both of them in the room — but he climbed the stairs.
Poppy waited until she heard the door close above.
Then she turned to her aunt.
"Tell me."
Niamh didn’t pretend not to understand.
