The Fudir cackled. “No worries, sahb. I haven’t laid hands on absolute power in almost twenty years.”
The restaurant called The Three Hens sits on a narrow side street just west of An Caislinn. It is entered by three short steps down into a small barroom and then through an archway into a larger dining room where the tables sit within vast wine barrels. The ceiling is vaulted stone, suggesting that this was once the cellar of a larger building and these had been its storage rooms.
The restaurant takes its name from three clone-lines of poultry that, to this very day, have been nurtured and pruned for their flesh. What grows in the vats is not exactly alive, nor does it resemble much the images of hens that decorate the dining room. How long the lines will yield their harvests no one can say. Legend holds that they were started by Commonwealth “scientists” and will last forever. Yet there are aged and nearly unreadable images at the Taran Archives in which, in the background, one can make out a sign: The Four Hens. Nothing lasts forever.
The meal is tasty, the smack of the poultry accented by subtle sauces, and the staff is attentive to de la Susa and his party.
Donovan has told the Kennel what happened to the Dancer and a portion of what the Names had done to him afterward. He has said only that his ill-treatment had left him “disoriented.”
Over Hunter’s Hen, fenneled potatoes, and glasses of Gehpari Mountain White, the scarred man does his best to forget the memories roiled by the debriefing. So he lets the Fudir tell of some scrambles in the Terran Corner of Jehovah. The Old Hound finds great amusement in the account of the rescue of Little Hugh O’Carroll. In return, he tells of his liberation of Hector Lamoy, the “Friend of Truth,” who had been sentenced to death on Chamberlain for a poem satirizing the Alish Bo Wanameer, the People’s Hope.
“He wasn’t happy with me,” the Hound concludes with a reedy chuckle. “His martyrdom was to signal the Insurrection. He’d been looking forward to it. But his fanatics were no better than the PeopHope thugs, and I saw no reason to bring the one down so the other could rise up.”
The host of the restaurant comes to their table and whispers in the harper’s ear.
“Of course, I will,” Méarana answers and reaches for her harp case. She follows the man to a stage area, which is hastily prepared for her.
Donovan had seen Zorba signal to the host, so he knows that Méarana has been removed from their table by design. He waits to hear the nature of that design. In the performance space, the harper begins a plaintive love song—a cliché, but suitable for this comfortable and satisfied audience.
“Lucia D. Thompson,” says the Hound.
The scarred man waits for elaboration on this point. But when none is forthcoming, he says, “An odd name; but her mother is of Die Bold and they name folk strangely there.”
“The Pashlik of Redoubt.” The Hound adds precision to the birthplace of Bridget ban. “But she had sought political asylum in the Kingdom before I met her. I trained her, you know. Bridget ban.”
The scarred man nods. He had known.
“She was my prize. My dearest one. A daughter to me.” A tear escapes his ancient eye and trembles on the edge of his withered cheek. “And I much fear she is dead now.”
The Fudir knows a sharp pain in his chest. “It is likely so.”
In the performance space, the harper has shifted to a more lively tune, and the Fudir recognizes it with a start. It is the theme she had developed on Jehovah. The Rescue in Amir Naith’s Gulli. The very tale the scarred man had spun during dinner. It conjures again for him the stinking radhi piles, the fetid pools of waste water, the assassin, the death of Sweeney the Red, Little Hugh desperately trying to pry loose the grating barring his escape. And he, the Fudir, climbing down from the rooftops to confront the assassin.
“I would rather she…” He would rather what? He does not dare explore that; not yet, not now. “But I fear you’re right.”
Zorba’s breath leaves him like a deflating bagpipe. “Bridget ban… Her base name was—”
“Francine Thompson. Yes, I know. It’s their custom to pass the mother’s name to the daughter, and the father’s to the son.”
“Ah, Frannie. Frannie. It wasn’t easy for her. When she defected in the Kingdom, she was cut off from her… No, not her family. The Pashlik thought families reactionary. But from her dormitory. From her age-mates. And Lucia… I was at her name-day ceremony. In the Kingdom, they had the custom of naming a child by pouring water on its head. I stood by her for that, what they call a goodfellow.’ I held her while they poured the water.”
The scarred man holds his breath.
“And Lucia’s mother was away a lot. Frannie was. A Hound expects that. A Hound’s daughter, maybe, does not. What do disasters and negotiations and assassinations and rescues mean to a child? She was raised by Drake and Mari Tenbottles, the ranch foreman and his wife. And now and then her mother would come home with wonderful presents and still more wonderful stories.”
“Cu,” says the scarred man with sudden fear. The harper is playing out the masquerade in the hills by the Dalhousie estate, when he and Bridget ban had fooled Lady Cargo’s security staff. She maintains a tremolo while the deceit lies in doubt and breaks into a jaunty geantraí at the end. “Cu,” he says again, “why are you telling me this?” That the Old Hound has a reason for his rambling he takes as granted.
The head turns and the eyes catch him, and they are the same iron-hard eyes as before. There is something yet inside that aging body. “I’ve lost my Frannie, I’ll not lose my Lucy. I held her while they poured water on her; I’ll not hold her while they pour dirt. I think I see where this may go, and that is into dangerous territory.”
“Tell her not to go.”
“‘Tell the wind to cease/Tell the tide to ease,’” he sings. “But don’t tell Lucia D. Thompson not to seek her mother. She’s been doing that her whole life and old habits are hard to break. I would not look kindly on the man who lost me my Lucy.”
“Cu, I—”
“I would go with her myself, but my legs will not take me there. You saw them. But you…”
“I’m returning to Jehovah.”
The Hound’s face turns entirely toward him then, and there is something of Gwillgi’s deadliness in his mild-eyed, basset-hound glance. “Well, no,” he says, “you’re not.”
A part of the scarred man thinks, Arrogant bastard! And Inner Child whimpers. The Brute says, He’s old. We could take him down. He’s tall, but they only fall farther. The scarred man grabs his skull with both hands to silence the cacophony.
“No,” he says. “You can’t ask me that. Send someone else. Send Greystroke. Or Grimpen. Or… It’s been years since I…”