Chapter 1339: Dinner Before Judgment

Eira had been to more than her share of noblemen’s feasts and pompous banquets, but nothing she’d ever seen quite prepared her for her first dinner with the Mother of Trees and her retinue.

Lady Ashlynn escorted Ollie to one of the long trestle tables, sitting him firmly next to her on the wooden bench seats at the center of the table, where she could keep an eye on him. That much wasn’t surprising, nor was the fact that the silver-haired woman, Isabell, took a seat next to her. She was clearly a woman of importance in Lady Ashlynn’s inner circle, and Eira had already memorized the woman’s features so that she would never mistake her for anyone ordinary, no matter how plainly she dressed.

It was when Samira, the woman who was heavily pregnant with Owain Lothian’s child, took a seat next to Ollie, flanked by the kind-eyed inquisitor with the archaic robes, that Eira’s eyes widened in surprise.

"There’s something for everyone here, no matter what your tastes are," Ashlynn said as Sir Carwyn, Diarmuid, Liam, Hugo, and Cadeyrn began carrying dishes from the bar over to the table. "The hand pies have four different fillings, though you’ll have to ask Samira which is which," she said warmly. "She did all the work of putting them together."

"I can’t do much to be useful," Samira said, her cheeks turning a faint shade of pink as she found herself the center of attention. "Lady Ashlynn made all of the fillings and the crust. I just sat at a table and stuffed them all. I can’t do much," she said, gently rubbing her large belly. "But at least I could help a little here."

"You’re already helping a great deal, just by coming along," Ashlynn insisted, reaching around behind Ollie to rest a hand on the shoulder of the woman who had once impersonated her. "You’re risking a great deal by coming to testify to Bors and Owain’s schemes. You could have stayed in Ollie’s manor with Noomi, and I wouldn’t have blamed you at all. You’ve already suffered enough at Owain’s hands as is," she said sincerely.

"I know that you’d have let me stay, Lady Ashlynn," Samira said, reaching up to touch Ashlynn’s hand and feeling the warmth of the other woman’s touch. "But... I need to face him myself. I, I know it’s not the same, but I need to make a clean end of things with him; this is the only chance I’ll have."

"We’ll make sure you get that chance," Isabell promised, adding her voice to Ashlynn’s. "Just stay close to me, and I promise, no harm will reach you."

"Thank you," Samira said, smiling as she basked in the warmth radiating from the pair of witches. "I promise, I’ll do my part as best I can. Until then, I hope you don’t mind that the pies are a little misshapen. I did my best to form them into different shapes so you can tell them apart," she said, pointing to the tray of pies that were still warm from baking in the oven.

"The round ones are steak and ale pies, with plenty of sweet onions," she said, pointing at the disk-shaped pies that were about the size of her own palm. "The long ones are stuffed with fish in a cream sauce with herbs... I’m sorry, Lady Ashlynn," she said, looking slightly embarrassed. "I can’t remember what you said went in the sauce."

"The fish is poached in cream with dill, parsley, and a bit of garlic," Ashlynn explained with a broad grin. "We passed a pair of boys fishing earlier, and they were willing to sell Hugo a nice steelhead as long as my arm for a silver penny," she praised.

"Hugo, I’ve run you ragged managing the wagons and all of the supplies," she said, pausing to touch him lightly as he passed by with another platter of food. "I know what Owain demanded of you, but if I ever ask too much, please, tell me. There are plenty of us here to share the load," she said, giving Liam a teasing look as he took a seat across from her in the space that Eira had saved for him.

"I can even appoint Liam as your page if you’d like," she teased. "I’m sure he wouldn’t mind."

"No, um, my Lady," Hugo said, looking mortified at the notion that Liam would be placed beneath him in any capacity. They’d been peers of a sort once, during the brief period of time when it looked like Hugo would inherit Hanrahan barony from his father, but the reality is that they’d lived in different worlds for most of their lives, and Hugo had never once considered himself to be Liam’s equal.

"It’s no trouble, really," he said. "I still don’t think the fish was worth a whole silver penny, though," he added. "They’d have been happy to get five snips for it, but..."

"In times like this, it’s important to be generous, Hugo," Ashlynn said softly. "Too many people fled. The ones who stayed are likely the ones who couldn’t afford to flee, or who have loved ones that are too old or infirm to travel during winter."

"Those boys couldn’t have been older than ten or eleven," she pointed out. "But they were fishing for dinner in the dead of winter, and keeping a whole string of fish in the water. They’re either fishing for money or fishing to feed a large family. Either way, a little extra coin will mean far more to them than a few extra snips in my own purse ever will."

"The ’Wheel of Wealth’ again, Ashlynn?" Ollie asked from around a mouthful of savory pastry filled with herbaceous cream sauce and tender, flaky fish.

"No," Ashlynn said, looking toward the doorway as if she could see the village beyond it. "This is the responsibility of nobility," she said, sweeping her eyes briefly over the young aristocrats from Dunn before facing Ollie. "You can never prevent every hardship, but you can’t let yourself be blind to the signs," she said, quoting one of her father’s many lessons.

"Even though we decided not to conquer Maeril, there’s already plenty of hardship to be found here," she said with a heavy sigh. "And it will get worse before we have a chance to make it better. So even if it’s just one family, and enough extra coin to buy a few extra sacks of flour, or a cask of cider... It’s worth doing what we can."

"Otherwise," Ashlynn said with a heavy sigh. "What’s the point of overturning a century of Lothian rule, if the common folk are just trading out one set of callous overlords for another? We have to be better than that if we’re going to make this work, Hugo," she said solemnly. "And I’ll be counting on you to help me do it."

"I won’t let you down, my Lady," Hugo said, bowing his head in acknowledgement of her intentions. Lady Ashlynn couldn’t be more different from her former husband if she tried. Lord Owain would never have spent a single snip of tin more than necessary to buy anything, and he’d have commanded Hugo to bully any merchant who wasn’t offering a steep discount for the son of the Marquis.

But Ashlynn saw the people, not the product she was buying, and she was willing to spend more of her own money to support those people, even when the product they were selling didn’t merit it. It was a completely different view of what it meant to be a ruler, but then, it was exactly the sort of thing that made Hugo want to serve as her Steward instead of taking any of the other positions she’d offered him.

Ashlynn was trying to build a better world, and while he didn’t have her vision, he was willing to do everything he could in order to help her realize hers.