Promise the Sky

Chapter 47

Chapter 47

Keenan

 

 

 

Will urges Hugh's mount closer to mine and leans over conspiratorially.

"Keenan," he breathes, destroying the subtlety of the tone, "we're like legends. We could be old heroes returning home. This is amazing."

"I don't get it," I reply, looking about the busy streets of our final destination, the city of Awyr, "all we did was scare off some kids, and now suddenly we're like this great story? People have been whispering about us in every village we've passed, and now we're actually here, they're out lining the streets? I mean, I expected an official welcome, but this?"

People cluster around the sides of the streets, lifting children onto their shoulders. Our tiny entourage trundles forwards and around every corner there are yet more cheering people. They even seem to know our names, which is more than I know; I still have yet to work out what my own manservant should be called.

It isn't right, we haven't done anything to deserve it.

Will waves cheerily and leans down to whisper again.

"It's not that we scared off those kids, Keenan, it's that we did it without magic. They use magic for everything in the mountains."

"But we didn't: you used magic. And the only one that actually fought anybody was me, and I almost got my throat pierced by a scruffy teen."

Will rolls his eyes.

"Stories get exaggerated, Keenan, that's what they're for." A slight girl blows him a kiss from an upper story window and he grins, "I'm going to enjoy this place," he decides, "I'm going to enjoy women that appreciate me for what I am; a hero, and a wielder of magic."

"And when you've finished enjoying those women, you're going to pay Hugh and I the money you owe."

"Curse you and your ridiculous bets, Keenan," Will spits, "it doesn't count if it's a different country."

"Yes it does."

We reach the end of the street and Snooty dismounts, taking a firm grip on my reigns as I join him on the ground. Will doesn't wait for assistance, jumping nimbly from Hugh's destrier, smiling and waving all the way to the floor.

Small hands wind their way into my hair and I look up to find Moira seated regally upon Hugh's shoulders. He grins.

"She's a right little queen," he says proudly, as Moira finishes messing with my hair and turns back to waving at everybody on the sidelines.

"She's going to be just as much trouble as her brother," I murmur.

"Keenan Nottinghan!"

I turn to the extravagant greeting just as strong arms envelope my shoulders. The hold is brief before pulling back to reveal a stout man with a smile on his face; a man and a smile, neither of which are even remotely familiar.

"Oh my," he says, "don't you just look so much like your father? What a handsome young man indeed. I have heard so much about you! But dear me, look at that expression, I am quite the strangest discovery, no?" The stranger chuckles good-naturedly, pulling back further and proffering up a hand to shake. "Celyn Owen, mayor of Awyr, your father's confidante and friend for coming up a decade now."