Torgan Wine Ch. 18

Isonei stepped in front of him and put both hands on his chest. "Please be calm. You're frightening them."

"Them?" Both Torgans looked at the hay.

Gwathe returned to the trio as Taugh brought in the horses. "For the daughter of Liadith they would like to be accommodating, but they have children and between their fear and the lack of space..."

"I understand. They all have fear?" She wasn't able to keep the disappointment from her voice.

"No Lady Isonei, you gave assurance that the Torgans would be polite. With that assurance and the knowledge that Daga Lothlaerith will address," he shifted his gaze to the Torgans emphasizing his next words carefully, "any rudeness or aggression whatsoever. Only the children are afraid."

"They could not sleep with me? In the carriage? They are small, yes?"

"I will ask, Lady Isonei." The innkeeper looked deeply amused.

"That is our father's carriage." Burgath hissed.

"And how gracious of you to allow me to share it with a few sweet children while you spend a more comfortable night, able to stretch out in the hay." She gave him a pointed look and he bowed stiffly.

"Wife, allow me to take you to the carriage and kiss you out of your sour mood." Draeseth stepped closer, his hand moving over her back encouraging her to lean against him.

Wrapping an arm around his waist and leaning with her cheek against his chest, she sighed, "I think it would take more than a kiss, my Draeseth."

"Lady Isonei?" Gwathe approached eyeing the Torgan's hand on her. "If you wish to invite the six children into your carriage, they will entrust them to you for the night."

"Six?" Burgath glanced to the hay warily. "You may be better off sharing the carriage with the three of us."

Pulling away from Draeseth and moving toward the nervous looking parents with a smile, Isonei tried to speak well, "It would be a pleasure; may I ask them?"

"Raithe, Raighe, bring the little ones." The woman looked at her curiously as she summoned the children. "You're the daughter of Liadith?"

"Yes." Isonei tried not to laugh at the way the woman in the muddied dress looked at her Torgan gown with a hint of disapproval. "Daga Gildith does not like these gowns also."

The woman flushed slightly but seemed to relax giving her a small smile. Two older children, a boy and a girl, only slightly smaller than Isonei, came forward timidly with four others. Two smaller boys who looked nearly identical stood with their brother, while the girl held a babe in arms, and a very small child peered from behind his sister's skirt.

The father introduced them, "These are our oldest, Raithe," the boy inclined his wheat colored head, staring, "and Raighe." The older girl inclined hers as well and looked nervously to her mother. "They'll care for the little ones, my Lady."

"First, may I ask them?" Isonei smiled warmly at the parents and then the children. "Would it please to sleep in the carriage with me? It belongs to a King." She let her lips curve with a hint of mischief and the younger children smiled shyly.

"It's not a Daga's carriage?" The boy asked and then looked nervous as if he shouldn't have.

"No. I am uhhmm I am going to Torga with these Princes. The pretty one," she gestured to Draeseth, "wishes a match. The King sent the carriage."

The sound of Taugh coughing as if trying to stifle laughter as he cleaned the horses' hooves made her glance back at the Princes. Burgath looked sour and Draeseth was grinning wickedly.

"I am the pretty one."

"Only to your wife." Burgath snapped with annoyance.

Turning back to the children, she tried not to laugh as they giggled. "Brothers argue."

"Not about who is prettier," Raithe muttered looking at the Torgans as if they were doing something disturbing.

"You are young!" Isonei beamed at him. "They do! In Ara I had six." She mimed bickering with her hands and made an exasperated face. "'She looked at ME.' 'I am tall and pretty.' My sisters did not." Her firm self-satisfied nod made them giggle again and even their mother was trying to suppress a smile. "Will you see the carriage?"

A chorus of nods and smiles answered her and she turned to Draeseth, "Can we borrow your cloak to get to the carriage relatively dry, my beautiful Draeseth?"

"Of course." He pulled it from his shoulders and looked at the children with a frown. "How?"

"Raithe? Like a tent?" Isonei took the neck, holding it up over her head and the boy immediately came to hold up the bottom as well. The rest laughed climbing under it. Draeseth made an amused noise in his throat.

"And who will bring it back?" Burgath rubbed the bridge of his nose. "You haven't thought this through brother."

"I will bring it back." Gwathe graciously offered, escorting them back out in the rain to the carriage. He held the cloak as Isonei helped the children climb in, taking off their muddy shoes and putting them in the same place she had seen the Princes put theirs. Once he was standing alone with her outside of the carriage he asked quietly, "Are you travelling with them willingly Lady? If they have coerced you in any way..."

"No! I thank you for your concern Master Gwathe but I am going with them willingly. They seem surly because of the journey we've had." She assured him in Aran since he seemed to understand it and because it was much easier to speak.

He gave her a skeptical look. "Lady?"

"I go willing. Aran is easier to explain."

"I understood you, but I needed to hear it in our tongue to be sure." He still didn't look convinced.

"They can be not so nice." Touching over her heart she reassured him, "but they have good in them."

"Are they nice to you Lady?" Gwathe looked at her intently.

"Yes, and when not I can make myself heard." Isonei smiled mischievously and he nodded.

She climbed into the carriage and took off her own muddy shoes placing them with the children's. The children were excitedly chattering amongst themselves. The babe had been sat upon the seat as Raighe stroked Isonei's soft, warm cloak and the other very young child was chewing on the corner of it experimentally. The boys were giddy about being in a King's carriage like Princes, only Raithe was trying to look unimpressed.

"Why is the Daga sending you away?" Raithe crossed his arms trying to look stern. "Did you do something wrong?"

"No, I chose and my Daga allowed it. He was not so happy with it but I am loved."

Raighe spoke quietly, "If you are loved... why would he allow it?"

"Sometimes that is how uhhmm how love is. You make people happy and not yourself."

Nodding slowly Raighe glanced at Raithe. "You care for one of them and let them sleep in the hay while you sleep here with us."

"Did you see them? They are large! How can they sleep?" Isonei curled into a ball and put on a miserable face making the children laugh. "We are small." She stretched out again and leaned against the window.

"There are only two seats, Lady." Raithe was trying not to smile.

"I will sleep there." She pointed to the floor, "You two," Isonei gestured to the seats. "The little ones can sleep close."

"No, Lady!" Raithe and Raighe chattered to each other briefly in a language she'd never heard and then Raithe very firmly insisted, "I will sleep on the floor with the twins. Raighe will sleep there with Aighe and Daighe."

"What did you speak?" Isonei asked with delight. "I don't know it!"

Raithe smiled sheepishly, "Mother calls it Twin."

"Clever!" Both sets of twins looked a little shy but proud at her praise.

"Thank you Lady."

"Isonei," she smiled, "please."

"Isonei can you-"

"-tell us a story?" The two boys settled on the floor at her feet.

"In Lerian?" Isonei tried not to laugh. "I could give one in Aran. Or a song?"

"You don't know any in Lerian?" Raighe looked at her curiously.

"Uhhmm I know the misunderstanding tree and the girl who danced."

The boys at her feet made faces. "Raighe, tell a good one?"

"She hasn't heard any good ones."

"If you lay down..." Raighe sighed.

Isonei insisted that the boys on the floor should have the cloak and the lap blankets would do for herself and Raighe. Raithe tried to argue until she gave him a peeved look. As the Lerian girl told a story of a clever Daga who looked for a match as clever as he was, the youngest child started to fuss and fidget. Isonei took little Daighe and cuddled with her on the other bench as the story went on. None of the other Dagas' daughters were half as clever and his cleverness made him unlikable until he found the wickedly smart guardsman's daughter who suited him.

At the end of the story the twin boys in the floor were asleep. The two youngest were still partly awake and Isonei sang a few of the songs her mothers used to sing to her to help her sleep as a child. When she finished the last one she could remember, she was the only one in the carriage left awake.