Mermaid in a Bowl of Tears (Exit Unicorns Series) (26 page)

“Do you understand?” she whispered to the silent stone man above her.

Paul however, under his feathery cap of snow, wasn’t talking. But she thought she knew what his answer would have been had he spoken. He was a ghost, but had been a man in life and she thought there were, as she’d told Father Kevin, things about the nature of sacrifice that men did not understand.

And this after all was not freedom, but love.

Part Two
A Little Irish Homestead

THE CRACKED POT WAS ONE of the few pubs in Belfast that British soldiers felt fairly safe drinking in, not completely safe, for no man who wore the Queen’s uniform on Irish soil was that foolish. In the Cracked Pot, however, they could drink in relative peace in the overly warm, smoke-laden fug that wrapped itself around a man like a blanket of comfort.

Sandy McCrorey had been drinking there since the beginning of his tenure in Northern Ireland. Tonight, he’d come reluctantly, dragged along in the wake of friends. It had been a long day, though every day in Belfast seemed like a week. It was the tension; it spread time out like a hand pushing on a pile of sand. Just this morning they’d had some bastard take a snipe at them from the top of a bakery. The gunman hadn’t hit them and though they’d returned fire, he’d disappeared into the warren of chimney pots and slated roofs that grew in tightly packed, mushroom-like clusters. And then there’d been the sweetly smiling young matron pushing an oddly silent baby in a pram. He hadn’t even wanted to look. He knew the Provos had any number of tricks up their sleeves when it came to running weapons in and out of the neighborhoods.

Tonight he wanted nothing more than to be home, with the cobblestones of familiar streets beneath his feet and the lights of Inverness glowing about him. If he were home, he’d pick Fiona up around seven. She’d tuck her arm into his and look up at him with shy adoration shining from her eyes. She’d smell of lemon polish and beeswax as Wednesday was her day to clean the church. Maybe they’d go to the pictures, maybe they’d just walk until they were up in the hills surrounding the city and the stars seemed so close a man would almost believe he could grab a fistful and give them to his sweetheart. Barring these things, Sandy just wanted a drink, something strong and quick.

The pub was full, only a couple of tables unoccupied, and the odd nod greeted them as they sat at a table in the far back left, regulars who were there for the drink and not concerned with the politics of the man on the stool next to them.

Neil went up to the bar and came back moments later with two pints of black ale for himself and Donny, a nineteen year old redhead who looked all of twelve and had only been in Belfast a week. For Sandy he brought a whiskey.

“Here’s something for the aches then, fast an’ to the point like ye asked.”

“Thanks Neil,” Sandy said, tipping his glass towards the boy with the thatch of blond curls, ruddy cheeks, and merry blue eyes. Neil was on his second month of duty in Belfast, and thus far his cheery disposition seemed unimpaired by the bleakness of the place.

Denny, the publican, gave a two finger wave from behind the bar. He was a nice fellow, a hard-working Protestant who kept his views to himself. Adorning the wall behind the bar was his collection of license plates from the United States. It was Denny’s grand ambition to have all fifty states of the union represented on his wall. So far he had thirty-nine. Sandy, who had family in the US, had managed to procure a Maine plate for Denny, and had drunk free for a week afterwards as a result.

Sandy smiled and waved back, only to see the stout publican return the smile and have it freeze in place just as quickly. There was a breath of chill air behind Sandy that told him the door to the street had opened. His spine, from training and experience, went rigid. He turned slowly, so as not to seem obvious and glanced at the newcomers. Three men in work clothes, lads out for a pint after dinner, escaping the wife and kids for an hour or two. Two on the smallish side, one with a tweed cap pulled low over his eyes, another unbuttoning a navy pea coat, the third shaking droplets of rain from a chestnut thatch of hair. The third was taller and younger than the other two, good-looking in a feral sort of way. The sort that had luck with the ladies. Sandy knew it had something to do with the aura of danger such men projected, though he’d never really understood the appeal.

Though Denny was more friendly to some and less so to others, Sandy had never seen him less than cordial to a customer in his pub. But the normally cheerful publican had a stone face on him at present and his lips were held tight against his teeth as he served the three now lounging against the counter.

Sandy gave them a closer look, while appearing to peer down into the amber depths of his whiskey. They didn’t appear so different from the regular clientele, Belfast toughs, though the youngest had an air about him. As if feeling Sandy’s thoughts on him he raised his head, tilting it up as a cat would to scent the air. Even at a distance, his eyes stood out against his face as though lined in fine pen; pretty eyes, the lavender blue of forget-me-nots. The eyes met his own without warning and Sandy started from the impact and the embarrassment of being caught staring. The man smiled, tipping his head in a friendly manner, except that Sandy felt even such a simple gesture held a wealth of unspoken threat.

He took a shaky breath and re-applied himself to his whiskey. Christ, this city made a man paranoid, where the simplest acknowledgement of one’s presence caused such chilling thought. He’d once said to another soldier—a Glaswegian on his way home after a year in Northern Ireland—that the man must be glad to leave the place behind. The soldier had considered him for a moment, taking in, Sandy had suspected, his youth and inexperience.

“Ye’ll know the saying about the beauty of things bein’ in the backside an’ not in the face, endearing more by their departure than their arrival. Well Belfast has got both an ugly arse an’ face, an’ I’d be a fool to think I’ll not carry her with me the rest of my days,” the Glaswegian had said, and then left Sandy to the un-tender mercies of youth, inexperience and a city with too much history.

A bit of corduroy jacket brushed past his shoulder then, and he realized to his chagrin that the only empty spot in the pub was the table directly behind the three of them.

“Evenin’ to ye lads,” said the young one as he passed, a flash of teeth and eyes and rain-wet hair.

“Evening,” the three of them murmured politely, the mood at their table suddenly as damp as the streets outside.

The tables were bunched tightly, the Cracked Pot being a small establishment. Sandy could smell the wet wool and tobacco scent of the men’s clothes as they sat, as well as a sharp whiff of some expensive aftershave.

“Yon laddies are a quiet bunch,” Sandy heard a voice behind him say, and knew the man was referring to the three of them. A tendril of cigarette smoke, translucent blue, curled around his neck, making his eyes water and his throat itch. He sneezed, three times in quick succession. Behind him he heard the rustle of cloth as the man turned around.

“Smoke botherin’ ye?”

“No, it’s fine,” Sandy said hastily, burying his face in his whiskey glass, the fumes making his eyes water once again.

The man rose and Sandy had to strain his neck to see his face. The Cracked Pot had been built in 1768 and its ceiling was of a height to accommodate the stature of the human species at the time. These, however, were different times and the man’s thick thatch of chestnut hair brushed the low, smoke-blackened beams.

The man made to move past them, his pint in one hand, the half-smoked cigarette in the other.

“Got to piss,” he said apologetically, flashing a mouthful of perfect, startlingly white teeth at the three of them. The space between tables was practically non-existent and the man seemed slightly unsteady on his feet. Odd, Sandy thought, he’d not seemed drunk when he and his companions had entered the pub. Likely this was not their first stop of the evening though. Therefore it wasn’t surprising when the man slopped most of his remaining drink on Donny’s shoulder while trying to negotiate the narrow space between chairs.

Donny jumped out of his chair with an audible curse, knocking into the man who stumbled back slightly, sending the drinks on the table behind him flying.

Two rather sturdy looking, red-faced men jumped up, obviously deep in their cups with fists at the ready. The man with the forget-me-not eyes smiled with distinct pleasure.

“Are yez lookin’ for a fight, boys?” he asked in an amiable tone, then threw his empty pint glass to the floor. There wasn’t even time to hear it smash when all hell, in the form of several drunken Irishmen, broke loose.

Sandy had the impression of several things happening all at once. Fists thunking solid against flesh, chairs being pushed back and then used as weapons, the air ripe with the smell of wet wool, spilled ale and smoke and filled with the triumphal roars of men in the joyous state of a full-fledged donnybrook. A glancing blow off the side of his head brought him stumbling to his feet.

The big man stood dead center of the room, eyes sparking with blue flame, flinging men off right and left as if they were no more than kittens. Which of course only caused more fools to charge him.

Sandy dodged several merrily flying fists, only to feel a chair leg make firm contact with the back of his head. The floor came up at an astonishingly fast rate towards his face. The next thing he knew someone had grabbed him by the shoulder and threw him towards the wall, wedging his head between table legs and wall.

It took a few minutes for constellations to quit wheeling in front of his eyes, and in those few minutes Sandy decided a Scotsman’s pride could only take so much and then it was time to weigh in and damn the consequences. Besides, Irish or not, one man against twenty simply wasn’t fair.

Two minutes later, caught in the midst of a heaving, grunting mass of wild, majorly pissed Irishmen, he wondered if he hadn’t made a serious error in judgement. Pinned facedown on the pub floor, which was less than pristine, he could only sense rather than see the flailing limbs and hear the grunts and curses of men having a rollicking good time. He caught a flash of red hair out of the corner of one eye and knew Donny had joined the fray. He gave an almighty heave, managing to extract himself from under several thrashing bodies, only to catch a hob-nailed boot directly under his chin. The constellations came whirling back and the salty taste of blood filled his mouth. He crawled back to the scant protection of the wall, blinking through a haze of pain.

The blue-eyed man was still on his feet, apparently unfazed by the fists, feet and furniture coming at him full bore. He was a fighter by nature, that much was apparent. A man who’d known his size and face would bring him trouble all his days and so had learned the skills necessary to deal with such trouble. Barbarians, the Irish, his captain said, didn’t understand the rules of civility, of where and when to make a stand. The man before him certainly fit the description, his entire being a lit fuse of raw, radiant savagery. And yet somehow his movements were deliberate, instinctual, each thrust and parry of other men’s hands, legs and bodies effortless, graceful as a dance.

From mid-air, the man caught a bottle and tossed it away again. He might have used it to his advantage, but his strength had not yet begun to recede and he was in the throttle of the beast that coursed swiftly through his blood. He had no need as yet for helpful implements.

Sandy found his feet a moment later and got on top of them with only a slight wobble. The air was now so thick with blood, sweat, and liquor that it trundled into his lungs like a dozy creature. He squeezed as much of it as he could into him and then waded back into the battle.

The fight had become an entity unto itself with too many limbs, teeth, fists, and drink-addled brains. The blue-eyed man, still miraculously standing, was the central nervous system of the whole mass. When he moved they all did. When he ducked they accordingly rippled.

The whole lot of them surged as one body toward the back end of the pub. A narrow entrance hall fed down to a back door, passing a tiny washroom on the way. The doorway of the washroom flew open under the duress of straining, heaving bodies, giving all and sundry a view of an abundant bare backside liberally adorned with gray, curling hair. Sandy caught a glimpse of shaking, indignant flesh before sailing onward with the melee.

He caught up hard on the wall opposite the washroom, tossed like flotsam off a thundering wave. Down the wall he slid, looking dizzily upward, uncertain of where he’d ended, only to see a huge white face spinning out of the murk at him.

The bastard slammed into him with a force that rattled the teeth in his head. Sandy thought he could hear his skull crack. At first nothing moved and then the world spun in a dark circle, flipping his stomach over. His shoulders were jammed tight in a small alcove. It afforded some small sanctuary from the violence that had moved back into the main room of the pub. That didn’t explain who’d hit him in the head with the force of a cannon though and now, judging from the weight resting on his head, was passed out on him.