Crown of a Prince (Finn Shelby)

19.

"I've got a bad feeling about this" Curly told Ailbhe for what felt like the hundredth time, his head shaking as they walked into the pasture behind Charlie's yard.

"It's alright Curly" she promised, not sure if she was lying or telling the truth.

Curly, Ailbhe and Lizzie were being accompanied to the funeral by Liam and Isiah, who walked behind them. Liam hadn't said much all day, not to anyone. Ailbhe knew he was processing it alone. The only person he would have talked about it with was who they were burying.

"Is it?" Lizzie muttered, her eyes scanning nervously around the pasture.

She had noticed Ailbhe's nervous disposition since they had left Watery Lane. She fidgeted with her ring and her teeth seemed intent on marking her bottom lip. 

The men had spent all morning gearing up for a war. Johnny Dogs arrived with cart loads of guns and ammunition, supplying every man they had with a weapon and ammo. Ailbhe watched the men line up, just like her brothers had lined up for war. They were almost excited looking, they felt like they were going to be real Peaky Blinders. It made her feel sick.

When they reached the centre, where John had been laid in a caravan, decorated and laid out with his things Ailbhe stopped. She tied the ribbons from her hair that John had always tugged out of her hair when she was little onto the caravan. She tied them onto one of the pieces of wood and felt her eyes glisten with tears.

John had been their brother. And they had to say goodbye to him. She was numb with the injustice and pain of it all so even when she watched Lizzie say goodbye with red eyes, watched Ada push a letter of her final words onto the piles of wood, she felt nothing but cold.

She heard muttering behind her, the rasp of Finn's voice easy to recognise.

"We're like sitting ducks out here if the fucking wops come".

She didn't have to look at Charlie to know he was clinging to a cigarette and shrugging, trying to avoid looking at John's resting place.

 "Yeah well, Tommy said to do it out in the open" 

Tommy cleared his throat, standing before them.

"This is how John wanted to go, on the smoke." He admitted, looking at the fire's smoke circling above them.

"The truth is, we died together once before" he sighed, his emotions threatening to come out "Arthur, Niall, Liam, Séan, Danny Whizzbang, Freddy Thorne, Jeremiah and John"

Ailbhe felt her heart clench at the mention of her brother. She tried to think about how lucky they were to be able to say goodbye properly to John, that it was nice they got the chance to see him and know what happened. They would never get that chance with Séan. They didn't even know he was dead until the letter arrived home from Niall five weeks later. But nothing about her life seemed lucky, not anymore. It all seemed disgustingly unfair, so unfair she wanted to scream until her throat gave up.

Tommy told the story of why the boys often said 'In the bleak Midwinter'. It was a story Ailbhe had heard before, that they told her to remind her that they had fought for their lives so they could come home to her and to their family, to live.

"We all agreed that everything after that was extra. And that when our time came, we would all remember..." Tommy admitted, his eyes misting up slightly but Polly interrupted him, her voice shaky with sadness

"You'd remember that God spared you but what did you do with that extra time that he gave you eh Thomas?" she snapped, her eyes moving to look him in the eyes. But Tommy looked down, he couldn't look at her.