Finan the Agile Fanfic: Shadowkin LAST KINGDOM Fanfiction COMPLETE

Chapter 6: Ui Neill

6. Winter 878

It had been a swift, footed, lively housekeeper, black hair parted under a mob cap, chatting nineteen-to-the-dozen who had, the second night in Doire, taken her to a blanket and straw bed at the back of the kitchen with the other servants.

The woman might have taken her the first night, except the drinking had gone on so long into the early hours of 1st November that Osthryth bowled along with Domhnall's other warriors to the stables, where she had been awoken, lying between Finnolai and Feargus, by an irate stable master. Osthryth had been first to awake, and had been spoken to at length by the man, catching only about one word in seven and unserstanding even less.

She did understand a pail of icy water over her for her insolence and being knocked to the ground before the third of Domhnall's warriors, Tadhg, a blonde-haired, wiry boy of about nineteen, sprang at him, screaming a stream if equally unintelligible words back. Finnolai had pulled him off, and the commotion had brought a worse-for-wear Domhnall into the stable, barking orders at each of them, before hauling Osthryth off to the fortress.

"Aunt Muire will not permit you to reside with the men," Domhnall explained. "I know you desire to be a warrior, Osthryth, however, while we live here, I have another role for you."

Osthryth had then been sent off to the kitchens, to help the elderly cook prepare the All Saints' feast, a slight man who turned out to be deaf, and whose words made a little more sense. She supposed that there weren't that many ways to say "meat" and "vegetables" in Gaelic, no matter the dialect, and she soon fell into the routine, so similar it had been to Dunnottar Castle.

But to took until the morning after that, having been woken early in the servants' sleeping quarter at the back of the kitchen to be told what she must do.

"The children need to be taught," Domhnall explained, as he took Osthryth to see his aunt. "And they need to practise their learning."

Osthryth protested that while she could read and write, she was not a scholar, nor did she know enough Gaelic even to write it.

"Your role will be to see the children complete what the monks tell them they must do; since I brought the Iona manuscript, they have been busy completing it and binding it. They do not have time to wait for the children to complete it, ah," he said, opening the door to the royal rooms.

"This is my aunt," Domhnall explained, as the woman, who had been by the king's side nodded. She was beautiful. Long, black hair framed skin that was milk white. She wore a linen dress dyed dark yellow with lichen andvaround her waist a circlet of beaded chain on which hung a key.

Domhnall waited beside Osthryth, but his aunt said, "I would speak with this girl alone," narrowing her eyes at Osthryth as the door clicked behind her nephew.

"You are a servant of Domhnall, and a companion of Constantine," Muire said, looking at Osthryth with curiosity. "And your family were murdered as you travelled to Iona?"

"Yes, Lady," nodded Osthryth. "And, you have a sword."

"My father's - "

"Your father's sword." Muire looked at her again. "And you are fifteen?"

"Thirteen, Lady."

"And you were educated...?

"At home. By my father." Osthryth's responses had been direct and prompt. Yet, this woman, the daugher of Ceinid mac Àlpin, was intelligent and shrewd. She watched as Mael Muire narrowed her eyes. Osthryth shuddered as she considered her limited options, for, if she did indeed believe her to be Aelfric's niece, Osthryth had walked freely into a trap of her own making.