“Fish and chips? Easy and fast.” She flicked her fingers over the coins. “I’ll bring you the change. And leave the kettle ‘til I’m back.” Griffin nodded, and without saying anything else, she slipped out the door again.
She was gone long enough for him to wheel to outside the loo, make use of it, wash his hands, snag a jumper from the bedroom, and return to the sitting room. He was very pleased he hadn’t fallen over doing any of it, though he was definitely going to be regretting several recent choices soon. Annice came in bearing a basket, and then said, “You eat there?” pointing at the lower table. “Or, no, your chair has a thing.”
“It does. Wherever you’d like to eat. The kitchen table’s fine if you’d rather.” Annice shook her head. She efficiently set out two packets of fish and chips, poured hot water into the teapot to steep, and had everything out on the low table by the sofa, where Griffin could reach it well enough. When he had a free hand, she held out hers with the change. He wanted to tell her to keep it - he wouldn’t miss it - but that would be an insult, so he took it back.
Once she sat, they both spent a couple of minutes inhaling half their respective food. Then the tea was ready, and she poured it out into the sturdy mugs that had come with the cottage. Griffin cupped his hands around it, letting the heat warm his fingers. “The fish and chips are grand.”
“My favourite place. Grandad loved them.” Annice wiped her mouth with her hand. “You wanted to know about the town?”
“What you love about it.” Griffin shrugged. “I love Trellech. I know Trellech, a way I’m never going to know anywhere else. But right now I’m here, and I’d like to know more about it. The way someone who loves a place can tell it.”
“You’re sure I do.” It wasn’t a question. She didn’t make it into a question. “I’m not arguing. Just. How do you know that?”
Griffin shrugged, setting the mug on his little ledge of a table so he could go back to nibbling at the chips with appropriate appreciation while listening. “I spend a lot of time listening to people talk about what they care about. Sometimes they say it outright. Most of my work is with the inheritance court. It brings out explicit things people want or are upset they’re not getting. But often, they want something, and they maybe can’t admit to it. That’s the hardest part. It’s so tricky to help someone feel like they can say the difficult bits out loud. Sometimes that’s because of family - someone else will be angry if they speak up, or disappointed. Disappointed is somehow worse, I think.”
Annice opened her mouth, closed it, then took a bit of a chip. Then, carefully - and oh, he could read volumes in that - she said, “Oh?”
He chose his words carefully, but also went to some pains to cover that. “If someone’s angry with you, you can argue with them. Stand up to them, resist them, whatever that looks like for you in that situation. Mostly my people don’t run to anger. I get along well with my Mum and Dad and sister and her husband. And my nieces and nephew are lovely. Sometimes very loud and messy, but they’re an age where that’s expected. Ordinary. But I’ve heard it enough. A few times at school, more since. Plenty, in the Army.”
Annice nodded, and that was what he’d wanted, to give her examples where she could see what he meant. For probably the millionth time in his life, he blessed the training he’d had in rhetoric, going back to Schola, and everything since. “But disappointment?”
She was quick. And he’d set that up, deliberately, but that didn’t mean it didn’t make him flinch a little, and that he let her see it. It was honest. It was truthful, and it was also a touch manipulative. “That too. Oh, my parents were plenty proud of me. But once I got into Schola, there were a lot of expectations. And I am, truth, excellent at my job. It is a highly specialised job. Other people can do it, but not that many people actually want to and are capable of it. Like a lot of other specialist jobs. And the path there isn’t very direct, sometimes.”
Now, there was a whole steep cliff piled with things he wasn’t saying. Some of them were about how what he wanted was to hold the land magic for Trellech, and what that would mean. Others were about how he’d be forever disappointed in himself if he didn’t try as long and as much and as well as he could. But that some part of him was bracing for that inevitable loss. “But you can’t, um. Disappointment is a fog, not a mirror. You can’t argue with it, you can’t straighten it out, you can’t get a grip on it at all. It slides right off. And that’s hard to live with, isn’t it?” Then, before he could stop himself, he added, “Especially when I’m disappointed in myself.”
Annice was quiet long enough to eat two chips and a bit more of her well-vinegared fish. “They train you how to see things like that?”
“Yes. Though honestly, I was like this as a kid.” Griffin spread his hands, making sure not to send his mug flying. “I’d apologise, but I meant to do it. And I can’t just turn off the skill. Just like I bet you can’t walk down the beach and not look for jet. Or start thinking about what you’d do with it when you got it home.”
She snorted, a definite sound of admitting that was also the truth.
“Anyway. You asked how I know you love Whitby, and it’s all of that. When people love a place - really love a place, I can hear it. And again, I hear about this in inheritance, who wants a family property because they adore it, and who sees what they could sell it for, sometimes - it comes out in all sorts of ways. And people who love a place know things about it. Not the things in whatever books there are, or the local newspaper...”
He gestured at the paper that had been wrapped around the fish and chips. “Or even the local gossip, though that’s a bit closer. But what makes the place itself? The smell that one day, when it’s suddenly properly spring. The glimpse you get through buildings, onto something different. The feel of it under your feet. The changes in the air. I could probably navigate Trellech just by smell now, bakery to pub to restaurant to the Ministry canteen or the Guard refractory.” He found himself half-smiling. “All right, though these days, it’s faster to tell by the ground under the wheels. But the smells are mostly much more fun. Fewer cobblestones in a smell.”
Chapter18
THAT AFTERNOON
Annice looked up at that, watching Griffin. “I’ve only been to Trellech twice, really briefly, and when I was little. It’s much, um. Much more? Isn’t it?”
“Oh, if you get me going about that, I’ll be going on for hours. And I’m likely boring.” But his eyes lit up, even just at the idea of that conversation. Annice still did not understand him, not remotely. She didn’t understand some of his references, certainly not how he looked at the world. There was an optimism there out of season, as well as the stubbornness that had absolutely been on display this afternoon.
Now, she considered. “If I tell you about Whitby, will you tell me a bit more about Trellech?”
“Of course. If you’d like. Tell me to stop when it gets too much.” He considered. “Beer, to go with your fish and chips? It’s chilled. No, you stay, I can get it.” Before she could do more than nod, he set his food back on the table, apparently so it wouldn’t fly off. He leaned back slightly, getting the chair to near enough pivot. He opened a trunk up against one side of the room, to one side of the window. Out came two bottles, and he was setting them to rest against the side of his chair and his leg as he came back. He opened one with a flourish of a charm and handed it to her.
Annice curled her hand around the cool glass, and wondered about a lot of things. For one thing, he used his magic easily. That must be living in Trellech. He was used to not having to hide it all the time, not in school, not in the shops, not on the street. For another, the beer was the right kind of cool, and he’d been able to grab it without any fussing. That meant all sorts of planning, the kind she’d learned to do taking care of Grandad and Nan, having things in the right place so half her day wasn’t taken up running up and downstairs.
Now she lifted it as he opened his own. “Thank you. You’re very generous. That’s not like here, for one thing. Not for people who aren’t from here.”
“Nets of families, I’m sure. Everyone’s got history with each other, if you’ve been here for a while. And I’m guessing some of it is where you live - east side of the river and west?”
Annice couldn’t stop herself from laughing. “Aye. My cousins, they’re on the other side of the Esk. More of the jet workers were here. The other side’s the fishing, and all the things that go into that. But also some jet. Can’t escape the jet.” She was feeling a little odd now, giddy with having done something complicated, unexpectedly complicated. And the way he was smiling at her, encouraging her, not laughing at her or expecting her to keep quiet. Then she took one more swallow of her beer and thought about how to talk about Whitby.
“You’ve seen one of our legends. And if you did much reading, you know about St Hild and the ammonites.” Griffin nodded at that. “I’ve got a few good ones, polished, in the shop. One that opalised, it’s gorgeous.” Then she considered. “And if you’ve read the guidebooks, you know a bit about Dracula and about Captain Cook.”
“Both of those. Though I’m more interested in Cook, he actually lived here. I mean, the atmospheric lurking is all well and good, but it’s not the same as knowing a place. Leaving from a place that’s been home.” Griffin’s voice took on a deeper note, something that made Annice frown. “Something the matter?”
