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Dulaan took the cup offered her by Jóra. ‘Oh, just what Granny needed, my sweet little sparrow.’ She wrapped her chilly fingers about the cup gratefully, letting the warmth of the mulled wine within seep into them. She waved away the platter of cheese Káta was offering around, taking instead a small chunk of bread from the basket as it was offered. She dunked the bread in her wine and chewed on it thoughtfully.
‘Say,’ she said, at a lull in the happy babble of conversation. ‘I heard something today from one of the other women out in the west pasture. Grinna, it was. Birla’s daughter. The middle one that just got wed this past autumn. She’s big as a house with her first child.’ Dulaan chortled. ‘Stars above, I thought she might deliver right then and there among her goats.’ She shifted on the bench, trying to ease the pressure on her old bones. ‘Twins run in that family, you know. Her mother’s sister had two sets. Of course, she died after that second birthing . . .’
The room had gone silent as she rambled on, waiting patiently for the old woman to come to the point of her story. Dulaan looked up, giving a half smile at their respectful attention. ‘Yes, well,’ she went on after a small sip at her wine. ‘Grinna said her husband had said his father had gone up to the Great Hall. To see about some messenger from those Elvish folks as had come to see Lord Ulfang.’ She nodded her head as she recollected what the woman had told her. ‘Now there’s someone long in the tooth. Even for a manchild. Time he was looking to hand down the rule, don’t you think? Though as I hear it, it’s Uldor as really speaks through his father.’
She looked up again and laughed. ‘Well, anyway, I was wondering what you men had heard about all this Elves and their visiting. Is there anything to be made of it? ’ She took a few more sips of her warm wine and looked expectantly toward Erling and Grimr.
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