"No. I want to put one on my cape. It would be brilliant, wouldn't it? The other girls would be so envious."

Mairead imagined the gossip. "We just don't have the money for that much thread. You'll have to wait."

"But you gave Miss Mary a handful of coins today! Why couldn't you save some for me?" She began to cry, and her voice reached a high-pitched screech on the "me."

"You shouldn't be spying, Emer. I've told you that a thousand times."

"You're giving all our money to Miss Mary and you don't care about me!"

"That's not so. That money wasn't all ours, and Mary is a very important lady, making us these things. You should be less selfish, girl, and listen to me more often. Stop spying and sneaking around things you don't understand."

"But I want to make a pretty cape!" Emer screamed, losing all control. Emer screamed, losing all control. "Why don't you love me anymore?" "Why don't you love me anymore?"

Mairead gathered all the sewing things and returned them to the sack. Emer tried twice to stop her, but had her hand slapped smartly. She rose with a yelp and raced out the door, up her stone stairway to the lookout. Upon her arrival, she found that none of her dirt drawings had been disturbed, and realized that her brother hadn't been there that day like he'd said he would be. She screamed again, and cried as hard as she could. People in the dusk-lit valley below shook their heads and pursed their lips with disappointment. Her father and brother heard her, too, a half mile away, and pretended they didn't as they continued to talk important business with their neighbors.

Before too long, Emer stopped sobbing. She just sat, peering into her starlit lap, and vowed two things: that she would never trust her brother again to take on her ch.o.r.e of watchman, and that she would one day st.i.tch the finest embroidered cape the world would ever see.

News traveled quickly to the valley. The Morriseys and their neighbors gathered in the cold to hear stories of Oliver Cromwell and his ma.s.sive army from a worried young man on a horse. By Christmas just past, the man reported, Cromwell had not only taken Drogheda, Wexford, and Ross, but he'd landed a brutal siege on Waterford before retreating to rest his troops to the south. Emer and Padraig stayed out of sight, in their secret hiding place near an old well, and listened to the young man as he spoke of the ma.s.sacres of people gathered in their churches for safety.

"He threw fire through the windows and stationed two men at each door to kill anyone who ran! No woman or child was spared, I tell you, not one! And that's not the least of it. His canons have destroyed the best of our fort walls and his cavalry are faster than any Irish horse!"

"Whose side are you on?" someone asked.

"It's the truth," the young man argued. "I speak of what I've seen with my own eyes, in Ross. His army breathes fire like a dragon! A monster that kills innocent babies! Have you readied your men and muskets? Have you found a place to hide your families, and readied your horses?"

"Now look here," Emer's father boomed, before anyone else could muster words. "I'm not readying my horses and I'm not going to hide. This is our valley and we'll have it that way until my body lies dead at the Carabine Bridge! How can you compare us to Ross or Wexford? We're not a walled town! We're not owned by any man nor shall we be! Let them come, and then come again, and meet with our pikes and our powder!"

The rest of the farmers cheered and yelped in a.s.sent. No, Oliver Cromwell wouldn't have their farms, their church, or their children.

"How do we know you're not one of them? If they killed every last beggar, then how did you escape?" Mr. Mullaly accused.

"A spy?" someone whispered. "A traitor?"

Emer's Uncle Martin added, "Maybe you're here to survey the next battlefield?"

The young man held his hand out and denied everything. "I came only to warn you of what's coming."

"Surely you are aware that we've known of this monster for months!"

"But did you know of his plans to take Kilkenny this spring?" The man looked at the gone-silent crowd. "He will surely pa.s.s through this valley!"

Emer looked at her brother. She could see his chest puffing out and his face twisting into a maze just like the other adults who had gathered. Suddenly, everyone in the valley looked twenty years older. She tapped on Padraig's leg in an attempt to whisper something to him, but when he wouldn't pay any attention to her, she quietly sneaked from their hiding place and scurried to watch from her panoramic outpost.

I knew it. I knew they would come for us, she thought as she climbed to her tower and sat on a large stone on the edge. Now they can't say I'm just a simple girl who never does anything right. Now they can say I'm the one who sounded the alarm when Oliver came. Now they can't say I'm just a simple girl who never does anything right. Now they can say I'm the one who sounded the alarm when Oliver came.

She looked down at the meeting and the young man on his horse. The stranger showed the crowd several wounds on his chest and a large scar on his calf to prove that he was not a traitor or a spy. Then the meeting dissolved, and people began walking or riding back to their farms.

As her parents returned to their house, Emer heard footsteps behind her.

"I want to help you watch," Padraig said. "We should work in shifts."

"No. It's my lookout. Get your own."

"It was my lookout before it was your lookout."

"You get out of here. Daddy will need you in the field. I can do it myself."

"No, you can't."

"Yes, I can!" Emer screamed. "Now get out!"

"No one will believe you if you sound the alarm because you're just a stupid girl."

"Yes they will."

"No they won't, because you're stupid."

"I am not."

"Yes you are. All girls are."

"Stop saying that. And get out!" she yelled, pushing him.

He pushed her back. "Just share it with me," he said. "I promise I'll do a good job."

"Like all the other times you watched for me?"

"Yeah. Just like those times."

"Ha!" Emer yelled, pointing. "You never even came up here those times I asked you to! I know you didn't. You can't be trusted! Just go away!"

"It's my house and I'll do what I want! You get out! It's my house," he said, and pushed her again.

She turned around with uncontrollable rage and pushed him down onto the stone floor and kicked him. "You get out! Traitor! Spy! Get out!"

"What's going on up there?" her father yelled. "Emer, come down here!"

"I can't. I'm looking out for the dragon, Daddy!"

"Where's Padraig?" Mairead asked.

"Tell Emer to let me watch!"

"Get down here, Padraig, and leave your sister alone! We have work to do!"

"But, Da!"

"Get down here!"

Padraig gave Emer a quick hard pinch to her thigh and she yelped in pain. Before she could retaliate, he was down the staircase, and she was alone again.

She made a point to look in every direction every minute, so that she rotated a fraction of an inch on each second. To keep track of her duties, she piled dirt onto the floor in organized mounds, and each time she looked one direction or another, she marked it on her pile of dirt, all the while humming the same tune her mother sang to keep the beat of her rotations.

After several hours of this, Mairead called up to her.

"What are you doing up there Emer?"

"Just looking."

"Come and help me with the dinner, so. You've been up there long enough."

"What about the dragon?"

Mairead answered, "Just come down and wash yourself."

"Where's Padraig?"

"He's out with your father. Come down now."

"But I can't leave until Padraig relieves me."

"Of course you can. No one is coming tonight."

"How do you know?"

"I just do," Mairead answered, making sure to sound as annoyed as she was.

Emer couldn't bear to step down from her wrap-around view of the valley.

"Emer!"

She took one last look and barreled down the steps.

"Come when I call you, girl! No more of your stories about dragons."

"But he said that a dragon came to ... " she forgot the name. "To ... to other places."

"Who said?"

Emer stopped to think for a moment. "Padraig."

"He told you about a dragon?"

"Yes."

"What else did he tell you?"

"About Oliver and the horses that are faster than any Irish horse," she answered.

Mairead put her hand out. "Stop that talk. Your brother is in some trouble now, and I'd say you're happy."

"But what about the dragon?"

"There is no dragon. Your brother tells you lies to scare you, that's all."

"Well then, why did that man come on the horse today? Wasn't he the one who told you all about it?"

"That man was here to sell us dried fish. He comes every winter in case we haven't enough of our own food. I certainly will have a word with your brother when he gets back."

"I don't want to die. I don't want you to die. Or Daddy. Or Padraig. If the soldiers do come, can I hide in my secret place instead of in the church?"

Mairead stopped busying herself and sat down next to her daughter. Gently she asked, "Pet, why would you think we're going to die? Who told you that?"

Emer didn't answer.

"Emer? I told you what your brother said was a lie."

"Padraig wasn't lying, I know it."

"Yes, he was."

"And that man wasn't here to sell us fish, either."

Mairead looked at her little girl and began to cry a little, but said nothing.

"Mammy, I don't want to die."

With that, Mairead pulled Emer into her arms and rocked her as they hugged quietly. She said nothing until she found something other than "Oh Emer" to say, which took over two minutes.

"I'm sorry. I know you can tell when I'm lying."

"So there is a dragon?"

"No. No. There is no dragon, but there could be some trouble, I guess. You know you're safe, don't you?"

"Yes."

"So please don't worry. Your father and I can take care of you and your brother no matter what happens upon us, I swear it."

Emer stopped crying and sat up on her mother's lap. "Can I be the lookout then?"

"Well ... "

"Please?"