Tara worked in the kitchen right beside her aunt, all the while Mary Lin kept talking, telling stories of the fey folk, and how they affected so many folk, e'en today in Ireland.  There was even a local politician or two that she thought had been given a faerie draft considering some of the fool choices he'd made.  "Is this the same one that signed off on the new road Aunt?"  She merely pressed her lips together and pointed Tara to the chiller, to get some more lard for the pastry.<br/><br/>"Ye kin nae believe me child, but yer own eyes should be tellin ya tha truth." Sighing, her well worn hands folding in the flour into the mixture, even as a previous batch filled the air with the spicy scents of cinnamon and clove.<br/><br/>Chastened a bit by the reminder again about last night, Tara brought over the lard and laid it on the table where her aunt worked the dough.  She brushed her face, a touch of flour marking her pale cheek.  Tara had inherited her ancestors' fair skin, though not the freckles.  It was said in the Hurley family that you came out as fire or ice.  Some had hair that was vibrantly red, with an abundance of freckles covering them, or they were like Tara, hair pitch black as night, with pale skin unmarked by anything but a single birthmark on one shoulder.<br/><br/>She glanced up to the herbs around the windows, "Isn't the hawthorne enough protection? I had to move it last night for the little man..."  Her voice trailed off as a knock sounded on the back door.  Surprised she looked to her aunt, it was early for any to be showing up there, and daylight for any of those visions from the night.  Her aunt shrugged, preoccupied with the soothing focus of the creation of her bread.<br/><br/>Tara lifted the latch of the oaken door, "Hello? Tis a bit early to be calling?  The pub doesn't open fer a wee bit yet." Her blue eyes narrowed as she tried to make out the face of the man who stood there. His face was shrouded in shadows from the hood of his cloak.  That somewhat surprised, sure'n she'd seen cloak being used here since she'd come, but they grew less and less common every summer she'd been here, but it were fair chilly enough for it this morn.