Shattered: The Iron Druid Chronicles, Book Seven Read Online Free PDF

Then follow with a few sips of the dark beer.”
    “All right,” he said, picking up the shot glass. “Your health.”
    “Sláinte,”
I replied in modern Irish.
    The whiskey burned precisely as it should, and the Guinness was a perfect pour.
    Owen coughed once and his eyes watered. “Oh, thank the gods below,” he said, putting down the pint glass. “My people aren’t completely lost.”
    We both laughed—a common enough occurrence, but one that I couldn’t recall ever sharing with him—and then I answered a stream of questions about what he’d seen on the way to the inn. That turned into a stream of questions about what he saw inside the bar and what was this strange new concept called
science
anyway?
    We talked through a couple more rounds, and the after-dinner crowd started to filter in. Owen became particularly animated at one point, and this amused some young toughs at the bar. They laughed and one of them aped him—an astoundingly poor decision, which meant that his night of fun with his mates was about to turn into The Night He Got His Ass Kicked.
    “Shut your hole, you,” Owen growled at him. It was in Old Irish, but the tone was unmistakable. The grin disappeared from the punk’s face, and he put down his drink and did that jaw-flexing thing that some guys do because they think it makes them look tougher.
    “Are you talking to me, old man?”
    In the punk’s experience, that was the point where most people backed down. He’d left room for Owen to say, “My mistake,” and look away, and he thought that would be the end of it. But my archdruid wasn’t the average senior citizen. He knew a challenge when he heard it, and he had never refused to accept one. Keeping his eyes on the punk and sneering the entire way through his next words, he said, “Siodhachan, tell him his mother makes badger noises when I tup her sideways.”
    I grinned but elected not to translate. There was no need; there was plenty of offense to be taken from Owen’s body languageand voice, and the punk was happy to take it. He balled his hands into fists and approached the table.
    “Look, old man, if you want trouble, I’ve plenty to give you.” He raised a fist and pointed at Owen when he got near. “In fact—”
    That was it. Owen grabbed his arm, yanked it toward him, and head-butted the punk. He went down with a yelp and Owen stood up, kicking his chair away behind him. “Respect your elders, lad!”
    The inn got quiet the way things will when shit gets real. The punk had four friends at the bar, who had just seen him lose in less than a second to a man who looked to be more than seventy and unable to pay for his drink. For a brief moment they had a choice regarding their mate: They could laugh at him and give him unending grief about it for the rest of his life, or they could back him up. Owen wasn’t going to let them get a laugh out of it. He kicked the punk in the gut and beckoned the others forward.
    “Come on and have your lesson, then,” he said, and though they didn’t speak Old Irish, his meaning was unambiguous. The dinosaur wanted a fight, and the huge grin on my face probably didn’t help matters.
    “Now, wait, boys—” the bartender said, but they all put down their drinks and rushed Owen. Pride and brotherhood wouldn’t allow them any other choice. I didn’t move but muttered words to boost my strength and speed in case they decided to involve me.
    The first one came in with the intent to tackle Owen to the ground, the better to pummel him into submission. It wouldn’t work out well; the archdruid used to have us charge him in just such a fashion for training, because it was a common tactic in unarmed combat. Owen feinted to his right, causing the punk to veer that way, then hopped left, slapping the outstretched right arm away to ensure he’d pass by. Pivoting as the poor bloke chugged past and keeping his fists near his sternum, the archdruid delivered a blow with his left elbow to the