Even if one knows they are in love, as long as they won’t admit it in the words, it is not entirely true. To honestly be in love, one must have realized it and told themselves that it was so.

For a week after Taelon had unveiled the nature of his heart, I refused to acknowledge the words to myself, because I knew that the moment I did, there would be no turning back. He kept his word. He treated me no differently than he ever did, he did not bring up the subject again. This was all done, however, not as though he wished to pretend his confession had not happened, but in a way that said that he had no need to speak of it.

I appeared to be the only one who was suffering, which, all things considered, seemed rather unfair. He went about life as usual, and I tried my best to do the same, but it was no good. I grew more and more distressed until finally, I burst, one fine, early spring evening.

“It is no good!” I exclaimed. “We must stop pretending that everything is the same between us. Something has changed, it is too obvious.”

“I have not changed,” he told me. “I am the same. If you feel a change, Ingrith, it is not I.”

To that, there was nothing I could say that would not make me ridiculous.

I lay in bed that night, rolling my mother’s ring between my fingers. For many months it had remained unworn in a small leather pouch that I carried around my waist. Only recently I had taken to bringing it out and holding it every night before I slept, to caress the smooth stone and brush my fingers along the firm, cool circlet of silver that it held onto. I refused to wear it, just as I refused to be loved, but I kept it close, just close enough to know that it was always within reach.

Taelon’s clover I kept pressed between the pages of the book near my bedside, it being far too precious to be kept anywhere else. I had not thanked him, for I didn’t know how. No words I knew could successfully carry what I wished to say. But then, I felt he didn’t wish me to. Neither was it a gift meant to seduce my affections. It was meant only to tell me in a way that the words could not, the depth of his love for me, and I hated that it touched me so deeply.

He did not chase me; he did not shy from me. He left me to find my own way, as I’d hoped to, and yet to make a decision seemed still impossible, and my sleep that night was fitful.

I sat up high in an apple tree. When I looked down, there was the sense that if I fell, I might break my bones, but I had not the fear of it happening. I swung my legs back and forth like a child sitting on a chair with a seat that was too high off the ground. One of my hands gripped the tree branch above me, and the other clung to the tree itself.

"Everyone knows apples aren’t in season.” I heard a laugh and tilted my head back to see James seated above me on another branch. He held an apple in his hand, and threw it up into the air, then caught it. Again, and again.

“Why do you suppose that there are apples in this tree then?” he asked me, suddenly disinterested with his game. His hands went still.

“I don’t see any.” I looked around, squinting at the green-leaved branches that surrounded us. There wasn’t a single apple in sight.

“Look, up there.” James pointed, and I followed his finger with my eyes. Sure enough, dangling above us on the smallest and highest branches at the top of the tree, was an entire harvest of beautiful, juicy, red apples.

“Oh, that is strange,” I agreed aloud.

He gave me a confident grin and stood up. “Let’s go pick them.”

“Wait—”

He paid my protests no mind and hopped from branch to branch like a squirrel.

“James!” I called out to him. “James! Those branches are too small! They will not hold you! You shall fall! Come down!”

“Shan’t!” he sang down to me. “I won’t fall, I’m the best at balancing of every boy in the town!”

“James!” I cried.

“Hurry up, Judeth! Don’t be slow! Just a little higher!”

The laughter disappeared from his voice when he realized that I had stopped climbing. “Judeth.” He smiled uncertainly. “Aren’t you coming?”

“No.” Below me was the ocean. Wide, deep, blue, and terrifying. “I can’t follow you, James,” I told him, and swallowed down the guilt that rose into my throat in a lump.

“If you jump,” he warned me, “you’ll fall into the water.”

“So?” I asked hotly. “I know how to swim.”

“No, you don’t,” James quipped. “You’re too scared.”

“Ingrith.”

I looked down again and saw Taelon standing in the water. Despite being almost fully submerged, he was dry. His tunic, his skin, his hair, and he was beautiful and kind.

He held out a hand toward me. “You don’t need to be scared, Ingrith. You won’t drown, I promise.”

“Judeth, Judeth love, climb the tree!” James called. “There are apples at the top!”

The choice was made. I could hardly even have called it one. It just was. Simple as breathing. I knew what I would do.

I looked up at James, sitting amongst the spindly upper branches of the apple tree. His brown eyes should have been the same eyes I knew, but they were not familiar to me. They were different.

“I am sorry.” I inhaled and jumped off my branch.

The ocean was deep. It was terrifying; it was blue. But the arms that enveloped me were warm, and I knew I would not drown.

I started awake. My eyes flew open, and my entire body jerked to lessen the impact that never came. I lay there for a long moment, trying to bring the pounding of my heart back down to its normal speed.

My shift clung to my body, and my hair was plastered against my forehead, soaked with perspiration.

I sat up and took the book from its place by my bed, and this time purposefully opened it to the page holding the clover, where it lay, green and dry against the decorated page. A thing of simplicity among red and black ink but holding the essence of so much more beauty. I was filled with the strangest mix of peace, relief, and gut-wrenching sadness. I had made my decision.

I stood and walked barefooted out of the house, being careful not to make any noise. Outside, it was still dark, though I knew that dawn was not far off. The air was restless.

Fresh dew wet my feet, and grass clung to the skirt of my gown as I walked with hastened footsteps down the path that led to the beach, following the alluring shhh of the waves.

I stood on the sand, just in reach of the surf, holding a small, smooth, round stone in my right hand, and a handful of early spring flowers. The breeze that disturbed my hair was warm. The sand between my toes was rough, though not unpleasant, and the air was full of salt.

The waves wet the hem of my chemise, and it clung to my ankles like a cold, second skin. Slowly, I went in deeper, holding out my arms for balance as the waves pushed and pulled at me, welcoming me in, and warning me to stay away. Once waist deep, I held the stone in both my hands and pressed it to my lips as I looked up at the moon, which hung delicate and pale in the sky.

I imagined James’s eyes; the ones I knew. The warm, bright, intelligent brown, like those of a deer. I imagined the overconfident tilt of his smile and the color that came to his cheeks when he laughed.

“Goodbye,” I whispered. “I hope that wherever you are, you want me to be happy. I know I hope you are.”

The waves sang louder in my ears, and the thin, white material covering my body floated around my legs like a cloud. It was cold. So cold that my skin burned.

“I love you,” I said. “I’ll always love you, but I’m letting you go. Let us set each other free. Goodbye, beloved.”

I pulled the stone away from my lips, drew back my hand, and threw it as far as I could into the ocean. I stood there for a moment afterward as I turned my eyes to the sky, which was blooming in shades of pink and orange.

I made four more silent prayers of happiness and dropped them, one by one into the ocean with a delicate flower bud. One to my parents; that they be kept safe and well until I could reunite with them. One for Sashada, that she would live a life of happiness. One for the child Asetha; that she might forgive me for being unable to save her; and another for Nahara; that she be free and glad wherever her soul now resided. With each one, I felt lighter; the shadow in my heart fading as surely as the darkness in the sky.

Too late I saw the wave. One moment the sea was calm. The next, it was there, towering up above me, and I had only a moment to think of how horribly beautiful it was. Then I was lost in the sea, with no sense of up or down; only water and darkness pressing at me from all sides and the burn in my lungs as they begged for air.

Somehow, through the everything, and the nothing, I fought my way to the surface. The waves pushed me roughly against the sandy beach, then crashed down on top of me in a roaring cascade, threatening to pull me back in. I dug my hands into the sand, pressing my body to the ground, refusing to give in, and finally, the ocean released me. I crawled out of the reaching waves, and lay on the ground, coughing the saltwater out of my lungs. My eyes burned and my throat stung, but I was alive.

“Ingrith!”

Through bleary vision, I lifted my head and saw Taelon standing on the beach, staring at me with wide eyes. He sprinted to my side and dropped to his knees, face bloodless.

I tried to tell him I was all right, but he didn’t give me the chance. He pulled me into a bone-crushing embrace, not remembering, or not thinking to care about my wet clothes.

“What were you thinking?” he whispered.

“It was an accident,” I rasped, pushing him away so we could speak. He let me, but kept his hands on my shoulders, as though afraid I would be swept away if he didn't. “I had something important to do. I had to say goodbye to someone I care for very much. I didn’t see the wave, or I would have gotten clear away.”

Taelon’s head was bent, his dark hair falling over his eyes so I could not see his face. When he spoke, his voice wobbled.

“I thought—I thought—You were in a white dress, and you just stood there. I thought—”

It dawned on me then, what he was trying to say, and I burst into a fit of helpless laughter.

“You thought I would do away with myself?” I clutched my stomach, and the now docile cove echoed with the sound of my cackles. Tears were streaming out of my eyes, and my body ached with the strain of holding my mirth.

“None of this—” Taelon gestured furiously, first at the ocean, then at me. “None of this should be laughed at! Have you any idea—” His voice caught. He gave up and embraced me again, this time refusing to let go.

“You fool.” The words came out emotional, and uneven. “You bloody, bloody fool.”

My hysterics faded out, leaving me with a sense of exhausted happiness. I was as light as a feather. The slightest gust of wind might blow me away if I were not held down.

The sky was light with pale dawn by the time I pulled myself together well enough to take pity on the man holding me tight to his chest. I pried myself gently out of his grasp and brought up a hand to cup his cheek.

“I had to do it,” I told him. “I had to say goodbye to him, or else I could not start anew. I wouldn’t tell you that I love you, not until I could do so with no guilt or resentment. Thank you.” I let myself look him full in the eyes. “Thank you for waiting for me.”

“Then,” he spoke slowly, pronouncing each word carefully as they came to him. “Then, do you—Do you love me, Ingrith?”

My back was stabbed with a throb of fierce pain, but it didn’t bother me. Maybe I hit it against something while being tossed in the waves. Who cared? Who cared when I was so perfectly happy for the first time in so long?

“I believe I do.” I was breathless, whether from terror, laughter, pain, or the sheer incredibility of what was happening to me, it didn’t matter.

“Yes.” I took his hand and placed it on my chest, over my heart, where it fluttered inside me so rapidly, that I knew he could feel it.

He said nothing. I thought he tried to speak a few times but could not manage it. In the end, he only looked at me, and his eyes and his smile were enough to tell me how wonderfully, impossibly, and incredibly happy he was.

Between us, we did not need words to tell the other what they needed to know.

Nothing changed between us on the surface. We spoke of the same things; we lived as we had always done, but things were different. Each time we said good morning, and every time we said goodnight, there was an intimacy that had not existed before, and an ease that came from truth and openness from both of us.

I felt light and joyful, with my only worry being that surely, with all this happiness, it was too good to last. Something terrible was bound to happen eventually.

Taelon was not impressed with my concerns, and told me that if this was so, wouldn’t it be best to enjoy ourselves as much as possible before the inevitable crisis dropped on our heads?

When I proceeded to argue that the happier we were, the more terrible the incident would be, he got up from where he had been seated by the hearth, stroking His Lordship’s glossy feathers, and told me that I had been listening to too many Fishermen’s wives’ tales and that if I were to live my entire life controlled by a fear of what might happen, I may as well jump off a cliff and have done with it.

“What I mean to say is,” he added quickly upon seeing my offended expression, “is that unfortunate things shall inevitably happen to you and I both; and whether they are caused by our actions, or are the product of mere bad luck, worrying about them shall not do any good. You cannot know when they are to happen, and when they do, wouldn’t you rather have a bounty of good memories to get you through them?”

“Oh, you do sound wise.” I grinned and clucked my tongue to attract His Lordship’s divided attention. The little crow was now full-grown and healthy with large, black wings, and had taken to flying about the house from time to time.

I sighed when he remained unmotivated to acknowledge me, and said to Taelon, “Well, you are right, I suppose. And plenty of terrible things have happened to me already. Perhaps I have had my fill of bad luck and am now free to be happy as I please.”

It seemed, perhaps, that this must be true. Living on Seaggis, one found it harder and harder with each passing day to remember the terrible things of the past, and the terrible things happening to the rest of the continent.

Was it selfish? Certainly. But eventually, the shadow catches up with us all, and we might as well make the most of the time we have before it does. There would always be plenty enough misery to go around.

Spring was in full bloom by the time I felt something amiss in my interactions with Taelon. The day was a fine one. The sticky buds clinging to the tree branches had become leaves. The yellowed, dead grass was made sightlier by some rich shoots of green. The sky was blue with smudges of white clouds scattered across it, and overall, there was a sense of peace and starting afresh.

I dug my fingers into the dark, damp soil of my garden; snagging stones, weeds, and other unwanted nuisances that had made their homes among the roots of my work.

There was one exquisite flower among the overgrowth of thistles and weeds, that I was particularly proud of, though I had not put it in the ground myself. Black bells. It was a tall, sturdy green stem, with hundreds of dark purple cups cascading down to the dirt on a white, gossamer net, like a decorative veil. When I might brush my fingers against it, I would imagine that even the finest silk could not compare to the smooth brilliance of the thing.

I was not the only one who had taken to admiring the flower. All manner of insect life would hover about it, often crawling inside one of the bells to dip their tiny legs into the gold powder that dusted the inside. It was on that particular day that I took a moment to sit back on my heels and wipe the sweat off my forehead with my sleeve and saw two butterflies alighted upon one of the blooms. Their delicate wings fluttered in the forgiving breeze, and they appeared perfectly at ease. Then, one of them, a pretty thing with black speckled colors, lifted off. The other followed and they danced into the air in a slow, ascending spiral, close enough to sometimes give the impression of their tangling together.

It struck me, bluntly, that something wasn’t right.

Before I had admitted to being in love, both to myself and him, Taelon had never shirked from touching me. Even if it was just the slightest thing, a brush of his fingers over my hand, a quick movement to tuck a strand of hair behind my ear; he had always seemed to do it so easily, so naturally.

Now I thought about it, he hadn’t even laid a hand on my shoulder once.

I became bothered by this the more I let myself ponder the mystery, and so I resolved to put it from my mind, with limp excuses on his behalf. Perhaps he was attempting to be all proper about it.

When he got back that evening, his eyes and smile said he was pleased to see me, but that was all, as it always was these days; and he only looked at me warily when he became aware that I was staring at him, pointedly and with some expectancy. When I could no longer ignore that he could not read my mind, nor had any intention of trying, I let it go and told him to go clean up.

After dinner, we sat together near the fire and watched His Lordship flit about the room.

“I’m not sure I’ll be able to bear it when he leaves,” I said morosely. “I do believe I’ve become fond of the little beast.”

“As have I,” Taelon agreed. “There is a chance he won’t leave.”

“A chance,” I agreed doubtfully, and wound the edge of my dress around my fingers, resenting the rough cloth. It wasn’t a fine dress that I had worn that day, for I knew from experience that whenever I spent time outside, I would always come away with spoiled clothing. It wasn’t as becoming as the ones made by Rollo either. After he had died, I had no choice but to take my business to one of the local women who was said to have a fine stitch. The stitching was fine, but the dress itself was made for practical daily use, and not to make a girl prettier.

These days it felt very important for me to be pretty. Or at least, not like some sort of underground gnome who bathed in dirt and ate moss.

“What were you doing this afternoon?” I asked Taelon and was gratified to see that his attention was mine as soon as the words were out of my mouth. “You were covered in ash.” I gave reason to my curiosity. “You generally come back covered in blood or hay, not ash.”

He pulled a disgruntled face and rubbed his hands over the cloth of his cotehardie, as though wishing to relieve a remembered discomfort.

“There was a fire. Only a small one,” he assured me when he read my alarm. “Someone fell asleep atop some hay outside his barn with a pipe in his mouth. No one was injured, but there was smoke and ashes enough.”

“Well, I am glad that no one was hurt.”

“As am I,” said Taelon. “But I wish everyone would be more careful so that others with nothing to do with it wouldn’t have to fix the mistakes.”

“You didn’t have to help,” I told him wisely. “You chose to.”

“That’s right.” He folded his slender hands together and frowned at them as though they were a weave of something far more complicated than his fingers. “I like helping people when I can. But I feel like . . . none if it ever adds up to anything. We hear so many stories about people who defend their cities and lead armies . . . I don’t want that. I don’t. But I feel like I should sometimes. Like it is wrong of me to be satisfied doing the small things, and not the heroic ones.”

“You helped me,” I offered with a smile. “I’m not sure whether my situation came about because of some folly of my own, but I am better off because of your kindness. I might not even be alive if you hadn’t taken pity on me.”

“I have never once regretted it,” he told me truthfully, then seemed to become bashful, for he stood up and turned stiffly away. I knew he was blushing, and it was endearing to me.

“Wait, just a moment.” I stood up from my chair and crossed my arms over my chest. If he was going to be shy, he might as well have a good reason to be.

Proper be damned.

“What is it?” he asked.

I tilted up my chin and held his gaze steadily with my own, refusing to let the slightest hint of my embarrassment touch my skin.

“Aren’t you going to kiss me?”

He looked as though he’d been hit over the head with a mace, and for a few thick moments, I feared he would walk away. But then he took a few diffident steps toward me, and though this had been exactly what I had hoped for, I hadn’t the least idea of what I was going to do.

Hesitance was the entirety of his movements before he finally became emboldened. He tilted his head, and I hadn’t the time to worry. His lips were sunlight and honeyed butterfly wings. The kiss was just as light, just as warm, and just as sweet.

I expected there to be something awkward or embarrassed between us afterward, but there was only our shared pulse and the excitement of a spark in my belly when we pulled apart and bid each other goodnight.

From then on, the physical barrier between us faded more each day, and I was proud of myself for having been the instigator of this positive amendment.

“Is he any good?” Verity asked me one late spring day as I helped her, her sister, and her aunts in arranging the weekend’s catch beneath their tent in a more eye-pleasing way.

Somehow, though neither of us had made it publicly known, everyone seemed fully aware that my and Taelon’s relationship had taken a romantic turn. When I had asked Purity how she knew, she’d said, “I didn’t, but I do now. And you can be sure everyone else on Seaggis shall too.” I felt foolish afterward and made every excuse not to go into the village for the next week and a half. But then when I finally did, I found that though there were some unkind whispers to be heard, few of our fellows seemed to actively disapprove.

In fact, as I learned from Pathedra, there had even been a bet on, and now some lucky people had their barns and larders full. This felt both very like an invasion of privacy, and a sort of flattery, that anyone not closely related to either of us should take such a care about whose lips I took a fancy to kiss.

I had, too, been worried that Taelon might be upset when he heard about it, but to my relief, he only laughed in a sweetly flustered way and told me not to worry about it.

“Is who good at what?” I asked, wiping a bit of sweat off my brow.

Verity rolled her eyes and set down the basket of herrings she had been carrying to tie back her flaming hair.

“Honestly, Ingrith. I don’t see what you hope to achieve by pretending to be innocent. I know that you’re not as ignorant of everything as you would have us believe. But I will humor you and ask again. Is he good at it? The mating of tongues? The caressing of lips? Kissing?”

I had to stop what I was doing for a moment to consider this.

“I don’t know,” I answered finally, wiping my palms down on my skirt.

Verity set her hands on her hips and glared at me. “You can’t expect me to think he’s never kissed you. You live under the same roof. If he hasn’t at least done that, there must be something wrong with him.”

“He has,” I defended quickly. “It’s only that he’s the only one who’s ever done it.”

James had never kissed me. Not properly, anyway. Once, a little bit drunk on ale during the harvest, there’d been some clumsy fondling. But that was all. I couldn’t remember how it felt either, only that my heart fluttered. There was not the pulsing spark I felt when Taelon had kissed me. Perhaps this meant that he was good at it.

“You don’t need someone to compare him to in order to know that he’s good,” Verity told me expertly. “You just need to enjoy it.”

“He’s good.” Purity jumped into the conversation. She had a fish knife in one hand, and a pail of entrails in the other, which she set down underneath one of the display tables. “Good as any grown man, I’d say. Perhaps a wee bit more, because he’s all nice to look at, too. We don’t have many around here like that. Though maybe that’s because they’re always covered in sheep shite, so we don’t notice. But aye, he is good.”

“How would you know?” Verity demanded.

Purity grinned.

“You didn’t!” gasped Verity.

Something like suspicious jealousy spoiled inside my chest. A thick, poisoned burr stuck inside my heart. Looking her over seriously for the first time, I found, to my alarm, that Purity was quite pretty. Tall and willowy. Dangerously red hair and bright green eyes that made her look like an elegant ginger cat.

They both are, in fact, I realized forlornly.

“It was only a quick little thing.” Purity stabbed the knife, point down into the wood of the table and it quivered there for a moment. “I saw him walking past the stall, maybe . . . three years ago? Before you arrived, Ingrith, of course,” She patted me on the arm. “Well, he looked all heavenly and fine, so I called out to him and asked if he wouldn’t buy a fish.”

“What did he do?” Verity whispered. Her eyes narrow and wild as she waited to pounce on the mouse that was her sister’s tale.

Purity flicked a strand of hair over her shoulder and grinned again. “He came up to me, all sweet and innocent like, and asked what I wanted for one. I told him a kiss would do.”

“You sold one of my fish for a kiss?” Pathedra entered the tent and glared disapprovingly at her niece.

“Oh, it was well worth it!” Purity assured her aunt. She ran a fingertip over her own pale, pink lips with a dreamy smile. “I’d have sold a dozen fish for another one.”

“You brazen little minx.” Pathedra slapped Purity stiffly over the head, but there was a gleam in her eyes that was not at all scolding.

“Ah, well.” Purity rubbed the back of her head as she glared daggers at her aunt. “I doubt he’ll go around kissing shop girls now he has Ingrith. How am I supposed to find a husband if you keep me all tied up in this stinking fish tent?”

Pathedra began arranging a basket of oysters on the table with meticulous precision. “No one’s keeping anybody ‘tied’ up. And shop girls are the ones most exposed to the folk around. You’d be grateful to me if you had a hint of sense in that hay-stuffed head of yours.”

“There are no men who come around here,” Purity whined. “It’s only their wives, and I’m not so desperate yet that I’ll wed a sheep farmer’s woman.”

“You’ll find your match one day, I know it.” Pariena joined us with an armload of seaweed.

“This is for you, Ingrith,” she told me and stuffed it into my arms. “You mentioned the other day that your mother used to make seaweed soup. We have some extra, and I thought you could try doing it for yourself.”

“Thank you.” I struggled to keep a grip on the slippery gift. “Might I borrow something to carry it in?”

I was handed a basket and told not to bother returning it. “Sunah knows we have enough,” Verity told me.

“Only because I make ‘em.” Purity pouted.

“You need to do something to earn your keep,” Pariena told her. “And we all know it isn’t helping out here.”

I was constantly warmed and amused by the incessant bickering and teasing between the four women, even when it became tiresome. They were so wholly at ease in each other’s company, and so secure in each other’s affections, that they could say whatever they pleased, and no irreparable harm would be done.

It reminded me of my parents. Of the teasing games they would play with each other when the weather was fine, and they were both in good moods. But I was not sad. I missed them both plenty but thinking of them now brought me warmth. Not grief.

“Oh, my!” Purity grabbed Verity’s arm and patted me excitedly on the shoulder. “Ooooh, see who is come, Ingrith!”

I turned my head and grinned, pleased to see Taelon coming toward us. He had a slightly preoccupied expression on his face, but when he saw me, he smiled brightly, and I decided that whatever he had been thinking about couldn’t be too serious.

“Hello,” he greeted bashfully.

“Hello,” we all answered together, and then the four of them burst into a fit of ridiculous giggling. I ignored them and spoke loudly to be heard over their voices.

“This is early, isn’t it, for you to finish?”

“There wasn’t much for me to do yet. Most of what is needed to be done has been done, and the Feignt won’t begin yet for another month.” He ran his fingers shyly through his hair. Under the glow of the sun, it didn’t seem black anymore, but many colors together. Blues, purples, and even some glimmers of red here and there.

“Oh, are you taking part in the Feignt again this year, Taelon?” Purity asked, and then sighed theatrically and fanned herself with her hand. “How very masculine of you.”

He blinked at her.

“What my dear niece means to say, is that we’re very grateful.” Pathedra elbowed Purity in the side and gave Taelon her shop woman smile. “To you and all of the young men who take part in the Feignt. It is very helpful.”

He smiled back at her, unaware of what he’d been saved from. “I hope so.”

“Are you headed back?” I asked him hopefully.

“I am, and I was hoping to convince you to come with me. Unless you’re busy here?” He tilted his head back to take in the tent, and the colorful array of seafood laid out in the shade.

“No, I’m not busy.” I hurried around the table, knowing that it was in my best interests to get him as far away from my friends as possible.

“See you soon, Ingrith.” Pathedra waved daintily at me while Verity and Purity’s lips pulled into matching smirks.

I tucked my basket of seaweed underneath my arm so I could wave to them, and Taelon and I made down the path that led to the gate.

“What were you talking about?” he asked me once we had started up the trail to the cliff.

“Oh, everything I suppose,” I answered awkwardly.

“Women—” he shook his head, puzzled, “—are the strangest creatures.”

“I am a woman,” I informed him, offended.

“Are you? Really? I’d never believe it.”

I tried to hit him, and he fended my fists away while laughing. “I did not mean it in a bad way,” he amended. “It is only that they seem to be able to talk about anything for any number of hours and still have plenty more to say when they meet each other again, not a day later.”

“Well, I cannot rebuke that,” I admitted.

When we arrived home, he went around the house to wash up, and I set about trying to remember how my mother made seaweed soup. It should have been easy enough. Most soups really were only ingredients thrown into a pot of boiling water with a bit of salt when it could be found, and some bread on the side. I couldn’t remember exactly what my mother did, but I was confident that I couldn’t stray too far from the right path.

The seaweed had gone somewhat dry during our journey back, so I placed it in a pot of water to soften again, then sat on a chair and twiddled my thumbs until Taelon emerged again, rubbing his wet hair dry with a cloth.

He asked me if there was something that needed doing, and I pointed him toward a knife that had gone dull. He brought it to the table and began to sharpen it, sliding it carefully across the sharpening stone. Each strike made a satisfying rasping sound.

There was something preoccupied about his expression again. His mouth was drawn into a firm line, and there was a crease in his brow that did not belong there.

“What is bothering you?”

I brought my chair over to sit beside him and waited expectantly for him to speak to me.

“You needn’t worry,” he told me. “It is nothing that would mean anything to you.”

“But it means something to you,” I pointed out. “And so, it means something to me.”

I waited as he considered this, and eventually, he seemed to find my point a valid one. “I have had a letter from my sister, Nuala,” he said. “A ship arrived today, from Ragnagh. There weren’t many people on it, but there was this.”

He set down the knife and the stone to pull a crumpled letter out of his tunic. He handed it to me.

“May I read it?”

“Of course.”

I unfolded it. The paper was smoother than any I had touched before, and a pleasant creamy color. The writing filling the page was pretty and neat in scrawling black ink that looked both practiced and natural.

My dear brother,

It has indeed been such a very long time since you’ve written, and I was ever so pleased to receive your letter and learn that you are well. I hope you are managing without Seowan.

I know my last letter was brief, which is strange because so much has happened since you left. So, I shall try and give this one more detail.

Father is busy as usual with his work, and very concerned. Especially now that the Radkkans have stopped trading their silk. I do not see him often. Mother keeps to herself. We all miss you. I hope you believe me when I say it.

You asked if we were all well, and oh, how I wish to tell you that we are. But I cannot lie to you, Ato. I never could. I am sure you know about the invasion. I did not mention it before. Of course, everyone was speaking of it when you were still home, but now I am afraid that it is much bigger than anyone thought it would be. I do not know what you have heard, as far away as you are, so I shall tell you what I know. I should have given you an account before, but I could not bring myself to.

Aibit was taken completely last year, as has Thessè, Cthos, and Jaggi, though that was bound to happen. Kanee is attempting to hold out, but Father says that they shall be defeated within the month.

Saje was invaded, and Kora fell quite some time ago.

You must wonder why the Lords and Governors make no real effort to fight back. I wondered about this as well. Father said, and I still do not understand completely, that unless King Abaekus raises his sword, no one else shall, because T’cor is the only Kingdom that comes close to equaling Radkka in strength, military power, and land. So, until he does, we shall have to wait as every inch of Sunah is taken over. It is terrible, isn’t it? That we cannot do a thing about it.

My heart sank steadily lower and lower in my chest as I read each word. In this faraway place, it was all too easy to pretend that this doomed continent was not mine, but in doing so I also failed to remember that it was the home of my family.

I am sorry if this worries you, but I know you would rather be told the worst, than pretty lies.

This has not terribly affected our own family personally, at least not dangerously so far, and though I am grateful, my heart does ache for those who are losing their lives to this horrible venture.

Dear brother,

There is more that I have not told you. I do not know the reason for why I have put it off, but I have, and I suppose I might as well tell you now.

I have been married to Uaceen Madrief, a Trader from T`cor. Father arranged the match himself. He is not home very often, but when he is, he is good to me, and we live in a pleasant house. It is nice to be the mistress of my own home.

We have a child. A little boy. We’ve named him Boji, after Mother’s father. Father was displeased that we used a Radkkan name and so we call him Bo. I am writing this a few days before his second birthday.

You must wonder why I have not told you of this for so long, and I am sorry. I have no excuse. No reasonable one, atany rate, but I shall tell you because I know that you are beginning to worry.

I have not been well. You see, I was told that I was to have another baby, but three months ago, I felt very ill, and the nun told me that the child had died. It seems, like Mother, I cannot have many children.

I was given a horrible tea that brought on the pains. It was heartbreaking. I did not want to do it, but I was told I must, or else I would become even more ill, and could die.

She was so very small. Smaller than a kitten. I named her Asa, after her constellation. Just as you were. I know you shall not think me foolish for giving a name to my dead child. I think I should feel so much better to walk by her stone and see that there is a name upon it.

Physically, I am quite recovered now, though the grief has not yet passed, and so I found it hard to speak or write to anyone. But rest assured I am well.

I wish upon you all the blessings in the world and hope that we may see each other again. And do write to me. I would like to know more about your friend Ingrith. I hope one day you shall bring her to visit us.

Your loving sister, Nuala Madrief

I finished reading the letter and folded it up as carefully as I could, then handed it back to Taelon.

“I am so terribly sorry for her,” I told him genuinely. “She seems to be a lovely, sweet woman.”

“But she isn’t a woman.” Taelon tucked the letter back into his tunic. “Nuala is a girl. Younger than you, Ingrith.”

He picked up the knife again and ran his thumb along the blade to test its sharpness.

“She would be fifteen years old now.”

“Oh my,” I said faintly.

“When my brother and I left, we were automatically giving up the burdens of our futures to Nuala. She could not learn the cloth trade, so Father’s only choice was to marry her off to a man and hope that she be able to give him an heir who could.”

He set down the knife and expelled a breath. “I sometimes feel that I’ve been terribly selfish,” he admitted.

“Is this man, Uaceen, a good man, do you think?”

“I may hope so. But even if he is, I can know for certain that he’s at least twice her age.”

“Well, I don’t believe that you are a selfish person if that means anything,” I said and reached across the table to take his hand. “You and I, we both did what we needed to do, even though it meant leaving someone precious behind.”

“It was different for you,” Taelon said. “You escaped because your life was in danger.”

“This is true, but it might not have been. The boy I loved, he and I had planned to run away together, even before the Radkkan invasion, and if he hadn’t been killed, we would have gone through with it.”

Taelon turned his hand over so that his fingers were interlaced with mine, and said in a quiet voice, “I feel dreadful in admitting it, but I’m glad you never got the chance. Do you hate me for saying so?”

“No.” His skin was darker than mine now, browned by hours spent in the climbing glare of the sun. “No, I don’t hate you for saying so. Though I wish none of the terrible circumstances that led us together had happened, I believe now that if I had the chance to go back, I would not.”

He smiled at me, and I saw a warm blush paint itself bashfully across his cheeks. I knew a similar shade was vibrantly displayed on my own, but I didn’t mind.

We stayed there until the sun was fully set, then I followed Taelon to the doorway of his room, asking if he didn’t want something to eat.

“I haven’t made anything yet, but if you wait, I can stew the seaweed and—”

In reply, he tucked his fingers behind my head and pulled me in gently for a kiss. I made no attempts to dissuade him, eager to explore the spark that had lit itself inside my stomach before.

Every touch of his lips, every brush of his fingertips, each sensation struck flint against steel inside my heart, and there was a ready bed of tinder and straw that welcomed each spark like an embrace.

Within moments, the spark had become a blaze that was unnaturally hot. I felt its hunger like it was my own and sought more. But like a fire, the more I was fed, the more I wanted.

“What is this?” the question came out like a whisper, my voice breathless. It was frightening and thrilling, and unlike anything I had ever experienced before.

I felt his heart beating in the answer that he wouldn’t speak, beneath my fingers, beneath cloth, and beneath heated skin. It beat with a fire that was akin to my own, and they yearned, craved, desired to become one.

Did I dare resist that which was impossible to even consider pushing away?

Taelon’s lips left my mouth and for a moment I feared that he dared. But then they found the pulse at my throat, and the fire seared hot and glorious throughout every inch of my body.

It was not a sin, what happened that night. The lips which touched were not cruel. What was lost was given and not stolen. The thoughts which were shared were not lecherous.

In the dark, a spark became a flame, a flame became a fire, and fire became an all-devouring ocean of sugared heat, lighting up a sparkle of green resting on a girl’s finger.

No, it was not sin which I relented to that night, but love, in its every aspect; and I would say so on bended knees before a sacred house of gods, dressed in the purest white, because love, I knew then, would never make me impure.