There was an empty silence as Sammy and Julie travelled. Compared to the six horses of before, their two horses made nearly no noise. There were none of the sighs or hums that Yewry had liked to let out, no whispered conversation between the guards, nor updates from Yo’can about how far the next stop was.

All there was was the gentle clip-clop of two horses on a paved road.

While Julie found it a bit unsettling at first, Sammy was thankful for the relative silence. Riding side-saddle, she admired the beautiful scenery, at times even able to see the distant sea peeking through. Sure enough, the wind sometimes brought a hint of the sea breeze, other times an earthy and flowery scent, the season turning and spring settling in.

Although they now didn’t have to stop as often and could travel faster, Julie kept a gentle pace and stopped at a roadside inn for their morning break as well as for lunch. Sammy appreciated the consideration—she made sure Julie knew that with a few kisses, snuck in when they had moments of privacy.

However, Sammy wasn’t in any particular need for consideration, the last day’s rest having covered the heaviest part of her flow. Compared to dealing with that, the cramps and such weren’t so bad. Well, perhaps she just felt that way because she could, whenever necessary, indulge in a good, long hug. Julie had yet to complain over the requests.

So their first day of travelling alone again went, quiet and peaceful.

In the morning, Julie roused early, bleary eyed and blinking as Sammy got up. Pushing herself up, she rubbed her eyes. “You okay?”

Sammy turned around with a small smile, her hand coming up to caress Julie’s cheek. “I am fine,” she whispered, finishing with a broader smile.

In Julie’s half-asleep state, she decided that Sammy still wanted a kiss good morning. So she reached over, held Sammy’s shoulders, and pulled herself in, somewhat missing her mark as her kiss landed more on the corner of Sammy’s mouth.

Oh Sammy giggled, her laughter tickling Julie’s lips as she replied to Julie’s kiss with one of her own—and this one didn’t miss the mark at all. But it was still as chaste, a peck and no more. “Please, sleep some more,” Sammy whispered, her words all the more convincing for being so softly spoken.

Julie nodded and lay back down. For a while, Sammy continued to simply brush her fingertips along Julie’s cheek. It was still rather funny to her how, even though Julie wasn’t pretty, she had never met someone so beautiful.

Books were full of lies.

How poorly a story would do, she knew, if it spoke of a princess with work-tanned skin that wasn’t all that soft, oily to the touch, some blemishes upon it—to say nothing of the small scars (unnoticeable at a glance as they were). A child could hardly grow up swinging sword and never have an accident.

Content Julie was asleep once more, Sammy’s hand strayed from cheek to shoulder, finger tracing the edge of Julie’s nightdress. And her gaze followed, only to go a little farther to the loose sleeves. There had been girls who had boasted to her about how thin their arms were, yet Sammy was far more interested in wrapping her fingers around Julie’s arm, wanted to feel Julie tense those muscles.

Every book worth its salt had the hero carry the damsel in his arms, and Sammy had always thought how nice it would be to carry her own damsel one day. Now, though, she wondered if Julie could lift her. How nice that would be.

Of course, Sammy still wanted to carry Julie—and she knew she definitely could. But she thought it would be nice to be carried too.

Sammy’s thoughts drifting around, she went back to books and what a book about Julie would be like. But she knew that, if ever there was a book about a princess who guarded the hero, sword and shield in hand, that, at the end of the story, that princess would marry the hero, put down her sword, and become a soft and beautiful mother who would never so much as raise her voice.

After all, in every story, a young woman could be anything—so long as she ended up a mother. And by the time a girl came of age, that was the only happily-ever-after she could imagine.

Catching herself becoming cynical, Sammy brought her hand back up and ran her fingers through Julie’s hair, pleased at how Julie leaned into the touch even in her sleep.

“I love you,” Sammy whispered.

Taking all her willpower, Sammy stopped and carefully stood up. She changed her cloth and got dressed and went to the laundry room. By the time she returned, Julie had woken up, about to leave for her morning exercises. Seeing Sammy, she let out a relieved sigh and—before Sammy could say a word—she strode over to give Sammy a quick kiss.

“Morning,” she said, softly smiling.

“Good morning,” Sammy replied.

After Sammy massaged out some of the lingering pains, she put on a coat, walked outside to the back of the inn, and watched Julie go through the motions. Her thoughts from earlier coming back, she closely followed as Julie’s arms tensed and strained.

No matter how Sammy looked at it, though, Julie was still very feminine. She still had soft features on her face. Despite how much she trained her body, her arms were still more lithe than muscled. That was to say nothing of how she acted. When Sammy teased her, flirted with her, well, Sammy loved the expressions she made, the look in her eye, and they didn’t exactly strike Sammy as masculine.

Rather than a create a dissonance, Sammy instead found this all the more fascinating. She loved that Julie could wield a sword with such control and could act demure from a single compliment. Perhaps, she thought, it was because she loved the feeling of control it gave her, knowing she could erase Julie’s years of training with just a word.

Sammy knew she was selfish and self-absorbed. That sort of went with being the heir-apparent princess—and with being queer. The world wasn’t going to give her what she wanted, no matter how patiently she waited, so she had to focus on getting what she wanted.

But Sammy had always hoped that wasn’t true. She hoped that other people didn’t feel like she was taking advantage of them, had always tried to be measured and mindful in what she was doing.

And she hoped that she didn’t love Julie just because of the control she had over her.

While Julie had noticed when Sammy had arrived, she’d carried on as normal, fairly used to the audience by now. But, as always, she was keenly aware of Sammy looking at her, a sixth sense in the back of her head telling her exactly where Sammy was.

So it was no surprise that Julie glanced at Sammy and stopped her routine, concern on her face as she rushed over. “Is everything okay?” she quietly asked, her free hand squeezing one of Sammy’s.

Sammy hesitated over what to say, blinking, and those blinks pushed out the tears that clouded her eyes. Surprised by that, she had no chance to react before Julie let go of her hand and wiped the tears.

Too many words trying to spill out, it took Sammy a long few seconds to whisper, “I need a hug.”

So Julie hugged her with one arm, keeping the sword away. Still, even with just one arm, Sammy felt safe. It was hard to put in words, but safe was close enough.

Strong and gentle.

Although Julie kept up the pampering through the rest of the day, Sammy didn’t need any more, graciously accepted it regardless. The morning chill gave way to a sunny warmth and melted away her lingering aches, their slow pace and the smooth ride of the horses keeping her comfortable. However, a kiss under an old oak tree wasn’t something to turn down, nor the cuddle afterwards.

The next morning, Sammy was relieved to see barely a spot on her cloth.

“We should travel inland now,” she told Julie, a rough drawing acting as a map. “The terrain isn’t so steep if we curve around the last mountain.”

Julie nodded along, then said, “We should find a farrier first, and stock up on supplies.”

Sammy smiled, saying nothing, until Julie finally looked over and something about that smile made her all shy. Seeing Julie turn away and knowing why, Sammy said, “Of course.”

So they travelled along the pilgrims’ road to the next large town, arriving there in the early afternoon. The horses were left at a farrier and their luggage at the inn near to it and they went through the streets to shop. There wasn’t much hard tack or any grain, but smoked fish and dried game was plentiful, pickled vegetables and some preserved fruits to go with them—Sammy bought a jar of plum jam, as well as a bottle of spiced plum wine.

Although Julie didn’t say anything about the wine, Sammy certainly noticed the look, replying with an innocent smile.

They stretched the shopping out for a good hour, but there were only so many shops. Not much else to see in what was a town for pilgrims and merchants, they walked back to the inn, retiring to their room. They went through their packs and checked everything was in good condition, which reminded Sammy of something.

“Ah, we saw a fletcher?” Sammy said aloud.

“Yeah? By the butcher,” Julie said.

Sammy nodded and, gesturing at the war bow, said, “We should get arrows.”

For a moment, Julie felt a dizziness. Words that Sammy had said before coalesced, bringing to mind a fleeting image: the sight of that last wild beast, peppered with arrows, only it was a human drenched in blood instead of darkness.

Julie didn’t know where that had come from and it left as suddenly as it came, but it put her out of sorts until Sammy’s hand touched her shoulder.

“Lia?” she whispered, gently squeezing.

Julie shook her head. “I’m fine,” she said, not even sounding convincing to herself.

Sammy hesitated over whether to press, then just wrapped Julie into a tight hug. With that, the moment passed and, after finishing their inspection, they headed out again

They found the fletcher where they’d remembered. It was an old building, wooden planks stained all different colours, marks on them where they’d been scrubbed and dirtied countless times. Only one storey tall, the roof was easy to see; it took Julie a second look to realise the tiles were strange and so she asked Sammy.

“Oh my, I think those are copper shingles,” Sammy quietly said, more to herself than Julie. “Yes, this area would be downstream of the Dohkohyanna mine.” Finally catching herself, she turned to Julie and smiled, a bit sheepish. “For a long time, areas of Dworfen had more copper than they knew what to do with. Not to mention, in these northern parts, there isn’t the plentiful straw and such for thatching and most of the slate is mined in the south.”

Julie nodded along, taking Sammy’s word for it. Still, looking at the tiles, she thought they were nice even after going all turquoise, but it must have been so pretty when the tiles were fresh.

Inside, it was dingy. What light made it through the dirty windows was grey, what little of the wall could be seen was stained, what remained of the rug on the floor looked little different to the dirty floorboards around it. An old counter, seemingly carved out of a large tree trunk, cut the small room in half, behind it various piles of arrows in various states of production. The front half of the room was boxed in by specialised cabinets, nearly floor-to-ceiling tall and with unstrung bows hung on their inside.

Sammy inspected the closest cabinet for a moment, intrigued by the door mechanism: from what she could deduce, the doors would open normally and then slide through, ending up flush with the sides of the cabinet. Ingenious, she thought. That moment of inspection also highlighted to her that the cabinets were the only part of the room that had been cleaned in years, no dirt on them, not even dust.

A grunt from the back stopped Sammy there. Through a door, an old man hobbled, squinting at them while he fiddled with his glasses. Only, even after putting them on, he still squinted, seemingly even his eyelids full of wrinkles.

His accent thick and voice unclear, Sammy had no clue what his grunts meant. However, he loosely gestured at the bows in the cabinets and the arrows behind him, so she guessed he was announcing his wares.

Not one to make a fuss, Sammy walked up to the counter with a smile. “These customers would like to urgently commission a half-sheaf of war arrows, or as many as can be produced by morning,” she said.

He stared at her, not that she could tell in the dim light and with him squinting. Eventually, though, he gruffly asked, “Yano’neh?”

Sammy’s smile turned awkward. “This one apologises, what was said?”

Although he clicked his tongue, his tone carried no extra annoyance when he said, “Ceremonial arrow heads?”

Sammy’s eyes flickered. “Hunting,” she said.

Drawing along with his finger, he said, “Sharp and long?”

Sammy nodded. “Steel, or only bronze?”

He clicked his tongue again and, though hard to tell, she was sure he narrowed his eyes at her. “Bronze.”

“This one understands an urgent request has a suitable reimbursement, please allow these ones to suitably reimburse this splendid craftsman,” she said, her hands open and smile welcoming.

He gave her a last look in the eye, then turned away. “This crotchety old man would be obliged to squint at our-guests-from-afar’s heirloom.”

Sammy laughed at the sudden change in tone, but readily agreed. “The least these guests could do is oblige a splendid craftsman.”

So Sammy put down a deposit and promised to return at dawn, then filled Julie in on the exchange on their way back. Julie listened, thinking, until she had something she wanted to ask. “You were looking at the bows, right? Is he skilled?”

“Well, it’s unlikely he is a bowyer and a fletcher,” Sammy said, tapping her fingertips together. “That said, I do not know their cultural traditions of businesses well. All I can say is that he is still running the business.”

Julie wasn’t sure what to make of that answer, but slowly thought over it, eventually realising that, well, he was old: who knew how many years, no decades, he had been working for.

That little chat brought them back to the inn. For dinner, they had a seafood soup and petty plum wine, reminding Julie of Sammy’s little purchase.

To Julie, that bottle was something scary and exciting. Wine was for drinking, she knew, and she knew what mistakes drunk people made, what mistakes her father had made if she believed the old rumours.

But there was still the part of her that wanted to become closer with Sammy. No, she wanted to become closer with Sammy, but there were parts of her that held her back. The doubts, the shyness, the uncertainty of not entirely knowing what closer meant. If the wine quieted those inhibitions—her heart beat that much quicker at just the thought of it.

Meanwhile, Sammy glumly ate, knowing that “seafood” usually meant “crabs boiled alive”. She couldn’t really tell if there actually was crab in the soup, but it would have been called a fish soup if it had fish in it and there weren’t any shells, so that narrowed it down to crustaceans.

Lost in their very different moods, barely a word was said as they ate.

However, they soon were on the same page once they returned to their room, Sammy humming a tune for them to dance to, the dancing interspersed with kisses that gradually lost their innocence. By bedtime, both of them were flushed and giddy, full of smiles as they stared into each other’s eyes.

“Goodnight, Lia,” Sammy whispered.

Julie shivered, always shivered when Sammy said her name like that. “G’night.”

“I love you,” Sammy said.

There was a moment of silence, of stillness, and then Julie murmured, “Me too,” and quickly rolled over.

Sammy froze, only to burst into the most broad smile a second later. It was a small step, but a step nonetheless, both entirely unexpected and entirely the sort of thing Julie would do. Really, it just continued Julie’s trend of being far too cute and precious when least expected.

Even though Julie’s face wasn’t the last thing Sammy saw before falling asleep, she still slept well.

In the morning, wanting to make the most of the daylight, they set out after only taking care of the necessities. They went to the farrier first and Julie was satisfied with the work, both horses moving comfortably on their new shoes. With the horses saddled up, they mounted up and trotted down the couple of streets to pick up the arrows.

“I’ll wait outside,” Julie said, taking the reins for Faith.

Sammy nodded with a smile, then dismounted as gracefully as always. She untied the wrapped war bow and took it into the shop. It looked even worse in the dim light of the hour, the morning sunshine not so inclined to fall through the grubby windows, but she could see enough to see she wasn’t alone—and that it wasn’t the old man.

“This guest greets the shopkeeper,” Sammy said as she walked up to the counter.

The young woman giggled and waved Sammy off. “Oh please, I don’t even know what to say to that,” she said, voice bubbly and light. She turned around, leaning to look through the open door at the back. “Jeejee, the princess is here.”

Only, the moment the young woman turned back and saw Sammy’s amused smile, she realised what she’d said, a blush coming to her.

“Ah, um, grandpa said a pretty young lady…” she said, trailing into mumbles before stopping herself. “My apologies, no disrespect meant.”

“This one apologises for she can only speak formally—is it less common these days?” Sammy asked.

The young woman looked relieved and readily nodded. “I mean, if you wanna work at an estate or something, you learn what you need to know, but, like, the old books are so hard to read.”

Sammy tapped her chin. “Interesting,” she said.

Before the young woman could say any more, the old man from yesterday shuffled through, a large quiver in his hands; at a glance, Sammy counted a full dozen. The young woman gave a small wave and slipped past to the back.

“A half sheaf,” he said, but didn’t put the quiver down on the counter.

Sammy understood and unwrapped the war bow before placing it for him to see. And see it he did, clumsily putting on his glasses and then squinting at the bow so closely that his nose almost brushed against it.

“You know,” he said, voice quiet while still gruff, “the last step of a bowyer’s apprenticeship is to craft a war bow.”

Sammy felt the comment was leading and asked, “Do you know this one?”

He looked it over a little longer, but eventually shook his head, glasses sliding to the end of his nose. “It’s well made.”

That seemed to mark the end of the conversation, so Sammy counted out the rest of the payment and exchanged it for the arrows, a string keeping them bundled even without the quiver. She looked them over, pleased with the craftsmanship—not that she knew much about arrows. What she could tell was that the point was pointy, the shaft smooth and sturdy, and the fletching neat.

A thought came to her at that time. “If this splendid craftsman would oblige a little more of his time,” she said, smiling.

At the edge of the town, they arrived at the archery range. It was somewhat in disarray, or rather not as well kept as the other few they had seen on the east coast, but it had targets and was well marked to keep wanderers from wandering into danger. Julie helped the old man down from Hope, Sammy dismounting as well.

The morning was still, little going on this side of town, a hint of chill to the air, every noise distant and muted. Sammy stepped up to the mark with the war bow in one hand, a war arrow in the other.

Julie glanced at the old man, but he wasn’t looking at Sammy, instead standing with his back to her. So she had the urge to say something, but she quickly realised he was doing what he wanted to do and left him to it. She wanted to watch Sammy, though, so she did, watching closely as Sammy raised the bow and drew back the arrow, effortless and graceful and oh so beautiful. Maybe that childhood memory just left that deep of a mark.

Sammy drew in a deep breath, let it out, then loosed the arrow. A streak, a whistle, a thud. Even staring, Julie hadn’t been able to follow the arrow, but she could see it now stuck deep into the farthest target—of course, it had landed true.

Without a word, the old man started walking. Julie saw that and turned to Sammy, and Sammy softly shook her head, smiling. “I believe he is pleased with the sound,” Sammy said.

“Okay,” Julie said, taking Sammy’s word for it as she so often did.

They wrapped up the war bow and retrieved the arrow (it took quite the tug to get it out) and then carried on with their journey.

Following Sammy’s “plan”, they took a small road heading inland. Far from the central mountains, it wasn’t too steep, so the horses comfortably kept pace. And it wasn’t too long before Julie was reminded of who exactly she was travelling with.

“I need to pee,” Sammy said.

Julie went to say, “Can you hold it?” only to catch herself in time. Sammy had put on airs while travelling with Yewry, but those days were over. “Okay.”

So Sammy happily squatted behind some bushes, Julie holding Faith’s reins, trying to keep herself from sighing.

However, things didn’t entirely return to how they were before.

They came across a river midmorning and followed it until lunchtime. No village to be seen, Julie cleared out a fire break and hung up a small pot of water to heat. When Julie went to pick up sticks, though, Sammy stopped her.

“May I try something?” Sammy asked.

Julie was confused, but said, “Sure.”

That confusion only got worse when Sammy took out another pot, filled it with a little water, and put it underneath the hanging pot. Though Julie wanted to ask, she waited. She waited and watched, watched as Sammy knelt down, hands clasped and eyes closed, an almost scary stillness coming to her, seconds stretching out to a minute.

Then finally, Julie’s patience was rewarded.

Sammy opened her hands, a bright light pooling inside, only it shrank one moment, burst into a flame the next—a single, flickering flame, ghostly blue. With such delicacy, she brought her hands to the pot of water and, as if oil for a lamp, the flame eagerly spread out across the surface.

“This should make camping much easier, no? I especially asked Liliana for this boon,” Sammy said, her voice a touch weak.

But Julie was too in awe to hear that, the divine fire enthralling. It had already amazed her when it was just a dot on the horizon. Coming closer, she held up her hands, feeling the heat. “Wow,” she murmured.

Sammy smiled, a bit happy to see Julie so captivated, a bit peeved at being ignored. A complicated feeling, one of the many Julie had given her.

Instead of putting up with the feeling, though, chose to hug Julie from behind, kissing the back of her neck. “Am I amazing?” Sammy whispered with a certain neediness to her voice.

The surprise had given Julie such a fright she would have jumped if not for the added weight keeping her down. Still, her focus drawn away from the fire, she quickly gave in to Sammy and said, “Yeah, you’re amazing.”

Sammy giggled, the beautiful sound simply reinforcing Julie’s instinct to spoil Sammy. “Am I beautiful?” Sammy asked, lips oh so close to Julie’s ear.

Tickled by the question, Julie shivered. “Yeah, the most beautiful,” she said.

“Do you love me?” Sammy asked.

“Yeah,” Julie said without thinking, only realising what had happened after a long second. Sammy was far too amused with herself, eagerly anticipating how shy Julie would become. So it was that she was caught entirely off-guard when Julie softly said, “I think I do.”

Just like that, it was instead Sammy overwhelmed with a shyness, burying her face into Julie’s neck. How many times had a girl professed her love only to leave her? How shallow that love had been, how fleeting, nothing more than a delusion in the moment.

How beautiful it was in comparison for Julie to think she was in love. Not something said in the heat of the moment, or something carefully coaxed out, or something misspoken, but something considered.

To try and recover some dignity, Sammy quietly asked, “Is it because I can make divine fire?”

It took Julie a good while to think through her answer. Eventually, she said, “No.”

“Fair enough,” Sammy replied.

One second, two, five—then they both broke, Sammy giggling and Julie chuckling. By the time they calmed down, it wasn’t much different from when they indulged in kissing: breathless and red-faced and (in Sammy’s case) clinging to the other.

“It’s nice being just the two of us,” Sammy said.

“Mm,” Julie said, not enough breath for words.