The days fell into a rhythm for Sammy and Julie. Moving inland and without a guide, they spent more time camping, never quite sure how near or far the next village would be. However, they didn’t mind.

When they could, they followed the rivers upstream and Sammy tested her new ability, gradually learning to control it better—and how to make the most of it. Julie certainly found it handy that all they needed to start a fire now was a pot of water, not to mention they didn’t have to worry about the smoke. Sammy could even stop it, so forest fires weren’t a worry either.

Of course, Sammy was curious and ingenious, constantly thinking. She tried burning green sticks, still full of moisture, to see what would happen: they sort of started turning to charcoal, then the charcoal would catch and boil out the rest of the moisture in a horrible smoke. She tried making strange arrangements with the pots, coming up with ways to use the hot steam the divine fire made to cook food; it took some trial and a lot of error, but they ended up loving the dried fish when it was steamed this way, full of flavour and the texture nice and firm.

That wasn’t to say that camping only had its benefits. Worst of all was that they couldn’t sleep together, having to take turns on watch duty. The nights also got a lot colder and being so close to the ground didn’t help. So, after the first couple of days, they tried to find villages to stay the night, even if that meant cutting their day short.

These days were mostly quiet, Sammy and Julie having long since said everything that needed to be said. But Sammy soon had a thought.

“Oh, shall we practise your Sonlettian? I had thought to cross Formadgo, but we can land farther south and spend a week in Sonlettier,” she said.

Julie had pretty much given up on Sonlettian after the incident with Yewry. Well, she had, just that the thought of listening to Sammy speak it… sounded nice. “Okay.”

“Tre be-an,” Sammy replied.

Yes, Julie thought, it did sound nice.

Reaching the northern slope of the mountain, they started heading as due west as the winding trails would let them. Although the horses had plenty of energy, the pace through the forested hills was slow, taking them a few days before they reached the coast.

That was where they then got stuck.

“There really isn’t a cattle ship scheduled today?” Sammy asked the harbourmaster.

“’Fraid not, Ms Lady,” the gruff man said, his genial tone the kind that comes from dealing with moody sailors all day.

Sammy’s nose wrinkled, a rare display of frustration from her. “Is there any leaving soon? I have rather pressing matters and may pay the appropriate rate for urgency,” she said.

He sighed, flicking through his journal, checking the cramped bookings he’d scrawled in. “Well, well, well, well… no tomorrow, but day after is a half-cattle. Gotta warn ya, though, this far north, it ain’t cheap to ship cattle, so yer looking at—”

“I can afford it,” Sammy said with a smile.

He looked up and couldn’t stop himself from sighing again. “Really, I know ya lot like yer horses, but ya can get as good as anything o’er the water. If ya like, I can put ya in touch wif a buyer this side—pro’ly make a tidy profit.”

Sammy’s smile stiffened, hard to follow exactly what he’d said, but she understood the gist. “I assure you, I would not give these horses for a kingdom.”

He chuckled and shook his head and held up his hands. “Fair ’nough, I’ll work it out.”

So they left him with a hefty deposit and started back to the town proper. On the way, Sammy caught Julie up on the conversation, and Julie suggested they find a farrier. “The horseshoes should be fine, but our route—I’m worried there’s small stones stuck inside.”

Sammy almost laughed, Julie’s soft tone revealing how attached she’d become to the horses. Well, Sammy didn’t think that was a bad thing, liked it even. “Sure.”

Once the horses were dropped off, they looked for an inn. Oh there were plenty of choices, just that most of those choices were near the port and boasted cheap alcohol, something that didn’t exactly promise quiet evenings. In the end, they were adopted by a middle-aged weaver who, upon seeing two lost ducklings, couldn’t help but insist on housing them, prattling on about how her four sons never wrote, and how her husband spent weeks out on the water at a time and she only ever knew he was back when a kind soul dropped his drunk butt on her doorstep.

Sammy said the right things, earning many a motherly hug from Mrs Tory, often accompanied by some form of, “Oh this old mother wishes she had such sweet daughters.”

The house she brought them to was rather small for (what had been) a family of six. However, that worked in Sammy’s and Julie’s favour, Mrs Tory putting them in a room with two single beds.

“Supper should be done in an hour,” Mrs Tory said on her way out.

“These humble guests are most thankful,” Sammy replied, smiling.

Mrs Tory waved her off. “No, no need, this old mother doesn’t know how to cook for one anyway.”

Sammy just kept smiling in reply, but it melted away as soon as the door closed. For a long moment, she stared at the door, then turned around and went to tell Julie about the exchange. Before she could, though, Julie swept her into a hug, an almost painfully tight embrace. Sammy softly laughed, surprised.

“What’s this for?” she whispered, her hand idly running through Julie’s hair.

“You looked like you needed it—when you were talking to her.”

That surprised Sammy. She thought she’d hidden it well, but, well, Julie had spent a lot of time watching her. No need to lie, she spoke honestly. “Sometimes, it seems that people take such pride in having a loveless family, yet my heart can’t help but ache out of sympathy.”

Julie listened to that, then fell into thought for a long moment. Eventually, she said, “This is just me, but, maybe, it’s the only thing you can do. If my father was still around… I’d just have to laugh him off, right? I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t want to let him hurt me. Not, like, hurt me, but, like, emotionally.”

Sammy listened to that, fell into thought for a long moment, then kissed Julie’s cheek. “You’re very kind,” she whispered.

Though the kiss had surprised Julie, she went to return it, only to be stilled by those words. “Kind? Me?” she asked, confused.

“It’s hard to see kindness through your own eyes, so I’m afraid you just have to believe me,” Sammy said, her tone rather serious and matter-of-fact.

Julie almost laughed at just how convincing Sammy had sounded, but it was so empty that it collapsed before she could let it out. Instead, she sighed, her hands on Sammy’s back growing restless.

The conversation ended there and the embrace soon followed. Sammy went to unpack a few things, Julie sat on the one bed. Though she watched Sammy for a minute, she then grew self-conscious about it and turned to the window, looking at the dreary sight of another building.

Julie’s thoughts had been strange the last week. Well, more like the last two weeks—since Yewry had walked in on them in the bath. There were moments where she remembered a flicker of Sammy’s naked body. There were times she remembered how beautiful that time with Sammy had been, forgetting all about the anxiety that had been there at first. And she knew that a new feeling had started then: a desire to be kissed.

It was different to before, wasn’t just Julie seeing that Sammy wanted a kiss, wasn’t about pleasing Sammy. No, this was more selfish. When Sammy kissed her, it was nice, both calming and exciting at the same time. She sometimes even felt anxious until their morning kiss.

Julie felt like she should be afraid to depend on someone like this, but… she wasn’t. There were dark moments where she thought about Sammy finding someone else or, gods forbid, dying, and they hurt so much. Those were just moments, though. Most of the time, Sammy made her feel… safe, safe in a way no one else had.

Yes, Julie thought she loved Sammy. She knew it wasn’t the same as Sammy’s love, but she knew it was more than friendship, something complicated and unclear. That it wasn’t normal.

But Sammy had never been normal, nor had Julie, so she joked to herself that it was only normal to have queer feelings for each other. Only, long after the humour had faded, that word still stuck with her: queer.

Julie had never found an interest in a woman before, but she hadn’t been keen on any man either. It didn’t quite feel right to call herself queer when Sammy was all she knew. Maybe, she thought, it would feel better to kiss a man, or maybe kissing other women wouldn’t feel the same. But she didn’t like thinking of that, her thoughts quickly shying away.

Instead, she thought about Sammy, Sammy who had courted every pretty girl, Sammy who was so proudly queer. And really, that was what made it hard for Julie. She struggled to think that the same word could describe them both.

Meanwhile, Sammy saw Julie deep in thought and so occupied herself with some reading.

When it came to dinner, Mrs Tory had really taken their adoption to heart, the table covered in all kinds of little tasters. Pretending to be embarrassed, she said to them, “Oh this old mother doesn’t know what her sweet daughters like, how terrible she is.”

Sammy softly laughed and quietly translated for Julie, then she replied. “This daughter and daughter-in-law apologise for being… picky eaters? Yes, picky eaters.”

There was a flicker of confusion on Mrs Tory’s face, but it was only a flicker, her plump face full of wrinkles from her broad smile. “Your Dworfen is very good for a traveller.”

Sammy didn’t reply, just smiling back.

The meal itself was mostly simple foods and similar to what Sammy and Julie had eaten at the start of their journey in Dworfen: grilled fish, breaded-and-fried morsels, and a touch of cheese and butter, used more as a topping than an ingredient. That all went with the familiar condiments of vinegar and horseradish, the latter a taste that Julie had really come to like for making their camping rations not so bland.

As for a drink afterwards, Mrs Tory offered “mainland tea”, but Sammy felt that really was too much hospitality. So Sammy said, “These daughters have rather come to like camomile tea.”

“You have? My, and you had the cheek to apologise for being picky eaters,” Mrs Tory replied, her tone teasing.

They all moved to lounge for the tea, drinking and talking. Well, Sammy had Mrs Tory talk and Julie sat there politely, the foreign language almost like rain, meaningless noises. That said, it was still nice to just sit beside Sammy on the old couch—a wooden bench padded with leather—and loosely hold hands, the small touch calming.

For the better part of an hour, Mrs Tory rambled, then she peppered Sammy with questions; at least, that was what Julie guessed was happening. But it came to an end when the sky darkened, Mrs Tory looking out at it with a sigh.

“Maybe tomorrow,” she murmured, Sammy barely hearing her.

“Pardon?” Sammy said.

Mrs Tory shook her head. “Nothing, dear.”

With a promise of breakfast in the morning, Mrs Tory left them, smiling all the while.

Sammy’s smile didn’t linger, though. Her heart ached. However, she didn’t have to say that for Julie to lean over and peck her on the cheek, a warmth blooming that soon eased the pain in her chest.

“I can’t imagine hurting someone I love,” Sammy whispered.

“I can’t either.”

This time, Sammy knew her smile would stick, not missing that subtle confession. She still yearned to hear Julie say those three words, yet there was something poetic about this. It reminded her of the Dworfen pieces she admired, how such a simple sentence could hold behind it such deep meaning.

Sammy’s gaze drifting to the window, she looked outside, pleasantly surprised to see all three moons, two of them quite close together. Sonlettian poetry even had a name for such nights: Lovers’ Delight. These were the perfect nights for clandestine affairs, lit so clearly.

Thoughts coalescing, Sammy couldn’t help but borrow a clichéd line of Dworfen poetry and say, “The moons look beautiful tonight.”

Julie turned, her shoulder coming to press against Sammy’s back. “Yeah, they do,” she softly said.

Sammy almost giggled, part of her unfairly hoping that Julie understood what that line meant. But no, one of them was subtle, the other blunt, and Sammy knew which one she was.

“Yet I would rather look at you.”

Julie half-heard that, focused on the pretty view, so it took her a second to realise and then another second to turn. When she did, she was close to Sammy’s face, Sammy’s eyes meeting hers, pulling her in, into a kiss, a hand running through her hair, another hand climbing up her back.

But Julie’s senses soon returned and she broke the kiss, though she couldn’t bring herself to pull away. “Not here,” she mumbled, hoping Sammy had more self-control.

“Then shall we throw away our innocence beneath the cherry blossoms?”

Julie stared at Sammy, confused—Sammy had spoken in Dworfen, after all—until Sammy laughed and left Julie with a peck on the lips before standing up.

“That is my favourite line of Dworfen poetry,” Sammy said, her voice calm and clear.

“Really? What does it mean?” Julie asked.

Sammy chuckled, caressing Julie’s cheek, enjoying how Julie leaned into the touch, how Julie glowed, softly smiling and with such curious eyes—no trace left of the fire that Sammy had so tenderly stoked. But she didn’t dislike that. No, it was good that Julie had enough innocence for the both of them as Sammy had so long ago discarded her own.

“It is, loosely speaking, a way to say that I love you,” Sammy said, speaking very loosely indeed.

Julie gently nodded, then rose to her feet. Not looking at Sammy, she whispered, “Maybe I can learn it.”

Sammy nearly burst out in laughter, so funny to think of the romantically-timid Julie propositioning her. However, she kept it in, smiling broadly. “We should focus on Sonlettian for now.”

“Right,” Julie said.

Feeling satisfied with how things had gone, Sammy didn’t start again when they returned to their room. She changed and gave Julie privacy to change, and they settled into bed, just enough room for them if they snuggled close together. Even a month ago, Sammy thought, Julie would’ve pushed the two single beds together, yet now they were practically joined at the hip.

“Lia?” she whispered.

“Mm?”

Sammy squeezed Julie’s hand and said, “I love you.”

There was a second of silence, then Julie mumbled, “Me too.”

The morning saw a return to old routines. With no rush, Julie went out back to train, and Sammy indulged, not so much out of pent-up frustrations but a growing anticipation, then joined Julie in the garden to watch.

Really, Sammy knew she shouldn’t. The intimacy Julie now gave her made the sight all the more tempting. Of her virtues, restraint was certainly her best, but that was certainly easier without the temptations. And what a temptress Julie was. In the more romantic books Sammy had read, there’d been long descriptions of the body exotic dancers had, littered with words like “supple” and “lithe”. However, Sammy thought that women would be better off learning swordswomanship instead.

Meanwhile, Julie had of course noticed her watcher, noticed that today’s gaze was that much more intense. Though she was too busy to really think about it, it motivated her. She’d already shed most of her shyness and now found herself wanting Sammy’s attention.

After Julie finished and wiped herself down in their bedroom, her thoughts fell back to what she’d been struggling with since, well, the beginning of their journey. Sammy saw that Julie was thinking, left her for the most of the morning, but had to eventually ask.

“Is something the matter?”

Julie broke from her thoughts, turned to find Sammy right next to her. Without thinking, she leaned over, tilting her head back, lips pursed. Sammy giggled and accepted the offer, but kept it brief.

“Is something the matter?” Sammy asked again, caressing Julie’s cheek.

Hearing the question this time, Julie started to blush and looked away. Sammy didn’t stop her, hand coming down to stroke her neck, then ran along her shoulder and arm all the way to her hand.

Julie felt like Sammy had scratched her, the sensation lingering, hot and sharp, but it wasn’t painful. Once the feeling faded, she remembered Sammy’s question. It was… hard to answer, even though the answer was easy to say. She tried to think of what to say for a bit, but she knew she wasn’t gonna get anywhere by herself and gave up.

“I just… don’t know what comes next,” Julie whispered.

Sammy squeezed Julie’s hand, nodding. “Well, we take a ship to Sonlettier and—”

“Not that,” Julie said, then she squeezed Sammy’s hand so hard it was almost painful. “Um, after… kissing.”

“Oh,” Sammy said, her train of thought coming to an abrupt stop, taking her a second to move it back onto the right track. “In that case, if we go by the books I have read, we should get married and have children and live happily ever after.”

Julie listened, entirely believing the convincing tone. “Okay.”

Then Sammy waited: one second, two, five, ten—

“Ch-children?” Julie sharply whispered, turning to Sammy with wide eyes and an open mouth.

“So the marriage part is fine?” Sammy asked.

Julie’s face scrunched up and she took her hand back, covering her face with both, lips trembling. An intense desire to kiss those trembling lips gripped Sammy, but she managed to hold back.

“Sammy, please,” Julie said, very much whining.

So Sammy softly laughed, both her hands running through Julie’s hair and giving her a little massage. “I am afraid I have yet to read books that go into such lurid details.”

Julie choked, keenly aware of that “yet”.

Once Julie settled down, Sammy carried on. “However, if you would like to know my best guess, then we… touched on this before. There is no order in which things are done. Rather, we do what we are comfortable doing. If you want to try something new, then we could, and you may decide at any point you aren’t comfortable doing it and we will stop. There might be some things we are never comfortable doing, and that is perfectly fine, because, more than anything, I want you to feel safe and happy.”

There was a long silence while Julie worked through all that. Sammy spent that time holding Julie, rubbing small circles on her back.

Eventually, Julie returned the embrace, resting her chin on Sammy’s shoulder. “I want to try something new,” she whispered.

Sammy smiled to herself. “Well, how I think of it, we could be more intimate with one of our senses.”

Julie frowned. “What do you mean?” she asked.

“Sight, smell, taste, touch, hearing,” Sammy said. “Perhaps we could see more of each other. It need not be erotic, though, like when we shared a bath. Even now, we are being more intimate with what we are talking about. It doesn’t even have to be reciprocated. If you would like to, I would be more than happy to, for example, let you touch my breasts.”

To say that Julie was overwhelmed was putting it lightly. Never mind what Sammy had suggested, Julie could barely cope with hearing Sammy softly say words like “erotic” and “breasts” so close to her ear. Her heart pounded in her chest, face so red that it prickled, a fidgetiness trying to make her squirm, tensing up so she didn’t.

And Sammy felt that tension, chiding herself for not controlling her lewd thoughts. She could hardly undo what she had said, but she squeezed Julie tightly and left a kiss on that beautiful neck, fighting the urge to bite it.

“How about this: may I choose an outfit for you to wear?” Sammy said, her tone cleared of the earlier heat.

It was such a normal sentence, it took Julie by surprise. Focus pulled away from what had been agitating her, she quickly calmed down, helped by how comfortable she was in Sammy’s embrace. “Really?” she asked.

“I think it is rather intimate.”

Though Julie didn’t disagree out loud, she couldn’t see how herself. Still, she agreed to it and so they parted, Sammy very excited as she rifled through clothes.

All too soon, Julie realised she had underestimated her opponent.

“I think these,” Sammy said, holding a pair of her own drawers. They were a very nice pair, made of soft linen, decorated with a bit of lace, but were rather short and would only come halfway down the thigh.

As nice as they were, Julie had just a bit of problem. “Aren’t those… yours?” she asked.

“They’ve been washed?” Sammy replied.

Julie didn’t know what to say to that and gave up.

Thankfully, Sammy chose one of Julie’s chemises and chose not to pick out a bodice—not that Sammy’s bodices would fit Julie and Julie had none of her own. There was then woollen stockings and the dress they had bought a few weeks ago to complete the outfit.

“If you wouldn’t mind,” Sammy said with a smile.

So Julie changed while Sammy turned away. Despite the drawers being clean, Julie still felt a sense of something when she put them on, flickers in her mind of Sammy’s bare legs. Putting on the stockings didn’t exactly stifle those intrusive flickers, but her mind had time to calm down while she put on everything else.

The dress itself was unusual. It was made of two pieces: a blouse and a skirt. The blouse was a simple white linen that had a loose, puffy fit. The skirt, then, was a bolt of wool: a long length of cloth with a tartan pattern, mostly white with thin stripes of red, almost appearing pink. When she’d tried it on, the shopkeeper had talked her through putting it on and, thankfully, she could remember how to do it herself. It first wrapped around her waist to make the skirt, then over her shoulder from the back, tucking in at her waist.

Julie really did feel vulnerable in the dress, afraid to move at all in case it slipped. Not only that, but there was this anxious dread about what Sammy would say, both suffocating and exciting.

After a few deep breaths, she carefully turned to Sammy and softly said, “I’m done.”

So Sammy turned around; Julie watched for Sammy’s reaction, caught it, saw how Sammy’s lips parted and drew into a smile, eyes crawling over every bit of her dress.

“How beautiful you are—oh I just knew it would suit you,” Sammy said.

For some reason, Julie felt the urge to cry. Her eyes prickled, lips trembled, and a shyness made her want to hide. Then she realised: she believed Sammy. She believed it when Sammy said she looked beautiful.

Maybe travelling with Yewry had been worth it. Julie knew she’d never be the feminine kind of woman that men loved, but she’d seen with her own eyes how women liked Yewry—could now believe that Sammy would like the look of her.

“Really?” Julie whispered.

Sammy had deliberated over what was wrong, but, upon hearing that question, understood what she needed to say. “Yes.”

Forgetting her earlier worry, Julie shuffled forwards to hug Sammy, who, of course, returned the hug. As they settled into it, Julie understood better what Sammy had meant earlier. How vulnerable she’d felt, how Sammy had acted: it was a new kind of intimacy between them, even if it wasn’t like kissing.

Meanwhile, very much conscious of how transient Julie’s clothing was, Sammy couldn’t help but share a bit of trivia. “Did you know that it is apparently tradition for women here to wear this dress and nothing underneath when they marry, all so that the husband simply has to unwrap her when they retire to the bridal chamber.”

There was a brief silence, then Sammy sighed.

“My apologies, I meant nothing by it,” Sammy mumbled.

“Is this my wedding dress?” Julie asked.

Caught entirely off-guard, Sammy’s breath stilled in her throat, blanking out entirely.

Julie didn’t notice that, though, her thoughts continuing, a frown settling on her brow. “Do we both wear dresses? You definitely should, but I don’t mind wearing a suit,” she said.

“You want… to get married?” Sammy asked, forcing her voice to stay level.

A laugh left Julie’s lips, so beautiful to Sammy’s nearby ear. “Yeah? That’s what lovers do after kissing, right?”

Sammy certainly heard the teasing in that. “It is,” she whispered.

Julie gave Sammy another squeeze. “Then we should,” she said.

“Yes, we should,” Sammy said, squeezing back.

They continued to hold each other in silence for a long minute, and they would have carried on for who knew how long if not for Mrs Tory knocking once and then opening the door.

“How are my daughters do… ing…” Mrs Tory asked, her voice trailing off as she took in the sight.

No sooner had she knocked that Julie had jumped back, her dress already loose from the embracing, now coming undone. Oh Julie tried to hold it together, but that only made it look worse, one arm across her chest and the other around her waist, giving a very caught-in-the-act appearance, not at all helped by blushing so hard she near enough glowed.

Julie’s only saving grace was that Sammy quickly stepped in-between and politely asked, “May we be of some help?”

Mrs Tory fixed her smile. “Oh no, nothing, dears. Just that lunch is ready soon.” With that said, she closed the door and her footsteps quickly trailed off.

Sammy let out a sigh, then turned around. The sight before her, well, Julie had truly mastered how to be accidentally seducing. “You shall wear that for the wedding,” she said, her voice a touch deep, rough.

Julie nodded.