“I love you, too.” The words seemed to come easily to her, as if she had said them a thousand times before. That pleased him. It wasn’t the saying of the words that mattered to her, then. It was just acknowledging what was.

He smiled, put his arm around her, and pulled her close. It was a good thing to know, on a day when he felt he knew nothing else for certain. “Looks like the clouds are breaking up over there. Perhaps we’ll have another sunny day,” Alise said, looking at the sky.

“More freckles for you!” Leftrin declared, and she shook her head with a mock frown.

“I don’t understand why you like them! I spent years of my life trying to avoid getting them and fading the ones I had with lemon juice and buttermilk.”

“Kissing you must have been delicious.”

“Foolish man. No one kissed me then.” A crooked smile.

“Seems to me the Bingtown men were the foolish ones.”

She smiled still, but a small shadow crossed her eyes, and he knew he had reminded her of Hest, and humiliation and deceptions. It saddened him that no matter how he tried he could not erase that from her heart. He knew that it still colored her relationship with Sedric. The two circled each other at a distance, polite, almost kind to each other, but with the caution of people who had bruised each other badly. He felt sorry for both of them. She had spoken enough of Sedric that he knew her friendship with him was years older than her disastrous marriage to Hest. He wished she still had the security of Sedric’s regard. Losing it had cracked her image of herself. He wished his own respect for her was enough to make her see her own worth, and he recognized the selfishness of that wish. He could not be her entire world. She needed to mend her bridges with her old friend before she would be whole. For all of their sakes, he hoped it would happen soon. Tarman was too small a world for strife and conflict.

Yet they had enough of that and to spare in the person of Greft. He moved about the ship, neither a keeper nor a member of the crew, rejected by the dragons; a failed leader with failing health. Leftrin would have pitied him if Greft had allowed it. He didn’t. He had become as bitter and nasty a man as Leftrin had ever known. Many a time he had wished that Kalo had simply eaten his keeper that night.

“You’ve grown quiet. What are you thinking?”

“Greft,” Leftrin said briefly, and she nodded.

“It’s coming to a head, isn’t it?”

“There was a bit of a tussle last night after you’d gone to bed. Greft stayed on board all day yesterday; I don’t know if the physical changes are hurting him that bad or if he’s just too discouraged to make the effort. Tats went to him and told him that if he didn’t hunt today, he and Harrikin intended to take the boat and gear and ‘do some good’ with it.” He sipped his tea and shook his head. “He made it sound like it was about the boat and the gear, but I think there was more to it than that.”

“What happened?”

“Not a great deal. Nasty exchange of words. Greft seemed willing to fight, but Tats said he wouldn’t hit a sick man and walked away. Ended there. I hope.” He took another long sip of the cooling tea. “Tats and Harrikin told him they were going to take the boat and gear and go hunting this morning. I hope Greft is smart enough to not be there when they take the boat. If he is, and it comes to blows, I’ll have to intervene.”

“Perhaps they’ve already gone,” Alise suggested hopefully.

“Perhaps, but it bears checking into. Care to talk a walk, my dear?”

“THANK YOU FOR the invitation, kind sir.” She mocked a curtsy to him, and then set a rough hand on the ragged sleeve that he so grandly extended to her. As they started their promenade down the deck, she found herself smiling at the picture they must present. She no longer had a single garment that didn’t show some sign of wear from sun and acid water. The exception was the Elderling gown he had given her, but the long skirt was not the most convenient style for life on a barge. Her hair had gone wild and curly. A Bingtown street vendor would have had a better complexion. She was barefoot; she now saved what was left of her boots for times when it was possible to walk on the shore; she had not put them on for days now. Never had she felt less beautiful.

Or more attractive. She glanced at Leftrin, and his eyes immediately met hers. And when she returned his gaze, his smile widened and his eyes lit with interest. Yes. Here on the deck of this ship, she was the most beautiful woman in his world. It was a wonderful sensation.

“The boat’s gone,” she told him, recalling him to the business at hand.