some made the sign of Kyr’s ward to save them from evil spirits or maybe just bad luck. Even that couldn’t dim his mood.
The sight of Ilsa ahead could though, dashed ice-water over everything so that he shivered. She moved easily through the crowds, ambling from one stall to the next. A stallholder shooed her off, shouting something about Remorians, but she smiled at him and left without a word.
Holden moved up behind her, smelled the spice of her perfume, and touched her arm. She spun to face him, and the smile…she was so happy that it twisted his heart.
Again, he floundered for something to say while she watched him, until the words fell from him without thought. “Would you like to see a lion?” he said, and then regretted it. He didn’t want Ilsa down in the delta, not in the dark. “I could take you tomorrow.”
She cocked her head, a crease between her eyebrows as though she was puzzled. “Maybe.”
Yet she was still smiling at him. Happy. He took what he could get and tried a smile in return. “It’s late, maybe we should get back to the ship. See if Van’s back.” And Tallia, but he kept that to himself. He should have been more careful, should have kept hold of her.
He tried not to see the way Ilsa changed at the mention of Van Gast, the way her eyes lit up, but took her arm as they made their way to Mucking Lane and struggled to find something to say. “I’m glad to see you happy” was all he could manage. Why, why so difficult to talk to her, when he could think of a thousand things to say to Tallia?
“I think I’m finding out who I am,” Ilsa said.
“And who is that?”
She looked up at him from under half-closed eyes and then looked away. “I’m not sure yet. I’m still finding out.”
He shielded her from the crowds of Mucking Lane and they approached the ships. A figure darted toward the gangplank as they approached and Holden stepped forward to grab an arm. “Tallia, you owe me an explanation. Where did you go?”
She pulled her arm away and glanced at Ilsa, a strange sort of look as though she was afraid. “I told you, to tell my family where I was. They were worried. You found Ilsa then.”
Still that look, fearful, guilty. When Holden turned back to Ilsa to help her up the gangplank, the look she was giving Tallia was worse. They looked like two cockerels about to fight, clawing at the ground with their spurs.
Holden shoved Tallia up the plank first, maybe more roughly than he should have. “Tallia, as soon as Van gets back. you’re going to explain to him just what is going on here, why you make him itch. Get on! Gilda, keep an eye on her. Is Van back yet?”
Once Tallia was on the deck, Gilda holding her with a sneer that surprised him, and with the news that Van was still ashore, Holden took Ilsa to their quarters.
“Holden, do you—I mean…” Ilsa stopped, her voice quivering. “Holden, are you going to be like the other racks? I hear them talk, and racks and tumbles and…would you?”
A break in the ice, just a chink. Enough that he knew this mattered to her, he mattered. And a subtle little stab to his heart, because he already had tumbled, once. Had betrayed Ilsa when he thought Josie loved him. He’d not make that mistake twice. “No, no tumbles. I’m not a rack, and I doubt I’ll ever be one, truly, despite what Van Gast says.”
Her lips twisted and she blinked rapidly as though holding in tears, but got up on tiptoes and kissed his cheek, a light brush of her lips. More of herself than she’d given him in weeks. “Good.”
He wanted to stay, to talk, to have her kiss him again and make all his doubts sail on the tide. But— “I have to go see Van, see if he’s back. Talk to him about what’s going on. I’ll be back soon, and then we’ll talk. I promise.”
He dared a kiss in return, and welcomed the soft feel of her hands at his waist, the scent of her, the warmth where once had been ice. When he left to find Van Gast, he could feel himself grinning.
* * *
Rillen pasted on his best ingratiating smile and faced his father. Urgaut sprawled on his cushions and picked at some fruit. He and