Desire, whether for men or women, had never burdened Marcus overmuch. If he’d been a more faithful man, or a less adventurous one, he would have made an excellent priest—which would have been a great loss to Toinette, as he was a damned good first mate. “And I suppose most of them would snore worse than you do, at that. Smell worse, almost definitely.”
“I can live, then?”
“Oh, for now. It’s late, and I’d as soon not go to the trouble of cleaning your blood off the mattress. And innkeepers make an unholy fuss about corpses in their rooms.”
Toinette stretched herself out, luxuriating in the length of the bed and the softness of the straw mattress. She’d chosen shipboard life freely and had yet to regret it, but all the same, it was lovely to have her back truly straight for a night or two. She wiggled her toes.
“Speaking of better company,” said Marcus, “willyoube needing the room to yourself while we’re here?”
“Doubtful.”
On the occasion that Toinette took a lover, she generally either went back to the man’s accommodations, hired a room herself, or—at times—found a stable loft or similar convenience for an hour’s privacy. When none of those options presented themselves, Marcus took himself out to find his own amusements for a while. It was never very long. The last man Toinette had let stay afterward had been Jehan. After he’d died, it had seemed a slight to his memory for others to remain.
Marcus was different. Wherever Jehan was, Toinette was sure he understood.
“Ill-favored city, is it?” Marcus asked.
“When I was young, it might have seemed otherwise. Now?” She shrugged. “The more men I’ve had in my bed, the more they all seem the same—and the less worth the trouble of getting them there.”
That might have been true after ten years; it was certainly true after more than a century. The exception who came to mind… Well, he was paying her, and they’d be on a ship full of her men for months. Best not to even think about that one, much as she might like to.
From the street outside came off-key singing: men drunk enough to take their chances in the darkness.
“They left out a line there, I think,” Marcus observed.
“D’you want to go out and correct them?”
“I might, if they don’t stop soon.”
“It always is a shock,” Toinette agreed, retrieving her share of the blankets, “how noisy cities are after the sea. Though the beds make up for it. And the food. I can’t say I’m looking forward to biscuit and fish again.”
“You’re the one who took the man up on his offer. And how does he intend tofindthis island, come to that?”
“He managed to get his hands on a map. He says it’s a long story. I’ll have it out of him by the third day at sea, I’ll wager—but meanwhile, I’ve seen the map, and it does look real. Besides, MacAlasdair’s not the sort to chase nursery tales without any solid sign. Never was.”
Punctuating her sentence, she blew out the candle and settled down into the bed. Marcus, a foot away, was a comfortably warm presence. Even summer nights in Bordeaux almost never got very hot.
His voice came out of the darkness, half drowned in a yawn. “How do you know this fellow, then?”
“Oh,” said Toinette, her own voice slurred as her eyelids grew heavy. “Long time ago. You might say we grew up together.”
In a way, she thought as she slid down under the waves of sleep, it was true. Only growing up meant more to the dragon-blooded than it did to mortals—and she, looking back, could never have said when it had happened to her. Adulthood had come in fits and starts, blood and pain and madness.
Toinette supposed that much was common enough even for mortals.
* * *
Loch Arach had long been familiar to Erik. As great a distance as it was from the island that he called home, it was still close enough for frequent travel in dragon form. Lamorak MacAlasdair held the island with his brother’s backing, and both knew it. A year or two sometimes passed between visits, but never more.
When Erik was fifteen, he’d gone to Artair MacAlasdair’s castle. To mortals, that had been the fostering common with most young men. For Erik, as for the others in his line, it had been more: his transformations had begun. Unlike the island, Loch Arach had room to keep changing and hunting a secret. Moreover, Castle MacAlasdair had rooms with magic woven into the walls that could hold a dragon if one’s nature broke free of control.
However many branches the family had, the youth came to Loch Arach. Erik came to suspect that Artair was fond of the arrangement. He was as canny as he was old, and no stranger to the advantages of strengthening blood ties with a bit of mingling.
Young Erik had welcomed the journey. He’d had a glorious few months at first: training both of his forms, playing games with his cousins, hunting in the forest, and swimming in the lake.
Shortly after harvest, a small band of traders had come through. With them had come a girl.
Erik still remembered his first look at her. She’d been thirteen and spider spindly, her hair a roughly cut shock of carrot-orange and her face all outthrust chin. Her clothing had been patched and too large; her hand had lingered near the dagger at her waist too long for any sort of courtesy. Standing in the tower room at Castle MacAlasdair, she’d watched the assembled MacAlasdairs with barely disguised skepticism.
