It made no difference.
I fought like a drowning man—wild, senseless, half-mad with the need to believe it might matter. There was no room for fear, only motion. Only the hollow drumbeat in my chest reminding me death hadn’t yet come to claim me.
The door flew open with a rush of wind and rain. And for one impossible breath, the shouts, curses, and clatter all fell silent.
A woman stood framed in the threshold. She looked like she’d stepped out of a painting no one remembered finishing—rainwater over glass, blurred but no less striking for it. It was plain she didn’t belong here. Something in me went still, like a coin spun on its edge, waiting for the call of heads or tails. My chest was suddenly tight with a sense of recognition I had no name for.How can I recognize someone I’ve never met?
She was barefoot, wearing a gown once fine—silver-threaded and soaked through, trailing like smoke around her ankles. She didn’t start at the noise, nor so much as blink when a tankard slammed against the wall near her head. Her eyes were a pale, unnatural blue—not the shade of sky or sea, but something colder, glacial water beneath moonlight. When they found me, something flickered there that looked impossibly like recognition.
For a moment, I wondered if she was an illusion, a conjuring of some higher order magic, or a trick played by hunger and sleepless nights. I hadn’t eaten anything that wasn’t soaked in liquor and regret, or slept properly in ages. Perhaps I’d finally lost my hold on the dregs of my sanity. But then, the wind from the open door struck me full in the face, sharp as a thousand pine needles, and I knew she was real.
A heavyset brute charged at me with a broken stool hoisted like a cudgel. I ducked on instinct, boots skidding on something slick I didn’t care to identify. The next thing I knew, I was on the floor, tangled beneath the wreckage of a chair, ribs howling in protest. The ceiling spun overhead. A pair of boots thundered past my line of sight.
Through the haze and falling splinters, I saw her.
She moved toward me like a vision dragged out of some forgotten ballad. Fair-skinned, rain-soaked to the knees, dark hair tumbling down her back in snarled ribbons. She wasn’t delicate. She was carved in contrast—features too bold for dainty, too honest for soft.
She knelt beside me, extending her hand. “May I offer you assistance?”
Her voice was low and melodic, something better suited for chapels cloaked in starlight than a floor littered with blood and broken chairs. I stared, blinking past the sting of sweat and blood. For one ridiculous, breath-held instant, all I could think was: she’s real. Not a ghost. Not a drunken illusion. Flesh and breath and rain.
A boot caught my ribs with a jolt. Someone staggered over me, muttering a curse.
“What makes you think I need assistance?” I coughed, the taste of iron sharp on my tongue. “Yeah, sure. Assist away.”
She smiled; not the sort of grin a man earned mid-melee, but something quieter. Sad, maybe. Certain. Like she already knew how the story ended and had chosen to walk into it anyway. Her hand curled in silent invitation.
I reached up, fingers split and shaking, and took her hand. The moment our palms met, something shuddered through the room. Somewhere above us, the rafters groaned like they felt it too. The tavern lanterns seemed to sway out of rhythm. A gust of wind, colder than it had any right to be, spiraled down the chimney. The space around us pulsed like breath held at the start of a storm.
Her skin was warm, the way memories can be. The way hope might be, if you were foolish enough to still believe in it. Something unseen caught hold of me—deep and sharp—a hook buried in the marrow, in a place untouched by anything honest in far too long.
Around us, the fight raged on. No one seemed to notice the way the air had changed. Men cursed, fists swung, laughter rose sharp and mean. The hearth split another log with a loud crack, but it sounded distant, belonging to a different world.
She hauled me to my feet with surprising strength for her frame. I stumbled, catching myself on her shoulder. She didn’t flinch, though I withdrew my hand quickly, suddenly aware I’dtouched a woman whom I didn’t know twice in full view of the room.
The crowd parted around her as if she were a tide they were powerless to resist. One man, scarred and red-faced with drink, lurched forward like he meant to stop her. She shot him a look. His mouth snapped shut. His hand dropped. He turned away without a word.
I frowned. “How did you manage that?”
She offered no reply. Simply turned and walked toward the door, and I followed—her bewildered shadow.
Outside, the cold struck sharper than any fist. Rain came slanting down in sheets. I drew my arm tight to my aching ribs, teeth clenched against the sting. She did not seem the least bit bothered by the storm, nor did she fill the silence between us with any pretense of comfort.
“You hungry?” I asked.
She tilted her head, as if I’d spoken in a tongue long forgotten. “Pardon?”
“Food. Hot. Likely unpoisoned. I know a place.” I motioned to the lane ahead. “It’s quieter, less inclined to end in bloodshed. You pulled me out of a scuffle that wouldn’t have ended well for me. The least I can do is offer supper.”
She hesitated, as though a meal posed greater danger than the tavern we’d just fled.
At last, she inclined her head. “Very well.”
I exhaled. Relief tasted like rain. The longer we walked, the more I started to believe there were entire worlds behind her eyes, and not all of them were kind. I’d seen women like her before, after battles, walking barefoot across burned fields, eyes emptied by whatever they’d left behind. But she wasn’t empty; it seemed more like she was waiting.
“Is such disorder a regular companion of yours?” she asked, eyes still forward.
“Only on days that end in disappointment. Which, truth be told, is most of them.”
