Sirena’s door is a riot of uneven stripes—red, gold, green—like a child’s fever dream. I knock and a low, smoke-rough voice answers. “Come in, please.”
Inside, the room is stunning. Embroidery, tassels, cushions heaped like treasure. Sirena is folding clothes into a crate on her table. On the bed lies a long leather coat, a floppy hat, a wornbackpack, and two foot-long knives, edges catching the light like wicked smiles.
I whistle low. “If only you’d had those the other night…”
Sirena glances up, lips curving in a slow, bruised-orchid smile. “Evie,” she husks, voice scraped raw by the night she nearly lost it. “Forgive the croak—a souvenir from that bastard.”
I nod, eyes sweeping the room’s bright chaos. “Packing to vanish?”
“Within the hour.” Her dark curls bounce as she tucks a strand behind one ear, then flicks a glance at the bed: coat, hat, knives gleaming like twin promises. “You’re right—if I’d had these, I’d have carved his prick off at the root. He reeked of rot and cheap gin.”
A short laugh escapes me. “He won’t stink up the world anymore. Neither will Mad Maude.”
Sirena’s face hardens and she spits to the side, a sharp, satisfied sound. “Heard she burned. Good.”
I let the silence settle. “Where to?”
“Everywhere.” Her grin flashes, sudden sun through storm clouds.
“Where are you starting?”
“With my people. There’s a camp outside the walls—brothers, cousins, the whole family.” She winks.
I fish in my purse, coins still heavy from the haul. I press a palmful into her hand. “For the night I never bought, for the road, for goodbye.”
She blinks, startled, then palms the gold with sleight-of-hand grace. She’s against me—ginger, smoke, and warm skin. The hug is fierce, brief; she kisses each cheek, soft as moth wings. “You saved more than my life, Evie. Find any Romani and speak my name; someone will remember the debt.”
I nod, throat tight. “Safe roads, Sirena.”
“‘Til the wheel turns again.” She’s already folding a scarf as I ease the door shut.
If only I believed in second chances.
I drift down the corridor to De’s office, I knock twice and ease the door open. She’s hunched over her desk, a tumbler of something black and bitter at her elbow, papers fanned like a losing hand. The sight jolts me—Bernie wore the same slump this morning. Then I really see her: no kohl, no rouge, no corseted glamour; just a plain linen tunic, hair scraped back, the years she usually erases etched plain on her face. She must be in her late forties, maybe fifty. Exhaustion has stripped her bare.
“Evie. Sit.”
I drop into the chair opposite, glance at the ledgers. “Holding it together, darling?”
She scrubs at her eyes, smearing ink across one cheekbone, and snorts when she notices. “Packing, selling, playing mother-hen to girls with nowhere to go. Sanity’s a distant memory.” She drains the glass. “You?”
I wobble a hand. “Witch-hunts killed my day job. Bernie’s twitchy, and this place…” I gesture at the walls that have soaked up years of moans and coin. “I’ll miss the smell of it.”
De leans back, refills her glass, slides one to me. “Truth? I’ll be glad to see the back of it.”
My brows climb. “Yeah?”
She laughs, low and cracked. “Twenty years, Evie. Started whoring at thirteen, maybe fourteen—mouth for bread, cunt for a corner to sleep. Took this place at twenty when the old madame wanted out. Thought I was ready to run girls instead of just keeping myself breathing. I wasn’t. Still, I learnt and saved who ever I could, watching the rest get used like chamber pots by men who called it ‘a bit of fun.’” Her lip curls. “I love sex, always have. But the men who pay? Rarely worth the spit. I’m bone-tired of swallowing their stink and calling it a living.”
I sip the whiskey, letting it burn. We’ve fucked a hundred times but never traded origin stories. I’m not sure whether to apologise for never asking or to keep quiet while the past spills out.
She tops us both up. “So yeah, I’m done. Might sail back to Ireland, buy a scrap of green, raise sheep that don’t talk back. Find a decent man who washes and keeps his hands to himself—well, except on me.” She winks, weary but real. “You?”
I school my face; De reads lies like tarot cards. “Got the forge, the cottage, the beasts. Need the killing work to slack off or the smithing to pick up. Mostly I’ll keep my head low. They light pyres on rumours these days.” I meet her eyes. “You watch your back, too.”
She nods, then flaps a hand at the chaos of paper. “I’d beg you for one last tumble, but these accounts won’t balance themselves and I’ll only end up riding you on the desktop. Out, woman, before the whiskey makes me stupid.”
Grinning, she stands and opens her arms. I step into them—warm, solid, smelling of ink and home. I can't help myself as I dip my lips to hers. The kiss starts soft, it’s farewell, not foreplay, but as always, it flares, familiar heat licking up my spine. My groan hums against her mouth and my hands find the perfect curve of her backside and squeeze. She laughs into the kiss, shoves me back, and drops into her chair so fast my fingers close on nothing but the ghost of warmth.
