“I had.” I kept my eyes forward. “I’d been moving for long enough that staying anywhere stopped feeling like a possibility. You go from one assignment to the next and you just hope you don’t leave each location completely destroyed.” But often, we did. I adjusted our heading slightly. “And then there was a day when I knew I was done.”
She was peering at me, not the sky. “How did you know?”
I shrugged. “It was a feeling. My old mentor told me that if I lived long enough, I’d know when it was time to quit. And I knew that if I kept going like I had, I wouldn’t walk away.” I shot her a quick grin. “The wisdom of age, I suppose.”
She laughed again. “And you chose this planet, of all the worlds you’ve visited. All the wonders you’ve seen.”
“My process was data-driven,” I explained, and ticked off my list of criteria. “When I found this planet, I knew it was right for me. I put the ship down.” I paused. “And then this woman showed up and told me to get lost.”
Her lips twitched. “You didn’t listen to her.”
“Nah. The fishing’s too good.” I glanced at her quickly. “And the woman grew on me.”
“The retired mercenary grew on her, too,” Maive murmured.
My hearts beat harder, but I kept my voice steady. “I’m trying to figure out who I am now,” I said. “I know who Iwas. But I’m not that anymore and I’m working out what comes next.” It was more than I’d meant to say. “It’s an uncomfortable place to be.”
“Yes,” she said, and I knew she wasn’t a stranger to uncomfortable places. “Transitions are rarely comfortable.”
“True,” I said.
We flew for a while longer, and I circled back around and brought us back to the village. I set the shuttle down in the clearing and opened the hatch. We walked down the ramp intothe cool night. The village was quiet. A few lit windows, the harbor lanterns, the ocean a soft sound in the dark behind the buildings. The walk to the path was short.
She turned to me before we entered the heart of the village.
I’d been assembling something reasonable to say. I wanted to thank her for coming, and say good night like a semi-normal person, when she kissed me. Quick. Her hand touched my jaw for a moment, warm and soft, and then it was gone before I’d fully understood what was happening.
She stepped back and looked up at me. There was something faintly startled in her expression. “I keep doing that.”
“I don’t mind it.”
Her eyes held mine. “You don’t?”
“No,” I said, trying to keep the hungry growl from my voice. “Don’t mistake my surprise for displeasure.”
“Good,” she said, then bit her lower lip. “I find I rather like doing it.”
I flexed my fingers to keep from reaching for her. “Then by all means, continue.”
“Maybe I will.” She patted the center of my chest, experimentally, and smiled. “I don’t need an escort back.”
“Okay.”
“Good night, Gilrox.”
“Good night.”
She walked back into the village with the dark and the harbor lights around her and didn’t look back. I stood in the clearing after she’d gone and thought about a scholar named Ulrid who had been quiet and gentle and known everything about the history of his people, and who had been the thing she leaned on.
I tried to find the version of myself that resembled him, and came up empty.
But she had kissed me twice now. She had asked me, in a manner of speaking, whether I minded it, and I had told herI did not, and she had saidgood.We were edging past the ambiguity stage. Thank thefleckingstars.
Whatever she saw when she looked at me, she seemed to like it, for reasons that defied comprehension. And I’d made it clear that I liked her, too.
I climbed back into the shuttle and went home, somewhat at a loss, which was becoming a familiar feeling. But also, with an unsteady but growing hope that my retirement may not be as lonely as I’d expected it to be.
Chapter
