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Are they only holding on to me because they’re lonely?
I grab the ale from Darcy and drink, privately toasting my sisters for killing my father. His death was well-deserved, after what he did to Zephyr.
“That makes me glad.”
Darcy watches my tongue glide along the glass rim. There’s a starry look in her eye, like the one I used to see sometimes when I thought she loved me.
I think her passion for adventure might be authentic, because for the first time since she lost her memories of us, she actually seems happy.
She lifts the glass while I’m still holding it, tipping it back into her mouth. “What if we share the bed tonight?” she asks. “Just to keep you warm.”
Zephyr drops their quill and flattens their hands on the table, their fingers splotched with ink. They stare straight ahead and pay no mind to the smudged letters on their paper.
“I—” I search for the words to gently remind Darcy that she’s the one who requested a loveless arrangement.
She snaps her attention to the inn’s front entrance as the four crew members who left earlier return to the tavern. The wind holds the door open and blows leaves over the floor.
Each one of the men left the inn alone, but now they’re all accompanied by beautiful women.
They must be sisters because they all have pale, oval faces with similar features and auburn hair that swishes around their hips. Their dresses flow past their feet as they move around the tables, their steps so graceful that they almost appear to be floating.
“Could you play a reel for us?” A diver named Seth tosses a coin to the fiddler sitting on a barrel beside the bar. “We’re here to celebrate.”
“Cheers to that.” Darcy raises her glass and throws a few more coins to the elderly man who’s been bowing the same tired song all evening.
He perks up, tapping his boot as he transitions to a jauntier tune. The sailors seated at the bar spin around on their stools, clapping their hands to the beat.
Everyone is getting out of their seats as the women begin twirling their hips and swinging beneath their partner’s arms.
Zephyr’s hands are still spread, their eyes glazing over like they’d prefer to be anywhere else.
But I know they won’t leave me. Not even when Darcy tugs on my elbow and asks, “Why don’t we take a spin around the floor with the rest of them?”
I look at Zephyr, but they drop their eyes to their ink-blotted parchment.
“I’m still feeling tired, and my feet are sore.”
“No worries, I’ll do most of the moving.” Darcy grabs me around the waist and spins me in the air, placing me down between the couples lining up around the tables.
“We don’t do this dance in Seshly,” I say as she hops back on one foot, then shuffles sideways around me.
“That’s ok.” She completes a circle, then jumps forward and claps in front of my face. “Just do what I’m doing.”
I repeat her steps, finding some joy in the motion, although it would be more enjoyable if it weren’t for the constant pressure in the balls of my feet.
The music kicks up, the fiddler absorbing the crowd’s energy. Even the tavern keepers—a lovely pair of elderly women—join in.
We spin around and around, and every time I pass a certain point, I see Zephyr in the corner of my eye. I regret that we never get the chance to do something this fun and easy.
Seth the diver spins his partner beneath his arm, walking her over to a corner near the door. Another one of the men from our crew is already pushed up against the wall, his partner bent over him while she kisses his neck.
There’s a feverish vibration running through the fiddler’s strings, like the night itself is approaching a climax.
Darcy’s clapping loses time with the rhythm of the reel, her eyes widening as they fall on Seth.
She holds an arm out, blocking the man beside us before he can circle his partner again. “Where did you say you met these women?”
“Up past the dunes, in the woods,” he says. “Aren’t they so beautiful?”
