I looked at Sorcha. He still stared at her, his head slightly cocked to the side, deep in thought. I wished I could have read him just then, but I couldn’t. I tried to speak again and found I had no words. It felt like the world had opened up, that there were endless possibilities, and all of them good. I tried to look anywhere but at Sorcha and couldn’t tear my eyes away. And so I watched while he took the decision I’d made but couldn’t voice and put it into action. I watched while he leaned forward, leaned onto his hands and knees, and closed the distance between him and Shayat. I watched, transfixed, while she stared at him wide-eyed and curious, and I saw the happy shock on her face when he kissed her. She kissed him back, but looked at me while she did it, a question in her eyes. How much was too much? Where were the lines? Sorcha pulled back and smiled. “One like you,” he said, “we got all the space in the world for. Right, Ariah?”

All I could do was nod. All I could do was let them draw me over, draw me in, and follow where they led. I was the center, the heart, the thing keeping the three of us together. Shayat spent the night there, and the next day. I abandoned my place on the line. I drowned myself in their attentions, and I was a conduit for their attentions to each other. Love in a triad is a strange thing: there are times when a pair breaks off and the third is left behind. There are times a pair starts and a third is brought in, but how and when are sometimes clumsy. I had expected, I think, for it to be two pairs: me and Sorcha, and me and Shayat. I had not expected Sorcha to pull us all together, to forge something himself with her. I think if it had occurred to me as a possibility it would have terrified me. I don’t think I would have let it happen. I would have pushed her away simply to have him all to myself. But it did happen, and it worked, and somehow the sharing made it sweeter between him and me. I don’t know how, I can’t explain it, but the three of us fit together: a puzzle solved.

* * *

I helped Shayat gather her things, and Sorcha walked her to the door. She had routes to plan. She had a father to talk out of worry. She promised to come back soon. Sorcha gave her a peck on the cheek and sent her out into the world grinning. I packed away and hid the remaining herb. We’d decided to ration it. “Hey, can we talk?” Sorcha asked.