He interrupted her. “No figurehead. I know. But a liveship all the same.” He sighed and felt his breath warm the space between their faces. “A liveship learns his own family. I know you must know about that. Tarman can’t speak, but he has other ways of communicating.”

For a time, she did not reply. She moved her body slightly against his, a communication of her own. Then she asked a question. “That first time I dreamed of flying over Kelsingra. Looking down on it. Was that a dragon dream from Tarman?”

“Only he could say for certain. But I suspect it was.”

“He remembers Kelsingra. He showed me things I couldn’t have imagined, but they fit perfectly with what I knew of Kelsingra. And now I can’t see the city any other way than how he showed it to me.” She hesitated, then asked, “Why is he talking to me?”

“He’s communicating with both of us. His talking to you is a message for me as well.”

“What’s the message?” she whispered against his mouth.

He kissed her, and her mouth was pliant under his. For a time, they both forgot the question he could not answer.

SHE DID NOT return to her own bed that night. Very early in the morning, he woke her, thinking it might be an oversight on her part. “Alise. It’s dawn. Soon the crew will be stirring.”

He didn’t need to say any more than that. She had been sleeping with her back against his belly, her head tucked under his chin, his arms around her holding her there, safe and warm. She did not lift her head from the pillow. “I don’t care who knows. Do you?”

He thought about it for a time. The only one who might look askance at the arrangement would be Skelly. If it became long term or permanent, it might lead to her losing her position as his heir. Now there was a strange thing to think about. A child of his own? He wondered if Skelly would be unhappy or angry about it. Perhaps. Regardless of that, he wasn’t going to give Alise up. The sooner Skelly knew about it, the better.

“No problems from me. Sedric?”

“Am I asking whom he sleeps with these days?”

So she knew about him and Carson. Hmm. The two men had been discreet, but perhaps not discreet enough. There was more than a drop of bitterness in her question. Something else was there, something he didn’t want to know about right now or perhaps ever. So he made no answer. He kissed her hair, clambered over her, and took his clothing from its hook. As he dressed he said, “I’ll stir up the galley fire and put on coffee. What would you like for breakfast?”

“Um. I may sleep in a bit longer.”