“I dream of sailing away one day,” she continued, when he remained silent. “All alone. Set sail and put out to sea… Far, far away. All the way to the horizon. Only water and sky all around. The salt foam splashes me, the wind tugs my hair in an utterly male caress. And I’m alone, completely alone, endlessly alone among the strange and hostile elements. Solitude amid a sea of strangeness. Don’t you dream of that?”

No, I don’t, he thought. I have it every day.

* * *

The summer solstice arrived, and after it a magical night, the shortest of the year, when the flower of the fern bloomed in the forest and naked girls, rubbed with adder’s-tongue fern, danced in dew-sprinkled clearings.

A night as short as the blink of an eye.

A wild night, bright from lightning.

* * *

He awoke alone in the morning after the solstice. Breakfast was waiting for him in the kitchen. And not just breakfast.

“Good morning, Mozaïk. Beautiful weather, isn’t it? Where’s Lytta?”

“You have a day off,” she replied without looking at him. “My unparalleled mistress will be busy. Until late. During the time she devoted to… pleasure, the list of patients grew.”

“Patients?”

“She treats infertility. And other women’s disorders. Didn’t you know? Well, now you do. Good day.”

“Don’t go out yet. I’d like to—”

“I don’t know what you’d like to do,” she interrupted. “But it’s probably a bad idea. It’d be better if you didn’t talk to me. Pretend I wasn’t here at all.”

“Coral won’t harm you any more, I give my word. In any case, she’s not here, she can’t see us.”

“She sees everything she wants to see; all she needs is a few spells and an artefact. And don’t kid yourself that you have any influence on her. That requires more than…” She nodded towards the bedroom. “Please, don’t mention my name in her presence. Not even casually. Because she won’t let me forget it. Even if it takes a year, she’ll remind me.”

“Since she treats you like that… can’t you simply go?”

“Go where?” she said crossly. “To a weaving manufactory? To serve time with a seamstress. Or head at once to a brothel? I don’t have anyone. I’m a nobody. And I’ll always be a nobody. Only she can change that. I can endure it all… But please don’t make it any worse.

“I met your pal in town.” She glanced at him a moment later. “That poet, Dandelion. He asked about you. He was anxious.”

“Did you calm him down? Explain I was safe? In no danger?”

“Why should I lie?”

“I beg your pardon?”