Her eyes narrowed and she reached out. For a moment I thought she might strike me. Instead, her fingers only brushed against mine as she plucked the book from my grasp. My stomach flipped like a porpoise in the waves. There was something magnetic about her presence, even dressed as she was in a plain brown tunic and pants, her hair pulled back in a simple bun. I swallowed and had to force my words past a throat gone suddenly tight. “Or have I committed some grievous error?” I felt like I was committing an error that had nothing to do with the book or the ship’s hold.

Her gaze met mine for only a moment before dropping away. Was it the lamp, or did her cheeks look flushed? “Not this one. I came here for this one. Choose another. Just put it back when you’re finished.”

It had been unfair of me to dig at all her locked doors. I’d come here to search for a sword, had lied about my intentions and she returned this all with sternness, yes, but with kindness too. She trusted me too much. Or I was too good of a liar. Or both.

I fumbled in the box and pulled out a book that I didn’t check the title on, slipping it into my satchel. “Thank you for that, Eminence. I’ll put it back. I promise.” And then I brushed past her with as wide a berth I could manage without seeming to avoid her, the jasmine scent of her hair chasing me half the length of the hold. I needed to set Mephi as a lookout next time. I needed to be more cautious. I needed to… I needed to clear my head.

The air outside the hold was tinged with the scent of seawater and old wood; I breathed it in as though it were the last breath I took before a dive. I shook out my fingers. There had been a time, when I’d been young, when I wouldn’t have known what I was feeling. But I was older now, and a widower, and had lived in my body long enough to know it. Lin was… complicated. She wasn’t Emahla or even anything like her.

I opened the door to my room to find Mephi curled in my bed beneath the covers, a book beneath his claws. The Alanga book I’d found in the Shardless Few hideout what seemed like a lifetime ago. That should have been in my satchel. I felt inside the satchel anyways, even though I knew it couldn’t possibly be in two places at once. “Did you take that from my bag?”

He leafed a page over with his claw. “No.”