Somehow a bold, brilliant creature had landed in the middle of Madeleine’s life: Hæra the shooting star. Madeleine would catch her so carefully in the palm of her hand.

When they were done, Hæra tucked her face into the sweaty curve of Madeleine’s throat. “Today was awful. I needed that. Thank you.”

“I needed it too.” Did Hæra understand that?

“What else do you need?” Hæra stroked the slight roundness of Madeleine’s bare stomach. There was more muscle there now. “Do you know?”

It might be a loaded question, but Hæra’s gentle touch, combined with the echoes of pleasure, had Madeleine melting into the mattress. Her eyelids were heavier than ever.

“I’ll figure it out,” she said. “Tomorrow. I promise.”

Madeleine had promised tomorrow. She kept her promises. Hæra shouldn’t have pushed. If she gave Madeleine more time, maybe Madeleine would say Yes, I’ll stay with you forever, because I love you.

Madeleine had told Hæra she loved her. Nobody had ever done that before. It was like being thrown a shining rope in the darkness. For a moment, Hæra had seen things clearly, and they weren’t all horrible. Madeleine loved her, and that was worth everything.

As fast as her mind was whirling, her body felt loose and contented for the first time in days. Madeleine had taken the lead tonight, and she’d been gentle and generous. She’d seen to Hæra’s pleasure and treated her as if she were more precious than anything in a treasure chest.

Madeleine slept now. Her eyelashes fluttered; her eyes moved beneath their fragile lids. Maybe she was dreaming. Dreadful thought. Hæra’s dreams were all nightmares: Asgall reaching for her beneath the waves in his human shape, the skull visible beneath his skin. Beathag returning to tear her apart, before turning away because she didn’t love her enough to take her life. Jonathan dissolving into ash and drifting away on the tide while Hæra begged him to return.

Hæra gently pushed a stray lock of hair from Madeleine’s brow. “I want to dream about you,” she whispered.

If wishes were horses, Jonathan used to say, beggars would ride.

There must be something she could keep. Some trace of herself, the self she was both then and now. Her life had a “before” and “after” period, divided between the night she broke and the weeks she’d spent afterward picking up the shards. There had to be more to her than that. She wouldn’t be a ruin.

Her mobile lay on the bedside table. Hæra considered it and then crept out of bed, reaching for her underwear.