Stood by the window thinking about that. Confusing thoughts, chasing each other. Looking down, he watched people leave the tavern, talking loudly once outside, excited. Two dogs began fighting in the street, just out of sight, then they stopped. He looked at the blue moon, risen over the rooftops.

The street grew quiet. He heard the sound of Eudes or Silvy locking the main door. Everyone had gone, then. He heard the sanctuary bells ringing. Orane. Its bells. He was back in Orane.

There was silence again.

This had not been the return to his city he’d expected. When did things go as you expected? he thought. He was thinking that when Silvy entered the room.

“I thought you’d be asleep,” she said.

He shrugged. “Thought I’d wait for you.”

It was true, he realized. He had been waiting. And that came with a different kind of awareness.

She crossed to the lamp by the bed. She said, a little awkwardly, “I’m sorry I hit you.”

“No you aren’t,” he said.

She shook her head. “I really am.” A half-smile that he knew. “Not sorry about Jolis. Think I broke her cheekbone?”

“Might have.”

“Good,” Silvy said.

“Could make for trouble.”

Her turn to shrug. “I doubt it. Her man killed a serjeant tonight.”

Which was true, of course. He looked at her across the room: slim, light-brown hair, brown eyes (he knew they were, couldn’t see it in the lamplight). And brave. His friend. His friend.

He drew a breath. He said, his voice a little shaky, “Silvy, I…has something happened here?”

“Happened?” A silence. “You mean…us? Here?” Hard to tell but he thought she looked pale now.

He nodded. It had become difficult to speak.

“You mean,” she said bravely (she was always brave), “should we become lovers, finally?”

All he could do, he found, was nod again.

He saw her also nod her head, down and up, just the once. “I think…I think it might be time?” she said.

And with those words, he was suddenly so aroused, so much desiring her. And…and more than that. He didn’t move yet.

He said, from by the window, “If I walk towards you, it feels like so much changes. Not just tonight.”

“Is that bad?” Silvy asked. And he caught the shift in her voice.

And suddenly he was not uncertain anymore, not afraid. He said, “It isn’t bad at all for me, my dear.” If she could be brave, so could he, he thought.

He saw her smile. There seemed to be tears on her face. “In that case, my dear, start walking,” she said. “My bed is here. And…and so am I. We aren’t far from you.”

He crossed the room.

—

It is possible to love someone, even for years, and not know it. Or to hide from it, in denial, and then in a moment…know it, and not be afraid.