Chapter Three

Isidor opened his eyes. He was very comfortable, aroused, a soft body pressing in front of him. For a moment he wondered if the Dorsan—Mina, her name had been Mina—was still on The Singsong. He raised his head. He was holding a siren.

That was enough to wake him up right away.

He looked. So much for their promise not to touch her. The siren was tucked in front of him, molded to him, her butt pressing directly on his cock under his pants. One of his arms was under her, his elbow crooked, her head resting on it, the other over her and hanging off Winter’s shoulder. Her hands were curled on Winter’s chest, holding the cloth of his shirt, who was facing them, her head under his chin, his hand on her hip, his knee between her legs.

They were like a complete puzzle full of pieces that had fit together perfectly, all of them.

Winter opened his eyes, blinking, meeting Isidor’s, and then he raised his head and also looked, not moving. His eyebrows went up.

Isidor began to gently extricate himself, realizing, in the process, that the siren’s dress had ridden up and what was pressing to him was bare female siren bottom, the prettiest skin, her ass round, difficult not to stare at that. Winter was also untangling himself and also noticed. Isidor reached and twitched her dress down.

They both rose at the same time, quiet. The siren, robbed of her props, turned on her back, her dress riding up to her thighs in front, her hand flung out, her wrist red, her cheeks flushed with sleep, her lips parted. They both looked down at her for a long moment and then walked to the other side of the room.

“Well?” Isidor said, at a loss.

Winter shrugged.

“What else? We watch her,” Winter said.

Isidor nodded. They looked around the cabin, staying quiet. Isidor stepped out and came back, picking up Maren’s journal and taking it to the front porch to read, sitting on the stairs.

#

Soule woke, the familiar view from her bed. Her eyes felt swollen and her nose was stuffy. She sniffed noisily, rubbing her eyes, sitting up. She looked at her wrists. They hurt, at her arm, aching. She touched her jaw, which also hurt, the back of her head where her hair had been pulled, her hand going to her belly, stinging. She looked out of the corner of her eye.

The black-haired man was sitting at the table in the house not far, staring at her. He was big, dark eyes, huge hands, his shoulders broad, a serious, strong and stern face. Winter.

Soule looked away quickly. The other one wasn’t in the house. The one who had cut her with his knife. Isidor. The dark-haired one was watching her. She stole another glance at him sidelong. He was still looking at her.

“Good morning,” he said.

He rose, so big. He came toward her. Her heart began to pound. She got quickly to her feet, her eyes darting to the door.

“Please don’t run,” he said, moving between her and the exit.

He kept coming toward her. She darted but she still couldn’t get past him. He just kept getting in her way. She broke away from him, backing up. She was breathing fast, panicking. She couldn’t fight him. He was too big. She hit the wall behind her.

He walked toward her, putting his hand up, palm forward.

“I know you can understand me,” he said. “I swear, we’re not going to hurt you.”

He came closer, right in front of her now. Soule looked down, to the side, anywhere but at his face. She felt him touch her hand. She pulled it away sharply but he caught it again, not letting go, pulling it toward himself. He turned it over and looked at it and then he dropped it. She brought it to her chest as he captured her other hand and did the same.

“Soule,” he said.

There was silence. She finally looked at him.

“I just want to check the cut. Come sit on the bed.”

He took her hand. She came, her eyes going to the door again. She wouldn’t reach it. He waited. She sat on the bed. She saw his knees as she squatted beside her. He took her shoulders like he had before, pushing her steadily onto her back. She lay down. He got the blanket beside the bed and put it over her. She flinched when she reached for the dress at her waist.

“Keep the blanket on. I’m just going to lift the dress.”

She looked away from him, remembering him putting his knife on her throat. Yelling at her, pulling her hair. She felt the dress rise. She jumped when he touched her bare belly.

“You’ll have a small scar,” he said after a moment.

Soule took an unsteady breath, feeling the tears prick behind her eyes, willing herself not to cry. Ever since she was young, father had told her about Isidor and Winter. She had grown up learning all about them. She knew that when Isidor was a boy, he had hated peas. That Isidor had once fallen overboard and Winter had cried. She knew that Winter had broken his wrist dangling from the rigging, that a person in a port had once accused Winter of stealing and father had confronted the man, making him tell the truth because Winter would never do that.

When she was a girl, she used to pretend they lived here. Sometimes she would dream about them, that Winter and Isidor had come and she and father left the island and they were all together.

Her eyes blurred. And then they had come, just shown up. But father hadn’t been here to explain because he’d died. Winter and Isidor had taken her Tal. They had chased her and caught her, tied her up and put a gag in her mouth and held a knife at her throat and cut her clothes off and Isidor had taken his knife and he had—.

She flinched when Winter touched her cheek, looking at him.

“Did Maren tell you about us?” he asked her, pulling her dress over her belly.

She nodded, pushing the dress down over her knees under the blanket, sitting up, not looking at him. He took her wrist and tilted her arm where the bruise was. She pulled away and he released her.

“What did he say?”

She couldn’t look at him, feeling her throat close again.

“That you wouldn’t h-hate me.”

He got up, standing there over her. Soule didn’t look at him. He walked to the table and sat. He went into his pack and pulled things out. She glanced again. He had an inkwell in front of him. He was writing in a journal like her father’s, a Siblin journal. He was dressed like her father. He wasn’t looking at her.

Soule stood up slowly, waiting, but he didn’t do anything. She reached for her comb on the side table. When she was done, she braided her hair over her shoulder. She didn’t know what they wanted here. Father was dead. She waited, but Winter didn’t say anything, didn’t look up. She was hungry. She sat on the bed and waited some more, her arms around her knees. She finally stood up again. She had to eat.

Soule got her basket, her bag that she put over her shoulder. She passed him slowly, watching to see what he did. When she went out, he rose and followed her. The other man was on the stairs reading her father’s journal. Isidor, the one who had cut her. She was between them now. She stopped, not moving. Isidor stood up, stepping back. She went by him carefully, not looking at him, relieved, walking quickly down to the river.

Winter was following her. She looked. He didn’t come near. She knelt at the bank, glancing at him to make sure he wasn’t close to her, drinking, washing her face, glancing at him again.

She stood and followed the river up, finding her basket traps and checking them, four traps and two fish, too small but that’s what there was. She lined the baskets with leaves and put the fish in the basket. She went and foraged for onions, wood sorrel and found mushrooms, returning to the river to wash them. She watched him. He only followed her.

Soule stopped by the garden on the way back, picking peas. When she got back, the other one had made a fire in the pit, but he was still reading father’s journal on the stairs, Winter joining him. She went and got her pan, setting it on the grate, glancing at them. She got her knife where she kept it, preparing the fish, cleaning and returning it, stopping to eat the peas raw, adding the onion and sorrel.

The man on the stairs, Isidor, got up and went past Winter. She looked up. He picked up his pack and walked straight toward her. Soule got up and walked away, sitting on the stump where her father used to chop wood, looking down miserably. She glanced at her food.

The other man, Winter, came with his pack, too. Her fish was burning, she could smell it. Now they were both by the fire. Isidor pulled the pan off the fire and set it aside. Winter began to pull things out of his pack. Food. She recognized it, the same kind her father had brought. Dried salted beef, biscuits, oatmeal, dried peas, rice, beans. Syrup for sweetener. Soule looked away. She was always hungry.

#

Winter glanced at her from the stairs. Whatever other sirens ate, this one ate like they did. But she hadn’t found much, and she wasn’t adding anything else to it. They were both surprised when she pulled out the knife from an alcove at the fire pit, but she didn’t seem to think of it as a weapon, replacing it.

Winter began to look at her more closely. It was difficult to get past her beauty and look at her objectively. Yes, she was fragile. But it wasn’t just that. He looked at her wrists, still red, her face, the too-defined jaw. She was thin, the kind of thin that came with not enough food.

He looked at Isidor, whose eyes were on her, seeing the same. Isidor got up, grabbing his pack, heading for the fire. She immediately abandoned her fish, going and sitting on a stump. Winter got up, getting his pack and going to the fire as well, pulling out food. He glanced at her. She was looking away.

They prepared food, Isidor getting a plate for her, including her fish, scraping off the black. She looked up when he stood, standing up when he walked toward her. She took a step back. Isidor stopped, holding the plate out.

“It’s for you,” he said.

She looked at the food. Yes, she was hungry. She looked at Isidor’s face. Isidor nodded, staying where he was, holding it out, but she wouldn’t approach him. Isidor finally set it down on the ground, coming back to the fire. They looked away from her, eating themselves. When Winter looked up again she had the plate on her lap, eating with her fingers. She finished the whole thing.

“Where are the food stores, Soule?” Winter asked her. “Maren wrote he got supplies in Dorsa.”

He didn’t think she would answer, but she did after a moment, not looking at them, her voice curling through his gut, a little husky and soft.

“They were stored in the cave, but there was a ground shake. The rocks came and fell across the entrance. I couldn’t move them.”

“When?”

“Last summer.”

If she truly only ate food like they did—Maren said so in his journal—then she had spent the last year alone on the island eating only what had been in the cabin, what she could forage or catch or grow, and he hadn’t seen a hunting bow. Traps. Every day a search for enough to sustain her.

Winter glanced at her. She’d been hungry enough that her body told her to sleep after the meal, trying to conserve what she’d given it. Her shoulders drooped. She finally sat on the ground, putting the plate next to her, glancing at them. She fought her eyes open for awhile and finally leaned her head against the stump, her arms around her knees. When he glanced at her again, she was asleep.

Isidor met his eyes, getting up and moving toward her quietly. He stopped, squatting, not too close.

“Soule,” he said.

She jerked awake, seeing him, blinking. She got to her feet quickly. Isidor didn’t move, looking up at her.

“If you go in the cabin, we’ll stay out here. We won’t come in.”

She didn’t say anything, but she went into the cabin. Too tired to do anything else, Winter thought. After awhile, Winter went and looked in. She was asleep on the pallet. He came back out, sitting with Isidor in front of the fire.

Isidor pulled Maren’s journal from his pack, handing it to him. Isidor had already finished it. Isidor went and got her plate, setting it with the others to wash, sitting again, staring into the fire. Winter sat and read for awhile, feeling more and more like he had a rock sitting in his lower gut. In Maren’s account, she was just a child. Sweet. A handful, playful and curious as Maren described her. Quiet. A little odd, yes. More than a little at times. But hardly a mindless flesh-eating hunter.

It was possible she’d been fooling Maren for twenty years, that she was trying to fool them now, a siren’s trick, but it seemed like a long time to wait for a meal. And there were other things in Maren’s journal that didn’t match up with that idea at all. He handed the journal back and Isidor put it away in his pack.

“She didn’t say so, but I’m guessing Maren’s body is in that cave as well,” Winter said heavily. “We’ll have to dig it out if we can.”

Isidor nodded, beginning to stack things, putting them away, his face grim. He and Isidor didn’t need to say anything. Neither of them had ever hurt a woman, unimaginable. They were both remembering what they’d done to her, both thinking about what they would have done if they hadn’t stopped to look at Maren’s journal first.

“We can’t leave her here,” Isidor said quietly. “Maren gave her his Tal.”

Winter sighed, running his hand through his hair.

“It doesn’t mean she still can’t sing us to death, you know,” Winter said. “She is a siren.”

Isidor gestured at the house.

“She’s tender, Winter. You see that, right?”

“Of course I see it,” he retorted irritably.

Isidor glanced at the door.

“The legends were right about one thing,” Isidor muttered.

“She’s difficult to look away from,” Winter agreed as low.

#

Winter asked her to show them where the cave was. She didn’t answer, just bringing them there. They set to work, digging out the boulders, the rocks far too heavy for her to lift. Isidor lifted and walked and dropped and Winter lifted and walked and dropped and they both did that again about a thousand times.

The siren stayed with them. She curled up on a rock with her legs tucked under her. She didn’t meet their eyes. If they approached, she moved away. She would disappear briefly, but she always came back. She never spoke unless they asked her a direct question.

Winter had taken the necklace from his pocket and repaired the chain at the table that morning. He had walked to the siren. She started to move away, but he had shown it to her. She had gone still, her eyes on it and then on his face. He held it up so she’d know what he was doing, approaching her slowly. She didn’t retreat, breathing faster. He reached, putting it around her neck and fastened it, returning Maren’s Tal, the skin at her neck soft. She’d stayed very still, avoiding his eyes.

“I’m sorry I took it from you,” he told her, stepping back.

She didn’t say anything, but he saw her bringing her hand to the necklace several times that day, as if reassuring herself.

#

It was evening before Maren’s body was outside the cave, wrapped in tarp. They lashed it with rope and built a travois. The next morning, Isidor took one end of the travois and he took the other. They carried him to the cove.

Winter glanced briefly at the siren, seeing her standing, a figure watching from the shore as they rowed the dinghy to The Wandering Eye with Maren’s body still strapped to the travois, awkwardly lifting him with the ropes and setting him on the deck. There was lamp oil on The Singsong, but they found enough in Maren’s hold. The flames shot up the rigging, both of them turning their heads to watch as they rowed.

When they got to shore, beaching the dinghy past the waves, they walked and sat on the beach, their shoulders touching, and watched Maren’s launch. Winter looked around briefly. He didn’t see the siren.

The Wandering Eye took the wind, her sails filling. Winter wished Maren well, his throat tight, comforting himself to imagine the joy of his reunion with Dane, his brother. With nobody at the helm, the ship went aimlessly, but she went, the flames licking up her sails. Winter said the prayer under his breath, hearing Isidor doing the same beside him. Neither of them realized at first, both of them lost in thoughts of Maren, the sound blending with the sound of the waves.

Then they both realized, panic blooming through him. Winter covered his ears, staggering to his feet, Isidor doing the same beside him, knowing it was useless, knowing they were dead. Maren had been wrong about her. They had.

Winter located her with his eyes. She was standing high on the bluff overlooking the cove, her eyes on the sea. They’d never get to her in time. Her song rose clear, so beautiful, siren song, washing over him. He waited to feel it, to go mad. Her song filled his mind, not on the outside now. He could hear it clearly despite his hands over his ears, louder than the surf, over his own heavy breathing, hear it as if she were singing it directly into his ear.

Winter’s breath choked, grief overwhelming him. Everything he felt was there, made into music, all his longing for the man who had been like a father to them, all their restless searching, all their love for him. There were no words to it. The grief swelled in him and then broke over him. He looked at his brother, the same reflected in Isidor’s eyes.

Winter looked at her again, her figure so still, her eyes on the ship, slowly lowering his hands. He was still in control. He could move. He wasn’t going mad, didn’t feel any compulsion. Her song was sad, yes, but he had already been sad. Both of them were staring at her, listening. It didn’t make them do anything. It was just beautiful.

Winter’s eyes shifted, both of them turning to look where she did. Winter watched the orange flame that was shaped like a ship as it slowly collapsed. The melody was eerie, achingly lovely, unlike anything he’d ever imagined. She was saying goodbye. They heard the heavy crack of The Wandering Eye’s mast tumbling, the final notes of the siren’s song trailing away. When Winter looked up at the bluff again, she was gone.

Isidor sat down heavily on the sand. After a moment, Winter walked and sat down next to him. Winter rubbed his face with his hands. Siren song.

When they were ready, they got up wearily and made their way back. Winter went straight to the front door of the cabin and opened it. She was on her pallet, curled up, her back to them. Winter eyed her, going in, Isidor glancing her way, but she didn’t move.

#

The next day they went through Maren’s chest, all of a Siblin’s private belongings kept there. Isidor was melancholy, looking at the familiar things. It was the way of Siblin, grieving, to talk about the dead, and they had memories of Maren that were fond and well worn by now, laughing at times. It was a relief to know, to grieve him for true after so long.

Both he and Winter were aware the siren listened from her pallet. She didn’t say anything.

“What will we do with this?” Isidor said, picking up Maren’s lyre.

Winter had never had any impulse to play. Isidor had picked it up briefly and lost interest, but Maren had cherished the instrument. The siren looked up and glanced at the lyre and then looked down again.

“Can you play, Soule?” Isidor asked her.

“Father taught me,” she replied after a moment, answering his question, not looking at them.

Isidor blinked, glancing at Winter, who looked just as surprised. She was talking about Maren. Her father. They should have realized she thought of him that way. It made sense. Maren had raised her. Isidor felt a stab of guilt. They’d come and taken Maren’s body, performed the rite without really including her. It just hadn’t occurred to them. Winter got up and took the lyre from him, bringing it to her.

Maren had left her his Tal, telling the world she was his daughter. By their traditions, she was adopted just like they were. It didn’t matter that she was a siren, and they didn’t know what that meant anymore, meeting her. She had as much right to these things as they did.

She looked up when Winter came toward her, looking at his face carefully when Winter offered it. She hesitated and then reached and took it from him. She put it on her lap, running her fingers along its surface, looking down at it.

“Thank you,” she said quietly, surprising them both.

“If there’s anything else you want—,” Winter said, gesturing.

She shook her head, not looking at him. Winter came back over and picked up one of Maren’s small carvings, fiddling with it, glancing at her.

#

Soule took down her hair from the braid and combed it, not looking at them, getting into her bed. She lay on her side with her eyes open. Winter and Isidor had been here for days. They’d launched her father. She was glad they’d stayed to do that. The cave was open. She had food now. Until she ran out, but it would last her a long time. There was no reason for them to stay.

Soon Isidor and Winter would get in their boat and row it to their ship and they would leave. She didn’t think they would want her to come, and there was nowhere they could take her anyway, nowhere for her to go. She was a siren. A screecher. As soon as people recognized what she was, they would kill her.

Maybe that would be better.

Father was gone. Nobody else would ever love her like he had. She had thought once that Isidor and Winter might still come, imagined them living here with her or that they would take her away with them somewhere. She knew better now. They hated her like everyone else.

Soule felt her chest ache, panic rising in her, breathing fast, burying her face in the blanket, afraid they would hear it. She had to ask them. She couldn’t endure the thought of being alone again.

#

Winter went out the front door in the morning, seeing Soule kneeling, making a fire. Her hair was down this morning, loose, her hands graceful. You didn’t get used to her beauty. It surprised him every time he looked at her.

She glanced up as he passed, surprising him again.

He walked past her to the privy, coming out to walk and wash his face and hands at the river, sweeping the cool water through his hair, washing his teeth and mouth. He came back, walking again to get water in the bucket and returning, sitting down across the fire from her, putting water on to heat in a pan. She didn’t get up, didn’t move away like she usually did.

When the water was hot, he set about making cavash. Isidor came out, going past them. Isidor returned in awhile, taking the cup Winter handed him, nodding his thanks. She still hadn’t moved. Isidor sat, glancing at her. To their surprise, Soule looked up at both of them. She looked down at her hands.

“Will you take me with you?” she asked low, not looking up.

They were both staring at her. It was the first time she’d talked to them, not just answering a question.

“I know I’m a siren, a screecher,” she continued, still looking at her hands, her husky voice saying she didn’t have much hope. “I won’t sing again. I’ll be quiet. Please don’t leave me here.”

“You’re Maren’s daughter,” Winter replied. “You’ll come with us if you want it. We wouldn’t ever leave a person trapped in a place anyway. Not who hadn’t harmed us.”

She looked up. She seemed so surprised.

“You’ll let me come with you?”

“The Singsong is the safest place for you,” Isidor said. “Nobody boards her but that we know it. We won’t let anyone hurt you.”

“You’re not a screecher, Soule,” Winter said. “We’re sorry we called you that, sorry we hurt you. You don’t have to stay here alone.”

It was going to be tricky. They couldn’t keep her in their cabin for obvious reasons, and they couldn’t exactly drop her off at a port either. They’d have to keep her in the hold, make a place for her, keep her secret. Find somewhere on land she could be, eventually, where she’d be safe. Wherever that was.

She was still staring at him like she didn’t quite believe it. Her gaze shifted to Isidor.

“You hated peas,” she told Isidor.

“What?” Isidor said.

“You hated peas,” she repeated.

Isidor blinked. She looked at Winter

“You broke your wrist,” she told him in turn.

When they were boys. Maren must have told her those things. She got up. They watched her go. She turned around once and glanced back at them.

#

It was early morning. Soule had the bucket and was walking to the river, Isidor already waiting for water to heat over the fire. She watched Isidor take the length of rope, her head turning. He tied a rolling hitch, very fast, and then tugged, undoing it. She faced forward, walking.

“Do you want to try, Soule?” he called.

He’d noticed her watching. Soule stopped, looking at him again. She set down the bucket and came and knelt in front of him. She put her hands out. He handed her the rope. Her hands worked.

“A rolling hitch,” he said when she was done, surprised.

She nodded and untied it, beginning again.

“Sheet bend.”

She untied it and began again.

“Clove hitch,” he said.

She shook her head, not done yet.

“Constrictor knot,” he said, surprised again, and she nodded. “Maren taught those to you?”

She nodded, untying and handing him the rope. He tied another, looking at her. She frowned.

“What is it?” she asked him, leaning forward, looking at it in his hands.

“Another binding knot. Put your hand out.”

She did. He put the gap of the rope on her wrist and pulled in one fast motion, closing it tight on her wrist, his eyes on her face. She watched how it worked, interested. He loosened it from her wrist, handing her the rope again.

“It’s called a transom knot. Here. Begin the constrictor knot. Stop there,” he said, taking her hand and showing her where to push the end through.

His hands were gentle and warm, giving her a fluttery feeling in her belly. She finished the knot. She looked up, pleased. He smiled back and then his smile faded, his eyes intense. She was suddenly aware how close they were, her heart going faster. She looked down at the rope. She untied it, handing the rope back to him. He took it, his fingers brushing hers, his eyes still on her face.

She stood up and walked back to the bucket, picking it up and continuing to the river. She glanced back once. He was still watching her.

#

Winter sat on the stairs, his leg crooked against the far rail. They had barrels of Dorsan wine in the hold, but it could wait, nowhere they had to be. They had decided to stay a couple weeks at the island. It would give them time to plan.

There hadn’t just been food stores in the cave under the canvas. The goods that Maren had come here to retrieve twenty years ago were there as well, presumably where Dane had hidden them.

The silks were ruined, were probably ruined before Maren came here, but there was a small pouch of jewels that hadn’t suffered any, a wealth of gold coins from various ports, different shapes and stamps, and, to their surprise, a small sealed jar of saffron, a fortune. No wonder Maren had wanted to come back here.

Winter’s eyes shifted as Soule came out of the front door to the cabin, her thick red braid over her shoulder. She looked so pretty, like springtime, her cheeks flushed lightly. It was difficult not to look at her. She glanced at him from under heavy lashes, honey eyes. She looked away.

He didn’t think she knew that she did that, what it signaled to a Siblin. Winter rose to his feet, staying where he was so she had to touch him to get down the stairs. She turned sideways, leaning back, brushing against him. He didn’t move, watching her face. Aware of him, yes, and not fear. His eyes followed the little siren down the stairs. No, he didn’t think she knew at all.

#

Isidor dove into the water, the pool deep under the fall. It was cool, wonderfully cool, the day blazing hot and sticky. They kept their pants on for Soule’s sake, the linen clinging to them so they might as well be naked. She was on her back on a rock, her dress still wet from swimming, both of them stealing glances when she got out, the cloth clinging to her, her face turned toward them.

Her hair was down and had dried all around her, unbelievably silky and thick and wavy, so much of it, the dark, rich red vivid against the rock, and wasn’t that arousing. The outline of her breasts rose high in the damp material, her knees up.

Isidor swam toward her. Her eyes followed him as he approached, honey color, shining in the light. He stopped and flicked water at her. It landed by her shoulder.

Soule’s brows crooked, her head coming up, glancing where the water had landed. Isidor flicked it again, water landing on her this time, across her leg. Soule looked at his face. He grinned. She eyed him, heavy lashes, and then her lips twitched slightly. She would play. Isidor swam closer. She was watching him. She sat up quickly, scrambling back as he pushed all the water he could, a great wave of it coming out and landing just where she had been.

He heard a husky giggle that went straight through him as she got to her feet and ran down the rocks parallel to the pool in full flight, her hair bouncing, her feet bare, Isidor following her and splashing, sometimes hitting her. He got her good once, a quick indrawn breath from her. She almost made it when Winter surged out of the water and caught her ankle.

She jumped back and Winter let go, not holding her, staying where he was. She stared at both of them, backing away and stopping, breathing fast, that strange stillness, her cheeks flushed, her red hair falling in long waves to her hips.

She turned and began to walk away, but she glanced at each of them over her shoulder, sidelong, the dress clinging to her little round butt where he’d gotten her wet, both of them still watching her. That glance went through him, shooting down to his belly and lower. He looked at Winter, seeing the same, Winter’s eyes narrowing after her, that look he got when he was hunting women in the towns.

“Are you hungry?” Winter said, leaning back in the water, ignoring all of it.

“Yeah,” Isidor answered.

Hungry and aroused, thinking of Soule naked with that hair, the pink flush in her cheeks and lips. Wondering if between her legs would flush as pink. His cock hadn’t caught up and realized nothing interesting was happening soon. Winter seemed to be having similar difficulties.

Neither one of them could bed her, not if she were going to live on The Singsong with them. That would become a very bad tangled mess quickly. She was practically their sister. But he could see what she was like, Winter could. They were Siblin. Regardless, he couldn’t touch her, Winter couldn’t. They’d just have to get used to it.

When they got back, Soule already had water on the fire and Isidor set about making food, glancing at her. Soule was in the garden, her back to him. Isidor glanced at her again, her hair still down, flaming the deepest red as she moved in and out of the sunlight. It was so difficult not to watch her.

She still didn’t talk much. He thought maybe it was being alone for so long, or maybe that was just her way. She was picking peas off the trellis, putting them in the basket she held on her arm.

Winter came and sat beside him by the fire, also watching her. She glanced over her shoulder at Isidor, seeing him, looking down, facing forward. It made him a little crazy when she did that, a wave of desire going through him. She glanced again a little later at Winter, a sidelong glance, long lashes, facing forward again, his brother muttering something unintelligible under his breath.

Then it happened. A pea pod fell from the crude trellis with the tugging. Soule bent down to pick it up, the dress riding up, stretching over her butt and hips.

Isidor’s jaw clenched, suddenly very aroused. He tensed, watching Soule as she straightened, putting it in the basket, watched her body under the shapeless dress, remembering what she looked like under it, thoughts in his head that moved down to his cock, tightening, a sense of pressure. He could hear his own breathing, his heart pounding.

He looked at Winter, uneasy at the suddenness of it. Winter’s eyes were fixed on her the same way, his eyes narrowed, leaning back on his elbow, his manner casual, almost careless, and under all of it coiled tension, that way he had when he was fully aroused. They both were.

Isidor didn’t know what to do with the urgency of it. He shifted. He couldn’t stop the thoughts in his head, couldn’t distract himself, hot thoughts, rich and wicked. Another wave took him, Winter breathing as heavily beside him. Sága, Isidor had never been so aroused. He clenched his teeth at the rawness of it, breathing, a flash of surprising her, pushing her onto her back with that red hair all around her, opening her legs, of spreading her pussy with his fingers, of tasting her, fucking her.

Something shifted in him, his arousal so keen he was almost panting. It didn’t stop, getting worse, his cock aching and hard and sensitive, the realization coming to him all at once.

Anthata.

Isidor sucked in his breath sharply. Winter turned his head, meeting his eyes, the knowing between them, absolute certainty

.