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me fish more often.”
    “I think I will,” Joscelin replied, sounding bemused. He glanced down. “What are you looking at?”
    “Nothing.” Imriel was hugging himself, grinning fit to split his face, shifting from foot to foot. “You should take a bath, Joscelin; you’re all over fish.”
    “So are you,” he said to Imriel, then blinked at me. “And so are you, now. I should ... I should clean the fish, first.”
    “I can do it.” Imriel wedged his fingers under the gills and dragged the fish a foot, rolling it onto its back to expose the pale belly. “See?” He traced a line with one damp forefinger. “I cut here to begin. You said I made a good job of it, remember? It’s bigger than the others, that’s all. Yedo can help me.”
    Joscelin raised his eyebrows at me.
    “Well?” I said. “Imri’s right, you’re all over fish. Go take a bath, Joscelin.”
    He went, gathering dry clothing , a lump of precious soap and a reasonably clean towel of Menekhetan cotton.
    Imriel gloated over his fish, and looked at me sidelong. “I will tell Yedo not to let anyone use the bathing-pool,” he said, all innocence. “If you want to go, and wash your gown.”
    “You think I should?” I touched his river-damp hair. Imriel looked down and nodded fiercely, the matter suddenly too great for words. I wondered why it meant so much to him. “All right,” I said. “I’ll go.”
    The passage to the bathing-pool was like a green tunnel, mimosa bushes crowding inward to filter the light, pungent sap weeping from the new-cut branches. Clusters of small yellow flowers brushed my gown as I passed, dusting the fabric with pollen. I felt strange in my own skin, sensitive to every breath of air, my heart beating too fast with uncertainty.
    And aching, still.
    The passage opened onto the bathing-pool, where Joscelin stood, not quite waist-deep. Since he had not seen me, I went to sit on the sun-warmed rocks at the water’s edge and watched him as he dunked his head and flung it back, water spraying in a glittering arc. Dappled light played over his skin, the muscles gliding beneath it. Pale scars marred his flesh and a few new ones, still pink. I knew the old scars by touch. Along his ribs was the curving gash he’d taken in Skaldia. That one, I’d sewn myself, in a cavern marked by the sigil of Blessed Elua, where we’d taken shelter from a blizzard.
    And made love, I remembered, for the first time; Cassiline and anguissette . Desire beat in my blood like the distant thunder of drums upon the mountain.
    Joscelin saw me and went still, water dripping from him in the sunlight. Even when I’d resented him, long ago, I’d thought him beautiful. He stood patient under my regard. Every one of the scars that marked him, he’d gotten on my behalf. I did not have words to speak to him.
    “Phèdre,” he said at length, saying my name softly. “Will you join me?”
    I nodded without speaking and stayed where I was.
    He took a few steps, shadows in the hollows of his flanks, and lifted me from the rocks as if I weighed no more than his enormous fish, lowering me to stand before him. The skirts of my gown floated on the water and I put both arms around his neck as he lowered his head to kiss me.
    That kiss, I cannot describe. It was like a poem, a prayer, a homecoming unlooked-for. It was like dungeon walls crumbling to reveal a glimpse of sky. It shook me to the very roots of my soul. All I could do was cling to him and gasp.
    With infinite gentleness, Joscelin undid the buttons of my gown, sliding it from my shoulders until I stood in its water-billowed folds as at the center of a lotus. What flesh he unveiled, he touched, until I shivered, the tenderness of it nearly unbearable. With cupped hands, he poured water over my head, until droplets clung to my lashes, then followed the water’s course with his lips. When he kissed my closed eyelids, I could have wept.
    I relearned him that day, with hands, mouth and tongue, tracing the line of his collarbone, the flat planes of his chest that no blade had yet marred, like a blind woman learning sight by touch. Mostly, though, I yielded, and relearned love. He undid my hair, that I wore at the nape of my neck. When his hands rose, dripping, to cup my breasts, I sighed; I whimpered at the touch of his mouth, warm and wet, encompassing my aching nipples.
    He lifted me out of the floating lotus of my gown, setting me so that my buttocks rested upon the warm stones to perform