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Vai thanks her. I wait outside and study the carving on the lintel until she comes back.

“Where would you like to eat?” I ask.

“The courtyard, if we can find a dry place.”

“There’s room beneath the awning.”

She takes my arm.

Vai brings two bowls of soup from the kitchen. I bring bread and two spoons because she has forgotten hers. We sit beneath the canvas while rain begins to tap above us.

“You were right about the cover,” she says.

“I wish that were a rarer achievement.”

She gives me half the bread, then takes back a corner for dipping.

For a while she tells me about Asha’s letter. Her sister has found a supplier and returned the money. I know the facts already; today Vai tells me about the cup her sister has been using. She draws its crooked handle in the damp on the table.

“Asha will tell you I chose it for the color. She chose the whole stall for those blue shutters.”

“That seems a poor basis for a business decision.”

“It was. We had to paint them again the next summer.”

“Blue?”

“Of course.”

I offer her the last of the bread. She takes it without checking whether I have finished. I had not known that could please me.

After we eat, she leans against my arm. I can feel the warmth of her through the green wool of her sleeve. Her wrist dressing has been replaced with a smaller strip.

“Does it still hurt?”

“Only if I catch it on something. Reivaka says I can leave it uncovered tomorrow.”

I retract my claws as she turns her hand beneath mine. She strokes the smooth tips of my fingers, and I spread them to make it easier for her.

“Kiss me,” she says.

I bend to her. She catches the back of my neck, keeping me close after the first kiss. Behind us, someone comes out of the kitchen and retreats again.

Vai laughs against my mouth.

“Who was that?”

“I didn’t look.”

“Neither did I.”

She kisses me once more, then sits back against my arm. The rain continues. I have work waiting, and she has a meeting tomorrow I would prefer she didn’t want. For the length of this meal, she has wanted to be here.

I stay until she is ready to get up.

As we carry the bowls inside, a guard comes through the western arch with a message for Reivaka. Edrin has reached the trade station. He will arrive here tomorrow evening, ready to complete the release the following morning.

Vai hears it beside me. Her grip tightens on the bowls, then she lets out a long breath.