It hurt.

It hurt watching Cloudy watch the door to their room, her worry over whether she’d made the right decision writ plain across her ears. It had hurt listening to her placatory words to Lace and Dapper that she would be okay, and she just needed time to listen to her heart for the way forward and she was thankful for Lace’s late-coming determination to raise her up to a proper lady.

The certainty in her voice that it wouldn’t be needed hurt, too.

All the while, Rosemary had sat there, her tongue cloven to the roof of her mouth, unable to speak, unable to do more than nod while images of Collar’s discomfort swirled around her. It was so plain when he sat next to Rosewater at dinner with her casual flirtatious looks.

She tried to remember if she’d ever seen that kind of look from him before, but she couldn’t recall. All she could remember was her more than insistent moment of weakness when she’d leaned against him and whispered to him about making love and held him in her magic until he came.

Did it start there?

He was a Dammer, half born of Merrie, but…

“I’m sorry,” Rosemary murmured, her voice sounding hollow to her own ears.

Cloudy’s ears flinched and her head raised briefly towards one of the silencing gems powering the spell, then another.

“It’s not your fault.” She shook her head and glanced back at Rosemary. Her eyes were red, and her cheeks were a mess of damp where she’d cried silently after closing the door. “I should have known you’d end up here someday, ‘Mary. You have a way of getting into the most fortuitous trouble.”

“Someday isn’t… it’s not as quickly as I did end up here, Cloudy. Stars, if she wasn’t my mother…”

“But she is. And he’s… kinda your father-in-law.”

“Exactly.” Rosemary sighed and scooted closer to sit with her forehooves on either side of Cloudy’s flanks where she sat. “I should have realized it as soon as we started putting together the plan.”

“Mmm.” Cloudy leaned her head back to bump against Rosemary’s chin. “But you, me, everypony was scrambling to get ideas out, plan, and lay out the elements we needed to get it to work the way it did in such a short time.”

“More on the doing than the effect?”

“Yeah.” Cloudy sighed. “I… didn’t realize how long two weeks could feel, ‘Mary.”

“I consider myself an expert in waiting, Cloudy, and let me tell you, two weeks is a long time.” Rosemary settled in on her back gently, scooting forward until her belly pressed up against Cloudy’s backside. “When you’re waiting for something to happen, it feels like months. It’s why I cherished you coming to see me every day.”

“It might be years still until Collar can change the laws here,” Cloudy said with a sigh. “And I really don’t want to have an ‘affair’ with him. It feels wrong. It should be open, with Rosewater there by our sides.”

“I know.” Rosemary settled in to rest her chin on Cloudy’s head, closing her eyes briefly as ears flicked up to play against her muzzle. “Or… well. By your side.”

Cloudy snorted and leaned to the side to give her a kiss on her muzzle. “You really didn’t give much thought to Rosewater being there, did you?”

“Hey! I thought about it!”

“I didn’t say you didn’t.” Cloudy nipped her muzzle and kissed her again. “But I know you. You thought about it, said ‘That’s a problem for future me.’ and went on dreaming.”

“Past me is a jerk,” Rosemary grumbled. “Give her a kick in the posterior if you see her.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Cloudy was silent for another long stretch while Rosemary watched her watching her. “What do you want to do? With the war, I mean. Rosewater’s right that you don’t need to pretend anymore, you know. You can denounce Roseate and seek asylum here. Roseate can make a fuss and annoy Rosewater, but she can’t keep her from coming here.”

It was tempting. To let go of her now self-imposed imprisonment and be free again. Unable to visit her friends again, but she couldn’t do that now. And having them visit her had dangers all on its own. Namely that their journeys might be entirely one-way.

There was too much she didn’t know and too much she feared would come to pass.

So much she hoped would come to pass. Some of which already had.

But at what cost? Cloudy’s future with Collar was… questionable. Hers was, too, but she couldn’t truly call what she’d wanted with Collar a plausible future. Not knowing what she knew now.

The important thing…

“The important thing,” Rosemary said, voicing her thoughts finally, “is making sure that I wait until Rosewater is pregnant at the least. Then, no matter what happens, Roseate can’t deny her the right to see the father of her child.”

“Reasonable…” Cloudy sighed and shook her head. “But we don’t know how long that will take. She admitted as much and I wager she knows more about her cycle than you do.”

“Probably,” Rosemary said with a sigh. “A month at most? I’ve been cooped up here for two. I can wait another.”

“Glory’s been here for three months. I don’t know how she stays sane.”

“Hate is a strong motivator,” Rosemary murmured, glancing at the wall towards Glory’s suite. “And she’s had Poppy since day one.”

“And you’ve had me.”

That was true. “I… I do hate Roseate. For what she’s done. But hate has never been a strong motivator for me. Love…” She’d done a lot for love, and to protect those she loved. She’d even given up Cloudy to protect her mother. Long ago, she’d realized that if she had fled, Rosewater would be given the impossible choice of recapturing her and bringing her back for ‘justice’ or abdicating her position and joining Rosemary. It had been, for her, an almost impossible choice.

But she’d never talked to Rosewater about the choice she’d made. It was hers, and if Rosewater knew about it, then she’d kept it to herself. She did know that afterwards, Rosewater had been an especially attentive mother in private, but had closed herself off even more from the outside world.

“I love you,” Cloudy said into the long, tense silence. She turned in place and met Rosemary with a light kiss and a nudge nose to nose. “I wish I had stayed. They had nothing they could have accused me of legally.”

“She’d have had three witnesses saying you denounced her to a group of ponies who would all say they agreed out of fear.” Rosemary nudged back. “You did the right thing, Cloudy.”

“Yeah.” Cloudy puffed up her cheeks as if getting ready to argue further, so Rosemary nipped her nose, making her deflate and laugh. “What was that for?”

“This is about the future. Our future, Cloudy.”

“Short term future, sure,” Cloudy replied, persisting. “Which is predicated on the past.”

“That we can’t change.” Rosemary nuzzled her lover again. “We can only learn from it. And one thing I learned is that I shouldn’t wait. It took me a while to figure out what I shouldn’t wait for. I thought it was romance with Collar. But it’s not.”

Cloudy searched her eyes for a long moment, but said nothing.

“It’s with you. I know I’m too young to ask, but I want you to think about it.” Rosemary set a hoof against Cloudy’s chest lightly and leaned in to kiss her lightly on the lips. “I want us to tell the world we’re committed to each other.”

Cloudy kissed her lips lightly. “Just us?”

Rosemary met her eyes briefly, searching for answers, and who Cloudy might be interested in. After a moment’s thought and putting together a few memories, she asked, “Sunrise?”

“And… maybe Platinum. They’re both mare-attracted. Sunrise is even more exclusive than I am, but Platinum is about as bisexual as you are.” Cloudy rolled a shoulder. “They’re in a relationship now and keeping it quiet, but both are at least sympathetic to our way of loving.”

“And,” Rosemary added, “there’s nothing saying that once the laws regarding bastardry in Damme are repealed, you can’t have Collar’s child under contracted pairing.” She flattened her ears and shrugged. “Or we can all migrate to Merrie after mom becomes the new Baroness and live our best life there. I’m sure there are still ponies there that would love to reconnect with you.”

“A few sent letters,” Cloudy said noncommittally. “Mostly wishing me well. I couldn’t send anything back. I still can’t. I can’t risk Rosewater being seen with my known lovers and friends lest they be targeted or she be accused of… something.”

“Having friends.” Rosemary rolled her eyes. “But what do you think? I like Sunrise, and while we’ve really only had kissing friend moments before she and Platinum got together, I think she might be interested, and I know Platinum is. I think I helped open her eyes… well.”

The mare had been a beauty sprawled on her bed, stomach heaving as she drew deep, frantic breaths after coming twice in as many minutes from Rosemary’s ministrations, her silver hair and gray coat doing little to hide the flush of cheek, belly, and nethers as she came down from the coital high.

And no hint of guilt in that look as Platinum met her eyes and used a spell to pull her closer to clean her muzzle with light kisses, licks, and not a little nuzzling as they settled in together.

Their talk afterwards, riding the afterglow of their joint venture, had ranged far and wide, from the mundane bit of trivia about the books in Rosemary’s room that were prominently displayed as conversation pieces for her visitors to ask her about, to more deep philosophical ideas that touched on the idea of having more than one lover, Rosemary’s relationship with Cloudy and bits and pieces of Platinum’s dabblings and flings with other guards and especially with Cloudy and all the ‘rumors’ going on about Cloudy’s promiscuity and the mares had had ‘affairs’ with her.

Maybe it was time to talk to her about bringing Sunrise into their little on-again-off-again brief flings. It would be a rebellion against her family, though, just like Rosewater was rebelling against hers. Except… Stride was also rebelling. In small ways that she’d seen here and there.

Talking to her. Listening to her, and befriending her against the normal teachings of the Primfeather clan. His sister was even more rebellious, having been her lover once, years ago, when they had both been exploring what it meant to be an adult in anonymous, frank sex.

Her own first rebellion against Roseate, in fact, making love to a mare from the family responsible for more than one intense, localized winter storm over the last decade.

The current storm might be more intense, in fact, simply because the Primfeathers delighted in pushing storm seed clouds into the airstreams that led back to Merrie.

That sometimes they also expanded to engulf Damme as well didn’t seem to bother them.

“I think,” Cloudy said after a long span of her own ruminating, “that I would very much like to bring them into our conspiracy of love.”

“Then, while Collar and Rosewater make sure we have a peaceful future, let’s make plans to take advantage of that future,” Rosemary said gently, a fervent light filling her thoughts and pushing back the worry over Collar’s response to her advances and her dreams. “Starting with us and how we can make sure that ponies here see us as… not threatening.”

Cloudy snorted, but didn’t argue.

“I think, tomorrow,” Rosemary said cautiously, “that we should be seen together outside the palace.”

It was cold by the window facing the storm, but Silk needed the cold then to keep her nerves from sending her into a breakdown. Something about the minute leak of cold wind every time the windows sagged inwards from the force of the wind calmed her on a level she was sure went all the way back to when her long-distant ancestors called the mountains their home.

Things were moving too quickly. Rosary was on the edge of rebellion, Vine was clearly falling in love with Dazzle, and he seemed to share the same kind of intense look throughout the dinner they’d had in order to get something in them to keep them from hangovers. Rosewater was doing… whatever she was doing, but seemed intent on making Roseate explode on pure outrage alone.

In the grand scheme of things, Dazzle and Vine starting a relationship was hardly the huge thing her mind seemed intent on making it, but it was one feather extra atop a mountainous load of worries.

Just that night, it was one feather too many.

Tomorrow, the load wouldn’t be less, but she would adjust.

Tonight…

The wind howled, fighting against the triple-latches holding the window closed against its fury and not for the first time, Silk pondered closing the storm shutters again. But the cold wind leaking through in a piercing whistle cooled her coat and ruffled her mane while the sound pushed back the whirling thoughts and worries centering around ‘How do I deal with this?’

Making plans now wasn’t the best of ideas, she knew, but the deeper part of her was still trying to. The plans the noisy part of her mind was trying to come up with included running away with Vine and just giving in to her desire somewhere nopony knew they were sisters.

After a time, maybe they would forget it, too. Just live as two mares who’d—

Stop it.

That wasn’t feasible. As much as trade was spreading there was no place they could flee that their history wouldn’t catch up eventually.

You’d live in fear that everypony already knows.

That seemed to quiet that particular part of her mind for the nonce, allowing her to worry about Vine leaving her forever and never seeing her beloved sister ever again.

A brief spate of jealousy towards Dazzle flared up inside her, quashed quickly with the reminder that Vine would no more leave her than the sun would go dark in the middle of the day.

Which circled back around to running away together.

Why not just throw open the window?

Or just open it a crack and let the cold frost her nose and eyelashes and cool the fears and madness trying to seep in through the cracks in her psyche.

How did Rosary handle it for so long?

She didn’t know.

And neither could she open the window, lest the papers she’d been working on get scattered to Tartarus and gone. She had too many dress designs from clients attached to their folios and preferences and her notes from their chats about what they wanted to make that kind of mistake.

Even the little bit of wind was ruffling the record she’d kept of creating Rosewater’s gala dress.

She couldn’t remember why she’d pulled out the notes, all of them false narratives tailored to look real and match the outcome of the dress itself. But here and there, she saw in them the real conversation she’d had with Rosewater that had shaped her desired dress.

It was the start of her own complicity in the rising rebellion against their mother.

No. Not quite. The first had been not facing down Rosewater on that ill-fated and ill-timed raid on Collar, offering ‘aid’ to the ‘enemy’.

“Stars, that feels like it was years ago,” she told the howling wind, tasting and smelling the mingled winter chill and smoky accents of dozens of chimneys with their fires. Yet even then, there had been the smoky accents in the air that said ponies were using their hearths for more than meals, leaving them to burn into the cooling nights.

Downstairs, their own hearth had been banked to flickering flames and coals, and the radiant heat from the slow-dying embers reached even here, though barely felt.

The only light came from the lone unicorn lamp outside on the street, the once-steady light relegated to the flickering uncertainty of flame by the cascading sheets of sleet and snow flying by and clinging to the frosted glass, then flowing away in the next gust.

It made the light more liquid and ephemeral look that cast strange shadows in her office. Those shapes helped distract her mind from trying to find a way out of the trap it was sure she was running into.

The trap of Roseate revealing her tryst with her sister so long ago and branding them as incestuous lovers.

“Running away with her isn’t going to solve that problem,” Silk told the window with a sigh, “so please stop trying to consider it.”

“It wouldn’t help.” Vine’s voice behind her startled her into a yelp. “It would be bliss for a few months at most. Then we’d need to run, and run, and keep running until there was nopony at all around us that could out us. Which means no ponies at all.”

“Stars, Vine.” She whirled to find her sister standing alone in the doorway, the darkness of the hallway behind her echoing the darker thoughts in her mind. She pushed them aside and pulled a pillow from a pile laying in the corner for guests and patrons. “What are you doing up?”

“I’ve given it a lot of thought, Silk. I think, sometimes, that it would be worth it. Then I think about all of our friends, the loves we’d be leaving behind. The chance at a normal life.”

Silk didn’t want to think about it. But some part of her mind wanted to. “I’ve thought it might be worth it, too. Overland instead of by sea. Just disappear one night. Tell nopony.”

Vine came closer, her eyes deep and dark pink in the flickering liquid light, her beautiful coat and mane mussed from sleeping oddly.

She gave into impulse and kissed her on the lips, something she hadn’t done in months. And immediately hated herself for it.

Vine’s surprised squeak banished the momentary lust for a life with her as her lover, reminding her why.

But she still said it, “We could do it. Everypony will be stocking up for winter, so buying long-lasting supplies and warm clothes wouldn’t look amiss. Even buying a pair of sleds and firewood and—”

“And a tent,” Vine added when Silk broke off, her tongue cloven to the roof of her mouth. “How would you explain that as a ‘normal’ purchase?”

“Yeah.” Silk slumped back and looked away from the desire in Vine’s eyes. She wanted to do it, she wanted the kiss to happen again, and she didn’t. Neither of them wanted to want it. “So there’s no way to do it, unless we steal a tent from the Dammeguard.”

“We—”

“Can’t.”

Vine huffed. “I know. We can still be together. Just not… you know. Sexually. Dazzle knows about us, and he likes me. I’m sure he’d grow to like you, too. The three of us, together, perhaps?”

That laid to silence the voice trying to say Vine was going to leave her all alone.

It was a stupid voice in the first place.

“Yeah?” Silk forced her ears to perk up. “Did he say that?”

“Not… yet. But he’s intrigued by you. Cautiously, at least.” Vine leaned in closer, raising a hoof to cover her mouth conspiratorially. “He thinks you’re pretty.”

Silk snorted. “That’s something, at least. A start.”

Dazzle lay awake listening to the storm. It would be his first full winter in Merrie, his first having been halfway through after a particularly bad argument with his parents and brother, hardline Damme traditionalists that they were.

The fact that he was here and not at the Garden weathering the storm with his already established lovers said something, didn’t it? That first night in the garden had been terrifying, liberating, and vindicating. He’d cast aside family, profession, and home to live there, and it had been everything he’d wanted. Everything that he’d dreamed it would be.

A summer of light duty after a sprain had given him plenty of chances to talk to his counterparts across the river resolving tariff disputes and the—very occasional—lunch shared with a lieutenant or sergeant from Merrie to discuss a particularly thorny issue or to commiserate on the intractability of traders trying to skirt tariff laws with the strangest and stupidest of excuses.

This was the home of ponies he’d thought, even after joining the small independent village centered around the vineyard and the villa of old style Rosethorns and Rosewines, were enemies.

But they’re not. They’re as much victims as anypony they captured for ransom.

Vine’s story hadn’t sickened him as she’d so clearly feared. He’d learned enough about the hardships that families had when raising multiple children in an openly sexual environment. With proper education and parental involvement, such things could be avoided. Without…

Dazzle breathed out and rolled over to his other side, watching the window on the other side of the room rattle and shudder. Here on the second floor, the heat rising from the fireplace down below and the heat from the stones of the chimney at the edge of the room radiating out as the smoke and heat rose from the fireplace just downstairs stayed trapped in the well-insulated rafters.

Notably, it did not linger around the floorboards and with every fresh howl that let a leak of wind through the windows, what warmth there was around the base of the bed fled.

Only the thick and piled blankets kept the cold at bay.

He would have much preferred a more natural means of generating warmth. Trying a cuddle with Vine would have been nice. She was small enough that she could tuck her head under his and not scrunch her neck.

Silk was taller by several hooves, almost shoulder-to-shoulder with Dazzle himself.

Unbidden, the thought of them laying together like he wished with Vine wormed its way through his mind. They likely did on colder nights than this, when a heavy pair of blankets was not enough to hold back the cold.

He tried not to imagine that they might desire more than merest warmth from one another.

But Vine had asked for help with divesting herself of her attraction to her sister.

And just how am I going to do that? He didn’t know the first thing about Silk aside from her prowess with all things woven and sewn, both as a tailor and as a fighter.

She’s prickly. That was one thing he knew about her. And she’d protect Vine with her life.

That Vine was the softer of the pair was clear, but no less strong of will than her older, fiercer sister. That she’d stayed mostly sane through the horrors of working under the threat of exposure for a foalish mistake years ago was a sign of her strength of mind and will.

He closed his eyes and tried to go to sleep in the warm embrace of the blankets and ignore the cold.

“He does not.” Silk’s voice filtered down the hallway.

“He does!” Vine’s muffled voice, light with laughter, made his ears perk up more.

“He told you?”

Are they talking about me? Dazzle resisted the urge to amplify the sounds of their voices through a spell for all of five seconds.

He was nowhere near as proficient as even Poppy with the spell, but he could manage crude eavesdropping if the target was particularly close, boisterous, or stupid.

“He didn’t say it,” Vine said, her voice full of the sound of the wind outside as well, making it harder to hear what she was saying. But she’d dropped her voice so when he released the spell, all he could hear was a faint murmur. “…looks at you. You can tell he’s at least appreciative. If you weren’t so stuck in the mud, you’d have seen it, too.”

“Well, forgive me for worrying about why Rosary wanted me to offload her daughter on—”

Silk’s voice cut off, and Dazzle felt a sudden pang of guilt and worry. It wasn’t the sudden, sharp cut of a spell being erected, but the sound of a pony realizing she was saying something she shouldn’t.

He imagined she was used to being able to speak her mind during storms. Not even Note could penetrate the howling storm unless he had his ear pressed against the wall. This was their haven, home, and even if Rosetail was technically living here, he doubted they’d had enough to time fully adjust to her living with them.

“Is he asleep?”

“I doubt it,” Vine said, her voice coming closer. “Who can sleep in an unfamiliar bed with a storm howling outside?”

“I don’t know. Rosewater, obviously.”

“Crown, too. She’s hardier than anypony thinks. Why would the bookworm be familiar with camping and living out of doors?” Vine snorted. “Dazzle might be a guard, but I don’t think he’s ever been on a long patrol.”

She’s right. Dazzle had always been a city pony, and the few times he’d stood guard at night, it was always in the city with a barracks bed waiting for him at the end of it. The Long Patrol guard platoon was a special set of ponies that actually enjoyed roughing it, even if they did spend every night they could in the Dammehollow inn on their way back.

“Has she told you who her lover is?”

“Who else would it be?” Silk snorted. “She has one interest aside from her shop, and that’s also contained in her shop. The only question is, which of her various Damme patrons it is.”

Dazzle debated pretending to be asleep even as they talked about their sister’s love life, but decided in the end that honesty and the hope that it would endear them to him for the warning. “I am awake,” he called out.

“He’s honest, at least,” Silk said with a snort, and her hoofsteps came closer, louder, then tapped against his door. “Are you awake and pleasing yourself to my sister, or trying to dream of her?”

“The latter.” Dazzle rolled to his belly and covered himself more fully with the blanket rather than getting up to greet them. It was still chillier than he’d become accustomed to. “Both of your sisters, actually.”

“Truly?” Silk opened the door and slipped in, leaving it open for Vine to follow her in. “You were Rosewater’s lover?”

Dazzle hesitated before answering, studying each mare in turn. They were younger than Rosewater by some years, closer to his age than he was to hers, but showed all the characteristic signs of a Rosethorn adult; muzzle slashes brighter red than Rosewaters deep crimson, pink eyes that glittered with other colors in their depths—silver for Silk and green for Vine.

And those eyes were studying him in turn, neither judging nor expecting. Vine seemed more honestly curious than Silk, though, who seemed to know already. Likely that revealing of secrets in the hallway was a test of his trustworthiness, and he’d passed. Maybe.

Is this a test or do they want to know how I’ll respond?

He swallowed. “For a while, I thought I was in love with her. My heart certainly wished I was, at any rate. But I think it was partly lust, partly affection, but not capital L love. Not like you have for your sister.” He smiled wanly. “I’m still new to the idea that love, lust, affection, friendship, and sex aren’t inextricably bound together for two ponies.”

Vine was bobbing her head enthusiastically, her beaming smile tugging at his heart even more. She was so earnest. More so than Rosewater. But she was also younger, and not scalded by the world as much.

Silk rolled a shoulder. “It takes time. Are you interested in pursuing my sister for a courtship?”

“Not in the Damme sense. Not as one alone, at least. I don’t like the idea of demanding monogamy,” Dazzle flicked a look to Vine to make sure that didn’t unsettle her. “But if she’s open to it, I would like to treat her to a very Dammeish courtship.”

“I would like that,” Vine said almost immediately. “Both Silk and I have our own separate coteries of occasional lovers, and I wouldn’t mind you mingling with them if you would like to. They can tell you all sorts of things about us that we might not think are important.” She hesitated, then, and glanced at Silk before rushing ahead, “And I would like to get to know your lovers in turn.”

Dazzle raised his muzzle briefly as if considering, then nodded sharply. “Of course. After our lunch date? I can take you to the garden to meet ponies.”

“It’s a double-date, then,” Vine said with a grin and a twinkle in her eyes. “Is that what they call it in Damme? Two dates at once?”

“Scamp, you know it’s not,” Silk said with a snort, and backed out of the door. “I’m going to bed before you infect me with silliness, Vine. Sleep well.”

Dazzle watched as a transformation came over Vine when the door closed behind her sister, some of the giddiness fading away, replaced by both uncertainty and a lower burning excitement in the set of her ears and the way she bit her lip.

“She gives you confidence,” Dazzle said gently.

“When she’s around, I feel like I can do anything.” Vine pulled her eyes away from the door and glanced at him, then focused on him with a flick of her ears. “I love that and hate it. I want to feel like I can do anything by myself without her. I don’t want her to feel like she needs to help me. I don’t want her to resent me.”

“I don’t think she does. Or would. She—”

“Has her own lovers. Will someday have her own children who look to her for help, and I don’t want to be that weird aunt who keeps nothing but flowers and can barely function.” Vine shook her head and stood up to come closer, hesitating, then firming jaw as she came to sit beside his bed.

It hadn’t passed Dazzle’s notice that Silk’s hoofsteps had stopped only after a few steps. Either her bedroom was on the other side of the wall, or she was listening in.

“You approached me on your own,” Dazzle said gently, pushing himself up further and letting the blankets slide back. Colder air pushed its way into his warm space. “You told me about yourselves on your own. Don’t put yourself into a weaker position than you are.”

She came closer, finally settling at the foot of the bed and crossed her forelegs on the mattress just a few inches from his. “I had this idealized image of you built up in my head, hearing about you from rumor and my own fancies. That you and Rosewater were so deeply in love after… what was it, a week?” She snorted. “And I fell in love with that idealized version of you and my sister starting a family.”

“You’re a romantic.” Dazzle chuckled and bent slightly to kiss the tip of her horn. “I can appreciate that. I suppose I am, too.” He started to go on, but he pushed Rosewater from his mind. She was on her own journey, and it wasn’t one he wanted to pursue, or wait for it to come back around. Days and weeks since her gentle rejection had softened the blow, but his heart still panged oddly when he thought about what might have been. “But that’s not a bad thing.”

“No.” Vine looked up at him. Then, tentatively, she sat up straighter, licked her lips, and then started to sit back down, her ears flat.

“May I?”

“Yes,” Vine blurted, then flushed and started to pull away, stopping Dazzle, then she reversed course and pressed her lips to his. It was brief, dry, and as chaste as any kiss he’d given to a mare in Damme, but her lips were soft and warm, and her eyes were alight with a spark of confused joy that sent a tingle of want pulsing through him.

“Thank you,” Dazzle murmured against her cheek when she parted. “Sleep well, Vine. I’m looking forward to our date tomorrow.”

Author's Note

I think I need to just say that I don't really have an update schedule at this time. Work is going to be in upheaval for the next several months. Several new hires, busy season, and just as much regular work as ever. Personal life, thankfully, is calmer now. Plans for the house are set, just need to save up the money and do some research about the land I'm building on. It's a three year plan, so I have lots of time to work on that. Most of the time will be saving up money, improving the land (it's pretty heavily farmed farmland, and the soil is about as dead as can be and still grow crops), and just... dreaming.