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out?”
    â€œIt can hold three, can’t it?”
    â€œI think so.”
    Impatiens glanced at Drimys again. “I say we take him along—it’s his boat.”
    His friend and business partner looked unconvinced.
    â€œLook, Lycaste—” Impatiens gestured for him to sit “—we’ve come up with a sort of adventure. Use of your boat, if you grant it, should in fairness get you a place on the crew.”
    â€œWe never discussed who’s captain,” said Drimys suddenly.
    Impatiens frowned. “I think you’ll find we did . I’ve a much greater knowledge of the coastline.” He turned his attention back to Lycaste, shaking his head. “Anyway, it’s Midsummer. There’s a lot of fish about. That means those sharks should be back.”
    Lycaste stared at them, unsure again. “All right.”
    â€œIt’ll be dangerous,” said Drimys, sitting forward.
    â€œYes,” said Impatiens, “but we’re going to take precautions, we’re going to plan this down to the smallest detail.”
    â€œPlan what ?” asked Lycaste, exasperated. He looked at their expectant faces. “You mean to catch a shark? The way the boys catch fish at the Point?”
    â€œExactly.” Impatiens raised his blond, tangled eyebrows. “You can be armourer.” He glanced back at Drimys, who was shaking his head. “ Chief armourer,” he added.
    â€œBut nobody’s seen one for a year or more,” Lycaste said, knowing that might not be true. “You think they’re out there now?”
    Drimys pointed at Impatiens. “Like my most esteemed partner said, it’s Midsummer. They’re out there.”
    Lycaste stuck a finger in his mouth, worrying the nail. “I don’t know about this.”
    Drimys smirked at Impatiens as he arranged his cutlery. “I told you he’d say that.”
    â€œWhy do you need my boat?” Lycaste asked. “Can’t you use Ipheon’s?”
    â€œHis needs mending,” Impatiens admitted sheepishly, looking at his empty plate. “Just think—we’d be famous. People would come from miles around to see!”
    â€œWhy would I want people to come from miles around?” The idea terrified Lycaste more than any shark could.
    â€œI forgot—you get that sort of attention already. But we have a business, Drimys and I. We’re gentlemen of prospects. It would be excellent publicity, at the very least.”
    Lycaste met Impatiens’s eye, something he rarely did with anyone. “I don’t need more people at my door.”
    Impatiens nodded solemnly, his gaze flicking to the table. “You won’t even lend us your boat?”
    Lycaste rose from his chair. “Excuse me.”
    He walked slowly, weaving through the whispering fruit trees, sometimes craning his neck to look at the spray of cold stars and the green half-moon that had begun to rise over the hills, its light staining them with artificial colour.
    Pentas’s absence struck him as more loaded a gesture than anything she could have possibly said, and he’d felt the weight of her scorn with each glance at the empty place-setting. He reached the edge of the water—green-tinged waves that bled to black lapping gently at the stones, still warm when he dipped his foot in—and looked up nervously from the sand, knowing before he did so that there would be no one to see. He carried on along the beach with one foot in the water, deliberately going in the opposite direction from where she might be—as if the reverie might subconsciously carry him to her.
    Lycaste had contemplated leaving, perhaps returning to Kipris Isle for a year or two, but he could hardly show his face there, either. His eyes moved unseeing across the jungle of indifferent stars, wondering where he could go. There were trade ships docked in the ports of the Tenth Province that might take a wealthy