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March 10 - March 12, 2025
“I do not think I could bring myself to win a man by slipping him a love potion,” I told her frankly, smiling to take the sting from the words. Her expression was sorrowful. “Nay, child. The potion is for you.
As long as men sail the seven seas, those bent upon mischief or profit will find it,”
“I have never, in all of my life, needed two people to shut their mouths more urgently.
Together we rapped our way down the panels, alternating to listen as the other knocked. “What are you both doing?” Tiberius demanded. “You look like figures in a fun fair.”
“Unhand me, Stoker,” I instructed. “Not until you promise not to hurl yourself into trouble,”
It was a futile gesture. The priest’s hole had been free of cobwebs. It was only the atmosphere of the place that clung to me like a spider’s silk.
“It’s not helping us to find Malcolm,” I pointed out. “That doesn’t seem to be anyone’s priority,”
“She might have been swallowed by a whale, but it’s not bloody likely,”
“I’ve read it,” he said simply. “I trade books with the parlormaid at Bishop’s Folly, and she has a penchant for French romances.
You wouldn’t like them,” he added with a malicious smile. “And why not?” “Because they always feature couples who trust one another.”
“Until you have been forced to contemplate selling your body, you have not been poor. Do not compare your situation to ours,”
“Forgive me. I quite forgot your refusal to accept anyone else’s help, your insistence upon never needing anyone, ever, for any purpose.
“I hadn’t realized you shared Stoker’s capacity for rage.” “Share it?” he mocked. “My dear lady, I taught it to him.
the pair of you doing that enraging thing where you seem to read one another’s minds.”
Stoker’s smile was slow and terrible. “You think that is love, brother? That I should kill for her?” He shook his head, his eyes locked with mine. “You are the fool, Tiberius, because you still do not understand. I do not love her enough to kill for her.” He stepped to the edge of the rock. “I love her enough to die for her.”
His arms came around me and he murmured into my hair. “We are more than family now, I think.” “More than family,” I agreed.
“Veronica Speedwell, I meant it then and I mean it now and I shall mean it with every breath until my last. I love you.”
His voice rose higher and higher as he was seized by hysteria, and it was a very long time before I forgot the sound of that laughter.
I had noticed Stoker had taken to swimming in the cold Atlantic waters twice a day to dampen his ardor.
I half expected him to protest, but I should have known him better than that. Adventure roared in his blood as it did in mine, and once more we would embark together.
“Shall we begin? Hand in hand?” “And back to back,”
