Did he mention fault only because he secretly knew it was her fault? “I brought him into this, Leftrin. He wasn’t your idea of tough, I know. But in his own way, he was strong, capable, and very competent. He was Hest’s right hand. I’ll never know why he decided to send him with me.” Her words stuttered to a halt. Unless Hest had believed that she deserved the kind of watching over her that Sedric had tried to provide.

“I wasn’t saying he wasn’t a good man, only that I doubted he was a good swimmer,” Leftrin said gently. “And we don’t have to give up hope. We’ve got a strong man looking for him. I think Carson wants to find him as badly as you do.”

“I’m grateful to him. I don’t know how to thank him for being so determined.”

Leftrin gave a small cough. “Well, I think he’s hoping that Sedric will do the thanking. Them being the same kind of men and all.”

“The same kind of men? I can’t think of two men more unlike.”

Leftrin shot her an odd look and then shrugged. “Like enough in the ways that matter to them, I’m thinking. But let’s let that go. It’s enough to say that Carson won’t give up easily.”

“SO WHY DID you do it, then? If you didn’t think you were, well, in love with him?”

Jerd lifted one shoulder. “I guess that I’d decided I was going to live my own life just as soon as I left Trehaug. It was like keeping a promise to myself. And”—she smiled wryly—“he was the first. It was flattering, I guess, that someone as soft-skinned as him would, well, want me. I don’t have to explain that to you. After a lifetime of being told that no one should touch you, that no one would or could touch you because you were born too much of a monster? Then a soft-skinned boy with a gentle manner doesn’t seem to think it matters…that just made me feel free. So I decided to be free.”

“So.” Thymara swallowed and tried to think how to phrase her next question. She was the one who had sought Jerd out. And she’d been surprised that the other girl hadn’t rebuffed her attempts at conversation. Neither of them had brought up Thymara’s spying on her and Greft. With a bit of luck, neither of them would. Perhaps Jerd was as uncomfortable about that as she was. She considered her question one last time. Did she really want to know?

“So, then, he came to you. Not you to him.”

Jerd glanced across at her and made a disparaging face. “I followed him into the woods. Is that what you’re asking? Or are you asking who touched whom first? Because I’m not sure I remember…” She sat up straighter, put her hand on her slight belly, and asked, “Why do you care, anyway?”

Thymara was suddenly sure that Jerd did remember, perfectly well. And she saw that she had just handed the other girl a little knife that she could use to dig at her anytime she wanted. “I don’t know,” she lied. “I just wondered.”

“If you want him, you can have him,” Jerd offered magnanimously. “I mean, I’ve got Greft, you know. And it isn’t like I wanted Tats permanently. I wouldn’t take him away from you.”

So she thought she could. Could she? “And you didn’t want Rapskal permanently?” Thymara countered. “Nor any of them?”

If she’d thought to pierce the other girl, she’d missed. Jerd gave a laugh. “No, not Rapskal! Though he was sweet, so boyish, and so handsome. But once with him was enough for me! He laughed in such a silly way; very annoying. Oh! I’m sorry he’s gone, though. I know you were close, and I’m sure you didn’t find his silly ways annoying at all. It must be very hard for you to lose him.”

The bitch. Thymara willed her throat not to close, her eyes not to tear, and failed. It wasn’t that she’d been in love with him. He was just too strange. But he’d been Rapskal and her friend; his absence left a hole in her life.

“It is hard. Too hard.” Without apology or explanation, Thymara swung her legs to the other side of the railing and hopped down. As she did, she felt a brief vibration of sympathy from Tarman. As she walked away, she let her hand trail along the railing, assuring him of her mutual regard for him. She saw Hennesey, the mate, give her an odd look and immediately lifted her hand from the railing. He gave her a slow, unsmiling nod as she passed. She’d crossed a line just then and she knew it. She wasn’t part of Tarman’s crew and had no right to communicate with the ship that way. Even if he had started it.

That thought brought an unwelcome comparison to what Jerd had said about Tats. She forced herself to think about it. Did it matter if Tats had initiated things with Jerd? Wasn’t it something that was over and done with?