Page 53 of Valour

“I dare you. Oh, yes, I double dare you to,” Hester yelped, clapping her hands together. She could just imagine Emlyn’s face.

“My God, no,” Fliss said, shaking her head, then sitting on the settee, Hester joining her. “Although I am seeing him later.”

Again?! Hester’s stomach tightened. Fliss seemed to be spending more time with Emlyn than with her lately. She pressed her back into the settee. “I thought I saw him sneaking around only yesterday!”

“Yes, well…there’s not much else to do around here, is there?”

Hester snorted. “Surely there’s more to it than that.”

“What do you want me to say? We’re madly in love?” Fliss curled her legs up under her, toes touching against Hester’s.

“Well, are you?” Hester wasn’t sure she wanted to know the answer to that, but the words were out before she could stop them.

“Maybe.”

Hester’s mouth dropped open. She knew Fliss had been keeping something from her. Knew it. “Are you?!”

“If I tell you that you’ll only tell everyone and make a big song and dance about it—I mean that literally. Last time I was in love you literally made a song and a dance about it.”

Hester cackled. “I did, didn’t I? Now, how did it go….”

“Oh, please don’t—I couldn’t show my face in The Ship’s Cat for a month.”

Hester hooted a laugh. It had been rather funny. But…had it upset Fliss so much she would keep something so huge from her? “Alright, fine. Don’t tell me then.”

“And what of you? Was it you who posed as Odette to have your wicked way with the Intrepid crew? You have been known to don a wig.”

Hester scowled. “Felicity. Don’t be ridiculous.”

“Alright!” Fliss held up her hands. “Do you think it was Mei? I could see her being a dark horse.”

“No. I spoke to everyone afterwards. Perhaps the men all had the same hallucination?”

“Seems unlikely.” Fliss pulled at the ends of her hair. “It gives me the shivers talking about this, if you’re certain it wasn’t any of us.”

“I am certain.” Hester bit the inside of her cheek. The word Septimus had used was ringing around her head. Siren. And then there was the image Charlotte had shown her in the book of myths. A red-headed woman.

Fliss leant closer to her. “Let’s change the subject.”

Hester was only too keen to talk about other things. “Good idea. How is the hull fairing?”

“A bit leaky. Winston is keeping on top of things. Nothing compared to the Intrepid, though.”

“Oh?” Septimus hadn’t mentioned anything, but she hadn’t seen much of him. Deliberately kept away. She couldn’t be developing feelings for him. It was out of the question.

“They had a big leak last week, Emlyn said, but all under control now.”

“Good. Say, how go the preparations for the dog races?”

“Very well. You, Snowball and the team are fastest, and Charlotte is pretty good too.”

Of course she was the fastest. What did Fliss expect? “Who shall we enter as the third team?”

“Peggy, I reckon.”

“Alright. We did some practice races against a few of the Intrepid crew yesterday. Frank is fast, but the rest aren’t up to much. I haven’t seen His Lordship race, though. He is an unknown quantity in all this.” Hester stroked her chin, brows furrowed. It was infuriating that he hadn’t shown up to the practises.

“Urgh. I’ll wager he’s fast. Men like him are good at everything,” Fliss said.