Chapter 23: Vows

I let him kneel on the cobbles for a count of ten.

Stavros did not move on the stair.

The fishwives at the stall corners had stopped selling.

"I have terms," I said.

"I would be surprised if you didn't."

"Not tonight. In three days, on the quay, at the turn of the tide, with the whole town there."

"Agreed."

"Stavros walks me down."

"Agreed."

"Zoe carries the ring."

"Agreed."

"And you say it in plain words, in front of everyone. Not the court's words. Yours."

He swallowed.

"I'm not good with words."

"You have three days."

"What if they come out wrong?"

"Then they'll be yours," I said. "That's the point."

I held out my left hand, and he put the ring on it, a plain band of grey silver.

It fit.

Before the three days were out I took it off and tied it to a ribbon, so Zoe could carry it.

Up the stair, Stavros blew his nose into his cap.

On the third day the tide turned at noon.

Half of Port Karyos stood on the quay in its best clothes.

The fishwives had tied shells into their hair.

The eldest elder sat in a folding chair at the front with her stick across her knees.

She wore a look of permanent disapproval that I had come to love.

I came down the quay steps on Stavros's arm.

I wore the grey linen dress I'd had made in the lower town, and the crown of sea glass.

Kyros waited on the stones at the water's edge, with the ring on his right hand and the sea at his back.

He had cut his hair.

Zoe came ahead of me in green, with the plain silver band on a ribbon around her neck.

She walked very slowly and with great purpose.

She stopped in front of her father and held up the ribbon.

"Don't drop it," she whispered.

"I won't."

"Don't cry either."

"I'll try."

He cried the instant I reached him.

He did not even pretend not to.

"In plain words," I said, very quietly.

Kyros turned to face the town.

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