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“If we only knew where it was.”

“Bollocks.”

“Precisely.”

When Briar made it back downstairs, Ethan was still in the garden.

Not only that, but he appeared to be mending her broken door.

Sorcha grinned. “I’ll leave that in your capable hands.”

“He’s after the moon charm,” Briar said.

“That’s not all he’s after.”

“Don’t be daft.”

Sorcha snorted. “One of us is being daft, and it’s not me.”

“He tied me to the mast of his ship!”

“Oh, well now, things are getting interesting. Do tell.”

Briar laughed. It was nice to know she had not forgotten how to in the last twenty-four hours. “Oh, go on.”

Sorcha waggled her eyebrows suggestively before darting out the front door.

“Wait,” Briar called after her. “Aren’t you going to the oak tree? For solstice?”

“I’ve had more than enough of the village for one day. Send word if you need me!” Sorcha waved and vanished into the fields, her red hair bright as copper pennies.

Briar noticed more than a few neighbors gathering on the road and casting glances in her direction. She smiled her shopkeeper smile and locked the door. Firmly. She added a sigil for privacy for good measure. Her mother had created it for her customers who bought love spells for someone who they had not married, or should not be seen with. Briar would also wash the windows with salt water as soon as possible. But first, she needed to get Ethan away from the cottage.

Unfortunately.

Fortunately.

Snapdragon, normally peevish by nature, looked smitten. If a swan could look smitten. Not a good sign. Especially when she pecked at Briar’s feet to hurry her along outside. “Not you too,” she muttered.

Ethan had fixed the warped hinges. The sun glinted on his silver rings, his sun-browned forearms. His sleeves were rolled up, which made perfect sense on a ship, but was rarely seen in Haven. If it wasn’t the thing in Mayfair, it wasn’t the thing in Haven.

Mayfair was missing out.

“One of the hinge pins was bent,” he said. There was a stamped tin ship’s anchor votive pinned to his shirt, the same tattooed on his right forearm. “Easy enough to fix. Looked worse than it was.”

She could only stare as he lifted the door off the ground and fit it into place, before working the screws through the doorjamb. He made it look easy, muscles flexing in the sun. The grass was warm as it tickled her ankles, growing a little faster than was natural. The hollyhocks swayed on their tall stalks, as though reaching for Ethan. He did not notice, thankfully. Snapdragon extended her long neck, magical light sparking like sun on water. Briar just shook her head. This was getting embarrassing. Wasn’t it bad enough that her sister was a thief and now the whole island would be hunting for her? Did Briar also have to have some kind of magical physical manifestation every time Ethan glanced her way?

“Thank you,” she said, softly, trying not to sound featherbrained. No one had ever done anything like this for her before. For some reason she had to clear her throat. “That was kind of you.”

Ethan did not smile but his eyes were not unkind, only wry. “I’m not kind.”

She wondered about that. He made it sound like a warning, and there was a definite flutter in her chest at his stern, uncompromising tone, but she was not entirely convinced. He was here for her sister, for the moon charm. She wasn’t a fool. But there was something else to him, something beneath the surface. “Well, thank you all the same,” she said.

“Keepers will be back,” he said. “I don’t fancy making things easy for them.”

“Nor I.” And now she could walk down to the village square. It was tradition to gather at the oak tree and tie ribbons and small flower wreaths for good luck. By the end of the week, there would also be ashes from the solstice bonfires in little glass vials for sale, as well as seawater gathered under the noon sun, Pegasus feathers, and hagstones from the beach. Painted gold, naturally.

If Briar did not attend, it would be noticed, and she could not afford to be noticed. It wouldn’t be long now before Petal’s name began to be whispered. Briar imagined it had only been quiet this long because the Keepers wanted the advantage. And the Iron Crows, like Ethan. And since Briar always tied ribbons to the oak tree at Midsummer and she always sold wreaths and circlets of flowers, she would do so today. Even if the idea of leaving Petal made her break out in hives. Her sister was as safe as she could be for the moment. And the moment was all Briar had, all she could focus on.