Argider stepped through the doorway and let his eyes adjust to the dim light. Inside, he saw what looked like any other living room, simply smaller and round. A pair of sofas faced each other in the center of the room, atop a faded carpet. An oil lamp sat on a table at the end of each sofa. The walls were decorated with dried floral wreaths and old maritime paraphernalia: ropes and fishing nets and mooring spikes. An old compass sat beside one of the lamps, next to a yellowed book, perhaps an almanac of years past.
"It may not be large," Esma said, closing the door behind her, "but it's comfortable. I remember playing in here as a child, on rainy days. That compass belonged to my grandfather, and how I cherished it so much back then! I always pretended I was a seafaring captain looking for safe harbor."
"And you found it, I assume?" Argider picked up the compass and turned it over in his hand. It still worked.
"Always. I was a child then. There was no other way for my stories to end." She let him linger and look for a moment longer, then walked toward the stairs. "Above us is the storage room; not remarkable. But you might remember the room above that."
How could he forget the little cramped kitchen! The table still took up most of the room and was decorated with a vase full of the last wildflowers of the season. The stove was still warm from making coffee, and heated the rest of the room to the point where sweat began to prickle along Argider's temples. How little he'd known the night he slept beside this stove: he'd never expected to find healing and usefulness on this island. He'd never expected to trust anyone with his story, let alone to find warmth and refuge in her arms. That night, he'd thought himself good as dead already, and would not have fought Death had it come for him; now, he spent every spare half-hearted prayer keeping it at bay.
Esma rearranged the flowers. "I hope the memory isn't too upsetting."
"Not at all. It isn't particularly clear, to begin with."
"Truthfully?"
"Truthfully... it seems like years ago." He ran his fingertips over the grain of the wood table. "Another lifetime."
"I understand. A lot has changed." She looked up at him. "Do you miss the sea?"
He cracked a grin. "How can I? It's all around us."
Esma laughed. "No, I mean, do you miss being on the sea?"
"Some days. It's in my blood, it's all I've ever known."
"Only some days?"
"On others... it frightens me. The sea has given me many things: work, food, lodging, meaning. But she's also taken many things. She's taken ships and cargo and lives, even from people who still breathe."
"Will you return to her, someday?"
Argider's shoulders dropped. "I don't know. I still hear her call—I always will—but I feel less inclined to answer it these days. I don't know when that might change."
"For all the sea gives, she takes," Esma murmured. "I'll not fight her if she wants you back." She climbed the first stair. "We're almost to the top. Come."
They passed without comment through a narrow bedroom with a small bed pushed against the wall, an old footlocker beside it, and emerged on a level full of light. A clockwork mechanism stood before them, and above them, the lighthouse's lantern and lenses.
"This is the heart of the lighthouse," Esma explained. "All of its operation is run from here." She grabbed a crank on the side of the clockwork and turned it. "It's a fairly reliable mechanism. Fully wound, it can run for about two days before needing to be turned again. Try it."
It was no secret to him that Esma was strong, but he underestimated the force needed to wind the clockwork. He could hear the gears groaning to life above him, and beneath that, Esma's soft sounds of approval.
"That's it," she said. "The sound of light. It's a bit sturdier than it looks, isn't it?"
"I've a new appreciation for your strength." Argider stepped back and watched the gears run and the lenses turn above him. "Can we go up there?"
"Certainly! This is only half the work down here. The lenses need polishing, and the lamp needs filling and trimming." She proceeded to demonstrate these duties, with efficiency and a smile she was probably unaware she wore.
"I may have mentioned before that it's not a lot of work, but it must be done frequently," she continued, shaking soot and dust from a piece of cloth. "Would you be interested in keeping watch with me sometimes? I will teach you all you need to know, and, frankly, I could use the company."
Argider looked past Esma to the sea, calm and blue on this late summer's day. He had spent nearly his whole life on the water, searching for home, for redemption. But it had given him neither, and certainly nothing like what he found in Esma. The strength, the understanding, the chance to start anew.
He smiled and took the cloth from her hand. "Show me what I need to do."
* * *
The weather was favorable for the first nights of Argider's watch. As such, he found there was very little to do. He and Esma took their supper in the kitchen, then sat in the lantern room and gazed at the sky, at the stars that appeared between swaths of light.
"Have you ever sailed by the stars alone?" she asked one night.
"No, but I've sailed with captains who had. I think I would have enjoyed it myself."
"Why?"
"The sense of freedom, of risk. The feeling of being so, so small compared to the sky above. The ease of getting lost. The adventure of finding the way."
"For the romance of it, then." She nudged his shoulder with her own.
"I suppose you could call it that. Haven't you had impractical dreams?"
"Oh, plenty. But none that involved venturing on the sea."
"Where did you go?"
"To the clouds, and over land." She tossed back her head and narrowed her eyes. "I've seen pictures of balloons and their riders, and I wondered what it felt like to be so free. To defy nature so boldly. I wondered what the clouds looked like up close, how much the farm fields might resemble a patchwork quilt from far away. I wondered what it might be like to leave this island, the lighthouse, the sea far behind in favor of the air.
"But I was very young then. My heart still yearned for the unknown. Now, it finds comfort in the familiar."
"I must say, I envy you that."
"What?"
"Comfort in the familiar." Argider turned toward her. "I've never been anywhere long enough to become familiar with it."
"What about here?"
"This may be the longest I've stayed anywhere since I began sailing."
"And how does it make you feel?"
He paused a moment, letting a smile spread across his lips. "Comfortable."
Esma laughed. "There you have it! No need to envy me now."
He pulled her close and they continued to watch the sky. He wondered if he meant what he said, or if he had only said it to please her. It was true that he'd found a level of comfort with her, but was it the same as the comfort of a home? What was a home, anyway? Years of searching had yielded no answer; perhaps, he ought to take what comfort he could find without question, as long as it might last.
* * *
Storms came up on Aselada Island fast and fierce. Argider had weathered three already, and found each time that he was not prepared for them to begin. Perhaps because there was so little preparation to do in a lighthouse compared to on a ship. There was no securing hatches and cargo holds, no running rigs and pulling up sails, no rain and sea spray in his face, blinding and choking him as he held tight to the rigging. Instead, there was a period of absolute calm broken suddenly by thunder, or a splash of rain against the glass. Then he was left scrambling to light the lantern well before sunset and turn the clockwork to make sure the lighthouse worked throughout the night.
Esma supervised him during these storms, ready to help if things went awry, but otherwise letting him learn how to man the lighthouse himself. At suppertime, she took over the watch so he could eat, and retired the moment he returned. A curious question came to his mind.
"When you're alone up here during a storm, do you eat?" he asked.
"If I have enough warning, I can prepare something beforehand, but if not, then no. Not until the storm has passed." Lightning flashed behind her, its resultant thunder rattling the glass.
"How long have you gone without eating?"
"Without a meal, almost three days, but I make sure to keep other foods on hand. Grain bars I've baked myself, some fresh fruit if it's in season. I pride myself on remaining at the ready."
He let out a low whistle, then turned to scan the eastern horizon. No ships in sight, yet.
"What about you?" she asked, sitting down near his feet. "I can't imagine that ships are that much more generous with their rations."
"Two and a half days, without fresh fruit." He smiled down at her. "The captain got a bit greedy with the labor, picked up too many of us at one harbor, then refused to feed us until he got rid of the extras at the next port."
"And you still didn't get off the ship."
"That's not even a question; you know me well, already. I had nowhere to go but onward, 'til the trip was over. Then turn around and do the same thing all over again." Lightning flashed and raindrops lashed the glass.
"Did you never get tired of doing that?"
Argider's smile faded to a thoughtful frown. "Never thought to get tired, I suppose. Just kept doing what I knew. But now—" He scowled at the clap of thunder. "—now I can see it. In the ships that drift in, in the sailors that disembark in Calmeni harbor: the wobbling masts, the sailors' slumped shoulders. That kind of work robs the life from you, and I wonder, do I look like that? Did I give up too much of my life to the sea?"
"You didn't look terribly well when I found you." Esma flashed a playful grin. "But I suppose those were unusual circumstances. Since you've recovered, however, I don't see what you mentioned. You look healthy and strong to me."
"Old?"
"No older than myself. Alas, time is one thing we can't control." She rose and studied their reflections in the glass. "Overall, you look very good. I guess the island air has done wonders for you."
"Not only the air." He winked at her and took her hand. She squeezed it and laughed.
"This is no time to get sentimental. You're on watch. I'll be nearby if you need help, but this watch is yours."
He nodded and released her hand, then turned back to the sea. More wind, more rain, but no ships. It was going to be a long night.
The storm cleared in the small hours before sunrise, no ships having sailed through it, and Argider sat heavily on the floor of the lantern room. Barring the arrival of fog, his work was nearly done for the night. Esma came up the stairs, clad in a coarse robe, and greeted him with a kiss on the top of his head.
"Your first solitary watch," she said, "and you survived. I'm proud of you."
Argider groaned. "Does it get any easier with time?"
"Not necessarily easier, but more tolerable. You learn to find the right kind of distractions—enough to engage your mind without taking your attention away from the sea—and the night passes much more quickly."
"Any suggestions?"
"I prefer books. Sometimes, a wooden puzzle, or some mending. I do think it's important, though, to get used to the monotony first; that's what drives most lighthouse keepers mad, after all."
"I sincerely hope you're jesting at my expense."
"Mostly." She took his arm and pulled him to his feet. "Now, go lie down and rest. I'll take the remainder of the watch. You've done well."
He shuffled downstairs to the bedroom and flopped across the bed but did not sleep. His freedom to focus on anything but the sea reenergized his mind, and he idly entertained a parade of pointless thoughts, until he lingered on one in particular. The night before had seemed interminable to him, but he realized that that was exactly the kind of nights Esma had spent here for the last eight years. And instead of complaining, instead of commiserating with him over the drudgeries of her work, she remained practical and upbeat.
Was she always like that? It was hard to believe that was the case when she started. What was her first solitary—truly solitary—watch like? No one to bid her good morning or tell her she did well. No one to help her if she faltered. No one to talk to or share her meals with. Argider exhaled slowly. If he thought he'd faced loneliness while watching the sky all night, he was gravely mistaken; he had been looking at loneliness all along. Loneliness that wore a mask of efficiency, loneliness with a smile bright enough to obscure the darkness within.
It had only been one night, but he believed he understood Esma better because of it. He knew she had been alone for years, but he never understood what alone meant until then.
Unable to sleep, he climbed the stairs to the clockwork deck and watched the first rays of sun stream through the lighthouse windows. Esma paced above, extinguishing the lantern and checking the horizon.
"Clear morning," he heard her say. "What a relief."
And there she was, at the top of the stairs, undoing the knot in her robe, swathed in the rose-gold light of dawn. She smiled at him, that same dreamy smile he'd seen in the cabin months ago, then drew her brows together in confusion.
"You're still awake?"
Argider shrugged. "I lay down, but couldn't sleep. My mind wouldn't settle."
"Ah, yes. That can happen sometimes. Would you like me to make anything for you? Breakfast? Tea?"
"No, thank you."
She descended to the clockwork level, her robe fluttering open to reveal a thin white nightgown beneath. A delicate bow adorned its collar, just low enough that Argider could see where Esma's skin had not become familiar with the sun. He gently grasped the edge of her robe between his fingers and looked into her eyes. Esma didn't flinch, didn't look away.
"Is something wrong?" she asked.
"Last night," he said, sliding the material between his fingertips, "felt like it would never end. The hours of staring into darkness, of keeping my mind in the moment and not letting it slip into darkness itself, were excruciating. I felt at once powerful and powerless. I kept the light that cut through the darkness, but I wasn't actually doing anything. I felt small, smaller than I ever could under a sky full of stars. And I felt, I think for the very first time, truly alone."
Esma reached up and cupped his cheek in her hand.
"Is that what it's like for you?" Argider went on. "Is that what loneliness is?"
She nodded.
"How did you live with it for so long?"
"Necessity. I wasn't going to give up this lighthouse, my only home, simply because I had no one else to live with."
"You could have asked for help."
Esma shook her head. "The thought never crossed my mind. You see, this place is sacred. It's my history, my legacy. I couldn't let just anyone in. I needed someone I can trust, someone who understands my work. Understands me."
Argider slipped the robe over her shoulder and let his fingertips trail over her skin and the smooth contour of muscle. She shivered beneath his touch, and he drew a sharp breath as the sensation rippled through his own body. "And you think," he whispered, " that I'm that person?"
"I know it." She slid her hand into his hair, her gaze entreating. "Please don't prove me wrong, Argider! I don't think I could bear it. Even if you have to lie to me, even if it's only for a little while—"
He pulled her close and silenced her with a kiss, hard and passionate, so far removed from those they'd shared before. She did not resist; in fact, she rose to meet him, clinging to his shoulders, a quiet moan slipping from her throat. When they parted, breathing heavily, he looked down to see the color risen in her face, a hungry sheen in her eyes.
"I don't have to lie," he said. "I'm honored."
She stared at him for a moment, letting the meaning of his words settle in her mind. Then, with little warning, she kissed him again, opening her mouth to him and laying her whole weight in his arms. Argider stumbled backward for a few steps, then slowly sank to his knees, pulling her down with him, letting their bodies entwine.