Rena inhaled sharply, flushing with embarrassed fury.

Squinting, Marja jabbed toward Jacob. “And this other fellow?”

Parsh, who had always been a little afraid of Marja, stammered an introduction.

Marja pursed her lips, studying Jacob for a long moment before turning to him with a sniff. “You’ll be coming back for the next order, Jacob?”

Jacob stood up straighter. “I expect so, ma’am.”

“Bring the cart back with you. It’s not like I can transport your food up the street.”

Parsh assumed Rena’s former position between the cart handles. “Why don’t you just stay here a little longer, Jacob, and wait for the next batch? I can handle this myself.” Lacing his fingers together, he stretched in an obvious attempt to show his muscles.

Rena rewarded Parsh with a tight-lipped smile.

Rena and Marja watched the young man dissolve into a curtain of fog before Marja pulled Rena toward the bakery. “Nice enough boy,” Marja said. “If Kail weren’t available, I’d tell you to accept Parsh.”

Rena refused to rise to Marja’s bait in front of Jacob. No need to give her aunt more ideas.

Marja pressed in the alphanumeric combination that unlocked the bakery’s business door, kicked the doorjamb into place, and raised a hinged section of counter, allowing her to step into the staging area. To Rena, she handed over trays of pale green nut puddings in fluted pastries, cookies erupting with candied fruit, and whole cakes frosted in a multitude of colors, the bakery’s signature, a series of white, interconnected ovals, etched into the surface. Jacob asked Marja what he could do to help. She tossed an apron over the counter, shoved a bucket with cleaning solution at him, and told him to start wiping fingerprints off the windows and doors. The trio worked in silence until another buzzer from the kitchen announced that the next batch was baked. Marja excused herself, leaving Jacob and Rena alone in the storefont.

“Why hello, Jacob Sisko,”Rena said under her breath. “Makes sense that the son of the Emissary is moonlighting as a steward to ladies in distress.”

“Talked to Kail lately?” Jacob retorted.

“Not today. But if you stay around a little longer, I’ll introduce you when he stops by for his morning pastry.” Rena unfastened the display cases mounted in the street-facing windows and started arranging the showy dessert pastries.

In his efforts to reach a particularly smudged windowpane, Jacob stood behind Rena and reached over her shoulders to spray the cleaner. Crouched down, Rena stepped back to survey her work and bumped into Jacob’s chest. The pastry tray she’d been holding tipped, sending a dozen mousse-filled puffs skidding down the polished surface; her heart plunged to her knees. She shifted the tray’s angle, preventing the pastries from splattering on the floor. She steadied her nerves before saying, “I don’t know what you’re trying to prove.”

“I’m just a hungry man who came searching for his morning meal,” Jacob said, retiring the cleaning bottle to the bucket.

Marja appeared carrying a smaller bread basket on each of her hips. “You two. Take this to Fofen.”

A protest would reveal more about her connection to Jacob than she wanted her aunt to know, so she accepted Marja’s basket without complaint and started out the door to Fofen’s, Jacob following by her side.

In spite of the strain between them, Rena was surprised how easily she slipped into the cadence of Jacob’s walk, just as she had when they hiked for the River Road. She stole a glance at him and wished there were a way they could start again. Starting over long before yesterday would work, too, back when she left secondary school and marrying Kail had seemed to fit perfectly into her life. But she had to remind herself of her commitment to Topa. Live for Bajor. Live for Mylea. Don’t let our ways pass into history. Give them to my grandchildren, he’d said.

Only a nudge from Topa’s paghcould have served as a greater reminder of her obligations than hearing Kail’s voice through the fog. Rena gathered that he was discussing solstice at Yyn with Parsh.

As they came into sight, Kail smiled broadly. “My woman has brought me food. Excellent.” He reached into the basket and took a roll. Rena slapped his hand; in response, Kail placed a peck on her cheek. She wished he’d make less of a show of their relationship. Poor Parsh looked on wistfully; he’d been soft on Rena since they were schoolchildren, and Kail’s displays merely reinforced what Parsh would never have with Rena. When they were younger, Rena had found Kail’s possessiveness endearing. Now it seemed a little cruel. Or maybe she was being overly critical because of her frustration. After Kenda, I should have stayed gone.

Throwing a thick, muscled arm around lanky Parsh’s bony shoulders, Kail squeezed him good-naturedly, coaxing a pained flush in his pale cheeks. “I was just extending an invitation to Parsh to join our group next week. He’s never been to Yyn before.”

Rena rolled her eyes. “Parsh isn’t the only one.”

When Jacob materialized beside Rena, Kail scrutinized him, probably comparing the newcomer with himself. Rena made her own comparison, deciding that two men couldn’t be more different. Kail, with his ruddy, clean-shaven complexion and shoulder-length curly blond-brown hair, evinced the strength of an arena wrestler, while darker Jacob stood taller than Kail but had a ropy muscularity that suited him for springball.

“Of course you haven’t been to Yyn, or we’d have had our wedding night already.” He winked at her.

Jacob looked genuinely puzzled, so Parsh explained the custom that on solstice night a couple need only take one of the thousands of Auster’s candles lighted at the ruins to be granted the privileges of married couples. The “blessing” lasted only until morning, in accordance with the legend. Rena felt Jacob’s eyes on her as Parsh explained, in his usual delicate terms, that the tradition typically resulted in a host of births in late fall.

“Why doesn’t Jacob join our group?” Parsh asked. “He’s not Bajoran. He’s a writer. He might find a story at Yyn. Besides, Halar would enjoy his company.”

Without moving his eyes from Rena’s face, Jacob nodded. “I’d like that. Count me in.”

The prospect of spending solstice caught between Kail’s expectations of sex and Jacob’s mind games pushed Rena too far. She shoved her basket at Parsh and announced that Marja needed her back at the bakery immediately. Kail called after her as she marched back up the hill, but Rena ignored him. If he cared about her feelings, let him prove it. Let Jacob prove it, too. Through the bakery doors and down the hall past Topa’s room, she blew past Marja, and stomped up the stairs to her room.

“We’ll have customers soon!” Marja called after her.

“I’m working on Topa’s memorial,” she said, and slammed her bedroom door. Once inside, she threw herself down on the floor and pulled her art supplies—charcoal, pastels—out from beneath her bed. Then she cast them aside and settled on paints. No amount of searching uncovered a canvas or even a large sheet of hardcopy, so she yanked the plain sheet off her bed and tacked two adjoining corners to the wall with hairpins shoved deep into the plaster. Stretching the sheet out the rest of the length of the wall, she affixed the remaining corners similarly. The rising morning temperature started making the attic room uncomfortably warm. Rena didn’t care. She peeled down to her chemise and started painting.

She didn’t think about strokes or composition or colors as she laid down a thick layer of black-green, the color of Mylea’s ocean churned up by a storm. Blue—Topa’s eyes—came next, followed by angry reds and gashes of yellow. Flecks of paint stuck to her eyelashes: she brushed them aside with her forearm, leaving a rainbow of smudges on her skin. If Marja had called her, Rena hadn’t heard. The shadows lengthened with the changing light. If she felt hunger pangs or thirst, Rena ignored them. She knew only the demands of her brush and the shifting kaleidoscope of emotions pouring out in colors on her wall. At last she came to the browns—the warm, soothing brown of soil, soaked with water, peaty with leaves and dried moss. The color of her father’s skin, the color of Jacob’s skin, the color of her own. And when the last dab of paint left her palette, in the dimming of the day, she collapsed, weary, on the ground, and scooted back against the opposite wall to see what she had created. She had no idea what had been born of her brush, she only knew that she couldn’t go on without it being poured out of her body into something outside of herself. Jacob’s words returned to her. She cursed aloud. Why in the name of the Prophets did it keep coming back to Jacob?