Answer the door

You slip out of bed and bad over to the door. Reluctantly, your heart pounding in your breast, you open the latch of the door. The old lighthouse keeper Erven is waiting in the hall with a candle cupped in his hands. He is wearing his woolen coat over his bare chest and has put on some trousers since the last time you saw him.

"Sister Sabine," he says. "We should speak. Please."

"Of course," you say, not knowing how else to reply to the man who is sharing his hospitality.

You follow him out of the room and descend the stairs with him. You pass by Lahana who is stark naked and making her bed in a lower bedroom. She smiles sweetly at you and waves, seemingly unconcerned with her nudity. Goddess, she is gorgeous, her body trim and yet shapely, as if she has been streamlined for diving into the water. Her sea green eyes flash at you in the light of the candle Erven is carrying.

Erven has set out cups of tea in the kitchen and you sit down at the worn table, mindful of the shortness of the gown Lahana has given to you. Erven sits down across from you and takes a deep breath.

"I know what you saw tonight might be strange, even wrong to your sensibilities. But it is not exactly as it seems, sister."

"I made no criticism," you say.

"I thank you for that. I wish you had not seen it, but... Lahana is not like you and your friend. She is the daughter of my love for a merfolk. I met her mother when I was a sailor in the king's navy. We made love in a lagoon one night and Lahana was born. I did not see her until a few months ago. She had reached her eighteenth year and among the merfolk that is time to seek their first mate."

Your expression of shock must have caught his attention. He chuckles and nods his head.

"I know, it is an unbelievable tale, but Lahana sought me to be her first. Among the merfolk it is not unusual for fathers to breed with their daughters and it is considered lucky for a landfather - that's me - to be a girl's first. I was lonely and she looked so much like her mother and... well... she was insatiable."

"I see," you say, although you don't.

Erven drains his cup of tea and bangs the tin cup against the table. He looks at you, his tone changing, and he reaches across the table to your hands.

"I have desires for human women too. You're so very beautiful, Sabine. Like a dream I never knew I had."

"Th-thank you," you say. Erven, though much older, is quite handsome in a rugged, sea-worn way. His hands are so rough and you find yourself lost in the blue of his eyes. You can see how a mermaid and even his daughter might be attracted to him.

"I respect your oath, very much. I light candles to the Burning Rose on the high holiday and I had a charm of hers on my neck until a certain visit in the first port we stopped in when I joined the king's navy." He stands and slowly walks around to your side of the table. His fingers tilt your chin to look up at him. "I would never ask you to abandon your faith. But there are other ways to pleasure, Sabine. I ask only for a kiss."

You want to kiss him. This is not the daemonic influence you felt in the abbey, this is raw lust, colored by what you saw earlier, and a desire for fatherly (perhaps grandfatherly) comfort. Something you have not felt since joining the Order of the Burning Rose. You know if you kiss him, there will be more. Can you trust him to guide you safely?