Selene came to me herself the following morning, before I'd finished dressing, with a soft knock at my door that I recognized even before I opened it. She looked tired in a way I hadn't seen from her before — not the careful, managed exhaustion she usually wore like armor, but something rawer underneath it, the particular weariness of a person who'd spent a long night finally saying things she'd been holding back for weeks. Her hair was pinned less perfectly than usual, a small, telling detail from a woman who never once let her appearance slip in front of anyone."May I come in?"I stepped aside, and she entered slowly, settling into the chair near my window rather than the one closer to the fire, putting a small, deliberate distance between us that I understood immediately as intentional, not accidental."I spoke with Kieran yesterday," she said, once she'd arranged herself, her hands folded neatly in her lap in a posture that reminded me, painfully, of our very first meeting in the
Last Updated : 2026-09-12 Read more