By midday, the house had begun moving on its new lines as though they had belonged to it longer than a single morning.
Not perfectly. Nothing about the last days had left room for perfection. Women still paused half a beat too long at turns that used to belong to them alone. Guards still reached instinctively for routes Rowan had already written and Grimridge had already torn away from her. Nessa still checked the key chest with the same fierce mistrust each time someone crossed too near it, and Mara still limped harder than she admitted whenever she thought no one important was looking. Even so, the practical body of the house was learning itself again at a speed Rowan had never wanted it to reach.
Bath women no longer moved by bath routes alone. Stores women no longer carried cloth or lists or cabinet heads without crossing those tasks through other hands.
