The space beside me was cold, the sheets already smoothed into place. Darius was gone. But this time, the emptiness felt different. It wasn't a void. It was a space that had been filled, and the memory of it lingered like the scent of rain after a storm.
I found the book he had been reading on the nightstand, a dense, leather-bound tome on military strategy. A small piece of paper was tucked inside, marking his place. On it, in his neat, precise handwriting, were two words: *For you.*
He hadn't just left me. He had left me a piece of himself. A key.
I spent the day in the library, not with my new book, but with his. I poured over the maps and battle plans, the complex strategies and counter-strategies. It was dry, dense reading, but for the first time, it felt like I was learning the language of this world. I wasn't just reading about history. I was reading about him. About the way his mind worked.
