She woke up and the palace felt different.
Not because it had changed.
Because she had stopped waiting for it to feel wrong.
The morning light came through the east window in a long pale stripe across the floor.
Nora lay still for a moment, looking at the ceiling, taking inventory.
She was in the palace. Three weeks now. She had chosen to stay — not because of the agreement, not because of the patronage, but because she wanted to see what happened when Malik resolved into himself.
She had said that out loud yesterday. In the library. To him.
I said it, she thought. And he said it might take a while. And I said I wasn't in a hurry.
She got up, dressed, and went to the library.
He was already there.
This was new.
He was sitting in his chair with a book open in his lap and a cup of something hot on the table beside him. He looked up when she came in with the expression of someone who had been there long enough to settle but not long enough to stop noticing the door.
"You're early," she said.
"So are you," he said.
She went to her shelf, took her book, and sat in her chair.
After a few minutes a steward appeared with a tray — two cups, bread, something warm under a cloth.
Neither of them had asked for it.
Aldric, she thought.
She took a cup. He took the bread. They ate without discussing it, reading their separate books, the morning moving around them at its own pace.
We didn't plan this, she noted. Neither of us planned this. We just both came here and now we're having breakfast together as though that's what this room is for.
He refilled her cup without looking up from his book.
She noted this. Said nothing.
Interesting, she thought. Very interesting