The third, she began to understand.
By the second week, she stopped expecting him to come to her.
She slept alone, waking in the early hours and listening for his steps anyway, because her body had not learned to let go of hope even when her mind tried to drag it away.
Sometimes she rose before dawn and lingered near his chambers, pretending to admire a tapestry in the corridor or to speak with a passing servant.
“Cold night,” she’d say, as if she were there only to remark on the weather.
“Aye, me lady,” the guard would reply, and his eyes would flick to her face with the pity of a man who had noticed too much.
Maxwell never emerged.
She knew he was not sleeping. Not truly.
Once, late at night, she passed the study and saw light beneath the door, a thin line of gold against the dark corridor. She paused, hand hovering near the handle, wanting to knock, but did not.
Because she could already imagine the cold voice. The clipped words,
“I have work.”
Once, near dawn, she smelled smoke on his cloak when he brushed past her without stopping, his shoulder nearly grazing hers.
“Maxwell,” she said before thinking.
He halted, turning only halfway, eyes already distant.
“Ye should rest,” she said, and her voice betrayed her, too soft, too personal.
“I have,” he lied, flat and quick.
She searched his face. “In the study?”
His gaze sharpened, as if she had dared to name something he did not want seen.
“Go back to bed, Ariella,” he said.
It was a command.
She nodded and stepped aside, letting him pass.
Only when he was gone did she realize her hands had begun to shake.
She told herself she was not in love with him.
She told herself this was normal.
That marriages forged in urgency or obligation did not bloom like songs. Warriors did not pause to tend to feelings while enemies gathered.
She told herself many things.
She took her meals alone. Sometimes in her room, with Isla hovering quietly and pretending not to notice what went untouched on the tray.
“Eat,” Isla would say, too blunt to soften it. “If ye faint, I’ll have to carry ye, and I daenae want to carry ye.”
Ariella would force herself to swallow a few bites just to quiet her maid.
Sometimes she ate in the kitchens, where the warmth of the hearth and the scent of bread softened the sharp edges of her thoughts.
