“Thank you,” he said.
Then he walked toward the room where his mother sat surrounded by light she no longer saw and memories she could not bear to let go. He hovered outside the door, then knocked, although he knew there would be no answer. There hadn’t been in months.
He exhaled, turned the handle, and stepped into the room.
His mother sat in her usual chair by the tall window, her form small and fragile against the pale light. Her hair, once dark andglossy, was now streaked through with silver. Her hands were folded neatly in her lap, and there was a handkerchief crumpled between her fingers. She stared out at the garden… at nothing.
Her eyes did not shift when he entered.
Greyson closed the door quietly behind him. “Mother.”
There was no reply. Not even the flicker of a blink.
He approached slowly, as though his presence might startle her, though he had never known her to startle anymore. He stopped a few feet from her chair, with his hands clasped behind his back.
“How are you feeling today?” he asked softly.
Silence replied instead of her.
He nodded to himself. “Not well, I suppose. Mrs. Atherton says you were concerned about your handkerchiefs.”
He waited pointlessly.
“She says the lace is fraying unevenly.” His voice gentled. “I shall have them all replaced. The entire set.”
Still no response. His mother’s eyes remained fixed on some distant point in the frost-coated garden.
Greyson inhaled, feeling the breath tight in his chest. He tried again. “I visited Jasper yesterday. He asked after you.” He paused. “He always asks.”
All he heard was silence.
He shifted his weight, swallowing. “He and Matilda are well. The baby is walking now. I know you would be pleased about that.”
His voice cracked so faintly he doubted anyone else would have heard it. But he did.
He circled to the other side of her chair so he could see her face. She did not track him. Her gaze stayed on the glass, distant and empty. The reflection of the garden flickered across her eyes.
Greyson lowered himself into the chair opposite hers. This was his ritual, the one he had perfected over long, difficult months.
“And…” He hesitated, unsure why this felt harder to say. “I have news.”
He inhaled deeply, but there was no flicker of anything in his mother’s posture.
“A… marriage proposal.” His tone grew stiff. “A woman.” That part felt ridiculous to add, but he didn’t know how to handle this conversation. “Miss Hazel Thorne.”
He waited for something: a blink, a shift, a breath. He got nothing.
Greyson swallowed again. “You would like her. She is… respectable. Proper.” He cleared his throat. “Practical. Sensible.”
He imagined his mother answering, imagined the soft hum she once gave when he told her something she approved of. He filled the silence as he always did.
“Yes,” he murmured, as though responding to her imagined voice. “I am certain she will do well as duchess. She is… steady.”
A pause.
“No,” he said quietly, “it was not planned. But it is necessary.”
He let the weight of that truth settle on the air between them. His mother’s fingers twitched faintly around her handkerchief. It was the only movement she had made.
