“Can we do more readin’ after supper?” Esther asked, standing and brushing the dirt from her knees.
“If ye like.”
“I want to finish the page we started.”
“Aye, we can finish it.” Ava stood too. “Are ye enjoyin’ it? The readin’?”
Esther thought about this seriously, in the way she thought about everything. “Aye,” she said at last. “It’s like, like havin’ a key. To things I couldnae open before.”
Ava looked at her.
“That’s a very good way to put it.”
Esther shrugged with the modesty of someone who didn’t yet know they’d said something remarkable. “Can we have bannocks?”
“We can absolutely have bannocks.”
She saw Noah twice before supper.
The first time was in the great hall. He was walking toward the east corridor with two of his guardsmen, in what she recognized as his working stride—long, fast, with his attention fixed straight ahead.
He glanced up as she crossed the opposite end of the hall, and their eyes met across forty feet of flagstone.
It lasted less than a second.
He looked away first, or she did; she couldn’t quite tell afterward. Either way, she walked the rest of the hall with her eyes on the door ahead and her ears inexplicably warm, which was absurd, and she was aware of its absurdity, and it made no difference whatsoever.
The second time was in the corridor outside the library.
She was returning a book she’d borrowed, and he was coming from the other way, alone, without guards or a purposeful stride. He simply appeared around the corner and nearly walked into her.
“Sorry…” she started.
“Me fault…” he said simultaneously.
They both stopped, with a foot of corridor between them. The book in her arms suddenly felt like the most important thing she had ever held.
He looked at her steadily, the way he always did, and she looked back, and for a moment neither of them said anything.
“How was yer day?” he said finally.
“Fine. Good, actually.” She paused. “Esther said readin’ was like havin’ a key to things she couldnae open before. She didnae ken she’d said somethin’ lovely.”
Something in his expression shifted, that small, quiet movement she was learning.
Ava held the book very tightly.
“I should get going,” she started.
“Aye.” He stepped to the side, clearing the corridor. “I’ll see ye at supper.”
She passed close enough to smell him. Woodsmoke, leather, and something beneath both that she recognized from last night and now couldn’t forget. She kept her eyes on the far end of the corridor until she turned the corner.
Then she stood with her back to the wall for a single moment, one hand pressed to the cold stone.
Pull yerself together, Ava.
She pulled herself together. Returned the book. Went to collect Esther for their evening lesson.
