Verity's mind would not cooperate.
She had descended the thirty-two steps at her usual hour, lit her usual lamps, opened her usual journal to the page she had left off the day before. She had positioned herself at the reading table with Varresh's organizational notes spread before her, ready to resume the painstaking work of mapping connections.
Three hours later, she had written exactly four words.
He kissed me and—
And what? And she had dissolved? And her entire understanding of her own body had rearranged itself around the memory of his hands? And she had spent the night staring at her ceiling, touching her own lips like a fool, unable to stop feeling the phantom pressure of his mouth?
She set down her quill.
This was ridiculous. She was a scholar. She had spent years at the Royal Archive developing the mental discipline to focus through any distraction. Through hungry afternoons and tedious committee meetings and Master Aldric's lengthy tangents about cataloguing methodology. She could certainly focus through the aftermath of one kiss.
One extraordinary, devastating, world-rearranging kiss.
Verity pressed her palms against her eyes.
I would like to touch you.
The words kept surfacing. She would be examining a document, tracing Varresh's notations, and then his voice would echo through her memory and she would lose ten minutes staring at nothing.
By midday, she had accomplished less than she typically managed in an hour. Her journal remained mostly blank. Her carefully maintained map of the archive's connections had not advanced a single node.
She was failing at the one thing she had always been able to do: disappear into her work.
It was sometime in the early afternoon when Delia descended the steps into the archives, wrapped in a thick wool shawl and carrying a package that smelled of honey and spice.
"You missed the midday meal," Delia said. "I brought provisions."
"I wasn't hungry."
"Sure you were." Delia found an empty table and sat. "You just didn't notice."
The package contained small cakes, still warm. She accepted one, more because refusing seemed like too much effort than because she wanted it.
"So," Delia said, "how was dinner?"
Verity choked on her cake.
Delia waited, eyebrows raised, while Verity coughed and reached for the waterskin.
"It was—" Verity wiped her mouth. "The report went well."
"The report."
"Yes. He found my methodology satisfactory."
"Did he."
"He complimented my thoroughness."
Delia took a bite of her own cake, chewing slowly. "And after the report?"
"There was dinner. The food was excellent."
"And after dinner?"
Verity stared at the half-eaten cake in her hands. The honey glaze was sticky on her fingers. She should wash them. She should return to her notebooks. She should do anything other than sit here while Delia watched her with that knowing expression.
