“Lyra?”
My body jerked, my eyes flying open. I blinked, the world coming back into focus. When I finally glanced to the left, Anna’s brow was raised, her eyes soft.
“I was just taking a rest,” I said, quickly folding up the classified letters before me.
Anna nodded, although her gaze twinkled as she wandered over and placed a steaming cup near me. Bitter, nutty steam rose and curled in the air.
“My aunt wanted us to take a break after the tedious morning shift, especially with Ella gone. We were having tea in the kitchen.”
I blinked at the coffee before me. “Oh.”
“I know you don’t care for tea,” she said, walking backward toward the door. “Thanks for finishing the stairwells.”
The words “thank you” were on my lips, but by the time my shock had abated, Anna had slipped away.
I sipped my drink and dove into the next letter, my mind awake, my soul a little less lonely.
When I arrived that night, Prince Thomas was hunched over on a boulder, scrawling out a message on a piece of parchment in the starlight. I cleared my throat, and he spared a glance my way.
“Good evening.”
“It’s practically night time.” I winked at Caleb. “Your poor guard.”
A smile formed on Caleb’s face. “I’m on night duty. Another guard is supposed to watch our prince during the day.”
“And you’re just fine with the prince up at all hours?”
He chuckled. “You try telling this man what to do. Especially with a beautiful woman waiting for him.”
I flushed and turned to Thom, who glared at Caleb in a way that confused me even more.
“Enough, Caleb,” he said with princely authority. “I pay you, not the other way around.”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “Thom.”
Caleb laughed at my expression. “Miss Lyra, he might be prickly, but he’s got a soft center. I promise I take no offense.”
“You have a very loyal guard,” I said in disbelief, knowing I wouldn’t be able to follow Prince Thomas around all evening.
A faint pink rose on Thom’s cheeks as he fiddled with the edge of his spectacles.
“Loyal’s one word for it. The truth is, most of the time, I don’t take offense because I’m not even listening to him.”
Thom snorted. “He’s been with me since I was ten,” he said. “And he’s always been a good sort of man. It’s nice to have someone older to rely on for advice.”
I smiled. “My sister’s like that for me. She makes mistakes, but she sees the world in a way I wish I could. In her eyes, it’s brighter. Kinder.”
“Sounds like a lovely soul,” Caleb said.
“She is.”
Thom rose to his feet. “Say, aren’t we supposed to be having a lesson?”
I was tempted to ignore him—I’d been enjoying the chat with Caleb, but I suppressed the frustration. I didn’t want to be out shivering in the cold longer than I had to. I rubbed my hands together and moved closer to the pond, to the prince. My eyesflicked over his parchment scribbles. “Are those your notes for your treatise?”
He nodded. “Thanks to your charts, I’ve made a great start on the background portion.”
“And what’s going to be so groundbreaking that you make it on the Mage Council?”
