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But I know who it was.

My brother talks for an hour and a half, barely pausing for breath between sentences. Then he leans in the way he used to when we were small and had something he wasn’t supposed to say. “He came again this morning.”

I glance at the flowers. “Really?”

“Ryven. He was here before seven. He kept standing around until I told him he was making the room untidy, so he laughed and finally sat down.”

Seren found him in a bar at four this morning, barely making sense. Three hours later he was here, before the sun, sitting where Onyx could see him.

“What did you talk about?”

“You, mostly.” Onyx grins. “He’s got a lot of opinions about you.”

“I’ll bet he does.”

“He asked what you were like when we were small.” He picks at the blanket. “Nobody’s ever asked me that.”

I study his face. “Was he all right?”

“What do you mean?”

“Nothing. Just asking.”

Onyx thinks about it. “He was a little strange, maybe. Kept rubbing his face and asking me the same thing twice, but he’s always strange.” His smile returns as he smooths the blanket over his knees. “He’s the only one of them who doesn’t look at me like I might break.”

His eyes start drifting closed while he’s still talking, and he fights it for another minute before finally giving in.

I sit with him a while longer, his blond hair fallen across his forehead and his lashes resting on his cheeks. After twenty-two years, that face still catches at something in me. I brush the hair back, wait until he settles, then slip out of the room.

The nurse is at the desk when I come out. “He’s had a good week. Numbers are right where they want them. Second phase is on schedule.”

“Thank you.”

“He’s also had quite a lot of attention from one particular visitor.”

I look up. “Ryven?”

“The tall one with the fair hair. He’s been here every morning since Tuesday.” The nurse glances towards Onyx’s room before lowering his voice. “Including today.”

I gesture back towards the door. “He really did all this?”

The nurse smiles. “Came in before sunrise, looking like he’d been drinking all night. Put every one of them in water himself. Wouldn’t let the night staff touch them or put his name on anything. Your brother thinks it was the hospital.”

“That’s Onyx for you. He still thinks the world is kinder than it is.”

The nurse chuckles. “It’s nice for him to think somebody’s kind, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” I say. “It is.”

I get the lift down with my jaw aching.

Three weeks.

Three weeks until Ryven stands beside a stranger because Ash married me instead.

Three weeks, and he still comes to the hospital before sunrise. Sits beside Onyx. Asks about the brother who sealed his own future.

And yet he hasn’t once made Onyx feel like he’s the one paying the price.