Chapter 24
Valerius had been awake long before sunrise.
Not restlessly.
Not in the agitated way of a man troubled by indecision.
Quite the opposite.
He had slept well.
That, in itself, was mildly irritating.
The early light over Ambervale had not yet fully broken when he stepped into the small outer sitting room of the rented estate, already dressed, already composed, already halfway through the first cup of tea that had been brought to him in silence.
The windows stood open enough to admit the coolness of morning, and through them came the softened sounds of a city only just beginning to stir—distant wheels, far-off voices, the occasional call of birds indifferent to human politics.
The room was orderly.
The papers on the table before him were orderly.
The current state of Ambervale, while still annoyingly incomplete in places, had at least reached a stage where order could be imposed upon it with less resistance than before.
The Crown auditors had completed the portion of the inquiry that concerned Regulus Voss, the household, and the estate. Regulus had been removed from office, fined heavily, and spared only the final indignity of losing title along with authority.
The larger conspiracy remained unresolved.
That thread had gone to ground. The auditors would likely spend weeks—perhaps months—pulling at loose ends, following false starts, and waiting for someone connected to the conspiracy to make a mistake.
But nothing tied directly to Regulus or the Voss estate remained urgent enough to justify Valerius’s continued presence on investigative grounds alone.
Which meant, by every reasonable measure, that he ought to be preparing to leave.
Valerius lifted his cup and took another measured sip of tea.
The thought did not trouble him.
It had, in fact, become rather simple.
His gaze shifted briefly toward the open window, though what he saw there was not truly the rented estate garden beyond it, nor the morning light on pale stone, nor the trimmed hedges still silvered at their edges by dawn.
For one brief, uninvited moment, he saw instead lanternlight reflected in dark water.
A rise in the land.
Petals moving through moonlight.
Lady Lynara standing very still beside him while the whole of Everbloom Garden glowed below like something imagined first and built afterward with sheer will.
And her face—quiet, proud, unguarded in a way she so rarely allowed herself to be—when she looked at what she had made and found it worthy of satisfaction.
Valerius set the cup down.
No.
There was no further need to revisit the matter internally.
He had already reached the correct conclusion.
A knock sounded at the door.
“Enter.”
Leon stepped in first, Edric just behind him. Both men were already dressed for the day, both wearing the controlled expressions of officers prepared to discuss departure schedules, outstanding reports, and the practical reshuffling of royal presence back toward the capital.
Reasonable expressions.
Mistaken, but reasonable.
“Your Highness,” Leon said, bowing lightly. “You’re up early.”
“I am.”
Edric’s gaze moved once over the papers on the table. “We thought it best to speak before arrangements begin moving too quickly.”
Valerius looked at him. “Arrangements?”
“For departure,” Edric said.
There it was.
Leon stepped a little nearer. “The auditors have assumed the greater part of the matter. The household has quieted. Security concerns appear reduced.” He paused. “Our continued stay is becoming less necessary.”
Valerius said nothing immediately.
That, by itself, was enough to make Leon slightly more careful.
Edric, who knew him too well to mistake silence for uncertainty, folded his arms and waited.
At last Valerius said, “Yes.”
Leon exhaled slightly, as though a straightforward answer had restored something to the universe.
“Then Your Highness has decided when we are to depart.”
Valerius lifted one hand and adjusted the alignment of a document that did not need adjusting.
“Yes," he said.
That, at least, sounded promising.
Leon looked briefly relieved.
Edric did not.
Valerius set the page down. “I intend to leave…”
A pause.
“…when my future fiancée is prepared to accompany me.”
Silence.
“Your Highness,” Leon said carefully, “you mean Lady Lynara?”
“Yes.”
Edric stared at him.
Leon stopped blinking.
The silence that followed was no longer respectful. It had moved beyond that into the dangerous territory of men trying very hard not to say the first thing that came into their heads.
Valerius let them struggle.
At length Edric said, “Are you certain?”
“Yes.”
Leon lifted one hand a fraction, as if trying to physically organize the conversation into something survivable. “Of this course?”
“Yes.”
A longer pause.
Then Leon, with the air of a man approaching the edge of a very elegant cliff, asked, “Of her?”
That, finally, drew the faintest shift at one corner of Valerius’s mouth.
“Particularly of her.”
Edric covered his face with one hand. “We are doomed,” he muttered.
Valerius regarded him over the rim of his teacup. “That seems dramatic.”
Leon turned toward Edric. “Dramatic? He means to court Lady Lynara.”
“Yes,” Edric said from behind his hand. “I heard him.”
Leon turned back to Valerius. “Your Highness, with the deepest respect available to me in this moment, Lady Lynara is not a simple woman.”
“No,” Valerius said. “She is not.”
Edric dropped his hand just enough to look at him directly. “That was not reassurance.”
“It was not intended as such.”
Leon stared for a second longer, then said, “You are serious.”
“Yes.”
“You mean to formally pursue her.”
“Yes.”
“In earnest.”
Valerius looked at him.
Leon closed his eyes briefly. “That was a foolish addition. Of course you mean it in earnest.”
“Yes.”
Edric leaned back a fraction and let out a slow breath that sounded suspiciously like a man trying not to laugh at his own destruction.
“Your Highness,” he said, “for clarity—is this because she built a beautiful garden and shared cocktails with you under the moon, or has this been forming for longer?”
Valerius did not answer immediately. Not because he objected to the question. Because accuracy required proper phrasing.
“Longer,” he said at last.
“That,” Leon said faintly, “is somehow worse.”
“No,” Valerius said. “It is merely less surprising.”
“To you,” Edric muttered.
Valerius let that pass.
Both men were still looking at him as though he had just announced an intention to personally negotiate with a tornado. Which, in some respects, was unfair to Lady Lynara. Tornadoes were often less deliberate.
Edric spoke first this time. “Has Lord Voss been informed?”
“Not yet.”
Leon blinked. “So this is not merely a passing thought.”
“No.”
“You have an actual plan.”
“Yes.”
“We are still doomed,” Edric said.
Valerius chose not to dignify that with a response. “I will be paying a formal call on Lord Voss today.”
Leon looked between him and Edric, then back again. “You intend to ask permission to court her.”
“I intend,” Valerius said evenly, “to proceed properly.”
That, finally, seemed to settle them—not into agreement, certainly, but into the exhausted acceptance of men who had realized the disaster was not hypothetical and must now be managed with as much grace as remained available.
Edric rubbed at his temple. “With respect, Your Highness, this may not go as simply as you appear to believe.”
Valerius considered that. “No, it will not.”
Leon narrowed his eyes. “And yet you remain absurdly calm.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Valerius looked at him.
Because the answer was obvious.
Because there was no uncertainty in the matter that actually counted.
Because Lady Lynara Voss, for all her contradictions, had become the one person in Ambervale who consistently made the world around her more difficult, more interesting, more alive, and more worth his continued attention.
Because the thought of leaving without first securing the right to remain in her life had ceased to be acceptable.
Because some conclusions, once properly reached, did not require agitation.
“At this point,” he said mildly, “there is no benefit in hesitation.”
Leon made a soft sound that suggested resignation had finally overtaken disbelief.
Edric crossed his arms again. “When do you intend to go?”
“This morning.”
Leon looked offended by the efficiency of it. “Of course.”
Valerius rose.
The movement was enough to bring both men immediately back into order, though their expressions had not yet entirely recovered from the conversation.
He set his cup aside, adjusted one cuff, and stepped away from the table.
Leon, still visibly processing, said, “Should we prepare anything?”
“Yes,” Valerius said.
That brought them both to attention.
“Ensure the gifts are appropriate.”
Edric stared. “Gifts.”
“Yes.”
Leon closed his eyes for one brief second. “We are past recovery.”
Valerius ignored him.
“Nothing excessive or theatrical,” he continued. “Refined. Intentional.”
Edric’s mouth twitched. “You’ve thought about this.”
“Yes.”
“Of course you have,” Leon muttered.
Valerius moved toward the door, then paused long enough to glance back at them both. “Try not to look as though you’re attending a funeral.”
Neither answered immediately.
Then Edric said, very dryly, “That depends entirely on how Lord Voss receives the conversation.”
Valerius’s expression did not change. “He will receive it well.”
Leon did not look convinced.
Edric looked less so.
But neither argued further.
There were, after all, limits to what could be argued once His Highness had decided something in that tone.