Caden’s POV
I have a habit of arriving early.
It is not strategic, or not entirely. It is just that I sleep lightly and think heavily and mornings have always been the hour when everything is clearest, before the day puts its hands on things and complicates them. I came down the east corridor because my room is in the east wing and the corridor leads to the side entrance where I walk in the mornings when I need to think.
I was not trying to overhear anything.
But I heard it.
I heard enough.
I stand at the end of the corridor and watch Selene’s feet slow down and watch her realise I am there and watch the sequence of things that moves through her face. Not guilt. She has nothing to feel guilty about. Something closer to tiredness, the particular kind that comes from being caught in th
