The letter from Richard didn’t change Aria’s day so much as tilt it.
She still hauled water. Still corrected Fen’s sums. Still confiscated a rock Lio was convinced was a “magic tracking crystal.” Nightfall didn’t pause for internal revelations.
But under everything, a new thought sat like a stone in her pocket:
You were not wrong. You were early.
By the time evening rolled around, the relentless hum in her chest had changed pitch. The bond to Aiden still tugged south when she was tired, but now it bumped against something solid instead of hollow space.
She wasn’t sure what to do with that.
The fire was smaller than usual that night — a practical choice, Mara had declared; wood didn’t grow itself. Wolves clustered closer, conversations overlapping.
Aria listened to a story about a fa
