The letter came with the morning tray.
Elara set the bread on the left, the tea on the right, and the small bowl of dried fruit she had added three weeks ago without a word. Her hands moved across the table with their usual quiet efficiency. Then they stopped.
“There’s something here that wasn’t here before,” she said. Her voice stayed careful, the way it did when she wasn’t sure how to sort the information. “Under the tray. Tucked against the base. I don’t know how it got there.”
“What does it look like?”
“An envelope. No seal. The writing on the front is—” She paused. “I don’t know what language that is.”
I held out my hand.
The envelope was small, lighter than I expected. My fingers traced the front. The letters of my name rose under my fingertips—old shapes, worn smoothly b
