Caleb stopped coming.
Not all at once.
Not in a way that could be named outright.
Just… gradually.
At first, it was meetings that ran late.
Then patrols that needed his presence.
Then meals eaten elsewhere, conversations finished without her.
Then days.
Lila noticed the absence in the smallest, cruelest ways.
Alden reaching toward the door when footsteps passed and Caleb not being there.
The way her son’s cries were answered by Seren instead of his father.
The way Caleb’s scent faded from their room until it lingered only on old fabric and memory.
She told herself not to keep count.
She failed.
“He hasn’t held him in three days,” Seren said one night, her voice tight with anger she was barely containing.
Lila didn’t look up from where she sat on the bed, Alden pressed agains
