Years slipped quietly away, carrying Eleanor from girlhood into the first blossoms of womanhood. Her hair, once kept in simple braids, now cascaded in dark waves past her shoulders, and her voice carried a gentleness tempered by maturity.
What had not changed, however, were the letters.
William kept his promise.
Every month without fail, his cheerful handwriting arrived on cream-colored parchment. His letters brimmed with mischief and wonder — tales of new horses in the stables, secret escapades into the castle's orchard, and sketches of the little hiding places they had once explored together. He filled the margins with drawings of birds, flowers, and sometimes even a smiling caricature of Eleanor herself.
Each letter brought her laughter, her eyes sparkling as though she were back in the gardens at Greystone. She treasured them all, tied with ribbon and stored in a box beneath her bed.
But from Theodore, there was nothing.
At first, Eleanor had waited patiently, hoping that perhaps his letter had been lost on the road. Weeks turned to months, and months into years, but his silence never broke. Slowly, the sharp lines of his face blurred in her memory. She recalled the warmth of his hand in hers, the quiet promise in his eyes, yet with every passing season, those memories grew faint.
William, meanwhile, remained vivid. His laughter, his playful vows written in ink, the endless sense of closeness his letters built — they anchored themselves in her heart. When she thought of Greystone, it was William's voice that filled her mind.
It was on a bright spring morning that Eleanor's mother entered her chamber with surprising news.
"The Greystone family is coming to visit," she announced with a smile. "Lord and Lady Greystone, and both of their sons."
Eleanor's heart gave a startled leap. "Both?" she asked softly.
"Yes, William and Theodore. It has been many years, has it not?" Her mother touched her cheek affectionately. "You should be glad. They are fine company."
Eleanor turned toward her window, her hands pressing against the sill. William's letters, his cheer, his promises — those she knew well. But Theodore… she hardly knew what to expect anymore.
When the day came, the grand carriage rolled up the Beaumont estate's path, its wheels crunching against gravel. Eleanor stood at the top of the steps beside her parents, her pulse quickening.
The doors opened.
William emerged first, taller now, his boyish charm ripened into a striking youth. His grin was just as wide, his eyes sparkling with the same playful warmth that had danced through his letters. "Eleanor!" he called, bounding up the steps without hesitation, seizing her hand as though no time had passed.
Behind him, Theodore stepped down slowly. He was no longer the quiet boy she remembered but a young man with broad shoulders and a gaze sharpened by years of responsibility. He bowed politely, his expression unreadable, his words formal.
"It has been some time, Lady Eleanor," he said, his voice even.
She curtsied, her lips forming a polite smile, but her chest gave no familiar flutter. Where William's presence felt like sunlight after a long winter, Theodore's felt distant, almost shadowed.
As the families entered the hall together, Eleanor found herself walking beside William, their conversation easy and lively. Theodore followed behind, silent, his eyes occasionally flicking toward her but never lingering long enough to speak what might lie within them.
And in that moment, Eleanor realized the bond of her heart had shifted.
Greystone still lived in her memory, but it was William's laughter, William's ink-stained letters, William's promises that had grown into something stronger than childhood friendship.
Theodore, once the quiet figure who had captured her young admiration, now seemed only a fading echo — a boy she used to know.