Spring softened the edges of the kingdom, and with it came a request from an unexpected quarter. It arrived not via formal scroll, but in a note delivered by a trusted Valeroy servant to Seraphina. The handwriting was elegant, familiar, and weary.
Sera,
I hope this finds you well, and that the mud is settling as intended. I am writing to ask a favor, not as a prince or a diplomat, but as a man navigating a quiet departure. Freya has accepted Sultan Argenthelm's invitation to visit his desert observatories for an extended period. Several months, at least. She has asked me not to come.
I find myself with a surplus of time and a deficit of purpose within these familiar walls. I understand you and Hadrian are to visit the canal construction at Brineton next week. I would be of use there. My diplomatic skills might help smooth the remaining tensions with the local lords, and my hands are not afraid of real work. More importantly, it would be a change of scene.
I would, of course, defer entirely to your and Hadrian's command. And I would understand completely if the presence of a ghost from the past is too disruptive for the new equilibrium you have built.
Please consider it. No offense will be taken, whatever your answer.
Yours,
Rian
Seraphina read it three times, the paper crisp in her fingers. The quiet anguish in it was palpable. Rian wasn't begging for a place in her life; he was asking for a purpose outside the ruin of his own. Freya's "extended visit" was clearly a prelude to something more permanent, a realignment he had facilitated and now had to live with.
She took the note to Hadrian. She handed it to him without comment, watching his face as he read.
He finished, his expression unreadable. He set the note down on his desk, next to the resin-encased model. "What do you think?"
"I think he's drowning," she said honestly. "Not in the dramatic way we were, but in a slow, polite seepage of irrelevance. And he's asking for a lifeline that isn't… us."
"He's asking to work," Hadrian mused. "To be useful on our terms. It's a surrender. And a test."
"A test of what?"
"Of us,"Hadrian said, looking at her. "Of whether what we've built is strong enough to include the man who was once the scaffolding—and the crack—in the old structure. Whether we can be generous without fear, and clear without cruelty."
It was the final piece of unfinished business. Not Berrick's malice, but Rian's lingering, honorable sadness. To say no would be to hold a grudge against a man who had, in the end, stepped aside. To say yes was to invite a complex, living reminder into the new world they were building.
"The Brineton locals do respect him," Seraphina said slowly. "And he's right about his skills. The transition is still fragile."
"And it would be a public statement,"Hadrian added. "That the past is truly past. That we are secure enough to employ our former… rival… as an ally."
They were silent, both looking at the note, then at the model of their fragile, resilient partnership.
"I'm not afraid," Seraphina said, realizing it was true. The thought of Rian on the site didn't conjure jealousy or old longings. It conjured a faint, protective pity, and a recognition of a fellow survivor.
"Neither am I,"Hadrian said. He picked up a pen. "We'll need an extra pair of hands. The work is hard, and the lodging basic. He'll have to earn his keep."
He wrote a simple reply on the bottom of Rian's note:
Report to the site foreman at Brineton, Monday next. Bring sturdy boots. – H. & S. Valentoire.
It was not forgiveness, for there was nothing to forgive. It was not friendship, for that bridge had burned. It was an offer of work, of purpose, on the new ground they were building. It was the final act of architecture in their personal saga: not to demolish the old structure in anger, but to salvage its useful materials for the new. The romantic void had been bridged. Now, they were building a wider causeway, strong enough for even the ghosts of the past to walk upon, without fear of falling through.