He had not seen Flora in several days.
This was not unusual. They lived separate lives, and while they met regularly to deal with aspects of Torchline's governance they had been doing it together long enough that their region ran relatively smoothly on a day-to-day basis. Hadama not thought twice about Flora's scarcity in the Court until Sohalia's letter had arrived.
And then he had thought very hard about it, indeed. And done a number of calculations involving the distance to Stormbreak by airship... and by Compass. She would not, he had tried to convince himself while waiting for Sohalia to travel the distance from one end of Caido to the other. Not without telling me.
But she had told him. In the meeting with Deimos and Sunjata she had told them all. And now...
Hadama's expression was carved from stone. Stoic, but not serene. He carried himself with a tension that manifested as slow deliberation in every motion, and a precision sharp enough to cut glass. His pen scratched cross the page as he signed off on another piece of business and then paused at the knock on his door.
The voice he had been waiting - dreading - to hear since the moment he had read her letter.
"Come in. Shut the door behind you." The low rumble of his voice emerged from the room, passing through the door without difficulty. He was setting the page aside and placing the pen into its well with delicate control when she entered, but his emerald eyes were shadowed as he slowly folded his now-empty hands on the desktop in front of him. "Sit," he bade her, not without courtesy as he inclined his head slightly at a plush chair in front of the desk. "And tell me. Please. How did you get her letter?"
This was not unusual. They lived separate lives, and while they met regularly to deal with aspects of Torchline's governance they had been doing it together long enough that their region ran relatively smoothly on a day-to-day basis. Hadama not thought twice about Flora's scarcity in the Court until Sohalia's letter had arrived.
And then he had thought very hard about it, indeed. And done a number of calculations involving the distance to Stormbreak by airship... and by Compass. She would not, he had tried to convince himself while waiting for Sohalia to travel the distance from one end of Caido to the other. Not without telling me.
But she had told him. In the meeting with Deimos and Sunjata she had told them all. And now...
Hadama's expression was carved from stone. Stoic, but not serene. He carried himself with a tension that manifested as slow deliberation in every motion, and a precision sharp enough to cut glass. His pen scratched cross the page as he signed off on another piece of business and then paused at the knock on his door.
The voice he had been waiting - dreading - to hear since the moment he had read her letter.
"Come in. Shut the door behind you." The low rumble of his voice emerged from the room, passing through the door without difficulty. He was setting the page aside and placing the pen into its well with delicate control when she entered, but his emerald eyes were shadowed as he slowly folded his now-empty hands on the desktop in front of him. "Sit," he bade her, not without courtesy as he inclined his head slightly at a plush chair in front of the desk. "And tell me. Please. How did you get her letter?"
