Kael found his father in the east study. Keith was still working through the household records when Kael pushed the door open, the same stack of papers spread across the table that had been there that morning, only thinner now. He looked up when Kael entered, his expression shifting into something more attentive. "Sit," Keith told him. Kael sat. He didn't spend long building up to it. There wasn't a clean way to frame it, so he didn't try. He simply told Keith what he had seen that morning. The alcove. The empty kitchen. The narrow side door that no one else used during active hours. The woman who had come through it and crossed to his tray without hesitating, who had lifted the cover and added something and replaced it in under fifteen seconds, her eyes checking the doorways first the way a person did when they had learned through repetition exactly how much time they had. Keith listened without interrupting once. When Kael finished, the room was quiet. "You've been w

Kael found his father in the east study. Keith was still working through the household records when Kael pushed the door open, the same stack of papers spread across the table that had been there that morning, only thinner now. He looked up when Kael entered, his expression shifting into something more attentive. "Sit," Keith told him. Kael sat. He didn't spend long building up to it. There wasn't a clean way to frame it, so he didn't try. He simply told Keith what he had seen that morning. The alcove. The empty kitchen. The narrow side door that no one else used during active hours. The woman who had come through it and crossed to his tray without hesitating, who had lifted the cover and added something and replaced it in under fifteen seconds, her eyes checking the doorways first the way a person did when they had learned through repetition exactly how much time they had. Keith listened without interrupting once. When Kael finished, the room was quiet. "You've been w

Kael found his father in the east study. Keith was still working through the household records when Kael pushed the door open, the same stack of papers spread across the table that had been there that morning, only thinner now. He looked up when Kael entered, his expression shifting into something more attentive. "Sit," Keith told him. Kael sat. He didn't spend long building up to it. There wasn't a clean way to frame it, so he didn't try. He simply told Keith what he had seen that morning. The alcove. The empty kitchen. The narrow side door that no one else used during active hours. The woman who had come through it and crossed to his tray without hesitating, who had lifted the cover and added something and replaced it in under fifteen seconds, her eyes checking the doorways first the way a person did when they had learned through repetition exactly how much time they had. Keith listened without interrupting once. When Kael finished, the room was quiet. "You've been w

Kael found his father in the east study. Keith was still working through the household records when Kael pushed the door open, the same stack of papers spread across the table that had been there that morning, only thinner now. He looked up when Kael entered, his expression shifting into something more attentive. "Sit," Keith told him. Kael sat. He didn't spend long building up to it. There wasn't a clean way to frame it, so he didn't try. He simply told Keith what he had seen that morning. The alcove. The empty kitchen. The narrow side door that no one else used during active hours. The woman who had come through it and crossed to his tray without hesitating, who had lifted the cover and added something and replaced it in under fifteen seconds, her eyes checking the doorways first the way a person did when they had learned through repetition exactly how much time they had. Keith listened without interrupting once. When Kael finished, the room was quiet. "You've been w