A hundred mourners filled the pews, veiled in black and bowed by silence. The vicar's voice rose and fell like distant thunder, but Y/n heard none of it. Her gaze was fixed on a single name, halfway down the third column. A name she had whispered to herself every night for the past nine months.

Beside her, Mrs. Harlow — her chaperone and distant aunt — dabbed at her eyes with a handkerchief that smelled of lavender water.

To her right, the pews were nearly empty. Most of the families had clustered together, drawing comfort from proximity. But Y/n sat apart, as she had done all season, as she had done since the news arrived.

The vicar concluded his sermon. The congregation rose for the final hymn, a psalm about deliverance and rest. Y/n's lips moved, but no sound came. She watched the widow in the front row — Lord Ashworth's widow — lean into her sister's shoulder, and something in her chest pulled tight.

When the service ended, the crowd flooded toward the doors, eager for fresh air and carriages and the warmth of waiting fires. Y/n lingered, waiting for the press of bodies to thin.

A hand touched her elbow.

Not yet.

She stepped forward, toward the memorial wall. Her heels clicked against the stone floor, the only sound in the emptying church. She stopped before the name she knew by heart.

LIEUTENANT GEORGE H. — BELOVED BROTHER

She traced the letters with her fingertips, the gold paint cool beneath her gloves.

A shadow fell across the light.

"You knew him?"

The voice was low, rough at the edges — a voice that had not spoken much recently, perhaps. Y/n turned.

The man standing there was tall, broad-shouldered, and plainly dressed in a black tailcoat without ornament. He wore no regimental colors, no medals, no mourning bands. His face was lean, sharp-boned, and his eyes were the color of storm-water — pale, unwavering, and deeply tired. He looked at her with the particular stillness of a man who had learned to watch for danger in silence.

He inclined his head slightly, an apology for the intrusion.