There is still something strange, even downright unsettling, about leaving Cam alone. Back home, even during the times in their life when they were most inseparable, they had spent plenty of hours apart, each with their own trainings and duties. But now moments spent away from one another feel weighty, dangerous. Palamedes is too rational to think that being by her side could stop Cam from falling victim to the randomness with which Darrow can make people disappear, but he hates the idea that he might accidentally waste time he could have had with her.

But he knows he owes it to Marianne, too, to explain why he’d briefly vanished. Pal hadn’t quite realized how close they had gotten until it had hit him that they had messaged each other nearly every day since his arrival. How strange, then, it must have seemed, for him to go silent. He wants to apologize—and more than that, he wants to tell Marianne the miracle of the last few days, of Harrow, and Cam, and everything that has happened. He wants her to be as delighted as he is.

She looks beautiful, waiting in the grayish light of the cloudy day outside the restaurant. Palamedes runs a hand though his hair self-consciously, and then raises it in greeting.