She was quiet.
"What's it like," he said. "Ashveil."
She'd described it before. He'd asked before. But this time the question had a different quality — not intelligence-gathering, not the patriarch building a picture. Just asking.
"It's—" She found it. "It's full. Not crowded. Full in the way of a place that has a lot of things actually happening in it rather than a lot of things being performed." She paused. "Bekah makes food without waiting to be asked. The crew argue about things that don't matter because arguing about things that don't matter is how you know the things that do matter are secure." She paused again. "Neva's wolf talks back to her constantly. She pretends to be annoyed. She isn't."
He looked at her.
"Are you happy," he said.
The question he'd never asked. Not in thi
