_Author's POV_
Kaelen stood in the receiving room after Celeste finished talking and said nothing for a full minute.
Then he straightened his jacket and said, with remarkable composure, that Rowena was clearly going through something and that he intended to be patient about it. He said it to the room in general, to his grandmother who was still sitting in her chair looking diminished, to his mother who was staring at the floor. He said it like a man restating a position he had already committed to and was not going to revisit.
Then he turned to see Virella storm out in anger. He went to find her.
She was in the back garden, which was where she went when she needed to be somewhere the rest of the household wasn't. She heard him coming and didn't turn around.
He stood beside
