Chapter Text
Every morning began the same way. It was not because Caitlyn Kiramman lacked imagination, but because routine was one of the few things she still trusted, that was still tested, tried and true.
The alarm chirped at six on the dot. The alarm itself was some ornate thing, brass-lined, golden and gilded. It played a classical tune, calm and content. She never snoozed or silenced it. She never ignored it either. She reached over before the second note sounded, pressing it silent with practiced precision. The apartment remained still and serene around her—a modest two-bedroom perched above an old tailor’s shop where the city gave up pretending there was a clean line between Piltover and Zaun. Through the bedroom window, the bridge stretched across the river like a scar stitched with steel, already humming with freight trucks, bicycles, and workers chasing the sunrise.
She lay there for exactly thirty seconds, yawning and blinking the sleep from bleary blue eyes. It was enough to count the cracks in the ceiling she had memorized years ago, seven years to be exact. Long enough to convince herself there wasn’t a good enough reason to stay in bed.
Then she stood. The floorboards were always cold, so she always let out a hiss or a hum, a hitch at the back of her throat. Still, she was never bothered enough to buy slippers like the silly, soft and silly ones she had as a girl. At least the cold woke her up, more so than a cup of coffee.
The kettle went on first. While it hissed toward a boil, she made the bed with military corners. It was hospital-neat, firm and flat, tucked and tidy. Her mother would’ve approved. Her father too, probably. Every pillow was fluffed and every blanket smoothed, no wrinkles to be seen.
There had been a time when mornings felt like something to endure rather than begin. A time when the mirror had reflected a stranger wearing her face, when every piece of clothing had felt like a costume chosen by someone else.
House Kiramman had always been very particular about appearances. About names. About legacy. About the image presented to the world. Caitlyn had spent years learning which parts of herself were inherited and which parts she had chosen. The woman staring back at her now—with her mother’s posture, her father’s eyes, and a softness she had fought hard to earn—was finally someone she recognized.
She showered for precisely nine minutes. Steam fogged the mirror while she washed away another night’s worth of dreams she rarely remembered. She stood under the water and let it warm her body. Then, shampoo, conditioner, foaming face wash, and the same lavender soap she had bought in bulk because changing brands felt unnecessary. A towel wrapped around dark, damp hair. Her simple skincare routine: a modest amount of moisturizer and a squeezing squirt of sun protection. She put on a single silver ring and small pearl earrings next, simple and slender by Piltovan standards.
Then, makeup. Concealer beneath eyes that never quite looked rested. A sweep of powder. Blush so subtle it was almost invisible. Mascara, which was the only step she lingered on. There had been a time when she had studied her own reflection like evidence, searching for traces of someone she no longer wished to be mistaken for. Years of patience and practice had softened those old instincts into habit. One careful coat, wait thirty seconds, and then a second. She had once tried a different brand when her usual one was discontinued for a month. She had hated it.
She stood by the sink for a moment, peering into the mirror, checking once, then twice. There had been a time she had searched her reflection for all the wrong things. Now she checked only for crooked collars, smudged kohl, and whether her hair had finally decided to cooperate. It was a quieter sort of peace.
She moved to her wardrobe next. Most of it was the same, formal and fancy, pressed and polished, straightened and steamed. She pulled on her outfit, dark slacks and a crisp button-down. Tailors on the Piltover side still cut jackets for shoulders they assumed every woman lacked. Mr. Bell altered hers without comment years ago. He simply measured, pinned the seams, and handed it back with a quiet, “Better.”
She liked leaving the collar loose and long, revealing the crook of her collarbone. She also wore suspenders, sometimes, if the weather was warm. A wool coat if it wasn’t.
The same leather satchel she had carried for six years sat waiting beside the door, already packed from the night before. She always carried a camera, notebook, pens, a measuring tape, gloves, a flashlight, spare batteries, and, finally, a folded map of the sister cities.
She carried them all always, but still checked anyway. Every pocket and piece, every clasp and crook, patting it down. Then the tea steeped for exactly four minutes while she watered the fern perched on the kitchen windowsill, taking small, slow sips of the, supposedly, calming chamomile tea, taking in the scent of damp soil and dark, drying leaves. Its leaves leaned toward the bridge. She often wondered if plants could miss somewhere they had never been.
At seven-fifteen, she locked the apartment door, checking it twice. Once satisfied, she slipped down the creaky, crooked staircase, taking the steps two at a time. The creak of the wooden steps and the clamping of her boots announced her arrival before she even ducked into the doorway of the shop, dewy sunlight spilling in from the storefront, where racks displayed crisp shirts, starched skirts, and shined leather shoes, smelling of fresh linen and the lavender detergent that she favored too.
The elderly tailor downstairs waved without looking up from his newspaper. “Morning, Miss Kiramman.”
She dipped her chin, all proper and polite, just as she was taught, or more so trained, to do. “Morning, Mr. Bell.”
He smiled softly, letting her slip out the door. He had stopped asking if she had spoken to her parents three years ago.
The walk to work took eighteen minutes if every crossing light cooperated and nineteen if they didn’t.
She passed the flower vendor arranging buckets of peonies before dawn, the mechanic opening garage doors, and the newspaper boy who always missed one house and had to double back. The woman with the brindled greyhound who somehow knew exactly when Caitlyn would appear each morning. The dog expected scratches and Caitlyn always obliged.
Then came Soot and Sugar around the corner. The little coffee cart was permanently parked beside a narrow pastry stand tucked against one of the bridge supports. It smelled perpetually of burnt espresso, butter, cinnamon, and the faint mineral scent of the river.
The owner looked up before Caitlyn reached the counter. Mae, a broad-shouldered, brown-haired woman, graying at the temples, and as blunt as an old blade. She only raised one eyebrow. “The usual?”
Caitlyn nodded nonchalantly. “The usual.”
She never had to specify. She always offered the same thing: a dark coffee, no sugar, just enough cream to soften the bitterness, and one blackberry scone. On Fridays, a lemon poppyseed muffin, just as a little treat. That was the only variation.
Mae always slipped an extra napkin into the bag because detectives were apparently incapable of eating pastries without immediately needing both hands. Caitlyn always had a handkerchief tucked into her pocket anyway.
Mae raised her other eyebrow as she placed the pastry in the wrinkly paper bag and then poured the steaming liquid into the cup. “Quiet yesterday?”
“Too quiet,” Caitlyn answered honestly.
Mae shrugged and reached for a lid, popping the plastic piece right on the paper cup. “It’ll pick up.”
Caitlyn nodded noncommittedly. It always did.
The bridge itself had become less a landmark than another coworker. In the mornings, it filled. It flowered, blooming with street musicians setting up beneath its arches, commuters flowing toward Piltover and vice versa, factory workers returning from overnight shifts and children racing one another over painted sidewalks. Fishermen pretending not to notice city inspectors and city inspectors ignoring said fishermen.
She recognized almost everyone. The woman who fed pigeons despite city ordinances. The retired dockworker who complained about weather forecasts. The teenager forever fixing the same motorcycle. The crossing guard who saluted everyone with his coffee mug.
Names came easily, faces even easier, and patterns easiest of all. A detective noticed things, of course. Who was missing. Who arrived late. Which windows stayed dark. Which storefront changed displays. Which strangers looked too long at maps.
And, sometimes, Caitlyn wondered who noticed her: the woman in crisp clothes, sipping the same coffee and nibbling on the same scone at seven-thirty each and every morning.
Her office occupied the second floor of a weathered brick building overlooking the bridge. A brass plaque beside the stairs read PILTOVER PRIVATE INQUIRY in big, blocky font, which glimmered and gleamed in the morning light. The lettering had dulled over time and she honestly preferred it that way.
Inside, the ritual continued. She unlocked the door, disarmed the alarm, and opened every blind. She always cracked at least one window, regardless of weather, and watered the spider plant. She then started the gramophone, always instrumental jazz until ten as she sorted the mail, pinned new clippings to the evidence board, and reviewed and revised the day’s appointments as needed.
Once all that was concluded, she read the local paper from back to front. Then, before touching a single case file, she would stand by the window with her coffee for exactly three minutes, watching the bridge, watching people leave one side believing the other held the answers.
She understood the feeling fully.
Years ago, she had crossed that same bridge carrying nothing but two suitcases and a stubborn conviction that truth was worth more than legacy. Her mother had called it throwing away generations of opportunity.
Cassandra Kiramman had never been cruel about it. That was perhaps what made it harder. She had loved Caitlyn. She had always loved her. But love and understanding were not always the same thing.
For years, her mother had spoken about the future as though it were a dress already tailored and waiting: a life of silk, Council halls, and carefully chosen words. A life where Caitlyn would become the daughter everyone expected her to be.
It had taken years for Caitlyn to understand that becoming herself did not make her a disappointment. It simply meant she had stopped trying to fit into something that was never made for her.
The night she left, father had hugged her at the door and quietly slipped an envelope of cash into her satchel. She had never spent it. The envelope remained tucked inside the bottom drawer of her desk beneath old photographs and a spare notebook, yellowing a little more each year, a reminder that some cases stayed open longer than others.
Her departure from House Kiramman had never truly been about the agency. That was what everyone assumed. They thought she had rejected the Council seat because she wanted independence, because she was stubborn, because she had always been too curious for a life spent behind polished marble walls.
The truth was far more complicated.
Caitlyn had spent years trying to become someone her family could recognize. Someone they could display proudly. Someone who fit neatly into the portrait of a Kiramman heir. Eventually, she realized she was exhausted from being a portrait at all.
She wanted to be a person.
At eight o’clock sharp, she took the first folder from the stack. The routine ended and the real work began.
At precisely eight-twelve, three measured knocks sounded against the frosted glass. Always three, not two, not four. Three, precise and persistent. Predictable.
Caitlyn didn’t look up from the newspaper she had folded into neat quarters beside her coffee. “Come in.”
The brass handle turned. The door swung inward with the familiar groan she had promised herself she would oil months ago. “Morning, boss.”
The title was said with just enough amusement to make it clear it was habit rather than hierarchy. Maren stepped inside, balancing a canvas tote on one shoulder and two paper bags tucked beneath her arm. She was somewhere in her forties, with weathered hands, sensible shoes, and auburn hair perpetually escaping whatever hairstyle she had attempted that morning. Before Piltover Private Inquiry had existed, she had worked reception at a law office in Piltover until budget cuts had shown her the door. Caitlyn had hired her almost immediately after opening, despite barely being able to afford the salary.
It remained, years later, one of the best decisions she had ever made. Maren had known Caitlyn before the agency, before the brass plaque and the office overlooking the bridge. She had never once stumbled over her name. Caitlyn had noticed.
She had never forgotten.
Now, Maren set the bags on her own desk just outside Caitlyn’s office before disappearing briefly into the front room. The sounds came in the same order they always did. Her handbag settling into a drawer, the scrape of a chair, the old radiator clicking, then the coffee pot beginning its low gurgle and the window opening an inch. Finally, she returned carrying the morning mail gathered from downstairs. It rested against her forearm in a tidy stack.
“Three bills.” She placed them on Caitlyn's desk. “One advertisement trying to sell us a faster printer.”
Caitlyn frowned. “We don’t own a printer.”
Maren simply shrugged. “They don’t know that.”
Another envelope slid into the shiny surface of her desk, the dark oak recently polished.
“Invitation to a charity gala.”
Without looking up, Caitlyn slid it into the recycling pile.
Maren nearly laughed. “I assumed.”
“You assumed correctly,” Caitlyn mumbled.
Another envelope invaded her personal space.
“This one is handwritten,” Maren stated with a side glance, curious. Cautious.
That earned a glance. It had cream stationery and, unsurprisingly, no return address. Caitlyn turned it over once before setting it atop the later pile. She sighed, already massaging her temples. “If it’s another anonymous tip about ghosts in the tunnels…”
This time, Maren did laugh. “I hope they’re paying this time.”
A smile ghosted across Caitlyn’s face, just enough to count. Maren noticed every single one. She smiled herself, then pushed more pieces of paper out. “Two checks from clients.”
Caitlyn nodded, small and sharp. “Good.”
“And…” She lifted the final envelope rather dramatically. Darkly. “Er, your mother.”
Silence settled for the briefest moment. The envelope was unmistakable, with its heavy ivory paper and dark blue ink. The Kiramman crest was so deeply embossed it caught the morning light. Even unopened, it carried weight.
Caitlyn accepted it with careful fingers. She didn’t open it. She didn’t sigh or frown. She simply placed it, face down, beneath the edge of her desk blotter. The movement was practiced, almost automatic, and Maren pretended not to notice. Instead, she reached into the paper bag she had brought in with her. “They accidentally gave me two cinnamon buns today.”
Caitlyn raised an even eyebrow, peering at Maren with a piercing stare, the same one her mother used in boardrooms and ballrooms alike. “They did?"
Maren shook her head almost sheepishly. “No,” she said softly and slowly. She placed one beside Caitlyn’s coffee. “I bought two.”
Caitlyn wrinkled her nose. “I already had breakfast.”
Maren’s lips pulled into a firm, flat one. “You had a singular scone.”
Caitlyn’s upper lip curled. “That counts.”
Maren’s lips tugged even tighter. “It absolutely does not.”
“It contains grain,” Caitlyn said with the swipe of her hand, the flick of her wrist.
Maren scoffed. “It contains butter masquerading as grain.”
Caitlyn looked down at the pastry almost accusingly. It was still warm, still fragrant, still waiting. The icing hadn’t quite set, a soft and sweet glaze.
She simply sighed. “You'll make me soft.”
“I’ve worked here six years,” Maren stated, then leaned one elbow on the desk, waggling a firm finger in her face, making her blink. “I’ve seen you smile fourteen times.”
Caitlyn almost raised her other eyebrow. “That many?”
Maren nodded, lips still pinched. “I keep a tally.”
Caitlyn furrowed her eyebrows and frowned. “I sincerely hope you don't.”
“I absolutely do,” Maren replied.
Another almost-smile.
Fifteen.
Maren would probably add it later.
Outside, someone rolled a delivery cart over uneven pavement. The rumble echoed faintly through the open window. The bridge was fully awake now with voices and people, distant gulls calling and crying over the river, scooping down to steal someone’s breakfast. A bicycle bell. Someone laughing. Someone shouting after a bus. The city breathing. Living.
“So,” Maren said, slipping and settling into the comfortable rhythm they had perfected over the years. “Mrs. Alvarez from downstairs says her grandson finally passed his driving test. She wants to buy that one motorcar off the mechanic down the street.”
Caitlyn frowned even deeper. “The one who kept clipping the curb?”
Maren nodded again. “The very one.”
“Huh,” she replied. “I was beginning to think the curb had offended him personally.”
“He celebrated by taking everyone for ice cream,” Maren informed her, as if it were breaking news.
Caitlyn nodded along. “As one does after surviving bureaucracy.”
Maren hummed thoughtfully. “Hm.” She nodded gravely. “Apparently he only hit one trash can.”
“Progress,” Caitlyn stated. “I suppose, however small.”
Maren made a vague gesture with her hands. “It was empty.”
“Excellent,” Caitlyn muttered.
“And Frank from the tailor’s is threatening retirement. Again.”
Caitlyn wrinkled her nose. “He says that every Tuesday.”
“It’s Thursday,” Maren breathed.
Caitlyn’s eyebrows furrowed. “Well then he’s late.”
Maren laughed loudly. Caitlyn liked that about her. She filled the silence instead of fearing it. Neither woman felt obligated to chatter endlessly. Conversation arrived naturally, like weather drifting through an open window.
“I also heard,” Maren continued while sorting incoming paperwork into tidy piles. “That someone stole six garden gnomes from that darling garden store just down the way.”
“Only six?”
“There were eight.”
It was quickly mental math. “So they left two.”
Maren grinned. “They apparently weren’t matching.”
Caitlyn blinked. “I suppose thieves have standards too.”
“The owner insists it’s organized crime,” Maren said in an exaggerated, dramatic tone of voice, clutching a hand to her chest.
Caitlyn only tsked her tongue. “I suspect teenagers.”
Maren shook her head, sighing. “They’re almost the same thing.”
That drew an unmistakable smile, small and soft. Crooked and creased. Gone almost before it arrived.
Maren silently added another tally in her head. Sixteen.
“You have appointments?” She inquired instantly, tilting her head.
“Mrs. Dalton at nine,” Caitlyn swiftly replied.
“The missing cat?” She asked.
“The missing cat,” Caitlyn answered.
“And Mr. Singh at eleven?”
“Yes, the insurance fraud.”
“And lunch?” Maren added pointedly, raising an eyebrow.
Caitlyn bit her bottom lip. “I’ll remember.”
Maren placed both hands on her hips. “You won’t.”
Caitlyn closed her eyes. “I’ll attempt to remember then.”
A dry chuckle. “Closer.”
Satisfied, Maren disappeared back into reception. A moment later, the front lights clicked on. The little brass bell above the front door was tested once. The typewriter carriage rolled. Piltover Private Inquiry had officially begun another day and Caitlyn reached for her notebook.
It was leather-bound, edges softened by years of use. Every morning began with a new page. She would write the date, the weather, cloud cover, temperature, and the wind direction. Not every investigation required it, but someday, someone might.
She wrote in looping lines and cursive letters.
Thursday
Overcast. River fog until approximately 7:40. Light northeasterly wind.
Then beneath it:
To Do
- Photograph warehouse before noon
- Follow up with the inspector
- Pay electric bill
- Replace flashlight batteries
She crossed off the last item. Already done. Her eyes drifted, almost despite herself, toward the ivory envelope tucked beneath the blotter. It waited, patient. Persistent. As though it knew it would eventually be opened. She knew what it would contain before she broke the seal. Another invitation. Another fundraiser. Another carefully phrased reminder that there was still a place for her at the Council Chambers if only she stopped chasing runaway spouses and missing pets.
You could be doing so much more.
The words never appeared exactly like that. They didn’t need to.
Cassandra had accepted many things eventually. Some only after months of arguments. Some never aloud. The Council career had simply become the newest item on a disappointingly familiar list.
She slid the envelope another inch beneath the blotter until only the corner remained visible. Later, perhaps. Or perhaps tomorrow.
Instead, she picked up the first case folder from the stack. The paper was worn at the edges from handling. The client's handwriting slanted unevenly across the intake form. People always believed they were bringing her mysteries. Most of the time, they were bringing her pieces of themselves.
And, like every morning before it, Caitlyn squared the pages against the desk, uncapped her fountain pen, took one final sip of coffee now lukewarm enough to drink without thinking, and settled into the quiet work of noticing what everyone else had overlooked. The rhythm was as familiar as her own heartbeat, steady and straight, ready and reassuring in its constancy.
Outside, the bridge carried thousands of lives in opposite directions. Inside, one more day of searching for the truth had begun.
By the time Caitlyn locked the office door, the bridge had changed hands.
The morning belonged to laborers and merchants, to apprentices hurrying toward workshops with ink still drying on their assignments and dockworkers greeting the dawn with sore backs and stronger coffee. Evening belonged to everyone else. Couples drifted arm in arm beneath the lanterns. Children chased one another between market stalls before exhausted parents called them home. Musicians settled into familiar corners, their melodies folding into the endless murmur of the river below.
The office sat dark behind her. The brass plaque caught the last of the sun, then surrendered it. Caitlyn slid the key into her satchel with a soft sigh.
Maren was already halfway down the stairs, shrugging into her coat. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Miss Kiramman.”
Caitlyn nodded stiffly. “Goodnight, Maren.”
Maren gave her a pointed look as she adjusted her collar. “Don’t work.”
Caitlyn hid her wince. This woman knew her too well. “I won’t.”
“That’s a lie.”
She almost smiled. “It is.”
Maren smiled back without even turning around. “I know.”
Then she was gone, swallowed into the crowd. Caitlyn lingered for a moment beneath the awning.
She watched the people flowing across the bridge as though they were the river itself, splitting around obstacles, joining together again, each with somewhere to be.
She recognized dozens of them. The florist carrying empty buckets. A pair of friends laughing over something one of them had said. An elderly Zaunite couple sharing roasted chestnuts from a paper cone. The same fisherman she had passed every morning, now heading home with little to show for the day’s patience.
Most of them nodded. She nodded back. It was a peculiar thing, being known by so many people while belonging to so few.
Eventually, she started walking.
The route home never changed. She preferred it that way. She passed Soot and Sugar, now packing away its little display of pastries. Mae looked up from wiping down the espresso machine with a dishrag.
“Tomorrow?” She asked, as she always did.
Caitlyn nodded, as she always did. “As always.”
Mae winked, tossing the dish rag over one shoulder, her bicep bulging briefly. “I’ll save you a blackberry scone.”
Caitlyn looked from her forearm to her face, cheeks flushing, and dipped her chin, chuckling. “I appreciate that.”
Mae tilted her head and tsked her tongue, now using the rag to dab at the sweat on her face, strands of hair sticking to her forehead. “Try not to solve too many crimes tonight.”
Caitlyn ignored the heat pouring and prickling in the base of her belly. No. It wasn’t Friday yet. And, besides, not Mae. Not a friend, not a familiar face.
“I’ll do my best,” Caitlyn replied shortly and sharply, stiffly.
The woman only laughed. “As if trouble ever asks permission.”
The smell of burnt coffee lingered long after Caitlyn continued on. A baker swept flour from his doorstep. A lamplighter moved methodically from post to post, each flame blooming into warm amber against the gathering dusk. Somewhere farther down the street, someone was practicing violin, and not particularly well.
The same passage. The same pattern. Again. Again. Again.
She found herself silently hoping they eventually mastered it.
Her apartment building leaned ever so slightly toward the bridge, as though curious what all the commotion was about. Mr. Bell was locking the tailor’s shop when she arrived. “Evening, Miss Kiramman,” he huffed.
“Good evening,” she trounced evenly, recovered from the internal distress brought on by the firm flesh of Mae’s forearm.
“Quiet day?” He asked, as he always did, adjusting the cap that covered gray, thinning hair.
“Reasonably,” Caitlyn responded back.
“That's usually the dangerous kind, isn’t it?”
She tilted her head. “So I’ve found.”
He chuckled. “My wife’s made too much stew.”
Her head only inclined further. “I suspect that was intentional.”
He gulped, then grinned. “It was.” He held out a covered ceramic bowl, grabbing it from the counter. “Take some.”
Caitlyn swallowed slowly. “You don't have to—”
He sighed, interrupting her. “If I bring it upstairs, she’ll only send me back down.”
Caitlyn accepted it with both hands, warming her palms. “Thank you.”
He waved her off, still smiling. “Tell me tomorrow whether she used too much thyme.”
Caitlyn glanced at the bowl and then up at him and the brim of his hat. “I'll make careful notes.”
He winked the way Mae did. “I expect nothing less from a detective.”
Inside, the apartment greeted her with silence. She locked the door and checked it twice. She set the bowl carefully on the kitchen counter and hung her satchel on the same hook beside the door, her coat on the next, and hat above them both. Everything had its place. Everything returned there each evening.
The kettle was the first thing she reached for, the familiar click of metal against the stove and the soft rush of flame. Only then did she remove the rest of herself from the day, unsnapping suspenders, undoing her holster and wristwatch. The pearl earrings came last, tucked into the little porcelain dish shaped like a lily that had belonged to her grandmother. It held pearl earrings, cufflinks she had never worn, and an old silver signet ring engraved with a crooked C. Her father had given it to her on the day the court finally recognized the name she had insisted had always belonged to her.
She washed her hands longer than necessary. Ink stained her fingers despite her care and collected beneath her nails from old archives and abandoned warehouses. The water ran gray before it cleared.
She changed into softer clothes. A cream-colored blouse with sleeves rolled to the elbows and comfortable trousers she had patched twice at the knee, thick wool socks despite it not being especially cold.
No one would see her. There was no reason to remain perfectly pressed. The thought still felt faintly rebellious.
Dinner was simple: Mr. Bell's stew with a heel of fresh bread and sharp white cheese. She ate at the little table beside the window overlooking the bridge. Lanterns drifted across the span. Voices floated upward in fragments, laughter and arguments. Merchants calling final prices. The distant whistle of a cargo lift.
Some nights she read while she ate. Tonight she simply watched. Across the river, Piltover glittered, gleaming and golden. She could just make out the upper silhouette of House Kiramman in the distance, perched proudly among the estates. Its windows glowed. Someone would be hosting dinner with crystal glasses, fresh flowers, and perfectly polished silver.
Perhaps her mother was discussing Council matters. Perhaps her father was quietly smiling into his soup while pretending not to notice the empty chair. Or perhaps… Perhaps they no longer set it. She looked away before her imagination answered.
After dinner came the washing. Only one bowl, one spoon, one plate, and one cup. Only the rhythm of the cloth circling porcelain and the squeak of clean ceramic. The sink scrubbed, water emptied, and hands dried. Everything was put away before bedtime.
She watered the fern by the window. Its fronds had grown enough that they brushed the glass now.
“You’re doing better than I expected,” she murmured.
The words surprised her. She hadn’t intended to speak aloud. The apartment settled back into silence after her voice faded.
She smiled faintly to herself. “I suppose we're both stubborn.”
She spent an hour reviewing notes from the day. Case files spread neatly across her desk, filled with dates, names, and observations. She copied everything into permanent ledgers using careful handwriting that left little room for ambiguity.
A detective’s memory was valuable. A detective’s records were indispensable.
When she finally closed the last ledger, she realized she had been rubbing the bridge of her nose. Her eyes ached. She extinguished the desk lamp.
The bedroom was cool when she entered it. She cracked the window just enough to hear the river, but not enough to invite the chill inside. She brushed her hair one hundred strokes, an old habit learned from a governess who had insisted it made the hair shine. Whether it did or not hardly mattered anymore. Some habits just survived long after their reasons disappeared.
She knew something about becoming. About looking in the mirror one day and realizing the person staring back was not someone new, but someone who had been waiting patiently beneath every layer the world had placed upon her.
Caitlyn had never become someone else. She had only, eventually, become herself.
She washed her face and folded tomorrow’s clothes over the chair. She wound her pocket watch and blew out every candle except the one beside the bed. The room softened into amber shadows.
It was then, as it often was, that the loneliness arrived. It never announced itself. It slipped quietly into the room, settling in the empty chair across from the bed as though it, too, had become part of the evening routine.
There was no one to tell about the little triumphs of the day. No one who would appreciate that Mrs. Dalton’s missing cat had been found asleep in the rafters of an abandoned warehouse, or that she had finally noticed the discrepancy in a merchant’s shipping records that had unraveled a week-long fraud. No one to laugh about Maren’s tally of her smiles. No one to complain to about the rain that threatened tomorrow.
The apartment was filled with evidence of a life: books worn from rereading, a teapot with a chipped spout, flowers she had bought herself three days ago. A half-finished crossword. The fern reaching toward the window.
And, yet, there remained a space that none of those things occupied, a silence between heartbeats. She had chosen this life. There had been a time when every choice had felt like another argument—with the Academy, with strangers, with society pages that insisted on recording every Kiramman daughter’s appearance while pretending not to remember there had once been a son instead. Leaving home had untangled more than one knot.
She reminded herself of that often. She had chosen to leave the marble halls of House Kiramman rather than become another polished portrait hung in a corridor of expectations. She had chosen the cramped apartment above a tailor’s shop, chosen long hours and uncertain clients, chosen truth over title.
She did not regret it.
Regret and loneliness, she had learned, were not the same thing. You could miss what might have been without wishing to return to it.
Caitlyn climbed into bed and pulled the quilt to her waist. Outside, the bridge carried one last scattering of late travelers beneath the lanterns, each one crossing toward someone waiting with a warm meal, a conversation, a familiar embrace. She listened until the footsteps faded into the rushed hush of the river. Then she reached to the bedside table and extinguished the final candle. Darkness settled gently around her.
Tomorrow, the alarm would ring before dawn. The kettle would whistle. The coffee would be waiting at Soot and Sugar. Maren would arrive with the mail and the day’s small talk. Another stack of mysteries would find its way to her desk. The routine would begin all again.
And, for one more night, the empty half of the bed remained undisturbed.
By late afternoon, the office had settled into that peculiar quiet that only arrived after a busy morning.
The waiting room was empty. Maren had stepped out to deliver paperwork to the courthouse. Somewhere below, a wagon rumbled over loose cobblestones, its wheels complaining with every revolution. The open window let in the familiar sounds of the bridge—the call of gulls circling the river, merchants advertising the last of their wares, the rhythmic hiss of the lifts carrying freight between Piltover and Zaun.
Caitlyn scarcely noticed any of it. She stood before the evidence board that occupied nearly an entire wall of her office. It was a sprawling thing, made of stained oak and scarred by years of pins driven into it. Maps overlapped maps. Newspaper clippings curled at the edges. Witness statements, charcoal sketches, receipts, train schedules, photographs developed in her own darkroom, all of it connected by lengths of colored thread that only she seemed capable of deciphering.
To anyone else, it looked like chaos. To Caitlyn, it was language.
She uncapped her fountain pen and made one last notation in the margin of a witness statement before pinning it beneath a shipping manifest.
“No…” she murmured to herself.
The thread wasn't right. She removed it and moved it two inches to the left. Better. Another pin. Another note. She stepped back, tilted her head, and looked again.
Years of detective work had taught her something few people understood. Sometimes the truth wasn't hidden. Sometimes it was simply standing in the wrong place.
She crossed the room, rummaged through a stack of folders, and returned carrying a folded surveyor’s map. The paper crackled softly as she opened it. Zaun, every district carefully inked, every bridge and warehouse, every forgotten alley that respectable Piltovans preferred to pretend did not exist.
She pinned one corner, then another. As she smoothed the center flat with her palm, her fingers drifted across familiar streets almost absentmindedly. The Lanes, the old market, the river dock, the Sump. Then, The Last Drop—
Her fingertips stopped.
The tiny square marking the old tavern sat no larger than the nail of her thumb. Barely a mark. Barely anything at all. Her hand remained there a moment too long. She withdrew it from the map as though the paper itself had burned her fingertips.
A slow breath. In. Out. Her jaw tightened almost imperceptibly. There was work to do.
She reached for another pin and pinned a warehouse inventory beside the map. She added fresh red thread and adjusted a witness statement.
She straightened two photographs that had not really needed straightening.
Order. She understood order. It asked nothing of her except attention. Feelings, on the other hand… Feelings had a habit of refusing to stay filed where they belonged.
She looked at the tiny square labeled The Last Drop once more. For years, she had avoided that part of Zaun whenever she could. If a case required it, she sent a letter requesting an interview elsewhere, or found another angle entirely. She had convinced herself it was practical. Efficient. There was no point dredging up old history.
It had nothing to do with Vi.
Nothing.
She repeated the lie often enough that it had become smooth around the edges, easy to carry.
But every so often, on quiet afternoons like this one, all it took was the brush of a fingertip over faded ink for the past to remind her it had never truly been solved.
Unlike the cases stacked on her desk, there had been no culprit to expose, no missing piece to uncover. Just two people who had loved each other, and a choice Caitlyn had made because she believed it would spare Vi a lifetime of being caught between two worlds.
She had never stopped hoping that Vi had found the life she deserved. Even if that life no longer had room for Caitlyn Kiramman in it.
The office door creaked open.
“Miss Kiramman?” Maren called from the reception room. “Your four o’clock is here.”
Caitlyn blinked once, and the detective returned, the woman who filed memories away as neatly as case reports. “I’ll be right there.”
She picked up her notebook, gave the evidence board one final, measured glance, and turned away before her eyes could linger on that little square in Zaun any longer. Some investigations, she had learned, were far easier to revisit than the ones she had left unfinished in her own heart.
Friday nights had become another routine. Not one she particularly enjoyed, but one she maintained nonetheless.
The office closed an hour earlier than usual. Maren wished her a pleasant weekend, reminding her—for the third Friday in a row—that she ought to do something fun for once.
Caitlyn nodded stiffly. “I intend to.”
Maren raised an eyebrow. “Your definition of fun worries me.”
Caitlyn frowned, furrowing her eyebrows. “It shouldn’t.”
“Oh, it absolutely should.”
Caitlyn smiled politely, waited until Maren disappeared down the stairs, then locked the office behind her. The brass plaque caught the last pale light of dusk. She didn’t look back.
At home, the ritual continued. She hung her coat and boiled water for tea she only drank half of. She opened the bedroom window to let in the cool evening air. Everything happened in the same order. Everything always did.
The difference tonight lay in the wardrobe. She opened the narrow armoire and bypassed her work clothes entirely: the tailored coats, the sensible trousers, and the crisp shirts. Instead, her fingers settled on a midnight-blue dress, elegant without being ostentatious. Its sleeves ended just below her elbows, the fabric fitted enough to flatter without inviting comment. The neckline was modest. The skirt fell cleanly to her calves.
It was expensive. Her mother would have approved of it. Perhaps that was why Caitlyn wore it only for this. The dress fit beautifully now. Once, years ago, she had needed every seam let out, every dart moved, every line softened by a patient dressmaker who had simply nodded at Caitlyn’s requests and chalked fresh lines across the fabric without a single unnecessary comment.
The first time Caitlyn had walked through Piltover wearing the clothes she had chosen for herself, she had expected the world to end. It hadn’t. The sky remained blue. The river kept moving. People still hurried across the bridge, still bought coffee, still argued over market prices. The world had not collapsed because Caitlyn Kiramman had finally become the person she had always been.
It had simply continued. And, for the first time, so had she.
Now, she added more faint, finishing touches. The pearl earrings. A touch more kohl than she wore during the day and a deeper shade of lipstick. She brushed her hair until it caught the candlelight. She regarded herself in the mirror.
She looked calm. Composed. Beautiful, someone had once told her. Though the word had meant more when it came from rough hands smelling faintly of engine grease and cedar smoke.
Vi had been the first person who looked at her as though there was nothing to explain. Not the Kiramman name, not the polished manners, nor the history she carried like a second shadow. With Vi, she was just Caitlyn. Cait. Cupcake.
Before that, so much of her life had been spent translating herself for other people—choosing careful words, careful clothes, careful expressions. Making herself understandable. Making herself palatable. Acceptable.
Vi had never asked her to be either. She had simply looked at her and said, There you are. As though Caitlyn had not been something to discover. As though she had been there all along.
She looked away from her reflection before the memory could root itself.
The bar sat on the Piltover side of the bridge. It was both discreet and tasteful, the sort of establishment where crystal glasses gleamed beneath warm chandeliers and patrons spoke softly enough to imply that wealth never needed to raise its voice. A violinist played somewhere near the fireplace. The music drifted through the room like smoke. Caitlyn arrived at precisely the same time each Friday. Nine o’clock on the dot.
The hostess recognized her, perking her head up and peering straight ahead at her. “A table?”
Caitlyn nodded. “As usual.”
She was led to a small corner near the windows overlooking the river. It wasn’t hidden, nor was it very prominent, visible enough to be noticed, but private enough to observe. Perfect.
She ordered the same drink, a glass of red wine, and she drank it very slowly. Never enough to dull her judgment. Never enough to forget herself. That wasn’t the point, after all. The point was waiting. Watching.
People revealed themselves in bars. She saw who laughed too loudly. Who watched the exits. Who came with friends only to spend the evening scanning the room for someone else. Years of detective work had made people-reading almost impossible to switch off.
So, she just watched. A merchant celebrating a successful negotiation. A pair of Academy professors debating philosophy. An artist sketching strangers in a notebook. A woman reading alone. Another woman quietly refusing the advances of an overly confident nobleman.
Eventually, someone’s eyes met hers. That was usually how it began.
The conversation rarely mattered. Introductions. A joke. A compliment delivered with practiced ease. Questions carefully chosen to reveal little about herself. She listened more than she spoke. She bought the next round of drinks and accepted a smile, returned one of her own.
If things continued naturally, she would ask, “Would you care to continue this somewhere quieter?”
Sometimes they declined. Often, they didn’t. Either answer was acceptable. There were no expectations. No promises. No connections. She had built rules around herself as carefully as she built cases. Never ask for a surname. Never speak of family. Never discuss work beyond saying she was an investigator. Never stay until morning. Never allow breakfast. Never permit familiarity.
And, most importantly, never let it become something worth losing.
She told herself the rules kept everyone safe. She suspected they mostly kept herself safe.
Tonight, the woman was charming, quick-witted and elegant with a dark green gown and a laugh that came easily. She spoke about traveling between Piltover’s merchant houses with animated hands and smiled whenever Caitlyn asked thoughtful questions. She was lovely, objectively. Kind. Interesting.
The sort of woman Caitlyn might have pursued once, years ago.
Instead, she found herself distracted, and not by the conversation. By another patron across the room. Copper-red hair caught the firelight only for an instant. The woman turned and then the illusion vanished. Brown eyes. No tattoos winding beneath rolled sleeves. No familiar scar cutting through an eyebrow. Not her.
Never her.
Caitlyn forced herself back into the present. “Sorry,” she said quietly.
The woman, Nina or something or other, pouted, her lips pretty and pink. Caitlyn briefly wondered what they would taste like. Her fruity little cocktail? Her lip gloss? “You looked miles away.”
Caitlyn swallowed slowly. “My apologies.”
The woman smiled gently, her teeth as white as the pearls in her ears. “It must have been important.”
Casting shook her head, stiff yet sure. “It wasn't.”
The lie came smoothly now. Practice had polished it. By the time they climbed the stairs to Caitlyn’s apartment, the city had settled into midnight quiet. Lantern light spilled across worn floorboards. The fern rested in the windowsill. The books remained stacked exactly as she had left them.
The apartment always surprised people.
“It feels…” The woman searched for the word. “Peaceful.”
Caitlyn almost laughed. Peace wasn't the word she would have chosen. Ordered. Disciplined. Empty. Those fit better.
Still, she accepted the observation with a nod. She poured two glasses of water. She set one beside the bed without thinking. Later, she took a slow sip, washing away the taste of the woman’s mouth, a mixture of mint, champagne, and cherry chapstick.
Later, the apartment returned to stillness. Her visitor slept for a short while, breathing softly beneath the quilt. She sat awake beside the window, wrapped in a robe, the river breeze cooling her skin. She watched lantern reflections ripple across the water below.
It should have worked. It usually did. The ache quieted for a little while. The loneliness retreated just enough for her to convince herself it had been managed rather than merely postponed. Yet, tonight, when she had closed her eyes, another face had risen unbidden. Pink hair falling into bright blue eyes. A crooked grin. Calloused hands. A voice that had once called her Cupcake with such effortless affection that it had sounded less like a nickname and more like a promise.
For one dangerous heartbeat, the name had nearly escaped her lips. She had swallowed it before it became sound. The effort left an ache in her throat.
The woman sleeping in her bed deserved better than being mistaken for a ghost. And Vi deserved better than being remembered only in fragments, summoned by loneliness and dismissed before dawn.
That, perhaps, was the cruelest part.
Caitlyn had convinced herself years ago that ending things had been an act of mercy. That Vi deserved someone who would choose her openly, without hesitation, without shame. She still believed that. What she hadn’t anticipated was that believing it would not lessen the loss. She had simply traded one pain for another.
Outside, the bridge stretched between Piltover and Zaun, lanterns glowing against the dark river like a string of patient stars. Every day she crossed it in pursuit of other people’s answers. Every night she returned home carrying one question she had never managed to solve.
Had she let Vi go because it was what Vi needed...
Or because she had been too afraid to imagine a life in which love was worth defying everything she had been raised to become?
The river, as always, kept its counsel.
Morning arrived slowly.
The bridge was already awake long before dawn had fully climbed over the rooftops, its constant murmur drifting through the cracked bedroom window. Wheels rattled over steel. Vendors called to one another while setting up their stalls. Somewhere below, a gull protested loudly enough to be heard over everything else.
Caitlyn opened her eyes before the alarm on her bedside table chimed. She reached out automatically and silenced it. Six o'clock exactly.
For one suspended moment, she forgot there was someone beside her. Then she heard the soft rustle of linen. The woman stretched, one arm disappearing beneath the quilt before emerging again, catching the pale morning light. She blinked sleepily toward Caitlyn and smiled. “Good morning.”
Her voice was warm with sleep. Wanton. Wanting.
Caitlyn sat up straighter, a spark going up her spine, skin feeling stiff. “Good morning.”
Already, she was moving. Her feet found the floorboards. She tied her robe tightly. She opened the curtains just enough to admit the gray light filtering through the clouds. The apartment began to resemble itself again.
Behind her, the mattress shifted. “You wake up early.”
“I usually do,” Caitlyn replied coldly.
A raised eyebrow. “For work?”
Caring sniffed. “For habit.”
The woman laughed quietly. “I was hoping you'd stay in bed a little longer.”
Caitlyn busied herself with the kettle. “I have things to do.”
The other eyebrow raised. “On a Saturday?”
Caitlyn hummed absentmindedly. “Mm.”
The flame caught beneath the kettle with a familiar click. Behind her came another smile she didn’t have to see to recognize. “You really are impossible.”
Caitlyn nodded. “So I've been told.”
She took two cups from the cupboard out of habit before pausing. Only one was needed. She returned the second.
The woman watched her from the bed, chin resting in one hand. “You know…” she began. “There's a lovely bakery not far from here.”
Caitlyn nodded again, still not looking back. “So I've heard.”
“We could have breakfast.” A pause. “It doesn't have to mean anything.”
Caitlyn closed the cupboard. “I appreciate the offer.”
Not yes. Not no. Just appreciation, enough to close the door without slamming it. The woman understood. Caitlyn could see the realization settle across her expression, not even surprise. Recognition. Perhaps this wasn’t the first time she had encountered someone who kept people carefully at arm's length.
She climbed out of bed and gathered her dress from the chair. “I suppose this is where we say goodbye.”
It wasn’t a question, but Caitlyn answered it anyway. “I believe so.”
A faint smile, pretty pink like parting, gloss now smeared. “You really don’t waste time.”
A shrug. “No.”
“No breakfast.”
Another shrug. “No.”
“No awkward attempts to exchange addresses.”
Yet another. “I'm afraid not.”
The woman pulled the last pin from her hair, auburn curls tumbling over one shoulder. “Can I ask you something?”
Caitlyn blinked, then nodded. “You may.”
A hum. “Do you always make leaving feel this polite?”
Caitlyn hesitated long enough that honesty almost won. “Yes.”
The answer came softly. The woman dressed in silence after that. There was no argument, just the quiet acceptance of someone realizing they had mistaken a closed door for one merely left ajar.
By the time Caitlyn escorted her downstairs, the streets were beginning to fill. The woman paused outside the building. “Well…”
Caitlyn blinked again. “Well.”
“I hope…” She stopped herself, smiling instead. “Take care of yourself."
She dipped her chin. “And you.”
For a heartbeat, it looked as though she might step closer. Instead, she tucked her hands into her coat pockets, turned on her heel, and walked away. Caitlyn watched until she disappeared into the morning crowd. Only then did she allow herself a slow exhale.
She climbed back upstairs. The apartment already looked as though no one had ever visited. She stripped the bed and added fresh sheets and pillowcases. The old linen was folded into the laundry basket. The room smelled faintly of unfamiliar perfume so she opened the window wider. Cold air rushed inside. By the time she had made the bed with crisp corners, the scent had almost disappeared. Almost.
She caught sight of herself in the hallway mirror while carrying the laundry basket. It still surprised her, occasionally, how ordinary this almost-happiness had become. There had been years when she had imagined comfort would arrive all at once, like sunrise. Instead it had come slowly—one altered hem, one legal document, one morning waking to a face that finally felt like her own.
Now, she stood at the foot of the mattress. Saturday. Normally, Saturday had its own rhythm. Laundry. The market. Fresh flowers. Reading for an hour beside the window. Writing letters she rarely sent. Organizing case ledgers. Perhaps a walk along the river, if the weather allowed. Every hour was accounted for and every movement was familiar.
Today, the thought of following it felt...
She looked toward the bookshelf. Toward the chair by the window. Toward the neat stack of unread reports she had planned to ignore until Monday. None of it appealed to her.
The apartment suddenly felt too quiet, too aware of itself. Without allowing herself time to reconsider, she reached for her satchel.
“I'll work.”
The words sounded strange spoken into an empty room, as though she were asking permission.
Piltover Private Inquiry wasn’t meant to be open on Saturdays.
The front room remained dark when she unlocked the door. Dust floated lazily through beams of morning light. The building creaked around her. She relit the lamps and opened the windows. She set her satchel beneath the desk.
The familiar motions settled her heartbeat. Better. Much better. She hadn’t realized how much she had wanted to be here until she had arrived.
Cases were simpler than people. Evidence asked for observation. Nothing more, nothing less.
An hour later, her stomach reminded her she had skipped breakfast. She glanced toward the bridge. Soot and Sugar would already be open. Of course it would. It always was. She pulled on her coat and crossed the street.
Mae looked up with immediate surprise. “Saturday?”
Caitlyn almost winced. “I know.”
“I was beginning to think you only existed Monday through Friday.”
“So was I,” Caitlyn replied.
The woman laughed. “The usual?”
The words hung between them. The usual. Dark coffee and a blackberry scone. Every time. Every week. Every year.
Caitlyn opened her mouth to answer. “Actually…”
Mae blinked. Caitlyn blinked too. She hadn’t planned to say anything else. The word had simply appeared.
“I think…” She frowned faintly at herself. “Could I have the honey-spiced coffee?”
Silence.
Mae just stared. “You've been coming here for almost seven years,” she finally spoke.
Caitlyn nodded. “I know.”
“You’ve never ordered anything except black coffee,” Mae went on.
She nodded again. “I'm aware.”
Mae squinted. “And you don't even like sweet drinks.”
She simply shrugged. “I suppose we'll find out.”
The woman grinned broadly. “I'll frame this day.”
Caitlyn frowned, fumbling for words. “It isn't that remarkable.”
Mae shook her head, sighing. “Oh, Miss Kiramman.” She busied herself preparing the drink. “This is the most excitement I’ve had all week.”
Caitlyn found herself watching the careful swirl of honey disappear into the dark coffee. Steam curled upward, carrying scents she wasn't accustomed to.
Honey, cardamom, and a whisper of orange peel. When the cup was finally placed before her, she accepted it almost cautiously. She took a sip. The sweetness arrived first. It was not overwhelming, just enough to soften the bitterness she had grown so accustomed to expecting. Unexpectedly, it worked.
She looked down at the cup, almost puzzled.
Mae folded her arms over the curve of her chest. “Well?”
Caitlyn considered her answer with the seriousness of someone evaluating evidence. “I think…” Another sip. “That I may order this again.”
The owner laughed so loudly that a pair of dockworkers looked over from the next table. “I knew miracles happened.”
Caitlyn shook her head, the ghost of a smile tugging at the corner of her mouth despite herself. As she walked back toward her office, the warm cup in her hands and the unfamiliar taste lingering on her tongue, she couldn’t explain why changing something as small as her coffee felt significant.
It wasn’t, of course. It was only a drink. Only a Saturday. Only one tiny deviation in a life built from careful repetition.
And yet, for the first time in a very long while, the day had not unfolded exactly as she had expected. She wasn't sure whether that unsettled her. Or whether, somewhere beneath years of routine and restraint, a quiet part of her had been waiting for something—anything—to be different.
Saturday mornings rarely brought clients.
Those who sought detectives on weekends usually arrived desperate, impatient, or both. They stumbled through the door with stolen heirlooms, runaway apprentices, suspicious spouses, or frantic theories that unraveled under the gentlest questioning.
Today, there had been none. Only silence, the kind Caitlyn ordinarily appreciated. She sat at her desk, sleeves rolled neatly to her forearms, a ledger open before her. The honey-spiced coffee from Soot and Sugar had long since cooled, forgotten beside a stack of invoices. Sunlight filtered weakly through the office windows, painting pale rectangles across the worn wooden floor. Somewhere beyond the bridge, a whistle sounded from the freight lifts, answered by the distant clank of machinery in Zaun.
She dipped her pen into the inkpot and made another notation. She pinned another receipt to the file. The clock on the wall clicked steadily toward noon.
Then there were three hesitant knocks. They were not Maren’s confident rhythm and not the hurried pounding of someone in crisis. They were almost timid.
Caitlyn looked up.
Another pause.
Then a fourth knock, quieter than the others.
She set her pen down. “I'll be right there.”
Crossing the reception room, she smoothed an absent wrinkle from her cuff before unlocking the front door. The hinges gave their familiar creak.
Standing on the threshold was a little girl. Six. Perhaps seven. She couldn’t have been older. She was bundled into a coat that had once been a little too large for her and was now only slightly so, its sleeves rolled twice at the wrists. Mud clung to the hem. One stocking had slipped halfway down her calf. Her boots were dusty from walking far longer than little legs ought to. Her hair was blue, an unruly, tangled blue that looked as though someone had attempted to braid it that morning only for the braid to lose a spirited argument with the rest of her hair. Wisps escaped in every direction, curling around ears and sticking to damp cheeks.
Those cheeks were bright with cold and streaked with drying tears. She looked up at Caitlyn with enormous eyes, also blue. A startling, crystalline blue, red-rimmed from crying.
For a heartbeat, Caitlyn forgot to breathe.
The child sniffed hard, rubbing one sleeve across her nose. “M-Miss?”
Caitlyn blinked. “Oh.” She immediately stepped aside. “Come in.”
The little girl hesitated only long enough to glance nervously over one shoulder toward the bridge before slipping inside. The office suddenly felt very large around someone so small.
Caitlyn quietly shut the door behind her. “There.” Her voice softened almost without her noticing. “You’re safe.”
The little girl’s shoulders loosened by the smallest degree. She stood awkwardly on the entry rug, twisting the edge of her sleeve between tiny fingers.
Caitlyn crouched so they were nearly eye level. “Would you like to sit down?”
A tiny nod. She guided the child toward the worn sofa in the waiting room. The cushions nearly swallowed her.
Caitlyn bit her bottom lip, still unsure of what exactly to do. “I’ll fetch some water.”
By the time Caitlyn returned with a glass, the girl had tucked both feet beneath herself, clutching the cushion as though uncertain whether she was allowed to touch anything else.
She accepted the glass with both hands. “Thank you.”
Her voice trembled just enough to betray how hard she had been trying not to cry again.
“What is your name?” Caitlyn asked.
The girl looked into the water instead of at Caitlyn. “Camellia”
The answer was almost whispered.
“Hello, Camellia.” She smiled gently. “I'm Caitlyn.”
The child nodded. “I know.”
Caitlyn blinked. “You do?”
She pointed toward the frosted front door. “You have got your name outside.”
The words came slowly, sounding each one out with obvious concentration. Caitlyn couldn’t help it. A smile touched the corner of her mouth. “Very observant.”
Camellia shrugged. “My mom says reading signs keeps you from getting lost.”
The last words caught in her throat. Fresh tears welled immediately.
Caitlyn’s heart squeezed. “Oh, love.”
She squeezed her eyes shut. “I still got lost.”
Caitlyn reached for the box of handkerchiefs she kept beneath the reception desk and offered one silently.
Camellia accepted it with a muttered, “Sorry.”
Caitlyn softly shook her head, not wanting to startle the poor girl. “You don't need to apologize.”
Her top lip was still trembling. “I wasn't supposed to leave.”
“What happened?”
The little girl took a careful breath. “Mama was working.” Another sniff. “She told me to stay where Miss Gert could watch me.” A pause. “But…” She stared miserably at her shoes. “I wanted to see the bridge.”
Caitlyn nodded along. It was a common story among lost children. “So you slipped away.”
A tiny nod. “I thought I could find it.”
“And then?” Caitlyn pressed gently.
“I found it.” Another pause. “Then I couldn’t find my way back.”
The words dissolved into fresh tears. Caitlyn waited. She had learned years ago that silence often made more room for honesty than questions ever could.
Eventually, Camellia whispered, “I’ve been walking forever.”
“You’ve done the right thing by asking for help, love,” Caitlyn murmured, ignoring the urge to reach out and brush away the girl’s tears.
She could never stand the sight of a crying child. Especially in high society, where children were expected to be prim and proper, always prepared. They were often left alone when distressed, or left to be tended to by nannies and nursemaids while their parents paraded around at some party.
If Caitlyn ever had children, she would be there to soothe every fever, kiss every scraped knee, and tie every shoelace. But that was a big if.
Camellia tilted her head. “I have?”
Caitlyn nodded. “You have.”
The girl considered that. “Asking is hard.”
Caitlyn nearly snorted. “I know.”
Camellia nodded solemnly, as though Caitlyn had confirmed a great universal truth. Only then did Caitlyn truly look at her. Those eyes, they held hers openly now. They were an impossible shade of blue, clear and bright, beautiful, almost silver around the edges.
Something in Caitlyn’s chest tightened again. She had seen those eyes before. Every morning of her childhood. Every formal portrait. Every reflection in polished silver mirrors. There was a painting that hung in the east corridor of House Kiramman, a portrait commissioned shortly after her thirteenth birthday. The first portrait had been quietly removed after her transition, as though history could be persuaded to cooperate if no one looked at the older canvas for too long.
She remembered hating it. The dress itched. The painter had insisted she remain perfectly still for hours. She had worn her hair neatly brushed, tied back with a blue ribbon.
When she was younger, visitors would often stop before it.
“She has Cassandra’s posture.”
“Tobias’s eyes.”
“Such a serious little thing.”
Camellia looked unnervingly like that child. Not identical. The freckles scattered generously across her nose belonged to someone who had spent more afternoons outdoors than etiquette lessons would ever allow. Her hair possessed a kind of joyful rebellion that no governess would have tolerated for more than five seconds. There was soot beneath one thumbnail. A small scrape across one knee. Her coat had been patched twice. She looked like a child who climbed where she wasn’t supposed to and came home with pockets full of interesting rocks.
But… The shape of her face. The angle of her chin. Those impossibly familiar eyes.
It was enough that, for one bewildering heartbeat, Caitlyn felt as though someone had lifted the little girl from that portrait and simply... allowed life to happen to her differently.
She realized she had been staring.
Camellia shifted self-consciously. “Is something wrong?”
“No.” The answer came perhaps a touch too quickly. She shook her head sharply. “No, not at all.” She forced herself to look away, reaching instead for her notebook. “What is your mother’s name, love?”
Camellia perked up, clear cerulean eyes whole and wide. She smiled small and soft, revealing a gap-toothed grin. “Vi.”
The pen stopped. The room seemed to forget how to breathe. A single drop of ink fell from the nib, blooming slowly across the page.
Caitlyn did not notice. The only sound was the distant hum of the bridge beyond the windows. Then, very carefully, she looked back at the little girl.
Camellia was still clutching the handkerchief in one hand and the water glass in the other, swinging her boots a few inches above the floor, entirely unaware that she had just spoken a name Caitlyn had spent years trying—and failing—to leave behind.