AFTER Five months.

That’s how long it had been since Norwan first stood beneath the garden’s twisted archway again, with Natalie only a few paces away but heartbreaks apart.

He hadn’t expected her to forgive him right away—hadn’t even dared hope. But he came back every week, sometimes with tea, sometimes with silence, sometimes with stories from the outpost or awkward attempts at old jokes she used to laugh at. Sometimes she walked away. Sometimes she listened. But slowly, something had changed.

She stopped flinching when he touched her hand.

She started asking him questions again—nothing deep at first, just idle curiosities. But over time, her words sharpened. So did...