Theon stayed longer than he intended. After Lena finally stopped crying, she sat curled into herself on the couch, her face pale and exhausted, eyes swollen from crying too much. She looked fragile in a way he had never seen before.

It unsettled him. The Lena he knew had always been stubborn. Even when things got hard regarding her father, she tried to stand through it all. But tonight… Tonight she looked like someone barely holding herself together.

Theon stood in the kitchen for a while, warming water and making tea he knew she probably would not drink.

“You should eat something,” he said quietly as he returned.

Lena only...