It began subtly, in the weeks following the meeting with Micah — small moments where Ezra would pause mid-sentence, reaching for a word or a detail that seemed to hover just out of reach, gone before he could properly grasp it. He didn’t mention it at first, telling himself it was simply the ordinary disorientation of reopening old wounds he’d spent years keeping carefully sealed.

He noticed it most acutely in the kitchen, oddly enough — reaching for an ingredient by name and finding, for a disorienting half-second, that the word simply wasn’t there, replaced by a frustrating blankness he covered quickly by gesturing instead, hoping Lucien wouldn’t notice the...