*Runze's POV*
Bael's still standing behind my chair, his hands rest on my shoulders, warm through my knit cardigan.
Then he comes around it and crouches down in front of me, and I have nowhere to look except his face.
For a moment neither of us speaks. His eyes are steady on mine, the way they get when he's decided something and is figuring out where to begin.
My fingers tighten around the diamond of the pendant at my throat, the sharp edge digging into my skin.
"Xue Lian and I were together," he says. His voice is flat and even. "Before the marriage. For a long time. When my father's will changed the inheritance conditions, I asked him to come back from abroad, to marry me." Something in his jaw tightens. "He said he wasn't ready, and asked me to wait a little longer."
I say nothing, I don't even nod. I just listen to the sound of his voice filling the quiet room, trying to match the words to the history I've been guessing at for months.
