Surrounded by scattered documents, Selene scribbled feverishly. She wrote down the date of every drought, fire, famine, battle, and any other calamity she could find. She began to write out a timeline, crossing off events that didn't fit her criteria.

Finally, she stilled. As her eyes scanned the page in front of her, they began to fill with tears. She carefully folded the paper and slipped it into her pocket, throwing the remainders that held her writings into the fire.

She stood patiently, watching them burn. Being so focused on her work, she had failed to notice when Kelheit entered the library. Just as the emperor had insisted, the Duke had planned to introduce himself.

But when he found her working so feverishly, he was too entranced with her passionate research to interrupt. When it became clear there was more to her scribbling than curiosity, that there was something deeply personal about the information she was compiling, he felt the same pang of shame he had experienced on the balcony.

He seemed to show a pattern of finding her in personal moments. Thinking better than to linger, he silently left the way he came.

Golden rays shone through the library windows, growing dimmer as the sun sank behind the horizon. The disarray she had previously created was now organized into stacks, awaiting their return to the shelves.

Selene was reading over the last of the reports from the recent war.

“They speak of the loss of life so lightly,” she muttered as she closed the folder.

Since the librarian had offered to refile the reports the following morning, Selene stacked them on a nearby cart, freeing up the table for a new pile of documents. But before she dove head-first into another subject, she decided to mill about the aisles to stretch her legs.

Wandering down the shelves that held the genealogical records available to the public, Selene began to flip through the books whose names she recognized from her celebration list. Her father had been quite insistent she memorize all the immediate family of his business partners.

None of the names captured her attention until her eyes rested on the book for the house of Umbra. The name had appeared on the list, but she remembered no mention of Umbra concerning the Vizio's business ventures.

She flipped open the book, taking a moment to study the rough portraits of the recently deceased and current Duke.

“Hmm...” her brow furrowed. “I'm sure I would have remembered meeting Duke Umbra...”

From what she understood, the Umbra family held a publicly neutral stance on political affairs. Despite their public statements, however, there are plenty of rumors that the Umbra family is deeply involved with the emperor behind the scenes.

None had the audacity to ever bring it up. The current head of the Dukedom had a nasty reputation for lacking mercy and desiring blood. Turning the tides in many battles had won him quite the fearsome reputation.

“It is flattering to hear a beautiful lady say she would remember me,” a deep voice jerked Selene out of her thoughts. “I apologize for startling you.”

“I apologize for thinking I was alone,” Selene responded dryly with a curtsy.