## Chapter 471 — Dry Weather

On the third morning, sunlight reached across the kitchen floor while the grass outside still held dew.

Lethira stood by the open window with her cup, looking up through the branches. The sky beyond them was clear. She could hear the stream and, farther off, wheels on the public road; close to the house, a bird was working through the same few notes with considerable persistence.

The roofers were due that afternoon. She found herself looking forward to their arrival, although she had less enthusiasm for whatever might come down once they started lifting the old covering. There would be things to move away from the work and somewhere to put the broken material. For now, none of it required her attention.

The cave report did.

Its waxed wrap lay at the far end of the scarred table in the front room. Lethira went through, set down her cup and tucked the bundle into her bag, taking a little care with the folded map. She remembered the stream chamber readily: the reach of the lamplight, the broad head beneath the arch, the patient way the mauler had watched them leave. She was curious what Brannock would make of it.

“I'd like to get there before the counter becomes crowded,” she said. “There should be time to deal with the report and come home without hurrying.”

Her cloak hung over a chair. She left it there, pleased by the mild air coming through the window, and held out her hand towards Ian.

“Ready?”

“Yes, my love. Let's see what the Guild makes of our discovery.”

Lethira's mouth curved. “I hope someone recognises the ridge from the directions. I'd like to know whether that grazing path has a name.”

She settled the bag against her hip and opened the front door. Mild air entered the hall, carrying the smell of damp grass. Beyond the trees, a cart rattled along the public road; closer by, the northern track bore the broad wheel marks of the earth deliveries.

She looked once towards the roof, shading her eyes against the sunlight. It would be pleasant to stop listening for the bucket whenever it rained.

Then she stepped outside.

Ian caught up with her and took her hand.

“Agreed. On to Merrowford.”

The western road grew busier towards town. A cart laden with empty baskets passed beneath the trees, its driver keeping to the firmer middle while the wheels disturbed old ruts. Nearer the gate, cooking smoke drifted across the road. Lethira caught the smell of fresh bread and glanced towards the roofs before returning her attention to the traffic.

The Guild counter had only a short queue. Brannock was finishing with a woman whose delivery receipt had been folded until the writing along one crease was almost illegible. She turned it towards the window, checked the troublesome line and entered something in her ledger before waving the next person forward.

Lethira brought out the waxed wrap.

“The northern cave. We found it.”

Brannock cleared a space beside the ledger. Lethira unfolded the copied report and laid the map with it, keeping the surface directions uppermost.

“We connected the entrance to a maintained path above the Varren grazing ground. A woman there gave us the directions back to the northern road. The underground distances are estimates.”

Brannock began with the route. Her ink-marked finger followed the turning, the shelter and the water-cut, then moved to the cave sketch. She read for a while without speaking. Around the counter, the morning continued: boots crossing the boards, a bench scraping farther back, somebody counting copper into a small untidy heap.

At the stream chamber, Brannock drew the written account closer. Lethira waited, her hands resting loosely on the edge of the counter. She had enjoyed making the map clearer; watching someone else use it made her notice how much blank paper remained beyond the surveyed passages.

Brannock looked up at them.

“How much did you tell the woman on the grazing ground about what you'd found uphill?”

“Nothing.” Ian looked towards Lethira.

“Only questions about the shelter, the path and the road,” Lethira confirmed. “She told us hunters use the path as well as the grazing households.”

Brannock looked back at the surface map. The maintained path crossed the water-cut below the entrance; beyond that, Lethira's charcoal line climbed into less certain ground. She drew a scrap of paper from beneath her ledger and wrote the Varren directions on it.

“I'll arrange a warning for the households using that shelter. They can pass it to anyone going farther uphill. That needn't wait until we've established who holds the ridge.”

Lethira's attention rested on the cave sketch. The mauler had watched her retreat without taking a step towards her. She could still recall the awkward shelf beneath her boots.

“Make it a warning about entering the cave. We have no evidence of it troubling the grazing.”

“Yes. I can read that here.” Brannock tapped the account of their withdrawal, then added a line to her note. “I'll keep the message specific.”

She laid the note beside the report rather than among the notices waiting for the public board.

Ian took Lethira's hand and let the process continue.

Her fingers closed around his while Brannock finished reading, occasionally returning to the map as the clerk matched a passage in the account to its place underground.

The scrutiny found nothing that required another explanation. Brannock turned to a clean section of her ledger and made the entry, pausing once to check the Varren directions before copying them.

“I'm recording this as a partial survey, under your name,” she told Lethira. “The upper-ground rights and branch question can follow. Neither needs you standing at my counter while I chase it.”

“Good. We have roofers coming this afternoon.”

“Then you have somewhere better to stand and worry.”

Lethira smiled. Brannock finished the line, sanded the ink and copied a reference onto a narrow slip. The report and map went together beneath a weighted board beside her ledger; the warning note remained on top, where she would see it.

“That's all I need from you this morning. Keep this in case you bring me anything further about the site.”

Lethira accepted the slip and put it in her bag. For two nights the report had occupied the far end of their table. She was pleased to leave it here, although she lingered for a moment over the corner of the map still showing beneath the board. There was a great deal of cave beyond those few charcoal lines.

“Thank you.”

Brannock nodded and reached for the next waiting receipt.

Lethira turned her attention to Ian, her hand still in his.

“Bread, then. And something we can eat without making much work for ourselves.”

“Pie?” Ian gave her a hopeful look.

Lethira held his gaze for a moment, enjoying the appeal.

“Yes. I was suggesting lunch, not prescribing bread.”

Her thumb moved across his knuckles. She had been prepared to eat something cold and practical at home, but now she could almost feel the first bite of warm pastry breaking beneath her teeth. There was time to sit somewhere, too. The roofers were not due for hours.

“I'd like one myself.”

“Onward, to pie.”

The market was busy enough to slow them at a crossing, where a porter was manoeuvring a handcart between a vegetable stall and several people who seemed determined not to notice him. Lethira waited for him to pass, then continued towards the smell of hot pastry.

The bakery door stood open. Behind the counter, a fresh tray occupied a cleared patch of wood, the pies unevenly browned along their crimped edges. One had leaked a little gravy onto the tray. Lethira found herself looking at that one rather than its tidier neighbours.

“Beef and onion, chicken and leek,” the seller said. “These have just come out.”

“Chicken and leek for me.”

Lethira loosened the fastening of her coin pouch, then glanced at Ian.

“Which would you like?”

“Beef and onion, please.”

The seller lifted a beef-and-onion pie from the tray and set it on a square of paper. Lethira's chicken and leek followed, its crimped edge a little darker on one side.

“Mind the filling. These will still be hot when you think they aren't.”

Lethira counted out the payment while the seller folded the paper around each pie, leaving the tops uncovered. Close to the counter, the smell was almost unfair: browned pastry, onion and the rich warmth escaping through the small cuts in the crust.

She picked up the beef-and-onion parcel first. Heat reached her fingers through the folded paper, encouraging her to shift her grip beneath the thicker base.

“I'd like to sit by the river with these,” she said. “Somewhere out of the cart traffic.”

She offered Ian his pie, holding it carefully level.

Ian took it with equal care. “A good idea. Shall we walk back along the river to ours afterwards?”

“Yes. We have time before the roofers.”

They followed the streets down towards the water, then the quieter riverside path beyond the loading places. The warehouses gave way by degrees to grazing ground and reeds. Water moved slowly past, wrinkling where the breeze reached it, and swallows skimmed low over the brighter stretches.

Ian followed Lethira until they found a pleasant place to sit outside the town, beneath a willow where the ground rose gently from the bank. Its branches overhung the water, but a broad patch of short grass remained dry in the sun.

“Here.”

Lethira set her bag beside the trunk and lowered herself onto the grass, keeping her pie level. The paper had developed a translucent patch beneath the pastry. She loosened its folded edges and breathed in the chicken-and-leek warmth, now considerably less fierce than it had been at the bakery.

For a moment she looked across the water. Someone was walking on the opposite bank, too far away for more than the movement of a pale shirt between trees. She could still hear a cart somewhere behind them, but there was no need to move out of its way.

“Come and sit with me. I've carried this quite far enough.”

Ian sat beside her, close enough that their hips and legs touched.

Lethira settled naturally into the contact, letting the outside of her thigh rest against his and shifting just enough that their shoulders touched as well.

For a few breaths she said nothing. The river moved below them, brown-green where the bank shadow crossed it and brighter farther out. A willow leaf landed on the water and travelled downstream with considerably less purpose than either of them had shown that morning.

Then she bit into her pie.

The pastry cracked softly. She caught a small piece against the paper before it escaped and chewed with evident concentration.

“Oh, that was worth walking for.”

She looked sideways at Ian, amusement warming her eyes.

“How's yours?”

Ian carefully took a bite, trying not to let any crumbs fall into the grass.

“It's nice. Warm pies are always better.”

Lethira glanced down at the few flakes already caught in the fold of her paper.

“You are being far more conscientious about the local wildlife than I am.”

She took another bite. A fragment of crust escaped onto her lap this time, and she picked it up with two fingers before eating it.

“And yes. Warm is better. Though I suspect that opinion would survive very little serious testing.”

Her shoulder remained against his. For a while she watched the river and ate, content enough to let the quiet stay quiet.

Then she looked sideways at him.

“Do you miss lunches like this when you're in your own world?”

“Yes. There is a river near where I live, actually, but I don't think I've eaten warm pie sat on the bank.”

Lethira smiled into the river.

“Then perhaps this is one of the advantages of you having two homes which cannot agree on what an ordinary lunch looks like.”

She rested her pie on the folded paper over one knee, careful not to tip the filling, and looked along the water as it disappeared behind the next bend.

“I like knowing there are still very simple things your world hasn't already done better.”

Her shoulder pressed a little more comfortably against his.

“Would you want to do this by your river someday?”

“Yes, I think I would.” Ian smiled at her.

Lethira's expression softened.

“I'd like that too.”

She looked back across the river, following the slow movement of the water between the reeds.

“Not because your river needs improving by us sitting beside it. I'd simply like to know one of the ordinary places that belongs to your life.”

Her hand settled over his where it rested between them.

“If the boundary ever changes enough to make that possible, warm pie by your river sounds like a very good use of impossible travel.”

Ian leaned over and kissed her between bites of pie.

Lethira made a small surprised sound against the kiss, mostly because she had still been chewing. Then she kissed him back.

One hand came up to rest lightly against his cheek while the other kept her pie safely upright. When she eased away, her eyes were bright with amusement.

“You have chosen an unusually dangerous moment for romance.”

She glanced at his pie, then at her own.

“Do we need a household rule about swallowing before kissing?”

“Romance should have some risk with it.” Ian smiled and finished his pie.

Lethira laughed softly.

“Some risk. I remain unconvinced that choking on pastry is the kind poets intended.”

She finished the last of her own pie, folded the greasy paper into a neat square and set it beside her bag. Then she leaned against him properly, shoulder and hip warm along his side, and rested her head against his.

For a while she simply watched the river.

“This was a good morning.”

Ian leaned over and kissed her on the lips.

“Elf, chicken and leek tastes better than just chicken and leek.”

He smiled and lost himself a little in her eyes.

Lethira's eyes narrowed with delighted suspicion.

“That is an appalling sentence.”

She kissed him again anyway, slower this time, one hand settling at the side of his neck while the river moved quietly below them.

When she drew back, she stayed close enough that her breath still touched his lips.

“Unfortunately, I may have to permit further testing.”

“You are very beautiful.” Ian paused. “Before I start to dribble, shall we return and prepare for our home to be invaded?”

Lethira's mouth curved.

“Yes. Before your condition worsens and I have to explain to the roofers that my human has been overcome by looking at me.”

She kissed him once, briefly, then gathered the folded pie papers and slipped them into her bag.

“Home, then. We can move anything beneath the south-west section before they arrive.”

She rose and held out her hand.

Ian took it, rose, and they walked home.

They kept the river beside them for part of the return before turning onto the familiar road towards the holding. The house appeared between the mature trees with the afternoon sun on its pale stone. The broad earth bank beyond it had risen further while they were away, another compacted layer laid across the prepared footprint. No workers remained there now. The range still looked more like civil engineering than archery.

Lethira went inside first and took the report slip from her bag, placing it at the far end of the scarred table where the report itself had sat for two nights.

“That is a considerably smaller piece of paper.”

Upstairs, she checked the south-west room. The old stain was dry. The self-emptying bucket sat beneath it, idle in the clear weather. She carried it downstairs; the standing condition would return it to ordinary use once the repair was complete.

Before she reached the kitchen, wheels sounded on the northern approach.

Lethira stopped.

A moment later came the heavier wooden knock of something being set down outside, followed by a familiar woman's voice speaking to someone nearer the cart.

Lethira looked towards Ian.

“That will be our invasion.”

Through the front window, the same compact human roofer who had inspected the house was visible beside a ladder, her weather-reddened hands already testing one of its rungs. The younger man with her was unloading tools and replacement covering from the small cart.

“They're here.” Lethira glanced towards the stairs, then back to Ian. “Would you like to come outside with me while they start?”

Ian followed her outside.

The roofer straightened from the ladder and gave Lethira a brief nod of recognition.

“Good. Dry enough to open it.”

The younger man had already set their tools beside the wall and was carrying the replacement material away from the cart in manageable bundles. Nothing about their arrival suggested ceremony; they had come to remove a known problem and see whether the roof underneath agreed with the earlier inspection.

Lethira looked up towards the south-west slope.

“The room below is clear enough to work over. The old stain is dry.”

“Keep it clear until we've opened the covering,” the roofer said. “If what's underneath matches what I saw from outside, we replace the failed section and check the timber before closing it again. If it doesn't, I show you before we make the job larger.”

“That was the agreement.”

The woman rested one hand on the ladder and looked between Lethira and Ian.

“Anyone going upstairs while we're working?”

Ian shook his head. “Not me.”

The roofer nodded.

“Good. Then stay below the working side unless we call you over. Old covering has an unfortunate habit of discovering gravity.”

Lethira folded her arms.

“I'll make a heroic effort not to stand underneath people removing pieces of roof.”

“That puts you ahead of some homeowners.”

The younger man laughed once from beside the cart and carried the last bundle towards the wall.

They set the ladder firmly, checked its feet and carried the tools up in two journeys. From below, the work was subdued: metal against old fixings, the scrape of covering being lifted, brief exchanges between the roofers and occasional fragments passed carefully down.

Lethira stayed near Ian but resisted the urge to follow every sound around the side of the house.

After several minutes the roofer leaned over the edge.

“Found the leak.”

Lethira stepped far enough out to see her without entering the drop zone.

“How bad?”

“Better than it could be. One section of covering has been letting water track underneath. The timber below is stained and the outer edge has softened, but it isn't rotten through and the main support is sound.”

She disappeared briefly, then returned holding a short darkened piece she had removed from beneath the covering.

“This bit wants replacing. The rest can stay. We're still inside the job we quoted.”

Lethira visibly relaxed.

“And the chimney?”

“I'll look at the top before we close up here. It's low, but low is not the same as wrong.”

The roofer glanced towards them.

“If you want to see the damaged piece before I take it apart further, now is the useful moment.”

“I'm fine not to. Lethira?”

Lethira looked up at the roofer, then at the darkened timber in her hand.

“I do.”

She stepped forward only after checking where the workers had indicated it was safe to stand.

“Not because I think I can diagnose it. I want to know what failed, so if the stain ever returns I have some idea whether I'm looking at the same problem.”

The roofer lowered the damaged piece far enough for her to examine it from the ground.

“Water travelled under the covering here,” she said, indicating the softened edge. “Once it got beneath, it followed the timber instead of dropping where you'd expect. That's why the mark inside sits farther over than the actual opening.”

Lethira studied the grain and the darker staining for a few moments, then nodded.

“All right. I've seen enough.”

She moved back beside Ian, leaving the roofers to continue.

“I prefer this version of home ownership,” she said quietly. “Someone else understands the roof.”

Ian leaned close to her ear.

“I prefer the part about an attendant washing his Lady.”

Then he looked entirely innocent to any passing tradespeople.

Lethira's composure survived for almost a second. Her eyes flicked towards the roofer above them, then back to Ian. A faint warmth reached her cheeks.

“You have developed extremely particular preferences about household labour,” she whispered.

Her mouth curved.

“And I remember that attendant. He was very diligent. Especially once his Lady had taken her shirt off.”

Then she faced the roof again with an expression of complete innocence.

The work continued above them.

Old covering came away in measured sections rather than dramatic sheets. Now and then the younger roofer passed something down, climbed again, and disappeared beyond the roofline. The sharper knocks changed tone once the softened timber had been removed; new wood answered differently beneath the tools.

Lethira stood with Ian beneath the trees where they could watch without hovering directly under the work. After a while she stopped trying to follow every sound.

“That one was new timber,” she murmured after a particularly clean series of blows.

A few minutes later the roofer crossed higher towards the chimney. From below, only her boots and part of one leg were visible before she vanished behind the roof pitch.

There was a longer pause.

Then she reappeared at the edge.

“Chimney's sound enough,” she called down. “Top is low, but the draw is good and there's no sign it's spilling smoke back under normal use. I wouldn't rebuild it just to make it taller.”

Lethira looked pleased by the absence of an additional problem.

“So we leave it.”

“That's what I'd do.”

“That's good,” Ian said. “One less invasion for chimney rebuilding.”

Lethira smiled.

“Yes. I'm beginning to appreciate repairs which end by refusing to become larger repairs.”

Above them, the hammering resumed. New covering went back over the opened section, followed by the quieter work of fastening and checking what had been disturbed.

After a while the roofer appeared at the edge again.

“That section's closed. We're finishing the edges now, then I'll check it once more from below.”

“I'm going to miss the mysterious bucket,” Ian said, “but I'm glad we'll be dry.”

Lethira glanced towards the bucket waiting inside by the wall.

“I admit, I grew fond of it.”

Her mouth curved.

“A bucket which empties itself at the mark I chose, into the place I chose, and then becomes an ordinary bucket again once the roof is repaired is exactly the sort of ridiculous luxury I can defend.”

She leaned lightly against Ian's shoulder.

“But yes. I would rather miss the bucket than need it.”

They waited for the workers to finish.

The younger man came down first with the worst of the removed material, stacking it beside the cart rather than leaving fragments around the house. The roofer remained above for several more minutes, checking the repaired edge and then working her way back towards the ladder.

When she finally descended, she walked around the south-west side before going inside with Lethira to look at the old stain from below. Nothing there had changed, which was precisely what she wanted.

Back outside, the roofer wiped her hands on a cloth.

“That's done. Failed covering replaced, softened edge replaced, surrounding timber sound. Chimney stays as it is.”

Lethira looked up at the roof, where the repaired section was almost disappointingly difficult to distinguish from the rest.

“And if it rains?”

“Then you discover whether I'm competent.”

That earned a small smile.

“I'll try not to arrange weather purely for the test.”

The roofer glanced towards the doorway.

“You can move things back upstairs. No reason to keep the room clear now.”

Lethira's hand found Ian's.

“Then I believe our home has survived its invasion.”

Ian went inside to move things back upstairs while Lethira dealt with the roofers.

Outside, payment and clearing up took almost as long as the final inspection. The roofer went through the agreed figure once more, deducted nothing and added nothing, then accepted payment while the younger man loaded the removed covering and softened timber onto the cart.

Lethira counted the coin into her hand.

“No surprises?”

“Not unless the next rain comes through somewhere else.”

“That would be a different surprise.”

The roofer gave her a brief, approving look.

“Keep an eye on the repaired section through the first proper rain. If the old stain darkens again, send word. Otherwise, leave it alone.”

Lethira nodded. “That sounds like excellent advice for roofs and several other things.”

The ladder went onto the cart. Tools followed. Within a few minutes the northern approach was empty again except for wheel marks and the increasingly substantial earth bank farther across the property.

Lethira stood looking up at the repaired roof for a moment after the cart had gone.

Then she went inside.

She found Ian upstairs, with the room returning to normal around him. The old stain remained overhead, dry and harmless-looking now that the cause above it had been removed.

Lethira leaned against the doorway.

“They're paid. The roof is officially somebody else's successful problem.”

Her eyes moved to the bucket. The repair had completed the condition she had set when Ian first altered it; whatever external behaviour had emptied it was already gone.

“Do we retire our mysterious bucket now?”

Ian checked it, confirming the influence had ended with the repair.

“It's back to being a normal bucket now.”

Lethira crossed the room, picked it up by the handle and turned it once in her hand.

“Good.”

There was a little affection in the word which had nothing to do with the bucket deserving it.

“It performed admirably in a position for which it was never qualified.”

She set it against the wall.

“Now it can return to the less distinguished career of carrying water.”

Ian approached from behind and wrapped his arms around her waist.

“Another house task done. I'd like to make some kind of start on the bathhouse next, as I imagine that will take quite a while?”

Lethira leaned back into him, resting her hands over his forearms where they crossed her waist.

“Yes. Longer than the roof, certainly.”

Her eyes drifted towards the window, roughly in the direction of the collapsed outbuilding whose old stone footprint they had already considered.

She turned her head enough to look back at him.

“We already know roughly what we want. The first useful step is finding someone competent to tell us what can be reused and what the drainage will require.”

A pause, her expression warming.

“Do you want something simple and practical, or are you imagining a bathhouse ambitious enough that I should become concerned?”

“Cosy, built for two. To share.” Ian held her a little closer. “I don't need marble and gold.”

Lethira's hands tightened lightly over his arms.

“Good. Cosy I can understand.”

She turned within his embrace until she was facing him.

“Warm and deep, with somewhere to sit, a proper place for clothes and towels, and enough hot water that sharing feels luxurious rather than efficient. Built properly enough that we are not discovering hidden rot in ten years, and ours—not a noble household's bathing room copied into the garden.”

She slid her arms around his neck and drew him closer.

Her forehead rested lightly against his.

“A proper bath for two. I think I'm going to enjoy planning this.”

“Speaking of planning, I have been mapping again...”

Lethira's expression changed immediately from bathhouse warmth to amused suspicion.

“Of course you have.”

Her hands remained resting against his chest.

“The last time you said that, three sheets of paper turned into a fairly serious attempt to make the world fit inside your study.”

A small smile returned.

“What have you been mapping this time?”

Ian produced two parchments: one labelled **Ground floor**, the other **First floor**. They were his own working plans of the house rather than a machine survey. The lower sheet showed the front room, entrance hall, kitchen, pantry and external store around the central stair. The upper sheet showed the short landing, their main bedroom, the south-west room beneath the repaired roof and the narrow third room. Both also marked the house yard around the building.

Lethira took them carefully.

For several moments she said nothing.

Her attention moved first over the lower floor: the front room occupying the broad eastern side, kitchen across the rear, pantry and store tucked into the western end, the entrance hall and stair between them. Then she compared it with the upper sheet—the main bedroom, the south-west room, the narrow room and the short central landing.

She turned one parchment slightly, orienting it against the actual walls around them.

“Oh.”

That was followed by a much more pleased, “Yes.”

She walked a few steps towards the landing, looking from the plan to the doorway and back again. This was not a ranger reading somebody else's territory now. It was recognition: rooms she crossed half-awake, the pantry she reached for without thinking, the bedroom where their belongings had acquired places.

“You mapped our house.”

Her finger traced the wall between the kitchen and pantry without touching the ink.

“It is strange seeing it flattened like this. I know where everything is, but I have never needed to know the shape all at once.”

She looked at the upper floor again and smiled when she found the south-west room.

“And there is our recently conquered roof.”

Then she glanced towards him, openly curious.

“Are these just because you wanted a plan of our home, or are you planning to use them for something?”

“I just wanted to see it, perceive its shape better. I hadn't thought of a use yet. I might do furniture next, if that's not too much excitement for me.”

Lethira laughed.

“Furniture. Yes. Clearly the natural next stage.”

She carried both parchments downstairs with rather more care than the joke suggested, then spread the ground-floor plan across the scarred table. Her eyes moved from the drawing to the actual room around them: six chairs, the table itself, the kitchen beyond, the routes they used without ever thinking of them as routes.

“Though furniture may expose your errors more quickly. A wall does not object if you draw it slightly wrong. A table becomes difficult to ignore when the parchment claims it is somewhere else.”

She shifted one chair aside just enough to see the space it normally occupied, then looked back down at the plan.

“I think I'd like this to show the house as we actually live in it before we start using it to imagine anything different.”

Her finger rested beside the front room.

“Would you map what is here now first?”

“Yes, I think so.”

“Then we make an honest map before an aspirational one.”

She found a piece of charcoal and bent over the ground-floor parchment. The scarred table went in first, roughly centred where it stood. Then came the six chairs: four around the table, two against the wall.

She paused, looked from the drawing to the room, and adjusted one chair mark slightly.

“This is already more revealing.”

The empty plan had made the house look larger. Furniture turned measurement into use.

Ian leaned against her arm as she mapped their home.

“I'm so very glad I got to meet you, Lethira.”

Her charcoal stopped.

For a moment she simply stood there with his weight against her arm, looking down at the little marks that had begun turning their house into something recognisable on paper.

Then she set the charcoal aside and slipped one arm around his shoulders.

“I'm glad too.”

Her other hand rested lightly over his where it touched the table.

“I had a good life before you appeared in it. I still do. Now part of it includes you, this house and apparently floor plans.”

Her eyes moved across the scarred table, the six chairs and the kitchen beyond.

“I like that very much.”

“I know it is not the most usual of relationships. I hope you like it, though.”

Lethira turned fully towards him.

“I do, Ian. Very much.”

Her hand came up to his cheek, thumb resting lightly against his beard.

Ian's expression shifted.

“My natural state is insecurity, lack of self-worth and self-doubt. It bubbles up sometimes.”

He kissed her shoulder and rested against it.

“So yes, sometimes.”

Lethira let him stay there. Her hand settled at the back of his neck.

“I know.”

She kissed the top of his head and glanced down at the half-finished plan.

“When you start inventing evidence that I secretly dislike being with you, I reserve the right to tell you you're being foolish.”

“After thirty years or whatever it is, I'd be amazed if you can change who I am with a perfect thing.” Ian smiled at her, not entirely serious.

“Then I won't attempt thirty years of repairs before supper.”

She nudged him gently with her shoulder and picked the charcoal back up.

“You may remain inconveniently yourself.”

Ian brushed a loose strand of her hair back behind her ear.

“May I brush your hair whilst you cartograph the world?”

Lethira glanced sideways at him, then at the charcoal in her hand.

“Yes.”

She gathered her hair forward over one shoulder for a moment, freeing the length down her back, then returned her attention to the parchment.

“You may brush it while I continue my extremely important cartographic survey of six chairs and one table.”

A small smile touched her mouth.

“But if you distract me enough that I put the pantry in the garden, I will blame the assistant.”

Ian stood behind her.

“Don't forget the rest of our furniture. I'm sure we need more.”

A good-quality hairbrush appeared from nowhere at his request. He began gently, gathering her hair in one hand and working from the ends upward so he did not pull through knots.

Lethira made a quiet sound of approval and tipped her head slightly forward, giving him easier access without abandoning the parchment.

“I haven't forgotten. I'm discovering that our current furniture is mostly table, chairs, bed, and the things required to prevent a kitchen becoming an empty room.”

Her charcoal moved again while he worked gradually higher through her hair. She resisted the temptation to make the marks neater than the objects deserved, leaving one chair at its actual slight angle to the table.

“That is useful, though. We keep talking about the house as if it is finished because we live here now. It isn't.”

She paused while the brush passed through a longer section, then resumed.

“So this sheet gets what we actually own and where it actually lives. Afterwards, perhaps another one for what we discover we want.”

A smile entered her voice.

“Preferably before you solve furniture planning by making twelve armchairs appear from nowhere.”

Ian made twelve tiny armchairs appear on the table in a circle around the floor plan.

Lethira stopped mid-mark.

The little chairs were absurdly well formed for things no larger than a few joined fingers. For a breath she simply stared at them while the brush paused in her hair.

Then she laughed—quietly at first, then enough that she had to set the charcoal down before she smudged the plan.

“That is exactly the sort of solution I had just forbidden.”

She picked up one of the tiny chairs between finger and thumb, turning it to inspect the back and arms with unmistakable amusement.

“They are very good armchairs. Completely useless, but very good.”

Still smiling, she set it back among the others and looked at the ring around the parchment.

“Our house plan now appears to be under council review.”

“I couldn't help myself. You have that effect on me.” Ian smiled. “In many categories.”

Lethira's smile turned slower.

“I had noticed.”

She kept her attention on the plan for another moment, though the charcoal did not move.

“Furniture, hair, pies, bedrooms, bathhouses...” Her eyes slid sideways towards him. “Your categories appear to be expanding.”

Then she leaned back just enough for her shoulder to rest against him, careful not to interfere with the brush.

“I don't object.”

Ian dismissed the armchairs and returned to brushing her hair.

Lethira watched the empty space for a moment, still smiling, then picked up the charcoal again. Without the tiny council, the plan returned to being their house rather than a very small parliament.

She added the remaining practical pieces downstairs, pausing now and then to look across the real room before committing a mark. The brushing gradually worked higher. Her shoulders loosened as Ian gathered each section carefully rather than pulling through it.

“This is becoming quite pleasant,” she said, studying the parchment. “I may have accidentally discovered a method of surveying which requires an attendant.”

Ian began braiding her hair, kissing the exposed skin at the side and back of her neck between folds of hair.

Lethira's charcoal slowed.

Each time he gathered another section and his lips found the newly exposed skin, her shoulders shifted almost imperceptibly beneath his hands. By the third interruption she had stopped pretending the map still possessed all of her attention.

“You are becoming extremely liberal in your interpretation of attendant-level cartography.”

She tipped her head slightly to one side as he crossed the next section of hair, giving him easier access while keeping one hand planted beside the parchment.

The next charcoal mark went down a little less precisely than the others.

Lethira stared at it.

“That chair is your fault.”

Ian laughed.

Lethira looked down at the crooked little chair on the parchment and decided against correcting it.

“Leave it.”

Her fingers rested lightly beside the mark.

“The map can contain evidence that we actually lived here while making it.”

Clear afternoon light lay across the table.

On the parchment, one chair stayed slightly crooked.