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He limped over to where the sage grew in profusion near the southern wall and set about his original task, though his mind remained elsewhere. The sage’s leaves were velvet-soft under his fingers, releasing their sharp, clean scent as he harvested several stems. The thyme he found by memory and touch, the moonlight bright enough to work by even as clouds began to gather again.

As he worked, Angelo found himself smiling despite the confusion and frustrated curiosity. Because however strange their interlude had been, however many questions it raised, one thing was certain. He would see Isolde again. She had promised it.

Next time, perhaps she would trust him enough to explain why she hid. Why she kept her face turned away. Why she knew his name and movements but remained herself a mystery.

Isolde.

Did she have a last name?

Angelo finished his collecting and made his way back inside, his feet now thoroughly chilled and his specimens clutched carefully in one hand. The kitchen was still warm and dark, the coals in the hearth glowing softly.

Tomorrow night, if she appeared, he would bring her a gift. Something to show his appreciation of her garden, of her knowledge, and of the strange and wonderful conversation they had shared.

He climbed the stairs to his chamber, his mind already planning what he might say, how he might coax her to trust him enough to step closer, to speak longer, to reveal the mystery at her heart.

Because he was certain now, as certain as he had ever been of anything, that Isolde was no threat despite the secrets she kept. She seemed lonely. Isolated by choice or circumstance, he could not yet say which, maintaining this hall and its hidden passages while apparently denying herself human connection. The way she had responded to his praise of her garden suggested someone starved for conversation, for recognition, for the simple acknowledgment that she existed and mattered.

And Angelo, who had spent his life learning to ease suffering wherever he found it, could not walk away from that knowledge. Could not leave her to her solitude when he might offer her … something.

Solace?

Even if he did not fully understand why the prospect of helping her made his heart race and his breath catch. She embodied the elusive ideal the great masters spent their lives pursuing, and he was humbled in her presence.

Even if he could not quite explain the warmth that bloomed in his chest when he thought of her voice in the darkness, her delicate face tilted toward moonlight, her obvious pleasure when he praised her garden.

These were puzzles for later consideration. For now, it was enough to know that he would see her again.

That she wanted to see him again.

That whatever strange fate had brought him to Grimsfell Hall, it had also brought him to Isolde.

And somehow, impossibly, that felt like the most important discovery of all.

* * *

Isolde leaned on cold stone in the passage. Her heart hammered in her throat, in her fingers, at her temples.

She had spoken to him.

She had spoken to him.

Not through iron. Not through a wall. Face to face. A true conversation. How many years had it been since she had spoken to someone so? Six at least, since Papa. Longer, if she was honest. Even while he lived, she had spoken to almost no one but the staff. Her mouth still felt his name. Angelo. The sound of it lingered on her tongue. She had said it aloud in a garden like a person meant to stand beneath the open sky.

And Angelo had not run. Had not flinched. Had not pointed or laughed or signed himself against a curse.

Of course he had not truly seen her. She had been exact. Right cheek kept to the dark. Distance held. Moon and cloak doing the work a veil would do in town.

Still. They had talked. Garden. Plants. Healing. Knowing.

And he had understood. Had read in the beds what no guest had ever read. Had named not mere tidiness but real craft, and done it with such matter-of-fact certainty that tears pressed behind her eyes.

“Fine work,” he had said. “Fine enough to teach from.”

When had anyone last praised a thing she had made without a hitch in the voice, without the little pity that always walked in after?

Her breath snagged on the wonder that had been in him. Not courtesy. Recognition, from a man whose own craft let him see hers.

He had looked at her labor and found her in it, and he had not even had her name yet.