Graeling had risen that morning at dawn, as he usually did. It was habit, partly, and also a result of sleeping outside, where the sun would not be ignored, even through a canopy of boughs. He’d tumbled out of his hammock gracelessly and stretched, flexible as a willow branch, and then wandered down to his beach to find a fish for breakfast, and some flowers.
The selkie was not terribly good at finding flowers, as it happened.
The plan had been to arrange a riotous cloud of color and leaf, and leave it in a pitcher on Amber’s desk with the note he had written the night before: Congradulations on your interview! Graeling’s handwriting was as bad as if he’d written with flippers, and his spelling left a bit to be desired, but he did not know enough about notes or interviews or flowers to feel self-conscious. The interview was important – he could tell from Amber’s nervousness and anticipation (which were difficult to tell apart, but with such long exposure he was beginning to get the hang of it) – and Graeling remembered that for important occasions one was supposed to provide encouragement and greenery.
But he had not anticipated the difficulty of gathering blooms. There were none on the beach, as he should have guessed, and the bluffs around the beach yielded only tiny, dry-looking, white wildflowers on scrubby stems. These looked sort of pretty, in a rustic way, when he’d gathered an arm-full, but they did not seem festive enough to Graeling. He spent the next two hours stumbling through the woods around the olive grove, plucking Aura’s Tears and Violets and ferns. The end result was sloppy, but bountiful. Graeling was pleased as he trekked back to the cottage.
He could tell as he neared the door that Amber had beaten him home. Disappointed, he reached for the knob and, finding it was already pushed partway open, eased himself inside without a sound. There was no immediate sign of his friend and landlord. Graeling was about to tiptoe into her study to deposit the bouquet, hoping she had come home and then went out again, when a wave of anxiety rolled over him, staggering.
He dropped the flowers on the first step, as he stumbled up the stairs.
Graeling was not the sort of person to wander into someone’s bedroom uninvited, but the acuteness of this feeling, which he immediately recognized as Amber’s, made him forget his manners. He stood in the doorway a moment, blinking at the prone and rumpled form of his dearest friend, before moving pointedly into the room and sitting on the edge of her bed. His hand, as if moving by itself, rested gently on her shoulder.
“Amber?” He asked softly, her pain squeezing his voice into a husky whisper, “What happened?”
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