Chapter 41 - Forty One
"What’s wrong with him?" Duchess Lyra asked, her voice sharp.
Delia, still shaking off the last remains of sleep, was confused by the Duchess’s alarm. She looked at Eric’s peaceful, sleeping form. "There’s nothing wrong with him, Your Grace," she responded, her own voice soft. "He’s just sleeping."
Lyra stared at her as if she had just said the sky was green. "He’s sleeping? Through all this noise? Through me shouting?" She took a step closer to the chair, her eyes wide with a disbelief that Delia didn’t understand. "Eric is?"
"Should I wake him up?" Delia asked, taking a hesitant step forward, intending to gently shake his shoulder.
"No!" Lyra’s command was so sharp and immediate that Delia froze in place. The Duchess’s expression was no longer one of shock or amusement, but something much deeper—a profound, motherly worry mixed with a strange sense of wonder.
"No," she repeated, her voice softer now. "He hasn’t slept well for his entire life. Not since he was a young lad. He’s the lightest sleeper I have ever known. The smallest sound wakes him."
She looked at her son, truly looked at him, at the way his chest rose and fell in a slow, even rhythm, at the way the lines of tension around his eyes had finally smoothed away. He was sleeping with a peace she hadn’t seen in him for years. The sight of it seemed to change something fundamental inside her.
She took one last, long look at her son, a mother witnessing a small miracle. Then, she turned and walked towards the door. "Leave him be," she said quietly. "Let him rest."
Delia quickly took her robe from the floor where it fell from her shoulders during the conversation and wrapped it around herself, trying to catch up with the Duchess who was already in the hallway. By the time Delia reached the front door, Lyra was about to step into her waiting carriage.