“Calm yourself, my dear. All will be well. Have no fear.” When they entered Esme’s apartments, Bria could hear someone sobbing in the chamber beyond. “Stay here, Chloe. I will go in to her,” she said softly, and moved to the door. She knocked gently. There was no answer. She opened the door and went in.

Esme lay facedown on the bed, her shoulders heaving, the sobs welling up from deep inside her. Bria sat down on the huge high bed beside her. She placed her hand on her friend’s shoulder, feeling instinctually the depths of her misery.

“Esme, I am here. I am with you. Tell me what has happened.” It was a time before Esme could talk. But at last Bria got her to sit up, dry her eyes, and tell her what had taken place.

“Oh, Bria!” she sniffed, her eyes wet from crying. She twisted a damp handkerchief in her hands. “He hates me! Despises me! And I do not blame him. I should not have come hoping to… Oh, I should never have come.”

“There, now. Toli does not hate you.” Bria said his name; she had guessed what had happened. “I am certain of it. You know how he is.”

“He ran from me. I went out to him, and he left without a word!” Her lips trembled and she seemed on the verge of another torrent of tears, but took a deep breath and kept them down. “Oh, Bria, how I must have hurt him. I thought-I thought… Oh, I do not know what I thought. I was wrong to come here. I was never born for happiness.”

“Nonsense. Do not talk so!” chided Bria. “You are welcome here; it can never be wrong to come where you are loved and cared for. As for Toli, perhaps it was a mistake to approach him so openly. Obviously, we will need to plan very carefully how best to win him back. But unless I am far wrong, he does not hate you. Never say it. If we could see inside his heart, we would see his love for you has never waned.”