Marcello had slept so much that day that now he could not sleep. Niabheara was so late that by now he assumed she was not coming back, so he had taken to sitting at the table with a pen and some paper, scrawling out a letter to his stepmother in the hopes that he could get it to Miranda before she left. His eyes were still bloodshot, though it didn't look like he had been crying for a while.

Niabheara hedged outside the door, starting forward only to back off again. She wasn't even sure if she should knock, as knocking gave the opportunity to be rejected before she even set foot inside. When the same guard that had led her up gave her a strange look in passing, she realised she had hesitated a bit too long, and finally rapped. Likely he wasn't even there. Likely he'd taken himself elsewhere already.

Marcello stopped, and dripped a blob of ink on his finger. "Who's there?" he called, as he stuck his finger in his mouth to suck the ink off.

"It's, um, Niabheara," she said, as if there was some doubt in her own mind as to who she was at the moment. Behind her, the guard shook her head and moved along.

He was silent for a long moment. He stood up. Then sat down. Then stood up again. "Come in?" he said, looking a bit confused.

She pushed the door open, stepped inside, and leaned back to close the door behind her. "Hullo," she said quietly. "I think we should talk about what we're going to do."

Marcello took a deep breath and put the letter aside. "All right," he said hesitantly. "Do you know what you want?"

Niabheara spared a nervous look at the letter--right now she was paranoid and sensitive enough to believe he might be writing something about her--before she jerked her gaze back up to his face. "I don't," she said. "I just know I don't want things to end this way. I'm afraid to ask for anything. I don't know what to say."

Marcello swallowed. He took a step back, away from her. "I've told you what I want, a hundred times over. It hasn't changed," he said. "If it's not what you want, I wish you would just say so once and for all. It's all well and good to want each other, but if you don't want the same things I do, or if you want more than I can offer you, I need you to let me g--" His voice cracked. "Go."

Niabheara gritted her teeth. "If that's the case . . . then you need to go. I can't marry you, I can't be what you want of me. If I could, I would." She lowered her head. "It isn't going to work, is it?"