For us.

She says it so casually, her arms wrapped around his waist and her cheek against the soft fabric of his shirt, and that in and of itself seems like something extraordinary. He could have lost all of this; almost had. Not even the restoration of Black Elm, he thinks, could have soothed that heavy a loss--and how quickly, how completely, he's come to know that here in a way he doubts he'd had the time to back home, based on all he knows.

Alex's question only takes a moment or two of thought to answer. "This way."

Darlington leads her down the long, dark hall, stopping at a door near the end, on the eastern side of the house. It looks like all the others, heavy wood darkened with age, but the room behind is large and light and airy, dominated by a bank of windows at the far wall, which curves to match the remainder of the tower just one floor above. "It's not the main suite," he says. "That's at the other end of the house. But this is..."

He trails off, looking at her, looking at the room. "We could make it ours."