"I want to protect you." Those words were still alive in her chest. Yukari remained seated on the edge of her bed, retracing last night's dining room. Tōma's counter-question—"And if you know, what then?"—the words that had spilled from her mouth before she could stop them. She hadn't meant it romantically. But she couldn't deny the weight of it either, couldn't claim it held no romantic meaning. (I surprised myself.) Only after speaking aloud did she understand the heaviness of her own feelings. Those ash-blue eyes had been looking at her. Something moved in their depths—different from what she'd glimpsed in the study at midnight, different from what she'd caught sight of at the Ebisu restaurant. Something quieter. Something deeper. Yukari looked out the window. The November morning sky over Shirokane was overcast, and the weeping cherry in the Shimoka mansion's garden swayed slightly in the winter wind. Late November. The dry cold air transmitted through the glass. When she eme