Crow groaned and rolled over on his bed as the light from the window hit his eyelids. He couldn’t tell what time it was, but he knew he didn’t want to get up. The warmth of the sheets felt good as the weather cooled down, bringing the temperature of his room down with it. He didn’t want to leave his bed until he absolutely had to. He pulled the blanket over his head and exhaled contentedly. Vaguely, he noticed that he couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt so well-rested. The morning was peaceful, his muscles were relaxed, and he hadn’t woken up in a cold sweat from nightmares—

[i]No nightmares.[/i]

The realization struck him at once, and he sat up with a start. Dazedly, he looked around the room and then down at himself, finding that nothing had changed since the night before. Somehow, it seemed he’d escaped the plague of horrible dreams this time. He felt weak with relief.

“Good morning, Collin.”

The viceroy blinked and turned toward Preston, who was sitting at the same table as usual. The attendant got up and carried a cup of water over to him. “You’re calmer than usual,” he observed as he handed the container off. “Your nightmare didn’t come back last night, did it?”

“No,” Crow answered absently. His throat didn’t hurt this morning since he hadn’t woken up screaming, but he downed the drink anyway.

“Do you think it’s finally going away?” the servant asked curiously.

“I don’t know,” the viceroy shook his head. “Honestly, I’m not sure why it did last night.” He stared down at the empty glass in his hand with a bewildered look. After he’d seen the mercenary in the market yesterday, he’d thought he was getting worse, but now he didn’t know what was going on. It was strange for the nightmare to suddenly vanish too. Had he done something different that had caused the dreams to go away?

Suddenly, he remembered what Penelope had told her about her talk with Tybalt a few days ago. The older knight had told her that exercise could help. He had spent most of the previous day walking with her to and through Bellmare, and they had even spent a portion of their trip running when he had challenged her to that competition. Maybe the physical exertion had been just enough to help him sleep through the night. He wasn’t certain, but the thought was enough to give him hope that he could fight back this time.

“Well I’m glad it didn’t come back,” Preston said as he took the cup from him again. “You’ve been looking like you could keel over any day lately.”

Crow rolled his eyes. He wanted to say the boy was wrong, but he [i]had[/i] been pretty exhausted since the dreams had come back. It wouldn’t have surprised him if his poor sleep had started taking a toll on his appearance. “You’re lucky you work for me, kid,” he snorted, swinging his legs over the edge of his bed to get up. “If you said that to anyone else, they’d send you to the stocks.”

Preston just shrugged, not seeming to care one way or the other as he stepped over to the wardrobe.

Crow let the servant pick out his clothes for him while he straightened up his appearance a bit in the mirror. He still didn’t overly care about what he looked like, but with the party coming up so soon, he didn’t want to give the other nobles in the castle another reason to dislike him. It seemed to be worth his effort to comb out the knots in his long hair and trim back his beard again, so he wouldn’t stand out for “looking like a peasant” or some other nonsense like that.

Once he finished getting ready and had dressed himself in the tunic and trousers Preston had chosen for him, the two headed to the Great Hall for breakfast. Crow walked at a brisk pace through the corridors, feeling much better than he usually did in the morning. He was eager to find out if he would catch Penelope before his next lesson too. After all the time they had spent together the day before, his closeness to her felt rekindled, and he couldn’t wait to talk to her again.

He just hoped Elizabeth wouldn’t be there too.