Octavia takes the job of collating old ex-Regent Scientia's memoirs, expecting it to be a dull gig, with her stuck for hours with a fossilized, prosy bore. But the money is good, and it would look amazing on her CV.
It's the most interesting thing she's ever done. Old Scientia, for all that he's left public office a bit before she was born, has decades of dirt on anybody important anywhere, a shrewd mind and a sharp tongue, and ancient courtly manners she finds helplessly endearing. And if his tales of the late and last Lucian King are obviously embellished to hell and back - prophecies, magic, floating swords! - his voice always turns so quiet and wistful that Octavia never interrupts him, and just enjoys the ride.
So when she types the last period in the manuscript, she gathers her nerve to ask if he'd like to employ her as a secretary. Even retired, he keeps a pretty robust correspondence and consults often.
But when Octavia turns to him, the old dear is fast asleep, head tilted back against his wheelchair's backrest. She tiptoes across the room to shift the brocade curtains so the afternoon sun wouldn't bother him.
Octavia is already in the doorway when she hears him speak - she would try to remember, afterward, and settle on somebody's name, and is it time? - with relief and clear, youthful joy. She whirls around, but the room is quiet, and the old man sleeps on, smiling.
She'll ask him tomorrow.
She cries at the funeral, surprised at the raw personal quality of her grief. But when she's placing her flower in the coffin, she sees the same contentment on his face. Octavia thinks of the manuscript in her bag, and of how she last saw him, and her heart is light.