Dawn broke with gentle light, as if the world had exhaled overnight and forgotten its previous tension. Jude awoke to the sweet scent of jasmine, carried by the breeze through the open windows of their home. He rose quietly, every muscle relaxed for the first time in days. The yesterday journey up the mountain and the opening of the dais, those echoes still hummed in his bones, but unlike before, they no longer carried a sense of frantic urgency. They had accomplished something, step by step, and now they were being allowed to rest in that accomplishment.
Grace appeared behind him in the doorway, her hair damp from the morning mist. "The children are up," she murmured. "And the wives are gathering by the fire."
Jude nodded and went to the hearth, where rose and Lavender tea bubbles in a clay pot. The steam carried through the house, tender and light. He drew a small cup and inhaled, then walked outside, Grace following with another for him.