The simulation began after a fifteen-minute break during which Eve drank an entire glass of water, stood in the garden for five minutes breathing fresh air, and returned to the table with the specific expression of someone who has processed a large amount of information and converted it into functional resolve.
Silas watched her come back in from his corner, noting the set of her shoulders....more settled than they'd been before the break. She'd reorganized internally during those fifteen minutes. Filed what she'd learned, found the confidence beneath the complexity.
He loved watching her do that. The way she processed difficulty not by denying it but by working through it until it became manageable.
