Loneliness hangs about the room like smoke. Self-loathing, anxiety, and grief all gather in the corners like dust, things he has shed and grown again and again. But there are lighter emotions fluttering around too. He had loved here, and been loved for a short, bright time. Happiness, hope, belonging, all tentatively taking flight. Desire, floating in a warm cloud around his bed curtains.

He wonders what River is thinking as she peers around his room. He has always gotten the sense that she sees things in a way that nobody else can.

"It's just Kell and me," he says, settling into one of the comfortable armchairs arranged in front of the dark fireplace. There are two other beds in the room. One had belonged to Elrond, his first roommate, nearly a year ago now. The other, Kelson's until recently, has sadness drawn tight around it like a curtain. A moment late, he realizes she might have been talking about the assorted frogs.

"Oh, uh...they get to have a place of honor here, so they can't complain."