Laurent nodded. It sounded like a request to be alone, and Laurent felt that Gansey had earned the right to make small requests. "Don't leave the library. If you require me before I return, open the door and call for me."

He hesitated over his book of fairy tales, but then he put it back on its place on the shelf. Gansey had obeyed all of his commands so far, and to Laurent there was no difference between an attempt to escape and a purloined glance at the book of fairy tales. If Gansey refrained from one, he would refrain from the other.

Heart aching with loneliness already to be leaving Gansey's company, Laurent left him alone in the library. He went to an antechamber nearby, intending to work on oiling the gears for one of the mechanisms, but all he could think about was Gansey.