Since he had already been partially jostled from sleep the noise was enough to startle him. Ezra opened his eyes right away, though it took a second for anything he saw to resolve itself into something sensible. He inhaled sharply and pushed himself up on one elbow from where he had been sleeping on his stomach, his cheek still sporting faint lines from the creases in his pillow.

There were any number of things that could make odd noises at night in an old country house, so even though he was awake he wasn't alarmed — until his vision fit together enough for him to realize there was someone in his room. With a sudden quick breath he scrambled into a sitting position, the comforter pooling around his lap, his loose sleeping shirt askew. He wasn't being robbed, or murdered, he determined quickly, and this wasn't an intrusion from a shadow. For one thing he still had half of a game of Ekarut on the table in the corner that he'd played with Byron before bed; for another, the glowing white of someone in feminine sleepwear was about as far from a shadow as one could get.

"Hanna?" he guessed, but the hair was wrong. A servant might have come to wake him up about something, but they would have dressed themselves first, so he was out of reasonable guesses as to who this might be. Which was just as well, because even with a dozen chances he wouldn't have guessed, "Rosie. Rosalie Hunniford. In my bedroom."

This was more than ridiculous; it was surreal. He had never had waking dreams before but supposed there must have been a first time for everything, because there was absolutely no way this was real.

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