Fresh starts? Reuben doubted that. What was going to change so dramatically in the course of a few months that he would truly be able to start over? The princess wasn't going anywhere. She probably wasn't going to hate him any less six months from now than she did right in this moment. Maybe his feelings for her would dissipate by then, but... well, somehow he doubted it. No, from where he was standing at the moment the future looked rather bleak, and he didn't have much faith that a six month walk-about would substantially change his outlook on life.

There was no point in bringing that up to Aldous, though. It would take more explaining than he cared to do in order to get his brother on the same page, and in order to get all of it out into the open, Ben would have had to put into words a lot of things he didn't really care to verbalize. What was he even supposed to say? That he loved Ellory? Would Aldous ever believe that? Did Ben even believe that?

"Yeah, alright," he said rather noncommittally, pushing Ellory's last letter under a pile of other things on his desk so that he didn't have to look at it anymore. "Let's hope."