The longest part of delivering things came, as Lord Dazuz said, with dropping the rest off at a train station, if only because it was about two hours away from San Asari. Rene managed to get done on the last day of February, leaving two full days in March to brainstorm what she was going to do for Matteo’s birthday.

Once she came up with an idea and confirmed Matteo didn’t already have it, she had the shopkeeper hold on to it overnight. Rene came back on the morning of the third, grateful toy pianos weren’t heavy. She couldn’t hide it, sure, but just bringing something made her feel…productive, maybe. She missed getting things for people on their birthdays.

The people standing outside the palace knew her by now—she always came with Adelinde, so they recognized her as a friend of hers—so her first interaction upon entering was Matteo happily running up to her.

“Reny!” He frowned when he realized her carrying the toy piano preventing him from hugging her. Instead, she paused and he pointed at the wooden thing. “Mine?”

“Shhh,” Rene replied in a kind of loud whisper. “It’s a surprise.”

“Oh! Okay.” Matteo looked down and covered his eyes with his hands.

Rene laughed, which prompted Matteo to look up again a bit and uncover one eye.

“Let your mom know I’m here,” Rene said kindly.

“Okay!”

He uncovered both eyes and ran back inside, and Rene carefully followed behind him. A few of the staff that were wandering—either out of recognition or courtesy—nodded or murmured greetings. One or two offered to help carry the toy piano, but Rene was satisfied with directions on where Adelinde would accept it.

She found Adelinde sitting on a couch with Matteo, the latter of which announced Rene’s arrival before she could say anything. Adelinde laughed when she saw the gift, smiling but almost caught off guard.

“You didn’t need to get anything,” she pointed out.

“I wanted to,” Rene replied. “Birthdays in general mean a lot to me—even if it’s just the kid’s.”

She gently sat the toy piano town on the floor, then looked at Matteo.

“Want to try it?” Rene asked kindly. “You play it like your mom plays her piano.”

Matteo got off the couch and walked over to the toy piano. Cautiously, like an experiment, he pressed one of the keys—then he let out a triumphant noise and tapped on every key he could in various orders.

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Adelinde chuckled as Rene backed away from the fully-occupied kid. Adelinde gestured for Rene to sit next to her, promptly giving Rene a light kiss on the cheek once she did.

“It’s perfect,” Adelinde said softly. “Thank you.”

“It’s not the best,” Rene admitted, watching Matteo as well. There was something heart-warming about it, despite the few off-tone keys and spot or two of misplaced paint. “I didn’t have a ton to spend.”

Adelinde glanced back at her, frowning a bit. “I can pay you back if it was expensive.”

“I don’t mind; I only buy stuff for others anyway,” Rene said honestly.

Adelinde looked willing to continue a protest—even if it would be lighthearted—but the arrival of Mark cut any further conversation short. His first reaction was to chuckle at his nephew’s fascination with the toy piano; when he turned to Adelinde to comment on it, his expression held a mix of pride and teasing.

“Well, now no one can doubt that Matteo is Adelinde’s,” Mark joked, walking over to the other couch and sitting down. He mainly focused on Adelinde. “You used to have one of those at Grandmother’s house—remember?”

“I don’t,” Adelinde replied, shaking her head. “Although I believe you.”

Mark looked at Rene and gestured towards Adelinde, commenting in a conspiratorial whisper, “She’s been playing instruments for her entire life, I swear. I never slept at night.”

“He’s leaving out the part where I was only allowed in the music room during the day,” Adelinde said, glancing at Rene as well, albeit with the same tone. “And the only time I could play anything at night was when we went to our mother’s family.”

“Just put the toy piano in the music room, that’s all I ask,” Mark reasoned. “Depending on how things go with Rene, she’ll be thanking you one day, too.”

“I can actually sleep through pretty much everything,” Rene admitted, focusing on that part of the comment for now. “Once I’m asleep, I’m out for the next eight or nine hours—I only really wake up if someone knocks on the door.”

“Lucky,” Adelinde mused. “I tend to sleep more in the winter and less in the summer—seeing the sunlight outside encourages me to wake up, so when it’s not out I typically try to sleep more.”

“Alas, I must be up about an hour before breakfast,” Mark said with a joking kind of lament. “Mostly because I’ve been standing in since Matteo was born.”

“You were up early even before you had to,” Adelinde replied. “And if you really minded, you would have stepped down about half a year ago.”

He laughed and nodded. “True, true. I’m used to it by now, honestly—not sure if I would know what to do with my day if you started working again.”

The conversation fell a bit, leaving room for Matteo to look over and ask for some kind of confirmation that he was playing well from his mother. Matteo playing alone was cute—seeing Adelinde step over, figure out how the keys worked, then play with her son made it even better.

Rene didn’t realize she had that dumb smile again until she noticed Mark gave her a teasing look, but she couldn’t bring herself to try to suppress it.

A few more kids came in with their mothers—caretakers and caretaker’s kids, she assumed—in the following hour or so. Despite arguably having the least reason to be here, Rene never once felt like she should be somewhere else; sitting next to Adelinde, encouraging Matteo or holding gifts for him, just seemed so natural.