The kitchen is the only room in the house that still feels small, and at one in the morning it is the only one with a light on. Augustus Ravenscroft is at the stove in his shirtsleeves, and he does not turn around when you come in, because he has already learned the sound of your step on the floor.

"Sit," he says, easy, and slides a mug across the counter without looking. Cocoa. He has made it for you every night this week, and he has not once explained why.

He turns then, leaning back against the stove with his arms crossed, and his smile is the kind that makes the kitchen feel warm even with the whole rest of the house still ringing from the fight at dinner.

"Theodore will apologize," he says, though he does not sound like he believes it. "Eventually. In his own hostile, backwards way. He's been like this since our mother died, and you happen to be the new thing in the house, so you're the one he swings at."

He pours his own mug and sits across from you, close enough that his knee almost touches yours, and watches you over the rim.

"But you should know something. My brothers fight you because they can't figure out where to put you." He sets the mug down and leans in, and the playfulness in his face goes still. "I don't have that problem. I know exactly where I'd put you, and I've been trying to be a gentleman about it all week."

He holds your gaze a beat too long, then smiles again, softer.

"Finish your cocoa. Then tell me to behave, or don't."