Thanks for the comments, Hubay.
For the "one day, one day", I've put it mostly as a joke on her. She dreams about doing a lot of things, but she's not ready to actually do anything to change her life. She's a little resentful towards her boss, but it's not really hate. Maybe I should remove the reference, it's maybe too early to point at Ciera's failings now.
For Onmk's explanation, you're not the first to point this, as I've been having problems with that paragraph from the start. The thing is, his explanation is just a cover up he's devising on the go (that's why I wanted the text to feel a little babbly here), but it never came out quite right. I'm seriously thinking about having him say that he doesn't know what happened to him, but first, it's not in character for him to say that he doesn't know something, and second, the cover up sets up his arc. You're probably right, and I should keep the same lines while doing it shorter.
A few words about the social order, since you won't have much more before act 2 :
For the men/women relationship. It's not actual oppression at play here, but you've seen the situation from two very biased characters (Destra comes from a very minor part of the women population, and Lorn was practically raised by his sister outside the law). The general feeling women have towards men is that they are a little like children : cute at times, and needing directions if you want them to do anything useful. As a result to that "benevolent" attitude, there is no real will in the men population to have things change, and women have demonstrated time and again that they excel at administration … and war. If they look to other kingdoms, men from this place feel like they're not that ill-treated there. The real question about how to treat men is actually asked by women and a large faction pushes for more men rights. This is actually a big political issue of the moment. You're in luck, one of the characters is heavily involved in politics, so if you bear with me, you'll get to see that.
See how I babble when I talk about my book?
Again, many thanks for your input.