"Well, I can't say that I do not understand that," he says. "After all, all these ages I lived only through flesh not my own." The life of an Ascian is certainly one that could qualify as incomplete, in many ways; a price he pays for the wholeness of soul.

He sighs quietly and relaxes under her hands, seemingly content to remain there for some time. Even as he does, his thoughts are still playing out behind his closed eyes; the immediate emotion past, his thoughts now turn to the practical.

"Zenos has no care for the throne," he says at length. "No doubt the civil war is begun even as you heard the tale. And no doubt that means you've another war in the offing, for surely the Alliance will wish for its champion to capitalize upon the chaos."