I gave up. The words are a metal fist to his gut, because Volterra does not understand giving up. He is the sort of man who would fight even if his heart oozed blood out of a gaping hole in his chest, if his legs were hanging by a tendon and his entrails leaked through his stomach. He wouldn't give up even if his opponent outweighed him, outfought him, outthought him; bending the knee is simply not in his nature. He knows that not everybody is the same, yet to hear Sikeax's confession makes him ache in more ways than he cares to imagine.

She elaborates, explains, and he listens with eager ears. He needs to know, needs to digest the information and understand it, which will help him make up his own mind about what to do next. He listens well, and he nods in all the right places, but one sentence in particular makes him pause and interject. "They thought you killed Gaucho?" The idea is simply so preposterous that it jars him; how could anybody think that? Of course, the herd had been looking for any excuse to condemn Sikeax, and perhaps the fact she'd not been able to save Gaucho had provided them with a useful stick to beat her with, but the sheer lack of logic makes him gawp.

She makes some good points. The herd had been determined to hate her, attacking her decisions even when they truly didn't require that much vitriol. Could he really blame her for not wanting to fight for a herd like that? For all their talk of being a family, the Throat is extremely unwelcoming to those it decides it doesn't like. Volterra feels himself softening, his steel exterior crumbling slightly, as does any displeasure he holds towards her. How can he hate her for following her heart? "I can't say I understand, Sikeax, because the idea of forfeiting such an important fight is utterly foreign to me." His stern gazes flakes away to be replaced with something akin to warmth as he looks at her. "But you did what you thought was right by yourself, and you followed your heart. That should be admired." Somehow he doesn't think it will be by anyone but him, but he prays Sikeax does not take the insults that will undoubtedly be thrown at her to heart.

The leviathan sighs, breaking eye contact at the same time that she does. "What now, then? Where will you go?" That crimson gaze of his returns to her, scrutinising her.