And just like that, he knows he has lost.

Ulrik was surprisingly tolerant of his distant, verbal affection, simply growling at the pair they'd better be courteous or face a lot of pain; some part of Mauja had expected the cold and taciturn Engineer to either spit at him (most of his loyal racists seemed to have a thing or two to say about his melted state), or to ask him since when they had been friends. He took the silence as affirmation of that tentative bond, and another of those alien feelings warmed his soul: relief. Ulrik had been the first of many to challenge his reign with words, but at that time, the only. Now, mostly everyone did it, and he wondered when he'd truly become so weak and incapable.

But despite Ulrik's prompting, Delinne was not at all interested in being courteous to greeting her Lord "properly" (whatever that meant in Ulrik's book). Her voice came out as a slithering hiss, eyes like flint and not at all the softness of the summer sky; inwardly, Mauja sighed, and steeled himself for the storm to come. Yet another failure to pile up on his crumbling back, another battle to fight against himself and the emotion's tide. He hid the sadness, the hurt and the sorrow, buried it beneath the cold blankets of snow and let his pale eyes yield nothing of his unhappiness with the situation. If she stared at him like a winter witch, he returned it with the quiet, calculating gaze of a winter wolf. He would not let her needles find their way beneath his armor and slip their poison into his veins. He was far too fragile to survive that.

She had well and truly made up her mind, as foolish and blind as the Qian and all his other enemies, tacking crimes onto him without even asking what he'd been doing. He'd offered Mirage a home, a chance she had not capitalized on, and instead come with an army and asking him to leave, saying she did not believe he wanted to share; and at that point, Ulrik had told him they didn't want to, and he'd made a promise, and because of that, they'd been left in the cold. And now, Delinne decided Mauja had lied to her, which, of course, was the complete truth, but was bothered him wasn't when they pieced the truth together; it was when they made up the motives themselves and never stopped to ask him what had truly happened, or gone through his head at the time. But clearly, she was riding some kind of vicious high, her fires stoked by the self-righteousness of her emotions and the perceived wrongs committed against her.

So Mauja held his tongue and listened, patient as the winter that knows it will come every year. It was his duty to listen, but he didn't want to; he didn't need her feeding the monsters of his doubts, when really all he'd done since his return was doubt his path and fitness as a King. What had once been easy, true and perfect, had become a chore he no longer remembered how to do, and all her words struck different tender parts of his heart, even as his mind sought refuge in weak bitterness to shield itself. If she had bled for him in the battle, it was nothing compared to the dangers he faced daily simply so she could have a home to live in, but if his experience in dealing with the self-righteous and enraged were anything to go by, she was beyond the point where she could be guilt-tripped. And what, she accused him of taking her here? The way he recalled it, it had been her choice to leave Azzaron, and her choice to be shepherded to the safety of the Basin. Funny, how memory works when under the effects of strong emotions.

And Mauja, he wasn't feeling much at all, just a dense weight of apathy and disappointment. Their eyes met, sky blue meeting ice blue, and he allowed it to happen, watched the iron in her eyes and wondered if she saw the wolf in his; she felt bad for him, she said, because he was the frostheart, who couldn't feel a thing. Frozen over. No compassion. Another truth the false preachers cried out to the skies, making him the devil without even checking his insides to see if there was blood in his veins and warmth in his heart. Sad, how mired they were in their perceptions and beliefs, and frustrating how he had to, over again, suffer because of their lacks. But try as he might, he couldn't deny the feeling of loss, as if it was the ending of an era, proof spelled out so clearly he couldn't ignore that he was but a pale shadow of greatness, the dust having taken the edge off his sheen and crumbled his edges. What was he, truly, but something broken, trapped with one foot in darkness, and one halfway out?

"I tried to save you," he rumbled once she had grown quiet, an edge of sadness tinging his voice before he severed that tie, and let his heart grow empty and cold. The blood would rush in again when no one was around, and some night he would howl to a darkened sky and search for a cure to that damnable ache in his chest, but for the moment, he would be everything she wanted him to be; cold, and cruel. "But clearly, you do not want to be saved." His voice rose from its near-whisper to something stronger, but never was there anger in it, simply the kind of cold iron which would not bend. "As you no longer wish to be here, so be it – but you will go alone. Azzaron will remain our prisoner, and a lactating mare will be found for Destry until she is old enough to feed on grass." If she was not strong enough to separate, he would keep them apart by force, but he didn't like how it tasted almost like revenge. "Go, Delinne, as that is your wish, and don't bother coming back again." The frost of his voice rose like smoke in the air, his heart was beating uncomfortably hard in his chest, it felt odd, lopsided, uneven in its struggle, but his eyes never faltered as he watched her. She would go, but she would go alone.