Eyes avert as the water muddies with the color of his blood, and he smiles softly to himself. He had anticipated her inability to stomach the sight of his lifeblood swirling from pale coat into the water below. She was too gentle and untainted for the images of war and the aftereffects of such. He envied her that, but in many ways he was grateful that such a trait was not one he possessed. After all, he was the protector, the warrior. Such liberties were not only useless but dangerous. Kaj would shoulder the weight of such lack of innocence if it meant she was safe and sure in her own grasping of it. They stand in silence and he is unsure of what more words he can say at that point. Her fear of him leaving had been swept from her visage with the words he had spoken firmly into poised ebony aurals, and he was grateful in his own way for understanding the Helovian language well enough to have comforted her adequately.

Strong words commanded attention as most of Kaj's actions did, and though he despised having to use such tactics on the sweetly mannered maiden, he could not stand to let her be consumed by her own self-doubt and fears. She had triumphed over Aurelia fairly, and he would not cast her away for it. Why, when he had done the exact same to Confutatis? He would have harmed Mongrel too had the kitsune attempted to harm him or any of his flock. He would have never desired to kill her, but had it ever been necessary he would have done so no matter his moral qualms with severing such a precious connection.

In moments she has received him, their brows touching, and he thanks for once that he is not the supposed purer race of unicorns, for they would never be able to know the comfort of such an embrace. Even as his heart turns cold as she speaks, a breath of a confession. I'm afraid of you. He pulls back as if her skin has burned him, staring at her with uncomprehending eyes. Her words are the most painful he has ever heard, and he loses his grasp on the language he has worked so hard to adapt for his people. She has driven the knife of her words deep into the flesh of his heart, the one he had offered up to her so trustingly. "Ik zou je nooit pijn doen," he choked, bewildered as his voice breaks, backing away from her as water splashes round earthen ankles, wondering why she would stay so near if he frightened her so. He was a macabre villain drenched in the blood of foes he had sought to protect his Beauty from, and in the end had only accomplished striking his disease of war and ruination into her unimpeachably genuine heart.

"Ik zou liever sterven dan je pijn," he presses, even if in the back of his mind he knows she cannot hope to understand him. His mind is in shambles of confusion and self-hatred. For truly it was Beauty who held the key to slay the Beast. Was that why the Goddess had named him the King to stand beside her? Tamed beneath her celestial whims through the bidding of Kahlua? Lyrics teem with heartbreak, the chasms in his understanding widening when no explanation is forthcoming. Had he failed her?

And then, impossibly, she speaks.

"I love you."

The Beauty had stabbed her silver sword into her Beastly defender's heart, only to kiss the shredded flesh and whisper "It's for your own good." He stared at her, wings limp and standing amongst crimson stained water. All had been drained from him, he couldn't find the words to speak, couldn't summon emotion past the numb of shock and confusion. Her lone tear only made everything so much harder to understand. Why did she torture him so?

Was love not a joyous occasion for her? Why did she cry when confessing her feelings for him? Crown shook slowly and he stumbled gracelessly backwards, water splashing awkwardly up the backs of his legs as he retreated from a harmless being made dangerous by love. "Why do you cry as you say it?" His tone is tortured and so hopelessly, childishly lost. His emotions are too convoluted to know how to respond, in either positive or negative. Did he even possess the heart to deny her anything she wanted? "You fear me, and yet you love me? Kahlua...weet je wat het is je voelt? I...I do not understand." He is a lost foal beneath her gaze. What is she doing to him?