“You said I am free to not care about him, but you also said in order to accept that and love you, I have to love him. Isn’t that what you said?” he asked in quiet reply.

“I am not acting like you are a vicious lady, I am acting like you hurt my feelings because you did.”

He took a breath and shrugged his shoulders. “Nevermind, it doesn’t matter. I am sorry for making you feel like a ‘vicious lady’ and misunderstanding. I’m sorry for disturbing the peace, I didn’t mean to.”

Noah could sense her piquing annoyance, further disheartening him from continuing his own argument. There was a lot on his mind in rebuttal to what Elann said, but she turned it into a topic about herself. It hurt her feelings that he turned away from her, yet he had not disengaged from the conversation like he would before. Sticking around to actually attempt to have a conversation, regardless of his discomfort was majorly different from his usual flighty nature. She thought the conversation simple when he didn’t, it was complex and convoluted, speaking in overarching religion, a subject that was hard for him to navigate as it were. She presented him with an ultimatum, seemingly backing him into a corner. She said with confidence that she was not hurting him, even though he felt as if she was, saying that any hurt and stress he was feeling was not her doing. The Kelvic was at a total loss with which way to go.

Noah stood up, turned, and approached her again, not making eye contact but moving to sit beside the boulder. He moved because she said she was hurt by his disconnection. He didn’t know what else to be but apologetic in the moment, despite his unwant to be there.

Based of her explanation of the wild, something she knew very little about in comparison to him, he felt as if he was truly impure. Noah had killed many animals without needing reason, even while in a relationship with her. He was not the only predator to do so either, thus he knew she was wrong in that regard, but felt trapped and silenced by her turning the conversation on its head. He did not feel as if he was given the chance to cement the fact that Yahal’s tenets of purity and faithfulness applied to the wild world, to the predatory nature.