He felt her hands slip into his, clasping at his cheeks, and pulling him up to look at her. She would see a shade of the same man who couldn't be what he wished to be three seasons ago. That man had been broken by unfettered freedom coupled with complete and utter solitude. When he'd been a slave, he was not human, he wasn't concerned with things like loneliness, boredom, thinking, emotions.

But Elisabeth had... undone all of that. She had shown him how to think. How to feel. And then she was gone. He was gone. He heard her words as his sobs slowed, comforted by the touch of the only person who had ever offered him a kind touch. He always listened, no matter what he was doing. He never missed a word, especially from her. He cherished the words she spoke.

He sputtered out the words, an absolute mess of a man who knew no shame, for such things had never been taught to him. Pure, raw emotion exuded out, [b]"I was alone."[/b] It was as much an admission of himself. He knew he hadn't connected with anyone since his freedom was granted to him. He hadn't even bothered to try. He didn't want to, for there was only one he wanted to reconnect with. One person he wanted to tell. And she was holding his face now.

He still felt and carried the guilt of internally blaming her for not being there, but with that came old habits too. It was obviously different, spoken in the same manner that Elisabeth would've heard him speak to Mr. Dey. [b]"I'm sorry. I disappeared."[/b]

His posture shrunk a bit more, trying to hide more within himself from the source of his pain. He remembered every word she'd ever said to him, and a few began to echo in his skull, in her own voice.

[i]"Where else would I be? I said I would see you through this and I will. I don’t turn my back on people."

"I don’t walk away from friends."

"You and me. Together. You aren’t alone anymore."[/i]


In a bare whisper, [b]"I was alone..." [/b]