When he went to release her hand, Ezner would find Elisabeth squeezing a bit tighter, keeping hold of his hand for a few trills more before allowing him to have it back. If pressed, she wouldn’t be able to say why but she suspected it simply had to do with wanting to make sure he was really there.

She noted him rubbing the tattoo – a nervous tick she remembered he had before. Why was he nervous? Nope. No more secrets. Elisabeth had spent a season with mysteries, secrets and enigmas. Gently grabbing his hand as he moved it back to his pocket, she stopped in the middle of the street, forcing him to stop and turn to regard her. Her eyes were always kind, but now he would see a bit of confusion swirling within them. [b]“Why are you nervous? It’s just me, Ezner. You rub your tattoo when you are nervous, and you just did it. I’m no threat to you.”[/b]

When that matter settled, she allowed them to move on as he voiced his dislike of the cold. The way he described it, how it hurt him, pinched her a little. Elisabeth knew there were people that would never like cold and it was possible he would be one of them. She would have to learn to accept that. Nodding her head gently, she didn’t say anything, just letting him talk.

What followed was something of a contradiction. He didn’t like the cold, but the snow reminded him of her…and he wished she had been able to talk a walk with him in the snow. The young woman didn’t know what to make of any of it. Luckily, he asked a question that she could answer. [b]“Yes. I left for Viden first and it always is cold and snowy there. Very far north. Then I went to Scavloris and was there through Cylus. Very cold. Very dark. Very snowy. I seem to thrive in that type of environment.” [/b]It was a fact she couldn’t deny, no matter how much sometimes she wanted to.