he tenses at her question, but tries to obscure it -- failing, of course, given his tendency to wear his heart on his sleeve, but nonetheless. olive surely does not know because if she did, seabreeze would know, and alarian would know, and everyone would know and it would be a trial and indictment and (he cannot imagine it would be a show of support for him, after all, the world's worst father-figure).
delight is not ready to talk about it. so he lies: "i am doing better," and "they're okay." sure he can't control the way his face twists slightly over the word okay, but he is clever enough to obfuscate. "my -- their mother, ah, recently came back out of the blue," delight murmurs, hoping this will suffice as an explanation for his expression (after all, it is not a lie that queenie's arrival has disrupted him, either). "she abandoned them some months ago, and i didn't think i'd see her again, so it was unsettling to say the least."
ugh. he doesn't want to talk about that. "but, um, how are you and yours? i'm sorry for the chaos of the past month," he adds, sheepish. a hell of a sanctuary, rotted cat flesh and the stink of urine and half of leadership nearly dying in his own bile. he is surprised and grateful seabreeze and olive remained at all.
he does not expect his story to resonate -- though in hindsight, he supposes it is bigheaded of him to assume he is the only one with relationship woes, if you can call what he and queenie have that. her words spark a curiosity in him that he has almost forgotten about, that needy, incessant desire to chronologicize the world around him, to pull narratives from his fellow wolves. and he does not know much of olive, which only increases his desire to ask more.
instead, for now, he bites his tongue, nodding at her sage words. "she -- we were not a romantic union," delight explains, "i still feel.. as if it is my fault she left in the first place. even if she had been cruel to them." it's a messy situation and maybe olive doesn't care. but saying even these small details aloud makes him feel more grounded in the situation.
delight cannot help the slight snort that escapes him at her thoughts -- but no, she is right, and he nods. nihilism comes more easily to him than hope these days. "eris was special here," he says softly, but shrugs, unable to help her anymore than he can help himself. "i am -- i am maybe more used to loss than most," the androgyne admits, "i don't know how much mourning i have left to give."
often delight has reflected (sometimes admiringly, often amusedly) on olive's similarities to mato. not to obscure the ways the sylph is her own person, for she has that dear sweet quality mato so severely lacked, pure empathy, yet he cannot help but find her presence naturally soothing. yeah, he gets it, he gets why seabreeze chose her. or was drawn to her, maybe, but chose her, coming here with her instead of staying with her children's father. it's exactly what he would have done with mato.
all that to say, she's doing more than she realises for him in this moment, gratefully accepting the soft press of her nose. the androgyne listens to her words with the gravity they deserve, something small lighting in his eyes at the word elysium. it's not a word he's heard before, but it immediately reminds him of mato's druid-language, though he is sure it is not the same.
"i don't," he admits easily to her question, unbothered by her proximity. something about her aura is healing. "i don't pray, and i don't know -- i've never really thought about, you know, having a soul." can he believe in olive's elysium, her souls? what does that mean for him, for his family, for mato and alarian and his children and the dead? the king elk had been something soul-like, or had it, perhaps. it is not that delight does not believe in the afterlife, it is that he has spent so much time running from the affects of death he has not paused to consider what might happen. now, though, he murmurs, "maybe you're right," though the idea of actively praying makes him feel... silly, somehow. curiously he shifts his gaze to her face. "though then i wonder, maybe, if my soul isn't bad." if anyone is fit to pass judgement he imagines it is olive and her aura, though he isn't seeking her judgement here, for she does not know the scope of his failures or his innermost wants, hidden under layers of repression. but the thought escapes him anyway, stolen from his mouth in the easy way he never can exactly hide what he's thinking.
her reaction to him is not exactly what the androgyne anticipates, feeling a somewhat surly defensiveness rise in him that he quickly banishes. he's not a teenager anymore, and she's reasons for feeling how she does, even if she doesn't know the depths of his ... him-ness. "i suppose," he murmurs, not wishing to argue the point with her -- delight really does want olive to like him, if only for seabreeze's sake. he likes olive well enough too, would like to be closer with her, but seabreeze is the priority, he suspects, for both of them.
what do you enjoy is more loaded than it should be. it's been so long since he's done anything he enjoys! well, no, that's unfair -- he enjoys the company of his children immensely, it's just all the guilt he carries around that makes it hard. "um," delight begins, feeling a blush start under his dark fur, "well, i -- i always fancied being a historian of sorts. i used to keep track of the pack's history in tindómë, but i fell out of the habit after... everything that happened." as he says it, he realises how much he did enjoy it, and how much he misses it, now. "it was -- i liked hearing everyone else's stories, and knowing that they were being preserved, somehow," he adds shyly, hoping she won't think it silly.