Noctisardor Bypass bedauert

nothing, he wanted to say. nothing at all. some saccharine pronouncement that he would not mean and wylla would not believe. but there was no reason for that now. even in these moments they had traveled a good deal along a path that had formerly been beset by thorns.
the absence of them now frightened mahler, more than he would admit to himself.
and so he took a breath and did not immediately answer.
he remembered too fierce-red the way that the smears of red had lain circular and horrendous upon the ground, how the blood had tasted of salt and of some iron metal deep inside himself; how it had clung short and bitter. but it had not come back! it was not with him now;
she was;
"because i did not think i vould see you again. and then, vhen i did, i thought it vas to say goodbye." and mahler could not look at her, did dare not look at her, lest the memory of it crush him again in her presence.
he could not pass before wylla this cup, not now; still more to be done.
for it was gone from him now, that moment, and now this one was theirs to share.