Jade Fern Grove but you are dressed in night and snow

perhaps;
something plinking and metallic inside mahler;
the cracking of some robotic core that splintered him through with a sudden breath of freedom.
had that been his curse then? to believe that every intimacy with a woman must certainly be —
destructive, perhaps, in the end. the confusion of rapport with romance. 
a lurch to think that this was how he had overstepped and undersuspected all first feeling, transferring it at once into some push for carnal knowing, and as a result, children.
iana, speaking the words he had long wished to hear but had never heard articulated before, even in his heart of hearts: that to love wylla was not to betray any others. he had not forgotten the duskfire woman's first request, but now it seemed as though these things had become unsnarled, more clear to the vision of it. 
iana, telling him that she wished only to exist in trust and alliance, that she harbored no secret demand or desire for children from him, upon which she might act.
a swift ice-rush of realization to know that this was the truth of who they were to one another: a sanctuary. and that was all that they had come to expect of one another.
a friendship.
how long had it been since mahler had been possessed of a friend?
he found his mouth was dry. "i trust you also. look how you have listened to me prattle on," and a smile. "i have shared so little of this."
tentative, "you are never far from mind. you. your pack. your health. i hope that vone day i might do for you vhat you have done for me, iana."