The feeling does not leave their chest, this...sense of failure, this shame. What are they but a thing that can fulfill no purpose given to it, from the mundane to the kingdom-saving purpose its entire existence was built for.

None of this is a question, and so they do not answer, do not have to answer, do not have to think about it, do not think about it, do not think.

They are not meant to want. They don't. They are not being told to stay nor leave nor anything direct, they don't know what to do, and their arm slides back beneath their cloak, blindly pressing the cloth across the cracked scars. They will do nothing. Nothing.