Once upon a time, he might've liked the plains for Leviathan. He might have liked to imagine his life there with her, with Caligula a distant memory only connected through their children - he might've liked to be king, to stretch his legs against the vast horizon. Yet, such a time seemed like another life. Now, his skin was puckered and his legs weary with age and years of battles lost and won; his heart still hurt from the loss of Glorall, his home, and so many leaving. He wondered after Rogue and her mate, Sinclaire, Riopat and Mortz, Tristan...so many. It was a past that sought to weigh him down and into Aster's embrace.

And then she breathed the word out and his heart seizes in his chest, the teeth of guilt and failure clenching tightly. He knows the feeling well for it is but a constant tickling in the back of his throat, a constant ache in his side - his blood, he thinks, was born to fail. It is with that thought that his eyes find hers and his heart skips a beat once more before pounding against his chest. She mustn't fail -
he knows this. She is Praetor's daughter and Lazarus his son. Perhaps that is why he has returned, to absolve the devils that lurk in their bloodstreams.

But there is strength in their blood too. His mother might have lost but she had won too and whereas he had ultimately failed, he had won along the way. It is not assured. It is not assured. It makes him breathe a sigh out as he closes his eyes once more. "Things cannot be replaced," he says quietly into the space between them and then, his words are for her, "but they can be rebuilt." He wants to believe it and he nods as if to affirm it is, indeed, a fact.

His heart sinks to his paws and through the very earth itself, lost somewhere between now and then and yet, he stands straight with a sharp inhale in, his eyes meeting hers more sternly as he nods again. "I failed my sons and daughters," he breathes heavily, as if the words hurt to say (and they do, yet he holds it deep within where such a thing belongs), "but I will not fail our blood again. I will not fail my son and your mother. You and Lazarus." He trails off, an implied question lingering between them - he hopes she will not turn him away, will understand he seeks to help so that he might help himself.