"You've got your own opinion, I'm sure. I suppose I'm glad you haven't already decided I put Max up to it in some fashion. I have been accused of that enough." And he's not hiding how much that accusation has stung.

He closes his eyes and draws in a deep breath all the way to his, practically atrophied, diaphragm. Frustrating as it is, he must remind himself that this outrage is deserved, no matter what his justifications were. He's not supposed to push back. And yet...

"Max is a more forgiving soul than most. For that, I am grateful. If he hated me, thought of me as nothing but a predator to him, I don't know that I could bear it. But he knows, whether the rest of you will believe it or not, that when I thought of him as mine it was never with malice. I was not like my old master. I was not purposefully cruel. Max was mine to protect. He was mine to care for and keep safe. Everything I did to him and for him I did because I believed it would protect him. I love him. Why can none of you believe that I loved him? I do still. Yes, I know, that is hardly an excuse in the end but... does it mean nothing? Do you, like the others, believe that because I am a vampire it cannot be true?"