He can hear the movement, and sense her in front of him, but it takes a few extra moments to find the courage to look. When he does, he's taken aback by the empathy he finds in her. She has every right not to grant it to him. Especially given what she came here to discuss. Part of him expected to be told it served him right. Part of him agrees. That part grows smaller by the day. Today, especially. He cannot deny the intensity of her gaze, or how the words seem to come from a place deep in her soul. A kindred place.

"I do not deny it is mine," he says with returning resolve. "That I had no power to stop it makes her no less dead. Nor any of the other poor victims whose throats my master cut right in front of me. Even as a vampire, I was still nothing more than his toy. I just happened to be far less breakable." He can't bring himself to elaborate on that but he's sure Fever has no trouble imagining what it could mean.

"He never let me forget it."