She was perceptive, he realized, angling his head slightly at the question. How he began to respond to that, he didn't know, but for a moment his shoulders curled incrementally inward, and his gaze shifted quickly to the fire and then back again, like he was looking for a way to avoid the topic.

He didn't shirk it, however, no matter how tempted he was to do so. She'd left him room to pull away from the topic if he needed to, and for that he was grateful, but there was no reason to hide, or fail to answer.

"Human life is fragile, isn't it? It shows how resilient it is, at times like this, but eventually everything dies and is consumed, like the flame consumes." He exhales slowly, lowering his eyes into his lap. "It's hard to sit comfortably with people when the chances of them being gone tomorrow, or the day after, looms omnipresent."