Ezra knew he hadn't gotten through to her correctly as soon as she looked up at him and he clocked her expression. He could have railed at the universe for that. It felt so unfair — and what had he, or any of them, ever done to deserve this curse? It wasn't even the shadows he minded, at least not right now, but if they were all going to be cursed why couldn't it have left his tongue alone? The worst part was that he didn't even know what it was he'd said, so he couldn't tell her she was right or try to backtrack it.

"I don't want to do this," he said again, more pleading this time. He didn't think he could keep himself from speaking entirely, if she was going to ask questions like this, but if he couldn't keep from speaking then it was only a matter of time before she heard something she didn't want to sit around and stomach. Whatever she'd just heard had clearly affected her. Didn't she already hate him enough for one lifetime? Couldn't they stop?

"I see what you're trying to do, here," he said. "But you can't break it. You can't fix me. If it was that easy I would have figured it out before I met you. And you're probably — not hearing any of this, are you?"

---