These words were like a blow.

“But—” he started.

“My wife’s heart bleeds for you, and as my wife owns my heart, I have little to say in the matter of her wishing to care for you. You are not a threat. You are clearly very confused. I have hope you will find your way and it will be the right way. But it is not gratitude for kindness that should guide that way. You should understand what you do is right, and that should guide your way. I will hope for this. That you learn right and how to act on it.”

He’d never thought about it before.

But he wanted to learn right and not simply because every part of his life until he met these people in this house had gone so wrong.

Tedrey turned his head away again, this time so Lorenz would not see the tears that sprang to his eyes.

“Why do you not look at me as you weep, amico?” Lorenz asked with open curiosity, sharing that Tedrey was hiding nothing.

“It is weak,” Tedrey muttered shakily.

“And again, I have proof the manner of your parents was no manner at all.”

Tedrey returned his surprised attention to Lorenz.

“You are warrior,” he remarked.

“I am,” Lorenz agreed. “And I wept when my father died. I wept when King Ares died. I wept when my bride bound her life to mine. I felt tears sting my eyes when my king claimed his queen. I will undoubtedly weep when my wife gives me my first child, and any that come after. If she were to move to the next realm before me, I do not know if I will ever stop weeping. What I do know is I will not have the will even to try. There is no weakness in being fully you and fully feeling anything you feel. What makes us weak is when we do not celebrate all that we are, all that we feel, which is what makes us strong.”

“My father did not like that I liked…”

“Men?” Lorenz guessed.

Tedrey nodded.

“A peculiar Dellish trait,” Lorenz murmured.

“I was…I was very…” He cleared his throat. “I did not know how to be around people who did not take extreme issue with this.”

“The Go’Doan,” Lorenz stated.

Tedrey again nodded. “They…having that freedom to be who I was and be with who I wished, I was seduced by that religion.”

“Religion is not seductive,” Lorenz returned. “It’s faith. Faith, at its heart, is pure. It is man who led you down the wrong path. Beware of laying blame on the gods, no matter which gods they are, for the actions of men, or your own. Only you are responsible for what you do and the same for any man or woman.”

Tedrey stood still, struck so deeply by these words, he could not move.