"It wasn't mine to give." He wonders, inwardly, if this would be the last time they ever spoke. Quite likely, isn't it? They don't see so much of each other in camp. He wonders if he's done everything he can for her. Not whether he's done everything humanly possible - no, useless man that he is, he never was able to help her. But has he done everything in his power? He's tried to arm her with knowledge, and he's given her some. He's tried to keep her spirits up, and at least he made her annoyed. Annoyed is better than frightened. It seems to him as though surely, surely there was more he could have done, things he could have said, ways he could have put her feet more firmly on the ground, ways he could have guided her...

But ah, this is the game he always plays with himself. Why-didn't-I-say-that. Even now, as she walks away, he plays that game in the present tense: why-can't-I-say-that. Why can't he tell her that she'll be all right, or tell her that this world will be good to her, tell her to continue on with the fight. Something graceful, something that she'll hold onto when she thinks of him later. So that her last memory won't be of him nattering on about his cowardice, but something better. He has a dozen things he can say, a dozen things that are sweet or inspirational or just good. A dozen things that cast him in the light he wants to be remembered in: as someone snarky, devastatingly witty, but someone who still fought the good fight. A dozen things that would make her think back on him, and when she thought back on him, she'd remember how much he believed in her.

He doesn't, though. No. None of that comes out of his mouth. Instead he just stands, one hand in his pocket, the other one twisting around the rough-hewn cup of wine, smiling awkwardly and looking at the roof of the tent. And that is all. That's what he'll leave her with. Only that.