In, out. Cesare is aware of his breathing, the constant, soft fluidum, the divine afflatus that allows him to be. And he remembers when and how it stopped. It's been more than a year now since he opened his eyes again; far less since he remembers what happened on that chilly morning in March. "Si. Si, signore. It is. I do not know about you, but I, for one, have few good things to say about death," he remarks as evenly as his voice will allow. All that blood. Choking on it. Twentysix stab wounds... Miquel had counted them, even as he passed his hand over Cesare's eyes to close them. "And if there are other deaths, Ser Xellos, then I do not wish to find them."
Excelling in obscurity. Isn't that like swimming without water. Cesare bites his lower lip, avoiding Xellos's strange, strange gaze.