The fingers of Clint's free hand drifted down to the arm curved around his waist, ringing her wrist so he could feel the beat of her pulse, the blood under her skin, right where it was supposed to be. He couldn't give her anything better, and it was stupid, maybe, for him to think he ever could've. Blood in her veins and not just smeared over some violent setpiece in the arena; after all this time, that was all he'd ever managed to guarantee. And even that wasn't a promise he'd been able to keep.
"Of course it won't be all right," Clint snapped, his grip on her loosening a little, though he didn't let go. The muscles in his jaw tightened, the words bitter in his mouth. "You really think I'm that naive, after all of this? It's not even that we're gonna lose people, it's--" He tipped his head back, closed his eyes. "I'm angry. That's all. I'm so angry I want to kill something. That's what I am, now. That's what I've been since I was fucking fourteen and they brought it back. Nothing I did in twenty years made that go away. Nothing is all right. I'm not all right."