Re: promenade ; elevator
The words, spoken in his native tongue, elicited a hearty laugh. "Very good, bella," he told her, more than willing to lavish praise and compliments upon her, though he didn't take her words literally and move to kiss her just yet. He had charmed many women over the years, but his unwillingness to commit did not make him cruel. What harm was there in appreciating beauty when he saw it? Even if that beauty was sickly sweet, too close to the grave than one such as herself should be. But she did not look ready to die just yet, and better she was with him than someone who might mean to do her harm.
He was neither rich nor famous, not in the way that she was. Family wealth had depleted over the years and being an enemy of very powerful, very corrupt people was not the sort of infamy she possessed. His life belonged to something greater than himself, but the differences in their paths did not mean he judged her for them.
"Ah, I do not," he said, almost regretfully, of having a lady to practice upon. There was one, once, whom he'd care for above the others, but she was gone and he did not think of her where anyone could see. He offered his arm without question when she asked, as the elevator passed the first floor, ever the gentleman who would never refuse a lady's request. Such rudeness would be unacceptable. "I suppose there is little else," he acknowledged, a teasing thing, as though a stateroom and pearls were so easily come by. He had other ways in which to impress his conquests.
He looked down at himself when she asked about his uniform. "It marks me as part of the Brotherhood," he explained, "like my father before me."