It was easy enough to let out a burst of a grin at Zee's teasing. It felt like months since he'd controlled his face though, tight and unfamiliar. But of course she got more serious when she actually got a look at him; dark circles under his eyes, sallow skin, unkempt in every sense of the word. It never felt any better coming out the other end, the middle was sometimes a blur but the numbness was alluring when everything else was utter shit.
"Usual." His fingers caught on hers when she reached out, familiarity with Istvan's practice of warding at least letting him feel when he was granted passage through it. "This year was just..." His head shook a little, still stringing it all together really, working out what Paimon's task was, the amount of power it drained from him at the time.
"I just... I'm not really, coming down is kind of hard, this time, it's just this itch, and I can't really stop it, like a prickling underneath." Zelda had seen him strung out from an Expression before, knew the while the act of completing a triangle was hard enough, coming through the otherside of it was just as difficult at times.
Especially when the sacrifices increased. "I feel wrong this time."