Her reaction wasn't something he was working on gauging, his attention had been more singularly devoted to the task. A sort of strangeness hung in the air between them for a moment. James reckoned it was coming from him - what he'd had rolling around in his head and hadn't told her. That was the trouble with unnecessary secrets between people; James didn't like them, and the bigger they were the worse they could be.
"I thought it was me," he said, almost to himself, his hand repeating the motion of smoothing the worn fabric against the bandage underneath. "I thought I was doing that to you."
It wasn't unthinkable. People had been poking and prodding and 'testing' him all week. Without a wand or a proper sort of outlet of course he'd been lashing out when he was angry. And he'd been angry at her. And then there'd been blood. He hadn't understood at the time, didn't know anything about her having been missing, having been hurt, or the fact that she was still hosting pieces of dark magic inside her body.
He thought he'd done it. The awareness of that had eaten at him a little, that he thought he'd be capable of it. Was he? Had he wanted to hurt her? When he thought she'd betrayed them and turned them over? Maybe. Maybe he was, but he hadn't. It was hard to say if that was better or worse.