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“I'm not a creep.” Tristan held up his hands. “Weddings, historically, were not private affairs. They occurred in public spaces—churches, town squares, great halls. It was easy to observe without intruding. Even today, people have outdoor weddings. I liked to watch if I could get near enough to do so without calling attention to myself.”

“Why?”

“Because weddings celebrate love in the most straightforwardly beautiful way. There's no tragedy attached. When people cry, it's because they're happy. It's just two people declaring publicly, in front of everyone they know, that they love each other enough to devote themselves to each other for the rest of their lives. Heartbreak cannot touch them in that moment. Maybe in the future, but on that day, there is only hope.”

“Tristan,” I said.

“Mm?”

“You are a hopeless romantic.”

“I prefer hopeful romantic.”

“You have been sneaking into other people's weddings for centuries because you like seeing people in love.”

He shrugged.

“That is the most romantic thing I've ever heard and it's also a little absurd.”

The corner of his mouth lifted. “I am aware.”

I was smiling at him, and for a moment it was just that—easy, warm, the simplest thing. Then I set my glass down and the question sitting at the back of my mind all through dinner came forward. “Have any of your relationships ended well?”

The warmth didn't leave his face, but it shifted, settled into something quieter. “Several. By any fair measure.”

“Tell me about them.”

He rolled his wine glass slowly between his palms. “There was a woman in London. Early nineteenth century. We were together for eleven years. She wanted, eventually, what I couldn't give her—a normal life, a husband who aged with her, an ordinary future. She left.” He said it without flinching. “It hurt. But we wrote letters to each other for thirty years afterward. I attended her wedding.” A small pause. “I was invited to that one.”

I smiled despite myself. “And?”

“And she was very happy. She died at seventy-three. Quietly, in her sleep, in her own bed. That is not a tragedy.”

“No,” I agreed. “Not for her.”

“There was another woman, much later. She stayed.” His voice was even, but careful. “She knew what I was and she stayed. She aged. I didn't, of course. She used to say it only bothered her on the days when she looked in the mirror.” He looked at the fire. “The physical aspects of our relationship changed. We lost the sexual aspects eventually, but the love was always there, and I didn't mind. It was an honor and a gift to take care of her when she grew more fragile. At the end she knew she was loved and she wasn't alone. But all she had was me. She had to leave her family to be with me, and I couldn't give her children.”

I was quiet for a moment. No children. I hadn't thought of that. And the family. They would have had to hide why he wasn't aging. Hard to do that when you have relatives. “I don't think most people would stay with someone who was aging when they weren't.”

“I don't see why they wouldn't if they loved that person.” He seemed genuinely puzzled, as though the alternative had never occurred to him. “The problem isn't that all my relationships end badly. The problem is that they end, and Heartbreak—” He paused. “Heartbreak ensures the ending is the part I feel most acutely. The last months, the last days, the last hour—those are vivid in a way the rest is not. It isn't accurate. It isn't even fair. But it is what I am. Eventually, I gave up on relationships and settled for... shorter affairs.”

I turned this over in my mind for a few moments. There were two opposing thoughts fighting for supremacy. There was my visceral discomfort at the thought of Tristan staying with me as I aged, of looking across a room at him to find him unchanged while I became someone he had to care for. I was twenty-seven years old and didn't consider myself vain, but I knew watching the years accumulate on me and not him would eat at me until I was hollow. Our relationship had a timer on it. It wouldn't tick down in an hour, or even a year, but the end would have to come.

But then there was the second thought, and it was a powerful one. I didn't want to leave Tristan with another ending to feel more vividly than everything before it. I didn't want to walk away because it would get difficult. If I fell in love with this magical, tormented man, I'd want to make his life a little brighter. But what would that mean for me? Love what cannot be loved. Maybe she hadn't been talking about Heartbreak. But what about the balance thing? Tristan had weight. Unless, she wasn't talking about physical weight, or maybe she wasn't referring to one thing, but three. Ugh, this was the problem with prophecies. They were too vague. Had she been this vague with Osric too?

Blinking, I pushed away those thoughts. I had asked for a distraction. So, I focused on Tristan. “You know what's wrong with what you just said?”

Tristan looked at me, hope tinting his green eyes.

“You're giving Heartbreak too much power. It may have magnified the endings, but it doesn't take away the rest. You told me you can remember the sound of mud on a battlefield. Your memory does not endure edits. So, why is it any different with your relationships? It's all still there, inside you. You just have to look past Heartbreak.”

“I've never—” He cut himself off. “You're right. I've let Heartbreak blind me. After so long, you'd think I'd know better.”

“But now you do. You can let your unedited memories surface.”

Tristan looked at me as if I'd handed him something he'd lost and forgotten he was missing. “You make me think about things I stopped letting myself want a long time ago. Waking up beside the same woman every day, celebrating holidays with her, and supporting each other through anything life brings us.”

“That sounds like hope.”