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[vrdantwind]

"Hey, this is Claude! Pretty sure I'm doing this correctly. You can leave me a message here, and I'll get to it as soon as I can. Talk to you soon~."

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[blackironspur]

Huh.

Glenn watches Claude mostly impassively throughout all of this, though he's clearly listening, not zoning out or just waiting for Claude to finish. It's not until the question is posed that his expression really changes - his brows lift, his gaze becomes a little more knowing.

"No, not at all. Though I know why you ask. Most of Faerghus would say yes."

He shakes his head. "You were the one who told me you'd decided to be honest 'for now.' That didn't fill me with confidence, though I didn't assume you'd be bad for them any more than I assumed you'd be good for them."

He shifts position in the sand to turn and face Claude more directly. "But you've made several good points. Among them that I ought to trust Felix's judgment, and that I ought to be pleased that he's found someone else he wants to be with. Like I said, the Felix I know is slow to warm up to people, and it sure doesn't sound like that much has changed. So if you've gotten close enough to him since coming here that he wanted to court you, you must be doing something right."

He offers Claude a hand for shaking. "So I hope you'll accept my apology for grilling you. And my thanks, for making my brother and the others happy and looking after them. Since, as you pointed out, I can't."

[vrdantwind]

"Honesty is a luxury not everyone can afford," Claude says dryly. "For instance, your brother and the others didn't learn I was Almyran until we ended up here, because you can imagine what the people of Fodlan - it's hardly just Faerghus - would have thought of a half-Almyran Duke Riegan. But my grandfather was desperate for someone to step in for him, and he didn't have a wealth of options...and control of the Alliance probably would have gone to Count Gloucester otherwise. And given that he became an Imperial sympathizer in the war, who wanted to hand the Alliance over to the Empire in exchange for power and favors, which would've definitely meant crushing the Kingdom...well, let's just say that my grandfather had good instincts. And that people who say 'honesty is the best policy' have never actually been at a serious disadvantage before."

He gazes out at the ocean. "Honesty is easy. You don't have to think about it, or try to keep a story straight. When honesty genuinely is the best policy, that's what I stick to. But plenty of people give me reasons not to trust them with the truth. They say the truth hurts, but usually the people who say that mean that they're going to hurt someone else with what they say. In my experience, the truth hurts the person saying it a lot more often than it hurts anyone listening. The truth can be a weapon in the wrong hands, and I don't go out of my way to arm people I don't trust."

He glances at Glenn. "When I said I'd stick to honesty for now, I meant you hadn't yet given me any reason to regret telling you what I know. The fact that my acknowledging I have the option to lie to you making you distrust me more, though...that's kind of hilarious, isn't it? If I was going to try to lie to you, you'd think I wouldn't bring that up.

"And let's face it, I can't believe you needed me to bring up the idea of me being able to lie to consider whether or not you can trust what I'm saying. You have to have been asking yourself that all along, right? And you didn't think I was lying before. What I've been saying matches up with what you already know, and it hangs together logically. I don't have any particular reason to lie to a dead man. I'm sure you thought all that out and settled yourself that you can trust me awhile ago. But I say that my honesty isn't necessarily unconditional or indefinite, and that makes you doubt me? I genuinely have to ask - why?"

Still, he shakes the offered hand of Glenn's. "But apology accepted. Honestly - " Claude's going to get sick of that word soon. " - I just don't know how these talks are supposed to go when people have them with me. I build a relationship with a guy for months, slowly show him sides of myself I don't just trust anyone with, and then a family member of theirs walks up to me and essentially goes 'I don't know you, but summarize for me what he sees in you and make me trust you the way he's come to over the course of actually getting to know you. Oh, yeah, and can you compress it into about fifteen minutes, max?' It's not just humiliating - it's impossible. It feels like a task people set for me to fail. How do I give them enough to judge me on? And why do they think that over the course of one acutely stilted conversation, I'll be able to give them enough evidence to make a better call than the guy I'm dating did? What's the game plan if someone does decide I'm not good enough for their family? Were you going to go tell Felix he should dump me, based on the one conversation you'd had with me?" He shakes his head. "I don't think you would have...but that just means those conversations aren't actually meant to protect the people I'm dating. They're meant to sweat me."

Glenn's apology has been accepted, but that doesn't mean Claude necessarily feels any better. The grilling is over, but the messages sent can't be unsent. And the weekend...it's worn him too thin. He'd been pleased to finally have the chance to meet Glenn, knowing how much so many important men in his life think of him, and Glenn does indeed seem to be all that he's heard of him...but this looks to be what will be Claude's defining experience with him. Glenn using Claude as a source of information about the people he actually cares about, then getting suspicious of how Claude has all that information, and then asking Claude why he should trust him with those people who actually matter.

Claude meant what he said - he can't blame Glenn for any of this. Glenn's got a lot to catch up on, and who knows how much time. The man knows he's dead; developing new relationships isn't exactly going to be a priority for him. He doesn't know Claude, and even if he cared to get to know him, odds are he won't have time for that. Glenn's being practical, not thoughtless.

But even without blame, there's hurt. The lines between the people who matter and the people who don't - the differences in how Glenn thinks and speaks of them - are too stark to ignore. Sylvain is lucky to have married Felix; Claude is lucky Glenn has deferred judgment of him to Felix, and that Glenn trusted evidence he'd demanded Claude provide.

Claude scoops up a handful of sand, letting it run through his gloved fingers. "But in any case...thanks aren't necessary. They're all good men I'd want to help, no matter what, and that inclination didn't start with our dating. I should be thanking you - for being so good to them while you could. I mean, Dimitri wouldn't even be here today if not for you. And it's clear that you passed on a number of your good qualities to Felix. All their lives were better for having you in them. And if there's some way you can stick around here, then I know they'll be better now, too."

He gets to his feet, brushing himself off. "In any case, I think that's most of the news I can offer, so..."