He's nearly forgotten the kettle on the stove behind him until it begins to whistle, and the Fool turns with a soft oath under his breath to turn the bloody thing off; tea will wait, and with the fire hazard dealt with he steps around the tiny table separating him from Devin to stand before him. "You try," he says and reaches out a hand to ghost gently along Devin's jaw, coaxing him not to look away, not to withdraw back into himself, for surely he's spent enough of his life doing penance in his own solitude. The Fool looks up into his eyes wistfully. "That is all any of us are able to do. Devin, that is all I am able to do, because I--I've never been wanted before, either."

It's a humbling, and slightly humiliating confession to make, given how the Fool first spoke of Fitz upon his arrival in Aifaran; to admit that the man he'd loved had never loved him in return will never grow any easier, especially recalling the cruel manner in which Fitz had first rebuffed him.

Now it's the Fool who suddenly can't meet Devin's eyes for long, looking aside from him with a shamed wince. His mouth works a moment like he's struggling to speak past the lump in his throat, but it is a long moment before he can get any words to come out. "That you want to give anything," he ends up whispering, because his voice has fled him, "is already more than anyone else has ever offered me." A fey, changeling child who grew into a beauty too angular and alien for the society that fate had propelled him into; what suitors he had entertained had come to him out of lurid fascination. None had known his heart, or bothered to try.

"It is all right to want," he finishes quietly, hesitates, and then frames Devin's face delicately between both hands. He searches those arrestingly blue eyes, thumb stroking the angle of his cheekbone. "Please, tell me what it is that you want."