"He says, he says he d-d-doesn't remember who I am," catch says, speaking of the boy as if he were not here, even though his red-rimmed eyes glared directly at him. "He says, he says he would like t-t-to be friends some day, as if we're n-n-not friends." Didn't Rhaena know? She knew everything. She heard everything. She just had to stretch out her mind and take it, and the Rhaena-taste on everyone told Catch that she has. Could. Would. So is this, then, a lie? Catch couldn't tell, not by himself. Perhaps it was a mistake. But Catch knew what Elliot had said, what he had written.
Only he could do this thing. Catch's chin pillowed against his bared chest, regarding the offered hand with a face full of longing-resolve. Why should I take it, he thinks, bitterly. it is because she wanted this. Because she needed it. It was a Trade, but an ill-tasting sort; pies and teas and affection, only so long as something was needed, something was wanted. Like putting things together with his head.
Be cautious, he had often be warned, by an Elliot exasperated. They're only nice because of the things you can do.
Catch stretched out his hand, hesitant, quite certain that this is a Joke, that the hand would be snatched away before he could take it, his silver-scarred fingers a tight, needful heat.
"I know about th-th-the Wall," he says, an inexcusable affront to the wilderness. "But you've n-n-not said th-th-that you would burn the Black Man, who is a dead-thing, and I want him gone."