It takes until I want to be with you for the baffled line to disappear from between Alistair's eyebrows, smoothed out by surprise and his widening eyes. They stay wide during her pause. Then they narrow--not much, but enough to no longer qualify as wide--and lower to her shoulder out of inward-focused concentration while he tries to keep up words like considerations and issues and discussions and complications. If she'd worked in negotiations she might have gotten Bingo on his Panic Bingo card.

He cracks his mouth open, but she's not done, so he shuts it again.

And he gets it together enough to look her back in the eyes for the rest of it, although the effort that that requires means he forgets about his hands and lowers both to hover in front of his abdomen, once again dangerously close to getting pheasant juice on the ring, until he thinks she's finished.

"Beleth," he says, in the tone of someone who's about to try to reason with someone who's being unreasonable, but that's all he has at the moment. He leaves his mouth slightly ajar in case more words happen to come out, but in the meantime he looks down at his hands, gaze darting between them, like maybe the ring or his pheasant leg will have some sage advice for him, beyond say something you idiot, which is advice he can give himself, thanks.