Alistair is looking at Nathaniel. It doesn't look like him anymore. There had been something of him left—there had to have been, for him to want to die, for him to refuse to give in—but with it gone now, he's hardly recognizable. If this body shambled toward Alistair in the dark he wouldn't hesitate.

I won't let him, he hears Teren say. It takes him a moment to look up, and when he does his brow is knitted. A little like he doesn't understand. A little like he doesn't believe her.

"We can wrap him in the blanket," he says after a pause where he's clearly decided not to argue with her about whether or not he needs protection and whether or not she has any right to offer it, now, after all this time. "He's was—he's been—"

Falling apart.