This charming tangle of sentences is quietly appreciated as they all come tumbling out in whatever order they arrive. Lea himself was much the same way at that age, bursting with ideas and questions, struggling to sort them all; now the flow of his thoughts is smooth as blood.

"Every sound."

Taking care to leave a clear line of sight between the boy and the man on the floor, Lea stops about halfway between them, looks from one to the other and back again. His look to the captive is a touch less neutral, eyes slipping sideways to complete the turn, the warning made clear.

To the boy, he says, "It'd be cruel to leave him like this, don't you think?"

He's watching Matthias carefully now, and calmly, to see how he answers with his body as well as his voice, his tone, the words he chooses. There's a bit of blood freckled on his cheekbone, his neck—probably not his own. (But then, he's probably not the only one.)