[ reasons he shouldn't love me, daan says. kaveh thinks -

... it lodges, somewhere in his chest, like an arrowhead or a thin spider's strand, one that perforates and draws blood as if a three-millimeter spout. ]

But you did not say you were loved, once. [ says kaveh, because he has lived with a haravatat for half his life, and the haravatat understands words, and what their absence means. ] ... were you afraid, that he would be making a mistake? Vergilius, that is. In loving you.