With Peter, she was laid bare; he extracted her from herself.

His memory loved her too much.

Peter," she began. He looked up at her, and she could see the pain in his eyes. "I love you," she said freely. With Peter, she was laid bare; he extracted her from herself.
Peter didn't know what to say. HIs eyes glimmered, bright and burning. He only let her see them a moment before he turned away. He took a ragged breath.
"What were you doing with Rose anyway" she demanded, asking a lot of him.
Peter darkened again. He turned his back to her, took a step farther into the alley, and said in a dead voice, "I don't have to like her
to get what I want."
"I don't believe you," Valerie said, reaching for his face, again. Peter pulled away from her. "You're lying.

For Lucie," Peter said quietly, the flame of a gilded saint's candle fluttering in his hand."
"Leave."
Peter had anticipated this reaction and was prepared. He cleared his throat. "I'm paying my respects," he said, still trying to be polite. The woman was grieving for her daughter.
"I can guess the reason you're here. I've just lost one daughter," she said, her hand on the door. "I won't lose another."
"Wait,"
"She's all I have left," she said. "And you have nothing to offer her."
Peter knew that she was right, that Valerie deserved better. But he could not give her up.
"I have a trade. The same one as your husband."
"I know what a woodcutter earns."
Peter began to protest, but Suzette stopped him. "Henry Lazar is her only hope for a better life."
Peter looked into Suzette's anguished eyes, her words hitting him somewhere deep. It sank in: He could not give Valerie a good life.
"If you love her," Suzette said, her voice cracking, "you'll leave her alone.

Henry...your father was a brave man."
He continued attacking the metal with a sledgehammer, brutally hacking at the anvil. She wasn't sure he had heard her. Then, he stopped short, the hammer hanging heavy in the air, the fire snapping in front of him.
"I was close enough to smell it," he seethed, not turning. "But I was afraid. I hid from it."
Clang!
I didn't do anything.
"I should have done something."
Clang!
"I should have saved him."
Valerie saw that he was destroying all of their half-finished projects. They would remain that way forever.
"I've lost someone, too, Henry—I know how it is. Please, come away from the fire."
He didn't.
Clang!
"Henry, please."
One of the fiery specks spat out of the forge an landed on Henry's arm, searing his flesh. Punishing himself, he did not stop to remove it until finally, with one quick motion, he gestured violently towards the door, shaking it off.
"Valerie, leave," he snarled. "I don't want you to see me like this.

Promise me you'll be careful, my boy." She handed him the pack she'd assembled.
"Don't worry. The Wolf has no interest in me," he said, smiling through his pain. "I'm all gristle.