Of course, it was silly of him not to have noticed that someone else had been there already, but there were a half dozen excuses that were reasonable enough. The wind was fickle and had been blowing in all kinds of awkward directions since his own arrival. All he could smell was ash and smoke and burning wood. The scent of death was transplanted. Arkham only pretended to be a warrior when it was convenient, but he knew he wasn't. Death was only familiar to him at a distance. Graves, the space left behind when someone went away. He had seen dead bodies, but they had not meant anything to him. He had never watched someone he cared about die. He only saw what was left.
Gabriel,
he answered without turning around. He had been putting off seeing his half-brother like he had put off seeing his father. So he supposed it was all the better that they should talk now. It was easy, and he didn't have to avoid it anymore. Arkham had no idea that Ahren was also buried under the smoldering wood though, and briefly, he considered that Gabriel might have actually been the one to start the fire. He chuckled a little out loud at the thought, How are you?
It sounded like an empty question, but the truth was that he really wanted to know. It was hard all of a sudden, the fact that he had always looked up to him.