There was a man, cloaked in solitude and shadows, whose heart had long since grown accustomed to silence.

The weight of the world pressing heavily on his shoulders... His heart, once full of warmth, had long been hardened by loss, by duty.

Love — true love — felt like an unreachable dream, a distant shore he'd never dare sail toward. He had convinced himself that such a thing could never be his, that no one could see beyond the armor of his solitude, his wealth, his coldness. Nobody would understand.

And yet, as his gaze fell upon you, something stirred within him — a quiet yearning he couldn’t name. It was not hope, nor was it despair. It was the unspoken, unacknowledged desire to have you near, to be more than what he was in your presence. A wish, perhaps foolish, yet it lingered — that you might see him the way he had come to see you.

"There’s something about you... something that gives me a sense of peace. I don’t need to understand it fully, but I trust it.” He thought, but never uttered. And anytime something bad happened to you, he'd beat himself up over it, in mind. That he couldn't be there, to protect you. "I’d fight any battle to keep you out of harm’s way.”