"Did I mention any sin?"

Malachi lifted a brow at that. He still peered down at the youth, cold as they might have been. A body was only a body, no matter how it moved.

With a click of his tongue, Malachi turned his attention back to the fire.

Chéri was beautiful, he would not deny them that. They were beautiful in the way that clear skies were -- in a way that no one could refute, for it was just a part of what made them what they were. Malachi, however... preferred the gray skies of a storm.

In English, he inquired, "Shall I liken you to someone else instead?"

It was a rhetorical question regardless of the language. There were plenty of more obvious figures he could have mentioned in place of Absalom, but he had chosen him for a reason. Malachi looked back to Chéri with a hum, and returned to his use of French.

"Did you have enough to eat?"