...What?

Malachi stared after them, silenced for a moment by their snappish retort. How quickly they had seemed to bond with a troublesome beggar they could not even speak to -- that he tried to allow them to speak to, if only through his own third-party voice -- and yet they had regarded him with such blatant distrust since his arrival.

Left by himself in the dining room, his gaze swept over the food left out on the table.

"...Peace be with you," came his defeated mutter into the empty space.

Moving on then.

Malachi slipped his hands into his pockets and left.