Daniel barely notices it these days, is used to adjusting his pour or the way he holds his knife and fork to compensate for the tremor, keeps his shoulder loose, elbow tight. The question calls indirect attention to it, which annoys him the same way it always does when the vampires bring up his sickness — it feels like a rich guy asking where a poor guy bought his clothes. A tacky little power play.

To that end,he turns with his drink: "Why bother wishing for the impossible?" he says. "Am I nostalgic? Sure. But nothing's gonna turn back the clock." He brings his glass over to join Armand, sitting closer than he should, the chairs set for intimacy. Has a moment where his eyes fall closed where he's grateful for a seat and the first warm hit of the alcohol; the stairs took more out of him than he wants to admit, and he eases twitching back muscles slowly, talking through the ache. "Even you guys, you're not young. Though I dunno if you get what it means to be old, either. You've been frozen into something else, some third thing." He remembers waxing lyrical about that in his notes at some point, the nature of age with regards to Claudia, girl-bodied immortal but dangerous and powerful beyond any real young woman from the moment she was turned. Real youth didn't need to hide from the sun.