"Yes, I bathed," Laurent drawled. His heart quickened, but his posture stayed relaxed and lazy. "So you're hoping that a young man won't fade so fast? Unlikely. Men would simply never survive childbirth--physically, they can endure less. So I'm an inefficient choice to not fade, by nature of my gender."

He reaches up over his shoulder toward the beast, intending to pat him on the head like an oversized dog.