Bariyan looks at Carolina for a long while, then reaches up to pinch the bridge of his nose.

"I'd have thought the past decade of my life would be proof enough," he murmurs, then closes his eyes and shakes his head. "No. I'm not giving up. I'm just -- confused. The Light has never left me before."

Its departure -- even if not complete, as the faint sparks that he's still able to summon suggest -- has left him more shaken than he could have ever predicted, had such a possibility every occurred to him before. But the Light has been with him all his life. Not taken for granted, but taken for a constant. Now he feels as if someone has yanked his foundations out from under him.