Sometimes you can't get the response you want right away. Istredd knows that intimately well. "I love you, Lucifer," he tells him quietly. But that is as far as he can go at this point without pushing, so he slides his fingers gently through Lucifer's hair and then backs off, over to a tree where he leans.

"For the record, I don't think I'd dislike myself for killing to save a loved one. I've just been around enough mages who start to enjoy it." And Istredd doesn't want to be that particular mage. That part of the Brotherhood. He doesn't want to enjoy hurting people but maybe a part of him thinks he could become that. He's said that the messed up mages are only a few centuries ahead of him. Maybe Stregobor is right that he is his natural heir, a few hundred years too early.

Anyway.

"We'll find more open spaces for you. There have to be a few of them that aren't attached to eternal darkness."