Ben holds her gaze, his beard twitching with the smile underneath it.

"By my blood freely given, I am your father."

It should feel momentous, one sentence breaking so many of the rules and traditions he has spent his life holding sacred. Abandoning of the the basic precepts - that of non attachment - for a girl he hasn't known 24 hours.

But instead it feels quiet and truthful. And he never thought much of that particular precept anyway.