The lack of tenderness in her tone is a relief, swiftly countermanded by the strange gentleness of her touch. He feels, as he rarely allows himself to feel, off-balance: caught between comfort and suspicion, between what he expects and what is happening. It does not help, either, that his mind still feels foggy and slow, as though his thoughts are creeping through a swamp. It irritates him.

It frightens him. That irritates him much more.

"I will not be eating supper." He is ill. Very well; he can grant that he is ill. (Eventually, and with very bad grace, but he is hardly about to admit that to himself.) Being ill, then, he should manage his illness, so he does not need her. He cannot need her. And he has a half-remembered sense of what his nursemaids told him, when he was young and prone to such human weaknesses as admitting to illness, before he was the Emperor. "Feed a cold, and starve a fever. A lean day or two will settle the matter."

Also, it will spare him the humiliation of finding out whether he can keep food down. He has absolutely no desire to fill his belly only to empty it again.