Alcuin is probably the closest thing Henry has to a confidant on the turtle. This is a somewhat saddening thought, considering how guarded he is even with Alcuin ... but it's true. It's sort of curious how that happened; Henry realised fairly early on that Alcuin's intellect is not so vulnerable as it might seem at first glance, and so I think he considers that angle of approach to have been closed off. Nevertheless he likes Alcuin tremendously, finds him exceptionally beautiful (and, um, skilled), and enjoys his company, and is probably at least a stumble and a good hard push away from actually ... not being 100% artificial around him. We won't go so far as to say "opening up", because that'sone of those cold-day-in-hell things, probably, but it's interesting to me that Henry doesn't seem to feel as acutely that he has a persona to keep up around Alcuin. Everyone else has a mask specifically tailored to them, but the mask for Alcuin is more of a domino than a full-face thing.

Una likes Lyall and needs to see more of him! She genuinely enjoys the company and conversation of people with a long view in history and humanity, and Lyall strikes her as a reasonably well-balanced, phlegmatic sort of guy with a smart head on his shoulders. She also likes his dry wit very much. She's also curious about this werewolf thing and kind of wants a look at how it works for herself, but feels like it would be rude to ask.