" But… I also kinda hope they can’t feel anything, since we eat them." The young prince hits the nail on the head here. The truth sinks into them at the same time, the possibility that they had taken a horrible thing for granted without even thinking about it until now. "I hope so too," Mateo says earnestly, for if the plants were aware of being eaten alive then horses were no more noble than wolves. And while nature needed a balance-- birth, life, death-- he hoped it did not need to be so violent and painful.
Oh, but the morning is too young, and their hearts too light, for the heaviness of philosophy! Mateo is glad to steer the conversation elsewhere, to kings and queens and the living history they are apart of. Eventually they reach the doors to the kitchen; tall, broad, well-worn. The dark grain of the wood(, walnut?) thirstily drinks up the morning light. Mateo hesitates, looking from the door to his friend and finally back to the door. "Just one," he echoes with an agreeable grin, and he quietly steps through the door into the kitchen.
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