nobody calls me peachfuzz

Tess tries to run from the past, to reject it and to not think about it - to bury her old self with her family and friends.

She's not just brave because it's her nature. She's "not afraid of anything anymore" because she, a person who has lost everything that mattered to her, is no longer afraid to die.

Henry is her complete opposite here. He becomes unrecognizable to his former self because, thanks to nepotism and gender, he's able to start an entirely new lifestyle in a way denied to Theresa... which may at first glance appear to be what Henry wants.

But it's not! Again and again, we see that everything Henry does is about wanting to go back, to cling to home, to try and salvage the scraps of his old self. He wants so badly to be truly unafraid, like Theresa is, but despite everything, he doesn't have the maturity to understand that fearing death isn't cowardice and lack of fear isn't bravery: it is pure tragedy. It means you have nothing left to lose.

It means you are Theresa.

Theresa, who despite being annihilated by the slaughter of her old self and loved ones, WAS NOT HAPPY (!) in that old life. She wasn't happy taking care of men, something she started doing far too young after her mother's death. She never wanted to get married, to be a wife, to raise children (she tells Jane as much; it's not just Feyfar; she wants nothing to do with boys; she's so young and already sick of laundry and cooking and cleaning and caring). She wanted the freedom to be herself, to have her own desires, to chase fun, to dance with her girl friends, to have more than the earliest hour of morning to herself.

Henry merely thought he wasn't happy, and for such a childish reason: he was bored of peace and comfort and being doted on by his family and his sweetheart. He knows now his mistake and that he can't take it back. But his former happiness also cannot be destroyed, even though it is no longer accessible to him, because he was so babied and undeniably loved and spoiled and undeservingly adored.

Not so with Theresa.

Of course she doesn't want to marry Henry.

Of course she laughs at him when he so casually suggests it.

Henry truly loves her, in his way, and she has much tenderness and a sort of sad love for him too. But no matter how damaged he is, he's still got a big piece of that good-natured oaf from Skalitz inside him. And so he thinks she's still the Theresa he knew all these years, partially because it helps him feel closer to a home that doesn't exist. He doesn't understand, no matter how many times or how many ways she tells him, that Theresa of Skalitz is gone or what she's lost.

And, whether or not Tess & Henry's sort-of-romance remains alive or (as KCD1's ending seems to suggest) kindly loosens and lets go, there is a part of Henry -- the old Henry, before the fire -- that Hans Capon, no matter how madly he loves him, can never truly know, understand, or touch. Theresa can. In no small part because that piece of her has been destroyed.

It's just so honest and worthwhile and real.