“Shh. Don’t cry.” He kisses my forehead. “Isn’t it sweet for us here, in the Dreaming? To have someplace to meet across time?”
His fingers slide into my hair as the wind plays with the loose strands around my face.
“But you’re dead.”
He shrugs dismissively, but the small smile tugging at his lips holds only tenderness. It’s not casual in the least. “Semantics.”
My prince kisses me beneath a sky that outshines every jewel in Faerie, stripped bare of everything but starlight.
He tastes of clean linen, sun-kissed stone, and sweet blossoms. I kiss him harder, desperate to commit every part of him to memory.
How his mouth curves against mine.
How his arms feel around me, strong enough to make me believe that nothing can take him away.
The steady rhythm of his heart beneath my palm.
The roughness of his fingertips tangled in my hair.
The warmth of his breath against my skin.
His scent.
His light.
I want to remember every stolen moment we shared on these cliffs and in the waking world, even if I know there aren't enough of them to fill the empty space he'll leave behind.
Not enough to carry me through a lifetime without him.
“You’re about to wake up,” he finally breathes, straightening his spine, softly holding himself away.
I shudder and hold on to him, sinking my nails into his shoulders. “Will I see you again?”
“There are things that we can have, but can't keep,” he muses, sliding a loose strand of hair behind my ear. “Are you done with me, little fox?”
“Do I have a choice?” I croak.
He tilts his head to the side. “I don’t know. Do you?”
His question leaves my heart in free fall.
Boom, boom,boom.
I wake with a start.
The room swims in and out of focus, and my chest aches.
Lady is meowing, tapping her paw against something, which is a refreshing change from her usual strategy of walking across my face. I rub the grit from my eyes, my heart feeling brittle as frozen glass, enormous and on the verge of shattering.
“What’s going on, girl?” I ask groggily, wishing I could have stayed in the Dreaming with my ghost.
In my mind, I’m still on the terrace beside the cliffs.
I’m back in that moment—with Ezra’s blood on my hands and his final words echoing in my ears. I can still feel the weight of his body in my arms, hear the strain in his dying voice, and remember the torturous way his hand slipped from my cheek.
Lady leaps onto my chest and lets out a questioningmeow.
I blink slowly, and for a moment, I forget I’m not dreaming.
