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"I can't hear you! I'm going to miss her!"
I shook my head, smiling. A few last faeries were going through when I realized that Reth was still standing nearby, his frame visibly shaking.
I gestured to the gate, but he stood there, frowning at me, then motioned me to him. Disentangling myself from Lend, I walked over, having to pull my hair out of my mouth three times.
"You should go!" I shouted. "You're the only one left and you look terrible and it's almost dawn!"
"I want to go through with you. I want to be there when you become what you should be. "
"Reth. " I shook my head. "I'm not going through!"
His eyebrows rose in confusion. "You're not going through. "
"No! I'm not going through!"
"Of course you are going through. This is what everything has been about, escaping this wretched planet. Together. "
"You can go!"
He reached out and cupped the side of my face with his palm that, once again, felt warm to my now extra-soul-free body. Feverish, actually, and I could feel his pulse racing through it. "You are the only thing I have ever cared for besides myself. I cannot leave you here. "
I-oh, bleep, I actually felt sorry for him. And a part of me wished that I could give him what he wanted, because even now, even dying he was so beautiful that the remnants of the girl I was when I loved him wanted to do nothing but make him happy.
But I wasn't that girl anymore. And I didn't want to become a different girl so I could be with him. I wanted to be with the boy who loved Evie, not the faerie who loved the potential for Neamh.
I put my hand over his and smiled, then shook my head. "I'm sorry, Reth. I'm not coming. This is my home. "
His eyebrows came together and formed a line that had never been there before on his smooth, perfect forehead. "You are really choosing to stay. "
"I am. "
His frown deepened. "I do not understand. "
I grinned, shrugging. "Isn't that what you hate about me? Flighty, unpredictable, squirmy human emotions? Even though you're a total jerk, and I hate you more than I like you, I can accept that you always thought you were doing the right things for me. You can't make these choices for me though, because you don't really know me and you never could. "
"But I love you. "
I pulled his hand away from my face and patted it. I'd seen the pregnant girls in the meadow. I knew what it meant to give everything in yourself to a faerie. "Faerie love is something I can live without. And I think you'll find that I'm something you can live without, too. "
Reth narrowed his eyes and looked from me to the gate and back again.
"Don't even think about it," I said, suddenly scared. "If you so much as take a step to drag me through, I will drain your soul and send it through the gate in the stars you're so scared of. And you know you can't fight me right now. "
His lip jutted out petulantly, then he sighed. "I really will miss you, my love. If nothing else you were always entertaining. "
I smiled. "I think I might miss you, too. So few things left in this world to terrorize me and look pretty while doing it. Now get out of here and enjoy your eternity. " He glanced calculatingly at the gate once again, and I raised my hand in warning. "I can drain faster than you can run. "
He looked torn, then leaned forward and pressed his smooth lips against mine in a whisper of a kiss. I staggered back, putting my fingers to my lips and still feeling his heat there.
"Perhaps if I had done that earlier you would be coming with me now. " He smiled at me, that enigmatic faerie smile that I realized with a pang I really would miss, then turned and walked, stooped and unsteady, through the gate.
"Good-bye, Reth," I whispered, letting the wind carry my words through the gate and wondering if he heard them on the other side. Something tight around my heart released as he grew taller and brighter, healed, his features smoothing until they were so much less human than they had ever been. He turned his head ever so briefly in my direction, smiled, and then ran on dancing feet to join the rest of his brothers and sisters.
I smiled back, happy and relieved that at least this time I'd managed to save someone I cared about, even if it meant losing him forever. I was strangely glad I had known him. And non-strangely glad he was gone forever. High time to have an easy life. I turned and ran back into Lend's arms, burying my face in his shoulder with a smile as I breathed him in.
"We did it!" I shouted, looking up at Vivian and smiling. "That's everyone! We're done! We can do anything we want now!"
Her teeth chattering, she smiled back, but hers looked oddly more like a grimace. "Umm, Evie?"
