“I will never see him again. Never know why he let me go. Never learn if he really whispered what I think he did. Beautiful.”

“I remember you. You were like burning firelight in that cave, all shimmery, dancing color." I lean closer over the island, mesmerized by his words, his hand on my face. If he keeps talking this way, he's going to see me like that again. "Tell me you thought about me. That you think about me now." "I thought about you," I whisper, "I've never stopped thinking about you." Somehow I doubt I ever will.”

“He may be stronger, but I'm not defenseless. He knows that, of coarse. That's why he's here. He wants me for what I can do after all.”

“Then again, there’s nothing simple about Will. I think back to what he can do—bend earth, resist shading, his immense strength—and it’s glaringly inaccurate to consider him a human. But then I can’t think of him as a draki either. And this strikes me as sad. Will doesn’t belong anywhere. Not among humans. Not among draki.But he belongs with me. The conviction is still there, as senseless and dangerous as always, seeping into my bones, my heart. A fact I wouldn’t change even if I could.”

“I wait for him to announce my presence, holding his gaze, refusing to look away, determined that this beautiful boy see the face he sentences to death with this next words.”

“In my mind, I see Will. Think how he has become the mist, the sky, everything, to me. I do more than survive here. I love.”

“I stare into his eyes, I shake my head, sorry for the chance we lost. The chance we maybe never had. But not for saving him. I would do that again, no matter the cost.”