Page 29 of A Bear in a Birdbath

“Then why wouldn’t you stay with me? Why couldn’t you love me that much without magic?”

“What we had wasn’t love,” Eva told her. “I’m not sorry I left.”

“The human world is ugly and uncaring,” the Queen argued. “People there suffer and starve. What could it offer you that I can’t?”

“Happiness,” Eva said simply. “My own whole happiness.”

“You said you were happiest making me the dress of starlight...”

“I said I was the happiest person in Faery. The merriment here, the parties, the glitter—it’s all shallow and fake. All this magic, and no one ever makes anything. You only noticed me because I was different. I wanted to do things with my hands, not spinning illusions like everyone else. I never wanted illusions, and that’s all we ever were! It’s real in the human world, and it’s not always pretty, but it’s always real…and real is better than pretty.”

“I could give you back your power,” the Queen said. “You could have your wings and magic back. Keep the troll and the bear as your pets, and rule at my side.”

“They aren’t my pets,” Eva said patiently. “They are my mates.”

“How is that different?” the Queen asked, and although her voice was angry, Eva thought that the question was genuine. “Your mates. Aren’t you forced to love them just as much as I ever did?”

“Not even a little,” Eva said immediately. “It’s a calling, not a compulsion. It’s the difference between a hankering for a cupcake and an addiction to drugs. My body, my heart, my soul, they want them, not because of the consequences of not having them, but because I know how much better and happier I’d be with them.”

“Cupcakes aren’t healthy,” the Queen pointed out. Eva observed that she seemed sulky, but she hadn’t shut down the way that Eva kept expecting her to.

“Sometimes a craving is for something your body needs. Sometimes, it’s an indulgence. It’s always a choice. I never had a choice with you. I never knew what I actually wanted for myself.”

“You chose to leave.”

“I needed to know who I was without you in my chest forcing every heartbeat to your rhythm. I’m not sorry I did it, even though it hurt worse than anything I’d ever done in my entire life. I found out who I was without you, and I found people who loved me without strings and clauses and Codes.”

“Did you love me?”

“Did you love me?” Eva countered. “Or did you just love having power over me? Did you ever once wonder if I was happy?”

The Queen vanished in a puff of glitter and a hum of angry bees, and Eva woke up cradled between Margo and Bruno, exactly where she ought to be.

25

MARGO

Faery was full of wonders, but none of them was quite as wonderful as being with Margo’s mates.

Margo had never seen the point of leisure, until she had mates to love and be loved by, and half the fun of being able to walk on golden clouds was holding onto their hands as she went, and swimming with them in a lake that sang instead of splashed. They laughed together, and told stories, comparing everything they loved and didn’t.

They made love in steaming pools and soft beds of moss and fields of flowers, in pairs and together, as the mood struck. There was a library made of flower-bound books and Margo read poetry that made her heart feel like a chest full of caged birds.

They quarreled over who Bruno should choose, until they couldn’t bear to speak of it, and forgave each other with kisses and assured him that they would love him forever no matter what he was forced to decide.

The second night was spent on a mountaintop wreathed in stars that would come down and dance on the rocks. Bruno and Eva slept curled together on a bed of cloudmatter under downy blankets while Margo measured the unfamiliar constellations with her outstretched hands and wondered if Faery astronomers were a thing that existed.

She didn’t realize that she’d fallen asleep at their feet until she was dreaming, and the Queen came to her.

“Leave me Eva of your free will and I will not make Bruno decide between you or battle to free you and risk his own freedom,” the Queen promised. “You can go in peace.”

Margo pinched herself, because she wanted to make sure that she was dreaming. Her skin was like velvet and pain was a weird echo of sound. She could look down and see herself, curled at Bruno and Eva’s feet. She was definitely dreaming. But Margo was equally sure that this was real.

“You’d just be asking me to choose, instead of Bruno,” Margo observed. “It’s no less cruel.”

“Do you really think I’m cruel?” the Queen asked winsomely. “I promise, I am only trying to keep what I love!”

“You don’t love Eva,” Margo said, and she said it with genuine pity. “Love doesn’t want to control and overpower. If you loved Eva, you would let her go.”

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