Page 135 of The Arrow and the Alder

He’d come with Alder, to fight beside him in the end, and Seph would never know how?—

Her eyes caught on another form.

Alder.

He lay—as himself—naked and unmoving. A carpet of moss, enormous green leaves, and blooming flowers spread beneath him, as if the forest itself had made a memorial to this beautiful man.

Seph ran to him and dropped to her knees, touching his black hair and handsome face while her eyes filled with tears. “Alder…I’m so sorry. I tried?—”

His dark lashes fluttered, and Seph froze.

Hope was like a sun inside of her.

She pressed two fingers just below his jaw, checking for a pulse, and when it greeted her, she nearly fell over him with relief. “Thank you,” she cried out softly to the Fates. “Thank you…for saving him.”

Seph sat there a moment, silently praising the Fates for the gift they had bestowed, though she still felt the soft pang of regret—that he was kith and she mortal, so they could not be together for very long, but at least helived.

Seph unwound the coat from her shoulders. The enchantments were gone now, the coat nothing more than a garment of plain wool. She was just draping it over Alder’s bare lower half when his hand weighed gently upon her arm.

Seph stilled and turned her face to find his steel-gray eyes gazing back at her.

His eyes were so full of emotion. “How am I alive?”

Seph smiled and wiped a tear. “The Fates gave you back your life.”

“The Fates?”

“The other two. Their sister—the one working with Massie—has been sent back to Demas, and the light has been restored. It’s over, Alder.”

His lips parted and closed, his gaze swept the space around them. A crease formed between his beautiful brows, and he looked so wonderfully charming, confounded as he was—and maybe even a little annoyed that he’d missed so much—that Seph chuckled and pressed her lips to that crease.

Which was when Alder reached up and traced his fingers over the bend of her ear. “Darling…”

His voice was low and urgent, and Seph followed his fingertips with her own, understanding at once what had stolen his attention.

Her ears…they werekithears.

She gasped, her fingers stilled on the curve, just as Alder grasped a clump of her hair and held it before her eyes.

It was no longer white, but pale gold.

Their gazes met.

“The light was in me too,” she said. “Not just the coat.”

He looked as though he wanted to ask more, but closed his eyes and touched his forehead to hers instead. “I thought I’d lost you.”

For a long while, they simply sat like that—together, soaking in the beautiful blessing of this moment and silently praising the Fates for the future they had been granted.

Alder pulled back a little, just enough to look at her, and he trailed a fingertip down her face and over her lips. “I’m so scared someone is going to wake me up, and I’ll realize this is all a dream.”

“It isn’t.” She kissed his fingertip.

“So when you said you loved me, that wasn’t a dream either?”

Seph smiled through her tears. “No.”

He grinned wickedly. “Excellent.”

---