Page 118 of Almost Midnight

He tried to convey that objectively, unemotionally.

He told them when the seer could no longer move houses again.

By then they were traveling as grandfather and grandson, and everyone praised Nick for being such a loyal lad, taking care of and doting on his pappy the way he did.

Nick tried to make that amusing.

He tried to make it an inside joke.

Jem tried as well, but Nick found that harder to take for some reason.

Then Jem got sick. He got really sick, and Nick didn’t leave the house at all other than to get medicine, water from the well, and food.

Jem made Nick promise he would live, that he wouldn’t end his life when the natural thing finally occurred. Foolishly, stupidly, Nick agreed.

He promised.

When even that hadn’t satisfied his mate, he made a blood vow.

In the end, Jem had died.

Jem had died, and Nick’s life, for close to a hundred years after, went completely dark and empty and cold, like he had died, too.

* * *

There wasa silence when Nick got that far in the story.

Nick didn’t look up as he trailed off; he couldn’t really deal with the emotions that would come with seeing how they all felt about his story so far.

In the end, someone had to say something, to move on from that moment, so Nick cleared his throat, gesturing vaguely but gracefully with a hand.

It didn’t occur to him until after he’d done it that it was one of Jem’s graceful gestures he emulated. He and Jem had moved and spoken and gestured so much alike by the end, Nick had forgotten where he’d picked it all up.

But now he saw the green-eyed seer doing it again, somewhere behind his eyes.

In a candlelit room, Dalejem, ex-warrior of the Adhipan, still young and dark-haired, gestured and laughed and told Nick about the crazy interaction he’d had in the village, or with one odd neighbor or another.

Nick wiped his eyes, realizing only then that he’d been crying.

He cleared his throat.

When he glanced up, he caught Wynter’s gaze first.

Her eyes were a confused tangle of feelings and empathy and love. She stared at him, and he saw her thinking, too, putting everything together around all the things he’d said.

“You believe him,” she said. “You think the portal is still there.”

Nick nodded slowly.

“But you and Jem… you really never tried to go back through it?” she asked, puzzled.

Nick grimaced, then slowly shook his head. “No.”

“Why not?” Morley asked, from the front of the van.

Nick raised his gaze to look at the gray-haired human.

“I more or less told you why,” he said, his eyes flat as he shrugged. “The portals are unpredictable. No uncertain, unknowable hope that wemightget home was worth the risk that we could lose one another.”

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