Page 174 of A Soul to Keep

To have Orpheus’ pain mocked hurt her heart further.

“You weren’t even this sad when Katerina told you you were nothing but a worthless monster.”

Reia dug her fingers into him harder even though that tensed her back and made the piercing ache worsen.He chose me over her.Even when told lies about Reia and being told Katerina wanted him back, Orpheus had chosen to find Reia instead.He trusted in me.

“You gave me something no one else has wanted to give me, and I don’t want it from anyone but you.”

“And what is that?” she sobbed, her heart breaking further for him. Her tears finally fell, dripping from the corners of her eyes to run over her temples and into her hair.

“Someone who wanted to be by my side.”

Why does this have to hurt so much?His words were more painful than the damn dagger in her back.

I-I don’t want him to be sad, or alone.She’d seen it already from him in the beginning and watching it slowly fade the longer she’d been with him had been beautiful to witness. To slowly watch Orpheus turn from worried and hesitant to warm and affectionate had stolen her.

So without her, someone who needed him to light the candles of his home so she could see, would he sit in the dark in that cabin alone? Crying, and whining, and yearning for Reia to come back to him?

She knew... had known for a while now that Orpheus was attached to her. That he didn’t like being without her presence even for a few short hours to get her water – not because he didn’t trust her to stay, but because he didn’t like being away from her.

I don’t know if I want to live forever.She wasn’t attached to this world, didn’t have a drive to stay in it.But I don’t want him to be sad for eternity.

She could feel him quaking. She knew he was not okay, and that he wasn’t going to be okay.

I…The emotions that swirled within told her the truth, the truth she didn’t know if she wanted, but felt anyway.I want to stay with him more than anything.

For him. Because he needed her to, because he couldn’t live peacefully without her, and Reia thought she might not be able to live without him either, if she was alive.

“Orpheus,” she whispered, feeling the strength in her body slowly leaving her.

“No, Reia,” he whimpered. “I do not want to find another human.”

She tucked her head further against him.

“How do I give you my soul?”

I can live for eternity.Only if it meant she got to be with Orpheus.If I can spend it with him, I’d be happy.

In his home, surrounded by all the things he’d made, in his smell, and his embrace, with all the touches that made her melt for him. Cooking, making ornaments and protective trinkets, and clothes, and tending to the garden. Watching him roam the yard so he could make sure she was safe and protected or stoking the fireplace to make sure she was warm as he asked if she was comfortable or needed anything.

To feel pampered, cherished, admired, and beautiful. To not feel like just the only human that mattered, but the only living creature in the world that mattered.

To be looked at by glowing orbs instead of eyes that reflected such deep emotions that his ethereal face couldn’t show. She would be content being buried within fur that tickled her face as she caressed all the protruding bones of his body, and the draping fish fins that raised when she brushed her fingers over them.

Reia wanted to be with this strange being who was so completely and utterly different to her, but had a heart that was so tender and gentle that it was more pure than any child or innocent animal.

It didn’t matter that he ate people, that others thought him a monster, not when he cared so much about her that he got upset when she pricked her finger on a sewing needle.

And yet, he’d cut her with his claw tips multiple times in the heat of the throws, was rough and naughty. He was always disappointed in himself after, but Reia wanted to show him that she adored it, that she liked the feel of them.

Reia was his. In body and in heart, all that was left was her soul.

“Your soul?” he asked, lifting his head back to stare down at her.

“H-how?”

She was feeling weaker by the second, and she was worried she’d waited too long to make this decision.

He leaned back in to hold her.

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