Page 71

“For as long as I can remember, I’ve dared not say aloud what I want, lest the wind or my conscience ensnare it,” he replied. “I feel resistant to answer, yet I’m compelled by you. Or perhaps by the late hour, or by this setting, which denies me rest. Or perhaps...yes, perhaps it is just you.”

The response made me tipsy. Icompelledhim.

His throat worked, a whisper slipping out. “I long to feast my eyes upon her once more. I long to feel whole.”

I should have anticipated this. I should have anticipated a wish that wrapped itself around his wife.

He longed to feel whole. Was that the same thing as not feeling hollow?

“It’s okay to want that,” I said.

He angled his head toward me, the liquid flames drenching him in light, while keeping me in the dark.

I had a stilted, acorn heart. He had a soft, flesh one.

Mine came from roots and didn’t budge, while his thrummed and soared.

Did that render me less or more natural? Or did that just mean we came from distinct parts of the land?

Me, the earth. Him, the sky.

Aire looked at me the way Aire looked at people: deeply.

Also, not that way at all: mystified.

“You astonish with me,” he said. “It is an experience that I’m unaccustomed to. You’ve moved me to such a disruption of thoughts, as to make me feel adrift, lamenting yet yearning for things I cannot name. Tonight, it has progressed from a disruption of thoughts to a collision of feelings.”

Oh, my Seasons.

“You disarm me.”

Oh, my Seasons.

Who knew the color blue could smolder? His eyes held mine, feasted on them.

No. Not feasted. He wanted that with her, not with me.

At any rate, my breathing stalled. I could lose my mind to that face, his expression strumming a hundred truths from me, whether I liked it or not.

“What do you wish for?” he asked.

For my mother to get better.

For her to look at me without grabbing that mallet.

For people to see me as a real girl. For them to believe it.

For me to believe it.

For you to believe it.

My list of wishes was longer than his. Did that make me greedy? Probably.

I gestured to the woodlands. “Whatever it is, it’s out there.”

He kept studying me, not the view. “Are you certain?”

I wasn’t certain. But I had to try.