He releases me, and I drop to the forest floor. He tugs me through the last bit of trees into a starlit clearing with mist floating low over the damp ground. And there, at least two stories high, is a waterfall crashing down into a pool surrounded by wet boulders the size of small cars. “Whoa…” I pull away from him, and step carefully through the mist. It shifts and breaks around my knees, but coalesces behind me in a thick layer. I turn back to Sel to see his reaction, but he’s not watching the water. He’s watching me.

“Is this my present?”

He moves through the mist to meet me, feet silent across the ground. “No.”

Something on his face stops my quick retort. A flicker of nerves. Rare, on Selwyn Kane. “What is it?”

He looks around the clearing, brows drawn tight. “I didn’t think about this part. For it to work, you have to close your eyes.” He smiles at me. “But I have to be honest, at this point, I have no trust in your ability to follow instructions.”

I glare at him. “I can cover my eyes.” I put both hands up, more than happy to prove him wrong.

Instead of responding verbally, I feel his hands slide over mine from behind.

I drop my hands. “You really don’t trust me,” I huff.

“Not for this.” He takes a small step forward, until I can feel his breath at my ear. “You don’t listen. You’re the most stubborn creature I have ever met.”

I shiver. “And?”

A pause. “And… you’re also the most wondrous being I have ever encountered, will ever encounter. And I believe there is nothing in this world that you cannot do.”

I swallow. “Oh.” I take a beat, then speak a truth that I think he will understand more than anyone. “I just keep thinking about what Nick would have done, if he had truly been Arthur’s Scion.”

Sel scoffs. Nudges me forward with slow steps until I start walking again.

“What?”

“You weren’t there when he was younger. You didn’t see him stumble, then fight his way through acceptance. Just two years before he met you, Nick wouldn’t have done… any of what you’re doing. He went through a rebellious phase in high school.”

“Really?” I laugh.

“It was dreadful.” He snorts in disgust. “Drinking plastic-bottle vodka behind bleachers with Onceborns.”

“Not studying?” I ask, somewhat shocked at this vision of Nick. When we met, he was a star student.

“Oh no, he studied,” Sel replies. “Drunkenly, sometimes.”

I snicker and he chuckles, breath warm at my ear. It seems time to say the quiet things, ask the quiet questions, so I do. “Do you miss him?”