At night, he crept from his own bed into Jaenelle’s because it was the only place he could sleep. Her scent was there, and in the dark, he could almost believe that she was simply away for a little while, that he would wake one morning and find her cuddled up next to him.

He stared at the statue of the male, with its paw/hand curved protectively above the sleeping woman. Part human, part beast. Savagery protecting beauty. But now he saw something else in its eyes: the anguish, the price that sometimes had to be paid.

He turned away from it, walked over to the other statue, stared at the woman’s face—that familiar, beloved face—for a long, long time.

The tears came—again. The pain was always there.

“Tersa keeps telling me that it will be all right, to trust one who sees,” he told the statue. “Surreal keeps telling me not to give up, that the kindred will be able to bring you back. And I want to believe that. I need to believe that. But when I ask Tersa about you directly, she hesitates, says it’s too soon to know, says the kindred are fighting to hold the dream to the flesh. Fighting to hold the dream to the flesh.” He laughed bitterly. “They’re not fighting to hold the dream to flesh, Jaenelle. They’re fighting to put enough of you together again for there to be something for the dream to come back to. And you knew what would happen, didn’t you? When you decided to do this, you knew.”

He paced, circled, came back to the statue.

“I did it for you,” he said quietly. “I bought the time, I played the game. For you.” His breathing hitched, came out in a sob. “I knew I would have to do some things that wouldn’t be forgiven. I knew it when you asked me to go to Hayll, but I did it anyway. F-for you. Because I was going to come back to you, and the rest of it wouldn’t matter. B-because I was coming back to you. But you sent me there knowing you wouldn’t be here when I got back, knowing…” He sank to his knees. “You said no sacrifices. You made me promise I wouldn’t make any sacrifices. But what do you call this, Jaenelle? What do you call this? When I got back, we were going to get m-married.…And you left me. Damn you, Jaenelle, I did this for you, and you left me. You left me.”

He collapsed on the grass near the statue, sobbing.

Lucivar rested a fist against the stone wall and bowed his head.

Mother Night. Daemon had gone into that game expecting to come back for his own wedding. Mother Night.