Title: Paper Flowers
Author: Bee
Disclaimer: I only own the plot bunnies (and a copy of Tin Man on DVD).
Summary: She was a paper flower in a thunderstorm. Mostly CDG angst.
A/N: There be ANGST a plenty here. You've been warned.
This is for Effie, whose unyielding excitement about this, and all the angsty music she sent me, pushed me through writer's block.
This is way more angst than I'm used to writing, so if it sucks, tell me. I can take criticism. Thank you ahead of time.
Paper flowers never die.
They never grow either.
They are unchanging; stagnant in a world of movement.
And yet, a single drop of rain can damage that perfect paper flower beyond repair; can rip its petals and wash away the color; bend the stem and leave it limp, broken.
A simple touch, innocent but powerful, was the raindrop on her flower.
On a hillside near the Black Tower, with imminent death staring them in the face, something had changed, had shifted. He had pulled her into a hug instead of the simple - safe - handshake she'd offered.
Something in her broke standing in his arms.
She felt guilt flood her when he had intended comfort.
And when the battle was over, when she had her family back and her friends - these men she had relied upon so much in seven days - bowed and gave her hugs, she could only fake a smile and throw one arm around his shoulder.
Less contact stemmed the pain.
A little.
But as they watched the suns part from the moon on the balcony, as she lied about remembering this place for her family's sake, his fingertips lingered against hers and her breath caught in her throat.
She didn't pull away from him then, selfishly hoping that the feelings warring in her head would be subdued by his touch, but the memory of this unbreakable man crying had assaulted her instead.
She was haunted.
Haunted by guilt and shame reflected in the face of a dead woman.
She felt dirty when he looked at her with that half-smile and her heart skipped a beat. She didn't understand why he looked at her like that when it was her fault his world had been destroyed.
He followed her around after the Eclipse. It should have brought her comfort, security, but it didn't.
He was just another shadow of pain that lurked in her wake.
Like her parents. Fifteen years had left them awkward around one another; no longer the lovey-dovey romantics but people turned cold and hard from suffering alone. She felt that weight on her shoulders with all the others.
Of all of them, Azkadellia was the bravest; at least she wore her guilt for everyone to see. She didn't hide the pain away in her dreams like the rest of the family.
She didn't wish for comfort from the one person for whom she felt most guilty.
He reached out to her often; he was trying to give her the solace he knew she needed most desperately, but every brush of his hands, every gaze of his concerned eyes drove the knife deeper in her soul - until it was too much.
"You should go." The words were whispered as they sat in the vast library together.
He turned to her then, pinning her with that look - like he was trying to get inside her head.
"Why?" It was the one question she knew he'd ask and the one question she could not answer.
"It's time," she replied, avoiding those blue eyes that frequented her dreams.
"You want me to go?" He didn't believe her.
She didn't believe herself.
Did she want him to go?
No.
Yes.
He didn't deserve to have her around him - feeling these feelings around him. He needed to find someplace else, someplace where a broken princess wasn't always begging him for the sanctuary he should not have to give her.
"Yes." The lie cut through her as it cut through him; she'd never lied to him before, they both knew it.
He saw behind her eyes - saw the fractured soul and the pain he'd tried to ease. He wanted to reach for her. He wanted to ask her why she was lying to him, why she wanted him to leave her alone.
But he couldn't.
He couldn't deny her anything - even this.
"Fine," it echoed in her ears like the slam of a door.
Maybe it was; like a door to her illusions, her happy endings. She didn't deserve them anyway.
He had left then, walked from the library with anger in his stride - anger at himself, his own inability to help this girl who had picked up his tarnished heart and given it back to him with a smile and hug. But he wasn't helping her.
He could see it in her eyes.
He was hurting her.
And he wanted to tell her, once again, that it wasn't her fault; she was a curious child, but she was a child, and he wouldn't blame her for that. But guilt is deliberate burden and no one can relieve it but its bearer.
He knew that from experience.
He didn't hear her broken sob as he left her alone with the pain he couldn't chase away.
He was packing his things when Jeb came to him.
They hadn't spoken in a week.
The fight had been about DG.
Jeb was seeing the things that Cain wouldn't admit to being aware of: the looks of adoration and longing, the light brush of fingers against a soft wrist, the smiles that had been so rare even before the suit.
But Jeb didn't understand.
All he saw was betrayal, to his mother, to him, to their family.
War had made him hostile; death had made him suffer.
He didn't see that DG, this little slipper, was the salvation for a man who had failed his greatest test; who had failed to protect those entrusted to him, his wife, his son, their family.
Despite the time apart, they were alike in their denial that the princess was more real than the ghost they held onto; in their stubbornness that the other was right and they were far from rebuilding their life by fighting about what could not be changed.
They had walked away without resolution.
But now Jeb was back, watching his father walk away; and he felt like he was seven-annuals-old again as the hero of his small world left in favor of duty. A lifetime of anger rose in his throat as the older man gathered his few possessions.
"You don't care about anything, do you?" he asked. Cain didn't reply, "Honor and duty aren't real, you know, you can't live with them alone."
Blue eyes met hazel eyes, but still no words broke through.
"You're just going to leave again; walk away from the people you care about without a fight."
Finally Cain spoke, "She wants me to go."
"Does she?" He'd never stood up for DG before. He'd never chosen her over his mother.
"She said it," Cain replied, as if that was all that mattered; as if knowing it was a lie was some illusion he'd created to help himself sleep.
"So you're just going to go?" The question hung in the air as Cain shouldered his bag. He looked from the empty room to his son.
"Yes."
There was something broken in his father's eyes, something that Jeb had never seen before. There had always been a fire there, no matter what the spark: anger, loyalty, pride, love, revenge; never had he seen them hollow, empty.
It was like a right hook to the jaw.
The truth of the Dark Cave, of DG's involvement, mounted on his father's obvious affection for the girl, he had felt like vomiting when he learned of it all. How could the man feel things for the person who had single-handedly ruined their lives? He didn't understand then.
He still didn't.
But he felt something else now: begrudging acceptance.
Cain stepped past him and paused at his shoulder. Jeb's memory dredged up a similar moment, when his father reminded him to have a heart; but Cain didn't give him any paternal advice now. He opened his mouth, but shut it with a snap and walked out of the room.
Once again Jeb had to watch his father choose duty above all else.
Azkadellia, the Crown Princess.
Azkadellia, the Sorceress.
Azkadellia, the child.
She couldn't keep them straight anymore. There were too many faces, too many voices to know which to hang onto, which to trust. She felt weak. The Witch had given her so much strength, had kept her standing up. Without her, without that power, she felt spent and exhausted. Her memories fought each other for control; always edged in the darkness that pervaded her core.
Core, not soul.
She didn't have a soul anymore.
The Witch had taken that.
There was just a hole inside her.
A black hole which drew everything around her into its dark depths; never to release them back into the light around her; around her but never in her.
She was told that there was still light in her, still magic in her grasp, but she didn't feel it. She only felt the pain of a hundred screams from the gallows; of the cries her people had made; of the guilt in her sister's eyes.
At her most loathing, she would see that guilt and the dark parts of her would laugh. She would look upon the girl, who abandoned her, with fifteen annuals of spite and hate. She would wish that this little wretch suffered even worse for the things she'd done.
But when that blackness receded and the voices stopped trying to take over, she forgot that DG had left her alone, and she just wanted to take the pain away. She wanted to hold her sister's hand and ask for the forgiveness they both craved.
Because these were the times when she remembered that DG came to sit with her everyday; that DG never judged her or tried to fix her. DG was the only one who would come near her when the voices came back and she spoke nonsense - scratching the words in her head on hundreds of sheets of parchment.
The words never meant anything but it didn't matter.
DG didn't try to take her pen away, like the Queen did; or tell her calm herself, like their father did. DG just watched her, drowning in her own guilt as Azkadellia floundered through hers.
They were quite a pair.
But they were quiet today. The voices were dormant and DG hadn't wanted to talk in nearly a month.
Az contented herself with petting Toto's soft head. Besides DG, he had become her constant companion; it hurt her as much as it touched her.
This man who had been so powerful - who had tried to help her, tried to convince her mother that there was something not right - had been reduced to this beastly form by her hand. Ambrose said that the bolt from her Alchemist's electric prod had done something to him; shocked him into a permanent stasis.
She felt that weight with the others.
One more life she'd ruined.
One more wound she'd caused.
She turned her eyes from the dog in her lap to the girl scrunched up on the loveseat. DG's knees were pulled up to her chest, her arms wrapped around them tightly. The girl's blue eyes looked tired, even more so than they had in the past weeks.
"Do you want to talk about it?" Azkadellia rarely took the first step and it drew both DG and Toto's surprised eyes.
After a moment, DG shook her head, "No."
"All right." Az looked down at her lap. She shouldn't have said anything. She shouldn't have spoken. She had no right to intrude on her sister's mind. She felt stupid.
"He left."
Azkadellia's head shot up. DG was looking through the single tiny window in Az's bedroom, her eyes far away. She didn't have to clarify the identity of the he; even locked in her room with limited contact to the outside world she knew who had been missing for the past month.
"Why?" she asked.
The same question.
"I told him to."
Az would have gasped had she been surprised; but as it was, she wasn't surprised and didn't gasp, she merely turned fully to her sister, something of her old self flashing in her eyes.
"Why?"
DG's eyes cut to her, but she didn't turn.
"Does it matter?"
"Yes it matters," Azkadellia's voice was still tired, "You love him, why would you send him away?"
She might have been weak, might have been feeling like something inside her was stealing her breath, but she straightened her back and sat like the princess she was for the first time in weeks. She gave her sister a challenging look and raised an eyebrow.
DG had never credited Az for being so observant, especially with her limited periods of lucidity, but the woman was daring her to deny the accusation. And she couldn't.
"That's why," she finally answered, "Because I don't deserve him. He's grieving for his wife and I -."
"You don't want to feel the pain." For a moment Azkadellia sounded like the Sorceress again, cold and hollow.
DG choked back a sob and nodded.
"Well forgive me, little sister, but it sounds like you're hurting yourself to keep from hurting yourself and that's just stupid," she felt the irrational anger rise up again, her voice going higher as she stood from the chair, "And selfish; you sent him away, maybe he has nowhere else to go, DG - maybe he'd staying because he's just as lost and alone as you are. Did you think of that? No, of course not."
She felt that darkness taking over her again; the black hole in her center growing larger and engulfing more of her, taking the life she didn't want. Her breathing faltered and she started to cough.
"Az?" DG was out of her seat, an arm around her sister's shoulder as the older woman pressed a hand to her chest in pain, "Az, are you okay?"
She coughed harder; a wet darkness rushing upwards from those shadows, leaving her gasping for water. DG rushed to the wash room and Azkadellia heard the water cascade from the taps as the world started to spin. She braced herself against the back of her chair, Toto barking at her frantically, her other hand trying to stifle the coughs escaping her throat.
DG returned with a glass and handed it to Az, helping her shift to the loveseat and lie down. Azkadellia sipped the water as her coughing finally subsided. The fit had left her even more exhausted than before and she felt the darkness of sleep crowd into her mind.
"You okay, Az?" DG asked again, taking the glass as her sister looked about ready to fall asleep.
Azkadellia nodded and let her eyes fluttered closed, one arm dangling from the edge of the settee, the other tucked against her side. DG leaned back, staring at Az's pale face in contrast to her dark hair. She sighed.
The Witch sapped up so much of Azkadellia's strength that the elder princess had had to rely on the parasite inside her to survive. Now that she was free, Az was barely able to endure simply tasks.
Not for the first time, she wondered if saving her sister had been the best choice.
She was getting up from her crouched position, Toto jumping on the couch to snuggle against Az's hip, when something caught her eye. Her sister's hand hanging off the side. DG grasped it gently - not wanting to startle Az from sleep - and turned it. The shiny darkness of blood made her gasp.
She wasn't a doctor, but even DG knew that if Azkadellia was coughing up blood it was not a good thing.
Making sure her sister was comfortable, the younger princess slipped from the bedroom and into the hallway, where she was surprised to find Jeb Cain standing.
"Jeb." Her eyes fell to the floor. They had never gotten along and she knew why.
It was just another reason why Cain had to leave: so that maybe one day he could heal the broken ties with his son.
"You're Highness." His voice wasn't clipped as it usually was when he spoke to her, it made her eyes jump back to his face, "I wanted to ask you something."
She had to find a doctor for her sister - something in her urging her to hurry - but the look in Jeb's eyes made her bite back her response and she simply nodded.
"Why did you make him leave?" his voice was pained and her jaw nearly dropped.
He of all people should know why she'd sent Cain away.
"He doesn't want to go," Jeb continued, "He wants to stay here with you. He doesn't know what he did."
She held up a hand, "He didn't do anything, Jeb; it was me. I needed him to leave."
"Why?"
She gave him a pointed look.
He'd been afraid of that. He'd kept quiet in the weeks since his father's departure but the anger and guilt were pulling at him as much as the rest of them. He couldn't have stopped himself from searching her out even if he'd tried.
"That's not fair."
Once again she felt like she'd been slapped across the face.
"What'd you mean?"
"You can't send him away because of something you think he feels."
DG frowned, "Doesn't he? I would."
"You're not him, Princess; you don't know what goes on inside his head."
"And neither do you," she shot back.
How dare he question her intentions? This was her sacrifice. They had all to make them. This was hers - for them, to help them, to make up for what she'd done to them by letting go of something that wasn't hers to hold onto. And he was looking at her like she'd just kicked his puppy.
"You're right, I'm not him - but I'm not blind either."
"What's that supposed to mean?" DG glared at him.
"That means you're so wrapped up in making everybody feel better that you've convinced yourself they feel like shit. Maybe he was happy here. Maybe being around you did make him feel better."
"How can you say that, Jeb? You, of all people?" her voice dropped an octave; she was struggling to keep control of her emotions.
"Because it's the truth - and at least I'm strong enough to admit it."
She felt the tears brimming in her eyes. She was desperately trying to cling to the belief that she had made the right decision all those days ago, but she wasn't sure anymore. His words, and her sister's - they were pulling at her resolve.
He saw her carefully sculpted world cracking around her and it hurt him a little to know that he was the cause of it; but things needed to be said, things he wouldn't take back even if he'd had the chance.
He bowed his head slightly, "I'll leave you alone now, Highness." He excused himself from her presence and didn't look back as he trudged off down the hallway, the sound of her whimpers reaching out to his ears.
He didn't regret it.
Four months.
Sixteen weeks.
One hundred and twenty two days.
Even eight annuals in the Iron Maiden hadn't felt so long.
He'd had something to focus on then: vengeance. He'd survived many nights plotting the violent death of the man who had rained destruction down on his family.
Now he was adrift.
The Queen had reinstated him as a Tin Man but it didn't hold the same luster as it once had. Catching the scum of Central City did nothing to cut the emptiness residing in his chest.
He forced himself into work.
And when that didn't help, a bottle usually did the trick; at least until he passed out, for then his dreams were haunted by her face and her words.
He hadn't heard from Jeb either. Not that he'd made any attempt to contact his son since he'd left but instead he'd relied on the whispers of the Central Citizens to inform him of the goings on in the Palace and of the Royal family.
Just the knowledge that she was okay should have been enough for him.
But it wasn't.
He trudged up the rotting stairs of the building he lived in, a second floor room with the sparsest of amenities; he didn't care. He was only there to sleep anyway. He'd never even unpacked.
His possessions - the few that he had - were still mostly in his pack; the only things not there were situated on his person: his hat, his gun, the tin horse with the bullet lodged in it, his razor - the meaningless things that he wished he could trade for something real.
Jeb's words floated back to his mind as he threw his coat against the rickety chair in the corner.
"Honor and duty aren't real, you know, you can't live with them alone."
He cracked his neck as he reached for the bottle of bourbon on his dresser.
He'd never imagined he'd end up like this - maybe in his most cynical of moments - but not seriously. He hadn't planned what he'd do after killing Zero but that didn't matter; all that had mattered was the rush, the thrill of taking so much more from Zero than he'd had taken from Cain.
Now he wished he'd killed the bastard. Then at least he'd have the guilt to drown out his thoughts of blue eyes and dark hair.
He flopped down on the bed - half the bottle already gone in the short distance there.
He was already feeling the affects too.
The room was getting fuzzy and he wasn't sure if he'd just driven himself into exhaustion or if he'd suddenly become a light-weight. At this point, he didn't care; he just let himself fall in oblivion.
He jolted upwards, nearly falling off the bed - blue eyes burning behind his eyelids - swearing loudly, he pushed himself from the tangled sheets, the empty bottle of bourbon dropping to the floor with a light thud. The world was swimming around him as he forced himself into the washroom and turned on the faucet.
The shock of the cold water chased the dizziness away but his head was still aching dully. He ground his teeth together and glanced up at himself in the dirt -encrusted mirror.
He'd never seen the man staring back at him.
Pale, tired, bloodshot-eyed, and old.
But the harder he looked the more he saw something else.
His chilled blue eyes morphing into wide ones - ones that had danced through his dreams and nightmares for months.
With strength he didn't know he still possessed, his slammed his fist against the mirror; the glass splintered and spider-webbed but didn't shatter, leaving a fist-sized crack in the grimy face.
Pinching the bridge of his nose, Cain moved back into the main room and grabbed his coat and hat. He wouldn't stay in that room.
That room where DG's eyes were just a memory.
Where she wasn't real.
And neither was he.
"You can't be serious," her voice was incredulous as she stared at her parents.
"I'm sorry, Angel -." Her mother began but DG stopped her.
"No - no sorry - you can't just sit here and let her die."
"There's nothing we can do, DG." Her father tried as well.
She didn't think she was being unreasonable. This was her sister they were talking about. This was the woman that they had all fought to save. Azkadellia, their daughter - her sister. They were just going to stand aside while some damn virus took her life.
"Bullshit. We have magic - Raw! Send for Raw! Or Glitch - I'm sure he could come up with some sort of cure for it." How could they not do anything?
"She is too far gone for any cure, Angel; she doesn't have that time left. And magic cannot fix everything," the Queen said, her face and voice resigned.
"She's your daughter - how can you not try everything to save her?" She looked between her parents and realization dawned on her, "Oh my god - it's political isn't it?"
They didn't say anything.
"You're going to let her die because your people want someone to pay. Well, how convenient for you!" she spat.
Something dark had risen in her chest. Her parents had never intended that she save her sister from the Witch. They had never expressed any desire for her to do so - it was all about saving the O.Z. not freeing Azkadellia. It had just been by pure coincidence that DG had been able to stop the Witch and save Az.
The thought made her want to vomit.
"It's not like that DG," Ahamo started toward her but she stepped away from him - the physical dance to match the emotional one they'd been doing since she was dropped back in the Zone.
"Then what is it like? Explain it to me because it seems pretty obvious now."
"The Witch stole any power your sister had to fight this disease - nothing will help her now," Lurline stated.
"And so it just happens that the people are calling for her blood and you're giving it to them, right?" DG whirled away from her parents, seething.
These people - these people who claimed to love her and Az - they were not parents. They were rulers. They did things for the sake of their realm, not their family. She wrapped her arms around her middle and gritted her teeth; Az was in the next room and didn't need to hear the fighting.
Things had gotten so much worse.
Doctors had come.
Azkadellia was sick, dying.
There was nothing they could do.
She was bed-ridden now.
DG felt a new guilt fall on her shoulders.
Her sister was dying.
Her parents were using it to their advantage.
She couldn't stop the tears from breaking forth.
One of the doctors stepped from Az's room into the antechambers. His face was grave and DG wondered if he even cared that this woman in his care was dying. Did any of them? Would anyone grieve for her sister?
"You should say your goodbyes now, Majesties," he said solemnly.
The Queen rose from the settee she'd been perched upon gracefully, "Thank you, Doctor, for all that you have done."
He gave her a short bow.
DG wanted to hit someone.
All of them.
Lurline and Ahamo swept into the room and shut the door behind them.
Toto was sitting on the floor, head on his paws. She couldn't understand him. He'd suffered so much at Az's hand - hell, he was a permanent pooch because of Azkadellia's Alchemist - and yet he had stayed by her side since the beginning.
It didn't make any sense.
Maybe it had to do with being part dog that he didn't blame the sisters for their actions. Or maybe because he knew that they should have been warned - watched - protected - at Finaqua.
Or maybe it was just because he loved them.
She felt another choking sob wrack her body as she rushed to him and scooped him into her arms. She held him close to her chest and cried into his hair - silently thanking him for everything he'd tried to do for them, for everything he still gave them.
For his unconditional love.
The door to Azkadellia's bedroom opened and her father stepped from it. She was pleased to see that at least he'd been crying. He stared at her a long moment and she thought he was going to embrace her. But he didn't, he shifted aside and let her enter the bedroom, with Toto in her arms.
Her mother rose from the edge of the bed and excused herself but DG wasn't paying attention. Her eyes were on her sister.
The woman was ghostly white and sweat was beading on her forehead. Her hair was long and strewn across the pillows, her arms lying useless at her sides. She was moaning quietly, forcing herself to stay consciousness even as the world was fading quickly around her.
DG moved to the bed in a daze. Toto dropped onto the sheets and sat down on the princess' other side, nudging her hand with his nose. Az's eyes opened at the touch and she smiled weakly.
"DG," she breathed painfully.
DG bit her lip to keep her sobs at bay, tears running down her cheeks. She shifted and lay down next to her older sister, her hand finding Azkadellia's on the bed. The tiny squeeze was enough to send DG over the edge.
"Oh, Az," she choked, "I'm so sorry."
Azkadellia shook her head. This wasn't the time for apologies or guilt. She'd lived with that too long.
"Don't."
"But -."
"Don't, Deeg."
How could Az be so strong when DG was so broken?
The older woman gave her a soft smile. She saw the pain in her sister's eyes; saw the worry and guilt. She saw the shame and the feeling of uselessness.
But nothing in her laughed.
"You're going to be okay, Deeg," she assured her.
"I'm scared." She sounded like the child again.
"Just hold on."
"But what about when you're…" She couldn't finish.
"I'll still be here," she squeezed her sister's hand, "in your magic."
"How can you be so brave?"
"You give me strength." The answer was more painful than the question.
"I can't save you." Her voice cracked.
But Az was only smiling again.
"You already did."
DG's strangled sob cut through the room. She shut her eyes tight to stem the flow of tears but they would not stop. She felt the pillow beneath her cheek begin to soak but she didn't move.
She couldn't.
She hadn't saved her. She was the cause of this - all the pain, the sorrow. She was the reason her sister was lying in this bed, dying alone, while the people who they served cheered for her death.
She had condemned her sister, not saved her.
"You did, Deeg." Az knew what she was thinking.
But she couldn't reply - not when she didn't believe her.
"You'll be all right Deeg, trust me, everything is going to be okay now, you'll see."
Azkadellia's eyes fluttered shut again.
But there was no darkness anymore.
Just the warm light she thought she would never feel again.
It beckoned to her.
She let go then.
And she wasn't frightened because this was where she belonged.
It always seemed to rain at funerals. Heavy droplets nestling in her hair or the dark veil her mother wore. They'd made her dress in some fancy black gown. She hadn't fought them. Just let them do with her whatever they wanted.
She was alone now anyway.
There were no cheers as they passed down the main street of Central City, past thousands who had stepped from their homes to see the Princess Azkadellia - the woman who had held them under brutal tyranny - unmoving in a casket of dark wood.
And not a single person clapped - as she had feared they would - as they entered the Royal Cemetery. Apparently, Azkadellia had informed their parents that she would not be buried with the other rulers of the O.Z. at the Grey Gale, but in the same patch of dirt that had once held the empty casket of the sister who had saved her.
She stared at the headstone that bore her sister's name.
She'd never felt so lost before.
Or so alone even with the hundreds of people who had crowded into the cemetery to hear the preacher talk about ashes and dust and life after death.
She wasn't crying anymore.
But the rain was keeping her cheeks damp.
She had refused an umbrella.
She could hear the strangled sobs of her mother beside her.
But she found she couldn't hate her.
Instead she moved her hand into her mother's and squeezed it tightly. The Queen glanced at her, surprised, but DG didn't move her eyes away from coffin being lowered into the ground. Lurline stared for a moment but looked away from the daughter she had chosen to save, back toward the one she had left to die.
She would never forgive herself.
The preacher finished his speech and the people started to move around DG. Her mother's hand dropped from hers as her parents turned to leave. Ahamo's hand fell gently onto her shoulder for a moment as he passed, but they left her.
Now she was as alone as she felt.
He just watched her - water dripping from the brim of his hat - as she stood in front of the open grave. He wanted to go to her, wanted to reach out to her; half to convince himself that she was really there and he wasn't in another nightmare.
He'd heard the whispers of Azkadellia's death only a day before. He'd run back to his apartment to write a letter to Jeb - but the boy had been there, waiting for him, a pained look on his face.
"She needs you," he'd said simply.
How he'd wished for it to be true. Then Jeb had told him the way the princess had been living since he'd left. The knowledge that she'd been as much of a ghost as him had torn through his heart. He'd nearly run to her right then.
But he'd stopped before he even moved.
He'd been too afraid.
She had told him to leave.
He hadn't been helping her then, who was to say he wouldn't make things worse showing up now?
Jeb had read him like a book.
"You won't know until you go to her."
Now he was frozen again, watching this girl suffer alone. He wanted to so badly to take her away from this. He wanted to hold her again.
His feet moved forward and he reached out to her.
Like he'd done after the Eclipse, while the suns parted from the moon, he slipped his hand into hers.
Tears came unbidden once more.
She didn't think she even had the ability to cry anymore. She didn't need to look to know who was standing by her side. He was the only one who could bring her any kind of comfort.
Something in her heart swelled as tears mixed with rain drops.
They didn't speak.
They didn't have to.
It was just as painful as it had been six months ago when she'd told him to leave.
But that didn't matter anymore.
He'd come back.
His thumb ran across the back of her hand and she smiled through her sadness.
She was a paper flower in a thunderstorm.
But he was there to shelter her from the rain.