Disclaimer: The characters aren't mine. The settings aren't mine. Diane Duane's stuff isn't mine. Let's just say that if all you think about is what's mine, you won't be thinking very long.

AN: Thanks so much to everyone who reviewed the last chapter! It means a lot!

2.)

He hadn't meant to leave me, I knew. But he'd known there was a possibility that he would, that it wouldn't work. So, he planned for the eventuality. Planned a little too well.

"It hadn't occurred to me that I would be able to stop you," he had said, that day on the moon, just before it all happened.

Only it had occurred to him. He wouldn't be able to stop me from helping, yes, but he could stop me from suffering the same fate he would, should the spell not work.

We were supposed to be doing the spell together, him, Spot and me. Doing it together, and lending each other power, to pack a greater punch. But the way he attached on to my power…I didn't realize it then, I thought I was being less effective because I was too worried about him to focus as closely as I should have been…but he had made himself a shield for me, in a way. He made it so my power cycled through him before reaching its final destination. That way, were the spell to rebound on and destroy the caster, it would reach him first and never get to me. And that's exactly what happened.

Only he wasn't destroyed. Instead, when he realized it wasn't going to work, he, almost subconsciously, drew the energy he had taken back, and it returned to the sun, pulling him with it. He should have died. He almost did die. But there was enough of him left, or rather, enough of his power left, for the sun to latch on to and use, it being able to do so due to Roshaun having worked with it before.

For a while he was in a sort of coma inside the sun, his body in a state "unconscious" can't begin to describe. He wasn't alive, but he wasn't dead, and the only thing that kept him from dying was the constant flow of power going through him. Once he was completely together again he somehow managed to get back to the moon where he'd done the spell in the first place. Luckily I'd been there when it happened; I had been visiting the spot a lot since the incident.

I took him back and got him patched up and, had I had my way, I would have had nothing more to do with him after that. He wasn't very cooperative on that front, though.

Some, like my dear sister, Nita, think I'm being harsh. To the point of being ridiculous, even. But they don't understand.

He treated me like a china doll that needed protection, as some damsel in distress. That by itself may not seem like so much, contrary to popular belief I can get past a wounded pride, but what he did was so careless…it just…if he hadn't done it the spell would have been more effective, and maybe it would have worked…okay, it probably wouldn't have, but when it rebounded it would have rebounded on all three of us and the results would have been spread out evenly rather then all going to him. No one would have disappeared.

He wanted to go out a hero. But it wasn't heroism, it was selfishness. If his plan didn't work he didn't want to live to see the consequences. I'm a wizard and it's my job, my duty, and my wish to do whatever it takes and to give my all to protect life, regardless of what may happen to me in the process. He made it so I didn't, couldn't give a hundred percent. That wasn't his choice to make. He shouldn't have done this. Dying when it isn't necessary surely must speed up entropy. And so must breaking a wizard's heart.

And he did…all that time…and I knew he was somewhere, I…I shed so many tears over him. I couldn't eat, and when I did it would just come up again. I couldn't sleep and whenever I managed it I would see images of him…hurt…dead…blood everywhere…and I couldn't scrub my eyelids clean of them. I searched for him ruthlessly. I never gave up hope. And the hope hurt the most, it was a vulnerability that kept being attacked and couldn't be protected, like an open wound life keeps throwing dirt in but it never closes. I closed everything else, I stopped letting anyone in, I stopped letting the world in, but my hope was the one thing that I still had thrown out there, just waiting to be stomped on and torn up and shattered by life. And it went through worse than that.

Nita and my dad and even Kit tried to talk to me. Sker'ret and Filif stopped by a few times. I was coolly polite to them all. I didn't want to hurt them but they didn't understand, they all thought I was in denial, that he was gone. Their attempts to comfort me only hurt me more.

I threw myself into finding him. I put everything I had into it, and every passing moment I hated him more for doing this to me. It got to the point where I almost didn't want to find him anymore but it was too late, I had made finding him the only focus of my life and without it I'd have been completely lost. It was the one hope I had.

And eventually I did find him, but only by chance, only by being at the right place at the right time, none of my efforts had really produced any results. Suddenly he was just there. Just there. The source of all my pain. He didn't protect me, he put me through the most haunting, plaguing torment I had ever been through and I came out of it only a shadow of the person I used to be. And there he was. He hurt to look at, but I healed him up nonetheless and after that I couldn't get him to leave. The one thing that was supposed to help me only made my anguish all the worse. And just like that I didn't have hope anymore either.

Someone who knew me before, but never very well, might say I'm as fiery as ever, but I'm a fire that's choking on its own smoke, and on the inside I'm cold.

"Dairine…"

AN: Terrible? Boring? Confusing? All of the above? Yeah, I had trouble saying what I wanted to…what else is new? The next chapter will (hopefully) be better. It will be more eventful, anyway. Feedback is greatly appreciated! Please and thank you.