"I decide when I've had enough," I snapped. "No one knows me but me."
But they let go of my hands, and the sound of the music surged back into my ears, louder than before.
I spun away, lighter without them anyway. The dancers parted for me as I danced by myself. The beat pulsed through me, relentless, driving, the same beat as my heart. I let myself imagine, for a second, that James was here in the circle, and that he would dance with me. Once I had the thought, I couldn't let it go, and the idea of him, his summer-brown arms draped around my waist, his body confident and hot against me, his cheek bristly against my smooth one, filled me with such a fiery need that I could barely breathe.
It was like a waking dream. The drum thumped, promising endless dancing and eternal life, and I closed my eyes, giving into the daydream. James' fingers, pressed against the bate skin at the small of my back as we spun, setting me on fire. The leather-and-soap smell of him, his forehead against my forehead, his hips against my hips, our bodies moving like one seamless instrument, grinding, dropping, spinning. The music driving us, urgently, dance dance dance, and my body screaming at me, savagely, more more more.
I couldn't tell if the world was spinning or if I was.
I wanted it. I wanted him here, dancing with me, so badly, that I could almost hear his voice.
Nuala.
Nuala. Open your eyes.
The hill was getting dark; night was winning against the orbs of faerie light. The music was fading. I could only hear the drum, thumping like my heartbeat.
Damn it, Nuala.
I could see stars above me, and I could actually smell him, his pipes and his breath and his skin.
Nuala, just tell me what to do. I don't know what to do. Tell me how to help you.
All I could think was, if he'd come earlier, we could've danced.
Create Text Message
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To:
James
I still cant believe i killd someone. Im a murderer. Do u know what luke did? He shrugged. I hav been lying 2 myself all along. The real luke is gone & i wz jst trying 2 keep loving him anyway. He knew what would happn 2 me & he didnt stop it.
From:
Dee
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Create Text Message
73/200
To:
James
Omg all this time it wasnt luke it wz someone else. What am i going 2 do?
From:
Dee
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To:
James
All along the persn i could confide in has been rite here.
Ive been writing him txt messages & not sending them.
Like this 1 that ill nvr send. Its 2 late now & i dont want u 2 hav 2 carry that w u. I can hear them coming now. I love u
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Dee
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It was so early that the daylight seemed fragile, like if you breathed too hard the light at the horizon would blow away and dissipate into the darkness. It was in this freezing cold halflight that I found Nuala on the steepest of the hills behind the school. My brown hoodie was nothing against the cold, and I'd only been kneeling beside her for a few minutes before I was shivering.
"Nuala," I said again, because I didn't know what else to say.
I was so used to her being powerful, kick-ass, all hard edges, that I couldn't stop looking at her in the grass. She looked like one of those police-body-chalk things, her arms sprawled out above her and her long, bare legs tangled together. She really was just a girl. Just a fragile body after all, looking a little like she was dressing up in someone else's clothes to look older.
Why won't you wake up? Her breaths were so slow, like it wouldn't take any effort at all for her just to skip one, and then the next one, and the next one.
I gritted my teeth, steeling myself against the cold, and then I pulled off my sweatshirt and lay it across her legs. I cupped one arm beneath her knees--God, her skin was frigid--and one beneath her neck, and I pulled her into my lap and held her against my body.
Goose bumps rippled across my skin, but not from her. From real cold. I cradled her head next to my chest, feeling how icy the skin of her cheek was through my T-shirt, and leaned down close to her. Her breath came out across my face and it didn't smell like anything at all. No flowers. Nothing.
"What's wrong with you?" I asked.
I couldn't feel sad, or angry, because I couldn't imagine why she wouldn't open her eyes. All I could think about was that I was sitting here in the middle of a field with a dying girl in my arms and my brain couldn't process anything but the shape her hair made on her face and the colorless dawn grass and the little bit of unraveling brown thread on the arm of my sweatshirt.
Suddenly, I became aware that there was someone else crouching in front of me--and it scared the crap out of me, because I couldn't think how they'd gotten there and I couldn't think how long they'd been there.
"Sentimentality is such a dangerous thing," said the other someone, and I realized, horribly, that I knew them.
"How do you figure?" I asked, pulling my arm out from under
Nuala's legs so that my iron bracelet was visible.
"Oh, don't worry, piper," said Eleanor. "I'm not here to kill you this time. I merely saw your distress and wished to see if I could be of service to one of my dying subjects."
She was terribly beautiful, in a sort of sweet, savage way that made my throat hurt. Kneeling in front of me, she reached her long fingers toward Nuala's forehead, but stopped short of touching her. "I really don't see how she could tolerate that iron, poor dear. How ironic that in the end, it'll be a human that kills her."
"How do you figure that?"
Eleanor sat back, her pale green dress spreading out around her like flower petals on the grass. "Well, she's a leanan sidhe, piper. Surely you know how it is she stays alive?"
She was right. I did. I just hadn't let myself think about it. "Life, right? Human life."
"Years, piper. She takes years off the life of those she graces with her inspiration. And she did not take any from you, did she?" Eleanor folded her hands gently in her lap and looked at them fondly, as if the arrangement of her fingers twined together pleased her greatly. "As I said, sentimentality is such a dangerous thing. So very human, too."
I shook, both with the frigid air and the proximity to Eleanor.
Everything in me screamed that she was an old, wild creature, and that I needed to get away. It took everything in me to not lift Nuala and get the hell out of there. "How much does she need?"