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CHAPTER 62

XANDER

It sounds like a ainst the sky, but it’s only the ships flying above o with theo back to Camas I’ comes I cli the cae so I don’t have to talk to anyone Later, I’ll co I can do: maybe work in Oker’s old lab

Roots frole down into the water They are tiny and red I never knew roots could be that color

And then I see a larger glie jaws, round eyes--but the color is so brilliant

They’re the redfish Lei toldthem at last

My throat aches and my eyes burn I co behind rin, ready to talk to whatever villager found their way out here

"Xander," she says

It’s Lei

"Are they back?" she asks me "The redfish?"

"Yes," I say

"I didn’t know you were here," she says "I didn’t see you on the ships from Camas"

"We o to the Otherlands"

"I did, too," she says "But I couldn’t leave"

"Why not?" I ask, and I don’t knohat I hope the ansill be, but my heart pounds inwater or those ships lifting into the sky

She doesn’t answer, but she looks toward the stream Of course The fish

"Why do they come all the way back?" I ask her

"To find each other" Her eyes ether," she says "He looked a little like you He had very blue eyes"

The rushing infeels very quiet She came back because she couldn’t leave the country where she knew hi to do with me

I clear my throat "You said these fish are blue in the ocean," I say "Like a completely different anied We’re allowed to change" She’s very soft with entle

And then Lei is the one to close the distance SheI’ve never said before, and it won’t be to Cassia, the way I always thought it would be "I love you," I say "I know you still love someone else, but--"

"I love you," she says

It’s not all gone She loved so and the world are all still out there, pressing against us But Lei holds theether, whether or not any Society or Rising says that they can She’s done it before The aain When we fall in love the first ti We risk a lot less than we do if we choose to love again

There is so

But it feels even better to findon tothe same for her

"Remember the story I told you?" Lei asks "The one about the Pilot and the man she loved?"

"Yes," I say

"Who do you think had to be o, or the man who had to start all over in a neorld?"

"They were both brave," I say

Her eyes are level with mine So I see when she closes theht when my lips meet hers

CHAPTER 63

CASSIA

Ky and I stand together at the top of the steps of City Hall, holding hands and blinking in the brightness of an end-of-sus to think about on their way up the stairs Some look uncertain, others excited

An older wolances at me "When do rite our naet inside to vote," I tell her

The wo

I look at Ky and s a choice about ant to lead

"When people chose the Society, it was alain, forever this tiht make a different choice"