“Release my mate,” I demanded.
“This lost spirit needs to leave this phase, and we shall take him. He will be safer with us, and we may one day return him to where he belongs so he can join the Great Ooze of Beyond.”
Caleb tried to yank out of their grasp. “I'm going to stay with Zoltilvoxfyn.”
“Let him go,” I demanded. “Caleb!”
“Sunshine,” he called, trying to wiggle free.
“We cannot release him. As soon as our ship is ready, we shall depart,” Tatas said, and the screen went blank.
I fought to escape Tatas’s clutch. Sunshine must be frantic. I had to get back to him. “Let me go,” I screamed, kicking them. My foot bounced back at me while their blob-like body rippled.
“Spirit, you are coming apart at your very molecules. If we leave you be, you shall dissipate. We must preserve you by taking you to our home, then eventually to yours,” Tatas replied, not loosening their solid grip.
“I’m coming apart?” I asked, stilling. I’d suspected it, but to have it confirmed was… My poor Sunshine.
“You are losing your vitality and solidity. You must pass on. Relinquish your hold on this plane.”
“My tether.” I swore my heart pounded, though it was softer than I remembered. “Zoltilvoxfyn.” It was like the sun had broken through the clouds on a rainy day. He was my tether. He held me here.
“Your mate.”
“He wasn’t my mate when I died. That was years ago. I don’t even know if he was born when I died. He can’t be my tether.”
“Your soul knew he was out there, so you went searching.”
After I died, I had an inexplicable need to wander. The urge had never disappeared until I saw Fyn. The second I saw him, something had changed. He was the center of my existence. Thevibration in my chest grew louder and my fingers curled around something as whispers tickled my ears.
He was my tether. If I let Fyn go, I would pass on.
No. I’d promised to never leave him, and I wouldn’t. I was willing to vanish. I was willing to cease to exist. Fyn needed me, but more than that, I needed him. I refused to live without him.
“No,” I said.
“Heisyour tie to this plane. You cannot dispute it.”
“He is, but I’m not leaving him.”
“Your time is short. You must go.”
“No,” I said, yanking on my arm. “I am Zoltilvoxfyn’s.”
“To allow a mind to cease to exist is a great crime among my kind. You must rejoin your hive or ours, so the next generations might be blessed with parts of you.”
I didn’t know what they were smoking or how death worked for them, but I wasn’t about to let anyone keep me from Fyn. I scratched my forehead to hide that I was focusing as hard as possible so I would disappear. When I came back, I should reappear at my Sunshine’s side—like last time.
“Stop,” Tatas ordered, pulling me to the door.
I dug my feet in, and I concentrated. The solidity of their tentacle grew by the second, and my fingertips began to turn transparent. It wouldn’t be long now.
Tatas tried to tighten their clutch, but their tentacle slid through my arm. “You must come with us boobaas.”
“I won’t leave him. I willneverleave him.”
Darkness crashed over me like a wave, and right before I lost all sense of self, I heard a voice cry, “Come back to me, please.”
Chapter 34
