Page 70 of Hunted

I threw myself at her and hugged her. “I don’t know what I would’ve done without you,” I said against her chest.

“I know. We’re amazing grandmothers, aren’t we?”

“You are. All of you. I couldn’t have asked for a better family.”

“Just remember you have it. You are a child of two worlds… this is as much your home as Arcadia.”

I nodded. “I won’t wait another ten years before coming here again.”

My grandmother held me at arm’s length and smiled at me again. “Be sure that you don’t, otherwise your mother will be hearing from me.” She wiped the tears from my cheeks. “And tell her that I miss her… will you?”

“You can tell her yourself when this is all over,” I said. “I don’t know what I’m going to find on the other side of that portal, but whatever it is, I’m going to deal with it… and fix it.” I paused. “How did you get the portal open, anyway? The crescent moon isn’t for another full day.”

Helen’s smile faded somewhat. “Ah,” she said, then paused. “Well, the portal needed an offering, as I had said before. Being that the moon wasn’t right, the offering needed to be somewhat larger than I had anticipated.”

I frowned. “Larger?”

“I took care of it,” came a voice from near the ground. I found Tallin there, looking up at me with his little rabbit-like face. Something was different about him, only I couldn’t quite figure out what.

“Tallin… what do you mean?”

“It doesn’t need mentioning.”

“Please… tell me what you did…”

Tallin smiled in a way only he could, and I realized, the sparkle in his eyes was… gone. That soft, blue light I could occasionally see had faded. “I gave up my immortality.”

My heart surged into my throat. “Youwhat?”

“Please, there’s no need to get upset.”

“Tallin, you shouldn’t have done that. Why did you do that?”

“The portal would not have opened any other way.”

“But I got us more time. Another few seconds, and you would…”

“The deal was done the moment we got to this place,” he said. “As soon as my paws touched the ground, I felt Arcadia reach out to me. She asked of me, and I granted her request… for you. The portal would otherwise never have opened. Not today, and not tomorrow.”

“What? Why?”

“I do not know. I think that question can only be answered on the other side.”

“I don’t understand.”

“You don’t have to. All you have to do is step through that portal so that my offering wasn’t in vain.”

I dropped to my knees in front of him. “You didn’t have to do that, you silly Sprite.”

Tallin bowed his head. “I am forever in your service. For you, I would go to the ends of either world. Remember?”

I picked him up and held him close to my chest. “This means you can’t come with me,” I said. “You know that, right?”

“And you know I am going to refuse to stay here.”

“You are going to try, anyway. But I don’t know what we are going to find on the other side of that portal. It could be incredibly dangerous, and if you’re mortal… I would die if anything happened to you.”

Evie came up beside us both and gently got to her knees. “We’ll take good care of him,” she said, smiling.