And as I dissolve into them, I light that spark I knew I must—but I don’t set the Ra’haam on fire with grief and rage and anger.
I don’t burn it from the inside out.
Because now I know, this is the way. Not the way of the Eshvaren—every last one of them spent themselves in battle, and just one fragment of the Ra’haam survived, and so the battle began again.
This time, something has to be different.
And that something will be me.
So instead, I willingly spread my wings and become utterly a part of the Ra’haam, and I feel the million connections light up around me as I join with it, and I know it and it knows me, and we know ourselves, and I travel through it at the speed of light, and
we fall
deeper
deeper
deeper
in
love.
My love spreads like wildfire, and I share the story of Aurora Jie-Lin O’Malley, who boarded a ship to a new world and woke up two centuries later.
And I becomes we, and we tell ourself my stories as I sink further in.
We tell ourself the story of Tyler Jericho Jones, son of a warrior and a Waywalker, who found us sleeping in the stars.
Saedii Gilwraeth, daughter of a warrior and a Waywalker herself, who learned a new way to see the world.
Finian de Karran de Seel, who was told by the world that he was not enough, and showed the world he was everything.
Scarlett Isobel Jones, who had a heart so large it could beat for her friends when theirs threatened to fail.
Kaliis Idraban Gilwraeth, who bore up under fists and taunts, who swore to serve even those who would never love him back, because it was right.
Zila Madran, who made a new life and brought us this one, her love paving the way for ours.
Catherine “Zero” Brannock, who is a part of us, who never flinched, never stopped fighting, or loving.
Caersan, Archon of the Unbroken, Slayer of Stars, who was unforgivable, and yet who loved.
We tell ourself all our stories, large and small, light and dark, and together we see every color of our rainbow. And there is one tiny part of us that is still me, not we, and I keep it alive just a few moments longer so I can speak.
It’s not about the sum of the rainbow’s parts, I tell them, though it’s beautiful together. It’s about every shade within it, each of them beautiful on their own. These stories are about the way each of these people lived and loved, sometimes wisely and well, sometimes foolishly, sometimes in dark and terrible ways. But each of their journeys was their own.
Love should never ask you to give up the things that make you different. The truths that can only be told about you, and nobody else.
And just as the last parts of me dissolve into the Ra’haam, as my memory of I fades out, giving way to a beautiful, irresistible we, it begins… .
My love spreads through us like joyous wildfire, and I watch as
one
by
one
the stories of the Ra’haam awaken, blinking into existence like coals in a fire that seemed to have died.
Like a galaxy full of stars, coming alive one by one.
The Ra’haam—or rather, each and every part of it—is remembering what it’s like to be they, not it.
What it’s like to be I, not we.
And in this moment, it remembers love cannot be demanded, or taken.
Only given.
It remembers that love offers a choice.
That love is a choice, one we make over and over again.
We want that choice, I tell it as the last parts of me merge with ecstatic joy. We are that choice.
And slowly, in a moment that takes an eternity, the lights twinkle back in answer. Each and every one of them, now a little closer to the person they were before they merged, before they became us. From one small light, then two, then millions, the answer comes back to me.
We … understand.
And because it is—no, they are—no, we are—so many, and have lived millions of lives, we know what we have to do.
Abruptly I’m back in my body, aboard the Neridaa. I’m lying on the floor, staring up at the crystal ceiling. But I’m also still with the Ra’haam, still a part of an extraordinary, unstoppable us that I will never leave, and it’s glorious.
This wasn’t just a price worth paying. This is the most beautiful experience of my life.
Kal is sitting by my side, and his head snaps up, eyes wet, cheeks streaked with tears.
“You have returned,” he gasps, lifting my fingers to his lips, hope dawning slowly.
“For a little,” I whisper, still smiling.
I can feel the Ra’haam fleet, I can sense the rest of me out there in the black, and I want to burst like a dandelion and let every part of me blow away, sinking into the us that awaits. Into the millions of lives and loves that are a part of me now. Together, forever.