Stavanger Bay Wilted

a muscle jumped in his jaw; he was hurt, and it plainly showed. but more than that lestan was not sure he believed reverie any more about her sense of mortality, not when she could so coldly threaten him that she would take her own life.
"i love you, reverie." he knew the absence of anything else would hurt her, tear her as it had done him; such a selfish act, and in his tiredness, his displacement, lestan felt for now no remorse. he could not leave, he could hardly stay, either way ended with her death, and frustration was beating upon the gate of his heart. 
she had refused healing help until it was too late, lestan believed; he remembered the whisper of haunting prognosis in her words as he held her and he cried, but the moment she had seen those wretched little children, spawn of the very witch sapping her life, she had been willing to surrender everything for them.
perhaps he should have let her.