Even as the dark cage contracted and he cried out, a ray of light struck one of the tall glass towers and the glass threw back the light even brighter than it had been before. The sunlight became a bright sword that pierced the bars of his cage.
When I saw it, I saw everything that I believed laid out in front of me like a shining map of the future. That the new destroyers would be destroyed as surely as the old ones had been. That a brilliant city, all the brighter for its shadows, would rise out of this abyss. That Ethan and I would spend our lives working toward that in both cities, not hiding anything from each other again, not pretending to be perfect anymore, just trying our best. I knew that one day we would be able to tell this story—Carwyn’s story, Ethan’s story, my story, the story of all we sacrificed and all we saved.
I felt I learned the value of every small, flawed thing we do in the darkness, trying to scramble our way into the light. People will come up with a hundred thousand reasons why other people do not count as human, but that does not mean anyone has to listen.
Nobody can ever tell me any different.
I know he did have a soul.