Blaine continues work on Kurt's offering.

He takes his materials in a folded work cloth and transfers it all to their cave. By the light of the baubles, Blaine weaves the line, braiding in beads and glass and feathers, working to the beat of the drip off the stalactites and the flow of the tides seeping in across the rocks. He performs his obligations to his flock and flies with them, hunting and gathering and scavenging off the sea, fishing and trading and building and growing. But as soon as he's done with it, he heads to his cave, staying until he can barely climb out and fly to his nest to sleep a scant number of hours before he wakes and does it all again.

It takes a week until it's finished.

It's perhaps the most stunning piece Blaine could ever have expected to make, with his negligible crafting skills. The back would connect between Kurt's shoulder blades, the clasp made of two glass beads that twist to interlock, the edge of one tied to a long, thick feather that would brush down Kurt's back. Around the front, the single thick braid continues just over the shoulders, at which point it splits into four smaller ropes that draped progressively lower, the split covered by two fan shells. The top alternates beads and sea glass woven into it, with two small feathers halfway to the center on each side. The next again alternates sea glass and various beads, but at the center, a long feather hangs, covering the center of the third rope, which is woven tightly and entirely with different kinds of sea shell. The fourth and final rope contains two long feathers at the halfway points to the center, and a tight string of beads all the way down to the middle, from which the large pearl dangles between the two beads of tiger's eye, just long enough to match where the bead clasp falls in the back. It's not perfect, and the beads and glass and shells aren't perfectly matched or symmetrical. The feathers aren't exactly the same lengths, and the line it's woven with wasn't the best material, but when it's done, Blaine thinks it would have been perfect.

Wouldhave been. Because no matter how much he wants to wait here every day, Kurt isn't coming back.

He lays the necklace on the top of the rock they'd favored sitting on. He lowers all the baubles into the water, letting them float and cast their renewed light, flickering over the cave. And then he gathers up his tools, folds them into the cloth, and ties it all to his belt so that he doesn't lose it on his final climb out. He doesn't want to have to come back here for any reason.

It hurts too much.

—

Blaine is different, after that. He's quieter, and more solemn. And when he's not fulfilling duties for his flock and the Eyrie, he's at the beach, sitting on the rocks and staring out at the sea.

He knows the others worry about him. But none of them try to talk to him. They know why he's despondent, why his heart breaks every day. Because Kurt isn't with him, he doesn't rise above the waves, doesn't return to him.

A few people have suggested he go on Flights, but Blaine has no desire to seek out another mate. As far as he's concerned, Kurt is his mate, and he won't take another. He made his offering, and he left it for Kurt—whether Kurt will ever find it or if it'll wash away in the tides, he'll never know, but either way, he considers it accepted. He won't ever make another.

He does sell the rest of his fallen feathers, though. He has no need for them anymore, as he has no offerings to make and no mate to gift them to. Instead, he uses the credit for them in the market to buy things that remind him of Kurt—beads that are the color of his scales, or a braid of leather that's the same color as his hair. Shells that Kurt said were his favorite, or things he'd think Kurt would like—clothes and trinkets and furnishings for their home, the home Blaine would never build.

Instead, everything he purchased went in a wicker chest he kept by his bed, with the necklace Kurt had given him when they parted. He doesn't have the heart to wear it and risk losing it or breaking it, or reliving memories of Kurt when he needs to be focused for his flock.

He knows it's not healthy. Sam and Brittany and Jan and Liz and Cooper and all his other friends try to cheer him up, take his mind off of things, but he merely acquiesces politely until they can keep him no longer, and he flies off to the shore again to look out and wonder where Kurt is, what he's doing.

Is he alive? Did he marry Santana? Are they having children together, locked in their underwater caves with only baubles to light their way? Has he had a brand burned into his skin? He must—it's been months, and he would have done what he had to to survive and save his loved ones by now. Is he content? Is he surviving? Is he looking up to the surface like Blaine is looking below it, hoping that the other is somewhere on the other side?

Either way, the change in the seasons is coming.

"We're going to fly soon, you know that, Blainey," Cooper says one day, walking up to him where he sits on the beach.

"I know," Blaine replies.

"Do you want to stay?" his brother asks, sitting next to him. "I mean...you'll have to go to the market and the land people for company, and you'll have to hunt and fish on your own, but I get the feeling you'd be happier by yourself, lately."

"I'd be happier with my mate."

Cooper sighs.

"I know," he says, and places a warm, strong hand on the back of Blaine's neck, squeezing affectionately. "Which is why I'll stay, if you stay."

"What?" Blaine asks, incredulous. "Coop, no. You love the migration. And you hate winter. Why would you stay?"

"Because my little brother needs me," Cooper says simply. "Besides, with the rest of the flocks down south for the winter, that leaves a distinct lack of competition for the land ladies who like wings on their men, if you know what I mean."

Blaine laughs, and ducks his head. He's so tired, so drawn, and laughing feels good.

"When do you leave?" Blaine asks quietly.

"The flock wants to head out before the end of the month," Cooper replies. "When they go depends entirely on you. Take your time deciding—but if you want to stay, let me know and I'll bring word to the Elders. You and me, we've done this plenty. We've gone on adventures together—"

"—you've gotten me into trouble—"

"—and we've made it through. This'll be an adventure. Maybe we'll build a boat and go out to sea and find Kurt, how about that? I hear there are some land folk who can go underwater, even. They've got these helmets—"

"No, Coop," Blaine says. "I—it'd be a waste of time."

"Well, you let me know, and we'll figure it out." He rises, shaking out his wings and stretching in the light of the evening sun. "Just keep in mind that there are people who love you that aren't beneath tons of water, okay?"

Blaine doesn't reply, and Cooper flies away, leaving him with that to consider.

Could he leave his family and friends for half a year, to wait here for something that will never come? Or could he leave the barest chance that he might see Kurt again? He promised he'd never give up, and he doesn't want to break that promise, but he's not sure he could survive the solitude. He's kept to himself more often than not recently, it's true, but the time with the flock has kept his mind and body occupied while his heart continues to ache.

Could he live like that, with only the pain to keep him company?

When he goes to bed that night, his doubt is too heavy to ignore for long.

—

"Cooper?"

Coop rubs his eyes and peeks out of his nest at Blaine.

"What's up, squirt?"

Blaine ignores the nickname and smiles sadly at his brother, who yawns widely, his jaw cracking, his face ridiculous when he squints against the palest of morning lights.

"I've made up my mind."

"Yeah? So what's the plan?"

Blaine looks out at the water, and then turns back.

"I'll fly with the flock."

—

As soon as Cooper is done hugging him and assuring him that he'll be okay, Blaine flies to the caves.

He doesn't go into the cave. He can't bear to see his offering still laying on the rock, abandoned and waiting, and there's a distinct chance that that is exactly what he'll see. And he can't let himself be convinced to stay if the offering is simply not there, because it was washed away by one of the higher tides that suddenly wash up and make the caves dangerous in the first place.

So he sits just inside the mouth of the cave, waves crashing into the pillars to his left, the tunnel echoing endlessly to his right.

"I love you, Kurt," he says to both. One way or another, maybe the message will travel. "I would have given anything to keep you with me. Maybe if I'd been born one of your people, or you born one of mine, we could've figured something out, but...I don't think there's anything I can do. Even if I could breathe underwater, I wouldn't know how to find you. I would try, though. I just don't think...I don't think I should stay here and wish, and dream, and wonder what could have happened. So...I'm leaving. I'm not giving up on us—I'll always wait for you, and I'll always hope you come back someday, but it'll have to be in the spring. I can't leave my family for a fantasy. If there's...any sign, anything you can give me, though...I'll stay."

Blaine waits. But the waves continue crashing, and the silence continues to ring on the other side. He whispers a final vow into the tunnel, and flies back to the Eyrie.

—

There is no last-minute rush. There is no dramatic moment of tension. Blaine simply packs his prized valuables, and secures the rest down against the winter storms. He takes Kurt's necklace with him, but leaves the rest in the chest, anchored to the rocks and covered with waterproof coverings and lashed tightly. His nest will be ready for him when they return in the spring, and he can decide what to do with everything then—build a home with them, perhaps, something larger and closer to the water, or maybe sell it all and use the gain from it to fly somewhere else, away from the memories. Maybe go to live with the land folk, so he's near his family, but not tempted by the ocean and caves. Maybe he'll find a place to settle down, or maybe he'll just fly for the rest of his life, seeking a release from the pain that the crashing of waves brings him.

Three days before the flock is set to leave, Cooper ambles up to him casually where he sits in the center of the village, perched on a branch and threading some fishing line for Liz, whose hands aren't steady enough to do so nowadays.

"Blainey, what would you say if I told you I went to the caves?"

Blaine looks up, confused and hurt and filled with heavy trepidation.

"I would ask why you would do that."

"Well, I'll admit, I did it on a whim," Cooper says, sitting easily next to Blaine, letting his legs swing like a child's. "I thought, if the world were truly cruel, I'd go to the caves and find nothing. And Blaine would let go of his fishman forever and I couldn't tell stories about how it was because of me that he found happiness. But so far, in my wisdom, I have found life to be, overall, a pretty nice experience."

Blaine rolls his eyes at Cooper's rambling.

"Cooper, what—"

"And, as always, I was right."

Blaine looks over at Cooper sharply.

"What are you saying, Coop—"

"I'm saying that I found something."

"In the caves?"

"That's right."

"What did you find?"

Cooper shrugs, smiling. Blaine pushes him off the branch, gritting his teeth when Cooper just laughs and flies back up.

"Take it easy, little brother. I can take you to see it. You know...if you're not quite ready to let go just yet."

Blaine stands. Anything, any sign from Kurt—he needs to see it. He needs to see whatever Cooper found.

"Cooper, show me."

Cooper grins.

"All right."