Outside, a gentle breeze is making the tops of the trees lean ever so slightly.
He mustn’t have been able to sleep, and if I know him as well as I think I do, there’s only one place he’ll be.
Pulling on a hoodie and sneakers before I head outside, I make my way through the sleeping camp. The fire is completely out, just the faint scent of smoke lingers in the air. The windows of the cabins are dark, the only sounds I can hear are crickets, cicadas, and wind. Without thinking of which direction I’m heading, I arrive at the edge of the trees and enter the forest.
Even though it’s been nearly two years since I was last here, I know my way without a map. My feet move instinctively, carefully avoiding trip-hazard roots, somehow knowing the way.
I arrive at the clearing, blinking as I step through the tree line. The moon is so big and bright here, it’s dazzling. Something in me stirs just setting foot here again, this place where Jasper and I learned we were mates. This place that is such an important landmark in our journey. Off to the side, Jasper sits atop his boulder, legs crossed, eyes closed, deep in meditation.
Stepping to the middle of the clearing, I close my eyes as well and take a deep breath. It’s like I can feel the lunar energy flooding my lungs as I do.
“Couldn’t sleep either?” Jasper asks, and I turn to find him just as he was, eyes still closed. But slowly a half grin creeps into one side of his face, and he opens one eye. “Fancy meeting you here.”
I head over to him. “How long have you been out here?”
“Not long. I didn’t want to wake you.”
He reaches out for my hand, and I help him down, but on the way he slips and all but falls into my arms.
“We have to stop meeting like this,” he says.
This sort of uber-romantic, cringey moment would usually make me run for the hills but tonight feels loaded with so much extra lunar energy and this strange sense of the unknown to come, it actually feels sort of appropriate.
“I hope we never stop meeting like this,” I say, as Jasper slips his arms around me further. “Although we should probably watch out for concussions.”
“Did I disturb you when I left?” he asks.
“No,” I say. “I don’t think so. But I wouldn’t have minded if you did.”
Leading me by the hand, Jasper walks me to the middle of the clearing once more and we sit, facing the moon, my back pressed against his side.
“I wasn’t sure if you wanted to be alone,” I say. “Thought maybe you needed to focus or something before tomorrow.”
“Nope,” he says, then kisses the side of my face. “I mean, yes I was trying to clear my head, but this works just as well.”
He tilts my chin toward him and plants another kiss on my lips.
I pull at his bottom lip with my teeth, trying to taste as much of him as I can. But then I stop, knowing I can’t hold back any longer.
“Jasper, there’s more I need to tell you.”
He doesn’t look concerned this time, simply patient, waiting for me.
“What is it?”
“When we visited your mother, as we were leaving, she spoke to me. She told me when the time came, I would need to leave you behind.”
Head tilting, Jasper is clearly trying to parse this new information, to figure out why his mother would send me a secret message and not him.
“Do you know what she meant?” he asks.
“No, no idea. I kept wondering if it had to do with the college thing, but it has to have something to do with the battle tomorrow, right?”
He presses his lips together, examining my face like he’s noticing details he’s never noticed before. I do the same, except I’ve already logged all of Jasper’s features into my memory vault. His freckles, his emerald eyes, his soft, peachy lips.
“I don’t want to leave you,” I say. “I won’t. No matter what, I won’t.”
With a firm hand he holds the side of my face, looking into my eyes with a sort of calmness that’s new.
