Everything had slowed and become too surreal. I watched absently his movements, his eyes, the way they trailed the length of my face, and even the soft heaving of his chest as he sighed, relieved. I couldn’t help but smile at his warmth and his excitement, but when had we come to share that feeling of calm between us? When had it become more than an idea, a fiber of truth that strung between us like a promise? I wasn’t sure what we had ever built together, for there were no fortresses tall enough to ward off my doubts, but there was something battling my insecurities… and it wasn’t me.

I could feel Romul’s own hesitancy intermingling with the harsh effects of my eagerness, but I couldn’t yet place a finger on why the young wolf appeared so guarded. His golden eyes were fixed pointedly on the stallion’s retriever and yet there was no malice in the way he received her. However, it was more of an afterthought on my part anyhow… I didn’t care to know the trivial conflicts between wolf and dog, so long as it didn’t come to a battle of tooth and claw. Everything else was menial in my eyes, a sullen image crafted of black and white, while he remained vivid, colorful.

In an unwanted moment of distrust, I was suddenly worried. I feared that I’d stumbled upon a mere mirage of wanting something so badly that it materialized at will. Yet, the notion felt contorted and lost, or just a figment of insanity for the sake of protecting my feeble heart. He was there, just there, and he was as real as the blood that pumped through my veins.

I thought again about Ulrik and I realized just how many wishes I’d spent on him, hoping and dreaming that he’d become more to me than the Engineer capable of stealing me from my warm bed chambers in the Falls. I thought I’d seen a flicker of light in him, a pleading of some sort that was likely misconstrued on my part, but a light nonetheless. Maybe that was a lifetime ago… or just a minute of time so long stretched that I’d forgotten the fine details. Uncertainty was all that remained in his wake, while assurance and a secret promise never to leave, never to lie, was all I saw before me now. Of course, I’d learned that I had my own funny way of going about life and I often saw only half of the circle; not once had I ever seen it completed.

When at last the warrior offered me his heated touch, I leaned into it lightly, worriedly. It was a feeling that I knew would linger upon my skin until I closed my eyes for sleep. It was also a moment of loss that I was certain I would remember when we again parted ways. For that was how all ties ended… nothing was definite in life, nothing was forever.

“Of course,” he’d said curtly, with no reason to oblige me or my wants. He didn’t offer anything more than his touch and his eyes -a troubled blue- to comfort me by. He didn’t find a reason to explain who he was or why’d he come back… Perhaps it was Ulrik who’d been most honest and true. He had revealed more of me –my loves, my losses, and even my agonies- in my capture than the warrior had done in my release. What was it that kept his lips so sealed by secrets? Was it something I’d said or done since last we met? Strangely, I’d come to think that with him I was more than just a child, a girl abandoned by her lord father. Perhaps it was only the Engineer who’d seen me for my truths… not matter how hard-put they were. Maybe I was just a girl trying to fill the shoes of her childish beliefs.

Awkwardly, and without words to fill the silent tension, I turned away from him, eager to lead him again into the darkness of the caves where even lies appeared beautiful in their own right.