Page 116 of Before the Bond
I was back on the porch by the time the light had changed.
The fog had burned off more than it usually did — a real effort from the sun today, cutting through in actual gold strips across the cleared ground.
I had a second cup of coffee. I wasn't thinking about anything in particular — just watching the light move.
I felt him before I heard him.
I felt the warmth in my chest that had been there since the night of the bond: a steady presence not asking anything of me, deepening slightly as he came closer. Like a second heartbeat finding its rhythm. Like something that had always been looking for its exact right place and had finally found it.
Caleb’s arms came around me from behind.
No greeting. No preamble. Just the weight of him.
I leaned back into him.
We stood there without speaking for a long time. The frost on the grass caught the light. The firs stood silver and still. The fog moved at the tree line in slow drifts, unhurried, going nowhere.
"You were up early," Caleb said. Low, close to my ear.
"I like this time of day," I said.
His arms shifted, not loosening, just settling more fully.
"Since when?"
I thought about it. "Since here, I think."
He didn't answer that. He pressed his jaw more firmly against my hair, the way he did instead of speaking when words were either not enough or not necessary. I felt his exhale. I watched the light on the frost and felt the warmth in my chest and let the silence be exactly what it was.
"I unpacked," I said, after a while, looking up at him.
He went still for a beat.
"The bag?"
"Both of them,” I replied. “It was high time. I don’t have anywhere I’ll be going anytime soon.”
Caleb’s lips curved into a smile. When I looked into his eyes, I noticed something that was no longer there. That quiet sense of urgency and hesitation that used to plague him during our early months.
After a long pause, he kissed me on the cheek.
“I’m glad,” he said.
A longer pause. Then, quietly: "Good."
I tightened my hands around the mug. He tightened his arms around me. We looked at the forest together.
The fog quietly changed shape in the distance.
I almost missed it. The way the mist moved across the cleared ground, it could have been wind. It could have been a deer at the edge of the firs thinking better of crossing. It could have been the morning playing tricks the way mornings sometimes did in Greyhollow, where the grey had a tendency to make shapes out of nothing.
It wasn't any of those things.
Caleb's arms tightened.
Just once. Just slightly. Not anxiety — just acknowledgement of what we both understood.
The Voss pack was still out there. Their plan had failed and we knew Maykhel wouldn’t be the kind to accept defeat.
