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Mud splashes beneath the great gold wheels of the Prince's carriage; coating the first row of townspeople gathered along the main street.
They wave and cheer while his royal highness remains imperious; eyes forward and giving no attention to those gathered for his sake.
It is expected that with the completion of the palace and the Prince's relocation to this region of the country, wealth will follow; trickling in from the capital city in goods and visitors.
For Prince Ben Solo, this is a banishment. An ousting from the capital by his uncle, the King's hand, and the acknowledgment of a litany of incidents Ben had been unable to prevent, and one which had ultimately ended in the death of a young steward.
A dark cloud of darkness has swirled around the man some twenty years, and without any other method of recourse, here he is. And here he must remain.
At the edge of the crowd stands a young woman, hood low over her face as she watches with a dip in her brow. Those nearby shift away from her; seeing the tattered state of her skirt and believing that poverty may rub off on them. To those who know her; of which there are few that remember, they will know what truth there is to fear; where she had come from and why she had been kept to the recesses of society.
The procession continues—passes and the crowd disperses, knocking past the woman who stays fixed in that moment; watching the retreating back of one prince drenched in darkness and misfortune.
#
The world has a quietude to it deep in these woods. The rush of the stream; the soft twitter of birdsong and the gentle creek of a forest that has lived longer than even memory serves.
It can be felt in the soil, in the rocks that make the riverbed Rey stands in now, her skirts tucked into the belt at her waist as she peers into the clear waters.
Small fish swim past her bare feet, seeming interested and not fearful as she picks at plants.
A soft mewl attracts her attention and Rey glances up, seeing orange fur perched on the edge of a rock, looking to her, the small animal's head twisting to the side.
'What are you doing here, Beebee? Isn't it too early for you to be awake?'
The small fox chirps, paws shifting on stone before he dips his head down to the water. It is an offering she takes, fingers moving through the soft fur as the fox drinks.
'Have you got something to tell me?' She asks, smiling.
Beebee's head shifts though, body rigid and alert. Then he's looking past her, across the water to the figure that strikes a large shape on the bank.
The aura cuts through the sunlight that beams down over head; shimmering like volcanic glass; beautiful and horrifying in tandem.
She is still, watching him watch her.
Some time passes, the pair frozen in their respective positions, before Rey finally breaks the silence, looking over the dark purple riding outfit he wears, not missing the golden buttons that glimmer, nor the sword sat at his hip.
'Do you take issue with me being here?' She asks, mostly polite. The cloud is still a concern, but she pushes the thought away for now.
'This is my stream on my land.'
She snorts, shaking her head and looking back to Beebee. 'I think I know someone who would disagree with that.'
His eyes narrow on her, though they don't quite dip to take in her dress or the state of her hair. They seem to only wish to pierce her; to pull at her seams. What can he say? What truth can he pull from her eyes alone?
'What are you doing?'
An apt question when she neither washes nor fishes.
'Gathering arrowheads.'
'You're a witch, are you?'
Another smile, a curt nod to her head. 'What else could a woman on her own in the forest be?'
The dip in his brow suggests he doesn't like the answer, but he does not make any moves, only continues to watch her.
'And what do you do with arrowheads?'
'The flowers are rather pretty and you can cook the roots into stew.' She holds the collection of tubers up. 'See.'
If the distance weren't so great between them, perhaps she would have approached and placed the plants in his hands, but she isn't unwise enough to challenge the depths of the stream. While she may be no enemy to these woods, they can be unpredictable.
'Not for witchcraft then…?'
'Maybe a little,' she answers, laughing.
She turns to traverse the bank, Beebee shifting nearer to her. She unrolls her skirt and smooths it with her palms as she looks across at the prince again. Feeling rather amused, she curtsies as if she's ever done it before.
'Until next time.'
The quiet with which he watches her is strange, and the aura that sits on him unsettles her still.
She hurries away, Beebee following on her heels, glancing back to only wonder.
#
He is there the next day, this time leading his horse to drink at the stream's edge, while Rey weaves reeds on the bank. They look at eachother, the man's mouth set in that same, insistent pout as his eyes follow her. It is another curious feature about him; he seems to be able to look through her, almost.
'This is a long stream with many places to drink from,' she says, raising her voice so he can hear her from the other side.
'Does it matter if it's mine?'
Rey sighs, shaking her head.
'You do know who I am, don't you?'
'Why?'
If it could even be possible, his brow furrows ever deeper. 'You seem uninterested in my presence. It is…confusing.'
'Why should I disturb you? I do not knock on each tree to wake up the squirrels and the birds? I do not shake beehives to greet the bees? Shall I approach you when you're simply passing by, minding your own?'
He considers, then shakes his head. 'I suppose not.'
'These woods are too wild to be managed, your highness. Owning them does not make that any less true.'
'Do you speak of dangers?'
Rey chuckles, considering that maybe she does. 'Maybe I do.'
'Are you dangerous?'
'I think so.' And she smiles, enjoying herself.
What she doesn't expect for him to do is to mount his horse and then pull it through the water to the otherside, where they stop, looming over where she sits with her work.
'Were you not listening when I said I was dangerous?' She asks, raising a brow.
'I wanted to see for myself.'
And he watches her from up on his horse, Rey silent beneath the attention. It could so simply be concluded there, but up close, the darkness that surrounds him almost licks out at her, and she cannot smile any longer.
It seems he notices and backs away.
'What is it that you do here?'
'I live here. I've always lived here. So did my aunt and my grandmother before her. And on and on.'
His expression says the answer isn't enough, but he pulls back and departs, Rey thinking him curious, and not just because of the shroud he bears.
The following day she discovers a length of ribbon tied to a tree. When she reaches to remove it, she hears his approach, but does not turn.
'What is this supposed to mean?'
'Marking where there has been an intruder.'
She can feel the humour in the words, even without looking at him. It is likely the first purposefully amusing thing he has said to her.
'Have you grown tired of being the brooding prince?'
'Am I a brooding prince?'
Rey scoffs again, not expecting that particular answer. 'I thought you might try to deny it.'
Finally she turns, and is quite set off kilter by the casual dress; a simple shirt and britches. Nothing much beyond that. He almost looks as if he plans to take a dive in the river.
'I think you've already made your mind up about me.'
He is likely right, but it is not his personality she has contention with, but the darkness that follows him like an odour.
'Maybe so. I do not judge you so heavily now, though. As you have not attempted to remove me.'
'I've been told that's not possible.'
Rey smiles again, and she does plan on saying more, but Beebee comes running from beneath the brush, barking and snapping at the prince until he is departing with his hands up, glancing intermittently at Rey as if he has so much more to say.
The next day, Beebee lets him stay. And the day after that, they dig for arrowheads and forage for mushrooms.
#
It is an odd thing. To live alone these many years since her aunt's death, long since ostracised and now to have a prince willing to pay her any attention.
The quiet solitude Rey had created for herself is quickly beginning to fade and she finds herself answering questions that she'd never thought could possibly be posed:
'Have you ever dreamed of being a princess?'
'Never.'
'Can you not sew?'
'Why?'
'Your dress is a pile or scraps. Would you like a new one?'
'No.'
And some she meets back with her own:
'Do you have no friends if you are bothering me?'
'Are we not friends already?'
'Friendship is usually mutual.'
'Should we not mutually agree to be friends?'
'Does this usually work the first time around?'
'Yes.'
The Prince is reticent to share his reasoning for his proximity to her, but just as well, Rey cannot stop thinking about what plagues him. It is something that he inherently seems to know, despite being unable to do anything about it.
The aura has her treading trails in the aged wood floor of her woodland home, conscious of its peculiarity and the magic that seems to whisper beneath it. It is not misfortune, caught like a burr on a trouser's leg. There's a heaviness to it that Rey can't stop thinking of.
It leads her to the wrought gates of the palace, sparingly guarded, particularly at night. The estate had been carved out of a dying section of forest, unusual in its countenance and location; a prison, if seen in the right light.
She'd slipped through the gates in the dark; crept quietly through the doors and halls, searching until she'd found him; uncomfortably asleep in a chaise in a drawing room, disturbance filling the space.
He'd rocked back and forth, muttering and murmuring with his hands in fists, almost as if he were fighting something within himself.
It took little more than a touch to confirm it—
Rey saw ruptures in the universe; felt a heart and head splitting in two at the intrusion of something else; the compulsion of something more powerful than her. As if he had been cursed by the devil himself; a lesion latching on to his psyche, trying to twist it as it sees fit, for no other reason than destruction. Darkness and a signal of imbalance.
The following days are spent in contemplation on a solution, Rey finding she can't let things live as they are; the peace of this corner of the world reliant on a balance she has learnt to keep over a sparse few decades on this earth.
A solution is not easily gained.
She thinks of curses; of the power the wood can grant her if she asks. That she has paid in years of service.
It comes to her; this image of ivy. Of how it can co-exist, but if given the chance can take over a living tree until no person would be able to know what is beneath it. Whether oak or hawthorn or birch.
So, there her plan forms. To conceal the Prince; to remove this connection to this darkness by making it so he cannot be found by light or dark.
There is a magic in every bough of every tree, in every blade of grass, in every petal of every flower that exists within the wood. A power that can be captured and shared with the simple giving of a rose.
A rose wished upon; magicked beneath the light of a full moon, and held between the fingers of an old crone, her voice carrying and dripping like a tincture into the ears of the sleeping.
The Prince is its mark; the memories of all those who know him growing clouded, obscured by the boughs of these ancient woods.
The voice is carried through those same palace gates, to the grand entrance and past its guards and inhabitants, that fall in sleep like perennial plants at winter rest, waiting for the spring again.
Carried up and up through the halls to that same room the Prince sleeps within.
The inadequacies of the mind are exposed and made a from; it is the heart of Ben Solo, or what he believes it to be. Something crumpled and raw. Whether beauty or beast, it is something startling.
A person's greatest fears come to life in physical form.
The transformation is singular. A prince turned monster, but made of the matter of man. Of his weaknesses, of his fears. All to coalesce in a mask of wood and vine. Of mud and bark. The vivid depths of the forest transforming flesh.
And so a tale is whispered in his dreams; of a prince who must fall in love to be free of his curse, delivered by an old crone who leaves a rose on his pillow, to count down the time he has left and to carry the weight of a spell so powerful, it bends the woods beneath it.
#
Rey knows he looks for her first; there's a desperation in the air she's known well enough from her own lived experience. Of days before she'd become her aunt's apprentice; before the forest. But it is not easy to hide from him; to pretend that this isn't all her own doing, even if she has done the best thing she could do.
Or at least she thinks.
He finds her; miles from that familiar junction of stream, and instead at the edge of the rushing river.
The wood has become a part of him as much as it is of her. The magic cursing him belongs to the wood, even if cast by her.
A cloak shrouds his body; the hood low over his face to conceal his truth.
'It's me,' he murmurs. 'I have not seen you in weeks—I thought you had left.'
Her mouth twitches, fingers tightening on the herbs in her hand as she watches him.
'I would not leave this wood; it is my home.'
'Would you—' The words fall away, and he shifts a little closer. '—do you think I'm capable of being loved?'
Rey's expression softens, turns inwards as she sees the devastation she has wrought on a man, just in the hopes of freeing him. It is sense that convinces her she has made the right choice, but something pulls at her that says she has done it in the wrong way.
'Yes.' It's the truth. Aren't all humans worthy of being loved?
He hesitates again, and his eyes pull to her; a gaze turned deep indigo by magic, strange and yet so familiar with the sadness they hold. 'Could you love me?'
The error seems to chime in her now as she looks at him; at the desperation required for him to turn to her.
'No.'
Her answer is cold; divorced, and she turns before she can see what she's done, knowing that this is for his own good. That it isn't that she's unable to give love, but that she is unable to receive it.
She hopes the decisive cutting of whatever tentative relationship they have, helps. That when, as that wizened crone, she'd told him this curse wouldn't last forever, she was telling the truth. It won't last forever because he'll find love.
But…he doesn't. Months pass as they do; the palace already wanting to be swallowed back up by the wood it carved apart, and Rey is watchful, as unchanging as the prince now is. Her visits to his dreams are brief, still as that old crone, warning him of the passage of time, but there's a reluctance to him now. A fury born of concession of will. The peace she had wished on him traded for this self-made solitude.
Every sunrise he is there at that stream, where he looks at his reflection in the stream, while Rey watches from the shade of a willow, wondering whether she made the right choice.
#
The seasons change, yet he stays a constant feature in Rey's mind.
When the forest is covered in a thick blanket of snow, there is little more to do than watch and wait for it to wake from its sleep. Only Beebee is a constant fixture, sticking by her, making the space between her floor and the earth his home, without regard for the other foxes that live within these trees.
It is in winter too, when Rey decides something must change.
Bazine is the only girl in the town willing to venture into the woods; the only girl willing to be coaxed into the mystery of the forgotten Prince. She had arrived early in the autumn, an enigma—a peculiarity, not unlike Rey, who had big city ideas reduced to the judgemental eyes of the townspeople. But, she hears the story from the old crone, and Rey can see her interest—her delight, and the sense that she could love a monster, even if Ben is anything but.
It takes a few tricks, of which Rey isn't proud of, but a turned sign shifts Bazine's direction, and a sudden weather change has the young woman finding wrought iron gates and a singular flame in a distant window. To the other inhabitants who have become trees and flowers and plants.
Rey watches the exchange from those same shadows; from the forest-like darkness she has shrouded this palace in. Like under the canopy of oaks, in the dark of a burrow, in the cold deep of the river.
Ben's confusion is sharp; furious, his actions rash and illogical as he claims Bazine is a thief. It is Bazine that surprises Rey—her demand for a place to stay from the cold; her acceptance of the curled form of a man in front of her.
Perhaps—perhaps it will work.
Yet, the days pass and Ben is reticent, even as Bazine seems willing to be open. He holds himself back in a way that Rey has never seen him do before, even knowing that loving her and her loving him will be his salvation.
The rose—the symbol of this spell is down to a quarter of its petals. A season left of life to it, and Rey wishes now she had been more able to give Ben more. That she hadn't so foolishly thought that love could be found in a matter of weeks or months at most.
She haunts the palace, a ghost in the winter; seeking some form of comfort and warmth like she is just another creature of the forest, wanting to hibernate. It is a foolish way of thinking when this is not her home; when she is becoming a villain in Ben's life without him knowing.
Now, her eyes remain on the rose, it gleaming beneath the lens of glass and mirror, spinning in front of her. She sits in her tattered skirts, fingers grasped on her knees, chattering in the cold that is perhaps more a product born of her own soul rather than the cascade of snowfall outside the windows.
'Is that you?'
Rey startles, slinking into the shadows.
'I thought you had—'
His tone is sombre, though the door remains closed, as he makes no moves to enter.
'Why did you leave?'
She doesn't know how to answer, when she shouldn't be here. When she has been so hellbent on keeping Ben at a distance, guilt at her own actions, but fearful that her presence might stop him from even trying.
The only consolation Rey has is that the darkness has not found him again, that just like the rest of the world beyond them, he has become forgotten. A relic left to crumble in the middle of this ancient wood.
'Please…just stay. I understand—I just don't want to be alone.'
Her brow dips, knowing Bazine still remains in a room in the other wing. But still, she approaches the door, her hand resting against the wood and feeling Ben on the other side of it.
Rey thinks of solitude; of loneliness and what it means. She has been on her own for as long as she can remember, but it has never truly felt like a crutch when she's had Beebee and the wood. But this—
'I'm sorry,' she murmurs and leaves before anything more can be said between them. Before she can examine the reasons why she keeps coming back.
#
Rey takes to keeping further away; walking the forest aimlessly, hoping that with the distance, Ben and Bazine can become closer. Convinced that she is what is holding them back.
It is Beebee's whimpers that concern her first; the fox bounding over ice and snow to get to her, pulling at her skirts with hurry. Then something seems to crumple; the sensation of magic shattering—her magic. Rey hears a tree break, and she stumbles as her eyes reach for the canopy—to the highest spire of the palace that she might be able to see.
She starts running then, stumbling over snow with Beebee running beside her.
Another break—another tree. It is a visceral sensation, like the snapping of a bone as the magic dies.
It happens four times before she finally reaches the gates of the palace; ajar and something ominous in the air. Her feet propel her forward until she finds them—
Bazine stands beside the rose, having plucked four of its five petals, her thumb and finger on the last as Ben looks to her, something broken in his gaze; shadowed and regressed, his sword scattered by his side.
'You.'
The woman turns, sees through Rey and there's a startlingly bright type of cunning in her eyes as she smiles.
'I should thank you.'
Rey is silent, trying to edge forward to stop her plucking the final petal; the premature breaking of a spell that Rey had attached to a rose—to the forest itself. A breaking which she doesn't know the outcome of. Her eyes flash to Ben and he is looking at her now, some deep hurt growing there in his gaze.
'You brought me here. Without you, I likely wouldn't have found this place. Found him.' She looks at Ben, taking the rose up by its stem, not caring that the thorns pierce flesh.
Blood drips, tainted by something Rey knows, because she'd seen it in Ben. Seen it on him; that darkness, that curse.
'My master doesn't like when his playthings hide from him.'
'What do you mean?' Rey asks fiercely, but she's looking at Ben, whose complacency grows into rage; becomes realisation.
'You cannot remove curses so easily, witch. You cannot outmatch one curse with another.' She huffs a laugh, narrowing her eyes. 'Not when someone is born with them. It can only be removed when he dies, and we wouldn't want that, would we?'
Bazine snickers and Rey moves forward, before an oppressive atmosphere fills the room and she's knocked off her feet. She can feel the wood thrum in distress, as Ben gets to his feet and moves over to her.
'Ben—I'm sorry.'
It seems all she is capable of doing, of being—apologetic.
He shakes his head, not accepting it. 'I brought this to you; to your wood.'
Rey wants to explain; to understand what he truly knows that he hadn't admitted to her before. Because he must know who she is, or would he not be scared already?
The chance is lost when a figure steps from the shadows; a disfigured man. It is as if his skin had been burned from him and healed with a sheen of blue and green to it. He is not quite human; a darkness living within him. A kind of unlife.
Ben gets in front of her from their position crouched on the floor, staring the man down.
'Oh Benjamin, how I have wanted to see you for so long.'
He leans forward, a gnarled finger curling beneath Ben's chin and pulling him upwards onto his knees. The creature looks into his face; measuring the temporary destruction Rey had wrought against it. The forest only stares back.
The creature snarls, looking at Rey now, long nails digging into Ben's chin and drawing blood.
'You are a miserly little thing, aren't you? I will have fun destroying your wood.' He snorts. 'Did your mother tell you about her, perhaps? The woman in the wood? Well look at her—what could she have done for you?' The hand shifts from Ben's chin to his hair; taking a fistful of it. 'Your grandfather promised you to me when he stole from me by taking his own life, so I will collect.'
'No—' Rey shouts, pulling at magic and feeling the wood lethargic, not just because of its winter stasis, but because of the damage made to the plucked petals.
It seems to pull at him, but not enough to make him stop; to convince him to remove his hands from Ben.
Then he turns on Rey, wrinkled flesh gross and inhuman when he draws closer, ignoring the tear of thorns her power causes in his skin; marring those boney arms. Her gaze holds fierce, however, fists tight as she calls as much magic as she is able.
It crackles beneath her fingers like fallen autumn leaves underfoot. It's the delicate crush of fresh snow, the snapping of twigs.
She lunges, the magic gathered in her hands as she presses them to his face.
The shriek is deafening, but it's fury rather than pain and Rey can barely catch herself when she is flung to the side by an arm. Then pursued.
A ringing resounds, Rey turning to face her fate, knowing that she has caused this. That she had been wrong all along.
It's what stops her from seeing Ben pull at the sword at the ground; and then for it to plunge into the creature's back, just as Bazine throws herself forward, attempting to get in the way. To save her master.
Rey sees the flutter of a single petal first, and then the crossguard of a dagger, deep within Ben's side.
Bazine falls first, and then her master. Both sharing the blow of the blade, both mortally wounded. Then, Ben falls to one knee and Rey can do little more than to crawl to him.
It's deep; blood already seeping through layers of fabric, before she pulls the dagger free, throwing the offending weapon across the room and pressing her hand to the wound, willing the blood flow to stop. Willing everything to be calmer.
'I'm sorry—I'm sorry,' she finds herself whispering, trying to help.
His breathing is shallow, affected and slow, but his eyes—they hold her; take her in as if there is nothing or no one else.
Perhaps there isn't. Perhaps he was always as lonely as she had so often been, and this is the first time she's truly been able to see it.
Yet, as his breathing grows more lethargic, the world begins to peel away; his skin losing that monstrous pallor in favour of something more human. Magic fading as his life fades with it. Until it is Ben again; resting in her arms as she watches him, blood still flowing.
'Why did you leave?'
The question is an echo of one asked before, when Rey had hidden herself, insistent on staying away; on not being a part of his story when she already was.
She touches his face, stroking tears away from his cooling cheeks—his and her own—that splash where she kneels over him, his head in her lap, not knowing how to answer.
'I was scared,' she murmurs. 'I only wanted to save you.'
And she did—she has. His smooth, untainted skin is proof of that. Even as his grip on the skirt of her dress grows weaker, the light in his eyes beginning to dull.
'Don't leave,' she pleads soft, pressing a kiss to his temple—to his cheek.
She feels the wood plead with her; desperate for some resolution, knowing that this hadn't truly been a curse at all. That the spell had been cast with kindness—with love.
Ben shakes his head, eyes fixed on her. 'It doesn't matter anymore—you saved me, and I…I'm free now. I can see you and I'm free.'
It's not right. None of it. Not the desiccating body next to them; nor the warmth fading from a woman who could have changed.
Rey had made so many mistakes, even if casting the spell hadn't been one of them. It was bringing Bazine here, it was running away from Ben—from her feelings, believing that it would make things better. That love could not be found with her; within the wood. She knows she was wrong now.
Her heart aches, tears not ceasing.
'I won't let you.'
And she closes her eyes, ignoring their sting as she sets her hands over the wound and wills it. Pulls whatever she can from the wood, even if the magic stumbles. She'll put herself into it, if she has to. Every last piece of herself, just to save him. It doesn't matter—nothing else matters.
It is like vines wrapping around her arms; wrapping themselves around Ben. Thousands of years worth of magic and life and death and rebirth being given over through Rey's palms. She feels herself weaken; feels magic drive itself from her in a wash, like the rushing river eroding the river banks. Constant and slowly ageing. Holding enough power, even if only for now.
When she cannot give anymore; only when she feels the passing of all the seasons in a single breath, do her hands fall; do her eyes flutter open again.
Ben is looking at her, his eyes wide.
Her gaze flickers to the injury; to the scar that resembles the bark of a silver birch. She cries again, air huffing from her as she leans her head against his, and then she can't remember, because the world goes dark and all she can hear is the delicate sound of birdsong through the trees.
#
Rey wakes to the sun.
Its warmth a soft caress against her cheeks. There is another of those, she realises soon after. A hand holding hers; a smile shared with her.
The wood is a distant thing. Still there but sitting at the recesses. Like the sun hidden behind a cloud.
Her magic however, pools like mud beneath her fingertips. Overused, stumbling to refill whatever had been emptied.
'You're alive?' She confirms, breathing a sigh of relief.
'Yes,' he murmurs, getting closer to her, until she can feel his warm breath against her cheek.
Everything looks different. As if Spring has finally broken through the winter.
It is the spell, most likely. It is gone and the veil she'd put over this place is gone. She can even hear the return of the servants, once turned to plants and trees, now human once more.
Her free hand slides to his cheek, watching him carefully, holding him there.
'I love you. It's…it was always you I loved.' He admits immediately, the words spilling like rain.
Rey doesn't answer immediately. She watches him almost confounded and then laughs—smiles.
'You do?'
He sighs, his forehead pressing to her shoulder.
'Why must you always torment me?'
Her laughter grows louder and she reaches for him; pulling him onto the bed beside her, curling herself into the warmth of him. She should have known. Should have expected it might feel like this.
'I love you too,' she murmurs, voice small, a little uncertain. Not about her feelings, but of what it means to share them. 'But…did you come here…to this forest…for me?'
His eyes narrow, seemingly thinking on his answer. 'I thought the enchantress of the wood could break the spell. I—I didn't expect you. I expected an old lady, or at least that was what I was told.'
Rey chuckles, shaking her head. 'That was my teacher—my aunt. Warden over these woods has passed through the women of my family for centuries. I—I wanted to believe myself a part of it so badly, I didn't consider what it was to be human anymore.' Guilt affects the words, even if it is without base.
'Which is why you sought out Bazine?'
She nods, her hand reaching to cup his cheek.
'I thought she might be better. Be more real.'
'You're real.'
That statement makes her smile.
'And so are you. Real and warm and beautiful. Whether now or then.'
When she had made him into a monster, even then he was beautiful still.
'What now, then?'
Rey had wondered that too. Had gutted herself with worries and anxieties, but in this moment she only has one answer:
'We live.'
And she bridges the gap between them, lips pressing softly against his. It is like true Spring; the warmth of the sun; the refreshing cascade of light rain; the life it encourages and the future it promises.
All theirs for the taking.