She moved into a beam of light, the golden pillar setting her face on fire. The yellowness of the light, amongst the gently filtered green hues of the space, brought warmth and softness to her pale skin. I felt my breath catch in my throat, paralyzing me. This was terrible danger. Not the immediate, physical peril I was growing so accustomed to. No, this was a danger of something else—more insidious, more permanent. Something so avoidable and yet inevitable.

She looked suddenly like a girl.

I remembered how she had marched through our Griid-train the first time I saw her. How she had gone to speak to Dirk, parading past me and Chowwick, past all the merchants and guards, as though she were the master of our caravan. The way she had kissed me that time, so brazen. She had been clearly showing off, flaunting her attractiveness, cowing all of us with her control of her sexuality. None of that was evident now. It was like this private moment had stripped all that bare. Only her face showed, the suit protecting the rest of her, and yet she seemed so naked in that moment.

I had thought of her often. Of that kiss. Of the way she moved, the brazen backward glances. Of the way we had spoken after she helped me fend Danefer off. I can't deny that I thought of her with a hunger. Strangely, that hunger waned as I stood here. I didn't want to take her as I looked on that expression. I didn't want to tear the armor from her and explode the bomb of desire ticking inside of me. I just wanted to put my arms out for her. She seemed so frail.

"Ti…" she said, stepping closer.

More letters had slipped between us since that first she had sent to me. There was risk in it. Griidlords could fraternize, within reason, between cities. We were lords of the highest order; we could build relations, make our own choices. Our letters should have been safe—who would dare break the seal of a Griidlord? And yet, the choices of our words had clearly revealed a caution of being observed.

Her first letter had been a plea, an invitation—but to what, I hadn't been sure beyond a vague, regretful hope.

"I want a friend. I want a conversation."

I took a step closer as well. I realized my helm was still in place and let it fade back, showing her my face.

My response had been so nervous. Even standing with her, alone, feeling nearly as naked as her face made her, I hated myself for that constant uncertainty. In the midst of rambling scribbles I had said:

"I didn't think I would write back. I'm not good at this kind of thing, but you've probably realized that already. If we could get the chance to sit across from one another without the world watching—whether or not that would be a good idea… if we did, I'd like to keep talking."

She smiled. How that smile transformed her. She had seemed such a devil when the others were there. She had played to them, played to me. She had been a performance, I think. With the smile, a little bit of that confidence resumed in her. She started to burn again with that character that was both gravitationally inevitable and intimidating all at once.

"You did come… I really wasn't sure…"

I said, "Didn't I say I would? Were you afraid I was lying or did you think I'd chicken out?"

She said, "Honestly… I thought you might cry off. I know a little about you. I know you had a weird courting going on in Boston."

She smiled, unable to conceal her amusement. I couldn't tell if the smile was cruel, mocking, or just plain and honest. She suppressed the smile.

"I'm sorry, Ti… I know how that ended. I'm not laughing at you… just the absurdity of it."

My cheeks glowed. I hadn't imagined she might know of my pursuit of Lauren and Katya. I certainly hadn't imagined she might know I had been jilted by not one, but both of them—and for each other. I found myself hesitating, my foot hovering, unable to move closer. I didn't want to be seen like that. I didn't want to be seen for the pathetic, failed romantic that I felt I was.

I wanted so badly to be close with someone, to be known. I had conquered demons and armies. I had exceeded the expectations a city placed in its very gods. I had stood victor over Doom. I had stood before a vanquished Morningstar. And yet here, unsure of what this was, what to really expect from this secret rendezvous, I was anxious again. I cursed the name of my dead father for what he had done to me, making me nothing but his tool.

She saw my hesitation, my embarrassment, and rushed to cover her words.

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"No… Ti… you're not understanding me. Not the absurdity of you—"

She closed the gap between us in dazzling, light steps, making up for my hesitation. Just like that she was before me, only inches between our bodies. My head swam, my heart hammered harder than it had when I stood across the field from Rosegold herself. I was aware, so impossibly aware, of the contours of her suit, the way it ran over the hills and valleys of her body. I was aware of her smallness this close to me, of the way she looked up to my face as I looked down. I was all at once eclipsed and comforted by the confidence and power of the personality looking up at me through those eyes.

Her voice was kind. I might have hated that kindness, read pity into the negative spaces—but I didn't.

"I just think it's so silly. The situation. The outcome. The choices. I mean… I don't want to belittle what must have been true love to make them choose each other over you. It must have been that. There's no other way to explain it. I just still… I shake my head and laugh every time I think of it. When I think about what they gave up."

I felt the heat in my cheeks, prayed that the green hues and shadows of the cave of trees would hide it. I suddenly remembered another secret place like this, outside the walls of Boston, where Katya and I had meditated together. I remembered the heat and nervousness, the excitement and trepidation I had felt then as well.

She had written me back. A third letter between us, pulling us to this time and place.

"It's stupid, I know. We belong to different cities and our destiny might be to meet on the field. Arrow of Minneapolis, Sword of Boston. But there's something that's been there since the first I met you. Something I felt stronger again after we met in the wilds near Buffalo." — she hadn't mentioned Danefer or the Greenmen. That had been a clandestine action. She knew that much at least shouldn't be laid on the page for spying eyes to read. "It feels like gravity between us. Maybe we're meant to be like two planets, trapped orbiting each other, never to actually meet. But I still feel trapped. I feel like I need to know you, Ti. I can't explain it fully, but I am trapped until I do. I don't know if truly knowing you will free me, like I hope it will, or if it will just leave me disappointed and more alone."

The gauntlet on her right hand dissolved, the particulate mystorium flowing back into the forearm of her suit, and her bare ivory hand lifted to my cheek, touching the hotness of my embarrassment.

There was too much silence, and I felt the need to speak.

"I… I don't want you to think I'm not excited to… speak with you. I want a friend as well… I mean, I have friends. But I… It's like you said, we come from the same place… I just…"

I didn't mean to let her see me wince. I hated the awkwardness of my words. Why couldn't I find my own tongue? I stood awkwardly, unsure how to move, not knowing what to do with my hands. Why did I have to sound like such an idiot?

But her eyes narrowed. There was a flash of that deadly predator I had seen before. Her eyes locked on mine, and that devilishness was back in full force—a devil that was suddenly and obviously hungry.

I went looking for words again. I tried to find them. But she silenced me.

Her body surged forward into mine, the shockingly softness of her breasts through her suit pressing against me, her form leaning up so her lips could find me. She pressed her lips to mine, almost mashed them against me, her arms around my neck, drawing me down to her. The heat, the hunger, it poured from her into me.

And for the first time, I wasn't unsure at all. Nature and a lifetime of repression were a weight the dams could hold no more. My body moved of its own, I pressed back into the kiss. My tongue could spew no more foolishness as it busily met hers. I suddenly knew exactly what to do with my hands. I cupped her lower back, ran my fingers down the curve of those lean, powerful legs. A hand rose up the achingly perfect arch of her hip and waist, and I found her breast. I wasn't startled when she let the armor melt from her chest—I responded instantly, letting my own hand become naked so I could feel the yielding softness of her chest, only a thin layer of fabric between my fingers and the bud of her nipple.

It's strange how the most indelible memory of the moment was that fabric. I can still feel the texture of it—the cords of its weave, its thinness—as it slid against my fingertips, the yielding, excited flesh just beneath.

Did she fall back and pull me with her? Did I push her down and take her to the soft leaves and smells of damp earth beneath us? However it happened, I was on her, our lips welded together, our suits melting away to bare flesh as our hands moved like animals of their own wills.

Later we lay together in the shade, at the base of a stout tree, hovering in a strange reality of perfect peace and the knowledge of stolen time. The Griid-train waited beyond the trees.

I was on my back, more flesh exposed to the air than had been in months. She lay across my bare chest, her naked breasts pressed into me, our nearly bare legs intertwined.

I had never known peace or satisfaction as I did in that moment. Here was something I had been missing too long. Touch, affection, gratification. All of them reciprocal. Not dancing on strings to please a father, or impress his stand-in. This was something truly real, whatever the hell it was and however long it might last.

It felt strangely like waking up.

We probably lay too long like that. She had duties, I had duties—more than a hundred men stood waiting in the near distance for me, surely oblivious to the reason why they waited.

She lifted her head and looked up at me. Her closeness, her scent, the warmth of her breath as she spoke—none of it filled me with anything but comfort and fresh desire.

She said, "This… this was probably a mistake…"

My heart fell a little. But the feeling was replaced by a determination, a certainty that it had not been. I would not let this disappear so easily. I would fight to make her see that it was no mistake.

Before I could respond she smiled, the devil dancing in her eyes.

"But I'd like to make a mistake like this again with you sometime…"

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