It wassilent in the meadow, but the dark hedge was gone. Flowers dotted the edges where the forest stood, silent and watchful over its residents. He cradled her in the grass, her arms twined around his neck.
“There’s a darkness,” she whispered. “And it scares me so much.”
“Do not fear the darkness.”
“And when the darkness is in me? Should I fear it then?”
“No,” he said, lifting her hand from his neck, knitting their fingers together. “Look, my love, there is light, too.”
Glowing silver letters pressed against gold. Their arms linked in the moonlight. His dark skin was lit from within by pure white light. And her pale skin—almost white in the moonlight—was touched by burnished gold. Glimmering black lined the edges of her mating marks, and they burned with frightening beauty.
“We were meant to be like this,” he whispered. “Two halves of the same soul. Dark and light together.”
“How do you know?”
“I know because you told me.”
“I did?”
He bent to her ear and whispered, “Remember…”