Phoenix Maplewood there was an empty space in the shadow beside you

Absently, she pulled back, preening the fur behind his ear. She remained silent in her worry, for even though she liked the wood (for she had always found the allure of thickly wooded places ever so enchanting) this observation was pushed aside.  "maybe we should have gone south." He pulled back, and his fur slipped away from her without complaint, and her gaze met his steadily. "no." 

to the latter she did not answer, but an acknowledging flick of her ears offered all the agreement needed. but this she could not share with him, not this time. for her pride was her weakness, and with her pride came a fierce avoidance of ever, ever appearing weak, as Pema had so implied. and certainly, these feelings - longing for an open future, the unknown, free wanderings, were selfish and thus weak. for a leader did not desire these things; a leader desired all that had been offered to her. and to shrink before her neatly paved future was to be weak in the face that all that was to come, and this - 

he was speaking again, the lyrical words slashing through the threads of thought in her mind, scattering them. she blinked at him, moving nearer a moment. "I want you." again, a simple statement, but one not as simple as it was intoned. she wanted to want him as easily as it was to say it, to want him and the future he offered. she was still as she regarded him, not sure why the words had left her maw.