When Ash had met Laney in Boston he had thought she was a victim, someone to be rescued and then forgotten.  It was what he had wanted her to be.  Yet this young wolf whose face reminded him so much of his bonded one would not be easily parted from him after he rescued her.  At first he thought the newness would wear off provided he made life difficult for her, but life with Ash was always difficult and Laney had never budged. 

He had tried to ditch her in the frozen North around Christmas time with a pack he had heard was quite renowned.  That was where they'd met Jessica and Alex and become some sort of bizarre traveling band bound for New Orleans on a mysterious calling.  He'd tried to run her to death in Mississippi, tried to deride her, to force her to give up, but she had fainted, gotten lost, pouted a bit, and in the end had not changed in her desire.  All she had wanted from him was to be taught.  She wanted to be like him.

That might seem like an easy request to oblige, but it was a lot easier to decide something for the rest of your life than it was to stand towards the end looking back.  Ash wasn't sure that he wanted to send someone off down his path even if he hoped that he could make it easier on them than it had been on himself.  When he looked in Laney's eyes he couldn't help but see Evie.  Maybe he always would, and the thought of the light going out of those eyes killed something inside of him.

Waiting for Laney to get home he had laid a yoga mat out on the back porch of the swamp house.  Evening meditation was a ritual taught to him by Anya so long ago that the memories were only snippets.  As he relaxed into the lotus pose his spine straightened and he breathed deeply in through his nose and out through his mouth.  The marks blossomed inside him and sudddenly he could see into an entirely different place.

When he didn't fight the marks, when he let them open, he could feel and see and know all that Marcus and Evie had to offer him.  There was love there and pure unadulterated joy as they spent their lives twined together.  Their hearts reached towards him and his shields held them at bay just enough, just enough to look but never touch.  Right now he needed a favor from Marcus, something only the vampire who was love in its purest form could provide to him.

Letting that question on his mind stretch out into the void he waited for the vampire and empath to commune and return to him with an answer.  In that time he basked in their healing glow and in their purity.  As he waited he didn't regret the time with them, but regretted that they were apart.  So very far from one another not just in miles but in the leagues that seperated the core of their beings.  He had told Marcus once long ago that he would make a terrible animal to call, and yet to save his life this unshakable bond had been formed.  Now, Ash was grateful.  Not because of the power or lifespan it brought, but because he would not trade those brief glimpses of pure happiness for anything.

"Ash....we have no reason to believe the prophecy isn't true.  Alex seems to agree with the visions.  Now, we just wait....together."

"Thank you."

The words were spoken aloud even though Evie and Marcus would have heard him anyway.  He had his answer.  Hearing noise in the house behind him he severed the connection that had only been active for a little while.  Such a short time to be in the center of that bliss.  Unfurling from the lotus position he rose to his feet in smooth movements, ever a creature of liquid silver effortlessness. 

"Laney, come out here.  I need to speak to you pet."

He had to tell her about their move to Alex's house.  To give her the gift that he had bought her, and to finally and truly agree to what she had wanted from him all along.  In helping Alex earlier in the week Ash had finally decided what he needed to do.  He needed to give Laney what she wanted.  To train her, to teach her, and to leave a piece of himself in the world when he was finally snuffed out of it.