Port Sitka is known for its beaches. The soft white sand, the glimmering waves. But today, Rose has taken me to the forest.

We’ve walked along these green, sunlit trails before. Explored the hidden pathways, usually with Charlie scampering a few feet ahead of us. Jahn and Scholz, the two Stasi agents watching over him - they're bored of this assignment, and it shows in their carelessness. They let Charlie out of their sight for hours, which I'm sure they were directed not to do. They regularly go into town to drink at the pub, leaving Charlie at home by himself. They don't care if Rose takes him from the farmhouse, which she does all the time.

The farmhouse is a beautiful old building, steeped in history. Lovingly maintained by the owner, a local man I’ve identified as Joe Finley. But Charlie hates it there.

All of his fears are so much worse there. He cries more easily, can’t be alone in its rooms. He clings even to Scholz and Jahn, who shake him off with obvious annoyance.

But it's not his fault. It’s the place he was nearly kidnapped from. The memories there haunt him.

So we take him away from the farmhouse whenever we can. To the beach, the town, the forest.

I love these excursions. Out in the forest, with Rose at my side and Charlie exploring up ahead - I can let myself imagine that we can’t be touched. That all the different forces working to keep us apart have fallen away.

I’m sharply aware of how precious these perfect, golden days are. There's no telling how many of them we have left. So I seize every opening, every opportunity to steal Rose and Charlie away. To cherish what little time we may have.

But it was Rose who suggested today’s adventure, and I have the sense that it’s for the purpose of something important. She keeps glancing at me, some quiet nervousness in her gorgeous eyes.

I glance at Charlie, who is weaving through the tremendous trunks of the Sitka spruces up ahead, gathering fistfuls of stones and moss and leaves. He’s preoccupied with that venture, so I slip my fingers into Rose’s, give her a look with my eyes full of questions.

She shakes her head at me, but doesn’t take her hand from mine.

“You’ll see,” she whispers. “Soon. I promise.”

We’ve struck out far into the forest, this time. So far that even Charlie is beginning to slow down, growing tired.

Rose and I are tired, too, and not just from the long walk. We’ve been doing everything we can to prepare for the day that the world catches up to us.

We're trying to plan down to the smallest detail. I even asked Rose if she could create some kind of magical signal, something akin to a distress flare. She tried to make light, but as she told me before, it isn’t her specialty. It glowed green, like a shady forest, like a boulder blanketed with moss. Like her eyes.

We agreed that if I see that green light, I’ll know that she’s in trouble.

I’ve also been doing whatever I can to help Charlie overcome his fears. Rose tends towards soothing words, touch, closeness. I have my own methods.

“Really?” Rose laughed, when she found me giving Charlie a demonstration on how to neatly break someone’s fingers. "I leave you two alone for one minute, and this is what I come back to?"

“It's only for emergencies," I protested, before turning back to Charlie. "Remember, baby, the pinkie is the weakest finger. That’s the easiest one for you to break. If you can’t catch that one, grab any of them. But just one, alright? They’re stronger together. Everything is.”

I know how true that last piece of advice I gave him is. I’ve been sending only very specific intelligence back to Command, trying to stall, to give them the impression that the time isn't right to make a move on either Rose or Charlie. But I don’t know what their plan is. All I know is that our chances are better if we’re together.

And... I just want to stay close to them. I just want to be happy with Rose and Charlie, while I can.

I take long breaths of the green, peaceful forest air. I covertly touch my fingers to Rose’s lower back, then bend down to scoop up Charlie, who I can tell is starting to get thoroughly worn out.

“Are we almost - wherever we’re going?” I ask Rose, speaking quietly. “We’ll be carrying Charlie all the way home, if not.”

I expected her to look around at our surroundings, but instead, she closes her eyes.

“Yes,” she says, opening them again. “Almost there. Very close.”

This is a part of the woods I can’t recall walking through before. Beautiful, though. The trees grow thick and close together, the sunlight dappling through their wind-stirred leaves. I’ve been faintly aware of a quiet rushing noise for some time, now, but it’s growing stronger as we walk. There must be a creek up ahead.

We step out through a break in the close-growing trees, and there it is. The creek. It's fast-moving, stunningly clear, edged with greenery. Just further uphill from where we stand, a small, naturally-formed shelf of earth and rock rises up from the water. It forms a little waterfall, and there, in the very center of that waterfall, growing out from the ledge -

“Oh,” I breathe, my heart standing still. “Rose, is that-?”

“Yes." She casts a nervous look at me, then takes my hand. "I - I wanted you to see it."

I can't answer her. I just stand there, frozen, my breath stolen away by the Guardian Tree.

It’s so small, compared to the giants all around us. No bigger than a tree that might grow in someone's backyard. But it looks very old, and very delicate.

It has a graceful trunk with dark, aged bark, half-covered in a blanket of ferns, brush, and fungi that rises all the way up into the highest branches. Supporting so much life, for such a fragile little thing. And with surprising reach, too. Small though it is, the Tree’s branches spread out far enough to cast shade over the banks on either side of the creek.

The canopy is thick with leaves, of a kind I’ve never seen before. They're opalescent, like a dragonfly wing. They release a sound like a peaceful sigh as they dance on the breeze, shimmering in the late afternoon light.

The slender, curved roots of the Tree are secured in the earth right beneath the water's surface. The waterfall pours around them, splashing against the bark. White, bell-shaped flowers sprout directly out of the Tree’s side, and grow in clusters on the grassy banks of the creek.

I’m stunned into speechlessness by the sublime, otherworldly beauty of this place. But I’m also stunned that Rose would take me here. Her power, her life - both are intricately tied to this Tree, and she just trusted me with its location. Even knowing who and what I am.

I need to breathe, to sit down. Charlie has passed out in my arms, so I gently lower him into a bed of those beautiful white flowers. He curls up there, sleepy and content.

I move to sit down on a patch of soft grass, giving Charlie some space. Rose follows me away from him, and we sit together, surrounded by the flowers, gazing at the Tree.

I can't believe that Rose trusted me with this. My heart is overfull, faltering and stuttering. I lay out on my back and stretch my arms over my head, close my eyes.

A moment later, I feel a gentle hand spread on my stomach, and full, soft lips pressed against mine.

I take Rose's head in my hands, then kiss her back. Slowly, intensely, adoringly. The natural music of the forest sings in my ears. The creek, the birds, the grasshoppers, the rippling leaves. And her breathing, her heartbeat, the way it all stumbles when I nibble her softly.

This is paradise, I think to myself.

Rose must be feeling the same way. I sense it in her body language, her dreamy kisses, the way she’s melting over me like honey.

When she draws back, she folds herself over me, tucking her face into my neck.

I hold her close and stroke her hair, looking up at the golden afternoon around us, at the way it shines down through the trees. I never want to move from this place, this moment. Never.

“Leyla,” Rose says softly. “I want a thousand more days like this. I want more than that.”

I push my nose into her hair, lock my arms around her.

“Have faith, darling,” I murmur. “We have a plan. It's already in motion.”

"I know, but - every time I’m with you like this, I’m so happy, and at the same time, I’m also heartbroken, because...”

This could be the last time.

She doesn't say it out loud, but I know that's what she's thinking.

I suddenly find myself determined to make Rose forget about that, even just for a few seconds. To let her experience what it feels like for us to be together, without having to worry about what might rip us apart.

To do that, I have to let go of those worries, myself. I have to experience it myself.

I roll us over, look down at the beautiful spirit in the grass beneath me. I lean down to kiss her, and as I do, I take a deep breath. I release everything except my feelings for her.

I sink my mouth against her mouth. I let all of my love for her pour forth, unclouded by anything else. I let it radiate out from me in waves, let it seep into her skin, let it fill the air. I can almost envision it around us, glowing softly like a shield of gold.

What flows from me to her is pure, undiluted. It shares the stage with nothing else.

When I draw back, Rose gazes up at me, her cheeks burning, her eyes wide. They're so luminous with her happiness that it takes me a moment to recognize the sparkling green fire within them.

“Are you doing magic?” I ask, surprised.

“I don’t know,” she stammers. “Something - I don’t know. I’m not trying to. Am I?”

I let out a burst of laughter, smiling down at her. “My darling wife, can you really not tell-?”

I cut myself off sharply, realizing what I said. I stare at Rose, and she stares up at me, her eyes even wider than they were before.

“Oh,” I say softly. “I'm sorry, love. Sometimes, with you, I get a little carried - carried away…”

I fade off, watching the radiant fire in Rose’s eyes turn so bright that her cheeks and nose are dusted with the glow. And then -

Pathways light up in my mind. Strings that haven’t been pulled on in years, memories I had forgotten so thoroughly that I didn’t realize I’d lost them in the first place. They come alive in rich, vivid intensity. I can see them, smell them, taste them, touch them.

I’m a little girl with my hair in bows, giggling excitedly as a birthday cake - thick with frosting, bathed in the warm glow of lit candles - is set down in front of me. Behind it is a big wrapped box, a present I’m itching to open.

I’m bundled up in my dad’s arms. He’s carrying me upstairs, but I’m only pretending to be asleep. He puts me in my bed, tucks me in. When he goes back downstairs, I hear his soft voice mingled with my mom's. I know they’re both down there, sitting by the fireplace. I feel safe, cozy in my blankets.

I’m biting into a piece of warm, crunchy toast, which my mom scraped with butter and then coated with her homemade strawberry jam. A light steam rises from it in the early morning cold.

I’m at a school dance and I’ve just slipped past the chaperones, made it outside. A strange feeling in my stomach when one of the girls from my class comes out there and stands with me. Her lipstick is badly done, so I smooth it away from the corner of her mouth, staining my fingertips red. Such a warm, fluttery, overwhelming feeling, so much heat in my cheeks. Afterwards, back home, laying alone in bed. Staring at that trace of red she left behind on my hand.

I’m suppressing a giant grin as the close-combat instructor back at base compliments my form, tells the other recruits to watch how I do it. I’m nearly crumbling apart with relief as I whip around to see my partner for a mission step through the door of the safe house, when I thought he’d been smoked out. I’m on my back in a big, soft bed, and there’s a gorgeous woman bent over me, whispering in my ear while I pant helplessly and twist beneath her and clutch handfuls of silky sheets.

I’m in my own bed for the first time after a mission that required me to sleep on the hard ground for a week. I’m delivering Sparrow to the embassy, seeing her step into a safe place unharmed. I’m swimming in the calm grey ocean at dawn, and it’s just beginning to rain.

I’m looking down at Charlie, who just called me mom in his sleepy haze.

I’m on the front step of the beach cottage, with Rose, seconds away from kissing her.

Tears are suddenly gathering in my eyes. My warmest, happiest memories are dancing through my head, each one leaving behind an imprint of the way I felt when I formed it. The image flashes by, and I’m left with the feeling, the taste, the emotion.

So many perfect, beautiful sensations. Each memory hits me so powerfully that I gasp, but they build on each other, too. The cumulative effect is like nothing I've ever felt before.

“Rose,” I stammer, overwhelmed. “What - what are you doing to me, darling?”

“I don’t know.” She sounds breathless, stunned. “Sometimes I do magic by accident, but I - I’ve never done whatever this is…”

She takes a deep breath, like she’s concentrating hard. The flow of memories slows, then stops.

I’ve melted into Rose without realizing it. She gently eases me upright. We stare at each other, entranced.

“Did you see all that, too?” I manage, and she nods.

“I can’t believe you let me,” she says quietly, her green eyes enormous. “Even if you didn’t mean to, you did. You - you must really trust me.”

“With all my heart, darling,” I laugh, feeling boneless and staggered. “And to think all I have to do to make that happen is call you my wife. I’ll have to start doing it all the time.”

Rose freezes, then lets out a laugh, her cheeks turning scarlet.

“I - don’t mind that idea,” she says softly, plucking at the hem of my slacks. “Except that it’s not fair, unless I can call you that, too.”

She peeks up at me from the very top of her eyes, then immediately looks away again.

I arch an eyebrow, then tuck a fingertip under her chin, make her look at me again. There’s a silence, and then we both dissolve into warm, dazed laughter, curling closer together.

A little voice calls out to us. We turn to see Charlie, woken up from his nap, headed across the grass towards us.

“Careful, sweetheart,” I call back to him. “Don't crush the flowers!”

“No, I won't!” He looks down at the graceful, bell-shaped blossoms. “What are these, mom? They're pretty!”

"Aren't they?" I touch a fingertip to one of them. “They’re Calla lilies.”

"Calla lilies," Charlie repeats, trying the new words out for himself.

He's careful not to crush any flowers, but he throws himself down onto us when he gets close enough, drawing surprised laughter from both of us. I wrap my arms around Rose and Charlie, and we snuggle up together in the shade of the Guardian Tree.

I close my eyes, savor this weightless moment with my wife and my son.

I know that the storm is on the horizon, getting closer every day. But I have to believe that I can keep them safe from it.

All I want is to build a future as warm, bright, and beautiful as those pieces of the past I just swam through. I have to believe that it's possible.

I have to.