13. Sakura
THIRTEEN
SAKURA
The plan is simple: watch Valesh. Document her movements. Find proof.
Simple plans, in my experience, have a way of becoming complicated.
“You don’t have to do this.” Torin is pacing my partially rebuilt studio. “The Network can handle surveillance.”
“My sensitivity might detect siphon activity.” I’m sorting crystals—the few that survived the sabotage—trying to make order from chaos. “If she’s checking on devices, I’ll feel it before anyone else does.”
“That’s exactly what concerns me.”
“Your concern is noted and overruled.” I set down a rose quartz that hums with residual energy. “She destroyed my studio. She tried to drive me out of town. I want to be there when we catch her.”
“Revenge isn’t—”
“Justice.” I meet his gaze. “I want justice. There’s a difference.”
He stops pacing. Studies me with those warm brown eyes that notice everything.
“You’re not going to let this go.”
“Absolutely not.”
A long pause. Then, almost a sigh: “Fine. But we do this my way. Careful. Controlled. No heroics.”
“Bears don’t do heroics?”
“Bears do heroics constantly. That’s the problem.” He moves toward the door. “Tonight. After sunset. Wear dark clothes and try not to create any weather.”
“I can’t control—”
“Try.” His lips twitch. “The mist will cover most of it, but sudden lightning tends to attract attention.”
He’s gone before I can argue.
I stare at the closed door for a long moment. Then I look at the crystals scattered across my workspace.
Surveillance. With Torin. For hours. In the dark. Alone.
This is going to be fine.
The crystals rattle with barely suppressed static. Outside, the sky darkens with clouds that weren’t there five minutes ago.
A knock at the door makes me jump. But it’s not Torin returning—it’s Berry Thornwick, clutching a book to her chest like a shield.
“The shop insisted.” She thrusts the book at me. “Very insistent. Practically threw it at me when I tried to leave.”
I look at the title. “Stakeout of the Heart: A Surveillance Romance.”
“I don’t control the shop’s literary recommendations.” Berry’s expression is utterly innocent. “It just... knows things. About people. And their romantic situations.”
“How does a bookshop know about my romantic situation?”
“Surveillance can be boring. Unless you make it interesting.” She winks and disappears before I can respond.
I stare at the book. The cover features a man and woman hiding behind bushes, their faces very close together.
Valesh’s house sits in a quiet residential area of The Hollow—respectable, well-maintained, utterly unremarkable. The kind of home that belongs to a trusted community member with nothing to hide.
We’re positioned across the street, tucked into the shadows of an alley between two shops. The mist provides cover, swirling thick and low tonight. Good for hiding. Less good for visibility.
Torin shifts beside me, and I hear the rustle of paper.
“What are you doing?”
“Anticipating.” He produces a small bag from his jacket. “Surveillance can take hours. You’ll get hungry.”
I peer into the bag. Chocolate. The good kind—dark with sea salt, my absolute favorite. A small container of the spiced nuts from Sunny’s bakery. Two of the lemon bars I mentioned loving yesterday.
“How do you always know what I want?”
“I pay attention.”
“That’s...” I search for the right word. “Disconcerting.”
“Romantic sounds better.”
I stare at him in the darkness. He’s brought me snacks. Surveillance snacks. Carefully curated based on observed preferences and casual comments.
“You’re ridiculous.”
“I’m thorough.” He holds out the chocolate. “Eat. It helps with the cold.”
I take a piece. It melts on my tongue—rich and sweet with just enough salt. Perfect.
“This is very good chocolate.”
“You mentioned it. Three weeks ago. When Berry gave you a sample from her trip to the coast.”
“You remembered a throwaway comment about chocolate from three weeks ago?”
“I remember everything you say.” His voice is matter-of-fact. Unembarrassed. “It’s becoming a problem, honestly. My brain has started organizing information by Sakura-relevance.”
“That sounds obsessive.”
“It’s incredibly obsessive. I’ve made peace with it.” He takes a piece of chocolate himself. “How long do we wait?”
“I thought you were the expert on surveillance.”
“As long as it takes.”
“That’s not a timeframe.”
“Surveillance rarely is.” Torin shifts slightly, adjusting his position. He’s warm and solid and disturbingly close. “Patience is part of the process.”
“I told you before, I’m not good at patience.”
“I’ve noticed.”
“That sounded judgmental.”
“It sounded observational.” His voice holds a hint of humor. “You’re many things, Sakura. Patient isn’t one of them.”
“What things am I?”
The question slips out before I can stop it. In the dark, in the cold, with hours stretching ahead of us, it feels like the kind of question that needs asking.
He’s quiet for a moment. Considering.
“I’ve had too much time, probably. Watching you from across the square.”
The cold seeps through my jacket, but my face feels warm. “Is this part of standard surveillance protocol? Complimenting the civilian you’re protecting?”
“No.” A shift in the shadows—he’s turned toward me. “This is me being honest because the dark makes it easier.”
“Easier than what?”
“Than looking at you when I say these things and seeing you decide whether to run.”
My heart hammers against my ribs. “I’m not running.”
“Yet.”
“At all.” I take a breath. “I’m tired of running.” I swallow. “I don’t want to leave Mistvale.”
“Good.”
“For the first time in years, I don’t want to be anywhere else. I don’t know what to do with that.”
The words hang in the cold air. I can’t take them back. Don’t want to.
Before he can respond, a light flickers in Valesh’s window.
We fall silent. Watch.
The light moves through the house—bedroom to hallway to kitchen. Valesh’s silhouette passes the window, then disappears.
Minutes tick by. The cold deepens.
Rain starts to fall—gentle at first, then steadier. I pull my jacket tighter.
“Is this you?”
“No.”
“You’re lying.”
“I’m not—” I stop. Close my eyes. Feel the tension in my chest, the anxiety that’s been building since we started this vigil. “Maybe. A little. I can’t always tell anymore.”
“It’s fine.” His voice is unexpectedly gentle. “The rain provides cover.”
“That’s very optimistic.”
“I’m trying to be supportive.”
A laugh escapes me—quiet, surprised. “Since when are you supportive of my weather disasters?”
“Since I realized they’re not disasters. They’re just... you.” He shifts closer. Not touching, but near enough that I feel the heat of him. “Your emotions made visible. It’s not a flaw.”
“Tell that to the people I’ve flooded.”
“You’ve spent years apologizing for what you are.” His hand finds mine in the darkness. “I’m asking you to stop.”
His palm is warm against my cold fingers. I should pull away—should maintain professional distance, should remember that we’re supposed to be watching for a Preserver agent, not having emotional conversations in the rain.
I don’t pull away.
“You mean every word you say to me.” It comes out barely above a whisper. The rain patters between us, steady and quiet.
“Yes.” He shifts closer. “I mean the ones I say and the ones I write. All of them. Even the clumsy ones.”
“Especially those.” My grip tightens on his hand. “Torin—”
Movement in the house. We both freeze.
Valesh appears at her front door. Coat on. Bag in hand. Moving with purpose.
“She’s leaving.” Torin releases my hand—the loss of warmth immediate and unwelcome. “Which direction?”
“North.” I watch her turn onto the main road. “Toward the Overgrowth.”
“At this hour?”
“Nothing innocent happens in the Overgrowth at midnight.”
He’s already moving. “Stay close. Stay quiet. If anything feels wrong—”
“Get behind you. I remember.” I fall into step beside him. “But, Torin? After this is over. We should talk about...”
“I know.” His voice is warm despite the circumstances. “We will. I promise.”
The Overgrowth is different after dark.
During the day, it’s wild and beautiful—aggressive gardens, strange paths, magic bleeding through at the edges. But at night, with the mist thick and the wild magic active, it becomes a different place entirely. Dangerous. Watchful. Alive in ways that make the hair on my arms stand up.
The trees seem to watch. The paths shift when you’re not looking. Reality feels thin here, flexible in ways that make my elemental senses scream.
A dryad materializes briefly at the edge of my vision—just a face in the bark, ancient eyes observing our passage before fading back into the wood. The tree spirits consider this area partially theirs. They watch. They remember.
“I feel it.” I press closer to Torin without meaning to. “The wrongness. It’s stronger here. Like the air itself is poisoned.”
The path twists beneath us. I could swear it wasn’t turning this direction a moment ago, but the Overgrowth has its own ideas about where visitors should go.
“Stay close,” Torin murmurs. “The paths here can separate people who aren’t careful.”
“Personal experience?”
“A training exercise when I was younger. Spent three hours trying to find my way back to the group. The forest found it amusing.” His hand finds mine in the darkness—anchor and reassurance. “I’m not losing you to aggressive shrubbery.”
Despite the tension, I almost smile. “Aggressive shrubbery?”
“The technical term. Very official.”
We push through and the Overgrowth fights us. Paths that were clear moments ago now twist in wrong directions. Branches grab at our clothes.
We lose sight of Valesh and try to catch up, but I don’t think that’s going to happen. She must have spelled the vegetation to allow her through, but no one else.
The wild magic responds to my fear, to my surging power, and the weather starts to churn.
Control. I need control.
But control has never been my strength. Survival has. Running has.
I’m very good at running.