CHAPTER 12 THE SHAPE OF ABSENCE
Dawn came too quickly after Jace left, and Eli couldn't sleep.
He'd tried. He'd lain in the furs that still smelled like Jace—sunlight and spice and something uniquely him—and willed himself to rest. But his mind wouldn't quiet.
His body wouldn't settle. Every sound in the forest made him tense, listening for Jace's return even though he knew it was impossible.
By mid-morning, hunger finally drove him out of the cave.
His body needed food. He'd burned through his reserves over the past week—hunting with Jace, making love to Jace, barely eating because he was too focused on Jace. Now his stomach was cramping, his wolf instincts demanding he hunt.
So he did.
He shifted to wolf form and tracked a young elk through the northern section of his territory. The hunt was mechanical, efficient. His body knew what to do even when his mind was elsewhere. He brought the elk down cleanly, his jaws closing around its throat with practiced precision.
But when the elk fell, there was no satisfaction.
No triumph. No sense of accomplishment.
Just... emptiness.
He shifted back to human form and stared at the kill. Normally, this would be a good day—fresh meat, a clean hunt, his territory secure. But all he could think was: Jace would have loved this. He would have circled from the east while I came from the west. We would have taken it down together.
Eli forced himself to eat. He carved off portions of meat, built a small fire, cooked enough to sustain himself. But the food tasted like ash in his mouth.
After an hour, he gave up.
He left the elk carcass for scavengers and returned to the cave, his stomach still half-empty, his mind completely elsewhere.
The walk back felt longer than it should have. Every tree, every rock, every stream reminded him of Jace. We hunted here. We bathed there. He laughed at me when I slipped on that moss.
By the time Eli reached the cave entrance, the sun was setting, and he felt like he'd aged a decade in a single day.
He stood at the threshold and looked inside.
The space that had been his sanctuary for three years now felt like a tomb.
For three years, he'd told himself he was content with solitude. That he didn't need anyone. That isolation was safety, and connection was weakness.
He'd been lying to himself.
Because one day without Jace felt like suffocation.
Eli paced the cave, his bare feet silent on the stone floor. He moved from the sleeping area to the fire pit to the entrance and back again, over and over, like a caged animal.
He kept expecting to hear Jace's voice. To smell his scent. To feel his presence.
Instead, there was nothing but the echo of his own breathing and the oppressive weight of silence.
This was different from the loneliness he'd felt before Jace.
Before, the silence had been neutral—neither good nor bad, just there. A fact of his existence.
Now, the silence was a living thing. It pressed against his chest, crawled under his skin, whispered that maybe Jace wouldn't come back.
Eli stopped pacing and pressed his palms against the cave wall, breathing hard.
"Five days," he said aloud, his voice low. "He said five days."
But five days felt like an eternity.
Evening fell, and Eli built a fire more out of habit than need.
He sat cross-legged in front of the flames, trying to read an old book he'd kept in the cave for years—some human novel about survival in the wilderness that he'd found abandoned in a cabin years ago.
The words blurred on the page.
He read the same paragraph three times and still couldn't tell you what it said.
His mind was elsewhere. His entire being was focused on the bond—the psychic connection he shared with Jace—waiting for any sign, any word.
It came just after sunset.
Jace's presence bloomed in his mind like warmth spreading through cold water. Safe. The pride is mobilizing. I'm helping coordinate scouts. Missing you terribly. Love you.
Eli's response was immediate, almost desperate: Hurry back. I don't know how to do this without you.
The vulnerability of that admission surprised him.
But it was true.
In just a few weeks, Jace had become essential to him. Not in an obsessive, possessive way—he was learning to separate his needs from his ownership instinct—but in a fundamental way.
Jace had changed how he saw himself. How he saw the future.
Before Jace, his future was predetermined: alone, territorial, defensive. A life measured in patrols and hunts and empty nights.
Now, his future was unwritten but filled with possibility.
And the thought of losing that possibility was terrifying.
Eli closed the book and set it aside. He couldn't focus. Couldn't think about anything except the fact that Jace was out there, in pride lands, surrounded by family who didn't approve of their bond.
What if Sarai convinced him to stay?
What if the pride threat was worse than Jace had said, and he couldn't leave?
What if—
Stop, Eli told himself firmly. Stop spiraling.
But the fear was already there, coiling in his chest like a living thing.
He stood and moved to the sleeping area, needing to be closer to something that still carried Jace's scent.
The furs were exactly as they'd left them—rumpled, still carrying the evidence of their desperate lovemaking the night before Jace left.
Eli knelt beside them and pressed his face into the soft pelts, breathing deeply.
Sunlight. Spice. Something uniquely Jace.
His chest ached.
He lay down in the furs, pulling them around himself like he could wrap himself in Jace's presence. His mind replayed moments unbidden:
Jace laughing at him after their first hunt together, his bright eyes bright with joy.
Jace asleep against his chest after the waterfall bonding, his breathing deep and even.
Jace taking control in the cave, demanding Eli trust him instead of possess him, teaching him how trust behaved when it mattered.
Jace's face this morning as he left—trying to be brave but terrified, his voice breaking when he said "I love you."
Eli realized something with sudden, painful clarity:
He'd been so focused on his own fears—his terror of abandonment, his struggle with ownership, his guilt over the pack collapse—that he hadn't fully appreciated Jace's sacrifice.
Jace had given up his place in his family for Eli.
He'd chosen exile. Chosen to be "other" in his own pride's eyes.
And when his family called, he'd answered not because he was abandoning Eli, but because he was loyal and brave and honorable.
He was everything Eli thought he'd never have.
Everything Eli told himself he didn't deserve.
"Come back to me," Eli whispered into the empty cave. "Please come back."
His body was responding to the scent, to the memories, to the overwhelming need for connection.
He was already half-hard, his cock pressing against his thigh.
He didn't fight it.
***
Eli's hand moved to his cock almost without conscious thought, wrapping around himself through the thin fabric of his pants.
He stroked slowly, his eyes closed, his mind filled with Jace.
This wasn't like the desperate, empty masturbation from three years ago—the mechanical release that left him feeling more alone than before.
This was different.
This was about connection, even in absence.
He pushed his pants down and kicked them off, lying naked in the furs that smelled like Jace. His hand wrapped around his cock properly now, stroking from base to tip in a slow, deliberate rhythm.
He thought about Jace straddling him, about how he looked in the firelight—all lean muscle and elegant lines, his golden gaze dark with desire.
He thought about the intensity in Jace's expression when he demanded Eli trust him, when he took control and showed Eli what surrender could feel like.
His hips thrust up into his fist, seeking more friction.
"Jace," he breathed, even though Jace couldn't hear him.
Or could he?
Through the bond, maybe. Through the spiritual connection that linked them across distance.
Eli's breathing increased as he stroked faster, his free hand moving to his chest, his nipples, touching himself the way Jace touched him.
He imagined it was Jace's hand on his cock. Jace's weight pressing him into the furs. Jace's voice in his ear saying You're doing so well, you're so beautiful like this.
His cock was leaking pre-come now, and he used it to ease his strokes, the wet sound obscene in the quiet cave.
The fantasy shifted.
He imagined the next time they were together, after Jace returned from the pride.
He'd kiss him thoroughly, would take his time, would show Jace exactly how much he'd been missed.
He'd lay Jace down in these furs and worship every inch of him—his throat, his chest, his stomach, his thighs.
He'd make Jace come apart slowly, would build his pleasure until he was begging.
And then—
Eli's hand moved faster, his hips thrusting up to meet his strokes.
—then he'd make love to him. Slow and deep and reverent. He'd look into Jace's eyes and tell him I love you, I choose you, I'm never letting you go.
"God, Jace," Eli groaned, his voice hoarse with need.
His other hand moved lower, between his legs, fingers pressing against his entrance the way Jace had done—the way Jace had taught him to accept.
He pressed one finger inside himself, gasping at the sensation.
It wasn't the same as when Jace did it. Jace's fingers were longer, more skilled, knew exactly where to touch to make Eli lose his mind.
But it was something.
It was connection, even through memory.
He worked himself open slowly, adding a second finger, his hand on his cock never stopping its rhythm.
He thought about Jace inside him. About the trust it took to surrender like that. About how Jace had looked at him with such tenderness, such love, when Eli finally let go of control.
"Come back to me," Eli whispered, his voice breaking. "Please, Jace, come back."
His fingers found that spot inside himself—the one that made stars burst behind his eyelids—and he pressed against it deliberately.