June awoke the day after she arrived at their uncles farmhouse, and she continued to do so for the next few weeks. Everyday she walked outside as the morning sun came up over the tree tops and watched as the light danced against the sky. She listened to the sounds of the rural landscape, the birds singing as the soft breeze of summer lifted through the tree trunks and cascaded around her.

It was freedom.

Freedom from the city and the chaos, freedom from the bad dreams and from the nightmare that she had lived through. She was mostly at peace. Except, there was a growing hole inside her lately. She had known Nico's absence was disappointing, but as the weeks came and went she grew more hollow. Yes, she was free, but what about Nico?

He had earned this type of freedom right along with her, he should be beside her. She had wondered for so long if she truly cared about him during her time as a Bloodmaid, how she had doubted her feelings and tried to put them aside to survive. Now that she was free, now that she could feel and do as she pleased again, she realized that all those feelings she had hid were coming to the surface.

Many nights, when Sarah and Luke were asleep, she would be up, staring at the moon through the window. She had cried, had lamented and wished things had been different. But if they had been, she would have never known Nico, and the wonderful life he had given to her. He had lost everything, she realized. His home, his mother, his life that he had grown accustomed to. True, he had already been fighting the Order, but he hadn't given up so much until he had met her. She wished she could repay him, she wished she could have equally given something up like him.

Now that she stood again in the daylight, she thought of him. His blue eyes, his genuine smirk, his lips on her neck...

It made her feel empty not to have him here. She had wanted this for so long, and now that she had it, how selfish she felt wanting more.

She made a decision, her body moving back inside the house to get changed. She wrote a quick note to Luke, and took the truck keys from the kitchen counter.

If Nico wasn't coming to her, she was going to him, wherever that was.

He loved her, and she loved him. She was going to be beside him, no matter what. It was a revelation, a resurrection in her bones as she felt the hole inside herself filling with purpose. Yes, to be beside him was the right thing to do. As she began driving down the gravel road she felt a pang of guilt leaving Sarah and Luke behind, but her note should explain why she had gone. Luke had noticed her sadness, Sarah probably had been naive about it. They would understand, she had never left like this before, so it should signify how much it meant to her.

The road led out onto the pavement street as she faintly remembered turning right when they had arrived here weeks back. Turning as the sun lit up the cab of the truck, she smiled to herself, her summer dress fluttering in the faint breeze that came through the window. The fields beside the road looked like a golden ocean as they moved and danced with the wind, the countryside almost another world to the one she had been living in for so long.

She would start at the house, go there and see if maybe Nico had gone back. She would go from there, she knew how to be resourceful, hell, spending a whole six months with blood sucking vampires had made her fearless. She wasn't afraid of going alone, she wasn't scared of failure. She had gone into the abyss and had come out, scarred and all. Nothing could touch her now.

She went to turn the radio on, the radio stations taking back their way of communication now. Things had been crazy, from what her and Luke had heard from the towns people a couple miles away. The government was in complete and utter redo mode. No longer where the old men of the past getting re-elected into their offices to make them corrupt, but now the young were taking control, speaking for the people and making the world better. It would take a lot longer than a couple weeks, but June was ready for the bright future.

As her truck ran down the street June saw a figure in the distance, and within moments recognized what seemed to be a drifter walking along the roadside. She passed him unfortunately, her speed suddenly coming to a halt as she realized who she had just saw his tousled brown hair whipping in the breeze as he looked contently out at the fields beside him before turning to look at the braking truck behind him puzzlingly.

"Nico" June said breathless as she put the truck in park and jumped out of the car.

As she jumped out she turned to him, her smile breaking across her face as she stood facing him. At first, he didn't recognize her, her skin tanned from the sun and her hair longer as it whipped behind her in blonde curls.

"Fancy meeting you here" she called out.

"June?" she heard him say. She giggled and nodded her head at him.

"June!" he said running towards her, she doing the same as they met in the middle of the road, their arms flinging around each other as their bodies crashed like waves.

"Where did you go?" she breathed into his neck.

"I had to bury my mother" he said breathing her in "and then I burnt that house to the ground, with him in it."

"Oh Nico I'm so sorry" she said pulling away and looking into his eyes "Why didn't you tell me?"

"I didn't want you to have to go back there" he said "I knew if I told you, you'd come. Those things are behind us now."

"So your staying this time?" she asked, her eyes wide and hopeful. The sun was bright against his face as his eyes looked down at her with such elation.

"I'm staying" he said as he pressed his forehead against hers "We are free June, forever."

"Forever" she whispered "We are free."

"What is light to the eyes, what air is to lungs. What love is to the heart, liberty is to the soul of man"- Robert Green Ingersoll

The End.