Lucia dropped her bag in preparation to climb the cliff ledge that was over twice her height. A heavy mist fell around her as she pulled herself up to the highest point of the mountain. The view down the cliff's edge was obscured by thick droplets that hung in the air and made her skin cold and slick. She stepped forward, trying to decipher the view, when she noticed she was walking on a completely flat surface with names etched into it.
The names spiraled out from the center of the surface. She read several of them before scanning forward and seeing Benj's name.
"So you did come up here," Lucia said when Benj finally joined her at the top.
"Yeah, I didn't want to spoil the surprise," Benj told her, smiling proudly.
"This is the real destination. You made it, Lucia. I'm so happy and relieved that you didn't turn around and leave this part of the mountain unexplored."
"Here's your name," Lucia said, pointing at the most recent entry. "Give me your knife."
Benj instinctively protected the hilt of his knife. It was the silver one he had gotten from his first job as a Crownsmith. There was no way he was going to let her use it. "Don't you have your own?" He asked, searching her beltline.
She pulled out a gold-handled dagger with a blue gem in the pommel. "Please? Mine is nicer, and I just don't want to ruin its tip."
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Benj took her dagger, inspected it, and then gave it back. "You won't ruin it."
Lucia shook her head incredulously but took her bejeweled blade and carved her name into the mountain. She started with something she had seen in her fake poetry book. It was a rune that implied there was a connection between the rune that came before and after. To her, it meant 'and' or 'is with.' She liked how it looked and used it to mean that Benj and Lucia were there together.
When she finished carving her name, Lucia Spicer, she felt an odd sensation. She felt that she had spelled her name wrong. She looked over it, and it was correct. She then looked at where it said Benjos Baker. She touched the name and could see something like it had just disappeared behind a corner. So she did something that was like leaning forward and looking behind it.
She wasn't sure what she did, but it felt natural. She saw Benj crouched down, carefully scratching his name into the stone. He looked different. He still wore the same orange scarf on his head, but his hair was shorter, and he was wearing drabby-looking clothes. Her name was no longer there.
As soon as Benj finished carving his name, he stood up, turned around, and stared directly into her eyes. He stood so close that they could have kissed. She reached forward to touch him, but her hand passed through his. "Hmm," he grunted, turned away, and walked toward the ledge. She looked away and found herself back where she had started.
She had seen something that felt like a glimpse of the past. She wasn't sure what it was but knew she was back in the present. She looked at Benj, and he jumped back, startled. She asked him what was wrong.
"I have some good news and some bad news," he said with a concerned look that worried her. She asked for the bad news first, and he told her she had a light blue circle on her forehead. He then lifted his shirt and showed her his back. "It looks like this, except it's in the middle of your forehead… it's pretty noticeable."