THE CHANGELING

Chapter 1

"So it is over, this time." David said "the danger is past."

"Not wholly. Eliot is still Hallie's son, and Laura's grandson and great-great-grandson."

"Yes, of course. The danger will still be there." David agreed, a bit sourly.

"It is something that you, and him, must be aware of. As soon as he is grown enough to understand he must be told. And he will need guidance when the time comes to marry. He should, ideally, marry someone touched by darkness... Georgina might be a good match. Not only she is Angelique's daughter, but she spent some time in my womb, in contact with my werewolf inheritance, and at the time Angelique was drawing power from Megan's energy, so she is also touched by vampire powers... She might be the ideal wife for him."

"Eliot might not agree."

"Which means that we will have to be very vigilant with any girl he brings home to the family."

"Not assume that the girl is a ordinary human as I did with Hallie." there was a touch of self-pity in David's words... "Hallie will not come back, will she?"

"Not for a while. And now she is a vampire. She is now wedded to Darkness... who knows, she might end up as Eliot's protector..."

"Did you have to make her a vampire?"

"It was necessary. She did not find the transition a pleasant one, but she knew that she must make the best of it. Once she has outgrown her pride and willfulness, she might learn wisdom yet."

David looked again at Amy, at her blinded eyes, which had been destroyed for his sake. He looked at her hands, unerringly shuffling the cards and laying patterns on the table which her eyes could not see, and yet she knew what they were and could read the message written on them.

"Amy, I am sorry."

"About my eyes? Don't be. They were lost in a good cause." she put her hand over his. "You did not will it nor did Eliot. It was a price that had to be paid, and I paid it."

"Still, I caused it. I was the one who married Hallie, and..."

"Stop blaming yourself for a story that as old by the time you were born. You did not begin it. And it will not be you who ends it. You were a player, same as me. If there is blame, you can try fixing it on Laura, on Hallie, on Ra himself."

"Still, when I think of the way I behaved. All I ever did was feel sorry for myself... when I think of all the wrong decisions I made."

"Our lives are full of good and bad decisions. We should not castigate ourselves more than necessary. Here, this is the first card of the deck. The Fool. So low, that it does not even have a number. That's us, most of the time. We seek to become wise, as the Magician, but mostly we learn the wrong things, and become adept at trickery, not true wisdom. So it is that the Magician means both wisdom achieved, and base trickery, depending on the choices we make... You were a fool, as we all are. You made bad choices, you stepped too close to the abyss. And regret over it is only useful if you learn from your mistakes."

"I should not have married Hallie. I should have married you."

Amy shook her head. "I once thought that."

"I still love you, Amy."

"Do you?"

"Yes. Do you love me?"

Amy did not answer. She had dreaded this moment, she had dreaded the knowledge that the choice would be given her, and that it would not be a true choice."

"Do you?" David insisted.

"David" she spoke slowly "David. I am not free to love or not love... when I chose to become what I became, to free myself and you, I gave up my chance for a normal life... I am not human, not anymore. I am a Sybil, and this is not my home anymore. I will have to go to the labyrinth and stay there."

"But what do you want?"

"It is no longer a question of what I want, but what I have to do. The power that possesses me is a jealous one. If it thought that your presence would weaken me and compromise my... service, it would destroy you. I have been given great power., and now I must live on its terms."

"It is unfair!"

"It may be, but it is what it is."

"Adam" Carolyn put her hand on her husband's arm. "I don't know how to say this."

"If it is what I think it is, don't worry as to how your say it." Adam smiled. "Just say it."

Carolyn embraced him closely "Do you still want me, spoiled child that I am?"

"I am no prize myself. We just have to keep reminding ourselves of what is important. And not to take each other for granted."

Carolyn nodded. "I neglected you and Edmund awfully, didn't I?"

"Edmund is OK. We got to be friends, him and I. Now I only have to get Roger to look kindly on me. Or at least nor murderously."

Carolyn sighed. "We really manage to screw ourselves up, don't we?"

"But we get up and try again."

"What do you say to a second honeymoon?"

"I say that it is overdue."

Carolyn hesitated, the asked. "Do you have Vicky's address? I want to write to her, too."

Chris and Oriana packed.

"You don't want to stay any longer?" Oriana asked, more to assuage her own conscience than anything else.

"No. We have done all we came to do. We helped when we could. Now Amy's gone where we cannot follow her."

"It seems a pity."

"She is alive and reasonably happy. She is following her destiny. And we have our own lives to lead, and there is nothing we can do for her, and nothing to hold us in Collinsport except some friends. Our lives are in Florida..."

He was right.

"I wonder." Oriana said.

"What you wonder?"

"She will have no children. Nor will you. Nor I. So you could say that Quentin's werewolf curse has come to an end."

Chris snorted. "This branch of the curse. There may be others."

"Others?"

"Great grandfather Quentin has been tomcatting through a long time and I doubt that he used protection. I think that there are more werewolves of his line going around. Only we have no way of contacting them."

"You mean that they were only trying to warn me?" Urien could not hide his disbelief. "Zoya, and Yolanda, and Loomis?"

"Surprising as it may sound. they were." Barnabas said. "They had an enemy in common with me, and it mattered more than any grievances they might harbor against me."

"Yes. I imagine it was so... but I was too scared to know better."

"You had no reason to trust Yolanda, who once tried to kill you, nor Zoya, who attacked you. As for Loomis, you had no reason to believe in his benevolence, either."

"Yeah... What happened to them, afterwards?"

"Zoya and Yolanda are free. All of Hallie's salamanders are free. Robert Loomis gained revenge on Hallie, which he wanted. What will be their final destiny, I cannot say. Maybe the Catholics are right, and they are in Purgatory... In any case, Angelique assured me that they won't bother us any more."

"And Hallie? You did..."

"Yes. I turned her into a vampire. As Amy requested. It was her price for extending protection to her."

"It might make her more dangerous... And she is dangerous. She wanted to burn her own child... I heard the things she wanted..."

'Yes. She could be dangerous. But no under the rules that Amy laid. She is to be enslaved to some sorceress who will keep her on a short leash. Until she learns wisdom, Angelique tells me."

"And you believe her?'

"I do. As I believe Amy... Believe me, Amy will not let her break loose and hurt us ever again."