Author's Note: This story was written for bj for the 2006 Yuletide – one of the greatest things ever. -grin- Seriously, go check it out: yuletidetreasure dot org.

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Emily Byrd Starr was walking alone in the New Moon garden, the airy fragrance of a July dusk surrounding her like a benediction. She had a small smile on her face; the smile that Teddy Kent would throw his paintbrush down in frustration over and the one Dean Priest sometimes dreamed of at night. A light dreamy smile that spoke of dreams and fairylands that no one could follow her to – perhaps this was why both Teddy and Dean were so fascinated by it. It spoke of things they could never know, a path which they could never follow with her.

It was like this Dean found her in the New Moon garden, alone and completely sufficient unto herself; but he was pleased to see a light flush steal over her cheeks when she saw him, and her smile blossomed wonderfully.

"Dean!" Emily cried happily, walking towards him. "I never expected you tonight."

"I didn't expect me myself," Dean answered wryly, looking into her lovely pale face. "My charming sister is entertaining company tonight. Not only do I not relish the thought of forcing friendship with a stranger for the evening, but I have the distinct impression my venerable brother-in-law would rather I not attempt to make friends. So I hied myself here in the hopes of finding you."

"Well, you have," Emily said, matching her step to Dean's as they began to walk. "I'm so happy to see you. Teddy and Ilse are both at home and I was feeling rather lonesome."

"Lonesome?" Dean's lips quirked. "And I thought you had the airy voices to keep you company."

Emily glanced at him, smiling ruefully. "The airy voices, I believe, are feeling towards me rather as your sister's husband feels to you. They're keeping their distance from me tonight." She sighed lightly, and Dean looked down at her, concerned. Nothing should make this creature of light unhappy. But he knew enough that no human is truly happy – and if there were anyone that could deliver happiness to Emily –

He was not the one to do it.

Dean waited a moment, watching the dusk around them swiftly turn to night. "Is something the matter, Star?"

Emily paused a moment, looking down at the path in front of her. She was trying to content herself with not going to Shrewsbury in the fall, and the unpleasantness of a few evenings ago –

She looked back up at Dean, smiling lightly. "I'm just – worried for Teddy, I suppose."

Dean didn't meet her eyes, and she heard nothing revealing in his tone. "Oh."

"His mother seems to be worse all the time," Emily frowned, remembering the tragic face confronting her as she and Teddy stood together in the graveyard. "She will never give him his chance – and she – she despises me, Dean."

"No one could despise you, Star. She is warped, perhaps, when it comes to her son – "

"No." Emily shook her head. "She does, Dean – I can see it in her eyes. I worry – " Emily looked down, lush black lashes brushing her cheeks. "Everything is changing so horribly quickly. Without you and Ilse this winter, I don't know …" Emily paused, her lips thin. "But I could bear it. And I can bear her hating me – but the way she treats Teddy, denying him, professing to love him – "

"Star," Dean said, grabbing up her hands. "You musn't worry like this." He looked seriously into her eyes. "And Teddy's mother …" He trailed off, looking to the dreamy horizon before returning to meet her gaze. "When the thing you want most in the world is denied to you, when life itself has been thwarted – "

"But don't you see, that is exactly why I must worry! If that ever happened to Teddy – "

Dean's lips curled in the tiny inscrutable smile that always made Emily wonder just what had happened in his life to make him smile like that. "I wasn't talking about Teddy. His mother – of course, I know no more than you of what led her to what she is today." Dean's eyes took on a faraway look. "But I can imagine, Star. And I would imagine whatever pain she has suffered has given her some birthright, if you will, to clutch ever more strongly to anything that has lessened that pain."

Emily's hands slipped from his grip, their absence leaving an almost imperceptible chill on his skin. She knew Dean was wise and educated, and knew ever so much more than she did; but she also knew that even Dean could be biased or blinded in his opinions.

Perhaps Mrs. Kent had been hurt terribly – and she had a right to that pain. But no pain, no loss or deficiency could excuse the thwarting of another life. Especially Teddy's. Emily knew that better, she knew, than anyone suspected. For as badly as she wanted Teddy to have his chance –

She knew, in the guilt of a three o'clock of a night, that not matter how ashamed it may make her, she was only too well pleased to have Teddy home and to herself.

"Emily," Dean said quietly. "What are you thinking?"

She smiled up at him, her eyes – not dull, but lacking the usual sparkle they contained when they were together.

"I am thinking," she said, "that I no longer wish to think of this. Come – there is a moon rising over yonder and I have a feeling she will become disagreeable should we not admire her sufficiently."

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The sun was shining and tiny flowers were winking up at it but Dean Priest noticed none of this as he walked up the pathway he had days ago decided he must go down, if only for Emily. For all his dreams and fancy and wit, Dean recognized he was also a pragmatic soul. But he took some comfort, whenever he thought of it, in the fact that a good deal of it was genuinely out of feeling for Emily.

When he reached it, Dean immediately rapped on the door with no hesitation, but with not a little trepidation. From all Emily had told him, he could not say he was looking forward to this interview.

A tiny, slight woman opened the door only partway, staying behind the protective shield it provided, half her body cast in shadow.

"…Yes?" she asked, her voice low but with a hard quality Dean felt he could almost recognize.

"Mrs. Kent," he said smoothly. "I was wondering if I could perhaps have a moment of your time."

The one eye he could see glared at him suspiciously. "Do I know you?"

"No," Dean answered reluctantly. "You see, I am a friend of Emily Starr, and therefore a friend of your son – "

Mrs. Kent's eye closed tiredly, then again stared out unflinchingly at him. "If you're a friend of the teacher, or have any illusions about what you may do here, you are wasting your time. Please excuse my bluntness, but I'm sorry to say I'm not feeling very well today."

Anticipating the door closing before the woman in front of him could even lift her hand, Dean shot out his arm.

"Please," he said, summoning any charm he felt he had and smiling. "It truly will only take a moment, and I swear I won't bother you again."

She looked at him a moment, a small spark of fear in her eyes that made Dean's heart clutch and brought his hand back to his side.

"All right, then," she said, her eyes sliding away before she turned back into her house. "But please, I do ask you to keep it brief."

Dean nodded, following her into a sitting room, the curtains drawn and a stale air pervading the place. He held back a shiver of recognition. Before – if Emily hadn't come into his life –

Mrs. Kent sat in a chair and gestured Dean to the seat opposite her. He sat carefully, aware of her gleaming eyes watching his every movement. There was a strange silence in the room, broken only by the tapping of a branch against the window.

Mrs. Kent broke the silence suddenly. "You are Dean Priest?"

Dean smiled, a dry smile that lifted only one corner of his mouth. He was uncertain as to whether she knew him from Emily and Teddy or from the limp that was all too noticeable as he had followed her into the room. Dean brushed the thought away – it was of no importance. Not here.

"Yes," he said, his voice even. Perhaps it was of no importance; still, Dean's words had an edge to them that he had not previously intended. "And as promised, I will keep this brief. It is about Teddy."

Dean could see the woman's face become more set. "Please – "

"You will make him hate you," Dean stated bluntly. "You are so afraid to lose him that you are bringing about the very thing you fear."

Mrs. Kent's face paled shockingly. Dean wondered a little hesitantly if he had been too brusque and for a moment repented of his words. But then a small point of colour came into Mrs. Kent's cheeks and she leaned forward, her hands seeming to tremble.

"You know nothing of my life. You don't know – you can't – "

Dean laughed sharply, wondering again why he was even here. Certainly there was something to be gained here – with Teddy away for years, such a considerable distance away, surrounded by other women … there was a chance he would forget about her. Not that anyone could easily forget a woman such as Emily was, God knew. But if he did forget – perhaps Emily –

Dean pushed away his train of thought. Regardless of motives, he was here for Emily and he must do what he came here to do. He bent forward, emanating the same kind of intensity that Mrs. Kent was trembling with.

"I know something about pain," Dean said, pointedly glancing at the thin scar that ran down the side of Mrs. Kent's face. She fully flushed now, and moved back in her chair.

"I also know something about never being able to escape reminders of what I can never have," Dean continued, feeling a sudden flash of intuition, a flash that was confirmed in the way Mrs. Kent looked up at him sharply. Dean leaned further towards her, his words ringing throughout the little house.

"Don't be a fool. If you let him go, you will lose him – but only in body, and only for a few years. But if you refuse him this chance, if you make him stay – he will change – he will resent you – resentment will turn to hatred – you will never again be to him what you are now – "

Mrs. Kent made a broken sound, turning her head and holding up a pleading hand. "No more."

Dean stopped, and after a moment Mrs. Kent let her hand fall as she turned back to him, their eyes meeting. They regarded each other uneasily for a few long moments. Feeling that he had done his part and not wishing to have that distraught gaze on him any longer, Dean stood.

"Thank you for your time," he said, not unkindly. "I can see myself out."

Mrs. Kent simply nodded, looking at the hands she had clasped tightly in her lap. But as Dean reached the doorway, he paused and turned back to face her.

"You would lose his heart forever," he said. "You must give him his freedom to keep his heart."

Dean saw Mrs. Kent look up at him with wide eyes but stayed no longer to see if anything he had said made a difference. He simply turned back to the door and stepped out of it, taking a deep breath of sunshiny air once the door was closed behind him.

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Lying in bed, fully dressed, Emily wondered what was wrong with her. When Aunt Elizabeth had asked her to see to the dishes she had snapped at her; and the small task had exhausted her so that when she finished Emily felt she could barely stand. She retired to her room, ignoring the concern in Aunt Laura's blue eyes when she told her she was going to bed.

Emily tossed her head restlessly, feeling a pain pounding behind her forehead and a chill running through her veins. She shivered, tugging her quilt from beneath her and wrapping herself in it. She wasn't sick, she couldn't be, she had things to do, she had to go to school, no, she needed to tell Teddy to go to school …

Emily sat up sharply in bed, her covers slipping away from her. Her eyes wide, she stared at the far right corner of her room, by her desk at the window, where Dean stood. But why was Dean here? Emily shook her head slowly, feeling terribly confused. Dean should not be in her room, that was not proper at all –

Dean took a step forward, a small mocking smile on his face. He had something in his hand – something which he lifted to hold in front of him to show Emily, something which, as he held it, obscured his face. Emily didn't like that she couldn't see Dean's face anymore – as improper as it was, there was something comforting about Dean's presence when things were so strange and confusing, when Emily could not quite see what it was Dean held in his hand –

With a small gasp, Emily realized what Dean was trying to show her. It was Teddy – Teddy's smiling face in a photograph, but it was an older Teddy, a different smile, alight, triumphant.

As Emily stared, Dean slid the photograph to reveal one side of his face. His expression was mocking, but somehow his eyes – his eyes seemed pained. So pained that Emily felt her heart clutch and reached out to him with one hand.

"There is always a choice, Star," he said gravely. "Always a choice."

And then as horrified Emily watched, Dean's features seemed to melt into the pattern of her rose wallpaper behind him before reassigning itself into the features of Teddy's mother – Mrs. Kent, who when she realized Emily was watching, glanced down at the picture of Teddy she held in her hand before locking eyes with Emily again. She dropped the picture; it fell to the floor with a clatter that to Emily's ears sounded loud as thunder.

When Emily looked up from the picture on her floor, Mrs. Kent was disappearing as Dean had, her features melting into the wall until she had vanished completely. It all happened so quickly, so terrifyingly fast, that Emily didn't even have time to cry out.

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"Dean!"

A few days later found Emily walking alone in the New Moon garden, and again Dean surprised her as she walked and dreamed.

"Emily," Dean smiled. "I'm glad I found you. I was wondering if you'd like to go on a ramble through the bush."

Emily, looking at him, had a sudden flash of something like remembrance. She could not quite put her finger on it, but something had happened – some kind thing Dean had done, and somehow she felt it had something to do with Teddy –

Whatever it may be, Emily felt a strong rush of affection for Dean surge through her. She flung herself at Dean, wrapping her arms around him and kissing the cheek that suddenly was flushing with a bright spot of colour.

"There," Emily said gaily, pulling away. "I'm still young enough yet that I can get away with such things."

Dean cleared his throat, brushing his fingers over the stone of the sundial he stood beside. "Star," he murmured, speaking softly until he cleared his throat once more. "You never need worry that you are too old for that with me."

"Good," Emily smiled, and Dean took one tentative step closer. He reached for her hand, which she easily slipped into his. There was a lightness in his step and his eyes now as he looked up at the sky. Perhaps he was not so ridiculous as he sometimes feared.

"Now," he said, beginning to walk from the garden. "The sun is still shining and the sky blue; and on my way here I had a positive premonition that the clouds intended to make splendid shapes for us. We must not let their work go to waste."

Emily smiled delightedly, looking down as they walked, her hand still warm in his. Perhaps, she reflected, life would not have to change so much after all. At the very least, when she was with Dean, pointing together at the clouds, she could feel as if it wouldn't.