Coram rushed back to the port. It had been a week since he had saved Serafina Pekkala. In his hand he clutched a letter from his own home. He had been called back to the Gyptians for a roping. An important roping or he would not be required to attend. He was eager to go home and to see his gyptian friends and family again. But it pained him to have to part from Serafina. She belonging in the North, it was her home.

Serafina smiled as she saw him approaching. His face was as cold as stone; inside his mind was a turmoil of emotions. She sensed his distress and tried to sooth him.

"What is it, Coram? What is troubling you?" She said in her light sing-song voice.

"I have to leave," he said desolately as he reached her. Her smile vanished instantly.

"I … I knew this would happen eventually," she said hoarsely, she seemed to be struggled with something, "when must you leave?"

"Tomorrow," he replied, his voice emotionless. But he felt such strong emotions that it pained him greatly.

They looked at each other, gazing into the others eyes. Serafina understood more fully what Coram was feeling, she was older and wiser. But still, she felt pain. He kissed her on her red lips.

The next day…

The horn blared. Coram stood on the deck of the boat he had passage on to England. From there he would use his boat (safely stored in cargo) to get to the roping. Serafina stood on the busy port. People were rushing around her, but she felt alone. Her daemon, Kaisa, hooted pitifully. Sophonax, Coram's daemon, silently watched as Kaisa seemed to grow smaller in the distance. Coram thought his heart was about to explode. He felt so much pain he had never though possible. The port was barely visible.

Serafina struggled to think, to clear her mind. She let out a little cry of anger and jumped on her pine-branch, darting in the sky. She sped towards Coram's boat. He saw her and his heart was filled with such a pure joy. Serafina's feet found the deck and she rushed into Coram's arms. He was filled with happiness that seemed to flow through very vein in his body. Serafina cried tears of joy and sorrow. One day, she knew, she would have to see him die. She was a witch; she could not change her nature.

Coram and Serafina had married the next month after the roping. They were happy. But a dark cloud seemed to always linger in the back of Serafina's mind. The knowledge that one day she would leave him. But she was filled with bliss to be his wife and a gyptian boat woman … for now.

Three years later Serafina and Coram had a baby boy. Coram rejoiced in his role as a father, tenderly caring for his son.

Almost two years later, a disease spread over the entire nation. Serafina watched in misery as her baby boy was taken by the illness. He died a week later. Serafina cried bitter tears of anguish, it broke Coram's heart.

News reached her of her own mother's death. Serafina had been dreading this moment; it meant she was now the clan queen. It broke her heart to tell Coram she must return to the north. His heart felt as if it could be torn no more. He had lost his son and his wife. Their goodbye was tearful, years later he could still feel her soft lips upon his own. Serafina's own heart seemed to be breaking as she flew away from her lover. She knew she would never see him again.

She yelled into the cold night-sky. She yelled and wept as she flew back to the north. Her heart was torn. She had wished for nothing more than to raise his children and be a gyptian boat mother. But she could no more change her nature than a fish could grow wings and fly.

They had both known it could not last forever, deep down. A gyptian and a witch, it was like trying to mix oil and water.