A/N: I've cut this Neal section in half because it was a little too long, so next chapter will be in Neal's POV too. Some answers, and some more questions here. I hope you'll enjoy this. I know you're all hoping to get right to the reunion but I'm building up to something, so be patient. Thank you all for reading, reviewing, favouriting and the lot, this is for you!

WC-WC-WC-WC

Neal tried to sketch Starry Night for Laura. He really did try, but he was so fixed on the light of the forest, of how everything seemed to glow at night, that when he managed to get a hold of a set of oil pastels from Mr. Vogt he painted the view out of June's flat, like he'd done a hundred times before, only this time the buildings seemed to grow out of the ground like trees, the sky was the brilliant blue of the rainforest, and the windows reflected fireflies and leaves, as if they were mirrors to another world. He made sure Mozzie wasn't around early the following Friday when he went to the main house to deliver it, knowing what his reaction would be. He'd hardly seen Laura since the game night; he'd only caught a glimpse of her as she galloped past the house towards the far off grazing fields and the river. He'd always waved, but she had not waved back.

David let him in and pointed upstairs. He found Laura sitting quietly in the deck of the top floor, from where you could look down on the endless green fields, scattered with cows, all the way to the snaking river. She had binoculars pressed against her eyes, looking North-West to the mountains, and when he came in through the mosquito-net door, she gasped in surprise. She dropped the binoculars, and almost knocked her chair when she stood. Neal raised his hands, letting the frame of the painting rest between his legs.

"What were you looking at?" he asked. She frowned.

"What are you doing here?"

"Your nephew let me in, I came to deliver your prize." He grabbed the frame and showed her the painting, studying her face for a reaction. He could tell she was trying to keep it straight, he knew the effort well, but she wasn't as good as he was, and still he caught the slight rise of the edges of her mouth, a smile cut short.

"You're actually good, aren't you," she said. "Who would've known?"

"Why, thank you, I try," said Neal.

She took the painting, thanked him, and opened the door and walked back to her room, which was on the third floor. She didn't invite him in, but Neal followed without a second thought. Her room only had two walls, the other two were just clear screens, with wide wood shutters hanging from the ceiling in case it rained, and Neal could easily imagine the view she must have at night. She left the painting against one of the walls, to hang later, but when she turned and saw he was there she went to the door frame.

"Excuse me, this is my bedroom," she said, clearly uncomfortable, but Neal ignored her and walked to her night stand. There was a picture frame there, but behind it he thought he'd caught a glimpse of something shiny.

"Yes, I know," he answered her.

"What are you doing?"

"What's this?" Neal moved the frame away, revealing a gold figurine of a horse and a rider. He grabbed it, with care, and brought it close to his face. It was heavy, and probably the most beautiful piece of work he'd seen since he stepped into the warehouse with the treasure. The rider was a woman holding on to the mane and standing up on rope stirrups, with a blanket as a saddle. Everything was made in perfect detail, and Neal traced the fine filigree with his fingers, as in a trance. He looked at the figurine's face, and delicate hair, and recognised it as a younger Laura. He was about to turn it over when she snatched it out of his hands, and stored it in a drawer.

"That's fine work. Who made it for you?" Neal asked.

"I'd rather you didn't touch anything."

"I'm sorry," said Neal. "I was just impressed by your horse. Is it all gold?"

"No. It's just a trinket," she answered, but her voice was clipped.

"You know it's not."

She sighed, and held on tight to the door handle again, waiting for him to leave. She looked nervous. She might as well be throwing him out. Why? Neal quickly scanned whatever lay around the room – there was a bag on the floor and her phone was blinking on the bed. 3 New Messages. Rob.

"I thought there was no signal here. Who's Rob?"

"There's signal in the higher floors, my dad just doesn't have a phone. I'll see you at dinner." Her voice was even more insistent, she really wanted him out. She grabbed the phone, squeezed it in her hands, and when it beeped again she turned it off.

"You're not answering that? Or is it not a welcomed call?" he said. This time she actually stepped outside. Neal pursed his lips. "Am I bothering you? Because I thought that-"

"Listen, Mr. Armstrong-"

"Actually, I'm Neal with an 'a'-"

"Look, I've just met you. You play a good game of dice and I'm happy to meet you for a rematch tonight, but I'd be more comfortable if you didn't just walk into my room."

"Oh... So you're kicking me out?" She just smiled, without showing her teeth. The smile did not reach her eyes. "You're kicking me out."

"But we can still play dice tonight."

"That trinket of yours-"

"See you tonight, Mr. Armstrong."

"It's NEAL." But she had already closed the door.

Neal stood outside her room, listening for anything, for several minutes. That horse... Even if he was wrong with the weight and the quality and it was made out of cheap, soft metal, the craftsmanship was still outstanding - he'd never seen filigree work like that, not in such detail, using such fine strands. And of course, he wasn't wrong - he was never wrong. It wasn't cheap soft metal. It wasn't even gold leaf. It was all gold. He knew Mr. Vogt made good money with his farm and lived comfortably, but he wasn't rich. That horse had been at least half a kilo heavy and solid, not hollow. Good gold, the kind that made his fingers tingle and his eyes widen. In bullion, it could be worth well over forty thousand dollars. And the work was really superb; he could only imagine what it would cost to have something like that made by a goldsmith. Mr. Vogt had no expensive decorations in his house, all his art was local, so were his clothes and gear. Neal had only seen him spend good money once, when he had a fine Cebú bull with a massive hump brought from Argentina as a stud for his cows. He haggled with every client that came to see his horses. It didn't add up. Laura was hiding something, and he needed to find out what.

Neal waited, during dinner, for the right moment to bring up the figurine. Casually - or not so casually - he brought up the words 'gold' and 'filigree', and he rambled about art and metalwork and how filigree work and water gilding was terrible on one's fingers. Laura's fingers were smooth and unblemished, and she showed no signs of reacting over how he was trying to steer the conversation. She just managed to steer it back to safer topics, and she did so with such grace it took Neal a moment to realise that she was doing it, that she had caught on and was purposefully avoiding the topic. Which made it all the more interesting.

There was no wager this time. Neal played better than he had the night before, and he reached the one-on-one round with five dice, but he still lost to Laura. He couldn't understand - he'd done everything, he'd called her bluffs, he'd played the round to perfection, and still, she had won.

"Tell me your secret, how do you do it?" he said, stowing the cups back in their leather box. The table was cleared and while everyone else brought their dishes to the kitchen, Neal sat alone with Laura.

She blinked once, very slowly.

"If you tell me yours," she said.

"What makes you think I have a secret?"

"I'm sure you have many. You seem like the kind."

"The kind?"

"The kind of person that has two faces. I see one face right now, but there's that other one, the reason you're here in the first place."

Neal felt his smile break, thought he knew that from the outside it looked just as perfect as before. He'd wanted to talk about her secrets, not his own. It frustrated him that she was a step ahead.

"That trinket you have there in your drawer. Do you have any idea what it's worth?" he asked, opting for a more direct approach, but she just smirked.

"I'm guessing you do know. And if you're planning a theft, it shouldn't even be hard for you. I don't keep it under key." She said it with ease, as she stacked the place mats together. She did not pull her eyes away.

"What makes you think I want to steal it? I was just curious."

She scoffed.

"Please, give me some credit. Have you ever tried googling Neal, Art, and Fugitive? Why on earth did you use your own name? We might be far, but there's still 2G service here. I had your mug-shot popping up all over my search results."

Neal opened his mouth, but for a brief moment he was lost for words. She knew! That changed everything. She had not been accusing him, she'd said it as if it was the most normal thing in the world, but before he could deny it she chuckled, raising the palm of her hand.

"Don't fret. I won't tell. I'm actually relieved." She smiled. Neal smiled too, but it was an anxious, not entirely honest smile. Mozzie's going to kill me. He'd warned him about the name, but Neal had been too reckless, too confident, too sure he was far enough, that he would never be found. He should've just used the alias.

"I'm not-I won't steal your horse. I really am curious; I've never seen work like that." He neither denied nor accepted her statement - it was pointless. She stood from the table, and stowed the unused glasses back in the wooden cupboards. Then she turned to him, her hands leaning on the hardwood.

"It was a gift. It has sentimental value to me. Wouldn't make a difference to me if it was pewter or gold, I never asked."

"Who made it? I'd be interested in knowing the -"

"You can't."

"Why-"

"Neal!" Mozzie suddenly walked in the room, and Neal made sure his face was straight when he turned towards him. Mozzie was holding two short brown bottles with no labels. "Best of both worlds, Neal. Coffee liqueur, there's a farm to the North that makes it, you have to try it. It's exquisite."

Neal looked up at Laura, but she was already walking up the stairs, and he sighed and went for the door, while Mozzie bid his thank-yous and farewells to Mr. Vogt.

"So what were you talking about with the dice prodigy?" said Mozzie, once they were outside and walking the familiar path over the grass. Neal shrugged.

"Oh, she was just thanking me for the painting. She was impressed."

"No doubt. What did you paint her? It wasn't New York, was it? Because we agreed-"

"It wasn't New York." Two lies in half a minute. "I sketched her Starry Night, like I said. Just in pencil, I didn't want to waste paints."

"Good. I'm liking this place. Mr. Vogt is giving me management of his coffee roasting emporium, I have control of the ovens, but I've been trying to convince the man to buy a good roasting drum. We could try and imitate that marvellous..."

Mozzie went on and on about coffee, and Neal lost his initial resolve to tell him everything. They had it good here. Even Mozzie liked it, despite the farm's many setbacks and infringements to the rules of sanitation and comfort that he'd laid down when they first hopped on that plane out of New York - before they had a definite place in mind. Mozzie liked it, and was not impatient or restless, but he also believed in the temporal nature of their current home down to his very core. If Neal told him now that he'd been made, it would all end. Mozzie would go into self-preservation mode, and he would probably be all set to leave within 12 hours; he had no qualms in leaving things behind - Neal remembered how he'd shredded to pieces the number of that hacker he'd had a thing for. No matter how much Mozzie claimed to like the farm, there was no doubt in Neal's mind that he would run. Neal didn't want to run again - not yet. Not without money or safe IDs. Not if there wasn't really any threat. And definitely not after seeing that gold figurine. He just had to pretend it didn't matter.

"So, what do you think?"

"What?" Neal raised his head, looking puzzled at his friend. Mozzie scoffed.

"Have you listened to a word I've said?"

"I'm sorry, Mozz... I'm just a little tired."

"Distracted would be more like it. And I am aware of the source of the distraction. I'm warning you once again my friend, don't get involved."

"Oh, so you get to be buddy-buddies with the boss, but I can't even - what was that?" Neal suddenly wheeled around, his eyes drawn to a dark corner of the forest opposite the river, where the water canal started.

"First, Vogt is not my boss, and second, that's not going to work with me Neal."

"No, Mozz. There was something there, I saw it." Neal started tramping across the grass to the canal. "I think it was a horse..."

"Seriously? You're going with that? If that's your idea of evading this conversation you are sorely mistaken if you think it's going to work. No these droids are not the ones you're looking for Jedi tricks for me, I see through all of it. What's going on?"

But Neal suddenly stopped, and he pointed to the forest as a beam of light shone for a second between the trees.

"Does that look like a Jedi mind trick to you?" he asked. Mozzie came closer, but his attitude did not change.

"Don't deflect. That's probably just a farm worker looking for a missing cow."

Then, as they both stood looking at the forest, the clear silhouette of a horse and rider came down the hill at a gallop, and then disappeared in the thick vegetation. It was very dark, but still Neal recognised the horse as Mara. It had to be her.

"Where is she going?"

"How do you know it's Laura?" Mozzie asked.

"Oh, it's her. I just know it." Neal turned, and continued on his way back to the house. Mozzie stood for a moment longer before he followed.

"This conversation isn't over, just so you know!" he called.

"Whatever you say, Mozz..."

Very early the next morning, when the fog was still partially blanketing the view, Neal sat drinking coffee in the veranda, and through the screen he saw Laura riding back to her house on Mara, her hair waving, and a heavy bag bouncing behind her. He didn't go looking for her, but the moment Mozzie returned from the main house from his round of roasting he asked him if he'd seen her.

"Now, why should I tell you?" Mozzie asked. Neal wanted to tell him that his interest also involved shiny yellow metal, but he needed to wait till he had more information. He turned away, and poured more coffee onto his cup.

"Just... never mind." He shrugged, and when Mozzie dropped yesterday's paper on the table - they were always a day behind on news - he began solving the two-page crossword puzzle that Mozzie usually claimed. Twenty minutes in, he was staring at a black and white picture of a young man with a boyish face and clear eyes, stuck on a clue.

"I remember, he's a Frenchman..." he turned the paper towards Mozzie. "Baudelaire? No, Baudelaire doesn't fit..."

"You need a hobby," said Mozzie. "Why don't you join me and Mr. Vogt this afternoon? We're going bean-shopping."

"Seriously? A hobby?" Neal turned his head around him, looking at the art hanging from every spare place in the walls. Then he looked back down at his puzzle. "Look at this guy, Mozzie, you should know him. I think he's a poet."

"I'm not telling you anything about Laura. In fact, she's banned forthwith from all conversation in this house."

"I already said never mind. I really don't get what your problem with her is, though, you hardly even know her."

"Neither do you. And someone who's that good at bluffing must certainly have something to hide."

"We all have something to hide. Okay, so what other Frenchman could it be? Sartre? No, it's six... seven letters..."

"Neal..."

"Rimbaud! That's it, that's the baby-faced poet. R-I-M-B-A-U-D. The A fits with Au - that's the chemical symbol for Gold."

"All right," Mozzie raised his hands as if he'd caved in, even though he hadn't actually met resistance on Neal's part. He sat down in the table. "Laura's gone off to town, she needs to fill in for another teacher till the end of the term."

"But it's almost summer," said Neal, without raising his eyes from the newspaper. He didn't try to hide his smile.

"That's why she'll be back in two weeks, next Saturday. And seriously, you didn't know that was Rimbaud, or were you just messing with me? 'Idle youth, enslaved by love; by being too sensitive I have wasted my life.'."

"I know the words, not the man's face. And I'm pretty sure there's no mention of love in that quote."

"Call it creative license. Do something useful, will you? I've got a book upstairs, on colonial Cusco School art. They're all anonymous, same style, plenty unaccounted for or believed destroyed, and they're worth quite a lot. We could fence them easily, and since you're in the mood for painting..."

"I don't have the right supplies for a forgery, Mozzie."

"It doesn't have to be a good quality one, the fence is not going to run an ultraviolet light on it or anything. Look, I hate to tell you this, but we're running low on cash. Why do you think I'm all up for this coffee enterprise?"

"You love coffee."

"Yes, I do. But you know what I love more? The Mediterranean sea. The Louvre. The Museo del Prado - do you want me to go on?"

"No, please don't."

"All right. Then get to work."

"Okay. I will." Neal smiled. He actually had an entirely different idea concerning possible sources of income.

One look through the heavy coffee-table book Mozzie had borrowed from Mr. Vogt, and it was obvious to Neal that he wasn't going to be able to make a forgery. It was not that he lacked paint from the right period or that he didn't have a big enough oven for ageing - he could always used the coffee-roasting stove. He didn't even have any primary pigments left. He was resourceful, but not even he could materialise paint out of thin air. He had watercolours and pastels, but no oils. He was down to half an inch of turpentine and though it wasn't hard to get another bottle, he could never find one the same quality. No, he couldn't work like this. And as he leafed through the book, he really thought it was a shame. It would have been nice to try something new, what with the bright reds and browns and the lavishly applied gold leaf... Gold leaf, God, he was seeing Gold everywhere... He looked closer at one painting, hanging in a private collection. What shone the brightest was not the painting itself, but the frame. It was large, carved of wood, not plaster, but heavily adorned, matching a baroque period even though the painting was much newer - a common occurrence for colonial works. And it was covered in gold. Water gilded in the most exquisite detail, almost as impressive as Laura's horse.

And then the idea struck.

He had four thick boards of dark wood brought into the second floor deck, where he had enough space to work. He laid them over a sturdy table, and set up the things he'd borrowed from the farm foreman's wood shop. His boards were not freshly cut - that would not have worked for a painting supposedly 400 years old, but they were smooth, hard enough to withstand time but soft enough to carve with regular wood chisels. He was going to make it to fit a 25cm x 40cm canvas, which he reckoned would not be too hard to get if he decided to actually sell the thing. As of yet, his plans for it were different.

By Friday night, a day before Laura was supposed to return, he had finished carving the four pieces to horror vacui perfection, and put together they formed the perfect frame for a nice colonial painting of red, brown and gold hues. After he had sandpapered it and polished it to satisfaction, he brought it down to the veranda and showed it to Mozzie.

"I don't know about you, but I think there's something missing in that picture," said Mozzie. Neal smiled.

"We'll worry about the painting later. This is almost done, only needs gilding, and we can sell it much more easily."

"And for much less profit."

"That depends on the gilding." He left the frame on the table, and then turned as he heard the distant neighing of a horse. Soon, Laura emerged from the far edge of the forest, and she rode along the tree line, heading for the hillock and the main house. The moon was big and she was perfectly visible. "She must be early," he muttered. Mozzie rolled his eyes.

"Neal, this is getting ridiculous."

"What? I was just commenting on..."

"Nope, no commenting for you. You have work to finish."

"I'm taking a break. Wood dust hurts my eyes, and I wanted to ask you a few things. You did your research before we came here, didn't you?"

"You know I did."

Neal took a deep breath before asking his question. "I need to know a few things regarding gold."

"Gold? It's a precious metal, ductile, malleable, used as a standard-"

"I meant gold here."

"Gold here?"

"Is it mined close? Is it mined at all? Good quality, bad quality, big mine, small mine, open pit or dark creepy tunnels, seriously, you know what I mean, Mozz."

"Gold is one thing, gold leaf is another. It might be hard to find around here. Is gilding even on your list of perfected crafts? I don't remember ever seeing you do that before."

"Just because you have never seen me do it before, doesn't mean I can't do it. It's a pretty straightforward procedure, actually. The only tricky thing about it would be getting the gold. And it has to be thick, not that wrinkly no-good stuff they put in a fancy whiskey."

"They put gold leaf on drinks?"

"On food too."

"That goes against a precious metal's dignity...!" Mozzie shook his head. Neal wondered again if he should tell him about the figurine - but no. He had to talk to Laura first. He'd use the frame to ask her about the gold.

"I'll ask Vogt about it in the morning, maybe he knows if there's a way to get it," said Neal.

"I'll ask him if you want. Though I doubt he'd know anything. He doesn't care a lot about anything not cow related. Besides dice, that is."

"No, it's all right. I'll go talk to him."

"Really? Cause it's no trouble for me, I see him every morning..."

"I'll go, Mozz," said Neal, this time his voice was firmer. He knew what his friend was trying to do, and it was starting to get on his nerves. "I know what I'm doing."

"You know what you need, Neal? You need to stop. You barely know her, and it's embarrassing. Obviously you're bored. You need a job."

"Mozzie, it's not even about her..." Neal said, tilting his head back.

"Oh? Then what is it about?"

"It's-"

"Mozzie?" Someone knocked on the door frame, and they both turned. David let himself in, holding up a lantern. In his other hand he carried a large plastic padded envelope. "Mozzie, it's mail for you. Laura brought it in, and you told me to let you know in case anything arrived, so..."

Mozzie took the envelope, checking the seal immediately, but he did not appear very relieved when he saw it was unbroken.

"Okay kid. Thanks." Mozzie produced a bar of chocolate, seemingly out of thin air, which the boy grabbed with a smile, and then he turned and ran past the door into the field. After he'd walked two steps away, all they could see of him was the hand that held his lamp, and that appeared to be floating next to it along the grass. Once he was gone, Mozzie tore the seal, and emptied the envelope's contents. There were six unopened paper envelopes inside the padded one, and he went through them quickly.

"They don't look manipulated... Though she could have ironed the glue out and that wouldn't be visible..."

"The stamps would have fallen off - why would Laura go through your mail?" Neal asked, as Mozzie brought one close to his nose and smelled it.

"I don't trust her, Neal. She's sneaky, she's hiding something, I just know it..." he seemed to catch the way Neal was staring at the letters, and he answered the unuttered question. "They're courier, not Post Office. And I've rerouted these through more PO boxes than you can count, trust me, we're untraceable."

"What are they?"

"Status updates on the items we're fencing... Possible good news!" He ripped the opening of the first letter, and read. Neal could actually see his eyebrows dropping as he moved down the page.

"What? What is it?"

"This is from Big Tom's wife, you remember Big Tom, the fence? I gave him four of the Egyptian pieces."

"He stole them and ran?" Neal guessed. Mozzie shook his head.

"More like he got caught and got sent to jail. 5 years. Possession of stolen property, and he resisted arrest."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

Mozzie then quickly moved through the rest of the letters, shredding them to unrecognisable pieces once he finished reading. Not one spelled good news. They had not sold a thing. Neal had to look down and away in order to hide his relief. It meant they had more time. It meant they weren't running.

"We tried to do this too quick," Mozzie lamented. "You never get a good price when you're in a hurry."

"Well... We don't have a lot of expenses right now, we could just cut on the wine. I can make work than can be sold and you can keep at that coffee business of yours."

"It's not enough. Remember the fuel, fuel is expensive, so unless you want to live in the dark... We can either do something bolder, or start taking regular jobs. Both alternatives have their risks."

"What regular job could I possibly take?" Neal asked. "There's nothing to do here."

"Actually, there is. Mr. Vogt is hiring. He wants to build a guest house, a really nice one, kind of like a boutique hotel out near the forest. I might have mentioned over drinks that you were an architect..."

"Mozz!"

"What? It's a wooden house, how hard can it be? And he can pay well. Not enough to help our retiring fund, but enough to live by while we plan something."

"All right then. I'll still go tomorrow and talk to Vogt. I want to sell this frame."

"Okay, just don't lose sight of the goal here." Mozzie repeated. It was starting to sound like his mantra.

A/N: To be continued soon! Any questions, comments, ideas, cries of despair, let me know! Hearing from you readers is the best part of my day.