A/N: Thank you for reviewing, Mynameiseverchanging, neko-rin, and dakari prince-aki. Neko-rin, I think of this story as around four years after the canon, when Sora is about 20 and Layla is about 24. This is the final part.

—

A woman will betray France and a woman will save France. One woman on one side of the coin from the other, a saint and a queen, their destinies intertwined forever.

There was a woman called Isabeau of Bavaria, Cathy explained from Layla's and her own historical research. Isabeau was said to be the woman who betrayed France and prepared the world for the Maid, because she signed the treaty giving France to the English. She was the mother of the Dauphin and she was also the grandmother of the young King of England, and she gave France away to her grandson and swore her son was illegitimate because she had to protect herself and the people she could. She was said to be polished and beautiful with long golden hair, she loved art and beautiful things, and she had twelve children and a mentally ill husband in real life.

Where Jeanne was fire, Sora thought, Isabeau was water: cool, calm, lovely, and making complicated and difficult choices in complex situations. Jeanne was fire, focused solely on winning battles where the outcomes were clear.

Together, Jeanne and Isabeau must reconcile by the end of the play...

Layla had lost her first role, so she created a new one. Sora beamed with happiness. To think they would be together again! When Layla described her performance, her eyes shone like stars. Sora could not wait to see it and join her.

"There's no time to waste," Cathy said. "We've made changes to the script almost all the way through, and performance is in nineteen days."

—

Now Layla and Sora carried out their stunt: that, in the end, when Jeanne was burned, Isabeau the water would carry her ashes away. They would fly together from the world.

And now Fool appeared before them, shining in golden light.

"I see Isabeau," Fool said, "for Isabeau was a Rooster. She was a deep thinker who always wished to do more than her abilities. She desired elegance and beauty in her surroundings. The dark side to Isabeau's traits is that she was disappointed, but her name lives on through history and her family line continues to this day. It is curious that Layla Hamilton's mother Lola had the French maiden name of Saint-Rémy, the same maiden name as a notorious jewel thief who claimed to be releated to the family line of Isabeau's son...but I know nothing about that.

"Your friend May Wong is also a Rooster, who is always devoted to her work and speaks out when she has something on her mind," he added about May.

"And I see Jeanne, now that your path lies clear before you," Fool said. "Jeanne's year of birth was the year of the Dragon. She was magnificent and strange, a woman unlike any other. She was honest, brave, and loved God and her country. She was clever in strategy and warfare, and a true idealist who followed the voice of her dreams.

"Here Layla is the Dragon, noble and justly proud, glorious and brave. Sora is the Monkey, the matchless daring fool wiling to chase her impossible dream. Together, you are unstoppable.

"Bring Jeanne to life in your show!"

Now Sora and Layla flew.

—

The two stars were called to perform Jeanne and Isabeau before the play's leaders, the three sponsors and the director.

Mrs Karunungan looked at them both. "That nice boy Kenneth warned me that we had two extraordinary performers in you. With Layla—a decent Jeanne. With Sora, it is the right Jeanne. With both, it becomes something new." She tapped her knotted ebony cane approvingly on the ground.

"A redemption of Isabeau's reputation as a historical villain," Madame De Conte said. Today the historical consultant wore a huge black and white hat like the wings of a giant butterfly. "There is support for this. As Jeanne was a miraculous saviour, Isabeau was made to become her opposite. But Isabeau was trying to survive in a difficult time. Both, in the end, caused France to be redeemed."

"It will drive audience demands using our two stars," Hortensia Virgil said. "Our advertisers and the press must know immediately."

Eyfridur the director watched them for some moments more. "I permit the changes," she said. It was enough. Cathy winked at them.

—

It was opening night. Sora and Layla had worked for a long time to accomplish the changes in the script, but it felt like they only gained energy from their work.

"Lucky talisman." Macquarie, already dressed in her costume, reached into Layla's long train and took out a small object and some pins from her bag. "Let me pin this into your costume, just for tonight, for luck! It's Miss Layla's old white rabbit from the Kaleido Stage," she told Sora.

"White rabbit...I remember that," Sora said. "Tweedledum, Alice, the white rabbit!" She went to Macquarie and rubbed the rabbit's fur slowly, trying to remember. "It was such a beautiful day when I went to the Kaleido Stage with my first parents. I caught a white rabbit, it landed in my lap like magic! Alice was so amazing and wonderful. When she disappeared inside the shimmering flower I couldn't believe it!"

Sora touched the white rabbit's head. "There was a big girl who cried...a girl bigger than me, with lovely hair and a green dress like a fairy. She didn't get a rabbit. So I made her smile by giving her one. I was so happy when she took the rabbit. I told her the Japanese words for white rabbit. Shiro usagi, she said."

"Shiro usagi," Layla repeated, a half-second after Sora. She'd said the words with a perfect accent. "I went to that play and later I learnt that you also were inspired by Donna Walker's Alice. Tweedledum missed me, and I was a crybaby back then. Until a tiny little girl who couldn't speak English gave me her own rabbit..."

"...Because a fairy girl with light blonde hair was crying, a girl I looked up to from the start. There you are!" Sora said, suddenly falling on Layla and hugging her. "We have been friends since the very beginning!"

"You'll spoil your costumes," Macquarie reminded them, and the quarter call came over the backstage speakers for the performers. Layla only had time to press Sora's hand warmly before they hastened to the stage.

This was Jeanne d'Arc and her partner!

—

And in the night, after the Stage had gone dark and the cheering audience was home in bed, the only sound that stirred in the theatre was the soft clink of silver trapezes. Layla was too exhilarated to sleep.

She felt all that she had felt when she and Sora were together in the Mystical Act, all wonder and daring and a hope that outlasted death and despair.

Layla knew something new with each performance. She and Sora became all they could be with each other. Both had separate experiences, had learnt to stand on their own. They had come full circle. An alchemical ring closed on them, changing to diamond at last.

"I love you, Sora," Layla said. But she thought that she was alone. Truths were best spoken at night. She dived upward to the next bar with her left hand, the golden phoenix reaching for her love...

She was lifted by something so gentle and light she thought it a ghost of the stage, taking her into the air. Then Sora, unmistakably, stood by her side on the swinging trapeze.

"I know," Sora said.

It began with a kiss.

—

A/N: Some brief notes.

- Ken's sister's name is given as Lucy in the fansub version I have, but a fan wiki says it's Susie.

- The white rabbit + Sora and Layla interaction as children at 'Alice' also occurs in the fic 'A Phoenix Reborn' by LyThi.