A/N: I hope you folks have had as much fun reading this as I've had writing it! Thanks to everyone who reviewed, favorited, commented, & followed. As always, all my readers rock!
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Epilogue
It had been a long day.
Watching the snow fall, Kris stood out on the back porch, the only light from the patio door behind her. It felt strange, knowing Mar was really her mother now. Scary-strange, but wonderful, too.
Kris shivered. The endless white, the falling flakes, the bright crescent of the waning moon, the stillness of the night: it all added to the strangeness.
After they'd left the Hardys, Mar had driven out to the Mortons' farm with another jug of the honey-wine and a loaf of homemade cheese bread. "A peace offering," Mar had said. When they'd pulled into the long gravel drive — relit with the glowing candles and white paper sacks — Kris spotted the back-hoe behind the house.
"I'm filling that shaft in once they get all the bones recovered," Mr. Morton had said. He'd accepted the gift with a somber 'thank you'; Kris could hear Chet and Iola back in the kitchen, arguing over Monopoly. "No more kids'll get lost out there. Can't believe it's been there all these years and we didn't know it." Mr. Morton glanced at Old Ma Morton, who sat by the fireplace, snoring in her rocking chair. "Mamaw remembered that cloth Fenton showed us. Said it was her little sister's dress."
"So it was her sister," Mar had said.
Mr. Morton had nodded. "We'll be holding funeral this week, once the coroner's done. The boys don't remember?"
Kris had looked down at the polished wood floors, dark with age and stains. She didn't know what the Mortons had been told, but she was pretty sure it wasn't about fairies.
"No," Mar said quietly. "It's probably for the best."
"Probably." Mr. Morton's face had darkened. "Worthless scumbags that grabbed 'em, won't get on my property again. I'll be fencing off the woods, let the dogs have the run of it. Anyone comes on that's not supposed to, they'll be on 'em." He grinned down at Kris. "Not that it'll stop you kids, mind. Dogs'll just lick you to death."
Carrying a covered basket, Mrs. Morton had come out from the kitchen. Mar took it, and Kris sneaked a peek under the cover: cookies and fudge. "Mar, could you make sure the boys get these? I forgot to give it to Fenton." Mrs. Morton looked uncomfortable. "Tell them I'm sorry."
"You didn't know they'd be grabbed," Mar said. "None of us did."
"No," Mrs. Morton said. "But it was because I yelled that they ran off like that."
Mar looked down at Kris; Kris bowed her head. "Joe and Kris shouldn't have been up in that tree," Mar said mildly. "Children have to learn to take the consequences. That's what makes them adults."
The drive back home had been quiet, broken only by the wind whistling through Mar's Jeep. "It was all my fault, Shimá," Kris had said finally, shamed. "I was up in that tree first. I went out after Click. Frank and Joe were just trying to make sure I didn't get hurt."
Mar had grasped her hand. "Frank and Joe made their own choices. Just as you did. I'm glad that they chose to follow you. Too many others would have just let you run away." Quieter, "You went after them, too, shiché'é. You made it right, and I think some deep part of them remembers that."
Kris hung her head. "Because of me," she whispered, "Click got tossed out of the fairy realm. He helped us, shimá. Now he doesn't have a home anymore."
"Click made his own choices, too," Mar said. "He chose to do what he did, all of it. God gave us all free will, even the Sidhe." They'd pulled into their driveway, and Mar had sat staring at the garage door for a moment, then turned to give Kris a direct look. "Do what you think is right, squirrel."
Now Kris stood out here in the snowy night, a bowl of milk and a plate of cookies on the patio table. Thinking about it, the little brownie might not chance getting so close to a human's house. After a glance around the yards and seeing no one, Kris picked up the offering and carried it out to the sugar maple, where she the bowl and plate down at the snow-covered roots.
"I'm sorry, Click," Kris said quietly. "I don't know if you followed us or if you're listening or if you're waiting to get me like you did Frank and Joe." Her brothers, now. Her big, resilient, brave brothers. Their certificate probably wouldn't count in the grown-ups' world, but Kris didn't care. It mattered where it really counted, down-deep. "It was really rotten, what you did. We didn't hurt you and we tried to protect you, but you made us choose between telling the truth or letting Frank die."
Nothing but silence, the wind, the snow.
"Maybe you didn't think you had a choice, either. Maybe you didn't know the grown-ups just wanted to help, too." Kris kept her gaze on the milk, watching the snowflakes fall into it, small floating ripples. She hadn't thought she had a choice, either, before. Before Mar. "But you still helped us. So I still think you're a friend. And I'll help you, if I can. If you'll let me. It's up to you." She turned away; she was getting too cold. "Enjoy the cookies."
Movement caught Kris's attention. Frank and Joe were watching from their window.
Great. Just great. They probably thought she was giving cookies to the tree.
They saw her looking up, and Joe started making faces at her, pulling his mouth open with his fingers, sticking his tongue out, and crossing his eyes. Kris stood there, arms crossed, trying to give them her best Mar-The-Implacable-Indian-Warrior imitation, until, grinning, Frank slid the window open and started to call something out —
Temptation was too much. Kris snatched up a fast handful of snowball, threw it, and scored right on their screen, splattering them both.
"Hey!" Joe yelped, right with Frank's "Kris!"
Then…unmistakably…the sound of her big brothers laughing their butts off.
Smiling, Kris went back inside to say goodnight to Mom.