***1967***

The long hall of fog stretched forward to a bright, dazzling green light.

Slowly the fog lifted, and the green light was the emerald, swinging from Professor Eliot Stokes's fingers in the Old
House's sitting room.

Barnabas Collins, living and breathing in 1967 in Collinsport, Maine, stared glassily ahead.

"Do you hear me, Barnabas Collins?" Asked the professor.

Silently Barnabas nodded.

"Then you know what you have to do. Josette is a pitiful animal, begging for mercy, for death. You know what you have to
do."

Several moments passed. Then a wistful smile, unconnected to the dreamy eyes, accompanied a final nod. "Yes...I
know what I have to do."

Elizabeth had never held Carolyn so tightly before, not even when she came back from her first disappearance. "You
mustn't, you mustn't," the mother spoke between deep intakes of breath, "you mustn't ever do anything like that to me
again."

Pandemonium reigned downstairs in Collinwood. Carolyn, her father, her cousin, and Willie had arrived in the entryway
just as Roger and Elizabeth were about to call the police. Now everyone was speaking at once, and the frustrated Roger
could barely make his question heard.

"Look, is anyone else unaccounted for?"

Liz took time out of her suffocating embrace of Carolyn to glance around the room, frowning. "I should think Barnabas
would have heard the ruckus and come in. Professor Stokes, too."

Carolyn and Willie froze at the same time.

Josette alone and fading in the basement...Jason mentioned Stokes.

Taking each other by the hand, they sped out the front door, into the deepening night.

"Wait!" Liz called, lunging after them.

Paul pulled her back. "Come, Liz," he said in a measured voice. "Have no fear. I've something to tell you about Barnabas,
Josette, and Stokes."

Barnabas knew what he had to do.

And Stokes, too weak with fear and heartbreak, left Barnabas to the professor's final revenge.

It was with slow, heavy steps that Barnabas reached the basement. He held a hammer and chisel.

He heard Josette's cries, subdued beneath the coffin's lid, as he descended into the darkness.

Willie and Carolyn raced through Collinwood's expansive grounds toward the Old House.

"I...I don't know why I want to save her," Carolyn said, teeth chattering from her own nerves and from the cold night air.

"I don't know why I want to either," Willie said swiftly, staring resolutely ahead.

"It's this damn connection to her," Carolyn continued shakily. "I feel if she were to die, I would, too."

"Me, too," Willie's voice broke.

Their figures disappeared into the forest just outside the Old House.

Barnabas traced a numb hand over the coffin's dark oak lid.

Then he chiseled away at the lock.

Josette had recognized Barnabas's tread, could recognize the hypnotized hum of his voice as he spoke to himself softly.

She wept pitifully. "Don't look at me, Barnabas, don't look at me," she pleaded from inside.

The lock gave way.

The coffin lid swung open.

Barnabas stared down at her, his eyes misty and lost.

Much like when he fell-

Josette squeezed shut her own withered eyelids, blocking out 200-year-old memories and the sight now of Barnabas
about to dispose of her old, broken form.

She heard him whisper, in that beautiful, strong, wonderful voice-

"I know what I have to do."

She waited for the sting in her chest of the stake.

Instead she heard the whisper of fabric.

She peeked over her wrinkled arm.

Barnabas knelt beside her, his shirt open, exposing his neck.

The eyes were tender now. Tender yet demanding.

"Drink."

His voice held no room for argument.

Too weak to resist, with a low moan Josette threw herself at him.

The Old House loomed ahead, dark against the moon.

Willie and Carolyn tore through the sitting room, down the rickety steps into the basement.

They held their breath in suspense at whatever awaited them.

They stopped at the coffin.

Josette lift her beautiful young face from Barnabas's chest. Willie was taken aback. The wrinkled yellow face was smooth
as porcelain, the glorious ringlets falling down her shoulders as they always did.

So stricken with relief was he that unlike Carolyn, he recoiled not at all at the stain of blood circling her mouth.
Barnabas turned his face to the two staring there.

Fangs peeked out of his upper-lip.

Carolyn screamed.

"Please, Carolyn," Barnabas said softly, reaching out an ice-cold hand. "Do not fear. I remember who I am now...I am still
Barnabas Collins of today, but am also the Barnabas who reigned here almost two-hundred years ago. We shall find
peace, Josette and I, now."

The two humans before them stood stunned, disbelieving.

Josette broke the silence with a self-loathing moan. "No, my beloved. You are wrong. I have taken away all hope of you
finding peace. I should have been strong enough to keep you from this. I have failed you once again." She sighed,
dropping her head on his shoulder. "There is no hope, no cure..."

Barnabas closed his eyes, concentrating as his fingers touched his temple. "No...you're wrong. There is a cure." He tilted
Josette's chin so that he could look into her eyes. "Nicholas entranced me before I could tell you that fateful night at
Widow's Hill. My mother...she knew of a cure in the West Indies. If I concentrate hard enough, I believe I can remember
the location. The instructions were surprisingly simple, too." His forehead creased as he scanned this centuries-old
memory. "You ground the bark of a mahogany tree into a potion with water and sap, then mix in the vampiric blood." He
frowned. "Yet Blair...Blair said the curse came with a price. Death. He said no magic or scientific way had yet been found
to prevent this outcome. I do not know if he was lying in order to hasten my fall, or"-

At his words, Josette stiffened in his arms. No scientific way.

Josette sat up, eyes wide. She studied her pale arms, and held them up to her narrowed eyes. She stared at her veins,
where faint hints of Stokes' cure still coursed through her bloodstream, despite his efforts at subterfuge. In almost a
whisper, she said, "Ah, but there is. There is a scientific way to mix with the old magic. The missing ingredient is now
inside me."

Lovers stared into each other's eyes. Understanding dawned in both.

Without breaking eye contact with her beloved, Josette said, "Oh, Willie? Will you and dear Carolyn fetch Professor
Stokes' notes for me? I believe they will come in handy on a voyage Barnabas and I shall soon embark on."

Her red lips curled into a mischievous, contented smile.