Author's Note: I can't believe I'm finished.
I can't believe it took me the better part of seven years to finish.
Is this a particularly satisfying ending? Not really. Unlike just about everything else I've ever written, Crossroads was written one chapter at the time, with me sprinkling plot hooks in there without knowing what I would end up using them for, and the end leaves most of them unresolved (though I would argue that the protagonists' personal arcs conclude in a more or less satisfying fashion). Still, it's an end, and for the longest time I didn't think I'd manage to get to it.
My thanks to everyone who's read and commented over all these... surprisingly many years, in particular Greenwine who I first met because of this story and now count as a very good friend, and who was the one who managed to prod me into finally finishing the damn thing. And thank you to the creators of Changeling: the Dreaming, for making what is by far my favourite oWoD game.
Jenny looked up at the house. It lay beyond a high iron fence, at the end of a long driveway. The garden was partly covered with ice and snow, but it was melting away. Spring was coming to Dougal, at long last. The air smelled fresh and felt downright warm after the long winter.
"Are you nervous?" Jameel said.
Jenny smiled and shook her head.
"Nervous is just a different kind of scared," she said. "It doesn't happen to me."
"But you don't look forward to it either."
Jenny sighed.
"No," she admitted.
Jameel smiled gently.
"You don't have to do this."
"I don't know." Jenny shrugged. "I think maybe I do. I threw everything into being a good knight to a good liege-lord. Then my liege-lord was gone, and everything that made me worth a damn just disappeared. I don't want to be that vulnerable a second time." She grinned wryly. "I don't think I can count on an over-clever rebel leader sending a pretty sorcerer boy to get me out of my funk a second time."
"I'm not pretty," Jameel said.
"Everyone's pretty. Haven't I taught you that yet?"
Jameel rolled his eyes but made no reply.
"Anyway," Jenny said. "After it is all over – however it ends – I'm leaving the duchy. So if I'm going to do this, it has to be now."
Jameel blinked.
"You're leaving?" he said. "Why? There's every chance everything will be okay. We're not fugitives anymore. We're here under the Queen's protection. And she doesn't seem to be too happy with Broch."
"Not after seeing that Malenna was right about the state of this place, no." Jenny chuckled nastily. "Got to hand it to the snot-nosed little brat, she really nailed that heartfelt plea for royal intervention. I don't think there was a dry eye in Mab's court when she was done."
"Exactly," Jameel said. "I don't know if she'll decide that Malenna is the rightful heir – no one's found the stupid sword yet, as far as I know – but she'll definitely throw out Broch. I don't know what will happen to Josey, but once there's no tyrant for him to be the only alternative to, he won't be as dangerous and powerful anymore. There'll still be some danger, but…" He grinned weakly. "Isn't that what you live for?"
"Honestly, the problem is that there won't be enough danger," Jenny said. "And too much politics. I need some good, simple adventure. Dragon-slaying. Damsel-rescuing. The whole wandering knight thing."
"I'll miss you," Jameel said.
Jenny made a face.
"You'll miss sex you don't have to sell your soul for."
"Well, that too." Jameel smiled sheepishly. "Try not to die heroically for a noble cause somewhere, okay?"
"Try not to die of boredom while you're bent over all those textbooks and grimoires," Jenny said. She took his face between her hands and kissed him. "And thank you. It's been weird, and messy, and confused, and none of it made much sense, and I haven't had so much fun in years."
"I'm not sure about 'fun,'" Jameel said. "But it's definitely been… interesting."
"Heh." Jenny looked up at the house again. "Okay, time to do this."
"You're sure you don't want me to come with you?" Jameel said.
"Yes." Jenny smiled unhappily. "But I think I'd like it if you waited for me out here."
He nodded, and she walked up the driveway, past the thawing garden. She was not afraid, no, but her heart was still pounding in her chest as if she was going into battle.
She rang the doorbell and remained standing where she was, her head light and empty. She tried to smile with her usual confidence. One way or another, this needed to be done.
A woman opened the door. She was tall, with long grey hair that had once been blonde and strong, handsome features. The look on her face turned from bemusement to shock as she saw who was standing in front of her.
"Jenny…?" she said in a choked voice.
Jenny grinned sheepishly.
"Hi, Mom," she said.