Please be kind; I've been in a foreign country for three weeks, switching back and forth between English, German, Greek, and Spanish, with a little French and Dutch thrown in for fun, and when I speak English with people, it's a sort of simplified version of English to make it easier for non-native speakers to understand. So I think my writing is a little messed up as a result. But this is about as done as it will ever be, and I thought I'd post it.

Chapter 43: Truce

Once Ethan and Rick left, Adrian and I sat down and discussed our options. We briefly considered taking the girls out for dinner at a restaurant, but in the end, we hesitantly decided to bring them to my father's house for Thanksgiving dinner. Adrian drove over to Joanne's house to pick them up while I napped with Ivy in a recliner in the living room.

When Adrian returned with the girls, I went out with my father to meet them in the driveway. The girls eyed their grandfather warily as he offered an awkward apology to each of them. He finally offered Amy his hand to shake, and she shook hands with him, her eyes huge and luminous. Violet, however, refused to shake his hand, choosing instead to simply walk into the house. The rest of us followed in her wake, not sure how to handle the situation. After all, no one could blame her for feeling the way she did, and I didn't want to push her.

As we walked inside, Amy grabbed Adrian by the arm and started telling him something I couldn't really hear. While they were busy laughing together, I caught up to Violet in the front hall. When she saw me, she grabbed my hand and said, in a confidential tone, "Me and Aim-Aim have been rehearsing a special team karate move, in case he attacks again. First I'll go like this –" she demonstrated a slow motion punch. "Then, Aim-Aim will go like that –" and she demonstrated a kick. She nodded, satisfied. "It'll work."

"That looks like a great plan," I said. "But I'm sure he won't attack again. He's a lot nicer now. He helped save little Ivy's life."

Violet regarded me gravely. "We'll see," she said, in her best impression of my voice.

I gave her the brightest smile I could. "Come meet the baby," I said, eager to change the topic, and Violet nodded.

"Yes," Adrian said, from behind me. "You can both meet her! This is going to be so much fun!"

We spent the next hour or so visiting with each other and playing with the baby while Dad finished getting dinner ready. Carly and Zoe dressed the baby in a silly little sailor outfit and then we took a few photographs of the girls and the baby in a variety of groupings and poses. For their part, Amy and Violet both seemed unsure as to how to react to this tiny, helpless person. Being generous little souls, they both wanted to like her, but were a little perplexed by her unsmiling face and tearless cries. All the books Adrian had been reading had warned us that older children don't always react well to new babies, so we decided to be patient with the process. After a while, Adrian and the girls sat down on the floor for a game of Crazy Eights, and the other adults took turns holding the baby, each of us marveling at her tiny fingers and toes.

At about seven o'clock, Dad declared dinner ready, and we sat down together at the dining room table. Dad asked me to say the prayer, so I thanked God for the health and safety of our family. Then we dug in to the enormous meal of turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, and all the fixings. Luckily, both Adrian and Carly were chatterboxes by nature, and between the two of them, they managed to start a conversation and keep it going. After a short while, Amy began to relax, and soon she was regaling us with stories from school, including her science fair experiment on turtle swimming speeds. Violet stayed quiet, occasionally whispering something that only Amy and Adrian could hear. My father, meanwhile, was completely silent, but he seemed to be enjoying the fact that we were all together.

After we were done with the main meal, we cleared off the table for dessert. Dad set out three different kinds of pie – pumpkin, pecan, and apple – and we each took as much as we wanted. As was his habit, Adrian covered nearly his entire plate with whipped cream, then added some to each of the girls' plates as well. For a moment, I considered objecting to the amount of sugar they were eating, and then remembered it was our first Thanksgiving without Rick and took another slice of apple pie for myself.

"Mmm, the pumpkin is my favorite," Violet sighed. "It doesn't taste like pumpkins, I don't think, but it's good."

"It is good," Amy said, her mouth full of pie. "Did you make it, Grampa?" A split-second after she uttered the familiar nickname for my father, I saw her expression change. The comfortable family setting had made her temporarily forget the strife between them, and she'd remembered a moment too late.

"My talents don't run to pies, Amy," my father said calmly. "I bought this one at the grocery store. But I think you're right, it's very good. Not quite as good as your grandmother used to make, but very good."

"Grandma used to make pumpkin pie?" Amy asked, curious despite herself.

"Oh yes," my father said. "She made it from scratch. Well, the pumpkin was from a can but otherwise..."

"They put pumpkins in cans?" Violet interjected, looking up from her plate. "Those must be really big cans!"

"Silly," Amy said affectionately. "They just use really small pumpkins."

I was about to explain about canned pumpkin when the doorbell rang, stopping all of us short. Violet dropped her fork full of pie, and Adrian paused with the can of whipped cream in his hand. A cold spike of fear went through my body. Any visitor on a day like today almost had to be unwelcome. Carly, who was holding the baby at the moment, clutched her more tightly to her chest in a reflexive protective gesture.

"I'll get the door," my father said, after a brief moment. "Zoe, grab your kit."

"It's right here," my sister replied, patting the shoulder bag hanging over the back of her chair.

"Get ready," Dad said, standing up. "Just in case."

"I'm ready," Zoe said, almost through clenched teeth as my father left the room.

"Who is it at the door, Mommy?" Violet asked, in a low voice.

"I'm not sure," I said, reaching out to take her hand. "But it'll be ok."

"Don't worry, Vy-Vy," Amy said. "I'll protect you."

"Nothing's going to happen to anyone," Adrian said, softly, but I heard the warning in his voice.

There was a small pause, then we heard voices drifting down the hall from the front door.

"It's him again," Adrian said, his face creasing in an annoyed expression.

"Him who?" I asked, just as my father called for me.

Adrian and I looked at each other for a second, then we got up together and headed down the hall to the front door.

"Who is it?" I asked in a low tone, as we walked.

"Whassisface," Adrian said, irritated.

I was going to repeat the question but we had already reached the front door and I could see for myself that our visitor was Ethan. My father had let him inside but clearly didn't intend to let him in any further than the laundry room. Ethan and I exchanged terse, automatic hellos. Then he said, "I'd like to speak to you alone, Sydney."

"Fat fucking chance," Adrian said. I saw my father wince slightly at the profanity.

"Please," Ethan said. "Just a few minutes. I'm alone and unarmed."

"Sure," Dad said. "And the minute we leave you alone with her, you'll throw Sleep in her face and drag her out to the car."

"I don't have my kit with me," Ethan said. "I left it in the car."

"Take off your coat and turn your pockets out," my dad said, and Ethan did as he had been requested. He was wearing a button down dress shirt and a pair of dress slacks, both of which fit relatively tightly. I didn't see where he could have possibly hidden a vial or jar of Sleep or any other alchemist technology. When he turned out his pockets, a receipt from Starbucks fluttered to the floor, but nothing else. It seemed that Ethan was really unarmed, just as he'd said.

"I guess I could talk to him for a few minutes," I said, cautiously. More than anything else, I was curious about what he wanted from me.

"I'll wait by Ethan's car for him to come back out," my father said, putting on his coat. Without waiting for a comment from us, he walked out the door.

"Guess you're not dragging Sydney anywhere with you," Adrian said. "Not with Mr. Sage guarding your car."

"I don't want to drag anyone anywhere," Ethan said.

Adrian took a moment to examine Ethan's aura. Finally, he must have been more or less satisfied that Ethan's intentions were good, because he said, "I'll leave you two to talk. But I'll be right in the next room." He pointed significantly.

"Fair enough," Ethan said.

I waited until Adrian had left. Then I turned to Ethan and said, "Ok, what do you want?"

"It's kind of a long story," Ethan said.

"Summarize it," I said, crossing my arms over my chest.

"I'll do my best," Ethan said. He made a face as he tried to find the right words to begin. Then he said, "Ok, well, after Rick and I left here, I thought it would be a wise move on my part to go and, you know, edit the birth records at the hospital a little."

This was something the alchemists had to do quite frequently – something I had done many times myself. "What for?" I asked, though I thought I knew.

"I had to change the record to show that you had had a single birth, not a twin birth."

I narrowed my eyes as if I hadn't just felt a trickle of sweat run down my spine. "Covering up for Rick," I said.

"Well... I guess you could look at it that way," Ethan said, uncomfortably. "But I don't want to focus on that issue. See, I found out something interesting, something... questionable. That's why I'm here."

"Oh yeah?" I said, sticking out my chin. "What was so questionable?"

"I was a bit surprised," Ethan said, "when I found out that the hospital's records already show a single live birth. That would be strange if you had given birth to twins."

"That is weird," I said, thoughtfully. "I wonder why it would say that."

"I have a theory," Ethan said.

"You know something?" I said. "I don't really care what your theory is. Your brother murdered my baby, and you're trying to cover up for him. You're not in a position to be harassing me or my family."

"I'm just asking you to hear me out," Ethan said. "I'm trying to make a point here – that the paramedics record a single live birth, not a twin birth."

"And?" I said. I made a rolling gesture with my hands.

"When I got home, I took some time going back through our files on Lord Ivashkov," Ethan said. "Apparently he has extremely strong and well documented healing powers. He has even been able to bring people back from the dead. His powers seem to be further activated by his emotions. Considering all of this, I think it's interesting that Lord Ivashkov wasn't able to revive the baby after Rick attacked her."

"What are you saying?" I asked. "Are you saying that Adrian didn't love our baby?"

"On the contrary," Ethan said. "I think he had an extremely strong reaction to her apparent death. It surprised me, in fact. I guess I had been under the impression that his kind didn't care as much for their offspring as we humans do. In fact, I had thought that a dhampir baby would have been particularly unwelcome."

"Well, now you know," I said. "Moroi can love just as strongly and deeply as humans do."

"I guess that maybe a few of them do," Ethan said. "It doesn't change their essential nature, but it does make them a bit more... I don't know... palatable somehow."

"So, is that what you came here to tell me?" I asked. "That you've revised your opinion of Moroi very slightly, from 'totally evil' to 'slightly less evil'?"

"That's not why I'm here," Ethan said. I made another rolling gesture with my hands, and he said, "Even at the time, I was surprised by Lord Ivashkov's reaction to the baby's death. It distracted me from how unusual your reaction was."

"What do you mean?" I said.

"Well," he said. "You cried, you fell to your knees, you were upset, sure. But you didn't fly at us screaming. You seemed resigned to the baby's fate."

"What good would it have done to fight?" I said. "She was already dead." I let my voice crack a little as I said the words. I was feeling pretty proud of my acting skills.

"And here's something else," Ethan went on, as if I hadn't spoken. "Just one other thing. Let's consider the situation you faced when you went upstairs to get the baby. You went into the room and gazed down at the crib, where both of your perfect newborn twins were lying, looking up at you. How did you choose which one to bring downstairs and give away? That is quite literally a Sophie's choice. Did you flip a coin? Play eeny-eenie-miny-mo?"

"I prayed about it," I said, with an air of righteous indignation. "I let the Lord lead me. It was His choice."

"I don't buy it," Ethan said. "I don't believe that a mother would sacrifice one of her twins to save the other one. I just don't. You would have found another solution."

"It wasn't just to save Ivy," I said. "It was to save Violet and Amy, too. And I didn't know that Lily would be killed. If I had known that..." I sniffed loudly.

"But you must have known that Rick was unstable," Ethan said. "Why did you let him hold the baby?"

"I used to be married to the guy," I said. "I never thought he'd hurt a baby. How could I be married to someone that I thought would hurt a baby?"

"You left him months ago," Ethan said. "I'm sure you could see him for who and what he is. Probably better than anyone else."

"Yeah, but... I thought he wouldn't hurt Violet's half-sister."

"I would think that your experience with him would lead you to the opposite conclusion," Ethan said.

"But..." I said, then trailed off. It was painful to pretend to stand up for Rick. Ethan wasn't buying it, anyway, so why bother?

"Really, Sydney," Ethan said, "none of this adds up. I don't believe that you would hand the baby over at all, much less to Rick. I don't believe that you would have reacted the way you did, and I don't understand why Lord Ivashkov wasn't able to revive the baby. And I don't understand why the hospital records show only one baby. There seems to be only one possible explanation for this: that the thing you handed over to Rick wasn't a baby at all."

"What?" I said, putting as much surprise and outrage into my voice as I could. "How could you say that about my daughter? She might not have been human but she was still a baby."

"I mean no insult to dhampirs," Ethan said. "I'm saying that the thing you were calling a baby was neither dhampir nor human. It wasn't even alive, I believe. It was... something else."

"What are you talking about?" I asked, as if bewildered. Internally, though, I was wondering how much longer I could continue this charade.

"You only had one baby, Sydney," Ethan said, very patiently. "One. Not twins. One baby, and she was upstairs, safe and sound, the whole time."

"You saw Lily," I said, still outraged. "You saw Rick murder her. You saw her moving and crying..." I trailed off, tearful.

"I don't know," Ethan said. "I know that I saw a baby, but that doesn't mean that it was a baby. On the one hand, I'd say that it was a replica. But that's obviously impossible because of size restrictions."

"Exactly," I said. "So, what other theory do you have?"

"I don't have any other specific theories," Ethan said. "But I know that you, your father, and your sister Zoe are all extremely talented alchemists. There are some notes in the file to indicate that you, Sydney, may have been meddling with non-approved... technology... while you were in Palm Springs. It should also be noted that Adrian Ivashkov's powers are not completely understood. There are many ways that you could have orchestrated an elaborate trick to save your baby from harm."

We stared each other down for a moment. Finally, I said, "So? What now?"

"Now?" Ethan said. "What do you mean?"

"What's going to happen?" I asked. "You think I deceived you somehow. You know that I'm involved romantically with a Moroi and have dhampir children. Are troops of alchemists going to swoop down and take me or my children away?"

"No," Ethan said. He sighed. "No matter what deception may have taken place today, a few things were authentic enough."

"Like..."

"Well, like the way that Rick actually believed that he was murdering an infant dhampir. The fact that he could do such a thing is very disturbing to me, even if it did turn out later that the thing he 'killed' wasn't really a baby. It was his intentions that frighten me."

"He's a murdering sack of shit," I said, pleasantly.

"Further," Ethan said, ignoring my comment. "I believe that Lord Ivashkov's reactions were sincere, as well. He seemed legitimately heart-broken over the apparent death of his baby. I suspect that whatever ruse you were perpetuating, he wasn't in on it, at least not at first."

"Adrian loves his children very deeply," I said, carefully. "He'd do anything for them."

"I see that," Ethan said. "Today, I learned that my own brother is far more despicable than I would have guessed, and that a Moroi is far more... well... human than I would have guessed."

"Moroi are just like us," I said. "Some are like angels, and some are like devils."

"No mortal is at all like an angel," Ethan said, a touch of church-like piety in his voice.

"It was a figure of speech," I said. "Relax."

Ethan nodded slightly. "Fine," he said.

"Ok, so, what's going to happen now?" I asked.

"Now?" he said. "Now, nothing. I think we're done."

"So... are you declaring a truce?"

"A permanent truce," Ethan said. "No matter what you may have done to trick my brother, you didn't deserve for him to attempt to murder your child."

"I didn't do anything to trick him," I said.

"Oh, yes you did," Ethan said. "And not just tonight. You tricked Rick eleven years ago, when you married him to shield Amy from scrutiny."

"I didn't – "

"You know you did," Ethan said. "You were already pregnant with a dhampir baby and you married my brother for no other reason than to keep her safe. You never loved my brother at all, did you? It was all for Amy." He started to say something else, but I saw his eyes go to something behind me. I turned to see what he was looking at, just as he said, "Hi there, Violet. You've gotten so big!"

Violet was standing in the doorway of the laundry room staring at Ethan with wide, frightened eyes. There were traces of whipped cream around her mouth from all the pie she'd eaten. She looked so small and terrified that it took all my effort not to run over to her and gather her in my arms. But it was important for me to keep as calm as possible, so I just spoke to Violet in a gentle voice. "Violet, sweetheart," I said. "Do you remember your Uncle Ethan? It's been a long time since you saw him."

She relaxed visibly. "Oh," she said. "I thought you were... someone else."

"Did you think I was your Daddy?" Ethan said, smiling. "I do look a little like him since we're brothers."

"No," Violet said, shaking her head for emphasis. "You don't look like my Daddy. I thought you were Rick Resnick."

Ethan needed a moment to take that in. Finally he said, "But isn't Rick Resnick your Daddy?"

"My Daddy is my Adrian-Daddy," Violet said proudly. "He's not my real Daddy, but he's my real-pretend-Daddy and anyway I like him better."

"Oh," Ethan said, clearly a little befuddled by both the import of her comment and the comment itself. "I see. Well, your... biological father misses you very much."

"No he doesn't," Violet said. "And anyway I don't care if he does. Tell him I hate him."

"You don't mean that, Violet," Ethan said, in a patronizing tone.

"I mean what I mean," Violet said, bristling slightly. She always hated being talked down to. "You don't know what I mean. I'm the only one who knows what I mean. And I hate him just like I said." She paused to wipe her nose, then went on, "Go away now. We're eating dessert." She smiled coldly. "And you can't have any."

Ethan seemed startled by Violet's comments. "That's not very nice," he said.

"I don't care," she said.

I wanted to cheer. My little Violet was standing up to a tall, condescending adult who resembled strongly the father whom she was still a little frightened of. Just a year ago this would have been unimaginable. But even though I wanted to congratulate my daughter, I needed to finish the conversation with Ethan in relative privacy, so I knelt down near her. "Violet," I said, stroking her hair. "I love you very much and am so proud of you for using your big voice. You did so well. But let me just finish talking to Ethan, ok? Just for a few more minutes. Then we can all have some more pie." I gave her a kiss on the forehead.

Violet considered that, then nodded. "Don't be mean to my mother," she said to Ethan, and then she turned on her heel and left the room.

Ethan watched her walking away, obviously still disconcerted by the encounter. "I don't remember her being so rude the last time I saw her," he said.

"She's come a long way," I said, fondly. "She's learning to use her big voice when she needs to. I couldn't be prouder of her."

Ethan took that in, then nodded. "And Amy?" he asked politely. "Is she well?"

"She's doing great," I said.

"I'm glad," Ethan said.

I waited for him to say something else, and when he didn't, I said, "So, are we done here?"

"Pretty much," Ethan said. "I just wanted to let you know where we stood. And I want you to know that I'll be watching Rick carefully in the future." He smiled uncomfortably, not meeting my eyes. "To be honest, I'm a little ashamed that I let him talk me into trying to take custody of your children. He made it seem reasonable, and I guess it might have made sense if conditions were different, but your family is obviously very closely bonded. I see now that it would have been a huge mistake to try to split you up."

"That's pretty much the deal with my family," I said. "We're better together."

Ethan looked up and met my eyes briefly, then nodded and held out his hand for me to shake. After a second of hesitation, I took it. "Take care, Sydney," he said.

"You too," I said.

He nodded and headed out the front door. As soon as the door closed behind him, Adrian appeared in the hallway. "That was unexpected," he said.

I didn't bother to ask him if he'd been listening. I knew he had. I just nodded and let him put his arm around me. Then the two of us returned to the kitchen, where our family was waiting for us.