Omnia mutantur, nos et mutamur in illis
All things are subject to change and we change with them
-- anonymous, often attributed to Ovid
Death's eyes seemed to fill the world as she looked into them.
Her gaze wasn't terrible or empty as Tara might have once feared. Instead, Tara felt as if she was falling into those limpid eyes, like she could drown in that sea of understanding and compassion. For just a moment, she wanted to forget, let go, and to do just that.
Almost unwillingly, forcing herself to remember whose eyes she was looking into, Tara looked away from that gaze, holding onto thoughts of Willow. Willow, who she had just found again. Willow, who she intended to hold and protect for as long as she lived. Willow, who told her stories by candlelight to get her to fall asleep, who had spoken softly of a Jewish legend of the Angel of Death, an angel who was so beautiful that your soul would be drawn out of your body simply by looking into her eyes.
Tara could feel that pull now, as she had once before while looking at a portrait on Destiny's wall. "These are my siblings, your aunts and uncles, Tara," Destiny said as he unbarred and opened the double doors, which had always been securely closed before. They led into a long hallway with portraits along one wall. "Each of us represents an aspect of existence."
The portraits were large, the individual figures within them life size. The people in the first couple were dressed in the formal styles of the 17th century, but they looked so lifelike that Tara half-expected them to step out of the pictures and into the hallway where she was standing with her father. Tara could sense something in this place, something deeper and older than magic. This was family. It had roots far deeper than her own lifetime.
The first canvas held the image of a woman of about Tara's own age. Her pale skin was accentuated by the absolute black of everything around her. Her dress. Her wide-brim hat. Her parasol. The only bit of color about her was a silver ankh on a chain around her neck. She was saved from looking too proper by the tiniest quirk of her lips that betrayed a bit of mirth, as if she couldn't take all this formality seriously.
"She's so beautiful," Tara exclaimed, as she leaned forward to look more closely into the woman's eyes which seemed so full of emotion. "Is she love?"
"She's Death."
"Death?" Tara exclaimed, jerking back from the picture. "Isn't Death supposed to be a skeleton with a scythe?"
"People have a tendency to see what they expect to see, and as they needlessly fear her, they imagine her as a horrifying apparition."
"Needlessly?" Tara asked, arching an eyebrow in surprise.
"Birth and death are transitions, entangled aspects of existence which couldn't be without each other. My sister governs these changes, ensuring that people have a guide as they enter and depart their lives."
The idea appealed to Tara, her mother having taught her about the interwoven nature of life and death, but she still didn't want to spend too long with this particular aunt of hers, so she walked to the next picture. "Who is this?"
It was a slender, pale man wearing a tricorne hat and a billowing black cape. One hand was on his hip, while the other held a carved walking stick as he looked sternly out of the picture. As Tara peered closer in an attempt to discern detail in the shades of darkness, she realized he had no eyes.
"This is my brother, Dream, whose realm you visit every night."
Destiny walked past the next portrait, which was shrouded by heavy, velvet curtains, without a word, his stride the smallest bit faster than usual. Tara lagged behind, curious about what could have so affected her imperturbable father. She halted in front of the curtains, wanting to see what they concealed but afraid to open them without permission.
"Why do you have this picture covered?"
When Destiny turned back to face Tara, his face was impassive, betraying no sign that the hidden portrait disturbed him. "It is covered because he is no longer part of the family."
"How? Why?" Tara exclaimed. She didn't think her father was like that.
"He abandoned his realm, his responsibilities, feeling that it should be no one's responsibility to control his domain."
"And that bothers you?" Tara asked with a tinge of challenge in her voice, then added in a softer, calmer voice, "I mean, I know your responsibilities are important to you, but..."
Destiny stood quietly for a moment, his fingers playing on the bindings of his book as if he wanted to open it and read his words from its pages instead of coming to them of his own accord. "It was his destiny," he said finally. "And I am Destiny so it cannot bother me." He started to resume their walk down the hallway.
"What was his name?"
"Destruction," Destiny said. "Nothing new can be created without destroying the old. His responsibility was ... change." He said that last word reluctantly as if it were the name of a demon which would manifest upon its utterance.
"Change?"
"Something that you can experience, but which I never can," Destiny replied. Despite his uneasiness with the word, his voice held a hint of longing for what he could never have.
When he turned away again, it had a sense of finality so Tara followed him down the corridor to the next portrait. It turned out that the next portrait was actually two paintings, hung close together. They shocked her speechless. In the first one stood the most beautiful woman Tara had ever seen, a devilish smile on her face. She was dressed in black leather like a dominatrix. Beside her stood a hideous, squat woman wearing nothing at all. Her eyes were grey and her teeth were tusks.
"The twins: Desire and Despair," Destiny introduced them.
Tara shuddered, unsure which one of her aunts she feared the most. There was nothing safe or loving in the face of Desire, but her heart plummeted when she looked into the grim, doubting eyes of Despair.
This time it was Tara who moved on to the next portrait.
The last painting was of a young girl of Dawn's age, standing in the middle of a grassy field with rolling hills behind her in an idyllic countryside. She wore a simple dress of pale blue and held a bouquet of flowers in her hands as she smiled out at Tara.
"What's her name?" Tara asked, unable to keep from mirroring the happy young girl's smile.
"Delirium who was once Delight. The youngest of the Endless."
Tara stepped closer to the portrait, feeling sympathy for the girl who seemed so innocent and carefree in the picture. She knew that the girl was older than gods or worlds, but it must be an oppressive burden to carry such a name after having once had one so fair. "What happened to her?"
"Some things are not written in my book. She was very happy when she received an offer of marriage, but something went wrong and the wedding never happened."
"That seems to be a common theme lately."
"Ah, yes, Anya's wedding. Did you enjoy yourself?"
"The groom bailed out, demons attacked, Willow had to save me-"
"I mean, how did it go with Willow?" Destiny said, interrupting the litany of disasters.
"We didn't get to talk much with everything going on, but ... it went well." Tara smiled broadly. "Really well."
"So you've made your decision?"
Tara knew which decision he was asking about. It was something she had tried to avoid thinking about too much, but she could feel change blossoming deep inside herself, sending out new green shoots of feeling and desire. She had felt giddy and excited at the wedding, unable to focus when Willow was around. None of the problems--demons, obnoxious relatives, missing grooms--none of them had mattered compared to the opportunity to see and touch Willow again.
She hadn't realized it until now, but she had made her decision that day amidst the chaos of the wedding. Somehow it seemed appropriate that their rekindled love had emerged from such chaos and sadness as life and hope always emerged from destruction and despair. Even after the seemingly total destruction of a forest fire, new life would sprout from the embers. She would take Willow back. It might not be today, or tomorrow, and it wouldn't happen all at once, but she had already accepted Willow back within her heart. The rest was as inevitable as destiny.
"I have." Tara had tried to explain her decision, her reasons, her feelings, to Willow last night when she couldn't wait any longer to be rejoined with her. But their love, their need for each other, had been too urgent, too powerful, and she had thought that she had all the time in the world. Looking in Death's eyes, she realized that she had no time at all.
"Hello, Tara," Death said.
"Hello, Aunt," Tara answered, trying to keep her voice from shaking without complete success.
"So you know who I am?"
Tara nodded, swallowing a lump in her throat. "Can I-can I at least say goodbye?" she asked. Though her choice had led her to this moment, she wouldn't take it back. Willow was her heart. Her destiny. She couldn't have made any other decision. All she wanted was one more moment in her beloved's arms to say farewell.
"I'm sorry, Tara," Death shook her head sadly. "I can't let you do that."
"It's not fair," Tara protested, tears beginning to trickle down her cheeks. "We had so little time together." There were so many moments that she was going to miss. Graduation. Moving into their first home alone together. Children. All the tiny moments that made up a life.
"It's never fair, Tara," Death said softly. She held out her hands. "Just take my hand."
"What will happen then? Where will you take me?"
"You'll find out."
"Why can't I just tell her goodbye?" Tara's voice was full of anguish.
"Too much weighs in the balance in this moment for me to change how you die."
"How I die?" Tara asked softly, then whirled to face her father. "Why does that matter?"
Destiny looked down at his book for guidance, as he always did in those rare instances when he felt uncomfortable with a situation. "Your death-" he began in his usual impassive tones, then broke off, looking down at his book again. There was a long moment of silence where no one spoke before he began again, sounding more human than she had ever heard him.
"There are consequences," he said, his voice full of pain. "This time Willow will go deeper into the dark magicks than she did when Glory sent you to the realm of my youngest sister, and the world will hang in the balance."
"But-then I need to speak to her, let her know that..." Tara started, her eyes flooded with urgent worry and need. She didn't know what she could tell Willow that make her death seem okay; she could barely face this moment herself, but she had to do something. "I mean ... I've got to change this."
"You cannot," Destiny said. "No matter what you do in this timeless span between moments, you will find yourself in front of that window where you started when time resumes."
"But why?" Tara cried. "Why me? Why now?"
"The bullet was just an accident, but its results are essential to the Story."
"So it's meaningless?" Tara said bitterly. "My life was just a way to force Willow to follow what's written in your book."
"I am Destiny. I am what is-"
"I know what you are," Tara shouted. "But you're also my father. I'm your daughter, not a fictional character following a meaningless, predestined path. How do my choices mean anything if they come to this?"
"We cannot control every aspect of our stories, my daughter," Destiny said. "But your life is not meaningless. I remember seeing you the day you were born. It changed my existence forever-"
"But you weren't there," Tara protested. "You're never there when I need you."
"In a sense, I'm everywhere," he said, quickly continuing before Tara could interrupt again, "but I know that is not the same for you. Nor for me. I read the stories about you in my book over and over, from your first steps and first words to your discovery of Willow, knowing that I'd have to wait to see you directly and always stopping before the end I knew must come."
"That doesn't do me any good," Tara said harshly. "If you love me, change this."
"I loved you the moment I saw you, seeing what your mother and I had created together," Destiny continued as if she hadn't interrupted. "Yet you also made me uneasy as I saw all the potential for change you contained within yourself. I am Destiny, first of and apart from my brothers and sisters; I do not sleep or dream, and without dreams, neither desire nor despair have a hold on me. I have not the luxury or tragedy of delirium, and I know when and how I must die."
"But somehow you taught me to dream, to know desire as I wanted you to live and to feel despair when I saw how short your time was, and your life and inevitable death have tempted me to the edge of delirium to avoid experiencing what I knew must happen. You brought me change, and that was unexpected for all that I had read in my book. Of all my siblings, only one have I ever dreaded: Destruction, for he governs change and that is one thing I cannot do."
"Yet he has left his realm behind, wild and ungoverned, leaving the choice to change within each of us, human or Endless."
Destiny looked down, seemingly exhausted after his speech. It was more than Tara had ever heard him say about himself, and she didn't know what to make of it. She sensed something important in his words, something that might save her from this moment, though she wasn't sure what it was.
"Big brother," Death said, placing her slender hand on his arm. "You cannot change the future."
"But I can," he said softly, his gaze unreadable as he turned from his sister to Tara. He took a pen from Willow's desk; the modern instrument looked anachronistic in his ancient hands as he used it to savagely strike out a passage from the yellowed page of vellum to which the book was open. "It's all I can do."
Tara, her heart pounding, felt vaguely uneasy at her father's words, watched as Destiny scribbled words in the book to replace those he had struck out. He held the pen awkwardly as he wrote, as if he had never written anything before. Then he was done. He dropped the pen back to the surface of the desk, the sound echoing eerily in the silent, timeless moment wherein her fate was being decided.
"It is done," he said. "Goodbye, Tara." He hugged her awkwardly.
"But you-" Tara began, completely confused. What had happened? Was she going to live or die?
"I don't know your future any longer, Tara," he said. "Or anyone's. It's all changed. But you won't die today."
"Thank you," she said, hugging him tightly. Her gaze was still uncertain. "But w-what did you do?"
"It's over, Tara. I wish there could have been another way, but there was nothing else I could do." He disentangled himself from her embrace, leaving her still uncertain of what was happening. He slowly unlocked the manacle that secured the book to his arm. Holding it open, he stared at it for a long moment, then dropped it to the desk upon which he also laid down his book with a curious mixture of reluctance and relief. When he stood again, he seemed straighter, taller than Tara ever recalled seeing him, as if he had been freed from a terrible burden. "It's over," he repeated.
"Destiny," Death said. Her voice was gentle, but sad. "Take my hand."
"No!" Tara shouted, still not comprehending but realizing that something was wrong. She ran to cross the room before he could take her hand.
As Death drew her brother close, her touch full of compassion, Tara felt like she was running in a dream, pumping her arms and legs as fast as she could without getting anywhere. Darkness hid what happened next; all Tara could hear was the beating of mighty wings. Then he was gone, and Death stood alone.
"What did you do?" Tara demanded.
"Nothing. He made his choice."
"And he died for it?"
"I didn't want to take him, but Destiny was the book, all the paths, past and future. He couldn't make a choice that violated that without unmaking all of that, unmaking himself."
"But-"
"I-I have other people to see." Death said. "And you have a life to return to." She vanished, leaving behind a dark silhouette, a hole in reality shaped like a young woman that faded after a moment as if it had all been a dream.
Tara instinctively threw herself to the floor even before she heard the crack of the window shattering behind her. She lay on the floor for a moment, her heart pounding with reaction, wondering if she was alive or dead, until the steady rapid beat of her heart and the panting of her breath told her that she was alive.
Fate wasn't immutable after all. Destiny had changed. For her, and for Willow.
"Tara!" Willow said, almost sobbing as she knelt beside Tara, frantically pulling her close. "Baby! Are you okay? Did you get hit?"
"No, I-I'm-" Tara began, looking down at her unblemished blue shirt. "I'm fine," she said, bursting into tears.
