A/N: Thanks for the reviews! I love you guys for the reviews!

Marzoog: I'm so glad you liked the Penny/Bruce story. Penny wasn't going to be a primary character when I started writing this story, but somehow she just wouldn't stay in the background!

Adriennelane: what an awesome compliment. And thanks for the link you posted. I've been looking at it and deciding which names I like for when I have kids of my own-- though one will almost certainly be called Anne. Anyway, I like OO-na a lot more than YOU-na. It sounds more alluring and mysterious that way.

Terreis: I did watch the men's routine. But I was routing for Marian Dragulescu from Romania. HE WAS SO HOT. Anyway, I hadn't thought about having Cee have an Emily-like revelation. She and Una will definitely have a chat about somethings, though, and Walter will be one of them.

Arie: It would be nice if Cee got to move back to the Island. You'll have to read on and see what happens...

Gufa: In the Juliet fics I wrote Cecilia and Joy seemed to be so close. I love both the characters and it hurt me to have them at odds with each other.

Miri: Cecilia's room in Uncle Bruce and Aunt Penny's house is based on my room when I was a kid. Glad you liked it...it was pretty nice. I think Bruce will show up a fair amount in the sequel. I hadn't thought about it, but I just can't let him go so I'll have to work him in. I guess he is pretty possessive, but maybe he'll mellow out in time.

Miri: Cecilia definitely wanted Blythe's present to be a surprise.

Karen: Don't worry, there's more of this story to come.

StrawberryLipGloss: This chapter answers your question, so it's dedicated to you, dear.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Late, late that night, Jem Blythe found his way down the stairs from the sickroom, to the kitchen, where the grownups were gathered in various stages of grief and worry. Jem was here to disperse their worries-- some of them. "She's going to live," he said, with a wan smile on his grim, tired face.

"Oh thank God!" Aunt Nan cried, and Aunt Rilla slumped in her chair with relief.

"Yes, thank God," Uncle Jerry echoed, folding his hands together and murmuring a prayer. "Not only for our sake--or Cecilia's--but Shirley and Una's. I don't know what would happen to them if--if--"

He did not want to finish the thought, but they all knew what he meant. Surely it would kill Shirley and Una to lose another one of their girls-- their last living little girl.

"She's concussed," Uncle Jem went on, looking gratefully as his mother set a steaming cup of tea in front of him. "And I've set her wrist--it's broken in two places--probably she put it out in front of her to break the fall. Dad's sitting up with her now-- her pulse seems steady but it'll be good to keep an eye on her. Tomorrow morning I'll call the hospital in Harmony and see if they think she should be moved. How is Joy? She seemed to be in shock. Where is she?"

"I thought Joy would go into hysterics," said Aunt Nan, dashing water from her eyes. "I was just about to go for some smelling salts when she suddenly pulled herself together. 'This won't help Cecilia,' she said, almost to herself more than anyone else. Then she fled--Blythe went with her--I suppose they're down in Rainbow Valley. You remember how much comfort we got from that lovely old place when we were young."

"I still do," said Aunt Rilla. "Right now I want to fly down there--lay myself on a bed of moss-- and cry and cry."

"Someone should call over to Green Gables," said Aunt Nan. "Di would want to know, and Cecilia and Bertha are special friends. And oh, it seems like such a shame to call Bruce and Penelope on their honeymoon but they would both want to know."

"I've already called the manse," Uncle Jerry said. "But Father and Mother are away."

"Mary Vance would go wild if we didn't call her. You know how much she loves Una."

"Oh, and tomorrow we should call over to Silver Bush," Aunt Rilla thought. "Sid will have to be told-- though he'll go wild with worry, probably. Poor dear! He really does love Cecilia."

"Someone should call Shirley and Una," said Grandmother quietly.

Jem stood and ran his hands though his ruddy hair-- well, it was almost completely silver now. Seeing so many cases as this one had done that to him.

He knew he must be the one to call Shirley, but he must tell him what he had not told the others. That Cecilia would live, certainly-- but in what state? She was sleeping peacefully now, but he feared her sleep might be coma. And when the swelling in her brain went down, the girl might never be the same again. He could not stand to be the bearer of more pain and suffering to the already-wounded man.

Jem thought for a fleeting moment of his own girls-- what if it were Merry, lying in the bed upstairs, pale and wan, with a great purple bruise on her white, white skin? A picture of little Nancy lying crumpled and twisted in the grass touched the corners of his mind and made him shiver. He had the sudden urge to fly out of the kitchen, and down the road into the Glen, to his own house, where Faith would be watching over his sleeping children. Then he could creep up to their rooms and make see for himself that they were well and safe and whole.

Jem said a very un-Inglesidian thing then. "Those damned trees should be cut down!" he spat, and kicked the chair he had been sitting on. It skittered across the kitchen and crashed roughly into the wall. Then Jem set his jaw and went to get Montreal on the long distance.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Joyce and Blythe had not gone to comfort one another in Rainbow Valley as the grown-ups had suspected. Instead, they had crept upstairs to the darkened hallway outside of Cecilia's room, where they stayed and refused to budge. Grandfather had seen them and smiled kindly but distractedly at them as he had gone in. Uncle Jem hadn't seen them at all. He had stepped right over them in his hurry to get downstairs. Joy had thought he might stop and give them some news, but he hadn't. She was glad-- she didn't want to hear bad news, and it couldn't be good judging from the look on Uncle Jem's face.

"Oh, Blythe!" Joyce reached for his hand and held it. "The sound, when she fell-- the way she looked--all twisted-- I shan't forget it, ever. Not if I live a hundred years. It was--so--terrible."

"What was she doing, climbing that tree?" Blythe asked, through white, set lips. "Not even the big boys can climb the Tree Loves. Oh, why did she do it?"

"I should have stopped her--I knew it was dangerous." Joy wept now. "It's my fault-- oh, Bly, she was going to do it for you-- she was hanging a string of bells to replace the ones Uncle Walter put up-- it was a gift for you."

"Why did you tell me that, Joyce?" Blythe looked miserable. "Now I will have that on my conscience for ever. If she does die, I'll have--her blood on my hands. Why did you tell me?"

"I love her dreadfully!" Joy was lost on her own miseries.

"So do I," said Blythe fiercely. "I love her more than anyone on the earth-- more than you and Mother and Dad, right now, because she needs it. Oh, Joy, go away and leave me alone. I've got to be alone with my thoughts."

Joy went, sobbing, and Blythe slumped against the wall.

Through the open door he could see her still, white form on the bed. Grandfather Blythe was sitting making notations in a book as she breathed slowly, in and out. But Blythe barely saw him-- his eyes were fixed on Cecilia. How terrible and dark the bruise on her white face seemed to be. The cast on her arm looked ridiculous-- far too big to hold her slender bones.

Her face looked troubled, and as Blythe moved closer to peer in, she shook her head back and forth on the pillow. "There, there, dear one," Grandfather murmured, touching his lips to her forehead. But Cecilia, in the deep, twilight world that surrounded her, refused to be quieted. Instead she cried out, and her words were a litany of those she loved.

"Mother," she moaned. "Father! Joy--Mother--Walter--Blythe!"

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

The Glen and Four Winds are a peaceful place by night-- usually. The darkened houses sleep along with their inhabitants, for what dangers do they have in that dear place to be watchful for? The wind in the trees soothes the sleeping children, and the silent clouds drop dreams into their slumber.

But that night there were many houses where one dire light shone out, marring the dark calm and peace of that place. The House of Dreams had a light in the upstairs bedroom where Rilla and Ken Ford talked in worried voices. They were worried about their niece, and also about their own children. The House of Dreams children were famous for climbing trees. Why, Gil and Owen were regular monkeys, and Hannah tried to emulate everything they did. A stop must be put to that. There was no light on in Trudy Ford's room, but that little maiden crept to her window and was bathed by the light of the moon. She had been so cold to Cecilia these last weeks-- she had been jealous of Cecilia's new friendship with Joy. Oh, what if Cee didn't get better? Trudy wished miserably that she had apologized.

In the manse, Aunt Nan and Uncle Jerry waited up for Grandmother and Grandfather Meredith in the parlor. They were due back in the wee hours-- how awful to come home and be greeted by such worrisome news. One light shone out from a lamp on the piano but its warm beam could not pierce the chill of their concern.

Blythe and Joyce were not in their beds. Joyce had crept back up to Blythe after leaving him alone for some time, and the two slept on the hard wooden floor outside of Cecilia's room. No one had the heart to move them.

Di was up in the Green Gables kitchen after her call from Jem. Several times she went to look in at Bertie and Teddy. She could not bear to wake them only to worry them. She would wait until morning. Oh, surely there would be better news by morning?

Jem had fallen into a deep, tired sleep after looking in at his children as he had wanted to, but Faith could not sleep. She found herself thinking of Una as she sat up and mended. It was not as romantic as lying prostrate with grief, but she had to take her mind off of things somehow, and the clothes did need to be mended. Why were Walt and Jake such ragamuffins? Anyway, Faith was sure that Cecilia would come out of this unscathed. Because God couldn't allow anything else to hurt Una. He just couldn't.

Mary Vance refused to sleep and did not make her children sleep, either. "We're going to sit up all night and pray for Cecilia," she said, and the girls agreed. Mary did go into the kitchen and cut them each a thick slice of cake. There was no use in being hungry while they did their praying.

Over at Silver Bush, Sid Gardiner awoke and felt that there was something wrong. And May Binnie could not sleep, either. She wondered if she was chasing a rainbow when it came to Sid. Could he ever love her, when there was a velvety creature like Cecilia Blythe staying over at Ingleside?

But Ingleside itself was dark and peaceful as it had always been, with its garden full of mists and fairies. It was always watchful, even when it slept, its ears pricked up like a cats. For the people inside of it were so very dear.

Not one light shone out as a man and woman got out of their car and went toward it, but when the door opened and Grandmother Blythe welcomed them in, she lit lamps and they were enveloped by a safe, consoling golden glow. The man allowed himself to be ushered into the kitchen, where he was fussed over and fed, but the woman picked up her skirts and ran daintily up the stairs. She stepped over the sleeping children in her path and leaned down to drop kisses on their troubled faces. Then she pushed the door of the sickroom open and saw that a light was indeed burning within.

She sat down in a chair by the bed, the woman did, and studied the face on the pillow that was so much like her own. How much stronger the face seemed since she had last seen it-- the last time, it had still had on it the flush of childhood, but now it was lovely and womanly completely.

The woman had thought she had forgotten how to be a mother-- it had been so long since she had acted like one. But as she looked down at that dear face, everything she'd learned at the altar of motherhood came back. She held the girl's slim, white hand in her own and crooned songs and spoke loving words as first light of the sun touched the gray sky over the harbor.

When the sun finally touched the panes of Ingleside, the girl's eyelids fluttered once--twice--and then opened to behold the face she loved most in the world. She struggled to find her voice-- she tried to lift her hand and place it against the woman's cheek. But it was so hard. Like moving through glue. The woman smiled, though, and picked up the girl's hand and kissed it. Then Cecilia found her voice. It came bubbling up from the depths of her soul and she said one of the names she had repeated over and over again during her time in dreamland. Only this one was the most dear.

"Mother," she said, her eyes lighting up like a flame. "Oh, Mother-- Mother!"