Chapter 3

The dew hung from the early morning leaves like pearlescent crystals, here and there dripping to the forest floor as the two horses trod in rhythm down the well worn path.

One horse was a pale, almost cream color, while the other was a deep chestnut.

The riders were equally different. On the chestnut mare was an older woman, her once blonde hair turned to a soft silver gray with the passing of years. Her green eyes were clear and sharp. Her wrinkled hands held the reigns casually, with practiced ease. She was dressed plainly, in a simple long traveling tunic, breaches, and simple hide boots.

A large traveling bag hung at her side. Protruding from it were two sealed scrolls. She had a wistful, reminiscent expression on her wizened face, and her head nodded gently in time with the movement of her horse.

By contrast, he traveling companion was younger, tall and proud, with raven black hair and piercing pale blue eyes which seemed to take in the surroundings easily, always on the alert for any threat.

The steel buckles on her black boots shone like silver in the wet morning, and her tough black bodice gleamed in the rising sun. About her waist hung a thick leather skirt, pleated and studded with steel. On her belt hung her belongings, a sword in a well tended scabbard and a circular weapon, silver and filigreed in gold. She looked over at the old woman and smiled.

"You know," she offered. "We didn't have to start off so early today."

When the elder woman was slow to answer, she leaned a bit closer.

"Mom?" she asked. "Are you here?"

"Hm?" Gabrielle blinked and looked at her daughter. "Oh, that's alright. I wanted to get to the house early today, just to see how things are holding up."

The younger woman eyed her mother closely.

"Xena?" Gabrielle asked with a smile. "I know that look. What are you thinking?"

Xena looked back towards the end of the path and sighed.

"Nothing," she said easily. "Just making sure you aren't going to fall off the horse. That's all."

In actuality, Xena thought her mother looked more careworn and tired than usual. A twinge of concern tugged at her heart. Gabrielle had not been looking well for several months now, and it seemed that there was something within her that was slowly fading away. In the two years since that fateful day, when David had been taken from them, Gabrielle had slowly been sinking back into melancholy, though she tried her best to hide it.

Gabrielle sighed. "Okay, you. Out with it."

Xena sighed in return. "I'm just worried about you, that's all. You haven't been yourself lately.

Gabrielle laughed quietly. "I'm old, Xena. I guess I'm slowing down." She shrugged. "Who knows. Maybe, when I die, if you ever decide to settle down." She flashed a smile at Xena. "Maybe you'll get to raise me next time."

"Don't talk like that!" Xena shot back tersely. "You still have plenty of time."

"Perhaps," Gabrielle replied. "You never know."

"But these long trips back to the old home aren't helping any!" Xena continued sharply.

"Xena," Gabrielle replied calmly. "I miss him, alright? I promised that I would come back and visit whenever I could."

"I know, I know," Xena's voice sank. "Don't you think I miss him too? He was my father, after all."

Gabrielle looked at Xena, and the two of them began smiling. The smiles gave way to soft chuckles and then to laughter.

"My, what a funny pair we've made," Gabrielle said. "My best friend becomes my daughter, thanks to a crazy biker from a world two thousand years away."

"Strange family tree, that's for sure," Xena agreed. Then he face sobered and she looked at Gabrielle again. "And right now, I know he'd be pissed at you."

Gabrielle looked at Xena in surprise.

"He wouldn't want you going back and forth just to see the coffin he's lying in," Xena continued. "He'd want you to be happy! He'd want you to enjoy the rest of your life, not mourn him for it."

"Xena," Gabrielle sighed. "I'm not mourning him like that, alright? I just think it's pointless to abandon everything we made simply because he's gone." She seemed introspective for a moment. "Besides. I miss my old home. I want to see it again."

"I just think that making this trip every year seems a little pointless," Xena replied and instantly regretted it.

"Pointless?" Gabrielle looked at her sternly.

"That isn't what I meant," Xena stammered. "It's just that, well, I love you, and I love having you in my life, and every time we go back there, it's like a reminder that I'm going to lose you someday too."

"But we always find each other," Gabrielle replied easily. She smiled that familiar smile.

"But it's never the same!" Xena countered. "The first time, I had you as a friend, my best friend, and I loved that. Now, I have you as my mother, and I'm not saying that I don't love that too, but it's just not the same."

"And the next time will be different as well," Gabrielle replied. "And the next time, and the next, for as long as we get to do this. Every time, every lifetime, will be different and special in its own way. Don't think of it as an ending, Xena. Think of it as setting up for the next beginning."

Xena's sardonic smile grew and she looked sidelong at her mother. "When did you get so wise?"

Gabrielle laughed. "Well, I do have a certain advantage in years on you, this time around." Then she looked at her daughter. "And I had a good teacher."

The rounded a small bend in the path and came to the crest of a hill. Down in the shallow valley below they saw the ruins of Poditea stretched out beneath them, broken and charred. Green life had taken root in many of the old, broken buildings. Small trees thrust up from within old walls. The field and the forest were slowly reclaiming the land.

Gabrielle knew that in the future, someone would come back and unearth the remains here, trying to piece the chaos together. In a strange way, the fact that someone she didn't even know would remember that place comforted her.

"Come on," Xena said quietly, turning her horse down a smaller, less traveled path.

Gabrielle tore her gaze away from the ruins and followed Xena down the side of the hill towards the family tomb.

They passed several other entrances before they found the one for their family. The horses slowed to a halt and Gabrielle slowly dismounted, feeling a slight jolt in her old legs as she dropped lightly to the ground.

Looking back towards the east, she saw the sun rising over the low hills. The white marble of the entrance suddenly gleamed like pearl, almost luminescent. She smiled.

"This was a good time to come here," she said in a whisper.

She handed the reigns to Xena and smiled.

"I won't be long," she said.

Xena nodded understandingly. Though she wouldn't admit it there and then, she too, had traveled back to this place while away from home. As much as she projected the strength that she had, she missed her father terribly. There were many nights, just after he had been killed, where, alone on the road, she had cried herself to sleep for missing him. In her existence, David had been the first full time father figure that she had ever known. Xena had been close to David, closer than she had ever been with any other man in this life, or the other. All the things she had missed, growing up the first time, without a father figure, had been amended the second time. It had been the happiest time of her life, those years, growing up under his watchful care. The down side had been that, when he was killed, she had felt the wound more strongly than ever, and it had torn at her heart.

Had it not been for his teachings, and the intervention of her younger brother, Alexander, history might very well have repeated itself, and she might have become the same blood hungry warlord that she had been in her previous life. As it was, she had found other ways to mourn his passing, while at the same time, carrying on his legacy of helping others.

She held the reigns of the horses and stood a respectful distance away from the tomb, watching as her mother – her best friend – entered to pay her respects.

Gabrielle passed into the long narrow arched corridor and down towards the main vault where her husband lay.

The air was cool and dry, with a dusty taint to it. She struck a spark on the old torches hanging at the entrance to the crypt and the flames flickered to life, driving the last of the shadows away.

The room was rectangular, hewn from the living rock by expert hands.

Towards the back, she saw the older sarcophagi. Those were the ones containing her mother, father, sister and niece. The stone of those containers was smoothed by time and dull. Before them rested a large gleaming white sarcophagus of pale stone.

She stepped around it and found the cluster of pigeon holes on the opposite side of David's resting place.

"Hello, honey," Gabrielle said in a quiet voice. She removed a cloth from her bag and began dusting the surface of the sarcophagus as she spoke.

"I finished a couple more scrolls and I thought I'd bring them by for you," she smiled as she drew the writings out and slid them into a pair of unused slots.

"Things have been rather busy lately," she went on. "Alexander, I think, is about to settle in with that lovely girl, Cylissa, that I told you about last year. They haven't set any kind of date yet, but you can see it in their eyes. They are so much in love it's funny."

She stood back up and rested her hand son the cold stone, gazing down at the engraved lid.

"Cylissa said she wanted a family," Gabrielle continued. "A big family. She told me that anyone like Alexander deserves to have as many children as possible. If there's a chance that any of them would turn out half as good as –" Her voice broke suddenly, and she paused.

"I promised myself that I wouldn't cry here," she said. Then she let a bitter laugh escape her lips. "Then again, I've been promising that for the last two years." She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. "Still, it seems to get a little easier each time. I'm doing okay, really. I still hear you in the new home, sometimes, when it's late at night, and the town is quiet. I know you're there, with me, just like always."

She sighed wearily. "Gods, this is so hard for me. Having you, then losing you, and then having you again. I just – I don't know." She shrugged.

"I won't be back again next year," she said suddenly. "Xena was right. I am getting old, and the trip is just so long and difficult." She stopped again. "Listen to me. I'm babbling again."

Gabrielle walked around the sarcophagus and seated herself on the next stone slab.

"I just hope you'll understand," she finally said.

When no otherworldly response was forthcoming, Gabrielle smiled and nodded. "I knew you'd understand."

She rose and then frowned as her eyes fell on the sandy floor around the base of David's resting place.

She looked back at the opposite side of the sarcophagus and then again at the other side. The signs were plain. A second sent of footprints facing the container.

"What the hell?" she asked aloud, using one of her late husbands expressions without even thinking about it.

Ignoring the slight pain in her limbs, she knelt down and gently placed her fingers in the gentle depression, studying the size and depth of the prints.

Old tracking instincts, dormant for years, reawakened with full vigor and Gabrielle knew instantly that these prints were not hers, not her children's, and not more than a day old. Someone else, besides her family, had been in this place recently. A quick inspection showed everything in place. Nothing had been disturbed, and yet?

She stepped next to the prints and studied the smooth finished engravings on the lid of the coffin and her eyes immediately spotted the subtle, soft, miniscule discolorations on the surface.

She gently touched the residue on the tiny spots and realization fell into place.

Salt. The remains of fresh tears shed over her husband within a day. Her mind reeled as she tried desperately to think of who it might have been. In the end, she could find nothing. Perhaps someone that he and she had aided in the past had learned of her husbands' demise and come to pay respects, but she couldn't think of whom. Most, if not all the people she had known, within a month's travel, had been wiped out by her daughter and the maniacal followers of Dahok.

In the end, she could come to no final conclusion, and she decided to let the matter rest. She gathered her things, straightened several items left in remembrance, and then she headed for the entrance.

Her hand came to rest on the frame of the entrance, and she turned back to the silent coffin and smiled.

"Don't worry, my love," she said wistfully. "I think I'll be back here pretty soon, in any event. Sleep well. I'll see you then."

When she emerged, Xena could see the renewed sadness and loss in Gabrielle's eyes. She sighed. Then she perceived the mild confusion as well.

"Everything alright?" She asked.

"Hm?" Gabrielle blinked and came back from her introspection. "Oh, yes. Everything's fine. I just – do you know if Alexander has been by here recently?"

Xena shook her head. "Why?"

"Just wondering," Gabrielle replied. "I thought perhaps someone had been there within the last day or so, but I could be wrong."

Slowly, she pulled herself back onto the horse and the two of them turned, moving back the way they had come and heading towards the remains of the village.

Neither one of them spoke as they moved through the ruins towards their old home. The buildings around them lay crumbling or broken, many scorched black from the fires that had destroyed them. The whole area held the sensation of an unquiet graveyard. Vegetation clawed its way through the ruins like small fingers attempting to hide the shameful scars of abuse. The wind moaned gently through opened roof's and abandoned hallways.

They followed the ruined street through the town and out past it into the once fertile farmlands, turning gently down the overgrown path until they rounded a bend and saw the old homestead.

The old barn had partially collapsed at some time in the previous months, and the wedding pavilion was nothing more than a settling mass of rotting punk. The home, however stood straight and strong, still completely intact, though gray with exposure to the elements.

The old shutters were still drawn shut and the old door was sealed, just the way they had left it the year prior.

They reined their horses in front of the old porch and noticed, for the first time, that several of the sturdy planking was beginning to warp and fail. Looking up, they saw the dark stains that indicated where water had begun to leak through.

Xena sighed.

"Well," she said. "I guess even this old place won't stay forever."

Gabrielle nodded. "It's lasted better than everything else, though." She smiled.

She dropped to the ground and moved to help Gabrielle do the same.

They both started when the old door creaked open and a figure stepped tentatively from within.

She wore a simple tunic, a light cream color, now stained with miles of travel, simple brown breeches, and a pair of dark hide boots. In her hand, she held a long oaken staff, resting on the planking next to her feet. Her long golden hair was tied back in a loose tail and her green eyes fixed on Gabrielle with anxiety.

When she spoke, her voice was tight. "Hello, mother."

Gabrielle felt her jaw drop in amazement. She forced herself to breathe.

"Hope?"

The fury exploded from somewhere deep within Xena's heart. With a cry, she surged forward, kicking the staff from Hope's hand and grasping the front of the tunic. There was the sound of tearing cloth as Hope was hurled out into the center of the yard.

"You're like a damned roach that just won't die!" Xena bellowed as she charged again.

Hope struggled to her feet, but offered no resistance as Xena's knee plowed into her midsection.

The air exploded from her lungs in a single gasp as she doubled over. She tried to hold a hand out to stop Xena's assault, and then felt her fist smash into her face and she went skyward, landing in a heap.

"Xena!" Gabrielle struggled from the back of the horse. She had seen the look in Hope's eyes, and also saw that Hope was doing nothing to defend herself. Even if Hope tried to fight, she would not have been able to win, but she could at least minimize the damage.

Gabrielle saw no hint that she was even trying. Hope was letting this carnage ensue.

"Xena! Stop!"

Xena was beyond hearing anything. All she beheld was shaded in red. The only thing she perceived was the thunder of her own heart and the vision of her prey within easy reach. The darkest aspect of her nature had at last seized control. It would not stop until its thirst for vengeance had been sated.

She hauled the doppelganger up to her feet, only to smash her down again and again, reveling in the new injuries each strike created. Behind all that rage lingered a single question which she screamed like a war cry.

"Why won't you die?"

The beating continued until the tunic was shredded and the breeches and boots were covered in mud. The beating continued until Hope was bleeding from the nose, mouth, and ear. The beating continued as the flesh on her sides and around her eyes began to puff and discolor to sickly purple yellow bruises.

The beating continued.

"Xena! Stop!" Gabrielle cried in a rising panic. Hope was like a limp doll being abused by a wrathful child. "Xena! You're killing her!"

"Too right!" Xena shouted back. She hauled the semi conscious Hope back up once more.

Hope's head lolled back and her arms hung uselessly at her sides. Her lips moved over and over forming the same words again and again as if this were her last, desperate conscious thought.

Xena saw, for the first time, the tears mixing with the blood on her face.

The rage suddenly subsided in shock, though it did not abate completely.

"What?" she shook Hope's limp form. "What did you say?"

She pulled the beaten girl closer and felt her head fall against the leather clad shoulder and then she heard it. The words flashed through her soul like lightning.

"I'm sorry."

Xena couldn't believe what she had heard. Then the words awoke another wave of fury.

"You're sorry?" she growled. She held Hope up and looked into her eyes.

The bleariness left Hope's eyes and they suddenly focused with crystal clarity, filled with fear and destitute expectation.

"You're sorry?" Xena repeated, feeling the surge rise once more. "You're sorry? Yeah, you are! You're real sorry! Now apologize!" She spun in a circle and flung Hope across the yard.

Hope fell upon the rotting pavilion. The wood shredded and shattered as she crashed through it. Splinters of wood flew in all directions as Hope landed with a sickening thud.

Xena drew her sword and stalked forward, consumed with rage.

Somehow, Gabrielle managed to get there first, interposing herself between her enraged daughter and her victim.

"Xena!" she cried with a new strength. "Stop!"

Xena froze in surprise. "You can't be serious? After everything she's done to you – to us?"

"She didn't even try and stop you, Xena!" Gabrielle shot back. She backed slowly towards the ruined pavilion. "She didn't even attempt to defend herself! She knew this would happen!"

"She should be dead!" Xena cried back.

Realization suddenly flooded Gabrielle's mind. The errant footprints in the family tomb and the residue on the lid of the coffin. The footprints were identical to hers.

"By the gods," Gabrielle breathed. Then she looked at Xena with fierce determination.

"She was at the tomb yesterday!" She said. "She was crying over your father!"

Those words were more of an insult to Xena than a revelation. Her blue eyes frosted over with renewed contempt. "She what?"

Gabrielle placed her hands on Xena's shoulders.

"Please," she pleaded. "Just stop."

The rage began to crumble and the tears began to well in Xena's eyes.

"She could have run," Gabrielle continued. "She could have fought back. She didn't have to come here, but she did, and she knew, if we were here, that you'd probably do this! She came back anyway!"

Gabrielle looked down at the weapon in Xena's hand. Slowly, she wrapped her fingers over her daughters.

"Let it go, honey," she said in a soft, calm voice. "Just let it go."

Reluctantly, Xena's fingers uncurled from the hilt of her sword, and let Gabrielle remove it.

She held the weapon for a moment and then let it fall to the earth. Then she picked her way slowly through the mass of ruined wood to the limp form entangled in the boards.

She lay sprawled out amongst the wreckage, her face a mask of crimson, her body a contorted mass of rapidly coloring bruises. Still, Hope's lips moved automatically, clinging desperately to that one conscious thought.

Gabrielle looked down at her first daughter, her mind a whirl of emotion, her eyes wide with expectation, tinged with fear.

It was not the first time that Hope had allowed herself to be wounded as part of an elaborate plot. Still, even then, she had been completely coherent, retaining all her malicious inhuman powers.

This pummeled mass of a person was something else entirely. Hope was broken and completely defenseless.

Then Hope's eyes locked on hers with child like desperation, and one hand struggled feebly to rise.

Gabrielle's breath stopped in that pitiful gaze. She saw more emotion, more humanity, and more frailty in this one expression than she had ever seen before in anyone in all her life.

The cold, lifeless, cruel creature that had been Hope was nowhere to be found.

She edged herself closer, kneeling next to the broken form and gently brushed a few stray locks of bloodied hair from Hope's eyes.

Weak, painful sobs, that were more like soft painful gasps, emerged from Hope's split lips.

Without knowing why, Gabrielle slowly slipped her arm beneath the shoulders of her daughter and gently raised her up, cradling Hope against her breast.

Xena watched this, her own heart in turmoil. As her mind replayed the enraged confrontation she suddenly realized that her mother was exactly right. Hope hadn't lifted an aggressive hand against her. She had offered no resistance, allowing Xena to physically destroy her.

If Hope had some diabolical plan to drive a wedge between her and her mother, then Xena had just played right into Hope's hand – again."

Now, as she saw her mother cradling that thing in her arms, she didn't know if she should feel compassion for the young woman she had just brutalized, or wariness that she might be the victim of another one of Hope's elaborate deceptions.

Suspicion and compassion battled back and forth within her, and she was shocked when compassion actually won.

Something like disgust at that revelation washed over her, and she grimaced.

"If she is pulling something, then I am dead from the neck up." She sighed.

When she saw Gabrielle struggling to lift Hope from the wreckage, she rolled her eyes.

"Hold on," she sighed. She picked her way through the broken wood and knelt opposite her mother.

She slid her arms underneath Hope with far less gentleness. Hope moaned in pain.

"Help me get her into the house," Gabrielle instructed.

"I got her," Xena nodded. "Go ahead."

Gabrielle slowly began picking her way back out toward the yard.

Xena stood, lifting Hope out of the wreckage.

"Listen to me, and listen good!" She growled in her ear. "If this is a con, I'll kill you twice, understand?"

Quickly, Gabrielle unslung her pack from the saddle of the horse and carried the large bundle of cloth into the old house. She laid her sleeping blankets on the frame of the bed in her old room.

Xena lay Hope on the blankets and withdrew. Gabrielle heard the front door open and shut.

Xena stepped up to her horse and let her forehead fall against the saddle. Her mind was reeling with the tumult of emotions she was feeling. She suddenly understood just how close to the edge she had gotten without falling over, again, into that darkness that had caused so much death and destruction the first time around.

A grim smile pulled at her lips. "Well," she thought. "If that was the plan, then the little bitch failed."

Her mind played out various brutal scenarios that resulted in Hope's long and painful demise, but when it came to the point where she would look into Hope's eyes before the end, all she saw was that same, pitiful, beaten, human expression of complete remorse. That expression removed any relish from the fantasies running through her mind and Xena found that mildly annoying in a sick way.

Her father's words burst from her lips just as one of his many life instructions finally asserted itself. She knew what she should do, as much as she felt it would only lead to disaster.

"Christ on a crutch," she muttered as she fumbled with the releases on her saddle and pulled her camping gear free.

When she reentered her parent's old room, Hope lay unconscious on the bed, and her mother sat alongside, a surprised and haunted expression on her face.

"Mom?" Xena asked, feeling a cold twitch in her gut. "What's wrong?"

Gabrielle blinked and something like a smile appeared on her lips.

"It was your father," she said in a near whisper, as if she dare not believe it.

"What?"

Gabrielle looked up at Xena. "Your father got her out of that prison somehow."

"That's impossible!" Xena replied vehemently.

"Oink," Gabrielle said quietly.

Xena frowned. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Gabrielle smiled. "It was a private joke that we shared." Gabrielle smiled as she reminisced.

"There were times that thought he behaved like a total pig," she explained. "I always teased him about it. Whenever I did, he would always reply by saying 'oink'."

"I don't see what that has to do with that," Xena replied, pointing at the motionless Hope.

Gabrielle's gaze darkened with sudden protectiveness.

"Before she passed out," she said with just a hint of ice in her voice. "She said that she had a message for me. She said he told her to tell me that my favorite pig says oink."

Xena was stunned. "There's no way!" she stammered.

"Xena," Gabrielle continued. "Hope is here, right now, because your father somehow managed to arrange it."

Suddenly, the relish of beating Hope tasted like bitter ashes in Xena's mouth. Her throat went dry. If she had waited a couple more seconds before giving in to her hatred, if – she shook her head vehemently.

"I refuse to feel sorry for this," she growled. "I don't care if Zeus pulled her out of that prison, the little bitch should be dead! If she tries anything, I'll make sure that's what she gets!"

Xena pulled her spare blanket free and tossed it on the floor at the foot of the bed.

"Just in case," she finished lamely, and she withdrew. The conflict between what was right and what she desired was plain on her face.

Gabrielle rose and picked up the blanket, gently draping it over Hope's unconscious form. She placed her hand gently against Hope's swollen cheek and then closed the door as she left the room.

She found Xena laying the rest of her sleeping gear on the frame of the old wooden couch in the main room of the cabin.

"What are you doing?" Gabrielle asked.

"You take my old room," Xena replied. "I want to make sure I'm between you and that thing in there." Her eyes flicked towards the closed door.

The fire in the hearth had burned down to warm, glowing embers and the night noises were singing beyond the walls when Xena's eyes snapped open. A noise was emanating from the behind the door in her parent's old room.

She laid perfectly still, her every sense heightened by the threat of what was in the next room.

There it was again. Xena frowned at the sound. It was a soft, choking gasp, or sob, as if someone were weeping.

She rose slowly to her feet, separating her chakram into two wickedly curving knives and, gripping each one tightly, she moved towards the door.

Placing her ear close to the weathered wood, she listened in awe at the sounds from within. Then, her curiosity piqued, she gently opened the door and looked inside.

Hope lay on the bed, the blanket that had been covering her was a mass of cloth at the foot of the bed, and the battered girl lay, curled in the fetal position, her eyes squeezed shut.

Xena studied the sleeping Hope with mild fascination, watching as she would move or twitch suddenly, mumbling words in her slumber.

Though Xena couldn't make out what she was saying, she recognized a nightmare when she saw one.

How many nightmares could one human being endure? That sudden question caught Xena off guard as she pondered the tortured, sleeping form before her.

Ever since her first encounter with Gabrielle's demonic child, she had never even considered her as she did her other human opponents. But then, she had never seen a spark of humanity in the thing twisting on the bed. Not until today.

Something like pity awoke in her heart, and she was instantly disgusted, once again, by what she had done.

Again, her conflicting self revulsion awoke her anger, only this time she felt it towards herself.

"Go away," Hope muttered in her sleep. "Go away!"

Xena blinked. For a moment, she had thought the battered figure had awakened, then she saw her hand brush along the blanket, as if warding something away.

Xena looked down at the weapons in her hands. Instantly, the cold, calculating side of her reasserted itself.

"Kill her!" A dark part of her mind begged. "Walk in and slit the bitch's throat! She should have been executed in Athens anyway! She didn't deserve to live! She killed your father! She killed your son! She was an abomination, a thing, a creature that should be put down, like a rabid dog!"

Another jerk from the bed brought her out of her dark thoughts as Hope turned over, her arm flailing slightly. "Go away," she sobbed.

Xena saw Hope's face in the moonlight, and instantly, the dark desires were washed away. The expression on the bruised features was so tormented that she couldn't remember ever seeing the like of it before, in either life.

"Gods," Xena breathed. How many faces were haunting those dreams?

Slowly, she closed the door.

When she opened her eyes again, the pale light of dawn was just beginning to shine through the small crack at the base of the front door. The house was still and silent. The embers were burnt down to a pile of black and gray ash.

Quickly, Xena rose and went to check on the others.

She peeked into her old room and found Gabrielle sleeping peacefully under the blankets. She smiled and quietly shut the door, moving down towards the other room.

When she opened the door to her parents old room, something like cold dread settled over her heart. The blankets had been pushed off the edge of the bed and lay in a pile on the floor. Hope was gone.

"Son of a bitch," Xena muttered. She turned and walked quickly to the front door.

She opened it and stepped out into the misty morning air.

Hope stood in the yard, her eyes focused on the ground before her. The mist curled gray about her ankles. She had the ripped tunic wrapped about her body, and she leaned on the oak staff.

Xena took a few steps onto the porch and realized that Hope was standing in the exact spot where she had killed David.

Anger reawakened in Xena's heart, heating the blood in her veins. This time, however, she refrained from lashing out.

She saw Hope tense in expectation, saw the subtle wince of pain on her face, and then it was gone.

Neither one spoke for a long time. Finally, Xena turned to go back into the house.

"I'm sorry," Hope said suddenly.

Xena stopped and turned back.

Hope looked up at her, tear streaks shining on her bruised face. Xena suddenly realized just how severely she had beaten the smaller woman. The entire left side of Hope's face was puffy and darkened; her left eye was nearly swollen shut.

She didn't know what to say. What do you say to the person that was responsible for the destruction of your family, the devastation of your home?

Hope looked back down. It was as if she could actually see David lying there.

"I've never cried before," she continued. "I never knew what it felt like."

She took a deep, painful breath.

"In the last two weeks," she went on. "I've cried more than in my whole life."

"Is that supposed to mean something to me?" Xena asked icily.

A grim smile touched the corners of Hope's mouth. "I suppose not."

Out of the corner of her eye, Hope watched as Xena stayed for a few moments and then vanished back into the home.

"But it does mean something to me," she finished quietly.

Several hours later, Gabrielle emerged from the other room and found Xena seated on the couch, absently rotating her chakram between her fingers, lost in thought.

"You're up early," she said. "Is everything alright?"

Xena shrugged and then nodded towards the front door.

"It's out there," she said darkly. "Standing in the middle of the yard."

Concerned, Gabrielle moved towards the door.

"Mom," Xena said suddenly. "Don't be gullible. Please?"

Gabrielle turned and looked back at her daughter. There was a stern look in her eyes.

"Meaning?" She asked.

Instantly Xena regretted her tone. "I just mean, be careful, okay?"

Gabrielle's expression softened a bit and she nodded. Then she quietly stepped out through the door.

Xena sat there, her mind whirling with thoughts and feelings that she had believed resolved a lifetime ago.

Of course, the freshest wound was the loss of her father. She could still see him lying in the yard. Beneath his body, the blood was flowing, yet he had this strangely peaceful, almost triumphant expression on his face. Then the fury had consumed her in a way that she had only experienced a lifetime ago.

A part of her feared that anger. It was a storm that unleashed its power with inhuman strength. Her father had always said that her temper could be her downfall, if she didn't learn to control it. She had devoted a good portion of her life, after remembering, to controlling and moderating that fire within her. In her heart she had felt that she had accomplished some form of inner control, more so than she ever had in her previous life, and still, there were those few exceptions that would set her off.

Those moments of madness had the potential to do more harm than good, and she recognized that. Still, she couldn't help what she felt. The creature standing outside that door had been responsible for the loss of the most important figure in her life. David had been a treasure, unique and irreplaceable.

That thought began a long string of other names of people she had lost.

A memory bubbled to the surface. A night where the two of them sat across one another, the tiny camp fire crackling merrily between them. The air was thick with the scent of burning pine, and the stars were twinkling like diamonds in the night.

David reached over and removed the small silver pot from the circular grill, suspended over the flames. He refilled his mug with coffee and took a sip.

"When you look a situation," he explained. "Don't simply look at them from your point of view. Try and see things from the perspective of the other person. Keep an open mind to other possibilities."

"How do you mean?" Xena had asked.

David had sipped his coffee as he thought.

"You're walking through town one night," David explained hypothetically. "As you round a corner, you see a couple of men pulling a woman up into the back of a carriage. The girl is making all kinds of noise, squealing and stuff. What do you do?"

"I stop them," Xena answered immediately.

David smiled. "Why?"

"Because if they're putting her in the wagon, they're trying to kidnap her, most likely." Xena replied, remembering the first time she met Gabrielle in her previous life. A group of Slavers from Draco's army had captured several of the young women from Poditea, and were preparing to march them off to a slave market.

"That's a possibility," David agreed. "But do you know it for certain?"

"Well," Xena countered, suspecting another one of her father's verbal traps. "If she's squealing, and they're lifting her into the cart?"

David smiled, seeing the suspicion in her eyes.

"What would you do to stop them?"

"Whatever it took," Xena replied.

"Okay," David said. "So, lets say you run over there, knock one of the guys out and pull the girl free, holding your chakram at the other guys throat, sound about right? No one gets hurt, just bumped about a little."

"Well," Xena countered. "I'm not going to run them through, no."

David chuckled. "So, in your zeal for justice, you have just run over and knocked out the young woman's fiancée, held a knife to the brother's throat, and rescued a girl who had had her ass pinched by her future husband as they were helping her into the wagon before leaving to elope somewhere. How would that make you feel?"

Xena blinked at her father, and then smiled, chuckling. "I really hate it when you do this."

"Not everything is as it sometimes appears, baby," David smiled. "You need to be able to see other perspectives, listen to other people's point of view before making a decision. You can't always go off half cocked just because you perceive something a certain way."

"I know, I know," Xena replied. "But there are times when you don't get the chance to look at things from different perspectives, as you call it."

"I'm not saying you should sit back and wait when the intent is obvious," David agreed. "But I am saying that you should do that whenever you get the chance."

Xena mulled that over for a few moments. It did make sense. Sometimes things aren't what they appear to be on the surface. Then she began to smile again.

"Had her ass pinched?" Xena asked, grinning.

David laughed. "What?" He asked innocently. "I pinch your mom's ass on occasion. I think she likes it."

"Whoa there, dad," Xena laughed. "There are some things that I don't really need to know."

David put on his best, most innocent expression. "What did I say?"

There was a sudden metallic clunk, followed by a hissing, as coffee burst out the worn seam on the side of the battered pot. The soft pine scent was suddenly overwhelmed by the bitter odor of burning coffee.

David sighed and pulled the broken implement off the grill.

"Then again," he sighed sadly. "Sometimes things are exactly what they seem to be. For example: It seems quite obvious that I won't be able to fix this thing again." He set the broken pot to the side and sipped his last cup of coffee, savoring every drop.

"Sometimes things are exactly what they seem to be," Xena sighed, though she didn't want to believe it. Then again, if she could change her ways, all those years ago, couldn't anyone?

"I am going to feel like the mother of all morons if this is a scheme," she admonished herself. "Well, I don't have to trust her. Just keep an eye on her."

She rose and moved towards the door.