Thanks so much to everyone who has reviewed so far! I know there are lots of questions right now... Unfortunately, you won't get many answers in this chapter - mostly just more questions, and some quality Oliver/Felicity time. Next chapter, however, will definitely start to unravel some of the mystery. Hope you enjoy!

Thankfully, everyone was in bed when Oliver and I got back to the house after the disaster at the Legion. I stopped Oliver in the dim light of the Merlyn hallway to look at all the cuts and bruises he'd gotten in the fight, but was surprised to find they were already fading.

"It looked worse than it was," he said, dismissing my concern with a shrug. "I'm fine. I heal fast."

Apparently so. I got myself a cup of tea from the kitchen and poured one for Oliver, and from there the two of us parted ways. Despite having technically agreed that I would be more honest with him about what was going on with me when I had my 'episodes,' we hadn't actually had that conversation yet. After everything that had happened, I was grateful he didn't push it. No doubt that was just a temporary reprieve, though; come morning, Oliver would definitely want to know more.

Yay - something else to look forward to.

The next morning, I woke predictably early - I've never been a late sleeper, but that seemed to be taken to the extreme on Crab's Neck. Though it was only five-thirty, the sun just rising, Oliver and Quentin were already in the kitchen when I wandered in. Based on how chipper Quentin was, I was guessing Oliver hadn't filled him in on what had happened the night before. That definitely earned a point in his favor.

"Are you headed out for a walk?" Oliver asked me as I filled my hiking thermos with coffee.

"That was my plan," I agreed. I tried not to look too tense about him coming along – it was his job, after all, and it was past time for me to get over myself and just be grateful he was good at it. How many times did he have to save my butt before I admitted maybe it was nice having him around? "I'll grab your coat when I get mine. Meet you at the door in five?"

Both he and Quentin looked surprised. "Sounds good," he agreed.

At the door four and a half minutes later, he handed me a granola bar and took his jacket from me. I was bundled in the requisite five-plus layers, barely able to move let alone hike, but Oliver didn't look hindered or, frankly, even that layered.

"Your eye looks better," I noted through a mouthful of granola, then paused. I shifted to face him and stood on my toes so we were eye to eye – or nearly, at least. "Whoa. Your eye looks…perfect."

"I told you, I heal fast. And it wasn't that bad."

"It was puffy and bleeding and swollen," I argued. "And kind of disgusting. Nobody but vampires heal that fast." I paused, uncertainty tightening my belly. "Wait. You're not…"

"A vampire?" He laughed out loud. "No, Felicity. I'm not a vampire."

"Of course not," I agreed. "Vampires are definitely not real."

Of course, voices from beyond the grave and bizarrely accurate visions of a past I hadn't experienced were also not supposed to be real.

"Come on," he said, before I could ask anything more. "We should get out before the others wake up, unless you want to be trapped here all day."

"Good point."

We escaped out the back door not long after sunrise and from there wandered the woods and trails, then visited the pond and meadow. The snow was melting fast, and I spotted five fat robins on a bare patch of lawn; heard the intermittent drumbeat of woodpeckers staking out territory in the trees above. Spring was in the air, and I was grateful to be outside and in the middle of it rather than stuck in the manor with the Merlyns.

Despite leaving together, Oliver was soon trailing about twenty paces behind. He was watching me every time I turned around, only to look away the second our eyes met. I knew, of course, that this was his job… Still, it was a little disconcerting. To make up for the awkwardness, I found myself babbling about the plants and the birds, the weather and the water. Anything to make up for his silence.

When we reached the pond, I scanned the area for any sign of a certain oversized black dog and his handsome brown-eyed owner, but Baron and Ray were nowhere in sight. Oliver walked on ahead, seemingly taking in anything and everything. I picked up the pace to keep up with his long strides, and called after him.

"You know," I began, "before we left this morning, you were about to tell me how it was that you had a very swollen black eye and a fat lip before we went to bed last night – separately, I mean," I added hurriedly, in case that was unclear, "and then this morning, you look like no one touched you."

"Was I?" he asked, without breaking his stride or even glancing back at me.

"Oh, come on," I said. I managed to catch up to him, so that we were walking side by side for one rare moment. "You're not a vampire, so what is it? Atomic spider bite? Bizarre, as-yet-undocumented super genes? Alien from outer space?"

He stopped. I pulled up short beside him and looked up, trying to read his face. Not an easy task. "What do you see, when you have one of those episodes like you did last night?" he asked, a challenge in his eyes. I met his gaze, refusing to back down.

"What are you?" I asked.

He held my gaze, unmistakable tumult in his eyes. It was obvious that he knew this was a test – all he had to do was tell me the truth. If he had, I'm almost positive I would have told him anything he wanted to know. Instead, he looked away first.

"Just a man," he said quietly. "That's it, Felicity. I'm just a guy who heals fast."

I couldn't hide my disappointment. "Right. Sure. Well… Those episodes I keep having?" He looked at me again, more intent than I expected. I tipped my chin up, and never looked away. "They're nothing. I just go blank. That's it."

My own disappointment was reflected in his eyes. He nodded. "Okay. Well… If it ends up one of these days that it's not nothing? Do me a favor, and come to me."

"Sure," I said, but I couldn't look him in the eye when I said it. The weight of the lies lay heavy between us. I looked around the pond, longing for an interruption – for Ray to appear, possibly with an explanation for even a fraction of what was happening right now.

"Come on," Oliver said, surprising me.

"Where to?"

"Just come on," he said. "You're looking for Palmer, right?"

I blushed. "What? No – of course not. I barely know the man."

"You're a terrible liar, Felicity. Just come with me. He's home, I'm sure."

My eyes widened. "We can't just barge in—"

"I wasn't planning on barging in. I figured we'd knock first." He met my gaze again, an expression I couldn't read in his blue eyes. "If it's you, he won't care. Trust me." The way he said it, I wasn't sure it was meant as a good thing.

Half an hour later, we were scaling a steep granite incline, Oliver several paces ahead of me. I took my time, enjoying the movement and the sights and the taste of the ocean in the air.

"You okay?" he asked as we approached what looked like it must be the summit. Oliver, I noticed, hadn't broken a sweat and was barely winded. I had taken off my parka and stuffed it in my day pack when we first got started, and I was huffing and puffing like an asthmatic freight train.

"I'm fine," I said. Well, panted. It wasn't like I had never climbed a mountain before – I'd climbed lots of them, as a matter of fact, most of them a lot bigger than the peak on Crab's Neck. I couldn't figure out why this one was taking so much out of me. "How much farther?"

"Just the top of that hill there," he said, nodding up ahead. "Are you sure you're all right? We could rest. You're looking a little…flushed."

"I told you, I'm fine," I said. I took a minute just the same, though, and looked down on the roiling sea far below us. The ocean was dark today, topped with white caps that I could hear even this high up. I managed a deep, shuddering breath, and immediately felt better.

"There's no shame in needing to stop occasionally, you know."

"Says the man who never, ever stops."

"It's not the same for me," he said grimly.

I rolled my eyes, and was about to argue that point but stopped when my focus shifted to an ancient spruce tree that seemed to spring from the cliffside overlooking the water. At sight of a nest made of sticks high up in the tree, my pulse ticked up a notch – okay, it ticked up three notches. "Whoa. Do you see that?"

He stepped closer, following my pointing finger. "What?"

"That nest. That can't… Whoa. Hang on." I forgot all about Oliver or Ray Palmer or voices from beyond, scrambling closer to the tree with binoculars in hand to get a better look.

"Felicity, what are you—"

"Oh my God," I said, still on the move. "This is huge – do you know how huge this is?"

I could hear Oliver scrambling to keep up with me, but I paid no attention. "Felicity! Wait, damn it!"

"I swear, that's the nest of a great black hawk. Which is impossible, because you don't usually find them anywhere but Central and South America. One was spotted in Maine a couple of years ago, and that pretty much blew everyone's minds. But that – that's a nest. And…" I took off my glasses and put the binoculars to my eyes, training the sights on the nest. Was that…? "I think there's an egg in there. Which means there's a breeding couple on this island."

I spun where I stood to face Oliver. Suddenly, a gust of wind rose up off the water and I felt...how do I explain this? I'm not sure I can without sounding completely insane. But something that felt exactly like an invisible hand wrapped around my ankle, and pulled me off my feet. I was on an incline, which meant gravity was already not in my favor; a sheet of ice just below the snow didn't help the situation. I caught a glimpse of the ocean far, far below us, and my stomach lurched. Suddenly, I was careening down the mountainside, the cliff's edge so close that I could feel cold air rising from the pounding surf below. I struck out blindly for something to hang onto, but I was moving too fast.

I hit my head at some point, jarring loose the voices that had lived with me day in and day out for years. The girls shouted; Rose laughed. I looked up to the gray sky overhead, and saw Oliver racing through the trees to get to me. He definitely wasn't a superhero – at least, not one that was super-fast or able to fly, since he was running the same way the rest of us mortals run. Well… He looked better than most mortals, and he had better footwork. But still, essentially human.

That was the last thought I had before I cracked the back of my skull on a rock, then hit a slight incline that had me airbound for an instant before something caught hold of me. Someone caught hold of me. Oliver's hand closed around my wrist, and he pulled me to him. We rolled together for a couple of turns before the world finally went still.

My eyes were shut tight, but when I realized I wasn't moving anymore, I opened one cautiously. I was lying on something hard-but-soft – like a firm mattress, but with more muscle. Oliver. I opened the other eye, and gazed down at him. He actually had the decency to be out of breath for once.

"Ow," I said.

He rubbed his eyebrow, as though he had a headache. Which he may have – there was a smear of blood on his temple, and it had been a hell of a ride down the mountain. "Are you all right?"

"I think so," I said. My head was spinning, my stomach definitely on the wrong side of right. I attributed my unwillingness to move to those things, and not to the fact that Oliver was beneath me in a very male, very…Oliver way, his blue eyes intent on mine. "Sorry about the…well. The bird's nest…"

He rolled his eyes and huffed a laugh at me, part relief and part pure frustration. "Yeah, I get it. Rare birds. Still, if you could maybe watch where you're going next time…"

"It wasn't that - I didn't trip, I..."

"You what?" he asked.

Right. I what, indeed? Felt a ghost hand that yanked me off my feet and threw me down the mountain? I shook my head. "Forget it. I'll be more careful, I promise. I hate to think what would have happened if you weren't here to fall for."

Something about that didn't sound right, but it took my brain a second before everything processed. Once it had, I felt my eyes widen. Oh, crap. "On. You weren't here to fall on – not for. I did not mean fall for – that would be ridiculous."

He frowned at that, which made everything a thousand times worse. "Not that it would be ridiculous for someone to fall for you – I mean, obviously," I babbled, talking at approximately the same rate that I'd been falling just a minute before. "You're…well. Forget it, I'm not going there. But you – clearly, someone would fall for you. And probably has. Lots of someones. Just not…this…someone."

He sighed again, dropping his head back so that it hit the ground with a slight thunk. "Felicity."

"I'll stop talking now."

"That would probably be good."

He shifted his head to a more comfortable position and looked up at me, his gaze steady. I was suddenly more aware than ever of his body beneath me – more muscle than I'd even imagined at first, a power there that felt primal and masculine and very…good. Oliver felt very good, his body against mine like that.

"I should get up," I said.

"Yes," he agreed.

Neither of us moved.

He reached up and pushed a strand of hair back from my face, tucking it behind my ear. His eyes seemed bluer somehow – darker. "You lost your glasses," he noted.

"Yeah. I was holding them but…my guess is they're in a thousand pieces somewhere up the mountain by now."

"But you're all right?" he said, his voice softer now. He ran the back of his hand down my cheek, the worry line back in his forehead. He felt like heaven beneath me, but there was something in his eyes that suggested there was a war waging somewhere within.

"I am," I said. "Thanks to you. Again."

I should be freaking out right now, I realized. Historically when I was this close to someone, bad things happened: brain-melting visions, an onslaught of voices so intense that they drowned out the rest of the world for hours afterward. Instead, it was just the two of us: Oliver, and me. Our eyes held for another second or two before I felt Oliver tense beneath me, the sound of footsteps crunching in the snow nearby at the same time.

"I thought I heard someone out here," Ray Palmer said. He held up my glasses. "Did someone lose these?"

Oliver did some kind of Ninja move where he hopped up with me still kind of…on him, set me on my feet, and came to stand himself an instant later. When he was done we stood about five feet apart, my cheeks flaming.

"Those are mine!" I said. I took them from Ray quickly, noting that there were some new scratches to add to the other new scratches I'd gotten the other day. I should probably get a couple of back-up pairs if life was going to be this rocky out on Crab's Neck. "Thank you. I fell," I added by way of explanation.

"Did you?" Ray said. He cast a deliberate glance toward Oliver, and Oliver looked away. "I'm glad you're all right – it can be dangerous out here."

"I got excited – there's a hawk's nest here, you know. A great black hawk, basically unheard of around here."

"Felicity wanted to see the house," Oliver said, interrupting me before I could get fully into ramble mode.

Ray smiled. There was still something cloaked about him, almost dangerous, but it vanished a second later – so suddenly that I was sure I'd imagined it. "Well, the lady should get what she wants," he said to Oliver. "Thank you for bringing her."

Oliver offered no reply, instead turning his back on both of us and heading back up the mountainside toward the house. Ray offered his hand, but I shook my head. I'd managed to stay in the here and now for most of the morning rather than being thrown back to the past – I wasn't ready to let go of that yet.

"I'm okay," I said. "Go on ahead. I'll follow."

He studied me a moment with those warm, familiar brown eyes. What am I going to do with you, Rose? I heard the Ray of old ask. The past flickered in my mind's eye like some old black-and-white film: Ray and Rose, dancing.

"That's all right," Ray said. "I'd prefer to walk with you. You can tell me about this rare bird of yours."

And so I did. Oliver was already out of sight, vanished up the mountainside without so much as a backward glance. It made me feel slightly better that he had so much faith in Ray; if Oliver thought I was in any danger, I couldn't imagine him just leaving me to a stranger. Still, I couldn't help but feel a little bit… abandoned by him – and irritated with myself for feeling that way at all.

Ray and I reached the summit without incident this time, Ray listening intently while I described the great black hawk and the nest and the projects I hoped to start on Merlyn land as soon as the ground had thawed and the weather was a little more predictable. I pulled up short when his house came into view, however. I'd thought it was impressive from the bottom of Crab's Neck, but that was nothing compared to the view up close.

"Wow," was the most I could manage.

"You like it?" Ray asked, far more earnest than I'd expected.

"How could I not? I mean… It's amazing." And it really was. Made of glass, granite, and steel, it fit its surroundings in a way I never would have imagined from a distance. The view from the massive windows out onto the water below must be incredible. "Who designed it?" I asked, once I was feeling slightly more coherent.

"That would be me," he said. I looked at him in surprise. We weren't talking some DIY pre-fab project here; the Palmer estate was a sophisticated design that married a keen understanding of physics and geometry with a deep respect for the island and all it stood for.

"Seriously? You must have had help, though," I insisted. "I mean, come on. You're, what, twenty-eight years old? And from what I've read, you have no formal degrees—"

He raised his eyebrows, a pleased, almost shy smile touching his lips. I think you're brilliant, Ray Palmer, I heard Rose whisper through time.

"So, you've been reading about me?"

"What? No. I mean – possibly, a little bit, but only because—"

"That's all right," he reassured me. "I did a little checking up on you, too."

"On me?" That thought sent a bolt of dread through me. Oliver had gotten my medical records from Willa – he wouldn't have shared those with Ray, though…would he?

"Relax, Felicity," Ray reassured me. "I found only good things – though precious little of that. You've stayed off the radar to an impressive degree for a woman in the digital age."

"And you haven't stayed off at all," I returned. Which was true. It turned out that Video Game Development really undersold Ray, who had created a line of popular video games revolving around a trio of jewel thieves in the 1920s. "You have whole websites devoted to you, you know. And your game are everywhere."

"So you've heard of them?"

"Only after I googled you," I admitted. "I'm not really a video game kind of girl."

His smile widened, endearing and surprisingly boyish. "Well, let's see if we can change that." He nodded toward his house of glass and granite. "Come on. I'll give you the grand tour."

He started to take my arm, but just then Oliver emerged from the house with Baron alongside. The Newfie bounded toward me, saving me from the awkwardness of having to shy away from Ray.

"Make yourself at home, Oliver," Ray said dryly. Oliver had a mug of something steaming in his hands, and looked marginally more relaxed than he had when Ray first found us.

"I have, thanks," Oliver said. He smiled at his friend with what seemed like genuine warmth, but there was something beneath it. Wariness, I thought. He might like Ray, but I suddenly wasn't nearly as sure as I had been that Oliver actually trusted him. The realization made me uneasy.

Ray went to the door and held it open for me, motioning me through. I crossed the threshold, while Oliver and Ray remained just outside. The silence between the two men was heavy, laden with tension.

"I'm just going to take Baron for a walk," Oliver announced, to my surprise. He turned to look at me, now inside the house while he was still on the doorstep. "Just call if you need anything, Felicity. I won't be far."

"Oh. Uh… Okay, sure. I'll see you in a while then, I guess." I had the sudden, unpleasant feeling that he'd brought me here specifically to deliver me to Ray, and I didn't like it. I frowned at him. Oliver hesitated, the mask that had fallen when Ray came on the scene lifting for an instant.

"You'll be fine," he reassured me. "I'll be right outside."

"All right," I agreed, only slightly more at ease now.

Ray closed the door once Oliver had gone, and we were alone.

To be honest, I expected to be afraid once it was just the two of us, or at least feel some kind of anxiety. Instead, Ray looked at me with those eyes that always seemed to be searching for something, and a surprising peace descended. He wasn't a stranger; I knew this man. I'd known him longer than just about anyone in my life.

The way he was looking at me combined with the visions in my head and the overwhelm of the morning made it impossible to hold still for long, however. I looked away first, focusing instead on the house. To be fair, it wasn't a hard house to focus on.

Open concept with polished granite floors and light flooding in from every direction, it was a design fit for Architectural Digest. The first floor was completely open, with two subsequent floors built with long corridors that formed a U around the perimeter, providing unimpeded sun from a massive skylight on the roof.

"There's a backup generator, but I rarely use it," Ray explained. "Solar is pretty reliable up here, even on cloudy days."

"I bet. You could power half the island – all of it, I bet, if you set up the right kind of array. What do you do with the excess electricity?"

"I've got a good-sized battery, so storage isn't a problem. There's a gas-powered generator, but I haven't had to use it for a couple of years."

"Nice. What kind of battery?"

He kind of smiled at that, eyebrows going up in a way that seemed familiar. "Do you want to see?"

Naturally, I agreed immediately, and followed him to the basement with my mind whirling with possibilities. I owned half this island - or I would, if I could just survive this year. If Ray and I teamed up, and I somehow got the other residents of Crab's Neck on my side, we could get the whole place off fossil fuel in as little as two to three years. And if we instituted a couple of programs that actually took carbon out of the atmosphere - kelp farming was a possibility, I thought - then we wouldn't just be a net-zero community... We could actually make a difference, and provide a model for other small communities like this one.

The basement was just as well built as the rest of Ray's zillion-dollar estate, lined with spray foam insulation and impressively dry. I quizzed him on the type of insulation he'd used and then asked about a dozen follow-up questions before the conversation shifted to thermal windows and heat pumps as Ray walked me through the rest of the house. Nearly forty-five minutes had gone by and I'd barely noticed when Oliver returned with Baron.

"Everything going okay?" Oliver asked once he was through the door. Baron made a beeline for me, and I greeted him with happy hugs while he in turn slobbered all over my jeans.

"It is," Ray confirmed. "Though I have to say, most of my guests just want to see the view. We haven't even made it that far."

"Yeah, well... Felicity isn't most people," Oliver said, with what sounded remarkably like affection in his voice. Or at least, not overt contempt. I looked up to find him watching me with Baron, that barest trace of a rare smile on his face. If he kept this up, I might start to think Oliver Knight actually liked me.

"Apparently not," Ray said. He hesitated, then nodded toward the skylight. "Did you want to see the view now?"

"We should get going soon," Oliver said, his customary frown returning. "I'm sure everyone's up by now, waiting for you."

"In a minute," I said, then turned back to Ray. We were in his immaculate stainless steel chef's kitchen, with a breathtaking view over the water. "Yeah - though I don't see how the view can get much better than this. From where I'm standing, this is pretty spectacular."

"Just wait," Ray said, with a grin. He led the way to a wrought-iron spiral staircase that seemed to climb straight to the heavens.

"Where does this lead, exactly?" I asked.

"Up," Ray said. When I rolled my eyes, he added, "I built a crow's nest at the top of the house - a bedroom with a 360-degree view of the island." He studied me, that intensity I'd seen earlier suddenly back as he gestured toward the stairs. "I think you'll like it."

I'll own this view someday, Rose, I heard Past Ray say. Rose looked at him. They were outside, on a peak overlooking the ocean - this peak, I quickly realized. They were younger in this vision, Rose just a teenager and Ray maybe a few years older than her.

And how do you propose to do that, Mr. Palmer? she asked, teasing him.

His intensity then matched that of Present Ray, and I felt his touch as he cupped Rose's cheek. For you, I'll find a way. The Palmers may not have much, but we're resourceful. If it meant you'd stay with me, I'd drop the moon and stars at your feet.

The vision faded and I was back in Ray's house, at the foot of the spiral stairs with Ray and Oliver watching me intently. "I'm okay," i said, before either man could ask. My head pounded, the past still echoing inside my skull.

"All right, that's it," Oliver said, anger simmering in his voice. "We need to get back. Come on, Felicity."

"One minute, please," Ray said. "We'll be done shortly." The glare he turned on Oliver surprised me, mostly because up till that point he had been so pleasant. A charged silence followed between them before Oliver nodded, his jaw so tight I was afraid he'd crack a tooth.

"Fine. But don't be long."

"Of course," Ray said, then turned to me with that million-watt smile again. "Ready?"

I shook my head, stepping away from both men. "Actually, no. Not at all."

"What do you-" Ray began, but I cut him off.

"This thing that's going on between the two of you-" I gestured with a wave between the two men, "-whatever it is, the weird 'Look, Mr. Palmer, at the pretty young virgin I've delivered'-" I blushed, cursing inwardly. "Not that I'm a virgin. Obviously - I'm twenty-two. There are no twenty-two-year-old virgins anymore."

"Felicity-" Oliver began.

I held up my hand to keep him quiet, and took a breath. "No - don't tell me that I'm imagining things. I've spent my whole life with people telling me all this stuff is in my head, and it turns out most of it wasn't in my head at all - or it was, but it wasn't there because I have a great imagination. And this...whatever-it-is you two have going that feels a lot like you're preparing me for some kind of ritual sacrifice...just knock it off already, okay? Because if you're not preparing me for a ritual sacrifice, you really need to work on the way the two of you interact with women when you're together."

I ran out of breath and words at roughly the same time, and drew up short. Oliver had that hint of a smile going again, which only served to piss me off because it felt a lot like he was laughing at me. Ray, on the other hand, didn't look amused at all. He took a step toward me.

"Felicity," he began, "I really am sorry if I've made you uncomfortable. It was the very last thing I wanted to do, I promise." He took another step, until we were close enough to touch. He reached out. A wave of fear ran through me; I backed away.

He didn't stop, though.

Instead, his hand closed around my arm with surprising strength.

"Let go," I said, through the rush of voices and images, smells and tastes and sensations so strong that they threatened to swamp me where I stood. He didn't let go, though. Instead, he took hold of my other arm, his eyes on mine.

"Ray!" Oliver shouted.

"I need to know what you're seeing," Ray said to me. You're mine, Rose, the old Ray said. Now and forever. A little girl screamed. I smelled the surf, felt the wind in my hair. The present disappeared, in the blink of an eye.

Phew! This turned out to be a bear of a chapter. Sorry for the cliffy here, but I promise you'll be getting some answers in the next installment. Thanks as ever for reading, and don't forget to drop a line with your thoughts if you have the notion!