Lena was at the ticket window as soon as it opened for the day.
"One ticket to Edinburgh, please. One way."
The stony-faced teller took her money and handed her a ticket.
There was nothing left for Lena in Duckburg. The only people she knew in the city had better things to do than to keep her around. They'd probably forgotten about her already. She'd never get out from under the shadow that Magica and the Revolution had cast over her, so she might as well return to Edinburgh.
Sure, she hadn't stuck around to collect her share of the reward money, but that was ok. Really. It was enough to see the kid reunite with his family. It was almost like she'd finally paid her debt after all these years. Made up for what she'd done…and what she hadn't been able to do.
A whistle blasted as a train pulled into the station. Not Lena's train—she still had a bit of time before it arrived—but it was enough to remind her that she'd might as well get a move on. Lena checked her ticket and started heading towards track 3.
"He…said what?" Louie asked.
"I'm sorry, kid," Gladstone said. "I don't know what else we can do except bide our time, wait until he gets used to the idea and might be willing to see you."
Louie nodded, though Gladstone's words did nothing to help him feel any better.
"And hey! You still have good ol' Uncle Scrooge!" Gladstone said, perking up a little. "And you've got me!"
"Yeah," Louie said, looking past Gladstone to the houseboat. He should be happy. Uncle Scrooge should be enough. He alone was so much more than Louie had had for so long. In just a short time, he'd gone from being completely alone in the world to having a family. But somehow…
Louie stroked the dime in his pocket. He remembered now. He remembered his Uncle Donald, the boat trips they'd taken together, the way that he'd looked after Louie and his brothers like they were his own. And his brothers. They'd been so close, getting into all sorts of mischief together, sharing inside jokes, fighting with one another, simply being there for each other.
The thought of never having that again put a gaping hole in Louie's chest so big that he couldn't stand it.
Gladstone sighed. "I know it's not enough," he said. He hopped up onto a shipping crate. "But it's all I've got."
Louie suddenly realized that he was fighting back tears. He blinked hard and swallowed against the scratchy ache building in his throat.
"I might as well go back to Scotland," he finally said.
"What?" Gladstone said, startled, looking up. "You can't just go back!"
"I can't stay here, either!"
"But you still have Scrooge—"
"And I don't have my brothers!" Louie snapped. "I can't live here knowing that they're on the other side of town and don't want anything to do with me!" He shook his head and buried his face in his hands. "I'd rather not remember them at all."
Gladstone was quiet for a long moment. Then, he suddenly said, "Well, Pandora's box is already open, and there's no closing it. You can go back to Edinburgh if you want to, but me, I'd stay in the city where I'm guaranteed my next meal."
Louie gave him a sour look. "You're always guaranteed—"
"Well, you're not. So you can do whatever you'd like, but I'm staying here."
"I never said I wanted you to come—"
Louie stopped mid-sentence as he noticed an odd coldness pooling around his feet. He looked down and saw a purple mist rolling in.
"What the—"
"No," Gladstone said, face suddenly very pale.
The train whistle sounded. "Train from Duckburg to Edinburgh by way of St. Canard arriving on track 3. Train from Duckburg to Edinburgh now arriving, track 3."
Lena shouldered her bag and took one last look at the city. What had once been a beacon of hope and new beginnings was now a symbol of the family and closeness that she didn't have and would never have. The blue skies, clear waters, and prosperity of Duckburg contrasted sharply with the oppressive dinginess she was about to return to. Lena turned towards the train, but something inside her made her take one more glance back at the city…
…where the wharf was slowly starting to turn purple.
No.
Louie backed away from the mist.
"What's going on?" he asked.
Gladstone looked around wildly. "We've gotta get out of here," he said.
Menacing laughter filled the air. "It's a bit too late for that," a voice said.
Gladstone grabbed Louie's wrist and started to run, but the mist grew in front of them, taller and taller until it started solidifying into the shape of an all-too-familiar duck.
"Magica De Spell," Gladstone spat.
"Ah, yes," Magica said. "The nephew. Or is it cousin? No matter. I don't have any use for you." She reached out her hand and flicked her fingers in Gladstone's direction.
Gladstone flew back as if he'd been hit with a club and crashed into the stack of shipping crates, where he lay still and unmoving.
"Hey! What was that for?" Louie demanded.
Magica shrugged. "It just seemed like the thing to do. And besides, I had to get him out of the way."
Louie's eyes narrowed. "What do you want?"
"The dime, of course."
Louie's hand drifted protectively to his pocket, and Magica grinned.
"Thank you for telling me exactly where it is," she said.
"I won't let you have it!"
"I didn't expect you would. That's not going to stop me from taking it."
Magica raised her arms, and the smaller crates around them began to rise. They paused mid-air, just long enough for Louie to realize where they were headed.
"H'oh boy."
He turned and ran. The crates flew towards him, missing him by mere inches. That is, all but one, which knocked into his shoulder before careening to the ground.
Louie turned around, holding his arm. A raven flew down and started tearing at his clothes and feathers.
"Hey! Get off! Let go!" Louie said, trying to fight it off.
"What a difference these last six years have made," Magica said. She was now holding a staff topped with a large, purple stone. "You've grown into a fine young man, but me, I've been abandoned and left to rot!"
Louie was too busy dealing with the stupid raven to respond.
"Hmm…I seem to remember a lot more snow that day." Magica raised her staff, and it let out a burst of magic that covered the pier, the docks, the crates, everything with ice.
Louie immediately slipped and fell.
"You should have died that day. You all should have died!" Magica said, coming closer. "I might not be able to kill you all, but at least I can get the dime!"
"No!" Louie said.
Magica raised her staff again, and a crack began to cut through the boards beneath his feet. Louie yelped, scrambling to find a foothold on quickly crumbling pier.
"Aunt Magica!" a voice rang out.
Magica spun around. "You!"
"Ahhh!" Louie said.
Lena tossed aside her bag and ran over to the broken part of the pier. She threw herself onto her stomach and reached for Louie.
"Almost…"
"A little more…"
"Gotcha!"
She pulled him back up onto stable ground and together they collapsed, panting. Before they could catch their breath, Magica raised her staff again and brought the statue of the grizzled old sea captain that guarded the entrance of the wharf to life.
A few docks down, a duck and two ducklings poked their heads out of their houseboat to see what was going on.
"No," Donald whispered. "It can't be…"
"Aw, come on!" Louie yelled, dodging the metallic oar that the statue swung at him.
"Give it up, Aunt Magica!" Lena said, doing the same.
Magica laughed. "Oh, this is too much fun," she said, wiping a tear from her eye. "But I think I know how to make it even better!"
She waved the staff around, and before Louie's eyes, he saw his shadow peel away from the ground and stand up on its own. It gave him a wicked grin and then punched him in the face.
Caught off-guard, Louie next found himself being smacked with the statue's oar square in the gut. He doubled over in pain as the air rushed out of his lungs and refused to go back in.
Donald ran.
"Uncle Donald! What are you doing?" Huey shouted.
"Where are you going?" Dewey shouted.
But Donald didn't answer as he ran straight towards whatever was going on down the wharf.
Huey and Dewey exchanged worried looks.
"We've gotta go after him," Dewey said.
Huey nodded, and together they sprinted after their uncle.
"Is it really worth all this? This stupid dime?" Louie wheezed as his breath slowly came back. "You tore…my whole family…apart…murdered…my mother…destroyed Scotland." Louie straightened painfully. "All for ten cents?"
"Ten cents?" Magica said. "That dime is worth more than ten cents. It's worth so much more than ten cents. That dime should have been my compensation for years of loyal service to the King!"
Louie's shadow grinned at him again. This time, he dodged its fist.
"You don't just get to have your pick of an old man's possessions because you've worked for him for a couple of years!"
The statue swung at Louie again, aiming for his ankles, and Louie leapt over the oar.
"He would be nothing without me!"
"Oh, please!" Lena said. "He was doing just fine before you showed up, and he's been doing just as well since you forced him here! You didn't have anything to do with his success!"
"Oh, shut up, you," Magica said. "You were never worth anything, always a hindrance. I created you to help me get the dime, and you went and befriended that stupid little girl and those unbearable princes. You owe me your life and this is how you repay me?"
"I owe you nothing!" Lena said, her voice low and dangerous.
"I can remove you from this plane of existence any time I want to!" Magica said. "In fact…"
Louie watched in horror as Magica raised her staff, which began pulling Lena to it.
"No!" Louie screamed, but it was no use.
Lena disappeared into the talisman.
Louie froze. He didn't know what to do. He didn't know how to help. Was Lena still alive, or was she just stuck in there? Would breaking the stone free her, or would it kill her?
And then Louie slowly became aware of a…yelling sound coming closer and closer. He looked to where it was coming from. He saw a blur of blue and yellow and white rush to Magica and attack her, moving so fast that he couldn't see the kicks and punches it landed (or even if they were kicks and punches), let alone who (or what) it was.
"What—get off of me!" Magica protested, stumbling backwards towards the break in the pier that she had created.
"No!" a third voice yelled as they went over the edge. Louie's shadow blinked out of existence.
Dewey.
"Uncle Donald!"
Huey
The three young ducklings ran over and poked their heads over the side of the pier. Donald was treading water, panting, holding the unconscious body of Magica De Spell.
"Her staff!" Louie yelled down. "Where's her staff?"
"Um…" Donald looked down, felt around in the water a little bit. Nothing.
Louie dove into the murky water. Eyes open, he swam down, but before he even had the chance to really look for it, a hand grabbed him by the back of the shirt and hauled him back up.
"Just what do you think you're doing?" Donald asked.
"Let me go!" Louie said, squirming. "Lena's in there!"
"What?"
"Just let me go!" Louie wrenched himself out of Donald's grasp and swam back down. He spotted the staff wedged in the silt at the bottom—luckily, standing up, albeit at an angle—and propelled himself down to grab it. Then, he started kicking back up towards the surface.
Somehow, the way back up seemed a lot longer than the way down had been. Louie's lungs began to burn, and was he just imagining things, or was the world around him starting to get dimmer? He kicked again, but this time, he didn't quite go in the right direction, and now he wasn't entirely sure which way was up.
A hand grabbed onto the back of his shirt once again and pulled him to the surface, leaving Louie coughing and sputtering and gulping in huge lungfuls of air.
"Did you, er, find what you needed?"
Louie nodded. Donald pulled him over to the ladder leading back up to the pier.
Dewey helped them up onto the pier while Huey sat with Gladstone, who was now sitting up on a crate and groaning, holding his head in his hands.
"Gladstone!" Louie ran over to him, he feet making wet slapping sounds against the wooden pier as his heavy, water-logged clothes dripped around him. "Are you ok?"
"Yeah, I'll be fine, Green Bean," he said, lifting his head up just enough to give Louie a reassuring smile.
Behind Louie, Donald stopped in his tracks.
Gladstone sat up a little straighter and then hopped off the crate. He cleared his throat.
"Prince Donald Fauntleroy Duck," Gladstone began.
Donald muttered something that Louie didn't quite catch.
"Please allow me to introduce you to your nephew, the formerly-but-no-longer-lost Prince Llewellyn Rebel Duck."
And Gladstone gave a grand, sweeping bow to punctuate this introduction.
Donald looked Louie up and down and opened his beak to speak.
But Louie shook his head. He couldn't bear it. He couldn't bear the chance that Donald might reject him. He couldn't bear the chance that his family might be ripped away from him again.
Twice was already too much.
"No. No. I'm not him. At least, I don't—I don't know if I am. I don't know anything. I can't remember anything; I just wanted—I thought that maybe—but it's not worth it."
He took the dime out of his wet pocket and plopped it into Donald's hand.
"I don't know how I got it. I probably stole it some time before I can remember. It's not mine." He took a shaky breath. He couldn't bear to look at it anymore, not after it had spent so long pointing the way to Duckburg, and for what? "It's more trouble than it's worth."
Gladstone was staring at him with open-mouthed shock. "But you said—you remembered—"
"I don't care what I thought I remembered!" Louie snapped.
He took a deep breath and shouldered his bag. He looked up at Donald, his eyes suddenly more than a little misty. "I just want to go home."
Donald's eyes filled with tears. He knew that voice. He knew those words. The image of Dewey saying the same thing, just after the Revolution, filled his memory.
Donald smiled through the tears blurring his vision. "You are home."
And he opened his arms, and Louie ran into them, sobbing loudly and messily, the familiar warmth and salty smell of the sea filling his senses.
He was home.