Chapter 20: Epilogue

When you travel with the Doctor, you usually arrive at your destination. Eventually. But the journey is often quite different than you expect. Donna had this thought as she and the Doctor sat at a café on the Île Saint-Louis in the late afternoon sunlight of a beautiful autumn day. Donna sipped at a café crème while the Doctor stirred his hot chocolate with single-minded intensity but never actually lifted the cup to his lips. Around them, conversations in French buzzed and swooped. They were in Paris, in the year 2008. History had been restored and all the familiar monuments were in place. They had done the job they had set out to do when they left here all those months ago. But that victory, if such it was, rang hollow because they had lost so much.

After Rosalind's death things had moved with dizzying speed. It had been Donna who gently eased Rosalind out of the Doctor's grip, who had called the servants and had the body taken away. She had washed his blood-stained hands as he sat in a near catatonic state. Then she had simply sat with him, waiting for him to come around. After an hour, when she had genuinely come to fear that he might not speak again, he had taken a deep breath, looked at her, and said, "I think it is time for us to go." After that, the Doctor could not be stopped, could not wait to be gone. That very night, as Rosalind's body lay in state in the palace chapel, he had infused the real Philip with his memories and returned him to his own bed. He had then told Donna curtly to prepare to leave within the hour. Donna had taken one last turn around her room but decided she wanted nothing from it. Then she went and sat in Rosalind's chamber. This had been where she had spent most of her time, with her friend. The bed had been stripped and the mattress and sheets, all irrevocably stained with blood, carried out of the palace and burned. She perched uncomfortably on the edge of the bed frame and allowed herself to weep for a few minutes before joining the Doctor on the TARDIS. With a brief glance at her, he had flung them into the vortex without a word.

After that, he had simply vanished. For more than two weeks, she had seen nothing of him. This was neither surprising to her nor particularly upsetting. Neither of them, she knew, was ready to talk about what had happened. She relished the time alone to think about her friend and to mull over all that she had been through. The TARDIS, of course, saw to all her physical needs and comforts.

Then suddenly, one morning, there he was, in the console room. At some point he must have used the chameleon arch, because his familiar form had returned. He was back in his brown suit, crouched over the screens, glasses on, hair wild. It was almost as if nothing had occurred, as if it had all been a terrible dream. Almost. To her trained eye, he looked thinner—if that were possible—and paler and older, and there was a universe of sadness in his face and eyes. He said to her, without looking up from the console, "We should go to Paris, in your time, to check on how things have turned out." She made a soft noise of consent and laid her hand over his. He looked in her eyes for a short moment, smiled the most joyless of smiles, and then removed his hand and set the coordinates.

Now, as she sat across from him, she gathered her courage. They had not yet spoken about Rosalind's death, but there were so many things she did not understand and wanted to know. Gently she asked, "What happened, Doctor? To Rosalind?"

He flinched almost imperceptibly at the sound of her name, and then he looked up. "She had a hemorrhage. Probably an infection too. All as a result of the birth. You know that."

"But…" She didn't know how to ask the question; didn't want him to feel she was blaming him.

"Why didn't I save her?" He laughed bitterly. "The wine was drugged."

"What?"

"The wine on her bedside table was full of some kind of crude painkiller, probably an opiate. Dame Beatrice left it for her, for her pain. I cornered her after Rosalind died and she swore that she had clearly told Rosalind that it was painkiller, that it would make her sleep, and only to drink a small dose of it at a time. She was telling the truth, it was clear. But Rosalind told me it was celebratory wine that you had brought for us to toast Louis's birth. She asked me to drink it all. I thought it tasted strange, but I wasn't paying close attention."

"But why? Why would she do that?"

He shook his head and put down his spoon on the saucer with a vicious clatter. "I should have realized what she was doing. She was so concerned, the day before, about the idea that I was harming myself, threatening myself, by changing the timeline. I think she didn't want to let me tinker any more by healing her with Time Lord medicine. She wanted things to take their natural course. She took me out of the equation."

Donna said decisively, "She would never have killed herself."

"No! Of course not. But she would have been willing to take a chance on her own life, if she thought doing so would help me."

Donna nodded. He was right. That was exactly the sort of thing Rosalind would have done. Donna pulled the absurdly tiny napkin out from under her coffee cup and dabbed at her eyes. He said, "I just wish she hadn't done it. I can't believe she was able to trick me like that, that I didn't see what she was doing and stop her."

"You sacrifice your own interests all the time for others, Doctor. Sometimes people who love you will do the same for you."

He reached out and grasped her hand, holding on tightly. After a moment she said, "Poor Philip. To wake up and deal with the aftermath of all that, having not had the joy of it before."

She expected the Doctor might be angry with her for saying that, might snap at her, but he simply nodded. "You're right. Actually, I softened things a bit for him when I transferred in my memories. I made him love her, of course, but not quite as much as I did. That would have been cruel."

"You didn't take memories away from him, did you?"

"No, Donna. No. I wouldn't have done that. But neither did I put the full force of my emotions into him."

"I see." She paused. "What will we do now?"

"Us? Oh, you know. Same old life, last of the Time Lords and his brilliant companion. Adventures across time and space."

She winced at the forced cheer in his voice. "Doctor…what about Rose?"

He lifted his eyebrows. "What about her?"

"What if she comes back? What will it mean for you?"

"Donna, that's…"

"Before you tell me it's impossible, Doctor, I should mention that I don't believe in that word anymore, when it comes to your life."

He sighed and gave her a wan smile. "Quite right, too." He ran his hands over his face and up through his hair, clearly gathering his thoughts. "When I first met Rosalind, I thought maybe she could be some sort of…solace to me, for losing Rose?" Donna raised an eyebrow but before she could speak he held up his hand and said, "Yes, I know. Self-centered, right? But that's what I thought. But after…after I fell in love with Rosalind, I wondered if maybe Rose was really leading me to Rosalind. After all, if she had not looked like Rose, I'm not sure I would have ever looked twice at her."

"We never figured out, did we, if she was Rose's ancestor, or how exactly they were connected?"

He shook his head. "I just don't know. I don't think I ever will. But so much seemed to connect them. Bad Wolf, and everything else."

"Yes, I heard you say that, but I never fully understood. What was Bad Wolf?"

"When I was in my ninth body, Rose and I kept seeing that phrase everywhere. Like it was following us. It turned out to be a signal that Rose had sent to herself." Donna scrunched her face in concentration, trying to understand, and he chuckled. "It's complicated. But the point is, it never really made sense. Why would Rose, a shop girl from London, choose the phrase "Bad Wolf" as a signal? But for Rosalind, it made perfect sense. The rebellious daughter of the earl of Northumberland, whose symbol was the black wolf." He sighed. "But I don't pretend to understand exactly how it worked or how everything was connected."

Donna smiled. "I guess you don't know everything, after all."

"Oh, Donna. The longer you stay with me, the more you will see that it's rare that I know very much at all." After a moment, his voice thick with emotion, he burst out, "If only I had listened to you and left her in Northumberland. She could have lived to a ripe old age."

"Or she could have died giving birth to the child of some horrible old man that her father had married her to."

He shook his head, his jaw clenched. Donna grasped his hand. "Doctor, I know I disagreed with a lot of what you did. But listen…if I die tomorrow, you might say that if I had never left Chiswick, I would still be alive. But it's not always about the length of our lives, Doctor, as much as it is about how we live. I wouldn't give up traveling with you for the world, even if it means I don't live as long. And I think…no, I know that Rosalind felt the same way."

He was silent for a long time, and then, returning to another train of thought, he said, "If I ever see Rose again—unlikely, but let's just say it is possible—if I ever did, I would be so delighted to see her. But…it would be difficult too. She would remind me so much of Rosalind, but she could never replace her. It wouldn't be fair to Rose to keep her with me, if she thought that things could be the same between us."

He looked down at his cup with distaste. "Donna, are you ready? We should go." He adopted an air of excitement, although it rang hollow in both their ears. "There's a Chinese market I thought I might take you to. Exotic foods, silk dresses, hustle and bustle!"

She smiled gently. "Yes, Doctor, whatever you want. Shopping would be nice. A distraction. But can you give me a few hours before we go?"

He frowned, clearly eager to put Paris behind him. "Why?"

Donna looked down. "Rosalind and I took a walk, just a few weeks before…" She paused and then cleared her throat. "We went on an outing to the Bois de Boulogne and walked in the parkland. Very little else of our Paris is still here, but I thought I might return there for a visit. Just to walk a bit and…say one last goodbye."

He relented immediately. "Of course. Take your time. I'll wait for you in the TARDIS, alright?" She nodded and stood, gathering her things. She paused to drop a kiss on the top of his head, before disappearing in the direction of the Metro.

The Doctor watched her go, so grateful for her presence and her friendship, but also relieved that she was gone. It was inevitable and natural that she was going to want to talk about Rosalind, but he didn't think he could stand much more of it. The physical pain and emotional trauma were astonishing, every time he thought of her or heard her spoken of. He could not keep Donna with him if she continued to press him about Rosalind. He could not lightly exchange anecdotes about her, or dwell on what might have been. It was simply too painful.

And so he had resolved to wipe Donna's memory of their French adventure. He knew—or at least he thought—that if that were the price of staying with him, of continuing their travels, that she would pay it. But he did not intend to ask. He ran a hand over his face. It was a repulsive thing to do. It was not noble, or strong, or fair. But he needed to do it. Perhaps, he thought, trying to justify his impulse, it was kinder to spare Donna this pain, as he had done for the real Philip. No, he told himself, look it in the face. He was doing this to spare himself. No other reason.

He stood up, verified that Donna had paid the bill before she left, and then wandered away from the café. Since he had a few hours, he was going to make another stop, one he had debated making, but now seemed unavoidable. And indeed, he wanted to go, even if it would be difficult. This was another thing to add to the list of his sins: he probably ought to have told Donna about the place, or even brought her along. But that, too, was something he could not manage. He had placed one last thought in Philip's sleeping mind before he had left him; he wanted to be alone to check if the king had remembered, had listened.

He crossed the bridge over the Seine and approached Notre-Dame from the east. He entered the first door he came to on the north side, known as the Porte Rouge. Above the door was a sculptural frieze that showed King Louis IX. He paused for a moment to marvel that that celebrated king was the son of the baby boy that he had held in his arms for a few minutes on that final night. He entered the nave and turned left, heading into the apse. Here, memory began to assault him, making his eyes sting. He could see Rosalind, twirling in the light thrown from the windows. The same light fell on him now; this was not surprising, given that it was almost the same time of year. He could hear her voice, telling him that she loved him for the first time. He swallowed hard and pressed on, turning into one of the small chapels in the apse. And there she was. He laughed even as his eyes overflowed. Philip had done it.

He approached the tomb slowly, pausing to glance at the placard thoughtfully placed for the benefit of tourists. "Rosalind of Northumberland, queen of France, 1200-1201. Died while giving birth to the future Louis VIII." A brief enough epitaph. A flat statement of her existence, which carried none of her unique presence with it. Gathering his courage, he turned to look at the effigy. He could not stifle the small whimper that passed his lips at the sight of her; luckily, no other visitors seemed inclined to turn into this small side chapel. His knees feeling weak, he leaned against the stone pillar by her head and studied her.

The artist had had his limitations, no doubt. But it was not bad. He had captured the curve of the cheek, the fullness of the mouth, the shape of the nose. Her eyes were closed, which was just as well, as no artist could have caught that ineffable expression. What pleased him most was that Philip had placed it exactly where he had suggested, in a spot along the wall bathed in colored light from the windows. "In the light, now and for all time, my love," he whispered, placing his cool hand over her cold marble one.

He reached into the pocket of his long coat and pulled out a small book, a manuscript with a cover in fine-tooled green leather. "I took it from him, Rosalind. I know you probably wouldn't like that, but it is all I have of you. He had your son." He paged through the book, savoring the sight of her handwriting and the memory of the morning after their marriage, when she had given it to him. He sighed and closed it, slipping it lovingly back into his pocket, where he felt its comforting weight against his leg. He turned to her effigy a final time. He whispered, "Thank you, my love. I wish that you had not left me. You were right, though. I would have done almost anything for more time with you. But I feel such gratitude for the time we had, for all you gave me."

He took one last look upward, his eyes dazzled by a blaze of color. Then he turned and walked away, through the darkness of the church into the bustle of the city, returning to his ship to await his companion.

Fin