An attempt to return to the original feeling of the fic... Thanks (as always) to ilex-ferox for keeping me in line. Also, if you haven't read it, I'm going to suggest you read a version of the Cupid and Psyche story because, from here on in, this fic'll make a lot more sense if you do.

Chapter Eight: A Study in Archetypes

Holly sits in her hospital bed, knees drawn up under her chin. Everything in the room is white: the walls, the floor, the curtains, the sheets, the bedside table and its tacky lamp, whose light reflects off the walls, becoming painfully bright. Holly feels like she is going blind, her eyes are wide open and see nothing. When she lies down she has the sensation of drowning in milk.

Once, a councilman came to visit her. Tall for an elf, and old, thousands of years old, his name is Apollonius, from back when the names of human deities were all the rage. He had come in, sat down in the lone chair and stared at her, the only dark spot in the whole room. Holly had stared right back, not wanting him to know he made her feel like a bloodstain on clean linen.

'There are names for women like you,' he said at last, 'in every language on this planet.'

'And what are women like me?' Holly asked, already knowing and not wanting to hear.

Apollonius smiled, 'Why don't you ask your little boy? He seems to know them all. And it is his species that is so enamoured with the archetype.'

'And what archetype is that?' her voice was flat, her speech slow and rhythmic, nearly a chant. She could refuse to acknowledge his thoughts just as long he could refuse to name them.

The councilman sighed, 'You know what I mean.'

'No,' she replied doggedly, 'I don't. I am a law enforcement officer. I have saved the world. I love a man. What does that make me?'

'You love a human. You love a human when you should love your people.'

'Love my people? It wasn't for love of my people that I jumped into time tunnel with a bunch of stone warlocks going Frond only knew when and where? It wasn't for love of my people that I snuck into the Koboi Labs during a goblin siege? It wasn't for love of my people that I fought trolls and psychopaths and megalomaniacs and child genii? When have I ever not loved my people?' Her eyes were slits, her fist clenching the white sheets.

'When you were faced with the choice between the life of your people and the life of some stinking criminal mudman, that's when. At the very end, when at long last you were our golden girl, that is when you betrayed us. And for what? A silent scream of passion and legs wrapped around scrawny hips,' Apollonius sneered, levelling a long and gnarled finger at her. 'You want to know your name, girl? Here it is, in the language of your lover: you are Lamia. You are Lilith, Babalon and Naamah. You are that snake in their ridiculous garden, their precious temptress that sends their holy men gibbering to their idols. They give you fancy names to cover up the fact that what has bewitched them is nothing more than the pretty face of a common whore. That is what you are, girl, a whore, nothing more. And you sold us along with yourself,' he paused, drawing in breath. 'What can I say? Fowl is a businessman, he can recognise a good deal when he sees one. And you were on offer for so little it was nearly criminal,' his lips twisted upwards into a horrible facsimile of a smile.

'I sold nothing,' she whispered, 'I gave myself away. Myself and only myself. I love him.' She drew herself up, 'At least I'm not a murderer.'

'It would have been self defence.'

'It would have been murder.'

'You are supposed to protect your people.'

'I am supposed to protect life.'

'It would have kept us safe.'

'From what? Our hypothetical children? Frond forbid! That's nearly as bad as having females in recon.'

'Don't be flippant. What you have done is an abomination.'

'It was love.'

'It was disgusting.'

'Get out.' Her cupid's mouth was a knife's edge and her eyes were so cold her face was nearly unrecognizable.

'We'll have you for this,' he spat. 'We know what you are now.'

'I said get out.'

He did.

She wants to cry, to see if the tears will wash away this blind white and let her see again. She wants to know that she can trust the man she loves. She wants her mother. Or even Julius.

Instead, for some unfathomable reason, she has Lili Frond.

'Can I get you anything Holly?'

Holly shakes her head.

'Come on, pouting is bad for your skin. A book, a game?'

'No.'

'You can't sit here like this forever.'

'Well, I can sure as Frond try.'

'What about some food? Are you hungry?'

Another shake of the head.

Lili sighs. Officially, nursemaid of the pining heroine is the lamest role ever. Especially when you want to be playing the hero.

Holly does, however, make an effort at cheerfulness when Vinyáya enters the room, carrying cartons of take out Italian.

'I brought all your favourites, even chocolate cake. Thought we might have a little party,' Vinyáya spreads the swag out on the end of Holly's bed.

Holly smiles, though only poking half-heartedly at the fiddlehead fettuccini. 'You're the best. Have we got a good excuse? Just get your nails done? Finally took your trash out?'

'How about Artemis couldn't strike a deal fast enough with the council? He's just finished doing file maintenance on the Minotaur.'

Holly swallows her mouthful slowly, 'Trying to save his skin after all? I must have really scared him with all that assassination talk. Well huh, who'd have thought. Apollonius forgot to mention that.'

'I don't doubt he did. After all, the deal is that Artemis does whatever they want done and they will grant you amnesty.'

Holly puts her fork down very slowly. 'Pardon me?' she asks, her voice suddenly calm and even.

'Whatever they want in exchange for your safety. No murders, no exile, no humiliation,' Vinyáya continues eating her pasta quite calmly, as though she hadn't just blown Holly's world to pieces. 'I thought that was a pretty good reason to celebrate.'

'For me?' Holly repeats again, eyes wide, completely missing Vinyáya's last sentence. 'Artemis's doing it for me?'

Vinyáya looks up at last, 'Mm hm.'

Holly smiles, timidly at first, but it grows, until she's grinning and then laughing, fingers splayed over her mouth.

The women with her see no hissing snake in the grass, only love and a blinding hope.

'We have reason to believe you had asistance from an inside source,' glowers the Councilman, 'so we are adding an additional task.'

Artemis raises an eyebrow. Clearly Foaly and No1 underestimated their political leaders. Always reassuring, if not terribly useful for Artemis. He wonders if Vinyáya will have better luck with them. Remembering her vicious smile, he thinks she probably will.

'I don't recall that be part of the agreement. I completed the task in the allotted time, before, even. Those are simply the results one receives when one employs a genius of my calibre. I'm afraid it's none of my concern if you are used to a lower standard of workmanship,' he flicks a tiny smile at Foaly beside him.

Foaly whinnies in disbelief, brandishing a half masticated beet, 'Dream on Artemis.'

'I don't believe you are really in a position to argue, Master Fowl. Unless you going to retract your pledge to the health and happiness of ... Captain Short,' the elf's upper lip curls on her name.

Artemis' face is stony, 'No, I have no intention of doing anything of the sort. Someone has to look after your citizens, as you appear to be wholly uninterested in their welfare.'

'She directly disobeyed orders concerning the safety of her nation. In her chosen career, that is unacceptable.'

'Yes, what a terrible pity. After all, who else could ever be so valuable a Delilah?' Artemis sneers, and his face is utterly white.

The councillor's face goes red and he opens his mouth to speak, but his colleague puts a restraining hand on his arm. On the other side of the screen, Foaly does the same to Artemis.

'The second commission we have for you concerns an ancient faery artefact,' continues the second councillor, 'it has been missing for some four thousand years and had been thought irretrievably lost until was discovered last week by a human archaeological expedition. I believe it is now being held the Ulster museum in Belfast.'

Artemis blinks, 'You mean the golden sheep everyone thinks is a Bronze Age idol?'

The councillor purses his lips, 'Yes, that one.'

'I see. And you want me to, not to put too fine a point on it, steal it back for you? I suppose discovering something by accident in a peat bog doesn't count as 'separating a faery from their gold'.'

'You tell me, Fowl. The minutiae of separating us from our gold do seem to be your area of expertise.'

'Very true. I wonder, however, that you don't simply do as you did when I stole from you, and send a troll in to recover it. Or does a gold sheep require more subtlety and tact than the life of an LEP test case?'

'Artemis,' warns Foaly in an undertone.

'Do you accept our terms, Master Fowl, or not?' asks the elf.

Artemis weighs his options, thinks briefly about what Julius Root would be like as a poltergeist, and nods, 'Yes, I do. But I will not accept them forever, so I suggest you choose wisely.'