A/N: Hey everybody, sorry for the long wait. These chapters are more difficult than I anticipated. On another note, I've posted a one-shot called "The Hank Journal", which is related to this story. For those who wants to know, it takes place during the ten years between part one and two in "Running in the Shadows" and explains how Hank got into the picture. Give it a try if you feel like it – I'd love to know what you thought. Same with this chapter of course. Now, let's get on with it.

Cordelia sat opposite Cometh, watched him sip his coffee out the corner of her eye. They sat in the kitchen, which made the meeting feel more businesslike instead of the social call Cometh had insisted it was. Cordelia wasn't quite sure what he wanted. She hoped he didn't mean to get to know her. She didn't have the resource to find a polite way of telling him that she had no room for him. They hadn't talked since the funeral. He wasn't there to reclaim the ring, Cordelia knew, because he had insisted that she be buried with it. So for now they just drank their coffee.

They hadn't talked aside from the first hello and Cometh asking how she was holding up. There was a fatherly concern to his tone, which she secretly loathed. She couldn't have said why. And she found herself thinking of her actual father. She almost never did, she didn't even have a face for him, but Cometh's question had brought something to surface and now she did. She wondered if he would come to her aid if he knew the chaos of her life. She didn't think so. He hadn't in all the previous crises they had had, so why now?

"I think I best tell you why I asked for a visit", Cometh finally said. Cordelia put down her coffee mug and looked at him directly for the first time since they had sat down.

"Please do."

"Fiona told me, well she made it very clear, that being engaged to her did not mean I would get any claim to her fortune. And I do not want it", he added quickly, when Cordelia raised an eyebrow. "But it made me think that perhaps you were in need of some finances? I have a substantial fond, which I have been saving to spend with Fiona, but seeing as that won't be possible…" He quieted for a moment, swallowed once and Cordelia caught a brief glance of the grief in him. It made her want to comfort him, but she said nothing. "I thought I would offer it to you. For whatever your needs. Perhaps an education for the boy?"

"Cage is barely four years old", was all Cordelia could think to say. The sorrow had robbed her of her courtesies and edged away her tact.

"I'm aware", Cometh said with a little smile. "Then perhaps some redecoration, some therapy for the butler. It's not for me to say. Either way, I have no use for this money. Would you have it?"

"I… I can't accept that, Cometh. It's immensely kind of you, but-"

"Please, Cordelia." It shocked her how vulnerable he sounded all of a sudden. "I longed to be Fiona's family. I know I would never have been much to you or your family, but I got to know your boy a little. Let me do this for your family, for Fiona's. It would give me some peace."

Cordelia didn't know what to answer. She wanted to ask where the money had come from, but didn't because she knew already. And she didn't want the attachment that might come with drug-money. But she didn't want to deny him closure either. If this truly helped him…

She didn't finish the thought, because Misty entered the room then. The exhaustion was over her as always, dark circles had started to form under her eyes again. Her hair had reached a new normal of messiness and her walk was cautious, wary.

Cometh tensed immediately. He had not forgotten Misty's behavior at the funeral, it seemed, and no one could explain to him what had made her do it. He did nothing, said nothing, but his eyes flashed with anger.

Misty gave them both a quick look and then went to fill the water bottle she kept with her in the greenhouse. She still didn't know what she had done at that funeral and she couldn't know that she had hurt him most of all. Still, when she saw his gaze on her, understanding flickered in her eyes.

"You can tell him, Misty", Cordelia said, releasing the spell without Cometh knowing it was there.

"I'm sorry", Misty said. Her voice was toneless and while Cordelia knew it was the exhaustion, which likely came off as carelessness to Cometh.

"You must hate her a lot to do something like that."

Misty's eyes widened and she looked at Cordelia. Cordelia knew at once that Misty thought he was talking about Fiona's murder and shook her head slightly so only Misty saw. She relaxed again and it only infuriated Cometh further.

"What kind of person spits into an open grave? Have you no moral?"

"Enough, Cometh", Cordelia said without stopping to think about it. "Misty wasn't herself that day."

"None of us were, but is self-control too much to ask for?"

Misty just looked shocked and Cordelia regretted not having told her. She could have avoided this whole farce with a single sentence. It would have aided the growing tension between them, but it would have saved Misty from this attack.

"I shouldn't have done that", Misty said. "I can't explain it to you, but I didn't hate her. I'm sorry for your loss." She gave Cordelia a dark glare and then left.

Cordelia uttered a painful sigh. She didn't know how to explain this to Cometh and Misty had only offered him more mystery. She wasn't used to lying for other people's benefit.

"I'm so sorry about that, Cometh. I…" But Cometh interrupted her:

"You don't have to explain. I know you are going through some troubles as well. I lost my head. I apologize."

"Well I-", she began, wanting to deny the trouble, but found that the words wouldn't form. She was used to lying for other people's benefit, but today she couldn't. "Yes, I suppose we are."

Cometh nodded and got up from the chair. "I will leave you now. My offer still stands, so you think on it. I have practice to do."

"Practice?" Cordelia asked, hoping to evade the offer yet again.

"The Sax. I've found jazz soothes me in these times. Feel free to come in and listen some night." He pulled a small card out of his inner pocket and put it on the table. Then he nodded again and announced that he would see himself out.

Cordelia sat back and stared ahead of her, some at the card in front of her and some just into space. She didn't know what to do about his offer, so her mind drifted to Misty and what Cometh had made her admit. It made her think of what Misty had said to her the last time they talked. It's up to you. It made her feel like she was choking. And it made her frustrated to think that Misty had once again presented her with this choice. She had done a horrid job at choosing the last time and it had almost cost two lives. If she told Misty to go now, would it save them? What kind of life would that be for either of them? She knew Misty would never love another person.

Some days it felt like a terrible burden, knowing there was someone who loved her that much. Even her mother could not do that. And she couldn't help but think where would Misty then go? It had never occurred to Cordelia until this moment that she didn't know. Misty couldn't go back to her swamp, all the death of the place scared her now. She would be lost.

She would be lost without me. Just as lost as Cordelia would be without her.

Just as lost as they felt with each other.

Cordelia made her way through the living room out into the back yard. Cage and Zoe sat on the porch and read a book. Zoe looked up when they came out, while Cage was busy tracing the figures on the page with his finger. Zoe smiled a sad smile of gratitude and Cordelia stroked her hair. Neither said a word. When Zoe returned to the book, Cordelia continued down to the greenhouse. Here she knocked on the door.

"Misty? Are you awake?" Her heart started pounding, but she refused to let it surface.

She received no answer.

Cordelia knocked again, then pulled at the handle. The door was locked.

"Misty? Can you hear me?"

She heard a low growl – one that would never been interpreted as human, if she hadn't known Misty so well – and then the sound of crawling. The thumb of a body falling against wood.

"We need to talk", Cordelia said.

"Not now, Delia. Can't." Her voice sounded strained, hoarse. She was under again. She was fighting and now she had taken to locking the door just to make sure she was alone in the fight.

Cordelia knocked again. "Please let me in, Misty. I only want to help."

"You can't help. Go back to the house."

"Please-"

"Go back!"

Cordelia flinched away from the door. She stammered a response and went, her rapid heartbeat dying out, as another inch of it fell off. She started to rethink what she had come to say, felt the doubt again.

Misty didn't show at dinner that night and Cordelia held her emotions in for Zoe's sake. The girl hadn't said much since their conversation on the edge of the bathtub, but in her eyes it was evident that Cordelia's words had struck a cord. There was a new fight in those eyes, a new insistence, a new yearning for comfort. Cordelia gave all she could. She had gotten into the habit of tugging Zoe in at nights when the exhaustion took her early. Time was moving too fast, she was in no way ready to care for a child who was already grown up, but whatever she did, the young adult received it with nothing but gratitude.

Today Zoe went to the attic to be with Kyle and Cordelia had only Cage to tug in. He always asked for Misty, when she didn't show and Cordelia could only tell him that she wasn't feeling well and she would see him tomorrow. Cage usually accepted that.

On this night he asked something new: "Where is grandma?"

Cordelia stood shocked, leaning over the crib and frozen with a hand at his warm little cheek.

"Grandma is dead, baby. She's with the angels now. We said goodbye to her, remember?" He nodded, but she wasn't sure that he meant it. The memories of a child seemed sometimes more volatile and perhaps his young mind had decided to let this one slide.

"When she coming back?" He asked then and as Cordelia prepared the answer, a well-known black wave of sorrow rolled over her again.

"She's not coming back, love. You can't come back once you die." It pained her so much to know that that was not always true in her world, because Fiona never would.

Cage accepted that too and said instead: "I miss her."

"Me too." She blinked the tear away, swallowed her bubbling emotions and bent down to kiss his forehead. She told him goodnight and left the room, because the wave overwhelmed her.

It felt like walking in half blindness, this all too familiar destructive determination. She went down the hall from Cage's room, into the master bedroom and further into the bathroom there. Her hands trembled and her lip quivered from the cries she tried to suppress. The tears she could allow because they didn't make a sound. Bottles and utensils clicked and clanged and she fumbled for the back of the closet and the razor there. She cut her finger on the edge of it and she was bleeding even before she sat down and pulled up her skirt. The first cut always made her gasp and it filled her with a sense of relief. Release too perhaps.

She sat there, ready to make the second cut, when she looked up at the door. There was nothing new about the door; she always closed it, never locked it though because Misty needed to be able to reach her if she went too far. The door was unchanged in this, but suddenly she remembered coming through there to find Zoe. It wasn't finding Zoe that made her think twice, as much as it was remembering how she had admitted to Misty helping her. Misty couldn't help her now. She had said that out loud for the first time and it was only now she stopped to acknowledge it.

Cordelia looked back down at her bleeding skin and the realization that Misty wouldn't cover it up brought an epiphany to her. There was no one left to fix her mess but herself. Misty was fighting her battle alone, but she didn't have to. If Cordelia would only stop acting the part of the damsel in distress, maybe Misty wouldn't be so alone in her fight. She needed strength and if Cordelia could be strong for Zoe and for Cage, why not for Misty too?

Her hands had stopped trembling now. Part of it was the relief of that first cut and part was this epiphany she experienced. Cordelia remembered she felt a similar calm the day she told her mother about the cutting. It had felt a bit like that first cut. Fiona was gone now and above the loss and the pain of that notion was this: Her passing meant that now Cordelia was the master of the house. It was about time she started acting like it.

Cordelia put the razor aside on the sink, wetted a paper towel and cleaned herself up. Once that was done, she cleaned the razor with water and (sprit) and placed it back into it's corner. It was a temptation to know that it was still right there within her reach, but she was a grown woman; she would have to learn how to resist temptation. It might not be a bottle of liquor, but the same rules applied.

The day after, she called Cometh to take him up on his offer.

O0O

Damian kept dropping the toys. And when he didn't drop them by accident, he threw them with his one good arm. There was a lot of strength in that little arm and he had broken most of his toys already. This was supposed to be the easy game. Marie had tried to teach him words again, the way Chinwee had told her the girl did with her beau. The boy, Kyle, seemed a lot more adequate at it than her little son. Perhaps it was just that he was too young. Or that it was too soon. That was why she switched to playing in hopes words would come out through that. So far she had had no luck.

Her little miracle took to gnawing on one of his old favorite cars and when it proved too solid to be bit in half he threw it with a wheezing sound of annoyance. Marie had learned to read him and while she knew it was time to stop, Damian could no longer read himself. He didn't know when he needed to shift focus and when to keep it.

Instead of continuing until he lost his patience completely, Marie gathered him and tried to put him down for a nap. She wasn't sure if he really needed the sleep anymore, but a couple of hours to lie in the crib and stare at the ceiling appeared to have a calming effect on him, so she kept up the routine. She thought perhaps that the simplicity of staring at a white space for a long time helped clear some of the confusion she felt was a constant presence in her son.

Marie took a moment to look at him. She used to talk to him all the time, he used to talk all the time, but as he had grown quiet so had she. She understood his non-verbal communication just fine by now, but she wasn't so sure he understood her. It made her think of Cage Goode again. How Chinwee had told her that he had seem Cage communicate with his parents. He didn't have so many words, not near as many as Damian had at that age, Chinwee had noted, but he communicated well without them. He and his witch mother talked like that a lot. The witch was in general very non-verbal, Marie had observed that in her short stay here. Perhaps she had passed these abilities onto her child. By nurture of cause, they had no genetic link. And if this ability could be passed through nurture, the right teacher could pass it to her Damian as well.

Marie pushed the thought away. She knew where it was going.

Damian had fallen into something resembling a slumber. Marie didn't think that he really slept, but it was close enough. It was the only time in the day that she could leave him without him throwing a fit of dangerous hysteria. She did so now to go visit Chinwee in his room.

The bite Damian had given him the day Hank Foxx had come knocking was almost healed now. It had gotten infected and he had caught a small fever. Marie had given him the treatment she could and the family doctor had provided him with antibiotics, where Marie's potions and salves didn't work. She thought with more time she might be able to cook something up, but Chinwee had shook his head at that.

"I don't want voodoo in my body, Marie. That's what got me this", he had said, pointing with difficulty as the oozing bite marks. His words had angered her, but he was sick so she swallowed it and brought him to the doctor. They answered no questions on what sort of creature had bit him and the doctor stopped asking when he saw that the treatment was working.

Chinwee was on the bed, staring into the ceiling as well. When Marie entered, he sat up and looked at her. He understood her so well. Sometimes she thought he knew her better than her sister did. His expression was sad, but hard. Whatever he meant to say, he could not be bent. Marie beat him to it and said:

"He needs a playmate, Chinwee. I can't teach him everythin' alone."

He grimaced from the discomfort when he stood up. He looked at her long then answered: "It can't be me."

"Why would you deny me this?"

Chinwee sighed. He went to her and took her hand. He was rarely physical with her and it made her uneasy. He was gentle, but she watched him grow up too fast in that mature touch and it felt too strange for her liking.

"You've always been there for me, Marie", he said. "You took me in when my parents died, I ain't forgotten about that. I'll do whatever you want of me, but I don't think I can help Damian. He don't know me no more. He scared of me and everyone but you."

Marie opened her mouth to argue, but had no words to steer her, so she closed it again. Before she had a chance to open it again, there were new steps in her hall.

Moments after, Chantal appeared in the doorway.

Chinwee's hand dropped, but Marie barely noticed. Instead she stared at her sister, who hadn't shown her face since she packed up her side of the family and left months ago.

"What are you doing here?" She couldn't help the sharp tone. Chantal caught it, lifted an eyebrow at her, but didn't comment on it. Instead she turned to Chinwee.

"Give us a minute?"

Chinwee nodded and backed away from Marie, then went past Chantal and disappeared. He closed the door behind him, because he knew Damian couldn't handle the noise. And there might be noise, Marie anticipated that from the way Chantal looked at her.

For a moment the two sisters just looked at each other. Marie didn't feel like the older one in that moment. Chantal didn't even feel like her sister, because she looked at her the way their mama used to look at them when she was disappointed with them. It was usually Marie getting that look. She was the one to let her anger get the better of her, where Chantal would move away from trouble. But not today it seemed.

"I want you to stop this", Chantal said. Marie opened her mouth to speak, but her sister cut her off. "I told myself I'd given you the last chance, but I miss you. I want our family back together, but you gotta give somethin'."

"I'm done soon", Marie assured her. The sharpness had gone out of her voice and she thought she sounded like a little girl begging for more playtime before bed. "I did almost all of it, Chantal. I got rid of my enemy. I got the witch on a leash. I have the upper hand, I just need to-"

"I don't wanna know! And remember, Marie, you're a witch too."

Her blood started to simmer. "I'm not… not like her."

Chantal crossed her arms with determination, her eyes hard as rock. "You're exactly like her, 'cept you got your powers by some spell. You ain't born like this, you chose to become this person and I wish someone would take it away!"

"Don't say that", Marie hissed. She immediately thought of Damian, terrified of what that would do to him.

"I will say that!" Chantal shouted back. Her eyes flashed with anger. "Maybe you'd be you again! You didn't used to be this obsessed. Look, none of us forgave Delphine or Fiona Goode and dammit, we shouldn't have to, but this is too much. This is being no better than them. Our fight couldda been over but you had to keep it 'live with those voodoo skills of yours."

Marie fought to keep her emotions from showing. She couldn't break, not for Damian. But the look on the Goode girl's face in that shack came back to her and she felt the hole inside her again, the one where there used to be a seething wish for revenge.

"I can leave that now, I promise", she told her sister. "But not my potions or my spells. I need them for Damian."

"You need to give your boy peace, Marie."

Marie turned away so she didn't have to react to the tears in Chantal's eyes. Or the ones in her own. "I can't."

"You don't know how or you scared to try?"

"I can't!"

There was a moment of silence. The anger twisted like snakes inside her and she thought she heard Damian hiss through the wall. Or maybe that was just her imagination. Her desperate wish for him to be more. To her sister he was already a ghost, but to her there was still a chance. She knew there was a way, with proper teaching. Chantal didn't.

Chantal gave a sigh of defeat. "Then I gotta go", she said.

Marie didn't speak. She barely looked her sister's way, only vaguely registered the shifting of her body, the steps of her feet and the creaking of the door. Then she was alone.