B8/Ch2: THE SAINTS OF GOODWICK

***CYFRINACH CASTLE - GOODWICK, SCOTLAND***

At the top of a towering hill overlooking the mirroring bay of Goodwick, Scotland, the stone walls of Cyfrinach Castle kept the noise and onlookers away along with its iron gates and gaunt looking guards. Inside the shadowy castle lived a court of mysterious people who never came out in the day. 

When asked by outsiders who lived in the castle, the villagers eyes went blank. Their stares cold and vacant of answers except for saying they believed them to be a religious order shrouded in secrecy who prayed during sunlight hours. These were lies to protect the outsiders, few as they came, from knowing the truth about those they called The Saints of Goodwick.

The villagers knew that behind their so called saintly nocturnal ways held deadly secrets that would run the good man's blood cold should he ever know the full extent of what truly happened behind the ancient walls of Cyfrinach. 

Village servants were sworn to secrecy — or risk death. 

**

Inside the Count’s room 

A young man of 28 years named Roman, with slick dark hair, skin so tan and sun kissed he looked as if he shined in a golden glow, quickly made his way up a back spiral stone staircase that led into a private apartment within the castle walls that belong to the leader of this mock religious order by the name of Count Alexandre Doshall. 

Alexandre's illness had progressed, but a silver lining of hope had arrived in the castle that made his existence, and those that followed his rule, keep faith that the dark face of luck was on their side.

Roman slowly pushed open the side entrance to the private room Count Doshall lay ill in. It was dark, the count was covered in dark maroon sheets a black shawl that covered his legs. Doshall was a sick man, dying. His face practically caving in with age, pale and blotchy with signs of malnutrition. 

Roman stood at the left of the bed and bowed his head at Count Doshall hoping his entrance did not wake the dying man.

“He can’t hear you now.” A whispery voice said from the right of the bed, a woman covered in black veils and lace gloves motioned for Roman to come to her. 

“Has he spoken? Does he know of the new arrivals? The others are fascinated by them.” Roman said to the woman, Doshall’s daughter Dominique. 

“He’s been sleeping since the turn for the worst. I haven’t had the courage to wake him to give him the good news of the arrivals. And what of them? How are they feeling in their apartments here?” Dominique wondered. 

“Mr. Lord is very enthusiastic about his stay. He’s the nephew of an old friend of mine, someone I met years ago as a boy and stayed close to. My friend is the one who wrote me about Mr. Lord and his child. I'm just happy they made it safely.” Roman explained.

Dominique’s eyes could be seen though the dark vails that covered her face and head. They were a hazel that seemed to jump from behind the lace and could freeze the fire in the hearth like the iciest Scottish winter. Yet her voice was calm and steady, like a mother telling a child fairy tail to smooth them into a slumber to dream. 

She motioned again for Roman, the Doshall’s trusted protector, to sit next to her in the red velvet upholstered loveseat by patting the soft cushion. 

“This Sebastian Lord, what of him? He’s new to this way of life of ours, how can we be sure the child is truly what your friend said it was — a mixling.” 

Roman took a breath, his eyes quickly glancing at the Count in his bed taking in a hearty breath of his own. 

“My friend promised me it’s true. The child is a mixling, son of a vampire and a mortal. He would never send them here to us with a lie. In his letter he said the father needed safe harbor and this place was the only place on earth his kind could find it. When my friend, Johnathon, realized the truth of his nephew he remembered me. He knows we'll keep them safe.” Roman said. 

“This child could save my father, Roman, it could save us all if it is a true mixling, we cannot make a mistake.” Dominique said, her whispery voice lighting up with a twinge is dark hope. 

Roman nodded, his warm skin again glowing in the firelight as she poured a thick red liquid from a glass kettle with golden feet. The liquid was thick and ruby red — fresh. She lifted the vails over her face revealing a beautiful woman with a tight jaw and a nose slender at the bridge. She drank from the glass and dabbed the corners of her lips with a white linen cloth that stained the color of her drink and her lipstick. 

“Tell me of the mother, Evangeline.” She said. 

“She is….” Roman begun but then quickly paused mid-thought. “I’m sorry what did you call her?” 

The vails fell again, the beautiful face once again shrouded behind layers of thing black lace. Dominique raised a brow at his sudden pause “Evangeline. Mrs. Lord.” She repeated. "Is there a problem?"

Roman’s face dropped. His heart sank at the name. It couldn’t be. This has to be a strange, bizarre coincidence. "Uh no, no problem at all." He answered. 

When Roman met with Sebastian when they arrived he had not seen the wife and Sebastian had not mentioned her by name. He never in his wildest dreams would expect the name to be that name. A name very familiar to him, a name he had kept in the back of his mind--in his past--decades ago

“Then what is it?” Dominique pressed, noting Roman’s still very obvious meandering. 

But before he could answer the old Count begin to cough in his bed uncontrollably. The coughing ripped through his windpipe, tore through his chest and entered the air in a spray of microscopic droplets of blood. 

Both Dominque and Roman jumped up from the velvet loveseat and rushed to his side. 

“Father, please you must drink. You must drink!” Dominique said, reaching for a glass of the red liquid that sat at the Count's bedside. “Help me lift him.” She added. 

Roman and Dominique lifted the dying Count, tipped his weak head back and tried to give him the drink of the same red liquid his daughter sipped. 

No use. His age was slowly creeping into reality. His veins were hardening. His insides rotting. His eyes graying. The Count of over 300 years of age was reaching the end of his dark dynasty, a curse that had traveled down over the years from the man that made him, and the man that made that man, and so on.

“The child." Dominique said. "We need to know if he is viable as prophecy has said, and quickly.” 

Roman nodded and helped lay the count back down. He bowed his head once to each of the Doshalls and made his way out of the room this time though the main entrance and down the glittering hall of candle light that led to another larger staircase where many of the people living in the castle had gathered at the bottom of the stairs in a large foyer with black and white checkered floor and a 535 year old chandelier crowning the entire room. 

“Is it true Roman?” A woman asked, wrapped in red silk robes and her hair tied up tightly in the back. Her skin pale like the others. 

“Tell us.” A man demanded, looking much the same.

Roman, his mind still on the name Evangeline, couldn't speak. 

"We have hoped for this for a very long time and now you hesitate to reply?" A third man, his hair dark at one time, now white as snow to match his white face, teal eyes and frosted over lashes. 

"Roman?" The woman said, her eyes narrowing at his uncharacteristic silence. She reached for his wrist. She pressed her fingernail into the veins as if to pinch him awake.

“It’s true," Roman replied finally, "the child that has been foretold of for all these centuries has finally arrived." 

A rush of murmuring came from the assembled "Saints".

“Then the count will live!” the first man shouted.

The crowd gathered continued to hum with happy words of life ever after for not only their leader, the Count Doshall, but for them as well. The clock on their possible demise slowly coming back to life. 

“We’ll see.” Roman said under a hushed voice as he quickly made his way through the corridors up another flight of stairs and into the private, smaller in size apartments of the  west wing where Sebastian and his family were kept. 

The whole brisk walk to see Sebastian the voice of Dominique echoed the name Evangeline in Roman's mind. It simply could not be possible. It could not be the same Evangeline. 

Roman opened a vestibule door that entered into the rooms with matching dark wallpaper of black dahlias and dark birds in flight. He crept about quietly to finally get a glance at Mrs. Lord. Roman turned to his left and saw Sebastian out on the newly opened balcony that had been shuttered. He stood out in the cool night air observing Goodwick’s harbor as small fishing boats set off to sea for an early morning catch. The Scottish night cooled his already icy skin. 

Roman then slithered into the back rooms and then he saw Evie through an open door as she attempted to get Gabriel to sleep on their second or third night locked away in the caste. 

Evie had lost count. 

As she turned around slowly, humming a lullaby, Roman saw a clear view of her fair face from his vantage point of the hall. The name was not a coincidence. 

This Evangeline was the same one in his memory. It was an ironic twist in his short life's history to see her again after so many years, since he was a small child of only 8 years old.

Roman quietly gasped to himself when he recognized her, it was her. The same sea blue eyes. same perfect bow-shaped lips, same small, tiny mole in the corner of her left eye --it was truly her: his maternal cousin Mrs. Evangeline Lord…. known to him all his life as simply Evie. There was no doubt.

**

Evie & Sebastian argue 

Back in the room, Evie finally was able to get Gabriel to sleep. But for her, sleep was no where to be found. The days she'd been trapped in the strange new place, even more strange that Tirymor, had all run together. She had no sense of time. The glass of windows was frosted over; sunlight could barely seep in through the opaque glass. So faint was the brightness she could never tell if it was dawn, midday, or dusk. Her whole mind felt a scramble, and she was becoming more and more agitated with Sebastian's lack of information and her inability to step out onto the balcony too. 

Sebastian reentered the apartment from the balcony as Evie entered. She snuck a peek of the night sky just as Sebastian closed the windowless balcony doors. A quick scene of glittery lights of the lanterns from the village touching the horizon and real sky gave Evie reassurance that wasn't dead. There was life out there, somewhere, wherever she was. 

She rushed to the balcony doors where Sebastian had just entered but was stopped by her former husband's steel-like arms. 

"You can't go out there alone." he ordered.

"I need air, Sebastian." She snarled.

He sighed "I'll go with you." 

She huffed and removed his arms forcibly from her body and together the former couple went back out onto the balcony. 

The night air touched Evie's warm skin, she closed her eyes and took in the fresh sea air, that seemed saltier than Welshport's. She did not recognize where she was. There was faint resemblance to somewhere she had been as a child, but she could not place it. The village itself did not have any defining landmarks that she could quickly note to help her know where Sebastian had taken her and their child, but the strong walls below and above and to the side of her were signs that the fortress they were in would not be easily escaped. 

She then reached for the wound on her neck and turned to Sebastian who smiled at her.

"Don't worry." He said. "I did not drink from you. You're safe. You’re not like me." 

Her brow furrowed "Then why did you bite me?" 

"I had to be sure you wouldn't protest coming. It was the only way to do it." 

“I think you’ve gone insane.” She said her eyes wide with shock at the extremes he had gone to. 

“Evie, …” he began before she cut him off. 

"Sebastian, stop. I don’t want to hear any lies so I’m going to stop you before you say anything else. Don’t you see what you've done? You've taken us against our will! This is not a place to raise a child. And even more so, where is this place? What is this place? Tell me!!" 

"Evie, listen to me," he said, grabbing her hands that had now cooled to the outside air. "There is no way you and I and our son could live together as a family in Welshport without persecution." He said.

"You and I were not living together, Sebastian. I had made that very clear that I wanted to focus on being a mother -- alone." She reminded.

He tolled his eyes as he rememebred. 

"Never the less, the persecution by the town, by my family, would be endess because of who Gabriel's father was. It would be an impossible life for him-- for you. Here, we can be together. Here we can live and be happy. There’s no judgement of me or what we are or our family here. This is what we’ve always wanted." 

She shook her head and yanked her hands out of his. "No, no…that’s not true! You don't understand. This is not how you do this. We are a family but a different kind of family. You cannot just take us because you want us for yourself. Welshport was a lot of things but it was our home, Gabriel's home. And you've taken us from our family and friends for your own selfish wish to have us for yourself."

"The Count will make it a better for us." He said.

"The Count? What are you talking about?" She asked.

"Count Alexandre Doshall and his daughter. Johnathon told me of them and their home. I learned of the Doshalls and what they've done for the world. This is a place for ...." he took a second to prepare for her reaction when she discovered what exactly Cyfrinach Castle was. "It's a place for people like me to live. Freely. Now we can all live here safely together."

Evie's head tilted to one as she processed what he had just said. People like me. 

"I...I can't believe what I've just heard." She replied. "Are you telling me this place is full of…vampires? We are in some kind of vampire compound? You brought YOUR CHILD to a vampire compound??? No we cannot stay here, I cannot allow this." She said, rushing back into the main rooms off the balcony and headed for Gabriel's little room.

Sebastian snapped his fingers and evaporated from the balcony and suddenly appeared in front of Evie blocking her path. She gasped and fell backwards onto the floor. She had never seen him use such powers before right in front of her. There was always an idea that he could do things like this, like how he appeared to her in jail almost invisibly but Evie had never witnessed it first hand. 

He approached her and reached out his hand to help her up. She scooted back, slowly on her backside, towards the balcony. She didn't want him to touch her, she didn't want him to even look in her eyes but he did. His intense stare was as cold as the Scottish wind blowing into the apartment and Evie noted the difference in him. This version of Sebastian reminded her of when he attacked Alice Winterborn and killed her at Lockwood Thicket 3 years ago. The darkness in him had returned like a solar eclipse blocking the soft light of a milky moon. 

"You don't have a choice." Sebastian said with a deep tone in his voice. "We will be a family again." 

"You certainly have thought of every way to remove my choice, haven't you. Everyone at home will know I would never just leave like this. And Matthew -- Matthew will find us, Sebastian, he will stop at nothing until he finds us." 

Sebastian's face dropped at the mention of Matthew, a name he hoped she'd soon forget or at least have the better sense not to speak. 

"You have never stopped loving him, have you?" He said with a darkness in his voice tainted with the paint of envy. "There is nothing I could do to win you fully back, is there?" 

"I told you just as I told him, my life right now, after those horrid unjust trials, is devoted to my son not a man to share my life with. I chose neither of you." Evie reminded him.

"Yet you will always love him, I can tell. But here, here you will see how we are meant to be together. In time. In time." Sebastian replied cryptically. 

"Matthew won't let you keep us against our will, Sebastian. He will know that you took us!" 

"Evie-- he will never find you. Do you understand? He will never find you. And if by the grace of whatever god he prays to, he DOES find you, there is no way, absolutely no way, he would ever survive entering the front gates. I want you to think about what I am saying I want to think about what you are hoping for. If he comes here he dies." Sebastian said, throat full of jealous anger. 

Evie stood up on her own from the floor. She clinched her fists and faced the man she once loved who had so desperately stolen them in the night away from their home, their family, the lives they had made and had suffered to finally be free and live on her own terms with no one ordering her around or telling her how she manage her life as the mother of a Lord heir. He had taken her power from her, the power of free will. She was angry and hurt and she wanted nothing more than to slap him across the face.

So she did it.

His cheek stung for a brief second. Sebastian sighed, he expected something like that to happen as Evie settled with the idea that they'd never see Welshport again. But then she lunged for Gabriel's room again. Sebastian grabbed her arm and yanked her back into his grasp. He locked her in his arms and tried to calm her as she squirmed to release herself. 

"No, no..." he said. 

"SEBASTIAN LET ME GO!" She shouted.

Sebastian refused and began to drag her to an adjoining room through a small hallway from the apartment Gabriel was in. This room was slightly larger, private and off to one corner of the tower they were in. 

Evie tried to stop him by anchoring her feet on furniture, knocking over a large plant that sat on a golden cradle, pulling down another table that had glass animals decorating it's top like a glass miniature circus -- then pushed her into the room.

Then he locked her in from the outside. 

"SEBASTIAN!!!!" Evie shouted in the dark room as she pounded on the door. "Let me out! LET ME OUT!!!" 

"You'll find table to your right with candles and matches. When I have The Count's approval for a gas lantern I'll bring it to you." He said to the door. "Evie, I love you. I truly do. But this is how its going to be from now on. You must accept it." He said.

Evie stumbled to the table and grabbed a match -- she struck it allowing the flame to spark and flicker on to give her a low glow. She scanned the dark room with it's lavish decorations and a small private bathroom towards the back. She grabbed a candle and lit it.

"Sebastian, let me out! Please! PLEASE! Let me out! Don't do this!" She shouted through the heavy door.

But Sebastian was got. He'd left her there alone, for now, as he went into his sleeping son's room and watched him sleep like a little cherub in his soft cushy bed. The distant candle shined on Gabriel's golden brown hair and his pink cheeks. Sebastian proudly watched his little chest lift up and down with breath.

The beauty of this little child felt surreal to him, his baby boy, now almost 3. He picked him up and took him to a different part of the castle, in a place where he would safe from Evie’s hope of escape.

Upstairs, further towards the east of the Castle, Dominique sat stoically, unveiled, now that she was alone with her father. Her eyes were closed; one hand gripped the arm of the love seat that was shaped like a lion's pay. Her mind drifted down into the corridors, passing ancient paintings and tapestries that lined the walls. She led herself deep into the belly of Cyfrinach and into the apartments given to the Lords where she saw Sebastian gazing at his beautiful boy. 

In her mind Dominque could see the child too, stunning to look at as he slept. She wanted a closer look.

She sent her energy from her father’s bedside to the new room where Sebastian was standing over to beautiful boy. She was invisible to the naked and she stood right behind Sebastian. She could smell Sebastian’s skin. It was like warm milk, laced with sugar. He was handsome, strong. She felt his powerful energy the second her transference entered the room. He would make a perfect fit for her. They’d be everything to the court. 

The child was exquisite. Perfect and could not wait to get her hands on him. 

He'd finally come -- the mixling her father's father and his father before him promised would save them from the curse that she hoped to avoid.

Sebastian turned feeling the coldness of her heart behind him. There was nothing there. Not a single soul. But Sebastian knew he was being watched. Some how. 

In candlelight, Evie slid down the door to the floor of her room crying silently as Roman spied her door from a shadowy corner wondering what he could do for his cousin to help her. His worry now gaining more strength than his devotion to the Doshalls.

**WELSHPORST VILLAGE,
WELSHPORT ISLAND, MAINE**

Matthew receives a visitor 

As Evie's tears and whimpers grew louder, a sudden burst of sun woke Matthew Winterborn in his bed.

Matthew felt an unease in his chest. He shivered and saw that all of the sheets had been pulled from his body exposing his naked torso to a cold room. A sickness in his stomach. He reached for a shirt that was thrown over the back of a chair and walked over to the window as the sun rose over the sea he loved so much and wondered what he'd find when he finally got to Scottland. 

He believed Charlotte's vision, he believed Evie was taken there. And he would stop at nothing to get to her. 

Then a sudden morning knock at the door. Matthew walked over barefoot and in his sleeping clothes and opened it to find Fatima Braga standing there with a basket of bread and fruit. 

"Bom dia." She said, greeting good morning in her native Portuguese.

"Bom dia." Matthew replied in perfect pronunciation after living in Portuguese island for months when he was lost at sea. "What can I do for you Senhora Braga?" He asked taking the basket and allowing her to step inside his home. 

She looked around, it was clearer than she realized, for a man living alone. She glanced down ats his bare feet. Clean. Strong. He stood on good ground she thought.

"I didn't realize I'd be waking you, Mateus." She said using his Portuguese name. "As a fisherman, I thought you'd be up with the seagulls welcoming the sun." 

"I've had a difficult time sleeping." he said. "What brings you?" He added glancing down at the basket.

"Fresh. I made it myself." She said of the bread. "I know that Charlotte has given you some information about Evangeline and her child Gabriel. I know that this information is important to you and I want to be sure you do nothing foolish with that information. Charlotte is young, she knows not what she sees." Fatima said.

Matthew's brow raised. He had not told anyone about the vision, his plan to leave for Scottland was kept secret and now he felt exposed. He stammered a reply but Fatima swatted his words away as if they were bees circling their honey dripping hive.

"You must keep a good distance from Charlotte's vision, she is but a novice, her powers are new and it would be a dangerous step for you to follow in what she has to say." Fatima replied.

As the two spoke, the woman Matthew saw the day before, a woman he knew well peeked her head out of the bedroom door down the hall in the apartment she had stayed the night in. Her long black hair spread over her shoulders like a shawl of thick black silk. 

She listened carefully to the elder Braga's advice but furrowed her brow at it, unsure Matthew would heed Fatima's possible sage advice. 

"Are you saying her vision of Evie and Gabriel being in Scottland is wrong?" He wondered.

Fatima's brow lifted "I didn't say that." 

Matthew was confused. If Charlotte didn't know what she saw, according to Fatima, how could it not be wrong. Fatima continued. 

"Her vision may be half seen."

"Half seen?" He asked.

"She sees what she sees, that is real, but the truth of what is in Scottland she has not seen. Neither have I, but I worry, Mateus, Sebastiao would not take Evangelina to a place so easily discoverable and if you appear there to save her from what he is, I can tell you there will be a death. Whose death, that is not for me to say, but it is inevitable." She warned.

"If you trying to convince me to leave Evie and Gabriel with Sebastian that is not going to happen Fatima. He's a killer... He killed my sister! He's killed others. I cannot just abandon them to his whim. Sebastian needs to be stopped, and I will finally stop him." Matthew said.

"Finality in the world of those like Sebastian is just a world, Mateus. They know nothing of finality, they only see infinity. It is a drug to them. It is a craving that they cannot reach and constantly chase. To go there is to put your own life in danger." 

"I won't leave her." He said.

Fatima sighed and repeated her worry "It's too dangerous." 

"Thank you for coming, and for your worry, but for now, my decision is final. I will get to Evie and give her a chance to tell me to my face she truly meant to go with Sebastian and to leave Welshport like her letter said, but as of now, I will not rest until she tells me herself; on Scottish land if need be." He replied.

Fatima took a breath, she knew better than to try and convince a man of the to steer his ship back a different direction when the wind was already in the sails. She nodded her head showing she understood and reached for a grape in his basket and ate it. 

"They're sweet to the naked eye." She said of the grapes. "But be careful of the rotted ones, sometimes you cannot see the decay until it's too late and you've already tasted the bitter juice." 

She patted his cheek with her hand and took her leave from his home leaving him there, barefoot and shirt opened to the wind with her basket of goods. 

As she walked out, the woman who came to see Matthew and was staying with him made her way to him in the living room. She has been listening to the conversation but Matthew had filled her in the night before when she first arrived. 

"We have to find a way for you to connect to where Evie is. We have to be safe Matthew. That woman's words worry me." She said, as Matthew had filled the mysterious woman on all the events of his life since she had gone away from Welshport all those years ago. She was up-to-speed, and was prepared to be there for Matthew, again, now that she had returned.

Matthew turned to her and shook his head.

"I know where you're going with this and I haven't done that in years. I don't even know if I can --- I --- Alice was the one would held our people's powers the most…she held them so dear to her heart it was almost second nature to her. I was too frightened. I couldn't. I--- had to let those instincts go." Matthew explained.

The woman, her face soft with cheeks so plump and peachy. Her eyes like his soft and brown, the same eyes. She smiled at him finding his worry boyish and cute, just as she remembered him. He was just as caring as she remembered too.

"Connecting to our people’s powers Matthew is the best way to be sure you know what you're getting into before you step off that ship in Scotland. They are yours to use, they are yours to build on and they have never left you." She said.

He took a second and a breath. She reached for him and he grabbed her hands leading her to the sofa across form him. 

They were linked. They were family. Seeing the familiar kind face staring back at him, a face he never thought he see again, memories can flooding back to his mind. Of their childhood. Of the games they’d play. Of their tribe and the magic and beauty within their world that the settlers of Welshport took away. He thought about the day she left — the they he thought she died like the rest of his tribe only leaving his late younger sister Alice and himself. 

"When you left, when we were kids, I thought they'd killed you. I thought they'd taken you from us and we'd never see you again. I never thought I'd see you again Hope." Matthew said, calling the woman by her first name.

His eldest long lost sister: Hope Winterborn. 

She smiled and held his hands, still, tightly in hers recalling the cold history of their tribe. "We were separated. The settlers of this island took our land, our homes. Our history. Over time and generations they made sure our world shrank so theirs could grow." Hope replied reminiscing. 

"How did you survive on your own at such a young age?" He asked her, remembering when Hope left their people while the village was becoming more and more gentrified with settlers, she was only 8 and he was only 4, their sister Alice was only 2. 

"I found kind people who helped me along the way. One woman, who I'm hoping to one day reconnect with, helped me find a family. They took me in but we moved away. It's taken me this long to finally come back here Matthew and now that I've come back I want to help you with everything and anything I can. For Alice's sake." Hope replied.

Matthew thought for a second. He wasn't sure he could connect to their people's ways, ways the meant going deep into his soul and sending it somewhere over the sea to discover where exactly where Evie was so that then he could take his physical being there to save her. 

This was an act of spectral vision quest. Matthew's people, Welshport's native people, had this power and many more that no one truly could define. 

"Taking part in the vision quest you will know if it is meant for your true hearted self to be with Evie. Your questions, Matthew will be answered." Hope added. 

Matthew swallowed hard at her words but knew his older sister Hope was right. He had to take part in the spiritual vision question. This would be the key to unlock Evie and Gabriel's location for him to then go and find her.  

"I'll do this." Matthew said, finally bending himself towards the powers of his people, powers he feared and fought so hard to contain within himself.

Hope smiled and wrapped her arms around her younger brother. 

"Today." She said. "We do it today." 

B8/Ch1: I HAVE SAVED YOU

Sebastian & Evie

In a darkened room in a secret place, a man rocked his 3-year-old baby boy to sleep in his arms. The old wood of the chair creaked like aching bones as a fire to his left burned and warmed his cold skin. The echoing of the wind on the large windowpane easily pierced through the room’s stone walls like banshees crying in the dark.  

The boy was wrapped in warm white wool blanket. He slept soundly unbothered by the coldness of his father's skin or the noise of ice cold wind. He was used to the harsh weather from where he came. 

In the glass of a mirror a reflectionless man held his child tightly — it was Sebastian Lord and his son Gabriel.  

Sebastian had succeeded in taking back his family, taking them back and taking them far, far away from Welshport, to another rocky shoreline place called Goodwick, in Scottland. 

***THREE MONTHS EARLIER***

The cold, dark cliffside overlooking the black sea of the Atlantic where waves bashed the equally as black rocks hundreds of feet below. A spinning chaotic beam of light from the Welshport Lighthouse illuminated the face of Johnathon DeViana, desperate from relief of his miserable existence contemplated meeting his maker at the bottom of that cliff -- only to be interrupted by his younger Uncle Sebastian Lord, frozen in his youth by vampirism, and convinced to keep himself alive.

In that conversation, Johnathon knew, his life was indeed valuable, at least to Sebastian who sincerely did not want Johnathon to take his own life, not for Jacqueline anyway. 

In the conversation that saved his life, Johnathon wondered, what would Sebastian do next?

"And you? What'll you do? You can't haunt this world forever as you are." Johnathon added.

Sebastian was confused. "I don't know. I'd like to get my family back." He said.

Johnathon grinned; a cruel icy wind blew over them both. "That's impossible." 

Sebastian didn't know how to answer his younger uncle, a man on the verge of madness. He could tell there was a still a streak of cruelty in him, but the next thing out of Johnathon's mouth was surprising. 

An idea, something he once read about but then a friend of his from his time in Philadelphia confirmed it was real. A place so strange and out there it could only be written in fiction; a novel by Braum Stoker even. 

"I've heard of a place, in Europe.” Johnathon revealed in a quiet voice to his nephew. “A place you can go and be there safely. I've never told a soul about it; in fact I wasn’t even sure it was real.” 

Sebastian moved closer, he narrowed his eyes as the wind blew colder and through his thick dark blond hair. 

Johnathon continued with tears in his eyes realizing the end of a very long tug of war with Sebastian was coming to an end.  “It's a place a friend of mine told me was real, he’s there now even. I'll write him for you. I’ll set you up and tell him about you. You can be safe there. Forever." Johnathon said.

***PRESENT DAY, SCOTLAND***

It had been done. 

Sebastian, now free of the chains of Welshport, sat in the rocking chair with his beloved Gabriel. Asleep. Innocent, like an angel in the dark. His father, looking down on him with the most glowing of expressions: pride, adoration, hope. Yes -- there was still hope in the shadowy place he'd taken his family. 

Across from the father and son, in a bed built for royalty overflowing with pillows and blankets and sheets as soft as clouds, was the sleeping Evie Jordan-Lord. She had been asleep for the last two nights since they boarded the ship set for some mysterious place; right after her abduction. 

Then, finally, she stirred. 

Sebastian carefully moved the baby over to a crib and laid him down with ease. His strong sculpted arms peeking through his crisp white shirt with the sleeves rolled up, reached down like giant cranes into the billowy crib where sleeping Gabriel would stay the night. 

Evie began to murmur incoherently as she began to wake. Then, her eyes opened, everything was blurry. The room seemed to be as dark as the coffin she once found herself in, buried alive. That memory, the claustrophobic sense chocking at her in the dark shocked her awake. She gasped for air and reached for her throat that oddly ached on the left side 

The flickering of the hearth was like a beacon for her scanning blurry eyes. Her heart beat felt slow, her mind a dizzying frenzy of panic not knowing where she was, where her child was and what had happened to her. 

"Evie?" Sebastian said softly. "Are you ok?" 

Hearing his voice, Evie leaned forward to get a better look. Her eyes suddenly fixed on the man she once loved but could not be with -- would not be with, not this way, not by kidnapping her and their child. To her horror he had done it.

"What --- what have you done?" She said in a low voice, her arms locking around her knees. "Where are we?" She then reached for her aching neck again; a bandage marked two tiny holes left by Sebastian's vampire grin. "Sebastian," Evie began again her voice filled with intensity and tears in her eyes as the memory of his fangs sinking into her flesh came back "What. Have. You. Done. TO ME!"

Sebastian's head tilted, realizing she was seeing everything that had happened as a negative thing. He had only wanted to be with this family free of the prying eyes of his family and the town that hunted him. 

He had taken Johnathon's advice, found the man Johnathon had known from his travels in Europe and found a place safe for creatures like Sebastian. His family was now on safe in this sanctuary where they could eventually live out the rest of their lives -- one way or another.

The answer to Evie's question was so simple. Sebastian moved over and sat on the edge of Evie's bed -- their bed-- and reached over and patted her cold foot as the wind continued to chill the air around the  in the locked stone bedroom with windows frosted over. Sebastian scooted over closer to her with their child in his arms. 

He smiled, a cold grin she did not find reassuring and even worse his expression chilled her more that the weather itself.

He said:
"I've saved you."  

****

Matthew with the Bragas: Filipe & Fatima

As the night carried on over the sea back to the village of Welshport an autumn day was welcomed with a bright butter yellow sun in the sky. The beech tress of Maine had already changed to their warm yellows and orange color of leaves. The crisp air cooled the summer away into memory. 

In the village, Matthew Winterborn sat in a small table with Filipe Braga in the home of Filipe's mother Fatima who had taken in her son and his family after the horrific events of the witch trial. Matthew was in a state of panic and needed advice.

Evie was gone. Matthew had overheard Sebatian tell her he wanted to take his family away. 

But the fact Matthew had seen Sebastian, or at least Sebastian's dark shadow, lurking into Churchill's home left Matthew in a horribly worried state, especially after reading Baxter's headline that Churchill was dead.

For his part, Filipe's mind could deduce all of the same conclusion Matthew had come up with, but he wanted no part in any of it. 

As Fatima brought over coffee for the two men to drink, Matthew laid out his case.

"All I want is to make sure Evie is ok, I know in my heart that she would never leave like this without saying goodbye to her family." Matthew noted.

"That's true, that doesn't seem like her at all, but there is the fact that so much has gone on that maybe she wanted to make a clean break too. Evie and Sebastian have had a long, long history of terrible events happen to them. There have always been forces mounting against them being together. Maybe they wanted to start fresh without anyone trying to convince them otherwise. Matthew, you yourself know how traumatizing the last few months have been. Doesn't it seem likely that they would have wanted it this way, on their own terms?" Filipe wondered.

Fatima lifted a brow -- not convinced of her son's words but said nothing. She turned to Charlotte who was watching over baby Caleb while Mary rested. The young heiress leaned up against the frame of the garden door that led back into the house. She felt the same as Fatima.

Matthew leaned in. His eyes intense with concern "No." He said with a calm voice. "It absolutely does not seem likely. She would never, ever not say goodbye to her brother and mother. She's taken Gabriel, how could she not allow him to say his goodbyes either?" 

"It's not Evangelina, no." Fatima whispered, as she went back into the house with Charlotte. 

"Listen Filipe, what I saw the night Churchill died wasn't normal. Sebastian had every reason to kill him, I don't care what that article says. Added to the fact of what I overheard him say at the beach house, it all makes sense, to me at least. He killed Churchill went to the beach house and stole his family away in the night. I know it in my heart, Filipe, I think she's in danger." 

"How would you even find her?" Filipe wondered.

Matthew sat back in his chair, there -- that was the part Matthew had the most trouble with. He had no idea where to start looking. They could be literally anywhere on earth far, far away from the rocky Maine coastline and the shores of Welshport Island. 

Filipe saw the anguish in Matthew's face, it was as if someone had taken his heart and squeezed all of the life out of it in front of his own eyes. 

"If Evie is in trouble," Filipe began before Matthew interrupted.

"She is. I will go to my grave saying that she is in trouble anytime Sebastian is involved." 

"Then she'll find a way to get a message to you." Filipe Continued. "She's very resourceful and a survivor, if she's in trouble she wont allow herself to say in trouble, not if she has Gabriel with her." Filipe added.

Matthew nodded, he knew it was true. He knew that Evie wouldn't just allow herself to be taken away by anyone, not even Sebastian. He took a breath, sipped some more coffee, and looked out over into the lush green of Fatima's gardens. The thick bushes of white hydrangeas had bloomed; their fresh scent wafted over to Matthew almost like a ghost slowly creeping around the garden table make it's presence known. 

"I just feel so alone now." Matthew said, his now blurry with tears gaze still locked on the hydrangeas. "I did everything I could to protect her, to protect Gabriel and it just suddenly is all gone. I have no one. My sister is gone. My whole family -- all my people. It's just me." 

"Matt, you have us, your friends. Lucas too. We're all here for you." Filipe said. 

Then an idea sprang into Matthew's mind. He turned his head from the flowers and blurted out: "MARY!"

Filipe looked confused. 

"Maybe Mary or Charlotte! Maybe they can do something to help me find them. They were able to find you when you were here recovering from the wolf. Couldn't they help me, even if it were just one time. If they could get me any information I could, I could find them! I could save them!" Matthew added.

Filipe shook his head. "No. Matthew, I can't let you ask them." His voice lowered as they were outdoors. "Not after everything they've survived during the trial. Mary could have been burned at the stake. If anyone, anyone at all, were to find out they were using their powers again or that they even had them to begin with after we've all denied and lied and covered for them, it could spell disaster. We've all, including you, have gone through too much to go back now into that world." 

"I'm begging you." Matthew said. "When Mary wakes from her nap, would you ask her opinion?" 

"You can't ask me to do that, Matt. I just can't. Mary would help you, I know she would. Charlotte too but their all I have, if they were to be discovered and something happen again taking them from me, I wouldn't know what to do. You understand, don't you?" 

Matthew did understand. He knew the dangerous world they lived in. He saw it first hand as he too was accused of being a witch, wrongfully at that. He felt selfish for even asking and nodded along with Filipe agreeing he wouldn't put Mary or worse, Charlotte, in that position. He finished it coffee and stood up from the table. Filipe too. They gave each other quick hug goodbye as Matthew decided to take himself to the docks and get things settled for a possible fishing trip.

Work. Work always soothed his searching mind. 

As he walked through the house and said goodbye to Fatima and little Caleb in her arms, he passed 14 year old Charlotte who was in the parlor reading. She set her book down on the sofa and carefully walked out behind Matthew without anyone seeing. She dashed across the front cobblestones of the front yard and yanked on Matthew's sleeve. 

Startled by her he turned quickly. His heart skipped at beat.

"I'm sorry, I just wanted to say something before you left." Charlotte said in a whisper as she looked around to see if they were being watched. 

"What is it?"

"Sebastian and I have a connection. We've always had one, being cousins, but there's more. As I've grown and my ---" she lowered her voice even more -- "powers have intensified, our lock has been unbreakable. Sometimes, I can almost see what he's thinking, but now always." She revealed.

"Do you know if he's taken Evie? And where?" Matthew asked.

"Sometimes he blocks me, he's gotten used to us being so connected that he's learned how to lock me out, but not always. Quickly, hold my hands." 

Matthew did as he was told.

She took hold of his hands, the calluses of a sailor scratching her soft palms. She looked around to be sure the coast was clear then closed her eyes. A breeze lifted her soft blond hair slightly into the air from around her face. Her eye lids shifted back and forth with her eye sliding underneath as if she were reading with her eyes closed. There was light and flashes of something -- the lighthouse! A ship in the dark. A ship with a name she could not read. Then intense waves, waves the reached the ship's deck that leaked into down, down into its body. Under all of the hidden things in the ship's hull three secret passengers: Sebastian, Evie and little Gabriel. 

"He's taken her." Charlotte whispered. "I see her asleep. He's awake. With little Gabriel. A ship has set off. East ... but I don't know where." 

"Can you see anything? Any clue as to where they might have gone?" Matthew questioned.

Charlotte searched the cargo hold where Sebastian was hiding his family. Crates and boxes and more crates. She saw writing on one of the crates that read ESCOCSIA. 

"Escosia? Scottland?" Charlotte said as her eyes opened. "I think he's taken her to Scottland." 

Matthew smiled, big and wide and scooped Charlotte up into a hug. She giggled as he set her down. He put both hands around her cheeks. 

"I will forever be grateful." 

She smiled and he dashed off down the street with the new lead on where Sebastian had taken Evie and Gabriel.

"Menina. You shouldn't have done that." Fatima said from the doorway, using the Portuguese word for girl. "Mateus will put himself in danger for Evangelina and now you may be responsible for that." 

Charlotte frowned "I love Sebastian, but I don't think taking his family away like that wasn't right. Evie deserves a say in her own life, don't you agree?

Fatima sighed agreeing with Charlotte but unwilling to give in for the sake of the argument. 

"I wanted to help her and Gabriel. Matthew is strong. He loves Evie. He respects her. I just want everyone to be where they want to be. Not where they are being forced to be." 

"You speak with wisdom beyond your 14 years, menina." Fatima noted. "I will give you that." 

"I know what it's like to be taken and held in a place against your will and the people you love kept from you all your life. My own father did it to me, it's not what I want for Evie or Gabriel, that's all." The young Lord heiress said.

Fatima crossed her arms and lifted a brow; in a way she was very happy to see Charlotte being so independent with her powers and thoughts. She was using them both for some good instead of squandering them on luxuries and parlor tricks, but she also saw the drawback of it. There would be a price to pay by intervening in fate. There always was. 

Fatima knew Charlotte may have sent Matthew to his demise. Sebastian would not free Evie without a bloody, deathly fight. 

****

Matthew receives visitors 

Later that after noon, walking down the cobblestone street of inner Welshport Village, a woman with long dark hair and dressed in thick shawl with intricate woven patterns on the back and tassels tied together in fine braids, walked towards Matthew Winterborn's apartment building. She knew this place, this town. She knew it's history, it's story.

It was her story too. It was a apart of her life for many years before she was swifty moved out for her own safety when she was just 8 years old. 

As she walked towards the front door of the building, she paused when she saw three people there before her. 

Aurora Ashby-Jordan, Nikolas Jordan and Lucas Mural had arrived before the woman to come and see Matthew at virtually the same time. They come to check on him after the realization Evie and Gabriel had left Sebastian. 

As the woman waited patiently outside for her turn, the group walked up the single flight of indoor stairs that lead up to the single apartment and knocked on his door. It was only a flash of minutes before Matthew opened to see his friends standing there with worried looks on their faces. Matthew smiled, touched that they'd be so concerned for him. He welcomed them and stood aside allowing them in.

"Have you eaten?" Aurora asked, always the concerned mother. "You shouldn't neglect taking care of yourself." 

Matthew smirked. "Thank you Mrs. Jordan, I have, yes...I'm ok." 

"We just worry for you." Lucas added. "Evie leaving with Sebastian was a shock to us all, I can't imagine how you're feeling." 

Matthew's jaw clenched at the idea that Evie would have chosen to leave with Sebastian after what she told them both, that she was not going to choose between them anymore, that she wanted to focus on Gabriel, raise him and then decide what she wanted to do in the romantic realm. 

"I admit, having her write a simple letter hurts." Nik added. "It's a bit rushed and unlike her, but considering the hell you've all been through with the trial, I can also see that they'd want to leave without much fanfare. 

Aurora sighed, the note bothered her too. "It wasn't something I expected from her either." She noted.

"So why do you believe it?" Matthew replied quickly. 

They all turned to him; Nik narrowed his eyes "You don't?" He said, but in the tone of Nik's voice, Matthew could tell that Nik perhaps didn't believe it either. 

"Evie wouldn't just choose to leave like this, you yourselves said it and I for one have no intent on ever believing that she thought being with Sebastian was the best thing for her and for Gabriel." Matthew replied. 

Aurora, Nik and Lucas looked at each other. Matthew was saying what they were thinking but they had no way of knowing the truth and in reality, they were too frightened to even imagine Sebastian kidnapping two people they loved. 

Aurora then looked over to a side table near the hallway and saw Matthew's seabag packed to it's rim with. 

"Is that what I think it is?" She said, everyone followed her eyes. "Are you leaving?"

Matthew took a breath to think. His journey to where ever Sebastian may be holding Evie was already too dangerous, he didn't want anyone to go with him, follow him or worse, talk him out of it.

"Yes. He replied. "I need time. I need time away to think." He lied.

Aurora narrowed her eyes, her motherly instinct was sure he wasn't telling the truth, and although she worried about Evie and Gabriel she wanted nothing more than for them to be safe. 

"Matthew, we care about you very much." Aurora said. "And I think you should go-- find what you need to find -- and return to us -- safe." She said with a slight hidden message in her words.

Nik was less obvious "Are you going after them?" He asked point blank. 

Matthew shook his head, again trying to keep them out of danger and trying to go with him.

"I'm not." he lied again. "She's made her choice, if we are to believe her letter and I have to live with that. It doesn't sit well with me, but what can I do? I don't know where she went, I don't know where I can find them, or who could tell me where they went. They've virtually vanished. It is what it is. My heart is broken, but I have to live with it now."

Aurora sighed, hoping Matthew's words would satisfy her son Nikolas.

"But what if she..." Lucas began before Aurora interrupted.

"We should let Matthew do what Matthew wants to do." She said. "We won't stop you from finding what you need to find, Matthew. When you come home you know you have us here for you. We love you." She said.

"But..." Lucas began. 

"Lucas, this is Matthew's choice. he's going to go where he needs to go to find himself." Aurora said. 

"Right." Nik replied, picking up what his mother was doing. "This is Matthew's choice." 

Lucas felt confused but could tell the Jordan's were speaking in a sort of code, perhaps a code only they understood. 

They each hugged Matthew goodbye and wished him a good voyage to wherever he needed to go. Lucas still confused continued on his way out of Matthew's apartment but before he left he turned back to his friend, a friend that he came to see as a brother, someone he got to know when Matthew had no memories of Welshport, of his life here -- of Evie. Matthew held such a special place in Lucas' heart -- he brought him to America, helped him find his way through the world which led him to so much happiness with Lear. This goodbye felt strangely final. 

"I'm going to miss you." Lucas said, as the Jordan's waiting just outside the door.

Matthew smiled, tears in his eyes "This isn't forever." He said to his friend.

Lucas smiled back, unsure if that was true in his heart "I hope to believe that soon. In Portuguese, we said saudade, its a feeling of longing, and a sense of sorrow of something we are missing. I will feel saudade when I think of you Matthew, my friend. I hope you come home soon." 

Matthew's lower lip quivered, he quickly rushed over and hugged Lucas goodbye one more time. Like the Jordans, Lucas had been family when Matthew had no family. And for now, they'd all just pretend to go along with Matthew's vague answer on his plans for the future. 

As the trio of Matthew's friends exited his apartment retracing their way down the staircase, the woman who watched outside waited enough time for them to vanish back into town before she herself went up to Matthew's apartment. 

She hesitated at the door. She took a breath. It had been years since they'd seen each other, yet she had no doubt he'd recognize her. 

She knocked. 

Matthew, fiddling with final things to put inside his bag to leave, thought perhaps his friends had returned, forgetting to say something or perhaps needed something else. 

Matthew opened the door. The light of the sun had seeped through the windows of the inside staircase and lit the stairwell causing a glow, to backlight the woman standing in front of Matthew as she were surrounded in a warm halo. 

"Is it you... is it really you????" He asked her. 

She smiled, so happy that he recognized her. 

"It is." She said. "It's really me." 

***SCOTLAND***

Cyfrinach Castle, Goodwick, Scotland 

As Evie did her best to figure out where Sebastian and taken her and their child, she felt the cold breath of something wash the back of her neck like an ice-cold ocean wave. Something was watching her in the room with Sebastian and their sleeping child. 

Eyes she could not find. Eyes she could not connect with.

This place was a world rife with spirits who lurked in every corner. Every shadow had a face that could not be seen. Every deathly howl of the wind was warning from behind the veil. 

Evie had never felt this power so strongly before. It was as if Welshport had become a living creature, hungry for something to devour and Sebastian offered them up on a silver platter allowing the beast to swallow them whole. 

What Evie was feeling wasn't her imagination. It was real. It was alive, but not the way she was alive.

Evie's eyes scanned the room searching for something to tell here where she was or a way out. 

But there was nothing. She was trapped. 

The eyes she felt on her slept now, in a bed far from the place she was held captive. The creature, old, centuries old, needed her to live. Needed her child to live. The Lords had come to this Scottish world of secrets and darkness thanks to the connection Johnathon DeViana had with one that dwelled within the same walls. 

An Ironic connection that even Evie could never have imagined.  

Here, was an empire built on something sinister that thrived and fed on the malevolence and weakness of the soul. A mystical man his beard long and gray cared for an ailing creature in a bed built for royalty. Swaddled and draped in red thick wools and the creature, born centuries before, lie there with labored breathing, his body skin and bone. 

The creature was bathed by the mystical man with the beard with a crimson liquid, thicker than water. The watched the creature in the bed absorb the liquid through it's paper-thin skin. This ritual was observed by a woman, veiled in black lace sitting on a red velvet loveseat giving her an appearance of a black blur only her pale white hands visible to the eye.

The creature she watched the mystical man bathe, was the shape of what was once a man; a ruler of those like it and ruled from its death bed awaiting some kind of miracle; a prophecy that was now closer to come true than he ever could have dreamed. The prophecy of a mixling child born of a mortal and a vampire -- was now sleeping only two floors away.

Cyfrinach Castle was a place where the living were the dead and the dead were the living A cross-section of where the veil between two worlds was as thin as air. It was a fortress where all could be lost if the one man they followed could vanquished without the precious lifeforce of the mixling. Gabriel.

Here, hope was tainted by a violence in the form of blood and not everyone would leave alive. 

Only daylight could save the lucky. 

B7/Ch18: EVERYONE'S GOT SECRETS

The Bragas gather 

In Fatima Braga's home in the village, a long-awaited reunion was finally happening. Mary Goode had returned home, free from the terrible ordeal that had plagued her and her friends Matthew and Evie. The loss of time while they were incarcerated and the devastating trial almost left her broken but the council of witches came to her aide and saved her life just as Sebastian saved Filipe's.

They were both finally free to live their lives with their children happily.

As the table in Fatima's kitchen began to fill with food from her native Portugal, Filipe held on to Mary as if she'd blow away by the wind. He wanted her close, so close that she could smell his skin. How she missed his scent, a warm tone like cinnamon and coffee.

"It is by the grace of God you're all free." Fatima said, placing two more plates down onto the table with Charlotte's help.

"I'll never understand how this sister of yours just suddenly appeared." Filipe said. "It's really a miracle."

Mary knew better, but had to keep up the lie that Verity was indeed a long lost twin.

"My mother was a secretive woman." Mary said. "She kept things even from me."

"But..." Charlotte began as the puzzle was fully forming in her mind "why would your sister take the blame for everything. We know what everyone saw. We know the truth." 

"Charlotte minha querida, it's best now to let things go the way they are. Especially with this. My advice is never go deeper into the sea if you don’t know what monsters lurk there." Fatima replied knowing that this surprise twin perhaps had a deeper story that maybe they shouldn't touch.

"I guess,” the young woman replied unsatisfied “I wish I had known her." Charlotte added.

"She saved us." Filipe said, sitting with Mary. "We should do something for her. Maybe have a place somewhere on Goode Island as a memorial. Next to Louise and Eliza's graves." He added mentioning the little baby Mary miscarried who'd been buried next Eliza Goode. 

"I think that's a good idea." Fatima said, pouring wine into the glasses. "Vamos-la, we should pray, say thanks for bringing our family back together." 

"Oh!" Mary said jumping up form the table hearing the baby in the other room wake up. "We forgot someone."

Seconds flashed by and Mary returned with her little son, Caleb, the boy who'd been born to Aurora and Caspian. The boy who’s birth parents were searching for him.

"We can't forget our little one." Filipe smiled taking his little boy into his arms.

Mary looked around the table. A family had formed. They'd survived so much and were finally together happy and safe. She wondered just how much more would happen and if they'd be happy this way forever. In Welshport, happiness and safety was never guaranteed, but for now, her little family was in the palm of her hand and this little lunch felt as if it were the best thing that had ever happened to her in a very long time. 

There was Fatima sitting in her chair making Charlotte's plate of potatoes and her favorite bacalhau recipe with greens that had been boiled on the side with carrots and Portuguese sausage. A plate Charlotte remarked was too much food for her.

Filipe chuckled, his mother-- the woman he'd always believed to be his aunt-- was always this way. She showed love with feeding someone. Mary watched, standing, as their interactions felt real and warm. The baby in his father's arms giggling and sipping on a bottle of milk. 

Then, in the glass of the window Mary saw a woman walking down the street. The woman was in gray. Cloaked or veiled -- all in gray. The family continued to giggle and laugh eat and drink, celebrate Mary's homecoming and the woman in Mary's eyeline walked closer and closer to the kitchen window until suddenly she was walking through the wall and standing only feet from the happy family.

No one reacted and it happened with such quick succession. Mary knew no one could see the woman.

Suddenly the veiled person, all in gray, began to remove her veil but before Mary could see who was under, the person turned to ash and fell into a heap onto the kitchen floor. 

Mary gasped in shock. The room fell silent, everyone looked up at her.

"What is it?" Filipe asked. "Are you ok?" 

Charlotte's eyes darted to where Mary was looking, she saw the mound of ash where the person once stood, then the young sorceress she saw the mound disappear before her eyes. Charlotte said nothing. She got up from her chair and walked over to her mother and grabbed her by the hand.

"It's alright."

Mary's eyes watered, she had no idea what she had just seen but she knew that it was some kind of premonition. Something was telling her about Verity, her twin sister created by the council that was now just ashes after being burned alive as a witch.

Or... was it Jacqueline. 

"It's alright." Charlotte repeated.

Mary felt safe again once Charlotte's voice and the baby's giggles cut through the shock of what she saw.

"Sit, let's eat." Filipe said happily.

Mary smiled and went back to her chair next to her husband. Charlotte's stomach was a knot. Mary's too.

Fatima, who had just witnessed the entire situation, said nothing either. But she knew too.

The woman of Ash was the first reminder things were not as they seemed. 

****

Lucas & Lear visit Matthew 

Back in his small apartment in the Village, Matthew Winterborn stared into a cold mug of beer and watched the islands of foam separate from the center to the edges of the inner glass. His mind felt as if it too was floating away and separating from himself. 

He was lonely and lost without Evie by his side and despite respecting her decision to end their romance so she could dedicate herself fully to her child, he was struggling accepting it.

As he sat there, in a fresh white A-shirt there was a knock at his door. Matthew didn't even move; he shouted for the visitor to enter the unlocked apartment. 

"Matthew?" A familiar voice said, "It's Lucas!" His friend said entering hand in hand with his equally as handsome young partner Lear Lockwood.

Matthew called to his old friend to come into the back room, there Lucas and Lear entered finding Matthew in a depressed state.

"Are you alright?" Lucas asked as the two good friends embraced. "We came by to check on you."

Lear looked around and could tell Matthew had been home a while. The apartment seemed disheveled and unkept, very unlike Matthew's personality. 

"Evie decided to end things." Matthew said in a low sad voice. "She thought that it was better for us to just be friends for now so that she can focus on Gabriel." 

"Oh." Lucas said his tone searching for words of comfort. "I'm — I’m so sorry. I know how much you love her, but after all you have been through together I am surprised." 

"She's going through a lot too." Lear reminded them. "Maybe it's for the best." 

"Of course. I — I can’t be selfish. It is for the best. For Gabriel’s best." Matthew replied. "But I can't help but think that maybe, I don't know, if I had done more to get us out of that whole situation in court we'd be together today. I didn't do enough. I just sat back and let things happened as they did." 

"Matthew what would have been able to do? This was an unprecedented situation two centuries in the making. No one knew where this would go." Lear replied. "I had no legal loophole to stand on and if this Verity person hadn't shown up I really think I would have lost this case. None of it is your fault, none of this could have been fixed by you." 

"Lear is right, the most important thing is that you stayed by her side and kept her safe as best you could. She didn't break up with you because you didn't do that, she just wants to focus on Gabriel. It's not really an end, I see it more as a pause." Lucas replied ever the optimist. 

Matthew's eyes twinkled at his best friend's attempt to cheer him up with some hope, but the truth is where it was, in Evie's words to end their relationship as it was. 

"Thank you for that vote of confidence, my friend, but I know where she and I stand. I can't pretend my heart isn't broken, but I'll get up from here and get better. Hopefully." Matthew replied.

Lear sighed "We were just in the neighborhood and thought we'd stop by. Perhaps we should let you have your day, huh? Some time alone?" Lear added.

Matthew nodded and the two visitors decided to let Matthew sulk in his heartbreak by himself. Sometimes people need to be alone with their feelings, they thought, and for now Matthew needed that.

"But just today!" Lucas joked. "I'll be back tomorrow to check on you, amigo." He added using the Portuguese word for friend. 

Matthew walked them out to the door and watched them go down the exterior stairs of his apartment. A seagull circled the building as if it were lost in the clouds above. Matthew looked up from his door at the top of the staircase and watched. He felt as lost as the pure white seagull, searching for some kind of beacon to bring him home. 

Once alone again, Matthew realized that evie was his beacon. Evie was his home and he didn’t need to be lost in the fog anymore. Even if Evie decided she didn't want to be with him now, he'd prove to her they were better together. Somehow, some way, he'd prove it. And Sebastian Lord had better watch himself. Matthew was determined to make sure Evie and Gabriel were kept safe from Sebastian's treacherous fangs, no matter how reformed he said he was.

**

Laurel runs into Lear & Lucas 

Outside, Lear and Lucas shook off the worry they had for Matthew and hoped that in the coming days he'd being to feel better about his relationship with Evie. Lucas knew his friend Matthew well, this, the young handsome Portuguese man believed was a small set back.

"Matthew will be back on to his old self soon. He's hurting now, but I think with time things will reset." Lucas told Lear.

"You think so? They've been through so much together, I can't imagine going through all of that and then not having you. " The handsome lawyer said squeezing Lucas's had as they bounded down the street. 

The notion that Lear felt so strongly for him sent tingles up Lucas' spine.

"Really?" Lucas asked.

Lear shrugged. "Yeah!"

As conversation of Matthew faded, Lucas and Lear walked along the street teasing each other, basking in their own happy glow of love. They'd met and began their tryst, and it all felt so right. It all happened at such a perfect time in both of their lives.

Lucas couldn't believe how lucky he was, Lear too. Lear had a succession of failed relationships that had started in and ended in ways that he'd rather not repeat, in this one with Lucas, he wanted to do all the right things from the start. 

They walked along the cobblestone street that snaked alongside a cliff that that overlooked the crashing waves of a deep blue sea. The wind blew though Lear's hair, Lucas pulled him close by the lapel of his coat. Their noses touched and for a brief moment the world stopped. No sounds of seagulls or crashing waves, just their beat of their pulses almost synchronizing and the warm touch of their skin touching. Hands together. Lips. Then a kiss. Soft and warm. A slip of a tongue that felt earth shaking. Lear held Lucas by his face with one hand almost as if to hold him there in the kiss forever.

A connection both needed from another person for so many years.

After this perfect moment, the world swirled again around them and like two schoolboys in their first crush the headed down happily towards Gramercy Cafe. There, they bumped into Dr. Peter Ward's wife Laurel with her granddaughter Samantha. The little girl was growing up fast, and her beauty was on full display, Laurel was a proud grandmother and had been raising the child since her son and daughter-in-law died in an accident when the 5-year-old was only a few months old. 

"Well she's really quite beautiful Mrs. Ward." Lear said squeezing the little girls pink cheeks.

"The spitting image of my daughter-in-law." Laurel replied. "Tell me, how are things are going? I'm afraid to trust anything I read in the papers now at days." She added hinting at all the courtroom drama she missed.

"Fine now!" Lear replied. "After Verity Spencer came forward and admitted she’d been posing as Mary at the coves, it ended the way it was supposed to." 

Laurel’s face twisted with confusion at how quick Lear accepted the outcome of the trial and wasn’t questioning any of as a good lawyer might.

"Thank god for that." Lucas added, quickly coming to his new partner’s agreement.

"Yes, thank god." Laurel replied with a hint of suspicion. "Though, don't you find it odd that Mary suddenly had a surprise twin sister? Of all the years I knew Eliza, she had never, ever told me that she had two daughters. It was always just Mary. And — Verity is dead now, I don’t find it at all a reason to celebrate." 

“Of course, Mrs. Ward, of course! Verity’s life ending is incredibly tragic but Mary was innocent of something Verity did. That’s all I meant.” Lear said attempting to clean up what he said.

“I still can’t believe Eliza never told me of this Verity person.” She said. 

Lucas felt a bit worried that there was obviously more to what happened on the last day of court than anyone really knew. "Maybe she didn't know." He said.

"Didn't know?" Laurel asked as a fresh breeze blew across her thick mane of red hair. "How couldn't she have known?" 

"I've learned in my short time here that people often don't know a lot about their families. Look at Coraline for example, she didn't know she was really Maggie Lockwood for her whole life. That was kept from her.”

Maggie lifted a brow and glanced at Lear who was expressionless, “Yes I remember the stories of Henry Lockwood.”

“It turns out someone helped her father sell her on the black market." Lucas innocelty revealed.

"Uhhh, Luc, maybe we shouldn't get into all that with Mrs. Ward." Lear interjected finally. 

"Oh, I was only..." Lucas began before Laurel interrupted.

"How do you know someone helped her father do this?" Laurel probed unrelentingly. 

"We have proof!" Lucas added, again to Lear's slight annoyance. 

"Lucas." 

"Oh, sorry." 

"Proof? How interesting. What kind of proof?" Laurel asked, her left brow lifting with wonder.

This time Lucas remained quiet, Lear sighed and filled her in.

"A name. We found a name deep in this forged adoption paperwork my Cora’s parents received that proves my father didn't act alone, that someone helped him broker the deal and Cora believes if we find this person than maybe more children who were illegally adopted will be discovered." 

Laurel gulped. "She wasn't the only one.”

"What's that?" Lear asked

"OH! I ... um I was, I was asking, She believes she wasn't the only child, then?" Laurel said, her words falling over themselves as they escaped her lips. 

"Right." Lucas replied. "We need to find this Ridgeway person who's on the papers." 

"I see, boys, good luck!" Laurel said, ending their conversation quickly. 

"Thanks,….” Lucas said as Laurel quickly rushed off. 

“um goodbye Mrs. Ward." Lear said, turning to Lucas "That was an abrupt about-face." 

Laurel quickly made her way down the street towards home when she passed a friendly florist who shouted over to her as she passed 

"AFTER NOON MRS. RIDGEWAY-WARD! Good to see you!!" 

Laurel's stomach sank. 

She was the Ridgeway in the papers.

She was the Ridgeway Cora, Lear and Lucas were looking for.

****

Aurora & Caspian

At The Welshport Inn, Aurora had spent the night with Caspian. Their connection a muddle of past secrets and history that still haunted them even in this very moment. But they had so much still to discover, mainly their missing child, a child being secretly raised by Mary and Filipe. 

Caspian stood in the bathroom staring at himself in the mirror. His headaches were coming and going like the waves on the shores. Sometimes they felt stronger than those waves, pushing up against his eyes with a powerful pressure that he could not describe.

Aurora stood in the main room of the hotel suite, folding the blanket she had used while sleeping on the small sofa. Her worry grew as Caspian, who fled from Tirymor House because of Rebecca's attempt to suppress the truth about Danielle from him, had been in the bathroom a great amount of time.

He splashed water on his face from a cooled porcelain basin with blue and white swirled paint of waves and a ship set at sea. He looked at himself in the mirror...his head ached. His eyes almost felt as if they were about the pop out of their sockets.

Aurora knocked on the door.

"WHAT!?!" he snapped.

"I…I was just checking on you." She stuttered through the door.

Caspian calmed himself realizing his bark was unwarranted. He opened the door to see the beautiful Aurora with the blanket she was folding now wrapped around her hands in a ball as her nerves took over. 

"I'm sorry. I just didn't sleep very well. These headaches are just torturing me." He replied.

"I wish Ward would finally know how to help you." She said.

"They'll go with time as I heal." He answered. "So, where do we start?" He added

"Start?" 

"To find our son." He smiled. 

"We have to go back to Asha. We have to see her and get answers to all of our questions. She's the only one who tell us what happened that night and finally tell us whom she placed our child with." 

But before Caspian could answer there was a knock on the hotel room door. 

Caspian worried it was Rebecca. Aurora too.

Caspian straightened out his vest prepared to fight his wife on what she had done, but when he opened the door, there was his daughter, Viktor's daughter, Danielle Holten.

Danielle stood there, her hands at her side standing tall stared in the eyes of her father. The man she believed dead for so long, the man who died and left her mother destitute and alone was now in front of her like a ghost. 

They stood there in silence. 

Aurora quickly came to the door to break the silence. 

"Nurse Holten, what are you doing here?" She asked.

"Mrs. Jordan, hello, I didn't expect to see you here, I... I came to see..." Danielle's eyes turned to her father, "my father."

Caspian stood there in the presence of a woman who had his nose. His dark eyes and dark hair. A connection in flesh and blood to his past.

"Please come in." He said.

"Was I interrupting?" Danielle said, noticing the unmade bed.

"It's not what you think." Aurora smirked. "Caspian and I, well, we've had a long night discussing something that has happened to the two of us. Its a very long story that in truth affects you too, now that we know you and Caspian are related." 

"Caspian." Danielle said. "I don't think I'll ever get use to that being your name." 

"It's all I've known." He replied.

"Viktor." Danielle said to him. "Your name is Viktor Holten, and you're my father."

Her eyes began to water. His too. He could see himself in her. All this time, almost 3 years now he'd been living a life of a man with no history. A man whose world had only begun after the awful demon left his body, freeing him of a terrible existence plagued by evil intentions to destroy and distort. The two Holtens had so much time to make up and Aurora felt as if she were just a fly on the wall as they reconnected. 

His past to his daughter's. Her past to her father's.

"Where do we begin?" She said.

"Anywhere." He said walking her over to the sofa where Aurora had slept.

"Before, though, if you excuse me, I just need to take a minute. Please." Caspian replied.

"Of course." Danielle answered.

Aurora's worry once again was plastered all over her face, she could see Capsian's headaches were back.

In the bathroom, once again with the door closed, Caspian stared intensely at his own reflection. His eyes darkened, his mouth fell, a sleek cruel grin stretched across his face. Something sinister was deep in his veins and he could only express it when the headaches came. 

As his fists balled on the bathroom counter, he could feel his headache breaking his mind in two. He could feel something in his telling him to do something that no ordinary person would think. The person in the reflection was not the person staring back. These were two different creatures.

One a man, Viktor Holten, the other a hungry violent monster that had become reborn with the blow to the head from the cave floors. The creature who called himself the Hunter, the creature named Caspian. 

The mind was split in one body.  

The devil and the man. 

****

Genevieve & Christopher in the Tirymor Drawing room  

Later that afternoon, Tirymor House seemed quiet by comparison to the last few weeks when several construction workers invaded the house to repair the damage done by the mob. The shredded carpets had been rethreaded, the broken golden frames around the giant family portraits that had been ripped form the walls had been rebound and brought back to their rectangular glory. 

Smashed vases were replaced. Potted plants replanted. Holes on the lawn refilled and the several doors rehinged. Someone had even taken a dagger or a sharp object and dragged it across Rebecca's lily white foyer walls marking them for what they hoped would be forever.

Rebecca, who had all the money in the world, had it quickly repainted and patched. It was as if nothing had even happened.

Tirymor remained standing and in almost mint condition. No one who saw what happened would have ever even known what the mob had done. 

As Rebecca wrote a quick note, she called Aaron Hamstead in. He was to deliver the note to Fatima Braga's house. In it, an update for Charlotte on her father's condition. 

"Are you alright ma'am?" Aaron asked, he sensed her uncharacteristic silence as a sign of her discontent. 

She rubbed the ink off her fingers and took a breath. Her marriage was in shambles. She had a plan to remedy that but had to wait for the lure to sink deeper into the ocean that she dunked it in for her fish to bite. And then, before she could answer, Jane entered with two guests.

"I apologize for the interruption," Jane said "but Ms. Genevieve Thorne and ... a guest are here ma'am."

Jane's white face told Rebecca Geneiveve had brought the back-form-the-dead David Lord, going under his new name Christopher.

"Ah. They're probably here to take young Morgan." Rebecca said. 

Genevieve and Chris walked in, Aaron gulped at the sight of the spitting images of David and Sabrina as they entered the room. Same faces. Different names. Aaron had not seen them together. It was eerie and strange to see his best friend and the dead ringer of his dead wife in front him again. Rebecca seemed unfazed.

"Aaron." Rebecca said, her voice like a snap of finger waking Aaron from a sleep. "Please fetch Morgan for us." 

"OH! Of course! Of course!" Aaron said rushing off with Jane.

In the corner of the halls, Jane begged to know what was going on, Aaron, who knew Chris was David pretended to know nothing. 

"Well, I see you're both doing well." Rebecca said, her heart feeling like a ship lost at sea without Caspian.

"We won't bother you Mrs. Casador, as soon as Morgan comes, we'll be off." Genevieve said, also feeling strange that Rebecca's reaction seemed so calm towards her after their physical altercation at the hospital.

Of course, the reason for Rebecca's calm demeanor was because she had so much on her mind. Her skirmish with Genevieve fell short of Rebecca’s attention. 

Rebecca had also already had conversation with Chris and accepted his turn away from his life as David. For now at least— she held strong to her hope that David would some day snap out of alias and come home. 

While they waited for Morgan, Chris said nothing. 

"It's no bother." Rebecca said, standing from her bureau, noting Chris’ awkward silence. "I completely understand how much a mother wants to be close to her child, her son. It's such a powerful connection and I for one would never ever keep a mother from that. Don't you agree Mr. Wesley?" 

It was obvious what Rebecca was trying to do, but Chris stayed true to himself.

"I wouldn't say that is the case for all mothers and sons." Chris said. "I'd say that for those who've had good relationships your view makes sense, but not everyone has had the same relationship with their parents as, perhaps, you have Mrs. Casador." he added as Rebecca lifted a brow.

"Mother." Morgan said, entering the room.

"Darling!" Genevieve shouted rushing over kissing both his cheeks. "Are you ready, you're coming with us. We've found a place in the village where we can all be together. A place where I will never ever leave you again."

Morgan nodded, sadly. 

"What is it?" Chris asked.

Morgan looked at Rebecca, her jaw set, her frame like stone statue with a glittering black gown.

"I'm going to miss her." He said.

Rebecca narrowed her eyes confused thinking Morgan was talking about her.

"Uh...Who darling?" Geneieve asked, knowing surely he didn't mean the cold dowager Lord matriarch.

"Charlotte."

The room felt as if the walls themselves exhaled in relief, finally understanding where the young man was going with this words. "I don't really know if I want to leave." 

"You'll be able to see Charlotte anytime you want. The house we've found is very close to Fatima Braga's and you can see her whenever you'd like." Chris said.

"That's not her permanent place of residence, is it?!" Rebecca shouted. 

"For the time being, yes." Genevieve replied.

Rebecca groaned "For god's sake, I thought it was temporary. I used to think that cottage on Goode Island was the worst place she could be raised now she's in a fortune teller's house." 

"She's happy with them there. They really treat her kindly." Morgan said.

"That will change once Jacob returns, Morgan, and you're more than welcome to visit any time you'd like." Rebecca said.

"Mrs. Casador?" a voice came from the door. "I'll be off to the village now to deliver your letter."

Everyone turned, it was Aaron who smiled at his best friend Christopher, the man he knew as David.

"Very we--" Rebecca said before Morgan interrupted.

"CAN I GO WITH YOU? Can I mother? I'll only got a bit and say hello then I'll come home to yours." He said.

"Morgan, I really would preferer you to come home with me straight away." Genevieve said.

"Oh, please! I promise, I won't be long, right Aaron?" The boy said.

"Not long, no." Aaron replied.

Genevieve couldn't resist her son. She allowed him to go after all she'd done to him leaving him in Welshport all along while she went to London in the hands of Johnathon who completely ignored rearing him while she was gone. She couldn't back away from giving him what he wanted. Aaron and Morgan rushed off together and Genevieve and Chris were to take their leave but not before Rebecca pulled Chris back by his sleeve.

"Morgan isn't the only one who is welcome to visit here any time he'd like...Mr. Wesley." She said.

Chris smiled and nodded. 

Rebecca wanted more than just her husband back at home, she wanted all of her children too. Starting with Christopher. But there was still so much to process before he could ever fully return to the gilded castle he once called home. 

****

At Welshport Hope Hospital, Celeste and 5-year-old Fabian walked hand in hand in the large lobby. The littlest Lord heir stared up at the large vaulted ceilings that dangled with the glitter of French chandeliers and reflected the sun light swooping in from skylights across from them. His eyes sparkled with the wonder of this place of healing and recovery but it also held a haunting reminder that his father, Jacob, was there recovering from a heart attack after seeing what he believed was his dead brother in front of the courthouse. 

"Remember what I told you. When we see daddy, be careful not to squeeze too tight. He's still recovering." Celeste warned her little boy. 

Little Fabian nodded signaling he understood, just as Dr. Nik Jordan encountered them.

"Well, hello you two. How's Jacob doing?" Dr. Jordan asked.

"He's getting better, isn't he Fabie?" Celeste said as the little boy shyly hid behind his mother's large maroon skirt. "He's still trying to piece it all together." Celeste added.

Nik knelt down so that he and the boy were eye to eye.

"You know, when I was your age, my mother got very, very sick too." He said.

"What happened?" Fabian asked meekly. 

"She caught a sickness that kept her in bed for a very long time. We were all very scared for her just like you are now." 

Celeste never knew this of Nik's mother Aurora. 

"Where is your mommy? Is she in heaven?" Fabian asked revealing his worst fear for Jacob.

"Not at all. She's very happy and very healthy. Sometimes healing takes a while. That's why we call people in the hospital patients, because they have to have patience." Nik joked.

Celeste giggled, Fabian's nose crinkled up, his little ears hearing two different words. 

"Get it?" Nik asked.

"Yet another thing we'll have to piece together: Dr. Jordan's very silly jokes." Celeste smiled. "See you Nik." 

"Bye now." 

As Celeste went off to with the adorable boy, Nik went into Asha's room where Asha was sleeping.

He went over and checked her vitals. All good. He worked on her sheet when suddenly she stirred. 

Asha had been awake from her coma for days but pretending to not have memory of the events that got her in the hospital and more importantly the events that got her kidnapped by Gregory in the first place. Her motive was to keep Nik as close as possible after finding him kissing Danielle Holten. 

"Hi." She said softly.

"Oh, I hope I didn't wake you." He said.

"Not, at all. Did you find out when I can go home?" She asked. 

"Yes, we have discharge papers for you ready to go, I just need Dr. Ward to sign off on them." Nik said. 

"Thank goodness, I've been really excited for us to get back to where we were." She said.

Nik felt a twinge of discomfort, Asha sensed it too. In the time Asha had been in a coma he had fallen out of love with her, not because of meeting Danielle but because of what he discovered she and Gregory had done. The encounter with Danielle was just a new beginning for him, but until Asha could remember what happened to the child she and Gregory took away from his mother, Nik could not tell Asha it was over between them. 

And she knew this. 

"I'd like for you to definitely get back to where you were, that's where we should start. I'm hoping you took some time to think about the psychotherapy I mentioned with the new psychiatrist coming in. She's world renowned and could really unlock the memories that your accident is holding back." he said.

"What is it that you think I'm holding back exactly -- I mean that my accident caused me to hold back." Asha replied, correcting her mistake of words. 

"I think maybe it's better for you to discover what happened on your own so that your mind isn't influenced by anything from the outside. It's important you tell us everything you know from your own recollection." 

Asha's heart felt as if it were beating out of her chest. They all knew. She knew it would come out and in fact she wanted it to come out before the fire and Gregory's kidnapping of her but the addition of Danielle into Nik's heart meant she would confess to her crime and lose everything. It was not what she wanted now that she had this second lease on life and surviving such a horrible accident. 

"I was almost killed in a fire, a devastating fire, you were there." Asha said. "I just want to go home and rest and not think of hospitals or doctors or anything of that nature.' 

"Asha, I'm a doctor. So are you. We both know you can run from any ailments, we cannot let you go if your body is unready." 

"You know what I mean." She said. "I need rest from this place, this town. I’ve decided something.” She announced

“Decided? What do you mean?” Nik asked confused.

“I’ve decided I want to go away for a while, and I'm hoping you'll come with me Nikolas."

"You want to leave?" 

Asha nodded. 

"How can we do that, we have so much to take care of here. And what about what happened with Gregory? We really should dive into that. And I can't leave Da..." Nik said almost revealing his new love's name. 

"You can't leave what?" Asha asked, knowing what it was but wanting to hear it from him. Would he be brave enough to say her name?

"I can't leave Dr. Ward." Nik said, lying. "he'll be only one of a few doctor's here and I can't do that to him. So short staffed and all." 

"Nik he'll figure it out. He always does.” Asha replied. "Please, please let's go away, far away this place with so much treachery and danger. I promise where ever we go I'll do what I can to get my memory back. But I can't do that here. It's too hard. There's just too much going on here to really focus." Asha said.

Nik wanted her to tell the truth. He wanted her to find it in the deepest part of her mind and for some reason he believed she wanted it too. He was trusting of her, this new Asha who had just woken up from her coma, who told him she had no memories of what had happened was clean slate, so he thought, and if he did leave with her for a little while, perhaps she'd finally get the truth back and tell them everything. 

It was a sacrifice, to leave his new budding relationship with Danielle to get Asha to remember, and so Nik agreed.

"We'll go. But only for a while." Nik said.

Asha squealed with glee. She reached up to him and held him in her arms, she could feel his body loose, no tension, no affection. It hurt her, but at least she'd now have a chance to win him back wherever they'd go. 

The deadly nightshade that so inspired her the day before in the hospital garden would now be her last resort, but still a last resort. She her plan to take Nik away from Danielle fail — the deadly nightshade would do it for her. 

****

That night at, still at the hospital, Aaron stood guard at Jacob's room. He'd been there all day and all night and stayed allowing the family to go back home and rest.

Soon, he wasn't alone.

Another informant that had recently joined Jacob’s secret network of spies had been keeping tabs on Sebastian walked down the hall of the hospital in a clip clop sound of heels.

Aaron smiled as the person’s face become seen in the shadowy light of the hall. 

"You're here late." Aaron said. "What brings you?"

The informant smiled and kissed Aaron on the lips. The informant and spy was Aaron's girlfriend: 

Coraline Tyler. 

"I'd had a really busy day with some other things. Wanted to check on Jacob. Is he ok?" She asked. 

All her time working at Tirymor with Gabriel had given Aaron and Cora time to get to know each other and they'd realized they had a lot in common. Jacob saw this too, when he caught them kissing one night in the gardens. It dawned on Jacob, Cora was a perfect person to do his secret work. She'd already owed him for slipping sensitive information about the family to Baxter, she could certainly do it for him. After all Cora was family too-- she was Maggie Lockwood, and it helped that Jacob paid better. 

"He's getting there. But it's still touch and go. Dr. Ward is great, I think Jacob will make it. He has nine lives." Aaron said.

Cora lifted a brow, "I think he's on his sixth." She joked.

And with that, the clock in the hall chimed one in the morning. Cora would leave Aaron at his post and dash off into the night, keeping herself stealth. 

No one could know her double life. 

****

Elsewhere that night, way after the sun went down over the hills of mainland Maine, Evie stood on her veranda bathed in the dim glow of the moon. She wrapped herself in a warm blanket and stared out onto the sea as waves crashed on the nearby beach. Off in the distance, in the dark, she heard the familia sound of whales breaching the surface of the sea pushing out the bursts of air and taking in more. 

It was a calming sound to her, something she had heard for the first few nights at Bellmore Beach. 

Gabriel was asleep. Aurora was in the village, Nik was at work, Matthew was at his own home. 

Sebastian -- somewhere in the shadows. 

She was alone thinking about the two men she loved. One an honest hard-working man who adored her and her child, the other said child's father, her former husband, a man whose life was turned upside down for no fault of his own. 

She recalled how Sebastian promised he'd changed, he'd found a way to control his cravings and how Matthew, a truehearted soul, was skeptical of him still. 

Within that sound of the whales and sea memories started to creep in. She thought about the day she arrived in Welshport. Her excitement. Her hopes. Her dreams. The dangers and tragedies she had faced and how she survived. She wanted to change this dynamic. She wanted to go back to the woman she was before she came to this island, so self-assured, poised to take control of her life before the marriage. Independant from any man, even though her heart still loved two at the same time. 

The night was coming, no more sun. A chill ran up her spine. 

**

Matthew walked along the Gaslamp lit streets of town. It was early yet, hid body wanted sleep but his mind kept him awake. So much to think about. So much to hope for in the future and it all involved the woman he loved so much. 

Evie. 

As he walked, he saw a man in silhouette dashing between shadows of buildings rushing down the cobblestone streets. Matthew narrowed his eyes and was certain it was Sebastian floating along going somewhere in a hurry.

Matthew followed. 

As Matthew went down a dark alley way through the town following the obscured by light Sebastian, a man was cleaning the area around the town square where Verity was tied to the pyre. The villagers had come by and left flowers for the woman, the guilt of all their consciences finally; the understanding of what they did in accusing the three innocent people of such archaic crimes felt ugly, even if this Verity woman admitted to it. 

The town had asked for the area to be cleaned after the mourning and in the middle of the night as to keep prying eyes from seeing any more of the charred body. 

The man, a town worker, carried the burned body of Verity Spencer, the twin of Mary created by the witch council for Jacqueline Gray to shapeshift into, in a crate over to a large work shed where later it would be buried in a small grave in Saint Thomas' cemetery in the morning. 

Once the door closed, and the light of the street Gaslamps peeked in from the open slits of the shed's slats the burned body stood up in the open crate. 

The charred skin, burned hair, ash of bones began to crumble away like sand from an Egyptian artifact. There, standing straight up was the pristine perfect body of Verity Spencer, the spitting image of her twin Mary Goode. 

She was alive.
As she stepped out of the crate on to the hard ground of the shed she turned back and looked inside her once wooden coffin: inside just a mound of ash in the shape of what was once there.

Verity smiled and dusted herself off -- then snuck out of the shed into the night. 

At the very same moment, Jacqueline Gray awoke screaming inside the now abandoned Goode Family cottage on the small island of the same name. Her mind flashing of flames and the pain of being burned alive, her mouth tasted of soot and fire. And yet not a scratch on her. Not a single burn or flame scorched her body. 

She had survived the burning just as the Council had promised but so had Verity. 

Now they were two, and Jacqueline sensed it. 

"What have they done?" She whispered to herself of the council. "What is to come?"

**

Matthew follows the shadowy figure 

Matthew followed the shadow. 

The dim lights darted in between buildings and alleyways and gates and fences.

Dogs barked at the two people slithering about the night. 

Then, Matthew stopped dead in his tracks when the person he was following snuck into the darkened garden of the house where Timothy Churchill lived. 

Matthew watched; his eyes intently focused on the person he thought was Sebastian literally walk through the wall.

Inside, the person the darkness walked through the halls of the Mayor's mansion floating off the ground. A heaviness entered the home, something hot and cold at the same time. Flowers wilted as the person passed them, pictures on the wall rattled in their frames. 

The door of Churchill's bedroom pushed open slowly revealing the man asleep in his bed, turned to one side. The person draped in the darkness of night reached down with a ghost like hand and grabbed Churchill by the throat. 

Choking him. 

The man's eyes flipped open, he gasped for air. He could felt the strong hands around his throat. His eyes were blurry with water. He could not see the person choking him. The hands grew tighter around his throat, his feet felt numb. His eyes bugged out from his head and then. 

Death.

Churchill was no more. The last of his legacy. 

Outside, the neighborhood empty. Matthew was gone, too scared to encounter the person he thought was Sebastian exiting Churchill's home and vanishing into thin air. 

Matthew was now back in his own living room pacing back and forth panicking wondering what he should do next. He had assumed Sebastian was lurking around people's homes in the shadows. Matthew couldn't decypher if that is what he saw just now outside Churchill's house. 

It had to. But did he now have proof?

Evie had to be warmed; she had to be warned that Sebastian as still shadowy creature he promised her he left behind.

**

Evie is not alone 

Back on her veranda at Bellmore Beach the night air of the ocean became too cold for her to handle. She reached over for the candle she lit on a small table next to the two white deck chairs and walked over to the screen door and blew it out.

When she looked up, Sebastian was standing at the screen door with Gabriel in his arms. 

She screamed! Startled by her son's father's sudden appearance out of thin air.

"Sebastian what are you doing here?" She asked. 

He smiled, a kind glow on his face, and looked down at his beautiful sleeping son.

"I'm taking back my family." 

Evie tilted her head and furrowed her brow, unsure of what he was talking about and then, the man she loved once upon a time opened his mouth revealing his fangs, 

“Sebastian? …NO!” Evie exclaimed with her arm covering her mouth as she slowly backed away from him terrified. 

As Sebastian approached, he snatched at the arm she held up and yanked her close. Her head bent back and his fanged mouth went down towards the soft flesh of her neck and then, in a flash, Evie's mind went blank.

Only darkness -- no sound.

Only a half an hour later, the panic-stricken Matthew arrived by Taxi at Bellmore Beach to tell Evie what he had seen at Churchill's home, to warn her, to protect her. He saw all the first-floor lights on in Evie's home. He burst in, hoping to find her to tell her he saw Sebastian still doing what he promised he wouldn't do.

But Evie was not there.

Gabriel was not there.

They were gone. The house was void of any life. Just pictures, a burning hearth, a cold cup of tea and a melted candle on the doorstep of the screen door that led to the veranda. The wax from the wick hadn't even had time to harden. One of the picture frames empty and tossed to the side of the white sofa.

Matthew recalled it being one of Evie and Gabriel that he took himself sitting on the beach. 

"They're gone." Matthew whispered to himself. 

Sebastian had taken his family back just as he said -- to parts unknown.