 |
| Rebecca & the baby on the iron lighthouse walk |
The storm had passed.
Caspian's control over Tirymor had ended.
But the damage was done.
As the spinning bulb in the lighthouse tore through the night fog in a thick beam of light the radio in the tower kept going off from the ship that had passed close to shore and saw Rebecca on the landing with the baby in her arms.
Rebecca held Evie and Sebastian's child in the cold night air. She looked out into the sea and saw the sprinkling of stars in the sky. They sparkled like little diamonds. It was beautiful to her. She signed and a puff of white breath came from her drying lips. The baby cooed in her warm arms only hours old.
Rebecca was completely oblivious to the gathering crowd of villagers down at the bottom of the lighthouse begging her to go back in.
"This is insanity! WHAT IS SHE DOING!?" One bundled up woman yelled.
"She doesn't seem sane. She's vacant. Look, she won't even look down at us when we're screaming at her." A man said.
Then, as the fog thickened, the Inn manager's car pulled into the area of the lighthouse. Sebastian in tow. Sebastian did the best he could to stay away from people, so he wasn't recognized, he stayed back as the Inn Manager joined the crowed. Some asked what they should do, another said he'd return to the village to get Constable Reigns.
Sebastian hid behind and went back towards the lighthouse slinking into the damp fog.
"MRS. LORD!!! IT'S TOO DANGEROUS UP THERE! COME DOWN!!!" The Inn Manager yelled.
"COME DOWN!" A person joined in. Followed by another, and another.
On the landing of the lighthouse as the bulb spun around and around behind her, Rebecca's mind was gone. She was only a fraction of herself. Once Caspian was defeated, something snapped in her worse than before. She stood there, the baby now crying for his mother, and Rebecca seemed to not even notice.
"Vivi. I want my Vivi." She whispered to herself.
The cold air still freezing her warm breath as she spoke.
"Vivi." She whispered. again.
She was standing there praying that once she did what she had promised evil Caspian she would do for hi, sacrifice the new baby or her own baby's return to life, that Vivi, her daughter, would appear.
Vivi was gone; Rebecca's mind was gone too.
Slowly and carefully, Sebastian made his way up the narrow spiral staircase that went up the long neck of the light house. The cold wet air made the each of the three rectangle windows of the tower fill with condensation. Little drips formed on the glass and faded down the glass as if each of the windows were shedding a tear.
Sebastian too felt like shedding tears. His baby, his own flesh and blood was only feet from him now in the arms of his grandmother who had lost her mind and was preparing to do the unthinkable. Sebastian slowly, and silently took step by step up to the top of the tower where the bulb brightly flashed on him and spun around and around.
Rebecca, shivering now, on the landing cuddled the baby ignoring the distant voices at the bottom screaming for her to come back down.
"Grandmother. Stop." Sebastian said calmly.
Rebecca turned around with a snap. Her red and gray hair tore out of a thick braid she tired up earlier in the night. The loosened curls swept across her face as she turned. Seeing her beloved Grandson Sebastian melted her stone heart slightly. She looked down at the baby who resembled him at that age and smiled even bigger.
"You're here. You're really here." Rebecca said softly.
"Come inside, please." Sebastian asked again calmly.
"Darling, this is your son." Rebecca said ignoring him. "He was born tonight."
"Grandmother, bring the baby in, please. Please come inside." Sebastian asked again slowly walking towards Rebecca.
As he inched closer, Rebecca inched backwards. "Sebastian, you have to stay back." She suddenly growled. "I have to make sure the child goes to the angels. I have to, darling. Its the only way." Rebecca added.
Sebastian, now on the landing bracing himself tilted his head "Why? Why would you want to hurt my baby? You should want to keep him safe from all harm, just like you did for me for my whole life." He said.
"Did I? Did I protect you? Look what happened to you! You became something that no human can ever come back from; to the point I asked you to stay away. Is that what you call a good grandmother?" Rebecca said, reminding Sebastian she was the one who asked him to pretend to be dead after surviving the fire at Lockwood Thicket set by Alice.
"That's what I mean, I've become something else, and you've asked me to stay away from the family to protect not only me but them. You know more than anyone that our two worlds cannot coexist. That is you being the strong protective woman you are." Sebastian noted. "But doing this, whatever this is, isn't the grandmother I know. Please, Grandmother, hand me my child." He added.
"I didn't save you. I didn't save Vivi, and I didn't save your father, my son David; God knows how my mistakes in life affected how Jacob turned out. But doing this, giving this baby back to the angels will fix all of that. It will, darling! IT WILL!" Rebecca said.
The baby began to cry with Rebecca's voice getting louder and the cold air hitting it's innocent little face. She was spiraling and preparing to toss the baby off of the landing of the lighthouse and into the sea below.
"Grandmother, STOP THIS! Please! You know this is wrong. Whatever you think you did is not reality. You didn't do anything to Vivi to make her die, you didn't do anything to my father do make him jump from this very lighthouse and there was nothing you could have done to have saved me. Do you understand? The things that happened to all of us would have happened to us regardless. It was destiny, grandmother, it was our fate. You have to believe me." Sebatian explained.
Rebecca seemed confused. His words were clear and truthful, but they didn't mesh with the warped mind games that Caspian had caused her brain to believe. She wanted to Sebastian the baby, but something was holding her from doing so, it was her own damaged mind holding her back.
"No, no...it's all been my fault! Caspian told me he'd bring back Vivi if I helped him and this is what he wanted, this is what he wanted!!!" Rebecca shouted. "I'm sorry Sebastian, I have to do this!" Rebecca said as she swaddled the baby in the blanked tightly and made a long handle at the top then she held the baby dangling over the landing of the lighthouse.
"GRANDMOTHER NO!!!" Sebastian screamed.
Screams came from the bottom at the horror of the baby dangling in the blanket.
Sebastian lunged at Rebecca and grabbed her arm that held the baby in the blanket. A car at the bottom of lighthouse pulled in, it was a man who drove off from lighthouse to find Constable Reigns; returning with Reigns and Jacob Lord. Both men freshly shaken up from the horrors of Caspian's exorcism.
"Good lord!" Jacob said seeing his mother.
"Who's up there? Who's with him?" Reigns asked.
Jacob couldn't believe his eyes. As the lighthouse's beam of light spun around it illuminated Sebastian's face.
"Who is it?" Reigns asked as he began to motion towards the door to the Lighthouse staircase to go up.
"No,” Jacob said stopping Reigns. “let me, I have to do this." Realizing who’s face he saw in the light.
Rebecca and Sebastian struggled over the baby while he screamed in his blanket as it swung back and forth in the air hanging.
Rebecca released the tightly wound blanket from around her fist, and as Jacob reached the tower door that lead to the landing, Sebastian was able to snatch the baby and blanket into his own arms and fell backwards onto the floor of the landing.
Rebecca screamed in anger at Sebatian succeeding in saving the baby and she lunged at him, Jacob then too lunged at her and held her back from Sebatian.
"HOW DARE YOU! HOW DARE YOU!!" She screamed seeing her dream of Vivi's return shattered before her.
Sebatian and the baby huddled on the ground in the shadow of the banister of the landing. The baby screamed in the night and Sebastian tried to comfort him while Reigns too finally reached the landing with another police officer but stayed near the top of the stairs.
"Mother, you need to go with Gregory." Jacob said.
"No, No! NO!!! This isn't what was supposed to happen. I was supposed to get Vivi back, Jacob, your baby sister. I was supposed to get her back." Rebecca said.
"Mother, please, go with Gregory. We'll get you what you need to do. Please." Jacob repeated his heart breaking in to a million pieces at his mother's mental break down.
Rebecca, shaking in the cold and in her derangement was scooped up by Reigns and the police officer, Sebastian slid himself up against the wall of the landing hiding himself further into the shadow so Reigns wouldn't see him.
Reigns and the police officer took Rebecca, screaming and crying, back down the winding staircase of the tower leaving Jacob still stunned at everything he had just seen, including that of his supposed dead nephew Sebatian. The vampire.
Sebastian stood up with his baby in his arms now alone with Jacob.
"How are you standing here in from of me? How are you here Sebastian?" Jacob asked as the lighthouse continued to spin around them both.
"Miracles happen." Sebastian replied.
"You were supposed to have died in the fire; I was told you died."
"You can't always believe what you are told Uncle Jacob. Including anything that involves me." Sebatian said. "I need to trust you now. I need you to do me the favor and take my beautiful boy back to his mother. Safely." The vampire added, as the light of the sun was slowly breaking over the waves.
Dawn approached.
Jacob reached for the child.
"I mean it." Sebastian repeated remembering Jacob's past treachery.
"You can trust me Sebastian. This baby will be returned to Evie safe and sound. I promise." Jacob said truthfully.
Sebastian lifted a brow but handed the now sleeping baby to Jacob.
"Never mention that it was me who was here. I think it would disturb Evie, she's gone through enough when it comes to me. I just want her to be happy and I want her to feel safe. If she were to know I was alive too I don't know that would happen. I want her to focus on being a new mother and not have to worry about looking over her shoulder for me. She should continue to believe I died in the fire along with Alice.” Sebastian ordered.
"That is very valiant of you." Jacob said. "You are more and more like David every day. I wish you had more time with your father, he would be very proud of the man you’ve become." Jacob said of his brother and Sebastian's father.
"I wish that too, but I guess that really was up to you. You chose not to give me more time with my father." Sebastian said with a cold reminder that Jacob's framing of David for killing David’s wife Sabrina was the cause of David’s long disappearance, another victim of a leap from the lighthouse.
"I deserve that." Jacob said. "Don't think it's not lost on me that the two of us are here, where he last stood, with your baby. And you saved him from David's same fate. We've come full circle in a way." Jacob added.
Sebastian saw the light of the sun still breaking in a pink glow over the sea. He only had about half an hour to get back to the Inn and hide in the shadows, yet for a split second he thought maybe he should let the sun come and take him, take him away forever. What was he living that life for? What more did he need to see, what more did he need to experience? Then the baby woke up and cried. Sebastian turned back to his uncle from viewing the sea and realized that his baby was the reason for him to live even in it meant watching him grow up from the shadows.
He would not wait to be vanquished by the sun. He had to leave.
"Take care of him, please. Kiss Evie for me." Sebastian asked.
"I don't think she'll let me do that." Jacob chuckled. "What should we call him? If you have to stay away from him the least we can do is let you pick his name."
Sebastian turned back to his uncle holding his son on the landing of the lighthouse. The bright beam of light struck them like a halo of light.
Seeing the halo Sebastian thought of the only name he could think of... the name of a guardian angel.
Sebastian’s guardian angel.
"Name him Gabriel. Ask Evie to name him that." Sebastian said just before he rushed back down the tower stairs and vanished into the fading night leaving Jacob and the baby alone in the cool night air on the lighthouse landing.
****
 |
| Johnathon confronts Celeste |
The light of day cracked through a cloud filled sky. Tirymor House was in disarray. Maids scrambled to clean rooms that had been flipped upside down with the horrors of the night before. Jane, the head maid, seemed to be melting down at the incredible amount of work to be done.
"You'll have to pull it together." Aaron Hamstead, the Lord Family driver shrugged at Jane from an open French door window as he smoked.
"You're awfully relaxed, I should get you to one of the latrines! We should all be helping." Jane said.
Aaron rolled his eyes and tossed his smoldering cigarette into the garden. "I just got back from the village. I had to be at the hospital."
"Hospital? Why?" Jane asked, as she shooed away one of the younger maids.
Aaron did not answer. "Just something I was asked to do."
The cryptic message stinging the nosey and gossipy maid's mind.
“Keeping secrets for the Madame are you?” Jane quipped.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about or to which Madame you refer.”
Jane grinned “oh I think you do. All this insanity around here would make me want to talk. Don’t you want to talk to me?”
Aaron’s jobs with the Lords always had a bit more to do than just be their personal valet and driver. Jane knew that, she knew he was so someone they relied on for other, more secretive and clandestine tasks.
But Aaron was like a steel trap.
“If I were you?” He said “What I would do, if I were you and hand any kind of respect for my position here, is mind my own business. Do that Jane.” Aaron replied.
Jane scoffed and lifted a brow at Aaron’s unrelenting Lord loyalty.
Over in one of the now brightly lit hallways, a passage door hidden behind a large pillar began to creak open. It was Genvieve and Johnathon finally emerging from a long night hidden in deep long and tangled secret corridors beneath the mansion, locked there by Celeste DeViana-Lord.
Johnathon, who had a shocking confrontation with the ghost of his biological father Albert, was livid that his sister had done this to them.
Genevieve, whose mind was now totally cohabitated by the spirit of Sabrina Lord, quickly left Johnathon alone to find his sister. He was like a bull in a China shop searching for her, and finally he did. Cuddling her toddler Fabian in the nursery with Charlotte in the room too, both children freshly removed from the turret room safe and sound after the frightening night.
"As long as they’re alright, I guess no one else matters." Johnathon said coldly as Celeste turned to the nursery door.
Celeste wasn't surprised to see him. She knew he and Genevieve would eventually find their way out, although she hoped whatever they experienced in the secret corridors would scare him enough he'd leave Tirymor and the idea of exposing the truth of his claim to the Lord family fortune.
"Charlotte, honey, would you take your brother out to play." Celeste asked.
Charlotte walked over to her stepmother and took her baby brother. She then turned to Johnathon and suddenly a flash in her mind, bright like the sun showed her a new vision.
The vision was of Johnathon and her father. The faces of the two men suddenly molded together into the face of Albert Lord, Charlotte's grandfather.
"Granddaddy knows you." Charlotte said.
Johnathon turned to the psychic little girl surprised at what she said, "Excuse me?"
"My granddaddy knows you. I think he does. I see him in you. Did you know him?" She asked, the young girl still trying to figure out how her psychic abilities worked.
Johnathon nodded his head, feeling sure of himself, feeling Charlotte's strange words about Albert after actually seeing him in below the mansion, seeing his ghost, was a sign: Reveal who you are.
"Charlotte, please." Celeste said somewhat impatiently, "go to the gardens with Fabian."
Charlotte complied leaving Celeste alone with her incensed brother.
"How could you?" Johnathon asked as soon as Charlotte and the baby were gone. "How could you do that to me?"
"Johnny I was protecting you. You and Genevieve were the safest in the house where you were. I didn't even put my children there. You were safe!" Celeste said.
"Protecting? Safe? What are you talking about? Celeste, you practically locked us in a dungeon. You didn't do this for me or for Genevieve’s safety, you did it for yourself. I don't know what you expected to happen to me down there, but it wasn't to keep me safe."
"You don't know what was happening up here. Johnathon, it was the devil. It was the most evil thing I had ever seen. It took over this whole house. I saved you and Genevieve." Celeste repeated.
"No, no! Stop! Stop lying! What you've been doing this whole time is trying to control how and when I finally tell everyone that I am a part of this family. Blood, I am THEIR blood, Celeste. And you're trying to stop me; well, I'm not going to be stopped anymore. I'm going to tell Jacob that I am his brother."
"Johnathon you cannot do that. Listen to me, I promised him I would never reveal to anyone that Albert had another son. I told him that not because I wanted to keep you from your rightful inheritance but because I know what Jacob does to his rivals. The moment he knows he has yet another sibling to fight off, there is no telling what he would do to you. Or me...." Celeste explained.
"Righ—Or you. That's the crux of all of this. I am not afraid of Jacob, Celeste. But you are. You are afraid of him, and you're worried he'd do to you what he did to everyone else. You're just as disposable and you don't want to be. You're now the lady of this house, the wife of the powerful Jacob Lord, why would anyone want to risk that position, right? That's what this is about. You. This has always been about you." Johnathon railed.
"No, Johnny—!" Celeste began before being interrupted.
"YES!" Johnathon shouted back.
Celeste burst into tears, her brother was right. Celeste had been manipulating the whole situation not to truly protect Johnathon from Jacob's plots and schemes, but also because it would in deep put her in a different position in the household. She'd lose Jacob's trust and when Jacob lost his trust in someone, he punished them.
Severely.
Jacob then entered the baby's nursery freshly returned from the hospital from a long, long night out.
"What is all this? Where are my children?" Jacon asked hearing the DeViana Siblings fighting from the hallway. Celeste cleared her eyes of tears and attempted to pretend nothing was wrong, but it was too late.
"I have to tell you something and my sister is fighting me on it." Johnaton said directly.
"Johnathon..." Celeste said in sniffles, fearing the worst to come.
Jacob lifted a brow; he was exhausted from the terrible night of the awful exorcism, the terrible events at the lighthouse and he was in no mood to fight anymore. Jacob huffed and sat down on a small, overstuffed chair in the corner of the nursey and looked over at Celeste who seemed not only just as tired as him but disheveled and worried and what Johnathon was about to say.
Celeste stood there, her stomach in knots as Johnathon began to unravel secrets of his paternity. First came the affair. Then the secret child: him. The facts clear. Johnathon was a Lord, a brother, a blood relative and a direct heir to the family dynasty -- no matter how bad anyone wanted to pretend it wasn't really true.
Once Johnathon was done, the room fell silent. Jacob looked up at his new half-brother and smirked.
"You think I don't already know this?" Jacob said calmly.
Celeste knew Jacob knew. She had been playing both sides the whole time to try and keep Jacob from punishing her from telling Johnathon and from Johnathon usurping her place in the Lord family hierarchy and power. She didn't want Johnathon or Jacob to know the other knew. She was caught in a web of her own double crossing surprising Johnathon.
"You know?" He asked Jacob, then turned to Celeste.
"I've always known. I've been in this family much longer than you, and honestly, I've created much of the narrative around the family name. What people think is true or not, what people want to believe or not, what people hear is fact or fiction. All of it, every strange secret & odd story that the people of this island have heard about the shadowy family from the Tirymor Forest, I've been able to curate, cut out things no one needs to know and add things people would like to hear. It's all something I have done all my life. That’s the truth. And yes --- even your existence was not immune to my twist."
"Celeste made it seem like you didn't know." Johnathon added.
"She's a good wife. She wanted to make sure to keep her hands clean of any exposure." Jacob said which to Celeste sounded like a forgiveness.
"I intend to stay here Jacob and take my place here as one of Albert's sons. You can't change my mind." Johnathon said assertively.
Jacob got up from the stuffy chair like a king lifting his long hard limbs from his throne and walked over to face his half-brother and look him dead in the eyes.
What happened the night before, the terror, the tragedy, the shocking events, changed Jacob's headspace. He looked evil, REAL evil, in the face. He saw death. He saw suffering in a way that perhaps he had not before, despite his own murderous past. He felt different, now; he felt calmer and in a strange way, he felt at peace with the idea of Johnathon being a part of their family. Long gone were his worries of threats to his own power of the family businesses and money. He knew who he was and what he could do with his power. No long-lost bastard sibling would change that.
"Very well." Jacob said surprising everyone. "You'll be welcomed here. As one of us." Jacob revealed.
Celeste's heart was beating almost out of her chest. The relief washed over her like one of the wild waves of the Atlantic that so often bashed up against the rocky coastline.
"Really Jacob??" She asked rushing over to him and falling into his arms.
"Really." He replied.
"Thank you Jacob. Thank you." She said, kissing him on the lips. "I'm going to find the children and give them the good news that their uncle is staying." Celeste said gleefully, even though Johnathon was still bitter with her for locking him in the underground tunnels.
"One note..." Jacob then said when he and Johnathon were alone. "You'll be brought on in any capacity you wish as the youngest son of my father. I cannot deny you that. I won't deny you that. It's only fair but be sure to keep yourself in strict understanding that this home is a place you are welcome in, but it's a home that I rule."
Johnathon lifted a brow and crossed his arms across his chest "You rule, not Rebecca?"
Jacob smiled "My mother was — shall we say—incapacitated during the storm. She's ill. Until she returns," he paused "if she returns, I will manage the household and Company as I see fit. Just keep yourself on notice."
"Is that warning?" Johnathon asked as Jacob turned to leave then turned back to look at Johnathon in the face again to answer.
He thought about the reply to Johnathon. He wanted his new young brother to feel welcome, just as he said when Celeste was in the room. He wanted Johnathon to feel good about being a part of the family no matter what, but he also knew that he had to keep things in line with his main goal: Keeping the power.
Then he answered the way only Jacob Lord could reply coldly: "It is a waring."
Jacob winked at his brother who stood alone now, the children's nursey on full notice: Do not mess with Jacob Lord.
****
 |
| Peter, Nik & Asha at the hospital |
At Welshport Hope Hospital, Nikolas Jordan, Asha Hoffman and Dr. Peter Ward were busy with patients who had injuries from the wild storm that passed over the island over the night. One man came in with broken bones from a falling tree, a woman and her two daughters had come after one of the children had slipped in the street and twisted their ankle, an older man suffered a heart attack during the storm after a battery of thunder and lightning had frightened him to illness.
It was the perfect test for the fresh paid of medical students who were training on the job in real time.
During the storm, however, both Nik and Asha found themselves in the blackout -- together in a romantic and intimate way. They were now, locked in a passionate romance that Asha did not want to implode with the revelations she discovered at Matthew's house just 4 nights before.
The truth about Alice Winterborn's return to life via reincarnation. Asha feared this revelation could make Nik desire more information about the woman he loved, could she be in this time, could she be in another time? Could he contact her? Those were all things Asha did not want Nik to pursue. She had just found this new love, and she did not want to lose it.
At the nurses station, Nik, Dr. Ward and Asha met to catch their breath.
"You both still keeping your head above water?" Dr. Water chuckled handing patient files to a nurse.
"So far so good." Nik replied.
"The new patients are comfortable. Evie too. She's been asking for you Nik." Asha said revealing Evie was at the hospital. "She's very anxious to be reunited with her baby."
"I'll be sure to take care of that, that two of you have a good amount of patient rounds to handle." Dr. Ward said handing them both more patient files to catch up on.
Nik smiled as Asha took a deep sigh at all the work ahead of them "Please give my sister my best. Ill be in to see her soon."
Just as Dr. Ward was about to reply he would pass the message from Nik to his sister Evie, the hospital doors burst open. Two men were carrying another man who was soaking wet from head to toe and weak. All three suddenly collapsed on the ground.
Dr. Ward, Nik and Asha with a nurse rushed over to help.
"What happened?" Dr. Ward asked, as they all flipped the soaking wet man over.
"Pulse is weak." Asha said.
Nik opened the man's eyes to examine. They were bloodshot. Cold. Almost dead.
"He washed up on shore, doctor. He mumbled something but we couldn't make sense of it." one the men said as Dr. Ward motioned to move the man to a gurney.
"Could he have fallen into the sea during the storm?" Nik asked.
"Check for broken bones." Ward instructed.
Asha and Nik both took one side of the man's body once he was on the gurney and carefully checked his body for broken bones but only found waterlogged and wrinkled skin, signs of long lasting hours in salt water.
"Nothing." Nik said.
"Here too." Asha replied.
"The ... boat." The man finally said coming out of his stupor.
"Boat? What boat?" Ward asked.
"The boat. The storm." The man replied.
"Yes, the storm. There was a storm, did your boat capsize?" Ward asked.
The man, grumbled and nodded yes from his laid-out position.
"Was there anyone else on the boat with you or were you out there alone?" Ward asked him. "We should get Reins to check the shoreline with officers, there might be others." He said to Nik in an aside.
"Many others." The man said. "Fishing ship."
"You were on a fishing ship! A fishing ship from here?" Nik asked almost immediately realizing what that meant.
The man nodded yes.
Nik got close to the man, almost where they were face-to-face. "What fishing ship! WAKE UP MAN! WHAT FISHIGN SHIP!" Nik shouted.
Dr. Ward pulled Nik back. "Dr. Jordan, calm down, what's going on!?"
Nik took a beat .. then asked calmly "What is the name of the ship that went down?"
"The Newas."
The Newas was Matthew's ship.
"Oh my god." Asha said stunned.
"Did anyone make it out with you? Where's Captain Winterborn?" Nik asked.
"We all went down. We all went under. I didn't see anyone else on when I washed up on shore." The man said.
"He's right." One of the men that brought him in said. "He was the only one."
"Alright, let's get him in to check him out. Nik, take a minute." Dr. Ward instructed.
The sailor was taken into an exam room. Nik and Asha stayed in the front, Nik sat down and dropped his head into his lap.
"I can't believe this. I can't believe this. Matthew can't be gone. He just can't be gone." Nik sobbed.
"Shhh. Shh. I'm so sorry. What can I do?" Asha said rubbing Nik's back.
"I don't know how am I going to tell Evie. She just lost Sebastian, she just had her baby and now this! I don't know how she's going to get through this one. Matthew had become everything to her." Nik added.
"I know, I know. I don't know what to tell you." Asha said, but then she had an epiphany. "There might be something."
"What?" Nik asked lifting his head confused.
Asha sat and looked into Nik's green eyes. She was very much in love and was about to let the truth spill from her guts, giving into what her friend Gregory's advice; not to start a new relationship with secrets.
She thought of Alice's death, and she remembered the book she found at Matthew's house with the names and the mysterious coordinates that supposedly marked the portal they were miraculously reborn into the world. She thought again how this might give Nik hope that Alice was alive, and he'd go looking for proof. But Matthew's sudden loss at sea could mean this too. He might come back. Just like the ones in the book.
There was hope.
"When we had dinner at Matthew's I found something. It was a book and it had names of people, many, many names. They were names of Matthew and Alice's ancestors. Next to Alice's name there was a year by it and I asked Matthew about." Asha confessed.
"A book with names? What?" Nik wondered attempting to connect the dots in his own foggy mind.
Asha got up from the seat next to Nik in the hospital foyer. She was about to tell him something she wasn't sure he'd believe but she was now sure he deserved to know.
Especially now that Matthew may be gone too.
"Nik, this is going to sound bizarre. It's going to sound like I'm making it up but this is what Matthew told me: he said it was a log of all the names of the people who had passed away. All his ancestors. It was a huge thick book. The last name in the log was Alice's and it had a number on it. When I asked Matthew what the numbers meant, because I had a strange hunch…and he confirmed it. It was nautical coordinates to a place out at sea where his people believed the person who died came back to life. Reincarnation." Asha explained.
"Reincarnation?"
"Yes." She said softly as she began to see the wheels in Nik's mind starting to turn and click and make sense of what she was saying. Matthew could come back from this, and Alice too.
"They're alive? They're out there somewhere?" He asked.
"I don't know, Nikolas. I don't know." She said.
"But you knew of this book, you asked him about it, and he said that that's what the book was. So, Alice-- is Alice alive??? WHERE IS SHE?" Nik shouted.
"I don't know Nik! Matthew explained that it was a possibility that she could be out there somewhere but he wasn’t too keen on figuring if it was true or not. He said it was superstition and lore from his people. Nik, it could me nothing." Asha replied.
“Or it could mean everything!” He shouted.
“I don’t know.” Asha replied unhappy he was so enthusiastic about the possibility of Alice’s return.
"You should have told me; you should have told me all of this so that I could ask Matthew myself and get more information. I mean, if Alice is alive, is she's back on earth, that would change so much." Nik said.
"Change what? Change us?" She asked.
Nik didn't answer her. "You should have told me."
"I wasn't even sure if it was true Nik! It sounds insane, doesn't it?" She said.
"But you believed it enough to not tell me about it.” Nik replied with dagger like words to Asha’s tearing heart. “You kept it from me." Nik said, Asha's lip began to quiver.
"I... " She paused unsure how to continue the sentence. "I'm sorry."
Nik did not reply further. He only furrowed his eyebrow and grabbed hold of the patient files Ward had given then, He split them in half and handed half to Asha.
"We have rounds to do. And I have to see my sister." He said coldly.
"Nik, I’m sorry. I would have told you if I knew more. Don't you believe me?" She asked.
Nik turned to her. He did believe she was sorry. He believed that she was sorry she had to tell him about this whole strange situation because he too knew what it could mean for them as as couple.
But the truth was, Nik had seen Sebastian come back, he had seen so many once unbelievable things since he moved to Welshport and this idea of reincarnation was not something he was going to ignore. Especially if Matthew had practically confirmed it to her.
"I believe you. I'm almost sorry that I do." He said sadly realizing she had been deceitful.
"Nik, wait! Nik!" She shouted. But he did not turn back. Too hurt by her lie by omission to continue the conversation.
Asha stood in the foyer of the Hope Hospital and realized she may have lost the best thing she had ever had.
****
 |
| Jacqueline & Mary at the cabin on Goode island |
As the sun disappeared over the Westridge Woods of Welshport the small and lonely cabin on Goode Island was filled again with life. Mary and Filipe had not only Sebastian back in their home, but also Jacqueline Gray, the last witch of the Sisters of Highgrove.
Together, Mary and Jacqueline united their powers and were successful at aiding Father Ryan in defeating the demon Caspian.
Their mission was complete.
For now.
Mary, who was pregnant with Filipe's baby, felt her child swirl in her belly like a happy little fish in a bowl. It reminded Mary of her pregnancy with Charlotte, and how happy she was at the time that she was going to be a mother. Those happy memories were clouded by the fact that Jacob took their child away from her and falsely accused her of awful things in town.
Mary touched her bell just in front of a warm hearth and thought to herself "Ill keep you close." She promised, as to not allow the same fate to this baby that happened to Charlotte. Not that Filipe was anything like Jacob.
"What's it like being mother for the first time?" Jacqueline asked as she came in with some tea for the to of them.
"This isn't my first." Mary replied with a smile.
"Oh! How many children do you have?" Jacqueline asked.
"One more, a girl. She lives with her father." Mary replied with a slight tightness in her voice.
"I don't have children. I wish I did, I guess time is ticking away for me." She replied.
"Not really. We're about the same age. Maybe it can happen soon. It only takes the right pair of people. Filipe and I came together in very out of the ordinary circumstances." Mary said remembering their time locked in the turret at Tirymor. "And, I see you've grown close to Sebastian."
"Sebastian is not exactly the right person for me." Jacqueline replied as she sipped her tea.
"Baggage?" Mary agreed.
"Baggage." Jacqueline smiled.
"On another topic, I can't thank you enough for coming with Sebastian and helping us. You have no idea how many lives you've saved." Mary added.
"I almost didn't. But when I was alone, after I sent Sebastian on his way I thought about everything he told me and I felt horrible at the idea that he may go back with nothing to help you here. I couldn't sit back and let god knows what happen without my help. I wouldn’t predict what happened or if we would succeed, but I'm glad we did too. It was all worth it. Even without the third." Jacqueline said.
"The third?" Filipe asked coming in from the rooms after a long day's sleep.
"Filipe, there's tea." Mary said handing him a cup.
"What's this about a third?" He asked again, exhausted from the night before.
Jacqueline gulped. "I thought you all understood before we met."
"Understood? No. I mean, you have to remember I was thrown into all of this myself. My mother died suddenly, so I'm learning about this as it happens. In real time." Mary explained.
"Every coven is connected by three witches. So, the two of us, and someone else." Jacqueline said.
"But there is no third witch." Filipe pointed out.
"There is! There has to be! Otherwise, we wouldn't have been able to do what we did to Caspian. Our powers would have been useless. There's a third witch out there. She has powers too. She may not know she has these powers, but she does." Jacqueline said.
"So, we were only able to use our powers, our coven's gift, because there is a third witch who helped us?" Mary wondered.
"Well, she didn't help us, but her close proximity and the fact she is alive, is the only way we were able to corral the power of the sisters and destroy Caspian Casador." Jacqueleine explained further. "So none of you know who this person is?"
Filipe looked at Mary, and Mary at Filipe.
"No." Mary replied with a soft voice.
"Looks like we have another sister to find." Jacqueline said with a smirk.
Then, Sebastian came in. He looked exhausted. He had had one of the most awful nights of his existence. His eyes were puffy. His face was still worn and wasted of sleep. Everyone in the room knew what had happened. Mary was worried the awful reality of what had occurred at the light house would take Sebastian down a dark road, when he was so quickly coming back to the kindhearted person he was before he was cursed to a life in the shadows.
Jacqueline watched this man she had suddenly become very interested walk out of the room and into the one she was in almost like a zombie. He did not greet them, he did not acknowledge them. He just flowed in like a silent breeze and went to an open window that sent fresh sea air to his face that was already cooled from his inability to connect with his own human warmth.
There was a sort of connection between the two of them, albeit new and untested, but Jacqueline was intrigued, and he left her with tingles that ran up and down her spine. The good kind of tinges, which for Jacqueline were a new sensation. Filipe, who was now sitting in the room with Mary and Jacqueline instantly noticed Jacqueline's interest in the vampire. He found it endearing. Sweet even.
For her part, Mary slowly rose from her chair and went over to her cousin who was now staring out of the cabin window towards the flashing light of the now infamous lighthouse. The same lighthouse his own father had supposedly jumped from and the same lighthouse he saved his child from being thrown off of by her grandmother.
"Are you ok?" Mary asked patting her cousin's back.
"I don't know." he said softly.
"I know seeing your child for the first time under such terrible circumstances must of been triggering for you, Sebastian, but you saved him. He's safe. you should be happy about that." Mary added.
"Saved him? Saved him to a life of what? Misery? Maybe I should have brought him back here." Sebastian said.
"You know that wouldn't have been possible Sebastian. It's a different world here. Its not a place for a baby." Mary said.
Sebastian turned to her and looked at her own baby bump and saw a bit of irony of what she was saying.
"Is that so?" He asked with sarcasm.
"Sebastian, I'm different than you. Filipe and I are, number one, together and number two not like you." Mary replied defiantly. "Could you honestly say you would have been the best person to raise a child ... only at night? Babies don't sleep the way you do. They have their own clocks." She added with a girn.
Sebastian rolled his eyes like a defiant teenage. He knew she was right, but the sting in his heart still felt as strong as it did when he handed the child he took from Rebecca's dangerous grasp to his uncle Jacob.
"Mary, would you do something for me?" He asked.
Mary lifted a brow, she was cautious at agreeing to Sebastian's requests knowing that sometimes he could wish for very impossible things, things that could put many people in danger.
Jacqueline and Filipe in ear shot both thought the same as Mary and shot each other looks.
"That depends on what you want from me." Mary said.
Sebastian, seeing that he and Mary were being listened to, pulled Mary into a corner of the room where they could not be seen.
"Cousin to Cousin." He said to her.
"Cousin to cousin." She confirmed. "But it's not a promise. What do you need?" Mary asked, happy to help him as a way to repay him for finding and bringing back Jacqueline but still weary of his possible dangerous request.
"In the book your mother left you, if there were something in there, something you could read and use to protect my son, would you? Would you use that spell of protection for him?" He asked.
It was quite sweet, Mary realized. All he wanted was some way to protect the baby born just the night before in the middle of a real exorcism.
"Oh," Mary said with a sweet smile to the new father "I can try, of course, I can try and see if there is anything in the book that would protect your son. Of course!" She replied.
"I could have lost him last night. You Should have seen my grandmother. She was not herself. She seemed lost in some kind of ... I don't know, worse than a fog. She was much, much more lost than anything or anyone I could even compare to. She had my son hanging over the side of the lighthouse, and all I could do is imagine him... gone. Into the sea. If there was something in your book that would protect him from any more horrible things, things that everyone in my family have suffered I would give you anything, anything you want to do it." Sebastian explained.
"Sebastian, listen to me. We are family. You saved your son from death, and you also saved us all from a much worse fate by risking your own life and going to Boston and bringing back Jacqueline, that's payment enough. Because of that bravery, I'll be able to give birth to this child and hopefully, one day, be able to full reunite with my daughter Charlotte. If there is a spell in that book to protect newborn's it your sons." Mary said with tears in her eyes, as she was touched by Sebastian's kind gesture towards his on.
"Gabriel." She said softy.
"What?" Mary asked.
"I named him. His name is Garbriel."
Mary's tears finally fell at the sound of the baby's name. “That’s so beautiful.” She replied softly. “Gabriel Lord.”
She pulled her cousin in close and hugged him tightly.
The walls kept the sound of the conversation away from Filipe, but not Jacqueline, she heard it all with her powerful abilities of magic. She was now sure she could do something for Sebastian and help him and perhaps they'd get even closer than they were.
Baby Gabriel was Jacqueline's next project. A project to bring her closer to the objects of her affections: Sebastian.
If he wanted a spell to protect his child A spell of Safety, is what Jacqueline would concoct.
“It must be a surprise.” The witch from Boston said in her mind as a happy grin splashed across her beautiful face.
****
 |
| Evie meets her baby Gabriel |
Back at the hospital, in a room lit by small little lamps that hummed with the newest form of form of electricity, Evie felt the stinging of pain after he rushed labor.
She was sleeping off the medicine that was given to her after she left Tirymor, but the medication soon wore off and when she opened her eyes, her mother Aurora was sitting at her bedside.
Evie moaned as she tried to sit up in her bed.
"Take it easy, now, take it easy." Aurora said rushing to her daughter's side.
"Did I have the baby?" Evie asked in her groggy state.
Aurora giggled "Yes."
"I did?" Evie asked excitedly, “where’s my baby?"
Dr. Ward and Nik entered the room. Dr. Ward was carrying her newborn baby boy.
"Evie, this is your boy." Nik said as Dr. Ward handed him his nephew and then Nik handed the baby to Evie.
"My boy! My baby is a boy!" Evie said as the tears came flooding from her face at the night of the beautiful child in her arms. His eyes a light gray color, his lips a perfect pink, hist sweet little smile perking up as soon as he and Evie made eye contact.
"He's so handsome." Aurora gushed of her new grandson.
"He's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen." Evie said.
"Looks like his uncle I think." Nik joked.
"Jacob saved him." Dr. Ward said.
"Saved him? What do you mean?" Evie asked, her memory of the kidnapping by Rebecca seemed to vanish with all the happiness of having her child in her arms.
"You don't remember?" Aurora asked.
Nik shot his mother a look, hoping to let Evie have this moment with the baby without having to relive some the trauma from the night of his birth. Evie noticed this.
"What? Tell me, what happened?" the new mother begged.
"Rebecca and Caspian had some sort of plan, Evie. A plan for your baby. It was a sick and twisted thing that I really don't think we should go over now, but as soon as the baby was born Rebecca, not in her right state of mind, took him in the night after you have birth and went into the storm and out to the lighthouse. She wanted to throw him off the landing and…” Rebecca paused and shook her head at the horror she was about to reveal thanks to Gregory Reigns’ update to her.
“What? What happened??” Evie pushed
“…darling, she tried to throw him off the landing.”
Evie gasped in horror and held her baby tight nuzzling his little nose to hers.
“But he was saved. By Jacob." Aurora finally said, neglecting to mention she was also involved in Caspian's plan at the beginning albeit she a much more an unwilling counterpart.
Evie cried and continued to snuggle her baby happy that he was safe, healthy and in her arms. The baby too snuggled up his mother. He squeaked and giggled in a show of affection that seemed almost too perfect and too happy to be real. But it was, he was really there in her arms, a big rollie pink baby with eyes of gray that she could hold, touch, kiss. He was hers.
And he was Sebastian's.
In the fading moments of the horror, she thought of Sebastian, and how proud he would be if he were to see his baby. How proud Sebastian would be to see this boy that if Evie was being honest, was truly his spitting image. She saw her former husband so much in the new baby's face and smile and it warmed her heart. The love she once had for Sebastian was still there, but now it was more of a fondness like a happy memory, not of passion and romance like it was the night the baby was conceived.
None the less, the baby was a symbol of their once solid love story that turned out was as fragile as caste made of sand up against a ocean wave; cold and unforgiving.
"Jacob was able to convince Rebecca to give him the child and after Reigns took Rebecca away. The baby was never hurt." Dr. Ward said, repeating the report Reigns had given him, which in truth was false. Sebastian had saved the baby and handed him to Jacob.
That secret truth would stay at the lighthouse at Sebastian's request.
"What should your name be, little one?" Evie asked in a tear soaked smiled.
"Gabriel." Nik said. "Just before he brought us the baby, Jacob asked that you name him Gabriel. Something about that name being the name of a guardian Angel.”
Evie wondered why Jacob would even think he would have any kind of say in naming her son. He had been so cruel to her, he had an atrocious history with almost everyone in the family.
If anyone was going to name her son, it was going to be Evie. She rolled her eyes at Nik for his news of what Jacob supposedly wanted but then, Evie’s eyes locked with her beautiful new born boy. He stared up at his mother and reached for her almost as it to say hello.
A calmness fell over Evie. Aurora noticed selfless motherhood was quickly setting in.
The name Gabriel fit him. It truly did. He looked like a Gabriel. Evie’s heart warmed and nothing mattered now not even who came up with his name. Evie, of course, did not know the request came from the baby’s father Sebastian — not Jacob. Jacob was just fulfilling a promise.
Another secret truth that would stay at light house by Sebastian's request.
"Gabriel Jordan Lord. This will be your name." Evie said to her son as he yelp with approval.
"I think he likes it." Aurora said smiling.
"Yes." Evie replied. "I can't wait for you to meet Matthew." She added.
As Matthew's name came out of her mouth and into the air, a silence fell over the room. While Evie was asleep, in the deep sleep of the medication she was under after giving birth for hours and hours, all day, the news of the sinking of Matthew's ship made it's way from Hope Hospital, around the village, around Tirymor House and all the way back to Evie's hospital room.
No one said a word at first. No one wanted to be the person to tell her the man she fell in love with, the man she was engaged to be married to, the man who said he'd be by her side and had been by her side for all the terrible things that happened in the last year and a half had perished in the sinking of his ship thank's Caspian's storm.
The waves had taken him, he was gone from her life, another man she cared for leaving the earth for all time.
Nik looked at Aurora, Dr. Ward waited for one of them to say something, but could see neither of the wanted to be the one to give the bad news. It was a horrible way for Evie to wake up and a terrible spoil to her reunion with her new baby, but someone had to tell her. Dr. Ward, nudged Nik to be that person, His Ward's eyes, Nik would have to get practice giving patients bad news as he'd soon learn being a doctor in the new psychiatric ward. What better way, Ward thought, than the first patient be his own sister.
"It should be you." Ward whispered.
Nik took a breath and sat on Evie's bedside.
"Evie, I need to tell you something that happened during the storm and while you were resting after the baby came." he said calmy.
"What is it?" She asked.
Aurora gulped preparing for the fall of Evie's happiness in quick motion.
"The storm was quite bad, worse than any of us really were prepared for. There were..." Nik paused and looked at his mother for help.
"There were some ships out at sea, honey, that got caught in the storm and they didn't make it back to shore." Aurora said helping Nik out.
"Ships, like Matthew's? Where is he? Didn't make it back to shore? But Matthew is back right? You're not saying what I think you're trying to say, are you?" Evie asked.
"Evie, listen," Nik said grabbing one of his sister's hands that was wrapped around the baby. "his ship went under. One of the sailors that served with him washed up on shore and he was found and brought to the hospital. He said said no one survived. Including Matthew."
"No." Evie said. "No, No, No! You can't be sure. None of this, none of this can be happening, not now. NO! Nikolas! NO!" Evie shouted.
"Evie calm down, darling, please." Aurora whispered as the baby began to fuss with his mother's raised voice.
"You're all lying to me! Where's Matthew! I WANT TO SEE MATTHEW!!" Evie shouted.
"Evie, Evie stop!" Nik replied sternly. "Matthew can't be here because he's gone. Matthew is gone."
Evie's face froze in horror. Her heart sank as like Matthew's ship in the sea. She began to cry her fears falling all over the baby and the blanket he was wrapped in. Aurora reached over and held the baby while Evie sobbed into a pillow. She had again lost another man she loved.
The Lords believed Sebastian died in the fire that exploded at Lockwood Thicket, while the village was told it was an illness to hide the truth, now Matthew and several of his seafaring shipmates were lost at sea.
Evie was again, the weeping widow, only this time she never got to be married but the pain was just as severe.
The entire room felt the heaviness of the moment. Dr. Ward excused himself so that the Jordans could be alone together. Nik too said he'd let Evie rest.
Aurora sat back down in the chair next to Evie and held her new grandson while Evie sobbed into her pillow the rest of the dark sad night.
Evie felt the pain deep in her soul. She felt cursed in love.
In her mind, as the pain of losing Matthew controlled her whole body; Evie vowed to herself that this would change her forever: She would never, ever love again.
