Shadows On The Wall

Chapter 75: How to Make Amends 

by Nicky


Voiceover by Thayer David: “Collinwood, in the year 1968, besieged by a force
from the dawn of time, something so darkly malevolent, something so
reprehensible, that it corrupts everything it touches.  And it is a force
wielded with expert efficiency by one young woman in the great house of
Collinwood ...  a woman who may hold the key to the destruction of everyone she
loves.” 

ACT I 

1 

Her eyes glittered like polished black stones, and her lips were drawn back in
a leering, toothy smile.  “I am the Queen,” she announced grandly, and waved
her hand.  As if in answer to a silent summons, the ebony sky over her head was
split by several waves of crimson streaks, as if the stars were hurling
themselves at her, shredding the sky, burning up before her.  Globes of fiery
beauty.  All for her.  

In her black garden.  

The woman that had been Victoria Winters was the Queen, and she was attended,
as a queen should be.  

A shifting emerald carpet of twisting, hissing serpents writhed around her
ankles and rubbed smooth and silky over her feet and up around her calves. 
Their ministrations were strangely soothing.  

A hand fell on her shoulder.  She stiffened at first; who would dare to touch
her now?  Here?  In her own palace, her own world?  

The hand was white and heavy, and the nails were black.  She shrugged, a tiny
token gesture of disgust, and the hand fell away.  

“You are our Queen,” a voice said.  She felt a tiny sliver of fear when she
heard it — buzzing, insectile, as inhuman as if a roach had learned to speak in
human words — but quickly shook the fear away.  This was her place, dammit, the
place where didn’t have to feel fear.  Or anything else, if she didn’t want to.
“We worship you.” It hesitated.  “But —” 

“I am powerful,” Vicki said.  “You will never touch me again.” 

“And where,” that voice said, and it was sly suddenly, and she didn’t like it,
“where do you suppose that power comes from?” 

“Leave this place,” Vicki said.  The snakes around her hissed reprovingly. 
“Leave me alone.  I don’t need you.  I don’t need anyone.” 

“You don’t really believe that.” 

“Of course I do.” 

The carpet of serpents parted, and a tiny form rose up from beneath them, and
stared up at Vicki with wide brown eyes.  

Vicki felt that nasty quaver of fear again, and tried to shrug it off.  “Amy?”
she said.  “Amy, what are you doing here?” 

“I belong here,” Amy said.  “This is my place too.” 

Vicki’s head throbbed, and she brushed a trembling hand against her forehead. 
“No,” she said, and began to shiver, “no, that’s not — I mean, that isn’t —” 

The little girl held out her arms imploringly, and Vicki saw a tiny mark on her
wrist.  Her hand lashed out before she could stop it and seized Amy’s arm, then
pulled her close.  The girl remained eerily silent, and she didn’t flinch. 
“What is this?” Vicki hissed, but she knew already.  She recognized the mark,
like a tattoo, because she had seen it a few weeks ago on David.  I erased it,
Vicki thought dazedly, I used my powers to erase it, because he wasn’t himself,
he was being ...  he was being controlled ...  

Amy gently removed her arm from Vicki’s numb fingers, and with a dainty gesture
stepped back and looked up at her governess.  “The time is coming,” Amy said. 
“You’ll know it soon.  The time of the Leviathan people is at hand.” 

According to Eliot, they are a race that ruled the earth long before our kind
ever made an appearance.  They were evil, the purest of evil apparently, and
incredibly powerful.  But at some point, mankind made a stand against them, and
they were banished, although no one knows to where.  

Quentin’s voice (dear and sweet, no, not, not sweet, just a, just a VOICE —) in
her ears, and she pressed her hands against them but it didn’t help, didn’t
make his voice go away.  

“The Leviathans,” she whimpered, and looked behind her, but whoever — whatever
— had stood there was gone now.  

Amy took her hand.  It was tiny and cold, like the belly of a fish.  “They’re
coming,” she said, and her voice was chiming and sweet, and her smile was
innocent.  “They’ll be here soon.” 

Vicki gasped and sat up.  Her head throbbed for a miserable moment, and she
reached out and groped at her hair, her beautiful fall of thick auburn hair
that had, until recently, remained unmarred.  Now, she realized, it was
streaked with a shock of white that seemed to grow daily.  

Not daily, she thought grimly; everytime I use my powers.  

She glanced around her, and realized that she was sitting in a chair in the
drawing room at Collinwood.  The double doors were closed, and a fire crackled
in the fireplace.  How did I get here?  she wondered; I don’t remember anything
after — 

A scream rose on her lips, and then died away as she pressed her hands against
her mouth to squelch it, force it away, force it not to exist.  

Quentin Collins, the man she loved more than anyone else on earth, was sprawled
out on the hideous green couch before her.  His eyes stared blankly ahead of
him, and they were dim and dazed and glassy, like marbles; his mouth gaped
open, and a runner of saliva ran in a silver stream down his chin.  The slight
rising and falling of his chest was the only indication that he still lived.  

“Oh Quentin,” Vicki murmured, and then she remembered.  He knows, she thought
with a cold shock of horror, he knows about me, he saw — he saw — 

He didn’t see anything, a cold, small voice said within her mind.  How could
he?  He doesn’t remember anything either, because you wiped it all away.  You
know.  With those powers you’re so fond of.  

She remembered now, oh yes she did.  The emptiness inside him.  Alive ...  but
not alive.  Dead ...  but not dead.  Something horribly inbetween.  

I might as well have killed him, she thought dimly.  Oh my god, oh my dear
sweet god — 

She sat up.  “I can make it better,” she said aloud, not caring that the room
was empty (more or less, she thought, and sobbed), “I can make it right,
there’s still time, I can fix it and no one has to know —” She was across the
room in a literal blink of an eye, and found herself kneeling beside him.  But
he didn’t move, or give any sign of recognition that there was someone else in
the room with him, or that he was even in a room at all.  

The power rose inside her like an obedient serpent, a familiar feeling, dark
and terrible and seductive and consuming, and she felt it spread inside her
like a stain, and she said, “Quentin Collins —” and her voice rumbled low and
throaty with power — 

“It won’t help him.” 

The power dissipated, and Vicki collapsed into a heap next to the couch as an
exhausted sigh left her lips.  She managed to lift her head, and watched the
approaching figure kneel beside her, and gently take her hand.  And it was
cold, dear lord, so cold.  

“You can’t do anything for him,” Amy Jennings said.  “He’s gone.  Gone for
good, see.  And you did that.  That thing.  See?” She blinked.  Horror had
strangled Vicki’s words in her throat, and she could only watch.  Amy nodded
sympathetically.  “I know.  But this is the way it has to be.  Like I told
David, when David still remembered.” The child’s eyes grew hard and flinty. 
“You did that too.” 

“I had to,” Vicki said throatily.  “I had to because — b-because —” 

“Doesn’t matter,” Amy said with a strangely adult gesture of dismissal.  “Now
is all that matters.  What we have to do.  Now.  Do you want him back?” 

“Yes,” Vicki wheezed.  “God.” 

“There is no god here,” Amy said, and grinned.  “There is only you ...  and
me.” She cocked her head to the darkness pressing eagerly against the window
behind them.  “And ...  them.” 

“I won’t play this game.” 

“You don’t have any choice.” Her voice, sweet and melodic.  Her eyes glinting,
flashing, devil’s eyes, snake’s eyes — 

You are strong now, Victoria Winters.  No one can tell you what to do.  

“Yes,” Vicki hissed, and felt the power inside her expand of its own accord. 
For a second Amy flinched back, and a shadow, a brief spasm of fear, crossed
over her face.  “I do what I want to do.  Tell them that.  Your masters.” She
stood up, and at her full height she towered above the girl.  Black skeins of
electricity began to crackle between Vicki’s fingers; a spark flew from her
hands and scorched Amy’s cheek, and the girl scuttled backwards on her hands
and knees like a crab, keening, a high desolate wail.  “I’ll find a way to save
him myself,” Vicki said, and her voice was deep and throaty with power and
confidence.  I know what I’m doing, she thought, I am absolutely in control. 
“Now get out of here,” Vicki said, and more black fire flew from her hands. 
Screaming, Amy clambered to her feet and fled, and slammed the drawing room
doors behind her.  

Satisfied, Vicki brushed her hands against her skirts, and turned back to
Quentin.  She stroked her chin thoughtfully as she stared into his vacant blue
eyes.  “I’ll make it right,” she said.  “I’ll make it better.  I promise you
that, my love.  I’ll make everything okay.” 

2 

“Get out of here, Sky,” Angelique hissed.  She had never felt more vulnerable
in her life, even after her most recent brush with death at the hands of two of
the most sadistic (and now, she thought with a momentary inner smile of
triumph, regrettably immolated), most vicious vampires she’d ever encountered. 
The nightgown she wore was blue and filmy, and she crossed her arms over her
breasts before she realized she had.  “Go on, leave!” 

The man she had once imagined she loved stood before her, and his head was
bowed slightly, and a lock of his chestnut hair fell across one eye in a tiny
curl.  She remembered running her fingers through his hair on their wedding
night (how long ago that now seemed, how foolish), tugging it in the heat of
passion, groaning in his ear, the night she had felt like a woman again, a real
woman, for the first time in centuries.  His hands were clasped before him
almost reverently, and she felt a spark of hatred flare within her, ignited by
the betrayal she had received at those hands.  

He’s just like you, Angelique, a mocking voice whispered in her ear.  Just the
same.  How typically female; you overlook your own deception, but you’re
furious at his.  It whispered to her in the snide tones of Nicholas Blair, but
it was her own voice.  Dammit.  

“I can’t leave, Angelique,” Sky said, and was that tenderness in his voice? 
She’d be damned if — “I came all this way to find you.” 

Her face hardened.  “Did your friend Nicholas Blair tell you about me?  Is that
it?  So you think you know the awful truth?” She drew herself up fiercely. 
“Well I know a few things about you too, Sky.  It’s frightening enough to know
that you know Nicholas Blair — and even more frightening that he should come to
you for a favor.  Evil?  Depraved?  Isn’t that what he said you were?” 

Sky’s hands were clenched into fists, and Angelique drew back, suddenly a
little frightened.  If Sky were as powerful as Nicholas had hinted — or perhaps
even more powerful — then he could destroy her right now, without a thought or
without even any effort expended.  “Angelique,” Sky said through gritted teeth,
“you don’t understand.” 

“Oh, I think I understand all too well,” she said.  She was nearly screaming
now; anger and fear made her voice shrill.  If only I had asked Professor
Stokes for some anti-witchcraft charms, she thought, and could only appreciate
the grim irony in that suggestion.  “You’re a warlock.  A powerful, evil
warlock.  What did Nicholas want from you, Sky?  What has he done for you in
the past?  And how much will it cost you?” 

“You’re right,” Sky said, and suddenly he sounded weak and defeated.  He
collapsed in a heap beside the bed, and dropped his head and then covered it
with his arms.  He began to rock back and forth, and she could only stare at
him in shock.  Crying?  Was Schuylar Rumson, one of the most powerful business
magnates in the Western hemisphere — Sky Rumson, the man who, laughing, had
swung her around in his powerful arms so that she could place the star on the
top of the highest tree in the forest he had cut down himself only a few weeks
ago — could Sky Rumson be crying?  Now?  “You’re right,” he said again.  “I
never wanted you to find out.  I was so afraid that you would hate me, run away
from me ...  just like you did.  And I can’t blame you.  I came to find you so
I could try to explain.  I wanted to make you see that I’ve changed.  Your love
changed me, Angelique.” He looked up at her, face streaming.  “Your love made
me a real man again.” 

“What are you talking about?” Suspicious hissed within her like a nest of
snakes.  

“I was a warlock.  I have been for — god, a hundred years.  I was born in
England in 1855, and came to America with my mother when she remarried just
after the Civil War.  My stepfather lived on a plantation in Virginia.  His
housekeeper was a woman named Zimba, this old black woman he had brought back
with him from the West Indies.  She was an Obeah woman, like a priestess, and
she taught me all about dark magic.  I’ve learned a lot since then.  About
immortality.  About power.  Oh, I wanted power more than anything in the world.
I sought it out.  I’ve been to so many places, places I don’t even want to
think about now.  I’ve done terrible things.  All in the name of power.” He
wiped his face, and stared at his hands.  His voice was feather-light, barely
more than a husky-leaf whisper.  “So much power.  I built my empire with the
witchcraft.  And still, it wasn’t enough.  I would lie in my bed at night and
send out my spirit to the farthest reaches of the cosmos, farther and farther,
away from earth, away from the netherworld, into worlds no one else has ever
visited, ever.  I met demons and spirits and offered them anything they wanted.
So long as they gave me power.  

“Still, not enough.” He sighed, and looked into her face.  “Even before I met
Nicholas, I was reconsidering.  Everything.  I was scaring myself, see.  I had
never felt fear before in all my long life, but suddenly ...” He shivered. 
“This wasn’t even a year ago.  I was casting a spell with my coven.  Three
witches and another warlock.  Paltry.  Weak.  But still ...  magic is magic. 
And I took it from them.  They offered it to me freely, and I sucked it out of
them and added it to my own.  There was a mirror.  I was going to tap into
their power and use it to open a portal to yet another dimension.  I thought I
could find a demon there who could increase my own powers a hundred-fold.  In
exchange I planned to offer him the world.  This world.  Our world.  All of it.
All dark.  Forever.  

“And then I caught a glimpse of my face in the mirror.  Mid-incantation.  And I
stopped.  My face was white, like a corpse, like salt.  There were veins
stretching all across it, purple, ugly, like bruises.  Not purple.  Black. 
Like the blood that pumped through me was ichor.  And my eyes ...” He wiped
sweat from his forehead.  “They were black too.  Not just black, but empty. 
Christ.  I don’t know if I believe in a soul, and I probably haven’t had one
for a long time, but suddenly I was afraid for it.  I was ugly.  Inhuman.  I
realized what I was about to do.  I was going to end the world, and for what? 
For power?  The power to do what exactly?  I didn’t know.  Couldn’t answer.  So
I stopped the ceremony and I broke the mirror, and I ran from that place and I
never looked back.  I swore that I would stop using my powers.  For good.  And
for awhile it was hard.  Falling back on old habits.  Teleporting to the
office, rematerializing at home.  Conjuring up fire to light a cigarette.  I
swore them off again and again.  But it never took.  

“Until I met you.” 

He gazed at her solemnly.  She couldn’t move.  She was uncertain.  Her body was
heavy, then light, heavy, then light.  She couldn’t take her eyes away from
his.  

“Angelique, you make me human.  I have never felt for anyone the way I feel for
you.  I love you.  I never thought I would know what that meant, but I do.  I
do.  God, Angelique, I’ve been nothing without you.  An animal.  I ...  I
nearly destroyed the house when I found out you had gone.” Shame burned in his
eyes and in the curl of his lips.  “And I knew why.  I knew you must have
overheard Nicholas.  The power came back, and it was strong.  So strong — but
not strong enough.  Because I’m stronger.  But I’m only strong because of you. 
Please, Angelique.” He reached out his hand for hers.  It hung in the air,
suspended between them.  “Please,” he said.  “Don’t leave me again.” 

She looked at it wordlessly, then up to his face.  

“Sky,” she said.  

And closed her fingers around his.  

“Can you ever forgive me?” he whispered.  He was in her arms; she was in his
arms; his face was pressed against her breasts; his face was hot and wet with
his tears.  

“I don’t know,” she said, over and over, “I don’t know, I don’t know, but I
love you, Sky.  I can’t help it.  And I understand.  I do.” 

He looked up at her.  “You do?” 

She cradled his face tenderly in her hands.  “Don’t you know?  Didn’t Nicholas
tell you?” He shook his head.  She took a breath and didn’t take her eyes from
his.  “I was a witch, Sky.  For far longer than you’ve been.  Since 1692, maybe
even before.  Maybe a million incarnations, and I’ve always been a witch.” She
grimaced.  “Except for now.  I have no powers.  None.  And I’ve never been
happier.” 

He was staring at her in shock.  “Angelique?” he whispered.  “Angelique ... 
Collins?” 

She recoiled a little at that name.  “You’ve ...  you’ve heard of me?” 

“Who hasn’t!” he exclaimed.  “Angelique Collins, the most fearsome, most
diabolical witch this world has ever known!” 

“Sky —” 

“I had no idea,” he said, as if he hadn’t heard her, “none at all!  I never
would’ve connected it.” He stood up; he was pacing now, across the length of
the room, like a tiger, and running his fingers over and over through his
chestnut hair.  Angelique watched, and a sick feeling grew in the pit of her
stomach.  “And I checked!  I can tell if someone uses magic or has any magical
powers; you know, you know how you can sense that?” She nodded slowly.  “But
you didn’t.  None!  Or no more than any other human I’d met.  And that’s just
it.  You were human, just like I wanted, just like I thought I needed —” 

“I am human.  Now.” He blinked at her.  “Nicholas,” she said.  “Nicholas made
me human.  About five months ago.  I left this place, and I never wanted to
come back here again.” 

“Barnabas Collins!” Sky said, and snapped his fingers.  “You turned Barnabas
Collins into a vampire!” 

She shrugged.  “Among many others things I did —” 

“Nicholas told me about you once.  He’s not very fond of you.” 

“The feeling,” she said, eyes flashing, “is mutual.” 

He stopped pacing.  “Is it really true,” he said, his voice a conspiratorial
whisper, hushed with awe, “that you were walled up for two hundred years?” 

She stared at him silently, one eybrow arched.  

“Did you come here to see Barnabas?” There was no jealousy in his voice, she
was relieved to discover, just honest curiosity, and maybe something else — 

“Yes,” she said.  “We’ve ...  we’re overcoming our differences.  I came here
for help.  And there’s another woman, a friend of Barnabas’ who’s helping me,
Julia —” 

“Julia Hoffman,” Sky said, “yes, I know her.  Well, I’ve heard of her, I mean.”

Angelique stared at him incredulously.  

He sighed.  “Elizabeth Collins Stoddard and I are old friends,” he said, then
amended, “or business partners, really.  Long time ago.  She owns stock in my
magazine.  I can’t believe her name never came up.” 

“No reason it should’ve,” Angelique said with a trace of bitterness.  “I was
trying so hard to avoid the subject of Maine at all.  I never wanted to bring
up the Collins family.  I never wanted to see them again.” 

“But the Collins family is why I’m here,” Sky said.  “Just because I haven’t
used magic in about a year doesn’t mean I’m not attuned to it.  I can feel when
something dark is rising.  Time was I’d have been drawn to it.  I’d have come
to this place to suck up all the dark juice that I could possibly take.  But
that’s over now.  I can feel it, though.  Something bad is coming here ...  and
I sensed you, Angelique.  I sensed that you had come to this place, and I came
to save you, even if you wouldn’t listen to me.” 

“You’re right, Sky,” Angelique said, and climbed out of bed.  Her arms were
still folded across her troubled breast.  Lightning flashed outside and
illuminated her features; her eyes flashed in the silver light.  “Something
terrible is coming, but we don’t know what it is.  Barnabas is a part of it,
maybe other people.  But Sky —” She grasped at his arms, looked into his face,
searched it with those same intoxicating blue eyes.  “We may have no other
choice.  Whatever is coming, whatever this menace is, its power stretches far
beyond me or anything I’m capable of doing now.  If you’re as powerful as you
say, we may need you.” 

He looked away, disgust marring for a moment his handsome, carved features. 
“Angelique —” 

“I mean it,” she said, and took his hands in her own, suddenly icy.  “I mean
it, Sky.  If worse comes to worse, you may have no choice.  None.  You may be
forced to fight Sky, and you may be forced to use your powers ...  or we will
all be lost.” 

3 

It was sobbing, Julia thought with amazement.  Whatever it was, it was sobbing
away as if its heart was broken, and long, silver tears in streams ran down its
twisted, inhuman features.  Its eyes were flat and yellow now, and a twisted
snout filled with razors jutting from black gums snuffled at the air; its face
was plated with armor that gleamed an opalescent black in the light of the
moon.  

It’s still human, Julia thought.  Somehow, underneath it all, that thing is
still human.  Still Chris Jennings.  

The tinkling music continued to pour from the music box Julia held in one
outstretched hand.  She had regained consciousness a few moments after she
passed out, and Barnabas had handed it to her wordlessly.  When she opened her
eyes, she saw that the monster had scuttled away from her and was curled up in
the corner of the room, making choked baying sounds and rocking.  It was huge,
she realized; even curled up on the floor with its long arms wrapped around its
knees, it was still as tall as Barnabas.  

It was staring at her with its strange eyes, flat yet strangely compelling,
with a sort of wonder that was almost childlike in that deformed face.  As she
watched it shifted again; hair sprouted from between the plates which receded
and disappeared back into the skin; the eyes glowed emerald, and the snout
became a horn that bristled with thousands of tiny teeth.  It blinked once, and
swallowed, and another cascade of tears poured from its eyes.  It held out what
had once been hands, then paws, and now resembled the pincers of a lobster.  

“Oh Chris,” Julia whispered, “what have I done to you?” 

“Julia, what do you mean?” Barnabas spoke in a low voice, but his eyes flashed
dangerously.  

“This really is all my fault,” Julia said.  The chiming minuet began again, and
the creature before them uttered a low, heartbreaking moan.  “I’ve been
administering injections to Chris for the past few months, Barnabas.  I thought
they were making an improvement, maybe paving the way for a total cure.  A
release from his curse.” She sniffled; her eyes burned; she would have killed
for a cigarette.  “But I guess it ...  um ...  backfired.  Made him something
even more monstrous than he already was.  Oh god —” 

“G-gar -d —” 

Julia gasped.  The monster had spoken, or tried to speak.  The horn had become
a vast hole in its head still lined with teeth like butcher knives.  Its eyes
rolled madly in their sockets.  

“He-ep meh — gard — hep meh —” A pointed pink tongue lapped briefly at its
swollen black lips.  

“Oh Christopher,” Julia said, and began to cry.  

“It’s all right, Julia,” Barnabas said, and laid a comforting arm across her
shoulder.  “You didn’t mean for this to happen.  We can fix it.  We can make it
right again, I promise you.” 

“I don’t know, Barnabas,” Julia whispered.  “I just don’t —” 

The creature before them gave a convulsive moan, and began to thrash in its
corner.  “Chris!” Julia exclaimed, but Barnabas held her back.  Black fur
sprouted all over the creature’s body and just as suddenly receded, and melted
away; the body began to shrink and reform itself, and in only moments Chris
Jennings lay before them, shivering, his naked body beaded with sweat.  

“I’ll get a blanket,” Barnabas said, and left Julia alone with him.  

She knelt at his side, and tried to smile down at him.  He blinked up at her
with dazed eyes that were filled with an unbearable pain.  “Chris,” Julia said,
“Chris, we’re here for you.  I’m here for you now.” 

“Julia,” he groaned, and tried to cover his face with his hands.  She stroked
his hair, and then he clung to her, his body rocking with the convulsive sobs
that wracked him.  

“It’s gonna be okay,” she whispered, “I promise, Chris, it’s gonna be —” 

“No,” he groaned, and sat up.  He stared at her with his eyes, glittering with
pain like broken shards of glass.  “I remember, Julia.  I remember it all.” 

She recoiled, suddenly stricken with horror, and as more pain passed over his
face, she cursed herself for her clumsiness.  

“It’s never happened before,” he said in a voice like a child, “never, never. 
I’ve never remembered — and then Joe was here, but he wasn’t Joe at all, he was
never Joe, and he was saying these things, these crazy things, and the things
he was doing, like he does, the way he was touching me —” Chris swallowed, and
another tear slid like a traitor down his face.  “And then I was different. 
Hot, and it hurt, and I was different, I wasn’t me.  It was like I was watching
myself from far away, and I couldn’t stop, I couldn’t stop, and I hurt him,
Julia, I hurt Not-Joe, but I didn’t just hurt him, I killed him and I ate him,
I ATE him, oh god Julia, oh GOD, and nothing will ever be all right again.” 

He collapsed against her again, and she held him and rocked him, and she tried
to smile at Barnabas as he draped a blanket over the young man’s vulnerable
body, but she knew, somewhere deep down inside, that Christopher was right. 
Nothing would ever be all right again. 

ACT II 

1 

"Miss Evans," Eliot Stokes said, and glared at the black-haired woman in the
floor-length ebnoy gown standing before him, "you must forgive an old man's
acerbic and potentially rude forthrightness, but I really have to say that you
haven't exactly give me reason to trust you these days." He paused, and added
carefully, "What with the company you keep." 

Maggie Evans batted her khol-lined lashes.  "Professor Stokes," she purred,
"there's no reason to take that tone with me.  You've known me since I was a
child.  Surely that's reason enough to speak to me now." 

Stokes' face hardened.  "Your father is dead," he said, but stepped aside to
allow Maggie entrance.  She brushed by him, a tiny smile dimpling her purple
lips, and let the black fur coat slip from her shoulders.  She hung it over the
arm of Stokes' favorite easy chair, then turned back to face him.  

"So you've heard all the village gossip," she said, and shrugged.  "What does
that matter to me?" 

"Not a lot these days, I'd wager.  Which is too bad, my dear.  If I didn't know
better, I'd say your attire is suitable for mourning.  Alas, I do know better."

"What on earth do you mean?" 

"Let's not play insane games, Miss Evans," Stokes thundered suddenly, and
Maggie recoiled a little.  "I know that you were responsible for Sam Evans'
death.  You ...  or whatever you've become." 

Maggie's eyes flashed, and for a moment — just a terrifying moment, Stokes
thought, and felt the world spin dizzily beneath him — they glowed a sinister
black.  Just like those of Victoria Winters, he realized.  It's the powers of
darkness, or how they manifest themselves.  The eyes are supposedly the windows
of the soul, so if the soul was corrupted ...  

Then the blackness faded away, if it was ever really there, and Maggie cocked
her head and smiled charmingly.  "Whatever I've become," she said, and added a
trill of musical laughter.  "Dear Professor Stokes, you are amusing.  Why, I've
become nothing more or less than I was before.  Well," she said, musing,
"perhaps a little more ..." 

"You have a purpose for visiting me tonight?" Stokes was finding it
increasingly difficult to maintain a stony wall of indifference when speaking
to her.  She was right.  He had known her since a child; why, she and his
daughter Alexis had skipped rope together down the sidewalk; Maggie would bring
him left-over slices of cherry pie from the diner some cold, blustery nights;
she had consulted him when she was thinking of leaving Colllinsport for college
in New York; she and Quentin were going to be married — 

But all that was a long time ago, Stokes thought, and warily eyed the
night-shaded young woman who now sat before him, legs crossed daintily, long
black-lacquered nails drumming airily on the arms of his easy chair.  A long
time ago indeed, and I'm nothing but an old, old man.  

"Over the past few months," Maggie said, and her teeth, Stokes noted, seemed
very white in her mouth, "you may have noticed that I've begun to play around
with a new hobby." 

"I'm going to assume that you are not referring to Nicholas Blair." 

Maggie laughed again.  "Touché, Professor." She sobered a little, but her eyes
were still dark and wicked.  "Nicholas is helping me reach my ...  potential, I
guess you might say, but I have recently realized that there are certain things
I would like to handle myself." She leaned forward, elbows on her knees.  "You
have something I am very much interested in obtaining." 

"I am not in the habit of loaning out anything that may be of value to a
practitioner of the supernatural," Stokes said with a tiny moue of disdain,
"particularly if their inclination seems as bent to the darkness as yours
does." 

"Darkness," Maggie said, and tittered, but her face was serious, and the pupils
threatened to swallow her entire eyes.  "Indeed.  But I'm afraid you're
mistaken, Professor Stokes.  I don't want you to loan me anything.  Rather, I
just want to pick your brain.  Yes, that's it.  I want ...  a little peek. 
That's all." She rose in one fluid motion from her chair, graceful and
ferocious and focused as a stalking panther, and he took a shambling half-step
backwards.  

"What do you want?" he barked, but he could hear the tremor in his voice. 
You're not a month out of the hospital yet, he scolded himself; get ahold of
yourself.  But it was difficult when a sorceress who was less of a novice than
he had anticipated was stalking him across his own living room.  Black sparks
had begun to jump and crackle between her fingers, and she was grinning in a
most unpleasant manner.  

"I told you," Maggie said.  "A peek, that's all.  A little tour of that big
frontal lobe of yours." Her voice was low and deceivingly gentle.  He supposed
she was supposed to sound soothing or cajoling.  Her pupils had completely
swallowed her eyes, and they were nothing but black, charred holes.  The air
around her was darkening in her eagerness.  Stokes could feel all the hair on
his arms beginning to stand up.  He stumbled backwards, hands outstretched
behind him, groping, and he bit down on his lip to prevent a cry from escaping
when he backed painfully into his desk, crammed haphazardly in a corner by the
fireplace.  

"What do you want to know?" he said, and his hands were digging about through
the papers on his desk, fumbling about.  I left it out, he thought, I left it
out after Julia and I had talked about Nicholas Blair, and how she believed he
was threatening her.  I know it's here, now focus, you soft, stupid old man,
focus and find it NOW!  "Maybe I can just tell you." 

"Oh, it's more fun this way," Maggie purred.  Her hair was blowing and drifting
about in a spectral wind, and her face had drained of color until she was like
salt, bleached and bony.  "Believe me." 

"What's happened to you, Maggie?" Stokes asked, and the despair in his voice
was real.  Where the hell is it?  he screamed inside, and tried to
inconspicuously knock over a stack of papers.  They spilled in a sheaf over his
fingers and see-sawed to the floor.  "You've changed, can't you feel it?" 

She was nearly upon him.  "Of course I can feel it," she said.  "I'm a hundred
times more the woman I used to be, a thousand.  You stupid, stupid man.  Can't
you see how powerful I've become?  It's in the air all around you.  And it's
me.  Can't you feel it?" 

And he could.  It sounded like a million voices screaming in pain thousands of
miles away; his skin prickled and crawled as if ants danced over its surface;
he smelled something charred and electrical.  And at that moment his fingers
closed around it, the blessed balm he had been seeking (but, he reminded
himself, had never tested, and there was no time like the present, was there?),
and he seized it and held it out before him.  

The effect was instantaneous.  

A surge of power like an invisible fist sewn inside his skin, his sinew, his
bones and his blood, rammed through his arm and ignited in the symbol he thrust
out.  It was made from bronze and was roughly a cross quartered in a circle; he
had bought it in an antique shop on his last trip to England more than ten
years before.  The owner of the shop had been a willowy woman with long red
hair, and she had assured him that it had protected one family in Devonshire
from a malicious witch for over a century.  Proven, never tested, he thought,
but the talisman was glowing with a fierce blue light, and Maggie Evans threw
her hands up before her face and cowered away from it with a shrill, feline
scream.  

"It burns!" she cried.  "Oh god, oh god, it burns!" 

"Get back," Stokes boomed, delirious with the sudden rush of power, and took a
step towards her.  She screamed again, and her arms pinwheeled as her feet
tangled together and she collapsed in an untidy heap.  

"Put it away," she moaned, and shook her clawed hands at him.  "Please, please,
you don't know, you just don't —" Her voice died off into a choked gurgle, and
she pressed her hands against her eyes.  

"I don't think that would be very wise, do you?" he asked pleasantly. 
"Considering what would happen to me if I did." 

"I'll leave you alone," Maggie cried.  "I swear, I swear —" 

"To whom, Miss Evans?  That's the question, isn't it." He knelt beside her, and
held the throbbing symbol very near to her cheek.  She tried to squirm away,
moaning and hissing, but her back was against the wall.  "Now this is
fascinating.  You're such a powerful witch — a baby witch, but a witch
nevertheless — and yet you're completely unable to dematerialize.  How
upsetting that must be for you at this moment." 

"Shut up," she spat.  A snarl of veins had stretched out across her face and
writhed now like thick worms about to burst their black guts across her
snow-white skin.  

"But only a moment ago you were so very intent on hearing what I had to say. 
Has that changed so much?" 

The look of hate in those inhuman, obsidian eyes would have frozen a man of
lesser years and an equal amount of experience in dealing with the
supernatural; fortunately for Eliot Stokes, he was, as they said in the
vernacular, very much seasoned.  

Her eyes narrowed.  Her lips, cracked now and as black as her eyes and hair,
tightened.  

Stokes pressed the amulet to her cheek.  

Maggie twisted away with a shriek, and cried, "The Mask!  The Mask!" 

He raised an eyebrow.  That rings a bell, he thought, but what sort of bell? 
"Mask?" 

"Of Ba'al," she snarled, panting like a dog.  "Nicholas told me about it, but I
sensed it myself.  A power greater, darker than anything I've ever felt before.
It's nearby, and I want it.  I need it." 

"The Mask of Ba'al," Stokes said.  "I've heard whispers of it.  It's been
thought legendary for centuries.  Not to mention irrevocably lost." 

"I sensed it," Maggie said, stubbornly, petulantly.  

"And Nicholas wants it." 

"I want it." 

"It supposedly imbues its wearer with so much magic that they become the most
powerful being in the universe." 

"Something like that." Maggie closed her eyes.  "But it's dangerous.  To ... 
to them." 

Stokes raised an eyebrow.  "Them?" Then he nodded.  "Ah, yes.  I see now.  The
Leviathans, of course." 

"Leviathans?" 

"Your boyfriend didn't tell you about them, did he.  They're old, my dear,
predating human civilization by at least a millennia.  Possibly more.  They
ruled this earth in a time when there was no man, no animals.  Only darkness —
the same darkness, I'd wager, that you're so fond of." Stokes removed the
amulet from her cheek, but cautiously, and she peered at him through slitted
eyelids, crafty, like a serpent.  "They're attempting to rise again, and when
they do, your life and the life of that miserable excuse for a warlock you
fancy won't be worth spit." Maggie opened her mouth; the amulet flashed blue
again, and she cringed back.  

"Let me go," she whimpered.  

"That wouldn't be very wise.  No, Miss Evans, I'm afraid we still have a few
things left to talk about.  Like why, for instance, you came calling instead of
Mr.  Nicholas Blair." Stokes smiled a little.  "Oh, of course.  He doesn't know
you're here, does he." She glared at him; he held up the amulet, and she
growled, then nodded miserably.  "I thought not.  You came here hoping that I
could show you an easy way to the Mask of Ba'al so that you could don it
yourself.  You were going to betray Nicholas, and why shouldn't you?  All that
power, just waiting for you, all that power untapped, all for you, just for
you.  You like power don't you?  And why not?  You've never had it before. 
Never tasted it.  And once you have the Mask you'll be truly free, won't you. 
You wouldn't need Nicholas Blair or your father —" 

"Shut up." 

"— or Quentin Collins —" 

"Shut up!" 

"— or anyone else, ever again." Stokes leaned back on his heels, satisfied. 
Tears streaked down her cheeks, and as he watched, the fat veins disappeared,
and the black faded from her hair and her eyes, and roses flooded her cheeks,
and she was Maggie Evans again, that simple hometown girl who only wanted to
not be alone ever again, who only wanted someone to love her.  She leaned
forward and fell into his arms, and he held her and rocked her, until she
pushed herself away with a groan and covered her face in her hands.  He watched
her, unsure what she would do next, but he kept a tight grip on the amulet. 
But something was broken inside of her, he thought, something has changed. 
We'll just have to see what.  

She looked at him through big brown eyes, familiar eyes, and whispered, "I'm so
sorry.  I'm so, so ...  sorry." 

"You have a lot to be sorry for." 

"I can't stop," she said, and snuffled once, and wiped the tears from her
cheeks.  "I'm sorry, but it's ...  it's too late for me.  I can't stop.  I
don't even know if I want to stop, Professor Stokes.  All of this ...  the
power, god, the power, and you don't know —" She broke off, and stared in
guilty silence at her hands, warring with each other in the lap of her soiled
black evening gown.  "I can't.  I just —" 

"It's possible that it's too late," Stokes said, "and I can't tell you what you
should do.  I'm not your father." She winced, and he thought that was, perhaps,
a good sign.  

"This was the first thing in my life I was ever good at." The pain in her eyes
was huge, a cavity, a maw.  The darkness was still there, and it roiled inside
her uneasily.  "Who was I before this?  Before Nicholas?  Nobody.  A dumb,
smalltown hick, a waitress.  I was nobody.  Not good enough for ...  for
anyone.  Then everything changed, I changed, and I was making a difference. 
All of a sudden.  I changed things, Professor Stokes, me, Maggie Evans, and I'm
more now than I ever was before." 

"I'm not going to judge you, Maggie.  Everyone has choices to make.  Your life
is what you make of it.  But you have to be strong; you can't be carried along
in a rushing tide of events, never reacting, never stepping outside the bounds.
You'll lose yourself for real, and you might never come back.  Choose, Maggie,
but whatever you do, choose to be strong.  Choose for yourself.  You cannot let
anyone else choose for you." 

"I don't know," she whispered.  "I'm so tired, Professor.  I'm just so tired."
She leaned her head against his shoulder.  "I can't ...  I can't choose now.  I
don't know what to do." She touched his hand.  "Please help me.  Please." 

He patted her hair.  "Go back to Nicholas.  Go home.  Do what you have to do. 
And come back to me when you decide.  I'll be here whenever you need me,
Maggie, I promise." 

And he meant it.  He just hoped she believed him.  

2 

Sky's face was grim as they drove towards Collinwood; it loomed above them,
waiting like a crouched, watchful beast at the end of the winding road that led
up the hill.  Angelique shivered; she hated it.  But Sky was here, and she
wasn't sure how that made her feel.  We're so alike after all, she thought, and
shouldn't that make us perfect for each other?  But I just don't know.  I don't
know if I'll ever be really sure.  Or comfortable.  Or safe.  

"I can feel it," he said, and she just blinked at him.  His face in the
darkness was white, but Hecate, he was a handsome man.  His jaw was like iron,
square and beautiful, and his eyes were gray and flinty.  I missed him so much,
she thought now, and felt a pang inside her like metal striking metal; I didn't
know how much I missed him until he was back again, and I love him, and I can't
help it.  "I can feel it, all that darkness.  It's like poison up here.  Like a
cloud.  What's going on there, Angelique?  What's happening?" 

"I don't know," she said, and chewed at her fingernails.  She examined them
suddenly in the green glow of the dashboard, and frowned.  She'd chewed them
down until they were ragged.  A drop of blood, perfect, like a black pearl in
the darkness, had bloomed from one torn cuticle.  "It's changing things,
whatever it is.  And people.  Everyone at Collinwood, for all I know." 

"And you're sure." 

"Sure?" She laughed, a hard sound, too hard.  Too much like old times.  The
laughter choked and died in her throat and suddenly she was just tired.  "I'm
not sure of anything anymore." 

"About the effect this ...  whatever it is will have on the world." He was
staring straight ahead, not looking at her.  She suddenly felt very cold.  

But determined.  

"Yes," she said as they pulled into the driveway.  "Whatever is responsible for
changing things the way they have can only be stopped by magic, or some other
supernatural force.  There is no other answer, Sky.  I can feel the darkness
too.  It's ...  difficult." She dropped her eyes, then opened them wide when
she felt his hand slip into hers.  He squeezed, and she returned it gratefully.
 
Then the contact was broken, and he slid out of the car and began to march,
very much the business man, towards Collinwood.  She followed him, holding her
breath.  

"Angelique!" 

And froze in her tracks.  It was Julia calling to her from the edge of the
trees, and as Angelique turned to greet her, she saw that someone else was with
her.  

Barnabas.  

My god, it's Barnabas.  

He couldn't meet her eyes either, but his face was white in all the darkness,
and he seemed ...  ashamed?  

"Angelique?" It was Sky beside her, running his arm around her waist, holding
her tight ...  and she breathed a sigh of relief.  Because she hadn't wanted to
pull away, hadn't wanted to run to Barnabas.  That part of her life was over;
she saw that now, finally.  Barnabas Collins was in her past, safely, where he
belonged.  Sky was her future.  She loved him, and he loved her, and she would
die for him.  How nice it felt to admit that.  She snuggled against him.  

"Barnabas," Angelique said, and her voice was soft, and gentle, completely
unlike the voice some of them knew, "Julia.  This is Sky Rumson.  My husband." 

And that was that.  It was easy; why had she always been so afraid?  

Barnabas was shaking Sky's hand, and Sky shot her a quick glance, because he
could feel how cold the other man's hands were.  

"Sky is here to help," Angelique said, because Julia's eyes were very wide, and
her nostrils were flaring like a frightened horse, and of course, Angelique
realized, it has to be because she's in the presence of a warlock ten thousand
times more powerful than Nicholas Blair.  "He's on our side, Julia.  Everything
is going to be all right." 

Julia nodded, but she still didn't trust him.  Angelique couldn't be bothered
with that right now.  There were a thousand things more important, and one of
them was before them.  Collinwood.  More than sinister, sheathed in shadows,
looming above them with one light burning.  

"It's there," Sky said, and his voice was slightly strangled.  "I can feel it. 
Pulsing, like in waves." He closed his eyes.  "Something's happening up there. 
There's power, and ...  and someone is trying —" He gritted his teeth.  "Damn. 
I can't see it, exactly, but I can feel it." He held up his hands, and stared
at them all simply.  "I'm draining." And Barnabas.  "Can't you feel it?" 

Barnabas nodded slowly.  "A little," he said.  "I think.  A little pulling,
like a tug." He tapped his forehead.  "Up here." 

"It's Victoria," Julia said.  She looked at the ground and shuffled her feet a
little, and her fingers drummed against her thigh.  She wants a cigarette,
Angelique thought wisely; I don't believe I've ever seen her without one.  

"How do you know?" Barnabas sounded concerned, but wary at the same time.  

Julia's voice was flat, completely without emotion.  "Because they know," she
said.  "I know what's happening to Vicki because they know it too.  And they
hate it." 

"Julia," Barnabas said, "who are you talking about?" 

She stared at him for a moment, and her face was blank and white in the
moonlight.  "The Leviathans," she said.  

3 

Roger Collins was possessed yet again, and he loathed it, mostly because it
made him very tired.  He sat on the child's bed and stared at his hands, folded
in his lap, and ground his teeth together as pain like the slashing of machetes
gored and gouged his brain.  His vision was black in places and red in others,
and his entire body pulsed and was numb, then pulsed, and then became numb
again.  But he couldn't move, even if he wanted to, because they didn't want
him to.  And he had to listen to them.  He had to obey.  They lived in his
brain, and they hissed like a nest of serpents.  

Amy Jennings raged before him, her tiny hands now tiny fists, and as he watched
she slammed one viciously against the wall of her room.  She left a little mark
behind, and plaster puffed out of it in a plume of white plaster.  He winced;
Liz would never forgive him if she knew what he'd seen and hadn't done anything
about.  "That bitch," Amy spat, "that vicious dog-bitch." Roger closed his
eyes.  To hear a child speak such abominations ...  it was ...  well,
abominable.  Amy turned and glared at him with flat, hooded cobra-eyes.  "She's
going to ruin absolutely everything." 

"Maybe that's for the best," Roger said.  Exhaustion — the kind of exhaustion
that came from three months of an hour of sleep a night (or sometimes less) —
made his voice brittle.  Even living with Laura had given him better peace of
mind.  

"You don't dare to speak like that," Amy said, and her voice was dangerous.  

"Why not?" Roger said, and managed to smile a little.  "What's the worst your
people can do to me?  Kill me?  That would be a blessing at this point." 

"We can kill your son," Amy said.  "We can kill your sister and your niece and
all your friends.  We can do it in front of you.  Make you watch.  Make you
drink their blood if we want.  We can do anything.  You shouldn't forget that."

Roger bowed his head.  "Right," he said.  "You're omnipotent.  I'll try to
remember." 

"Won't matter soon," Amy said.  "She can only block us for so long.  And she
won't want to soon." 

"How is it possible that she's blocking you now?  You all being so omnipotent."

Amy's face went dark.  It was a terrifying expression, a look so black and so
murderous, resting on the porcelain features of a child.  But it flitted away a
moment later, and Roger understood that, for all her posturing and snarling,
Amy had no real power.  Neither did the monsters that possessed her and spoke
through her in such obscenities.  That didn't mean that they wouldn't
eventually, but for now — 

"Because of her father," Amy said.  "Do you remember her father?" 

Roger stared at her.  "Vicki is an orphan," he said.  "How on earth could I
possibly know —" He broke off.  An idea was dawning on him, a most unpleasant
idea, and he suddenly felt like the world's greatest prat.  

"You're beginning to understand," Amy said, "if that astounded chimpanzee look
on your face is any indication." 

"Fenn-Gibbon," Roger whispered.  "That awful, that beastly man —" 

Amy nodded.  

"Oh dear lord," Roger said.  His face was very pale.  "I saw the resemblance to
Louise, of course, but I thought that's why Liz hired her.  Sentimental
reasons.  She said the baby died with Louise." 

"She lied to you." 

"And Fenn-Gibbon ...  Victor ...  Victoria.  Of course." He thought he might
vomit.  "Liz always said he had powers, and I never believed her." 

Amy's face was smug.  "Bet you know a thing or two about power now, don't you."

"And he was one of you?" 

"He promised to bring us back," Amy said.  "His powers were vast.  Like the
scope of the universe.  But she undid him.  His own daughter.  Trapped him,
never to return." Her smile was crafty again.  "Unless." 

"Unless?" 

"Unless she becomes one of us.  Accepts her destiny, as it was meant to be." 

"And what is her destiny?" 

"She will open the way for us.  For our leader.  Through Victoria Winters, the
Leviathans will take back this world.  We will claim it from our place beyond
the sea, from the darkest of the darkest depths.  It will be ours again.  All
dark.  Forever." Amy crossed her arms and smiled beatifically.  "I think it's
time we bring some authority to our presence." A shadow of greed flitted across
her face.  "Do you have it?" 

Roger nodded.  "I stole it from Carolyn." He held it up; it caught the light
and sparkled.  

Amy snatched it from his hand and watched it, her face alight with a child's
simple sense of wonder.  It dangled on the end of Paul Stoddard's silver chain;
a horrible thing, a totem, a talisman.  It was crystal and jade and emerald and
ivory and was carved in the shape of a serpent with two heads.  Their eyes were
rubies.  

"Yes," Amy hissed, "I think the time has come.  The time has come at last." 

ACT THREE 

1 

Vicki fell back on her knees with a keening wail of desperation and
frustration.  The power that crackled obsidian fire between her fingers
dissipated and fell away, and she felt it all begin to cool and fade away
inside her.  The black in her eyes faded to brown.  She slammed a fist against
the carpet, and felt hot tears begin to course down her cheeks.  She wiped them
away with the back of her arm, but more fell in their place.  

She didn't understand, she didn't understand at all, and that was the most
frustrating.  She was powerful.  She knew it, could feel it; everytime she
opened that door within herself she knew it grew a little wider, a little more
difficult to close, but it was worth it, because the power inside was like a
great furnace.  It came from her; she was the power, and it had always been
enough before.  She had undone Count Petofi's mind switch with Quentin, trapped
the Count within his own ring, brought Professor Stokes back from the darkness
of his coma, freed Carolyn from the grip of the Roget-thing and banished said
thing to a dimension of unspeakable torment, saved David from the Leviathans,
and fried two threatening vampires to a crisp.  She wasn't just powerful; she
was the power itself.  So why couldn't she bring her lover back from the abyss?

"I can't give up," she thought, and tottered back to her feet.  She stood
before him, swaying a little, and stared down at him ...  and for just a moment
felt a bolt of something so pure, so vile, swim through her that at first she
couldn't identify it.  And when she did, her mouth fell open and she shook her
head in vehement denial.  

Hatred.  A hatred so black and consuming that it had threatened, momentarily,
to overwhelm her, and she had almost — 

Almost what?  Given up?  

And not just that.  

Bile rose in her throat in a burning tide, and she covered her face with her
hands and sobbed helplessly.  

I almost gave up, she thought, and that means nothing more than letting the
power take over, a living tide, a thing of blackness; I almost let it take over
...  and I almost burned my lover to a crisp.  And I could do it.  With little
effort.  With no effort.  Just ...  give up.  

"No," she snarled.  "There has to be a way.  I can fix this.  I can do it." 

She raised her hands and willed the power to rise in her again, and felt the
door spring open and a tide of something, roiling and black and awesome, build
inside her, huge and leaping like fire like love like a tide hot fearsome
ferocious insatiable hot hot and cold nothing like cold ice ice ice — 

"NO!" And someone slammed against her and knocked her to the ground, and the
power fell apart into invisible shards, and she cried out, a cheated, wounded
wail.  

There were people in the door, three faces, pale and chalky, like sheep, and
the man before her, the man rising to his feet and staring at her like some new
specimen of monster, this was someone new, someone she'd never seen before in
her life, and how dare he — 

"I'm sorry," the stranger said sheepishly, and offered her her his hand. 
Dazed, she took it, and allowed him to pull her to her feet.  "I didn't mean to
do it like that.  But the air — I mean, I've seen things like that before I
guess, but never so black.  And I've never heard it scream like that, the air
...  like something alive.  Like something was killing it.  And I didn't want
you to be hurt." 

"Vicki —" one of the doorway people said, and it was Barnabas, and his face was
like paper.  Barnabas is back!  some distant part of her thought, and then she
saw him — really saw him — and she knew what had happened to him.  Again. 
Somehow.  And it all began to make a lot of sense.  

"Who are you?" she asked the man who had tackled her like a linebacker.  He was
handsome in a dull sort of way; lantern jaw, tousled brown hair, dark eyes. 
And then she felt him, without even intending to do so, felt inside him, and
she recoiled.  There was a darkness there, like a seed planted deep inside,
like a tree, but stunted and dead, cut off and away, but a darkness
nonetheless.  A power.  Potent.  And tappable.  She licked her lips.  

And he saw her do it.  

"My name is Schuylar Rumson," he said.  "And you're Victoria Winters." 

"Now that's hardly fair," she said, and tossed her head coquettishly.  "You
know me, and I don't know a thing about you." 

He scowled at her, and she felt that pang of fear again, distantly, and she
hated it, because he did know — he could see inside her just as well as she
could see in him, and it made her afraid.  Afraid and ashamed.  "I don't think
that's true now, do you?" he said, and smiled, but his eyes were flinty and
watchful.  

She opened her mouth to reply, and then saw the others in the doorway, lurking
beside the vampire-man-then- vampire-again, and her the words died in her
throat.  Dark, bitter amusement replaced them, and she couldn't help but laugh.
"Well, well, well," she chuckled.  "If it isn't Cassandra Collins.  Or is it
Miranda tonight?  It's so hard to keep up with you." 

Angelique quailed, and Vicki laughed again.  She could smell the fear coming
off of her in waves; it was a terrible smell, an irritating smell, like iron
shavings, like spoiled tomato sauce, like curdled milk.  It made her want to
darken, to reach inside herself and — 

Sky Rumson dropped a hand over hers, and Vicki bared her teeth, but froze under
his forcible — and yet somehow deeply patient and ...  and god, caring — stare,
and found that she couldn't move at all.  "Don't," he said simply.  "You don't
want to hurt anybody else, do you?" 

Her eyes narrowed.  "I don't know what you mean," she said icily.  

"Quentin!" Julia cried, and knelt beside him.  Vicki had to quash the urge to
knock her aside with an energy bolt.  Besides, she thought, annoyed, Mr. 
Schuylar Rumson would probably just get in the way.  Whoever — or whatever —
the hell he is.  

Julia pressed her fingers against Quentin's limp wrist, and then against his
throat.  "He's alive," she said, brow furrowed.  "His pulse is steady.  I don't
understand —" 

Vicki rolled her eyes.  

Sky joined Julia next to Quentin, and placed his fingers against the other
man's temples, then closed his eyes.  "He's gone," he said after a moment. 
"Quentin Collins is not at home." 

Angelique rushed to his side.  "What does that mean?" she cried.  "Sky?  What's
the matter with him?" 

"I was trying to help," Vicki said, "when Mr.  Rumson knocked me down." 

Sky raised an eyebrow.  "Tried to help him?  Miss Winters, you're responsible
for his condition." 

Vicki felt blood rushing crimson to her cheeks, and railed at herself that she
was unable to stop herself from something so simple — so human — as blushing.  

Barnabas was staring at her with something like horror, and for a moment (and
only a moment) she felt the blush in her cheeks again.  From shame.  But that
ice inside her rose again, and she returned his gaze levelly until he looked
away, his eyes low with guilt.  

"The power," Sky said quietly.  "There's a lot of it inside you, isn't there." 

Vicki said nothing.  

Sky shrugged.  "Must be important to you.  Has to be, if you were willing to do
whatever it was you did to him." He jerked a thumb in Quentin's direction.  

"You don't know anything," Vicki said.  

"Sure I do," Sky said.  He stood beside her now, and something was rising in
him.  Vicki could feel all the hair on her body beginning to stand up, and a
tiny spark of terror broke through the sheath of ice inside her.  "I know you. 
I can feel you, Victoria Collins." 

Vicki gasped and tried to move away, but she couldn't.  She was bound to the
floor, and Sky was very near to her.  

"Who are you?" she whispered.  There were tears in her eyes, and they hurt,
they burned and they dug at her, but she couldn't blink them away.  

"That's who you are, isn't it?  A Collins?  You know it, but it doesn't matter.
 All that matters is now.  I can feel the power inside you, Victoria.  I had a
lot of power once too.  Might be that I still do.  I'm not really sure.  To be
honest, I'm a little afraid to test it out." His eyes were glowing now, the
pupils dilating and contracting, dilating and contracting; red lightning
flashed inside them, and crackled between his fingers.  

"Sky —" Angelique said, her voice tense with worry.  

"So much power," Sky said, his voice soft and caressing, and his eyes were
totally black now.  "It's dangerous.  Alluring, but difficult.  Such a burden. 
Why don't you just let me —" And suddenly, quick as a cat, quick as lightning,
quicker than time and in the taking of a breath, he slammed one hand against
Vicki's breast.  She arched backwards and tried to scream; her eyes flew open
and glowed a dark, hellish obsidian; a surge of power, black, always black,
flowed out of her and into Sky Rumson; he stumbled backwards but was held aloft
by the energy around him that now began to glow a feverish red.  With that same
devil's speed he spun around and placed both his hands on the temples of
Quentin Collins.  The power around him faded to a soft pink; Sky's breathing
came in huge, snuffling gasps; "Suscito!" he commanded, and "Sentio!  Cogito!" 

And Quentin sat up with a surge of power; his eyes bulged, and he opened his
mouth to suck in a huge gasp of air.  Sky fell backwards, drained, exhausted,
and the power around him snapped and popped, then finally dissipated.  

"Quentin!" Julia cried, and scrambled forward to examine him.  

He blinked at her with wide blue eyes, but still dull and dazed.  "V-Vicki?" he
whispered.  His voice was harsh and his breathing labored; he placed a hand to
his forehead and winced.  He shook his head, as if to clear his thoughts, and
then let his eyes scan the people before him.  Sky Rumson had sank to his knees
with his head down, breathing deeply and then exhaling slowly and carefully;
Angelique sat at his side, one hand on his shoulder, but her face was shadowed
with trouble; Barnabas cradled Vicki in his arms, and held her as her head
drooped backwards and her eyes fluttered.  

"What happened?" Quentin asked, then clutched his head again.  "Ow," he
murmured.  

"You don't remember?" Julia monitored him carefully.  

"I don't ...  it's hard to remember," he said.  "Or to think at all." His eyes
fell on Barnabas and Vicki, and he tried to sit up, then fell backwards onto
the sofa.  "Vicki," he groaned.  "How is she?  What happened to her?" 

Sky lifted his head.  "That's what we're trying to figure out, Mr.  Collins." 

Quentin scowled at him.  "Who the hell are you?" 

"Schuylar Rumson." Quentin's eyes darted to Angelique, and widened as she
nodded.  "I brought you back, Mr.  Collins.  Don't ask me from where; I'm not
sure I could tell you even if I did know.  A dark place.  Cold.  Not ...  not
somewhere I'd want to be." 

"And Barnabas ..." Quentin said in a near whisper.  

Julia squeezed his hand.  "We have a lot to discuss, Quentin," she said, and
her voice was thin, like paper.  

Vicki groaned and opened her eyes, and they were brown and lucid.  She blinked,
and rubbed her forehead.  "Hurts," she whispered.  She looked into Barnabas'
eyes, then scuttled away from him, shaking her head and whimpering.  

"Sky?" Angelique whispered.  Her hand trembled in his.  

"I'm fine," he said, but his face was pale and his hands were shaking like
little birds.  "Miss Winters ...  Victoria ...?" 

Vicki opened her mouth, then closed it, and dropped her head.  "Oh," she said,
and then, "Oh ..." and covered her face with her hands.  Her shoulders shook,
and her hair, now more than half a fall of snowy white, fell about her like a
shroud.  They watched her silently, unsure, all of them, their faces white and
their eyes wide and their mouths tightly closed.  Finally she lifted her head
and blinked at them, and her face was strained and wet with tears.  "I'm
sorry," she said; her voice grated and cracked, and her eyes were wide with
misery.  "I'm so ...  sorry." 

No one said a word.  

They're afraid of me, Vicki thought, and looked at her hands.  They were small
and nicely shaped, even though one of her nails was chipped.  Nice hands, she
thought, pretty little hands.  That could end the world right now, if I wished
it to be so.  

She wanted to cover her face again and moan.  

Instead, she said, "I don't know what you did, Mr.  Rumson ...  but thank you. 
So ...  so much." 

Sky nodded.  He still looked drained, but the color was returning to his
cheeks.  Vicki watched the two of them, Angelique and Schuylar Rumson, and
thought how much in love they seemed, their hands linked, their eyes returning
to each other every few seconds.  She felt a stab of jealousy, then willed it
away.  It went, easily, like leaves drifting away in a gentle wind.  She looked
to Quentin, then looked away.  I can't ever have him, she thought remotely,
never touch him.  Ever again.  Not after ...  

She swallowed.  It felt like glass in her throat.  

"Sorry," she said, and watched her hands.  "God." 

2 

Later, Julia watched the moon sailing through the sky, and puffed distractedly
on her cigarette.  It's not a man, she thought, and shivered a little; at
least, not a living man.  It's like a skull in the sky.  Always watching us. 
Always aware ...  but dead just the same.  Just ...  dead.  

Barnabas put a hand on her shoulder, and she jumped a little.  His fingers were
cold and hard, like marble, like a statue.  He tried to smile, but it didn't
fit his face very well; it was hard too, and mask-like.  "I'm sorry for
everything I've ever put you through," he said, and though his face was cold
and watchful, his voice was warm.  Tender.  "Julia," he said, as if tasting her
name.  

She shrugged.  "Occupational hazard," she said.  It was mid-March, and the wind
sailing over and across her was still jagged with a hint of ice and redolent of
the salt of the sea.  Not usually an unpleasant odor, but tonight ...  tonight,
the associations were just a little too ...  

She didn't know.  

"You're going to be fine," Barnabas said.  "So is Vicki.  So is everyone at
Collinwood.  We will fight these things; we'll beat them back.  Humankind has
done it before.  We will prevail." 

"I'm afraid, Barnabas," she said softly.  He put his arm around her shoulder
and drew her close.  "I can feel them all the time now.  Watching ... 
listening.  Waiting.  They're like ...  like snakes in my brain." 

"Professor Stokes can help." 

"He's a part of it too." 

"But he's fighting.  So can you." 

She closed her eyes.  "Oh Barnabas," she whispered, "Barnabas, I want to.  So
badly.  These creatures are responsible for so much pain and suffering.  Vicki
..." Her voice trailed off, and for a moment she seemed to go deep inside
herself.  She returned with a tiny start.  He watched her questioningly.  "I've
seen her like that before," she said at last.  "When she brought Eliot back
from his coma.  I was scared then, but she was nothing like she was tonight. 
The air — the air around her was screaming, Barnabas, like it was in pain. 
Like it was dying.  And it was all black." 

"She's afraid now.  She's promised to stop." 

"I don't think it's that easy," Julia said, and worried her lower lip.  "Her
power comes from Petofi, and Petofi is a part of the Leviathans somehow." 

"She told us.  She's fighting too.  She has been, it sounds like, for awhile. 
She cured David —" 

"And she nearly killed Quentin.  Her powers are dangerous and uncontrollable,
Barnabas, and who knows how long this ...  this abstinence will last?  She has
a taste for it now; it's in her blood.  Like an addiction." 

"You forget," Barnabas said.  "I know how that feels." 

She touched his hand, his cold, dead hand, and did not shudder or tremble.  "Oh
Barnabas," she said.  "I could never forget.  But look at you.  You've
conquered your demons, and these were the literal kind.  You could have chosen
to continue down that path, that darkness, but you didn't.  You came back." 

"I have so much to make up for," Barnabas said.  "Sabrina Stuart —" His voice
choked off.  

"We're going to make it better," Julia said, and squeezed his hand.  "I
promise." 

He broke away from her, pulling his fingers from hers, and she frowned, but
forced her forehead to smooth again.  She followed him to the door of Chris'
cottage.  No lights burned, but Julia figured that he was sleeping it off. 
They had disposed of Nathan Forbes' body after Julia had given Chris a sedative
and put him to bed.  It's really very sad, Julia had thought at the time,
helping Barnabas drag the tarp-covered body while ducking branches, that we
have to plan where to bury the bodies now.  The forest near Collinwood is full
of 'em.  

Barnabas didn't bother knocking; he simply faded through the door.  Julia
frowned again, and wondered if he even realized that he had done it.  The
vampire inside him is stronger than he thinks, she told herself; we have to be
careful.  Not out of the woods quite yet.  

"Julia!" Barnabas cried, and the alarm in his voice spurred her to running. 
She dashed through the door, her long green coat flapping behind her like
wings, and she nearly stumbled before she came to a complete stop.  He was
standing next to the kitchen table, a note held tight in his hands.  "It's from
Chris," he said, and handed it to her.  

B AND J, it read, I'M SORRY.  DIDN'T TAKE THE SEDATIVE.  HAVE TO GET AWAY. 
FROM HERE.  FROM THIS TOWN.  FROM JOE AND FROM EVERYONE.  THE ANIMAL IS THERE
ALL THE TIME NOW, AND I DON'T KNOW WHAT THE MEANS ANYMORE.  I DON'T WANT TO
HURT ANYBODY ELSE.  I'LL CALL.  TAKE CARY OF AMY.  PLEASE DON'T TRY TO FIND ME.
I'M SORRY.  

She let the note sail from her fingers and see-saw lazily down to the floor. 
They stared at each other wordlessly for a moment.  "He's gone," she said at
last.  A tear ran from one eye down her cheek, and she made no move to brush it
away.  Her chest felt heavy and hot.  Her fingers itched.  "He's really gone." 

"Dammit," Barnabas growled.  

"My fault," Julia said.  "All my fault." 

"You were trying to help him." 

"Some help I turned out to be.  He's even worse off than he was before." Her
eyes widened with terror.  "Barnabas," she said, clutching at his arm,
"Barnabas, you don't suppose he went off to ...  to ..." She couldn't even say
it.  

Barnabas shook his head slowly.  "I can sense him," he admitted at last. 
"Things are different now, Julia.  For me.  For Vicki.  Even for Sky Rumson. 
The Leviathans are a power of darkness none of us have ever encountered before,
and somehow they're heightening our powers as well.  It frightens me ...  but I
can still sense Christopher Jennings.  He's far from here by now — I couldn't
follow him if my life depended on it, or his, or yours — but still alive.  And
powerful.  He'll go far from here, I'm sure ...  but I think he'll be back." 

"Poor Amy," Julia said.  "I'll have to tell her tomorrow." 

"If she is as Vicki says, you may not have to worry.  I don't think the real
Amy Jennings is in there anymore." 

"Oh god," Julia said, and she couldn't stop crying, even as she folded herself
into his arms, "oh god, Barnabas, what are we going to do?  What can we do?" 

He held her out before him and stared into her eyes.  "What we always do,
Julia.  What we will continue to do.  What we have to.  

"We'll survive." 

3 

And this is the way that awful night, that dreadful night, that long and
terrible (and miles to go before they sleep) night, finally, irrevocably ends: 

Chris Jennings places his chin in the palm of his hand, and watches the scenery
speed by him, now gently bathed in the rose of the early morning sun.  He has
never felt so alive in his life, and this terrifies him.  He can feel the
darkness pulsing like a heartbeat as he leaves Collinsport behind.  He needs to
be away from humans, any humans, all humans.  Somewhere quiet, with trees,
maybe mountains.  A place he can think.  And sleep.  Sleep with no dreams.  He
closes his eyes.  God, what he would give to not dream.  

Angelique Rumson lies in the arms of the man she loves, and places her head on
Sky's barrel chest.  Their lovemaking was fierce at first, frantic in its
intensity and the heat of their desire, but ended quietly, gently, less a bang
but never a whimper.  I'm afraid, she tells him now, I can't help it; it's
silly I know but I'm afraid.  Of me?  he asks.  She nods.  She has to.  She can
never lie to him again.  I saw you, Sky, she says, and a tear slips unbidden
from her eye.  I saw what it did to you, and I'm sorry I ever — No, he says,
and touches her lips with one fingertip.  He is serious, but his love for her
bathes her in warmth, and it's okay.  She feels that; everything is going to be
okay.  You were right, Sky says, and strokes her hair.  I have to help.  It'll
be hard, but I have to.  I don't have any other choice.  This is something I
have to do.  To make it all right again.  And you will, she whispers in his
ear, and she loves him again, as she has never loved him before, but deep down,
she is still afraid.  

Maggie Evans whispers one word under her breath as she approaches the House by
the Sea: infusco, she says, and can feel the magic work as her hair changes
from a dark copper to a fathomless, shiny obsidian.  Nicholas mustn't know what
has happened this night.  He's a fool really, a victim of his own vanity. 
Easily disposed of.  And she told Professor Stokes the truth.  She can't stop,
and she doesn't think she ever will.  A door has opened inside her, and it's
far too late to close it now.  But she's moved beyond Nicholas, beyond evil,
beyond feeling.  This might have frightened her once.  It doesn't now.  She
slips through the door like a shadow, and glides up the stairs.  He's in bed. 
Waiting for her.  Smirking.  His face is a weasel's.  She can't even hate him. 
He doesn't speak; he slips inside her, but she is already occupied.  She is
Maggie Evans.  She is darkness.  

Julia Hoffman administers an injection of her newly developed serum into
Barnabas' arm.  She'll prepare one for Carolyn later in the afternoon, after
she allows herself a long nap.  It won't do any good.  She'll dream.  She
doesn't want to; she fears the dreams; she fears the voices; she fears herself.
The needle slides into Barnabas' skin like a fang, and he doesn't wince.  She
wonders if he even feels it.  When it's all over he squeezes her hand.  I don't
know what I'd do without you, he says.  She looks at him.  Looks at the
syringe.  Catches a glimpse of her reflection in a beaker.  Alone.  Talking to
herself.  Talking to a ghost.  She looks at the syringe.  She looks at him. 
Let's hope we never find out, she says.  

Victoria Winters (never Collins, she thinks darkly, and then wills the darkness
away) watches the sea rage beneath her from where she stands near the edge of
Widow's Hill.  The ledge should crumble away beneath me, she thinks; it would
be an easy death, the one I deserve.  I don't think I can do this.  I don't
think I can stop.  I don't know if I can leave the black garden, oh god, oh god
I just don't know.  When Quentin appears behind her she can sense him, and is
disturbed by the fact that she can sense him, but she doesn't protest when he
slides his arms around her and pulls her to him.  He nuzzles her gently.  You
could never hurt me, he says, and breathes deeply into her hair.  There's more
white than dark now.  He pretends not to notice.  We can watch the sunrise from
here, he whispers into her ear.  It's a beautiful spot.  You're beautiful.  I
love you, Victoria.  I have always loved you.  She turns to kiss him, without
words, without tears, and though she knows she can never touch him she is
touching him, because his love for her is pure and white and it will redeem
her, and god and everyone, she wants to be redeemed.  I just hope it isn't too
late, she thinks, but while she's in the arms of Quentin Collins, she knows
that everything is going to be all right.  

And the sea continues to sing its ancient song.  

TO BE CONTINUED ...