Giles felt the car’s seat under his rear, the slick, nubbled wheel in his hands. The setting sun gleamed from a second story window and the engine ticked lightly. Tiffany had her gloved hand on the back of his. Her gloves were smooth, sophisticated.

He was the teller of this tale. In some reality he already stood on the stage, telling it. “It were best to retell that last bit,” she’d suggested. She waited for his decision.

He yearned for Melanie Greyfire across the years, felt raw and bleeding the pain he had numbed out when she died. But what did he really yearn for? He could barely remember her face except that she’d had brown hair and been good looking. What did he remember of her or their time together that was truly about her and not about himself?

That moment in the car when she had awakened with a little yawn, smiled sleepily at him and set his heart glowing.

Now Tiffany sat beside him in a car. He had born her from the desert up to here and she sat, calm and capable, beside him as the day became lighted small-town evening. She might not ever love him as he wanted but she was ready to help him. And much as he wanted to know exactly who she was, exactly where he stood, exactly what she wanted… much as he wanted that clarity, he could not have it. She had answered him but he had known on some level that he could not hear her answer, not yet.

He must be in this story and live it and let the answers come as they would. Or at least, he must learn the answers through his own cleverness and not because he looked ahead to the last page.

“We’d better try to get into the festival on the QT,” he said, weeping for everything he was letting go, but accepting. “I’m not sure where the ‘real me’ is supposed to be at this moment, but I’m sure he’s not supposed to be gallivanting across half the state.”

Instantly, she replied, as though he had never said or asked anything else. “Agreed. Turn off this main thoroughfare and park on a side street. We shall walk and unless I’m thoroughly off my game, I can get us past any guards they can throw at us.”

Her gloved hand squeezed his and he looked over at her. She looked deep into his eyes, gave a little nod, a sweet sharing of a secret that was just for him, and then released his hand and climbed out the door.

***

“None of this is strange to you, little one, is it?” The old woman’s dark eyes were like lasers as she at last looked directly into Jasmine’s, her story finished.

Jasmine shook her head, wondering if Doree had screamed when the man fell from the sky and bashed his head (she refused to think of any gory details). Would Tiffany, who Doree had become, would Tiffany remember it now that old Rootiger (she was still sure she spelled it wrong in her head) had changed the world?

“Was today,” she asked, “the first time you went up to that place all on your own? I mean, without getting pulled there by magic?”

The old woman seemed surprised. “I guess so. I didn’t want to go up there ever again but then this reporter, he’s asking me these questions and I just knew it was time at last. So I took him up there. Now I think of it, strange to see the place just a little older. I’m so used to seeing everything exactly the same down to the lizards and the way the leaves flitter on the bushes.”

Jasmine had an idea. They should go back in time once more and she should look at just what did happen (at least, what happened in this reality) on that day ten years ago. But she was just a little girl after all, and she was getting sleepy. The demons weren’t trying to get in anymore, Mrs. Benz was done talking, and she was yawning.

She walked over to Mrs. Benz and kissed her leathery wrinkled-apple cheek. Her cheek was as warm as the red rock and she seemed to pulse, as filled with stories as the layers of red stone.

“If we wanted to go back…” she began, but she shouldn’t have. She was too sleepy and the old woman turned to her a face like stone.

“We can’t go back. I won’t live those ten years no more. I want to know what comes next. But we can’t go back nohow. Old man, see, he found his son. He’s not lookin’ no more. He got him. Where he took him, who they are now?” She shrugged.

“Sorry.” Jasmine pressed her hands together like she’d seen the Mindbari do on Babylon 5. The old woman grunted, stood and led her to a bed and tucked her in. The usually thoughtful Jasmine was too tired to ask where Mrs. Benz was going to sleep. The old woman sat up, the kerosene lantern lighting her face so it seemed more precious than gold. She has one more story Jasmine thought, and then she was asleep.

In a dream, she saw the two demons. She had not looked at them when they chased her in the dark, though she’d heard Tiffany say, “Unsightly beast you are.” Even now, she couldn’t see them clearly. It was like they had a veil in front of them, not like a wedding gown veil or anything pretty like that, more like a fever veil, like a time she’d been so sick that it was hard to see or think about anything.

But she could see the little demon, the “Gawrd feck it” demon, looking at the bigger demon with just the widest, most amazed and solemn eyes, like you’d imagine a kitten looking at the mother of all cat goddesses. And the bigger demon put a shaggy (or was it bony or scaly?) arm around the other and led him away.

The old woman had one more story and she, Jasmine, had one last task. Tomorrow it would all come together.