'Come here, come to me!' Lisa said softly.

It was a beautiful day. The sun was shining and Lisa could feel the warmth of it on her face. A few feet away from her, sat a small girl. She was quiet, but then again, she was always quiet. Ever since they'd taken her away from Alma Stack and Hercules. Achilles's parents had said that the entire time they'd driven her home she had just sat in silence and looked out the window. She didn't even tell them her name until they had realized that maybe she didn't have one. When Lisa had arrived in she finally spoke. She didn't really talk to anyone except Lisa. Lisa had started to call her Anna and she had started to respond to that name, and now she was just beside Lisa, staring into the sky. Lisa suspected that she was haunted by what had happened to her and she imagined that she always would be. She understood because she felt the same.

Across from her, a younger child responded to her calls of 'come to me'. He had just started to walk. He toddled over to her and fell into her arms. Holding him more securely to her chest, she sank into the soft green grass, laughing as she did. She was almost happy.

The events that unfolded a year ago was something that Lisa thought about frequently. In the months that followed from Alma's arrest, Lisa Farrow had become a household name across the world. Once everyone knew the news of the illegal activity between Hercules, everyone wanted to know about the human girl that had the incubus's child. She had been on the TV, radio and newspapers in countless interviews, speculations, and stories. It has caused a knock on effect and once her story was out, there was countless other ones. So many families were coming forward with a human-incubus partnership. It was phenomenal press for the supernatural rights movement. Adam's sacrifice had helped it too and Lisa had named her son after him.

Hire an Incubus folded. As soon as it had been linked with Hercules and Lisa, it failed. It seemed that at long last all their enemies had disappeared and Lisa was finally safe to live her life. But there was something that hadn't changed since that fateful day.

Achilles was still gone.

Lisa had waited for him to come back. She really had. She had times when she thought she had heard something in the middle of the night only to wake up and find no-one. Ezra and Aster had tried to sense him, but to no avail. A year had passed and Lisa really didn't know if he was ever coming back or if he was even alive.

She sat with Adam and Anna and it was like they were almost a family.

'Let's go inside, shall we? We'll see what your grandparents are doing.' Lisa, holding Adam, stood up. Anna followed behind her and they walked back into the house. Lisa had decided to stay with the Starlings because it was the best thing for them all. Moving back to her old place would have been too painful and there wasn't really much there for her anymore, besides Alison, who came to visit regularly enough anyway.

Achilles's parents were sitting inside reading.

'Good evening Lisa.' Ezra said, looking up from a book.

'Hi, we were out in the garden, weren't we?' She smiled at Adam, who giggled in return. She put him down and watched him walk slowly over to Ezra. It was strange because the entire time she was pregnant, she had felt completely connected to Achilles, until he had disappeared. It had lessened and lessened until one day she had just woken up and felt nothing at all. It was unbelievably sad.

'I think Aster is coming over later.' May said quietly from her chair.

'That's nice, it's been a while since we've seen him.' Ezra replied.

Many of the days passed like this now. Lisa didn't know what to do anymore. The children were her only reason to get up in the morning and she didn't know how long it would take to get over Achilles or if she ever could.

A few days later, true to what May had said, Aster arrived at the house.

They were sitting around a dinner table eating, and there wasn't much conversation flowing.

'So Aster,how's work been?' Ezra asked, breaking the silence.

'It's alright.' Aster replied. 'The people I work with are getting a bit tiresome.'

'Oh really?' May chirped it.

Aster looked up from his plate.

'Yeah. Last week one of my co-workers asked me if I'd heard the news about Lisa Farrow, that apparently she had been living in our city for a bit when she was on the run from Hercules.'

'And what did you say?' Lisa laughed softly.

'I said I had. And do you know what he said?'

'What?' Lisa replied.

'He said that he felt nothing but sorry for that girl and that incubus who disappeared.'

'That's nice.' May said softly, a sad smile on her face.

Aster sat up and looked at his parents. 'You know what? It isn't though.' He exhaled loudly. 'I don't need or want to be constantly reminded of it. Then I feel bad because then I think why should I be allowed to forget about it? Why should I be allowed to go on and pretend everything is normal when it isn't?'

'There's no point beating yourself up about it Aster.' May raised her voice slightly and it was the first time Lisa had ever seen her do so. 'This isn't the first time this happened and we got through it then so we'll get through it now.'

'But...It's different now.' Aster responded pointedly. 'Last time, things weren't okay. Now, things are. We're all safe. Hell, if we wanted we could even come out and say we were the family of the incubus in question, people wouldn't come after us.'

'Why would we do that?' Ezra replied, sounding confused.

'I'm not saying we should. I'm just saying that if we did that last time, we would all be dead. Now, we'd essentially be celebrities. It just all feels a bit strange. Last time I assumed the reason why we didn't hear from him in Hell for so long was because he wasn't sure he would be safe coming back, but now he would be.'

'We don't even know that he's in Hell.' Ezra said quietly.

Lisa could see Aster getting upset. He was speaking so erratically that even Lisa couldn't really follow what he was saying.

'Where else would he be?'

'I...I don't know.'

'I don't think we should talk about this anymore.' May looked at both her husband and son.

'I agree.' Lisa said quietly, not looking up. She could see that everybody at the table was slowly getting agitated and she knew that more of the same wasn't going to do anything except start a meaningless argument.

The dinner continued in silence and Lisa didn't get to speak to Aster until later that night, when his parents had gone to bed. They were sitting in the living room watching TV when Lisa looked over at Aster and spoke.

'So what was all that about at dinner?'

Aster's head snapped over towards Lisa. 'What?'

'I said,' Lisa said a little louder. 'What was that at dinner?'

'Oh.' Aster turned back towards the TV. 'That.'

'Yeah.'

He sighed sadly and then replied. 'I'm just afraid if we don't speak about him, it'll be like he doesn't exist, that we'll forget him.'

'That's stupid.' Lisa scoffed. 'You don't forget about someone just because they're not there.'

'You really think so? The first time this happened, we didn't talk about him for months. My mother wouldn't say his name for months. It was like he was dead, although he might as well have been when he came back.'

Lisa remembered when Aster had told her how Achilles had been acting crazy when he'd come back from Hell the first time.

'Do you really think he's there? Hell I mean.'

'Undoubtedly. I can't think of anywhere else.'

Lisa sighed. 'I did that.'

Aster gave a humorless laugh. 'Don't be a martyr Lisa, he told you to do it himself, he knew what the consequences would be.'

'Do you think he would have killed all those people if I hadn't?'

'Yes.' Aster said, sounding pained. 'I do.'

'At least he did the right thing then.'

'You could say that.'

Lisa wasn't sure what he meant and tried to move the topic along a bit.

'So, if he is in Hell, why can't we just go get him?'

'It doesn't work like that. Hell is huge. There's different parts of it, going in blindly would be suicide, it'd be like going into a pitch black room full of broken glass with your eyes closed.'

'How would we find him then?'

'We'd have to sense him. But that hasn't happened yet.'

'Do you think it will?

'I don't know.'

Lisa sighed softly and looked at the TV. There was some reality show on that she wasn't paying any attention to at all. She looked over and Aster again and tried a new subject.

'Aster, do you know anything about Alice?'

A unidentifiable emotion flashed across his face and then disappeared suddenly. He shifted slightly and then spoke tentatively.

'Achilles's last girlfriend? Why do you want to talk about her?'

'I'm just curious I guess.'

'I mean, I didn't know her super well but Achilles loved her. The last time I remember him being totally normal was when he was with her. Although if you ask me, Achilles should never have got in to a relationship with her from working with Hire an Incubus.'

'What? That's how it happened.' Lisa had always suspected this but she had never actually asked how Alice and Achilles ended up together.

'Oh yeah.' Aster raised his eyebrows and nodded. 'It was a big scandal at the time. Then she got pregnant and that's when it turned from a scandal into a nightmare.'

'I know that.' Lisa said thoughtfully before continuing; 'But what was she like, as a person?'

'She wasn't like you if that's what you're asking.' Aster laughed. 'You're quieter than her, she was very much a take over a whole room kind of person while you're a 'ponder quietly' type.'

'I see.'

Aster shifted slightly again. His tone changed slightly and he said 'Lisa, why did you ask me about this?'

'I already said, I was curious.'

'I don't think that that's true.'

Now it was Lisa's turn to shift uncomfortably. In truth, she didn't even really know why she had asked. Maybe there was some deeper meaning behind it, but she honestly didn't know.

'I don't know. It's nice talking about him. Learning new things I didn't know before.'

'I don't see why Alice is of any importance.'

'I don't understand why you're being so sensitive about this. Is there something I'm missing here? Was Alice involved in some deep love triangle with you and Achilles or something?'

This was weird. Aster never normally acted to erratically. He seemed to be one of the more balanced people that Lisa knew and to see him get so inflamed about something that didn't really concern him was foreign to Lisa.

'As if.'

'What is then?'

'I don't like talking about Alice, Lisa.'

'Why?'

'Because Alice gave Achilles up.' He blurted out, annoyed. He sighed and lowered his voice, turning his head to face the ceiling. 'Don't get me wrong, she did love him, but she didn't protect him. When Hire an Incubus came knocking she told them straight away. She didn't even try to defend him.'

'Oh.' Lisa said. 'I didn't know that. I'm sorry.'

'She told me herself.'

This surprised Lisa. 'When? Why?'

'Guilt, I presume. She called me straight after it happened. Then she didn't call again. I'm assuming at some point between her telling me and him being apprehended she was killed.'

'That's awful.' Lisa said.

'It was. It was horrible.'

Lisa was about to say something else when her phone started to ring on the coffee table. It was a number didn't recognise and she reluctantly answered.

'Hello?' she said softly.

'Lisa, it's me.' said a familiar voice.