"You don't realize how insignificant you are, do you?" Amy glared at him, looking down at the monster that had always been on top of her for the first time in her life. "If I wanted to, if all I cared about was finishing you off, I could squash you like a bug. Right here and wherever you might try to hide from me. You couldn't stop me. That's the only thing that saves you, that there are things I care about. But, with each passing day, the more you push me to that point. Maybe it's already arrived?"

That threatening question hung in the air between them.

Henry smiled in response, but she squeezed tighter the hand she had pierced, which was no longer functioning properly and wouldn't stop bleeding. And she saw the pain in his face. The vulnerability.

Stop pretending. You're not fooling me.

"How funny. That sounds like something I might have said myself."

Amy stiffened in a manner completely distant from a moment ago. How dare he suggest they were anything alike?

For insolence, Amy stuck her fork in his neck before she realized it.

No, it had been an illusion.

She'd seen it in her mind's eye so clearly that she'd thought she'd done it for real, but that was all.

The fork was still clenched in her hand, not buried in the neck of that grinning monster that reeked of blood.

"You don't know what you're talking about. You and I are nothing alike."

The demon raised his head, there on the ground, and looked her in the eyes, still smiling.

"It's true. It wasn't me who got your mother pregnant. However, I am your father. You have no father but me. I've been your father almost from the beginning. How could you not take after me?"

Blood kept falling from the fork dipped in it, drop by drop. The sound of splashing sounded like the hands of a clock counting down the time to....

Toward what?

Toward death?

"You do nothing but bark like a dog now. Where's your bite? Come on." She gestured with the hand that held the fork. "Try it. But this time I won't stand still, waiting."

The demon stood up slowly, with effort. The smile had been wiped from his face. Another victory. Albeit a small one.

"You're desperately trying to convince yourself. And I don't blame you. But I'm not the only one shaking here."

Amy took a look at herself, giving in to his provocations...

And found that, much to her chagrin, he was right.

Her hand was shaking. The hand holding the fork. His legs too. Although she was in total control of this situation, she had no control over herself.

The fear with which he had branded her was eating her up inside, no matter that she had managed to muster the courage to fight back.

This was... This was...

This was maddening.

Amy dropped the fork to the floor and turned away without a word.

She took one step at a time, calm, trying hard to look as if his words hadn't affected her and succeeding. However, she ruined all her efforts, letting him see, by slamming the door shut.

Now that she couldn't see him, she ran away and locked herself inside her shelter, the only shelter she had. That is, her room. Only her own wasn't the right word. Only she didn't even feel that this place belonged to her.

She had nowhere to go.

No, she did have a place to go..... Amy closed her eyes.

She gently leaned her forehead against the door, took a deep breath.

There was a room that would be her home for four years, well, maybe less. And then... then... Only time would tell. But she wanted to find out. She needed to.

As she turned around, she saw it.

One of the windows was open. The curtains were swaying in the night wind.

There was a woman sitting at the edge of the window.

She recognized that woman, of course.

Abigail. The person Desmond saw as a mother, the one who had saved him. How had she gotten here?

No, that wasn't important.

"What are you doing here?

"Waiting for you.

"That's not what I meant. You...

Abigail laughed. Illuminated by the moonlight, she looked both beautiful and unreal. As if she would disappear at any moment. As if she had only imagined it.

Amy was mesmerized.

Not because of her... predilections, or at least she didn't think it was just that, far from it. It was just that...

She didn't seem to be a human being, like her.

She looked like something else.

Or maybe, rather, something more.

"I know, I know. I'm sorry. I came to get you out of here, of course. I've come to get you out of here, of course. At Desmond's request."

"Even if you get me out of here... and take me back to the academy, that man will come back for me. Even if he didn't, I couldn't just go back to the academy, regain my position as if nothing had happened. How can you help me?"

"I'm aware of these things..."

"Hey, come down from there first. If anyone hears you..."

"Believe me. There's no one listening. And it's nice here. As I was saying before you interrupted me, I've come to offer you power."

"Power?"

"As I did with Desmond. To save him... no, to save myself, mostly."

At least I was honest. Proving that I was not noble and perfect, as the woman was according to Desmond, who was unable to see her faults.

However...

"Don't make that face," Abigail said. "As I said, I'm willing to do this for Desmond. He's the one who's going to spare me the agony of living. You're not going to pay the price, so you can take it as a gift."

"That's not what I wanted to say. Does it have to be Desmond? When the time comes, couldn't I... do it myself?"

Abigail arched an eyebrow.

"Are you trying to protect him? Give up your life for his, so to speak?"

"Protect him from what? Quite the opposite. I'd be robbing him of the chance to live forever. I love him... I've bled to protect him, but I don't love him nearly as much as to offer myself to something like that if I saw it as a punishment. The way you see it."

"Yeah. You humans are full of strange ideas because you are ephemeral like the petals of a flower. You think the thing to fear most is death. And why? Because it is the end? Is an end better than eternal suffering?"

Abigail shook her head.

Humans, she had said. Interesting. Did that mean she wasn't human and never had been? Eliminating the possibility that she hadn't been the first link in this chain?

Or had Abigail simply spent so long living that way that she was now distanced from humanity to such an extent that it was as if she wasn't, not anymore?

Well. Either way, the result was the same.

Abigail couldn't understand what humans felt, so she wasn't quite human, to say the least.

"You're in such a privileged position that you have no idea what we feel. I... even in the midst of the worst of my suffering, not once, not for an instant, have I ever wished for an end."

Yes. There was nothing worse than death.

"That's because you haven't suffered like me."

"Yes. I imagined you would say that."

Abigail cocked her head like a bird. Even the way she moved was peculiar, but in a more subtle way than her ethereal appearance and those burning blood"red eyes.

She couldn't tell why her way of moving seemed strange to her.

"Do you think I'm wrong? Well, you may realize in time that I'm right."

"Does that mean I can take his place?"

"It means that only time will tell. No more, no less."

Amy frowned. Time?

She could decide things here and now, she had offered. And so had Desmond even before, yet even though she claimed she wanted to die, Abigail was still here.

It didn't make sense.

Not with the details she knew, at least.

"Why? You said you want to be released from this agony. I'm willing to do it right now."

"It's not that simple."

"Why?"

"Because I say so." Abigail climbed down from the edge of the window. Her long hair, waving behind her, seemed to melt into the darkness of the night. "You don't need to know any more. Now, can we get back to the matter at hand?"

The woman extended a hand toward her.

"Take my hand and I will do the rest. I will give you power."

Amy stared at the offered hand, silently.

"I would like to be more powerful than I am now, no doubt. But how are you going to help me out of this situation? If things were as easy as causing great destruction, I could do it myself, without anyone's help."

"Good question. The answer is that Desmond has the powers he has because he is Desmond. And you'll get others."

"So, all that stuff about the darkness and the wings...?"

"It's a manifestation of his desires. I don't understand Desmond as well as I'd like to because I've been away from him for so long, but it makes it clear that, even though it seems he was desperately seeking to put down roots someplace, anywhere, what he wants in his heart of hearts is to fly."

I want to fly too, she thought.

How many times have I stared out the window at the world outside the window, dreaming of flying far away from here?

Far, far away.

Anywhere.

"And the regeneration, so fast and effective that it's practically immortality?"

"That too is a manifestation of his desires, not something that comes included for anyone. I thought his powers would come down to that, because he had been on the verge of death when I found him. What's really amazing is that energy... and the wings.... I never thought his powers would go that far.... Anyway, I guess it's another sign that he's the one I've been waiting for."

She had said that time would decide. But it sounded as if Abigail had already made the decision on her own.

At least she was convinced that Desmond would be the one to set her free because it was fate.

"In short, whether the power granted to me by the contract will be useful is a matter of luck."

"You said it."

Amy swallowed. She had suspected as much, but to hear her admit it so readily? Well, no, she couldn't even imagine a power that would allow her to escape her prison and return to the life she wanted in the first place. That was, perhaps, the biggest problem.

Brute force wouldn't be enough, so then....

"Okay then."

Amy grabbed the offered hand and squeezed it, digging her nails into the other woman's skin, putting every last ounce of her strength into that hand as if she wanted to rip it off.

As time passed with nothing happening, that silence coiled around her like a huge snake, making it difficult for her to breathe.

It had to happen.

It had to happen, of course it had to happen, it would happen, it would happen, it would happen.

She couldn't miss this opportunity when hope dangled in front of her, waiting for her to take it. Now, instead of just worrying that the power she received wouldn't be useful to her, she was beginning to worry that for some reason she wasn't worth it and wouldn't even be able to try her luck.

Maybe that was the problem.

That she was spending too much time worrying and less time thinking. Concentrating on...

How had she put it?

Desmond's powers were an expression of his heart's innermost desire.

It was what he had wished for, so she should be wishing for something concrete, right? Something vague like she wanted to get out of here and get back to her life, without even being able to imagine how, wasn't going to do, that was why this was happening, why nothing was happening?

Or was it?

Abigail's expression hadn't changed and said nothing.

Maybe everything was going well after all.

Abigail let go of her hand, dropping it.

Amy tensed up even more than she still was. She felt a lump in her throat, swallowed saliva to undo it. But she didn't have the courage to ask the question that came to her mind. She could only wait.

"It's done," the other woman declared.

"Really? But I don't feel any different."

"Because it doesn't work that way. But believe me, I can feel it, it's done. And there was no chance for me to fail from the start. I've done this too many times to fail."

"Okay, I believe you. How do I know what I have?" Amy asked, looking at her hand.

Clenching it into a fist and opening it, over and over, as if trying to grasp something that always slipped through her fingers.

Ah, the story of my life, she thought.

"Can you feel that too? What I can do?"

"I'm afraid it's not so convenient. I only knew what Desmond received when I saw him heal before my eyes. And Desmond himself knew nothing of the gift I had bestowed upon him, probably assuming I had healed him, in ten years because in all that time no one mortally wounded him, nor.... well, whatever activates the wings of darkness. If you've received a power of that kind, which needs certain conditions to be met, the only active thing you can do to discover it is to guess and get lucky."

Amy frowned.

"So all this could have been for nothing."

"It's up to you. But, even if you can't predict the exact power, it's not hard to guess its nature."

"What does that mean?"

"Desmond desires wings from the bottom of his heart. What you desire is control. Or am I wrong?"

I need control, Amy thought. What I desire is a life where I don't need that control. But...

Abigail wasn't wrong.

Control over her life. Amy wanted that and nothing else. Something so simple was beyond her reach, so of course she desperately pursued it. Everyone was entitled to at least that much.