"I don't understand!" Cried Hope. "How could she do that to me?"

"I suppose she did it because she loved you." He explained.

"What are you talking about?' Exclaimed Hope. "That doesn't even make any since!"

"You see, after Michael, Greg, and Lois stole my bottle from the museum." He began to explain. "Greg and Lois anonymously alerted the authorities, and framed Michael. Then while the Moroccan police where questioning Michael, Greg and Lois smuggled the bottle out of the country."

"Wait?" Hope inquired. "Why didn't Michael inform the police about my mother and Greg?"

"That I don't know." He replied. "We were out of the country by then. Anyway, when we reached the US, I was released from the bottle. Both Greg, and Lois were each guaranteed one wish. Greg had wished to be the sole winner of a lottery that had a grand prize of 500 million dollar."

"Greedy bastard!" She cried. "Not only did he have you steal money from the person who would have been rightful winner, but he was too greedy to share it!"

"You do please me very much, my dear." He said as he smiled at her. "Most people wouldn't have seen why such a wish would be morally corrupt. That's why a genie has no remorse about tricking people. But you my dear are very special, and unique. I had seen that in you, even when you were just a small child."

"What are you some kind of pedophile?" She asked as she was horrified by this revelation.

"No my dear, I promise I'm not." He told her. "Please let me explain. Lois, and Greg's marriage was in a lot of trouble. Even when she betrayed her own brother to prove her love, Greg could not get over the fact that you were no his biological daughter. He still felt betrayed. So Lois's wish was for the two of them to fall madly in love with one another. So I granted her wish, and it worked. They were once again a happily married couple."

"But what was her second wish?' Hope asked.

The genie looked at her and sighed. "After they made their wishes, Lois's wish had effected them greatly. Love is a highly powerful emotion, They not only fell madly in love, they fell obsessively in love. There was so much emotional power behind it, that neither of them could love anyone else. This included you, it is why they grew colder towards you over the years. However, it was soon after she made the wish, that she found out you were dying."

"What do you mean?" Hope asked shocked, since no one had ever told her. "Nobody ever told me. W-what did I have?'

"It was a rare childhood leukemia." He explained. "You wouldn't have made it to age three. All the money they had, and there was no doctor in the world who could treat you. Greg was still in possession of the bottle, he had to keep it hidden. After all, it was a stolen artifact. They couldn't let the world know about it. So your mother brought you before me."

"I don't understand!" Cried Hope. "If her wish made it so she was only capable of loving Greg, than why did she even give a damn?"

"It was before her love spell had taken full effect." He told her. "So at the time, she still did love you. She was holding you in her arms, crying and begging. I was actually touched. I think that was the first time someone had ever presented me, with an unselfish wish. I looked at the small child that was asleep in her arms. You looked so peaceful, and so innocent. I guess I had never actually seen a child before. I looked into your future self, and into your soul. I saw a woman of great beauty. You were not only going to grow up to be a beautiful woman on the outside, but your inner beauty would bring it out tenfold. And I fell in love."

"Are you telling me that a crying woman brought you her dying child?" Hope began to ask in anger. "And you told her you would let that child die, if she did give you her child? You're a pedophile, and a monster!"

"Don't you see." He told her. "It was meant to be. Everything fell into place. If that had been her first wish, then I would have had to have granted it without any strings attached."

"You could have just granted it out of the kindness of her heart!" She cried. "You didn't have to make her agree to give me to you!"

"I have no heart!" He exclaimed. "At least not until I saw you. I knew they would eventually become neglectful parents! I was the only reason, they didn't physically harm you. I was the one who kept them in line. And maybe it was selfish of me to force her to let me lay claim. But try being imprisoned in isolation for over ten thousand years! Believe me, I don't care how morally superior you may feel. You will do whatever you have to, to no longer be alone, especially when you've fallen in love."

"What if I refuse to be with you?' She cried. "Doesn't my free will count for anything?"

"We are forever linked." He told her. "I just didn't let myself be known to you, until Greg, and Lois died."

"Oh my god!" She cried. "Did you kill them?"

"No." He replied. "I had nothing to do with their deaths. Their lives were no longer my concern. My only concern was when you turned eighteen. That is when I could lay claim to you. Why would I kill them? I was going to use them as leverage."

"Leverage?" She asked as se began to tremble. "What kind of leverage?"

"It is time to make your wish my dear." He replied. "Wish to be mine forever."

"And if I refuse?" She asked.

"Then I will kill anyone you care about, or even strangers you don't." He told her. "It'll be my right, because you would be breaking a sacred mystical agreement. The magic that bonds me to my powers, will not allow me to kill mortals. But if you try and break your mother's agreement, then the magics that would prevent me from killing anyone would be null and void. I have every right to do what is ever necessary, to hold you to that agreement. Believe me, they way Lois and Greg treated you, I would have gladly killed them for being so neglectful towards you. But if I tried, it couldn't have possibly worked."

"You mean, you'll kill John." She asked as she feared for his safety

"The thing is my dear." He told her. "I can't really kill someone, if they never existed."

"What the hell are you talking about?" She cried, in confusion and frustration.

"A genie can only exists in the human world for a very short time." He told her. "Eventually our very essence needs to find a vessel in which we can exist. Lamps, and bottles are the most common vessels to hold a genie. But another one is a human body, or a host. I needed to be close to you, to keep an eye on you. I wanted to make sure you would always be safe. So I set up a fake persona, Greg's personal lawyer. A perfect disguise really. Plus I could always make sure you were being well take care of. Do you really think Greg and Lois really stopped to think about your needs? I was the one who took care of you Christmas, and in sending you to the best schools."

"But that doesn't make any since." Replied Hope as she continued to look at him with confusion. "Then why the charade of going inside the house? Why didn't you reveal all of this the day of the memorial service. Why were sneaking into my dreams, if you were hiding inside John the whole time?"

"Because when I took human form, I didn't remember who I was." He told her. "Only when I was asleep, did I remember the truth. I honestly thought that I was a lawyer by the name of John Beckmann. When I slept, my conscious could leave the host body, and I could travel to the bottle. As I did, I pulled your conscience in with me. Unfortunately, when you told me that you never wanted that moment to end, you said it in a dream. I cannot grant wishes in dreams. But I used your dreams to show you how wonderful I could make your life."

"How did you find time to put the sheets, that I destroyed, back on the bed? She asked.

"Don't forget my dear." He told her. "I can see into the future, and genie magic is powerful enough to to exist outside of linear time. I guess you can say, that I was able to get the sheets back on the bed, before you even threw them into the fire in the first place. And my voice that you heard, when you found them on the bed, lets just say I said those words long before you actually heard them."

"How do you know who you are now?" She asked.

"Because of the blood red moon." He told her. "It's power helps me to remember who I really am. As soon as it was at it's full peak, I remembered who I truly was. I put a magical barrier around this room, so I could remember who I was even after the moon had past it peak. I wanted to recreate the Christmas Ball for you, because I guess you could say, it was where you and John fell in love. Or where you, and I fell in love. The funny thing is, as I look back on the night, I think Greg sent you to bed because he thought the genie might harm me. Ironic isn't it?"

"What will happen if I agree to be your's?" She asked, as she could feel the tears streaming down her face.

He then smiled at her, and lifted her chin. "Then we will return bottle, and we'll be together forever. Where your beauty shall never fade, and I will love you forever in our own eternal paradise. We can create any existence we want. It's can actually be quite amazing in there, as long as one is not alone."

"Do you promise not to hurt anybody?" She asked.

He then kissed her on her forehead. "The only thing I want my dear, it to please you."

"Alright, you win." She cried, as her body shivered with fright. He had won. She just couldn't be responsible for hurting anyone. "I w—"

"Get your hands off my daughter!" a voice cried out of nowhere. As Hope looked up, she saw that Michael had stabbed John with a dagger. John's body dissolved, as it turned into a green smoke. Michael then held out a flask of some sort that soon captured the green smoke.

"NO!" Shrieked the genie in terror, as his essence was being forced into the flask.

Before the genie could leave his new prison, Michael rammed the lid on the it.

"Daddy!" Hope cried. He looked, at her and smile. He then opened his arms, and welcomed her to his warm and caring embrace.

"How-how did you know?" She cried.

"You forget, I was an archeologist." he told her. "I've studied many ancient cultures, and different lore. I figured that the genie had a sleeper persona, the lawyer seemed the most obvious. So I followed you guys here."

"But how were you able to hurt him?" She asked. "Or capture him?"

He then held up the flask, and the dagger. "These are both made of iron." He explained. "It is a Fae creatures weakness."

"I'm so glad you're here!" She cried. "I'm sorry, It's just that he was able to convince me what a horrible person you were."

"Well, genies can be manipulative." He told her.

"Mom promised me to him!" Hope explained. "She traded me for a wish to save my life!"

As Michael still held her in his arms, he gently began rubbing her back. Hope couldn't help but break down in tears. Perhaps she finally found a parent to love her.

"Shh.." he said. "It's okay. It's over now, you don't belong to the genie. I promise, you don't have to worry about the bargain you mother made. It doesn't matter anymore, because I promised you to the dark fairy king."

Hope slowly pulled away, and then looked at her father in shock, surely he had to be kidding. But his expression was cold, and almost eerily calm. Her father than took another iron flask bottle out of a pocket, that was hidden inside his jacket, and removed the lid. Black smoke billowed out of the bottle, until is formed into a winged man.

"What do you think of the human bride that I have presented you with, my master?" Michael asked. "As I told you before, she will make the perfect queen." Michael then bowed to the fairy king.

"She is even more beautiful in person." Remarked the fairy king with a lustful smile. "I could not ask for a more enchanting bride. You must proud to have spread the seed, that conceived such an enchantress. You have served me well, and shall be justly rewarded."