ALL THINGS NEW

by TESS FREEMAN

(from TAPESTRY TALES)

CHAPTER ONE

DEATH SHALL HAVE NO DOMINION

Fierce pain stabbed into Vincent's abdomen. He jolted upright on his bed. 'Catherine's pain'. The Bond, it was back. He had sensed her, for a moment, sudden and swift. He leaned sideways on his hands, ready to spring when it happened again! He jerked. Her pain clutched at his insides, physical, overpowering pain. The intensity of it raced through his veins, throbbing through his blood like insanity. She's said the Bond would come back, when it was needed. It had been gone for eight months, the last time he'd seen her. And now he must get to her, find her and bring her back.

He started to run, his sense of her growing stronger as he got closer. He abandoned the safety of the tunnels when they could take him no further. The building loomed up large and menacing in front of him. Catherine was in there somewhere.

There would be danger, there always was, but Vincent didn't hesitate. Driven by his love and the desperation he felt in her, he burst through the building's doors and took the stairs three or four steps at a time. They tried to stop him as usual, but they were no match for his strength and his rage, feeble men who didn't know what was hitting them. They meant nothing to him, mere obstacles which stood between him and Catherine. He slashed them, tore them, threw them down the stairs, whatever was necessary to get through them. He ripped a security camera from the wall. They knew him, that was why they had her, because they knew he would come.

He kicked down a door and stood in a room filled with technical equipment, the workings of which were beyond him. he spun around, dizzy. Her pain came in waves, rising and falling, building to a pitch, swimming over him so that he could not think, could not see, could not feel anything but the sensation of it. She was in great distress. Where was she? He dug his fingers into his head until it was over.

He looked up. There was a momentary calm, and joy, before he sensed her loss and deep sorrow, followed by extreme weakness.

He cried out, ''CATHERINE!"

There was a deafening noise on the rooftop - helicopter blades. He was almost at the top of the building and by the time he got there it was circling up and away from him.

"CATHERINE!" he roared at it, but the men inside just stared down at him, smug faces gloating in their victory.

He stood on the rooftop, encompassed by the lights of New York City which seemed to mock his aloneness and his destitution. The helicopter had disappeared into the night and she was gone, taken from him once again.

The faint voice speaking his name made him turn. Catherine. She stumbled towards him, bedraggled in some kind of white gown. He reached out to steady her, but she was too weak to stand. he held her as she folded down onto the rooftop. Cradling her head, he knew there was very little life left in her.

"Catherine," he whispered.

She made an attempt to speak. He tried to silence her, to preserve her last few ounces of strength.

"Vincent."

Every breath was an effort. He would not let his tears come, not yet, for her sake. Their final moments together must be ones of love, not sorrow. There would be time for that .... later.

"Vincent." She was trying to tell him something. "We loved, there was a child."

'"A child?" He didn't understand, he had no recollection. That day in the cave... He shook his head, hardly believing what she was saying.

She smiled. "He's beautiful."

A son, their child... He lifted his head to the black skies, the distant helicopter. It all made sense now.

Catherine reached up and touched his cheek. "Though lovers be lost."

"Love shall not," he continued hoarsely. They were the lines of the Dylan Thomas poem he had repeated constantly during the time of his psychological breakdown, when Catherine had saved him with her love.

And now - this. Catherine's head fell to one side as her eyes drifted shut and she slipped into that dark place beyond life, where there is no sense of anything, nothing at all.

Vincent knew because her life left him too, ebbing slowly until all that was left was a vast hollow chasm inside of him. He could cry now if he wanted to, but now the tears wouldn't come.

He scooped her up into his arms. Her body hung limply as her golden hair spilled over his elbow, her face turned into his chest as loving as in life.

Hardly knowing where he was going, he carried her through the city, stepping over vagrants who'd lost hope. And what was hope? This? Was this where all their hope and love had led to? Catherine's death? This beautiful woman in his arms had died because he had dared to love her, to hope in what should have remained impossible for him. When she had saved him from his own madness, she had unwittingly sacrificed her own life.

He should have left her alone that night three years ago in the park. Rescued her, and then let her go back to her world. He should never have revealed himself to her, never let her enter his life. And he certainly should have never entered hers.

The tunnels were ahead, he would take her there. He couldn't leave her here to be found by strangers.

Father was waiting. "Vincent, you're back! Catherine! Is she ....? His voice trembled. "What is it? What's wrong?" he demanded.

Vincent tried to shake his head, but all that happened was that his eyelids flickered shut, finally stung by tears which would stay unshed no longer. His throat felt like someone had scraped away at its insides, his voice wouldn't come. He held the woman he loved out to Father, as his tears splashed onto her cheeks. He heard himself speak, words wre barely audible, even to himself.

"I've killed her, Father, my love has killed her."

"No, Vincent."

"Yes!" he shouted. "She's dead because of me."

Father didn't reply this time.

"I'm taking her to the guest chamber until...."

Father's face was as cold and silent as stone. He was clearly in shock.

Mouse and Pascal had appeared. Vincent couldnt' speak any more.

"Catherine's... dead." He heard the strain in Father's voice, the muffled cries of the others vibrating through his ears as he carried Catherine the final stretch of her journey.

He laid her in the bed, recalling the last time she'd stayed in the tunnels. There had been death there too-- Catherine's father's. And she had come to the tunnels, to Vincent, for healing.

He stood up, ashamed with his memories of that time. Even then, in her hour of utmost need, his thoughts had gone beyond what his love for her should have been. He'd had to battle with himself to give her the love and comfort she craved while stamping out his own unimaginable feelings for her.He was forever destined to be the animal striving to be a man, and she had paid the price.

Sighing, he pulled up the sheet to her neck, but he could not bring himself to cover her face. Even in death she was beautiful, as though she were simply sleeping.

*****

His chamber was cold, familiar yet unfamiliar. There was comfort in the underground train which rattled past his stained glass window, chugging out it near primal beat. He sat on his bed and dug his fingers into his skull. Their dream had been hurtling towards this point from the beginning, but he had always thought that it would end in his death and not hers.

'There is something within me that longs to awaken

Something unmistakable that makes me who I am

It rests in the silent places of my heart

Waiting impatiently to come alive.'

Father just stared at her. He still could not believe she was dead, that this was the end of this remarkable woman. The end for Vincent too, because he would have no life without her.

The past eight months had been a nightmare with Vincent pacing the tunnels all day, searching for Catherine all night, unable to regain his telepathy with her which would tell him where she was being held.

And now he was torturing himself with believing he had caused her death. Whatever he meant by that, they could discuss when Vincent was ready to share it, and Father would try to convince him otherwise.

He frowned and reached out his hand to stroke Catherine's ivory cheek. He cupped her jawbone in his palm.

There was a pulse!

He whipped back the sheet and gathered her up, calling out for whoever could hear.

"Quickly! Anyone! Catherine's alive!" he shouted. "HELP ME!"

He bundled her across his shoulder and limped from the chamber.

"Jacob!"

"Mary! Help me get her to the Hospital chamber, quickly!"

Mary ran in front, taking the weight of Catherine's feet. They laid her on the hospital bed, Father rolling up his sleeves. "Where are the others?"

Mary shook her head. "Nowhere near."

"We need help. Someone to go Above, someone to keep Vincent out of the guest chamber. No one is to tell him there's hope" He fixed his eyes on Mary's expectant face. "Until we 're sure there is. Can you arrange all this?"

Mary, kind reliable Mary, had not needed to wait for that question. She'd already gone.

*****

Vincent was sleeping. Father backed out of Vincent's chamber and rubbed his forehead where tension was begining to settle; he was exhausted.

Peter had come down and together they had worked on Catherine, doing tests, carrying out examinations, monitoring her. The night had already passed and he'd not yet slept. He would wait until Vincent awoke, to make sure he was all right, and then he himself would sleep. There was nothing more he could do for Catherine now.

*****

"Where is she?"

Father was aware of being violently shaken, Vincent's gruff voice reverberating through his head.

"What have you done with her?"

The next thing he felt was the creak in his neck. He forced his eyes open, they were inches from his desktop. He must have nodded off, slumped over his desk. Slowly, he straightened his upper body until he was in a sitting position.

"Father! Tell me where Catherine is," Vincent's wet eyes pleaded with him.

"Catherine..." Father looked around him. "What time is it?"

"I don't know," Vincent stated. "Morning. Catherine, Father, where is Catherine? Please?"

Father stood up stiffly and took Vincent by the shoulders. He looked into the blue eye which searched his own.

"I've something to tell you, Vincent, and I want you to promise to stay calm."

Vincent looked ready to explode. "You've had someone take her away," he accused, "While I slept."

"No, just listen to me. Catherine is not dead."

"Not dead? But I saw-- I've no sense of her."

"Vincent," Father was over-tired and angry. "You place far too much emphasis on your telepathic powers. Wonderful as they are, they have not been exactly reliable of late. Besides, when it come to Catherine, you're far too - volatile - to think straight."

Vincent's shoulders dropped and he turned his head away.

"Now listen to me," Father repeated. "Catherine didn't die. She was unconscious from being drugged, poisoned. Peter and I have been working through the night, she's in the Hospital chamber now."

Vincent sprang away.

"Wait!"

He turned on the steps. "What?"

"She's still unconscious. She's slipped into a coma."

Vincent's face transformed into an expression of pain. "I need to see her, Father."

Father nodded. "Speak to her, read her some poetry. Your voice is the one thing that may bring her back." He hoped.

The tubes and the heart monitor were the first thing Vincent saw. They overpowered Catherine, lying dependent on them. She was not really alive then, was she?

He pulled up a chair to her bedside. It scraped across the stone floor. Carefully, he lifted her right arm, gently stroking it. It dropped heavily when he released his hold. Her left arm had a drip attached to it. A thick needle slid visibly under the skin at the back of her wrist, held in place by sticky plaster. It was attached to a one inch length of orange plastic tubing. This in turn was connected to the transparent tubes leading to the balloon-like bag filled with fluid which nourished Catherine. Her heartbeat was portrayed as green zigzags bleeping across a screen. It was all too much for him - the precision of it. But if it worked, it would be another medical miracle, responsible for giving his Catherine back to him.

He let go of her hand and opened the book on his knee. He started to read. The words became meaningless to him after the first couple of pages, but if Father was right and the sound of his voice drifting past her unconscious state into her subconscious would revitalize her, then he would never stop reading until he witnessed that response.

CHAPTER TWO

REAWAKENING

Vincent lost all track of time. He didn't know when his vigil had begun, or when it would end. His existence had become as numb as Catherine's unconscious state. Everything outside of the hospital chamber became oblivious.

"Vincent."

He almost walked into Father, barely seeing him.

"You'll wear a hole in the floor."

Vincent sopped pacing. "What else is there to do?"

Father waved an arm. "Oh, eating, sleeping, remembering that the rest of us exist. Things like that."

Vincent started pacing again. "I have to be here."

"All the time? Your bed's hardly been slept in for three weeks."

Vincent paced harder. "What do you want me to do? Give up? Abandon her?"

"Of course not, but there are other things."

"What other things?"

"Something we need to talk about." There was an edge to Father's voice as the older man glanced across at Catherine's immobile frame, covered by a white linen sheet, folded over gray blankets. "But not here, in case she can hear."

Vincent's gaze froze on Father's grim face. It was the most hopeful statement that had been uttered since he'd brought Catherine back almost a month ago. He let his eyes sweep over her frame now. What if she woke when he was gone?

"Vincent." Father's arm was outstretched. "This is important."

Vincent sighed and went with Father. They walked in silence, ending up at the waterfall.

"It's a beautiful spot," Father observed.

"Yes." Vincent sat on a rock. It was a place for quiet contemplation, for shared moments with Catherine. "What's on your mind, Father?"

Father used his stick for support to lower himself down beside Vincent. "This isn't easy, Vincent, what I have to tell you. But you must know."

"Then tell me."

Father coughed. "Very well." His eyes diverted from Vincent's several times before he managed to keep them there.

"What is it, Father? Something about Catherine?"

Another lowering of the eyes. "Yes." He seemed to gather himself before continuing. "Vincent, when Peter and I were trying to save Catherine's life, we had to - carry out certain examinations. We discovered something."

"Please tell me, Father."

Father stared at the tunnel wall as though it might provide the words for him. When it didn't, he gave a deep sigh.

"Vincent, Catherine had very recently given birth."

Vincent shut his eyes.

Father hurried on. "During the time she was away, she must have..."

"The child is mine."

"What?"

Vincent shook his head slowly and waited for the deluge which would surely come. There was no need to repeat himself. Father had heard. He was mere assorting his thoughts into the best possible antagonistic order.

"Wh-----? How did this happen?"

"I don't remember."

"You don't---" Father stood up and walked around a little.

"Please tell me what you're thinking, Father."

"What I'm thinking!" He leaned heavily on his stick, standing over Vincent. "What I'm thinking is how you could have let this happen."

"Don't you think I haven't asked myself that same question a thousand times since Catherine's return?"

Father raised his eyebrows. "Only since then? And what about before that, Vincent. What about at the time?"

Vincent jumped up. "I told you I don't remember."

Father whipped around in a flash, his features altered by the scoffing, false smile he presented Vincent with. "Please... enlighten me."

Vincent shook his head. "I wish I could. That day in the cave, Father, a long time ago, before Catherine's disappearance. I asked you what happened in there."

The colour drained from Father's face as he collapsed onto the rock beside Vincent, his stick clattering onto the stone floor. Vincent stopped it with his foot, to prevent it from rolling away over the edge to the waters far below. He put his arm around Father's shoulder.

"You said you had 'no recollection'."

"I still don't. All I have to go on is what you told me, that Catherine went in after me and delivered me from my terrifying insanity."

"In the only way she knew... I should have 'known.' I missed it, all this time. It was her way of showing you how much she loved you, so that you would never have to doubt again. She brought you back from the edge by proving her love for you."

"Yes. And that is why she is lying back there now."

"The baby..."

"They've got him."

"A son. Catherine told you this? Before she passed out?"

Vincent nodded. "He's out there somewhere, Father, and I don't even know who these men are."

Father's voice and face were gentle now. "We'll find them. We'll get the child back." He took Vincent's hands in his. "I promise you that I will do everything in my power to help you and Catherine and your child."

"Thank you, Father. Now I must get back to Catherine."

*****

The scratching on his palm was what woke him. He raised his head, his eyes focusing on the small generator which powered the heart machine, its steady hum droning through his brain.

Something sharp dug into his hand again. Catherine's hand was moving in his, her head was starting to twist from side to side, she was waking up!"

"Catherine." He brushed the side of her face.

A groan escaped from her throat and he jumped back.

The zigzags on the screen had gone erratic, the bleeps so close together they sounded like a siren. He stood up as her eyes opened. He must get Father!

It was late, the middle of the night. Father would be in his chamber. It meant leaving Catherine, but what if she injured herself while he was away? He hesitated between the bed and the doorway, knowing that if he stayed something much more serious might happen. The high-pitched irregularity of the bleeping decided for him. He dashed from the chamber, his cloak flowing out behind him. Without stopping, he struggled out of it and left it where it fell. The tunnel walls flashed past him as he ran, an unyielding corner jutting painfully into his shoulder as he bolted around it. He snatched at his shoulder with his opposite hand, the pain only serving to increase his speed and his determination to reach Father's chamber.

"Father!" He pulled him upright, this time not giving him the option to wake up slowly. "Come on, get your shoes on! It's Catherine, she's awake!"

Father groaned and rolled his eyes, but hurried. Vincent pulling him along by the right arm. "Not so fast, Vincent."

"We've got to be fast." Vincent shot over his shoulder, to which he heard Father's muttered reply about Catherine taking all this time to wake up and then doing it when everyone else was asleep.

Vincent saw the funny side of it and laughed at Father shuffling behind issuing half-hearted complaints. His excitement at seeing Catherine awake was bubbling up inside him by the time they reached the Hospital chamber.

Father was bent double, his hands above his knees, panting, "I ... want ... you ... to stay outside," he managed in between gasps for breath.

Vincent shook his head. "I don't understand."

Father pulled his mouth into a tight, determined line. "I'll come for you," he promised, "When it's okay."

Vincent threw up his hands in defeat as Father entered the hospital chamber without him. He fought the urge to pace up and down, standing instead with his head leaning back against the rock wall. The rough surface tugged at his hair and he pushed away from it, turning into the chamber entrance. There he stood on the threshold between the cold darkness of the tunnel corridor behind him and the warm glow of candlelight in the chamber, emptiness behind him and an overflowing of emotions in front of him, 'too much emotion'.

He took a step back. Could he really have expected to resume things with her, knowing where their love had led to the last time, to Catherine's near death? No, he would not go in there again, to destroy her once more. He reeled backwards and clutched his head in his hands. Father could handle it this time, arrange to have her transported back to her world Above, back to the life she'd had before she'd ever met Vincent.

As for the child... Well, it should never have been...

Vincent ran, faster now than minutes ago when he'd raced for Father, filled with eagerness and fresh hope. The tunnel walls buffeted him on every side, tearing his clothes, bruising him, mocking him by their imprisonment of him. He roared, lashing out with his fists and claws at them, wanting to tear them down, to free himself of their existence, of his dependence on them because they were a constant reminder of what he was, and of what he was not. He stumbled into his chamber, exhausted, and collapsed onto his bed. Catherine was alive, he'd done his duty, now he must let her go.

*****

"Elliot! Elliot!"

Father squeezed his eyes shut at Catherine's call. Her head ceased to twist from side to side, her eyes began to focus on him as he took her hand in his.

"Who are you? Where's Elliot?" She peered about the chamber. "Where am I?"

His voice very nearly didn't come. "You're in a safe place," he whispered, forcing himself to smile through his pain. "It's all right."

But it wasn't all right because Catherine clearly did not remember.

*****

"You must not go in to her, Vincent. She does not remember us, or this place."

Vincent flicked the pages of a poetry volume with his thumb. "That will make it easier, then."

"Will make what easier?"

Vincent sighed and placed the book back on its shelf, keeping his back to Father. "Not seeing her again. What we had is finished."

"You've decided this?"

"Yes." He looked up at the high chamber ceiling and waited for Father's reply.

Father's words came out measured, his voice strained. "You know I would give anything to see you and Catherine happy - together - but as things stand, I think perhaps your decision is the right one, the only one."

Vincent felt his lips tremble, his throat clog. He turned around, defeated. "She must not be told about me, Father. 'NEVER' It's better that she forget."

The quiver in Father's voice betrayed his anguish. "You're being very strong."

Vincent shook his head and formed the word 'no', but it got stuck. His eyes filled with tears at the same time that Father opened his arms, and Vincent went to him and sobbed like a child.

*****

What an unusual place this was - it must be underground. Catherine tentatively reached out and touched the walls with her fingertips, discovering they were as cold as the rock floor beneath her feet. Her nightdress brushed her ankles as she padded about barefoot. She must ask for her shoes and her clothes. She couldn't walk about like this all the time, and she would need to get washed.

That man, Father, was nice, but what a strange name to call yourself by. He wouldn't be pleased that she was wandering about the place, but she was stronger now, and curious. Who else lived here? She'd only met Father and Mary, but she knew there were others. She'd heard voices and Father had said that everybody called him by that paternal title.

She let the tunnels lead her on, as though she were following a pre-set path, as though somehow she knew where she was going, which was impossible as she'd never been here before.

There was somebody coming! She hoped it was only Father or Mary and then she'd get a reprimand for being out of bed which she could laugh off.

The footsteps and swishing of clothes grew louder as her own panic rose. There was nowhere to hide and she didn't have time to turn and run, so she kept her head down, not wanting to be the stranger in someone else's territory. The swishing stopped and Catherine felt the presence of someone formidable in front of her, which she knew instinctively was neither Father nor Mary.

Slowly she lifted her eyes as the other person spun around, his face out of her view, but revealing a long mane of golden hair down his back.

"I'm... sorry," she faltered. "I must have come the wrong way. I was just taking a walk."

The well-made figure nodded, but did not turn around, apparently more frightened than she was.

This revelation lent her courage. "Could you tell me how to get back to the Hospital chamber? I'm ..."

"I know who you are."

His voice was husky, ringing deep inside her ears, filtering into the deep recesses of her brain as something recognizable. She shook her head vigorously. It was ridiculous to think that she could recognize a voice she had never heard before. She was just confused, that was all, and tired. It was time she got back and lay down.

"I've forgotten the way back," she pressed.

"Just turn around and keep going until........."

Catherine's head began to spin. "There's so many different ways... If you could just take me..."

"Please!" It was an agonized plea. "Don't ask me that."

The tunnel walls became a blur and seemed to close in around her before she fell.

"Catherine!"

She heard his feet as he ran to her, felt his hand, soft and hairy, on her forehead, his arms going around and under her, and she guessed she was being carried, for she felt the pounding of his heart in her ear.

Her head rolled back and her vision swam, but she could hear perfectly well. He was walking very fast with her, almost running, and he was crying and talking

"Don't fall unconscious again, not this time, not again. Wake up, 'please!' WAKE UP, CATHERINE!"

She was being lain on a bed, her own familiar sick bed. A glass of water was at her lips; she drank some and the lightheadedness passed.

Everything came into focus again and as gravity ceased to orbit around her, her gaze settled on the face of her rescuer. He did not try to hide now, but smiled down at her very, very softly, with eyes extremely gentle, unusually so for such blue eyes, and beautiful in a way, so that she was compelled to reach up and touch his cheek. He closed his eyes and breathed deeply when she did so.

"Why am I not afraid?" she asked.

His answer made her more afraid than she thought she could ever be.

"Because you know me, Catherine."

She shook her head slowly, disbelieving, but two parts of her mind were at war with each other, and for some unknown reason she was unable to look away.

CHAPTER THREE

THE HEART REMEMBERS

"Vincent! What are you doing?"

The two surprised faces upturned to him were smiling and relaxed. Father rubbed his chin between finger and thumb, confused. It was Catherine who spoke first.

"It's all right, Father. I was going walkabout and Vincent brought me back."

He approached the bed to stand beside them both, his beloved Vincent and Catherine. "I see." He searched their faces for signs which would tell him how to tread. "And Vincent's been keeping you company."

Catherine touched Vincent's arm and laughed. "Yes, he has a wonderful voice for reading poetry."

Father nodded. "I couldn't agree more." So Catherine did not remember Vincent, but she was accepting him again. He directed a beckoning glance at Vincent. "I need to talk to you," he whispered, "in private."

Outside the chamber, he admonished Vincent. "What's going on? I thought you had decided there was to be no contact between the two of you."

"She collapsed in the tunnels, Father, near my chamber. I had to bring her back."

"And then 'stay' with her, laugh with her, read her poetry of all things?"

"She asked me to stay."

"Wasn't she ...?"

"Frightened?" Vincent supplied, walking a little way away. "That is the strangest thing, Father. She knew she should be, but she wasn't and she asked me why."

"What did you tell her?"

Vincent stopped walking. "That she knew me."

"That she knew you." He tried to keep his voice calm. "And what do you think that is going to achieve?"

Vincent threw up his arms. "I don't know. I didn't plan this."

"Yet you've let her see you, filfilled her wishes, answered her questions, after all you said. Vincent, how could you?"

"It happened, Father, it just happened."

Father lowered his voice. "Like it happened the first time?"

"NO! Not like then." He grew suddenly silent.

"Tell me, Vincent."

Vincent's face was set. "Catherine does not remember me, or anything that we shared. She thinks...." He closed his eyes momentarily, in an attempt to block out the pain. Father guessed. "She thinks she was about to marry Elliot Burch before 'the accident'. She doesn't even know what happened to her, Father. She's asking all sorts of questions."

"What are you being so secretive about."

"CATHERINE!" Both men jumped.

"Where are you going?" Father demanded.

She held up a jug. "For some water, if that's allowed," she teased.

Father waved her on and, when she was out of earshot, said to Vincent. "Then we'd better start thinking of some answers."

*****

"What happened to me, Vincent?"

They were at the waterfall, Catherine sitting at a distance from him, like they were strangers, not like they used to be when Catherine would lie in the loop of his arm and they would just sit and talk, relishing every moment together.

"You were abducted." He watched for her reaction and saw it as a slow shaking of her head.

"'Why?"

"Don't you remember your job?" he asked.

"Of course," she laughed, implying that such a major area of her life could not possibly be forgotten. "I'm with the D.A.'s office."

He bowed his head. "So you do remember some things."

She was quiet for a moment, before saying lightheartedly. "I guess I must have been pretty good at my job to be abducted, so what did they... did they do... hit me over the head until I passed out?"

He stared down at his feet, knowing that the time had come when her questions demanded a truthful answer. He placed up at her relaxed face which showed no anxiety whatsoever in its expectancy.

"You really don't remember ... anything .... of your ordeal?"

She appeared blank. "No, should I?"

Against his better judgment, he got up and crossed to where she sat, kneeling down beside her and cupping her elbow in his large hand. He saw and felt fear in her wide eyes, not of him, but of what he was going to tell her.

Her voice was very soft, barely a whisper. "What is it, Vincent? What happened to me?"

"Catherine." He opened out his hand and, very tentatively, she edged her own hand forwards, never taking her eyes off his, and finally placed her palm in his, allowing him to close his fingers around hers and held onto them tightly.

"Catherine," He repeated. "You were administered a lethal dose of morphine."

Her shock was evident as her mouth opened, quivering, searching for words. "I don't understand, why? I had some information they wanted?"

"Yes, you had something they wanted."

"What?" She was pleading with him to fill in the gaps in her uncooperative brain, but he could not do that until she remembered of her own accord. If she ever did, and if she didn't, then he could never tell her more than half-truths.

"Initially, you did have information they wanted."

"Initially?"

His knees were getting sore on the stone floor, so he sat beside her on her rock, half-turning towards her. She didn't object or even appear uncomfortable with his closeness, but he knew that was because her mind was on what he was telling her, not on him personally, and, as she had no idea that there had ever been anything between them, he posed no threat.

"Things got complicated."

He had let go of both her elbows and her hand. She rubbed at her forehead as if trying to erase the block that was lodged there. "How?"

He dared to make eye contact, and hold it. "When I became involved."

She got up and started walking around. "I don't understand, Vincent. You said before that ... I know you."

"Yes." He wanted to tell her so badly and see her face remember, and smile at him the way she used to, so long ago. He was desperate to hold her in his arms, caress her back, kiss her hair.... He tore his gaze away from her and fixed it instead on the eternal waterfall away to their right, its never-ceasing spillage an added reminder of his insignificence and dispensability. He sighed as he turned back to her. "Catherine, I cannot tell you everything. There are things which may frighten you."

"What sort of things.

Such persistence? Things my heart cries out to tell you, Catherine, but which I know I never shall.

"You must go back to your world, Catherine, and carry on with your life, but know that we are always here for you, always," he emphasized. "I speak for all of us."

She smiled and came closer. "You are all such good, kind people. I feel disloyal not being able to remember."

"Don't. Some things are best forgotten. You will go forward now and remember what you need to know."

She stepped closer to him and hugged him. "Thank you for everything, Vincent."

It was like that first time, their very first parting, at the basement of her apartment building, when she had embraced him and he had held his hand away from touching her, knowing that when he did so, his life would change forever, until the pull had become too strong and he had allowed his fingers to close around her waist, drawing her nearer and never wanting to release her.

It was like that now, his arms two stiff rods fastened to his sides, terrified to hold her, to let himself feel her warmth and her softness, this time not only because of the inevitable pain of having to let her go, but for fear of betraying his true feelings, of not being able to prevent his passion from flowing from him into her, of transmitting more than either of them could deal with.

She thought he was just a good friend, no different from Father or any of the others, and she would expect no more in his embrace. And so he brought his hands up to her back and patted in between her shoulder blades with one while he held the other on her lower spine.

It had been so long since he'd held her' that for a moment, when her face was buried in his neck, he closed his eyes and let himself believe that she was his again. He breathed in sharply, too sharply, for she drew back abruptly and would not look directly at him.

She shuffled about nervously, all the time creating more and more distance between them. "I'd... better go," she murmured, raising her arms a little, walking backwards.

Vincent sensed fear in her, new fear which had not been present before, which had only surfaced with their embrace. "I'll walk you back."

"NO!" she laughed and her voice shook. "I mean, thank you, but I'll be all right. Thank you for everything, Vincent."

She met his eyes for a split second, a darting glance that was laden with uncertainty. "I'm glad to have met you, Vincent ... again," she added.

"And I am glad to have known you, Catherine."

She gave a little smile and was gone, no goodbye, but Vincent knew what was unspoken, that she was going, not just back to her chamber, but to her world Above, to be with Elliot. Elliot, not Vincent, had been the one she'd remembered. He pulled his cloak around him and walked slowly back through the tunnels.

*****

Catherine's hands shook as she straightened out her bedclothes and checked around the chamber. She had to get out of here quickly, before she went delirious. What on earth had happened back there?

Her entire upper body had begun to shake and she was growing hot and cold. She sank onto the just-made bed and peeled off Jamie's cardigan, goose pimples immediately rising up on her bare arms. She rubbed at them with her hands and wrapped the cardigan around her shoulders in a compromise for her fluctuating body temperature.

What had happened to her? She was going crazy, reacting to someone who wasn't even... fully human. She was ashamed to have harboured the thought, because Vincent had been nothing but kind to her since the beginning, but to feel herself respond to his closeness in a physical way was too scary to ponder. She shook her head fiercely. She couldn't ponder it, she just couldn't.

She froze when she heard footsteps. "Mary!"

"You look relieved," Mary's smile was replaced with a concerned frown as she took in the tidied chamber, the canvas bag Catherine was clutching to her side. "You're leaving."

Catherine nodded. "It's time for me to go." She patted her lap. "Thanks for my clothes and stuff."

"They're just things, Catherine. Everybody was more than delighted to donate something. You won't forget where we are, will you?"

Catherine gave a wry laugh as she looked around the chamber. "How could I?"

Mary smiled warmly and opened her arms. "Come here."

Catherine gave her a hug and had her back patted for the second time that afternoon before Mary held her a little way back and fixed her with a soft quizzical expression. "Haven't you said goodbye to anyone else? Has something happened?"

"No!" She pulled away, lowering her eyes. "I don't know. Vincent knows I'm going. I think so, anyway. Mary?"

"Yes, dear?"

Her hesitance stretched into a long drawn out silence deep-rooted emotions battled with her memory to be allowed to resurface and be acknowledged.

"Nothing." She didn't want to ask, didn't want the answer, already semi-consciously fearful of what that might be. She was going Above to be reunited with Elliot and she would never return here again, not because she wished to forsake the tunnel people, but because staying away was the only assurance she could give herself that she would never have to see Vincent again.

*****

Catherine paused in the vertical column of light which marked the exit from the tunnels before taking that first tentative step forwards into the world Above.

She sidestepped the puddles and the piles of wet leaves at the Central Park exit, instinctively knowing where to put her feet, which route to take across the park to lead her home. She knew she had tramped this route dozens of times, if not more, and yet to remember distinctly, to see it in her mind's eye, would not come to her.

It was as though she did not really exist, as she left the park behind and stood on the sidewalk, observing the jammed lanes of traffic, the Yellow cabs squeezing in and out of spaces as they become available, the almost constant honking of horns, the angry shouts, the suffocating exhaust fumes. And across the street, the traffic of people, shoppers and workers, swinging designer store bags and briefcase. Compared with the tranquility of the tunnels, it was madness. A vision of Vincent and herself sitting in hushed silence on her apartment balcony flashed through her mind, but she shook it off and dodged in between a motorcycle courier and a battered Volvo estate to cross the street.

Where to now?

She had no keys for her apartment, no ID, no credit cards, no cash, none of the essential criteria necessary for life outside the tunnels, normal life in the real world, but was all this real? She was invisible here, unseen among the throngs of other people going about their business. New York had proved her expendable these past ten months, and yet, Below, she knew she had mattered. It would be so easy to run back there now, while no one Above knew she was back ... but there was Vincent. She couldn't bring herself to face him again.

And so she carried on, not conscious of where she was going, until she ended up at her place of work.

"Cathy!" Joe's mouth gaped, his face white. "I don't believe it!" He dragged his chair away from his desk and pushed it towards her. "You'd better sit down."

Catherine laughed, ralaxed with Joe. "You look like you need it."

"Yeah." He leaned back against the desk, rubbing his forehead. "It really is you, isn't it?"

She flopped down onto the chair. "Here I am."

"What happened to you, Cathy? Where've you been all this time?"

She sighed. "It's too complicated to go into right now."

"Okay, whatever you say."

"I need your help, Joe."

He held out his arms. "Sure, what are friends for?" He laughed as he added, "as long as it's legal."

"Hey," she intoned, "what do you take me for? By the way, who's doing my job around here these days?"

Joe glanced at his feet for a moment before answering her. "You are," he grinned. "Welcome back, Radcliffe."

"Radcliffe.... where I went to college, right?"

"You all right, Cathy. You lost your memory or something?"

She thought she had, but she seemed to remember everything... except the tunnels and Vincent. She stood up quickly and shook her head.

"No," she replied. "I haven't forgotten anything."

*****

She flicked the light on in her apartment. Thankfully it hadn't been re-let, the benefit of paying her rent directly from her bank account, she guessed, if there was anything left in it after almost a year without a paycheck.

There was nothing unfamiliar here. She sank into one of her pair of couches, let her head loll back and closed her eyes. It was good to be home, here in her own place again. She felt herself begin to drift off to sleep and jerked herself up to the edge of her seat, glancing towards the veranda, as though half-expecting to see a shadow move across the glass at any moment.

She rubbed her eyes and went to run the shower. As she laid out her gown on her bed, she tried not to keep looking sideways, but for some reason, she had an overwhelming compulsion to gaze towards the balcony doors.

CHAPTER FOUR

THE BINDING

The hot jets of water prickled Catherine's shoulders and neck as she turned her face into the delicious shower spray, sheer luxury after the bowls of water which had to suffice in the tunnels. She tilted back her head and let the water pour past her mouth and her chin before turning to rivulets as it streamed down over her shoulders, back and stomach.

That was when she saw them, the stretch marks. What else could they be, silver-white stripes crossing her breasts, abdomen and thighs? She'd never had anything like them before, As the water continued to dart at her from the overhead rose, she ran her fingers over the wide, opaque-like lines. She had not noticed them in the tunnels, what with the semi-light and only washing a portion of herself at a time.

She twisted off the shower knobs and the pool created at her feet swirled around the plug hole, making rude noises as it gurgled down the drain to the depths of the earth. She shuddered and jumped out, grabbing hold of the shower door for support while water dripped off her naked body onto the carpet and all her thoughts attempted to take precedence in her brain at once.

So she'd had a baby, but what had become of it? 'Whose' was it? Elliot's - of course. She got dressed in slow motion, the only kind of mobility she seemed capable of at the moment, and lay back on her bed. Where was Elliot? How could she get in touch with him? She turned onto her side and pulled her legs up to her chin. She supposed word would soon get around that she was back.

*****

It did, or at least it must have got as far as Elliot, because she opened her door to his knock at eleven the following morning and he was standing there with his longish hair and his rugged beard, eyes beaming as he looked her up and down.

His unabashed delight made her laugh and she threw her arms around his neck, entwining her fingers in the curls at his nape.

"Elliot! It's so good to see you again! Come on in."

She thought he looked surprised by her enthusiastic welcome, but he said nothing. "Can I get you a drink?"

"Sure." He flopped down lengthwise onto one of the couches and she had to smile at his feet dangling over the arm, as though he belonged just there. "So, where have you been all this time, Cathy?"

She handed him a Scotch and sat down on the opposite sofa. "I don't know, Elliot. I can't remember and what I do remember is all muddled. But I am glad to see you again."

"Likewise!" He held his glass out to hers. "To you!"

Clinking his glass with hers, she smiled ruefully. "To us."

"I'll drink to that!"

She watched his eyebrows raise as she took a sip of her own Martini. "Elliot...?"

"Hmmmm.....?"

"What do you know of our baby?"

A coughing fit was the last reaction Catherine had expected for a response as the glass erupted from Elliot's hand, sloshing liquid over his lips and beard.

"Sorry, I guess you didn't know."

"Didn't know!'" he repeated, wiping at his face with a handkerchief pulled from his jacket pocket. "Cathy, much as I wish otherwise, our relationship never reached the baby-making stage."

"Oh." Catherine felt her face burn and stood up, turning away, but looked back when she heard him chuckling.

"You were right when you said you were a bit muddled, Cathy. In fact, imagining you - we' - had a baby is a lot of muddling." He laughed again, waving his arm around. "Sorry, but you really should see a doctor about it, get it sorted out."

"Yeah, maybe I will." He thought she had imagined it. Well, there wasn't much point in trying to convince him otherwise now that she'd learned they weren't as close as she had thought. he was idling around her apartment now, studying all her little trinkets. "Elliot, was there ... did I have ...?"

When he turned to await her question, he was holding up a delicate crystal pendant on a length of cord. "What?"

She cleared her throat. "Was I involved with anyone else, Elliot, do you know?"

He threw back his head and laughed. "You don't remember?"

"No."

He walked towards her with arms outstretched. "Then I'm not sure that I should tell you."

"Please, Elliot. I need to know."

He took hold of her shoulders, but held her at arms' length as he raised his eyes to the ceiling and shook his head. "The sacrifices one must make in the name of love."

"Sorry? It's just that I thought you and I ..."

"So did I until you told me there was someone else in your life."

"Who?"

He shrugged. "I really have no idea, Cathy. It was always such a big secret. But ..." he took his hands from her elbows, "maybe this is a clue." In his hand he still had the crystal pendant. "It certainly isn't one I've ever given you. Quite unique, wouldn't you say?"

Catherine felt her horror begin to close in around her as her eyes refused to be taken off the sparkling pendant. There was only one place that could have come from - underground.

*****

She caught Joe just as he was about to go for lunch. "Mind if I join you?"

"Radcliffe, you are asking me if you may join me for lunch. Well, this is a turnaround."

She pushed back her hair. "Joe, I've got some things I need to ask you."

"You want me to help you sort out your head?" He was grinning as he held the office door open for her to pass through in front of him. "Be my guest."

The day was warm and they sat outside at a pizzeria which Joe was familiar with. He picked a balcony table which overlooked Central Park in the distance. Catherine glanced across once and then turned her chair around so that her back was to the cast iron gothic railings. Why couldn't they have gone to MacDonald's? At least there was nothing there which could have stimulated anything from the tunnels.

Joe munched his way through a mega-sized ham, mushroom and pineapple affair while Catherine sipped a mineral water and waited until he was finished.

"You on a diet, Radcliffe? You don't need to be, you know. You look great the way you are."

"I'm not on a diet, Joe. I just don't feel like eating."

"Oh." He wiped the grease from his lips with the back of his hand and propped his elbows on the table. "So, what can I help you with?"

He looked so little-boyish, he really wasn't her type, but she still had to ask. "You're going to think I'm silly..."

"Probably, but spit it out anyway."

If anybody could put her at ease, Joe could. Maybe he had been her type, after all. His expectant look was growing more expectant by the minute.

"Come on, you've just had the privilege to watch me stuff my face. The least you can do is share your secrets with me."

"Secrets! Did I have secrets?"

"Cathy, your whole 'life' was one big secret."

She nodded sideways and studied the paving stones. "I take it you weren't one of them."

"I beg your pardon?"

It was the politest expression she could remember ever hearing from Joe. She must really have caught him off guard with that one. There was no need to repeat it and embarrass either of them further, but Joe was waiting.

She sighed deeply and fixed her eyes on his. "Did you and I ever ... sleep together?"

He was shocked, she could tell by the way his eyes drew back, by the way his entire body drew back away from her.

"I'm sorry," she apologized.

"Hey." His voice and expression were soft again as he reached across the table for her hand. "Don't be. You're mixed up, that's all. And you're trying to remember who's who in your life."

"Something like that."

"Is there anything you're not telling me, Cathy?"

She hesitated. How much could she trust him with? He must have read her uncertainty because he answered her unspoken question.

"You can trust me, Cathy. We were never any more than friends, but we were pretty good once at that."

"Okay."

He stood up. "Come on, let's take a walk."

They strolled back to the office, thankfully avoiding Central Park. Catherine told him about the baby and he listened without judging her, accepting the news with the seriousness with which it was intended.

"Have you no idea at all who I was involved with, Joe?"

"I may be giving you a wrong lead here, but there was some cultural guy ..."

"Go on."

He rubbed his chin. "Well, he took you to a lot of concerts in the park."

" In the park!"

"That's all I know. But one of your friends may be able to help you."

"My friends..."

"Yeah, Jenny or Nancy ... You do remember them?"

"I'm not sure what I remember any more, Joe. But thanks for today, for everything."

"Any time, and you find out any more information, bring it to me and I'll see what I can do. Don't worry, we'll get this sorted out."

*****

Catherine wandered in the park, backwards and forwards across the tunnel entrance, she lost count of the number of times. It was broad daylight and there were too many people around for her to risk being seen going down there, but she had known that before she came here today. That was why she wouldn't come at night, because there would be nothing to stop her from going in, and she needed that outside force to stop her, because she could not stop herself. It was crazy, but she was being inexorably drawn back to the tunnels, and she was powerless to fight it. The truth was down there, she knew it, but if there was another way to find out the answers to her questions, she would seek that way first.

She headed to the office, having started back at work, and she was glad to be busy, the work occupying much of her thinking time and taking her mind off her dilemma, at least partly.

The meeting with her friends had proven fruitless as she'd expected. They'd merely endorsed what Elliot and Joe had already told her about her relationship being very much a closed book. But one which the media had been increasingly interested in uncovering prior to her disappearance. The other piece of disturbing information they provided her with, she preferred not to dwell on. There 'had' been a man in her life, and his name, not surprisingly had been Vincent, but none of them had ever met him. So what did that mean? Okay, so Vincent had been an important figure in her life, she already knew that, and her reluctance to speak about him had obviously led her friends to read more into the relationship than there ever had been, nothing more.

Her bag hit the desk with a sliding bang, sending papers flying. She groaned and stooped to pick them up. So where did that leave her? Just under a year ago her life had undergone a major drama. To start with, she'd become pregnant. The fact that none of her colleagues knew anything of her pregnancy indicated that either she'd kept it a secret, or she herself had not known until after her abduction. One thing was certain, if her abductors had not known about the baby at the onset, they definitely would have known as time went on, so why had they kept her for the duration of her pregnancy and then killed her(or so they thought) after her delivery? Why not just get rid of her and the unborn child at an earlier date? Unless the child was what they had been after... It was the only explanation that made sense.

She placed the papers in a neat pile on the desk and sat down over them, rubbing her eyes. Sooner or later she was going to have to face the truth, but for now she was back to square one.

Joe burst through the door, startling her, and she grappled for the papers before they scattered again.

"We've located the baby! Your baby!"

"My'baby! How?"

"Cathy, you underestimate the power and excellency of this office."

"Yeah, I guess I did. So what do we do now? Are you sure it's mine? How can you be sure?"

"There you go again," he scolded her. "Come on, I'll explain on the way."

"We're going now?"

"When else?" He ushered her out the door. "By the way, Radcliffe, you've already had your 'maternity' leave!"

*****

The sound on the pipes meant one thing to Vincent - his son had been found! It was the only thing that had kept him going since Catherine had left three weeks ago and never returned, the one hope he had left, a new hope.

He made his way to Father's chamber, as they had arranged should this happen. There was to be a clearly laid out plan to follow, as this was too important to mess up by anyone taking risks. Vincent knew that warning had been intended for him alone, as he was the only one likely to lose control. But he was calm as he walked into Father's chamber. He knew the rules and he would stick to them, there was too much at stake not to.

Father was speaking. "Everybody gather around. The Helpers have done a marvelous job this time. Thanks to them, we know that Vincent's son is being held at a house in Harlem. We do not normally resort to underhanded means, but in this circumstance, we are left with no alternative. So, friends, our object is to kidnap back the child as he was taken from us."

Pascal was wary. "Is this safe?"

"NOTHING is safe! We have already discussed this and have decided it is the only way. Our Helpers and as many of ourselves as we can afford will keep the house and the activities of its occupants under surveillance at all times. At the first possible chance and we will only get one chance ... Jamie will snatch the baby and get away in the van which will be waiting. Now," Father wiped his brow and his hand visibly shook. "has everybody got that clear?"

Vincent took the opportunity to speak. "I should be there, Father. The risk is too great for Jamie and the others."

"NO!" Father was adamant. "Don't you know that trapping you is what all this is about? You are not to be there, Vincent, under 'any' circumstances."

Vincent retired to his chamber to wait. It was all he could do, having been delegated a back seat yet again, the price to pay for being different.

*****

"Keep the siren off," Joe instructed the cop who was driving the car. "We don't want to alert them too soon."

Catherine turned to Joe who was sitting beside her in the back seat of the patrol car. "Forgive me, Joe, but I don't get any of this. How have you managed to track down these people, when I still don't even know who they are?"

He was following the road with his eyes, his left arm resting half on the rear of the seat and half of the way up the window, but he afforded her a quick glance as the car swung around a bend.

"Cathy, you obviously don't recall that it was me who got you into this mess."

"You?"

"Yeah, they were after me in the first place and they would've kept after me too, if I hadn't been stupid enough to let you in on the deal."

Catherine peered out her side window at the rather imposing statue of Alexander Hamilton whose face adorned the ten dollar note.

"So I mucked things up," she surmised.

"No way! But you had the information to expose them. I've been chasing these guys up for the best part of a year, Cathy. There's no doubt about who they are."

The driver pulled up across the road from a row of tightly packed terraced four-story Romanesque-style houses.

"This is it," he said. "We wait five minutes and we'll have backup surrounding the entire property."

Catherine reached for her door handle. She needed air.

"What the hell do you think you're doing, Radcliffe? Get your head down before you're seen!"

"I feel sick, Joe!"

"Now? Open the window, man, before she throws up all over us!"

The air helped her nausea, but not her nerves. "So what's going to happen? You've no proof they ever did hold me hostage."

Joe turned to her. "Cathy, we're not here for that. We're here to get that baby of yours back."

"Joe, I don't even feel like I've had a baby. I don't 'remember' having a baby. I don't even feel maternal."

"No, but you do care what happens to that child, enough to get it out of the hands of kidnappers and murderers?"

"Of course." The backup vehicles were beginning to accumulate in the vicinity. Catherine folded her arms tightly and squeezed them into her stomach. "How do you even know it's my baby, Joe?"

His expression was bland. "We don't," he said. "but a blood test will prove it."

She didn't want to hear any more."

"It may also give us some clue as to who the father is."

The nausea rose in her throat again. As if she didn't know.

"Let me go in," she proposed.

"What are you, crazy? They think you're dead!"

"Exactly! I'll surprise them, catch them off guard. I'll take two cops with me."

"I don't know, Radcliffe."

She smiled. "Thanks, Joe. You're a pushover!"

"Hey!"

But she was already out of the vehicle and crossing the road.

"What about the two cops?" he called after her.

"I forgot!" she shouted back and didn't wait to hear the expletive she knew would follow.

The mahogny door had been neglected. She pushed the bell, the resulting two-tone chime seeming to reverberate through every nerve in her body.

She had expected it would be an unsuspecting maid who would answer the door and not the man she recognized as one of her abductors. Momentarily frozen, she realized too late that she was the one caught off guard as she was pulled inside the house.

"Come to rejoin us, Miss Chandler?"

She yanked her arm free. "You've got something belonging to me, which I suggest you hand over. If you don't, the two dozen cops surrounding this building will be in here in seconds."

"I don't think so, Miss Chandler. If they value your life as much as we don't." He laughed harshly. "Come inside and make yourself comfortable while we wait for the child's father to appear."

Vincent! It had to be! And they knew. She sank into the leather armchair pointed put to her. How were they so sure he would come? Because this must have happened before, because he must always come when she was in danger. But how did he know where she was? Instinct... telepathy... some sort of extrasensory perception which he shared with only her? Apparently.

She glanced out the window and spotted Jamie in a white parked van. If she had needed any more proof as to Vincent's involvement, then that was it. Dammit, she'd walked straight into a trap, only it wasn't her trap, it was Vincent's. She had to stop him from coming here, somehow... Whatever had happened between them, however close they'd been, was in the past, and it was the only way she could deal with the shock of it, but she still cared enough not to want to see him come to any harm. Don't show your fear! Don't feel it, then he'll have nothing to follow! She stood back from the window and stretched. "I want to see my baby."

She was getting used to the mocking laugh by now. "Are you sure? You might not like what you see."

He was bluffing, trying to frighten her, but still the element of doubt crept in as he led her to the nursery. The baby, which lay kicking about in the crib, was perfectly human and perfectly gorgeous. Something moved inside her and she bent to pick him up.

Her abductor's hand darted across her chest. "Not so fast. You wouldn't want to get too attached ... to him," he sneered, "in case anything should happen to him."

"No," Catherine pushed him back against the wall and bundled the baby into her arms.

Within seconds, three more men had barged in, blocking her escape. All trace of smugness had vanished from the abductor's face as he picked himself up. "Finish them off!" he ordered, tossing one of the men a gun. "And do it right this time! We don't want any more unanticipated resurrections!"

*****

Catherine's fear reached Vincent before the message on the pipes did. The subway was the fastest way. He gripped the sides of the train with his nails as he lay prostrate on its roof, his face buried against the fierce wind created by the speeding locomotive.

'He wasn't going to let her down this time!'

They could kill him first or do as they wanted with him because he had no life left since losing Catherine since losing her love from his life.

He crashed through the basement floorboards, knocking over tins of paint. The door at the top of the stairs was flung open as he reached it; all Vincent saw was the gun pointing towards the ceiling as it went off. He swiped it from its owner and smashed it against the door frame. He lunged after the fleeing felon, ripping the back of his checked shirt as his claws embedded deep into the man's shoulders. He screams of agony barely registered in Vincent's ears as he cast the dying man aside and went in pursuit of the others.

"Vincent!"

It was Catherine's voice! He spun around and she was being held between two men, one with a gun to her head, a third man had a knife to the baby's throat.

"It's 'you' we want." The smooth, velvet voice crawled under his skin, infiltrating every fibre in his being. The face of the beautiful woman he loved and the helplessness of his son were all he saw clearly. The faces of the three men merged into one hideous blur and he leaped, with no premeditated intention, onto all of them, one part of him totally out of control, slashing and tearing skin and bone, completely removed from the other part which untangled Catherine from the mess and gave her clear instructions.

"Go! Run now. Back to the police before anyone comes in and sees us together."

Her eyes seemed to plead with him, for what he knew not, for a brief moment before she complied with his wishes and made off quickly out the front door.

The baby was crying and wriggling on the floor. Vincent stooped and picked up his son for the first time, holding him close to his chest to reassure him.

*****

"Cathy, what the hell was going on in there? You were ages!"

Joe obviously suspected nothing. "They took some persuading."

"So where's the kid, Radcliffe?"

Jamie had just walked into the house and was now leaving with the baby in her arms! She was about to get into the van that was parked outside.

"What are you staring at? Holy shit!" He dived for the car door.

"No, leave it! It's all right. She's taking the baby to his father."

"His 'father'! You know who the father is now?"

"Can we just go? I really want to get out of here." Before the police found the savaged bodies and demanded an explanation from her.

Joe was rambling on. "A little boy, eh?"

Catherine only half heard what he said, she had other things on her mind. She addressed the driver. "Officer, can you let me out at East 62nd Street near Central Park?" To Joe, she said, "There's something I've got to do."

*****

The handmade wooden cradle was suffused in the soft dim light of Vincent's chamber. He sat on the edge of his bed and rocked it rhythmically with his foot.

Catherine went and stood in front of him. "You came to that house today to protect me, because you knew I was there."

"Yes," he admitted.

The cradle creaked hypnotically, disturbingly. "I tried to stop you coming," she said quickly. "I didn't want to endanger you."

"Catherine," his voice was low and husky. "You could never have kept me away today. I felt the bond too strongly."

"Your bond with me?"

"Yes." Another admission.

She took a deep breath. "Vincent ... the others ... I saw Jamie .... they were there because...." She looked down at the baby who was drifting off to sleep. "He's your son, isn't he?"

"Yes."

"And his mother...?"

Vincent removed his foot from the cradle and hung his head. The soft lapping of the candle flame was the only sound in the chamber.

"Vincent, please! I need to know the truth."

He lifted his head and said very quietly. "You already know the truth, Catherine. You just need to remember."

"I CAN'T remember!" she shouted. The baby stirred and she moved away from the cradle. Vincent following. "Why can't I remember?"

"Perhaps you don't want to." His voice was deep and serious and bore into her otherwise inaccessible inner being. "Perhaps your subconscious is trying to tell you that the truth is too much for you to cope with."

She opened her mouth to protest, but then she looked at him, really looked at him, at his long mane of light-coloured hair, at his deep-set blue eyes, so intense they seemed to penetrate her own, at his facial features, strong and attractive, distinctive, not entirely human... at his solid physique, and she was both aroused and repulsed. She was in love with his intellect, with his noble restraint, with his ability to separate from himself, to put her needs first. She knew that his mind could bore into her soul. She looked at him and something stronger than herself was compelling her to go to him, to give into the overpowering desire sweeping through her, to feel him against her, holding her, loving her.

Yet she could not do it.

She walked over to the cradle and fondled her son's fine fair hair. "Tell him ... tell him whatever you think is best."

Then she turned and made herself walk sedately back through the tunnels because if she ran, she might lose herself to emotion.

CHAPTER FIVE

NO OTHER WAY

Catherine felt her head was spinning, reeling from all that had happened. She had faced the truth before running away from it. She had acknowledged it, but she could not accept it, and that was what was causing her turmoil. She stalked through her apartment, holding her forehead in both hands, her fingers pushing through her hair as each side of her brain waged war with the other.

It was too much, she had to go - somewhere - get out of here. Barging into the bedroom, she snatched a suitcase from the top shelf in her closet and dumped it on the bed. It snapped open. Tears burst from her eyes. She didn't even know what to take ... where to go ... there was nowhere ... or no one in whom she could confide ... she was alone in this, totally alone.

There was a knock on the door.

'Not now!' Her hands instinctively few to her eyes, scrubbing at the telltale tears. She jerked a tissue from the flower-patterned box on her bedside cabinet and blew her nose hard into it.

"Just a minute!" she called out. Smoothing down her sweater, she put a neutral look on her face and went to open the door.

The police, two of them, men. Was this a genuine call? If it wasn't, would Vincent sense her fear and come to save her? Or would he ignore it now that she had well and truly left him? No, never Vincent! Unless she had severed the bond with her departing. What was going through her mind? She wasn't thinking straight. The officers were waiting outside the door.

"May we come in, Miss Chandler?"

More doubts. She was a woman completely alone now. She raised her head and tried to appear confident.

"What can I do for you?"

One of the men,  the younger, spoke. "We're here regarding today's incidents, Miss Chandler. I think it's best we discuss the matter in private."

Suddenly, all she saw were the four savaged men, lying ripped apart and bleeding in that house. Her shock must have shown on her face as she edged back from the door and the two cops stepped inside.

"Maybe you ought to sit down, Miss." The older cop, a thin, gray man, indicated one of the sofas and she sat on it obediently. She wasn't ready for this; she had no answsers, but she had to protect Vincent at all costs. If all logic deserted her, her allegience to Vincent never would.

"There were dogs!" she spat out. "Dobermans."

"Dogs?" The younger cop pulled out his notepad and scribbled on it. "There was so sign of any dogs. How many were there?"

Catherine kept her eyes transfixed on those of the cop, trying to make her own appear as honest as possible. Was that how one behaved when lying, or was it a dead giveaway? "At least half a dozen," she replied casually. "They must have run off after."

The cop paused in his writing. "Forgive me for my skepticisim, Miss Chandler, but why didn't they tear 'you' to pieces as well as those poor guys?"

"Easy, Maloney!"

"I don't know," Catherine retaliated. "Maybe because I wasn't waving a gun around and behaving in a threatening manner."

"Or maybe they like women better than their own handlers," the young cop supplied.

Catherine stood, finding new strength within herself, strength and willingness to defend Vincent against this irritating, measly man who was just doing his job, she knew, but who would nevertheless expose that gentlest of persons and destroy him in the process, given half the chance. So she would give him none.

"You don't know that those men even handled the dogs themselves. Didn't it occur to you they might have employed a kennel hand?"

"There weren't any kennels, and I'm not so sure there were dogs either."

The other cop spoke up. "What're you saying, Maloney? What else could have done that sort of damage?"

"That's what I'm trying to find out."

It was all starting again. This was how it had ended last time, with questions that she had been unable to answer, impossible pressure from the media, insatiable curiosity from all she knew, and a driven desire from the most evil of men to ruin the most intelligible.

"All I know is," the younger cop continued, "That things have been quiet in this city while you were missing, Miss Chandler. You're only back and already four people have been mauled to death. Seems to me there's something you're not telling me."

"Have you come here to question me or accuse me, Mr. Maloney?"

He kept his head in his notepad and started to drum his pen in it. When he looked up he said, "There's the other matter, of the baby - what happened to it?"

Catherine sighed and went to switch on a light. Were they ever going to go away? "He's safe," she retorted.

"I'm sure he is, but how did he come to be safe?"

She sat down again and her eyes strayed to the growing dark outside her balcony window, to the lights being switched on all over the city. This was Vincent's time for roaming the streets. She wished the policemen would just go and leave her in peace.

"What do you mean?" she asked tiredly.

"We mean," Maloney repeated, "that you fled from the house to escape a pack of marauding dogs, but you were happy to abandon your son to them."

"He was never in any danger."

Maloney was quick to jump in, looming over her on the sofa. "Why not?" he pursued his point. "Was there someone else in the house to protect him?"

Her stomach lurched and she felt her face drain of blood. She couldn't keep up this pretense for much longer.

"He was nowhere near the dogs," she shouted. Could they tell she was breaking under the strain? "He was safe, upstairs, in his crib."

The policeman leaned over her and she twisted her head away.

"The girl who entered the house and took the child, who was she?"

Catherine placed her hands on either side of her on the couch. "A friend," she stated.

"Of yours?"

"Yes."

"We let her go," he said. "We thought you arranged it."

What now? She studied the backs of her hands. Take the blame, anything to divert them from Vincent.

"I did arrange it. I knew she 'd be there," she lied.

Maloney leaned so close she could smell his aftershave. she wrinkled her nose.

"But you and your boss still went ahead with this farce."

"Joe didn't know anything about the arrangements I'd made. He thought we were collecting the baby."

"As we all did, Miss Chandler." He backed away and walked in a little circle. "So why the change of plan?"

She shook her head and opened out her palms. "I don't know. I wanted to surprise the kidnappers by turning up like that, but I knew the child would be better off with his father, so at the last minute I contacted Jamie." They'd never trace her. "And asked her to take the baby to his father."

"And the father's name?" Maloney stood with pen paused on paper, ready to write, waiting to sign away Vincent's life.

She jumped up and, brushing past him, went straight to the door and opened it. "I don't have to supply you with that information."

"Unless it becomes a police matter," Maloney corrected.

The older cop butted in at last. "C'mon, it's late. Miss Chandler's tired."

Maloney had the gall to tip his cap before leaving.

Catherine ran to the door immediately after they'd gone, snatcing at the bolts and chains with trembling fingers. In the bedroom, she stared at the open suitcase on the bed. She had made the right decision cutting Vicnent out of her life. This must have been how it had happened before, and she couldn't live like that again, always in fear of being found out. There was no way forward for them together, neither of them would be safe and truly free from prying eyes until they went their separate ways.

*****

Vincent watched as his son's little body began to twitch in his sleep. The chubby hands opened and closed simultanelously while tiny baby sounds issued from his throat. When his eyes opened Vincent wrapped him in his shawl and carried him to Father's chamber.

Father was just getting up from his desk.

"I've come to a decision, Father."

"Oh?"

Vincent smoothed his son's hair. "We've got to go ahead and name him without Catherine."

Father pulled at his chin. "There's no chance she'll come back?"

"She refuses to remember, Father."

"Refuses?"

"Her fear is holding her back."

Father's cane tapped on the stone floor. "Fear of what?"

"Everything that a life with me involves," Vincent sighed.

"But she made all those decisions before."

"And look where they got her."

Father's deep-set eyes poured out from under his dark brows. "So she may never remember?"

Vincent picked up a rook from Father's chess set and turned it over in his fingers. "Not unless ..."

Father's eyes quickly shot to Vincent's face. "What is it? What's on your mind?"

Vincent replaced the rook and gave his full attention to Father. "Not unless I help her to remember."

Father frowned. "Tell her what happened? But you don't even remember everything yourself."

Vincent sat on the edge of the bed and rocked the baby in his arms. "I know what you told me and that knowledge has been my redemption. Without it I couldn't have got through this past year."

The baby stretched and stiffened in his arms, growing restless. Vincent rearranged him until he was holding him upright against his chest, his large hand supporting the back of the baby's head. "I've decided to call him Jacob," he digressed.

The smile which crept into Father's face clearly portrayed his pleasure. Rather awkwardly, Vincent thoguht, he made it disappear again.

"What about Catherine? You said she won't return here."

Vincent tilted back his head and tried to see through the jagged ceiling in the world Above. "Then I will go to her."

He awaited Father's disapproval but it never came, so into the silence Vincent spoke again. "She's begged me for the truth from the beginning. It's time I gave it to her."

*****

Catherine's suitcase was fully packed. She snapped it shut and looked around her apartment. It was the second time in a month that she was leaving somewhere she regarded as home.

But this was the only way, to go somewhere where nobody knew her or Vincent and start afresh. Staying out of Vincent's life was the only way she could protect him and live her own life free from constant media intrusion and police inquiries.

Once she reached her destination she would contact her friends and arrange to have her things sent on. Joe would give her a good reference.

She flopped onto the bed and picked up the phone. Everything was ready and she had only to call a cab. She could not get her fingers to press the buttons.

Come on, Cathy! she chided herself. Now is not the time to have a breakdown!

She watched as her index finger obeyed her numbed brain and prodded the first three digits.

A shadow passed across her balcony window.

Did she see him? Would she come? He tapped gently on the glass and held his breath. As soon as the curtain moved and he saw her face through the glass, he knew. Even before the doors opened and she stood in front of him, he read her mind through her eyes, as if the blood pumping fast through his heart wasn't enough to tell him what she felt. And yet there was always room for doubt.

He hung his head, suddenly afraid to look at her. She was so beautiful, with her honey-coloured hair billowing back from her face in the cool night breeze, her clear green eyes bright and honest, always so full of trust. And he, what was he? He only had to look down on his ragged clothes, his hair-covered claws instead of hands and compare this with Catherine's loveliness and smart appearance to know in his mind that she could not possibly want or even need to hear anything he could tell her. Why would she even want to be reminded? He turned away.

"No!" she flung herself against him, throwing her arms around his neck. "Don't go! Don't go ever again, not without me!"

He held onto her tightly, smelt her sweetness, her perfume, the shampoo in her hair. Intoxicated, his mouth opened on her hair and he tasted its silkiness on his lips.

She leaned her head back and smiled up at him. There were wet splashes on her cheeks. "You're crying," he said.

"No," she laughed. "It's raining!"

He glanced out across the balcony. A fine drizzle was driving across the distant skyscrapers.

"Remember, Vincent, 'Schubert's Unfinished Symphony'."

"The concert in the park when it rained. I remember. It was a special night."

She squeezed his upper arms through the thick leather material which covered his shoulders. "And so is this one. I was miserable without you, Vincent. I'd never felt so alone."

"Nor I," he whispered. He turned and planted his hands on the balcony wall and gazed out across the night sky at the flickering haze of lights as New York lived. Catherine came up behind him and massaged between his shoulder blades.

"What is it?" she asked quietly.

He turned slightly sideways. "You still don't remember. I came here to tell you, because you asked and because you have a right to know."

She reached up and covered his lips with her finger. "Sometime," she said, "Sometime you can tell me or I'll remember. Once we're away from here and I don't have to keep my feelings hidden any more for fear of someone finding out."

He held her face gently between his hands. "Was that the reason for your fear? Not me?"

"A little of both, I guess," she admitted, allowing him to draw her close again. "And of myself, my reaction to you, of all that lies ahead."

"And now?"

She studied him once again and caressed his cheek with her palm. "Now I know why I fell in love with you the first time, because I've gone and done it all over again."

He bent his head and sought her lips, closing his eyes when his mouth made contact with hers. He pushed at her mouth gently at first and then more demandingly as she responded. His desire grew and he held her away, smoothing down her now wet hair.

"Take me home, Vincent," she said, "And let's not leave anything else unfinished ."

He extended his hand and she reached for it, but he changed his mind and encircled her waist instead. Close to him was where she wanted to be. He knew it is his heart where there was no room left for doubt because his love filled all of it.

TOGETHER AGAIN

Part 2 of the trilogy

(from CRYSTAL CAVERN ELEVEN)

Catherine slithered out from under the weight of Vincent's arm, unable to sleep. These Tunnels were never completely silent. There was a hushed closeness which filled her ears and closed in on her senses and tingled the hairs on her neck, making them stand coldly on end. She could never sleep in this suffocating atmosphere. It has been a week since she had asked Vincent to bring her here so that they could set up a home together, a week in which she'd slept only in short fretful bursts. And yet Vincent slept, the rising and falling of his vast chest the only sign of life. But Vincent had been sleeping beneath this city for over 30 years. She couldn't have hoped to adjust within one week.

But that was exactly what she had hoped for. In truth, she hadn't hoped at all. In her impetuousness, she had not foreseen,nor even contemplated, any problems. Living and working in New York did not give one time to think, let alone contemplate. Wandering about Below lent plenty of opportunity for reflection ...

She lay back down on the bed again and nestled into Vincent's back, wrapping her upper arm around his warm body. She loved him so much. She had only just reappeared after almost a year of being missing. Now she had 'disappeared' again without any explanation. It wasn't fair on them. And what about her neighbours and landlord? The bank. The police. How long would it be before all these noticed she wasn't around any more? How long before they started to question and investigate her whereabouts?

She turned onto her back, leaning her cheeks against Vincent's mane of coarse-soft hair, its golden strands a pillow and a resting place for her troubled mind. She had to go back. She had to go and cut off all ties with the world Above, make up some story about where she was going, why she wouldn't see them again, something believable, so that if they ever tried to seek her out sometime in the future and did not find her, they wouldn't think it strange.

She turned onto her stomach and propped herself on one elbow. It was almost light. Vincent stirred and opened his eyes.

"What troubles you?" he asked. She laid her palm on the side of his face. He reached up and covered it with his own.

"You're leaving."

"Only for a short while, until I can get away without being followed."

"You're here, now."

"Yes, and people will be looking for me."

"They can't find you here. They can't ... harm us, as long as you stay."

"But is it fair, Vincent?" He flopped hhis head back on the pillow and sighed.

"No. They will be worried about you. You must go."

She reached over and kissed him lightly on the mouth. "And when I come back, we can put that other world behind us for good."

He held her with the intensity of his blue gaze.

"We can never eradicate it completely, Catherine. We live below it, we depend on it for our own survival. The most we can hope for is that it does not affect us beyond our control."

"That is why I'm going back, to leave it properly, so that I can return here free to live under a new set of principles."

"How long will you be gone?"

"A week maybe. No more." She rose from the bed. At the chamber exit, she turned and hesitated, expecting him to speak. He had sat up and was watching her go.

"I will be here, Catherine, waiting for you when you come back."

She knew he would be. Waiting was all he could do when others made decisions he couldn't partake of. Waiting was a facet of Vincent's lonely and isolated existence. It made her feel more guilty for leaving him. He was more important to her than her friends. He needed her more than they did. He relied on her. And she relied on him, and needed him more then she needed anybody else. She and Vincent were interdependent of each other. So why wasn't she putting him first? Why was she forcing him to wait, again, just so her old friends didn't have to worry? It didn't make any sense, and yet she was doing it.

Emerging from the Tunnels into her apartment basement, she felt as though she was deserting Vincent, disregarding his feelings for the sake of those to whom she was going to say good-bye anyway, and she knew she was. Still she carried on, up and upward, away from him and his world of peace to the surface existence of chaos and distraction.

The moment she turned the key in her apartment door, she wished she'd felt well enough alone and stayed Below. There was somebody waiting for her. It was Maloney, the cop who'd interrogated her after Vincent had killed the men who'd kidnapped his and Catherine's baby. He hadn't believed her cock-and-bull story about Doberman dogs then, and she doubted he believed it now either.

He rose off her two-seater settee.

"Miss Chandler, do come in."

"Mr. Maloney, do leave." He chuckled.

"Very good, Catherine. But I haven't camped out here for a whole week just to wish you welcome back."

She threw down her bag and placed her knuckles on her hip bone.

"You've been staying at my apartment?" He pulled a piece of paper from his shirt pocket and fanned it in front of her face.

"It's all above board, Catherine. Authorized by the Chief commissioner himself. Care to read it?"

"No." She flopped down onto the other sofa. Now what? Vincent was right. She should have stayed with him in the Tunnels. Nobody could have unearthed her there. Now she had given them opportunity to pry and probe all over again. Wouldn't she ever learn? Couldn't she stay away from this world long enough to just give them a little peace and security? Anybody would think she was deliberately inviting trouble. It was a wonder Vincent stuck with her at all. He never had a minute's rest from rescuing her and getting themselves into yet more strife. If she had been a 'nice, quiet girl,' they wouldn't end up in these sort of predicaments. But no, Catherine Chandler meant trouble. Wherever she went and whatever she did, she brought grief to them both.

She got up and slid her bag onto her shoulder once more.

"I'm going out for breakfast." She was going back to the Tunnels, that was what, and never emerging again. The rest of the world would just have to wonder. Eventually, after years of her never resurfacing, they would write her off and forget all about her.

Maloney planted his stocky frame in front of her and pushed his teeth into a grin.

"You're going nowhere, Catherine, not until I get some answers, and realistic ones this time." She cocked her head sidways.

"Realistic, huh?"

"Yeah, like who the slasher is." She wrung her hands together breezily and brushed past him toward the fridge.

"So what you got to eat.

*****

Vincent stood with his head back and his eyes lifted to the ceiling, to the roof of his chamber, to the floor on which Catherine walked. Would she ever truly be a part of his world? Would she ever be fully able to integrate into it, to drink of its hushed silence and let its limitations be enough to fill her soul? Could he ever hope to provide her with all that she needed for life? She was young. Would she soon grow restless, even if not with him, with these walls? It had only been a week and they had failed to contain her.

And yet didn't he know how she felt? Didn't he understand the insatiable yearning which led her on journeys of exploration, the wild urgent which caused her to take risks, to walk directly in the path of danger and look destruction and death in the face? Because such roads, when they spiralled back to calmness, made that calm all the more so.

*****

"Taking a vacation."

"Might I ask where?" She bit into an onion bagel.

"A private spot I go to when I want to be alone." He shrugged.

"Who did you go with?"

"Mr. Malony," she licked butter from her thumb, "I just said I'd wanted to be alone." He shook his head.

"This I don't buy, this 'alone' thing. You seem to do an awful lot of things alone, or so you say, but you're never really 'on your own,' are you, Catherine? There's always somebody lurking about the background, waiting to pounce on anybody who doesn't like you." She took a sip of coffee.

"Maybe I've got a stalker."

He nodded. "Yeah. A prowler. I say you got a damn good prowler, Catherine Chandler."

She set the mug down on the counter and kept her face free of any expression. She wondered if he realized how close to the truth he was, or was it simply wild speculations? Whatever it was, she would have to tread with extreme caution and do nothing to endanger herself, so as to ultimately lure Vincent to her. She would play along with Malony's game. Let him keep her here if that's what he wanted. She regarded the smugness which pulled his mouth into a thin, self-satisfied grimace, the defiance which made his eyes glimmer with malice. He would expect her to retaliate, and when she didn't, he would grow bored and let her be.

Vincent knew she had business to attend to which may take a few days, so he wouldn't seek her out. When Maloney's superiors get fed up with him wasting their time and money on his own ludicrous suspicions, he would have to drop the case. Then she would make her excuses to all concerned and return to the Tunnels, without worry of ever being missed. It was a waiting game now, a test of endurance between her and Maloney. He had a frantic world out there, one which rushed and raved and was impatient of his return, demanded answeres that she would never give. Whereas she had all the time she required.

*****

A whole week passed and there was no word from Catherine. She'd said she would be no longer than a week. It had been the longest week of his life, a week of uncertainty in which he felt she may never come back. She's been away from him for longer periods in the past, the longest and most distressing being the eight months of her pregnancy in which she'd been held prisoner by the evil Gabriel and during which time he had lost his Bond with her. But that had been a time when she had been held against her will and could not come to him.

Then there had been the weeks which followed when she had lain in a coma, her reawakening unsure. And the months afterwards when her memory was lost to her and she did not know him. But their will and their determination had brought them through all those times, their mutual love working as a union to bring them repeatedly back together. But what neither of their individual or combined strengths could do was keep them together. They could fight against outside forces and all sorts of exterior adversity - intrusive investigators, the evil Paracelsus, the mind-sick Gabriel - they'd conquered them all. Why was it that they could not subdue their own interior apprehensions, the fears which, when everything else stood back and allowed them to be together, still rose firm and prominent as a blockade forever erect between them?

He held his pen poised in the fingers of his left hand over his journal. Were those fears in himself or in Catherine? He would have said Catherine, for she was the one who had felt the need to leave. But weren't there fears in him too, fears which made him afraid to believe in her love for him, fears which threatened to consume him with their intensity and threatened to suffocate his own love for Catherine, to shatter destruction?

He pushed his chair back and shook his great mane of hair about his shoulders. Why had she had to go? To say good-bye to her friends! Yes, and to provide herself and him with some sort of legitimate passport to eternal peace and happiness. But would they ever have that figurative document? They would never have it as long as Catherine still embarked on walkabout tours of the world Above and he questioned her motives.

*****

Things weren't going according to plan. Maloney was not letting up. He was resolute as Catherine was and he seemed to find a perverse delight in her persisting obstinacy, as though he believed he could outsmart her or outlast her and wear her down.

She got up from flicking through a woman's magazine he had bought her, its pages filled with superfluous stories and gratuitous advertisements. If the magazine carried a message, it was void of any real meaning fo her at this stage in her life. It was empty and worldly and unessential. She tossed it into the garbage and wished she could do the same with Maloney. He was wearing her down. It had been 10 days altogether now that he had imprisoned her in her own apartment and she would bet it would be ten or a hundred more if she didn't start pulling some strings herself.

She walked across to where he sat on the sofa and stood over him, snatching the newspaper out of his hands.

"How much longer do you intend to keep up this charade?" she demanded.

He took the paper from her and folded it neatly on the seat beside him.

"As far as I can see, you're the only one playing charades, Catherine."

"And you've got all the clues wrong, Mr. Maloney."

"I don't think so. The fact alone that you've consented to this little set-up here the past week and a half proves me right. You must be really desperate to protect this Vincent whoever he is."

Something lurched within her at the sound of his name peeling off Maloney's smarmy lips. She shook her head.

"Vincent?"

Maloney clasped his hand behind his head and leaned bacl on the sofa, a cynical smile playing about his mouth.

"Everybody knows his name is Vincent. That's no longer a secret." She turned away. What else did they know?

Maloney stretched out his legs in front of him.

"All we need to find out now is where he's at, so we can ask him a few questions about the method he employs to kill people, and make him pay for his crimes." She faced him.

"Vincent kills only to protect."

"Protect whom? You?" She tilte her chin.

"When the need arises." Maloney sat up and leaned forward, his elbows on his knees.

"And how does that make you feel, Catherine Chandler? Doesn't it make you feel guilty, responsible even, for all those needless deaths?" She felt her chin rise higher.

"They would have killed me."

"Ah, yes, self-defense, but tell me, Catherine, why are you in these dangerous situations so much of the time?" She waved an arm across her face.

"It goes along with my job, Mr. Maloney."

"Uh huh. Working for the D.A.'s office is a shade more hazardous than say, selling real estate." Catherine pressed her fingers to her forehead.

"But we both know your job isn't the real reason why you find yourself landed in all these life and death situations, which you consistently manage to come out of unscathed. I would propose that your lifestyle, and the company you keep, as opposed to your line of work, is what makes people dislike you so much."

"Be that as it may, Mr. Maloney, all it proves is that people should mind their own business, and that includes you."

She strode to the door and shoved her feet into her boots. Maloney leaped off the sofa.

"It's my business when people are being slashed to death. Where do you think you're going?"

"I'm going out. I've got a pounding headache.

"I'll make you an aspirin."

"I don't want or need an aspirin. I need some fresh air. You can't keep me here any longer. It's unhealthy. I want to go for a walk."

"Very well. Let's go for a walk. Perhaps it will clear your head enough to release some answers."

They walked in the Park and it did clear Catherine's head, enough to appreciate the cool fresh air on her face, the weak sun warm on the top of her head, the scent of wet grass filling her nostrils. Having been cooped up for ten days inside her own apartment, everything about outdoors seemed so much more vibrant, so alive and clean and fresh, and necessary.

And vital.

And then it struck her. She couldn't live in the Tunnels. She would suffocate, if not physically, then mentally, psychologically, down there, stripped of the sky above her and nowhere to look far away.

They skirted past the Tunnel entrance and she tensed. Maloney seemed to know so much. Maybe he already knew where Vincent lived and he was leading her here to force her to take him to his fugitive. She reminded herself that she, not Maloney, had initiated the walk, but he hadn't put up much of any argument either. They headed for home and she decided it was time to put an end to this sham. Her mind worked out its plan of lies in silence.

*****

"No word yet?"

Father's familiar figure entered Vincent's chamber. Vincent half-turned from his position at his desk.

"Nothing. I sensed her, Father."

"Sensed her?"

Vincent turned fully now, to face Jacob, the man who had been the only Father he had known, the man he had named his baby son after.

"Moments ago. She was close, as close as the Tunnels themselves, and then she went away again."

"Is she in danger?"

"No. She is coming back. I sense a ... withdrawal in her."

"From you?" Father ventured.

"From this place. She does not want to be here. She fears that if she comes back now, I will expect her to stay."

"But that was her own decision," Father said.

"Decisions made can be the wrong ones."

"What will you do?"

Vincent stood.

"I must go and convince Catherine that I do not wish to take away her freedom. I was wrong to think that she could remain happy Below. We are from two different worlds, Father. I cannot live in hers and she is unable to live in mine, except for a short time. Catherine needs space, and room, to live and breath. I must make her believe that I understand or I could lose her altogether.

*****

Maloney turned Catherine's key in her lock.

"Vincent is dead," Catherine said as soon as they entered the apartment.

Maloney shut the door and scoffed.

"I would have expected something a little more original than that from you, Catherine."

"It's the truth!" She'd never told so many lies in her life until she met Vincent.

"You cracking up yet? You ready to talk? I think it's time we went down to the station. Leave your coat on."

At the station the Chief of Police questioned her some more. Unlike Maloney, he seemed satisfied with her answers. He was altogether a more amiable man, older and greyer with soft eyes and heart. But when he addressed Maloney, his face grew stern.

"Be in my office at four. I intend to have words with you about your handling of this case. I'm not at all happy. Miss Chandler," he smiled warmly at her. "Allow me to escort you home by means of an apology. I'm sure you do not wish to spend any more time in the company of Mr. Maloney."

"Not if I can help it," she said.

"Tell me," she queried, clipping in her seat belt into its holster. "I was led to believe that you authorized that whole farce."

The chief pulled out into the lunch time traffic. "I did. I understood that Maloney had proof, solid evidence of your involvement in those killings."

She was thankful he couldn't see her face. He was such a nice man she didn't like to keep the truth from him. But amiable or not, he was still police and it was his job to see the law was not broken. Even if she and Vincent were a law unto themselves. As far as NYPD was concerned, if New York citizens were harmed, you were liable to New York law. Which was fair enough. Just not in hers and Vincent's case. That was an entirely different scenario, one which nobody could comprehend, not even this genial man driving her home.

*****

Vincent stood on Catherine's balcony, his ear close to the glass of the French doors and rapped his knuckles against it. No answers came. She was not inside. He would have felt her if she had been there. Slowly, he twisted the handle and felt the door open in his hand. He let himself in and closed it behind him. Her scent filled the apartment, but that was that of another too, unfamiliar and masculine and unfriendly. They had been here for a long time and until very recently and probably they would return soon.

He must not be here when they came through the door and yet he must stay, find out who was with Catherine and why he must try to speak with her and tell her that he did not wish to snatch away her freedom and hold back her wings from their full expansion. He went out onto the balcony again and sat, leaning against the brick wall, one leg outstretched, the other bent at the knee, waiting. He was used to waiting and his own silence.

They came not long after, Catherine, and an elderly man by his voice, not the same man who had been here earlier, the man whose scent the apartment reeked of. This man posed no direct threat and Catherine felt relaxed and relieved. But relieved of what? The departure of the other man, whoever he was? His ears strained to pick up what they were saying though the glass.

"I can only apologize for Maloney," the elderly man's voice tricked to him. "He turned every case into a personal vendetta and this particular case had been eating away at him more so than others. He just got so caught up in the whole thing that he forgot to separate fact from fantasy. I warned him to let it go if he couldn't prove anything. But you've got my word, Miss Chandler, he'll be dealt with savagely."

"Apology accepted on Maloney's behalf." Catherine's voice coursed through him like some sweet thing to savour, the days in which he had not heard it adding to its intensity. "And don't you worry, Chief, no harms been done."

Vincent's head collapsed back against the wall. The Chief of Police was here. They had been investigating him, and Catherine had been pulled into the thicket by that young officer, Maloney. Catherine had told him about the cop's incessant questioning regarding Vincent's latest spate of killings and the lies she had been forced to make up on the spot to cover them. It had been the officer's clever calculating persistence to win and reveal the truth for his own glory, and his very likelihood of doing so, which had finally pushed Catherine over the edge and into her impulsive decision to leave her world Above for good and settle Below on a permanent basis.

Now it seemed that the Chief was overruling Maloney's well-founded suspicions and was releasing Catherine back into her own, free life again. As soon as the Chief left, Vincent would break through and tell Catherine that he was releasing her too. Releasing her to work and live and meet with her friends and stroll in the sunshine and the snow in New York City and to come to him whenever she wanted. The way it had always been, the way they could make it again, the only way that Catherine, and ultimately himself, could be truly happy.

He didn't get the chance to tell her just then, because the sound of a key in the front door lock interrupted everything.

"Forgot to give Miss Chandler's spare key."

Maloney! Vincent sucked in a huge nasal breath and smelled him, even through the glass doors. He stood and pressed the door handle hard into his palm, ready for action. There was going to be trouble.

"Put the gun away, Maloney," the Chief was saying.

Vincent quieted his breathing, intent only on what was happening and about to happen in the adjacent room.

"Why don't you let Miss Chandler come on over here?" Maloney said.

"I'm a faster shot than you," the Chief reminded him.

"She was about to talk until you butted in and took over. You're too old and soft to be in this Force. I think its time you stepped aside. Know what I mean?"

"No!" The gunshot belted his eardrums at the same time as Catherine's voice sang out to them. He burst through the door in an incited, protective rage, knowing not where to look or attack or shield first, only that the three occupants of the room were as momentarily surprised and disoriented as he, and that silence prevailed a brief moment before chaos again took over and Catherine was reaching toward the raised gun in Maloney's hand. He saw her in a premonition, dying against him with her own blood, which dripped from her fatal wound and pooled out in deep dark redness to cushion her lifeless form as she fell.

The second gunshot he awaited, when it came, sprang and reverberated, ricocheted back and forth a dozen times off all the walls and the ceiling and the floor and every object in the apartment, like a great quarry blast recoiling into every diminishing spirals of a tragic, yodelling echo. Sounds such as were known to him which the Tunnels' walls had offered up to him as their music and their epitaph.

When Maloney's body hit the floor, Catherine ran to him unharmed and thrust herself against his chest and flung her arms about his neck, he did not understand. He held her lightly, afraid to believe that this time she was not dead, she was here with him, clearly still loving him. And then another fear took over, the fear that they were not alone and that he was fully exposed to another person, the Chief of Police no less.

The uniformed man back stepped until his knees and then his seat hit the sofa and the gun which had killed Maloney turned limp in his fingers. Disbelieving eyes stared at Vincent.

"Maloney was right." Vincent released Catherine and edged toward the balcony.

"Wait!"

Vincent turned as the Chief's command, only too aware fo the lethal gun still in his grip. But the gun was not raised. It lay forgotten about on the seat pad beside the Chief.

"Please," the Chief intoned. "I mean you no harm."

"Nor I, you."

A gasp. Clearly the Chief was surprised at his ability of speech. Vincent was used to it. Was he really so abhorrent, so inhuman that people consistently expected him to communicate soley in a series of grunts? He should have found it upsetting, but he had been through it before, time and time again. He knew what people's reaction to him was. His own response to that was immaterial any more. What mattered was how Catherine saw him, and she had already erased his fears in that department. But what mattered most now, was leaving here before the Chief could alert a whole posse to come after him and track him down. He made for the window again.

"Please," the Chief repeated. "Stay a few moments, I promise not to turn you in. I promise."

He caught Catherine's eyes close briefly and her head gave a succession of small, affirmative nods. He sighed and stood.

"What do you wish to know?"

The Chief, somewhat recovered, replaced the gun in his holster and sat up, wringing his hands together.

"Off the record, you are this lady's protector?"

"In the sense that you refer to, yes."

"You are our mystery killer?"

"I did what was necessary."

"I believe you did."

Catherine ran to the Chief and knelt in front of him.

"Vincent wouldn't hurt anyone for no reason."

He waved her away with a dismissive hand.

"Sit down, please," he gestured toward the facing sofa. "You, too," he motioned to Vincent.

Out of courtesy, Vincent took Catherine's cue and sat beside her, opposite the Chief.

"You two are ... together?"

Vincent looked at Catherine and she looked back and smiled and took his hand.

"Yes."

The Chief nodded. "It is good to have someone to love. Twenty years ago a gang of four thugs broke into our suburban house. They killed my wife and maimed my son. I never loved another woman. Instead I joined the Force. My son was taunted throughout his teens, because you see, they didn't just shoot his leg off and leave it at that. They cut him up real bad so that even his friends couldn't recognize him or bring themselves to hang out with him anymore. They just couldn't see, that inside this was still their buddy, with exactly the same feelings as before.

"Who did this awful thing?" Vincent asked gently.

"Jealous, bitter young men, resentful of our happy family and Brett's popularity. Men who wished to destroy, the same class of men who have undoubtedly attempted to destroy what you have. Am I right?"

Catherine nodded for both of them. Vincent's anger and sorrow for the man sitting opposite and the innocent boy who had been brutally hurt and the wife and mother who had been shamelessly slaughtered, burned away any words which might have formed in his throat.

"So you see, I understand about love and hate and crime and destruction and who is guilty. All I ask is that you go someplace, if there is one, where it is safe and where you will not get that sort of malicious opposition with which I deal every day."

Vincent dropped his eyes from the Chief and turned them to Catherine. She was still holding his hand.

"There is such a place," she said.

The Chief nodded.

"I thought there must be. Maloney was right. I am getting too old and soft for this. Maybe some day when I get older and softer still, you can let me know where this place is."

Vincent extended his free hand, the one Catherine was not holding onto, and the Chief took it, and grasped it firm in a handshake and a pact.

"You will always be welcome there," Vincent told him.

After the Chief left, Vincent stood up too. "I must get back," he said.

Catherine clutched his arm. "You're going alone?"

"You heard what he said."

"He meant both of us should go and keep out of trouble."

"Catherine, you do not belong Below. I came here today to tell you that I think you should stay here, Above, where you are happy. Come to me, to us, as you have always done, but do not give up what is so much a part of you."

"I'm so confused, Vincent. I want to go with you, to live my life as fully as you do within the tunnel walls..."

"Even I feel the need to walk the streets, Catherine. None of us can stay Below without ever surfacing. Some need it more than others. There is no shame in that."

"But you are there, and our son. I should yearn to be there too. Why don't I?"

He had no answer for her, only another question.

"Have you managed to see your friends yet?"

"No."

"Maybe once you do and decide what to tell them, your mind will find its own way."

"Oh Vincent!" She threw herself at him. "I'm sorry."

He held her close before he had to let her go, knowing he had done the right thing. Catherine did have to find her own way, on her own, with no outside influence to invalidate her conclusion. Only when she sought and found, purely independently of all and everyone else, would he be content that she was sure in her choice. And he would have to accept, if she chose that way, that her choice may well be a combination of both worlds as before. He could not presume to take pre-eminence over her former life, no matter how much she loved him and little Jacob. She would still come regularly, probably daily, most nights he was certain, and he would be selfish beyond the extreme to expect any more when she had already given her all.

*****

Catherine slumped back on her sofa, her apartment still and quiet now that she was alone in it once more. It did not seem like home now. Her thoughts and her longing strayed to the Tunnels, where she wanted to be right now, not only with Vincent and Jacob, but with Father and Mary and Mouse and Jamie and Pascal, and all the others who were her extended family members, good people whom she could trust, who loved her and cared about what happened to her and looked out for her, and she them. And what of her friends up here? She loved them too and did not wish to cut them out of her life. Perhaps Vincent's suggestions was the most sensible and practical one, the one which would cause less problems all round. What had he said? Everybody needed to spend part of their time Up Top. The question was, how much time did she, Catherine Chandler, resident New Yorker, need to spend Above, and how much time Below? And it was not simply a matter of hours, but of lifestyle. She was very tempted to cease the tenancy on her apartment and move Below. But if she intended to live out a fair chunk of her life this side of the ground, then she would need some sort of abode to put to her name.

And what about work? Strangely enough, her subconscious had already made up her mind for her on that score. She really had no option but to give up her job, whether she remained Above or not. It placed her in far more  scrapes and sticky situations than she and Vincent could afford to contend with, after their meeting with the Chief of Police. He couldn't keep covering for them. So what should she do instead? Look for another job with no potential danger aspect? Or do this thing which was calling her more insistently as each day passed? She had missed most of her baby's first few months, so much so that her maternal instincts had not had time to develop. It was something she could not reverse, just like the months lost could never be returned. And yet she wasted more and more time staying away, building on her resentment, rather than nurturing what was still available while it was.

In the morning she drove up to visit her friend Jenny.

"I'm going away for a while, Jen," she told her. "There's been a lot going on with my life lately. I really need a break."

"Where will you go?"

It was a reasonable enough question and one which Catherine had prepared for.

"You might say I'm going on a personal discovery trip. Everything will be pretty much as it comes, no well laid plans or expectations."

"Gee, you are needing to get away, aren't you?"

Catherine laughed and hugged her friend.

"You will come back and tell us all about it?" Jenny checked, her eyes not so sure.

"I promise to keep in touch."

"Good." Jenny held her by the arms. "Because we couldn't bear it if you just disappeared out of our lives again, Cathy."

Catherine nodded sincerely.

"I promise, I won't."

As she drove home she knew that she intended to keep her promises to Jenny. Her home from now on would be Below with her family, but like all folks, she would take time out to go on vacation once in a while.

Joe was not quite so understanding as Jenny had been.

"You can't quit, Cathy, we need you. I  need you!"

"Thanks for the flattery, Joe, but this time it's not going to work."

He smiled ruefully. "It never did."

She pulled a face. "Poor Joe."

"Poor Joe indeed. So what's the deal? Your music man finally won you over?"

"Something like that. I'm going away."

"Where?"

"To another world, Joe."

"Well, half his luck," Joe said.

"I'll come and visit you sometimes," she said.

"Make sure that you do."

She went back to her apartment for the last time and used her phone to sort out her outer business, then she sold her car to a dealer on the outskirts of town and took a cab back to Central Park. She breathed in the invigorating smell of wet grass once more and the nature-scented air as she crossed to the Tunnel entrance, but she was not sorry to leave it behind. She would see it again.

*****

Vincent was not in his chamber. Neither was Jacob. She found Mary who was taking very good care of the baby and who informed her that Vincent was reading to the children.

"Here," Mary smiled, handing her the infant, "he will be pleased to see you've come back. You have come back?"

"Yes," Catherine assured her, "for good this time."

Mary went on her way and Catherine stood looking down at her young son, hers and Vincent's child. A warm shudder crept through her and she cradled little Jacob closer. Here in her arms lay her destiny, to bring up this child in the very best manner that she could, to love and respect and to give and to seek for himself what she and his father had sought and had found.

Vincent's rasping voice filtered along the tunnel, as she approached the classroom. And when she got there she waited in silence, until some of the children saw her and waved. She smiled and waved back and then Vincent turned too and she caught the unguarded surprise on his face. She walked to him and kissed him lightly on the cheek and all the children cheered.

"Go on now," Vincent admonished them gently. "Same time tomorrow and we'll finish the book."

They scurried out of the hall, leaving the three family members together.

"Your presence always give me such pleasure, Catherine."

"Good," she said, allowing him to take part of Jacob's weight as she stood closer to embrace him. "Because you're going to be seeing an awful lot of me around here."

"Catherine?"

She kissed him on the mouth.

A wolf whistle and some giggles sounded from the side of the room. Vincent made a mock run at the straggling children and they scampered in squeals of delight. They were wonderful children. When Jacob was older he would join them and perhaps she could read to them sometimes, or have some part in their education. There was plenty to occupy a mind Below.

"I've severed all ties with Above," she told him. "Oh, I'll still go back and visit, but I've given up my apartment, my job, closed my bank accounts..."

He stopped her with the deep sadness which assailed his intense blue eyes.

"It is unfair that it must always be you who has to give up everything and make all the sacrifices. You who show of your never failing generosity while I reap all the benefits."

"But I'm happy to do so."

"Catherine," he shifted Jacob into the crook of his arm and gripped Catherine's shoulder with the other hand.

"I fail to see how you could be happy here, truly happy and content, when you've left so much behind."

"But I have so much here."

"But your freedom, Catherine."

"My freedom is inside me. Being with you is what truly liberates me, Vincent. Anywhere else, without you, I'm in prison. I'm being denied all I need and want to exist. You. I do crave you, you know, and only when the craving is satisfied by being this close to you, is my mind truly freed."

He gathered her closer still to him, sandwiching Jacob between.

"What did you tell your friends?"

"That I was going on a journey."

"And now here you are, starting out."

She stood back from him a little to peer up at him and hold his cheek in her palm.

"No Vincent, I've arrived."

TO REALIZE THE DREAM

Part 3 of the trilogy

by Tess Freeman

(from CRYSTAL CAVERN ELEVEN)

Catherine Chandler, the woman he loved, did everything well, but it was patently obvious that bringing up their son, Jacob, was the thing she did best of all. That, and loving him, Vincent Wells. Catherine was very good at loving.

She was also very good at pretending everything was okay. But she forgot that he could read her thoughts. Six months had passed since she'd come back to him, after making the difficult decision to live in the Tunnels permanently, as opposed to just visiting a lot. She'd stressed it wasn't really a hard decision. Permanent didn't mean she could never go back. It just meant the Tunnels would be her home and she would visit the world Above on occasion, as did most of the other Tunnel residents. Why should she be any different from anybody else? This way she could have the best of both worlds, except that she would have more of the Tunnels and less of Manhattan, instead of the other way around.

Six months on, she proved that it worked. She was still happy - or was she?

He knew that her excursions Above were lonely ventures, during which she longed for him to accompany her. Not that she would dare to ask him again. They'd been through that once before and had almost lived the dream. She'd gone so far as arranging a van to take them to a special place of hers in the mountains, but in the end he had opted out, too afraid of being discovered, of losing all that they already had, for the want of something more.

And now there was even more at stake. He had her love completely, and their son safely back with them. He would never risk either of those things for the short-lived pleasure of walking on the beach, or standing victorious on a mountain summit. He already had it all, more than he had ever dreamed was possible for him. But as for Catherine, her possibilities had been cut short by choosing a life with him. Had she chosen another partner, she would have done all those things with him. But she had chosen Vincent and the limitations which life with him presented.

There had to be a time when acceptance overcame want, when want should cease and be replaced with fulfillment. But there was something in human nature, and her own, which was incapable of being satisfied conclusively.

She came breezing into the chamber they shared, brandishing a letter in her free hand. Her other hand secured Jacob, who was sitting very sturdily astride her hip. She put him down on the bedside rug and he scampered about on all fours.

"News?" News always worried him, especially news which made Catherine smile with such fervour. News from Up Top, which still involved Catherine and of necessity, excluded him. He was not jealous, but news of that nature only served to reinforce the problem which already existed. The problem of him not being able to integrate fully into her life, the problem which pushed her into seclusion away from him. He sighed.

"Vincent," she smiled softly, taking his hands and leading him to sit on the bed. "We've been invited to Jenny's 35th birthday. She says she doesn't want any celebrations when she turns 40, so by doing it now..."

"You and Jacob?"

"No," she smiled happily. "You and me, Vincent. She wants to meet you, they all do, all my friends."

"Catherine, what have you told them?"

"Nothing. They say it doesn't matter. They know there's always been some big secret, but they reckon it can't be all that bad seeing as I'm still with you."

"Catherine, they couldn't possibly imagine ... what I am. How you could even suggest ...?"

"But they're my friends, Vincent. They won't betray us."

"Catherine, it's just not possible. Please, for my sake, please, you've got to let this go, this hope that I can be accepted Above. Our lives together are limited to these underground passages. You go, please, I'm happy for you to do so. Take Jacob, make your excuses for me, sickness, whatever you wish."

Her shining eyes grew sad then, and apologetic, as she laid her head against his chest and he lifted his hand to smooth her hair.

"I won't go either, Vincent," she whispered. "If you must stay behind, then so will I."

"But Catherine, that's not ..."

But she shushed him and in the ensuing silence his despair at the restricted lifestyle he could offer her crept inwards to his soul, until it engulfed him completely. By the time she lifted her head and kissed him, he knew that he had to figure a way to give her what they both craved, at least in part.

*****

He did not have much time to think about it, because within a few days he had a letter of his own. The contents of it did not make sense to him at first, and once they did they shook him.

Dear Vincent,

For many years now I have tried to trace you. At last my search has led me to the underground New York Tunnels which I believe to be your home. I will come on Wednesday next, the 5th, to the 14th Street entrance, at 8:30 pm. I will wait for one hour after that time. If you wish to meet me, be sure that our meeting will be the culmination of my life until now. Do not be afraid. I have reason to believe that you are my full blood brother.

Yours,

Rafael

It was a hoax. It had to be. There could be nobody else like him, a brother, presumably a twin, for how could this, this abhorrence that had resulted in his life, how could this happen twice? This must be a ploy, a trap. And yet who would have known how to get in touch with the Helpers? A private detective? Somebody from the policeman Maloney's family, out to avenge his death. Who of the Helpers would have disclosed his whereabouts, without proof that the investigator was genuine? Proof. And how would they get that proof? With their eyes? Someone like him, a brother ... Rafael. Where did he live? What was his life? On Wednesday night he would find out all.

*****

On Wednesday night, Catherine was on his arm and they walked together through the tunnels towards whatever lay ahead. They were five minutes early, but their visitor, approaching in concealed darkness, was promptly on time. Vincent felt Catherine clutch his arm more tightly and move closer, or was the tenseness he sensed in her a reflection of his own?

The advancing figure was his own height and build, but dressed in standard type Up Top clothes, dark trousers and casual jacket. He had a neat beard and moustache and his light sandy hair appeared short under the tan cowboy hat. From a distance he looked like an ordinary guy and Vincent moved Catherine behind him.

The man tipped his hat.

"Shoulda changed this for a baseball cap," he said good-naturedly. "Would've looked less conspicuous in New York."

He stopped in front of them and Vincent did see that yes, this man had reason to want to remain as inconspicuous as possible. The wide brim of the hat shaded his forehead and eyes and the beard and moustache concealed much of his mouth, and his mutations were less marked than Vincent's own, but when the midwestern stranger stood in front of him, and was still and silent for a moment so that Vincent could take in all his features, Vincent had no trouble at all in accepting that his man was indeed his blood relative.

"Rafael Toole." He extended his hand, a hand that was heavily-clad in soft light hair, with the nails clipped short and blunt.

"Makes it easier to work, he explained.

Vincent reached for Rafael's hand but, instead of shaking it, he pulled his brother toward him and locked him in a powerful embrace.

"Come," said Vincent, "and meet the rest of our family and friends. Rafael, this is Catherine, the woman I love."

Catherine stepped forward and planted a gentle kiss on the newcomer's cheek.

"Welcome, Rafael."

*****

The first question Catherine had for Rafael, as she and Vincent sat with him near the waterfall, was how he had managed to get from Montana all the way to New York.

He laughed.

"I drove."

She could barely contain herself.

"You drove a car!?"

"Well, actually, it was a truck - a pickup."

"Wow! But how? I mean, what did you do when you needed gas?"

Rafael pulled out a pair of shades and fixed them over the bridge of his nose.

"Wore these. Besides, most folks don't even look at you these days, 'less they need to."

"But there must have been risks."

"There are ways of minimizing risks - travelling by night, sleeping when everybody else is rushing about, too busy to notice anything out of the ordinary, choosing quiet spots to rest up."

"What if you'd broken down?"

Rafael shrugged.

"My surname is not Toole for nothing. Can fix most jobs myself. Look," he said more seriously, "I don't go driving interstate every day of the week. I regarded this trip as essential and I took every precaution possible and I got here."

Vincent, who had been quiet until now, stepped forward. "Yes, and you will have to return in the same manner. The risk you have taken is undeniably enormous, your courage immense."

"And so I hope yours too will be."

"I don't understand."

"I wish for you to come back with me, Vincent, and you, too, Catherine, at least for a visit, to meet my family and see the life I lead ..."

"Vincent, this is the chance we've been waiting for."

She saw him hesitate, then as he looked toward Rafael who raised his eyebrows expectantly, he realized he was outnumbered and Catherine knew the battle was won. It was vacation time.

"l'm not sure about this."

Vincent's dismay as Rafael held up a pair of old denims against him spurred Catherine into rippling laughter.

"You're about the same size as me," Rafael encouraged.

"You'll look good in them," Catherine teased.

Vincent held out his hand for them.

"I will try them on," he conceded. "I am not promising to leave them on."

He went off with the jeans and Catherine gave a victorious thumbs up sign to Rafael.

"Now we just have to sort out his hair," he said.

An image of a pair of enormous shears cutting off Vincent's luxurious locks with one irresparable snip sliced through Catherine's mind. What she felt must have shown on her face because Rafael quickly amended.

"Maybe we can tie it back. What sort of hat do you think will suit him?"

She realized more so than ever at that moment that she loved Vincent the way he was. The idea of transformation was fast becoming scary. She didn't want him to look different. She knew he would still be the same Vincent, no matter what metamorphosis Rafael inflicted on him. But it would take some adjusting to, when all she really wanted was for Vincent to stay the same forever.

*****

Thankfully, the change wasn't too dramatic, but convincing enough not to cause people to stop in their tracks. And for Catherine, the dark brown chinos they had finally settled on, the matching short jacket and Western hat with golden hair covered up at the back, really made no difference. When he removed the dark shades, they were the same blue eyes which looked back at her, the same intensity and passion was there still, and that was where Vincent's truth was revealed. Nothing could ever disguise that.

He had been right too. There was plenty of opportunity to converse with Rafael, as the truck rolled out of New York City late on the Monday night, five days after his arrival, and as it transported them across State boundaries and land which grew more remote and more breathtaking with each mile further west that they travelled.

Catherine and Vincent took it in turns to sit up front with Rafael, the other going in the back with Jacob. Their little son was too young to realize the adventure he was partaking of, but he sensed the excitement in his parents and was content for the most part. For long stretches, everybody would be silent, and then Catherine would feel in Vincent a calmness, a oneness with this unspoilt nature surrounding them, as though he too had always been a part of it, but had been denied it until now.

After a couple of days, she took over some of the driving from Rafael who was glad of the break, and promised to teach Vincent to drive when they reached his family ranch. They slept in the truck and picnicked in the dense forests of Wisconsin. They washed in its cold, clean streams and dozed, warming in the afternoon orange halo, which induced rest of body and mind. The two brothers pulled their hats forward to cover their faces and nobody disturbed them.

They drove under the bull-horned entrance of the Low Ridge Ranch late one afternoon, a mile and a half of dust and stones driveway, until Rafael finally parked the truck outside the homestead. Having called ahead on his cell phone, he'd barely switched off the engine, when a dozen or so of a welcoming party emerged from the two-story house. Vincent, in the front seat, ducked reflexively, but Rafael pulled him slowly up, slightly assuaging Catherine's panic.

"It's all right," he assured them both. "They've been waiting for us. Come on." He strode on ahead as Catherine and Vincent left the security of the truck, Jacob clutched between them. Somewhere a horse whinnied.

"Everybody, this is my brother Vincent, and his good lady Catherine, and their son Jacob."

A very pretty girl with long black hair to her waist stepped forward and embraced Rafael.

"Thank God, you are back," she breathed.

"Everything was fine, honey."

Catherine smiled at the native Indian woman. She could understand that sort of worry.

"Vincent, Catherine, this is my wife. She calls herself Teona."

She extended her arms to each of them in turn, even Jacob.

"Welcome. I am so glad to meet you."

Two very attractive children, not quite so dark as their mother, came rushing from the house and hurled themselves at Rafael.

"Daddy! Daddy!"

"My kids," Rafael supplied with a grin that was supposed to be sheepish but came out real proud. "Jordan and Lisa."

Inevitable, their eyes crept upward toward Vincent and then they smiled.

"Howdy, Uncle Vincent!" Jordan shook hands vigorously, while Lisa performed a little curtsy.

"Pleased to meet you. You too, Miss Catherine."

Catherine stooped down to the children's level.

"And I am delighted to make your acquaintance."

"Say," Jordan noted, "your baby boy's real cute."

"Yes," Catherine agreed, "he takes after his father."

Everybody laughed and moved forward one by one to greet them. Within the next few minutes, they'd been introduced to and welcomed by Rafael's adoptive parents, his uncle, his two step-brothers and step-sister, one of the brother's wives and various trustworthy neighbours from their small community. Soon after, most people filed away to their respective homes, leaving just Rafael and his mom and dad and Teona, when the children had gone to bed.

Mrs. Toole leaned across the table to Vincent. She took his hand and tears formed in her soft eyes as she searched his face.

"Can you ever forgive me for not taking you, too?"

"Forgive?"

"There were two of you," she explained. "I didn't think I could cope with two. We'd been hoping for a baby of our own at the time, but even then I wouldn't have wanted twins. I know that sounds silly now, looking back, with the tribe I had after Rafael, but back then, Ray and I were so young. We always wondered what had happened to the other baby. And now Rafael tells us you have to hide out underground, I ..." She clasped her hands to the sides of her head. "All those wasted years, you could have been here, with us, living a ful life..."

Catherine shot a glance at Vincent. Mrs. Toole was relying on him for her redemption. The calm resonance which covered his face was an expression of the serenity he had discovered within himself and of which he would impart to this woman, who could so easily have been his mother.

"You have nothing to feel guilty for," he assured her. "I was found by a man named Jacob Wells, a kind man, a doctor. He taught me everything I know, educated me, brought me up in a world where trust and goodness prevails. I have a whole family Below, not related by blood, but by purpose."

Mrs. Toole pulled a handkerchief from her apron pocket and blew hard into it. "I'm sorry blubbering like this."

Vincent got up and went to her, embraced her as a son would his long-lost mother. Raymond Toole stood behind, regarding the pair with fond bewilderment.

"You know, we were halfway across town that night when she changed her mind about wanting twins and made me take her back. But when we got there, you were already gone." He shook his head. "You would have thought she'd lost a child."

She managed to compose herself and smile at Vincent. "And now I've found him."

"Good," Rafael said good naturedly, clapping his hands together with a loud smack, "now we can all get some sleep. Early start tomorrow."

*****

It was still the middle of the night, as far as Catherine was concerned, when the tap at their door was followed by:

"Breakfast on the griddle! Gotta eat if you folks want to learn how to round up cattle!"

Catherine groaned, but prodded Vincent in the shoulder all the same.

"Time to get up and earn your keep, cowboy."

"Huh?"

"Don't suppose you've ever been on a horse before?" Vincent flipped over onto his back, his eyes fluttering open.

"Why couldn't Rafael have been a deep sea diver?"

They tumbled out of bed and gnawed their way through a plate of pancakes shared with Rafael and the other riders, all of whom they'd met yesterday. If it hadn't been for the very real and delicious taste of the maple syrup, Catherine would have assumed they were deeply and very consciously ensconced in one of their dreams.

And if she needed any more of this new-found reality, it was presented to her 20 minutes later in the form of a very pretty but substantial stock horse named Ella.

"I've never ridden Western style," was the only protest she was permitted to utter, before finding she had no choice but to swing her legs across the sorrel's flank and settle herself into the deep seat of the saddle behind the protruding horn.

But she was much, much more concerned for Vincent. She didn't know how he would take to riding or, more appropriately, how his mount would react to him. But when she heard Rafael inform him that he was giving him his old horse, Cowcatcher, she relaxed.

Vincent was lithe getting on the leggy buckskin and seemed to possess an innate sense of comradeship with the horse from the start. Anything Vincent did, he did well. And today proved to be no different. At one with the time served cutting horse, he didn't interfere as it did its job, merely pointing it in the right direction and thereafter complementing it in the task of its namesake. He waved to her about midmorning and called across.

"He doesn't need me up here. He could do this work alone."

"Yeah, but you look good," Catherine said silently and smiled. And you're enjoying yourself. And you're really, truly free, freer than you could ever be in New York City. Don't let us ever go back.

Just before noon, Rafael drew up beside them.

"You two can head home now. Don't want you too saddle sore on your first day."

"Too late for that." Catherine said, "it's going to take me a month to recover." Rafael laughed.

"Don't worry, soon your butt will be as tough as the leather it's sitting on." Not wanting to laugh out of turn, she looked at Vincent, whose mouth had flexed from a straight line to a curve. The moment their eyes met each others, neither could hold it back and both joined Rafael in a raucous culmination to their first roundup.

*****

The Rocky Mountains. Whoever would have thought he ever would have seen them with his own eyes, least of all himself? And what wonder of creation to behold. Their peaks, gazing towards the heavens, begging for lavish helpings of whipped snow which, when deposited, tongued their way earthwards over sheer blue rock, until met by a rise in temperature and a sigh of hunger satisfied. Vincent felt like that now.

"Hey, how you doing, Vince?"

"Rafael!"

"You were miles away." Vincent nodded and got to his feet.

"I am miles away."

"Well, here's your chance to go even further." Rafael dropped the pickup keys into Vincent's hand.

"Drive me into town. We need some supplies."

Vincent tossed the keys in the air and caught them again. He knew better than to argue with the determined character of his brother. Rafael's instructions were clear and, apart from the expected jerks and false starts and unanticipated halts, they made fair progress along the ten-mile long choppy dirt road into town.

"Don't I need a licence?" Vincent interjected on the approach to what could have been a pioneer town, if it hadn't been for the abundance of pickups and off roaders as well as horses parked in the main street.

"I don't see any cops."

"Good. I've had enough cops to last me for the rest of my life."

Rafael turned to him. "I guess you've had a hard time back in New York, huh?"

"You might say that. How can it be different out here?"

"It's a matter of trust, Vincent. These people trust me and I trust them. I grew up with them, just like you grew up with your Tunnel friends."

"But what if there's a stranger or newcomer in town, skiers? Climbers? Don't they ever make trouble for you?"

"Sometimes, but this is my home, so I deal with it until the problem passes."

"How? Where is there to hide out? It's all so .... exposed?"

"Vincent." Rafael laid a hand on his shoulder. "Come out here a minute, come on."

With the persuasion that Rafael was particularly adept at, Vincent allowed himself to be lured away from the relative safety of the confines of the truck.

"Look around you. Look at the serene forests, look at the mountain range you were so beautifully contemplating earlier. It is the very exposure of this place that we can find solace, and escape if necessary. We can run faster and move more steathily than our pursuers, we can burrow deeper into this unforgiving landscape and beg its forgiveness, we can face mountain lions and grizzly bears without fear. Heck, I used to ward off grizzlies where they'd wander down to my neighbour's farms when I was a kid. That's why these folks are all so indebted to me now. Come on, they'll love to meet you."

Vincent pulled his hat down further over his ears and meekly followed. This was one of those occasions when he could have done with with cape and hood and a dark night to do with it.

"Why, it's the prodigal brother!" exclaimed the scarf-clad lady behind the counter of the general store. "And what a fine young man you are!"

Vincent felt his facial muscles relax. One thing was certain. Out here they definitely hadn't been tainted by the rest of the world. They carried the purchases to the pickup and were met by several men, women and children from neighbouring ranches en-route.

"Hold on until we get these sacks out of our arms." Rafael fought off the youngsters with good humour.

"This here's your Uncle Vincent - if he doesn't mind being called that?"

"Not at all." Their enthusiasm and genuine curiosity warmed him, not the sort of curiosity which ignited fear and flight, but the sort which simply wanted to know where he'd lived all these years and how long was he going to stay.

*****

It was a question which had been keeping him awake at night for a week or so now. Rafael had already said that he could stay as long as he liked. And Rafael's parents had made it more than clear that they wished he and Catherine and Jacob would move here permanently. They would be safe and would be welcomed into the community as part of the ever-extending Toole family. There would be work on the ranch, and a healthy and vibrant atmosphere for bringing up children. Healthier and more stimulating than the Tunnels? Was there really any question? But what of Father and the others? The people he knew and loved and trusted, who loved and trusted him.

"That is it." He had not realized he had spoken out loud, until Catherine, lifting herelf up beside him in bed, asked him what was. He turned to look at her, at her beautiful face, her loving eyes, and for the briefest of moments wondered why she was with him. He'd forgotten what she'd asked.

"You said 'that is it'," she repeated softly. "What is?"

Her night-dress had slipped off her shoulder. Its bare vulnerability caused him to reach out and stroke her smooth skin.

"Trust," he said. Her eyes were darkened by the shadows of dawn in the room, but he knew that they never once left his face, Catherine's attention was on him completely, never wandering. Her total love of him, her dedication, would always bewilder him. He would never quite comprehend it, although he believed it. He fixed the shoulder of her night-dress for her, then put his arm around her and pulled her to him, so that they leaned back together in unison against the old walnut headboard.

"Before we came here, you asked me to attend a birthday party with your friends."

"I shouldn't have."

"You said they would accept me because you had chosen me. I was afraid, Catherine, I couldn't trust. Then we came here and everybody accepted me on account of Rafael. He has the same relationship with these people as I enjoy with everybody Below. It is because of trust, on all sides, and understanding. There is no reason why others cannot be part of that same trust."

"My friends?"

"I am not without fear, Catherine, but I have learned in this vast place what every other place was too small to teach me."

Catherine twisted in his arms until she faced him. "Tell me."

"That trust is the essence of freedom."

*****

He experienced the full extent of that freedom later that morning, when he took Jacob down to the corral and put him up on Cowcatcher, then hauled himself up behind his young son and rode out into the developing sunrise.

Jacob gurgled and hiccuped, thoroughly enjoying himself. This was the life his son should lead, under the sun and the wide skies, the earth beneath his feet and not above his head. This was the life Catherine deserved: it was the only life fit to meet the passion which fired through her veins and which she had kept dampered down for his sake for far too long. Now he had the chance to provide for the yearning of her soul, he would not walk away without doing so.

And as for himself? He reined in the horse, then relaxed his hand and his body while the animal stood still as Rafael had taught him. Jacob leaned back against him, turning his little head of blond curls and grasping handfuls of air with his fist.

"Da-da."

Vincent breathed deeply of all that was peace and satisfaction, of all that was fresh and clear and clean and wholesome, of mountain and sky and a horizon so far, yet so vividly close that he could reach out his finger and touch its shimmering indigo line.

Another finger joined his there and he turned and saw Catherine, her horse beside him. Their fingers touched and entwined as together they gazed toward the horizon that would become their new destiny. Then Catherine brought their hands back to rest between them, still held together. Her upturned face looked sad.

"What is it, Catherine?"

She shook her head. "I don't know. It's all so perfect, yet ... I worry ... that you could not be happy here. The Tunnels were your home for so long."

"Yes, they were. And we will go back, someday, and meet your friends, I promise. But fate has brought us to this new place. To leave it now would be to deny our fate, to forsake what has been ordained. Only by accepting graciously this truly wonderful gift, can we hope to live in peace."

Her face was thoughtful while she pondered this, then she nodded, smiled gently and gave one of the little nods that she was apt to perform, which he knew and loved so well.

"Let's go," he said, "we should be just about be in time for some Montana pancakes."

And as they rode down the hill toward the homestead, the bright orange circle, rising somewhat higher, illuminated their passage.

"...........is to possess it forever.............."

THE END