"Let's go get everyone, and I'll tell you all at once."

Egyptia and Laurel were serving cider in the kitchen when Taryn and Rosalind came in. Goblin and Joe were sitting at the table with Ellie. Rosalind looked around for Rhea.

"She's upstairs meditating. She wanted some time alone before we begin. This evening has raised her hopes, and Rhea doesn't do well with hope. She'll be down," Joe said to her. Egyptia handed Rosalind a mug of cider.

"I hope you don't mind me being here. Joe said this was for family."

"Egyptia, I hope to be as much a part of this family as you are. I'm glad you're here," Rosalind said warmly.

"It is perfect that she is here," Rhea said, making everyone jump. She'd come into the room quiet as a cat. "Royalty is fraught with its own power, both inherent and cultural. Drag royalty has the trickster power, the crossing of realms. Anyone who walks a hard road to be true to themselves has magic."

Taryn went to the stove and poured Rhea a cup of cider. When she handed it to Rhea, Rosalind saw that it was in her blue gla.s.s mug. Rhea took the cup and kissed Taryn's hand, a startling display of affection. Taryn stood behind her chair and ma.s.saged her shoulders as she spoke.

"I've been meditating on the symbols for tonight's ritual. I looked everywhere for flaws, but found none. You are right. All the elements align at this time, in this place and incarnation. The season is right. Autumn at the high end of late summer, with the hint of winter on the wind. The time to secure the house and make ready for the winter sleep, to put away stores against the lean times. A time for changing state in a glorious display.

"The place is right. Buffalo is a city perpetually on the frontier and perpetually falling behind, a perfect place to cross borders. This house has been Taryn's home. She hasn't lived with me before. I've always been outside her immediate family. I planned otherwise this time, but her stubbornness kept her from being born on time."

"Same story. I was late getting born and haven't made up for it since," Taryn said, kissing the top of Rhea's head.

"Yet it worked. If you had been born when I predicted, you'd be Rosalind's age now, as is usually the case. But you refused and so are thirteen years younger. That allows the symbol to be in alignment with the original. The prince was younger than the priestess by that many years," Rhea said. She saw Rosalind flinch when this was mentioned.

"I know I was angry with you for the events that led to this," Rhea said to her.

Rosalind shook her head. "I would be, too. It was a ghastly thing."

"My rage at you kept me from seeing clearly. It was a ghastly thing Taryn did in her hurt pride. But only when I could look beyond that one event could I see the use for it. It allowed the age to come back into balance. It was terrible. I had no right to make you suffer for it this time. I was already gone when it happened. You had to live the remainder of your life with it."

Rosalind tried to speak, but found she couldn't around the lump in her throat. She felt the urge to sob with that remembered pain. She blinked furiously and looked away. When she could look back up, Rhea was speaking again, addressing the rest of the group. Rosalind looked over the witch's shoulder and saw Taryn looking back at her. They were both here now. It was time to let go of the past and try something new.

"What troubles me is the ending. We can enact the ritual as you've laid out, Rosalind. We can let Taryn take on the death. But I confess, my mind refuses to go on. I can't see what would come after," Rhea said, handing Taryn's blue gla.s.s mug back to her. There was a moment when their hands brushed in pa.s.sing and held, the contact extended automatically. It was the reflex of a close-knit clan, to take affection and rea.s.surance in whatever moments they could. The behavior of people who had to rely only on one another to face the world. Rosalind watched them together very carefully.

"We each have our roles. Egyptia, if you would, act as the satrap. Royalty needs to be symbolized by royalty," Rhea said. "Joe, Ellie, Laurel, and Goblin will be the soldiers."

"I have knives for us to wear. We need a weapon to indicate our profession." Joe started handing out the knives, a wicked collection. He handed Ellie a broad-bladed skinning knife with a bone handle.

It slashed the air convincingly when Ellie waved it about. "I feel like a killer with this thing."

"We will begin in a few minutes," said Rhea. "Change clothes, do what you need to prepare yourselves."

"I have some wine down in the bas.e.m.e.nt that'd be perfect for the ending," said Joe. "Egyptia, Ellie, would you help me haul some of it up?"

The others abandoned the kitchen with unrehea.r.s.ed speed, responding to the painfully intimate look that Taryn and Rosalind shared. It was as if Rhea could see the emotion coming and vanished first, unable or unwilling to witness the moment. Egyptia was still closing the bas.e.m.e.nt door behind her when the gravity between the lovers exerted its force and they came together. With her arms wrapped tightly around Taryn's body Rosalind could almost believe in paradise. There, within her reach, was everything she hadn't known she desired. Pain, time, and circ.u.mstance would alter their bodies. Age would eventually bring them down.

Standing with her ear against her boy's drumming heart, Rosalind knew that it would one day cease. That earth would cradle what her arms now held. The name and memory of Taryn would wash away like a chalk painting in the rain. She knew that she might be alive to witness this. The only thing that let her bear that knowledge was the belief that the burning core that inhabited the body would not end.

Love is what lets us endure the knowledge that we must die, but love is also what makes death unbearable. New love balks at separation; what would a lifelong love feel at the final separation? The argument that cannot be won, the final reprove.

The night she met Taryn came back in a tidal wave, the recognition she'd felt when she first looked into Taryn's eyes. Desire had called her out, woken her body, made the urge to know her an ache. It was the surrender to that impulse, to follow desire where it led, that gave her back her soul. All things were connected forward and back; the golden snake formed an endless loop, a wheel.

"I know how to finish it," Rosalind said, her cheek resting against Taryn's chest.

"You breaking up with me already? Give me two weeks at least."

Rosalind took Taryn's left hand and kissed it. "The ritual. Rhea couldn't see what comes after completion. The only way to end it is in joy. We know that things begin, and end, and begin again. So all there is left to do is celebrate."

"You sure don't think like Rhea does. About ritual or anything else."

Rosalind looked up at her face and saw admiration, mingled with the desire that was never far from the surface between them. "I do about a few things. I think you are worth facing death."

Taryn closed her eyes, then opened them slowly as if gazing into the sun. "I've had enough of death. Screw it. Let's all live for a change."

The middle room was cleared to the floorboards, swept by a cornhusk broom and prepared with sage and sweetgra.s.s. Rosalind watched Joe carry the burning knot to each corner, speaking in his low, burring voice the household phrase. "Let all who come in peace be welcome here."

They'd all changed clothes. Joe wore his ceremonial robe-yards of simple white with a belt of braided leather. The robe fell open, exposing his powerful chest with the tattoo of intertwined snakes. In the belt he carried his knife to indicate his role as a soldier. He looked the part from the grim expression on his face, to his martial carriage. Laurel wore a robe of black with a crow embroidered on the back.

For a moment Rosalind felt like she should be wearing a more elaborate costume; then Goblin entered in jeans and a T-shirt. Egyptia glided in as only royalty may, gorgeous and strange, scintillating in gold and scarlet. In her arms was a black iron cauldron. She knelt in the center of the room and set it on a piece of slate. Laurel poured Epsom salts and a bottle of rubbing alcohol into it; Goblin lit a wooden match and tossed it. Fire danced in the pot, blue and yellow.

Rhea came down the back stairs. She'd changed into a robe of shimmering black like crushed obsidian mingled with shards of beetles' carapace. The sleeves were sewn with spiders, and it closed at the front with b.u.t.tons of carved bone. Her hair was free, standing out from her head. In her hands were a bouquet of wildflowers tied with a red ribbon and a knife with a curving blade and a hilt of bra.s.s. She set the flowers next to the cauldron and cut the air above it with the knife, before setting that down as well.

Ellie stood next to Rosalind, holding her hand. Whenever Rosalind felt the apprehension rise, Ellie would squeeze her hand and ground her. Everyone stood in a circle around the cauldron.

Taryn entered. She had changed into her black suit and strode the floor like a stage. The magic worked. Here was a beautiful young man, serious as an altar boy at his first Ma.s.s. Taryn offered her bandaged hand to her lover, almost apologetically.

Rosalind took it and drew it up to her lips. Rosalind watched Taryn and Rhea join hands, right hand palm down, left hand palm up, and imitated the motion with Ellie. She knew that Rhea would lead them in casting the circle; then the ritual would be under her guidance.

She tried to stay present, to listen to Joe, Laurel, Goblin, and Rhea call the directions, but all she could think about was the sweat gathering in her palms. Taryn called the center, spoke words of invitation, and everyone responded with a murmured, "Blessed Be."

The singing began. It took Rosalind a few moments to follow it; it was a chant, cycling around and around, names she recognized with a start as old G.o.ddesses. "Isis, Astarte, Diana, Hecate, Demeter, Kali, Inanna..."

Ellie picked up on it right away and joined in, winking at Rosalind. As soon as the list finished it began again. Rosalind joined in. It was the singing, or the antic.i.p.ation, but Rosalind felt something gathering in the room. The chant ended, Rhea looked across Taryn, at Rosalind, and nodded.

This was it. Rosalind opened the paper bag and handed the arrow to Ellie. The bear-killing head caught the light from the cauldron and flared gold and red. Ellie and Joe, Laurel and Goblin moved to the doorway near the stairs, standing away from the center. Taryn squeezed Rosalind's hand, to get her lover's attention. Her eyes were as blue as steel in the witchlight of the cauldron. There was no question there, only a moment of connection that Rosalind felt rise in herself and meet Taryn. She felt the love she had for this splendid youth, this wounded warrior, and let her hand go.

Taryn walked to the center of the room and crouched next to the cauldron. She picked up the bra.s.s hilt knife with her right hand and cut away the bandages on her left. Perhaps it was a quality of the light, or of the mood in the room, but the wound looked savage when revealed, the damage greater than Rosalind remembered.

Taryn stretched out on the floor, flung her left arm out, and rested her dark head against the boards. Rhea walked into the circle, her hands full of white cloth, torn in strips. She knelt gracefully next to Taryn and took the mangled hand into her lap. She began binding the wound with the strips of cloth.

A shiver went through Rosalind. It was enough like her dream to give her pause-not just a symbol of something that happened long ago, but the thing itself, happening again. Taryn was really wounded, a product of her own anger, and Rhea was really caring for her. Where does the symbol end and the event begin? She looked at the scene, feeling the distance in time and place.

This was a window on the past. She saw the look Rhea gave Taryn and knew it wasn't re-creation. Rhea saw the angry youth in pain and took that pain on herself. Taryn opened her eyes and saw Rhea. Rhea spoke, but the words were incomprehensible to Rosalind, and perhaps to Taryn, but she appeared to understand the tone. She sat up, looking into Rhea's face, in wonder. Rhea cradled the dark head against her chest, tears streaming down her face.

The beautiful young man stood up, pushing away from Rhea's embrace. He stretched up toward the vault of the sky with his hands open, seeking, yearning. Rosalind knew that it was her time. She dropped Ellie's hand and stepped away. In the archway between the rooms she waited, lingering, looking out as if over vast distances. The young man strolled, walking around the room, a serpentine path that led to the archway.

In one eternal moment they saw one another and all else faded like smoke. The recognition was there; Rosalind nearly sobbed in gladness to see her. Her boy had come home, the other half of her soul. She held out her arms.

There was a crash from the doorway. She knew it was coming, she'd given everyone their parts, but Rosalind still jumped when Joe, Laurel, Ellie, and Goblin burst into the room. The soldiers came on them, seizing Taryn's arms. Rosalind went along willingly, unable to be separated from her lover.

In the west corner of the room they made Taryn kneel. Rosalind was kept in the south corner, her arms held by Joe and Goblin. Egyptia entered through the archway-cold, relentless, with the bearing of a ruler. As the satrap, Egyptia motioned to Ellie imperiously. Ellie drew forth the arrow from her belt. In the light of the cauldron the bear-killing head burned red and ghastly. She held it like a javelin, ready to throw.

There was a flash of yellow smoke; Rhea had hurled something into the cauldron. She appeared out of the earth, out of the smoke, standing between Taryn and Ellie. The choice she made was the choice she had always made, out of love, out of belief, out of sacrifice. Wordlessly, she pushed her body between the wounded Taryn and the presence of death.

Taryn got to her feet. She lay one hand on Rhea's shoulder, urging her out of the way. Rhea turned to her with horror in her face, unable to let this happen, even now. Taryn had to take her shoulders and move her, gently but firmly. With the witch behind her, she stood, the beautiful boy, and faced the soldier who held her death. She arched her head back, opened her hands, and in a moment of regal abandon took on the fate that was meant for her.

It was too real. Rosalind had coached everyone on the order of events, given them the sequence, but the reality was happening so fast. The soldiers attacked, the flames danced in the cauldron, Taryn offered herself as a sacrifice. Ellie threw the arrow.

It arched through the smoke-laden air, directly at Taryn's throat. Rhea collapsed with a sob, unable to face this. Rosalind cried out in horror. She had orchestrated these events; what if she'd been wrong?

The arrow took the beautiful boy in the neck, the bear-killing head gouging a b.l.o.o.d.y furrow across the front of the throat to lodge in the thick muscle of the shoulder. Taryn opened her eyes and saw the arrow sticking out of her flesh. She pulled it out. She had taken the death meant for her. The Wheel was free to turn.

Taryn held up the arrow in her fist, then, with a flexing of her hand, snapped it in half. She gave both halves to Rhea, her dark head bowed in reverence. Rhea took the pieces of the arrow, almost casually, then tossed them into the cauldron with a sideways flick of her left hand.

Taryn stood in front of Rhea, towering over the woman who had been her lover, protector, and friend. She took Rhea's hands in hers and held them. "Thank you. For taking care of me, every time around. I wouldn't have made it through without you. I'd like the chance to take care of you, now."

Rosalind watched them, the powerfully built girl cradling the slender form of Rhea, both of them with their eyes shut tight. There was something ending, and endings always bring a measure of grief. She watched as Taryn, with a gentleness she had never displayed in front of people, stroked Rhea's hair, murmured into her ear. Rhea had relaxed completely into Taryn's arms. For the first time, Rosalind saw Rhea's vulnerability. Taryn had taken on something beyond her angry youth-a seasoning of wisdom, a hint at the woman she would become. It gave Rhea room to be something other than unceasingly strong. The balance had shifted between them.

Joe took Goblin's hand and held his other out to Rosalind. She accepted. Egyptia gathered up Laurel and Ellie and joined them. They stood in a circle around Taryn and Rhea, holding one another in the light from the cauldron. A deep voice began singing, Joe's. It started out very low, a background to the scene before them, then rose, filling the room. He sang the song through once, then began again, this time with Laurel, Goblin, and Ellie joining in.

Rosalind looked at her lover, looked at the woman she held, and smiled. Something was ending, something was beginning. Rosalind joined in the singing.

"Amazing Grace, how sweet the earth that formed a witch like me- I was once was burned Now I survive Was hanged, but now I sing.

'Twas grace that drew down the Moon, 'Twas grace that raised the sea- The magic of the people's will Will set our Rhea free."

The song ended, Rhea stepped back from Taryn. They took up position in the circle, Rhea to Rosalind's left, Taryn to her right. When Taryn took her hand, Rosalind felt a jolt of electricity sizzle up her arm. She looked down at their joined hands, expecting to see them glow. She glanced at her lover. Taryn's broad grin indicated that she had felt it, too.

"Would you do the honors?" Rhea asked her.

Rosalind cleared her throat before speaking. "I wanted to say something brilliant to complete the ritual, but all that came to me was the fragment of a prayer I read a long time ago, so I'm going with that.

"In beauty it is finished. In beauty it is finished. In beauty it is finished. Thanks."

Sunday morning. Rosalind's eyes opened. She had been dreaming something and struggled to retain it. Nothing so earth-shattering as the battles she had seen. No, they were walking down a road. Two women, just having a conversation. She wished she could remember who they were, or what they were discussing, but the dream slipped through her fingers like smoke. Oh well, it was Sunday, and the ritual had gone well, and the handsomest boy in Buffalo was splayed out like a puppy at her side. Rosalind pulled the sheet down and stroked the bulldagger tattoo on Taryn's back, smiling like a satiated cat. It was a stroke to her ego, to have worn Taryn out.

"Didn't know I had it in me, did ya?" she whispered. "Neither did I."

Taryn slept like the dead. The mood after the ceremony had been joyous, celebratory. Joe had broken out a few bottles of wine he'd been hiding in the bas.e.m.e.nt and even gotten Rhea to have a gla.s.s. Rosalind had a vague memory of Joe teaching them obscene drinking songs, after Goblin had gone to bed. At one point, while they both pried Taryn out of her suit so they could bandage her wound, Rhea had asked her something unbelievable.

Her eyes moved from the body of her lover to the room. Rosalind looked at the small circle of furniture, an oasis in the echoing s.p.a.ce, and sighed. It had been sweet and generous of Joe and Taryn to move her stuff up to the third floor, to create a s.p.a.ce for them. But it was still the third floor of 34 Mariner, Rhea's house. As much as she felt a part of the family, there was a part of Rosalind that still felt like a teenager sleeping over.

Rosalind slipped out of bed carefully, though Taryn was unlikely to wake up. She walked down the back stairs to the kitchen, half expecting to find Joe already cooking. The kitchen was empty, sunlight streaming in the windows. In one of the squares of light, the calico dozed. Rosalind put the coffee pot on the flame, then knelt next to her. She scratched between the calico's ears. The cat squinted in pleasure.

"Oh. I'm surprised to find someone else up." The voice came from the doorway, Rhea's. She had just come down the stairs, in the robe Rosalind remembered seeing the first morning she'd slept at the house.

Rosalind stood up, dusting her hands off on her pants. "I didn't mean to surprise you."

"Don't apologize. I think I'll get to like being surprised." Rhea sat down at the table.

"I was making coffee. Can I put on water for your tea?" Rosalind asked, filling the kettle.

"Coffee. I'll have a cup with you, if you don't mind," Rhea said, and smiled at Rosalind's surprised look.

Rosalind arched her eyebrow at Rhea, but set a coffee mug down in front of her.

"You do that as well as she does, you know."

"Do I? I think I picked it up just watching her. She got it from you."

"Or I from her. It's hard to tell, after a while," Rhea said.

Rosalind poured the coffee and sat back down at the table. "What a gorgeous morning," she said, looking at the cat dozing in the sun.

"Hmm. A time for change. We've done the clearing of the way. It's time to do everything the daylight world offers. I don't know what will happen with it, but it feels like there's a chance now for something different. You know, I owe you an apology," Rhea said, over the rim of her cup.

"You do?" Rosalind put her coffee mug down on the table.

"Yes. For trying to drive you out when you showed up. I was convinced that everything would happen the way it always had. I am very rarely wrong about anything. If I had to be wrong, I'm glad it was about you."

"Thank you. That means the world. You know I was scared to death of you when we met."

Rhea's eyes went wide. "Really?"

"Oh, yes. You were clear on your dislike."

"Well, you didn't let on. You were clear on your affection for Taryn. She made a good choice in you. You, however, will have your hands full," Rhea said, and smiled.

"That a prediction?"

"Observation," Rhea said mildly. "Have you thought about my offer?"

"To join the household? Yes, I have." Rosalind looked down into her coffee cup.

"Hmm." Rhea pushed away from the table. "Well, I think I could get a few more hours' sleep. Joe and his wine have that effect on me. I should know better than to let the man have me drink." She paused in the doorway, looking over her shoulder at Rosalind. "I circled something in the paper for you. You might find it interesting."

Rosalind pulled the paper toward her. It was open to the cla.s.sifieds, and she scanned down the page. In the center was a red circle, done in Rhea's forceful hand. She read it, idly, until she reached the bottom of the ad. Her head snapped up, but Rhea was gone. A smile replaced her look of surprise. "You already knew," she said to the empty kitchen.

Epilogue.