Passing without fear the Standing Stone, she regarded it now in blank wonder, that she could ever have thought it more than a broken and projecting bone of the lifeless earth. It fell behind her plodding footsteps, an impotent slab of nothingness. A wolf cried out in the distance, and she did not even care. Right foot, left foot, followed one another in mindless, meaningless rhythm. All was dead for her. Nothing lived, nothing moved, nothing breathed. There was only this one last task to perform, and then oblivion. At long, impossible length her weary footsteps took her along a familiar path, past a silent dell wreathed in scrub oak and maple. White crosses of stone shone dully in the moonlight, in a hollow she had once held sacred. A name was spoken in her mind, and in distant memory a hand caressed her face. She felt a moment of profound sadness, for a love that had died. But even that lost sorrow faded, till she knew that it was truly over. Up the shallow hill to the cottage. She turned the knob of the thrice-familiar back door, and entered. Through the kitchen, into the passage to the main room, where a fire was burning brightly. Her aunt looked up as she entered, from the same armchair in which she had left her. A man stood beside her, with eyes so deep and piercing..... She collapsed to the floor. Michael James Scott lifted her in his trembling arms, and carried her to his mother's bed. Part Two: The Fortress Seventeen Mary felt something cool being pressed against her forehead, and at the same time a warmth and lightness of being for which she could in no way account. Remembering the vision she had seen of him---was it days, hours, moments before?---she opened her eyes slowly, afraid of waking from the blissful dream of his return, which could not possibly be real. Yet the first thing she saw as they focused in the gentle candlelight, was the same beloved face, neither shrouded nor ghostly nor pale. It had aged, become more serious. But it was still of living flesh, still shared the same world as her own. He sat leaning across her on the bed, with softened, loving eyes taking in her every movement. His arms were spread to either side of her, within reach of her hands. And feeling again the swoon of emotion and disbelief, she caught at them quickly. Her fingers encircled his wrists, and he did not fade away. Again he pressed the cloth lightly to her forehead. Then with a tenderness and swelling of the heart that erased in one moment the imprisoned hell of the past three years, he bent down and kissed her gently. "Stay, Mary. It's your Michael, in the flesh, and he'll not leave you again." Her eyes closed hard, and the tears that flowed from them were an anguish and an ecstasy for which no words exist. "Hold me," was all she could say. "Just hold me." He raised her up and crushed her to him, his face as wet as hers.