"Love alone
is the true seed of every merit in you
and of all acts for which you must atone."
- Dante

have been here too long. I must go back."

"No. The plague rages still. You will die... both of you."

Isa turned to regard me. "I still do not know what you are, Alix. This..." she gestured at the tower's walls rising about us, "this is not natural. And it certainly is not living. What will life be like for my child... our child, in the land of illusion?"

"Do you mean if that child lives? I seem to remember the possibility that you would kill it, if it had one green eye and one blue one, or some other such oddity."

She flushed angrily and spun as if to leave. We had had this argument more times than I would care to count in the days since I had brought Isa here. There, in the waking world, the plague had barely begun to do its damage.

What happened after I died is, as they say, history. I did what I could, but the cloud did not stop its expansion. I slowed it some, for if it had been left to run its course there would be no one to hear my tale. They say that a third of the world died from the Black Death, and that is more or less true. Numbers do not really apply when death happens on such a scale. All that matters is that people suffered.

I should know.

Isa turned back to me. "It is not that I am ungrateful for what you did. I know that you did it for me. And in return, I will promise you this. Our child will live. Even if it is the antichrist itself, and I have no reason to believe it won't be, it will not die by my hand. But you have to send us back. Alix, please. I fear for my sanity in this place. I have seen much that cannot be. Death is there, yes, but death I can understand. Waking in a dream, dreaming while awake, magic, gods, demons... these things are not for us. Let us go, let us go..."

Her voice was becoming shrill, her expression ragged. I could see that she was nearing the breaking point. No act, this. Plague or no plague, I would have to send her back.

"I am not certain what will happen. You have lived in Dream, with no other concurrent existence. It is possible that you will not be able to exist at all in the waking world."

"But you don't really believe that."

We stood atop a rise overlooking the cemetery where I had first met Riothamus. I missed him now, missed his counsel. Where had he gone?

"No," I said, "but what I believe has very little to do with it. That is why I am giving you this." I pulled the Valkan-Meer from my finger, took her hand, place it there. "I wouldn't suggest you wear it on your finger. But keep it. It will strengthen your spirit."

Isa regarded it with an expression of distaste, holding it flat in her palm, staring sidelong at it. "Where did it come from?"

"I don't know, but it is not malign. Everything it does is for the good of the bearer. You needn't worry. Please, take it; at least do this for me... for our child."

Her expression softened. Reaching a hand out to my face, she said, "Alix, I thank you. And for what it's worth, I do not believe that you are a devil. But I still don't believe you are a man, either. Whatever you are, I will always be grateful." She paused. "Do not hate me for my harsh words."

"Hate you?" I laughed sardonically. "Isa, I will always-" She pressed her fingers against my lips before I could finish. Then, turning, back straight, she waited. I parted the curtain between the worlds, and she was gone.

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