Barnabas sat alone in the drawing room after giving up his frantic search for a way back to Julia. His insistance in finding Quentin's staircase only led to a linen closet that would not transform for him, even when he threw all of the linens on the floor and tore out the shelves. All it got him was a glower from Mrs. Johnson, who grumbled at having to pick up after a grown man, and looks of pity from Roger.

His numb stare rested for a long time on a small flat object that was lying on the floor, partly hidden under the table. At first it meant nothing, and he merely looked at it as a spot of color which was out of place on the carpet, a focal point of no significance -- until he realized what it was. He slowly picked it up and turned it over in his fingers, a flat cardboard piece printed on one side with the image of a handsome dark-haired, dark-eyed man wearing a business suit. The missing game pice. He knew with certainty that Julia would have chosen it iinstead, and the thought of her filled his mind again.

He didn't want to think any more, it only rubbed salt into the raw, open wound where his heart had been torn out. But he couldn't stop his thoughts, and they all came back to Julia. Barnabas stared at the flickering flames in the fireplace, knowing there was nothing he could do alone. Nothing seemed to make sense. All of the changes, all of the time travel, everything he'd done in the last five years to ensure the survival of his family from the evil that cursed them had been accomplished with Julia. Always together. He'd done none of it without her. The family had known total peace for a year since their return from 1840, and the amazing change to his own life had brought more happiness than he had ever known. He knew it had all happened -- he could feel the agony of her loss too keenly for it to have been a dream. He had never felt so incomplete before in his life, never realizing the measure of what he was with her, until she was gone.

But now it was all wiped away as if none of it had happened, all that they had succeeded in doing to change the course of events had been changed back. Then why was he still able to remember when no one else did? The whys were making his head explode, but the biggest why left a black hole he couldn't fill. Why was he the only one unchanged? There was no doubt in his mind that somehow all of their tampering with time had been reversed. Was time like a rubber band, stretched repeatedly to fit innumerable shapes and sizes, only to return to its original form when released? Then how had it all been released in one swift act? Barnabas cradled his head in his hands, wishing for unconsciousness.

Dr. Woodard had given both him and Roger a mild sedative, and Roger had quickly decided on bed, but Barnabas was unable to stop thinking, sedation only seemed to make him focus better. 'So many lives ruined in a brief few minutes,' he thought. 'but why, when it wasn't all directed at the Collins family. Maggie Evans, Victoria Winters, Tom Jennings, Willie, Amy Jennings, and who knows how many more. They weren't Collins', and Dr. Woodard back from the dead, alive and well. That didn't seem to fit in with the rest. What did it all mean? How are they connected?' Barnabas clasped his hands and lowered his forehead onto them. 'Julia would know by figuring it out logically. She could always see through the superfluous and find the core of a thing - always see what I overlooked. What am I missing or leaving out, other than myself? I haven't changed. Everyone else has, but I haven't reverted back to the way I was.' He sat upright. 'I am still human. If I leave myself out of the puzzle, then what do I have left?'

He picked up the crystal ball that David left behind on the table, and stared into its depths, but no images came to his eyes, no visions of Julia helping him work out the equation. Barnabas squeezed his eyes shut, hoping to focus his mind on the problem, but what he saw was an image of Julia, soft and goldenly radiant by candlelight, the natural curl of her copper hair shining, framing her face, the glow of satin clinging to the curves of her body, a private image of Julia no one ever saw but him. He wanted her back so badly that he could smell the elusive fragrance she wore between her breasts that teased him into searching for its source, he wanted back their life together that they had fought so hard to win. Somehow it had been taken away, but how could he get it back -- get 'her' back.

If only he knew what had caused the change. What was the common thread? He rubbed the pain over his eyes and knew he was getting nowhere. Obviously, 'he' was the thread that tied them all together, he was responsible for making them the way they were -- but -- no -- wait! He hadn't made Tom into a vampire -- he had staked him, but -- Amy! He had never done anything to harm that sweet child, she had been at Wyndcliffe, traumatized after seeing Chris change into the wolf. Julia was treating her. And Tom -- Tom had attacked Julia --

Barnabas quickly began mentally collating events of the last five years. 'Maggie was being treated by Julia and hypnotized to forget what I had done to her, and Julia's intervention stopped me from killing Maggie -- stopped me from bringing Vickie across -- and Carolyn as well, and Dave Woodard died at my hands -- with Julia's help. Elizabeth's burial was avoided -- with Julia's counseling young David overcame his murderous resentment of his father -- Julia helped Quentin regain his memory and identity --' Barnabas felt like his head had cleared of two centuries of cobwebs. 'These are the things that have not occurred, because Julia was not alive to intervene. Then we did not go back in time to 1840, so Angelique could not have released me from the curse. I should still be as I was, yet I am not. I should have no memory of Julia, yet she is all I can think of'.

Barnabas realized that he had become a paradox, and the only way it made sense was if magic was the cause of it all. A witch's magic. Perhaps it made sense after all. Angelique had convinced him that she renounced her powers, and she died in his arms after testifying to save Quentin, but her unselfishness had been such a complete change of character for her -- had it been merely a ruse to trick him? To trick him into declaring his love -- and then what? 'To mourn her for the rest of my life? Is that what she wanted of me? But I have not, I do not -- I grieve for Julia, "my Julia," he whispered aloud. "If only there were a way for me to save her."

He was concentrating so intently on his problem, that Barnabas failed to notice David had entered the drawing room, and was standing close by, listening to him.

"Cousin Barnabas?" Daavid's strong, youthful voice startled him from his reverie.

Barnabas almost self-consciously returned the crystal ball to the table. "I beg your pardon, David, I suppose I had hopes of seeing more in your crystal -- but I don't have the gift of second sight, as you do." He turned his pain filled eyes to the boy. "Why did this happen? Can your gift tell you that?"

"Hell hath no fury," David mumbled to himself with a grin. David's demeanor was changed from what it had been earlier, he was unusually assured and even patronizing in the amusement that flickered across his young face as he gloated over Barnabas' beaten expression. Had Barnabas been less preoccupied with his own misery, he might have noticed that David's body was, in fact possessed of a certain spirited elan characteristic of an immortal who took immeasurable joy in seeing him so disheartened.

David pulled the crystal across the table and smirked at Barnabas' bowed head as he feigned concern. "I couldn't sleep, I kept having visions of the lady/" He said, sitting before the crystal and staring into its depths. When Barnabas turned eyes full of questions to him, the spirit that was borrowing David's body askd, "Would you like for me to look some more?"

"The only thing I want your crystal to tell me is how to stop a death that happened 20 years ago." His voice, full of emotion, trembled slightly.

This time David didn't try to entertain with theatrical antics, he quietly looked into the ball and then spoke with an oddly knowing assurance. "Only you can stop her death. Only by your being at the scene of the accident can she be saved from the inevitable outcome."

"How can I cross the barrier of time?" Barnabas said with frantic exasperation. "I've alrady been upstairs looking for Quentin's staircase through time, but it no longer exists. Does your crystal tell you that?"

"It can be done, but you'll have to face danger before you can pass through the membrane that separates time," warned the damned soul that possessed David's body. "Are you willing to risk your own life to save her's?"

"Without her, I have nothing." Barnabas' eyes held pain that made David smile. "I'll do anything to change the events that ended her life Can your crystal tell me what I must do?"

David pretended to concentrate on the crystal and spoke slowly. "You must go now to Blair Cottage, while the moon is still full, even though there is danger in the woods. If you wait until the sun is up, it will be too late, the entrance through the membrane can only be penetrated at night. When you get inside the house, you will find a carved stone box sitting on the study desk -- inside the box is a small glass skull, hold the skull in your hand and concentrate on the time and place that you want to go. Don't drop the skull, or you will become lost in time. You will fail -- and she will die."

to be continued

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