Tabitha, since leaving Stephen's bedside had done a fair amount of thinking about a number of things which is why she was laying in wait for Liam as he made his way past the dining room.

"Liam, I want to speak with you." It was less a command for immediate attendance than a statement of desire.

Liam, his mind on the Reverend, was startled but willing to comply. Usually she simply told him what to do. "Sure, what do you need? You want me to hear your confession?"

Tabitha ignored the bait, something Liam had never thought to see in this life. "No, but I think it would be best if we had a little more privacy. Let's go this way." She led him, following dutifully after her, through dining room and kitchen, out the kitchen door and back towards her cherished herb garden to a bench set under a tree. Settled she seemed reluctant to get to what was on her mind.

"Tabitha," Liam finally prompted, "What is it? Is something wrong?"

"Well, you tell me. You spent over a day and a half in his mind, so you tell me."

"So, sometimes it takes a long time. You know that."

"Yes, I know. But towards the end, a couple hours before you brought him back you started weeping. Liam I've been there for a lot of these things, with you and others, you know that. No one's ever done that before. So what happened?"

"I don't know if I have the right to tell you Tabitha." He said it after some thought, hesitantly.

"I don't think that enters into it. Something is wrong and it's time someone started trying to find out what, rather than saying it's just grief and letting it go at that. We've both seen what happens when a bond pair is separated by death. It's horrible and the loss is always there, but the wound heals, it doesn't fester, if you will, the way it is here."

"You didn't just sit and wait did you?"

"No. He is dearer to me than any child of my own I could have had. But more than that he is the architect of our future, he is too important to our people.

"You were gone, and Baylee, who nice enough, but remarkably foolish, nor does she doesn't understand these things…well she couldn't find you either so she panicked and I got her out of there. Then while you were searching, I had to go into his mind to keep his heart and lungs going. I almost lost him a couple of times towards the end. He wanted to die so badly, Liam, he'd completely overcome any survival instinct…you saw it too, and he is in such pain…it breaks my heart. So if there's a way to help him then I'm not going to sit around and do nothing." Tabitha had tears running down her cheeks when she finished.

Liam found a handkerchief and passed it to her in silence. He had seen Tabitha go through many things and any crying she'd ever done had been in private. When she finished he said, "You're right; what is happening there isn't what I would have expected to find. When a bond pair is separated by death it's as if the bond, all its links were cut cleanly, surgically and they heal, fade back into the mind. That's not what I found in the linkages in his mind. They resemble something that has been violently pulled apart, shredded even and all of them raw, like ground meat.

You know what it's like, with Eli. Think of the bond as a physical link between two people that always connects them, no matter how far apart they might be. The main link, in a functioning bond, is what I can only describe as a living thing. In Stephen's mind it's still is a living thing and it's trying desperately to reach its end, which is union with the other...the imperative of bonded love, complete communion with the Beloved in self giving. It is as if the bond itself thinks she is still alive and is trying desperately to reach her. Tabitha, I know of no way to stop it short of killing him."

"Nor do I but the Old Ones may. "

"The Old Ones? Tabitha we don't even know if they are real or just a story we tell our children at bedtime."

"Believe me, Liam, they are real."

Liam shook his head. "Ok, I believe you. But what makes you think they'll help you, that you can even find them? I mean, if they do exist they've ignored us for thousands of years, if not longer."

"They will help me."

She was, perhaps, in her mid thirties, tall, slender and stately, even queenly in the pride of her carriage and moved with a natural grace. Her hair was molded high on her head and encircled in gold and silver bands that matched the ones around the column of her neck and on her arms. Her face was oval, with high cheekbones and a straight nose, her chin rounded but firm. Her eyes were perfect almond shapes, large and luminous, an ebony brown surrounded by crystalline white and outlined in kohl set under arching brows. Her mouth was a vivid ruby, full and sensual. Her skin was smooth and damask-like, the color of the richest of earth. She was dressed in draped silks of layered, flowing colors from palest cream to deepest emerald.

She looked nothing like she usually did.

She inclined her head slightly to the man who answered the door. "Inshallah."

His bow in response was deep, his reply deferential, "Inshallah, Amma." Then he turned and led her through the house and out to the center of the gardens where he bowed, if it was possible, even deeper to her and then her host and left them alone.

Her host was seated at a table, where he'd obviously been working, placed to the side of a fountain that played water-borne notes of delight that sparkled in the sunshine. He rose, smiling a slow smile of welcome and gestured her towards a chair away from the table. "Inshallah, Amma. You honor my house with your presence. Be welcome here." He waited until she was seated before taking the chair next to hers. "Truly I am blessed by God to be given the gift of your presence."

She matched his smile with one of simple friendship. "It is I who am blessed by your welcome, Abba Orsisius, after such an absence from the light of your countenance. It has been too long since that was a daily gift."

"It has been too long since Scetis where many things were a daily gift. You are well, you and Eli?"

"We are. He asked me to convey to you his greetings and regret that he could not accompany me today. And you, my eyes do not tell me lies, you are also well?"

He nodded permission to his servant who had returned with refreshments while saying, "Yes, Snycleta would allow nothing else, as you know. She will be sorry to miss your visit."

"I am also saddened." She said, accepting a glass of tea, garnished with mint and wrapped in a napkin to collect the condensation. She sipped politely, murmured her appreciation and set the glass down beside her. She knew there would be hurry here, no rushing straight into the reason for her visit. She had learned patience in her life and could wait with grace, enjoying the simple exchange of conversation about the small things of daily life.

Finally, still in no hurry, it was he, as was his right and not hers, who began to move in the direction of her purpose asking. "Tell me, do you still present yourself as an elderly woman with a simple gift for healing and nothing else?"

"Yes, it is the easiest and certainly no lie as far as it goes. I am both an old woman and a healer."

"But you are also so very much more."

Correctly discerning his intent she said "To describe myself in any other way would serve no purpose. I am what I am there, it is enough."

"I must accept that I suppose, since you are there, not I. You have never regretted," he began delicately, "being there?"

"No. I am in no way diminished or lessened. What was important among what I gave up I may pick up again when I wish. For the rest, it is of no matter and to be detached a state one must seek daily."

"Then you have not come to say you wish to return to us, being finished there?" In his words were the invitation she's been waiting for.

"No, Abba, I have not. I have come to ask your help for Stephen."

"Tell me," he said.

So she did and then she waited.

Eventually he said, "I knew things had been difficult for him…Eli being, as you know, kind enough to keep us informed. But I did not know…"

"None of us did."

"What you've described…that is something we have no experience of. For a bond to be broken in such a way…" He stopped and regarded her for a moment. "Have you ever reflected on the gift of it, the gift of such a relationship; available to all and embraced by so few, perhaps because it requires an acceptance of such vulnerability with another?"

"We are a people born out of an impulse towards self-transcendence, it is true, at least for most of us. But to consent to live that which is what consenting to bonding really is, moment to moment with another; that is not so easy. We are still a people of many flaws, and much selfishness. Within the bond those things, even the littlest, become…well perhaps not impossible, but certainly impossible to hide. And, it is a commitment that can not be set aside while both live, even when it becomes difficult as it sometimes does for all of us."

Nodding he said softly, reflectively, "But within it, regardless of its demands, what it has the potential to become is ultimately what man has sought since he first rose to walk on two feet; a relationship of utter acceptance by an Other, total unconditional love that is tangibly present between them," he answered her.

"Fear sees only the cost of a thing; it takes faith to see its promise. Fear is a commodity that one may purchase very cheaply, for nothing even…while faith requires more."

He said nothing for several moments, then with great compassion he told her, "What you tell me about Stephen is…unwelcome news. It is distressing and I would help you if I could, but I can not. I will however, inquire of the others, though I see little hope there. I don't think there is anything that can be done by anyone, perhaps not even him." He spread his hands, palms up, in reflection of his paucity.

Her response was an immediate rejection of his answer. "I can not, nor will I, simply wait around for him to reach a point where he can no longer bear the unbearable. There has to be something that can be done." Her beautiful face might have been carved from marble; it was as implacable as her voice.

"I do not suggest that you should. I have not met with your foster son since he was placed in your care. I would be grateful if you would convey to him an invitation to visit me one day."

She rose, graceful and proud, understanding that the interview was at an end. "I will." Then, inclining her head slightly she murmured the ritual formula of farewell, "Inshallah, may peace remain with this house always."