Forgotten Memories

[Maira]

The town had a rich history. Originally Native Americans had lived in the area until the rumors of gold brought white settlers in droves, who then built the town. It was now nothing more than a husk of what it had been. Not far off there was a replica of the town for the tourists but the original site had long ago been given over to archeological studies. That was why Sokkemi was wandering around abandoned buildings with other college students. She was armed with her favorite camera, taking pictures of the old abandoned buildings and the objects left inside.

She had just exitted the Mercantile and was taking a drink of water as she waited for her classmates to join her when a strange feeling of familiarity made her look further down the road. Curious what had caught her attention, Sokkemi called out to her classmates, "Hey guys, I'll be back in a minute." Their answeres were muffled but Sokkemi didn't even hear them because she was already jogging off down the old road.

The farther she went, the faster her pace became. It was as if she was being drawn along by something and as she got closer the draw continued to increase. She had thought what she was looking for was on the way out of town but as she approached a road that T 'd into the one she was on, she felt drawn even stronger and her pace increased almost to a sprint as she then ran up the other road. She was so busy watching where she put her feet, taking car so she wouldn't trip in the old wagon ruts, that she didn't see where she was heading until she stopped, panting, and looked up.

As she looked at the building in front of her, Sokkemi felt like a horse had kicked her in the stomach and like her mind was suddenly not her own. She felt lost and confused as her own mind scrambled to make sense of the feelings of familiarity that were surging through her. There were strange flashes of people going in and out of the old Saloon in period clothing. Almost without knowing, as she watched the the people she made her way up the stairs and inside. Once inside the flashes of people mostly stopped. The only one still happening was of a dark haired woman with a small girl child on her hip ascending another set of stairs at the back of the building and it wasn't really so much a "flash" anymore as it was moving fluidly like an old movie. She decided she was hallucinating and tried to turn away but something continued to draw her into the Saloon and up the stairs after the woman and the little girl. She followed them up the stairs and then down a hallway to a quiet room at the front of the building.

Sokkemi hesitated at the slightly open door of the room for only a moment before pushing on it. The door creaked as it swung inward on rusty hinges and when she looked inside, Sokkemi had the urge to shake her head to clear her vision. Not only was she seenig the room as it was now, everything dusty and old, but she was seeing it as it must have been when the woman and little girl occupied it. The colors were surprisingly bright and the furniture was arranged differently that iw was now, including the addition of a second smaller bed tucked behind a pair of standing screens. This smaller, almost hidden area of the room is what finally pulled her into the room. She watched as the woman tucked the little girl into bed, watched the woman's lips move as if singing a lullaby or telling a story. It didn't take long for the little girl's eyes to close and the woman pressed a quick kiss to her forehead before going back into the main part of the room.

The little girl falling asleep seemed like a good place, to Sokkemi, for this bizarre hallucination to stop. When it kept going with the woman walking over to her bed, Sokkemi did shake her head. The current furniture arrangement and the one from the strange scene she was watching didn't match up and it was making her a bit dizzy and nauseous. When the woman moved the bed, instead of getting into it, creating a gap between the head of the bed and the wall, Sokemmi was suddenly curious. Moving closer, and trying to ignore the trunk in the real room where the bed was in the hallucination, Sokkemi watched as the woman used a small knife she pulled from under the mattress to gently pry a board loose from the wall. The woman then reached her hand into the hole int he wall and pulled out a small, plain, wooden box and pulled from it a necklace intricately decorated with a symbol Sokkemi was not familiar with. Again the woman's lips moved and this time Sokkemi was convinced she could almost hear what woman was saying. It seemed like she was talking to the little girl's father, saying how she was jsut like him and how amazed he'd be by her. Sokkemi watched then as tears slipped down the woman's cheeks as she kissed the necklace and reverently placed it back in the box and then back in the wall.

As the woman was pushing the bed back against the wall, the hallucination finally started to fade and Sokkemi found herself just staring straight ahead at the trunk. It took her a while to fully come back to herself but once she did, Sokkemi was at the trunk in an instant, pulling it away from the wall. Only once she had done that, Sokkemi realized that she had no idea which board the little box should be hidden behind. She also didn't have a knife to pry the board loose with once she found it. With a frustrated grunt, Sokkemi hit the wall with the side of her closed fist and then immediately squeaked in surprise when the board just below her fist fell to the floor with a clatter. Surely that couldn't be the right board. Not willing to second guess what seemed to be fate, Sokkemi slipped her hand into the hole and felt around the space between the walls. It only took her a moment before her hand landed on the box and she quickly grabbed it and pulled it from its hiding place.

Wanting to see the necklace better, Sokkemi moved toward the light flowing in the single window in the room. Opening the simple box, Sokkemi stared in awe at the pendant for a moment before reaching in to pull it out. As her fingers gently grasped the silver disk shaped pendant, Sokkemi felt an electric shock travel up her arm to her shoulder where it branched and continued both to her brain and her heart before travelling to the rest of her body. As the shock travelled down her spine it split just below her shoulder blades and to where her strange scars were. It felt like her back was exploding in fire and a loud primal scream roared out of her just as the rest of her body felt like it had been engulfed in a giant fireball. The wooden box slipped free of her hand as she lost all control of her body and her sense. She then crumpled forward onto the floor, the chain of the necklace entwined in her fingers. A pair of silvery brown wings were sprawled over and around her, and a silver hand-sized tattoo that matched the pendant perfectly glowed gently at the base of her neck where it met her shoulders.

[Demeter]

Trust walked down the rough path that would take her to the ghost town. Somehow, she'd been elected to give the students a tour of the dig site. She didn't mind giving the students a tour as they were college students and keeping them from falling into an open pit wasn't nearly as important as when they had grade schoolers coming through. And seeing as how these were archeology students, they'd probably dive into the pits if she let them.

It also gave her a chance to hang out with Savannah. She'd met the lioness during Cedar Valley University's winter quarter and liked arguing with the woman. Savannah had fold her that some their arguments had led to some excellent papers. Which was Trust's reason for living. She loved inspiring people. She'd pointed the leader of the archeological team to the right spot to test for the site of the Native American village. That had been two seasons ago and they were making some excellent progress. Right now, the ghost town was for the anthropologists and they dug up all they could there.

Dressed in shorts and a light colored tank top, with a floppy hat on her head and sturdy boots on her feet, Trust entered the town from the far side. She glanced down the dirt street and raised an eyebrow at the crowd of college students milling around outside the merchantile. Spotting Savannah at the center of the group, Trust wandered over to her. "Hey, Vanny, what's going on? You guys ready to head over to the dig site?"

Savannah shook her head. "One of the students has wandered off and no one knows where she went. Sokkemi isn't answering her cell phone. The security people and the anthropoligists are searching for her now."

Trust glanced towards the nearest buildings and saw the secuirty time for the dig and restoration project carefully entering one the buildings that was still very shaking. "We haven't gotten a lot of the buildings shored up and stable enough for people to go into yet. I'll go see if I can lend a hand." Trust said before jogging over to one of the security team. She spoke to him for a minute before jogging down to the buidling on the far end of the street. She carefully entered what they believed to have been a saloon or brothel. She picked her way through the building, testing each step to make sure the wooden planks wouldn't gave in beneath her weight. Using that method, she slowly made her way to the second floor and the rabbit's warren of rooms.

It was in one the last ones that she found the woman, sprawled across the floor and out cold. Cursing quietly when she saw the wings, Trust pulled out her own cell and called Hank, the newest recruit to the security team and a Alati. She crossed to the window and watched as Hank went over to Savannah. They talked for a minute before heading towards the saloon. Trust turned back to the woman sprawled on the floor and knelt next to her. She glanced at the marking on the woman's shoulder blades and to the necklace in her hand. She'd seen that symbol before.

[Maira]

Savannah really hated being called "Vanny" and normally she would remind Trust of that but she had bigger things than an annoying nickname to worry about. Instead of grumbling about the nickname, she explained what was going on to the other woman, that one of the students was missing. She watched with relief as Trust immediately joined the search. Surprisingly, it didn't take that long before Trust found the girl. Only there was an interesting complication, Sokkemi was not only unconscious but apparently she had sprouted a pair of wings.

It had been a very long time since her feline sense had been fooled and hearing that Sokkemi was at least part Alati really surprised Savannah. Even though they appeared human most of the time, Savannah had come to notice that even Alati had a common, recognizable, scent about them and it wasn't until she walked into the room that Sokkemi had collapsed in that she smelled it around the girl. "Well huh, that's new," she mumbled to herself in reaction to Sokkemi's changed scent and appearance.

Then to Trust and the Alati man Hank, Savannah asked curiously, "So how do we go about, one, finding out what happened, and two, keeping those enormous wings a secret from the paramedics, students, and everybody else?

*****

Dymion was on leave from the museum and was home on the Islands spending time with family and friends, and tending to settlement business. He was actually having lunch with his daughter Asiah, who was also home visiting during her summer break from college, when he felt it. When it didn't come on Selene's 18th birthday he had always believed she hadn't survived that long. But now, 90 years later, he still knew what the electric sensation searing through his body had to mean. The pain wracked his body for only a few moments but once it stopped his world quickly faded to black. As he collapsed, Asiah heard him say quietly, "My sweet Selene..."

When he finally woke up, Dymion was back at his house on his couch and Asiah was watching him anxiously from the nearby armchair. When she noticed him stirring she immediately was at his side drilling him, "Are you okay? What just happened? Can I get you anything? Is Selene my sister? Or her mom?"

"Whoa Asiah, honey, one at a time please," Dymion soothed his anxious daughter as he slowly, carefully, tried sitting up. He got a little dizzy if he moved too quickly but eventually, with some help from Asiah, he was upright and able to look at her on eye level. "Okay, let me try answering those questions now. I'm going to be fine, water would be great, and what happened was that the spell I put on your sister Selene, to bind her magic and Alati heritage to keep her safe, finally triggered."

Dymion watched as Asiah tried to process just what it was he was telling her. He had tried to make it simple and straightforward but it was even still a lot for him to process too. When she got up and walked to the kitchen without saying anything Dymion frowned, worried. She wasn't gone long though and when she came back carrying a large glass of water, Asiah still looked thoughtful but there was a hint of a smile around her eyes and mouth. Before he could say anything, Asiah asked, "So how do we find my sister?" That really was a good question, and unfortunately one he didn't have an answer to.

[Demeter]

Trust pocketed the necklace and stood up. "I can force the wings into hiding. It's not a pleasant experience but she's already knocked out. Then we'll take her to my tent. No need to involve anyone else just yet.

Trust straightened out the woman's limbs and gently folded the wings along her back. With Hank and Savannah's help, she rolled her onto her back. "Hank, can you go see if the way to the tents is clear and then come back here? Savannah, go back to Professor Andrews and let him know that she's fine. Saying that she wandered off, got lost and fell through a rotted board. Say that she's a little scratched up and shaky. Stress that I'm taking care of her; Andrews will understand."

Once the two had left to do their tasks, Trust placed her fingers on the woman's forehead and bent her will on getting those wings to go back to a dormant state. Even thought the woman, Sokkemi as Savannah had called her, was unconscious, her body twitched and jerked as the wings faded away. Once she was done, Trust stat back against the wall and wiped sweat away from her brow.

When the other two returned, they moved Sokkemi to Trust's tent. It was a clean place, set away from the others and on a raised wooden platform. They placed her on the cot and Trust sat on a camp chair. "Go on back to the students, Savannah, I'll call when she wakes."

[Maira]

The first thing Sokkemi remembered when she woke up was the searing pain that had ripped through her body. When she wasn't assaulted by the pain again, she couldn't help but wonder if maybe it had been her imagination. And with that thought, the rest of her memories from before her collapse came back to her and her eyes flashed open to check her surroundings. She was both relieved and confused to find that she wasn't in the old saloon anymore.

Sitting up slowly, rolling her shoulders as she did so to ease the aching stiffness in them, Sokkemi looked around her and decided she was probably in one of the archaeologist or anthropologist's tents. And then, just as she finished looking around, her gaze landed on a woman sitting at the table in the corner. The woman was watching her curiously and it took all of Sokkemi's will to stifle the squeak of surprise at finding another person in the tent with her.

Nervously, Sokkemi greeted the woman, "Hi, I'm Sokkemi. If this is your tent I'm sorry to inconvenience you by being here. I'm not exactly sure how I even got here." Then she waited, hoping the other woman would give her some idea of just what had happened to her in the saloon and just why she was in the woman's tent.

[Demeter]

After Sokkemi was brought to her tent, Trust knocked off for the day. Instead of digging at the sight, she spent the rest of the afternoon in her tent, cataloguing finds. The interns who’d brought her the tubs of carefully packaged artifacts had given the girl sprawled on her cot a long look. The explanation Trist had given was the girl had been unprepared for the heat of Eastern Washington and had felt ill. She’d offered her cool tent to the girl and stayed to watch over her.

Once night fell, Trust had returned the finds to the dig trailer. After that, she’d hustled Savannah along, shooing the girl back to her hotel with Promises to look after Sokkemi as if her very life depended on it. And then Sokkemi’s professor had waltzed around to check on his student.

Jackson Black had a reputation. Oh, he was a good professor and digger but he had a habit of seducing every female to cross his path, especially his students. He was a charming bastard and knew it. He was also the father of the three children currently visiting with grandma Truth and Grandpa Lucius.

Four years ago, when she’d been sent to inspire him in his work, she’d fallen for his charms. For a number of weeks, they’d had a very hot, very physical relationship until she’d caught him inspiring one of his students. She’d given him the finger and walked away. And when she’d discovered her pregnancy, she’d made the decision not to tell him. And when she’d learned that he’d be bringing his class for a tour, she’d sent Joy, Jubilee and Bliss to her mother. He didn’t need to know about his daughters.

She’d sent him packing from her tent as there was no way she’d leave an unconscious female in his care. Once she was sure that there’d be no more visitors, Trust sat down and studied the necklace she’d found with Sokkemi. The symbol on the necklace seemed so very familiar. She’d just finished sketching the pendent when the woman woke.

“Good Evening, Sokkemi,” she said, “I’m Trust Cote and this is my tent. I had you brought here after you collapsed in the saloon. What I want to know is what you were even doing in the saloon and how did you find this?” she asked, holding up the necklace.

[Maira]

Sokkemi's first thought at hearing the other woman's words was, *Its evening? It was only mid-morning before!* Swallowing down the shock at finding out how long she'd been out, Sokkemi then answered Trust, "My best guess is hallucinations, honestly. Maybe the sun was getting to me or something, though I know I had been keeping hydrated..." Those visions had been incredibly disturbing and Sokkemi would love to be able to brush them off as a form of heat stroke.

It didn't appear that the woman was buying her excuse any more than she was herself, so, with a sigh, Sokkemi got off the cot and went to take the necklace from the woman so she could look more closely at it. When she reached to take it her hand hesitated. Touching this necklace had caused the searing pain and she didn't want to feel that again. Instead she just took a seat in the other chair at the table and stared at it for a moment before saying softly, "It was in the wall in a hidden compartment behind the trunk in the room."

After that and against her better judgement, Sokkemi related the whole experience with the hallucinations of the people, and the woman and the little girl. She even mentioned the pain that came from touching the necklace and how it had intensified at the twin scars on her back right below her shoulderblades. When Trust's eyes widened slightly at that, Sokkemi didn't miss it and she asked, "What? Why is that important? If you know what's going on with me please tell me because I am really confused."

[Demeter]

Trust stared at the young woman. She'd heard of half blooded beings born into mortal communities and not knowing about their Alati heritage. Because they didn't know, they were unable to control their wings. For their to be scar tissue around the area of the back that housed the wing joints, some mortal must have seen the wings and carved them off her back. But why didn't she remember it?

Suddenly the necklace didn't seem so important.

Trust got up and, going over to the front of tent, she made sure that they were alone. There were plenty of mortals at this dig site. After hauling her chair closer to Sokkemi, she sat and gripped the woman's shoulders. "I need you to not freak out about what I'm going to tell you. Tell me that you will try to remain calm."

Though the woman looked pale and afraid, she nodded. Trust sighed, wondering what had happened to this lost child. "There is a race of people in this world called the Alati. They aren't like most humans. They are supernatural beings with powers and wings. I believe that you are one of these beings. When we found you passed out, you were not only holding hat necklace but you had grown wings."

Sokkemi had paled even further now and she was trembling. Trust placed gentle hands on her shoulders. "It's okay. I'm one too. Here, I'll show you," she said before standing and turning.

With a little concentration, Trust dropped the glamor that hide her wings from sight. They were large and white with streaks of red and gold throughout.

[Maira]

Being asked not to freak out was a sure fire way to get Sokkemi on the verge of panicking. As Trust started talking, explaining about a race of people other than human, Sokkemi could feel her heart rate picking up and her breathing getting shallow. She tried to keep herself calm but when Trust stood up and wings appeared to spring from her back, Sokkemi's world started to go black. Just before she completely went under did Sokkemi realize that Trust's wings were connected to her body at the same place that she had her twin scars. After that, she knew nothing else.

*****

When she finally awoke the next time, Sokkemi was alone. It was also dark out, giving her a strange sense of security that the dark didn't normally bring her. But if it was dark, that meant nobody would see her slipping out of Trust's tent. Where she would go once she had left the tent she had no idea, but she knew she had to get away. It didn't matter that what Trust had told her rang true, all she knew was that she needed to get away from this place and this day.

Before leaving, she did a quick survey of Trust's tent trying to find the necklace that she'd found in the wall. When she didnt find it right away she just gave up. Poking her head out of the tent to make sure nobody was around, Sokkemi slipped out and down the row of tents away from the common area of the campground. She needed to get away and the darkness beckoned.

[Demeter]

Trust could see the girl as she ran for the woods. Sighing, Trust thrust the dinner trays of pre-packaged food into her tent and headed after Sokkemi at a trot. She didn't care if the girl freaked out but she'd taken a good whack to the back of the head only hours before hand.

She didn't know what kind of survival skills the girl had but Trust had decades if climbing through some if the densest, darkest, dangerous jungles in the world. The woods of Eastern Washington were not difficult. Also, the girl wasn't trying to hide her tracks.

Trust grinned when she heard an yelp and headed in that direction. She found the girl sitting at the base of a small hill in an undignified sprawl. She squatted down next to her. "Only a few hours ago, you passed out and bounced your noggin on a hard wood floor. You really should be taking it easy. You can run away in fear and panic in the morning when you can see."

Trust stood and held out her hand. "Come on. I have food at the tent."

[Maira]

Once she was away from the tents, Sokkemi made quickly for the woods surrounding the camp. She wasn't sure where she was going but she just knew she needed to get away so she could think. Only, running through a forest in the dark before the moon had even risen to light her way proved too complicated for Sokkemi and she was quickly tripped by a root that was hidden in a shadow. Tumbling down a small hill, she was surprised that she landed in a sitting position without having bumped her already sore head. In a matter of moments, she heard footsteps coming up over the hill and then Trust was kneeling next to her, teasing her gently. A wry smile spread on Sokkemi's face as she took Trust's hand and let herself be lead away back to the tent and the food.

*****

The next morning, Sokkemi's head was a raging lump of ow. The light and sound coming through the tent walls was too much for her so she had taken to hiding her head under the balled up blanket from Trust's cot. It helped with the light pretty well, but the sounds were still too much.

*****

By evening, Sokkemi was able to come out of hiding from under the blanket, and even managed to join Trust and the rest of the research team around one of the camp fires for dinner. She felt out of place, having only supposed to have been visiting with her class, but Trust stuck with her and pretty soon the two women started talking about the dig and anything else that came to mind.

Only when Trust was ready to leave the fire did Sokkemi let her mind wander to what had happened the with the weird vision the day before. She followed Trust back to her tent and was surprised to see a second cot squeezed into the limited space. Well that answered the question of where she'd be sleeping that night. "So, you're not kicking me out?" she asked curiously, half wondering if its because Trust was still trying to figure out who Sokkemi was and why she'd been caught in the weird vision.

[Demeter]

Trust blinked at Sokkemi’s question. “Why would I kick you out? It’s not like you have anywhere else to go, do you? Besides, you’ve spent all day nursing your skull and its getting dark again. I spoke with Savannah earlier today and told her I’d run you home tomorrow.”

Trust herded Sokkemi back into their shared tent. On her folding table was the drawing of the necklace; and the worked symbol she now knew to be a clan signet. Earlier in the day, while Sokkemi had been sleeping, Trust had contact her uncle, a lord in the Alati world and had asked him about the image. He’d identified it as the mark of the leader of North Haven, Dymion Velis.

Her uncle had already contacted Dymion Velis to tell him about Trust’s find. Velis was on his way to the dig site. After Sokkemi had settle back onto her cot, Trust excused herself to go wash up. A 15 minute hike from her tent and she met up with the man. “Dymion Velis?”

When he positively identified himself, Trust handed over the drawing of the necklace. “One of the students found this yesterday right before she sprouted wings and passed out. According to her professor’s student aid, this student has an interesting history. She has no memory of most of her life and was found in a cave with no idea how she got there.”

Trust handed over a second drawing, a quick sketch of Sokkemi.

[Maira]

After his incident with the pain, Asiah left him to his own devices so that she could go on a Google rampage to see if she could discover any events that may have triggered her father's pain. Dymion was just as capable of doing the search himself but it made Asiah feel useful and considering how useless he felt himself, he wasn't going to take that from her.

The rest of that day, night, and into the next day, Dymion waited while Asiah did her research. He was very glad to be home on the islands because home never ran out of things that needed doing. He was out with one of the ranchers checking on that year's new calves when his phone went off. He excused himself before pulling the phone out of his pocket, sure it was just Asiah. Only, the number belonged to his friend Josif. Curious why the other man might be calling after having only talked a week or so prior, he quickly answered, "Josif, what a surprise." Only the surprise was on Dymion, the news that Josif bore sent the man to his knees in shock.

"A necklace, found in Washington, that has my clan symbol. And it was found by a girl who then sprouted wings and passed out," he repeated back to his friend a few moments later when the shock wore off. After Josif's confirmation, Dymion asked shakily, "It was found yesterday morning, wasn't it?"

This time it was Josif's turn to be quiet for a moment. When he finally spoke again, it was clear that Josif was putting the pieces together himself and he excitedly passed along his niece's contact information and location.

Dymion thanked his friend before hanging up and just holding the phone in his hand. He stared blindly at the calves and other cattle milling about him until the rancher tapped him on the shoulder and asked if he was okay. Clearly the other man was a little flustered seeing one of the settlement's leaders on his knees in a cow field. Dymion smiled warmly at him and reassured the man that he was fine, just that he'd gotten some rather shocking news that he needed to attend to right away. After that, he left the farmer with the cattle and headed back to his house and Asiah.

On his way home, he called Asiah and informed her that he was going to Washington and needed to know what the closest gateway was to the dig site in Eastern Washington. Asiah tried to get more information out of him than that, but Dymion had already hung up the phone again as he let his wings free and took to the sky.

*****

Once she had known that Dymion was going to Eastern Washington, Asiah had repeated her searches. She knew that if he was going, and telling her so abruptly, then something must've happened to spur him to action. This time during her searching she looked at events from more contemporary times than before, when she had searched for old records from around the time that Dymion would have been at that town.

By the time Dymion got back to the house, Asiah had a few leads and one of them was very promising. The only thing it lacked was a picture of the girl in question. It was that elusive picture that she hunted down while Dymion rattled off his conversation with Josif. As she scrolled through image results, Dymion stopped her and told her to click on a certain picture. "But that headline has nothing to do with the story I'm trying to find the picture for, Dad," she told him as she tried to scroll past. Only he wouldn't let her. He took control and scrolled back up the page of results and click on the photo, which blew it up bigger.

For what would have been the second time in less than 30 minutes, Dymion nearly went to his knees in shock. Luckily he caught himself on the edge of Asiah's desk and managed to "squat down" instead of falling. Balanced on the balls of his feet, Dymion quickly scanned through the story about the girl pictured. It was a simple blurb on an adoption website, telling what activities the girl liked, how old she seemed to be, and what she was hoping for in a family. He looked to the top of the girl's bio and saw her name, "Sokkemi," it read. Turning to Asiah he asked, "What was the name of the girl in the article you found?"

Asiah looked down at the paper she'd jotted her notes on and then back up at the open browser window. With a smile, she told him, "It matches Dad, I think that's her!" She watched as her father sat back on his heels and rubbed his hands over his face a few times. Had they found her sister? How was it that she looked no older than Asiah when, even as a half-breed Alati, she should appear to be a woman grown?

Without warning, Dymion leapt up off the floor and bolted from Asiah's room. She would have run after him, but she heard him move into his room and start rummaging in what she assumed was his closet. Knowing he was just looking for something, Asiah saved the girl's bio picture to her laptop before shutting the machine down and shoving it in her backpack. If her dad was going to Washington to meet her sister, she was going too!

Asiah was already shoving a few necessities in her bag when Dymion came back into the room carrying something small and old looking. He held it out for her to see. When she saw what it was that her father held, she gasped. It was a very old photograph of Dymion and a young native woman in period clothing with a baby nestled in her arms. The woman didn't look much like the girl who's picture she'd saved, but if that was Sokkemi's birth mother, then it explained the girl's slightly darker skin tone. "That's them, isn't it?" Asiah asked, her packing forgotten.

Dymion smiled sadly and nodded. "Sacnite was 17 then, and Selene less than a month old. I had the photographer take two photos and when I left them, to keep them safe, I left one picture behind. I had hoped that someday Selene would come searching for me and that the photo would help her." With a sigh, Dymion pressed the photo to his chest and stared at Asiah for a moment before heading back to his own room to pack.

*****

Despite telling Asiah that she needed to stay in Alaska, the stubborn girl insisted on tagging along with him and Dymion just didn't have the energy to fight her on the matter. Dymion had wanted a gateway to open at the dig site itself, but the closest one of the resident mages could manage was a city a few hours away since that was as close as she had been before. He did his best not to fuss at the woman, but as soon as the gateway closed behind them a string of mild curses slipped from his tongue. It didn't take Dymion and Asiah long to find a car rental office, once in the new city, and they were quickly on their way.

They arrived at the dig site at dusk. Asiah unbuckled and was about to get out of the car when Dymion put a hand on her shoulder. "Wait here a minute okay? Josif set up a meeting for me and his niece but I don't think he knew you were coming. Let me talk to her, find out if this girl really is Selene, and then you can come with me okay?" He knew she was trying to hid her disappointment, but there was a slight downturn to Asiah's mouth as she watched him get out of the car and proceed without her.

Before they had left home, Dymion had tucked the old photo of him, Sacnite, and infant Selene in his wallet. As he approached the woman, he pulled it out again. After she believed who he was, Trust handed him two drawings. The first was of the necklace he'd had made for Selene to keep her safe. The second was a rough sketch of a slightly older version of the girl pictured on the adoption website.

Not able to take his eyes from the sketch Dymion told Trust, "My younger daughter insisted on tagging along, now I'm glad she did. You'll see why." This last, Dymion said as he half turned to beckon at Asiah to join them. The girl practically erupted out of the rental car and hurried over to her father. When Asiah was finally close enough for Trust to see her clearly in the dimming light, Dymion watched the stranger's face closely. The widening of her eyes and the small "o" that her mouth formed told him what he knew already; Asiah and this Sokkemi girl looked like twins.

[Demeter]

Trust looked from father to daughter before nodding. "Yep, I guess she really is yours. What I know about her is that, a couple of years ago, she woke up in a cave, not far from here, I think, with no memory of who she was or how she got there. The other day, while her class was touring the wreck of a western town over the ridge, she wandered off, found the necklace, popped her wings and passed out."

Trust paused for a moment, hands on hips, "I'm not sure she remembers anything about anything so I don't know how to play this. Can't just go up to her and say "Yo, Sokkemi, here's your father and sister."