Disclaimers & Warnings: See Part 1

Two candlemarks past noon, a shaggy horse from the north bore its rider out of the Amazon forest. The pale haired warrior guided her mount onto the south road that led towards Thrace. She knew the way well, having ridden it many times in the last forty-five years. In five leagues she would join the watercourse that cut through the highlands, and she would follow it for another thirty leagues. It would slowly veer south by east; losing altitude and then finally hooking west, until the long, Lake Cercinitis lay before her. There she would follow its western bank, skirting Chalcidice, past the mouth of the lake, where the Stryma Vale would open before her. Three miles from the sea, on the border of Thrace, lay the city of Amphipolis, and there, across the Stryma River, her destiny awaited her in the tomb of the God of War.

That afternoon Gabrielle rode swiftly and with purpose, stopping only to rest her horse. Her thoughts were as much on the turmoil she had left behind as on the task looming ahead. Varia will be furious, she thought, and Cyane will be resigned. La'shaunti will probably crack bad jokes, but eventually, I hope she'll make them understand. They just need time to recover from having to shoot helpless men and then finding that it was never necessary. They'll need more time to accept that their culture still has validity. Eventually, they'll realize I have no intention of taking over the Amazon Nation or making their skills obsolete. Yet the blow is already struck. To a people who spend their lives learning how to wrest control of their own destiny from the whims of fate, having it snatched, so easily by another, can only be a devastating challenge to their faith.

The road bore her to the top of a ridge, as the sun chariot of Apollo followed its eternal path, down towards its distant passage to Gaia's bosom. A gusty breeze lifted her hair and ruffled her horse's mane. It carried the chill of the coming dusk in the highlands. Gabrielle reigned her horse to a halt and scanned the landscape for the campsite she remembered. There it was, a hundred yards off the road, without running water, but with wood, forage, and surrounded by rocks that would shelter her from the wind.

Eventually she turned and gazed into the distant haze to the south. Somewhere in that haze lay Amphipolis, with Cyrene's old tavern, and the mausoleum of Xena's family. I just couldn't bear to go there before, she thought, too many memories. I think you knew that, Xena, because we didn't even discuss it on the road out of Therme. You only asked if I wanted to visit Potidaea, and I said, 'no', thinking, maybe some other time.

Some other time…in her mind's eye she saw herself, approaching her present position on this road. Her memory revealed a girl of seventeen, dressed in a blue peasant blouse and a long rust brown skirt, happily striding beside a leather clad warrior on a palomino war horse. She was chattering and waving her hands, and the older woman looked down indulgently at her, her blue eyes betraying the smile that her lips held in check. It was the first time she'd traveled this road, and though she hadn't known it then, Xena was leading them towards Amazon lands. Gabrielle had been two days from a brush with destiny, which would bring her wayward soul back to the people of her ancestors, back to the people of the Utma. For trying to save a life, she would become a princess.

The travelers came up to her, her younger self passing obliviously on her left, but Xena directed Argo to shift to the right, moving around her, and for a moment she held her gaze. Only someone who knew the Warrior Princess as intimately as she did would have noticed the slight widening of her eyes that was her only expression of surprise. For Xena, the brief vision confirmed many things she'd just begun to suspect about her young companion. That familiar katana…and the unfamiliar chakram. When Gabrielle turned to watch their progress, they were gone, but she could fill in the next few moments.

"Xena, what is it?" She had asked, noticing that Argo had sidestepped something. Looking backwards down the road, she had seen nothing there.

"Uhhh, nothing, Gabrielle," Xena had reassured her, "maybe a trick of the light. For a moment I thought I saw something on the road."

"Well, take my word for it, there was nothing there," she'd replied with a smile, "and I'm much closer to the road than you are."

Xena had laughed at her joke, but she had also turned in the saddle to glance behind her.

Gabrielle looked where they had passed so many years before, and gave a little wave. From the timing, she knew that Xena in the past would have been looking.

That night, Gabrielle ate a small meal by her campfire. She remembered it being colder up here, but her years in the Norselands had conditioned her, and the night only seemed cool. Those years of her renewed life had seemed so real, so immediate, and yet now it was that life in the Norselands that felt like a distant dream. She was riding back to Greece, back to where her adventure had started…back to where her life had changed. Staring into the flames, with the star speckled sky above, it almost felt like one of those timeless nights that she had lived through so many years ago. For a moment, she half expected to hear the strokes of the sharpening stone against Xena's sword. An ember popped, startling her and throwing sparks up into the darkness.

Gabrielle blinked and looked around. She was alone. A few yards away, the shaggy northern horse stood silent, its coat chestnut, not palomino. She was dressed in the suede costume of a southern Amazon queen, not the garb of a peasant girl from a farming village in Chalcidice. Next to her bedroll lay a pair of sais, a katana from Japa, and the chakram, not a bag of scrolls and a quill. The land was familiar, but she had changed.

"It's true," she mused, "there can be no going back."

"No one would ever expect you to go backwards, and everything looks different because you see it with different eyes." Her memory answered.

"Now I see what cannot be seen with eyes that only see the world."

"Why don't you stay with us, Gabrielle? Everyone here loves you, and we could learn so much from you."

"I couldn't stay there," she whispered sadly, thinking of so many places.

"No, you can't, you've got so much more to do."

"Just a few more things to do now. I've already done everything the farm girl from Potidaea dreamed of doing, when I followed you all those years ago."

"Maybe you just need new dreams."

"It's no longer about dreams, Xena. You see, I'm done with dreams, now, it's destiny."

Somewhere during the conversation, Gabrielle had fallen asleep.


Once before, she had dreamed of her descendants and her ancestors, and she had seen them arrayed in a continuing lineage. She had looked forward, finding her distant future daughter, Janice Covington, and then she had seen that woman's granddaughter, Amy, who was to be the Utma and the first Cyane. In a flash, Gabrielle had known that among her ancestors stood this same girl, wrenched from her future, to create her past. Later, she had seen Amy's brokenhearted soulmate, Jamie, a distant daughter and reincarnation of her own soulmate, Xena. In that future time they had been separated, and that separation would endure through all the futures from that point on, for her own soul would never again be reborn. Instead, it had been called back into the distant past, only to exist in a closed loop, cycling endlessly through eternity. It was not the destiny that they had been promised.

Now she looked back among her ancestors. She saw the generations, arrayed like a migration of souls on a pilgrimage to the future. Back she went, through the age before steel, when there had been only bronze, back even further, to the time before metals, when warriors had fought with wooden clubs, bone spear points, and blades of flint. Finally she found the Utma, and after her, another leader, the only daughter of the first Cyane.

The dream whisked her forward through time. Now she was in a room, dry, hot, and dusty. Out a hazy, dust filmed window, the view revealed that she was in the top of a house, and outside, it was spring. Azaleas and rhododendrons bloomed out there, dressing the yard in white, pink, red, and violet. The grounds spread wide, beyond a rolling lawn to a wooded border of new green.

All around her in the attic there were boxes and old furniture, books and cases. She scanned them, looking rapidly at the writing on the journals that filled a shelf. They were in a sequence by dates, but all bore the same graceful script, and all bore the same name, Melinda Pappas. Past the bookshelf stood a display case, its glass sides enclosing many artifacts from ancient times. There were coins, fragments of armor, and even part of an Amazon drum. With a gasp, she recognized the beads of the silver necklace she wore, and the wooden spindle from a scroll. She looked at the shelf below it and saw an object wrapped in a skin. Even through the wrapping, she could see its curved length; the shaft extending at a right angle from a carved animal head that jutted out of the skin. Gabrielle stared at it in amazement. How had it come to be here?

Standing along the wall opposite her were a row of paintings, frighteningly lifelike. Among them, the likeness of a woman who could have been her soulmate. The resemblance was exact. It was as if someone had painted Xena, in perfect detail, but in clothing from two millennia later. She was drawn toward it, as if mesmerized by a god's command. On the bottom edge of the carved wooden frame was a brass plaque, bearing the notation, "Melinda Pappas, 1947".

In the yard below, a rumbling sound grew in volume, and she returned to the window to seek its source. Now it was early summer. The trees were fully leafed in mature green. A brightly colored enclosed metal cart was just arriving, slowing to a halt beneath her window. The cart stopped completely with a small jerk and then it fell silent.

Gabrielle suddenly found herself standing next to the cart, and it pinged and hissed softly as it cooled. Strange smells came from it. A door on its side swung open and a woman stepped out. When she turned around, Gabrielle covered her mouth in shock, for she was the younger twin of her soulmate. Even the way her body moved was familiar. She watched transfixed as the woman turned to greet the older couple who had come out of the house to welcome her.

"Hi Mom. Hi Dad," she happily said, meeting them with hugs.

"My daughter, the college grad," her proud father kidded. The young woman blushed.

"Jamie, sweetheart, it's so good to have you home again," her redheaded mother said with a broad smile, reaching up to drape an arm across her daughter's shoulders, and leading her up the steps towards the door. As her tall dark haired father picked up her bag and moved to follow them inside, his eyes swept past Gabrielle. She saw that they were sky blue.


As she had so often over the years, Gabrielle awoke in the last failing depth of the night. In these highlands, she could see for leagues in all directions, even with only the starlight's illumination. The sky to the east still preserved its dark cloak and bright stars, yet she could hear birds already stirring, calling out their greetings to prophesize the coming day. At some imperceptible level they felt the unseen dawn. Gabrielle felt nothing, for her mind was occupied in contemplation of a world far away.

She had seen the Utma's daughter, the first princess of the new Amazon tribe, who would succeed Cyane and assure her lineage. She had seen her soulmate's future descendant, her first reincarnation to be bereft of their promised destiny. And she had seen the disposition of the Utma Dagger. In that future time, Jamie stood only yards from the solution to her mystery and the cause of her heartbreak. It was an immaculate irony.

If only I could tell her, she thought, but no reincarnation of mine will ever exist in that time, for Amy is already gone. Jamie, I can't tell you of the treasure that lies, disregarded and incomprehensible, in your parents' attic. You will never know that long ago, it was the source of your mystery. You will wonder where your soulmate disappeared to for the rest of your life, and the answer, unrecognized, will be so very close, all through the years of your youth.

As Gabrielle sat, Gaia moved beneath her, rolling through the heavens to meet the coming of Eos yet again. All of nature held its breath, pausing for a moment on the verge of birthing another day. To Gabrielle, this morning seemed gentle in its coming. The sky lightened by gradual degrees and the stars faded without complaint. In the east, the light of Apollo's chariot crept before it, heralding his approach. The night accepted gracefully.

Will my soulmate's descendants see a dawn like this, on some distant day, when their destiny is no longer what it was meant to be? Will those who come, possessed of only half a soul, and living with no hope of finding what they don't know they lack, ever feel the peace of this time? Will their footsteps carry them forward through their lives, with no greater chance of fulfillment than the footfalls of the lost legionnaires? Like all mortals, death will await them in their proper time, but will they ever fully know life?

Across the ridge tops to the east, the sun's rays tinted the sky with their ethereal beauty; ever-changing living colors painting the wispy clouds. Even with eyes that spoke to only half a soul, Gabrielle still found it beautiful. Like my Amazons, she thought, what doubts they feel, because of my actions, will only color their view of life. Life goes on…heaven endures, and the earth lasts a long time, because they do not live for themselves. It was the wisdom of Lao Ma.

And now, I too no longer live for myself, she realized. I have found and held dear all of my dreams. Now I live for the achievement of destiny. The destiny of my descendants, my soulmate's line, and the millions who will die before their time, on Armageddon Day. This is my destiny…still the Greater Good, Xena, but on a scale we never looked to see.

The realization brought her peace, and it hastened her journey. After six days' travel, she sat atop her horse, gazing down the Stryma River to the tan walls of Amphipolis on the far bank. There, a narrow bridge of wooden beams spanned the river, seventy yards wide. Ahead of her, nestled in the cliff face, stood a façade, carved from the living stone of Thrace. Half a mile's ride would bring her to the Tomb of Ares, lying hidden beneath this temple of war. Each of the nights on her journey had brought dreams, and each dawn had renewed her faith. She practically sizzled with purpose.

In the Amazon forest, among the stone bodies of the defeated Legion of Serdica, a pulse of bluish light flared. The figure of a warrior swaggered out of its radiance, his left hand draped easily on the hilt of his sword. He was clad in black; leather pants and a decorated vest, and he projected a dangerous air of menace. He paid the Amazon observers in the trees above no attention at all, and instead walked to the petrified figure of a Roman officer. A small grin curled his lips as he looked on the stone face of Legatus Galena. It had been two days since the legion's final defeat.

"Loser," he whispered softly, no trace of sympathy coloring his voice, "your servants will cause more damage here than you and all your soldiers. You were just the bait."

He turned and looked wistfully through the woods, towards where the Amazon village lay, and then he vanished. Above the place where he had been, a scout began her race through the trees, hastening to report what her company had seen and heard, to the council.

Later, in an antique hut in the Amazon village, a young warrior sat at a table. Night had fallen long ago, but she didn't sleep much anymore. She was focused on reading the scroll stretched out before her. "…this is the only copy of Lao Ma's 'Book of Wisdom', outside of the Kingdom of Lao…If you take time to read anything here, read this," her mother had advised, "what it teaches is the key." Learning these lessons took her twenty years, Tillit thought, but she had to start somewhere. Invariably, she would awaken before the dawn, and with her new friend, climb the path to the ridge overlooking the village in the east.

Since her mother's departure, Cyane had appointed a warrior from her own tribe to accompany their princess. A companion, who had distinguished herself in battle, to be Tillit's bodyguard, assistant, confidant, and perhaps one day, the right hand of the future queen. It was fitting, since she had been a ruler herself, and was still the regent of the northern tribe.

Though her initial welcome of the princess, back in the north, had been cool, much had changed. Being killed and then resurrected had taught her a greater value of life. In returning with her people to the nation, Aliah had regained her faded pride in her identity as an Amazon. The awareness of her duty was strong within her now, and Gabrielle's supernatural actions had threatened her less than most. They didn't challenge her identity as a warrior, for she had maintained that, even in her self-imposed exile in the north. If anything, Gabrielle's actions had impressed upon her the special potential of the princess. After a few days, they'd developed a relationship in which Aliah became the older sister Tillit had never had. So in the darkness before dawn, Aliah kept watch over Tillit.

Forty-five leagues to the south, Gabrielle had completed her ride. Her horse stood before the temple and she had armed herself, preparing to enter. It's funny, she thought, but I don't fear him at all anymore. He can't hurt me with his energy blasts, and he probably can't defeat me with his sword either. Odder still, I don't even feel like I hate him. I feel like he's another part of some past I've left behind.

She glanced one last time at the Stryma River, as it wound below her, curving around the headland where Amphipolis had been built. The bridge joined the banks with a narrow ribbon of wood. A mildly humid breeze wafted up to the temple, and she could smell the water. Several boats lay berthed at the docks. Gabrielle could hear the faint shouts of the men unloading their cargo, but their words were lost in the distance. Above the docks, the walls of Amphipolis stood bright in the late afternoon sunlight. Its gates lay open for the daily traffic from the ships and the main road that ran along the river.

She had seen the city in both better times and worse, and she realized that its appearance had changed little in the years she had known it. Hardly surprising, she thought, Amphipolis is over five hundred years old. And yet, it had changed in all the ways that were important to her. Xena was long gone. Cyrene and her tavern were ghosts from the past. All that remained of them were the coffins in the mausoleum, and the fading memories of some of the older citizens. Finally she turned away and climbed the steps that led up to the temple portico.

The entrance to the temple was a modest doorway between paired columns on either side. A shallow pediment overhung the portico, its wind scoured frieze depicting a scene of some unremembered battle. Cool air washed up out of the doorway, bringing the scents of stone, burning torches, and incense that braced rather than soothed. It was an old and unassuming structure. She had only heard it mentioned a couple times by Cyrene, in conjunction with Xena's father, Atrius. Being across the river from Amphipolis, she'd never had occasion to visit it. Xena would have had nothing to do with the place, and Cyrene wouldn't have been caught dead there. Gabrielle took a deep breath and walked through the doorway into the cool dimness of the temple.

Two hundred miles north of Amphipolis, in Novae, on the Danuvian border of Moesia Inferior, Consul Adrianus had received a report of the renegade activity of Legatus Galena and the Serdica legion. They had marched west without orders, committing atrocities against the populace. News of villages razed and roadside crucifixions reinforced the words of his spies, convincing him that action was necessary. That the legion's goal seemed to be the only independent lands for hundreds of miles condemned the man's actions as opportunistic land grabbing. It implied that Galena was preparing to rebel. That the lands in question were, by imperial treaty, to be left untouched, made the matter treason against the emperor. Consul Adrianus almost cackled with glee. At last he had a reason to depose the ambitious Galena. He'd always seen the man as a potential threat.

On the day before the Legion of Serdica's defeat, he ordered most of four cavalry wings, twelve hundred riders strong, to proceed after Legatus Galena with greatest speed. They were to apprehend him if possible, or to track him if not. At the same time, Consul Adrianus set out at the head of three legions, marching to Serdica to pick up Galena's trail of destruction.

They marched in haste, covering eight leagues a day. On the fifth day, they reached Serdica, and Consul Adrianus' suspicions were confirmed. A few surviving servants had returned to the garrison, and he confirmed the ill-fated attack on the Amazons. When they'd fled, Galena was still determined to assault the Amazon village, though he'd lost half his men and all of their support. The survivors he questioned were still in terror of what they'd seen. It was now four days after the destruction of Galena's legion.

Adrianus was determined to march the next day, after a night's rest, to apprehend the renegade legatus and any of his officers they could find. Halfway through the evening meal, a commotion at the gates of the garrison drew his attention. A tribunus laticlavius reported that almost eight hundred legionnaires from the Serdica legion had arrived; dirty, hungry, and with only the clothes on their backs. They had barely a sword among them, and only their numbers had saved them from the wrath of the peasants. They had run as much of the way as their strength would allow.

Consul Adrianus laughed himself to sleep that night. In the morning he heard the accounts of the Amazon defenses, and then he had all the surviving officers crucified along the roads for the placation of the locals. The regular soldiers, whom he deemed to be cowards, he left locked up in the garrison; guarded by details of his own men. Then he marched east with his three legions, heading for the Amazon lands as the peasants cheered him on.

If Legatus Galena had been stupid and ambitious, then Consul Adrianus was an ambitious fox. He was a decade and a half older, two decades more experienced at war, and understood imperial politics because he had been born to it. He held an imperial appointment, and for all practical purposes, Moesia Inferior was his realm. His command of six legions amounted to a private army of thirty-six thousand soldiers, plus almost two thousand cavalry, and all their support personnel. He had no illusions about the mental health of the emperor, and he felt far more comfortable on the frontier, safely away from Rome. He had no more use for the God of War than he'd had for that idiot Galena, but he had always loved a challenge.

He knew the Amazons had been around longer than the empire. Their reputation as warriors was held in high esteem by informed members of the military. By treaty with Claudius Caesar, theirs was a land apart, and they were legendary. Not since the predations of Livia, had the Romans successfully assaulted their lands.

He remembered Livia. He had seen her in triumphal processions in Rome, during his early career, leading captured Elisians before Augustus Caesar. She still lived in his memory, and she was still magnificent. In many ways, she had been his role model. He had carefully studied her old campaigns, and he had learned many things about ambition and ruthlessness from her. And he had learned not to trust the God of War.

Now he had an excuse to test these Amazons himself. He would eventually report that he had marched, only to apprehend the renegade, Legatus Galena, and rescue his legion. He had gone without any intention of fighting, he would claim, bringing his overwhelming force only as a measure of security against the possible treachery of the Legion of Serdica. (Surely the local people would attest to that, after all, he'd had to crucify Galena's seditious officers). With the Amazon Nation he would claim no quarrel. It had been six days since Galena's defeat.

Though Consul Adrianus had no need of the God of War, the brewing conflict drew Ares like a magnet. He watched, invisible and undetected, throughout the Novae legions' march. He laughed with the consul at the condition of Galena's surviving soldiers. He applauded Adrianus' crucifixion of Galena's surviving officers. Then he joined them on their march towards the Amazon lands. Sacrificing Galena had lured Adrianus. His plan was succeeding…well, according to plan. Thus occupied, he wasn't at his temple to greet Gabrielle.

Outside of Amphipolis, the Amazon Queen had entered Ares' temple, and her very presence should have set off an alarm. No Amazon had ever come here before, and the God of War would never have believed that this Amazon had come to worship. She made her way through the entrance hall, following her instincts for direction. The temple seemed almost deserted to Gabrielle; perhaps it was because the empire was mostly still at peace. The few temple guards and priests she had passed had marked her weapons, and simply regarded her as another warrior seeking their god's favor.

From the entrance hall, she made her way down a short flight of stairs, through a wide corridor, and into a large chamber. The space had been hewn from the natural sandstone of the cliff. Everywhere, the buff stone walls were covered with carved symbols and figures. Gabrielle thought they looked almost…Egyptian. She had been to Egypt, but she couldn't read these symbols at all. Perhaps they dated from before Alexander's time.

Only a couple of other warriors were present and they seemed to be focused inward, their attention consumed by their prayers. According to tradition, they totally ignored each other and her. The Temples of Ares were some of the few places where worldly animosities were forgotten. Men and women, whose mutual hatred would normally ignite a rage of bloodshed, actually coexisted for short periods within these walls. Before the God of War, the warriors honored a sacred truce. Gabrielle found it ironic, knowing that Ares would happily pit them against each other outside.

The large chamber that Gabrielle had entered was the main hall of worship. Tall tripods supporting shallow dishes filled with wavering orange flames, and torches mounted in sconces along the walls dimly lighted the space. Both produced wisps of black smoke, scenting the air with partially burned fuel. Between the sconces, shields and weapons of all kinds were mounted on the walls. They appeared among the shifting shadows, glinting when the flames' light reflected off a sharpened edge, an embedded gemstone, or a polished ornament. As she walked down the length of the hall, Gabrielle noted that the variety of swords alone was astonishing. Among them, she spied a curved blade similar to the one that the Egyptian barge guard, Nasir, had once shown her on the Nile. It still struck her as a ridiculous weapon. She was soon at the front of the hall.

She gazed at the massive, chest high, altar of war, and behind it, at Ares' throne. Both were carved of the same black granite. Both rested on a wide dais, with the throne overlooking the altar from an even higher platform. Flanking the altar were bronze censers, wide shallow dishes on low pedestals, from which clouds of fumes roiled into the air. The fumes of the incense flowed forward, from the altar into the hall, and almost choked her as she stood before it. She detected sulfur, dragon's blood resin, artemesia, and camphor. As hard on the nose as war is on the soul, she thought with disgust.

The altar itself was rectangular, with a recessed section centered in the top, and what Gabrielle realized were drainage channels, running along the inner edge of the surrounding lip. The channels funneled their runoff into a catch basin, on the floor in front of the Altar. The basin was a smaller version of the censors. It was an altar of sacrifice, and judging from its size, the sacrifices were probably human. The God of War could have watched, looking down on the rites from a commanding position on his throne, looming over his congregation, and keeping them within easy view.

The wall behind the throne was lost in shadows. No tripods or sconces lit the hall beyond the front of the altar. Even the throne was only dimly lit, as though Ares had sought to preserve his mystique, while at the same time shocking his worshippers with the flash of his appearance from darkness. Gabrielle looked carefully at her surroundings. It was a dramatic stage setting, highly theatrical. A good show for the easily impressed, she mused derisively, guess I've become jaded.

Finally, she noticed the cool air flowing forward from somewhere behind Ares' throne, carrying the smoke of the incense with it. Back there in the shadows, Gabrielle realized, there must be an opening, a doorway…and something beyond.

Behind her, she saw that the two other warriors were still deep in prayer, their heads still bowed, their eyes still closed. With quick silent steps, Gabrielle slipped around the altar and into the darkness. Crouching down, her size worked to her advantage, keeping her below a viewer's line of sight from the hall. She made her way past the throne, feeling the current of cool air strengthening as she approached the back wall. She could have found the doorway with her eyes closed, just by following the draft on her skin.

When Gabrielle reached the doorway she rested her hands on the side posts. The lintel was barely a hand above her head. It was pitch black and the stairs leading downwards began immediately. She had expected a landing and nearly tumbled down headfirst, missing the second step. Whoa! Her hands snapped out to her sides to steady herself, and she found the walls against her hands. Geeez, no guarantee of those being there either, she chided herself, anything is possible. For a moment she stood still, listening, catching her breath and letting the surge of adrenaline pass. There was only an empty silence waiting below her. She continued down more cautiously, feeling her way with her senses, as she had while climbing the path to the eastern ridge in the darkness of the Amazon predawn. A dozen steps brought her to a level surface.

The distance between the walls on either side of her hadn't changed. With the draft still on her face and her hands on the walls, Gabrielle moved cautiously forward. The corridor took a sharp U-turn to the right, doubling back on itself. Now she detected a slight glow of light from up ahead. She could see well enough to take the immediate sharp U-turn to the left, and she realized that the pair of turns formed a light trap. They had efficiently hidden the flickering of the torches in the wall sconces that lit the corridor she was standing in. The stairway was designed to be negotiated in the dark, and she couldn't know that the second step, that she had missed, would have triggered the stairway to turn into a ramp. She had unwittingly thwarted the first trap.

Gabrielle wandered through a series of deserted corridors and rooms. When she found herself in the same room a second time, she realized that the subterranean precincts of the temple were a labyrinth. At least, it looked like the same room. Same carved figures on the walls, same alcove with a shield carved from the rock. What puzzled her was that the draft had always been on her face, and she had followed the air currents for lack of any better map. This won't do, she told herself, I need a moment to figure this out.

She took a seat on the convenient ledge of the alcove. Immediately, she heard the grating of stone on stone behind her, and she instinctively leaped to the side, out of the alcove. Two dozen spear-headed shafts, each of them the length of her lower arm, shot past her into the room. When she looked around the corner and into the alcove, she saw that where the carved shield had been, a rough domed surface had been revealed. Bored into its face were holes from which the projectiles had been launched. The rounded surface had allowed them to be directed in a radiating pattern that would have killed a company walking through the room. Gabrielle exhaled a deep breath. It didn't really surprise her that Ares would rig his tomb with traps, but this one was ingenious, and it had been a close call.

The rough stone dome was set into the back of the alcove and mounted on a hidden pivot. Gabrielle could move it easily by hand, and she rotated it back, until, with a click, the carved shield was in its original position. She pressed her hand down on the edge of the alcove and leapt back around the edge of the alcove wall. When she looked back again, the rough dome was facing out, but this time there had been no projectiles loaded in it. She reset it a second time to its original position.

After glancing around the room, she picked up one of the shafts. The spearhead was of steel, and she tested it on the sandstone wall. With a few strokes, she was able to incise a readable arrow. There was only one other thing to do. She stood in the center of the room and allowed herself to become still. She stopped trying to reason out Ares' maze, stopped trying to guess which direction to go. Almost without being conscious of it, Gabrielle began to move. The will directed her unerringly, for it could not be fooled by the tricks of the mortal realm. It was already blind, and it was ruthless.

Scratch an arrow in the wall and leave the room. Walk down a corridor and scratch another arrow. Turn off into a chamber, cross it, and scratch an arrow by the door. Another turn, another corridor, and another room. Scratch another arrow and pass through a heavy doorway with a wide frame. Enter the chamber and become conscious of the world again. Gabrielle dropped the spear shaft. Across the chamber stood an altar of war. Behind it, a giant horned skull, and above that, the blackened bronze relief of rays projecting from the Eye of Hephaestus. Before it lay the stone sarcophagus carved in the likeness of the God of War. She had seen it before, more than once. The scene flickered in the light of flames from tripods and torches.

With one hand she unhooked the chakram, and with the other, she drew the katana. Gabrielle half expected Ares to appear in front of her at any moment. Her senses were on high alert, but her spirit was at peace. No feeling of threat or danger came to her as she moved into the tomb. Somehow it seemed anti-climactic. Still, she maintained her vigilance, turning to scan all quarters of the chamber, as she made her way to the sarcophagus. Despite all the moving shadows, she knew that she was alone.

She came to stand beside the sarcophagus, and she set her weapons atop the carved chest of the God of War. With both hands, she heaved against the lid, but even with all her strength, she couldn't budge it. It probably outweighed her six fold. She snatched a sword off the altar next to her and tried to work its tip into the seam between the lid and the body of Ares' coffin. The seam was perfectly fitted, so tight that not even the blade's killing edge could impinge. In disgust she tossed the sword back onto the altar and moved away.

Gabrielle had a method that could open that lid. It wouldn't matter if it weighed seven hundred pounds or seven tons. Using her power she could shatter it, like so much plaster struck by the bolt from a ballista. She would be vulnerable while she was doing it, but she didn't see any other option. She was there now, and nothing would stop her from repossessing Xena's ashes. So she closed her mind to the world and she stopped willing, stopped desiring, and let the emptiness come. Would you kill a mosquito with an axe? Lao Ma had once laughingly asked her soulmate. Unlike Xena, she could answer, "no".

Slowly, the massive lid of the sarcophagus began to move across the body below it. A grating sound rose as the thick edges ground against each other, and the lower end of the lid swung aside. It had taken just a few moments, and Gabrielle shook herself as the power released her.

Quickly she strode back to the sarcophagus, and wasting no time, snatched the urn and her bag of scrolls. She found it impossible to choke down a small sob of thanksgiving. It wasn't as though she'd spent much time looking at the urn, especially during the last years of her life in the Norselands. Yet she had felt a kind of honored trust in keeping it safe, and it had long ago become more than just a physical reminder of Xena, her lost soulmate. It was symbolic of their loss, of the promise of their destiny beyond this life, and of her own choice to finally accept Xena's desire to remain dead. It was the focus of what their life together had led to; a final act of redemption for the warrior princess, and the beginning of an independent destiny for Gabrielle. The retirement of one and the graduation of the other; a legacy, passed on and received, and a reminder of a promise that was meant to last beyond the world and grace eternity with two souls joined as one.

Their eternal destiny had been stolen from them, as surely as the urn had been stolen from her. The closed loop of the Utma, which seemed so necessary for her, had to be undone. Yet, if Amy had never been brought back into the past, then Gabrielle and her ancestors would not have been. She would not have existed to meet Xena, in this or any other time. But if Amy was left to exist in the future and the past, then Gabrielle's soul would be limited to that finite time, and Xena's soul would be forced to go on without her after Amy's disappearance in 1997. It was a paradox and an enigma, and it made her head hurt just to think about it.

She held the urn in her hand, staring at its black surface that hungrily soaked up the room's light. It seemed like such a small thing to be all that remained of such a legendary person; such a small thing to be coveted by both a mortal and a god. She tucked it into the bag with the copies of her scrolls.

Two hundred miles to the north, on a road just west of Serdica, the God of War faltered. He had just been enjoying the view of the magnificent ranks of Roman legions, as Consul Adrianus marched towards the Amazon Nation. Then he had felt a pang in his heart. It had come like a cramp, as close to a physical pain as he could feel, and he almost sank to his knees in shock at what it signified. Against all odds, someone had managed to enter his tomb. Someone had managed to circumvent all the traps, all the confusion of the labyrinth, and enter where no mortal had ever stood.

Worse than that, someone had violated his sarcophagus. It would have been unthinkable, but for a brief time, there was still one mortal that he suspected could accomplish it. No hint or clue of the tomb or the sarcophagus existed in the mortal world. No legend or tale of bards told of its existence. No human hand had hewed the rock or carved the stone, placed the torches or hung the weapons. It had all been done by his power, enchanted and protected, and hidden below an almost forgotten temple in Thrace. Yes, among all mortals, he could guess who that someone was.

The old temple, across the Stryma River from Amphipolis, had great significance to him, for in it, he had set in motion the events that had created his greatest warrior. It had been in what seemed like another age, in a time when his fellow gods still ruled men; a time when legends were still the stuff of the world, and a god's Favorite could conquer in his name. It had been a time when he had allowed himself to feel, and now, it seemed like an eon ago.

The last time Ares had let himself briefly feel for a mortal was when he had finally held the ashes of his last Favorite in his hand. It had taken him years to find and seize them, for they had been within the domain of other gods, and in the custody of one whose right to claim them equaled his own. When he had sensed her life nearing its end, he had ceased hesitating, and at the first opportunity, he had struck. It was the best way to keep the urn from being left in the Norselands, among strangers.

Ares knew that Gabrielle would never have returned to bring Xena's ashes home to Amphipolis as she had once promised. He had assumed that her destiny was to die in Adrianus' attack. Destiny though, was strange, and it was possible for a god to be wrong.

He felt he owed Xena that much, to honor her desire to be interred with her family. And though he wouldn't admit it, even to himself, he was only waiting to take the bard's remains to be buried with her, even if he'd had to collect her ashes from an Amazon pyre. He didn't begrudge them that. He had entombed them together before, almost half a century ago. For too short a while, they had made his life interesting; they had made him feel things. Strong things. And he suspected that, like Xena herself, it was a one time serendipity of fate, for there would never be another like her. Nowadays, it was rare for him to feel fondness at all. Even as bad as his flirtations with mortality had been, he was thankful for their time together. Xena and Gabrielle had been a brief flame that had illuminated his world, allowing him a glimpse beyond the glamour of bloodshed, the glory of victory, and the games of his desires. His worshippers made him a god, but Xena and Gabrielle had allowed him to be human.

"You should thank me, Gabrielle," he whispered as he vanished, "for you will be gone before the sun rises."

Gabrielle had just turned away from Ares' sarcophagus, intending to call back the power and close the lid. Suddenly her senses tingled, her whole body feeling as though she'd held a copper in her mouth after biting a lemon. She whirled around, just in time to see the flash of light, as Ares materialized before his altar, about ten feet away. What really surprised her was that he was smiling at her. Then he began to clap.

"Well done, Gabrielle," he said in praise, making her more uncertain than if he'd simply attacked. "It shouldn't even have been possible for you to find that this place existed, much less enter and rob it." Here, the God of War cast a quick pointed glance into the empty sarcophagus, then flicked his laughing eyes back to the small warrior.

At the mention of robbery, Gabrielle's eyes narrowed. "That's the pan calling the cauldron black! If I hadn't been robbed first, then I wouldn't be here. Ares, I can't believe you stole Xena's ashes from me. That's low, even for you."

The smile still hadn't left his face. "Gabrielle, don't think of it as theft, think of it as…motivation. Tell me, would you really have come to Amphipolis with Xena's ashes if it weren't for me?"

Gabrielle had to ponder that, and as she did, Ares' smile grew wider. "I'd always intended to bring her ashes back here to Amphipolis," she began, "to place them in the mausoleum with Lyceus and Cyrene…but there've been so many things to do, and the years passed, and I just couldn't bring myself to come."

"I see you still speak the truth from your heart," he observed, "annoying habit that. Still, I'm glad you're here, because I actually intended to see that the two of you were laid to rest together…again."

The statement left her divided. She felt the implied threat against her own life, but she didn't fear it. She also felt thankful for his intentions. There was no argument she could make against his claim, for he had laid them to rest together before. I find that I neither hate nor fear him anymore, she thought, truth be told, I owe him my thanks…but I've still got to stop him.

He was advancing towards her now, and she didn't move away. She softly whispered, "Thank you." They had always enjoyed an antagonistic relationship, mediated only by their mutual love for the Warrior Princess. Now, as the time for their relationship drew to a close, it was still Xena who bound them together. "I once asked her to bury me with her family if I died first," she continued, "and I'm glad to think it can still be."

He had laid his hands on her shoulders, slowly sliding them up and down her upper arms. She shivered, feeling a sensation that she'd only felt a time or two before. She remembered it from when he'd tempted her in the desert, after the death of Eli.

"Look inside yourself, Gabrielle," he softly said, "can you feel how little time there is left?"

She had felt a sense of finality growing for some time, an acceptance of her destiny and its consequences. And now, I too no longer live for myself. I have found and held dear all of my dreams. Now I live for the achievement of destiny. Yes, she thought, there wasn't much time left. "Yes," she whispered, relaxing in his embrace, "so little time, and still so much to achieve."

He realized that her words were incongruous and they gave him pause. It was just the sort of thing Xena would have said, before springing some unexpected plan on him. Maybe it was just a reflex, but he gave her a closer examination with his godly senses. He was surprised to find that she seemed so…empty.

"That's right, Gabrielle, it's so much easier when you don't fight me."

Ares found Gabrielle becoming almost limp as he exerted his power over her, a kind of seduction to his will. Finally he lifted her and walked towards the altar. The flickering torchlight seemed brighter, the draft of air was gone, and though Gabrielle was small, she seemed unexpectedly light in his arms. As he passed the sarcophagus, he discerned a telltale translucence in her form. He did a double take, holding up his own hand and finding that he could see faint outlines of the altar through it. Gabrielle's body vanished.

Ares spun around in horror and looked behind him. He could see himself standing frozen, and Gabrielle beginning to move away. She dropped the bag of scrolls and snatched the chakram from its hook, and then she cast it at the Eye of Hephaestus. It hit the Eye squarely but nothing happened. No ruddy rays projected from it. The chakram wasn't divided into dark and light.

Now he discerned her plan. She had somehow managed to separate them both from their bodies, and then return to hers, hoping to trap his spirit under the Eye. It would have worked if she had been using the Dark Chakram alone, but the combined chakram would never activate Eye. In a rage, his spirit slammed back into his body, as Gabrielle caught the returning chakram, clipping it to her belt, and drew her sword.

What she had done was incredibly dangerous for a mortal and he would never underestimate her again. She was far from being the sidekick he had enjoyed belittling so many years ago. Not even Xena had demonstrated such abilities, for Gabrielle had fooled all his godly senses, separated their bodies from their spirits, and then reclaimed her own at will. He should have watched her more closely all those years since Xena died, for now, he wasn't sure what else she could do. Accursed Amazon magick, he thought.

He drew his blade and they circled, and again he probed her with his senses. There was something about that unusual sword she was holding. It wasn't just a pretty blade, though it gleamed in the torchlight, all killing lines and purity of function. He examined it with godly vision and perceived that Gabrielle's sword could slay in both the mortal and the spiritual realms. She could have killed him when he had been out of his body, he realized, and yet, she had tried to trap him with the Eye. He didn't understand, and he realized there was more to her plan than he had thought.

He made a feint with his sword and then spun the opposite direction, lashing out at her in a wide arc. The God of War's sword passed a head above her, cutting only air. He had to leap to avoid her blade as it sliced for his knees, then block her recovery stroke a hand's breadth from his neck. When had she become so good with a sword? Then he couldn't spend any more time wondering, for the katana was moving in short precise strokes, almost to fast to see, and every attack was aimed with lethal intent. He was amazed at how relentlessly she pressured him, but what he found most disturbing was the complete lack of expression on her face, and empty look in her eyes.

It only took a short while for him to realize that he would probably never lay his blade on her. Rather than fighting an exchange of attacks and parries, and then disengaging, Gabrielle pursued him in a methodical and tenacious assault. She minimized her own energy expenditures with her short strokes and lack of wasted motion. Her style would have tired and confused a mortal swordsman in little time. Where had such a style come from? Eventually, he thought briefly, she would tire, but as they continued, he saw no signs of fatigue.

Then she drew the chakram with her left hand and wielded her sword in her right. His blade was parried by the chakram, and he felt the slight drag as the katana sliced through the flesh of his upper arm. She had drawn first blood and he knew he was in trouble. He vanished and reappeared across the room with the open sarcophagus between them.

He remembered only one time when a mortal had cut him while he had been a god. In a burning house, Xena had found him about to kill Eve, and she had cut his arm with the rebound of her chakram. Of course, she'd also later shot him. She'd had the power to kill gods then. Without it, even the metal of Hephaestus wouldn't have bitten his divine flesh. Now Gabrielle had cut him with a foreign sword, and when he looked up from the wound, he saw her striding towards him, utterly without fear.

She was without fear, without hate, without desire. Training the body is hard, but training the mind is harder. It had taken her a lifetime. Don't be fooled because it is the hand that wields the sword, she had told Tillit, it is the mind that controls the hand. The anguish of the future victims had coalesced, and it was like the wrath of millions of mice bringing down a lion. It was Gabrielle's destiny to fight for their cause. The aggregate of their souls had infused her with a power that even a god could not overcome.

He threw the first fireball, and she turned it away with her sword. She was still moving towards him and he found it unnerving. The second fireball she deflected with the chakram. The third she sent back at him with her blade and the fourth one she dodged.

Ares thought he detected a flicker of something in her eyes, as the fourth fireball slammed into the floor beside the bag of scrolls she had dropped behind her. She had finally stopped advancing. As if in slow motion, they watched as the contents flew into the air; burning scrolls flying up and unrolling, and the small urn, flipping end over end in an arc. It shattered on the floor, a cloud of pale gray lofted above the scattered shards of pottery and a dwindling pile of ash. The air draft began to take the particles away forever. When he looked back at Gabrielle, he had never seen such an expression of hatred. And then in an instant it was gone, replaced by those same blank and empty eyes.

She was moving towards him again and didn't even notice the shaft of light that came down through the ceiling, spotlighting the ashes and the shards of the urn. It brightened behind her as she cocked her arm back to cast the chakram. Within the beam, the presence of a figure materialized, and then Ares had to duck because the chakram was slamming and ricocheting all around him. Gabrielle followed the chakram, closing in to attack him while ignoring the whizzing blade that crisscrossed around them but only seemed to endanger him.

She reached him as the chakram sped off into the chamber behind them. As their swords clashed, neither of them noticed that it hadn't returned to her. Instead, it had sought another. Its whine was silenced as a practiced hand snatched it from the air. Then there was a flash of light that stopped Ares and Gabrielle in mid-stroke, and they backed away from each other in shock and amazement.

Across the chamber stood a figure with the black wings of an archangel, and she held two identical rings in her hands. Her lips curled into a lopsided grin as she took in the combatants. When she noticed Ares' wound, an eyebrow rose into her black bangs.

The darkness lives within me too, Gabrielle had once thought, but not enough darkness or light to split or combine the chakram. Who among the living could claim such purity? Not even the purest monk of his order had been pure enough to claim the Chakram of Light. Among the living there was no one, and yet…anything is possible.

"Xena…" Gabrielle whispered as tears blurred her vision. The emptiness had vanished from her eyes.

"Xena!" Ares gasped as his sword clattered to the floor.

"Do it," Xena said, nodding to her soulmate.

Ares felt the strangest sensation. It crept up from his feet and hands, climbed his arms and legs, and moved to threaten his very spirit. Eight feet in front of him Gabrielle was again confronting him with empty eyes, tears staining her expressionless face. On her back, the Eastern Dragon glowed. The God of War concentrated all his will and fought the power that sought to turn him to stone, and slowly, he forced it back. He drove the force down to his knees and elbows, but there it stopped. Gradually, try as he might to resist it, it crept back up to his shoulders and waist. He could sense the force gathering its power as the dragon's glow pulsed, threatening its deadly efflorescence, seeking to petrify his body and trap his spirit in the sarcophagus of his own form. Ares saw how, again, Gabrielle would trap his spirit under the Eye. Now the Dark Chakram lay in Xena's hand and his doom stood only a heartbeat away. He understood her tactic and he perceived her strategy. In desperation, he formulated his response.

A strategy is a flexible plan for a campaign, aimed at achieving a particular goal. A tactic is a tool, a means to achieve that goal. The tactics have to be flexible to meet any response, and you do that by applying techniques. The more techniques you have, the more flexible your tactics can be. The more flexible your tactics, the better your chances of achieving your goal. Both Ares and Gabrielle had many techniques at their disposal.

At the God of War's command, the swirling blue of the vortex opened at the midpoint between them, four feet before Gabrielle. Staring into it, the warrior faltered. It showed a vision of the alternate future she'd already partially defeated, and to her horror, she realized that it could still be. If she failed here, Ares could eliminate her descendants by destroying Tillit and Lyceus. There would be no future for her line…no past either, for there would be no Janice Covington, no Amy, no Utma, and no Cyane. There would be no Gabrielle. And her soulmate, forever alone, might well fall under the war god's influence once again. She looked into the vortex and cringed at what she saw.

"No," she whispered, "not again." But she was transfixed, powerless to look away.

Her eye point was high above a great city of men, with buildings reaching for the heavens and spreading to the horizon. Above the city, the sky faded to a peaceful blue…peaceful for just a few more heartbeats. It was breathtaking, but Gabrielle held her breath. It was her nightmare…Armageddon Day. Behind her, Xena gasped in wonder.

It was as though a desert sun had risen to noon in an instant. The brightness pierced her lids even as her reflexes snapped her eyes closed against the flash. Then there was a fireball, and she was enthralled, unable to keep from watching. The sphere of brightness leapt to engulf the central island of the city, snapping the bridges like harp strings before the fire overtook them. The ball of flame continued to expand until it covered four leagues and the roaring and tremors shook her very soul.

This was no dream, but a true portal between worlds, an interface between one possible reality and another. Through it, the effects of one world intruded briefly on the theirs. From the vantagepoint of the vortex, Gabrielle was protected from the direct effects of the blast, but even miles above the city the radiation found her. The shock wave knocked her to the floor, but the radiation had arrived a moment sooner and she was burned.

"Gabrielle!" Xena screamed in horror. She leaped forward to join her.

Ares collapsed the vortex and stood surveying the damage, sadly shaking his head. His godly vision allowed him to clearly see the mortal wound that his response had inflicted. Gabrielle was stunned by the blast, her clothing and hair singed, still smoldering. There was a telltale redness covering the front of her body. Every surface that had faced the blast was burned. At first, though she seemed only dazed, shaking her head and slowly struggling to raise herself, Ares could see that her life was now only a matter of a few candlemarks. It would end in pain. You will be gone before the sun rises.

Xena had knelt beside her soulmate and was examining her carefully. To her, Gabrielle looked as if she'd fallen asleep in the sun, her fair skin burned by an excess of rays.

"No, Xena, it's not just a sunburn," Ares told her with remorse, "it's more like she has absorbed all that the sun has offered since Apollo first carried it into the heavens. She cannot survive this for long, and she will be in anguish."

"Then if you care so much, heal her!" Xena demanded, staring at him. The anger in her eyes matched the venom in her voice.

"You know I can't do that anymore," he reminded her sadly. "Why did she have to attack me? Why did she have to be so skilled?" His voce was rising with feelings he had thought he'd abandoned. "How did she become so powerful? She forced me to defend my very existence with desperation, and for what? For your ashes?"

Xena felt the rise of an old enemy. Had Gabrielle really come here to defeat the God of War because he'd stolen her last remains? Had her old request to be buried with Lyceus launched her soulmate on this quest? Was her pitiful urn of ashes the cause of this? After she'd died, the disposition of her body had hardly mattered to her anymore. She'd realized that the interment of the dead was only a concern of the living; more for their comfort than for the souls of the deceased. It didn't influence the final judgement in the least. Guilt began to gnaw at her and the feeling was all too familiar.

Gabrielle was struggling and Xena raised her so she could sit up, supporting her with one arm across her back. Then she looked into Gabrielle's eyes and her heart broke. They had once been the most compelling eyes she'd ever seen, clear, deep pools of feeling. The trust and faith she'd read in Gabrielle's eyes had been her inspiration, giving her strength and hope in her darkest moments. They had looked at her with love when she couldn't love herself. Now they were sunken and burned, clouded white like the eyes of a blind man. When Xena waved a hand in front of her soulmate's face there was no response.

"Oh Gabrielle," Xena sobbed, "why?"

"It was for the Greater Good, Xena," Gabrielle whispered, causing her lips to split, "you taught me that. You taught me that there are things in life worth dying for. Things that hold a higher meaning than our own existence." She'd said almost the exact same words over four decades before, when a shoulder wound from a poisoned arrow had left them both believing she'd soon be dead. It was a sentiment from the past that had never really changed. It was the core of her being, the sense of commitment to doing what was right. It was her Way, and regardless of the tactics it had always been her goal.

"You had to die to redeem the forty thousand who'd burned in the past, Xena," the blond whispered, "now it seems that I have to die to spare the tens of millions who'd burn in the future."

Hearing Gabrielle's words made Xena realize it hadn't just been about her ashes. There had been more. She'd seen an evil that her soulmate felt she couldn't abide, or turn away from righting. A part of it was the destruction they'd seen in the vortex.

"Ares," Xena said, turning to him as he stood above them, "you say she will die in anguish?" The tears running freely down her face attested to her compassion as an archangel, as well as the love she felt for Gabrielle. It affected the God of War.

"Xena, Gabrielle has been burned by a power like the sun that was harnessed in the explosion you saw. Far in the future, men will fight with forces that even the gods cannot claim. It will be as though she has continued to burn from the inside out."

"This is not right!" Xena screamed. "She has become the greatest living warrior…and she deserves a warrior's death!"

"She has fallen in battle, Xena, what more would you ask?"

"Only that she escape her torment and die in peace. She can't continue this battle. Let her take her own life, Ares, like the defeated warriors of legend. Her soul was once purified in heaven. As an archangel, I cannot kill her now even for mercy's sake, and you know you've already won."

"So be it," Ares declared, "it's the least I can do. I didn't want this fight."

The God of War withdrew and stood before his altar, leaning both arms wearily on his sarcophagus. He hadn't meant for it to end this way. He had intended to take Gabrielle's body and Xena's ashes to the mausoleum, to be together in their final rest. With a sigh, he realized that he could still accomplish at least a part of that last tribute.

Xena and Gabrielle whispered together, probably a last goodbye, he thought as he watched them. Then the fallen warrior took a chakram from the archangel's hand. Seeing that gave him an uncomfortable feeling. Now Xena was helping Gabrielle to stand, returning the katana to its scabbard on her back. How he'd love to add that weapon to his collection, he mused. Gabrielle was standing, but only barely. A fit of coughing wracked her, and Xena had to support her until it passed. A trickle of blood ran down her chin. Those sightless eyes unnerved him.

Gabrielle raised the chakram slowly. Her hand shook as she brought her arm back, turning slightly as she laid its razor edge along the side of her neck. Yes, Ares thought, it is a fitting end. Over in a few moments, instead of drawn out in pain. The blade was so sharp she'd feel the cut but little. Gabrielle seemed to tilt her head to bare her neck, and her burned eyes found him, staring sightlessly into his own. After a moment, he couldn't bear it and he had to look away. It was what she had been waiting for.

Gabrielle's arm whipped forward from the cocked back position, as her body turned, launching the chakram across the room and directly into the body of the God of War. She could see what mortal eyes could not reveal, and she no longer depended only on her eyes for her vision. Her target had been as clear as if he had stood in the light of day. Only with the special vision the power gave her, could she confirm that she had held the Chakram of Light. Even an archangel couldn't tell them apart.

Ares' body was sizzling where the chakram had buried itself in his chest. He would be dead in moments, but Gabrielle had never intended to kill him. It wasn't her destiny. She had a solution for the God of War.

"Ares, you will be dead in moments," she croaked, "if you do not separate your spirit and forsake your body."

He stared at her, still shocked by what she'd done. His body was already half gone and he fought down panic.

"Do it!" Xena yelled at him. "Save yourself, Ares!"

And he did. He took a step forward and left his body, still watching as it sizzled behind him. The dust that had been the physical being of the God of War fell into a pile behind his feet. The Chakram of Light clattered to the floor. He noticed that he was actually superimposed atop his open sarcophagus, seemingly standing with it around his waist. He was still appreciating the irony of that, when he heard a metallic whine cutting the air.

His ethereal head snapped up at the sound, seeing Xena just recovering from casting the other chakram, and again, too late, he understood their strategy. The Dark Chakram struck the Eye of Hephaestus, and the ruddy rays projected from it, bathing him in their ruby glow. He heard the broken pieces of the Dark Chakram falling to the floor. He felt the drawing sensation, like a strong current pulling him down. It made him drowsy and he felt the Sleep of the Gods coming upon him. He didn't even have the strength to applaud their victory. His spirit would be preserved in his sarcophagus, trapped and unchanging in his tomb. But nothing was forever, and anything was possible.

"One day, Xena," he whispered, "your spirit will return, to reclaim the Dark Chakram, and free mine." Reuniting its halves would reunite Ares' spirit with his body as well.

Gabrielle heard his words and their prophecy filled her with foreboding, for in a future time, Xena's spirit would be alone. Her destiny was still not achieved, but she was already dying. For a moment she stood still and heard the lid of the sarcophagus grinding into place as it sealed shut. Then she turned to her soulmate, for she had little time left. She still had a promise to keep, and there was something she desired for herself.

Xena had come to her and held her, but even her gentle contact caused Gabrielle pain. She tried to sooth her with soft words, but Gabrielle was still driven. Much as she relished this reunion with her soulmate, she knew it couldn't last. Not yet.

I no longer live for myself, Gabrielle thought. I'm sorry Lyceus; I'm sorry Tillit. I won't be back, but I'll keep watch over you both.

"Xena," she whispered, "you know what you must do. I know archangels can appear to mortals. Go across time to find her and save our destiny."

There were so many things that Xena wanted to say. So many feelings she'd wanted to share. It had been so long, yet she knew that now was not the time. Gabrielle's time on earth was short, but soon they would be together again. You're each willing to give and take, but are you each willing to withhold? In the end, she settled for placing a gentle kiss on the top of Gabrielle's head. They separated, and she whispered, "I love you, Gabrielle."

The shaft of light came down, and the archangel seemed to dissolve in its radiance. When it faded, Gabrielle was left alone in the tomb. Now the darkness didn't matter any longer. With sight that needed no eyes to see, she gathered the remaining scrolls and what was left of Xena's ashes and the urn. She wrapped the shattered vessel and the precious powder in a torn and burned fragment of a scroll. She clipped the Chakram of Light to her belt. One half of the Dark Chakram she hid behind a tripod, the other half she took with her. Then she left the Tomb of Ares and made her way back through the corridors and rooms.

Gabrielle could feel the unnatural burn growing in her flesh, weakening her as it drew her toward her death. The bag of scrolls felt like it weighed a ton, for her strength was quickly failing. She could carry them no further and she still had a long way to go. When she came to the room where the alcove held the rotating trap, an idea came to her. She sat on the lip of the alcove and heard the carved shield rotate behind her. She placed her scrolls into the holes that had once held the deadly projectiles. Another idea presented itself. With strength born of emptiness, she slammed the ends of the broken Dark Chakram into the stone, and then reset the trap.

"Someday, Xena, perhaps your spirit will find it with them," she whispered, for she believed what Ares had said. It was the best she could do. Destiny, she realized, was never truly finished. It persisted and grew through the centuries, connecting the generations in a legacy. She folded the packet containing Xena's ashes and put it in her belt pouch.

Gabrielle didn't know how long it took her to find her way back out of the temple. All she knew was that her senses guided her as fast as her failing legs could carry her. Long before she reached the doorway, she wished that she still carried a staff to lean on. At last, she stood in the cool night, outside the portico, and she climbed into the saddle of her horse.

She took the road she'd never ridden before. The horse followed it down from the temple and onto the bridge, crossing the Stryma River at a slow but steady walk. The hollow clop of hooves on the wooden span measured off Gabrielle's shortening strand of time. It was a gait that didn't challenge her failing ability to remain in the saddle.

The night was old by the time Gabrielle came to the gates of Amphipolis. When she told the sentries that she had come to pay her respects at the mausoleum where the family of the Warrior Princess lay, they let her pass. The chakram hanging from her waist was all the sign they needed. She looked way too weak to survive for long, and whatever battle she had ridden from must have been horrific. Though her eyes were blind, she stared unnervingly at each of them. When they tried to direct her instead to the city hospice, she assured them that it would be her second stop. Then she went on her way.

She turned her horse toward the northern side of Amphipolis, where the buildings were older. They dated from times long past, when families still buried their dead within the city walls, rather than in the cemeteries outside, as was the current custom. Gabrielle knew she was close when her horse's hooves struck dirt rather than cobbles, silencing their clip-clop. Her senses told her of the square she had entered, and her memory supplied the image of Cyrene's tavern on her right. It was just a little ways further.

Fifty yards ahead, Gabrielle pulled her horse to the left side of the road and stopped. She dismounted, but couldn't keep her footing. With a weak cry, she crashed down and lay panting on her side in the road. Her body was on fire from the inside out. She felt as though she'd been gutted and her carcass filled with glowing coals.

The horse nosed her, blowing air through its lips that ruffled her hair. It prodded her from her stupor. Gabrielle reclaimed her resolve, gritting her teeth, and crawling towards the doorway of the mausoleum. She found there was no longer any sensation in her legs, for the nerves had been burned away. Now she measured her progress in feet, hauling herself forward on scorched and swollen hands. Finally she felt cool stone beneath the raw flesh of her belly as she passed through the entrance. She rested there for a moment, gasping from the effort. In her mind's eye she saw herself, on a bright afternoon long ago; she had stood here so easily then, happily telling a newly reformed Xena that she was no longer alone. The memory made her smile in spite of her pain.

Too soon it was time for the last effort. Gabrielle dragged her dead legs behind her through the dust, crossing the room to the second coffin in the row. With the last of her strength she grasped the carved stone and hauled her dying body up, until she was clinging to Lyceus' sarcophagus. For the last time the power came to her, shifting the coffin's lid open a hand's breadth. Gabrielle's own hands were shaking with palsy from the progressing nerve damage, and she could barely undo the pouch at her waist. She tucked the packet with Xena's ashes inside, then added the deadly Chakram of Light, and the lid shifted shut.

"I kept my promise to you, my love," she barely whispered. A small smile graced her burned and cracked lips, but it could no longer touch her eyes.

It was the silent time of the night, the moment of stillness just before the dawn. For one last time it brought Gabrielle peace. Anything is possible, she thought, as darkness gently enfolded her. She lost her grasp on Lyceus' coffin and fell. She had no will, no hate, no desires, for she was dead before her head struck the flooring stones. No one in the city saw the shaft of light that came down through the ceiling. Before the sun rose, she was gone.

The next day, a sentry from the gate sent a soldier in search of her. The man found her horse outside the mausoleum of the Warrior Princess' family. The soldier entered reverently. Nothing appeared to have been disturbed inside. His own footprints alone tracked through the years of dust on the floor. Of the injured warrior, there was no trace. Though no thorough search of the city was ever conducted, neither a shred of evidence, nor a single witness could attest to her presence in Amphipolis. It was as if she had been a ghost from some heroic past, riding restless on a night of battle. Eventually, she was forgotten.