Epilogue

A month later

Jim awakes to find that he is alone in bed. It isn't happening as often as it used to, not since Blair started talking to the therapist. He can't tell her everything, or he'd end up on a locked ward, medicated and being observed by psych students, but it helps. He talks to Jim about the rest of it, and that helps Jim too, knowing what Blair went throught. He isn't as worried as he was at first.

Jim reaches out with his senses and locates Blair easily. His Guide is out on the balcony again, watching the night. Specifically, watching the moon. Last night was the first full moon since the incident up in the woods. They had discussed things together, and Jim had prepared a storage room in the basement, putting two strong deadbolts on the outside of the door, and providing bedding inside. At sunset Blair, pale faced, had kissed him and gone inside, and Jim had locked the door. Then he had settled down in his sleeping bag in front of the door and waited. He hadn't slept all night, listening to the soft sound of Blair's tread as he nervously paced the room. All his senses had been focused on that little room behind the secured door, but aside from elevated heart rate and breathing, there was nothing unusual: nothing that he hadn't sensed on a thousand nights. The curse was gone.

Jim had known that, deep in his heart. The wrongness had been gone. Blair was still troubled, probably would be for a long time, but he was not wrong any more. There was no lingering scent of the beast about him. There had been with Gabriel. When he had shook hands with the roguish southerner at the airport before he left once again for Germany, there had been the feral scent he had come to associate with lycanthropy about him. Jim knew that he was going to be looking for that smell, consciously and unconsciously, for the rest of his life.

The smell also came from Frederick von Glower, who leaned heavily on Gabriel's arm. He was pale and drawn, but it was obvious that he was on his way to recovery. The doctors had been astounded. In a week he'd healed what they would have expected would involve at least a month of convalescence.

Blair had hugged the elder werewolf gently in deferense to his still tender back. Frederick had stroked his hair gently, and smiled at him as he pulled away. "You were a magnificent wolf, cub, but I'm glad you are back with you friend. This life is not an easy one, and I wouldn't wish it on anyone who did not choose it." He reached out, without looking, his hand finding Gabriel's.

His younger lover slipped a strong arm around Frederick, supporting him carefully, his expression tender. They were returning to Germany. Gabriel would stay at von Glower's house while he regained his strength, then they would see what would come next. Gabriel was talking about Frederick joining him at Schloss von Ritter, working with him in his endeavors as a Schattenjaeger. He had been immersed in thte darkness for a time, and could not abandon the calling that was bred into his blood. Frederick seemed doubtful, but Jim had the feeling that he would be won over. Gabriel could be very persuasive when he wanted to.

And he felt that with Frederick to help him learn to control his beast, he could turn the supernatural strength he had gained to fighting the true evil that lurked in the darker corners of the world. He had been touched by it, and it had made him more aware, and more determined to fight. It would be good for Frederick, too. He had done dark things in the past centuries, things he regretted bitterly. This was a chance to pay back a little to the greater good. There was no telling how long he would live, and he wanted to do his penance here on Earth as best he could.

Jim got out of bed and went to the railing, looking down into the the living room. The sliding door to the balcony was open. The faint breeze that blew through it brought him Blair's scent. Jim closed his eyes for a moment, savoring it. There was nothing but the clean smell of soap and the herbal conditioner he'd used on his hair. Those, and his own warm, musky scent. There was no tang of fear, or sorrow, no stink of madness or rank odor of the beast.

Jim pulled on sweat pants over his boxers and went down the stairs. He looked through the door and saw Blair in his ratty old flannel bathrobe *God, Blair and flannel,* he thought affectionately. *He should buy stock*, leaning with his hands on the rail. His head was tipped back, hair trickling almost down to the middle of his back, his face turned up to the full silver disk of the moon.

Jim came up behing him, slipping his arms around his waist, moving to press against his body. Blair, relaxed and unsurprised, took his hands off the rail and laid them on Jim's arms where they croseed over his belly, leaning back against him. "Whatcha thinking, Chief?"

"It's not the same anymore."

"It doesn't affect you now."

"That's not exactly what I mean. Sure, it's not the same as when I had the beast, but it's not the same as it was before... before it all started. That night in Germany I was walking along and looking at a moon just like that. I can hardly remember what I was thinking or feeling then."

Jim nuzzled his ear. "You were probably thinking what a shit I was."

Blair smiled, "Oh. Yeah! That's it. Jim's a shit."

Jim snorted in his ear, causing him to laugh and shiver. "Well, you don't have to agree quite so enthusiastically."

"I was thinking that I was going to have to go back to that inn and lay next to you all night long without touching you. I was thinking that maybe it might be a little easier if I had just checked directly into purgatory."

Jim's arms tightened. "I want you to know, Chief, so you'll be sure. This didn't happen just because you were hurt, or endangered." Blair's head dropped. "You were worried about that, weren't you?"

Blair's voice was soft. "I don't question what we have, Jim. I'm just grateful for it."

"But it's worried you."

Blair makes an indecisive noise, then says reluctantly. "The timing..."

"Was unfortunate. But I knew I loved you before it happened, Blair. I was on my way back from that bar to make love to you."

Blair stiffened slightly. He turned his head, looking back at Jim, his eyes huge and serious. "You were?"

Jim nods. "I was going to try, anyway." He kisses Blair softly. "I had alternate plans all worked out in case you got mad at me. I was going to be so drunk I didn't know what I was doing."

Blair frowned. "That's kind of a lame ass excuse, Jim."

"I know that, Chief. Are you aware of any notable success I've ever had in the romance department, aside from you?"

Blair smiled. "No. But you made up for it with me."

"Flatterer."

"Hey, anything that gets me laid."

Jim laughed, but it turned into a low growl as Blair ground his rump back against Jim's crotch. "You're asking for it."

"I'm begging for it."

Jim slid his hands down over Blair's hips, kissing his throat. "Do you want to top?" Bottoming still didn't come completely easily to Jim, but he enjoyed it, now that he'd tried it a few times with Blair. At first he'd done it to give his lover a much needed sense of control, but he'd found that there was something very freeing about turning over all the decisions to his Blair--he didn't want to do it exclusively, he still enjoyed fucking Blair too much--but it made a nice change.

"Not tonight," Blair murmured. He reached back and, stretching, managed to cup Jim's firm ass, squeezing. "I want my alpha to show me who I belong to."

Jim sighed, rubbing his face in Blair's curls. "Come inside."

"No. Here." He punctuated the words with squeezes.

Jim's heart sped up a little, and his cock, already half-hard, started thumping toward a full erection. "Chief, we can't. Not right out here in the open. Someone might see us."

"It's three-thirty, Jim. No one is out at this time of the morning. And if they are, hell--their job is so shitty they deserve a little show. Besides, with the robe, we don't really have to show anything."

"You're a pervert, you know that."

Blair wiggled, crooning, "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but a good rod makes me scream."

Jim laughed again. "I'll have to go get a condom." Blair reached in his pocket and handed Jim a tiny foil packet. "I'll be damned. I still need to go get the lube."

"No ya don't." Blair took Jim's hand and pulled it up under his robe, guiding it to the crease of his ass. Taking the hint, Jim gently pushed the cheeks apart and probed carefully.

His eyes widened when he encountered the slickness. "Blair..."

"I prepared myself in the bathroom before I came out here."

"Why you... Pretty sure of yourself, aren't you?"

"I just know my Sentinel." His hand was tugging at the waistband of Jim's sweatpants. "C'mon stud."

First Jim looked up and down the street, vision at maximum accuity, hearing fine tuned. Nothing except for an alley cat foraging almost a block away. "Oh, hell." He shoved his sweats and boxers down to his knees and lifted the tail of Blair's robe, moving up behind him, them paused. "Come over here and lean against the wall."

"Aw, Jim, I wanna stay here and look at the moon."

Jim was rolling the rubber down over his erection. "You can do that from over by the wall. If I'm going to fuck you out under God's glorious sky, I don't want to have to worry about fucking you over the damn rail."

Blair chortled as they shuffled together back closer to the apartment. "Intend to get that passionate, do ya?"

"You're going to be lucky if I don't fuck you through the wall, Sandburg."

"Big talk..." He had braced his forearms against the wall, and he gasped suddenly as Jim jerked his robe up again and, in almost one motion, spread his cheeks and rammed into his already greased hole. "Oh, damn!"

Sunk deep inside him, Jim paused. "Okay, Chief?"

Blair's answer was a backward hump. "Fan-tastic. Fuck me, Big Guy."

Jim snarled softly and began to drive in and out of his lover's snug channel. The cool wind ghosting across his bare, humping ass was in direct counterpoint to he moist heat engulfing his cock. He knew now that Blair needed this sometimes. He needed to be mastered, and lose himself in the sensations. Jim no longer agonized over whether or not he was using Blair when he did this. The young man had made his enjoyment abundantly clear, as he was doing now.

Blair moaned and writhed, tilting his pelvis so that Jim's cock would scrape over his prostate on each thrust. Soon he was slamming his hips back to meet each thrust, moving as strongly as the man who was plowing into him, matching his fervor. When Jim fumbled for his prick, he pushed his hand away. "I'll do it. Use those big hands to jerk me tighter when you stick it in me." He was going to have bruises on his hips from Jim's grip, but he'd prize every one of them.

He kept one arm braced to keep his face from smashing into the wall and grabbed at his wavering prick with the other. It took him three tries before he managed to get a grip on it, it was bobbing so wildly with the force of Jim's lunges. He finally did, though, and started to masturbate roughly. It wasn't going to take much, and he wanted Jim to come quickly, too. Then they could go to bed and, in an hour or so, have one of the nice, long, slow screws the so often enjoyed, maybe with Jim on the bottom this time.

Jim lost it when Blair started chanting, "Fuck me! Fuck me! Fuck me!" Over and over, like a fierce form of one of his mantras. Blair knew he was coming when he shortened his strokes, giving him little, forceful jabs that almost lifted him onto his toes. The battering of his prostate did it for him and he cried out Jim's name, his spunk splashing the wall in front of him. Jim howled in response to the strong, pulsing clench of Blair's ass, and shot his load. The latex caught and held it, but Blair felt the heated throb deep in his core, and it coaxed the last few dribbles of come from his tight balls.

When it was over Blair leaned panting against the wall, and Jim leaned panting against Blair. He stroked his Guide's heaving back and sides, murmuring nonsense words of love and sated lust. Blair listened, filled with a peace that he hadn't known too many times in his life, but was experiencing more and more these days.

He turned in Jim's arms and kissed him, then just held him, his head on the broad, solid shoulder, feeling so damn warm and safe. His eyes slid up, and fixed on the moon, looking down at him as he held his lover. The moon, which had once been his mistress, and Jim couldn't understand until he explained later why he whispered, "Jealous?"

Forty years later

"Gramma Gracie, c'mon. It'll be fun!"

Grace Tomosaku smiled at her youngest grandaughter. Lacey had only turned eighteen a month ago, and was eager to enjoy her new status as an official 'adult'. "Lacey, you don't want an old lady like me with you when you go down to Bourbon Street. Go on with your young man."

"No, Gramma, please! Mardi Gras won't be nearly as much fun without you. Just come watch the parade, you don't have to stay out late."

"You know I usually keep the shop open late during Mardi Gras. Sometimes we get some good customers who wander in just looking for some peace and quiet, and end up buying."

"Oh, pooh! You don't need to. You're doing well enough."

That was true. Her husband had retired with a very nice package from his engineering firm, and she had a nice little income of her own from her research and consulting jobs. But... Well, the St. George Bookstore was special. Always had been, always would be.

Grace had gone back to her parent's home after the debacle in the woods, letting them believe that she'd finally become disgusted with her low-level, low-paying job and decided to finish her degree. They were ecstatic. Two nights after she'd returned home, Ronald Tomosaku had come home with her Dad for dinner and to 'discuss business'. Right. Yeah. About as subtle as a twelve-pound sledgehammer. But he was nice, and pleasant looking, and normal. Oh, so normal. Very normal. As she'd learned during the years of their subsequent marriage, almost excruciatingly normal.

Gabriel had meant what he'd said when he told her to take the shop, he didn't want it any more. The deed to the place, and all the other paperwork, had arrived in the mail one day. There had been a phone call from a lawyer informing her that the deal was good only so long as she never tried to contact Mr. Gabriel Knight or Baron Frederick von Glower.

Grace was tempted for about a half second to rip up the deed in a grand gesture of contempt. But she didn't. If nothing else, Grace was a practicle girl. She found a good manager for the store, and the money it brought in took her comfortably through college.

She married Ronald, got her degree, became a respected researcher, contributing to many important books and became much sought after as a consultant for museum exhibits and such things as period movies. She had babies: two boys and a girl. They grew up and had babies. She had eight grandchildren now, ranging in age from Lacey at eighteen to Lewis at twenty-three.

Grace had retired two years before, and devoted herself full time to running the St. George Bookstore. It was still in the same place, and still much the same. Her husband, and then her children had tried to persuade her to tear it down and put up a more modern building, or at least rennovate, but all she would agree to was minor redecorating.

And she told them that she kept the small apartment in the back in case she had to work over late and just didn't feel like going home for a few hours sleep. They didn't know that she'd sometimes go into the back room and just sit on the bed, or at the desk, occasionally rubbing an ancient T-shirt between her hands, or squeezing out a dab of hair styling gel from an almost empty tube that had been long abandonned in a medicine chest.

"Please, Gramma." Lacey brought out the ultimate weapon. Her bottom lip quivered. "Mom said I can't go without a 'responsible adult' with me."

Grace smiled indulgently. "Oh, all right. Let me get my coat."

The weather was clear, but cold, and she wrapped up tight. Lacey's latest young man was waiting out on the sidewalk, and they whispered and giggled together as Grace locked up the store. Seeing that the children were involved with each other, Grace quickly checked out her reflection in the front window. Not bad for a broad on Social Security, she thought. The hair was still thick and healthy, even if it was iron grey. She'd given up trying to dye it. It tended to end up looking like a Halloween fright wig. There weren't many lines, even it they were a little deep. Whe wished she had more around her eyes from laughing, and fewer on her forehead and bracketting her mouth from frowning. And the body... She shook her head. She'd managed to avoid most of the chunkiness women her age tended toward, but the bosom and butt only stayed in place thanks to Maidenform these days. Oh, well. No one stayed young forever, and she didn't look bad for someone with grandkids in the double diget age range.

She glanced up at the sky, noting the quarter moon hanging almost overhead. It was surprisingly bright for such a small moon. They made their way to Bourbon Street. The crowd got thicker and noisier and roudier the farther in they went. Most of them weren't interested in giving way for the safe passage of an elderly lady and a teen-age girl, but Lacey's young man was a junior fullback at Rice University, and was very adept at clearing paths. He got them right up to the curb just after the parade had begun.

She enjoyed the parade. The krewes had outdone themselves once again. The theme for this year was 'Eternity', and the floats were elaborate, fantastic, phantasmagorical. The men and women riding them were dressed in elaborate concoctions of satin, net, velvet, sequins, spangles, and beads. Lots and lots of beads. They tossed handfuls of candy and strings of beads to the noisy, begging crowds. Grown men and women shoved and snatched for the trinkets and goodies.

Lacey's beaux snagged necklaces for them both, and managed to scare a group of teenagers away from a handful of foil wrapped chocolate coins, which he presented to Grace with a courtly bow. She didn't eat sweets much anymore, not for years, since her mother had become diabetic, but she figured she could treat herself tonight.

Unwrapping one of the coins, she nibbled, letting the sweet taste spread through her mouth as she looked at the crowd around her.

It was the leather that caught her attention. The arm that thrust out of the crowd a few yards down the curb to snatch a strand of neon green plastic beads was clad in brown leather. Grace froze, eyes locking on that arm, remembering another brown leather jacket, remembering scolding the owner for wearing it in ridiculously hot weather, simply because he knew he looked good in it.

"No." Grace whispered.

Another float was passing, and another shower of beads flew toward the crowd. Again the arm snaked out, easily visible in a waving sea of limbs, and this time it caught a lurid purple strand. Grace heard a hearty laugh rising over the babble of the crowd, a familiar laugh. Candy pattered to the pavement, and most of the crowd stooped to grope for it. Only a few people remained standing.

They were standing less than a quarter of a block away. The shorter man, his red-gold hair flowing to his shoulders, was draping the beads around the neck of his taller companion. The dark haired man, dressed in rich tweeds, laughed and leaned down to press a kiss to the generous, smiling mouth of his companion. The tall man with the ice blue eyes smiled fondly at his companion, caressing his cheek in a gesture so tender that it could be made only by a lover. They spoke to each other, but Grace could not make out the words over the ambient noise. Still she knew that one spoke with a German accent, and the other with a honeyed Southern drawl.

Just before they turned to go, the younger one glanced casually in Grace's direction. The green eyes lighted on her, and her heart thudded painfully in her chest. Then he smiled at her, a smile full of sweet and utterly impersonal charm--the smile that a polite young stranger would offer a dignified little old lady. Then he linked arms with his lover, and they started back up the street, quickly disappearing into the milling crowd.

Grace stared after them, the candy melting forgotten in her hand, the sweetness on her tongue turning to bitterness. She felt a jog at her elbow. "Gramma?" Grace just stared, wanting desperately to catch one last glimpst of that shining hair, those broad shoulder, that body that was still lean and strong and vigorous after two score years. "Gramma, are you all right?"

Feeling very, very old Grace Tomosuka, nee Nakimura turned to her grandaughter and said numbly, "I'm all right, dear. I just saw a ghost, that's all."