Phew! Finally, eh? Well, the truth is, the last bit of this chapter turned out to be a lot longer and more eventful than I had intended, which is why it took so much longer to finish than I had planned. Even so, I'd say I'm fairly satisfied with the way it turned out, though I guess I should let you judge that for yourselves. ;-) Anyway, I'm reproducing Chapter 4 in it's entirety here, so you can read it from beginning to end without all those annoying several-weeks-long interludes. Incidentally, if you have an opinion on the question of the 'section every couple of weeks' method versus the 'entire chapter every couple of months' method, feel free to pester me with it. The same, of course, goes for the contents of the chapter itself. ;-)

And now, without further ado, I give you:

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Chapter 4: The Foreshadowing

Or

Conversations with Quicksilver

"Aye, 'twas on a night much like this..." The Captain paused for dramatic effect, taking a long draw from his pipe, blowing a ring of smoke out over the moonlit ocean, where he watched it dissipate before continuing. "... a night very much like this... that I saw the Woman in White..."

"Yarr," interjected the Cabin Boy.

"Stow it, boy," grumbled the Captain, "I've told ye before, what kind o' self-respectin' seaman talks like that, eh?"

"Ya- oh, ah, sorry, Cap'n."

"And stop pronouncing 'Captain' like that. It's annoyin'."

"Aye, uh, Captain."

The Captain sighed; youth these days... "Now, where was I?"

"Woman in White, sir..."

"Oh, aye. Quite a sight it was for a young sprout such as I was back then - "

"'Sprout', Captain?"

"Youth, boy. Lad. Young person. Are ye goin' to let me finish the story or aren't ye?"

"Right, sir, sorry, sir."

Another sigh, followed by another draw on the pipe. "Now then. I was stuck wi' guard duty that night, so there I was, up on deck, keepin' as sharp a lookout as I knew how. It's a calm night, hardly a cloud in the sky or a wave on the ocean, and I'm nearly asleep on me feet. When suddenly, I sees a strange sort o' light in the distance, off to the right of the ship..."

"You mean 'starboard', sir."

"I know what I mean, boy," snapped the Captain. "Now as I was sayin', a weird light off to starboard, and comin' closer every second. Now, I'm thinkin' I should sound the alarm, but there's somethin' about this light that just scares me stiff, like nothin' I've ever seen. So I just stands there watchin' the thing - couldn't look away if I wanted to - and as it comes closer, I starts t' see what it is..."

"Is it the Woman in White, Captain?"

"I'm gettin' to that, boy! Now shut up, yer spoilin' the mood!"

"Sorry sir."

The Captain sought solace in his pipe once more before continuing. "What I see is a woman as beautiful as any I've ever seen, all white - her skin, hair, robes, all so pale that they seem to glow. Even stranger than that, she's walkin' across the water like it were no dif'rent than dry land - movin' all slow and graceful, her feet not makin' so much as a ripple in the waves beneath 'er. She walks right past the ship, all silent-like, me watchin' the whole while. Then, just as she comes right next to it, right underneath the spot where I'm standin', what does she do?"

"What does she do, Captain?"

"She stops, that's what. Stops an' looks straight up at me, right into me eyes. Stands there for, well, I don't know how long, just starin at me with those weird white eyes of hers. There's things in those eyes that I still can't give voice to... things both wonderful an' terrible..." The Captain paused, visibly shaken for the first time the Cabin Boy could remember. It took him a moment, and another draw from the pipe, before he regained his composure. "Well. Anyway, at last she turns away and moves on, walks right past the ship; I keep watchin', o' course, as she walks away, head down, robes flowin' out behind her. Finally, she's just a light in the distance, just like when I first spotted her, and then she disappears." The Captain stopped and looked at the Cabin Boy expectantly.

"And you never saw her again, Captain?" said the boy, taking the hint.

"Nay, never *saw* 'er again," said the Captain ominously, "but we felt 'er presence one last time, we did. You know what they say about the Woman in White, don't ye, boy?"

"Aye, sir, they say that she's-"

"I SAID, you know what they say about the Woman in White, don't ye?"

"Um... Oh, ah, no sir. What do they say about her?"

"Well, I'm surprised ye've never heard, boy." The Cabin Boy just coughed lightly. "Why, they say that she's the ghost of a woman - a sorceress, they say - who drowned at sea over three hundred years ago, and that ever since then, she appears wherever a ship is about to go down, or where someone's about to die at sea. She takes the souls of the drowned, they say, and keeps them in her lair somewhere at the bottom of the ocean. O' course, that's just talk - no way to prove any of it. I'll tell ye this, though - the very next night after I saw the Woman, our ship was caught in a great storm; we went down, and I was the only one who survived... Are ye listenin' to this, boy?"

The boy turned to face the Captain again. "Sorry sir, thought I heard something."

"Hmph. I was sayin', I was the only survivor. Saved myself by clingin' to one of the big poles that the sails were attached to..."

"The mast, sir?"

"Aye, that. Nearly died anyway, I did. But I was desp'rate enough to live that I soon managed to paddle my way to dry land. Wouldn't be here if I hadn't, would I? I've had many a strange experience since then, but none that can compare with that." The Captain stood and stretched, his story finished. "Well, what d'ye think, boy?"

There was no answer; the Cabin Boy was leaning against the deck, straining to look at some point in the distance. "Something's out there, Captain..."

"Don't talk nonsense, boy," grumbled the Captain, annoyed at being upstaged by imaginary noises. "Yer lettin' yer imagination get the better of ye."

"I'm sure I can see something sir; look, it's coming this way." He pointed, and the Captain couldn't help but look. And yes, much as he hated to admit it, some Thing, a strange greyish blot, was approaching them out of the gloom; it was too small and far away to identify, but it was moving closer at a rather alarming rate. The two seamen stood and watched in bewilderment as the thing bore down on them, gradually gaining more definition. There was a noise emanating from it as well, a strange sort of wailing sound, that grew louder with each passing second...

Suddenly, it was directly beneath them; then, a split second later, it had left them behind. What was visible in the intervening time was enough to make the Captain almost drop his pipe: a massive grey bird, its wings spread and its huge feet moving almost too fast to be seen, dashing across the waves like an enormous seagoing bullet, sending up a huge cloud of spray behind it. As if that weren't bizarre enough, seated atop the bird, and apparently clinging to it for dear life, was a humanoid figure in a ragged grey cloak, and it was from this figure that the strange noise, like a single continuous scream, was emanating.

The two only glimpsed the scene for a moment; the next thing they knew, the noise had faded, and the figure and the bird were again just a grey blot in the distance, before finally disappearing into the darkness. Even after the apparitions were no longer visible, they simply stood and stared at the point in the distance where they had disappeared, each alone with his thoughts, whatever they may have been. It was some time before the Cabin Boy finally broke the silence.

"With all due respect, Captain," he said hesitantly, "I think I can top your story."

"I was *not* screaming," Lucius growled as he lay, dripping and more than a bit humiliated, on his back in the sand. "I was merely vocalizing my extreme displeasure at your ridiculous method of travel."

Rocina merely pawed at the ground silently, clearly thinking to herself: "He was screaming."

They stood (or sprawled, in Lucius' case) on an unfamiliar shore, having crossed the vast ocean in what Lucius was sure had been the most unpleasant way possible - by running, nonstop, straight across it. Lucius had begun vocalizing his displeasure around the time that Rocina, with him on her back, had unhesitatingly plummeted headlong off the first cliff she saw; and (since he had no need to pause to draw breath) he had continued to do so pretty much without cease as the irascible mount hit the water running, dashed across the bounding main at ludicrous speeds, and reached the other side in about the same amount of time it might take a normal person to prepare his dinner. At which point, apparently having decided he had made his point, the brine-soaked Lucius had collapsed onto the ground, and had proceeded to do absolutely nothing for the space of several hours. Rocina seemed content to stand and watch him with an air of insufferable smugness about her.

This clarification of his earlier behavior was the first thing either of them had uttered since his arrival in this strange new land, as Lucius had only now recovered sufficiently from the experience to form a coherent sentence. Nevertheless, having said it and thereby broken the spell of silence, Lucius decided that now was as good a time as any to clamber to his feet, brush himself off as best he could, and take in his new surroundings - which he did.

That done, however, there didn't seem to be much here to hold his interest. There was the ocean behind him, an apparently endless stretch of grassland in front of him, and the slowly brightening morning sky above - no signs of civilization at all, as far as he could make out. Lucius snorted; it figured that this accursed bird would drag him clear across the ocean, only to deposit him in yet another godsforsaken wilderness that was in no wise discernible from the one they had just left. He might have concluded that it was his own fault for relying on the beast to get him where he was going, except of course that he would never admit to being at fault, especially not in a situation such as this. As it was, he decided that the best course of action would be to take out his frustrations on Rocina. He whirled to face her, sending seawater and sand flying every which-way. "Well, you massive beaked menace, now that you've brought us here, what exactly do you intend..."

He broke off. He was getting the distinct impression that Rocina was not paying the slightest bit of attention to him; in fact, she seemed to be an unusual amount of interest in a particular spot on the horizon. He started to approach her, with the intent of grabbing the reins and jerking her head back around, but hadn't gotten very far before he finally noticed what she was looking at. Through the early morning gloom, in the distance off to the south, he could just make out a few pinpricks of light, one of which extinguished itself even as he watched it. If he squinted just right, he also thought he could make out a number of spires and towers - attached, presumably, to buildings which in turn comprised (he could only hope) a decent-sized town. Civilization at last.

"Well, we seem to have finally stumbled upon a city with a population that exceeds the double digits. Took you long enough to get us here, didn't it?" grumbled Lucius, not yet ready to relinquish his bad mood. "Well, now that we're within spitting distance of the place," he concluded, mounting Rocina once more, "we'd best waste no time in getting there. One can only hope that the people here have more manners and a better sense of direction than you..."

He flicked the reins in a distinctly grumpy fashion; Rocina, getting the hint, broke into a trot with a minimum of fuss, following the coastline in the direction of the pair's latest target. The city of Waveshore loomed ever larger before them, thanks to the miracle of perspective.

It was high noon as Lucius arrived at the outskirts of the town, which he would later come to know as Waveshore, and so he was more concerned at the time with not slipping into unconsciousness and falling off his chocobo than he was with familiarizing himself with his new environment. Nevertheless, even in his barely-awake state, he could tell that it was quite unlike anything he had so far encountered in this world. For one thing, the roads were not dirt, for a change - from what he could see (which was, admittedly, not much), they consisted mainly of small tiles or cobblestones laid in intricate patterns. A good sign, he supposed. Perhaps he had yet a chance of discovering some real civilization on this backwater planet after all.

For another thing, it was quite crowded. Vaguely defined blurs that he assumed were people - he couldn't quite tell through the bright haze of the sun's light - jostled and jabbered all around him. A few particularly determined ones tried to force him and Rocina out of their way, but quickly learned their lesson after Rocina started biting; Lucius, meanwhile, was too dazed to do more than hurl a few insults in their general direction. Regardless, after the first few nips, the crowd seemed to decide that it would be best to give the odd pair a wide berth - which they did.

As usual, Rocina seemed to have a better idea of where they were headed than Lucius did, and made immediately for a nice shaded area protected by a large awning. This area also happened to contain the entrance to a small inn, Lucius realized once his vision had cleared sufficiently to read the sign by the door. 'The Dolphin Hotel' it read, in big swirly letters, with a small and none-too-skillful painting of a leaping dolphin underneath. An intensely stupid name, Lucius thought, but it was either this or wander around in the noonday sun in search of something better. He promptly and somewhat unsteadily dismounted, tethered Rocina to a convenient post (much to her annoyance), and went inside.

As he entered, Lucius was pleased to note that for once not all the buildings were little wood and thatch huts. The inn itself, in fact, was a nice little brick affair, with some tasteful wood paneling and a variety of useless but attractive (and possibly quite valuable) decorations inside. A clerk, sharply dressed (by hotel clerk standards, at any rate), sat behind an oaken counter, passing the time by looking as snooty as he possibly could. A set of steps near the far wall presumably led up to the rooms.

Lucius strode up to the counter in as imperious a manner as he could muster and struck the bell sharply - unnecessary considering the fact that the clerk had been regarding him with a mixture of fear and contempt from the moment he had passed the threshold. The two instantly loathed each other.

There was an extremely uncomfortable silence for a few seconds as the two exchanged introductory glares. Finally the clerk cleared his throat, apparently deciding that it was better to just get the inevitable over with. "Good morning, sir. Can I - "

"Help me?" finished Lucius. "I can think of several things that might improve my situation, but most of them involve you not being here. In lieu of that, you can give me the best room you have in this rat trap."

Incredibly, things were off to an even worse start than the clerk had expected. Oh, well... "Sir, are you aware that a room at this hotel costs upwards of 100 gold pieces a night?" Maybe the prices would scare him off...

Lucius narrowed his eye. "Highway robbery. Under other circumstances I'd simply run you through and stay here for free. Nevertheless..." He fished something out of the bag hanging from his belt and plunked it down on the counter between them. "I expect you'll find that will be sufficient payment."

The clerk regarded the object sceptically: a small round stone, maybe an inch across, that he might have take for glass had it not been for the myriad streaks of color that seemed to swirl around and into each other at its center, constantly moving and changing in an almost hypnotic way... He picked it up to examine it better, and was only mildly surprised when the colors blurred, shifted and finally resolved themselves into a small but exquisitely detailed seascape, complete with crashing waves and swooping gulls.

A remarkable find, he thought as he stared at the tiny image in the stone's center - undoubtedly magical, and probably worth a small fortune to the right buyer. His heart sank as he realized that this item would also purchase at least a week's stay in one of their best rooms for the horrid man who was even now looking at him expectantly, and they both knew it.

Sighing, he unlocked the small cashbox he kept under the counter and placed the stone in it (the picture inside it once again fading into random swirls) before once again facing Lucius. There was a brief pause as the clerk prepared himself for what was to come... "Very well, sir," he finally announced, "I believe that item will cover your expenses..."

"Of course it will, you small rodent-like man," snapped Lucius, who was not in the mood for pleasantries. "Just give me my room so I can be rid of your company."

The clerk stiffened, but professional courtesy overcame his baser instincts. Reaching for the board on the wall behind him, he plucked one of several remaining keys from its respectful hook and dropped it into Lucius' waiting hand, none too keen on making any sort of physical contact with this disturbing individual. "Room 13, sir. On the left as you reach the top of the stairs."

"Finally," growled Lucius, not bothering to lower his voice more than a notch or two. Without another word, he turned and strode toward the staircase, his boots leaving bits of dirt and grass on the steps as he stomped upward to his room. The clerk couldn't suppress a smirk as Lucius left; Room 13 was one of their best, but he hadn't bothered to mention what else the masked man would find when he got there...

Lucius was in a fairly good mood - by his standards - at least as he unlocked the door (attractively carved wood, he noted, with an assortment of brass doodads attached here and there, including a large plate with the number 13 engraved on it) that led to the suite which would most likely be his headquarters for the next week or so. He felt he had done a decent job of cutting that snobby clerk down to size, and he had managed to a free room to stay in as long as he wanted, all for the cost of a useless magical bauble - a masterful bit of bargaining, in his ever-so-humble opinion. Indeed, with each passing day, he was growing more attuned to the nuances of this backwater world; perhaps he could learn to like it here after all...

After a moment or two of fumbling (it had been a while since he had last had to deal with a lock of this sort), the key turned with a satisfying click, and the door swung open, allowing Lucius to step through and inspect his new... place of residence. A cursory examination revealed nothing out of place; a moderately-sized dining/living room, oak panelled and tastefully furnished with comfortable-looking chairs, a table or two, and a rather large and inviting fireplace on the far wall. There were also three doors which presumably led to other parts of the suite. He looked behind one and found that it concealed a kitchen, complete with wood-burning stove, oven, and what appeared to be a wooden box filled with ice, presumably for food storage or some such thing; there were other instruments scattered around the room whose uses he couldn't discern, but it didn't really matter since he likely wouldn't be needing them anyway.

Another door opened onto a bathroom, along with all the various device which bathrooms usually contain; Lucius had a few moments' difficulty identifying some of them, having not encountered objects of this sort for several centuries. Even now he had no real use for them, but it was nevertheless nice to know that the option was there. He took a moment to remove his boots, along with some of his heavier clothing, and let his tired feet soak in what he presumed was the sink; he flushed it a couple of times to get them nice and clean, and dried them off on a convenient towel before once again donning his boots and moving on to the third door.

Behind this door was a bedroom, containing a wardrobe, a nightstand, and, of course, a bed - king-sized, no less. None of this really registered with Lucius, though, as his attention was focused primarily on the bloody, bloated corpse which lay sprawled out on the bed, making a royal mess of the sheets.

"Shit," Lucius said.

"No need for profanity," replied the corpse.

Lucius blinked. Underworld-weary warrior though he was, he hadn't really expected the formerly lifeless cadaver to respond to his outburst; nor, for that matter, had he expected that same cadaver to disappear without a trace during the fraction of a second for which he had his eyes closed. Which is exactly what it did.

By this time, the clerk downstairs was relishing the thought of the man in Room 13 quivering with fear in a dark corner; as it was, Lucius merely blinked again. This was all more than a tad... unanticipated, but nothing he hadn't dealt with before in some fashion; indeed, the more he thought about it, the less unusual it seemed. It was, after all, not uncommon for inns such as this one to be haunted, was it? Come to think of it, he could remember doing a couple himself a few centuries ago - a couple of apparitions, strange little noises at night, that sort of thing. By and large, it had been pointless, demeaning work (which was no doubt his Overseer's intention), the sort of thing usually left to poltergeists...

At this point his reminiscences were interrupted by a large metal receptacle (a spittoon, and not a clean one, as he quickly discovered) clanging against the back of his head. Cursing once more and wiping the substances-best-left-undescribed from his face, he whirled about - a foolish thing to do, of course, as he knew even before he looked that there would be nothing there. Nothing visible, anyway. There was, however, a soft, bubbling sort of sound off to his left now; something was giggling at him, he realized. The separate threads began to come together in his head, and suddenly he knew what he was dealing with.

Quickly scanning the room with eyes squinted half-shut, it wasn't long before he saw it - a fist-sized, dimly glowing ball winding its way across the ceiling, flickering and changing shape in an erratic sort of way, no doubt invisible to mortal eyes (though clear as, well, night to his own). A poltergeist. Gods, as if he hadn't dealt with enough of these things in Z-land or whatever that place was called...

As he watched, the thing hopped down onto a nearby table and flicked a small piece of statuary at him, which he easily swatted aside now that he saw where it was coming from.

"Cute," he said caustically, "but you're not fooling anyone now. If you knew me, you'd know that I'm not so easily cowed, wisp."

The poltergeist halted its bouncing around, flickering guiltily with the realization that it had been caught; it quickly recovered, though, resolving itself into the shape of a human hand, which performed a certain rude gesture that is apparently recognized throughout the multiverse.

Lucius rolled his eyes; minor spirits were such a pain to deal with. "Yes, hilarious, I'm sure. Now are you going to start acting halfway civilized, or am I going to have to get *really* annoyed?"

The spirit hesitated again, apparently unused to being spoken to so boldly; then, after a few moments of stony silence had passed, the little ball of light seemed to disperse like so much dust, and Lucius once again heard giggling behind him. Turning, he beheld what appeared to be a small, surprisingly ordinary-looking young boy looking back at him with a grin.

--Hi!-- it said.

Then again, perhaps 'said' was not the right word. Certainly the child's lips moved, and the words seemed to come from the same general location as the child, and yet... there was still something vaguely *artificial* about it all, as though both child and voice were manufactured by some other invisible entity. Which they were, of course; Lucius had to remember what he was dealing with here.

"Yes. Hi," Lucius responded at last, in as grumpy a tone as he could muster (which was very grumpy indeed); he had to convince this pest that he meant business. "Now then, you are going to tell me just who you are, why you're here, and what it will take to make you leave."

The boy just grinned wider. --I'm Quicksilver. I like it here. I came here so I could meet lots of interesting people and play with them. I have lots of fun here. I like it so much here that I'm not ever ever going to leave. I'm staying here forever.--

<Wonderful,> Lucius sighed mentally. As usual, the spirit was exaggerating; forever was a long time by anyone's standards, and your average poltergeist could barely stick to any plan for more than a day or two without taxing its so-called mind... Nevertheless, 'Quicksilver' was clearly intent on hanging around long enough to disrupt Lucius' stay, which was something that Lucius was not about to stand for. Leaving or requesting another room was out of the question, as doing so would be the equivalent of admitting defeat to that snot of a clerk downstairs; which meant that his only real option was to try and reason with the little pest.

"Surely," he said, in a voice that could theoretically have been interpreted as pleasant, "there are other places you would enjoy more..."

--Nope,-- returned the spirit. --I like it here just fine.--

Lucius groaned inwardly; why was nothing ever easy? "Perhaps one of the other rooms..."

--I like it here.-- the tone of the spirit's voice left little room for argument.

A thought occurred to him, and Lucius tried another angle. "You really want to stay here, then?"

--Yes.--

"Get plenty of people to, ah, play with here, do you?"

--Yes.--

"Regular feedings, and all that?"

--...Yes.--

The poltergeist had hesitated for a moment; perhaps Lucius was onto something. He pressed further... "Lots of nice, energy-rich people come to stay here, then?"

--...Sometimes.--

"And I take it the hotel owners know about you being here."

Quicksilver brightened a bit. --I threw things at them!--

"Quite. But when they found out, did they start making guests stay in other rooms?"

--... I like it here.-- Its tone was a bit more defensive now.

Aha. "But wouldn't you get more feedings in one of the less, ah, infamous rooms? The ones that people don't avoid?"

Abruptly the boy's countenance darkened, and the entire suite suddenly shook as though it had been struck by a giant hammer. --I'M STAYING HERE!-- the boy seemed to shout.

Again Lucius was startled, but not worried; poltergeists were all sound and fury, unable to do any real harm to sentient beings even if they wanted to. Regardless, he was definitely on the right track here... "Do you know what I think?" he said, as courteously as he knew how. "I think that you don't really want to stay here at all. You'd much rather be somewhere where there's plenty of people, plenty of life and energy, wouldn't you?"

The boy stamped his feet, sending another tremor through the room, and vanished; apparently Lucius had struck a nerve. Though Quicksilver was no longer visible, his volatile presence was still obvious to Lucius. In fact... "I think," Lucius called out, "that you don't stay here because you want to, but because you have to."

The angry presence in the room seemed to deflate at Lucius' words; all fell silent, and a few minutes later, the boy reappeared, seated on the bed with a downcast look about him.

"You're trapped here, aren't you?" said Lucius, trying to sound sympathetic.

--...Maybe.--

Typical poltergeist, too stubborn to acknowledge its own foolishness. Lucius couldn't help thinking that the pest could have saved them both a lot of trouble if it had just admitted that up front. "Did one of the Powers sentence you to stay in this place? Or did some wizard lock you up here?"

--I was only having a little fun! But then she got all mad and grabbed me and stuck me inside that little person!--

'Little person'? "You mean a statue?"

--Yeah, one of those! And then she brought me to this town and sold me to some people and then they sold it to some other people and then they sold it to some other people and then they brought me here and left me!--

"Wh-"

--And now I'm all alone and I don't have anyone to play with and I'm hungry and I'm bored and I wanna get out of this place and--

"YES. Yes, I got all that. Well now..." <Now,> Lucius thought, <we can get down to business.> "Suppose I were to help you escape from this place? Would you promise to, oh I don't know, go away and let me get a decent day's sleep for once?"

The boy's countenance brightened considerably. --Yes yes yes! Can you get me out of the statue so I can get away from here? I'm really hungry...--

"Possibly. First you have to show me where this statue is, though."

Suddenly Lucius felt as though a pair of hands were against his back, pushing him rather forcibly out of the room. He stumbled along in the direction that they shoved him, until finally the pressure on his back ceased and he found himself standing in front of a bookshelf in the front room of the suite, on which there were situated a number of knick-knacks and statues of varying quality (as well as a few books). Presumably it was one of these to which the irritating little spirit was bound. "So," Lucius said in a 'get-on-with-it' tone of voice, "which one is it?"

--It's the little white one that looks like a crying woman.--

Lucius quickly located it: a small plaster sculpture, not especially well-done or remarkable in any way. Somehow he had been expecting something a bit more, well, mystical, but oh well... He picked it up and examined it casually. How typically *mortal* of these people, not to connect the purchase of a mysterious statue with the sudden hauntedness of the room in which it was stored...

--Well?-- said the anxious voice from somewhere over his shoulder. --Can you free me from it? Pleeeease?--

In answer to this rather annoyingly phrased question, Lucius dropped the statue onto the floor and stomped it with his boot, scattering bits of plaster hither and yon and grinding a fair amount of white grit into the carpet.

A stunned pause, and then a loud, joyous whoop went up behind him. --I'm free again! I can feel it! The statue's gone and I'm free!-- Now the whole building seemed to shake. Books flew off the shelves, chairs turned upside down, and the logs in the fireplace spontaneously lit themselves; typical poltergeist celebration, Lucius thought sardonically.

--It's wonderful! Now I can go out and feed and have fun again! I'm gonna go right now! Bye!-- There was a strange whooshing sound coming from the chimney, and suddenly the flames in the hearth died down again, all was silent, and Lucius realized that he was, finally, the only one in the room. The only indicator of Quicksilver's former imprisonment there was the mess he had made of the room, and the large capital 'Q' that it had apparently just now scrawled in soot on the wall above the fireplace.

"Well. You're welcome," snorted Lucius.

Evening drew nigh, and Lucius lay sprawled out comfortably on the bed, ruminating on the events of the past few days and generally feeling pretty damn good about himself. Later that night he would come down the steps, fresh as a recently-dead daisy, cape freshly washed and sweeping out behind him, and announce to the clerk that he would like his magical trinket back as payment for ridding Room 13 of its ghostly inhabitant. He thought about the look on the man's face, and grinned in anticipation...

At about the same time, nestled securely at the bottom of Lucius' scabbard, Quicksilver lay dormant, full of energy and pleasantly tired from a day of hard celebration. It had been fun, but the truth was this town just wasn't for the adventurous spirit; and besides, this strange undead human was the most interesting creature it had met in years - surely he wouldn't mind a little extra company? Quicksilver thought about the look on Lucius' face the next time he drew his sword, and giggled quietly in anticipation...

Probably Not The End...