Here come the sun 
in the form of the girl
she's the finest, sweetest thing
in the world

Siobhan stands in front of the antique, full length mirror. The reflection reveals a young woman whose loose, hunter green jumper can't hide her slim, muscular figure. She balances precariously on one foot, with the other tucked behind a knee. The denim of her jeans hugs her smooth thighs and tight calves then pour into leather soled, hand woven mukluks. Her red hair falls in a single braid, reaching almost to her waist. She wiggles a bit to the music, holding a sheaf of photographs in one hand.

She's been unpacking.  Boxes lay strewn around the room. Clothes tossed in heaps upon her iron framed, canopied bed. A number of wool kilts, silk dresses and historical costumes hang in the oak armoire. Various bottles adorn the top of the hand crafted chest of drawers. 

He hit so hard
I saw stars
He hit so hard
I saw God

In the back of one of the drawer hides a small vial containing the fragments of a bullet. She tucked it away, way in the back, underneath some t-shirts she doesn't wear anymore. She can't get rid of it, but does not want to see it again for awhile. She looked at it a long time today. Sat on the bed in shock when it rolled out of one of the boxes Tristan must have packed. She held it in her hands, looking at the bullet that would have killed her, if not for Lupita. Killed her, if she had not awoken.

How are you so burnt
when you're barely on fire?
Cry to the angels
I'm gonna rescue you
I'm gonna set you free tonight, baby

She holds the pictures in one hand, twirling a wisp of hair with the other. The picture in her hand shows a young red-headed girl, dressed in a tunic and breeches. She sits on the lap of an older gentleman, looking  distinguished in a smoking jacket, pipe in one hand, Le Morte D'Arthur in the other. Sir Warwick could always tell a good tale, make it sound so alive, so vivid.

And I wait staring at the Northern Star
I'm afraid it won't lead me anywhere
He's so cold he will ruin the world tonight
All the angels kneel into the Northern Lights

Warwick had called Seanmhair last week. He had found out about Jacob rejoining the other wolves, somehow. A conditional, lying bastard, with a soft spot for abandoned women. A gentleman in the best and worst terms. He filled her with a love of the past. Hell, she hadn't even seen a television until she was sixteen. That bright box had given her quite a start. A small smile on her face, she slides his picture into the slot between the frame and the glass of the mirror.

Siobhan and a young man stand arm in arm in the next picture. Both wear white breeches and woolen red coats. Tendrils of red hair, escaped from the tall shako perched on her head, frame a beaming, dirty face. She wonders if he knows what happened to her, why she stopped writing. Does he even remember her?

Love hangs herself
With the bed sheets in her cell

She folds the picture in half and tucks it into the frame. The tip of Gavin's Brown Bess still pokes out from around the fold, but she doesn't mind. That had been her first visit to Spain, her first re-creation, her first time out of Warwick.

A well muscled arm swings down a hammer onto an anvil in the next picture. A proof from a series of images used for a guide of the re-constructed village in Warwick, the picture shows Siobhan working a horseshoe in front of the blazing forge. The photographer spent hours trying to get the shot just right, and Siobhan had crafted enough shoes by the time they finally finished to meet the needs of the community for a month. She slides the photograph into the frame of the mirror.

You want a piece of me?
Well I'm not selling cheap
No, I'm not selling cheap

Without much of a glance, she places the next three pictures in a column down the right side of the mirror. Action shots from a tournament at Warwick, her first tournament championship. Warwick stands next to her in one of the photos, not visibly disturbed by all the torches of the medieval faire. She had fought through twenty opponents over three days to claim that prize. He had come to watch each one, taxing his abilities and those of his retainers. Gavin had even come from Leeds. In fact, he had lost to her in one of the final bouts. That was the month before she moved to San Francisco.

Samantha sits on a wooden chair, her blue silk pau covering her from its high collared neck to just above her satin slippers. Siobhan stands just behind and to the left of her grandmother, her red pau resplendent with its embroidered dragons and phoenix. She remembers the memorial she attended for a man she never knew. She remembers the days of wonder, her first visit to the U.S., meeting Lupita, Mallory, Ruth, and the others for the first time. The long talks with Seanmhair, with Samantha staying up past the dawn to spend more time with her inghean, her granddaughter. Siobhan's head swims with the richness of those memories.  She takes the picture to her bed, stopping to think for a while about her family....