As Astrid walked through her despair, pushing herself forward and further away from her flat; she felt many prying eyes staring at her in the shadows of the night. Deep black eyes burrowing deep into her. 

The dark didn't bother her when her memories were lost, but now that they were coming back, all of her past fears were taking root inside of her again. 

She could hear Luchinda's whispering voice echo in her mind as the night breeze brushed her ears. 

"Astrid! Astrid, I saw it. I saw. My dear niece, it is to happen. We're running out of time!"

"Slow down, Luchinda, what's going to happen?" Astrid heard her own voice echo from a memory.

"Oh, my dear, I'm sorry, I'm so very sorry," Luchinda's words shook with emotion.

"What is it? You're not making sense."

"I saw, in the smoke, your eyes growing dark. My dear, Noir-Astra, he is coming, he will catch up with us and he'll take you!"

"When?" Astrid's voice began to reflect her aunt's panic. "Luchinda, when?"

"You have a week, maybe two, Astrid, I'm so sorry. The prophecy, my dear, it's coming true."

A tear fell from Astrid's eye as she walked along the dark streets of her home-town. She couldn't shake the memories that insisted on echoing in her mind and she couldn't ignore the darkness that pressed in from all sides. 

"What can I do?" The memory continued with a worried whisper. "Luchinda, tell me, what can I do? I'll do anything."

"I'm sorry, there is only one thing that can be done." Luchinda's response caused a sharp pain to drive through Astrid's abdomen. She remembered the pain she felt as apprehension stabbed its way through her in the moment that played so clearly in her mind. "You must leave, join your father - my brother, in the other realm."

Astrid stopped and stood before a darkened window. The dim glow from a streetlight cast her reflection into the glass.

"The non-magical realm?" Astrid's past self asked, to confirm her suspicions.

"Yes, that is the only place where we can starve the dark magic and stop Noir-Astra from working through you."

Astrid's, crystal clear, memory caused her face to tremble. She looked into her reflection's eyes in the dimly lit glass. The greyish, lilac tint to her irises showcased how this realm truly affected her. The bright violet glow they should have was gone, as the magic that touched them was gone. 

"I had to come here," she confessed to the empty building standing in front of her. "I had to come, alone, to save my family, to save Natanstrelle. I can't go back. How can I go back?"

The echoes of her memory spiked her mind again.

"You don't have to go alone, of course, take True and Amber with you," Luchinda said in a rush. Astrid, remembering the warm touch of her aunt's small hands grasping at her own in desperation.

"Can you guarantee their safety," Astrid's voice from years ago echoed in the darkness. "Can three people travel without risk?" 

"It's never been done…" Luchinda answered, the truth was too important to try and hide.

"What have you seen? In the smoke. What do I do?"

A distinct pause choked all voices from Astrid's memory in a brief moment. It felt like a lifetime, as Astrid remembered how Luchinda's hesitation caused her to think the worst.

"I saw you leaving," Luchinda's trembling voice began, struggling to reach the end of what she must say. Astrid's heart grew heavy when Luchinda finally found the courage to continue. 

"Alone."

"Luchinda, over all these years, kept an eye on you and your mother," True explained to his sleepy daughter. She lay tucked up in her bed and her father knelt on the floor beside her. His elbow rested on the pillow above her and his gentle thumb stroked the top of her forehead, tracing and retracing the same warm line of movement. 

"I wasn't allowed to look, myself. The smoke is a fickle thing - that's what your great aunt told me. But she let me know all that you were getting up to. You, living in that building with strangers. Your mother, not knowing who you were but finding you anyway," True carried on his strange bedtime story. "Luchinda watched you through a cat's eyes, all these years and I knew you were safe, that you were alive." True coughed back his threatening tears. "And I was able to help you, you and your mother. Luchinda discovered a way where Natanstrelle's magic could manipulate the other realm, this realm."

Amber's slow blinking then stopped as this information grabbed her interest. She shot a glance at her father, making him jump a little and retract his arm away from her pillow.

"What? How?"

"Well it was because of Luchinda that your mother met James, that she managed to learn more about art and to find a means to survive."

"You mean, Luchinda, got mum the job at my school?" Amber asked with an awe filled smile.

"That's right, and I made sure that she found you and that you could always be together."

"Light magic fixed the adoption?" 

True nodded his head.

"Oh, wow! That always bugged me, how little Mum had to go through to adopt me. Others I have seen going through it before me had to go through so much more." Amber stopped to contemplate her situation. Then an excited smile took over her baffled face. "Now I know, it was light magic all along! That is so cool!"

True smiled at his daughter as a brightness entered her eyes. The wonder of magic being a reality coloured her happy mood.

The flat's front door was then opened, interrupting all further conversation with a creaking sound that Amber could not ignore.

"Mum! She's back!" she announced, then jumped from her bed, ran past her father who rose to his feet. He watched the blur of red and white leave the room as Amber ran to greet Astrid.

True sat peacefully on the sofa with his two favourite people sitting either side of him. His arm hugging around Amber, who was beginning to lose consciousness whilst hugging into his side. 

"True…" Astrid began.

"Shh…" True attempted to quieten her worried voice as he stroked his free hand across her shaking knees. Astrid's physical trembling calmed down at his touch, but her mind raced on.

"All those awful things I said…"

True shook his head but Astrid ignored him.

"I'm sorry."

True let out a deep sigh and looked at his wife. The regret she felt spilled out in salty tears. Instinctively he put his free arm around her and pulled her close to him.

"I know you didn't truly mean what you said, my love, don't you worry about a thing," he whispered into her dark hair.

"But I did mean some things that I said," Astrid began, she tried to pull herself away but True refused to free her from his embrace.

"It doesn't matter. We're okay. I love you," he said and let his eyes close.

"I love you too," Astrid responded in a rush, before allowing her thoughts to roam free. "But True, I meant what I said about Luchinda. I can't trust her. I mean, she's lied to us. Why would she lie to us?"

"She must have her reasons."

"True…" The hint of warning in Astrid's voice made True open his eyes again. Worry carved its way across his brow as he glanced quickly down at his sleeping daughter.

"Erm… I'm just going to take Amber to bed…" he announced. He wasn't sure where the conversation was going to go and he didn't want Amber to get caught in the middle of a possible yelling match. He scooped her up in his arms and left before Astrid could say anything else. 

He was gone for a couple of minutes but then returned, bracing himself, ready for whatever Astrid may say.

But what he was faced with was not a look of anger, but of sadness. Tears fell in streams down Astrid's face. She refused to look up at True as so many memories, thoughts and fears battled for her attention.

"Astrid, my love." He made his way to his wife and knelt in front of her. He searched for her gaze but it seemed lost in the darkness. "I'm sorry."

Astrid shook her head. "No. I'm sorry. I'm just confused. I don't know what to think. I don't know… anything…" 

"Oh, Astrid." True wiped the warm tears from her cheeks and looked deep into her eyes. "I understand that. Of course I do. This whole thing is crazy. But believe me and trust me when I say this," he said with great conviction in his voice. "Luchinda can be trusted. She has been looking into the smoke to save us. Her goal was always to help us."

"But how is lying helping us?"

"She wasn't lying. She just told us separate truths."

"That doesn't make sense, True."

"I know. I'm sorry. It's the best I can do," True fumbled through his words. "Luchinda has seen a bigger picture, she knows what needs to happen. All we need to do is listen, and trust her."

Confusion and doubt painted the expression on Astrid's face but the desperate look in True's eyes melted her heart.

"So, you're saying, she had her reasons to tell me one thing and you another?"

"Yes," True breathed with a sigh of relief as Astrid's demeanour began to soften.

"Fine," Astrid uttered through an exhausted sigh. 

Then silence fell between them. True got up and took a seat next to her. A small smile playing on his mouth as he felt that he managed to achieve the impossible. 

Although that was not the end of the questions that plagued Astrid's mind.

"Did I hear you say that you and Luchinda have been working alongside each other for the last eight years?" She asked, out of the blue.

"That's right."

"What were you doing for that long? It took you eight years to be able to get here? How can that be? It took Luchinda and I only a few weeks to organise a portal. What took you so long?" Astrid's thoughts rushed out of her in a clumsy, unplanned interrogation and True's wide eyes reflected how overwhelmed he felt as his wife listed her enquiries.

"Alright, erm, let me, erm…" True stumbled into an attempt to answer her. His perplexed look grabbed at Astrid's heart and she began to feel bad for how aggressive her questioning came out.

"Sorry, True," she whispered her awkward apology.

"No, no, you're right. You should know what I've been doing. You have a right to know." True lifted his head and stared unseeingly across the living room. He took a deep breath and began his story.

True sat, perched on the edge of the green leather sofa within the Slànacus house. He no longer let himself get comfortable, now that his wife and daughter had been pulled into a portal to a realm that no one he had ever spoken to had been. All anyone seemed to know is that people go there and never come back. He could only wait now - wait for news from Luchinda, the only one who claimed to have a way to find his family.

A small knock on the door made True move so fast it was as if someone lit a fire underneath him. He yanked the front door open and pulled the timid Fiosolim sister into the house, without any sort of formal, or informal, greeting.

"Did you find them? Are they alright? Tell me they're okay!" His voice trembled.

"They're okay. They survived the portal," Luchinda said in a calm and collected way, then walked into the living room.

True ran behind her, refusing to leave her side until she told him everything.

"True, calm yourself. You need to listen to me carefully. Do you understand?" she said with a quiet authority.

True forced himself to stop flapping and took shaky, deep breaths to calm his nerves.

"Take a seat, Boy."

True did as instructed, his eyes not leaving his wife's aunt's face.

"True, I have seen what we must do next," Luchinda announced. "Your wife has forgotten who she is and I have set her on a course to help her get her memories back, but she can't fully recover them all without our help," Luchinda continued, her small frame only just tall enough for her to look down upon True, who sat in front of her.

"I'll do anything. Anything!" True said, his knees shaking up and down as he failed to suppress his nervous energy. "What must I do?"

"We must use ancient magic. Magic, long lost to us. To prepare you for when you must go and fetch them, and bring them home."

"They are to come home?" True's eyes lit up with the thought.

"I've seen it. They must return," Luchinda answered with no hesitation.

True's next thought broke his hope to bits within a second, the light that touched his eyes dimmed as quickly as it sparked.

"I don't understand, how can they? It's impossible. Isn't it?"

"Nothing is impossible, True. Soon enough you will come to understand that. Soon everybody will."

Luchinda's strange words caused True's brow to slam down in further bewilderment.

"Don't worry, My Boy. All in good time. But, what we must do now, is cast a memory retrieving spell upon you, so that when you reach Astrid her locked memories will be set free." Luchinda sat down next to True. She felt that the next piece of information, that she had to tell him, would be easier for him to swallow if she spoke in a more caring way.

"This is not a quick fix sort of spell. You understand? No ancient spells are. That's not how they work. It'll be a long, painful process. You'll be sent into the darkness, you'll relive her deepest and darkest memories, her pain, her sorrow." Luchinda stopped to make sure True was still listening.

"How long will this take?" True asked the only question that truly mattered to him; all he cared about was getting to his wife as quickly as he possibly could.

"I don't know."

"What do you mean, you don't know?" He couldn't help the frustration that fought its way through as he spoke.

"I'm sorry, I know that's not what you want to hear. It could take weeks, it could take years. There's no way I can tell," Luchinda explained in a calm velvety tone.

"Did you say years?" True coughed in shock.

"I did and no matter how long this takes, you must be committed throughout." Luchinda turned and grabbed True's hand in a firm grip. "Can I count on you?" 

True let her words sink in. He could not still his thoughts as they seemed to ping pong, back and forth, inside his mind.

"True?"

"Of course, you can count on me. I'll do anything to bring back my Astrid! You know that!" True said, almost offended by the question.

"Very good." Luchinda then stood up. "Let's go."

"What? Now?"

"The earlier we start, the earlier we can get to your family." She paused and let out a sad sigh, "and mine."

True jumped to his feet and followed her out of the room, to the empty lobby.

"What is this spell? Am I allowed to know?" True directed his question to the back of Luchinda's head as she reached for the closed front door. She stopped and glanced over her shoulder.

"Yes, you're allowed to know. In the book they call it - True Love's Kiss."