Three years later:

It was the end of October, and a furious autumn storm was beating the mansion.

Charles sat in his small library, staring at the window. The water was running down the black glass, the windows creaked as the heavy wind tried to find it's way inside. Charles watched his own reflection stare back at him, pale faced, eyes dark with sorrow and memories.

He remembered a night just like this, three years ago.

Alice had sat on that chair by the fire, reading Wuthering Heights. The chair was still here, as was the fire - as warm and calming as ever, but Alice…. The thought cut through Charle's heart like a spear. Alice was gone, and she was never coming back.

They had buried her here, on the land of the mansion, for no one had known if she'd preferred some other burial place. Charles still visited the grave almost every day, but to tell the truth, he never felt her presence there. It was just a grave, a stone.

It was on nights like this, he felt her near.

Like her voice was hidden in the sound of the wind and the rain, so that he could almost hear it if he just tried enough.

Feeling her presence he looked away from the window, and to the chair by the fire, but the chair was empty as always. She never showed herself to him.

How long did Heathcliff wait for Cathrine's ghost? It was years, he knew, decades. He went to the bookshelf and picked the Wuthering Heights, the same huge leather covered edition Alice had read, and began to go through the pages.

"And what does not recall her? I cannot look down to this floor, but her features are shaped in the flags! In every cloud, in every tree - filling the air at night, and caught by glimpses in every object by day - I am surrounded with her image! The most ordinary faces of men and women - my own features - mock me with a resemblance. The entire world is a dreadful collection of memoranda that she did exist, and that I have lost her!"

Tears dwell in his eyes as he read Heathcliff's lines. He felt the same agony in his essence, the inability to move on, the unbearable hardship to go on living when your heart had died. Cathrine's ghost had come for Heathcliff in the end, and he had yearned to die, to finally have a closure, to finally be able to be with her. But Alice's ghost did not show up, no matter how many a time had Charles sat here through the night and plead for her to show herself.

And what would he do, if Alice did come for him?

Charles knew, he could not die. He could not throw his life away, no matter how much he wanted to. Yes, he had desperately wanted to take his life, since the moment he had seen Alice lying on the floor in a pool of blood. Many a night had he sat in this room, with a knife in his hand, and a drowning need in his heart to end this torment. But he did not have that luxury. His life was not his, he did not live for his desires and needs. He only lived for other people, and they needed him to live.

No matter how damaged his soul was, people still depended on him, and he could not let them down.

"You promised you'd haunt me." he whispered to the emptiness of the library. "I am waiting. Show yourself to me, Alice. Please, just let me see you."

But nothing answered to his plea, nothing but the loud wailing of the wind - and a knock on the door.

- Yes? Charles cleared his throat and wiped his eyes.

The door opened, and a slender, dark haired woman stepped inside.

- I could not sleep, so I figured you could not either, she said.

Charles sighed, and let his gaze rest in her delicate features. She reminded him of Alice so much it hurt. Would he ever be able to look at her without this overwhelming pain?

- You are right, Maria, he said, but it is not the storm that keeps me up.

- I know. It is another kind of a storm is it not? The kind that will never let me rest.

Maria closed the door and entered the room. Her footsteps were catlike, almost soundless as she walked through the carpet and took a sit in the chair by the fire. They were silent for a while, just staring into the flames, until she looked up to him and noticed the book in his lap.

- She loved that book, you know? a small smile played on her sad face. She read it to me when we were teenagers, and made me love it too.

Charles did not answer. It was too hard, no matter how much he tried. Too hard to hear her talking about Alice.

Raven had found Maria a few months ago, and dragged her back here, ready to kill her if needed. And by God had Charles wanted to kill her, more than he had wanted anything for a long, long time.

But he did not. Not even, if her words were full of venom, and threat. Not even if she revealed that she had planned to kill them all, to end the mutant race all together.

And when she had finally slept, restlessly, tied up in her bed, he had reached deep into her mind.

There had been horrible things there. A decade of hate and vengeance, of hurt and agony. It had taken Charles the whole night to dig through that layer of filth, until he found what he had been looking for.

Her soul, hidden, cradling, sleeping. It had been badly damaged, but he had slowly begun to fix it. He'd find her essence, the true Maria, what she had been before it all begun. And he had surfaced those memories and feelings, as he'd destroyed the tainted parts of her mind.

It had been a full night's work, and finally he had collapsed in his chair, losing his consciousness from exhaustion. But it had been worth it.

When she had waken up, her eyes had been full of pain and knowing, her voice a desperate cry of a woman who suddenly understands her deeds, and cannot bear the pain she's facing.

Now she was sitting in front of him in the chair, and even if Charles felt her mind, and knew she was not the woman who had killed Alice, it still was hard to look at her.

She looked so much like her, it hurt. The same dark, curly hair, the same slender figure. The delicate features, the swan like neck. They could have been twins, so strong was the resemblance. But still, Maria was not Alice, and could never be. Nothing could bring Alice back, and they both knew it.

- I miss her too, you know, she said in a silent voice.

- I know.

- Of course you do, you are a telepath, she gave a sad laugh, But do you know that I miss her so much it feels like my heart is cut in half? At least your sorrow is clean, it's beautiful. Mine is tainted and ugly, as am I, for eternity, for her blood is in my hands, no matter what you say.

- Maria, it was not you who killed her, he said in a strained voice.

- Then who was it? For I can remember every detail of it, even if it now feels like I am watching someone else's nightmare. But still, I remember it all: how I pulled the trigger and… and she was no more. I remember it, for I did it - even if I was like a shadow of myself then.

He was silent for a while, listening the storm that was raging outside.

Alice's voice was in the wind, it was in the rain, in the crackling of the fire and the silence between the words. It was hard for him to speak, and he had a lump in his throat, a burning of tears in behind his eyes, as he finally answered.

- Alice loved you, and she missed you every day of her life. And I made a promise to her, only a few days before she died, that if I ever found you, I'd try to save you. Now I have fulfilled that promise, but Maria, there is nothing more I can give you. I have nothing left to give.

- You have already given me more than I deserve, she said, I planned to kill you, and you gave me my life. But Charles, this is a life of agony. How can I ever forgive myself that what is unforgivable?

- Alice lived the last 11 years of her life, constantly haunted by the things she had done, the lives she had taken… The memories never left her in peace and she never forgave herself. I cannot give you any advice, but I do hope you find your peace even if she could not. The two of you have suffered enough - it should stop here.

- Easier said than done, professor, Maria whispered and turned her gaze back to the fire.

She was silent for a good while, until she finally said;

- I will be leaving tomorrow.

- Where will you go?

- I have not decided yet, someplace I can do something good. I want to help people, and I am a doctor - I should put my skills in good use. The world is full of people who are in need of a doctor and cannot afford one.

Charles gave a small, sad smile. There was symmetry in that plan, and he liked it.

- You know, you could stay here, he still said, There are kids here who need help, kids like Alice. And you do have a vast knowledge about mutations.

- I cannot stay here, Charles, you know that. Seeing me will only rip your heart open, and your wounds would never heal.

- I am not sure they can heal, he stated, Regardless of your presence.

- They will, Charles. You are not Heathcliff.

- Apparently not, he said, for Alice's ghost will not come for me.

- As it shouldn't, Maria said with a serious voice, She didn't find rest in her life, let us hope that she'll find it in the afterlife.

He knew she was right, of course. But still, there was nothing he wouldn't give to see Alice one last time. One smile, one touch of her hand, one sweet kiss. He would give his sanity to have them.

They sat in silence for a long time, both buried deep in their thoughts, listening the sounds of the storm and the ticking of a big wooden clock on the wall as it ate time steadily, like nothing could interrupt the endless flow of time. Time, that went on, life that went on, even in the moments that were darker than the darkest night.

- It is my last night here, Charles, and I cannot sleep, said Maria finally, after an hour or more. Would you not read to me?

He had done so, many a time, when both of their minds were restless and needed to be taken away of the moment.

- Of course, he said, and opened the book in his lap, from a random page.

"And yet I cannot continue in this condition! I have to remind myself to breathe - almost to remind my heart to beat! And it is like bending back a stiff spring: it is by compulsion that I do the slightest act not prompted by one thought; and by compulsion that I notice anything alive or dead, which is not associated with one universal idea. I have a single wish, and my whole being and faculties are yearning to attain it. They have yearned towards it so long, and so unwaveringly, that I'm convinced it will be reached - and soon - because it has devoured my existence: I am swallowed up in the anticipation of its fulfilment. My confessions have not relieved me; but they may account for some otherwise unaccountable phases of humour which I show. O God! It is a long fight; I wish it were over!"

Alice was in the room with them now, he could feel it. Her presence lingered on the outskirts of his consciousness, like a faint whisper in the wind, like shadow of a shadow, playing on the window.

He kept on reading, until the storm finally died outside.

This was the final chapter of the story, at least for now. I still have some ideas and glimpses, that I might write and add to this, but at least for now I will let the story rest.

I hope you have enjoyed reading my stuff. This summer has been wonderful, writing and dreaming, and I am gladdened that I have had the privilege to share my thoughts with you. Thank you for your interest and support during the road.

I hope that you'd take the time to write a review and share your thoughts of this story with me. I do hope to become a better writer, so all criticism is welcome.