She didn't hear from Ji-hun for months.

In one way, it was great; she didn't want to see the man ever again.

In another, it was a pain; couldn't he get it over with already?

Something else that was a pain:

Closing the portal.

"Would you shut up about that? It was December."

"Yeah, and it was extra cold down there. I bet space was leaking in, too, making it worse."

"As far as school goes," Donner said, hoping to break that particular line of grievances. She brought it up at least once a week. "It makes no sense for you to try and get accepted so early. That and he, no doubt, has affairs to put in order."

"I can pay for it myself and everything!"

"He won't let you."

"Another honor thing?"

"Yes. Now that we've seen him, I recall his rather strict standards regarding matters such as that. I didn't often deal with him in situations that brought out that side of him, so I didn't think of it."

The family honor.

"His mother gave him his father's surname, Rysing, and your mother gave it to you. Regardless of your personal feelings, it holds significance to him."

She'd been asking him about Ji-hun on and off over the weeks since his departure and pretending not to care as much as she did. Her questions revealed how little he knew of the man, not that he ever presumed to know much. They had a working relationship if it could even be called that.

Still, she didn't understand it. It was a name. Blood. Why did it matter so much? People threw away their families all the time.

"And it's under negative circumstances," Donner said. "Abuse, fear, anger. A healthy family is not embroiled in all of that. Respect for the elders, the ancestors. Blood does matter when it comes to magic and Ji-hun has learned of its importance from both sides. If you take anything from him, that should be it. It matters whether you want it to or not."

Living alone wasn't all it was cracked up to be. She'd seen countless movies and television shows based on the premise of a child wanting to become an adult. They moved out to live by themselves, or with their boyfriend/girlfriend, like it was some kind of rite of passage. Cool people lived in their own apartments.

Well, she had a whole mansion to herself and it wasn't that great.

She'd had to figure out how to make the plumbing work and Donner wouldn't let her create electricity. People would see the house lit up, he said.

She didn't think it was a problem. If anyone came knocking, she'd make them believe it was haunted and they'd run away for good.

It was going on summer.

They hadn't done much. She fixed up the mansion for something to do, trying to restore it to whatever its former glory was. Trips to the library allowed her to find books about historical restoration and she supposed Donner's prohibition on electricity was in keeping with the aesthetic.

She'd found things left behind by the vampires, bits and pieces of their lives. Clothing and papers. Journals. Cædmon was even crazier than she thought, as it turned out, and she didn't understand half of what his written ramblings meant. Still, Donner was interested and had her hide them with a spell of protection. Once he had his body back, he would pursue them himself.

He wasn't sure it could be called a spell in the classical sense though, considering she didn't use a wand or chant or anything but force of will.

"Today, we can do something different," he said. "Get a wand."

"But I don't need one."

"For show."

"I'm not paying for a stick."

"Appearances, Luna. Appearances. For the sake of your cover, buy a damn wand. Wave it around like the other children in your classes and pretend you're as dependent on it as they are. This will be your true entrance into Society."

Because her meeting with that bratty boy didn't count. Or at least, he hoped it didn't. The chances of seeing that child again were fairly good. Luna wouldn't be shopping Toad Road and neither would he. They were bound to run into one another again at some point.

"Who the heck are you?!" she shouted as a person appeared before her. A girl. Older girl, maybe not all grown up yet though.

"Here," said the stranger, holding out a stick. "Take this one."

"Don't you dare," Donner said. There was no possible way.

"Are you me?"

Was that herself? From the future? Like, years in the future?

The teenager shrugged.

Had to be.

"Donner's not with me anymore, so he can't stop me. And he doesn't stop you either," she said. "It's fine. Nothing happens."

In her mind, "As far as you know!" He sounded a bit frantic. "This can't be done. Some things I can overlook or attribute to your godhood, but not this. You cannot give yourself something that you got from yourself in the first place. That was the problem with the note in the forest!"

"Maybe Father Time fixes it," little Luna said out loud for the benefit of herself. "Or the other me. I don't want to spend money on this so thanks." The world did not split apart at the seams as she took it. "He's not with you anymore? How long does it take?"

She shook her head. "I didn't tell me anything like that. You'll have to wait. It's a load off his mind though, after he finally gets over what we did."

Which, the timeline appropriate Luna thought, would take a while.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

"Hey, can we go somewhere? I haven't left this place except to check in on the farm and a couple of library visits for months. A kid can't wander around alone in this day and age. I think we'd pass for sisters or cousins or something." She considered it for a moment and asked, "Could I be my own sister?"

The older her blinked, was silent for a minute, and then shook her head quickly. "No. No way. Don't even think about it. Stop there, okay? You'll have to deal with that thought later," she cringed. "Right now, for me. I didn't realize…" she trailed off and shuddered. "No, sorry. That was it. I'm going to tell Donner now. He'll be super pissed."

That was too bad and, as she knew she would, she disappeared with a goodbye. She was there one second and gone the next.

"Wow. I wonder if I'll meet myself again later?"

Donner was in the midst of another breakdown.

"This is a problem, Luna. You have set a future event in stone and taken something that you never got from anywhere."

"Lighten up," she told him. "With all the gods or whatever, someone must be taking care of stuff like this. Let it go."

"If that Luna was fifteen? Sixteen? Then you've had that wand for the better part of a decade. It was old before you got it. It has no origin. You received it when you were six and kept it to give to yourself in the past. That is not something to be swept aside!"

"Well, can you do anything about it? No. So why be upset? There's nothing to do! For all we know, she got it somewhere else and was messing with you. I'd do that." She considered it. "Yup. I think I'll do that. I'll buy it brand new, go back in time, and give it to me to freak you out."

He wasn't sure that fixed the entire issue, but it made enough sense for him to accept it.

"I was pretty."

"Shut up."

"You don't think I was pretty?"

"I don't think anything like that about you ever. Now or in the future. I wasn't paying much attention to the appearance of the future you as you were handing over an object without an origin!"

"Now we know it does come from somewhere. I don't have to spend any money, future me will do that. I won't care as much by then and it's for a prank. No wonder you'll be mad in the future."

"Regardless," he was trying very hard to put it aside. "You need a new introduction to Society, less bombastic than the first. The chances of meeting people again over time are high. After Arcane it's Nyx and Aether and that's the school the older you was either already going to or preparing to attend." Which meant she was at least twelve, older than that clearly, and it was a reasonable assumption that Luna would attend Arcane for a few years. At some point in there, he would be removed from her mind and returned to his own body.

Finally, some peace. It may take a while longer for it to happen, but he now had a rough date of departure.

Before that, however, there were still things to be done and plans to be made. Unfortunately, their execution relied heavily on her acceptance into Arcane, which was dependent on Ji-hun. Without the need for a wand, there was no sense in going to Lighted Way when they didn't know her supply and book list yet. He'd planned for multiple trips, a slower introduction, but that was on hold now.

"The next time you go will be with your father."

"What? Why would he take me?"

"You are to be used when available and helpful to his situation. You will lend a certain credibility."

"He didn't marry my mother."

"Your mother is dead and you told him you never knew her. He will tell whatever lie is necessary to further his gain and don't mistake me, I'm not passing judgment on that."

"Because you're the same, right?"

"And so are you."

It was kind of rotten when she thought about it. It was fine for her of course, and Donner to a lesser degree, but not for Ji-hun.

"It's fine for everyone and has been the way of the world since the dawn of time," he said. "There are a few questions involved. What is it you want? What will you do to attain what you want? Are you capable of attaining it? That's all there is to it and most people can make those decisions. They do so daily. The fact that society is generally composed of lazy fools shouldn't hold anyone with determination back."

"What if I want to do that? Hold them back?"

"Then you are free to try and they are free to resist."

"I would win."

"Yes and with little trouble I assume, if that was what you wanted to do."

At the end of the day, though, she didn't know what she wanted to do. She'd thought about it a lot during these months alone with Donner, he even made suggestions, but nothing struck her as worthwhile. She'd concluded that she would have to wait it out. For now, her goal was to go to school. To do that, she needed to use Ji-hun and that meant giving him the so-called respect he demanded.

Fortunately, it didn't look like he had a whole lot of use for her, considering he'd been absent for months. She did wonder what he was doing, but not enough to find out.

"Be proactive," Donner ordered. "You don't have to spend money if you don't want to, but go to Lighted Way. Your face should be seen at least a few times before you show up at Arcane. It will be strange enough as it is. You have no connections."

"Who cares about that?"

"Society cares. Whether they should or not is up for debate, but they do. This issue may make it harder for you to obtain the books we'll need. I don't want to see your name in the gossip section of the paper, though I'm not sure we can avoid it."

With her history of behavior, she would no doubt go overboard during her examination and it would leak. On top of that, Ji-hun, whenever he was around, tended to garner attention. He had impeccable manners when it suited him and had charmed his way into many a ritzy party. Some of his most valuable information was gathered from the loose lips of the inebriated wealthy. Chatting up an old maid was not beneath Ji-hun.

An odd sense of dignity that he wouldn't claim to understand.

"Once you are known to be his child, it will inevitably make the news. He attracts attention generally."

"For being a whore?"

"I wasn't going to say it that way, but yes, if you must know."

"I thought Society was all old world values? Isn't that super bad?"

It was not a conversation he wanted to have with her. "There are some things that are simply not spoken of. If it was ever out in the open, it would be frowned upon. He would be kicked out of social clubs and the like. Scorned. However, many of his-"

"Clients? Like Pink had?"

"Similarly, yes, I suppose so. Many, if not all of them now that I think of it, are in the upper echelon."

"I wonder if that's how they met," she said.

"I don't know." He'd never asked about Ji-hun's personal life because he didn't care. If the man got the job done, that was good enough. No need to invest in extra information.

There were different conditions for different followers, of course. Some he knew far more about because it benefited the cause. A little extortion, a little blackmail, kept them in line. They joined without much thought and stayed because they were too afraid to leave.

Others wanted to be on the winning side and it was clear that he, Helios though Luna never thought of him as such, would win in the end. They understood few of his plans, but what they saw was enough. Society would fall to him with little resistance. They would hardly know it happened.

More still were stupid. Able to be ordered around with hardly an original idea between them. He required them as much as any other, though the dense fog that clouded their minds was, at times, frustrating.

"If you want something to do," he told Luna, "I believe it is time to find out where my followers have gone." For all he knew, she would have him free within her first week of school; that was doubtful, but it was best to be prepared. "One of them may have my body, though I'm not sure about that."

The lead-up to his death was a blurry memory. That woman and her trap of a mind!

"What lady are you thinking of? Your ex-girlfriend?"

"No. This was the last person I saw before I died."

"Did she kill you?"

He shifted in agitation. "I'm not sure, but it is a possibility. Perhaps not purposely, but she had information I wanted. When I attempted to enter her mind," he paused to think back. "I believe that was when I died."

"Shouldn't I go where that happened then?"

"I suppose so," he'd wanted to keep her from that place if possible. The last thing he wanted was for her to be able to show up when she felt like it. Then again, the future Luna appeared to know exactly where he was so it seemed there was no getting around it.

Doubtless, she would find him even if he was trying to hide.