There was stunned silence on the other end of the line for a full ten seconds. "You've told your children, haven't you?"

Gwynt laughed, the nerve-wracking kind of laugh that meant someone was on the edge of utter mania, and holding on to sanity by the fingernails. "And say what, exactly? Hey, flicker, your ma's dead, come set fire to her for me? Pandemona's purple tail, Taran, it took a goddamn bottle of Jagermeister just to call you."

"I can tell," came Taran's tired response. After a pause, very gently, "It gets easier, Gwynt."

"No," Gwynt growled, all trace of humor lost. "No, it fucking doesn't. And I can't -" he broke off, taking deep breaths, while under his grip the wood of the kitchen table began to compress and splinter.

"She must be properly burned," came Taran's voice over the line. "And Vesta and Kochi deserve to hear it from you."

The table wood gave, and a thick piece fell into Gwynt's hand. His fingers bled, but he wasn't apparently paying any attention. With a growl that had a hint of howl, he clicked the phone off.

He'd known she was dying. Happened to everyone, sooner or later. She'd gotten smaller, and lighter, and for months now Gwynt had been afraid to sleep in case she wasn't breathing when he woke up. He knew he should've called Vesta and Kochi, let them say goodbye, but his children had their own lives and there wasn't anything they could have done. If there was a gift that could turn back time, it hadn't been born yet.

At least he didn't have to explain anything. Not to Vesta, not to Kochi. He'd rigged an automatic page years ago, they would come. Trying not to think about what he was doing, he pressed the code on the keypad, waited for the beep that confirmed the call had been sent, and clicked the phone off again. Kochi had moved to Tear's Point. No plane would get him here fast enough; Gwynt mechanically moved around the kitchen and laid out lunchmeats; he well knew what flying that kind of distance at speed would do to his son.

He waited for them to arrive, and kept his control as his daughter wailed and his son wept.

The ceremony, such as it was, was simple. Taran had decreed that no one connected to their kind be...available for study. Bodies had to be destroyed, completely. Vesta called her Fire to her mother's body, steam rising from her shifted eyes, and Gwynt watched his wife's features wither in flames, char to ash. Fire.

Kochi whirled ash heavenward. High above the earth were the eternal winds; Cho would fly for ever. Gwynt used his own winds to pick up the smaller pieces, shards of bone that would not float, into a small urn. And that was that...almost.

They took Gwynt's own plane, and flew out to Winhill. Gwynt shrugged off sympathy and anger alike, and built a plain wooden chest. Made orders through Ahnah for marble; he had plenty of cash, and Ahnah promised she would handle the moving when all was ready.

Into the chest he put the urn, and his own rifle, and her wedding band and his. He sealed the chest with his power - a perfect vacuum. Ahnah would look after it.

Fire, and wind. Gwynt rose on his power, into the air. He would find out how high he could fly, how close to the stars, above the eternal winds. And when he could go no higher, when even his power could not hold him up, why then he would fall....

That evening, there was a shooting star over Winhill.