"Blood Ties" is set in Katrina's Blood & Roses altaverse and follows after "Bite Me," which is essential canon to all altaverse plots. If you're not familiar with Katrina's immortal version of Gabrielle and Xena, I strongly recommend a detour before reading this story.

Blood Ties

by Ella Quince

"Gabrielle...." Feeble hands clutched at the bedcovers and weakening lungs drew a rasping breath. The old woman's eyes watered from the flickering light of a single candle. "Gabrielle...."

Hekabe bit her lip to keep from arguing. Instead, she said, "Shhh, Mother, don't worry yourself so."

"Is she... here, yet?"

"No, not just yet," said her daughter with forced cheer. She fussed with the rumpled blankets, tucking them more closely about the bony frame on the bed. "But I'm sure she'll show up soon."

"Don't humor me, Hekabe. I'm old and I'm dying, but I'm not feeble-minded."

"Of course not, Mother." She stifled a sigh. Even approaching death had failed to dampen her mother's temper.

"Wish she would hurry..." The old woman groaned softly as she shifted, futilely searching for a position that would ease her pain. "... can't wait much longer...." Her eyelids fluttered, as if fighting against closing.

"Rest now," urged Hekabe, stroking wispy locks of white hair back into place. "I'll wake you if... when... she arrives."

Edging her way out of the bedroom, she was careful not to make any noise that might break her mother's slumber, so hard won and so easily lost. Thus it was, in this pervasive silence, that she started violently at the sound of knocking on the front door. Who in Poteidaia had ever made such a formal request for entry? With curiosity overriding her apprehension, Hekabe quickly crossed the room and pulled the door open.

She drew back at the sight of a cloaked figure, travel-stained and weary. Then the visitor threw off the hood, revealing a face Hekabe recognized instantly. "Oh, but it can't be..."

"You were expecting my mother, weren't you?"

"Yes, of course." She sighed with relief at such an obvious answer, then hastily ushered her relative inside. "Please excuse me for being startled. You look so much like my cousin that...." She smiled sheepishly. "But of course Gabrielle's aged thirty years since the last time I saw her, so you couldn't possibly be her."

"No," said the young woman. She smiled, too, but with a touch of wistfulness. "Of course not. In fact... my mother isn't feeling well enough to travel these days. She sent me in her place."

"So, Cousin," said Hekabe, rejoicing at this unexpected arrival, "you're called...?"

After a slight hesitation, the woman said, "I'm also called Gabrielle, after my mother... and grand-mother." She shrugged in resignation. "It's a family thing, like being a bard. Can't fight tradition."

Hekabe nodded politely, agreeing in principle. "Still... it must be a little... confusing."

"You have no idea," murmured Gabrielle. "Anyway, I came as soon as I... we... got word. I'm not... too late, am I?"

"No," said her cousin, working to keep her voice even. "But you're none too early either. It won't be long now."

"Then, please, can I see her tonight?" asked Gabrielle hesitantly. "Just for a moment."

"Yes, of course. She'll sleep sounder for knowing you've finally arrived. She never doubted you -- well, I mean your mother -- would come." Then, as Hekabe led her visitor to the bedroom, she said, "I should...warn... you about, Mother. She's very old, and she gets a little muddled at times. She may mistake you for your mother, or even your grandmother. The family resemblance is so strong, and your names...."

"It's all right," said Gabrielle, "I understand." Her eyes seemed to tear up suddenly, as if she was touched with genuine grief for this elderly woman she'd never met before. "And I don't mind if it makes her happy to think I'm... her sister." She shook her head, her voice choked to silence.

"You're very kind," said Hekabe, and motioned her cousin into the shadowed room, calling softly, "Mother, we have a visitor. This is--"

"I know who she is!" The old woman was too weak to sit up, but not too weak to scold. "Where are your manners, Hekabe? Go fetch Gabrielle some tea." Then, as soon as they were alone, she held out her arms to her guest.

With a sob, the woman fell into the embrace. "I'm sorry it's been so long, Lila. We didn't dare come back too often."

"No," said the old woman with a knowing grin. Despite the wrinkles creasing her face, Gabrielle could still see an echo of the mischievous young girl her sister had once been. "The two of you are rather hard to forget, and people would start to wonder."

"It's funny, isn't it?" said Gabrielle wryly. "I spent my childhood, in this very room, yearning for travel and adventure. Now... I'll spend the rest of my life moving from one place to another. I'll never have another house I can call home, not like this one."

Lila reached out, her gnarled hand softly stroking Gabrielle's cheek. "The rest of your life -- I've always been afraid to ask, but just how long is that going to be?"

The bard shrugged uncomfortably and watched as Lila's eyes widened with amazement. Then her sister laughed. "Immortality suits you, though. You always were the odd one, like a rough jewel cast among stones. I'm surprised you stayed with us as long as you did." Her fingers pressed against Gabrielle's lips, stifling a protest. "Nothing I've ever learned about you has made me sorry that I can call you my sister."

And then, as if a string had been cut, the old woman's arms fell away and her head lolled back onto her pillow. In a whispering voice, eyes closed, she said, "I'm... tired... so very tired.... I only waited this long for you..."

The rustle of Celesta's gown swept through the room, or perhaps it was only a night breeze stirring the window curtains. Lila took one last breath and was still.

From behind her, Gabrielle heard a gasp of anguish and the clatter of a tea tray falling to the floor. The bard remained motionless, on bent knee, clasping her sister's hand, feeling the skin cool while Hekabe roused the family with her wailing. But even as her own grief gathered force, an instinct for survival urged Gabrielle to flee. Every moment she lingered here increased her chance of having to answer awkward questions, of being remembered in all the wrong ways.

So the bard finally rose and backed her way out through the gathering crowd of her nieces and nephews, their children, the grandchildren of neighbors she had known in childhood, all strangers to her now. No one noticed her as she slipped out the door and ran away from her parents' house, the smooth skin of her cheeks glistening with tears.

She kept on running, guided by the moon's light, until she reached the woods surrounding Poteidaia. There, a dark figure stepped out of the shadows and caught her, wrapping her in a strong embrace, rocking her until there were no more tears.

"Oh, Xena," said Gabrielle, her voice still thick with grief. "Lila was the last one... the last one who really knew us." She buried her face in the rough fabric of Xena's cloak, and only the warrior's keen hearing could have picked out the bard's muffled words. "If only I could have saved her, if somehow I could have given her a life as long as ours."

"I wanted to save Toris and my mother, too" said Xena quietly. "And don't forget Ephiny. But if we could have made Ephiny immortal, then what about her son Xenos? And his children, each and every one of them as precious as--"

"You're right." Gabrielle rubbed a hand across her face, wiping away her regrets. "We couldn't keep everyone we love alive, and it's impossible to choose among them." So many good-byes, without the comfort of meeting on the other side.... She looked up into blue eyes that gleamed in the moonlight. "It's selfish, but... you're the only one who really matters to me. I can accept the death of everyone I've ever known, but not yours. Never yours."

"You won't have to," said Xena solemnly. "I once promised you I wouldn't die, and it looks like I never will."

Gabrielle studied the sculpted face that hadn't aged one day since that vow was made. A taste of ambrosia, or perhaps the legacy of a god who would not admit his paternity -- it didn't really matter to her what had given unexpected weight to those idle words of comfort. "Together... for eternity."

"Give or take a day." Xena smiled. "That's a very long time, my bard. You may grow tired of me." Beneath the amusement Gabrielle could hear a thread of tension in the warrior's voice. "It's easy to love someone for a few decades, but a few centuries of my company could strain your heart."

"Oh, I suppose so," she said, knowing better than to address Xena's concern too seriously, too directly. "But even my imagination can't stretch that far, not tonight. Tonight, I'm going to love you forever." Beneath the teasing was a vow of her own, one she knew was inviolate.

Perhaps Xena sensed the unspoken ending to this declaration: Tonight, every night, through the ages. The warrior sighed softly, relaxing even as her arms strengthened their embrace. "Yeah, me too."

Was immortality supposed to be a blessing or a curse? wondered Gabrielle. Surely, without Xena beside her, the prospect of eternal life would have been bleak and unendurably lonely. Instead...

"This is going to make such a great story," murmured the bard, and she felt rather than heard the warrior's laughter.

"But who would believe it?"

"Who indeed?" said Gabrielle. And she tilted her head up for the kiss she knew was there waiting for her. She took it hungrily, suddenly craving more than chaste comfort from Xena's lips. Everything around them would turn to dust, but their passion would endure.

The warrior and bard were still lost in each other when the moon set and night swallowed them fully into its shadows.

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