Life, Death, and Time - A Books Of Beginning Collection

Oneshot: Dancing by Firelight

Background: Rafe is alive in this, he and the Wibberly family are all at the house in Cambridge Falls. Rafe feels extreme guilt for all he's done and though the Wibberly family wants to help him, he's kind of hiding from them, not believing he deserves their help.

Content: Kate/Rafe shipping and some  Wibberly Family Fun. Slight angst at the beginning.

It had been three months since well, everything. Three months since the Dire Magnus had died and the books of beginning died with him. Only, Rafe hadn't died. He was supposed to have, he knew that. But he hadn't, whether because of a final pulse of magic from the chronicle or even sheer strength of will. Not his own will though, her will.

He had been staying with the Wibberly family in Cambridge Falls. They were still trying to figure out where they wanted to live and what they wanted to do with their lives. Richard and Clare has missed ten years after all. Ten years, all because of him.

Rafe had tried to stay out of their way. After all, they were still figuring out what to make of him and what was going to happen to him. He didn't want to make things any harder on them then he already had. 

When they did see him, each Wibberly had a different reaction. Richard seemed wary and a bit fearful, though he tried to be polite in his own awkward way. Clare rarely spoke to Rafe, and never without a note of anger in her voice and eyes. Which was understandable, and he didn't blame her for it at all. How could he after all he had done.

Michael and Emma's reactions were more confusing. Michael was much like his father, awkwardly polite, but without the underlying note of fear. And sometimes he would engage in conversation with Rafe, asking him questions about magic or even his childhood in New York. Rafe knew that Michael had once used the chronicle on him, and therefore seen his soul, so he suppose that was what the curiosity was all about. Emma at first had been angry and sarcastic to him at all times. She clearly hates him and obviously didn't trust him. But over the past three months things had changed. She no longer seemed angry or hateful towards him. She was still sarcastic, but it seemed to be in more of a joking manner now, which Rafe found very odd.

Then there was Kate. While the other Wibberlys left him alone, she came to find him, to talk to him, to take his hand and sit beside him. She was the one who listened to his confessions of guilt, only to tell him she still cared about him no matter what he did. And she told him about her life too, from funny  childhood stories of Michael and Emma's shenanigans, to her feelings of confusion and awkwardness with the new dynamic she had with her parents. Rafe felt comfortable with her, and she clearly felt the same way with him. Many an evening they had spent sitting in his room talking for hours. 

Rafe wondered how she possibly still cared, but he was ever so happy that she did. She brought joy into his life and made him more then guilt and regret. She was his world. But then again, she had always been his world. She certainly had been a hundred years ago when he traded his soul for hers. And she was now.

Rafe smiled at the thought of her. His brave, kind Kate, who he loved endlessly, though he felt he did not deserve her. His Kate, who has saved his life with her love and her will, and who believed in him even when he didn't believe in himself.

As if the very thought of her had caused her to materialize, he suddenly heard her voice from outside his door, "Rafe, come downstairs. It's cold up here and we have a warm fire down there."

"No thank you," Rafe called back softly, "I don't want to intrude."

In reality he wanted nothing more then to sit by the fire, to hold Kate's hand, and to be happy and at peace. But he didn't want to cause her family any more pain with his presence.