University has started up again, which is why this took so long. However, better late than never.

Ladies and gentlemen: I present to you the epilogue of Beautiful Chaos.

Epilogue

When Light began to read, he assumed he would gain his memories with each unfolding of the story, if he regained them at all. The first chapter went past and . . . nothing. His memory of November 28th stayed notebook free. He grew increasingly cynical of the whole exercise as he continued on, convinced that Minerva had made a mistake. Part of him worried that she was becoming delusional again. She'd been sane for over a year now and formed a new life around it. Regressing would be disastrous.

However, when he reached the point about his parents' death, the constant thought of remembering backslided and seeing through Minerva's eyes took precedence. Had he really been that distant when he moved in with the Catearros? To the point where Sayu had noticed?

The more he read, the more uneasy he felt. Minerva's story was opening up a hole in his heart and guilt poured in like cement. He'd treated her abominably.

Then came a point where his memory was a total blank – him attacking her after the second hospital trip. In the space between Quinn coming back after the phone call and L restraining him, there was nothing. According to her he'd lost himself to the murderer inside. He wanted to reject it, wanted to say that Minerva was lying. But he knew her brand of insanity and this wasn't it. Here, in her words, she was entirely sane. Which meant she was telling he truth. He was Kira.

He felt like throwing the book out the window.

He felt like hiding in his room forever.

He felt like crawling to Minerva on his hands and knees and begging for forgiveness.

He kept reading.

The sun was setting when he finally got to the end, the end he couldn't remember either. For the past fourteen months it had frightened him that he didn't know what happened in that warehouse.

Minerva's description of their fight, of her promise for vengeance, of his inability to care that his sister was dead, sprang to life in his mind in surprising clarity. It wasn't a memory, only a supposition that was disturbingly realistic. It slotted in perfectly with what L had told him about the altercation.

With a heavy hand, he closed the final page of the book, breathed in. Then jerked as a thousand forgotten moments swamped his mind. He groaned and it quickly turned into a yell. Dropping the book, he clamped his head in a vice-like grip, willing the onslaught to end.

Light twitched on the bed, propped up only by the headboard.

Breathe in. Breathe out. Deal with it, Light. Minerva dealt with insanity. You can deal with this.

You're only a mass murderer.

Were a mass murderer.

"I'm not like that anymore," Light whispered. "I'm not. I've changed."

And he desperately hoped it was true, because the threat of Minerva stabbing him in the heart was more than enough motivation not to become a serial killer again.

It took a few minutes for him to reconnect all the new memories with the impressions formed in the wake of the memory loss. He had to rethink everything. Most of all, he had to shut down the bitter anger at Minerva for burning the Death Note.

"She had to," he told himself. "I was destroying her and myself."

A sly notion whispered to him that if it wasn't for her, he would have been fine. That it was just her drama and madness seeping into his consciousness.

He shook his head, replaced the book on the bedside table and stood. He needed to find Minerva. Despite everything they'd done to each other, though the fault lay more on his side, she was the most grounding presence he had. A few minutes in her company and he would know what was right and wrong again.

You're a genius. You don't need to be taught right from wrong.

He crushed the thought under foot. It was that sort of reasoning that had birthed Kira in the first place.

His room was on the third floor. Only two others were on this floor; Minerva and L. L's door was on the other side of the hall. Minerva's was on the other side of the house. L let slip she requested the isolation.

Light padded down the thickly carpeted hallway – something L had put in to save his bare feet from freezing in winter – and turned the corner onto the landing. The main staircase swept down to the entrance hall. Hung on the walls like signs to guide guests were Minerva's paintings. On ground floor were landscapes of the Orphanage and its grounds. First floor, where the students lived, were class portraits and scenes of them playing on the lawn. Second was of the staff and rooms within the orphanage itself.

Third floor, the images became personal. Vivid reimaginings of a boy with golden hair, a girl with a cheeky smile, a young woman with bright eyes. A hunting lodge. A group of girls chewing bubblegum, their hair in pigtails. A bronze skeleton.

Next to L's door hung an old drawing, done in a hand much less practiced than the ones downstairs.

Solace in Sweets. L stared, panda-eyed, out the window. In his hand was a teacup that was overflowing with sugar cubes and candy wrappers littered the floor around his computer. Light always grinned when he passed it.

Crossing the landing, he stood in the corridor leading to Minerva's room. Sunlight spilled in from the windows along one wall, brightening the wooden panels opposite to a deep red, struck through by black lines that swirled with the grain. Minerva hung no paintings here, lest they be damaged by the sunlight.

It was a long hallway and her room was at the very end.

Breathe in. Breathe out.

Light took one step.

The door at the end opened.

Mello stepped out.

Both of them drew up short, a second of solidarity in disbelief.

"Mello?" Light said. His mind worked through the possibilities and came up with one logical solution. "How was church?"

Mello shrugged. "We went to the new Pentecostal church in town. V liked it."

Inwardly, Light was drowning. Reading the book had brought back the memories that it was this boy's fault Sayu was dead. He wanted to speak Mello into a corner and twist his words against himself. Force him to apologise and fall to his knees and repent.

How Minerva managed to forgive this boy, Light had no idea.

Light clenched and unclenched his fists, partially wishing he could get rid of the need for vengeance like she did, and partially wanting nothing of the sort. The Kira within him hissed that no one would miss the blonde rat.

"If you become Kira again, I will personally drive a knife through your skull."

Light held onto the words because they were the only things stopping him from finding Gelus' Death Note that Minerva must still have. Oh, and didn't the Kira inside him burn at that little deception.

"Do you know where she is?" asked Light, not even feigning politeness. Mello noticed and raised an eyebrow. He leaned his weight on one hip, crossed his arms and tapped his fingers in a rhythm that set Light's teeth on edge.

"Why?"

Light had to physically clasp his hands behind his back to stop from punching the belligerent little blighter in the throat.

"That's between her and I." It pained him to be so blunt but he needed this conversation to end quickly.

Mello peered at him with shrewd eyes too old in the face of a teenager. A light dawned. He tried to hide his shock, unsuccessfully.

"You got your memories back," he said. Light said nothing. Mello's fingers continued tapping out a frantic beat. He was scared. Kira preened in the shadows of Light's mind. Eventually the long silence broke by Mello admitting, "She said something about taking a walk."

Light nodded and turned on his heel. Mello was left alone in the hallway with the sharp light making his face a contrast of fear and bravado, grey and gold. Matt found him pacing his room hours later, muttering to himself about packing up again and running, this time to Russia.

Light headed back to the landing and descended. He didn't bother stopping at the second floor where the classrooms were, or the first where the students he barely talked to roamed. Ground floor consisted of the dining room, kitchen and the administrative offices. Out of a side door marked 'Wammy' in gold came L. He halted on the cold wood of the entrance hall. At a glance he knew what Mello took minutes to figure out.

"V gave you the book," he stated. It wasn't a question. Light didn't nod. The two had formed a strong working relationship. It seemed that without Kira in the equation, L trusted Light immensely. The two debated criminal personalities, crime scene inconsistencies and political agendas back and forth all day long, only breaking when food and sleep was required or they needed a dose of humanity. Usually involving Minerva.

That isn't to say they were best friends. There was always a gap between them that started and ended with the last months of 2003 and the start of 2004. Now, perhaps, it could be overcome.

There was time for that later, though. Minerva was priority.

L understood this and made the effort to gesture out the front door. "She's in the grove."

"Thanks," said Light. As he walked away, the detective left behind found himself amused. That was the first monosyllable conversation the two had ever had. It filled him with hope. Light hadn't fallen into that eloquent, Machiavellian entity of Kira. He was fighting back. L returned to Watari's office with a smile playing around his lips.

The grove was west of the House, on the outskirts of the lawn where a dozen of the younger protégés ran amok, causing havoc in ways not that different from their peers of more average intelligence. Perhaps their pranks were a bit more thought out, their arguments a little more piercing, their games more convoluted, but emotionally they were the same. A young girl hit the ground hard and scraped her palms. Two boys ran over, helped her up and led her to Trinette. Minerva's old carer smiled warmly and thanked the boys before taking the girl inside to get some bandages. The boys both trilled 'get well soon' back and darted off to play with the others.

Trinette had arrived two days after Minerva came back from her month-long holiday with Misa. Aged and no longer a jigsaw of broken pieces, the girl arrived at the House with a single suitcase, a large art bag, and a beat up corvette. She'd absorbed some of the model's brightness, her eyes shining for the first time in months. As soon as she arrived she met with Watari, set herself up in a room, and didn't leave it until Trinette was called in.

Light didn't cry when his parents died. He refused to admit he did when Minerva collapsed in the Frenchwoman's arms.

Since then it had been a long year to regain the trust Light didn't fully remember losing. It was a testament to Minerva's profound ability to forgive that she allowed him to be in the same room as her, let alone walk beside her on many rambles through the nearby village.

Speaking of rambles, where had Minerva gone on hers? On closer inspection the grove was more of a forest. The sun was setting, shafts piercing through the trees and aiming for his eyes. Squinting, Light entered the world of green and gold and brown. The trees were far apart here, tall, pale trunks that stretched into the sky. Canopies of bright emerald that flared to life in the sunlight. The sky, a blue sheet that faded into the horizon, was visible between the leaves. He wondered, as he often did, how Minerva saw this world. With her painter's eyes, did she see things differently? When she walked these paths, did her eyes linger on the way the shadows played along the ground, triple the height of the actual beech and smothering the grass and weeds and ferns that sprouted underfoot? Did she sit back and hear the dull roar of the river and its white water in the distance? Did she run her fingers along the bark, catching them on spider's webs that dug into the whorls to create a labyrinth of miniature monsters waiting for their next meal?

What did she see when she looked at him? What would she see now?

She appeared suddenly. Silent as the sunset falling behind her, she emerged from the trees. Head tilted back to peer into the heavens, her hair curled down her back. She was the same as he remembered from their first meeting. Down to the leather jacket and paint splattered jeans. Minerva Catearro. The girl who entranced him, bound him, saved him.

In her presence it was easy to push Kira away. The entity was folded away and locked in a box in the deepest part of Light's subconscious without Light needed to lift a finger. He felt his mind rid itself of the demon like a dog shaking off water and the world was brought into sharper clarity than he could remember experiencing. Light decided then and there that Minerva was more important than a creature that knew only how to destroy people's lives.

Kira died in that forest and didn't return.

"Did I ever tell you my photographic memory stopped working?" she said, still staring at the sky. She spoke English here, like her book. Aloud, her words were an accented combination of French and English and the smallest touch of Canadian.

"No."

"It was as soon as I walked out of the warehouse. I saw the car and when I looked away the numberplate was blurred in my memory." She glanced at him and a brilliant smile lit her face. Light saw his sister in that smile. "That was when I knew everything was going to be okay."

Light took a tentative step forwards. "Were you right?"

Minerva held out a hand. He tried not to walk too fast to take it. Her fingers laced easily in his, tugging him close so she was pressed into his side.

"Isn't this place beautiful?" she whispered, more to herself than him. He agreed, seeing only chestnut hair. She seemed to be steeling herself, inhaling deeply and leaning further into him with every exhale. Light couldn't complain.

At length she said, "Forgiveness is personal. Rarely does it have anything to do with the offender making amends. It's something we have to process, understand and deal with. Otherwise the pain can fester and poison everything." She muttered the last part and the memory was clear in her words. After reading her book it was easier than ever to understand just how much she knew about pain and how to grow past it.

"That's what I've been doing with Mello. Dealing with it. In the end I can't change what he did. I can't make it go away. But I can choose for it not to govern my life. So that's what I'm doing. Forgiving. Moving on. Letting go. I'm learning to forgive myself as well." For lying to Quinn, went unsaid. On another day Light might have broached the subject. Today, his mind was on other things.

He could barely say the words. They caught on his throat, tugged on his tongue, refused to surface until he had to almost spit them out. "Just Mello?"

She smirked impishly. "I wonder if the trees forgive the fungi that eat their leaves."

"Minerva."

"Should I forgive the worms that are eating –"

"Valeria."

That shut her up. She looked up in astonishment. He took the chance and plunged in.

"I'm sorry," he said quickly. It wasn't an act of swallowing his pride to say this. It was an act of pride in itself. He needed to prove to her that he wasn't Kira anymore. "I am sorry." There was nothing more to add. Everything else would detract from the sentiment and Light had been learning lately that sometimes less words make more of an impact. Instead he held her gaze and willed her to see how much he wished he could take it all back. He wished he could return Quinn to her and have loved Sayu like an older brother should. He wished most of all not to have taken advantage of every scrap of loyalty Minerva had for him.

It was an age before she moved. To Light she turned as slowly as the grass grew. Chest to chest, she read his intent. This was it. If she decided that he was still dangerous he would have nothing more to give. Heck, he'd even allow her to take his life. She'd proven enough times that her judgement was impeccable. Mostly.

Light twitched when she laid a hand upon the side of his face. Her fingers twined with hair, threading it around her knuckles. To his surprise, a mischievous grin appeared at the corners of her mouth.

"Did I ever tell you your hair looks like a kettle?"

He blinked. "What?"

Minerva nodded. "That was the first thing I thought when I saw you. Your hair looks like a seventeenth century copper kettle. I drew a comic of your head transforming into one during class that day."

Light choked on a laugh. Minerva was more successful and the tension snapped like a string. She tugged his hand and dragged him to the ground, her laughter ringing through the forest and startling deer and birds alike. He couldn't help but join in.

The hysterics died quickly and the peace of the grove surrounded them once more. Minerva hummed in contentment. Sitting shoulder to shoulder with her, Light knew he didn't want to be anywhere else.

"I forgive you, Light Yagami."

The weight Light had been carrying on his shoulders for nearly two years finally fell away. He breathed in and decided the scent of freedom was of dirt and grass and Minerva's perfume. "I'll endeavour to deserve it."

Though I know I never will.

.

.

THE END

TOWRTA: It's done. The wild ride of Minerva Catearro, Valerie, Valeria, V is over. It feels as though I'm losing a part of myself. Quinn, Sayu, Light and Minerva. They're walking away. I've grown so much in writing this and I have those characters to thank for being challenging and difficult and imperfect. They've taught me how to value my writing as it is and understand that you can't keep your writing locked away in a cupboard to fiddle with and try to perfect. There is no perfect. Only the now. Use it while it's here.

I want to say thank you to all my readers! Thank you to those who read from afar, those who decided this was good enough to favourite and follow, and especially those who entered into conversation with me. Especially TTY7 and az23bv. Many of you I've had chats with but these two have put up with long winded messages and terrible reply times for nearly (over?) a year now and have never failed to make me smile! Thanks for all the fun, guys! Keep in touch!

God Bless, everyone. Thanks for joining in with the ride, to readers now and to readers in the future who have stuck with this curveball of a story. I wish you the best of luck with all your endeavours.

Yours Truly (for the last time)

TOWRTA