It was the first weekend of March, and a bitter winter chill was lingering in the air. The temperatures on Saturday morning were just above freezing, but Piper Halliwell barely noticed the cold. Piper and her two younger sisters, Phoebe and Paige, were busy clearing out the rest of Piper's belongings from her tiny apartment in San Francisco, and preparing to move everything over to the Halliwell manor, just a few blocks away on Prescott Street.

It was just after 10 in the morning, and the sisters had been hard at work packing since sunrise. Paige's boyfriend Glen had graciously offered to provide some of the heavy lifting, which Piper gratefully accepted. But as everyone had skipped breakfast, and stomachs were growling, Paige had sent the young man off in search of croissant sandwiches and fruit, while Piper plugged in her coffee maker for the final time. In moments, the aging percolator began to make its reassuring, repetitive gurgle.

"You haven't packed all the coffee mugs yet, I hope?" Piper asked her sister Phoebe, who was busy taping up boxes in the small kitchen. Phoebe brushed away a stray lock of her light brown hair from her face, and grinned at her big sister.

"I left cups and plates for four. I figured, last meal in the old place, right?"

"Right."

Piper gazed around the space almost wistfully. The walls and cupboards were now bare; paintings and pictures had been taken down, the utensil and spice racks had been packed away; and most of what Piper owned now sat in square, brown packing boxes stacked against the far wall.

"You're not sorry you're leaving?" Phoebe asked, noting her sister's pensive look.

Piper shook her head as if to clear it, and then smiled at her sister. "No. Nothing like that. I was just thinking, I won't miss this place much. I never really lived here. I mean, I kept my stuff here. But as soon as I was up, I was either at work, or taking care of Grams. I never actually spent any time here. Just slept here and took a shower in the mornings. That was about it. Never managed to start a life of my own, like I planned."

"Yeah, I tried to get away too," Phoebe agreed somberly, fixing a band of tape to the top of one of the boxes. "And you see how well that worked out."

"Well, I'm glad you're home," Piper said, with all sincerity.

Phoebe gave her sister a grateful smile. "So am I," she confided, almost shyly.

There was an indistinct scuffling noise at the front door, and a few moments later, Piper's baby sister Paige entered the apartment, cupping her hands and blowing on them.

"Jeepers, it's still freezing outside," she complained. "I thought it would warm up a little, now that the sun is out."

"It's San Francisco, honey, you should be used to the cold by now," Piper grinned. "Don't worry, we'll have hot coffee in about three minutes. No cream or sugar, though. You'll have to take it black."

"That's okay, mostly I just want to warm my hands." Paige shrugged herself out of her long coat and doffed her woolen cap, then smoothed down a few loose strands of her long ebony hair that had been captured and teased by static electricity. "I locked up the van. I figured for the next few minutes we wouldn't be loading any stuff downstairs."

"Take a pew," Piper drawled, pointing to one of only three straight-backed chairs remaining in the apartment. The dinette table had already been loaded into the van, leaving a small, open area in the middle of the floor.

"This is exciting," Paige declared, still rubbing her hands as she sat down. "We're finally going to be in our own house together! This is so cool!"

Phoebe gave her sister a tolerating grin. "Paige, we've been living together for over a week now."

"Yeah, but this kinda makes it official. You know?"

"Well, it certainly makes it official for me," Piper declared. "I'll finally have all my underwear in one place, for a change."

"Wherever your toothbrush and your panty drawer is, that's home," Phoebe agreed solemnly. She looked at the growing pile of boxes and sighed. "We should have asked Leo to help us with all this stuff."

"This is a little outside his jurisdiction," Piper grinned. "Besides, I'm really not sure how much I want to impose on him. He's already got his hands full, introducing us to magic."

"And there's also the teeny tiny little fact that you want to date him," Phoebe teased gently.

"I don't need for things to be any more complicated than they already are," Piper answered evenly. "God knows, it seems like the whole world has turned upside-down in the last few weeks as it is."

"Well, as Leo said, it's not the world that's changed. It's us," Paige pointed out. "We know we're witches now, and that we have powers. I haven't even begun to figure out everything I can do yet."

"If Leo is right, there's nothing we can't do," Phoebe added. "I sure wish I'd known about this when I was in New York."

"Why? You think the Big Apple needs a few more Wiccans?" Piper asked, gathering the coffee mugs together.

Phoebe's look turned thoughtful. "No," she said at last. "It's just… I think my experience there would have been very different, had I known then what I was capable of."

"Better, or worse?" Paige asked, and Phoebe caught her sister's inference right away.

"I… don't know," Phoebe answered, in all honesty. "I think it's probably better that I learned about magic from my sisters. On my own…" she trailed off, leaving the sentence unfinished.

Piper began to pour the coffee into the waiting mugs. "Well, we're glad you learned about magic with us, too," she said. "There's no way I could have dealt with this by myself. I'd probably be hiding under the bed in a catatonic state, if you guys hadn't been around."

"I wanna know when I can tell Glen that I'm a witch," Paige said plaintively.

"Paige…" Piper subconsciously used the same moderating tone that her Grams had used, when disciplining them as children. "Right now, we have to assume that demons everywhere are watching us, to see if we have any powers. And if they find out that we have powers, before we know how to use them, our family reunion is going to be nasty, brutish and short."

She handed each of her sisters a coffee mug.

"Ooh. Leviathan reference. Cool. Thanks," Paige said, taking the proffered mug and sipping from it.

"Yeah, but Paige has a point," Phoebe suggested, taking her mug as well. "We can't hide from the world forever. Sooner or later, we gotta come out of the closet." She grinned mischievously. "Flying around on our broomsticks."

Paige made a face. "I don't have to learn how to fly… do I?"

"Why not? Being able to fly would be so cool!"

"Phoebe," Piper remonstrated gently, in the same moderating tone. "It's good you guys are interested in learning about witchcraft. But right now, we have no idea what we're doing, or even what we can do. So our best safety means, hiding our secret. For now. And that means, no telling boyfriends," she intoned severely, staring down her nose at Paige.

"All right, all right," Paige conceded, a little sulkily. "I just… it would be nice to tell him. That's all."

"Well, one day soon, I hope you can. For now, we keep things quiet. We have enough to deal with as it is. Let's not add anything to our worry pile until we absolutely have to."

"So, when do we get to meet this detective guy?" Phoebe asked. "Leo's buddy."

"His name is Darryl Morris," Piper reminded her sister, for probably the fourth or fifth time that week. "And… I don't know. Leo said he would talk to him."

"If he's got us under surveillance, why can't we meet him? Isn't he kind of like one of our protectors, too?" Paige asked.

"I suppose," Piper nodded. "But I don't know what the rules are for San Francisco police officers on stakeout. I know technically we're not the target of any investigation, but still, I doubt Inspector Morris can just come in and join us for coffee."

"Still, it would be nice to meet him," Phoebe said. "We have someone watching over us, but we have no idea who he is, or what he looks like, or anything."

"Do you think he's cute?" Paige wondered aloud.

"He's probably forty-five, jowly and with love handles," Phoebe giggled. "Only shaves every other week."

"Nahh. I bet he's movie star hot. With rock hard muscles," Paige countered, almost wistfully.

"All right, you two," Piper drawled. "We'll find out about Inspector Morris soon enough. For now, let's keep the subject on moving day. Glen will be back with our breakfast any time now, and he doesn't need to overhear anything about witches or demons or stakeouts, or any other weird thing we have to deal with."

"There's something else we need to talk about," Phoebe said quietly. "When it's just the three of us alone. The monster in the lake." She paused. "We need to deal with that."

"Yes, we do," Piper agreed. "And we will. But not until we're ready."

"Piper, it killed mom. And it killed Prue. We need to be ready now."

Piper set her coffee mug down on the counter, stepped behind Phoebe's chair, and settled her hands across her sister's shoulders in a reassuring gesture. "We'll talk about it at home," she promised.

Phoebe reached up and placed her hand over one of Piper's, giving it a gentle squeeze. The two sisters exchanged a subdued smile, which clearly said, I'm so glad you're here. Their reverie was interrupted as they heard a male voice calling out from the doorway.

"Hallo!" Glen Belland somehow managed to make a slight tapping at the door, even with his hands full of a large tray filled with breakfast sandwiches and a shopping bag. "Roach coach is here!"

"Oh, thank God, I'm starving," Paige declared, leaping from her seat and rushing to the door to help him.

"Hey Glen, where'd you run off to find breakfast? San Jose?" Phoebe teased.

"Nahh. Just a couple blocks away," the young, handsome dark haired man smiled broadly. "Sorry it took so long. Apparently everyone on this side of town wanted breakfast out at the same time we did."

He set the tray on the counter, while Paige began to extract fruit cups, napkins and plastic utensils from the large bag.

"Well, I greatly appreciate your assistance," Piper assured him. "This really would have been a lot harder without your help."

"Glad I could be of service," Glen smiled, but his response was cut short as Paige forcefully pulled him close into a passionate kiss.

Phoebe waved her hands in front of her face in mock annoyance. "Hey! Hey!" she scolded. "A little less 'P' in the 'PDA', please."

"Come on, Phoebe, I haven't seen my boyfriend for two whole weeks," Paige protested, still hugging Glen tightly to her. She glanced at her other sister. "You don't mind, do you, Piper?"

"Nahh," Piper smiled tolerantly. "I remember being twenty-four, once."

"Yeah, because twenty-eight is so damn old," Paige shot back. "You're so ready for the rest home."

"Besides, we've seen how you look at Leo," Phoebe added with a mischievous smirk. "Particularly when he's walking away. You know, that spot you stare at, where his legs kinda meet his back?"

"All right, all right, that's enough out of both of you," Piper barked. "Shut up and eat your breakfast. Before I decide I'm moving into this house by myself."

"Can't do that," Phoebe sang softly, her smirk widening into a crocodile grin.

"You put the house in all three of our names," Paige joined in.

"Yeah, that was a big mistake," Piper sighed, rolling her eyes.

"Who's Leo?" Glen asked, finally releasing Paige so he could grab breakfast sandwiches for both of them.

"He's the handyman who's been doing house repairs for us," Phoebe explained. She lowered her voice to a stage whisper. "Piper's been flirting shamelessly with him since day one."

"I have not," Piper protested vehemently.

"Sounds pretty smart to me," Glen answered, handing one of the breakfast sandwiches to Paige. "If you're looking for a boyfriend, why not pick one who's good with house repairs?"

"I am not looking for - " Piper started to say, and then gave up with a resigned sigh. "Yeah. Okay. I like him," she admitted. "But I only just met him. My sisters just like to give me crap about him," she retorted, glaring at each of them.

"Are you going to ask him out? Or are you waiting for him to do that? If that's not too personal a question."

"He's waiting for me," Piper admitted. "I kind of told him I was working through some stuff." She handed the last coffee mug to Glen, and he took it with a grateful smile.

"Well, if you think you really like him, don't wait," he suggested. "Even if it's just to say, hey, let's get together soon. Let him know you're really interested."

"Oh, she's interested," Phoebe nodded solemnly, and Piper responded by giving her a playful swat.

"Well, I'm glad you guys are all moving in together," Glen said in all seriousness. "I think it's great. I haven't seen Paige this happy in weeks." He shot a quick smile at Paige. "And it's good to see you guys mixing it up a little. Makes you sound normal. Like sisters," he added quickly, hoping his comment wouldn't be misinterpreted.

"Yeah, you probably saw enough of us hating on each other for real when we were teenagers, huh?" Phoebe sighed, and then vowed solemnly, "I promise you, Glen, you're never going to see that kind of thing again. And especially, not from me."

Glen didn't reply, but he gave Phoebe a shy, approving smile.

"Yeah, I'd forgotten just how annoying my sisters can be," Piper deadpanned. "But I think I'll keep 'em, all the same."

"I'm glad you're keeping the house, too. It's a really nice place. It would have been a shame to lose it."

"That's the conclusion we came to," Piper agreed, unwrapping her sandwich. "It's still going to be tough, though. Lots of work to be done. And it's gonna cost most of what all three of us make to live there."

"Well, help's coming," Paige declared. "My first day of work is Monday." She made a face. "I'm joining the ranks of the gainfully employed. God help me."

"And not a moment too soon," Piper agreed, sipping her coffee.

"How about you, Phoebe?" Glen asked. "Any idea what you want to do yet?"

"Not a clue," Phoebe sighed. "But, I'm headed to the temp agency first thing Monday morning. I can do temp jobs for a while, until I figure out what I want to do with the rest of my life." She regarded the young man with sudden curiosity. "Say, Glen, what do you do, anyway? It just occurs to me, I don't think I've seen you since, well, high school. You do have a job, right?"

Glen smiled shyly. "I book travel tours and stuff. Mostly Australia, but some SoCal events too. And sometimes, I'm lucky enough to be a guide on the tours."

"Really. You've been to Australia."

"Three times now. Once to Sydney, once to Uluru, and I just got back from being one of the guides on a two week tour of New South Wales."

"Wow. That sounds great."

"It's fun," Glen agreed, bobbing his head. "It's a great place to visit and hang out. Really cool people. Amazing things to see. Kinda want to find something closer to home, though."

"Really?" Phoebe arched an eyebrow.

"Yeah, well…" Glen grinned sheepishly as he glanced at Paige. "There's someone I'm kind of getting really serious with now, and I want to stay nearby."

Phoebe's mouth fell open in delighted surprise. "Wow. You guys were like, high school sweethearts, and you're still that serious?"

"We were trying to show you just how serious we are, and you told us to knock it off," Paige pointed out with a wicked grin.

"We were pretty casual in high school and college," Glen admitted. "But, when we started dating other people, we just realized… we didn't like any of these people as much as we liked each other."

"Wow. That's really cool," Phoebe said admiringly.

"Thanks. I think I'm pretty lucky," Glen smiled shyly.

Despite the bitter cold, the sun was shining brightly over the deserted Skylark Woodland campground. In fact, were it not for the chill, the scene would have been bucolic. Darryl Morris' nondescript sedan pulled into the neglected parking lot at the top of the ridge, a few hundred feet from the lake shore. The car stopped in one of the few spots where the asphalt had not yet cracked and been broken apart by weeds.

Darryl Morris emerged from the car, pulled his long coat a little tighter around him, and shivered; not entirely from the cold. He glanced at Leo Wyatt, who was getting out of the passenger side door.

"This is the place."

The two men surveyed the campgrounds that lie nestled just below the ridge. A winding path, partly hidden by a copse of evergreens, led away from the parking area down to the bunkhouses and docks at the water's edge. The area was utterly still - no wind rustling through the trees, no birds singing, even the surface of the lake itself was flat and featureless. The entire site was still and silent - almost too eerily quiet to be tranquil.

"Hard to believe so many deaths have occurred in a place as beautiful as this," Leo remarked sadly.

Darryl shrugged. "They did the right thing, closing this place down."

"Well, the best thing to do is make it safe again. Where did the cameras pick up Sam?"

"Pretty close to the docks." He pointed down the pathway, then cast a troubled glance at his companion. "Sure you want to go down there?"

"We should be safe enough," Leo answered. "We're not going into the water."

"Yeah, sure about that, are you?"

Leo gave his friend a grim smile. "Come on."

Minding their feet, the two men carefully made their way down the steep trail. As they neared the base of the ridge, the path widened out, and both men noted that the walkway had been carefully maintained - the path itself was cleared of any weeds, and the tall grasses had been trimmed well back on either side of the gravel path.

"Someone's been taking care of this place," Leo remarked.

"The utility crews might have been up here, checking on the water supply lines."

"Maybe. But they wouldn't do maintenance on the trail head. And the camp itself is deserted, right?"

"It's supposed to be."

The eerie silence continued, and the only sound Darryl and Leo could hear was their own footsteps, crunching on the gravel beneath them. As they neared the camp entrance, the gravel gave way to a simple dirt path - but even here, the grounds looked groomed, maintained, cared for.

"If Sam is around, how do you suggest we draw him out?" Leo involuntarily lowered his voice, almost feeling like he shouldn't disturb the silence.

"Well, he could be most anywhere," Darryl admitted. "The whole area around the lake is several hundred acres. But if he's been spotted on the security cameras set up by the utility crews, my guess is, he's bunking down in one of these cabins."

"So, even if we don't find him, we might be able to find where he's laying low."

"And then have an officer stake out the area, and wait for him to turn up."

Darryl glanced out towards the dock area. There were no boats tied alongside the pilings, but the dock itself, like the campground, seemed well maintained. Leo noticed his pensive stare.

"Three quarters of the drownings occurred within thirty feet of that dock."

"Yeah." After a moment's hesitation, Darryl began to move towards it. Leo quickly followed.

"I doubt you're going to see anything," he suggested hesitantly.

Darryl snorted in mild derision.

"You think you will?" Leo seemed surprised.

"I don't like cold cases, Leo," Darryl answered tersely. "They don't always mean that the officers and detectives didn't do the best job they could. But they're unfinished business. People died here. Their families don't know why, they want answers, and we can't explain it - or stop it from happening again. When Andy and I first got into this gig, we bought into the whole 'protect and serve' thing. Completely. A cop's first job is to protect people. I've always believed that. Now we're facing something that, maybe, we can't protect anyone from. It doesn't sit well with me."

"Me, either," Leo agreed grimly. "Let's see what we can see."

They stepped out onto the dock, and their footsteps echoed slightly between the wood and the water. The dock was a fixed-pier type, solidly built and showed no signs of age or wear.

"This dock could have been built a week ago," Darryl muttered. "No dry rot. No weathering. It's damn near brand new."

"The hawsers are a little worse for wear, though," Leo noted, stooping down to lift one end of the thick, moldering, coiled rope. "These have been here for months, at least."

He stood up, wiping his hands on his jeans. The two men made their way to the end of the dock and stared out over the water. The lake was perfectly calm - no waves could be seen or heard lapping against the pilings. There was no hint of a breeze. The air was clear and cold - and unnaturally still.

Darryl's stare hardened as he looked out over the water. "You know, I could imagine, like, a big crocodile, or a school of piranha fish, taking people," he said. "That's far-fetched but at least it's something real. The idea that there's a demon lurking somewhere down there, breathing under the water, looking up at the people… looking at us…"

His voice trailed off, apparently unable or unwilling to finish his thought.

"You've seen enough supernatural creatures by now to know they're real," Leo pointed out.

"I know. Still creeps me out, though." Darryl knelt down at the end of the dock and stared at his own reflection in the perfectly calm water. He was just about to straighten up when his reflection shimmered slightly, continuing to stare back him, but now with a distinctly malevolent grin.

"What the hell?"

Darryl leaned forward slightly. The water immediately beneath him began to agitate by some unseen force.

"Get off the dock!" A male voice bawled at them.

Darryl got to his feet, and he and Leo both turned to see a bearded, middle-aged man running towards them, waving his arms frantically.

"Get off the dock, NOW!" The man was almost screaming his warning.

As Leo and Darryl exchanged a worried glance, the dock planking beneath them gave a sickening lurch. At the very edge of the dock, a waterspout was forming - but it did not have the normal shape of a spout. The churning water was pushing itself upward and outward, away from the surface of the lake, into something that almost resembled a human form - but several times larger than any man. Darryl and Leo gaped at the sight in astonishment, transfixed.

"RUN!" The man screamed.

The water began to fall inwards, rushing upon them; without thinking, Leo grabbed Darryl and in the blink of an eye, they vanished in a cloud of tiny white lights. A few moments later, they were standing on the ridge again, several hundred feet from shore.

The water demon was still crouching over the end of the dock, clearly dumbfounded that its prey had vanished. It almost appeared to straighten up, and turn towards them. The water began to gurgle angrily, making a sound eerily like the roar of a frustrated carnivore.

"It sees us," Darryl gasped.

"Well… it senses us," Leo agreed.

Both men were still too amazed - and perhaps to frightened - to move. Leo cast a furtive glance at the shoreline. The man who sought to warn them was sprinting at top speed for the relative safety of the trees, well back from the shore. In a moment, he disappeared into the dark cover of the forest.

"It can't… get up here?" Darryl was almost too breathless to ask the question.

"I don't think so," Leo said uncertainly.

Even from the considerable distance, the effect of seeing a large spout of water assuming an anthropomorphic form was terrifying. The column of water seemed to turn away from the dock, as a man might turn on his heel, and moments later, the water abruptly began to spill away from its unnatural shape, falling back into the lakebed. In less than a minute, it was entirely gone, leaving behind only agitated ripples in the surface of the lake to indicate its passing.

"What… the hell… was that?" Darryl demanded, desperately gasping for breath.

"That," Leo said grimly, "Is why we need the Halliwell sisters to learn how to use their magical powers as quickly as possible."

"That thing… it - it was made… out of water… but it was alive… it…"

Darryl leaned forward, hands on his knees, convulsively gagging.

"Give it a minute," Leo said, placing a comforting hand on Darryl's shoulder. "It'll pass."

As Leo indicated, the dry heaves passed after a moment, and Darryl - rather unsteadily - straightened up.

"Are you okay?" Leo asked worriedly.

"Man, how do you DO that?" Darryl demanded, his voice strangled.

Leo shrugged. "You get used to it."

"I don't think I could ever get used to traveling that way."

"I suppose it bothers me less, because technically I'm dead."

"Yeah, let's not even go there, Wyatt. Please." Darryl's grimace suggested that he was finally regaining some semblance of self-possession after being badly frightened. "So, what the hell was that thing?"

"It's a demon of some kind. I don't know the classification."

"Demons come in classif - you know what, never mind. I really don't want to know."

"That was Sam Wilder, wasn't it? Who warned us off?" Leo asked.

"That was him."

"Well, he's no White Lighter."

"How can you tell?"

"He didn't orb to get away to safety. Trust me, if he still had those abilities, confronted with a demon like that - he'd have used them."

"So, he's not one of your people, then."

"Maybe. He could have been a White Lighter before now."

"What, and he just quit? Are you allowed to do that?"

"It's not a conscription, Darryl," Leo grinned. "No one is forced into service. Everyone who becomes a White Lighter does so willingly. And if at some point they want to stop, for whatever reason, they can walk away."

"Huh. I guess I never figured that."

"It doesn't mean there aren't consequences to those decisions. If Sam was a White Lighter, and he gave up his powers, then he'd become an ordinary mortal again. He'd start to age."

"Well, he looks fiftyish now. So if he's really a hundred and twenty five…"

"Then it's a good bet he spent a long part of his life as a White Lighter, at some earlier time." Leo frowned. "So if he's given up his powers, what's he doing hanging around up here? Where he knows there's a demon lurking?"

Darryl was continuing to stare at the lake, which had resumed its deceptively tranquil appearance. He shuddered involuntarily. "Maybe he does for other folks like he did for us. Tries to warn 'em away."

"Maybe. But why do that as a mortal? He'd be far better able to protect himself and others if he still had his White Lighter abilities."

"Well, if we can find him again, let's ask him."

"Agreed," Leo nodded tersely. "But not now. He'll have gone to ground somewhere. We could spend all day looking for him, and my bet is, he doesn't want to be found. And frankly… after what we just saw, we shouldn't come back up here again. Not without reinforcements."

"You mean, magical reinforcements," Darryl sought to clarify. "You want to bring the sisters up here."

"Actually, that's the very last thing I want to do," Leo sighed heavily. "But we can't stop this thing without their help. And they're going to have to confront it, sooner or later. This is the demon that killed their mother and their oldest sister."

"Damn." Darryl finally turned away from the lake, looking back at Leo with a worried expression on his face. "So, we ask them to get involved."

"Yeah." Despite his malaise, Leo forced himself to smile at the detective. "Come on, Darryl," he cajoled him, clapping him on the shoulder. "It's time I introduced you to the Charmed Ones."