Title: Revelations

Summary: After confronting Faith, Hope's past links to Rambaldi are revealed.

Disclaimer: I don't own Alias or anything related to the show.

Rating: PG-13

A/N: Another quick update. I should have a longer chapter done by the weekend

"So the stories are true." Faith looked up from the water to find Julian Sark standing behind her. "It exists." Hope nodded and starred down in the waters again, hoping the artefact would present itself even though she didn't really desire it.

"I can't get it." She muttered, not really talking to Sark. "Its not in my heart."

"Faith is?" Hot stinging tears ran down the immortal warrior's face as she nodded. "If it helps, even if you could get the sword you wouldn't get near Faith. Even Sydney would join Rambaldi before letting her child be killed. After all, it is a mother's duty to protect her child, no matter what the costs." He knew. The worthless mortal knew her gravest secret.

"Bastard." Hope growled as she turned her attention on him. "I killed Helena for the good of humanity. If I hadn't of then neither you nor your damn daughter would exist today. Rambaldi would have won and humanity would have been enslaved…and I would still have my precious daughter."

As Hope broke down in to tears she heard the water slosh behind her and when she looked in to she found the Blade of Peace. She pulled the ancient sword from out of the clear water and watched as rivulets of the sacred water fell from the blade's tip. Sark looked pained as he spoke again. "You're ready now." Hope holstered the blade and nodded towards him.

"Thank you. It's not easy to give up a child for the sake of strangers. You truly are a changed man Julian." He had helped her to realise that killing Helena, her own child, had been the hardest thing in the world and no matter how much she cared for Faith she had destroyed something even more precious to her for the same reasons she would slay Faith. It had to be done. As Hope walked past him he grabbed her arm and held his steely gaze with her own.

"Make it quick and painless. And then flee. Sydney will never forgive either of us for this." Hope understood and hugged the young father. He was giving up his daughter and the woman he loved for a cause she had sacrificed much for. In her eyes he was her equal.

Rambaldi listened to the CIA mole standing before her repeat his news for the second time. "Agent Sark went to Lourdes yesterday afternoon. He was spotted with Hope Mercanti."

"Faith!" Rambaldi shouted at the top of her voice, but needn't have bothered considering her teenage daughter stood just outside the door.
"You bellowed?" Faith smirked, but lost her smirk when she saw her mother's pale complexion and the fear that haunted her eyes.
"Sit." She looked to the CIA mole. "Leave." He scurried out as quickly as he could, leaving the two women alone.

"There are some things I need to tell you Faith and you need to pay attention and do as I say, understood?" Faith nodded. "Where to begin?" Rambaldi tried to smile, but only managed a grimace.

"I had a daughter before you. She was both mine and Hope's daughter, with Hope's husband, Charles Doyle. Hope had no idea what I had done, Charles knew everything. He was easily bought. When our daughter, Helena, reached sixteen I told her everything, from the love I had for her mother to the unique circumstances of her birth. I believed that with Helena on my side and Hope becoming aware of Charles' lack of moral standards, that she would join me. I would finally have my family. But she didn't."

Rambaldi was close to tears as she recalled her earlier life. "She left Helena and I for many years. When she returned she was heartless, cold and bitter, barely human anymore. She also possessed the Blade of Peace. The only known weapon that can kill an immortal-"

"She couldn't have." Faith choked. "Hope could never…her own daughter?" Rambaldi nodded.

"She killed our child for a world that rejected us both. It was then that I knew she was not my true soul mate, and Helena was not the child I was destined for." Rambaldi held her daughter soothingly in her arms. "But you are. I love you Faith. I could not bear to lose you. I need you to stay with me at all times and never leave the safety of this house, understood? Hope will kill you. Regardless of whatever bond you share. If she can kill her own daughter, she can kill you." Rambaldi sobbed silently as she held her second child, memories of the loss of her first child tearing her mind apart.

"Mother." A gasp escaped as Helena felt the blade sink through her chest. The pain was excruciating, and unlike any wound she had suffered before. The pain was true death, something she had never expected to experience. She clung to her mother as the world around her began to grow cold and distant. "Thank you." She cried in relief. Over a century of pain and anguish washing away with each drop of blood that spilled out from her wound.

Rambaldi knelt down beside Hope and clutched her child, letting her die in the loving embrace of both of her mothers. "It's over." Hope muttered as Helena drew her last breath. "She's at peace." Hope held the blade in front of her and to Rambaldi's horror launched herself on to it. She cried in pain and fell to her knees but as she pulled the sword out the wound began to heal instantly.

"But you are not." Rambaldi spat. "The sword brings peace only to those worthy of it. You will never be allowed to rest Hope, not after today. I'll make sure of it."

"She won't take you from me." Rambaldi growled through gritted teeth as she gripped her daughter tightly. All too suddenly Faith was aware of Hope's intentions, as though she were in the scorned woman's desperate mind.
"She'll take mom first."