Author's Notes: I wrote this story as a NaNoWriMo entry back in November 2006. I edited it May 2007 as part of a very belated National Novel Editing Month (which is actually in March, but May begins with a "M" too, see? It's an honest mistake, really!) and posted it here for your entertainment. I'd love to be able to polish this up, so please critique anything that might need more work. Enjoy!

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"Dull, dull, dull," Morgan muttered under her breath. When her mother had offered to take her to England, to see the family and the sights, she had jumped at the chance. While her mother was Welsh, there were relatives spread throughout the isles, and it became clear that she and her mother were meant to hunt down every last one of them. Worse yet, none of them seemed at all happy to meet her. The cold stares she got at every stop along the way seemed to say, "Yankee, go home." By the time it became clear that the promised sightseeing was not about to materialize, Morgan was already resigned to her fate. Smile, shake hands, answer the same questions over and over and over again, until she was sure she would go mad from boredom.

Late at night, she thought about her father and her parents' divorce. He hadn't fought for custody or even asked for her to live with him. How could he, when he spent more time away on business than not? When he offered to pay for the rest of her schooling, she saw the bribe and took it as a peace offering between them. That was when her mother had suggested the trip, one last summer together before Morgan left for college.

Now, she was in a tiny motor car, headed toward the next destination on her mother's list, right inside the border of Wales. Her mother hadn't bothered to tell her whom it was that they were visiting, and Morgan hadn't bothered to ask. The morning had been full of surprises enough. When they had stopped for gas -- sorry, petrol -- her mother had recognized a group of sheep farmers and begun to jabber away with them in Welsh. Morgan, still in the car, had wondered idly if these men were also somehow related to her. She waited patiently to see if her mother would draw her out and introduce her, but it seemed that her mother had forgotten that Morgan was even there. The Welsh sounded alien to her ears, and that, combined with her mother's new found absentmindedness, had made her realize just how far away from home she had come. After several long minutes, her mother had made her farewells, paid for the gas/petrol, and had gotten back in the car. She had seemed startled when she saw Morgan in the seat beside her, but she didn't break her silence.

The silence continued into the early part of the afternoon, and Morgan was beginning to find it tiresome. An ugly thought crossed her mind. What if her mother resented her American daughter? The part of her that was her father? "I didn't know you spoke Welsh," Morgan said abruptly, suddenly desperate to hear another human voice.

Her mother smiled over at her, transformed from the stranger Morgan had seen that morning into the mother she had known all her life. "I come from a very old Welsh family. We were all raised to be bilingual. I'm surprised you didn't know."

"You rarely spoke about Wales, and I assumed you only spoke English. Who were those shepherds?"

"Old friends of mine. We grew up together." She blushed suddenly. "I almost married Kyle. We were sweethearts. I'm glad I didn't. Marry him, I mean. I never would have left Wales or the village I grew up in if I had."

"Or had me," Morgan reminded her mother in a small voice. Her mother turned her head, clearly startled.

"Well, of course." Her mother jerked her eyes back to the road. It seemed that they would travel the rest of the way in silence. Morgan just stifled a sigh and contented herself with the view outside her window. At some point, they must have curved around so that they were driving toward the mountain range that had been on their left. At each fork in the road, her mother unerringly chose the less traveled path, so that the road began to steadily narrow until it was hardly more than a single lane across. Still, Morgan wasn't prepared for the jolt when one of those forks opened back out into a gravel path. As they followed it past a clump of trees, Morgan realized that it was someone's driveway. She snuck a glance at her mother's carefully composed face before peering out the windows again, trying to spot their destination. There, at the end of the path, was some sort of overgrown cottage and what appeared to be a small farm. For a minute, Morgan thought she had traveled back in time. There was an actual water pump in the front yard, and all the adjacent buildings still had thatched roofs. They drew to a stop outside a small barn, chickens scattering every which way.

"Who lives here?" Morgan asked.

"My younger sister, your Aunt Ceridwen."

Morgan was too surprised to respond. She had understood vaguely that her mother must have had parents, even if she never spoke of them, but this was the first she had heard about any siblings. Her mother got out of the car and headed straight for the cottage's front door, but Morgan chose to wait by the car, waiting for her introduction. She had no reason to expect that this one would be any more friendly than the others.

The door opened and a young woman stepped forward and drew up Morgan's mother in a warm embrace. "Catrin! I've been expecting you for hours!" Morgan was startled at how much they looked alike. Their hair was different, but the faces were the same.

Her Aunt Ceridwen looked over her sister's shoulder and saw Morgan by the car. Her eyes widened when they met Morgan's. "You realize she looks exactly like her, don't you? Tell me, what did you name her?" her aunt demanded.

"What else? She's a Morgan," her mother replied.

Morgan walked up the stairs to stand by her mother, her eyes narrowed. "Is there something I should know?" she asked her mother. "You said I was named after my grandmother."

"And you are," her mother assured her. "I left out the part about how you could be her twin. Well, when she was your age, that is."

Ceridwen laughed. "You're leaving out the best part, Catrin. I can't believe you haven't told her about it." To Morgan, she confided, "Legend has it that our family always has a Morgan. When one dies, the next girl born takes her place. Our mother was a Morgan, and she died right before your parents were married."

"That's a funny tradition for passing down a family name. How do you know one of your cousins didn't make the same decision my mother did? Do you coordinate it somehow?"

"Ah, it's a little more complicated than that. It's a genetic quirk, I guess, but all the Morgans look alike." Her aunt saw the puzzlement on Morgan's face. "Oh, bother, I'm not explaining this very well. It might make more sense when you see the family photos."

Morgan looked askance at her mother, but her mother only shrugged and said "I didn't really believe it myself until you were born. I mean, you must have noticed that you don't look like anyone else in the family, on your father's side or on mine. Since we'll be here a while, we have the time to look through the old albums."

"What, you waited until last to see me?" her aunt asked.

Morgan's mother smiled. "Of course. I always save the best for last."

"Such a charmer. No wonder you were able to sweep that American off his feet. Well, let's get your bags. Then I'll put on a pot of water for the tea and we'll delve into a few albums before dinner."

Together, they wrestled the luggage into the house and up the stairs to a pair of snug rooms that had obviously been prepared for them. The beds were made, and fresh towels were neatly folded atop the covers, leading Morgan to ask her mother how long she had been planning this trip.

"I made a few calls last winter and again right before we left, even before I knew for sure that the divorce was final. It was your father that had kept me from coming back, all those years. I think he was a little intimidated by the part of me that spoke Welsh and grew up on a farm and did all those other foreign things, so when I talked about making this trip in the past, he told me that he wouldn't come along. I wasn't brave enough to come alone. I guess I'm still not. I'm glad you said yes."

Morgan felt suddenly ashamed of all the mean thoughts she had harbored toward her mother on this trip. Of course her mother loved her, and of course she didn't resent her. "You grew up here, then."

"All my life, until I met your father at the University up north." She paused, no doubt remembering what it was like. "I'm sorry I never taught you Welsh, and I'm sorry I never taught you about your heritage. Your father didn't approve. He actually claimed that you wouldn't be able to keep Welsh and English straight, which is absurd since everyone around here slips in and out of it without a thought. If you're interested, I can still teach you, but for now you're going to have to keep reminding the people here that you're an American."

Great, as if I didn't stand out enough, Morgan thought. Now I find out they don't even speak the same language. I guess the shepherds should have been the first clue.

"Don't look so glum. I'm sorry we didn't get to see all the touristy places you wanted on the way here, but at least you got to meet my side of the family. I bet you never realized how many cousins you have."

"Mum, they hated me."

"They didn't hate you. Maybe they were just afraid. There's some family superstition wrapped up with the Morgans, something about a curse. I didn't catch the connection until my sister brought it up. I had almost forgotten why I gave you that name." She smoothed Morgan's hair with one hand and sighed. "They ostracized my mother for the same reason. Can you forgive me?"

"Like I'm going to blame you for that nonsense," Morgan retorted. Even so, she found it hard to meet her mother's eyes. There were so many secrets here that she had only just begun to uncover. What else was she going to find?

"We're the last of the family that stayed in Wales. Or rather, I used to be. Come on, let's go find my sister downstairs. She knows the stories better than I do, and she'll have the photo albums out by now."