Seasons of Rest Part 2

by Cameron Dial

Post "To BeNot to Be," Methos heads out to bring MacLeod back to Paris.

Seasons of Rest

Part Two

by Cameron Dial

Disclaimer: "Highlander" and its associated names, trademarks and characters are the property

of Davis/Panzer Productions, Inc., which reserves all copyrights. This story is

for entertainment purposes only. No monetary compensation is received by the author.

No copyright infringement is intended.

I know it's their sandbox. I just dropped by to play.

Chapter Sixteen

May - June 1999

It was a century since MacLeod had last been in Buenos Aires. Where once he had landed in a wooden packet ship and trekked up a winding trail in a cart pulled by a poor excuse for a horse, there were now magnificent docks. Vast fortunes had been spent in remodeling the harbor a dozen times since then, and the port captain had half a hundred berths he could have offered Absolution. The city, of course, was so greatly changed that it bore no comparison to his memories of it. He spent a leisurely week in harbor, seeing to small repairs and changes in Absolution's rigging, enjoying the musical sound of the language all around him. It was ages, too, since he'd last spoken the local dialect, but his memory served him well enough and he was soon exchanging commonalties with his neighbors along the docks, and venturing into the city with increased confidence. Not all of his neighbors were locals, either, for Buenos Aires was as international a city as Paris. In the afternoon he would often walk about, stretching his legs after the cramped confinement of the cutter, and would as likely end up sitting outside one of the gorgeous city or government buildings, enjoying the local version of "lemonade"--lukewarm water sweetened with brown sugar, with a slice of lemon floating in the glass but having nothing else to do with the flavor.

In addition to the work he did on the boat and the time he spent wandering about the city, he also made it his business to seek out anyone who had previously made the trip round Cape Horn who could spare him the time for a conversation. Those who pulled their naval charts out and took the time to pour over them with him, discussing currents, weather, wind and water were especially appreciated. He gratefully took their advice on re-provisioning and anything else they cared to discuss with him, welcoming their input and the ready camaraderie between sailors. It was, he knew, all part of what would lead ultimately to his own decision-making process.

So it was on the morning of the twenty-sixth that he arose, realizing he'd decided to make for the Strait of Magellan rather than attempting to round the Cape itself. Another time, he told himself, when he could pick the weather--as for this trip, he had arrived during winter, when the storms were predictably worst, and it would be foolish to needlessly risk his boat, the kittens, and himself merely for the pleasure of saying he'd sailed round the Cape. If that was his goal, there would be time enough for it in the future; he had nothing to prove to himself, after all.

Being refitted and re-provisioned in every way, he set sail from Buenos Aires the next day. There was little wind in the morning and he was grateful to accept the help of the harbor tug boat to set him on his way; it moved him effortlessly out of dock and into the wide, wide River Plate, the surface so smooth that it stretched out before and behind him with just the little eddy stirred by the tug and his own trailing lifeline. Past the buoys, the tug boat cut him free and waved him off, sending him on his way with three friendly blasts on its horn. He waved in turn, and then turned his eyes to the bow and the next leg of the journey.

Just hours out a gale came up, creating an ugly sea and stirring the Plate's silver waters to gray; before the storm blew itself out, he knew, it would be nothing but mud. He cast anchor before dark in the best lee he could find near the land, but still tossed miserably all night, sitting cross-legged on his bunk, the cats in his lap. It was hard to say whether he or they were more heartsore at the choppy seas, but they were none of them happy. By morning the Plate had calmed and he was underway again, working down the river against a head wind, shaping his course to clear Point Indio on one hand and the English Bank on the other.

Two days out, he was clear of Point Indio and all the difficulties of the River Plate. A fair wind drove him onward, toward the Strait of Magellan under full sail, pressing farther and farther south all the while. His landmarks were passed safely, first Bahia Blanca, then St. Matias and the mighty Gulf of St. George. Remembering the nearly disastrous beaching he'd experienced shortly after leaving Rio, he'd been keeping Absolution well offshore, knowing that here the "shore" reached underwater for many, many miles. It was a fact that had caught more than one sailor unawares at low tide, and he was determined to avoid running aground again. Unfortunately, the care he was taking to avoid running aground put him in trouble of another sort, and one day when the cutter was under short sail a tremendous wave roared toward him in a storm, the culmination, it seemed, of all the waves that had come before it.

Knowing precisely what would happen if the wave crashed into him with sheets up, he had only a moment to scramble aloft and drop the sail. The cats, he thought abruptly, fearing more for them than himself. In the same breath he remembered he'd locked them safely below decks when the storm had come up, since neither particularly liked taking a drenching in foul weather, and he wasn't willing to chance them being swept overboard. In the next moment there was no time for thought, though. Once aloft he realized the oncoming wave was a forty-footer, towering twice the height of his mast and roiling with white at the tips as it reared up. The mountain of water crashed down, completely submerging the boat, and all MacLeod could do was cling to the mast as the Absolution went under.

The little cutter shook to her soul and reeled like a drunken man under the weight of the sea pouring onto her, but she rose quickly enough out of it to ride over the rolling waves that followed. MacLeod--who had been drenched to begin with--was spitting out saltwater and desperately clutching the mast with both arms. They'd survived it, and Absolution was bobbing along like a cork in a bathtub. As soon as he realized he was aloft again he sucked in good air to replace bad water, but it seemed a full minute before enough water had run off and over the sides of the boat for him to even see the decks and deckhouse. Intellectually he knew it probably wasn't that long--he thought of the notion of one's life passing before one's eyes in a moment of danger and had an abrupt and bizarre image of how much longer that would take for an Immortal than a mortal man, especially if that Immortal were Methos. God, he thought. They'd have to put the crisis on freeze-frame so he could reflect. It was irresistibly funny, and since all he could do was hang on anyway, he had to laugh, despite the rain pouring down, despite the fact that he was eighteen feet up and clinging for life to the cutter's mast, despite the fact that anyone who saw him would doubtless think they'd stumbled upon a crazy man.

From the time the forty-footer swept over the Absolution until she reached Cape Virgins nearly two weeks later, nothing occurred that even came close to accelerating MacLeod's pulse rate. Life had become tranquil again, the weather fine, and the sea smooth. He enjoyed watching the cats play around the deck again, enjoyed fishing for their breakfast, and twice had to climb the mast into the rigging to rescue Boots when the silly thing apparently exceeded his comfort zone in climbing and clung to mast and sails, mewing piteously for help. Having experienced much the same thing himself not too long ago, MacLeod felt annoyed but obligated. When Puss did the same thing the following week there was no pitiful meowing from him, however. He set up such a caterwauling that MacLeod could hardly scale the mast fast enough to put a stop to it, leaning down to drop him unceremoniously to the deck, all limbs stretched out, claws reaching until, with a flip and a solid-bodied little thunk, he was once again safely on all four feet. The cat shook himself off as if insulted, turned his back grandly on his rescuer, and went below to sleep off the affront to his dignity.

On June eleventh the Absolution rounded Cape Virgins and entered the Strait of Magellan to traverse the South American continent at its narrowest point and to cross from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean. Fitful rain-squalls from the northwest followed a northeast gale, and he reefed the sails, slipping below for a few hours' sleep--sleep, as it urned out, that was every bit as fitful as the rain drumming overhead and bounding off the deck house roof. When at last he'd given up trying to sleep and had decided he'd have to settle merely for resting his eyes, every sense seemed to come suddenly alert when he heard his name shouted in warning. He sprang to the deck, pulses racing, into the blackest of nights, eyes sweeping the horizon on all points. There, in the southwest, was the white arch of Cape Horn, rushing toward him at astounding speed. His heart leapt and he threw himself at the mast, dousing all sail and lashing it down as the gale hit. For thirty hours or more it continued, blowing hard, with the cutter carrying no more than minimal sail. It was enough, though, he thought wearily; otherwise they'd have been pushed right out of the Strait and had all the work to do again. MacLeod spent what was left of the night, the next morning, and the following day fighting the weather, dousing all sail whenever the squalls hit. The gale blew itself out sometime after midnight and turned into nothing more than a strong breeze. Wearier than he'd been in a very long time, MacLeod dropped the anchor and threw himself down on his bunk sopping wet, sitting upright in the corner. Vaguely, he wondered when he'd last slept. He glanced at his ship's clock: four a.m. That, minus twenty-four hours, and another six before that--he had to have dosed off around ten p.m. the night before, though it seemed much longer ago than that. He had to have been asleep, though--how else could he explain his name shouted aloud where there was no other soul alive?

MacLeod. Look up, MacLeod.

The following day he passed through the last of the narrows without incident, and on the fourteenth he cast anchor at Punta Arenas, a former coaling-station in Chile, alternately known as "Sandy Point." A fair wind drove him onward, but it was about this time he encountered his first williwaw.

Ludicrous name that it was, a williwaw was the local sailors' name for the local version of the terrific squalls that blew hereabouts. They were compressed gales of wind that poured over the land sporadically, making travel by sea miserable off and on. He'd heard that a full-blown williwaw could throw a ship bow over beam even without sail up, and was ready to believe it. Remembering the forty-foot wave that had already paid him that particular compliment, he pushed onward, making the best time he could to the Pacific. A week later, without so much as a bird in sight, he arrived at Cape Froward, notable primarily for being the southern-most point of the South American continent. Beyond Cape Froward was a cluster of islands that claimed allegiance to the mainland, but here the continent itself ran out, among them Coffee Island, named by Joshua Slocum, whose name his own Absolution had borne not so very long ago.

By daylight the next morning he was under way again, passing out of Fortescue Bay with a fair wind to Three Island Cove; he shipped beyond only to be driven back by yet another gale and anchored where he could, half convinced by now that it would have been just as easy to sail around the Cape. It took the better part of a day to make the eight mile trip to Notch Cove, where he'd been accustomed on the open sea to making 30 miles or more in the same time. He was exhausted by the time the cove came into view and he could drop anchor again, and glad for the chance after to ride at rest for a bit in good weather before leaving the desolate spot.

Past Notch Cove there was nothing new--just more days of sailing and anchoring, beating as often as not against the stubborn current, gaining a few miles at a time. He could feel the Pacific pulling at him, though, and knew at last that the weeks of effort hadn't been wasted. On the last day of June Absolution sailed from Port Tamar for Cape Pillar, with the wind from the northeast. She was rapidly approaching Cape Pillar's granite peaks and, at two p.m. by the ship's clock, MacLeod left the Strait of Magellan behind and plunged into the Pacific Ocean, with blue water ahead.

Chapter Seventeen

July 1999

"No," Joe Dawson said. "No, no, no, no, no. I don't care what they reported, they're wrong."

"Joe--"

"You know him, Zoll. Methos just doesn't go around killing people without a good reason."

"You mean Adam Pierson doesn't go around killing people without a good reason," Zoll said. "Adam Pierson, whom you've known--whom I've known--for about six years. What Methos does is quite a different matter."

"You make him sound like a split personality," Joe grumbled.

"I'm not so sure that's not a reasonable analogy," Zoll said. "Joe, the man is five thousand years old, for God's sake. You don't know him, you just think you do. Nobody knows him. He survives by compartmentalizing himself, and by only showing you what he wants you to see. What you want to see. And whatever name you call Methos, the face he shows you most of the time is Adam Pierson's. It's not real, Joe. It's a mask he puts on out of convenience, or out of habit, or out of courtesy for you. But it is a mask."

"She's right, Joe." It was Amy Thomas, leaning in the open doorway between her office and Zoll's. "You just don't want to admit it. Look--remember when Carole Marmion was killed?"

Dr. Zoll always made Amy feel like a college intern who was under dressed for a meeting with the boss, and Zoll wasn't even her boss. She had once been Adam Pierson's, though, and the sound of Zoll's heels tapping solidly across the bar's polished hardwood floor promised an interesting confrontation as she crossed the room to within inches of Adam's barstool.

"You unconscionable bastard," she said quite clearly.

"Me?" Methos asked. Predictably, as soon as she'd spoken his expression had gone from curiosity to something closer to amusement. "What did I do?" he asked.

"You know exactly what you did--"

Amy saw the slap coming, but so did Methos. Before either she or Joe could move, he'd caught Zoll's right forearm in his left hand, his right hand snatching the other arm automatically, long fingers wrapped around her wrist in an unbreakable grip. "Not a good idea, Doctor," he said levelly, eye to eye with Zoll. The woman had gone red in the face, her gasping breath--mixed with tears now, he could see clearly--coming in time with the exaggerated rise and fall of her chest. "I'm going to let you go now and you're going to step away," he said quietly, his tone completely devoid of the humor that had danced in it just a moment before.

Riveted on the scene, Amy swallowed self-consciously As harmless as "Adam Pierson" usually appeared, it never paid to forget how dangerous his alter ego was. As she watched, he kept his grip on Amy Zoll for an instant more, releasing her arms then with a slight backward push designed to put distance between them without throwing her off balance.

"You bastard," Zoll said.

"Yes, I think we've already established your opinion of me," Methos replied.

"Yeah," Joe said. "I remember." What he remembered in particular was that Methos--who had quite plainly been in "Adam Pierson" mode--had quickly become anything but "Adam Pierson." They were right, damn it. Methos did slip that mask on regularly, and he apparently did so because it was what good ol' Joe was accustomed to seeing and responding to. The hell of it was . . . well, he knew Methos did it for him, to make him feel comfortable, but Joe couldn't help smarting at the duplicity it implied. He remembered, too, that Zoll had accused Methos point blank that evening of stealing top secret computer files from the Watchers and arranging her secretary's hit-and-run death. The accusation had elicited a shocked protest from Amy Thomas, but Joe hadn't been able to think of any reason to automatically exonerate the Immortal.

"Methos?" Joe had said.

"What?" the Immortal snapped, his irritation easily over-riding Amy's softer objection. "You want me to account for my whereabouts, Joe?" he'd demanded. "You think I need an alibi?" His almost-sneer, though, had been aimed not at Joe but at Zoll. "Believe me, if I wanted someone dead a car wouldn't be my weapon of choice. And the police wouldn't have notified you about it, Dr. Zoll, because they wouldn't know a damned thing about it."

It reminded him that he'd been thinking pretty much along these lines himself on the night that Methos had disappeared. Joe had met Ian Lane in Chartres, and--as usual--his reputation had preceded him to the point that Lane had asked, "But you are Joe Dawson? I mean, I've heard about you and . . . and MacLeod, of course. And now you head the Methos Chronicles."

Hesitantly, Joe had nodded, and Lane had gone on, saying, "Then he really exists."

"Oh, yeah," Joe had agreed wearily. "He definitely exists."

After a while, Joe had just come out with it and told Lane that he needed him to get him into the Septaguent's meeting. Lane had hesitated, wanting to know if Methos was hunting John the Revelator, whom Lane watched.

"You mean headhunting?" Joe had asked, saying almost instantly: "No--that's not his style."

At the same time he remembered being less than sure just what Methos' "style" really was. He remembered he'd begun noticing a real change in Methos about the time the oldest Immortal had eliminated Morgan Walker from the Game. There was no question that the Methos he'd watched calmly stalk and kill Walker's men was very different from the man he'd come to think of as Methos in the three years before that time. He was so different, in fact, that Joe had begun to wonder just how well either he or MacLeod had known the old man in the first place. Ironic, now, to remember thinking that he'd long ago accepted the idea that the man he'd known for ten years as Adam Pierson had been a convenient facade. Had he accepted it? Or had he only thought he'd accepted it? He'd known intellectually, at least, that there was no "Adam Pierson." Yet--Methos had played Adam Pierson and seemed so comfortable in the role . . . . That was it, of course--Joe had been so comfortable with thinking of Methos and Adam Pierson as the same person that he'd let himself forget there was very definitely a difference between the two. He'd just assumed that the things he'd liked and trusted in Adam must also be present in Methos. The soft-spoken, bookish graduate student had turned out to be a shrewd, cynical, even pigheaded loner with a sometimes venomous wit who apparently needed no one--

No, Joe thought. That's not true. Methos had extended himself to Joe numerous times, and he'd put himself at risk for Duncan MacLeod half a dozen times that Joe knew of. And he was apparently doing exactly that one more time. And why was that, anyway? Joe wondered. Why would one Immortal willingly and repeatedly help another when the norm among their kind was quite the opposite? He knew MacLeod and Methos were friends--in fact, virtually everything Methos had ever done demonstrated that he enjoyed talking to Duncan MacLeod and spending time with him. Even when he was laughing at MacLeod "tussling on the horns of one of his moral dilemmas," it was evident that Methos only wished MacLeod well. Radically different personalities shaped in different times by different circumstances, yes. They were undoubtedly that. But the fact was, Methos had come out of his shell as a result of being around MacLeod, and he'd become involved in the world he'd been content merely to observe for so long. And MacLeod? After sustaining so many losses over the last several years, MacLeod had found in Methos the one man who might reasonably know and understand what the Highlander was experiencing. He'd found the one person who might reasonably guide him through the times to come. In short, he'd found a teacher.

"Joe?" It was Amy Zoll, and Joe looked across the desk at her, realizing he'd been lost in his own thoughts. Amy Thomas was there, too, his Amy. His daughter, who might also have died, but for Methos.

"Look," Joe said slowly. "I'd be the first to concede that Methos isn't an easy person to know. You're right, Amy--he does hold people at a distance, most of them quite deliberately. And you're right, too, that it's an error to think of Methos as Adam Pierson. Maybe he does put that face on for me, but it isn't deceit. It's habit. It's an identify he and I are both comfortable with, and to an extent, I think it's him. Maybe it's a vulnerable side of him that he's unable to show any other way, or a much younger version of himself he only dimly remembers. I don't know that a bevy of psychiatrists could say with any certainty, because there are layers and layers to the man. But I do know this: Methos has never hurt me in any way that mattered. Oh, he can be brutal even to his friends--sometimes especially to his friends--but that's just Methos being Methos."

"And exactly which Methos was it who killed the Watcher in Rio?" Amy Zoll asked.

"I don't believe Methos would kill a Watcher if he could avoid it," Joe said. "And believe me--Methos is damned good at avoiding anything he doesn't want to do."

"I've got the report, Joe." Zoll tapped the paper in front of her. "This . . . Juan Bartolo challenged him. The same Juan Bartolo who had the run in with MacLeod--"

"Assuming it was MacLeod."

"Yes," she conceded, "assuming it was MacLeod. And Methos took his head."

"It's what they do, Amy," Joe said quietly.

"All right," she said. "All right. Maybe I am putting too much emphasis on the beheading. It is, as you say, what they do--all part of the Game, and Bartolo challenged Methos, not the other way around. Not to mention the fact that Bartolo was apparently a regular scum bucket, and no one seems to regret his passing in the least. But the girl, Joe! She wasn't even twenty-five! Are you going to tell me--"

"She was killed with Bartolo's sword," Joe said. "For all we know, Bartolo killed her. She was his watcher. At a guess, he found out who and what she was. It wouldn't be the first time."

"The man I had on Methos said specifically that he heard voices in the warehouse after the quickening--Bartolo's quickening. He wasn't close enough to tell what was said, but he reported seeing Bartolo's watcher close and bolt the warehouse door when Methos went inside. She opened the door and slipped inside a few minutes later, and then he saw the quickening. That left Methos and the girl in the warehouse alone, Joe. Now, you tell me what other conclusion I'm to come to."

"Maybe you should ask Methos the next time you see him."

"Revisionist history?" Zoll snapped. "Why don't we just let him write his own Chronicles, then?"

"Better yet," Joe said, "why don't we just record our assumptions, without any fact to justify the interpretation of events?"

"Is that any worse than automatically recording his version of things?" she asked. "Joe, I think you're letting friendship get in the way here."

"Look!" Joe snapped, pushing up out of the chair. He stared down at Zoll, seated behind her desk, then glanced at Amy, realizing he'd let himself be goaded precisely when he couldn't afford to be. "Look," he repeated, his voice much quieter. "You're entitled to your opinion, Dr. Zoll, but as long as I'm in charge of the Methos Chronicles you're to record the facts on this event, and only the facts." He took a breath. "You can, of course, append a list of possible interpretations to the incident, but make sure they're clearly labeled as possibilities only."

"As long as I'm also free to report my interpretation of events to the First Tribunal," Zoll said.

He held her eyes for a moment and shook his head. "You have that right as a watcher," he said tiredly. "Before you do, though, I'd advise you to be sure it's worth wasting their time over."

"You consider accuracy in the Methos Chronicles a waste of time?"

"No, of course not. I just think this is--"

"What?" she demanded.

"Hey, guys." Amy Thomas, of course. "Don't you think this is getting a bit out of hand? You do both have the same goal, you know."

It was enough to stop them, with Joe standing there, staring at the edge of Zoll's desk and Zoll staring at Amy Thomas. After a moment Zoll blinked and said, "You're right, of course. I'm sorry, Joe. I owe you an apology."

"Yeah, me too," Joe mumbled. "Just be fair when you make the report, okay? Try to remember that he's not John the Baptist and you're not Herodias' daughter." He looked at his wristwatch and said, "Hey, I'm sorry, but I've got to run. We'll talk later, all right?"

"Yeah, later, Joe," Amy Thomas said.

A moment later he'd made his way down the stairs and Amy Thomas turned back to look at Amy Zoll. "All right," she said. "John the Baptist I know. Who was Herodias' daughter?"

A crooked smile quirked Amy Zoll's mouth. "Herodias' daughter," she repeated. "It's in the New Testament. After she danced for King Herod, he promised her anything she wanted."

"And?"

"She asked for the head of John the Baptist," Zoll said drily. "On a platter."

"And did she get it?" Amy asked.

Zoll smiled. "Ask Methos the next time you see him," she suggested. "I'm sure he's at least familiar with the story."

Chapter Eighteen

July 1999

Fifteen days after he first broached the Pacific, MacLeod sighted Juan Fernando, also called Robinson Crusoe Island. From as far off as thirty miles away he could make out the island's blue hills, but the wind was light enough throughout the day that Absolution did not reach the island until nightfall. What wind there was carried the boat into the shore on the northeast side, where the wind fell off and remained calm all night. MacLeod could hear the sea booming against the cliffs and realized the ocean swell was still there to be felt, although from Absolution's deck the current looked gentle enough. There was the cry of birds throughout the night as well, sounding fainter and fainter toward midnight, so he judged that the current must be drifting the cutter slightly away from the land. A time or two during the night he was up and stirring on deck, restless, and concerned that the Absolution was too near the shore; in the end, though, he was convinced it was merely that the island sat so high in the water, making appearances deceptive from the sea. Finally, he switched the cabin light on and stretched out on his bunk with a copy not of Defoe's Robinson Crusoe, but with a reprint of Captain Woodes Rogers' book, A Voyage Around the World, one of the sources Defoe had used in the creation of his fictional character. There, he read of his fellow Scot, Alexander Selkirk:

"He had with him his clothes and bedding, with a firelock, some powder, bullets and tobacco, a hatchet, a knife, a kettle, a Bible, some practical pieces, and his mathematical instruments and books. He diverted and provided for himself as well as he could, but for the first eight months had to bear up against melancholy, and the terror of being left alone in such a desolate place . . . "

Eight months. It was that and more, now, since he'd left Paris and his friends behind, he realized. Still, he'd diverted and provided for himself as well as he could. And the terror of being left alone in such a desolate place? Unlike Selkirk, his desolate place had no geographic boundaries. His desolate place was one of self-imposed isolation and memory as inescapable as the past.

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine."

"You don't have to be."

"Tessa, he's dead and there's nothing I can do to bring him back. What else is there to say?"

"You don't have to say anything. I just want you to let yourself mourn."

"I've buried more friends than I can count, Tess. Death is part of my life."

"Not his death."

Darius. They'd been speaking of Darius, he remembered, not Richie. He and Tessa, sitting together in the dark on the deck of the barge, talking of Darius while the Seine rose in its ever gentle swell beneath them. Tessa. October 23, 1993. Six years gone and the wound still bled.

I close my eyes . . . only for a moment, and the moment's gone. . . .

Tessa had been killed in a senseless mugging that had gone wrong, dying in a Seacouver street for what? Because she didn't have a purse on her when some hopped up kid with a gun demanded money. And Richie. Richie had died that night, too, but he had been Immortal. He had revived. He had lived, and Mac had choked back a resentment that could never be expressed, but which he knew Richie sensed anyway. Richie had lived until MacLeod had taken his head. May 19, 1997.

"Please," MacLeod had whispered. His voice had been hoarse as he held the katana out to Methos, begging for death.

And Methos had turned his back on him. "Absolutely not," he'd said.

He'd killed his own student, the one person in the world he thought of as his son, and he had turned to Methos for judgment. And Methos had turned his back on him. Methos. Oldest of the old. The one man who had any right in the world--

"Of course you accept me as an authority figure," he remembered Methos snapping at him waspishly. "It's that damned clan mentality of yours." They'd been . . . where? Paris. Standing on the bridge overlooking the marina at Bassin de l'Arsenal, and Methos had been pissed over something or other, despite a good lunch at L'Oulette. "God, MacLeod," he'd growled. "When are you going to figure out that I'm not some all-knowing wise man sent from above for your exclusive enlightenment? And if you are going to listen to me, why do you insist on listening at the wrong time?"

It was true, naturally. Despite all the razzing and sniping he and Joe put the old man through, MacLeod did have a tendency to see Methos as an authority figure. Of course, it was hard not to, given that the man was five thousand years old.

"And when I refused to judge you," Methos had said, "you judged yourself."

Another time altogether, after Methos had killed Warren Cochrane, and MacLeod remembered the surprise--no, the shock that he'd felt. "But you said--"

"I said that I wouldn't judge you, and I didn't."

"But I killed him," Mac remembered saying. "I killed my own student."

"And you found yourself guilty," Methos said, "and you gave yourself the same sentence you'd imposed on Warren Cochrane--life with the knowledge of what you'd done, never to be forgotten or forgiven."

He remembered standing and turning his back on Methos. The street lamps had come on, their reflections rippling with the water when he turned back, swimming, too, in the tears that stood in his eyes. Methos had risen, too, and was standing with his hands shoved casually in his jeans pockets, elbows pushing his coat back in a familiar posture. Mac swallowed, finally asking in a strained voice, "Was I wrong?"

"Richie's death was an accident, Mac," Methos had said. "At some level you have to know that."

He did know it, of course, but he didn't know how to put an end to the self-loathing he felt. Unbidden, Betty Bannen's words came back to him: "Healing has its own time to keep. The calendar was made for other things." Had the wound gone so deep that the healing process itself would do irreparable damage? For some reason, it sounded like something Methos would say, and MacLeod snorted, sitting upright. Blinking, MacLeod realized he'd dosed, dreaming, and the open book lay in his lap, untouched for hours.

"He built two huts with pimento trees, covered them with long grass, and lined them with the skins of goats, which he killed with his own gun as he wanted, so long as the powder lasted, which was but a pound; and that being almost spent he got fire by rubbing two sticks of pimento wood together upon his knee. . . .

"After he had conquered his melancholy, he diverted himself sometimes with cutting his name on trees, and of the time of his being left, and continuance there. He was at first much pestered with cats and rats that bred in great numbers from some of each species which had got ashore from ships that put in there for wood and water. The rats gnawed his feet and clothes whilst asleep, which obliged him to cherish the cats with his goats' flesh, by which so many of them became so tame, that they would lie about in hundreds, and soon delivered him from the rats."

Cats, he thought suddenly. And then, what time was it, anyway? The cats were more regular than clockwork in their demands for food. The fact that they had not yet disturbed him meant it wasn't six yet. That being the case, it took him a moment longer to figure out why it was so light if it wasn't six o'clock, only then noticing that he'd left the cabin light on and slept despite it.

"He likewise tamed some kids; to divert himself, [and] would now and then sing and dance with them and his cats; so that by the favor of providence, and the vigor of his youth, being now but thirty years old, he came, at last, to conquer all the inconveniences of his solitude, and to be very easy."

Selkirk had been in the vigor of his youth, "but thirty years old." Compared to most of the people he knew, MacLeod felt as old as the sea itself these days. There were times, though, when Methos made him feel like a kid, untried and untutored, as brash as Richie had ever been--but then, that was natural, wasn't it, considering he was ten times Mac's age? Ten times. God, it was staggering. Methos, he realized abruptly, was ten times as old as he was, just as he was ten times older than Joe Dawson was. The difference was that Joe Dawson probably had twenty or thirty years of mortal life left to him. Methos, on the other hand, showed every sign of going on indefinitely. World without end, forever. Amen.

"So, what?" he'd raged at Methos. "You want me to plead temporary insanity? You think I should find myself not guilty by reason of mental defect? Richie isn't any less dead because I didn't mean to do it. I killed him, Methos!"

"Yes, you did. Just like Warren Cochrane killed his student."

"So add that to my crimes! You said it yourself: I set myself up as judge and jury. I wanted Cochrane to suffer lifelong for what he'd done--well, he did that, didn't he? He lost his home, his friends, the woman he loved, possibly even his mind. He became a fugitive wanted for murder. He became a murderer, Methos--in the end he was nothing like the man I'd known or the friend I'd loved. And it might all have been avoided if I'd tried to understand--"

He knew. Looking at him, watching Methos just stand there, so still in that maddening way he had, Mac knew that Methos understood the helplessness, the frustration, the fury. He understood the need to cry to heaven, even when heaven held no answer. Somehow, knowing that helped, at least a little. I'm just a guy, Joe, he'd said a dozen times. Yeah, right. A guy who was 5,000 years old. "Been there, done that" took on a whole different meaning around Methos.

Mac took a step forward. "Why'd you kill Cochrane?" he asked, and he'd seen the answer in the other man's face--the real answer, 'Because I wasn't sure you could bear the consequences of having to do it yourself,' despite the easy lie Methos had offered, saying only, "Because it had to be done." And he'd watched Methos watching him, making sure he worked it out, calculating the meaning of a dozen warring emotions flickering nearly imperceptibly across his face in the time it took brown eyes to meet hazel.

And, in the end, Mac had nodded. He had no doubt Cochrane would have taken his head on holy ground that morning if Methos hadn't stumbled into the trap instead, and there was little doubt that Cochrane had been unstable--torching the barge was, perhaps, understandable, but killing a mortal had been . . . Mac swallowed. The word "unforgivable" hovered in his mind.

Mac walked down the steps to the water's edge and sat again, Methos joining him after a moment. They sat together while Methos finished his second beer and Mac made silent headway on the whisky. Eventually, Methos bundled his empties back into the plastic bag and MacLeod found himself smiling, secretly amused. Methos the good citizen, he thought. No littering allowed, despite the collection of bottle caps the ancient Immortal habitually--annoyingly--deliberately--tossed behind MacLeod's refrigerator. There's probably a deposit on the bottles, he thought. He had a cartoon image of Methos suddenly, rich as Midas, gleefully stacking the coins he'd collected over the years from countless returned beer bottles. He grinned in the dark and stretched one leg, prodding Methos with his foot. "So what are you telling me?" he asked. "Judge not that ye be not judged?"

"You do know that's an incomplete translation, don't you?" Methos asked, the suggestion of a smile shaping his lips. "It's supposed to be 'Judge not unrighteously, that ye be not judged.'" Mac said nothing, but merely sat there, looking at him. "There's another one I really like," Methos said. "'I, the Lord, will forgive whom I will forgive, but of you it is required to forgive all men.' I've always liked to think that extends to forgiving yourself, as well as others."

"That's not--"

"Yeah, I know. It got left out when they translated the original Hebrew into Greek. Pity."

Funny, how he'd thought at the time that he'd worked it through and understood everything. Of course, he'd thought the same about his role as the millennial champion. The more he'd hated Ahriman for what he'd done--for what he'd made him do--the stronger the demon had become. The more he hated, the more he had been lost. The true answer to the destruction of evil, he'd learned, was peace. He had finally figured out that he could only defeat the demon by rejecting all provocation to violence.

"You've avenged Richie's death," Joe had told him at the time. "Mac, you've defeated Ahriman. You are still Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod."

At the time, he'd believed him. He'd even begun carrying the katana again. He remembered Alex Raven; Willie Kingsley and Steve Banner; Kyra; Devon Marek; Armando Baptista and Katya; Reagan Cole and Brian Murphy--all the people he'd crossed paths with in the past year. Yes, he was still Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod, but in a very real way he'd come to understand that he'd never forgiven himself for Richie's death, despite Methos' urging.

"So, nice day for it," Methos had said conversationally. He'd stepped deliberately into MacLeod's path on a walkway at the Luxembourg Gardens, unerringly intercepting the Highlander on his way to fight Steven Keane. "You know--not too cold . . . the ground's nice and dry."

"Amanda's got a big mouth," MacLeod said.

" Well, she's worried about you."

"Yeah?" MacLeod shot back. "And you?"

"Oh, me? No. Just scholarly interest. I just came by to watch the perfect Immortal die."

"I'm not!" MacLeod snapped.

"Not what?" Method demanded. "Not the perfect Immortal, or not going to die?"

There really were times when Methos was just too much to bear. "Go away," MacLeod grumbled.

'Hey! We're none of us perfect, MacLeod. Not you, not me. Not even Darius. And for sure not your friend Steven Keane."

You should write fortune cookies."

"Yeah? Well, maybe I should. Just as long as I am not writing your epitaph." The bantering tone had changed then, and Methos had held his eyes. "What Keane hates you for happened," he'd said. "Nothing you do is going to change that. You accept it, MacLeod. It's part of who you are."

"Are we talking about me now?" MacLeod demanded, and for just an instant he'd seen a change in the other's eyes. Sharp dagger, that one. They both knew he was talking about the Horsemen, about Methos' own past and the lies between them, but it didn't deter the ancient Immortal.

"Yes," he'd said clearly. Then: "Do you remember what happened after Culloden?"

"Yeah," MacLeod said stubbornly. "I went after innocent men and slaughtered them."

"No," Methos said. "That's how Keane tells it. I want to know how you remember it, because they weren't innocent, were they? They were murderers. They were the English bastards who destroyed your people, and they deserved to die, all of them."

"Are you sure all of them did?" MacLeod asked.

"Well, you were," Methos snapped. "You wanted to kill, and you killed," he said. "Look--Keane's just like you. He wants to divide the world up into good and bad. Well, it's not that simple. We are all both. Good and evil. We have rage and compassion. We have love and hate. . . . Murder and forgiveness." He'd paused, letting the words sink in before asking, "Why don't you try forgiving yourself for once?"

"Why don't you try minding your own business for once? And tell Amanda to do the same." Despite his words, the anger had gone out of Mac. He knew the old man meant well despite his tendencies to butt in where he wasn't needed, and there was no denying the rough affection beneath his words. MacLeod knew a friend when he saw one. At the moment, it just happened that he didn't want to see him.

Odd, how clearly he remembered the next moment. Methos had smiled as if he'd expected nothing more or less from MacLeod, and then bowed mockingly, gesturing for MacLeod to go on his way. Yeah, right, MacLeod remembered thinking. Like I'm stupid enough to turn my back on you. He did turn his back on him, though, walking past him to the appointment he'd made with Keane.

"She can't say I didn't try," he remembered Methos saying. And then, of course, he had shot MacLeod in the back. "You are such a pain in the ass," he thought he'd heard Methos say just before everything went black.

He'd come to, face down on the gravel path, furious at Methos and without a doubt what the old man was up to. Katana firmly in hand, he'd charged through the gardens toward the sound of steel on steel, not in the least surprised to see Keane dead on the ground and Methos ready to behead the body.

"You do, and I'm next!" he'd shouted at Methos, and the ancient Immortal's shoulders had sagged.

"I am trying to save your head," he'd pointed out.

"I don't need your help!" MacLeod had shouted. Still, the Ivanhoe wavered, so he'd said the only thing he could. "You kill him and I swear it, Methos! You face me."

It was, in fact, the last thing in the world he wanted, and he remembered the disbelieving laugh, and then the look as Methos realized he was serious. The narrow mouth had quirked, and Methos had barked, "Fine! It's your funeral!" before sheathing his sword and walking away.

In the end, though, he hadn't killed Keane. They had managed to come to an agreement of sorts, and no one had died. Still, he'd meant it when he'd threatened Methos. He'd have taken Methos' head on the spot, killing a friend to save someone he himself planned to kill, knowing all the while that he'd have regretted it later, probably every bit as much as he regretted killing Richie. Not that Methos would have been any less dead, of course, but the point was . . . What? MacLeod wondered abruptly. The point was . . . that the guilt would have been his to bear, and not Methos'. Oh, yeah. That made sense. Two grown men, fighting for the right to carry the guilt for an action that shouldn't be committed in the first place.

I'm so tired of the killing. So tired of deciding who to kill.

MacLeod. Look up, MacLeod.

He did, and saw his katana in the rack he'd fixed for it above the bunk. Except to clean it occasionally, he hadn't touched it in over eight months; as a result it had taken on a largely decorative appearance in the small cabin. Laying the book aside, he stood and looked at the katana for a moment, studying the intricately carved dragon's head handle. For more than two hundred and twenty years MacLeod had used that same katana, and in a very real way it had become a part of him, as familiar to him as his own face.

It had killed Richie, he remembered. At best, though, that was a half-truth. In and of itself, the katana was an inanimate object, with no will of its own. In fact, the katana hadn't killed Richie. He had.

Chapter Nineteen

July 1999

"What happened to Richie?" he'd asked Fitzcairn.

"When you met him he was a tough kid from the streets who stole because it was easier than working for a living, and he liked the rush. He got busted and decided it was better to skip bail and vacation in Mexico than face three to five in jail for breaking and entering. Nothing much else changed, except the way he died the first time. And when he came back to life he didn't know what had happened to him, so he kept on running. At first it was from the police in the states, so he left the country, thinking he'd be safe. Then the Immortals came hunting. He ran from city to city, always wondering how they were able to find him. Richie still had no teacher. He had no idea what he was, or why people he had never known were trying to kill him. Methos became Richie's teacher, but he taught him a lot more than how to use a sword."

Methos, Mac thought. In the world Fitz had shown him--the world in which Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod had never existed--Methos had joined forces with Kronos. The Four Horsemen had ridden again and, as Fitz had said, "they made the Russian Mafia look like the Vienna Boys Choir."

"But Methos had changed," MacLeod remembered protesting.

"Well," Fitz said, "without you, he hadn't changed enough."

Methos had become Richie's teacher, and with Methos Richie had graduated from breaking and entering to a whole new range of illegal activities. Paris, 1995. Their Paris, he reminded himself, not his.

Richie walked into the room where Methos and Kronos stood waiting for him. "Done," he announced, swinging the briefcase he carried onto the table.

"Any problems?" Methos asked him, and Richie grinned.

"I didn't think a million bucks would be that heavy."

Kronos smiled, looking from Richie to Methos. "I think our friend is a quick learner," he'd said.

"Well," Methos said, "I always could spot potential."

"It's time, I think," Kronos said slowly, "for a little . . . test."

Methos lifted one expressive eyebrow. "Dawson, d'you think?" he asked.

"Whoa--who's Dawson?" Richie asked, looking from one to the other.

"He's one of the bastards who killed our brothers, Caspian and Silas." It was Kronos who answered, his voice gruff. Kronos, whom even Methos deferred to, which made him someone of great importance in Richie's eyes.

"Hey--whatever you want," he said. "I'm your man."

"We want him dead," Methos said.

To his credit, though, Richie hadn't been able to kill Dawson.

"I'm sorry," Richie said. "I tried. I couldn't do it."

"Not a problem," Kronos said as the car came to a stop. Then, to Methos, "Let's do it."

"What's going on?" Richie asked.

"It's a reckoning," Kronos said.

"Oh--come on, man. Just give me another chance."

"You're just not the man for the job, Richie," Methos said calmly.

"I'll blow town, man, I swear." Richie's eyes were enormous, the fear plain in his voice. "You won't even know I exist."

"How true," Kronos said on a chuckle.

"No weak links," Methos said. One hand on Richie's shoulder, he pushed the young Immortal to his knees beneath the trees.

"Oh, Methos--please. I thought we were friends."

"We are friends," Methos said. He patted Richie's cheek, a twinkle in the hazel eyes. "Good-bye, my friend."

Richie's life had ended on a hoarse scream, cut off--literally--by the stroke of a sword. Methos' sword.

"That son of a bitch," MacLeod had said. "Where is he, Fitz?"

Frustrated, Fitzcairn looked at him. "When will you get it through your thick head," he asked, "that you can't make a difference here?"

"Fitz, where is he?"

"Don't blame me!" Fitz sputtered. "I'm only the messenger! You can't change anyone's fate, MacLeod," he reminded him. "If you've got a problem, take it up with the front office."

"You take me to him," MacLeod said, "and you take me to him now."

He had, in the end, of course, since that was what happened in dreams, and it had been MacLeod's dream. He'd found himself in an observatory of some sort, an enormous circular dome that had once been fitted with an astronomical telescope, and there he'd faced Kronos . . . and Methos.

He'd never forget the look on that face, so lean, so angular, as Methos stared at him, assessing him as an opponent in a look as sharp and familiar as the broadsword he carried.

"I'm Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod," he'd said, and Methos had looked him up and down.

"Never heard of you" he said as he slammed into him without hesitation, his broadsword crashing down on MacLeod's own.

Eventually Methos pulled the main gauche he had hidden at the small of his back, but MacLeod had almost been expecting it. "I've seen that one before," he said, slashing brutally across Methos' exposed left forearm, severing muscles and nerves so he was forced to drop the dagger.

"Kill him!" Joe Dawson shouted. "Kill that bastard!"

Angered now and in pain, Methos aimed a vicious right-handed swipe at MacLeod, but the Highlander dropped low, under the blade, and cut Methos across the abdomen. Methos dropped to his knees, cradling his wounded arm against his belly. Knowing it was over but still playing for time, he shouted one last demand at his killer: "What are you?"

"The ghost of Christmas Past," MacLeod responded.

In one last effort, Methos threw himself half sideways, striking at MacLeod with the last of his strength, but MacLeod blocked the strike easily enough, feeling the impact of steel on steel reverberate up his bent arms. He spun, the sword raised, and felt the momentary resistance as the sword's cutting edge swiped through the other man's neck, severing the head from the body. The body dropped heavily to the floor, the broadsword dropping as well, and there was . . .

Nothing.

No sword, no body, no severed head, no quickening.

It had never happened.

Fitzcairn stood a little ways off from him, hands shoved deep into his pockets, watching MacLeod stare in mystification around him.

"So this is the world without Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod," Fitz had said clearly. "Amanda's dead. Joe's about to die. Tessa will drift into bitterness, facing a life without passion. Richie Ryan lived and died a thief." He smiled. "And me? I missed out on almost three centuries of living. Now, that's an awful lot of unhappy women."

It was so like him, MacLeod had to laugh. "Ah, Fitz, I've missed you," he said fondly.

"Not half as much as I've missed you, laddie," Fitz said. "But it's time for you to go home now. There's places to go."

"Places to go," Mac agreed, nodding slightly.

"And friends that need you," Fitz added.

"Yeah," MacLeod said. "I guess. Good-bye, Fitz."

They threw their arms around each other for a moment, and when they parted Fitz gave him a scolding look. "Now you make sure it's a long time before you darken my doorstep again," Fitz told him. "D'you hear me?"

MacLeod smiled. "I hear you," he'd said, but already it had been fading, so he was only half sure he'd heard correctly when Fitz spoke again.

"MacLeod. Look up, MacLeod."

"What?"

"Look up, you silly mug," Fitz's voice had said.

And he'd found himself flat on his back and staring up at Methos--his Methos--alive and well and looking more than a bit exasperated with him, which had seemed natural enough somehow, and then he'd snatched the front of Methos' coat, demanding, "Where am I?"

"What?"

"Where am I?" he'd repeated impatiently.

"You're in Paris," Methos said. "I just saved your life. I had to get you shot to do it, but you have to take the rough with the smooth--"

"We were fighting, you and I," Mac said. "You killed Richie, and then Joe--"

"What are you babbling about?" Methos asked, but it was clear he'd already written it off as a fantasy or fainting dream. He hauled Mac to his feet and pushed him forward, down the tunnel so they could regroup to face O'Rourke's men and rescue Joe and Amanda.

Had he dreamed it, or had it been real? MacLeod had wondered a hundred times since then, but in the end it didn't much matter. He'd faced O'Rourke, defeating him one on one. The quickening, he remembered, had seemed to go on and on, far longer than he'd have guessed, surrounding him in a storm of crackling blue and white electricity and sparking enough fires to warm a pyromaniac's heart. He remembered Amanda running to him at the end of it, kneeling beside him.

"I thought I'd lost you," she'd whispered.

He'd managed something like a smile for her, his head on her shoulder as he answered, "Never." A moment later he'd been aware of Joe and Methos beside them, and he'd gotten to his feet. "Never again," he said, and with that he'd walked away from them, wearier than he'd been in a very long time.

It hadn't ended there, of course. They'd met at the barge the next evening, in sight of Notre Dame, and Methos had produced a bottle of expensive champagne. "To good friends," he'd said simply.

He knows, MacLeod thought. Methos had been the one he'd most dreaded seeing, dreaded trying to reach a sense of closure with, but the old man had simply looked at him, watching him with Joe and Amanda, consciously making a memory for himself of each of them that night. There'd come a moment while Joe and Amanda were talking about something, though, and MacLeod had walked over to Methos.

"You know," he said, "I don't know who or what you are, Methos, and I know you don't want to hear this; but you did teach me something. You taught me that life is about change. It's about learning to accept who you are, good or bad, and I thank you for that."

Sometime later in the evening he'd managed a moment alone with Joe, and he could picture him still, standing in front of the port hole.

"I can't imagine my life without you, Mac," Joe said. "Fact is, I don't want to." Not used to expressing his emotions, he'd gripped
MacLeod's shoulder through the white, roll-neck sweater and let his hand slide down Mac's strong right arm, clasping him just above the elbow.

Mac's throat had constricted, making speech impossible for a moment, and he'd pulled Joe into a brief but powerful hug--the only hug he could recall them ever sharing.

And, still later, he'd put his arms around Amanda's waist and looked down at her.

"I love you," he'd said.

"Really?" she'd asked, sounding so much like a little girl that he had to smile.

"Yeah," he said. "You make my heart glad. You always have."

They'd talked for a few hours of triflings, the four of them, and Amanda had left around eleven to catch the red-eye to Cairo. It was midnight when Joe said he, for one, had a bar to open the next day, and not surprisingly, Methos volunteered to give him a ride home.

"See you, Mac," Joe had called, and MacLeod's response had been routine and automatic.

"G'night, Joe."

He watched Methos pulling on his coat and thought for a moment the old man was going to say something. The possibilities teased the edges of his mind, and he imagined Methos saying something monumental. Something profound, and appropriate for a leave taking. Something--

"See you, Mac."

MacLeod smiled. "See you, Methos," he said.

Chapter Twenty

July 1999

His first day in harbor he found himself among a fleet of lobster boats anchored close to shore. Heading into town around noon, he found the town--village, really--reminded him of a sleeping Mexican village baking in midday heat, the pace slow and unhurried, with few people about. On Robinson Crusoe island, though, the weather that day was cold and windy, with heavy clouds gathering overhead. The name of the village, he learned for the asking, was San Juan Bautista; the harbor he'd nosed into during the night was called Cumberland Bay. Despite the rain, his curiosity took him wandering, and for the rest of the day he walked and meditated along the interminable paths that laced the island--paths traced by the footprints of men, since the only vehicle on the island appeared to be the mail jeep. It was a place that was fresh and clean, the skies uncontaminated. It was, in its own way, invigorating, and the ocean surrounding the island sparkled like daylight stars.

A cluster of ramshackle huts crowded the narrow shore and clung precariously to the mountainside that rose 3,000 feet above the sea. The mountainside itself was lost in a tangled swarm of guayaba and chanta trees; somewhere, too, there was eucalyptus--he could smell its dried, musty scent on the breeze. Waterfalls decorated the steep mountains, their trickles changed into raging torrents during the frequent rainfalls, sweeping rocks and trees down the mountains with a force that could be destructive. When the rain stopped, hummingbirds darted in and out of the bush and a bird he'd never seen before skimmed the dark green tree tops. When he asked its name, one of the villagers waiting for the daily bread delivery from the island bakery told him they were "los fardeles." He grinned, showing the gaps where several missing teeth should have been, when MacLeod repeated the name, and nodded. "Si. Los fardeles," he repeated.

He spent the night on board the Absolution, and the next day toward midmorning he set out for "el mirador"--the lookout point where Selkirk had watched and waited for rescue all those years. Dozens of trails crisscrossed the mountainside, making navigation difficult; footing, too, was difficult on the rocky face of the mountain, requiring his attention to avoid a nasty fall. The grade was steeper than he'd imagined it would be, but eventually he saw the sign: "Marauder del Selkirk, 2500 meters." He pushed on to the small shrine and plaque adorning the lookout.

In Memory

of

Alexander Selkirk,

Mariner,

A native of Largo, in the county of Fife, Scotland, who lived on this island in complete solitude for four years and four months. He was landed from the Cinque Ports galley, 96 tons, 18 guns, A.D. 1704, and was taken off in the Duke, privateer, 12th February, 1709. He died Lieutenant of H.M.S. Weymouth, A.D. 1723, aged 47. This tablet is erected near Selkirk's lookout, by Commodore Powell and the officers of H.M.S. Topazes, A.D. 1868.

MacLeod sat lingering for a while, arms wrapped loosely around his knees as he looked out to sea, puzzling over what life must have been like for his fellow Scot so many years ago. 1705 to 1709, he thought. For over four years, Selkirk had watched and waited, looking out to sea, making the same hike MacLeod had just made, possibly on a daily basis. Mac closed his eyes, leaning his head back until it touched the sign behind him. What had he been doing in 1705? Forty years before Culloden; fifteen years before he let that idiot Fitzcairn talk him into trying to steal the Crown Jewels from the Tower of London. He grinned, remembering, and then shook his head. God, had he ever really been that young?

Early the next morning, after a breakfast of hard rolls, jam, and coffee, he wandered into the village again. In the distance he could see a white steeple and cross; curious, he wandered in that direction, soon coming abreast of a Pentecostal church. Beyond that was the village cemetery behind a low fence; what caught he eye was one of the grave sites, painted a stark, brilliant white, with an anchor at the foot of the tombstone and a circular lifebuoy on top. There, too, was a brass plaque in severe need of polishing. He had to look closely to read the epitaph in German, but when he deciphered it he realized it commemorated three crew members of the German battleship Dresden. With his curiosity throughly aroused, he walked to the church doors and, finding them open, walked inside. In a tiny office inside, he found the church custodian, who was happy enough to explain, in Spanish, that Cumberland Bay had been the site of a long forgotten sea battle during the First World War. With MacLeod at his side, the custodian walked a bit further up the road, pointing out the sign that told the story. Above the sign, the overhanging cliff was pockmarked with numerous large shell holes, one with an unexploded eight inch shell still in place, its back sticking out of the mountainside.

The man explained that the German cruiser Dresden had been caught by a British fleet at Cumberland Bay while it was repairing previous battle damage. Recognizing he was trapped, the commander of the German ship had blown his ship up to avoid capture by the enemy. Three men had survived the initial explosion, only to die several days later; the villagers had given them an honorable, Christian burial. Under the right conditions, the custodian told Mac, you could still see the Dresden not far from shore, lying under 180 feet of water.

"Es verdad?" MacLeod asked, and the man grinned hugely.

"Si, senor. Verdad."

Later that day MacLeod moved the Absolution, following the custodian's recommendation, to a spot in the bay where it was said one could
see the Dresden when the waters were clear. He counted himself lucky the next morning, shortly after sun up, when the clouds that had lingered for the last several days were gone and the waters lost the murky, storm-tossed look the usual undertow normally gave them. After feeding the cats, MacLeod stripped down to a pair of cut-off jeans and pulled on the swim flippers and diving mask he'd bought in Gibraltar. He couldn't actually dive down 180 feet, of course, but with the mask and attached snorkel he could swim over and around the area for a sustained period of time and see what could be seen. It was enough for his purposes, and the swim made a nice change of pace from his wanderings about the island over the last several days. He planned to move the boat yet again the next day, to the seldom-used anchorage west of Cumberland Bay--Robinson Crusoe Bay by name, and separated from his present location by a dozen miles and a prominent outcropping of land. It was there, he'd been told, that he would find the cave Selkirk had lived in when he'd first come to the island. The cave was, of course, the main reason MacLeod had come to the island in the first place. When that bit of sight-seeing was done, he planned to refill his fresh water stores and sail north again, headed for the Galapagos this time. He wasn't in such a hurry, though, that he couldn't afford a morning's snorkeling in hope of seeing the wreck of the Dresden.

He let himself into the water off the boat's stern, taking a moment to get used to the cold water. He could feel the undertow, but it didn't worry him much since he would be staying near the surface; enjoying the bobbing waves around him, he struck out leisurely, swimming toward the spot his guide had indicated yesterday. Perhaps ten minutes later he thought he glimpsed something in the waters below him. Treading water for a moment, he rinsed out his diving mask and adjusted it over his face, tugging the rubber straps tight. That done, he took a deep breath, pushing himself up in the water and then diving under. The sea closed over him, the pressure making itself felt in his ears, and he scoured the seascape beneath him for the glint that had originally caught his attention.

There--trailing seaweed waved like a flag from what appeared to be a manmade structure. Yes, he was sure of it now. Kicking strongly, he dove deeper, feeling the increased pressure, fighting against the salt water's natural buoyant quality, pushing himself further down. He saw it, then--as advertised, a World War I cruiser, or what was left of it after eighty-five years, rested at an angle on the bottom of the bay. It had been deliberately scuttled by the captain, and had apparently broken clean in half about midships; the bay wasn't particularly deep, though, so the halves hadn't floated more than eight or ten feet apart as they sank. Little wonder, he thought, that some of the crew had survived the explosion; if they'd been thrown clear of the decks, there was no reason at all that the villagers couldn't have reached them even in fishing and row boats.

Intrigued, he let himself float over the area slowly, kicking occasionally but satisfied, for the most part, with allowing the sea to push him here and there as he surveyed the wreck, imagining what it must have been like on that day in 1915. Floating gently over the Dresden, he exhaled slowly, letting his store of air escape gradually through the snorkel's mouthpiece. For a moment he longed for a scuba tank and the right gear to really explore the wreck. Mentally he shrugged off the thought: He could always return to the island another time and mount a scuba exploration if he wanted to. It was silly, though, to let such thoughts interfere with his enjoyment of the time he had in this place, at this moment. Satisfied for the moment and feeling the burning start in his oxygen-deprived lungs, he forced the last of his breath out through the snorkel as he let himself rise slowly topside. Releasing the snorkel's mouthpiece, he broke the water's surface, ready to draw a breath and reorient himself to his position as he treaded water before diving again. What he was not prepared for was the wave of Immortal presence that met him, like a ringing of cymbals from across the water.

Damn, MacLeod thought. He'd been caught like an infant, in the worst place possible, with his katana on board the Absolution. As for his chances of reaching it--he forced himself to hold as still as possible, still treading water, and focused on the scene around him. He'd anchored the Absolution several hundred yards from shore the night before, anticipating this morning's dive. While he could see the thirty or so boats of the village fishing fleet in miniature in the distance, he'd have been hard pressed to recognize anyone on board them even if he'd been on the island long enough to make friends with the taciturn villagers. With the wind against him as well, he stood little chance of attracting attention by shouting, and any attempt to wave would probably be greeted as just that--a casual, friendly wave. More, any shouting would no doubt attract attention from unwanted sources . . .

Given the distance of the fishing fleet from him, there was only one possible conclusion: The ring of presence he was sensing was coming from his boat, and that meant whoever was aboard the Absolution most likely had the katana. And if he could sense them, of course, they could no doubt sense him and knew precisely the disadvantage he was at. Damn, damn, and double damn.

All right, think, damn it . . . . Near the Absolution's bow there was a dinghy or rowboat that hadn't been there before, evidence, no doubt, of how his unexpected company had arrived. Frustrated, MacLeod glanced at the Absolution's stern, contemplating the rope he'd attached there as a trail line. It was slimed over with the gatherings of a thousand or more miles of trailing in the ocean, though, and he'd been telling himself for a month now that he needed to replace it. Otherwise, he might find himself overboard and in need of it sometime, only to find it impossible to grip and use to haul himself onboard again. In addition, there was the fact that his weight on the rope would be more than sufficient warning to anyone onboard they were about to have company even if his own radiating presence wasn't enough advanced warning for another Immortal. Damn, damn, damn. Talk about being caught with your pants down.

For the space of two heart beats he was absurdly grateful Methos wasn't there to see him in his present fix. In the same fleeting moment he realized he'd have been abjectly grateful to suddenly see that familiar face peering over the rail at him, even if it would have meant eating crow for the next century or so. No such luck, though, and the only thing he was gaining by treading water was exercise. And it was damned cold, besides. Irritated, he drew as deep a breath as he could manage and swam underwater as close to Absolution's keel as he could manage, trusting the boat's body would conceal him from the other Immortal's sight. Moving to the bow, he climbed as silently as he could into the row boat; from there he could at last see the rope ladder the other had secured to the bow to scale the railing. Well, what had worked for one would work another.

Being back onboard didn't solve the problem at hand, however--namely the fact that the other Immortal was very likely armed and MacLeod wasn't. Add to the problem the fact that the Absolution was only twenty nine feet in length, and MacLeod saw only one likelihood: He was going to come up against steel real fast. The fact that it was likely to be his own katana only added to his frustration. Logic screamed at him that the other Immortal had to be below decks, in the boat house--otherwise they'd already had been face to face--and Absolution was just too small for the other not to have already realized he was on board. Moving as quietly as he could to the built-in storage locker near the bow, MacLeod eased it open, eyes on the boathouse. The boat's previous owner had been into spear fishing, and the Absolution's purchase price had included everything left aboard her when MacLeod took possession, including the spear gun Mac lifted out of the locker. Since he'd always preferred a rod and tackle, MacLeod hadn't as much as thought of the spear gun since he'd begun refitting Absolution; looking at it now, with its single spear already fitted into the barrel, he wished he'd at least checked it out before. The ring of rust that blurred where the barrel ended and the spear shaft began didn't auger well, but the fact was he had no other choice of weapon ready to hand.

He could, he thought, try a bluff--and then, abruptly, there was no time. A blond head appeared above the top of the deckhouse, and in the next second the other turned, MacLeod's katana gripped in his right fist. MacLeod brought the spear gun up to shoulder level, taking aim. "I'm Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod," he said, "and that's my sword you have there."

The youngster blanched, obviously startled, and stared at MacLeod. His mouth worked, and he stuttered something in German before trying again, switching to English this time. "I'm sorry," he said. "I--I'll put it back, honestly. I . . . I thought the boat was deserted."

MacLeod said nothing. Nor did he lower the spear gun, and the young Immortal swallowed visibly.

"I . . . I'm going below again now, to put this back. All right?"

He lowered the katana, taking a step toward the short ladder that led below deck. For just that moment his torso was concealed by the deckhouse, and Mac's hands tensed on the spear gun.

"I--I'll just . . . "

His left hand appeared above the deckhouse, followed by his upper body. He was holding something. A gun, Mac realized, fitted with a silencer.

Shit. His hand spasmed on the trigger of the unfamiliar spear gun, but the best he could do was hope the damned thing would work. It was, of course, too much to try to aim, fire, and simultaneously throw himself out of the way of the other's weapon. As the silenced round caught MacLeod above the heart, slamming him back a pace and making him curl instinctively inward to cradle himself against the pain, the dislodged spear zipped through the air, skimming over the top of the deckhouse. Mac fell to his knees. It was hard to breathe and the deck was suddenly in very close relief. Only as a second thought did it occur to him that was because he was face down on the deck and dying. Red and black swam behind his closed eye lids, competing for his attention. After a moment, the blackness won.

He drew breath and blinked, forcing himself to roll over onto his back, staring up at the sky for a moment. The left side of his chest hurt, and his right hand, exploring, came away sticky with blood. Oh. Right. He'd been shot. Never his favorite way to start the morning. With a grunt of protest, he pushed the dropped spear gun aside, managed to sit upright, and then got to his feet, stumbling across the deck to check on the other guy.

He lay sprawled at the rear of the deckhouse, slumped against the stern, the barbed spear from the spear gun through his chest. The spear's momentum had thrown him backward, as well. As he'd fallen toward the stern, the spear had been traveling at sufficient speed to partly bury itself just below the railing, pinning him there like a gruesome trophy as he'd died. The fact that he was still pinned there, the spear through his chest, quite possibly accounted for the fact that MacLeod had revived first. The silenced handgun lay where it had fallen to the deck, as did his katana. Looking at it, Mac made a face. The possibility of being beheaded with his own sword had never really appealed to him, but spearguns were definitely messier.

MacLeod sighed, looking around. It had all happened so quickly, he doubted anyone could have noticed anything much, unless . . . there it was. A glint from the shore, like sunlight on glass. Binoculars? Did his would-be thief turned assailant have a partner? If so, he likely had an audience, and there was no time to waste. Stooping, MacLeod retrieved the katana, tossing it through the deckhouse to bounce gently on the mattress of his bunk. The handgun he tucked into the waistband of his cut-off shorts. Damn, but spearguns were messy. In fact, pulling a barbed spear out of the younger-looking man's chest was going to make one hell of a mess, and he wasn't looking forward to it. Better to pull the body off the spear, actually, to minimize tissue damage and what have you--

Stooping, MacLeod untied the trailing follow-rope that kept the spear secured to the spear gun--no sense having to pull all that through the body as well--and dropped the yellow nylon coil to the deck. Wrapping his arms under the younger-looking man's arms and around his chest, Mac pulled the body forward, glad he wasn't the squeamish type. That done, he lifted the body from the deck and hauled it below, away from curious eyes. His first thought was to lay the body down on the bunk opposite his own, but he couldn't take the chance of the Immortal reviving with the katana at such close quarters. For one moment Mac bit his lip, thinking the tiny cabin would be a hell of a place for a Quickening. Besides, he didn't particularly want the kid's head. And he was a kid--that much was painfully obvious now that he had time to look.

"Shit," Mac muttered. He settled for dumping him on the floorboards and tying him to the mast in a sitting position, hands behind him. He took a few precious seconds to return the katana to its place above his bunk and then gagged his prisoner as well, figuring he didn't want to have to deal with screaming or shouting. He definitely didn't need the attention it might draw, especially if Sleeping Beauty here had a companion on shore who might already be rousing the police. That done, Mac plunged the sponge he used for dishes into last night's cold dishwater and did a quick mop-up of his own chest--now considerably messier with his blood mingled with his prisoner's--and headed back on deck. The only thing he could do was weigh anchor and set sail willy nilly. He'd have to sort things out when there was time.

Chapter Twenty-One

July 1999

"Well," MacLeod said. "Welcome back to the land of the living." Deftly, he bent over his prisoner's curly blonde head and snagged the rag he'd used as a gag for his mouth, tossing the rag onto the table that served as the Absolution's miniature galley. Instead of the string of obscenities he had expected, he was met with silence and blue eyes that looked capable of burning a hole in him. "All right," Mac said laconically, "I'll start. What the hell were you doing on board my boat?"

Nothing.

MacLeod sighed. "Look," he said reasonably, "I could have left you for dead, you know. I think you at least owe me an answer."

"I passed out," the young Immortal snapped.

"Yeah, right," Mac said. "You passed out with a bolt from a spear gun through your chest, and now you've come round from your fainting spell. Just like I passed out from the bullet you fired at me. Lucky for me I came to first."

From the looks of things, the silent treatment could go on indefinitely, though the kid had the grace to blush, at least. MacLeod's mouth quirked. He wasn't sure if the young Immortal reminded him more of Richie or Methos in a snit, but he definitely had the snit part down. Had to be Richie, Mac thought suddenly. Methos wouldn't have blushed.

"You got a name?" he asked casually.

"Rainart. Rainart Breit."

Well, that explained the accent. "So, Rainart Breit," MacLeod said, "what'd you want with the sword?"

The blue eyes flickered upward, and MacLeod followed their movement to the katana, safely secured above his bunk again. Breit shrugged. "I thought I might be able to sell it," he said. "I told you--I thought the boat was deserted. I need the money."

"Uh huh. So you steal the sword, take my head and Quickening, and then--" He stopped, aware of Breit's eyes on him, aware simultaneously of the look of utter incomprehension in the eyes. The kid didn't have a clue what he was talking about. Oh, Lord save us all. "You don't have the least idea what you are, do you?" MacLeod asked.

"I--" Breit started, but it was obvious he didn't begin to know what MacLeod expected of him. "I don't know what you mean," he said finally. "I don't know this word 'quickening'--"

"What happened to Richie?" he'd asked Fitzcairn.

"When you met him he was a tough kid from the streets who stole because it was easier than working for a living, and he liked the rush. He got busted and decided it was better to skip bail than face three to five in jail for breaking and entering. Nothing much else changed, except the way he died the first time. And when he came back to life he didn't know what had happened to him, so he kept on running. At first it was from the police in the states, so he left the country, thinking he'd be safe. Then the Immortals came hunting. He ran from city to city, always wondering how they were able to find him. Richie still had no teacher. He had no idea what he was, or why people he had never known were trying to kill him."

"You had a serious accident recently," MacLeod said suddenly. "A car crash, something like that."

Breit looked surprised, and it took him a moment to answer. "A lightrail train went off the tracks," he said. "Half a dozen people were killed, including my parents. My brother, Ingo, was in the hospital three days. But I . . . I was fine. They said I was unconscious, that I must have struck my head, but I was fine."

Father! It's a miracle! "When was it?" MacLeod asked.

"A year and a half ago. I've been taking care of Ingo since then."

"Stealing?"

Breit colored again. "When I had to," he said.

"What are you?" Mac asked. "Twenty?"

"Twenty-two. Ingo is seventeen."

Joe had seen to all the arrangements, and had picked the simple, dark headstone as well: "Richie Ryan," the inscription read. "22 years. Friend."

"And they keep coming, don't they?" MacLeod asked. "The others. You run, you hide, but they always find you. And they carry swords."

"Yes." It came out almost as a whisper, the boy's eyes enormous in his face.

"And you don't know why."

"But you do," Breit said. He pushed up against the nylon rope that held him to the mast still, his face avid as he stared at MacLeod. "You know, don't you?"

Yes, I know. "Rainart," he said slowly, "some of us . . . we're not like other people. You know the way you feel sometimes, the way you felt when you came into contact with the ones who carried swords?"

"My head hurt."

"Yes. And sometimes it's a passing nausea--"

"I passed out," he'd said.

On his knees now, the boy was nodding.

"But you only feel that with certain people," Mac said. "With the ones who carry swords."

"I feel it with you," Rainart said quietly. Again the blue eyes flickered toward the katana.

"Yes, I know," Mac said. "I feel it with you, too. You get so you don't notice it so much, though," he said. "You feel it at first, but after you're with someone for a bit, your awareness of it goes away so it doesn't bother you."

"We feel it because we're different?" Rainart asked.

"Because we're Immortal," Mac said. "It's the way we recognize each other, the way we can tell another Immortal." He saw it, then, the flicker of disbelief, turning rapidly to anger, maybe even hatred at the thought that he'd been tricked, led to believe that MacLeod knew what he, Rainart, needed to know. "Watch, now," Mac said before the boy could protest. "Don't worry," Mac added. "It'll be all right."

With that he picked up the handgun he'd tossed on the bunk, its silencer beside it., and placed the gun barrel to his chest, very near his heart. With just a moment's hesitation, he pulled the trigger, and the gun jumped in his hand even as Rainart shouted something to stop him.

Oh, God--oh, God, oh, God, oh, God--Rainart's heart jumped at the abrupt sound, so much louder without the silencer attached, incredibly loud just a few feet away from him, in the cramped confines of the cabin. MacLeod's body crumpled forward over the gun barrel, falling toward Rainart. Terrified, the only thing he could do at first was scramble out of the way, repulsed by the idea of being so near to a dead body. His breath was coming in gasps punctuated by the sound of sobbing--his sobbing, he realized--and for a moment he could picture himself locked in this tableau forever, the dead body beside him, himself tied helplessly to the mast while the little boat sailed on, perhaps drifting endlessly on the ocean.

Perhaps a minute later MacLeod drew breath again, and Rainart's hoarse scream echoed in the room as Mac reached out and laid a hand on his ankle.

"No!" Rainart shouted. "No! You were dead!"

"I'm Immortal," MacLeod reminded him gently. "Rainart--I can't die. Not like you think. And neither can you. You're Immortal, too, Rainart."

Frantic, the boy shoved himself up on his knees again, drawing as far away from MacLeod as the confined space would permit. "No!" he protested. "You were dead--"

"Yes, but I'm not anymore, am I?" he asked gently, his eyes on the young man's face. "Look at me, Rainart. See?" he asked gently, gesturing toward his chest. A powder burn remained on the flesh for just a moment, and then faded. "There's no wound anymore. Just a little redness left, a little soreness, and that will go away, too. Rainart, I wasn't lying to you, and I'm not crazy. I'm an Immortal, and so are you."

"How--"

MacLeod shook his head. "How?" he echoed. "I can't tell you that. I don't know if anyone can. I just know it's true. It's . . . a kind of magic, if you want to think of it that way. When the street car went off its tracks and you hit your head--you were killed. You died, Rainart, but you came back to life, just as you saw me come back to life. Since that time, you've projected a sort of field, a presence that other Immortals can feel when they get close enough. It's how I knew you were onboard. It's how the others were always able to find you, even when you ran. Even when you hid."

The boy's mouth worked, but he shook his head, unable to get past it. "I--No. No. The doctors said I was all right. They said I'd been unconscious."

"Rainart," MacLeod said, "do you remember the first moment you saw me today?"

"On deck."

"Yes, on deck. And I had a spear gun in my hands. You had my sword in your hand. You said you were going to put it back, but you didn't, did you? You had a gun--that gun. And you fired it at me."

Blushing, Rainart nodded reluctantly.

"When you fired the gun at me, what did I do?"

"You--you fired . . . "

"And you were hit by the spear gun, just like I was hit when you shot at me."

Rainart swallowed, and MacLeod saw his throat working, saw him accepting it slowly. "The spear--"

"It went in right here," MacLeod said, reaching toward the boy's chest but stopping short of touching him. "You were killed. I was killed, too, Rainart, when you fired at me. When I recovered, you were dead, with the spear still in you. I pulled out the spear and carried you below. I tied you up and gagged you. Think, Rainart. Where were you when you came to?"

"I was . . . here." A moment passed, filled only with silence. Then: "I'm like you? I'm Immortal?"

MacLeod nodded. "Rainart," he said, "there's one more thing I have to know. When I came to, after we'd fired at each other--I thought I saw a flash, like sunlight on glass. Was there someone on shore? Someone watching us through binoculars?"

"My brother, Ingo. I made him stay on shore, but he had the binoculars."

"Then he saw you die," MacLeod said.

"He . . . no!"

"He saw you die, Rainart. You can't go back there. You have to see that."

"But he's my brother," Rainart protested. "He's all I have!" He stared at MacLeod, understanding but not wanting to. "I can talk to him!" he insisted. "I can make him understand!"

"Understand that he can die at any moment, but that you can live forever? Do you really want to do that to him?"

"But if I'm Immortal, what's to say he isn't, too?"

"You are," MacLeod said. "When you're with him, do you feel the way you do when you're with me? Do you feel the headache, or the wave of nausea?"

"But he's my brother!"

"It doesn't matter," MacLeod said. "Only some of us are Immortal. Maybe one in a hundred thousand, maybe one in a million. I don't know how many of us there are. But if he were Immortal, you'd already know it."

"It's not fair," Rainart whispered, and MacLeod turned his back, not wanting to see the tears in the young man's eyes.

He was right, though. It wasn't fair.

Chapter Twenty-two

August 1999

A week later, MacLeod sat cross-legged on top of the deckhouse, watching Rainart playing with the kittens on deck. Absolution's small size was close living for two relative strangers, but MacLeod found he enjoyed the reserved company Rainart offered. In fact, once his shyness left him he proved intelligent enough, and willing to learn. It was obvious he'd never been onboard a working sailboat before, but he listened attentively whenever MacLeod instructed him in how to help with this or that small task that needed doing. Anxious to please, he'd taken over the morning fishing required to feed the cats and become a fair hand at it. Idly drawing figure eights on the roof of the deckhouse, MacLeod studied the young man and forced himself to look squarely at the question of what he was going to do with him.

The facts were simple enough: He couldn't take Rainart with him around the world, but he couldn't abandon him, either. In fact, he didn't want to take Rainart with him, even if the admission did cause him some guilt. The simple truth was that he didn't want the responsibility of a student. He wanted . . . what? Freedom to go wherever and do whatever struck his fancy. Freedom from obligations. Freedom from entanglements --and Rainart, he had no doubt, represented entanglements aplenty. He wanted . . . freedom. All right. Given all the givens, he still had at least some obligation toward the boy. He'd uprooted Rainart from the only family he'd ever known and set him adrift without boundaries, so surely he owed him something. What he owed him, obviously, was the same thing he'd owe anyone in such circumstances: as good a start on Immortality as he could reasonably provide. And that meant finding him a teacher.

Just yesterday he'd found Rainart below in the galley, standing with the gun in his hand.

"Are you sure you want to do that?" Mac had asked him, and Rainart jumped guiltily at the sight of him. "It's all right if you do," MacLeod continued calmly, "but keep in mind that it does hurt." More than that, there was the fact that it took a tremendous amount of faith and courage to press a gun point blank to your chest and trust you were coming back, and he wasn't sure the boy was quite ready for that. "Here," Mac said. "I've got a better idea." He'd held out his hand and Rainart had surrendered the gun, watching him curiously. "Hold out your hand," Mac said, picking up his one kitchen knife. "This will hurt, but not nearly as much as shooting yourself." Mac sliced the boy's palm open quickly with the knife, holding onto Rainart's fingers to steady him against the instinctive attempt to snatch his hand away. "It's all right," Mac said calmly. " Watch
now."

Blue quickening flashes had appeared behind the swelling blood and danced across the young man's trembling hand. The gash Mac had sliced into his hand sealed before Rainart's heart stopped thundering in his chest. Rainart's eyes stayed on his hand for a long moment before lifting to look at MacLeod.

"There's no cut," Rainart said.

"No, but there was," Mac said. He'd tossed the knife onto the table and wiped the blood off with his palm. "You jumped when the knife went in, and you saw the skin open. You felt the pain. Immortality isn't a free ride, Rainart, but it does have its advantages. Most things, like this, your body will heal almost immediately. Get beat up, cut up, shot, whatever, you'll heal with no sign of ever having been hurt. But you'll still feel the pain every time. Break a bone and it will mend itself--not always in perfect alignment, though, so you may have to break it yourself a second time to get it to line up properly. Cut yourself like this in public and you'll heal--in public, for everyone to see."

"I assume that's to be avoided?" Rainart said drily.

"Whenever possible," Mac agreed with a grin.

"Did anyone ever . . . die . . . in public?"

"You did, just a few days ago," MacLeod reminded him, "with your brother watching." Then, to soften it a bit: "A woman I was dating saw me die a few years ago. Since there are certain things that are . . . rather complicated to explain . . . I had to leave the country." It had been a half truth, but it was good enough to answer Rainart's question.

"How old are you?" Rainart had asked him suddenly.

Mac had smiled. "I was born in 1592, in Scotland."

"But that's four hundred years ago!"

Mac lifted his shoulders in a shrug. "A good friend of mine is three times that," he'd said.

"And the oldest of us . . . ?"

Has a wicked sense of humor and eats young Immortals like you for breakfast. MacLeod had grinned, shaking his head. "Let's just say he claims to remember the flood. Of course, he has been known to stretch the truth a bit."

"But--the flood . . . " Rainart looked stunned. "That's--"

"A very long time ago indeed," MacLeod said.

"To live forever . . . "

"Sounds a lot easier than it is. You had your first lesson in that when you had to leave your brother behind."

The problem was, MacLeod thought, that he had relatively few contacts in this part of the world. In Europe or in the States, there were at least half a dozen friends he could have placed the boy with, people he could have counted on to teach him the right way to do things; people who would have willingly given him the start he needed as an Immortal. In South America, though, he had fewer options. In fact, the only one he could think of was Katya.

He'd first met her a year ago, and if he remembered correctly, she had business interests in Panama City. With few options, he'd set a course for Valparaiso, where he at least stood a chance of being able to track her down. Beyond that, all he could do was bide his time. Bide his time he did, for another half a week; and when the coastline of Chile came in sight he found some simple tasks to keep Rainart busy while he brought them into port. The harbor master directed Duncan to a reasonable hotel and he got Rainart settled into a room with a television and the room service menu for entertainment; once the boy had ordered up enough food for four, he headed for the bathroom. Mac had to bang on the door to make himself heard over the start of the hot water, but Rainart obediently shut off the taps and poked his head out, towel kirted about his waist and a look of curiosity on his face.

"Toss out your clothes," MacLeod told him.

"What?" Rainart asked.

"Your clothes," Mac repeated. "Toss out your things so they can go to the laundry."

For two weeks the boy had been making do with the same pair of jeans and a couple of borrowed shirts that were too large for him. Now, checking the sizes, MacLeod called downstairs to the small boutique in the lobby and bought two pairs of jeans and a couple of shirts unseen, to be billed to his room along with socks and undershorts. "Would you have them sent up, please?" he asked, thanking the salesclerk when she assured him they could be delivered before his protégée got out of the shower. From the sound of the shower through the bathroom door, Rainart would be content to stay under the hot water until the millennium, so MacLeod took advantage of his time alone to place several more phone calls. On the third attempt he was absurdly gratified when he recognized Katya's voice coming over the line.

"Katya--it's Duncan MacLeod."

"Duncan, yes, of course! What can I do for you?"

"I have a favor to ask, Katya. A big favor."

"I'd think you're entitled to at least one."

"How are you set for taking on a student?" he asked.

"Oooh, Duncan . . . that is a big favor." There was a moment's pause. "Better give me the details."

"His name's Rainart Breit, and he's twenty-two. He's German, but his family moved to South America when he was about ten. The parents were killed about a year and a half ago in a train crash."

"And he became Immortal?"

"Yes, but he didn't know what had happened to him. Katya--I've got him straightened out on that, but I haven't even tried to explain about the Game yet. He's been living hand to mouth, stealing to support himself and a teenage brother. Unfortunately, the brother just saw him die, so I've had to uproot him and separate them."

"And how is he handling that in light of everything else?"

"About as well as you'd expect."

"And you can't take him on yourself?" Katya asked.

"No," MacLeod said. He hesitated and then added, "I lost a student about two years ago, Katya. I'm not ready yet to take on another."

"It's all right, Duncan. I understand." She sighed. "All right. I'm living in Panama City now, but you know that since you tracked me down. Is that a problem?"

"No. I'm calling from Valparaiso."

"Really? I just assumed you were in Paris. So you can fly in within a few hours--"

"Uh uh. I'm on a sailboat. I've been sailing around the world--"

She burst into laughter. "Oh, Duncan. Only you would let yourself get roped into babysitting a brand new Immortal while on a trip around the world!"

"So you'll take him?" MacLeod asked.

"Yes, yes, I'll take him. I'm sorry. Didn't I say that?"

"I really appreciate it, Katya."

"So, where or how do you want me to meet you?"

"If it's all right with you," he said, "I'd like to just put him on a plane. I'll describe you to him, so he'll know who to look for. Assuming he's the only other twenty-two year old German Immortal at the Panama airport, you should have no trouble identifying him."

"As long as he has a buzz and answers to the name 'Rainart,' " she agreed with a chuckle. They chatted a bit while she had her secretary check flights between the two cities. After a moment she interrupted herself to give him the necessary flight information and he could picture her, cheerful and efficient as she nodded confirmation to her secretary, telling her to go ahead and book a flight for Rainart Breit from their end and to clear her calendar so she could meet him at the airport. "I wish you could see your way clear for a short visit, at least, Duncan," she said.

"I know," he agreed. "I'm sorry to saddle you with this out of the blue, Katya," he apologized, "but I really do think it's best if I just put him on a plane and get on my way. It's not like I planned on this, you know."

"All right, then," Katya said. "I'll meet him at the airport this evening." She sighed abruptly. "Lord, Duncan, how did I let you talk me into this?"

"I'm just glad you did. Thanks, Katya. I'll be in touch." He hung up, only then aware that the sound of the shower had stopped some time ago and that Rainart was standing in the bathroom's open doorway, a towel wrapped around his middle.

"So," MacLeod greeted him. "Did you leave me any hot water?"

"Yes," the boy said quietly.

"That was a friend of mine in Panama City," Mac said, gesturing to the phone. "She's agreed to have you live with her while you get your feet under you, learn what being an Immortal's all about. Her name's Katya," he added, realizing suddenly he didn't know her last name. Oh, well. He hadn't known Darius' last name, either, come to think of it. "I think you'll like her."

"You don't want me with you."

It wasn't a question, but an assumption of personal worth, and it made MacLeod feel like a heel. "Rainart," he said as gently as he could. "It isn't that I don't want you with me. It's just that I can't right now--"

"You don't have to explain. It's very good of you to . . . arrange something for me with your friend. It's more than I deserve, or should have expected."

"No," Mac said, "it isn't more than you deserve. You have your whole life in front of you, Rainart, and it could be a very long life indeed. Katya is a very bright, successful, and capable woman. She'll see you get everything you need to succeed, too."

"I . . . I had hoped I might go with you. Sail around the world."

"So, if you want to sail around the world, you will one day. You'll do it another time, when you've figured out who and what you are, and what you want to be."

"I would like to be like you."

God, that kind of vulnerability just took your breath away, didn't it? MacLeod nodded. "Thank you, Rainart," he said. "That's quite a compliment. I hope you'll be a little like Katya, too. She's a good person."

"Yes," Rainart said. "To take in a stranger because a friend asks her to--she must be a good person."

Room service arrived at the same time as the package from the hotel's store, and Mac bundled the boy off to the bathroom, saying, "Here. I got you a change of clothes. Hurry," he added, "or I won't save you any food." Given the quantity that had been delivered it was obviously a joke, and it won at least a faint smile from Rainart as he headed back into the bathroom to put on his new things.

He emerged a few minutes later, dressed and rubbing the towel through his hair. Seeing Mac on the phone again, he hesitated, but Mac waved him into the room. "Eat," he said. "I'll be just a minute. Katya--it's MacLeod. Slight change in plans." He shot a look at Rainart. "I'll be bringing him to Panama myself. Yeah, I know. I thought it would give us a little more time together. We'll see you in about three or four weeks, if that's okay." He nodded, splitting his attention between Rainart's wolfish grin and what Katya was saying. Damn it, he thought, I meant not to do this. "Yeah. Okay. Thanks, Katya. I'll give you a call when we get there. Okay. 'Bye."

Chapter Twenty-three

August 1999

There was only one sensible way for Methos to get to the Robinson Crusoe island, and that was to fly from Rio to Santiago, Chile, on the opposite side of South America. That still left another 400 or so miles to the island, though, and it being winter, there were no regular tourist flights. He could, Methos was told, catch one of the regular if infrequent supply ships to the islands, but that would mean another week's wait for transportation. After some casting about he found a six-passenger plane had been chartered in Valparaiso for a flight to the island the following day. Negotiations for a seat on the plane were easy enough, it turned out: Two of the plane's four passengers were returning home to Robinson Crusoe Island, and two others were a husband and wife team of American college professors from Cal Tech, visiting the island during their vacation time. Since the cost of the plane had been prorated among the passengers, they were more than happy to have him join the party as number five and further defray their expenses. That settled, he had only to get himself to Valparaiso, less than 60 miles away. Fortunately, Santiago boasted plenty of car rental agencies, and one was able to set him up with a jeep at an only mildly outrageous price.

When they took off from Valparaiso the next day there were six of them aboard the Cessna 320, including the pilot. The three hour flight was uneventful until Robinson Crusoe island came into view through the windows on the Cessna's right-hand side. As they approached the island one of the two Professors Bruce peered out the nearest window and asked, "Where's the airstrip?"

"Right below us," replied the pilot in mildly accented English.

Methos--seated in the rear of the plane--couldn't help but smile at the look of trepidation Mrs. Professor Bruce shot Mr. Professor Bruce. All there was to see below was the ocean and the island itself, a rugged volcanic pile of rock, looking massive and barren as the face of the moon from this distance. Cloud enshrouded, it looked hostile and lifeless, and if there was any identifiable airstrip beneath them Methos had yet to spot it. Still, the pilot seemed to know what he was doing, and the two teenage natives of the island showed no sign of alarm, having presumably made this trip before, so Methos was inclined to trust in their combined experience.

A lonely driver and his jeep awaited them at the airstrip, which turned out to be located to the left of one of the two extinct volcanoes that had created the island in the first place. The ride to the bay was short enough and their driver deposited them on a small pier. The teenagers they'd shared the trip with grabbed their bags and strode off happily enough, Methos assumed, in the general direction of home; he and the Drs. Bruce were left to wait for another hour for the captain of a local boat, whose job it was to take them to Cumberland Bay, on the island's north side. The Bruces amused themselves with watching seals playing in the water, occasionally making an effort to include Methos in their entertainment until their boat arrived. Watching them--the Bruces, not the seals--Methos couldn't help thinking the two Cal Tech instructors were trying a bit too hard, probably trying to stave off a sense of disappointment in their choice of vacation spots. Having arrived sans expectations, Methos had no reason to share in their disappointment. He smiled gamely enough and accepted her hand when Mrs. Dr. Bruce introduced herself and her husband. "Please," she said, "call me Carolyn. This is my husband, Gerald. And I think the pilot said your name was Dr. Pierson?"

"Adam Pierson," Methos said.

"Medical doctor?"

"Ph.D.," Methos said.

"Oh, really? My husband and I are both at Cal Tech."

"Yes, I thought that's what the pilot said."

"Do you teach, too?" Gerald Bruce asked.

Methos shrugged. "Linguistics and history," he said. "I've just left the University of Paris. I'm doing a bit of traveling."

In Cumberland Bay, they arrived in the village of San Juan Bautista, exciting no particular attention from anyone except Roberto Porfiro, the proprietor of the Villa Green, where the Bruces had booked rooms. Learning on the boat that Methos--Adam Pierson, as he'd introduced himself--had made no arrangements for a hotel prior to leaving the mainland, they suggested he ask at their hotel for accommodations, and he saw no reason not to accept their suggestion. In fact, the Bruces were almost abjectly grateful for Methos' presence when it turned out that Porfiro spoke no English and the Bruces spoke no Spanish. Methos made introductions and verified the Bruces' reservations, accompanying them and the proprietor to the twelve by twelve foot room that had been set aside for them.

Carolyn Bruce's face was a study in disbelief as she was shown to her room: The "hotel" turned out to be a tiny collection of four rooms, all in a row like a miniature stateside motel, all opening off the same narrow, dark hallway. The surprise was that each room included a rod with hangers attached that could be described as a closet, and its own bath--well, toilet and washbasin, actually--but a pleasant surprise nonetheless since Methos had been anticipating a shared bath off the hall for all guests. There was a double bed, a bedside table with two drawers, and a single straight-backed chair as well. That it was less than the Bruces had expected was obvious from their faces and body language, but Methos only shrugged and told them in English it was quite likely as good as they would find elsewhere--"And many other places might not have their own bathrooms in each room," he added, guessing that that would settle that.

With the Bruces settling in, Methos asked in Spanish if the proprietor might have a room for him, apologizing for not having made reservations in advance. Senor Porfiro waved off his apologies and escorted him to the last room at the end of the hall, next to the Bruces'. There was, he was told, another guest at the hotel: "Un hombre muy malo," Porfiro told him--a young, non-communicative German who drank too much and came and went without a word to anyone. "He and his brother were here together," Porfiro said, "but now it is just him. The bill is paid until the end of the week, unfortunately, so there is nothing I can do until then." With a smile and a shrug, the man confided that he'd separated the young German from his other guests as much as possible--meaning his was the first room while they had the third and fourth rooms--and recommended Methos give him a wide berth.

"The lady and her husband," Porfiro said. "They are your friends?"

"Not really," Methos said. "We met on the flight from Valparaiso."

"You will explain about the German?"

"Yes," Methos said. "I'll tell them for you."

"He is away much of the time," Porfiro said, "so perhaps he will not bother you or the others. I hope he will go away at the end of the week."

It was an odd enough admission for a man whose livelihood depended on renting out the tiny hotel's four rooms, so Methos nodded, filing the information away. It had been on his mind to ask if the hotel manager had rented in the last month or so to anyone of MacLeod's description, but since the Highlander had his own boat it seemed unlikely he'd availed himself of the Villa Green's few amenities. It was, Methos thought, impossible, really, to picture the larger than life MacLeod in the miniature hotel's cramped spaces. In fact, it was far more likely he'd kept to himself, staying aboard his boat in the harbor while on the island--assuming he'd come this way at all. With that in mind, Methos locked the door to his room and latched the chain as well. First removing his broadsword, he tossed his jacket over the back of the room's chair. His one bag he dropped at the foot of the bed and then lay down for a nap before dinner, the broadsword tucked beneath the pillows, ready to hand.

He dreamed of Richie, which was, in itself, a bit surprising.

They were together, he, Richie, and Joe, in the Luxemburg Gardens in Paris, and Richie was talking to him about MacLeod and Jason Landry's diary. "Oh, come on," Methos had protested. "Most people have some version of the savior myth: Demons are sent to destroy the earth and a champion comes to protect it."

"That's exactly what it says in the journal," Richie agreed.

"But millennium theory is nothing new," Methos said. "Every thousand years I hear these same stories. Look, kid, I don't know what MacLeod thinks he's seeing, but I have never seen a demon."

"A Zoroastrian demon, no less," Joe threw in.

"Well," Richie said, "then maybe you guys have another explanation for what's going on here."

In fact, he hadn't, not then and not now, but what was equally disturbing in the dream was the echoing memory of the conversation he had had with Joe just before they'd met Richie.

"You know," Methos had said, "I had the strangest encounter with our friend MacLeod last night."

"Yeah?" Joe asked. "Did he tell you the dead are roaming the streets of Paris?"

"As a matter of fact, he did."

"And Horton's--"

"Horton?" Methos asked.

"Yeah," Joe said. "James Horton."

"Not Kronos?" Methos had asked.

"Oh, shit," Joe said. "Now he's talking about your friend Kronos? Kind of makes you wonder who's next."

"Joe--what on earth are you talking about?" Methos demanded.

"I'm talking about an immortal who's seriously off his nut, that's what I'm talking about," Joe had sighed.

Methos blinked, staring up at the ceiling of his rented room, the dream fading to memory. At the barge, he remembered, MacLeod had stared at them, unwelcoming.

"So where are the men in the white coats?" he'd asked, and Methos remembered Joe looking first at him and then at MacLeod.

"We think you're in trouble, Mac," Joe had said.

"Trouble," MacLeod had repeated. "You think I'm in trouble."

"Mac," Methos remembered saying, "you need help."

"I'm not insane," MacLeod had said slowly. "I saw them--Horton, and Kronos. I heard them. I don't know what they were, but they were real."

"And you think they were demons," Methos remembered saying carefully.

"Yeah," MacLeod had said, but at the look in Methos' eyes he had turned away.

"I've never seen a demon," he'd said. Not the truth, precisely, but telling Ryan he'd come to expect demons in Kronos' eyes wouldn't have helped anything, so he'd taken the easy way out and said what had to be said to ease the kid's concerns over the Highlander. I've never seen a demon. God, he'd been so glib--so cavalierly reassuring when he hadn't known one God damned thing about it, and it had gotten the kid killed. "Mac, you need help," he'd said. Well, duh. And exactly what had he done about it? Not one damn thing. And because of that, MacLeod had gone into a year's exile and mourning, followed by six months' pretense at a life he could no longer believe was worth living.

Ah, Duncan, what am I going to do with you?

He remembered Amanda's mouth on his--what was it now? He wondered. Close to a month ago, now. She'd thrown her arms around his neck, saying, "All right, I'll watch Nick for a couple of months, even if he doesn't like it." After a moment she'd kissed his mouth, drawing away to say, "That's for MacLeod if and when you find him. I'll understand if you prefer to wait until I can give it to him myself." He remembered laughing at that, and she'd caught his face between the palms of her hands, dark eyes intense as she searched his face, and he'd wondered what she'd seen there to satisfy her. She'd kissed him gently then, and when they parted, her eyes had met his again. "That one's for you," she'd said, "so you'll remember there are people here who love you and miss you."

He'd smiled. "I'll remember," he said. And then he'd walked away, as usual.

"Hey!" Joe Dawson snapped.

Anyone else would have jumped half out of his skin, but Methos had only half turned toward the door while continuing to peck rapidly away at the computer keyboard. "Oh, hi, Joe," he'd said. "I'll just be a minute."

"What the hell are you doing?" Joe demanded.

"I'm . . . um . . . looking for something."

"I can see that," Joe grumbled. Then, genuinely irritated, he'd demanded, "Where have you been?"

Methos glanced up from the computer screen. "Here and there," he replied casually. Something in Joe's expression made an impression, though, and he recalled it had been nearly eighteen months since they'd last seen each other. "There, mostly," he admitted.

A year and a half he'd been gone from Paris. He'd tracked MacLeod to the monastery at Kempak, satisfying himself that the Highlander was on holy ground and likely to stay there for a time, at least, but in the meantime he'd left a grieving Joe alone to see to arrangements for Richie Ryan's burial. He hadn't doubted the logic of his choice, neither then nor in retrospect: No one was likely to be after Joe's head, after all, and since MacLeod had left Paris without his sword Methos felt obligated to play nursemaid, even if it was from the shadows. He'd planned to return to Paris and had, in fact, heard of MacLeod's return in May of '98; he'd planned to be back in Paris himself well before then, actually, but as usual things hadn't quite worked out that way. Even when he had returned at the end of September, he'd been in town over a month before he'd managed to drop in on Joe, and then it had been to discover that Joe had a daughter.

Amy. He remembered the first time he'd seen her, in Chartres, just as he'd last seen her there.

In heels she was about Joe's height, paler in complexion and with round cheeks, her short hair a brown that would be nearly red in the right light. Narrow brows winged away over perfect almond-shaped blue eyes, wide with fear at the moment. She wore a black and gray striped sweater under a short black coat that showed the hem of a pearl gray mini skirt beneath its edge, and had the figure to carry it off. Her mouth, a cupid's bow, was firmly set.

At any other time, Methos might have grinned: There was something distinctly pleasurable about meeting Joe Dawson's daughter, although the circumstances left something to be desired. The concept had initially required a bit of adjustment on Methos' part--although he knew there had been women in Joe's life at various times, Methos also knew that Joe's loss of both legs in Vietnam had shaped the man's life in more ways than one. He'd become a Watcher, of course, and had gained a unique knowledge that had ultimately brought him into contact with both Methos and Duncan MacLeod, but in some ways he'd also lost self-confidence in his day to day interactions with others, women in particular. Not too unusually, Joe had come in some ways to equate the loss of his legs with the notion that he had less to offer women than another man might. At least one result of that combination of facts was that Joe had never married; consequently, about the last thing Methos had ever expected the Watcher to drop in his lap was a full-grown daughter, particularly a daughter who was also a Watcher. And the lesson to be taken from that set of facts, boys and girls? Hmm. Good question.

She'd come looking for help just before last Christmas, he remembered, when Joe hadn't returned from the states as he'd been scheduled to do. Methos remembered dragging the pillow over his head in an effort to muffle the insistent knocking at his door, inevitably reminded of Amanda's last visit to his place. When the knocking had turned to pounding he'd given it up and dragged himself out of bed, throwing the pillow half way across the room in disgust. There'd been no ring of presence to indicate another immortal's presence, but he'd snagged his sword from the bedside table out of habit. Clad only in navy blue boxer shorts, he'd stomped barefoot across the living room floor and jerked the door open, one hand gripping the forty inch Ivanhoe and the other the doorknob. Amy Thomas stood in the doorway, hand raised to knock again. She'd had the grace to color slightly--the boxers, combined with the obviously lethal grip on the sword, must have made for an interesting picture. With hardly a pause, though, she'd slipped uninvited into the room, asking, "Have you heard from Joe?"

"I believe the phrase is, 'Would you mind if I came inside?' " Methos remembered responding irritably. It had been the start of a relationship that had culminated--or failed to culminate--where it had begun, in Chartres, roughly three and a half weeks ago.

Well, life went on, or at least that was what he'd been trying to tell MacLeod all this time. It wasn't as if he were going to die of a broken heart, after all.

He sighed, sitting up, and decided washing up wouldn't be a bad idea either. He'd feel better after a change of clothes, and then it was time for dinner. With luck, he could avoid the Bruces and make an early night of it. The thought made him smile ruefully: He had a hunch he was going to be grateful for the three paperbacks he'd picked up in Santiago. There was one other task he'd been putting off as well, though, and a glance at the bedside clock assured him he had plenty of time to see to it. Rummaging in his duffel bag, he found the supplies he needed to clean his sword and set them out on the bedside chest, pulling his broadsword from beneath the pillows. Yawning, he made a quick trip to the bathroom to wash the sleep out of his eyes and walked back into the main room just in time to see the shift of shadows through the room's only window. Someone had been watching him, peering through the chink in the curtains from outside. Which meant they'd no doubt seen the sword cleaning preparations, and the sword.

Curiouser and curiouser, said Alice.

Well, there was nothing he could do about it at the moment, so the sensible thing was to clean the broadsword as he'd planned, and then see about dinner. And then he'd no doubt be sleeping with one eye open, waiting to see what developed. Well, at least it wouldn't be the first time. He finished cleaning the broadsword and used a clean, dry cloth to rub on a thin coating of oil to protect the blade from the salt air. That done, he returned the blade to its hidden sheath inside his coat and started to head for the bathroom and a washcloth bath before changing clothes. Halfway there, he sighed and freed the broadsword from its sheath. Tossing the coat on the bed, he took the blade into the bathroom with him, standing it up in the corner within easy reach. There was, he figured, no sense in tempting fate.

Chapter Twenty-four

August 1999

It was after midnight when the lock on Methos' door made a quiet little clicking sound. A moment later the doorknob turned, very nearly silently, and then the door itself was pushed open, the only sound that of the door whispering across the room's ancient carpeting. Ingo Breit stood quietly in the open doorway, all but holding his breath. Just six feet away was the foot of the room's double bed; in the bed, the man he'd seen earlier through the curtains, cleaning or polishing a sword. A sword, to his untrained eyes, very much like the sword he recalled seeing his brother holding just before he died.

Rainart was five years older than Ingo. Had been, Ingo corrected himself. He was seventeen and Rainart had been twenty-two. He remembered the last place they'd been, before they'd come here, stowaways on one of the irregular ships to the island--it had been not much worse than this, though certainly no better, near the docks in Valparaiso. He remembered awaking, terrified in the night, with Rainart's hand clamped hard over his mouth to stop any sound he might have made. He remembered Rainart's voice, low and whispered in his ear: "Get up. Now, Ingo--no noise. They've found us."

They always found them, no matter where they went, no matter how low a profile they tried to maintain, and they always carried swords. Swords. As if a gun wouldn't do in this day and age And, as always, he and Rainart had run, like cowards.

The last day he had been with Rainart they'd "borrowed" a dinghy from one of the docks and Rainart had rowed out to the Absolution, a small, one-man cutter that had only been in the harbor a few days. Ingo had been opposed to his brother's suggestion, arguing that the Absolution didn't look to be anything special, or worth checking out. Checking it out. That was what they'd come to call it--they meant robbing, of course, though the words themselves had come to leave a bad taste in Ingo's mouth. Stealing to live, even to eat and have a roof over their heads, was very different from occasionally shoplifting for the thrill of it with school friends, and they both knew it. Twice, though, Ingo remembered, they'd tried to settle down somewhere and Rainart had found menial work, once in a warehouse, once delivering groceries, only to be found. Found by the men who carried swords. And they'd been forced to run both times, days away from an honest paycheck, worse off than before.

Ingo remembered Rainart over-riding his objection to checking out the Absolution that day, insisting that only a rich man could afford to sail alone, for pleasure, in such a place, and Ingo had reluctantly given in to the seeming logic. "Baby," Rainart had snapped at him. "You have the binoculars if you're so afraid."

Yes, he'd had the binoculars. They'd belonged to their father, who had taught the boys to peer through the lenses as children and identify different species of birds while on hikes together. They were all that remained of what had been their normal family existence, though these days Ingo peered through them to keep an eye on Rainart from a distance when his older brother refused to allow Ingo to accompany him on some "adventure" or other. He'd been watching through the binoculars from shore when the dark-headed owner of the Absolution had climbed on board his boat and flushed Rainart out from below. He"d been watching through the binoculars from shore when the man had climbed out of the water into the row boat, and watched helplessly as he'd opened the storage locker near the bow, pulling out what even a landlubber like Ingo could identify as a spear gun, a barbed spear already fitted into the barrel.

Ingo had watched Rainart emerge from below decks, a sword in his hand, watched in sheer frustration as something he couldn't hope to hear had passed between owner and intruder. The boat's owner had brought the spear gun up to shoulder level and taken a no-nonsense aim on Rainart who, for all his brave talk earlier in the day, had gone nearly white. The distance from ship to shore had been too great, obviously, for Ingo to make out what was being said, but he'd seen Rainart's mouth work, seen him raise and then lower the sword, starting to disappear below again.

There had been a minute pause and then Ingo had realized that Rainart had something in his left hand--the handgun and silencer he had "acquired" some months ago, in Valparaiso--and before Ingo could draw breath it had happened.

Rainart had fired. Seemingly at the same time, the spear gun had gone off, throwing its projectile across the length of the boat, slamming into Rainart's chest, pinning him to the rear of the boat like a gruesome specimen in a collection, reminding Ingo of some gross parody of crucifixion. Ingo had dropped the binoculars, fallen to his hands and knees on the wet sand of the beach, vomiting the little he'd eaten for breakfast into the shallows washing about him, mewling and sobbing like the baby Rainart had accused him of being less than an hour before. One minute--five minutes--he didn't know how long it had been before he'd gotten to his knees and brought the binoculars up to his eyes again. When he had, though, the dark-headed man had been moving across the Absolution's deck toward the stern, toward Rainart's dead body. Obviously Rainart had missed his shot, and Ingo had watched, his hands trembling on the binoculars, as the man bent to retrieve the gun, shoving it into the waistband of his cut-offs. In the same moment, he retrieved the sword and turned to toss it below decks.

Ingo had seen the face of his brother's murderer as he turned to toss the sword below, but there had been nothing in the strong, handsome face to prepare him for what happened next. As Ingo watched, the man had stood for a moment, hands on his hips, staring down at Rainart's body, pinned grotesquely by the spear to the boat's stern. And then, as Ingo had looked on, the man untied the follow-rope and tossed the yellow nylon coil matter-of-factly to the deck, as if what had happened was some sort of annoyance he now had to deal with. Wrapping his arms around Rainart's chest, the man had pulled Rainart's body toward him, off the spear--and Ingo had fallen to his face again in the wet sand, sprawling in his own vomit and the cold wash of the tide, one fist shoved into his mouth to muffle his sobbing, unable to watch any more. Some time later he had come to, staring up at the sun rising higher in the sky, and when he had reached for the binoculars at last, the Absolution was nowhere to be seen in the harbor.

And then had come this stranger, and he, too, carried a sword.

Ingo stepped into the room and eased the door almost shut; giving his eyes a moment to adjust to the darkness. There, in the bed, relaxed in sleep, was the stranger. There, barely visible beneath one of the bed's pillows, was the sword's handle. Slowly, carefully, Ingo drew a steadying breath and stepped toward the bed, at which point Methos clamped his left hand over the boy's mouth and touched the naked blade of the Ivanhoe to the boy's Adam's apple.

"Now hold perfectly still," Methos said quietly, "and you just might get out of here alive."

Frozen where he stood, Ingo's eyes flared huge, but he said nothing. His breath--abruptly labored--and the trembling Methos could feel beneath his hands were the only sign that the boy was anything other than a statue.

"Good," Methos said. "Now I'm going to take my hand away from your mouth. When I do, you may turn on the bedside lamp."

He took his hand away from the boy's mouth and lowered the sword's blade enough to let Ingo step forward.

The bed, one pillow, and the deliberately if barely exposed handle of Methos' dagger were to the boy's right. The bedside table and lamp were immediately in front of him. Without hesitating, the boy threw himself toward the bed, snatched the dagger, and whirled to face Methos. The fact that the dagger was considerably shorter and lighter than the boy had been expecting was enough to throw him off balance as he whirled, finding the Ivanhoe's point abruptly at the his throat again. This time Methos made sure it drew blood.

"That hurts!" Ingo gasped, his hand spasming on the dagger handle.

"It was meant to," Methos said. "It's also very sharp, which you know, since you watched me sharpening it earlier this evening. And now that I have your attention," he added, pressing forward with the tip again, "I said you could turn on the lamp. That is not a lamp. Drop it." The dagger fell to the floor and Methos kicked it toward the door without a second look. Oh, hell, he thought, staring at the boy. He's just a baby. What is it with homicidal mortals suddenly coming out of the woodwork at me? "Have a seat," Methos instructed, increased pressure on the sword's tip urging the boy's cooperation as he scrambled up against the headboard. "Good," Methos said. "I had begun to think someone had seriously neglected your language skills."

"I hate you!" Ingo choked out on the start of a sob.

"Don't be silly," Methos said. "You haven't known me long enough to hate me. In fact, it probably takes at least half an hour to genuinely hate me." He flipped on the bedside lamp, snagged the room's single straight-backed chair and spun it toward him. Straddling it easily, he rested his arms--and sword--along its back. "Now," Methos said, "the only real question is what I'm to do with you."

"Call the police!" Ingo grated at him.

"What? And let you get off easy? Why would I do that?"

"I don't want to die!"

From bluster to the verge of tears in less than three seconds. This was not what one would call an emotionally well balanced youth. "And what does a boy your age know about dying?" Methos demanded.

"He killed my brother--"

"Who did?"

"The other man with the sword!"

"What man? When was this?" When no answer appeared to be forthcoming, Methos raised an eyebrow in the boy's direction. "I asked you a question," he said. "In fact, I asked you two, and I expect answers to both of them."

"The man on the boat," Ingo muttered. "It was a few days ago. A week, maybe. I don't know any more."

"Meaning you know nothing more, or you no longer know?"

The boy stared, unsure how to answer, but Methos had already decided it was a moot point. "Did the boat have a name?" Methos asked calmly, and Ingo's eyes snapped up and toward him. It was not, obviously, the question the boy had been expecting.

"Absolution," Ingo whispered. "It was called the Absolution."

As if I couldn't have guessed.

Chapter Twenty-five

"Hi, it's me."

Amanda smiled at the familiar voice and turned her back on Nick, who was working through attack and parry sword drills in the middle of what would have been the living room in anyone else's apartment. In the interest of expedience, of course, he and Methos had turned the room into a sort of gymnasium, complete with punching bag and weight bench. With the exception of the couch, it rather reminded her of MacLeod's dojo in miniature. "Well, hello, me," Amanda said into the phone. She waggled her fingers at Nick and blew him a kiss, indicating she'd be in the hall. Strolling into the foyer that separated Nick's apartment from Methos' half of the house, she said, "So, what's up?"

"Unfortunately, I appear to be at a dead end."

"Want some help?"

"Do you know something I don't?" Methos asked.

"Of course," Amanda said archly. "I am a woman."

"I meant about MacLeod's whereabouts."

"Oh. Now, that I can't help you with."

"That's pretty much what I thought."

"Poor baby. I could come keep you company," she offered.

"Why?" he asked. "So two of us can be at a dead end?"

She shrugged. "If I brought Nick, there'd be three of us."

"What? You're bored with Paris?"

"That depends. Where are you?"

"South America."

"Oooh--Rio! I love Rio!"

"Not Rio. Rio was . . . about a week and a half ago. Ever heard of Juan Fernando Island?"

"You mean Robinson Crusoe?" she asked. " 'I am monarch of all I survey; my right there is none to dispute--' "

He laughed. "I was thinking of the part that goes 'O Solitude! Where are the charms that sages have seen in thy face? Better to dwell in the midst of alarms--' "

" 'Than reign in this horrible place,' " she chorused with him, ending it in laughter. "Oh, Methos. You have no imagination. Aren't you supposed to learn from the wisdom of age--"

"And be cheered by the sallies of youth?" he finished for her. "All right. I think we've both amply illustrated we know our Selkirk. Do you have an affinity for Scots?"

"No more so than you."

He snorted, and then asked, "How's Nick?"

"He's all right. Bored, I think. Believe it or not, I think he misses you."

"God. There's a thought." He said nothing for a moment, and she waited for him to get around to it. "Mac mentioned the Galapagos to Betty Bannen, so I'll try there, but it's really just a long shot."

"From the Galapagos to the Marquesas?" she asked, and she could visualize him shrugging, or maybe nodding.

"It's the logical route," he said. "He has to make Australia eventually, but I keep thinking he'd have headed there from the Cape if that had been his plan, and he wouldn't have bothered with Juan Fernando."

"Robinson Crusoe."

"Whatever."

"So, he was there?"

"Oh, he was here, all right. I just don't know where he went from here."

"So what do your instincts tell you?"

"That if I make a mistake it's a mighty damn big ocean. What if I'm wrong?"

"If you're wrong, you're wrong. Lighten up, Methos. It's not like it would be the first time you'd made a mistake, you know."

"Don't tell me you're keeping track?"

"Of your mistakes?" she asked. "Oh, please. You couldn't pay me to keep track of your mistakes!"

Everything considered, she thought, he had a really nice laugh.

Chapter Twenty-six

"Anything on Methos?" Joe Dawson asked as Amy Zoll slid onto a bar stool.

Zoll reached into her briefcase for a single sheet of paper and handed it across the desk to him. "This came in today," she said. "I haven't had a chance to verify anything, though."

Joe turned the sheet right side up and scanned the page. A retired watcher living on . . . Robinson Crusoe Island? . . . had reported a visit from the local chief of police, asking for the watcher's help. The watcher, it seemed, was the caretaker of a local Pentecostal church, which, Joe gathered, meant he was both the janitor and the groundskeeper. It was just part time work, but in such a small community it placed him in a position to know most of his neighbors. Accordingly, the chief of police had been in recently to ask his help locating a local family that might accept a temporary foster child--

Joe canted an eyebrow at Zoll, and she rolled her shoulders in a shrug.

"I said I hadn't had time to check it out," she reminded him.

--A boy who had apparently been turned over to the local police by a hotel owner on a charge of breaking and entering into a guest's hotel room. What was interesting was that the boy claimed the hotel guest had carried both a sword and a dagger. There was more to his story, but the police chief had not confided all the details in his conversation with the retired watcher. The man had since learned from his own inquiries that the man was either American or British--English speaking, at any rate--and he'd left the island within 24 hours of arriving there. It he did own a sword and a dagger, he'd obviously taken them with him, but what was really interesting was the caretaker's claim that it had reminded him of a meeting he'd had with another visitor to the island a week before.

A visitor the retired watcher had, in retrospect, identified as Duncan MacLeod, based on a sketch delivered to him by the island's mail packet from Watchers headquarters in Rio.

"I've asked the Rio office to fax him a picture of Methos," Zoll said noncommittally.

"Where on earth is Robinson Crusoe Island?" Joe asked.

"Somewhere off the coast of Chile," Zoll said. "I had to look it up, too."

Robinson Crusoe. Friday. Daniel DeFoe. Not Daniel DeFoe-

"Alexander Selkirk--" Joe said.

Zoll nodded. "Was a Scot. He was also the model for the character of Robinson Crusoe, you'll recall."

"You think MacLeod's doing old home week off the coast of Chile?"

"I don't have a clue what MacLeod's doing," Zoll said with a sigh, "and I'm just as happy it's not my job to figure it out. I've got my hands full trying to figure out what the hell Methos is up to--"

"He's tracking Duncan MacLeod, that's what he'd doing. And what's more, he's doing a damned sight better job at it than any of the Watchers have done in the past year."

"Maybe we should hire him back," Zoll grumbled, and Joe couldn't help grinning.

"Maybe we should at that," he said.

"Not funny, Joe," Zoll muttered.

"What's not funny?" Nick Wolfe asked.

Both Joe and Amy Zoll looked up at his words, and in a moment Nick and Amanda had joined the Watchers at the bar.

"Zoll thinks we should hire Methos to Watch MacLeod," Joe said.

"He called Amanda the other day," Nick said.

"He did what?" Joe and Amy Zoll chorused.

Amanda made a face at Nick.

"What?" Nick asked. He plopped down on the stool next to Zoll. "You thought I didn't know?"

"I thought you knew enough to keep your mouth shut about certain people's business," Amanda responded. "He's very picky about things like that in case you didn't know."

Nick shrugged. "And exactly how would I know that?" he asked. "He takes off for parts unknown without a word to me--"

"Oh, and your feelings are hurt, so you have to get even by sniping. For God's sake, Nick, show a little common sense."

"Amanda, I'm a grown man--"

"Then act like it."

Bewildered, Nick turned to Joe. "Now what did I do?" he asked.

"You're consorting with the enemy."

"Well, hell," Nick said. "We spend half our time in here, you know. How am I supposed to know when you're the enemy and when you're not?"

"It appears to be an acquired skill," Amy Zoll muttered.

Amanda ignored her, instead tapping a manicured fingernail at the paper resting on the bar in front of Joe. "What's this?" she asked innocently.

"A message from the front," Joe said.

Amanda slid it from under Joe's unresisting hand to an angle where she could read it over Nick's shoulder. "Robinson Crusoe Island?" she asked. She waved one hand dismissively. "I hate to tell you this, but that's old news--"

"I suppose you knew all about Methos' run in with a seventeen year old juvenile delinquent," Joe commented, and Amanda shrugged elegantly.

"Of course," she said.

"Liar," he chuckled, pulling the page back and folding it in half. "So, come on, Amanda, you can tell me. Where did he say he was headed next?"

Amanda shook her head. "That's just it," she said. "He didn't say, Joe, not with any certainty. In fact, what he did say was that he thought he'd run into a dead end."

"And?" Nick prompted.

She shrugged. "I told him to follow his instincts."

Zoll snorted inelegantly, shaking her head, but Joe smiled, watching Amanda rest her chin on her fist, her elbow propped up on Nick Wolfe's shoulder. Like Amanda, Joe wasn't too concerned. In fact, he thought, tossing the page into his safe and spinning the tumblers, he'd trust Methos' instincts over most people's concerted analyses . . . well, at least 99% of the time. Not, of course, that he'd tell Zoll that.

"So," Nick said. "Who's for something to eat?"

Joe looked up from the safe. "You buying?" he asked.

"Well, I thought I'd cook--"

"Uh uh," Joe said. "I've pretty much gotten used to the idea of standing Methos to an endless round of beer, but I'm going broke feeding you for free. Amanda, you'd better take this one firmly in hand before we have another Immortal mooch on our hands. He's got no rent to pay and no expenses to speak of--"

"And no income at the moment, either," Nick said pointedly, "since Amanda won't let me play private cop while I'm in training to chop off people's heads."

"Oh, right," Joe said, ready to give in after all. "I forgot about that."

"Oh, please," Amy Zoll snapped. "I'll buy." She pushed up from her bar stool and headed for the door, realizing belatedly that she'd caught them all by surprise and they were all staring at her. "What?" she asked. "I said I'd buy."

"You're buying," Nick Wolfe said.

"Didn't I just say that?"

Joe looked at her. "And . . . you do know that these two are Immortals, right?" he asked, pointing a finger back and forth between Nick and Amanda.

Zoll looked surprised. "No!" she gasped in mock horror. "You're kidding me!" She rolled her eyes. "Last chance," she announced, headed for the door.

"Hey, I'm coming," Nick said.

"Me, too," Joe said. "This I've got to see. Luc!" he called over his shoulder to the daytime bar tender. "You're on your own for a bit!"

Smiling, Amanda trailed slowly after the others, gently shaking her head. By the time she'd reached the door, the debate had turned to the choice of restaurants, with Zoll holding firm for Les Bookinstres on the Seine over what Nick was calling "something more substantial." For a moment it looked like it would evolve into a full-scale negotiation, but Zoll snapped, "Hey!" effectively silencing Nick in mid-sentence.

"My treat, my pick," the Watcher informed him in no-nonsense tones, and Amanda raised both eyebrows at Joe in an amused look as Nick first opened and then closed his mouth.

"Remind you of anyone?" Joe asked on a chuckle, and Amanda smiled, meeting Nick's eyes.

"Maybe she'll let you drive," she suggested sweetly.

At the same moment, Zoll tossed Nick the keys to her car. "You do know where Les Bookinstres is, don't you?" she asked.

Nick just looked at her. "Should we pick up Amy Thomas on the way?" he asked.

Zoll smiled. "Why, Nick," she purred ala-Amanda. "What a nice idea!"

Chapter Twenty-seven

September 1999

Whether Methos liked it or not, the only reliable regular transportation to the Galapagos was by boat. In fact, though the islands belonged to Ecuador, the "enchanted isles" of Galapagos had become--over the last century and a half--a sort of shrine to the natural sciences, thanks, of course, to Darwin's immortalizing them in The Origin of Species. A variety of scientific-oriented studies were conducted there every year, and a permanent bird-watching sanctuary was maintained by the National Geographic Society; beyond that, though, the dozen or so islands that made up the group were largely uninhabited and likely to remain that way.

"Blackbeard, Bluebeard, Drake--" he remembered Robert de Valicourt treating him to a recitation of his glory days with the brethren of the coast, punctuating each name with a swipe of his sword. "I must have sailed with half the pirates in the Caribbean," de Valicourt had concluded, looking a bit nostalgic for the good old days. "I kind of miss those old ships," he'd commented.

"Not me," Methos remembered saying. "I hate the sea."

"Oh? Why's that?"

"I crossed the Atlantic to Iceland with a bunch of Irish monks in 765," he'd said. "Six of us in a rowboat with no facilities."

"Ooh," de Valicourt had said, the single syllable showing a world of respect for such an adventure.

Adventure my ass, Methos thought. It had been a waking nightmare, all the more so because he'd been the only one of their number who hadn't been sick half the way and so had had the responsibility of caring for those who were sick. And here he was, barely twelve hundred years later, chasing half way around the world after an Immortal who hadn't even been born at the time. He smiled, rubbing his forefinger across the bridge of his nose. Who said God didn't have a sense of humor?

For two and a half weeks Methos lingered among the islands, viewed by his fellow passengers as an uncommunicative stranger, just one academic among many; an historian, they'd been given to understand, though one who kept to himself. Chatham, Hand and Floreana islands; Barrington, Indefatigable and Seymour islands; Tower, Marchena, Pinta and James islands; Albemarle and Norborough islands--he saw them all. Not even tiny Duncan Island was too small for his acute attention, though it was of no conceivable interest to any other member of the party. In fact, he lingered on the rocky beach there longer than any of them, and no one understood what prompted his amusement when he laughed aloud and shook his head before joining them for the return to the ship.

The only time he willingly joined any of the others was for a trip into Post Office Bay on Floreana Island. In "ancient" times, they'd all been told by their ship's captain, a mailing station had been created by whaling ships of old, outward bound to their hunting waters in the deeper Pacific. In passing, such ships would drop off letters to folks at home and take advantage of Floreana's bounty to stock up on fresh water, fruits, vegetables, and, of course, the great land tortoises--called Galapagos--that had been a source of fresh meat for the sea voyage. Any ship that happened by obligingly picked up and delivered whatever mail was found staked on the beach in an old wooden box, with or without postage. In modern times a barrel still stood there, and any northeastern-bound fisherman, or in fact anyone clearing the island for the mainland, would check it. Outgoing mail usually wound up in a post office in Panama or San Diego, the captain told them, where the letters received the necessary postage and were sent on their way around the world as part of the tradition.

"And do the letters arrive?" someone asked, and the ship's captain smiled.

"Oh, yes," he said. "Eventually. Of course, castaways have been known to beat their own letters home."

Methos smiled at the joke, but there was nothing in the box bearing the Highlander's elaborate handwriting. For a moment he considered sending Joe or Amanda a post card from the stack the captain offered them, but it seemed a waste of time. Given that the Galapagos had been the last step in the fragile chain of logic he'd been following, it seemed likely that he, too, would be back in France before anything posted from this distant location could reach there. It was either that or head for Australia, he thought, staring across the water. Sydney was a possibility, of course, though it would mean shipping back to Panama and flying from there--or maybe shipping straight out from here if he could arrange transportation. From the Marquesas the trade winds blew to Samoa, and then on to the Fijis. Either way, you wound up in Australia, but the facts were plain enough. The hunting ground was spreading out too far for practicality and, as he'd told Amanda, it was a mighty damn big ocean.

Continued in Part Three