Disclaiming here… don't own anything except the story idea, setup, the format of the writing, and the Wonder Triplets of Ree, Red, and Rita… Everything else belongs to Davis-Panzer, even if I wish I owned it anyway. Play nice!

"I don't believe you did it, Marie!" Red shrieked. "Oh my god! He was a complete stranger! He could have had herpes or something!"

She flushed and turned her head aside.

"Why'd you pick him, and not the one with the fish?" Margarita asked, confusion running rampant in her voice. "I mean, that nose! The fish guy definitely had muscles, and boy, that hair! I tell you, he looked hot! You had to pick the middle one, I mean, at least it wasn't the old guy, but…"

"And why'd you run like that? I mean, I just about broke my neck trying to catch up to you!" Red moaned. She chuckled suddenly. "It might have been that dig about the guys you keep getting. She must have felt guilty."

"That does sound like Ree's modus operandi, yeah." Rita said, rolling her eyes. "Jeez, Ree, you gotta stop going on the guilt trips! I mean, you never unpack those bags of yours!"

She remained silent, staring into the forest she'd finally stopped in. She sat lightly on a fallen tree at the side of the path. It looked like some Boy Scouts had been drafted to drag this giant off the path, for last time they'd been this way, they'd had to climb over the fallen oak.

How do I say I saw him in a dream? One of the strange ones, where I'm someone else, but I'm not? Like I'm in a life I've lived before? But that's sheer nonsense, and Red and Rita would justly scorch me for it. Well, Red has been hanging out with that Dee person. One of these days she'll have to introduce us to her new pal. After all, you only get one life... But something deep within her said no, and spoke of cycles, and drinks at the river of forgetfulness not being so deep as they should be. That something deep within chuckled at the distraught face the stranger had displayed. Methos, that voice called him, and chided her for using the name she'd heard the other two call, while she held him trapped with her gaze. His name was Adam. Pierson, I think the old guy called him. Adam Pierson? Strange enough name, but better than Methos, which comes from I don't know where. Besides! How'd he recognize me if he is from this conjectural past-life?! Whoever would have known me then would be dead, because nobody lives forever. And that voice deep within her spoke again. Methos had spoken of others, whose wounds healed with a speed surely blessed by the Mother. Spoken of others who lived despite all battles wounds, and death itself could not claim them, lest their heads were sundered from their bodies. They were the children of the Goddess, the voice whispered. There is no Goddess! This is foolishness! There is only the Lord, the Creator of All!

But what if He let others worship Him in other ways, let them worship Him not as a man as custom portrays Him, but as a Goddess? A Life Force who commands others to interact with humans for him? Is that not the Lord and His angels, child? The voice spoke again, in a different way. Another of those so-called past lives asserting itself? This one whispered to her of herbs, and how to play the lap harp. It whispered of the stages of the moon, and pagan rituals she firmly squished, ruthlessly suppressing any hint of rebellion. She'd allow no doubts to mar her faith.

A hand settled onto her shoulder, and she looked up with startlement into the gentle, understanding eyes of Red. "Struggling again? Are you still upset about that Roderick character calling you a 'dark paladin of Yahweh, who'd quite gleefully drag anyone who disagreed with you to the stake, as witches and warlocks'?"

"Yeah, I'm still upset about that. I don't fight…"

"Except for play, in the SCA…" Red chanted, like a long repeated plea. "I know, I know."

"Ah, calm down, Ree. He's a fag." Rita said, plopping down on the oak with all the sheer oomph of a self-possessed American teen. "Hey, I still get a kick out of that rhyme, you know. Besides, you're not half so stuck up and judgmental as you used to be!"

"Gee, thanks, I think…" Ree said, drawling. "Could you be a little less damning in your praise?"

"What's wrong Methos?" Dawson asked. "You look like you've seen a ghost."

Duncan frowned off to where the girl had vanished. He hummed a snatch of song, almost to himself, recalling something, or someone.

"She just looked like someone I knew about two thousand years ago. A Celtic warrior maid, who killed another Celt that was about to take my head for a trophy. She went down under the boots of another clan, and she tossed me her sword as she died. It was the only thing that let me keep my head, again. The Romans enjoyed taking heads as trophies, especially if they think you're Spartacus, and she helped me so.... They killed her, but I didn't let them take her head or mine." Methos muttered.

Duncan looked back at Methos. "She reminded you of someone too, hmm?"

"You remembered someone?" Methos said, frowning.

"Just someone I knew looked exactly like that, when I was a wee lad."

"Who?" Both friendly and professional curiosity warred in Dawson, and Methos snickered to see it.

Duncan spoke slowly. "Maire. She was one of the bards, the Old Faith. I knew her when I was a child."

His mind flashed back to the woman who'd sung the news, and whose eyes burned. Many of the older ladies spoke to her, and would not permit the more Christian young folk to drive her out. He remembered, faintly, the fuss they'd made of her. She was Irish, they said, and a Celtic Christian. She'd looked right at him and winked, then told him to remember her, when he was a great warrior. He'd thought it great, that this bard and singer said he'd be a great warrior.

"I think she was pagan, and I think she only pretended to be a good Christian so she wouldn't be stoned. She certainly knew too many of the old myths, and she spoke of druids like she knew them. Oh, but she could tell you stories that trapped you for hours. The mothers of the clan loved her, keeping us out of their hair for however long she chose to weave stories of Lugh, of Morgana, and Arthur, and Merlin" Duncan said. "She wasn't an Immortal though, and died even before she should have."

"How?" Dawson asked. Methos wondered when the notebook would be pulled out. Or perhaps the senior Watcher had developed the ability to remember MacLeod's yarns, filing the rare information about the Immortal's mortal life away.

"She was caught between two warring clans, and slain. The rumors passed to us that she'd been buried, and no sooner was a cairn raised over her head, than fairies and other things of pagan ilk started to appear about the area." The Highlander chuckled. "She always washed her hair with a soap that smelled of heather."

Methos paled. "Julia. The Celt, she was obsessed with cleanliness, and her hair always smelled of heather. If they looked exactly the same, and…."

Dawson looked at the two of them. "It can't be the same person. I mean, both of them died, right?"

"Could it be?" Methos wondered. "Could she be returning to life again and again? And never forgetting?"

Dawson chuckled. "If you ask the Eastern faiths, they'd say yes."

Duncan sighed. "And the faith that Maire practiced would say yes as well…"

© Lady Cinnibar