5
Disclaimer: Methos, Joe, Richie, and Duncan Macleod are the property of Davis-Panzer Productions. Gwen MacQueen is mine.
I want to thank my beta reader R.J. Bingham without his help I would still be rewriting this story.
Chapter 9
PUT THE TOWEL BACK ON!
After Joe left, Methos sat down on the sofa and motioned for Gwennie to sit too. Instead, she put her sword case down and walked into the kitchen to snatch a six pack of beers out of the refrigerator. Then she tossed one of the cans to Methos before she came and sat down beside him.
"I thought we needed a beer. It's only 12:30 PM but it's been a long morning. OK, we are alone, what do we do now?" Gwen said as she started to drink her beer. Methos started to speak but Gwennie rushed in saying
"Oh no me first, I was the one who was ambushed, really now Methos, did you know I've been looking for you for the past nearly 80 plus years and now when I'm finally ready to put us in the past, and meet someone new, try something different, then literally, KABOOM you walk in the door. Oh hell! Where have you been and why haven't our paths crossed!"
"Gwennie I only found out you might be alive two days ago. I believed you were killed back in 18 BC, Darius swore to me you had lost your head. I came here to find if it was really you or not as soon as I could. So don't be angry with me, I really believed you were dead." Methos said as he put the beer on the coffee table.
"Please Methos, or what ever you're calling your self these days, drink the beer. I think you are going to need it." Gwen pondered Methos face, and then with a sigh she went on. "I knew you were still alive, sometimes when I meditate I can reach out my quickening and touch that of other immortals. I have felt yours many times but never have been able to locate you. I begged Darius to tell me if he knew where you were, he refused. He just said that too many years had passed and both he and you had changed too much. Finally Daruis demanded that I stop asking him." Gwen's demeanor always was somber whenever she talked about Darius.
"Well Darius and I had a difference of opinion back around the turn of the first century and I didn't speak to him for a long time. It wasn't actually until about WW II that I stated talking to him again. I blamed him for your death, but last time I spoke to him the good father Darius neglected to tell me you were alive." Methos' voice sounded very surprised.
"Well that explains why in 1915 Darius wouldn't tell me where you were. All of the younger immortals I met said you were a myth. Connor MacLeod's first teacher was Tak Ne and he knew both of us. Connor had said that Ramirez as he called himself then had seen you many times, since the old days. Connor did try to help me find you but the game interrupted us too many times and I finally just stopped looking." Gwennie said as she sat closer to Methos. Her anger was beginning to fade.
"It's good to be a myth; no one hunts down a myth and yes Tak Ne was a good friend but the Kurgan killed him in 1542, he was calling himself Juan Sanchez Villa Lobos Ramirez when he was Connor MacLeod's teacher." Methos took a deep breath remembering his old friend. "Gwennie how, after so many years, do you still find the passion for all the fighting and killing, after we have lost so many friends to the game?"
"I do it because it's what you taught me to do. I only hunt and kill those who I deem evil or I kill those who try to kill me. It's doesn't have anything to do with passion. It is about my life, what I am. Methos I am immortal, I live, I grow stronger, and I fight," Gwen said to Methos.
"I forgot how good of a teacher I was, but that was a long time ago. Did you know that after I thought you were dead, I went on a killing spree? I went insane and killed every Immortal I came across for the next ten years. I guess I just wanted revenge on the one who took your head. Even Darius hid from me. I just wanted to kill the one that killed you. Somehow I thought if I found the Immortal who took your quickening I would have part of you with me and it would bring me closure. But it never happened, since then I have lived mostly as a mortal, creating a life, time after time. I have gotten very good at blending in to the mortal's world. Only a few know I am really Methos the Immortal, Joe Dawson, and one of Connor's kinsmen, Duncan MacLeod. It's easier to hide from the game now, if the others knew who I really was every immortal would be after my head" Methos tried to explain to Gwennie.
"I was forced to hide in a tomb, waking up just to die again continually for 2000 years. The Game went on without me. Yet I still knew it was there. I meditated, like I was when you first came in Joe's house. In that state I can speak with all the quickenings of all the immortals I have taken, and in turn learn their secrets and share their power and knowledge. Sorry I was in such a state when you walked in and I felt your quickening jump out at mine and I guess it turned in to a lighting bolt between us. That must have been what knocked me across the room. Sorry about that." She smiled at him although feeling a little strange about the experience.
"Well we could always feel were the other was, I always thought that was just part of your mystical power rubbing off on me. Gwennie the lightning bolt was very different, to say the least. Good thing Joe is my friend and he will keep what he sees to himself. So all the time I thought you were dead, you weren't, actually dead and you could still feel me and the game going on?" Methos asked her
"Yes, I knew you were there and still alive. At times I stopped believing that I would ever leave my prison. Then in 1915 one of the Germans bombs broke through the walls and I came out in to a new world. Somehow the game seemed to have gotten tougher. The world was smaller and other immortals had a lot more interaction than before. Things heated up fast." Gwennie looked in to Methos eyes and he into hers.
"I know I've been around the last 2000 years. I know just how hot the game has gotten. Gwennie I can't be in the game right now. I have a good hiding place as Adam Pierson and I'm not ready to give this identity up." Methos mournfully said reached out and touched her hair remembering how soft it was and how he used to playfully twirl it around his finger.
"Oh Methos, I can't hide, I am Gwennie of Britanny and I am Immortal. I can't remember any other life. We are what we are, and nothing can make us like regular mortals. We can live a life most mortals only dream about. Frankly even the down side of being an Immortal isn't all that bad. I mean the fighting and taking a quickening can be very thrilling too. I know what you are going to say, but even when I lose my head I will still pass my quickening on and that is OK, its part of the bargain. My power and knowledge will still be here even if I'm not." Gwen stared at Methos.
"Well, I'm glad you are so at peace with your fate. I'm not nearly so confident about my own." Methos smiled back at her. "And what this about Gwenaversha of Britanny? As I remember it my dear you were raised in Minoa, which is on the other side of the world from Brittany or Britain come to that. You always just told every one what you wanted them, to believe, even if you lied about it completely" Methos laughed.
Gwennie gave Methos an ugly look and replied "Well I was taught by the best. You are no one to talk; you have told so many lies yourself I doubt I can remember all of them"
"Gwennie I really don't want to argue with you. I was at peace with the idea that you were dead. I see you are still the same impulsive, crazy, wild woman you always were. I just want you to understand right now it's too dangerous for us old immortals to be declaring ourselves to the others. There are too many young ones just wanting a crack at taking our heads. I have found a place to keep track of the others, lay low and stay out of the game, maybe then I can just survive. You see Gwennie I don't want to die now or ever."
"But Methos, remember something's are worst than death, and I think I've been through them and survived. I can't just stay in the shadows, no one will ever treat me like a little whore, hiding, and afraid again. I have taken a thousand quickening and I will continue to take as many as I need to, so that no one will ever again treat me like that." Gwennie said with a conviction in her voice.
Methos took a deep breath, seeing this was going nowhere he changed the subject "Gwennie there is no one left alive today besides me who would even know about your past. I can never picture you ever being afraid of anything. But its 12:30 now so why don't you take a shower, wash your hair. I know how you hate having blood in your hair, and then you can change in to something clean. I know this has been a difficult morning for both of us. I'm not going to let you leave this house without giving you a full explanation about what is really happening here and who the Watchers are. I am very weary from my trip and could use a rest. Please can't this discussion wait until after lunch? I think we need some time to gather our thoughts. I know we have got a lot to say to each other but."
Gwen interrupted Methos and said "OK, that sounds like a good idea, I could use a moment to reflect on the fact that you're back in my life. I should have realized that during all the time I was in the tomb, you where out living life and the centuries might have changed you a lot more than they changed me. Maybe I'm still very much the same woman you knew in 18 BC."
Methos smiled at Gwen and said "I wouldn't say that, you seem much more able to see the other person's point of view than I can remember you doing. I think you might have changed more than you think you have."
After calling for a pizza to be delivered, Methos went up to the guest room to rest a bit while Gwen took her shower. Methos had been traveling for over 24 hours and his body was still on Paris time and he'd had little sleep ever since he received the word about his field assignment. Without Joe in the house the two seemed more relaxed and could take their time. Methos knew Gwennie was most comfortable around her own kind. He was a little shocked to see Gwennie being intimate with Joe a mortal. To his recollections she had only taken other immortals as lovers, never mortal men like Joe.
After her shower Gwen walked into her room still dripping wet. She had only put on a towel and was going through her suit case to find something appropriate to wear. Seeing Methos again had dredged up many of those old feelings she had tried to forget during the past few eons. She stopped looking for the right outfit and instead decided to find out if 2,000 years had dulled her desire for him. She walked to the quest room he was in and sat on the bed next to the resting immortal. His hair was different, short instead of the long hair he always used to have, and she was glad to see him clean shaven. Methos had changed his appearance many times during the years when they were together and Gwen decided she liked the way he looked now. Oh Yea, the desire for Methos had never faded. She still wanted him more than ever. Gwen bent down and kissed him on the cheek, her hair dripping all over his face.
Methos opened his eyes and looked up at Gwen "Hey stop you're getting me wet. Haven't you heard that electricity was invented over a hundred years ago and most people use hairdryers these days. Gwennie! What are you doing in my room? Can't you see I'm trying to rest? Put some clothing on women, this isn't our hut near the Parthenon; besides you are making it impossible for me to relax"
"Ooh I'm sorry; I didn't mean to wake you. Here let me dry off your face." she said seductively as she slowly took off the towel she was wearing and wiped his face with it.
"Gwennie stop! What are you doing? Put the towel back on! My God woman it's been two thousand years, have you no shame! I might be married or something!"
"Are you married …..or something?" Gwen asked in a coy voice.
"No" Methos paused and then said "I'm not, but you are acting like its still 18 BC and we just saw each other yesterday. I don't think we should just pick up right were we left off. Didn't we just agree to take some time to talk?" Methos said as he tried not to look at Gwennie's nude body. He remembered back to when she was his student, how she seemed to always be losing her clothes, lost a cloak or cut up her tunic. Some how they always ended up naked together.
"But Methos, what is the point; I thought about it and I still feel the same about you. I need to find out if you can find those old feelings again too. We have been separated for other long times before but our greeting has never changed," Gwennie said as she wiped the tears from her eyes.
"The day before yesterday I was just living my life safe and sound and now you have to show up after 2,000 years! Oh you can still drive me crazy! I don't think the two of us making mad passionate love is what most people would consider a greeting!" Methos looked up at the women sitting beside him; suddenly he realized it would be a lot harder to break this particular old habit than he had anticipated. Memories of thousands of other such greetings filled his mind and Methos's voice softened as he said. "Gwennie you're even more exquisite than I remember." Methos reached up and touched her sensuous body. He closed his eyes for a moment. The emotion he had been holding in since he first learned Gwennie was alive broke forth as a dam breaking and tears began rolling down his cheek. "You know you are the only woman I ever really loved."
"Thank you Methos, I needed to hear that, even if I know it's a lie. You know I have always been your slave." Gwen said as she started to unbuttoned his shirt and run her fingers on his chest, softly caressing him.
Methos shuddered with passion "My slave, well that is an interesting concept. Gwennie, you know I think it's really me that was always your slave."
Then the two lovers fell into each other's embrace. Their kisses were sweeter than either had remembered and Gwennie's body joined Methos's with a passion the two forgot was possible. Even her wet hair seemed to heighten the lovemaking as they licked off the water from each other's bodies. As they held each other close, the outside world began too disappeared. Methos started to feel his flesh burn as if it was on fire. She turned his insides out until Methos thought he would die of pleasure. Gwen once again made him feel like he had left his body and moved on to a higher plane of existence as his bliss over took him. All Gwennie knew was that they were together again at last and she was safe in his arms.
End chapter 9
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Look for chapter 10 - METHOS' TRUE CONFESSIONS
