AN – yep, still not finished.

***

"Will you stop that?" For at least the thousandth time in the last hour, Duncan slapped Richie's hand away. "It'll never heal if you keep scratching at it."

"It itches." Richie pouted.

"That's because you keep scratching it."

"I'm scratching it, because it itches."

"You're bored aren't you?" Duncan smiled, as he gently shoved the teenager's feet to one side, so he could sit on the coffee table.

"Gee Mac, how did you guess?" Richie scowled. "Could it have anything to do with the fact that you've barely let me move off this couch for the last three days?"

"How about a game of chess?"

"How about not?"

"We could watch a movie?"

"We could go outside and look at real people."

"A snack," Duncan decided. "You always want a snack."

"What I want, is a world where there is music composed by people born in this century, food that will clog all my arteries and girls. Lots of girls. And not necessarily in that order. Hey, stop laughing, I'm serious."

"I know you are. Sorry," Duncan didn't look remotely contrite. "Its just good to hear you sounding like yourself again."

"What?" Richie cocked a rueful brow. "Whining and complaining?

"Making me laugh. You've had a hard time of it"

"It hasn't all been bad," Richie allowed. "You, in particular, you've been pretty cool. Especially, with the nightmares and all."

Richie had woken them both up that first night with nightmares of killing. Richie killing Walker, Walker killing Richie or Walker killing Mac. Duncan had crawled out of bed, to soothe his distressed cries several times before he simply tucked the exhausted lad in beside him. There had been no more nightmares, after that. So, for the last couple of nights, he had been sleeping with Duncan, until they were sure Walker was laid to rest.

"Hey," Duncan mussed his hair gently. "What's family for?"

"Yeah," Richie gave him that rare, gentle, bashful, smile. "I'm getting that."

"I take it you're feeling better, all round?" Duncan asked, lightly.

"Yeah, I think so. Just me in here now," He gave a rueful smile. "Well, kinda. What with the speaking Russian and all."

"It doesn't change who you are Rich," Duncan reminded him. "It just makes you stronger."

"If I'm stronger," Richie seized on that. "Then I should be able to go out."

"How about we go out for lunch?" Duncan offered. "That little café, you like in the Latin Quarter?"

"You mean it?" Richie sat up a little straighter, as his face lit up. "Really?"

"Sure," Duncan patted his leg. "It'll be something for you to look forward to."

"Look, forward to?" Richie repeated slowly.

"Tomorrow," Duncan gave him a tight grin, as he stood up. "For now, how about a nice bowl of soup?"

"Maac!"

"I could always make it gruel," Duncan moved towards the galley. "Build you up some."

"I feel fine now!" Richie called after him.

"Then you'll feel even better when we go out .. tomorrow." Duncan retorted sweetly.

***

"How has he been?" Darius asked, his voice coming slightly tinnily down the phone line.

"Not quite as good as he keeps trying to convince me, he is,"  Darius could hear the shrug in his voice. "Although, I think we're over the worst of it. But that wasn't why I was calling."

"I'm afraid my first suspicions were correct, my friend," Darius tone was regretful. "There's been no sign of him."

"He can't just have disappeared off the face of the earth," Duncan protested. "He only went out for some beer."

"Did he say when he'd be back?" Darius asked meaningfully.

"Why?" Duncan paused. "Has he done this sort of thing before?"

"Frequently. Don't concern yourself Duncan. If he went to all this trouble to make himself known to you, then you will see him again. When the time is right."

"For him or for me?" Duncan groused.

"Either," Darius counted smoothly. "Is that not the root of all friendships?"

Duncan put down the phone feeling oddly disconcerted by the phone call. It wasn't as if he thought that Adam was a threat, not as such. He'd hardly have let him be so free with Richie if Darius hadn't offered his assurances on that, but he couldn't help feel that there was more to him that met the eye.

He wondered if he would ever find out what it was.

"So, what did Darius say?" Richie returned from his trip to the bathroom, his only permitted excursion right now. "Has the good ole Doc done a disappearing act then?"

"Looks that way," Duncan tried to unobtrusively assess Richie's condition. His colour looked good and the short walk seemed to have had no ill effects. Maybe things were getting back to normal.

"Mac, who is Zoser?"

Or maybe not.

"He was an Egyptian Pharaoh, a King to you, in about 2630 BC." Duncan explained.

"Wow, that's pretty old." Richie looked awed.

"Rich, Walker wasn't anywhere that old. We looked him up. It much just be a memory, or something he read."

"Not Walker, Adam," Richie surprised him. "He said he was his Doctor, Imyhopty or something."

"Imhotep?" Duncan blinked. "He told you he was Imhotep? Rich, that would make him almost 5000 years old."

Richie had no clue about the significance of that.

"Yeah, well. Newsflash, Mac. He's an Immortal. I thought you'd noticed already." Richie grinned at him.

"Oh, that I knew." Duncan suddenly felt like he needed a drink.

A very large one.

***
"This is such a nice day, look at that sky, those birds, those ladies …" Richie turned around to drool, only to have Duncan seize him by the collar and tug him onwards. "Aw, c'mon Mac," he pleaded, still looking at the two cute blondes, in short, short skirts, who were smiling at him. "I'm like a thirsty guy passing an oasis here."

"We can't stop and chat to Bambo and Bimbi," Duncan told him. "We'll be late."

"So," Richie reluctantly let himself be pulled along. Not that he had much choice. "This is France. Late is a way of life."

"What?" Duncan stopped and made eye contact with him. "You're not hungry?"

"Oh yeah," Richie looked longingly back over his shoulder in the direction of the girls. "I'm hungry, alright."

"We're meeting someone."

"We are?" Richie's head snapped around. This was the first he had heard of it. "Um. Mac. This isn't like a blind date, is it?"

"Well, I don't much like the look of yours," Duncan chuckled, as they turned the corner and the small café came into sight. As expected, their dinner guests were already seated at the pavement table.

"Tessa!" Richie's face lit up as she stood up to greet him with a kiss on the cheek, that made him blush a warm pink, before pulling back, leaving a hand on each shoulder to search his face.

"How are you?"

"I'm good," Richie assured her earnestly, with a small smile. "Mac's made sure of it."

"And so he should," Tessa released him to plant a rather longer, and deeper kiss on her lover. "He knows what is good for him."

"Indeed, he does." Duncan agreed, his voice a little hoarse with passion.

"For Lord's sake, Duncan," the other person at the table protested. "Its only been a few weeks. You've gone decades without a ladies, ahem, company, before now."

"You have?" Richie blinked at him.

"I was a monk," Duncan scowled, none too fondly, at his teacher, over Tessa's shoulder. "It was in the job description."

"You? A monk?" Tessa giggled.

"Did you have one of those holes in your head?" Richie asked, far too innocently for Duncan's taste.

"Its called a tonsure, laddie, and its on your head, not in it."

"I can't believe you guys are here." Richie grinned as he sat down. "You couldn't have said you were coming home?"

"Then it wouldn't have been a surprise." Connor pointed out.

"And," Tessa gave her lover an impish smile. "We couldn't miss Mac's birthday."

"Birthday?" Richie blinked. "Its your birthday? You never said. When?"

"Oh, sometime in the 16th Century. I thought I told you that already?" Duncan grinned.

***

"He doesn't seem to have suffered any ill effects from the Quickening." Connor accepted the glass, looking back over at Richie as he slept on the couch. For all his protests  that he was "just fine" he had flaked out the moment they got home. Still, the two burgers, large portion of chips, and towering ice cream sundae he had consumed were comforting evidence that he was feeling better.

"After that incident with that waiter spilling soup in his lap, Tessa might not agree." Duncan said dryly.

"Richie could swear in French before he took Walker's head. He can just do it more fluently now. Has he acquired any other skills?"

"At the last count, he could speak Russian and Italian, he actually understood some of my arias, the other day."

"We'll get some culture into the lad yet."

"I never said he liked it."

"And?" Connor asked the thorny question. "Have you tried him with a blade?"

"I have not," Duncan said shortly. "No more will you. Twas a foolish indulgence to allow him to put his hand to a sword in the first place. He was lucky this time. Walker's blade didn't do half as much harm as it might have. Next time, he might not be so lucky."

"Oh?" Connor's tone was deceptively mild, as he sighed inwardly. He had been expecting this. Of course, Duncan would blame himself  for Richie's injury.

"He's already born late to the game Connor," In deference to the sleeping teen, Duncan kept his voice low, but the pent up anger in his tone came across clearly. "He can't afford any further disadvantages. Accidents happen. What if, he had damaged muscle or bone beyond repair? T'would be akin to a death sentence."

"Duncan, you weren't responsible for what Walker did to him. That had its roots in a time long before Richie met you."

"But I was supposed to protect him, I was supposed to keep him safe and I failed him. Twice." Duncan's voice cracked.

"You couldn't have known Walker would take him from the barge. You thought he was dead," Connor dismissed that. "And you'd never have killed Marc if he hadn't turned on Risteard. You were protecting him, Duncan. It wasn't your fault that Walker had no honour."

"Still .." Duncan looked over at the sleeping teen, pain clear in his eyes.

"You can't protect him from the Game, kinsman," Connor told him softly. "You can only love him soundly, so he has a reason to live. And teach him well, so he has the ability to live."

"But .." Duncan looked up. "He's too young yet. And not one of us. You said so yourself. That's not the way we do things."

"Duncan," Connor allowed himself a small chuckle. "You have a pre-immortal, who knows exactly what he is and what he will be, with full knowledge of Immortals and the Game, not to mention a thread of a Quickening. I'm not our traditions are relevant anymore."

"You think I should teach him?" Duncan blinked.

"You do have an advantage over Walker," Connor shrugged. "To men like us, a sword is no sport. Your father taught you that it was a weapon to defend yourself, but also to kill if need be. He put you to the sword as soon as you were strong enough to life it. Did he ever harm you in practise?"

"Ah course not," Duncan looked shocked by the very idea.

"And when you were older and he put you to teaching the striplings of the Clan, did you ever hurt them with a careless parry or a wild cut?"

"A fighting man in practise has a duty to be careful," Duncan recited. "You know that."

"So, teach Risteard as your father taught you."

Duncan considered that. A myriad of emotions flickering across his face.

"He never taught me to kill in the way of our kind."

"I think yon laddie has already worked that one out for himself." Connor said dryly.

***

Richie flopped on the couch and sighed heavily, three times, put his feet up on the coffee table, put them down again, sighed again.

Biting back a smile, Connor waited a full five minutes before he looked up from his book.

"Something wrong?"

 "I thought I'd found Mac, the best present ever for his birthday. This little silver kilt pin, in the shape of a sword, but  .."

"He already has one." Connor nodded.

"Yeah," Richie sighed. "What do you get for the man who has everything?"

 "Well. I found a watercolour, a landscape of the Highlands, by a young Scottish artist, that I think will appeal to him."

"See, I don't know anything, about art and stuff," Richie complained. "I bet if I brought Mac some piece of art that I like, he'd secretly hate it."

"Risteard, he'd love it, simply because you gave it to him, you know that."

"I'd rather he loved it, because he actually loved it.."

"What about a new shirt?" Connor suggested. "An Immortal can never have too many shirts."

"I know, I think Tess must have bought him at least six."

"I'll warrant yours would be different," Connor didn't try to hide his amusement at the very idea of Duncan in a shirt that Richie had picked out for him.

"He'll be getting a musical haggis, at this rate." Richie glowered.

"If you could even find such a monstrosity in Paris," Connor huffed. "I'd teach you swordplay myself."

"You would?" Richie looked up eagerly. "Cos, Mac said I had to wait a while. But you're his teacher, right? So, he can't boss you."

Somehow, Connor doubted that Duncan would see it that way. At all. Still, he thought he saw safe enough.

"Risteard, Paris is a city of culture. You could never find such a thing here."

"Yeah, like the plastic souvenir Eiffel Towers are so classy."

"Have you thought of buying him a book?" Connor changed the subject.

"That was the first thing I thought of," Richie sighed. "But some guy named Fitz already sent him, this parcel by registered mail that I'm pretty sure is some kind of first edition."

"What about socks, or aftershave?" Connor shrugged.

"Yeah, right. Maybe if he was a normal Dad .." Richie scoffed.

Then his eyes widened.

"Of course, that's it! I can't believe I didn't think about it before!"

"You're going to buy him a pipe and slippers?" Connor teased.

"No. Besides, he already has slippers," Richie pointed out, already shrugging into his coat. "Later."

"Don't slam the .." Connor began. "Door." He ended lamely, as Richie closed the door behind him, with enough force to rock the barge on its moorings.