Chapter 14
New York
For Cassandra, the meeting with Phillip had yielded few clues concerning the whereabouts of the Ancient's crystal. Even under the compulsion of her voice... all Phillip could say was that Little Sister's husband had planned the heist and that he'd confiscated the crystal. Phillip had never seen nor heard of it again. Curiously... Phillip had seemed unable to offer even the broadest detail of the heist or of the true identity of Little Sister's husband... he was Edward Gray... that seemed to be all Phillip knew or could say for certain.
Failing to discover more... Cassandra had placed the compulsion in his mind to find out something about the crystal... perhaps from his student... the one he called Little Sister. She'd had to be careful... Phillip seemed almost immune to her voice... but not quite... as though there were aspects of his life and the identity of some of his friends which were so buried beneath an even greater compulsion that he not reveal them. Cassandra could not help but wonder if Lilith... or Danae as he still called her... was the root of this apparent resistance.
The Ancient had had great power. Yet even now... Cassandra wondered if she had truly been as powerful as she had seemed... or if it had all been slight of hand... smoke and mirrors... a trick of the eye.
***********
Palestine ca 900 b.c.e.
Xandra ducked her head as the stones were thrown. She knew she would re-awaken if they killed her. If she were lucky... this would be quick... but it was always painful. And she never knew exactly where she would find herself when she awoke once more.
In the years since her flight from the camp of the hated horsemen... she had come to learn that it was not just because of the one called Methos that she returned to life... he was nowhere to be seen... It seemed to just be something that happened to her.
As yet... she had met no others... but she had heard tales that demons who could not die walked the earth. She believed it... she had met at least one... likely four if all four of them were like her. The dizzying wail that she had always sensed while a slave in their camp had faded as she had run. Despite several deaths... she had not yet felt that sickening feeling again.
Another stone landed on her head and she felt warm blood trickle down her face. She wailed in pain... it was what the crowd seemed to expect... and huddled on the ground... wishing only that it were over.
Even before the next stone hit her back leaving what was likely a huge bruise that would soon fade, Xandra began to sense what she had known in the horsemen's camp... That buzzing cry that seemed to fill her mind with the sound of a thousand voices wailing on the wind. Xandra dared to lift her head... fearful that they had found her... Was there no end to this life... must she die and be reborn into pain and terror forever?
Xandra saw the villagers part as waves before an oncoming force. Soon there was a wide gap surrounding a tall, dark-haired woman who gazed at her with a sorrowful expression.
Another rock hit Xandra's head... and this time... the darkness claimed her.
***
She awoke in the cool semi-darkness of one of the caves that seemed to litter this portion of the countryside. At first she feared she might have been enclosed in a tomb... but Xandra heard low voices and was faintly aware of a pale light flickering. Then she realized the wail that she had felt just before that last rock had hit her, was still here with her... so close and so much a part of her... that it had seemed to fade into the background.
Xandra sat up quickly and glanced about for anything she could use as a weapon. They... whoever they were... would not have her. She would kill them and leave them and run... run... run... as she had been running for nearly a century. Her hands at last located a fist-sized rock. She hefted it in her hand and then, crouching a bit from the low ceiling of the cave, approached the voices and the light.
As her eyes adjusted to the greater light at the campfire, Xandra blinked and held her empty hand before her eyes. At the fire was an old, bald man, with a scraggly white beard. He glanced up at her and she noticed that his right eye had turned white. Across from him sat the tall dark-haired woman Xandra had seen in the crowd just before she'd been hit by that last rock.
She raised the rock in her hand and made a threatening motion. The old man laughed at her, shook his head, and then rose to leave. He made some sarcastic remark to the woman as he exited the cave.
Xandra faced the woman and drew back her hand once more, "I'm not afraid to use this."
"Put it down child... there is no need for your fear with me."
Xandra hesitated. Then she drew back her arm again and threw the rock at the woman. The woman smiled as she casually lifted one hand to catch the thrown rock and toss it back and forth between her hands. Then she tossed it behind her as if it were no matter.
Xandra turned looking for something else to throw.
"You cannot hurt me child... Look within yourself and you will know this to be true. If you wish to go... then do so... no one here will stop you... But I'd advise you to stay away from the village to the north... That is where you were when I found you."
"Who are you?" Xandra finally managed to get out.
The woman smiled and shrugged. "Around here they call me Lilith. Over the years I've learned... one name is as good as another."
"You are like me... you cannot die?"
Lilith threw back her head and laughed a great lusty laugh. When it finally subsided she chuckled at Xandra, "Child... all living things die in their own time. You and I simply have a little more time than the others."
Xandra was momentarily startled when the old man returned. Her sense of another like herself and the woman Lilith was re-doubled. This old one was one, too. He said something to Lilith in a tongue that Xandra did not know... The tall woman nodded. "Stay here in the cave child." Then she rose, grasped a stout staff and made her way out of the cave. The old man's gaze followed the departing woman... but he re-settled himself by the fire and stared into it with his one good eye.
"You too are one that cannot die?" Xandra asked him.
He looked over at her and stared... then slowly he nodded his head. Xandra felt there was a great sadness in the man and wondered how old he was... how long had he walked the earth? "Were you always this way?" she asked him.
Once more he simply stared at her without speaking. Then he sighed. "My speech is not so pleasant a thing to hear... I have troubles with this tongue... language." He shrugged a bit and chuckled.
Xandra felt herself relaxing a bit. Neither of these two seemed too terribly dangerous... at least they weren't mistreating her. She glanced up in concern at the sound of raised voices outside the cave.
"Should we help her?"
"She does not need our help girl... That one can summon even the lightning if she chooses."
Xandra shook her head. This made no sense to her. Once again the sounds of voices rose outside the cave. Then there was only silence and the mournful whistling of the wind.
Lilith returned and lay her staff against the wall. She closed her eyes, shaking her head sadly, and then seemed to shrug it all off. "Are you hungry child?" she asked Xandra.
"Yes... that was their reason for stoning me... I was hungry and stole some fruit at the market."
"So I gather. They were angry I took you in. I have paid for the fruit you took... and twice more besides." Lilith motioned to a basket near the door. "Take what you need child and go in peace if that is your wish."
Xandra sidled over to the basket and filled both of her hands with the ripe pulpy fruit of the area. She bit into one and then devoured it. She started on the second one and grabbed a third out of the basket with her empty hand. Then she paused and stared at the couple sitting quietly at the fire. Chewing thoughtfully, Xandra asked, "I can really just go?"
"If that is your choice. You may take what you need and go... or..." Lilith paused and smiled coldly at Xandra, "... or... you can stay and learn how to live."
"I live." Xandra retorted.
"If that is what you call it." Lilith turned away from her and stirred the fire thoughtfully.
Xandra finished the second fruit. She started to bite into the third one, and then thought better of it. She no longer had her pouch... or anyway to carry extra food. She had nothing. Staring at the gift of fruit in her hand Xandra considered what Lilith was saying... what she was offering... how to live versus how to survive... Xandra knew the woman was right... She needed to learn to live again. Slowly Xandra replaced the fruit gently in the basket... her hunger satisfied by the two she had eaten... and returned to the fire.
"Teach me then... why are we this way? How can we die and finally end this torture?"
Lilith continued to stir the fire for a long time. Finally she glanced at Xandra, "I don't normally meet with our kind after the change... but for you child... I will make an exception...for in you is a great gift... one that if properly developed may change the game."
"Game? What game is this you speak of?"
The old man laughed at her questions... but it was a gentle and patient laugh. "Girl... now you ask the questions that I, with my Lady's permission, will answer."
The woman smiled and nodded at her companion. And so the three of them remained huddled about the fire until a rosy dawn fingered her way into the morning sky.
