Entr'acte One

Paris, May 1985

Shrouded by the night

And by the secret stair I quickly fled

The veil concealed my eyes

While all within [me] lay quiet as the dead

from Dark Night of the Soul by St. John of the Cross

words adapted by Loreena McKennitt

Eleanor hurt. She hurt more than she could recall hurting in a very long time. She tied to sit up in the bed… and immediately regretted it. Collapsing back on the bed she tried to clearly think where she was and what had happened to her. She saw the rough beam ceiling and then noticed the thin lace curtain blowing in the breeze that covered her small window. She was in her room… in her bed… and she hurt. She felt like she had been torn apart. So… she was home… but what had happened?

Casting her memory back… she tried to recall the last thing she could remember. Methos! She'd been with Methos. There had been an urgency in their desire for one another that had nearly pushed the bounds of decency. It had been centuries since either of them had felt that way… that need to simply possess one another… have one another… Not since before Kae Dhun. Since then… their relationship had evolved. Slower … more tentative… as if they needed to gradually rediscover one another. Loving… but not needing. Eighty years prior… they had considered doing something more permanent… but had both withdrawn… and though they had been together a few times this century… most notably thirty some years ago… a permanent relationship had not been in the cards.

But this time… both she and Methos had seemed ready. They'd discussed it quietly at dinner, speaking in languages no longer known to the modern world… And then that other couple had wandered by… Methos worked with the man… Salzer she thought his name was. Methos knew both of them socially… and had introduced her as a cousin. Eleanor had nearly broken into laughter and had kicked him under the table when he'd called her Evie. Such a prankster… Adam and Evie…

Later… after they'd left… he'd mumbled something about Evelyn Trenton being a name on his biography. "It'll help… Dan will vouch for me that I have family." He'd grinned at her.

Then what had happened? They'd finished dinner… then gone to Notre Dame to visit with Darius for a while… and then… Eleanor closed her eyes. It was at that point that everything seemed to devolve into a need of Methos… and his need for her. Urgent… all-encompassing… an imperative that had overwhelmed them both… and then… Eleanor rubbed a hand over her forehead… feeling that it was slick with perspiration. It seemed so hot in here today…

She felt an immortal presence approaching. Straining, she could hear the soft sound of the hidden door from the sewers open and shut… and then slow measured footsteps on the stone stairs. It had to be Darius… perhaps he would have the answers as to why she was here and what had happened. Once more she attempted to sit up and once more… vertigo seized her and the pain pierced her… she lay back… her eyes closed.

The outer door opened and she could hear him settle something onto the counter before coming to her open door.

"Hey," she managed and opened her eyes.

"You're awake. How do you feel?"

"Very confused." Eleanor ran a hand through her hair… feeling it damp, tangled and matted about her head.

"I don't doubt it." Darius's voice was clipped… non-committal.

Eleanor tried to rise up on her elbows and then fell back once more. "What happened?" When Darius said nothing… Eleanor stared at him. He crossed her room to stare out of her window… his hands hidden within the sleeves of his robes. "Darius?"

Finally he turned to gaze at her sadly. "You said you'd been raped when you showed up here. You weren't entirely making sense."

Eleanor froze… for a moment her memories of her first death encompassed her so fully that nothing else seemed real. Only Edward… Methos… who had found her and Darius knew how she'd died that first time. It was still the one nightmare of her life that she'd never put behind her. She'd sworn early on in her immortal life… it would never happen again… she'd die first. Once she'd even knifed Edward when he'd tried to force her against her will. "My choice!" she'd told him. He'd never tried to force her again… understanding that her memories of her rape were still too painful… that she would lash out to kill anyone who tried. After she'd taken Kae Dhun's quickening… she'd been even more deadly towards any man who even looked at her the wrong way. Kae had fed off of her fear and had sometimes gained control of her when she was faced with situations over which she had no control.

Closing her eyes… Eleanor tried once more to recall what had happened. But nothing came… just her memories of being with Methos. "Did I say who did it?" she finally asked.

Again Darius turned to stare out the window. "Does it matter?"

"It does to me," she snapped.

The priest continued to stare out the window. "Methos," he finally said. "You told me it was Methos."

Eleanor closed her eyes… trying to bring forth a memory… but nothing beyond that sense of attacking one another with passion and need would come. "He wouldn't… he knows… I don't believe it…" she finally mumbled in a broken voice… sobs behind her words. She hurt… she hurt so badly.

Darius shrugged. "I only know what you told me." He turned to regard her sadly. "You said nothing else."

Eleanor curled into a ball, letting her tears freely flow… and her sobs wrack her bruised and beaten body. This made no sense… but if she had told Darius this… "Are you certain?" she finally got out, hoping against hope that somehow… he had misunderstood something she'd said.

Darius shrugged. "Why would I lie?" he turned back to the window to stare out onto the street, leaving her to sob on her narrow bed alone. He made no attempt to comfort her… she doubted she'd have let him anyway.

By dark… Eleanor felt much better… at least physically. She pulled her backpack and a couple of changes of clothes from the deep wooden chest, thrusting them into the pack. She stared around the room. "I'd thought to stay a while this time… but I can't… not now. I need to leave and think this out… get it all straight in my head before I see him again." She shouldered her pack and smiled thinly at her friend. "Don't tell him where I went… if he happens to come by to ask… don't tell him."

"I won't tell him anything." Darius continued to stare out the window… as if embarrassed by what had happened.

"I will miss you Darius," she'd said with a small smile.

He stared out the window. Finally he answered, "I'll miss you more." But there was no teasing in his words… only a great sadness she could not fathom.

Eleanor nodded and left quietly. She'd backpacked across Europe. It was almost eight years before she even dared to return to Paris. And in all that time… she did not contact any of her friends… but simply moved through her life… as if it were something to be endured rather than celebrated. Where once she'd finally made a decision to tell Methos how she felt about him… now she closed her heart to any memory of him or their times together. She would endure the consequences of her choice… she would endure life without him… but she doubted she'd ever forgive him.

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After Eleanor left, Darius cleaned and straightened her room and then returned to his church… where he prayed for his friends… for what had happened… for what he'd done… and not done… and for himself… that one day… they'd understand… that they would forgive him. He'd needed to test his theory… it had worked… but there had been unforeseen circumstances… ones he'd not considered. Now… he had to keep them apart for a while… not forever… but just long enough to finish the task at hand and to see what fruit would come from the seeds he had planted.

Within him… he felt only an empty void… where once he'd felt the power of the Ancients. Within him was only a shadow of what they'd been… a reflection of their power. Darius felt more alone than he had in over fourteen hundred years.