AN- Wow, thank you everyone so much for all the reviews, it really fires me up to write more when I know people are so interested in the story. A special thank you to Jodi and Annikaya for the kind words, I'm so sorry I couldn't find your e-mails but I really appreciate your comments. Hope you all enjoy the next instalment.
"I don't understand," Duncan looked blankly at his mentor. "Connor, I'd never even met the lad before the other day. You know that. You were there."
"No, you never did," Connor agreed, "But you would have met him, about three weeks from now, if Ares hadn't taken matters into his own hands."
"That's as maybe, except that mark was made when the lad was still mortal." Duncan ran a hand through his hair. He didn't dispute the fact that his mentor had been going to tell him about the Clan mark. It made sense to bring the lad to meet him. What didn't make sense was Connor's insistence that he had had any part in agreeing to the adoption. He wasn't exactly sure how old Richie was, but nobody got to be that skilled with a blade without a great deal of practice. The lad had already worked his way through several teachers. He must have been Immortal for decades, perhaps even centuries.
"You're not listening Duncan. He was mortal enough when you first met him."
"I think I would have remembered."
It wasn't as if he had met that many pre-immortals in his time and he had always made a point of keeping in touch to ensure that they had someone to help them over those first few difficult years of Immortality. He still had a couple of students living. Not necessarily doing him proud, but alive.
"When Richie was a few weeks short of his sixteenth birthday, he broke into your Antique Store and ended up in the middle of a challenge. You killed Slan Quince and Tessa followed you to the Island to stop you from leaving her." Connor attempted to explain.
"First of all, I haven't owned an Antique Store since I got burned over those fake Chinese vases in the 17th century. Secondly, I have never met an Immortal named Slan Quince, let alone fought him and in case you've forgotten the Island is in Washington State and Tessa's never even been out of Europe."
"Yet." Connor regarded him steadily.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"It means," Adam put in from the doorway. "That you had better make sure that your passports are up to date. This prophecy has a way of arranging things to its own liking."
"Oh come on," Duncan protested. "You can't really believe that all our destinies are being controlled by some mythical prophecy?"
"What? The sensible practical Scot doesn't hold sway with myths and legends?" Adam challenged.
"What if I don't?"
"What about Cassandra? You remember the witch of Donan woods, don't you? All myths hold an element of truth, Macleod. That's why people remember then. What about Santa Claus? Excalibur?" Adam tipped his head on one side. "Methos."
"Methos isn't real."
"Are you quite sure about that?"
Duncan watched with his arms folded across his chest as Adam spoke in quiet tones into the phone. The language was like nothing he had ever heard spoken, soft and musical, like notes on a wooden pipe.
It was also bloody annoying, as it meant he couldn't tell what was being said.
"Alright," Adam put the phone down and looked at Connor. "Darius is on his way. He just needs a few moments to collect something en route."
"Such as the oldest living Immortal?" Duncan raised a sceptical brow.
"Why do people find that idea so hard to believe?"
Duncan supposed that of all the surviving Immortals, one of them would inevitably be the oldest. He'd heard of a few Ancient Immortals, Darius, of course, Grayson, this Ares seemed to be one. But still. It was the scale that was hard to comprehend.
"Five Thousand years?" He shook his head.
"I do not understand," Tessa looked up from where she was sitting on the sofa and glared at the pair of them. "Why do you even care about who is the oldest? When what you should be worrying about is finding Richie!"
"Darius has people looking." Adam assured her. Sometimes Darius' network of clerics was more useful than the Watchers. They were certainly more discreet and they had easy access to holy ground.
"He'll be fine Tess," Duncan attempted to soothe her. "He's old enough to take care of himself."
"No-one is ever too old to need the love and support of family. You of all people should know this, Duncan Macleod of the blessed Clan Macleod!"
Tessa slammed her coffee cup down on the table, sloshing the still hot liquid over her thumb. "Damn!" She exclaimed, putting thumb in her mouth to cool it.
"Let me see." Duncan's tone was conciliatory.
With a sigh, Tessa offered the injured hand, allowing him to lead her into the galley to apply cold water and a dressing.
"Is all this cloak and dagger stuff really necessary?" Connor asked once they were alone. "Couldn't you have just told him who you are?"
"Oh yes, that would work," Methos wasn't agreeing. "Do you remember Richie's reaction when I first told him?"
"He believed you," Connor considered that. "Eventually."
He wasn't at all sure what he was expecting. But even so the identity of Darius' Immortal guest took him completely by surprise.
"Duncan!"
Amanda threw herself into his arms with such force that Duncan had to wrap his arms around her to keep her on her feet. Unfortunately, she seemed to take this as some kind of invitation and began kissing him fervently on the lips, on the cheeks, on the forehead and just about anywhere she could reach.
"'Manda." Duncan protested, with an embarrassed laugh, trying to extricate himself from her attentions, acutely aware that Tessa was watching every move. "I know its been a while but .."
She stopped and drew back, searching his gaze intently and her face fell.
"You're not him."
"Only now you notice this?" Tessa cut in archly ready to defend her territory.
"Um, Tessa," Duncan drew her forward, wrapping an arm around her stiff shoulders and pasting a smile on his face. "Sweetheart, this is Amanda, she's an old friend of .. um .. Connor's?"
"Indeed?" Tessa asked icily. "How old exactly?"
"A lady never tells." Amanda preened, confident of her enduring good looks.
Duncan paused. He realised that Amanda had never told him how old she was. Not exactly. Surely she couldn't be? He looked helplessly at Darius.
"You are not going to tell me that our Amanda here is the oldest living Immortal, are you?"
"What?" Amanda looked offended. "You don't think I could be?"
"Well, of course you could," Duncan backtracked. "I mean, you're beautiful, talented and intelligent, it's just that I never think of you as old, Amanda."
He sighed in relief when she dimpled prettily under the compliment, only to feel his heart sink when he saw the stony expression on Tessa's face.
"Perhaps," Darius suggested. "We should all sit down?"
Tessa had claimed the couch pulling Duncan down possessively beside her. Connor had settled into the easy chair, not looking remotely surprised when Amanda perched playfully on the arm. Darius had chosen the upright wooden chair where he had a clear view of them all whilst Adam stood a little off to the left, staring out of the porthole at the pedestrians walking up and down the quay.
"And you will know him by his company assembled," Darius read from the small leather bound book. "For the faithful wife shall nurture him, the favoured son shall watch over him and his good possession will be the key. The wolf will teach him the way of the pack, the lover will show him his path and from the spring of youth the brown warrior will raise him to his destiny in the brief light of summer and be his strength through all the seasons of his life."
"And that is Richie?" Tessa asked. "How can you be so certain?"
Duncan looked at his kinsman. Connor of course, was the wolf. His name in Gaelic Conchobhar meant wolf and as the Clan elder it was his duty to instruct others in their duties as a Macleod. Amanda too was easy. She always said she was a lover not a fighter and her name if he recalled correctly, came from the Latin for love.
"The favoured son?" Duncan looked at Adam. He knew, of course, that in the original Hebrew Adam meant favoured son. "But that's not your real name, is it?"
"Its not the name I was born with," Adam acknowledged. "But it's as real as any I've had."
Then there was Darius or Dareios in its Roman form,the good possession, in Ancient Persian. Duncan had always wondered if Darius actually was the King of Persia who had invaded Greece but been defeated at the Battle of Marathon. He was certainly old enough.
"The faithful wife?" He frowned.
Marriage was not entirely unknown among Immortals, but monogamy was difficult if you both expected to live for centuries. Look at Robert and Gina.
"Hebrew." Darius supplied.
"Oh. Rebecca." Duncan realised. A shiver ran down his spine as he realised the Ancient root of all these names. Had present events really been set in motion so long ago? And then there was the one whose role it was to raise the lad to his destiny and be his strength.
The brown warrior, in Gaelic Donnchadh, in English Duncan, in other words him.
"Alright," Duncan set the tray of coffee down on the table. "So, we are all in some way connected to the lad. I still don't see what that has to do with his adoption."
"This account was written in the 6th Century," Darius shrugged as if this was unremarkable. "There were others before."
"And they all said the same?" Duncan asked.
"As far as I can remember," Adam spoke up. "They might have lost a nuance or two in translation."
"You wrote this?"
"Well, the first versions weren't written of course," Adam acknowledged. "But I recorded what my teacher told me. For as long as I can remember, you have always been the one Richie looked to as his father."
"But I'd never even heard of him until this week." Duncan protested.
"I had," Darius' quiet assurance captured Duncan's attention. "I started watching him when his first foster mother died in ah, unusual circumstances. I did what I could to ease his plight when he found himself in Catholic Orphanages. I wish I could have done more, but to have done so would have attracted unwanted attention."
"From Ares?"
"Indeed," Darius nodded sagely. "The boy had to be kept from his clutches, at any cost. And unfortunately, it was Richie who paid the price. He had a hard time of things growing up. A very hard time."
"Oh, le pauvre," Tessa put her hand to her mouth. "It is terrible how people used to allow children to be so badly treated."
"I'm afraid I haven't made myself clear," Darius shook his head. "Richie was born in 1974."
"That lad is never sixteen." Duncan shook his head in denial.
"The one you met isn't," Darius agreed. "But this one is."
He passed Duncan a Kodak print with a date of a few weeks previously taken in Seacouver. The photo showed a teenager with slightly long, unkempt blonde curly hair, wearing dirty, ripped jeans and holey tennis shoes, with an ugly green and blue jacket over the top. To Duncan's critical eye he was painfully thin, all arms and legs where muscle should have been, but the cocky grin was strikingly familiar.
"But that's Richie."
"Isn't that what we've been trying to tell him?" Adam asked nobody in particular.
He listened as Connor outlined the life he might have had, the move to Seacouver, the Antique Store, Tessa's blossoming career as an artist, his apparently fateful meeting with Richie and a glimpse of a future yet to be, the three of them as the family he had wished for, subtly introducing Richie into the ways of their kind, the move back to Paris.
Images of the lad flowed through his mind. The way he came alive with a sword in his hand, his grin flashing and his eyes sparkling, with the thrill and skill of the blade. That soft smile when they were alone.
God he wanted it. He really wanted it to be true.
"I don't know." He shook his head. "I mean, time travel?"
"You expected me to believe in Immortals." Tessa sniffed.
"I didn't just expect you to believe. I shot myself!" Duncan looked at Adam. "What if you told me the winner of the downhill ski-ing championships tomorrow?"
"I have no idea," At Duncan's sceptical look he defended himself. "It has been nearly a hundred years." He looked at Connor. "Do you know?"
"No, but I know a man who can help us."
Duncan wasn't at all sure why he was bothering to make a phone call to a man sitting not three feet from him but he dutifully dialled the number of the Hotel he knew Connor favoured when he was in Seattle.
"Yes, hello," he stood up and cupped the phone under his chin. "Can I speak to one of your guests, Russell Nash, please?"
"One moment please."
He fully expected the woman to come back and tell him that no such person was in residence, but after a few seconds the line clicked and a familiar voice came on.
"This is Nash."
"Connor." Duncan sank back down onto the sofa in slaw jawed surprise as he looked up into the eyes of the man sitting across the room from him. "Is that you?"
"Duncan," his teacher's voice reacted to the stress in his tone. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing," Duncan made an effort to swallow his feelings as he hunted for a suitable explanation for his shock. "I just haven't heard from you in a long time."
"I sent you a card at Christmas." He heard rustling as his teacher shifted in the bed.
"Connor," Duncan rolled his eyes. "That was in 1972."
"I'm well, Duncan. You would have had word otherwise." Connor's tone was mild rebuke.
"Tell him not to buy the Italian Rapier," his mentor scowled across the room. "The damn thing never went up in value. Tell him to go for the Spanish dagger instead. There's going to be a real market for those in a decade or so."
Duncan scowled.
"Are you sure you don't want to talk to yourself?"
The streets of Paris were still crowded with the evening's revellers. Light and colour spilled out of café's onto the pavements, the warmth of conversation and laughter echoing off the cobblestones in the Latin Quarter. Duncan checked for a third time that the bottle of cognac Segur had left him was tucked safely inside his coat. He had always said he wanted to drink it with a friend. Adam had assured him that Richie would understand the gesture.
As he moved further on the streets got quieter, the lights of scattered apartments over shops and offices dark and closed. Instinctively, Duncan looked around for danger. The last thing he needed right now was to be delayed by some damn fool mugger. Darius' information had said Richie was at a bar not far from here. But who knew how long he would stay put?
The pain hit without warning. Striking in his back and exploding in his chest and driving him to his hands and knees in one, sharp, agonising moment. Dimly he was aware of Segur's bottle being catapulted out of his coat to shatter on the cobblestones, its precious contents leaking onto the street.
He'd been shot.
Pressing his hand up against the gaping wound he saw the rich dark blood gushing forth over his fingers at a rate that spelt real trouble. He could easily pass out from the blood loss before he healed from this.
Then he felt the buzz.
Without thinking he went for his sword, but even to attempt the movement sent waves of agony washing over him. By sheer effort of will he clung to consciousness peering up to see a dark figure looming over him.
"Well now, we meet again Macleod," Ares lifted his chin with the point of his sword. "You're looking a bit peaky, I must say."
Duncan tried to speak, but the words got lost in a frothy gargle of breath and blood.
"Hurts, does it?" Ares lifted a foot and placed it squarely on his back, pressing him down on to the stones, causing Duncan to squeeze his eyes shut in a wave of blinding pain. "You know, in the last hundred years we've invented ways to inflict pain, you can't even begin to imagine. I'm looking forward to introducing you to each and every one. By the time I'm done with you, you won't even remember your own name."
"Step away from him." Richie's voice called, just befere the buzz hit.
"You're in no position to give me orders." Ares scoffed.
"Yes, I am. Because I have something you want more badly than him," Duncan heard the rustle of a coat and then the sound of Richie's sword slithering across the cobblestones, coming closer, presumably towards Ares. "Me."
"You'd give yourself up for his sake? He doesn't even know you! Much less want you."
No. Duncan silently protested in the agony of his own mind. He didn't want it to be like this. He couldn't even open his eyes to telegraph to the lad his contrition. He hadn't meant to reject him. He hadn't known. Hadn't understood.
"That doesn't matter," Richie spoke with conviction. "Because I know him. Duncan Macleod is a good man and I won't let you hurt him."
"As you wish. I'll simply kill him instead." The last thing Duncan heard was Ares picking Richie's sword up off the cobblestones and then everything went black.
Even after four hundred years, Duncan had never got used to coming back from the dead. That first rasping breath of stale air through empty lungs hurt like blazes and only gradually did the pain ease and anything like normalcy return.
"About bloody time." A hand pressed a bottle up against his lips. "Here, drink this."
Duncan took a deep draught, spluttering his surprise.
"That's wine."
"Worked for the Romans." Adam sank back on his haunches and surveyed him critically. "You've looked better. What happened?"
"Richie!" Duncan gasped, looking around in sudden realisation.
"He's not here. And judging by the fact that you had his sword sticking out of your chest, I'm guessing he's in trouble."
"Ares," Duncan could hardly bear to admit it. "He gave himself up to Ares to save me."
Adam looked away and sighed. "I was afraid of that."
"But he won't kill him? I mean, he can't, can he? Not without voiding the prophecy?"
"No, he can't kill him, but he can make him wish for death."
Duncan looked at the pinched, hollow, expression on Adam's face. He knows, he thought. He knows what it is like to be tortured by Ares. And clearly it is very, very bad. Duncan clenched his jaw tight, feeling a sudden wash of helpless anger as he thought of Ares vicious torture being inflicted on his lad. They had to find him. Soon.
"They could be anyway," He thought aloud. "We don't even know that Ares will keep him in Paris.
"Then we start looking in Paris," Adam offered him a hand up. "And we keep looking until we find him."