VI

Paris, Two Weeks Later.

Duncan got off the taxi and helped Rachel off. She looked around. Paris was a beautiful city. She wished Connor had been with her to see it. Duncan motioned towards a boat, helped her in and opened the door. A slender, beautiful blonde woman smiled at Duncan. She rushed into his arms and kissed him. Rachel felt uncomfortably out of place.

"Rachel. This is Tessa Noel."

"Hi." Tessa shook her hand and kissed her on both cheeks.

"Pleased to meet you." Rachel said.

"Where is Richie?" Tessa's eyes went moist. She dabbed them.

"He is in the police department."

"What did he do?""

Rachel grabbed her head, feeling a disturbing headache. Duncan glimpsed at her and then to the door. A young teenager with red curly hair appeared before him.

"Mac!"

"Hey, Richie." He stared reproachingly.

"I... It was a dude that wanted to slice me like you do guys.""

"This is Rachel Ellinstein. Rachel Johnson, according to her new passport."

Richie shook her hand and made a comic reverence. "Pleased to meet you, ma'am!"

"We have a visit to make. We'll return by night." Duncan said seriously.

"Watch your back." Tessa warned.

"It's not my back that worries me."

-----

Driving a rented car, Duncan took Rachel to the house of a long time friend, Sean Burns. Burns was a psychologist. He had helped Duncan see things in a different light. But now it was Rachel who needed his help. The nightmares still haunted her. He was worried.

He thought of his clansman. Connor had disappeared one morning, without saying goodbye, farewell, arrivederci, adios, or sayonara. He just vanished. He did not leave a note or anything. Duncan felt the situation had taken its toll on him. And there was the matter of the dark-haired guy. Connor seemed to know who he was but had said nothing.

He parked amid a row of trees and they both got off. Lots of trees were all around them, and in the distance, a large and quaint house stood majestically. Rachel held her head, feeling again the throbbing headache. A man who looked in his late thirties, neatly dressed in a brown suit, waved at them from the stairs of the old house. Duncan approached and embraced him.

"You look well, Sean."

"You let your hair grow." Sean commented funnily.

"This is Rachel."

Sean gazed at the startled lady. He beamed recognising her. A trace of sadness glimmered in his eyes.

"Hello, Rachel. It's been a long time since I last saw you."

"Hi... I don't quite..."

"Don't worry. You were only a child when I met you."

"Yes..." she smiled embarrassed.

"Connor phoned me a couple of weeks ago and told me. I know what to do."

"He didn't say where he was, right?"

"At your place, or so he said."

"Doesn't matter. I'll return in a couple of hours."

-----

"Now, Rachel. I want you to look at my hand." She did so. "Focus on it. Examine it." Her eyes travelled through his hand. The lines in his hand, his neat skin. Suddenly she felt dizzy and lost. She felt her brain punching inside, struggling to get out. "Tell me what happened..."

She began to speak. Nothing she omitted, not even the bald man of her nightmares. Sean heard carefully and took notes. She spoke from a third-person perspective, witnessing herself undergo the last moments of her mortal life. She did not shiver or yell, not even when telling the horrid way she died.

He closed his hand. Rachel left the trance she was in. "Everything's OK, doctor?"

"Sean, please. Yes, everything is OK. I want to talk about a dark-haired man who you mentioned."

Rachel was taken aback. "Dark-haired man?"

"You mentioned his name was... Oliver?"

She squirmed in the chair, uneasy. "He was a boyfriend I had when I was young. I thought I saw him..."

"But he should be your age."

"I know. It was a trick of the mind merely."

"Indeed." Sean looked away. "So, how do you get along with Duncan?"

"He is really kind."

"Is he teaching you well?"

"I can't fight yet. And I find the sword too heavy to carry it inside my clothes."

Sean smiled. "That's a problem we all have. I have something for you."

He stood up and went to a large built-in wardrobe. He opened it and looked for something. He produced a cane, passed a tissue over it to wipe the dust and approached. She grinned, complimented but at the same time somewhat offended.

"I am not that old to use it."

Sean grinned understandingly. He pulled the top of the car and a blade was revealed. She stared baffled. He folded the blade again and handed it to her.

"This is a sword cane. Connor used it for a while in the late 18th century. He gave it to me for my birthday in... 1913." He smiled with some embarrassment. "I haven't taken much care of it, I fear. I want you to have it."

"I can't. It's a present you were given."

"Just watch it for me. It's the lightest blade you will find." He smiled, as she grabbed her head yet again. "Duncan's back."

They walked out and indeed, Duncan was waiting. Inside the car, Tessa and Richie were there as well. Sean waved and Rachel climbed down the stairs, using the cane. Duncan recognised the cane and nodded approvingly. She kissed Sean twice in the cheeks and joined them. Tessa eased into the backseat to let Rachel the passenger seat. Duncan waved one last time at Sean and drove away.

"So... how was it?" The Highlander asked.

"It was a bald man with a hat. Evil all around him."

Duncan widened his look, surprised of how Sean had lifted the blockage she had imposed upon herself. "Name?"

"I don't know." Deep in her mind, something kicked in her mind and she somehow felt she was lying.