Cassandra and the Sisterhood
Hope Triumphant II: Sister

CHAPTER 9

(World population: 7.47 billion)

THE REVOLUTIONARY

2023-2024
The MacLeod/Ellenstein Home, Greenwich Village, New York City

"There's another letter from Cassandra, Alex," Rachel said as she sat at the kitchen table and sorted through the household's paper mail.

"Good," Alex said, without looking up from the sports-gateway of the news-surfer, where the hoopla over the upcoming Superbowl LIX was only a click away from the death list of last night's surviv-all game. A flashing skull promised the usual "slo-mo death throes" and interviews with the families of the deceased, plus quotes from the winners and the line-up for next week's game. Alex switched to the technology gateway. The Jacquez Group was predicting the opening of their first moon colony in 2025; stock had risen to $157 a share. Gen-E-Sys announced that yet another disease-causing gene had been found. There was no cure for that disease, of course, but they could tell who was going to get it years ahead of time, and they could diagnose it within days. Small comfort there. Alex clicked off the surfer with a jab of her thumb.

"Real letters are so rare now," Rachel said, pushing the pale gold envelope towards Alex's side of the table. "But you and Cassandra never use v-mail, do you?"

"No." Alex picked up the letter, only to turn it over slowly in her hands. She and Cass had been corresponding weekly for the last five years, but Alex hadn't seen Cassandra in nine. Nor had Cass seen her. Not in v-mail, not in photographs, not in person.

They could have, of course. Alex had retired from the Museum of Ancient History last month, right after her sixtieth birthday. She had plenty of time now to visit Cass. And even while she'd been working, she could have visited Cass or invited Cass to visit her—if she'd wanted to.

"Want to go?" Connor had asked four and a half years ago, when an announcement of a Phinyx council meeting had come in the mail. Cass had added a personal note of invitation, saying she hoped they would both come. Toronto was lovely this time of year, and also, Emory was scheduled to speak at the mental health convention in the hotel next door, and oh, by the way, had Connor and Alex heard that Emory had married again? She and the children were doing fine; Haylie was sixteen now and learning how to drive.

"I've never liked meetings," Alex said, folding the note into halves and then into fourths, then unfolding it and pleating it into narrow bands. "And Sara will be there to give my report; she knows what to do. Besides, traveling is such a hassle now. The noise, the lines, the paperwork, never knowing if you'll have enough fuel to get there …"

"I'll fly you," he offered.

"With or without an airplane?" she replied with a teasing smile.

Connor grinned. "Why, Mrs. MacLeod. Shall we go flying right now?"

"Right now?" she repeated then reminded him primly, "The preflight inspection comes first."

"So it does," Connor agreed. "And since I'm the pilot in command …" He put his hands on her shoulders and turned her around, then nuzzled beneath her hair to place a warm, slow kiss on the nape of her neck. Alex drew in a quick breath.

"Air intake: check," Connor said. His hands moved to the buttons on her shirt. "This is clearly a 'remove before flight' item."

"Oh, clearly," Alex said. Some minutes later, when the checklist had been completed—control surfaces free and clear, all tie-downs removed, prop clear, throttle friction lock properly adjusted—she reported: "Ready for takeoff."

"Touch-and-goes today?" Connor suggested.

Alex smiled up at him from the floor. "Sure. Gear up? Or gear down?"

But Alex knew that diverting Connor—and herself—from the real reason she didn't want to see Cassandra was just another way to lie. So she hauled her feelings out and examined them ruthlessly, one by one.

"I don't want to see her," Alex admitted later that night to Connor, in the warm darkness of their bed, the place to share those secrets that couldn't bear the light of day, the place where voice and touch said more than words.

She heard his slow exhalation, not a sigh of irritation or impatience, just a steady, thoughtful letting go of air. Connor tightened his arms around her before he asked, "Why?"

"It's silly, I know, but I like to imagine that she's getting older, just like me. And if I see her, then I'll know that's not true."

"You see me," Connor pointed out after a careful pause.

"I don't have any reason to be jealous of you," Alex said, not with bitterness or anger, not anymore, just a calm statement of fact.

"Alex," Connor began, a growl of frustrated helplessness. "I'm not—"

"I know," Alex cut in and kissed him swiftly, once on the mouth and once on the cheek, passion and affection, love and trust. "It's not you, Connor. It's not anything you've done. It's me. I wish I didn't feel that way about her, but I do."

Connor found her hand in the darkness and brought it to his lips, his kiss a pledge of loyalty and faithfulness, down through all the years. "My lady," he named her, and coming from him, the old-fashioned gesture and title were utterly right and true.

Alex smiled as she reached out to touch his hair, the strands above his ear soft under the tips of her fingers. "My good and faithful knight."

"No shining armor," he said, and she could feel the dismissive shrug that went with the words.

"But an excellent sword," she replied, and he chuckled and kissed her hand again, on the palm this time, sending shivers all along her arm, but she wasn't going to get sidetracked again. Not yet, anyway. "It's not just that I don't want to see her," Alex said. "I don't want her to see me."

This time, Connor did sigh. In recognition? Resignation? Alex wasn't sure. "You want her to remember you the way you used to be," he said.

"Yes," Alex said, relieved that Connor had understood so quickly and so well. But then, he had been through this before, with Heather all those years ago. "I want her to be able to imagine me staying young, just as I imagine her growing old," Alex added. And she did not want to endure that initial encounter, those first few seconds of a meeting when appearances are evaluated, judged, and then compared with the memory of what had been. There had been so many changes in these last few years.

"It's stupid, I know," Alex said. "Wishful thinking. An escape from reality." She sat up and thumped her pillow a few times, trying to make it more comfortable. "I ought to able to face this. I ought to be stronger. I wish—"

Connor was sitting up, too, and he caught her hands in his, bringing them both to lie against his heart. She could feel the steady beat of his pulse underneath her hands. "It's all right, Alex."

"I ought to be stronger," she repeated, the words coming out quiet and small.

She caught a flash of white in the dimness as Connor grinned. "You told me once that nobody can be strong all the time," he said. "Remember?"

That had been another night of secrets shared in the dark, another night of things too hard to say, and Alex had been the one to listen then. "I remember."

"It's true for you, too, not just for me." He shifted closer to her on the bed and held her tightly again. "I know how hard this is, Alex. Don't feel you have to push yourself farther than you can go."

"But—"

He touched the scars on her ankle, lightly, a mere brush of the hand. "You're careful not to injure your ankle."

Which meant she didn't do the things she once had done. She couldn't. She simply was not that strong anymore, and she never would be again.

"We've dealt with this before, Alex, and gotten through it, but we both know the problem isn't going to go away."

"I know," she said. Immortality and aging were both chronic conditions, not temporary injuries or week-long colds.

"It hurt then, and God help us," Connor said, his voice suddenly sounding ragged and torn, "it's going to hurt again. Don't make it worse than it has to be."

No scar could form over that hurt between them, only a scab, a fragile covering over a forever bleeding wound. Alex wouldn't take a chance on ripping it open now. "I love you," she told him and kissed him fiercely, with all the strength she had. She would always be strong enough to love, until the day she died.

Alex had written to Cass the next day, explaining why she thought it best they not see each other. Cass had expressed regret but agreed. "I've always trusted in your wisdom, Alex, and I think you're being very wise now. Writing letters worked for John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, and it will work for you and me."

And it had. Letters and emails went back and forth between them, supplemented by links to news items, magazine articles, and of course the ribald jokes and silly cartoons they'd always shared, plus gifts for birthdays, anniversaries, Christmas, or just because. Soon after Mitzi died in 2021, Alex and Connor had moved from the loft to be with Rachel in her brownstone, and Cass sent Alex a selection of one hundred daffodil bulbs as a house-warming gift. They bloomed every spring in the window boxes and in the tiny back yard: white, yellow, orange, and gold. In return, Alex had sent Cass a cat sculpture for her new garden when Cass (through Phinyx) bought a castle in the Alps. Alex and Cass didn't always use the mail; sometimes Sara was the courier, since she was working in the Finance Division of Phinyx now and saw Cass a lot.

Maybe too much.

"Cassandra wants to increase the funding for the birth centers," Sara reported when she called in June.

"And what does the Phinyx council say?" Alex asked.

"Well," Sara said, sounding nonplussed and surprised, "they agree."

Of course they did. Alex had agreed to it, too, when the report had come across her desk the month before. It had seemed straight-forward enough: train doctors, nurses, and midwives and put a clinic in every county, an office in every town. Safer births for mothers and babies, access to better health care for every member of the family, free birth control (though there wasn't as much need for that these days, with over half the population sterile), information on nutrition and help in preventing disease … who would say no?

"Cassandra thinks we need to recruit more local people, so that eventually there will be someone in every village in the world," Sara went on.

"What do you think, Sara?" Alex asked.

"I think it's good that there aren't as many babies being born nowadays, or we'd never be able to keep up with the need. But even so, it makes a lot of sense. Putting local people in charge of the birth centers will, eventually, help people to help themselves. And the centers will be more theirs, more a part of their everyday life, not something some outsider thinks they should do. Cassandra says people like to make things into their own."

Cassandra says, Cassandra wants, Cassandra thinks … Sara never used to sound like a parrot. Or a robot.

"Do you think Cassandra would ever use the Voice on Sara?" Alex asked Connor that evening, as they lay reading on the rooftop garden of the four-story brownstone, enjoying the summer night and what little breeze was to be had.

That question brought out the Immortal in him, the deadly warrior with the ice-cold eyes, and got the immediate growled answer of: "She wouldn't dare."

"What makes you so sure?"

Connor snapped his book shut with a clap. "She likes her head."

"You warned her not to use it on us."

"I ordered her."

Alex nodded, but she wasn't sure Cassandra was that submissive anymore, not even to him.

"Why are you asking?" Connor demanded next, as of course, he would.

"Oh, just wondering," Alex said quickly, trying to back away from the unfounded accusation, which was—admit it, Alex!—probably based more on jealousy than on reason. Her vague feelings of uneasiness weren't enough to justify sending Connor after Cassandra's head. "Sara talks about her a lot," Alex explained then added, "She talks about her all the time."

"I know," Connor said, and he didn't sound pleased. He laced his hands behind the back of his head and stared up at the sky, a murky haze of gray, no stars to be seen.

"Hero worship?" Alex suggested, hoping that was all it was.

He shrugged. "It happens, especially in the young."

"Oh, is that so, Mr. Five Hundred and Five?" she asked.

"Five hundred and five and a half," he corrected with a grin.

Alex shook her head even as she smiled in return, but said, "Twenty-six shouldn't be that young. Nor that impressionable."

Connor nodded. "It's time Sara got a different job."

"I'll speak to the Phinyx personnel office tomorrow," Alex agreed, and within three weeks, Sara was transferred to Idaho to help set up a new school.

"It's a tiny town without much to do, except the library," she reported in September, "but the skiing is going to be great this winter, and I've met this most amazing guy."

She came home early for Thanksgiving and brought "the amazing guy" along. Connor immediately took the poor boy out running. Alex shook her head and sighed. Some things never changed. "Let's start cooking," she said to Sara. "They're going to be hungry when they get home."

"Medea Productions is going to do another biographical movie this year," Sara announced as she peeled apples for pie.

Alex dusted the pastry board with flour then gathered the dough in the bowl. "Who's the heroine going to be?"

"Hecuba. People are getting bored with the Renaissance fashions from the Joan of Arc craze, and ancient Greece is hot right now."

"Hecuba was from Troy," Alex corrected automatically. Queen of a doomed city, wife to Priam, and mother of children slain before their time. Hecuba herself had ended up as a slave, not much cheerful or uplifting there. Although, Alex considered as she rolled the crust from a ball into a circle, the movie about Spartacus had ended with him being crucified, and the defenders of the Alamo had died at their posts. Heroes and heroines lived on forever; they didn't necessarily have to survive.

Sara shrugged. "Yeah, but the Trojans fought the Greeks, so it's all part of the same. There are a lot of good stories in those myths, and people will learn some history."

Alex found herself correcting once more. "History and myth aren't the same."

Sara raised an eyebrow, suddenly very much the cynical adult. "No?"

Alex carefully folded the crusts in fourths and maneuvered it into the pie plate. "No." When she unfolded the crust she saw with relief that she would have to patch only three holes. Rachel and Connor usually made the pies in the household, but Connor was busy torturing Sara's boyfriend and Rachel had gone to visit Mitzi's grave this afternoon, so Alex was in charge. She wiped the flour off her nose and sighed before she bent to repair the crust. Cookies were easier.

Sara shrugged again. "Cassandra says myth turns into history, if it's repeated often enough. She's seen it happen before." She sliced off the last bit of apple then looked dubiously at the heap of fruit in her bowl. "Maybe we should make two. Daniel really likes apple pie."

Which was, of course, why they were making it. Everything had to be perfect for Daniel. Alex smiled, remembering how nervous she'd been when she'd first taken Connor home, and how glad she'd been to see that her mother had made three pies: apple, lemon meringue, and strawberry chiffon. Over that weekend, Connor and John had devoured them all, with many compliments and oohs and ahhs. It had been the start of a great friendship between her mom, her husband, and her son.

"Your father likes apple pie, too," Alex said. "And so does Rachel and so do I. And so, young lady, do you. You're right; let's make two."

"It's a good thing Colin and John aren't coming until tomorrow, or we would have to make three," Sara said with a grin.

"Four."

"What do you think of Daniel?" Alex asked Connor later that night, as she stood in front of the bathroom mirror and brushed her short, snow-white hair before going to bed. A dandelion fluffball, her granddaughter had called it, and tried to blow Alex's hair from her head. Little Celia had been very disappointed when the white fluff hadn't floated off and away. Alex was just as glad not to be completely bald.

"I like him," Connor said. He spit toothpaste into the sink. "You?"

"Yes, me too." She traded her hairbrush for her toothbrush. "Sara said they met at a baseball game. He was playing left field."

Connor nodded. "And by God, he can run."

"And that is, of course, how you judge all your prospective sons-in-law," Alex teased.

"Absolutely," Connor agreed. "And tomorrow night, when John and Colin are here, we'll see how he handles his whisky."

That poor boy. Alex sighed again and finished brushing her teeth. As she and Connor were sliding under the bedcovers, Alex said suddenly, "He looks like John."

"Taller."

"Yes, but the same coloring. Dark hair, dark skin, dark eyes."

"A Cree mother and a Scandinavian father," Connor said, pulling the blankets over her shoulder and tucking her in. "Not hard to tell who he takes after."

Or who was taken with him. Once Daniel had returned from the eight-mile trek around and about the city, Sara hadn't left his side all evening, and she hadn't mentioned Cassandra at all. So that was good. "I hope Colin finds someone soon," Alex said. "He's all alone on the farm, and it's not easy to find girls in the Highlands."

"Oh, there are a few," Connor said dryly. "If you know where to look."

"And you do?"

"Don't need to," came the prompt reply, along with roving and very knowledgeable hands. "My girl's right here."

That was good, too.

The wedding the next summer was more than good; Sara made a beautiful bride, and Connor looked superbly distinguished and very proud, walking his daughter down the aisle. Cassandra did not come, even though Alex had done the proper thing and invited her.

"I'll watch it live on the net," Cass had written. "Sara understands, and as you said years ago, it's best this way."

Alex had agreed, and not reluctantly. And when, a few months after the honeymoon, Sara started in again (though not as often) with the "Cassandra says, Cassandra thinks, Cassandra wants," Alex was glad that Cass had kept her distance these last eleven years. Not just because of the aging issue, and not because she was afraid Cass would use the Voice—Connor had reminded Cassandra of his decree—but because Cassandra had other ways to charm. Her enthusiasm, her beauty, and her intensity combined to make her a compelling personality … gave her glamour in the archaic sense of the word … and those close to her soon fell under her spell. Alex could see that in the wording of the Phinyx council reports, in the lack of debate, in the unanimous decisions time and time again.

The latest report merely followed the trend. Alex read it over as she sat in the doctor's waiting room. Sales of the tract "In His Own Words: the gospel according to Jesus" had reached over thirty million. It was especially popular among fundamentalist Christians, and was being cited on their radio shows. The Phinyx council had ordered it translated into five more languages. They wanted the tract about the tenets of Mohammed translated into ten. "Many people prefer a dogmatic religion," Cass had written to Alex a few years ago. "They like to have the rules spelled out so that they don't have many decisions to make. That's fine, as long as the rules are good. That's what's important."

"That, and who makes the rules," Alex had written back, but in her next letter Cass had moved on to discussing channeling aggression into sports and hadn't responded. She'd never really answered that question about what Phinyx was using to pave the roads it was building, either, and Alex had brought it up several times.

"The ends justify the means?" Alex had prodded.

"There are no ends," came the Zen koan reply in the next letter. "Only journeys."

"Journeys to where?"

"A better world, Alex, better for everyone, just as we agreed on the mountains of New Zealand eighteen years ago."

And that sounded good, that sounded fine, but one person's heaven was another person's hell, and the road paved with good intentions went both ways. All roads did.

"Alexandra MacLeod?" the nurse called, and Alex tucked the report into her bag and followed him into the examining room.

When she arrived home later that afternoon, Alex told Connor, "You should start going to the council meetings."

Connor looked up from the accounts on his desk. "Something new going in Phinyx?"

"No," she answered casually, and it was true. "I just think it's wise to keep an eye on things."

His eyes narrowed. "You haven't wanted me to go."

"That's because I didn't want you keeping an eye on her," Alex replied, keeping the words flippant and the tone light, and adding a smile to make it a tease instead of a nag.

He accepted that with the snort of amused disbelief, a quick "hmph" through the upper nose, then asked bluntly, "What's changed?"

Alex set the report on his desk for him to read. "She's moving faster, now that she most has the pieces in place. Too fast. It could be dangerous. I think she needs someone to put on the brakes, or at least remind her to slow down."

"I can do that," he said, sounding cheerful.

Alex smiled back. "I know."

But there were some things Connor couldn't do, or rather, some things Alex could never ask him to do, not if she was to heed Rachel's advice about leaving him someone to love. So Alex called Duncan instead. She got through to New Zealand on the first try for a change; all the necessary satellites were online.

"Sure, Alex, I'll let him know," Duncan replied, sounding surprised at her request. "But it may be a while. I haven't heard from Methos in over a decade, and he can be hard to find."

"So I hear," she answered dryly. Even when the Watchers had been in their heyday, they had never been able to keep track of him. Now that they were reduced to an editing society, they didn't even try. Cassandra had tried, frequently, but she hadn't had any luck, either.

"Tell him, please, as soon as you can," Alex said to Duncan. "And tell him it's important, and to contact me immediately."

"All right," Duncan said. They chatted of family and horses before they said goodbye. She turned off the phone, fumbling a little as she set it on her desk, then sat staring at the wall. Methos had better reappear soon.

8 September 2026
Chicago, Illinois

Nearly two years went by before she and Methos finally connected, but still Alex bided her time. Funerals were never easy, and the funeral of Sean Hennessey was worse than most. Murder did that, a senseless shooting during the robbery of a Chinese restaurant by a pair of teenaged girls. Evann stood by her husband's open grave, dry-eyed and pale, watching as the occasional snowflake melted on the coffin or was swallowed by the broken, muddy ground. Her old friend Matthew McCormick (dark-haired, handsome, and an Immortal) stood beside her on the left. Methos, as always during these last few days, was right by Evann's side. His hair was shoulder-length, and his mustache was neatly trimmed, as was the fashion these days. Other than that, he hadn't changed at all.

Next to the grave, a pair of joined headstones read "Brian Arthur Hennessey, 1935-1993, loving husband" and "Gail Margaret Hennessey, 1938-1972, beloved wife." Sean had requested to be buried next to his parents, and so Evann had transported his body from their home on the coast of Maine to Chicago, Illinois. And why not? Sean wasn't likely to ever be buried next to his wife, not if she survived him by two or three thousand years.

Alex suddenly wondered if Methos had buried all sixty-eight of his wives. Or had some of them buried him? Or maybe he'd simply left before the need could arrive. Connor put his arm around her to shield her from the bitter wind off Lake Michigan, and Alex leaned against his side, all at once exhausted and in tears.

When the service was finally over, she went to Methos and said, "I need to talk to you."

"Not now," came the quick but still courteous reply. He never took his eyes off Evann, who was now standing by the grave alone. Matthew McCormick stood a discreet distance behind. Thirty or more people were milling about in dark coats and woolen caps, the Hennessey clan come to pay their last respects to one of their own, plus a few friends from Sean's school days and a cluster of cops from his time on the Chicago police force.

"It's a good thing they're pumping the fresh water from the lakes to the plains states now," Alex heard one of them say. "Otherwise, with the warming, this whole cemetery would have been drowned years before, and then we'd have had to move all the bodies."

"And our homes," somebody added, but another snorted, "Warming, they call it. It's snowing today, and it's only September."

"It'll be hot again next summer," the first one said. "Remember July?" Then they got into trading the usual anecdotes about drowned towns and empty aquifers.

Alex ignored them and asked Methos: "When?"

"A month or two." He spared Alex a momentary glance as he explained, "I can't leave Evann alone right now."

"I know." She also knew that someday, Connor would be saying that about Duncan. And soon enough, Duncan would be saying that about Connor. She handed Methos her card. "Call me, as soon as you can. It's important."

That got her another look, more interested this time. "Is it?"

"Yes."

3 November 2026
Shelby's Steakhouse, NYC

Methos had called at the end of October, and Alex had made lunch reservations for them at Shelby's, her favorite steakhouse. There was the usual picket line of vegan-atics, five of them today, kept at bay by two armed guards. Through the tinted (and bullet-proof) car window, Alex recognized the peacock blue and stark black of the Argus uniform; Rachel employed them for deliveries to and from the antique store, and Phinyx had a contract with them, too.

"Carnivores!" one of the demonstrators yelled, hurling a plastic bag at a couple who had just walked out the door. It fell short of hitting them but broke open on the sidewalk, spattering dark red liquid over their legs and shoes. Blood, no doubt, probably the demonstrator's own. Vegan-atics wouldn't touch blood from animals. The shorter of the guards moved in with his stunner, and she went down, writhing on the ground, her blonde hair trailing across her face and into the gray puddle of water on the street. The other guard had pulled his gun, a slug-thrower, and was warily watching the remaining four. They kept their distance but started to chant: "Murderers, murderers, murderers …"

Alex sighed. "Bart, would you drive around to the back, please," she said to her driver. She didn't want to deal with this today.

"Yes, ma'am," he answered then drove down the alley and parked the car next to a rust-streaked green dumpster. He opened her door and helped her out. Alex was glad for his steady arm as they walked on slippery, wet ground to the kitchen entrance and then up the wooden stairs.

"I'll be at least an hour, Bart," Alex told him. "Probably two."

"I'll be back by one-thirty, Mrs. MacLeod," he promised as he opened the door for her.

Shelby was waiting for her; he took her other arm before she was halfway through the door. "She's in good hands now, Bart!" he said, his New Orleans accent turning the words into a grand pronouncement. Bart nodded and waved goodbye before he headed back to the car. "Been too long, Alex," Shelby said as he forged ahead through the steamy kitchen, around the scurrying white-hatted cooks, and past the smoky barbecue pit. "We haven't seen you here since the summer."

"We've been out of town," Alex explained. "We spent August in Colorado with John and his family. Colin came, too, all the way from Scotland, and brought his fiancee. Then we spent a month with Sara and Daniel. They're expecting a baby girl in the spring."

"That's wonderful!" Shelby said. "Absolutely wonderful! We don't hear that sort of news often these days."

"No," Alex agreed quietly. "We don't."

"But they live in Canada, don't they?"

"Manitoba."

"It's not as bad there, I hear." A busboy opened the door into the dining room for them as Shelby asked, "What will they name her?"

"Alexandra Rachel," Alex said, and found herself smiling, proud and pleased.

"A beautiful name." Shelby steered her to a corner table then helped her with her coat. "And how's your other son doing? We haven't seen Connor in here lately, either."

Alex kept the smile on her face as she reminded herself that the charade had been her idea, and that Connor hadn't wanted to pretend. "You're my wife, damn it!" he had said ten years ago, when Alex had first suggested that they put a different public face on their relationship. "I'm proud of that, and I'm proud of you," Connor had continued.

"Being conspicuous is never a good idea," Alex had reminded him. "Especially for Immortals. Especially now, and especially in the States." Personal liberty kept getting scarcer in the land of the free and the home of the brave. "With gray hair and glasses you can pass for forty, Connor. Passing for fifty? Or sixty? No."

"So? People will just think you married a younger man. Before we got married, you said you wanted me as your gigolo."

"And as my cook," she'd added with a smile. "And I must say, you've fulfilled your duties in both areas remarkably well." She'd kissed him then and taken his hand in hers. "But, Connor … this isn't going to go away. Fifty, sixty, seventy …"

"… eighty, ninety, a hundred … We've got fifty years still ahead of us, Alex."

He'd sounded so determined, so hopeful, that Alex hadn't had the heart to remind him that each of those fifty years (assuming she lived that long, which wasn't by any means certain) would be harder than the one before, especially for her. She'd stopped arguing with him, but when they'd moved back to New York permanently in '17, she'd simply introduced him as her son to everyone they met, and rather than call her a liar in public, Connor had gritted his teeth and gone along.

"Connor's fine," Alex told Shelby.

Shelby pulled out the heavy wooden chair for her. "And is he getting married anytime soon?"

Alex sat down before she answered. "No. Not anytime soon."

Shelby laid out her menu and swept the "Reserved" sign off the table, tucking it under his arm. "I'll send the waiter right over," he said, but before the waiter arrived, Methos appeared, coming from the direction of the bar with a beer in his hand.

"Alex," he greeted her.

"Ben," she said in return, for that was the name he had been using the last time she'd seen him, at Duncan's wedding twenty years ago. "Or ...?"

"Ben is fine," he said easily, as he pulled out the chair across from her and sat down.

Which meant it probably wasn't the name he was using these days. But that didn't matter. She had other things to talk about today. "I'm sorry I was late; with three of the tunnels and half the subway still closed after the last flood, traffic is just impossible. Have you been waiting long?"

That got her a grin. "Not as long as I hear you've been waiting for me."

"You've spoken with Duncan."

"Mmm."

"Where've you been these last fifteen years?" she asked, her curiosity getting the better of her discretion.

"Oh, around."

That killed that cat. The waiter arrived then with full glasses of water. Alex ordered hot tea to go with her salad and bowl of gumbo, the specialty of the house; Methos stayed with his beer and ordered a salad, a baked potato and a T-bone, rare. "How's Evann?" Alex asked when the waiter was gone.

"Better. McCormick invited her to spend some time at his ranch in Texas. They left on Sunday." Methos unfolded his napkin with a flick of one hand. "It'll do her good to get out of Maine." He added under his breath, "It'll do me good, too."

Alex ignored that private aside and focused on what he'd said to her. "Is that how it's done?" she said. "Just walk away from the home you shared with a mortal spouse? Just leave it all behind?"

Methos paused briefly in the laying of his napkin on his lap. A corner of his mouth twitched, but whether with weary amusement or sympathetic pain, Alex couldn't tell. He looked straight at her across the table. "The grief goes with you, Alex," Methos said quietly. "Every step of the way. Every single time."

Alex dropped her gaze as she reached for her water. "That's what Cassandra said," Alex said finally. "Then she said you move on."

"That's right," Methos agreed equably. "You do. You have to, if you want to survive." He lifted his beer to her in a toast. "That's true for all of us, isn't it?"

"I suppose," she allowed, not very graciously, but then she faced the truth of what he had said. "Yes, it is." They drank together in silence, and Alex was conscious of Methos's gaze on her the whole time.

"So," he said at last, putting down his glass. "What's up?"

Now that she had his attention, she didn't want to tell him. She didn't want to do this at all. But sometimes, you had to face unpleasant things. You had to be honest, with yourself and with others, and, as her mother had always said, "You have to take care of whatever mess you make, as much as you possibly can."

Yet this mess was far beyond Alex's capabilities, as she had started to suspect during her first therapy session with Jennifer, ten years ago.

6 September 2016
Stanford Hotel in Sterling, Scotland

"Tell me about your marriage," Jennifer suggested, after she and Alex had gotten comfortable: Alex sitting on the edge of the double bed, and Jennifer seated in the chair in the corner of the hotel room, underneath a god-awful picture of fruit and tropical birds. At least the curtains were plain white instead of flamingo pink or electric green, and the bedspread was a soothing blue.

"My marriage is good," Alex replied. "Connor's wonderful. He loves me; I love him. We're happy together."

"Mmm," Jennifer said, nodding a little. "Any money problems?

"Oh, no. Connor's very wealthy, and he gave me millions as soon as we were engaged, so I wouldn't feel dependent on him, so now I'm wealthy, too. No, no money problems."

"Hmm," Jennifer said this time, making a note on her pad. "Any unusual stress factors?"

"No. Not really." Alex thought about that for a moment. Her problems were with Cassandra, not with Connor. "No."

Jennifer's eyebrows went up. "Not even his being an Immortal?"

"Oh, well, that," Alex said in surprise. "Yes, of course." She got up from the bed and walked over to the windows, looking down at the small park below. "Sometimes he can be overprotective, even overbearing, and I don't like that, but he does that only because he's worried about my safety because of the Game."

"The game?"

"Yes, the Game," Alex repeated, turning away from the windows, but Jennifer was just staring at her in total confusion, so Alex added with some impatience, "The Game Immortals play for the Prize."

"What prize?"

Slowly it dawned on Alex that in an entire decade of therapy with Jennifer, Cassandra had never once mentioned the Game, that bloody contest that affected every aspect of Alex and Connor's lives. "Did she at least tell you about the swords?" Alex demanded.

"Yes, Cassandra said that Immortals could die by beheading, that there was a transfer of energy, called a 'quickening.' She said Roland enjoyed them, but that they made her ill. Why? Is there more?"

Alex sank down on the edge of the bed. "A lot more."

When she finished explaining, Jennifer was shaking her head. "I suppose since Cassandra doesn't play the Game, it didn't matter much to her."

"She doesn't have to play, since she has the Voice."

"The voice?" Jennifer asked, with just the same incomprehension as before, and Alex realized that Cassandra hadn't lost any of her talent—or her predilection—for keeping secrets, not even from her very close friends.

3 November 2026
Shelby's Steakhouse, NYC

And what secrets, Alex wondered, was Cassandra keeping now? What plans did she have that she hadn't bothered to share?

"Alex?" Methos prompted, still waiting for her answer.

There is always a choice, Evann had once said, but one choice may become necessary when the alternative becomes worse. Alex didn't know what the alternatives would be as the centuries went by, but she did know she wouldn't be there to take care of whatever mess might arise. Methos would. "In the years to come," Alex said slowly, "there may be a task you need to perform."

"Really?" Methos slouched back in his chair, regarding her with lazy eyes. "And what task is that?"

"Taking Cassandra's head."

This story is continued in Comes a Horseman, in which Methos responds to Alex's presumptuous suggestion