The Alchemist

by MoSRhyo

This is an AU/AR story about Carlos Manoso, the 17 year-old-son of Ricardo Carlos Manoso and his late wife Stephanie. It was co-written with Kevan S a couple decades ago. It is a dark and angsty fantasy story, but it is also the story of an unlikely friendship. Rated T for violence only, there is zip, nada, no sexual content.

2. Chapter 2

The Alchemist – Chapter 5

Something was wrong. The boy's soul had been torn from his body and cast into the next life. It should have been easy to take possession of his body. Instead, the Alchemist could no longer sense the boy or his son.

His son. The thought brought an evil smile to his thin lips. He had sired many children in his lives, but only one had caused him the trouble the one called Dante had. His smile faded and he snarled aloud remembering the pain he had experienced at being cast unwilling and unprepared out of the body that had sired Dante, remembered how close he had come to truly dying when he had been unable to find another acceptable host body for months. His mortal servant cringed and backed into the shadows. What was the servant's name? he wondered. What was his own name? What had it been, those centuries before when he had come into being? Davos, that was it. He had been called Davos. It no longer seemed important.

All that was important was to continue. He could feel the body he occupied dying around him; a disease ate at it constantly, draining it a bit more each day. He had to have a new one. The boy with his son was perfect. Young, strong, virile and the body already possessed a minor talent that he could greatly expand. With that body, he would be able to spread his legacy far and wide. With selective breeding to similarly talented women, he could create even more powerful inheritors. He felt a tightening in his loins, thinking of the women he would get with child and those he would take merely for his pleasure. Power. Dominance. Pain. Already, there were many of his offspring who followed his lead. He wanted thousands.

Briefly, he considered taking Dante's body. It would cause his son great mental anguish to know that his body was being used by his father and pain was something on which the Alchemist fed. No longer needing physical sustenance, pain and fear were staples in his diet, along with sex. Often all three were tied together for the ultimate satisfaction. He remembered taking the young bodies of Dante and his brother. Remembered their pain and terror. It had been exquisite. All the more so because they had fought, resisting the evil they had sensed in him.

No, he decided. Dante's body was too old. He desired one younger, one he could inhabit for many years. The boy would do perfectly and he sensed that his possession of the boy's body would cause Dante almost as much pain as possession of his own body. The son who had dared to defy him would suffer forever, knowing he had failed. It would be enough. He smiled again and beckoned his mortal servant. The man moved instantly from the dark alcove where he cowered.

"I am unable to sense them. Something is blocking me. I must cast a scrying spell." The man paled and trembled, backing up a step. "You would deny me your blood?" The Alchemist's voice was a low, ominous hiss. The man shook his head.

"No, master. I would deny you nothing."

"Then why do you back away from me?" The man's jaw worked, but no sounds issued. "Is it that you fear the pain or the manner in which I take your blood?" The man tried to shake his head no, but the Alchemist fixed him with a penetrating stare, locking him in place.

Slowly, he extended a hand, the long sharp nails looking like a lion's claws as they ripped down the front of the man's tunic. The man's bony chest trembled as the Alchemist picked up a hollow metal rod perhaps an eighth-inch in diameter. One end of it tapered to a needle-like point. Like a butcher inspecting a piece of meat, the Alchemist studied the man's chest with its many scars on the left side. Selecting an unmarked place, he slid the metal tube into the man's flesh. The man's mind screamed in agony, but he remained silent and motionless, his muscles locked in place by the mental command. Ignoring the mental scream, the Alchemist slid the metal tube in further until he found the man's heart. Dark, nearly black, blood dripped from the tube into an ivory cup he held underneath the tube's open end.

"Heart's blood," he murmured. After taking nearly two tablespoons, he blocked the end of the tube with his index finger and carefully set the cup on a nearby table. He withdrew the metal tube carelessly, knowing that the substance it was coated with would seal and heal his servant's flesh. When he was done, all that was left was a fresh, angry, red scar that perfectly matched all the others in size and shape. Within days, it would heal and fade until it was no more noticeable than they. He released his hold on his servant's mind and the man slumped to his knees, moaning in pain. The Alchemist ignored him and moved across the room to a high table piled with old books and strange devices, taking the ivory cup and its precious blood with him.

Twenty minutes later, his preparations complete, he added the last few drops of blood to that already in the small brazier on the table in front of him, closed his eyes, and fell into a deep trance, his awareness separating from his body as it sought to find the boy and his troublesome son. When he found them, he would go to them and finish what he had begun. He would take the boy's body and it would be done.

---

Pain. It was everywhere. He couldn't breathe. Couldn't feel his body, but it was on fire. Light, brighter than a sun exploding, assaulted his eyes. His eyes were closed. Something ripped loose from him inside with a searing pain and blackness claimed him.

Opening his eyes slowly, Dante blinked, his surroundings gradually coming into focus. He heard movement to his right and turned his head gingerly in that direction, half-afraid of a return of the earlier agony. Fayed sat cross-legged in the floor a few feet from the narrow bed he was lying in. The boy tuned and called out to someone. All Dante could make out was " Al-Zaim" and he assumed the boy was informing whoever that he was awake.

Footsteps approached. A face appeared in his vision. Dante cast about in his memory. The doctor. Recognition triggered the rest of his memories. Carlos. The garrote attack. The soul-stealer. Kris.

Pain lanced through him at her memory. He had held her, touched her, spoken to her. He had been with his beloved. His stomach roiled and he rolled onto his side, hands clenching into fists, eyes shut tightly. Kris. He wanted to scream and howl like an animal, to broadcast his pain. He knew there were voices speaking to him, but he couldn't hear them. Nothing existed but the agony of losing her again. How long passed, he didn't know, but gradually he became aware that he had rolled to a sitting position, his legs over the side of the bed. There was a sharp pain in the palm of his left hand.

He became aware of leaning against someone. Arms were around him. Strong hands on his shoulders, the fingers gripping him tightly. Reopening his eyes, breathing deeply, he focused on the pain in his left palm. Opening his hand took concentration. He had to uncurl each finger individually.

Kris's medallion lay revealed. The medallion he had commissioned for her. The medallion she had worn always. The medallion he had burned with her body. He could still see it in his mind's eye – a small twisted chunk of metal lying amidst the ashes of her body. It couldn't exist yet it was lying in his hand – real and solid and warm.

Its basic design was like that of the medallion he had given Carlos at the beginning of the summer. A gold circle surrounding a black center with three swooping lines etched in gold across it. Unlike the relatively plain one Carlos wore, Kris's was made of 18 kt. gold, the surface treated so that it looked antique, and black onyx. And rather than being etched, the lines on its surface were actually embedded in the onyx, going all the way through, and separating the stone into three pieces. In addition, a small, looping tail hung from the bottom of the circle.

Something deep inside him shifted. Kris. She was watching for him. Waiting. Her love kept her there until he joined her. Time was meaningless; they would have eternity. As if her soul was still merged with his, he could sense her presence and he realized that feeling would never leave him again. She was part of him, almost lived again within him. Almost.

A hand squeezed his shoulder. Dante roused himself to sit upright. Looking to his right, he saw Carlos, standing beside his bed. It was Carlos he had been leaning against, as the young man had leaned on him in the alley. The irony of the reversal of their positions was not lost on Dante. At least it appeared that all the things Carlos had learned of him had not driven him away. Dante studied the young man, looking carefully for any sign of fear or revulsion or rejection. There was none. Carlos stood steadfast beside him, regarding him quietly, his expression open and earnest and filled with compassion. Dante wanted to reject the compassion he saw in the young man's eyes, but he was too tired, too drained.

"I would say I hope I find somebody and have with them the same kind of feelings and connection you and Kris have, but…that seems presumptuous. What the two of you have…," Carlos trailed off, unsure how to put into words what he was feeling.

Dante merely nodded, accepting the young man's words and understanding the feeling behind them.

"She left you a present, you know." Dante looked at him questioningly, then glanced down at the medallion in his hand. "No, not that." Carlos shook his head. "It's something she…something she put in my mind to give you and when we were merged, I put it in your mind." He shrugged, gesturing helplessly with his hands. "That's as good as I can describe it. She said if you looked inside yourself, you'd find it."

Carefully, Dante turned his thoughts and senses inward. Was he the same person he had been only a few hours before? No. Some fundamental things had changed inside him. He didn't view reality the same anymore. What was possible and not had changed. He concentrated on feeling himself. He found it – a warm, small nugget of her presence. Even as his mind's fingers touched it and reached for it, he knew what it was. It was her memories of him. Her memories of the time they had spent together, loved together. Unconsciously, he smiled. He left them unopened. If he lived through the impending confrontation, he would explore them when he was alone.

Shifting his thoughts and senses back to the room, Dante saw the boy, Fayed, still sitting cross-legged on the floor at Carlos's feet. Fayed shifted to his knees and bowed low to Dante, his forehead on the floor. Dante saw a quick flash of movement and stiffened as Fayed pulled a knife from behind him, the blued finish of the blade giving no reflection in the light. Instant recognition jolted Dante. Fayed held his largest combat knife, his treasured and trusted companion.

Carlos glanced at Fayed in amusement. "He was guarding us while we slept. He's been here, never more than a step or two away from me, since I woke up."

Fayed kept his eyes low and his head bent as Dante reached out to claim the knife. Fayed presented it with both hands, hilt and haft first, and Dante grasped it and pulled it back. The boy let the knife slide through his fingers, two fingers closed on either side of the wickedly sharp edge and two fingers closed on the scarred spine of the knife. The boy clearly knew knives and his touch was sure. Dante waited until Fayed looked up at him and then nodded. Fayed touched his forehead to the floor once more and then re-seated himself by Carlos.

Dante looked to his left and saw the doctor who had aided them seated in a plain wooden chair at a small table against the far wall, his attention focused on a set of old and heavy books in front of him. Beside the desk was a workbench with a marble top and several sets of glass- and ceramic-ware.

Dante looked back at Carlos. The young man had seen much and been exposed to many different emotions – some far beyond his years and ability to understand. The experiences had changed him as surely as they had changed Dante, but he was still a boy, not yet a man. He didn't fully understand everything he thought he did. Maybe someday he would find his own Kris – then he would understand. Dante hoped he would.

Aware that he was the subject of Dante's thoughts, Carlos stared back at him. "You okay?"

Dante laughed at the dubious expression on his face. "I am well, my young wolf." He fastened Kris's medallion around his neck, the smooth warm weight settling against his skin as if it had always been there.

Carlos reached up to touch his own bandaged neck and the medallion there. "Kris told me how to make a talisman to bind the Alchemist." He nodded his head at the doctor, who still sat at his desk, ancient tomes open around him. "He understood what she wanted." His expression said that he was less sure of the process and results than the doctor had been.

"How much time has passed?"

"About four hours since we.. uh.. got back. He's been looking through those books and mixing things together for about an hour." Carlos shook his head. "I can't even recognize the language those books are in."

Dante nodded. "This is likely ancient knowledge."

Carlos snorted as Dante rose from the bed. "Well, I didn't think he was going to pull out his laptop to get potion-making instructions."

The doctor looked up from his books and slid open the lowest drawer of his desk to reveal a sleek silver laptop. Carlos rolled his eyes and Dante laughed.

"It is time," the doctor announced, and motioned them to join him at the workbench.

The smell of the solution was incredible – acrid and eye-watering - and Carlos wrinkled his nose. "I don't have to drink that, do I?" he asked dubiously. He was fairly sure he wouldn't have to, still it never hurt to confirm things.

The doctor's lips twitched. "I do not believe that will be necessary, unless, of course, you would like to." Carlos hastily backed up. The doctor smiled and bent back over the solution, using tongs to lay several small rectangles of cloth into it. Carlos moved back to look over his shoulder.

The time came when the doctor judged the solution correct and he removed the cloths from it and lay them down on a marble slab. He held up his hand. "The medallion."

Carlos hesitated, closing his fingers around the design. The design that marked him as a temporary member of Dante's house. He'd worn it for months and had gotten used to the weight and the feel of the chain around his neck and it felt like a part of him. "It's strange, but I don't really want to take this off. It's seen me through some interesting adventures."

He heard Dante's rumbling laugh behind him. "Be at ease, young wolf, I will have another made for you. And," he continued, his deep, rich voice rolling over Carlos as his eyes took in the braided hair bracelet on Carlos's wrist and the bandages around his neck, "you seem to collect other tokens of your... adventures."

Carlos slid him an unamused sideways glance as he silently pulled the necklace over his head and handed it over. They watched as the doctor used the tongs to lay it across the first cloth and then wrapped the others tightly. He used the tongs to hold the wrapped medallion over a flame and the cloths shrank to a solid coating on the medallion, the pattern showing clearly through the tight cloth. Carlos looked down at the cooling object and slowly reached his hand out for it.

Kris closed her eyes and concentrated on Carlos. It was difficult to keep her thoughts and attention focused – Dante was near him and his dark presence pulled at all her senses. For a moment, she gave in to her heart and let herself revel in the strengthened contact between them. He was aware of her regard; she could feel it.

After a few moments she turned back to the task at hand. The talisman lay ready to be used and she needed to complete but one more step. She breathed in deeply, gathering in tendrils of power from the realm around her - forming them, shaping them, holding them ready.

She watched as Carlos drew close to the talisman. She felt the moment his fingers closed around it and she hurled the bound energy out toward him. Because of the link it formed between them, she felt the impact of the energy twice – once as it left her and again as, without warning, it hit him. He dropped to his knees and she fell with him.

Between her presence and his body existed a shining arc of power, spanning an impossible distance, a bridge between them that she would be able to use in the battle.

"Kris," he ground out, "what… "

"The pain will pass – you see, even now it eases. Do not fight it, let it go." She let the power wrap around the boy's soul then reached out and sealed the power in place, binding it to him with a final mark and then cutting the connection.

"It is done now." She reached out in her mind and brushed fingertips across the boy's chest and he shivered as her presence retreated from him.

She let herself sag down and then opened her eyes and looked into the beyond. Carlos was still on his knees, but his head was up and he was speaking to Dante. She watched as the doctor moved Carlos's shirt aside to reveal the soul mark that she had placed on him – Dante's symbol, formed on Carlos's skin on his chest just above his heart. The black lines of the mark were fluid and perfect, alive as no tattoo could ever be. Hair-thin lines of color outlined the center swooping line – one violet, one emerald green. The colors of their eyes. A combined mark, Dante's and Kris's.

The doctor studied it without touching. "You have been given a rare gift," he said softly. "A soul mark. It will stay with you all of your life, just as it is now."

"What kind of gift?" Carlos rubbed his fingers across the mark, noting that the lines were smoother than his own skin, like fine velvet.

"That is yet to be seen."

Kris watched Dante as he listened to the doctor speak and then watched Dante's eyes go to the mark and then to the boy's eyes. She felt the surge of primal instinct and emotion in Dante as he reached out with his thumb and brushed the mark once. "My young wolf," he said, his voice low.

Carlos grinned at him. "Does that mean I'm part of the pack now? I get to eat with the big wolves?"

"It means my house is more than Sasha and me. Three instead of two."

"Aren't you a little old to be having children?" His tone was gentle, teasing, but his eyes, fixed on Dante, were serious.

"I am not your father and I do not seek to be. But I accept responsibility for you." The words had a formal, final tone.

Kris smiled at the exchange. Her men - stubborn and thick-headed.

Snarling in frustration, the sorcerer's awareness crisscrossed the ancient city, twisting down narrow alleyways, gliding through open windows and doorways, searching, always seeking the presence of the boy or Dante. He checked the harbor. Their boat – Little Falcon – was still there. They hadn't left. He concentrated his search in the areas where his servant had attacked the boy. He had been injured. Between the physical injuries and the poison, the boy shouldn't have been able to travel far.

He stopped at one particular building. Except for a small sign to one side of the door, it looked no different from its neighbors to each side, but it was different – very different. From somewhere inside the local medical clinic, power was emanating. He could sense it. He tried to get closer, drawn by the arcane energy, but was repulsed. Something was barring his way. He pushed at the barrier, testing its strength.

"He seeks you," the doctor announced quietly. "He is testing the wards I placed on the building. Soon, they will fail and he will be able to sense you again. He is too strong."

"And then?" Dante's voice was calm.

The doctor shrugged, palms up. "Likely he will come for the boy. Much work went into the initial spells, he would not want to start over with another. It will take time for his spirit to return to his body, and he must then prepare, but he will likely come within the hour."

"And then, my father, you die again – forever." Dante's voice, as cold as the void of space, held no hint of doubt. He put his hand on the hilt of his biggest knife.

"Those in his service that he brings with him will surely be bar-Tasawif - the living dead. They can only be slain by cutting the spell that binds their souls to their bodies and to his service." The doctor held out both hands. "Your knives." It was not a request.

Dante eyes him flatly for several minutes, then placed both hunting blades and throwing blades in the older man's hands. The doctor turned and moved to a tall cabinet in the corner, opened it, and extracted a black earthenware jar. Removing the stopper, he poured the viscous black substance it contained on the blades and then spread it evenly across their surface.

" Ahlakmaroush. It will negate the power of the binding and free their souls. Older methods must carry the day, I fear."

"The manner is unimportant. They will die."

Sighing, Kris smiled fondly. Her Dark Angel. So direct, so sure. His strength and certainty were comforting. Reaching out, she touched both Carlos and Dante, felt their instant recognition of her presence. For a moment, she allowed the love she felt for both of them to flow unchecked and felt the return of their love for her.

She felt the power beating at the wards the doctor had erected and was grateful that they had held. The soul-stealer was not yet aware of her presence and, until he became aware, could take no steps to counter her. If they could keep her presence secret until the proper time, it would greatly increase their chances of success.

It is almost time, she informed them. Do you remember all that I told you, everything you must do? Carlos nodded. The soul mark you now bear is dangerous. It can be used by you and against you. Through it, I can pull power from you to use in my battle against the soul-stealer, as I explained before. But if the battle continues too long and I pull too much power, you will die. Know also that once I start to pull power from you, I cannot cease to do so until the battle is decided – one way or the other. Carlos shivered, but nodded again resolutely. It is okay to be afraid, Carlos. I too fear what may befall us.

Carlos laughed hollowly. "Afraid? I'm way beyond terror and you're talking about being afraid?"

How will you go forward if your fear is so great?

He shrugged. "However I need to. If I let my fear stop me, we've already lost. Besides, who else is there to do this?"

T hen you show true bravery, for bravery is not lack of fear, but continuing in the face of it. She regarded Dante, knowing he feared nothing but failure. And you, Beloved? Do you understand what you must do?

"As I have always done," Dante replied, his voice flat. "I bring death."

She felt the wards shudder once more. I must go now, before he senses me. Know that I await our reunion. Beloved.

"As do I."

Suddenly, the sense of her vanished.

---

The wards broke, crumbling under the Alchemist's assault. His senses searched the building. Yes. They were there. The boy – the fine young body that would soon house his spirit. His son – the one who had caused him such pain and trouble. The others were unimportant and he paid them no heed.

His gloating triumph faltered as he realized what was wrong. The boy was on his knees, surrounded by a thin mist of power. The Alchemist tasted the power and found it rich. The boy could not be the source of that power, nor was any other in the room capable of generating it. The boy spoke. The Alchemist snarled as he realized that he was animate. His soul had been returned to the body. How had it happened? The soul had been cast far out of the body and should not have been able to return. The Alchemist concentrated his awareness on Dante. The son who had already caused him such trouble. The one who was certainly behind the return of the boy's soul. Such treachery could not be allowed. It was time for Dante to die.

As if he sensed the sorcerer's concentration on him, Dante looked up, his flat gaze fixing unerringly on the area where the Alchemist's awareness was concentrated.

Raging, the Alchemist started back to his body. The boy's soul would have to be cast out again. It would require more effort. Before he did that though, he would have the boy's body in his possession. There would be no more mistakes, no more underestimating the power and determination of either the boy or Dante. He merged his awareness back into his body with the ease of long practice.

With a deep breath, the Alchemist's eyes opened. He snarled, his lips curling, his fingers hooking into claws as his nails dug into and shredded the thin pallet of the cot he lay on. Rising abruptly, he let his rage overtake him. When it passed, he stared dismissively at the destruction around him – the shattered earthenware containers, their contents spilled across the floor, the books and papers flung about, the overturned furniture. None of it was important. At that moment, he had two desires - to gain possession of the boy's body and to kill his troublesome son. He sent out a mental call to some of his followers. As he waited for them, he began to make his preparations.

The Alchemist – Chapter 6

Dante watched as Carlos moved restlessly across the room. Not quite pacing, but close. He had admitted to being afraid of the upcoming struggle. Dante viewed that as a positive thing; the boy could easily have had an idealistic view of an easy conquest. No, a certain amount of nervousness on Carlos's part would keep his actions in perspective and keep him from doing something rash – Dante had already seen he was capable of that. The boy was highly intelligent and his instincts were good, but he often let his heart direct his actions. He would have to learn otherwise.

Carlos stopped to speak to Fayed, who nodded in reply to whatever Carlos said. The doctor called Carlos over to assist him with one of the solutions he was preparing and Dante watched Fayed's worried young eyes follow him.

Dante smiled grimly. Fayed seemed to have Carlos's measure. Dante called Fayed's name softly, and the boy came to stand before him, his head bowed, his eyes on the floor. Dante unsheathed the smallest of his combat knives and he saw Fayed's eyes go wide at the hiss of the blade leaving the leather sheath. Dante held the knife out to Fayed, careful not to touch the substance the doctor had smeared on the blade edge. Dante knew a few phrases and gestures in Arabic and hoped he could make Fayed understand what he wanted.

Fayed stared at the knife and Dante turned it so that the hilt was facing the boy, lifting it closer to him. "Fayed sayf. Fayed's knife." The boy's eyes widened but he didn't touch the knife.

He nodded at Dante. " Al Zaim Dante sayf." He gestured at the knife and then Dante, indicating that he knew it was Dante's sayf .

Dante shook his head. " La. No." He grasped the boy's hand and put the haft of the knife in it. "Fayed sayf. Fayed's knife."

The boy sucked in his breath as his fingers curled around the haft. " Ya'a.." He placed the knife on the floor in front of him and bowed to Dante again, speaking in a torrent of Arabic too fast and too jumbled for Dante to follow.

" Bas," Dante said. "Enough."

Reverently Fayed picked up the knife again. Dante unbuckled the knife's sheath and gave it to Fayed as well. The boy's eyes were huge as he accepted it. The sheath had fit around Dante's upper thigh, but with a small adjustment it spanned Fayed's entire waist. Dante watched the boy fasten the sheath down, practicing drawing the knife and adjusting the sheath until he was satisfied with the placement. Clearly, he had been trained to use a knife. Knowing that gave Dante more confidence in what he was about to demand of the boy.

Dante had one more instruction for the boy and it was important that he understand. Dante's use of Arabic had always been confined to the words of his trade: dead - meit, kill - itbah, fight - harbah. It was only on the voyage with Carlos that he had learned words for trade, for pleasantries. But again, he found himself using the basic words learned years ago. "Fayed haressin Carlos. You are Carlos's guard."

Fayed nodded his understanding, his hand going to the haft of the knife, and his eyes swiftly glancing at Carlos and then back to Dante. " Na'am. Awqaf Al Zaim." Dante nodded. The boy understood and promised him it would be as he commanded.

Dante pantomimed being stabbed. " Harbah. Ghul itbah Dante." The fight. The demon kills Dante. The boy shook his head vigorously and Dante stopped him. " Meit Dante. I die." The boy shuddered and Dante put a hand on his shoulder, clasping him tightly. " Meit Dante," he repeated softly but forcefully. Fayed looked up at him and Dante locked eyes with him. "Fayed itbah Carlos. Then you must kill Carlos."

Fayed stared at him and Dante could see the boy thinking. Finally his head dipped. " Awqaf, Al Zaim. Itbah Carlos . Itbah Fayed." He understood. If Dante should be killed in the fight, Fayed would kill both Carlos and himself to prevent them from being taken. Dante felt a small measure of relief. He knew that Fayed, unlike Carlos, would follow his orders without question or hesitation. The boy understood the meaning of absolute obedience.

"They come," the doctor stated quietly. "They attack the wards now."

Dante looked down at Fayed, who moved to stand between Carlos and the outer doorway. Carlos folded his arms and looked at Fayed and then at Dante and rolled his eyes. Dante felt his lips stretch into a grin despite the situation.

And then the time for reflection passed and the front door of the clinic shuddered under assault. Dante breathed in deeply, letting his body relax, his muscles smoothing as he turned his focus inward and his hands moved to hover above the hilts of his knives. He was prepared. Let them come.

The door crashed inward. Gesturing impatiently, the Alchemist sent the first of his minions into the doorway.

The men – if they could still be called men – stepped into the opening. Carlos flinched backward, away from them, unable to control his reaction. Their faces, revealed in the light of the room, were hideous. The eyes deep sunk and burning red with hatred. The skin grayish white and bloodless, drawn tight over the underlying bones. A stench of death and decay emanated from them. 'Walking death' was the descriptive that came immediately to mind. 'Animated corpses' was the next descriptive that Carlos thought of.

Dante never hesitated. It mattered nothing to him what his opponent looked like. Living or walking dead, they would die by his hand. Carlos would be protected no matter the cost. The two largest knives slid from their sheaths with a hiss in one fluid movement. Without pausing, he lashed out with his left hand, a single skilled deadly stroke that sliced the man on the right from his abdomen to his chest. Entrails spilled across the floor. Ignoring the gore, Dante ducked the slash of the man on the left, catching him on the thigh, and opening a deep gash. The man howled in pain and fell back as the substance on Dante's knife entered him.

Two more immediately took their place in the doorway. Again, Dante's knives flashed as he sank the blades deep into their bodies, his movements precise and perfect, no wasted motion, no unnecessary sparring. Carlos realized at that moment that Dante was a well-honed killing machine. The image of a black panther he'd seen once on a nature show sprang to mind. Sleek, sinuous, graceful, and deadly. There was no emotion evident in Dante, nothing to show he recognized his opponents as human, and Carlos supposed that they probably weren't anymore. Still, the Dante he saw before him was scary – a pure, emotionless killing machine. The image was hard to reconcile with the patient teacher and good companion that Carlos also knew, but he had to take Kris's advice and accept Dante for all of what he was.

Again, the bodies were replaced by two more. Carlos felt a surge of hope. If they continued to come two-by-two through the door, Dante would simply cut them down and the whole issue could be decided quickly.

The Alchemist snarled in frustration, seeing his minions so easily disposed of. His son was proving troublesome again. Angrily, he gestured two of his remaining minions around the back of the building, instructing them to gain entrance and seek out the boy.

Carlos felt useless and discouraged. Dante had told him to stay out of the way, but surely that hadn't meant he shouldn't come to Dante's aid. He knew he had an advantage that Dante didn't. The men, the things, that attacked them would not be trying to kill him - at least not directly. He glanced down at the remains of the creatures as he circled to the far side of the room, nearest the back hallway. Horrified and fascinated, he looked closer at them. They hadn't been exactly attractive in life and death hadn't improved them. He froze when he saw that they shared something with him – a soul mark, in the same place as his, but of a different design. It seemed like the Alchemist used it to control them. His mind reeled. What did having a mark mean?

He heard a sound behind him and turned and found himself face-to-face with one of the living creatures as another flanked him to his left. He had been sure that they would not be trying to kill him but he rapidly changed that assessment as the thing snarled at him and its knife slashed where his chest would have been had he remained still. He was already in motion when something hit him from behind, buckling his knees, throwing him off balance and backward. He glanced over. Fayed.

Fayed was small, agile, and very determined. He was haressin to Carlos, Al Zaim Dante, the mightiest warrior he had ever known, had told him so and he would not fail either of them. He darted between the two creatures, his knife flashing as he slashed at the waistband of the one closest to Carlos. The creature fell to its knees as its loose trousers dropped. It reached out for Fayed, snarling, and Fayed skipped backward. That movement put him in reach of the other creature and Fayed twisted to shove his knife into its groin. The creature howled in pain from both the location of the wound and the sting of the poison as it grasped the knife, trying to pull it out.

Carlos grimaced. It was one thing to have the deadly entity that was Dante fight his battles for him; it was entirely another to have a boy several years younger than himself try it. Fayed stood, watching the thing before him die. Behind him, the other creature had gained its feet again and was moving toward Fayed, knife upraised.

An image flashed in Carlos's mind – the scene in the dockside bar, when he had witnessed the recreation of a long-past knife fight through Dante's eyes. The one man had been moving away from Dante, just as this creature was moving away from him, and Dante had reached for his knife and thrown it, his movements sure, graceful and fluid. Carlos felt his own fingers close around his knife and he knew he could do it. He drew back his arm and the knife left his fingers with the same terrible eagerness that Dante's had. Carlos watched as the knife struck true, directly between the shoulders of the creature, and it fell without a sound, unmoving, the knife embedded in its back to the hilt.

Carlos looked down at his hand, still extended. The hand he had used to throw the knife. His left hand. But he was right-handed and he had never before thrown a knife. He looked at his left hand again and then at Dante, who fought with another one of the creatures, feinting with the knife in his dominant hand. His left hand. Carlos shook his head. Somehow he had absorbed the skill from Dante while they were connected.

Hearing sound behind him, Dante knew immediately that the attackers had split forces in an attempt to take Carlos. One of the three attackers crowded in the doorway managed to get inside the room, forcing him to back away from the door slightly. Instantly, the other two leaped into the small area of no man's land just inside the door. Even as they all three sprang for him at the same time, their wicked looking, jagged-edged blades flashing, he dropped nearly prone on the floor, sweeping out with his right leg and immediately rolling to his left. Two of them went down, their legs knocked out from under them. The third struck at the space where a split second before, Dante's upper body had been, his momentum carrying him to his knees. Coming back to his feet in a continuation of the same fluid motion, his weight perfectly balanced, Dante slashed behind his left side and was rewarded to feel the blade bite deep into flesh. Before the one who had fallen to his knees could recover, Dante was on him, jerking his head back and slashing his throat open.

He risked a quick glance toward where Carlos and Fayed stood. Their attackers were down. The glance nearly cost him; instinct saved him. He ducked and the last remaining attacker's stroke went wide, slicing through the air over his head. Raising both hands over his head, Dante drove his knives deep into the abdomen of the last of the Alchemist's minions.

"Are you injured?" he asked Carlos. The young man shook his head. Dante took a moment to inspect him. Carlos was wide-eyed and breathing rapidly, his skin flushed. Dante saw the haft of Carlos's knife in one of the bodies on the floor. His first kill. Dante knew the emotions that were surging through Carlos – excitement, revulsion, power, satisfaction. It was a heady mix, but Carlos would have to deal with it on his own. There was no time. A howl of rage and frustration from outside jerked his attention back to the doorway. Without hesitation, he glided through it and moved into the night to confront the monster, the soul-stealer, the Alchemist. His father.

The moon had risen and its light lent an air of unreality to the street, casting everything in stark contrast – inky black shadows and silver, ghostly white. The Alchemist stood on the far side of the street, his face and upper body lost in the shadow from a small balcony above him. Dante knew the body was that of an older man, but Kris had warned him that it would be possible for his enemy to use power to make himself the equal of Dante in speed and strength. It would be training and skill that made the difference.

Movement. The Alchemist shifted his weight, his body moving so that his face was no longer in the darkest shadow. It was possible to dimly make out his features. Dante recognized the eyes – his father's eyes. Eyes that had burned with evil desire and lust as he forced Dante and Sasha to satisfy him. Eyes that, once his body had been sated, glowed with enjoyment as he inflicted brutal beatings on their young, defenseless bodies. Eyes that had filled with taunting glee as they lay at his feet, broken and bleeding, begging for mercy. There had been no mercy for them; there would be none for the Alchemist.

The hilts of his two large combat knives lay snugly in the palms of his hands, their blades alongside his forearms acting as protection as well as weapons, Dante stepped forward, his grip light but firm, his movement fluid. The Alchemist moved to meet him, a scimitar held low in front of his body with both hands. In contrast to the black blades of Dante's knives that reflected no light, the wickedly sharp blade of the scimitar gleamed in the moonlight, showing clearly against the black background of its wielder's robe.

The Alchemist struck the first blow, sweeping upward, surprising Dante with his speed and strength. Dante managed to catch the sword with one of his own blades and redirect it, but the force behind it jarred him, sending a shock up his left arm. Silently, he cursed his own inattention and overconfidence. Kris had warned him. He knew he faced no normal man, but one who commanded arcane powers that Dante would have dismissed as fairy tales a mere two days earlier. The visage of the old man his opponent wore was a sham. He shut off all further thoughts firmly, emptying his mind and letting his body and instincts take over.

Time slowed. Dante saw every move in slow motion and easily countered the flurry of strokes the Alchemist dealt, while searching for a way to get inside the longer reach of the scimitar to deal his own killing blow. He blocked another slashing attack with his left forearm, the scimitar's blade ringing as it slid off the blade of his own knife, and struck with his right hand – a quick, hard blow that forced the Alchemist to leap backward to avoid it.

In spite of the deadly nature of the battle Dante was engaged in, Carlos admired the fluidity of his movements, the naturalness of them. His knives were not weapons he wielded. He was the weapon - his mind and body. The knives were merely part of him. How many fights had it taken to achieve that naturalness? How much training? How many years had Dante lived, locked within his deadly world where life and death were the only coin that counted? His thoughts scared Carlos. Every time he thought he understood how dark and tormented Dante's life had been, something else was revealed – another layer uncovered. He watched the two figures battling, Dante driving the Alchemist back and forcing him into an angle of walls where his maneuverability was limited, and thought of what Dante must have lived through to become what he was. Carlos wondered if he himself would have been strong enough to survive those experiences. He didn't think so. They had hardened Dante; Carlos was afraid they would have broken him. It was another measure of the differences that separated him and Dante – and his father.

Kris spread her senses out, seeking the power sources the Alchemist was tapping. She could feel the lines of dark and corrupted power that he fed upon. She closed her eyes and reached out for Carlos, opening the bridge between them again. He was prepared for her and she felt only the slightest flinch from him as she made contact and began to use his energy. Slowly, carefully, she began to weave a living cage of energy around the Alchemist. A cage which would block the separation of his soul from the body he possessed. She smiled in satisfaction. That retreat was now blocked. Kris concentrated on the Alchemist's power sources in her realm and began, one at a time, to close them off. His powers would be slowly cut down and then instead of a supernaturally enhanced soul stealer he would be a man, most mortal, and he would face Dante without aid. When that happened, she had no doubt who would be victorious.

Dante felt his right foot slip. Something, perhaps refuse dropped carelessly during the day, slicked the broken surface of the street. Instinctively, he reacted, going with his momentum and dropping to the ground in a quick, rolling movement. Not quick enough. He felt the pull of fabric as the tip of the Alchemist's scimitar ripped through his tunic and sliced across his shoulder. A burning pain followed seconds later.

Carlos jumped when he saw Dante go down. Choking back a cry of protest, he started to move toward Dante. A strong hand on his arm, jerked him back sharply. Carlos glanced to his right and saw the doctor, a frown of displeasure on his face. "You would merely distract him, not aid him," the doctor's words caused a wave of guilt.

Small hands shoved against him, pushing him back a step as Fayed added his own silent opinion that Carlos stay put. "All right, all right. I get the message. Stay out of it," Carlos grumbled.

A burning sensation began in his wounded shoulder and spread slowly through his body. Dante moved back, widening the distance between himself and the Alchemist, giving him more time to react, while he assessed what was happening to him. Poison of some sort he guessed. "Can you feel it, my son?" the Alchemist taunted. "Does your body begin to burn? Soon you will die and I will have won – again."

The time for subtlety had passed. Kris felt the poisons twist through Dante, the power of the Alchemist spreading corruption through him. She felt Dante falter and with a scream of rage she severed all of the power the Alchemist tapped from her realm. She felt and heard his feral snarl, but it was mixed with triumph. He was still strong. She had only one resource left to help Dante and she hesitated before reaching out for it.

Carlos turned to her before she reached for him. "Take what he needs, Kris - I give everything I have to Dante, freely. End this here and now with whatever it takes." He felt her fear for Dante, her anger and her terror, and he opened his arms and spread his hands out. "We can do this, Kris."

He felt the brush of her mind across his, a soft caress, an apology. Then his sense of the world was wrenched away as Kris ripped the energy from him to complete her block of the Alchemist's powers. He dropped to his knees, trying desperately not to cry out and distract Dante as the pain hammered at him. She had warned him that once she started she could not stop until it was done.

The Alchemist screamed in impotent fury as he felt the source of his power blocked. Someone in the other time aided his son! He reached again for the power. Again, he was blocked, his probe cast back at him. He staggered back in pain as the backlash struck him. He could pull no more power. What he had already taken would have to suffice. He would have to defeat his son using nothing more than the body he had with its enhanced strength and power.

The burning pain receded and Dante's vision cleared. He heard his father's scream of fury and turned to the sound, pushing away from the wall he'd fallen against. Both knives were still in his hands. He flexed and rolled his injured shoulder, testing its usefulness. He decided it shouldn't hinder him and promptly pushed the injury from his mind. Anger threatened and he shoved it aside too. Emotions – of any kind - would only get in the way.

Metal rang as their blades met each other and the battle was rejoined. Again and again, the Alchemist slashed at him and always Dante slipped the blows. Like a dancer, he parried and side-stepped, maneuvering his father back up the street to where the moonlight revealed several holes in the paving stones of the street. As they reached the edge of that section, Dante suddenly attacked, pressing forward as his father struggled to fend off the blows. Caught unawares, off-balance, his entire concentration on his son, the Alchemist staggered as his foot came down in one of the holes.

One of Dante's knives ripped open the front of his robe and the moonlight revealed an amulet in the form of an inverted pyramid with a cobra wrapped around one side of it. The same symbol was on his skin over his heart – like Carlos's soul mark.

The doctor gasped. "Of course," he muttered. "It is the only way he could have controlled such power…" Raising his voice, he yelled to Dante. " Al Zaim! The mark! Stab through the mark!"

The two were past the rough section of street and were once again trading blows, the Alchemist unable to penetrate Dante's defense and Dante unable to get inside the scimitar's longer reach. A flash of movement caught Dante's eye, but too late for him to stop the sweep of his knife. He saw Fayed flinch as the blade opened a cut along his right bicep. The boy gasped and flinched but kept running, dodging behind the Alchemist. Dante pressed the attack again, keeping the Alchemist's attention on himself as Fayed reached up and ripped the chain, with its pyramid and cobra medallion, free. Fractionally, the Alchemist hesitated, his blade dropping low. Dante saw his father's eyes open wide in fear and, with a triumphant cry, struck instantly, burying both blades deep into the symbol over his heart. Dante roared in victory as the Alchemist collapsed to the ground and lay still.

Fayed retreated to stand behind Dante, still holding the necklace, much as he would hold a venomous snake. Dante's lip curled. "It is done. He holds no more power. Drop the medallion."

Fayed did as he was told and Dante crushed the medallion and chain beneath the heel of his boot, grinding and twisting the metal into formless debris.

The doctor helped Carlos to his feet and they moved closer to look down on the motionless form of the Alchemist. As they watched, his face and shape began to writhe. Fayed took a fearful step backward and Dante held up his hand to stop the boy's retreat.

The Alchemist's features began to change and he wore a different face, and then another. Carlos gasped at the third face – so close to Dante's, so much like him. He heard Dante's growl as he beheld his father's face again, and then the moment passed and the face changed. The stream of faces and shapes continued as they watched silently. In death, every body the soul stealer had possessed was revealed until, at last, his original visage was revealed. It was horrific, the long years of death revealed in it at last. With one final shift, the long dead Druid priest disappeared and all that remained was the body of the alchemist whose soul had been stolen last.

Dante looked up at Carlos, and saw the young man's eyes on the knives that pierced the mark on the Alchemist's chest. Carlos's hand came up to rub the same spot on his own chest. He raised troubled eyes to Dante as he sought an answer to a question he couldn't even begin to form. Dante had no answers for him; he felt only a creeping lethargy, beginning in his wounded shoulder and spreading outwards as the pounding adrenalin that kept him from feeling his injuries began to seep away.

The doctor took Dante's arm and leaned him against the wall of the alley as he tried to look at Dante's wounds. Dante felt his knees buckle as he slowly and silently slid down the wall to the ground.

Kris saw the Alchemist fall and felt the pressure of his mind against her defenses vanish. She heard Dante's triumphant cry and let go of all the threaded power she held. It slipped away immediately, leaving her empty and weak. Staggering once, she fell to her knees and then collapsed onto the warm tiles of the terrace. She blinked as color drained away, leaving only dull whites and grays in place of the terrace's rich terra cottas and browns. The stone below her face and fingers turned smooth and cold. She shivered.

She was no longer on the terrace but had gone back to the first place she had come to in the beyond. She had awakened there, conscious of the fact of her death, of Dante's arms around her empty body, his own body shaking with pain and grief as he felt her last, slow exhalation without a following inhalation. She had expected to be punished for letting herself love her Dark Angel, for letting herself dream and soar beyond the narrow boundaries of her upbringing, and so, after death she had returned there, to the sterile emptiness of the foster home in which she was raised.

She felt the cold hardwood floor underneath her fingertips and turned her head to look at the familiar room, feeling the heat leaching out of her body and into the floor. It looked as it had all her childhood. White walls washed by pale gray light coming in through small windows. A bare room, the only furniture her small bed with its dull black steel frame, a white-painted wood dresser, a small pine desk with school books stacked neatly on it, and a single straight-backed wooden chair without a cushion. There were no photographs, no paintings, no toys, no rugs. No warmth or color. Just the precise alignment of the furniture, as straightforward and foursquare as the couple who had raised her out of duty and charity, precepts they had followed without understanding, without love or warmth for the child whose life they held. She closed her eyes and let despair overcome her.

Carlos saw two worlds simultaneously and his head spun with vertigo as he tried to separate the images. Only a few steps away from him, Dante sat in the dark of the night and the alley, propped up against a wall, the doctor checking his wounds and preparing to move him back into the clinic. Only a few steps in the other direction, Kris lay on the cold wood floor of a sterile room illuminated with weak winter daylight, exhausted and spent.

"Dante," he ground out, and Dante's attention snapped to him. "It's Kris. We need to help her." He slowly got to his feet and took those few halting steps toward Dante necessary to close the distance between them before falling back to his knees.

"Kris…" Dante's voice was weak, his eyes filled with worry.

"She's weak, she's… fading."

Dante pushed the doctor away, mindless of the renewed bleeding. "How?"

Carlos assessed him. "I think we can help her, but I can't do it alone."

"Tell me what she needs."

Carlos smiled at the renewed strength in Dante's voice. "We need to go to her. I think I know how." He ripped the collar of his shirt open, exposing the soul mark. The two thin lines of color that flanked the center swooping gold line of the mark, previously so faint as to be only a suggestion of true color, glowed bright in the dim light, as though charged by the energy that had passed through him. "Give me your hand."

Dante looked at his mark on the young man's chest and nodded, holding out his hand. Carlos grasped it, then met Dante's eyes and shrugged. It would work or it wouldn't. Neither of them were in top shape and he didn't feel very good about asking Dante, who had shouldered the burden of the fight to protect him and was badly wounded, for more help. But he didn't think he could pull it off himself and he couldn't abandon Kris without trying. He took a deep breath, firmly placed Dante's palm over the soul mark, holding it there with his own hand, and closed his eyes.

Both cried out as they were thrust together and hurled back along the bridge spanning realities. Unlike before, it was Dante's turn to see through Carlos's eyes and feel what Carlos felt. That time, Carlos was the guide and Dante the passenger. The first impression Dante had was one of great weariness – Carlos had been used hard during the battle and it was stubbornness alone that kept him on his feet and headed back to Kris. Dante concentrated on sharing what little strength he himself had left with his young companion.

"No, save it for her. I'll be okay." Abruptly, they stood at the end of a cold silent hallway, the bridge back to their own reality a shining silver arc behind them. Carlos looked around him, cautiously taking in his surroundings, even as he felt the pull of Kris from the other end of the hallway. He could sense no one else nearby, but previous adventures in that realm and his exhausted state convinced him to go slow. He smiled to himself as he felt Dante chafe at his slow pace and caution, knowing that if he had hurried, Dante would have counseled patience. It seemed even Dante could be at least partially ruled by his emotions under the right circumstances – namely, where Kris was concerned. Maybe he really was human after all.

Go. Dante growled. Carlos started cautiously down the hallway.

Kris lay with her cheek on the hard floor and silently wept. The battle was done and Dante had survived, but she didn't have the strength left to get up off of the floor and put her shields back in place and recreate her home on the terrace. There would be no reunion, no twinning of her soul with Dante's in the afterlife. It would end for her there, in the cold half-light, as she either faded away or one of the dark, twisted things that existed in that reality found her, weak and alone, and fed off her until all her essence was drained. She shuddered, her tears continuing to fall silently.

Someone knelt by her and called her name and she felt strong arms around her, lifting her to cradle her against a broad, warm chest. Her cheek fell against the soul mark on Carlos's chest as his gentle hand stroked her hair. She felt the soundless fall of power from him into her as his skin warmed hers in all the places they touched. She savored the feel and flavor of the power – young, male, vibrantly alive in all his senses. Reveling in his youthful joy and strength, she became aware of something more. She opened her eyes and stared into Carlos's very blue ones, strangely overlaid by the vivid emerald green of her beloved's. She recognized the second flow of energy as uniquely Dante's and basked in it – rich, full, and complex, laced with subtleties. So different from Carlos's and so familiar to her. Carlos stopped stroking her hair and lifted his thumb to her face, gently wiping away the traces of the tears she had cried for herself and for Dante.

He kissed her lightly on the forehead and drew her to her feet, steadying her as she swayed. She clasped him for support and his smile grew and became the heart-stoppingly beautiful Manoso family smile. His arms went around her and he bent his head and kissed her with the power and passion he was capable of. As he kissed her, she felt one last pulse of energy, directly from his heart to hers, and she accepted the gift of love and admiration for what it was, kissing him back and smiling up at him.

She felt Dante's flash of annoyance and saw Carlos wince as he stepped away from her, grinning, as Dante communicated that annoyance to him. She threw back her head and laughed, throwing her hands wide, filled with joy and love from the two with her.

She looked around her at the room she had so silently, so desperately, hated as a child, and the pale walls misted away, taking on color and life and texture as Dante's terrace appeared around her again. She breathed in the warm air with its scent of cypress, citrus, and salt air, and saw the red tiles, the rough gray stone, the dark lavender in clay pots, and the deep blue of the sea. She reached for Dante with her mind and felt his exhaustion, the pain of his wounds, and the poison coursing through his body. "Go back now, Carlos. Care for Dante and I will destroy the connection between places after you."

He stepped further away from her, the grin still firmly in place. "Until we meet again, Kris."

He waved and stepped into the bridge as light and time fell away and then blinked. He and Dante were still in the same position in the dark alley. Dante pulled his hand away and looked up at Carlos as if to speak and Carlos watched in alarm as Dante's eyes slowly rolled upward and his body sagged.

The doctor met Carlos's frantic gaze calmly. "He has done what needed to be done and now his body shuts down. We must go inside and clean these wounds. With the death of the soul stealer, the power of his poisons is greatly reduced, but we must still neutralize them." The two men bent and lifted Dante to his feet, splitting the burden of his heavily muscled but limp body between them.

Fayed began to collect Dante's knives from the bodies they remained embedded in and Carlos turned to stop him until he saw the look on Fayed's face and simply nodded at him as he moved among the many bodies. Fayed was disturbed and anxious by Dante's collapse and the boy wanted to feel useful and so he did what he thought Dante would want him to do – care for the weapons that had seen them through the battle.

"What about this ..uh.. mess?"

"Do not worry, young hero. First we will see to your companions and then it will be taken care of."

Carlos snorted and shifted Dante's weight as they moved through the narrow doorway. "Here's your hero," he said, as they lay him gently down on the cot.

The doctor efficiently exposed the knife cuts with their ugly, discolored edges. "Dante is not a hero. He is beyond that. Dante is Kismet." He began to wash out the cuts and apply salves before stitching them up. "He is the hand of Fate, sent here at the appointed time to complete a task, which he did relentlessly and absolutely."

Carlos frowned. "Dante is a man, not some force of nature."

The doctor began to stitch the wounds closed and Carlos flinched as the raw edges of the largest cut moved. "He is all that. You bear his mark now and you will share part of that legacy." The doctor caught Carlos's dubious look and smiled. "You will need the bravery you showed tonight in the future, young wolf. The soul mark you bear can be a great trial and even a danger."

Carlos rubbed the aching spot on his chest and shook his head. "I don't understand whatever the hell it is you're trying to tell me."

"It is not necessary that you understand."

Carlos rolled his eyes. "Good then." He watched as the doctor called Fayed to him and began to dress the boy's wound. He sat down in one of the hard chairs and closed his eyes. Just for a minute, he told himself.

Dante came awake abruptly, jarred out of healing sleep by a sound that had rarely been part of his life. Laughter. Simple joy. Carlos and Fayed, laughing and joking in a mix of English and Arabic. Dante listened for a moment longer. Carlos was teaching Fayed English, starting with the most useful things – names of foods and words to use when swearing.

Dante looked around the large forward cabin of the sailboat, so comfortable and so familiar. The foredeck hatch was open and a gentle breeze blew through the cabin and companionway; combined with the gentle rocking motion and the hiss of water across the outside of the bulkheads, Dante knew they were on the open ocean. Carlos had been sailing since he was a small boy and was very capable of handling Little Falcon on his own. Dante let the moment and his responsibilities go and relaxed back into the bed.

His young wolf, whom he had regarded as little more than a child the first months they had spent together, was in charge for the moment and Dante was content to let it be so.

The Alchemist – Chapter 7

Little Falcon glided across the sea, white sails spread wide. Dante lounged in the cockpit, lazily keeping an eye on the wheel, but giving most of his attention to watching Carlos teach Fayed how to juggle. All three wore nothing but worn and faded shorts, as usual, although Fayed wore the knife and sheath Dante had given him. He always wore it, refusing to part from it even while sleeping. Dante smiled, Fayed would do well for the task he had in mind for the boy. Already, the boy was fiercely loyal to Carlos and took his appointment as Carlos's haressin, or guard, seriously. Dante knew it irritated Carlos at times, but he felt better knowing that, if nothing else, Fayed would alert him to Carlos's potentially dangerous escapades.

His thoughts turned to the eventual return of Carlos's father. It would not be an easy time, Dante knew that. Ric had left a boy in his keeping; he would give back a young man who had seen and experienced things beyond his years. He knew Ric wouldn't be pleased about all the experiences he had allowed Carlos. Knew his old friend would, in fact, be quite angry about some of them. He also understood that Ric would not be totally pleased at the relationship he had with Carlos. Even though, as he had told Carlos, he had no desire to take Ric's place as his father, the young man was part of his family now and Dante had accepted responsibility for him.

"It takes concentration," Carlos said, laughing as Fayed's head moved, trying to track the three balls he kept in the air in front of the boy. "But not on the balls, on the pattern the balls follow. You have to concentrate hard," he said, trying to think of a time he had seen someone focus intently on something. Unbidden and unwanted, a memory rose in Carlos's mind. The memory of the day his mother had been killed. And the way his father had carefully looked at the faces of each of the men in the room. Committing them to memory. Why had his father wanted to memorize the faces?

Dante saw Carlos freeze, the balls falling to the deck and rolling toward the edge. Fayed scrambled after them. Carlos looked up and Dante found himself being measured, considered. And finally rejected. Dante raised an eyebrow at him, but the young man was silent.

Carlos rose, ignoring the balls Fayed offered him, and ducked into the cabin, pulling out the boat's satellite phone. With a grunt, he dropped onto the deck and flipped it open, punching in a number. Voice mail cut in without a ring on the other end. " Call me. Satellite number on Little Falcon." He tried another number and got another machine. That time he left no message.

Dante nodded. Carlos had put it together somehow. He knew the young man had been suspicious of his father's prolonged absence and angry when Dante had refused to discuss it with him. He also knew who Carlos would call next and wondered if he would get the answers he sought. Dante had thought Ric wrong to hide his actions from his son, but had been unwilling to step between them then.

Carlos could feel Dante watching him as he cracked his knuckles. He punched in another number and that time the phone rang, and was answered by a sleepy voice.

"Talk to me," the voice said, rusty with sleep. Carlos ducked his head and looked at the ship's clock through the companionway, and grimaced. Ten in the morning local time was three in the morning in Miami.

"It's me."

The voice on the other end came very awake. "Carlos? Are you alright? Where are you?"

"I'm fine, Tio, but I want to know where my father is." The absolute silence on the other end of the line confirmed every suspicion he had. "Where is he, Tio?"

"I don't know."

"You always know where he is. Don't start lying – no, don't keep lying to me now."

"I don't know where he is, Carlos."

"Semantics," Carlos snapped into the phone. "Maybe you don't know where he is right this precise second, but you know where he was going and what he was going to do."

"Carlos, it's three in the morning…"

"Quit stalling and tell me, dammit."

"He doesn't tell me everything…" Carlos snarled into the phone and snapped it shut, ending the call. The phone began to ring almost immediately. Carlos looked at the calling number and then ignored the phone, clipping it to the waistband of his pants.

"I have to go back, Dante." He ducked his head and dropped down into the cabin, shuffling through charts and maps on the navigation table. "I think the closest large port is Haifa and I can get a shuttle to Tel Aviv and then probably into Orly or Heathrow…"

"No."

The cold finality of Dante's voice stopped him in the middle of unfolding a map. He looked back at Dante. "No?" Carlos looked past Dante to Fayed, who crouched down on the deck, miserable, the balls he had retrieved held in his hands. Deeply loyal to both of them, Fayed found their infrequent clashes disturbing.

"He brought you to me and put the care of your life in my hands. You stay with me."

"You think you can keep me here if I don't want to stay?"

Dante's expression didn't change. "Easily." No threat, simply a flat statement of fact.

Carlos moved closer to Dante, folding his arms across his chest and frowning. The posture, the position, the frown all enhanced his resemblance to his father. It was an effective tactic to intimidate his father's men. "You know what he's doing."

It was the wrong tactic with Dante, who smiled lazily up at him. "Yes."

"Kris called it a vendetta. I'm sure it has to do with the men that murdered my mother." Dante nodded in confirmation. "Why is he doing it?"

Dante had refused to answer Carlos's questions on the subject the first time he had asked them, but Dante thought that his outlook had changed enough that it might be possible to make him understand. "They killed the woman he loved. Threatened your life. If you do not instinctively know why he hunts them, then you do not understand him. Or me."

Carlos sat next to him, turning toward him and tilting his head. "You would do the same thing."

Dante locked eyes with Carlos, willing him to hear the finality in his voice. "If someone had even threatened Kris, I would have done the same. She was mine."

"I do not understand this ownership crap. My father is exactly like that. Like he owned my mother. Owns me. No one owns me." Carlos looked defiant. "Not my father and not you. Just like no one owns Fayed." Fayed and Dante exchanged a glance. Dante understood what Carlos did not – Fayed might not have a legal owner but Carlos owned Fayed's mind and heart as surely as the slaver had owned Fayed's body.

Dante shook his head and leaned forward. "It is not ownership. Kris gave me her love and her life. I accepted them and gave her the same in return. As the keeper of her life it was my privilege to guard her." He paused, his voice so low it was almost inaudible. "Until she was taken from me by a faceless disease that I could not stop."

They sat silent as the boat moved through the swells, letting the soft sounds of the wind and water glide over them as they each contemplated thoughts of Kris. Dante's eyes slid to Carlos and he could see that the young man was cursing himself for starting the conversation.

"As, now, I keep your life in my hands the same way."

"So if someone killed me…"

"I would kill them. Not for you, but because of you." Dante studied him. "Why did you go back to get Fayed even though I'd expressly forbidden it? Why is it so important to you to go to your father right now?"

"Because he could be in trouble, he could be hurt." Carlos paused. "Okay, okay, I get the point. Part of it, anyway." Carlos shrugged. "So why didn't he say something to me?"

"He doesn't want your help. This is something he does for himself. Because of her."

"She wouldn't want this. Wouldn't want him to risk himself. Kris said as much to me – that she wasn't happy with him."

"It is a task he has set for himself and he will do it regardless of what other people think."

Carlos sighed angrily and rubbed his eyes. "How very … Dad-like." He folded his arms and looked out at the calm sea. "Let's go back to the villa, Dante."

---

The engine noise of the car resonated through the cockpit, the throaty, deep growl from the Ferrari Modena's big oversquare Italian V-8 edgy and arousing. Sasha, with a quick glance at Ric, simply concentrated on driving. They were far enough out of Athens traffic that he could wind the engine out a little and he did, the stately old cypress trees that lined the road flashing by faster and faster.

His thoughts turned to the man sitting silently beside him, his expression shuttered and tense. He had never been particularly close to Ric, not the way Dante was. They had cooperated long enough to go back to Kinsha and pull Dante out, but then Sasha had chosen his brother over Special Forces, deserting without a backward glance to take Dante back to the warm calm of Greece to heal, mind and body. Or heal as much as he could. Ric had chosen to return to base and settle accounts. Ric and Dante as a team had already been admired by the Special Forces groups, but the cold fury with which Ric led the team that had wiped both the prison camp and the men who ran it out of existence and then had pursued the upper brass that had stranded Dante there had made Ric a legend in his own time and the story was one that was still passed down to new Special Forces members. The teams were about comradeship, about looking out for each other above all else, no matter what. Ric's actions were the ultimate example of that. No matter that they were unsanctioned and against orders. That only added to the legend.

Still, Sasha knew him fairly well. Well enough in any event to enjoy needling him. The answers he had given to Ric's inquiries about Carlos had been carefully phrased – truthful tantalizing bits calculated to get under Ric's skin. Sasha looked at the set face beside him again and fought the urge to laugh. In response to Ric's inquiries about Carlos, he'd related only that both Dante and Carlos had been nearly lost at sea in a storm and that he'd had a near fatal run-in with an assassin in a dark alley. A few little hints about mysteries and bad guys. He'd watched as Ric's face became more remote and impassive with each word. If Ric was going to take minor-level teasing so rigidly, he couldn't wait to see the reception that the full story from Dante would get. Sasha shrugged. He'd probably gone a little further sharing information with Ric than Dante would have liked, but he'd always thought Manoso a little too concerned about control. And if he thought that his son was going to hop back under his thumb after the freedom of the last several months, he'd find out how wrong he was quick enough. Sasha was betting on Carlos.

Initially, Sasha had viewed Carlos as an annoying obligation, but it was impossible to be around Carlos without developing genuine affection for him, and Fayed, with his black hair and black eyes and eagerness to please, always reminded Sasha of their long-dead little brother Nicolo. It was easy to accept both of them as long-lost, much younger brothers. With the four of them in residence, the villa was crowded, lively, and noisy, something it had never been before. He had enjoyed the novelty, but would welcome the return of calm and quiet when Ric took his son and they could return to their previous life. Except that Sasha, pragmatic and perceptive, had a feeling that the introduction of Carlos into their lives meant there had been a fundamental shift and things wouldn't ever really be the same again.

Though deep in thought, Sasha's attention had never wandered from the road, and when the farm tractor pulled out in front of them, Sasha wasn't surprised. The tractor was going less than 40kph and the Ferrari rather more than 160kph. Ric simply glanced at him as he slalomed the tractor, briefly crossing into on-coming traffic before swerving back again.

Although his body was still, Ric's thoughts were moving faster than the car. Carlos. His son. Nearly drowned in a storm at sea. Nearly killed by an assassin in a dark alley. He admonished himself again to remain calm. He would listen to the whole story and then kill Dante for exposing the boy to such danger. The whole story. He wondered how much of it Sasha had told him and how much he had slanted the truth. Knowing Sasha and the way he loved to torment, the answers were 'not much' and 'enough to suit his purpose'. That Sasha's purpose was to get him anxious and worried and angry, Ric didn't doubt. Dante's brother wasn't any more intimidated by him than Dante was.

Carlos was alive and well - Sasha wouldn't be teasing if he wasn't – but it seemed he'd had some adventures in the time he'd spent with Dante. Again, Ric considered killing, or at least severely beating, his old friend. He'd brought Carlos to Dante to keep him safe, not to drag him into dangerous situations. But how much was Sasha embellishing the facts for his own amusement? He sighed. It was going to be a long ride to the villa and the answers to his questions, even at the speed Sasha was driving.

"Carlos loves this car. You should have seen him the first time Dante let him drive it." With a quick glance out of the corner of his eye, he saw Ric turn to look at him, a disbelieving look on his face. He resisted the urge to laugh.

"Tell me you're joking."

Sasha did laugh aloud then. The tone of Ric's voice – at once hopeful and fearful – was too funny. If Ric was worried about Carlos driving a car, he couldn't wait to see his reaction to hearing of the young man's adventure with the courtesan and the women in the village, although he was fairly sure Dante would attempt to cut those parts of the story out as unnecessary. Sasha decided he would have to see what he could do to work them into the discussion.

He was still sorting through the various conversational openings to use when he pulled into the long driveway to the villa and found Dante already awaiting them. "Damn," Sasha muttered under his breath and Ric shot him another oblique look.

Though Ric could feel his temper simmering, look for an excuse to boil over, he was still pleased to see Dante. When he'd left Carlos there, six months before, he'd felt the pull of life at the villa and had briefly wished he could stay with them as well. But he had had a mission, one he needed to complete. "Dante," he said, getting out of the car and clasping his old friend's shoulder. "You look well."

Dante's eyes missed nothing – not the smirk on Sasha's face or the tense line of Ric's shoulders. "I am well, as is Carlos."

"I hear," Ric's voice was flat and his eyes cut to Sasha, who stood to one side, grinning, "my son has had a busy few months in your care."

Dante shot Sasha a dirty look. When Ric had called from Athens to say he had arrived, with characteristically no notice, Carlos had already been gone for the day. Dante had wondered what his brother was up to when he volunteered to pick Ric up at the airport. Given Sasha's propensity for stirring things up, he should have known. Knowing it would do absolutely no good to reprimand Sasha, he sighed. "The story is long. Would you rather rest or shower or eat first?"

Ric shook his head. "What I want is to know is what has happened to Carlos. All of it."

Dante motioned toward the den. "At least let us talk in comfort." They started into the room, Sasha following, and Dante stopped Sasha. "I think you have been enough help for the day," he said dryly. He looked toward Ric, taking in the set line of his jaw and the stiff shoulders and had an unpleasant premonition about what else would happen that day. He pulled Sasha back a few steps and lowered his voice. "I have another task for you…"

Ric stood at the french doors just inside the villa, his arms folded across his chest, staring thoughtfully out at the terrace and the sea. Behind him, Dante sat in a leather chair, relaxed and patient, watching his back. Dante was not sure how he would have responded if it had been Ric telling him the story he had just told and he waited to see what his old friend's reaction would be.

After a few minutes, Ric half-turned to look at him. "Quite a story."

"Yet true."

Ric nodded. He didn't doubt Dante – he had trusted Dante with his own life more times than he could remember and he had brought Carlos to him because he trusted him to safeguard Carlos in the same way. Accepting what he had just heard as the truth required more than simple belief in Dante's abilities, however. It required acceptance of things his rational mind told him were utterly impossible. He moved away from the doors and over to the bar set against one wall of the den, pouring himself a small shot of rum. "Thought you would keep him here. Safe." His voice was flat.

"He grows restless, Ric. He is no longer a young boy; he cannot be kept locked down."

Ric shrugged. "I came to take him home. I will decide what happens then."

"He is part of this house as well," Dante said softly. "What happens to Carlos now concerns my house as well."

A stab of anger slashed through Ric at the implication of Dante's words. His son, his flesh and blood, tied to Dante. And the subtle use of the term 'my house' to assert that Sasha concurred. He started to turn to Dante, but his eyes were caught by two photographs on the shelf above the bar. The first was the familiar photograph of Kris, the one Ric knew Dante had taken of her before she had fallen ill. Once, it had been the only photograph in the villa, but now, next to it, was another. That photograph was of three men, standing on the deck of a dive boat, tanks and masks at their feet. Dante - flanked by Carlos and Sasha. Dante stood with his arms crossed, Carlos and Sasha to either side and slightly behind him, each with a hand on his shoulder. They were smiling and relaxed, three good companions enjoying a holiday of sun and sea. Jealousy cut through him. There was more to the photograph than that. Dante's posture radiated confidence and control and emphasized his dominance of the two behind him. They, in turn, a half-step behind him, freely offered their allegiance and support. It was clear that his son was content to be a part of Dante's house. The thought stung. What had happened that caused Sasha, three months the elder, to defer to Dante, Ric had never known. It was something the brothers never spoke about.

Ric studied Carlos in the photograph. The scar from the garrote attack Dante had told him about was a thin welt around Carlos's neck. The mark over his heart stood out clearly in the photograph, matching the gold and black onyx medallion hung on a chain around Dante's neck and the plainer silver one Sasha wore - a visible symbol of a shared bond. His son, branded with another man's mark. Ric struggled with something close to anger. He closed his eyes against the unwarranted emotion. It was not just another man; it was Dante. "Explain the mark."

"It is my mark. You know that." He sighed. "Beyond that, I can not explain further than I have already told you. In the light of day, here in my home, it is difficult to believe, even for me." His hand lifted to the symbol at his neck and he amended his words. "Parts of it are difficult to believe." Like a warm caress, he could feel the weight of the gift Kris had given him in his mind. A gift that waited to be opened until he had dealt with the immediate issues and was free to luxuriate in it for as long as he desired. No longer did he feel the desire to end it all, to take his own life and join her. As much as he longed to be reunited with her, he understood that it would happen in its own time and that there was still life left for him in his current existence. He knew. Kris knew. It was enough.

Ric studied Dante, noting the strange shift in his body language, the ease with which he sat, the relaxation and acceptance he saw in his comrade's body. It was something he had never seen before so overtly. Emotion lanced through him again – jealousy rather than anger. If he believed everything Dante had said - and, in spite of the fantastic nature of the tale, he did believe – then Dante had somehow been with Kris, had spoken to his love. Ric wished for the chance to see Stephanie again, to tell her how much he loved her still.

Dante stirred, drawing both of them out of their reverie. "I do not seek to be his father, Ric. But, he is of my house now. What happened…" he sighed heavily. "I did not intend or foresee what happened. Yet, there is a bond between us - one that I freely accept and honor. Carlos's well-being is as important to me as my own and Sasha's. Know also that Sasha recognizes him. Your son is our brother; we will care for him and watch over him."

Ric nodded, anger warring with gratitude. He knew Dante did not seek to take Carlos from him and he knew that both Dante and Sasha would look after the boy as they did each other. His son couldn't have two better guardians outside of himself. Even his own men wouldn't be as effective. Still, there was some resentment over the obvious bond that existed between Dante and Carlos. He knew he hadn't been the presence in Carlos's life that he should have been since Stephanie's death, but keeping Carlos safe had demanded certain sacrifices – sacrifices Ric was no longer certain had been worth the cost. Swiftly his eyes cut back to the picture of Carlos with Dante and Sasha, and then away again.

"Where is he?"

"He has worked in the fishing fleet for the last several months." Dante checked his watch. "It is already in for the day, so he is probably down in the village, having coffee with the old men and listening to their stories. Or he could be with one of his girlfriends."

"Girlfriends?"

Dante shrugged. "He does a man's work and lives a man's life. Here in this village, where I am well known, no harm will come while he is on his own."

Girlfriends? A man's life? Ric's eyebrow climbed. He would speak to Carlos about it later, among other subjects. "Why would he choose to work? He knows he can draw on family accounts."

"You'll have to ask him." Dante laughed shortly. "But you already know he has another mouth to feed now." He laughed again at the expression in Ric's face, then walked out the door to the garage. "Let's go get him."

Ric followed Dante out the door and stepped into the big sedan. Dante drove quickly and efficiently and parked the car outside the village. The two men walked down toward the docks. On a slight rise, overlooking the commercial docks, stood a small taverna with outdoor tables. A group of men clustered together in chairs shaded under a large old spreading olive tree, tucked away in a corner of the courtyard.

Carlos sat as part of the group, his long body draped over a wooden chair much too small for him. The men in the group were dressed in the traditional style of black woolen clothing that they had worn all of their lives. The oldest man in the group leaned in toward Carlos, his aged, wrinkled face animated as he told a complicated story, complete with hand gestures and sound effects. The matron of the taverna, easily more than four times Carlos's age, stood to one side, laughing along with the story and tugging on the thick braid of Carlos's hair, a casual gesture of grandmotherly affection.

Ric stopped and studied his son, who sat listening to the rapid-fire Greek story with a warm smile on his face. It had always been that way for Carlos. Everywhere the boy went, people turned to him with a smile and offered him easy acceptance. His mother had had the same natural ability to draw people to her, to make them open up to her, and so it was with him. Ric had never been an open man and the experiences of his life had closed him even further. As he watched Carlos he wondered fleetingly what it would be like to be offered friendship and warmth at every turn.

Carlos threw his head back in a full laugh at the story's conclusion and Ric raised an eyebrow. This was not the boy he had brought to Dante almost six months ago. The changes were obvious even at a glance. Outwardly, he'd grown and filled out, his skin, once slightly lighter than his father's, had darkened in the sun to a rich mocha, his American teenager uniform of baggy jeans and t-shirt given up for worn canvas work clothing. He no longer looked like a spoiled son of wealth and power, he looked like he had grown up in the village and worked hard every day of his life.

Ric's eyes picked up the other details of his son's appearance – the woven hair bracelet on one wrist, the slight line of a concealed knife, and the thin scar that circled his throat, partially hidden under a braided leather cord. He tilted his head. "Was the term "safekeeping" unclear in some way, Dante?"

Dante shrugged. "They were his choices."

Ric knew the moment his son became aware of him. Carlos stood as Ric and Dante crossed the square toward him and he bowed his way out of the group of men, his Greek fluid and perfect. Carlos moved toward them and Ric saw the tense line of his shoulders. Carlos was angry with him. Ric watched his son walk toward him. The casual slouching walk and posture were gone, replaced by a confident, upright stride.

Dante spoke softly. "Respect him, Ric."

"I can handle my boy, Dante."

"Perhaps you could handle the boy, but can you handle the young man?"

Ric's face remained expressionless, but Dante felt the surge of anger from him. He did not want or appreciate the advice, although it was clear to Dante that he needed it.

Carlos was smiling as he approached. "You're here," Carlos began. "I was beginning to wonder. You never called me back and Tio hadn't heard from you. I checked several times." His tone, which had started as welcoming, slipped to accusatory.

His father put both hands on his shoulders. "It's good to see you again. I didn't call you because I didn't check my messages. I came straight here instead. Are you alright?" He touched the line of the scar around Carlos's neck. Up close he could see how deeply the garrote had cut; Carlos must have come very close to bleeding to death or having his neck broken. His hands tightened on his son's shoulders.

Carlos pulled away from his touch impatiently. "Yeah, I'm fine. It's nothing." Ric saw the quick flick of Carlos's eyes to Dante, clearly asking how much he had been told. Ric didn't have to see it to know that Dante had nodded. "It's not really a big deal."

"I want to know how it happened."

Carlos shrugged. "Dante's already told you what happened. He's pretty thorough; I doubt I'd have anything new to add."

Ric's eyes narrowed. "I'd like to hear it from you. Now."

"No," Carlos said firmly. "I'm going to meet Fayed at school. It can wait until I get back to the villa." He avoided Dante's eyes, knowing what he would see there. He was trying to put off the confrontation with his father until he'd had more time to think about what he wanted to say, and Dante would know he was stalling. Fayed usually walked back from school or one of the local farmers, returning home from market, gave him a ride. He hoped Dante wouldn't give him away.

Dante caught the lie and closed his eyes; he had been right. The reunion would likely not end well. Ric sought to impose his will and Carlos sought to escape it.

Ric nodded once, stiffly. "We'll talk when you return." He turned back toward the car.

Dante saw Carlos wince at his father's tone but the young man remained silent. Dante shook his head and started after Ric.

Carlos folded his arms and watched them walk away. When he knew they wouldn't be able to hear it, he let out the breath he'd been holding. In a distant corner of his mind, Carlos was surprised; he had just lied to his father and gotten away with it. So why did he feel so bad? He turned to walk up the hill to the school. He needed to intercept Fayed and make sure they arrived at the villa at the same time. And he needed time to think.

The Alchemist – Chapter 8

It was more than an hour later when Fayed and Carlos came in. Both were silent, a circumstance unusual enough to bring Dante out of the den to check on the arrivals. Carlos nodded to him and then raised his eyes as his father appeared in the doorway behind Dante.

Carlos heard Fayed's sharp indrawn breath and looked down at him in concern. Fayed was staring at his father. Carlos smiled. He often forgot how much he looked like his father and Fayed had not been prepared for the resemblance.

"This is Fayed. Fayed, this is my father."

Fayed bowed low to Ric " Abu Carlos. Father of Carlos."

Carlos laughed. "Yes, he is my father, but don't call him that. Call him "Great Uncle," just like you do Dante and Sasha. And no more bowing, remember?"

Ric studied the boy in front of him. "Marhaba, Fayed ibn'allah, ba keni wahad. Min fain inta?"

Carlos rolled his eyes. Of course, his father spoke Arabic, and better than he did. Christ, was there anything he could do that his father couldn't? He listened with a growing smile as Fayed dodged his father's questions about where he was from and where he lived, answering, in English, that he belonged with Carlos now.

His father was not amused and nodded his head back toward the den. Dante moved forward and laid a hand on Fayed's shoulder, steering him away from the den, toward the kitchen.

Carlos watched them go and took a deep breath. He turned toward his father and walked past him into the den, stopping in the middle of the room. His father considered him a moment. "So," Carlos said, forestalling Ric's questions. "How did the vendetta go?

"Vendetta?"

Carlos shrugged. "Call it what you want to, then. You were hunting the men who killed Mom."

Ric studied him for clues. The fact that his posture and tone gave nothing away spoke for how hard he was working on controlling them. Ric sighed and went for the truth as an answer. "Yes. Every man who stood in the room and witnessed her death is now dead and by my hand."

There was a long pause as Carlos thought about the statement. "Except, of course, for us. Everyone has been punished except you and me. The two who caused it."

Ric looked at his son sharply. They had never discussed her death; both of them avoided the subject. "What do you mean?"

"If it hadn't been for you she wouldn't have been kidnapped and if it hadn't been for me she wouldn't have been shot. I'd say that makes us both responsible."

Ric shook his head. He accepted the blame for his wife's death and it was something that often replayed in his mind as a slow-motion nightmare, the details clear and brutal despite the passage of time. He had failed her and if his son felt responsible he had failed him as well. "No," he said softly. "They never intended to leave a witness, Carlos, despite what they said. None of us would have left that warehouse alive and I knew that. All three of us were going to die. I was stalling for time until my team could arrive and time had run out for us. The distraction you created bought us precious extra minutes."

Carlos looked away from his father's intent eyes and swallowed once. "It didn't bring her extra minutes. And it wasn't a planned distraction. I was scared. Terrified. And you were standing there, so cool, co calm, like it was just another day at the Rangeman office…"

Ric took a step closer. "Do you remember just before … all that happened, when Tank and his wife stayed with you at the house, and she and I were gone?"

Carlos shrugged. "Maybe." He had a distant memory of Tio and Tia, indulging him in ice cream and late night television, two things his father disapproved of.

"We had gone away to talk. She gave me a choice and said it was for the final time. Rangeman and the life I was living, alone, or a new life somewhere else with the two of you. She said if I wanted her to have a 24-hour bodyguard, I could do it myself." Despite his grim tone the corners of his lips turned up in a smile at the memory of her as she'd flung the words out at him – hands on hips, eyes narrowed, angry blue eyes flashing. Then he sighed. "She hated the compound, the guards, the checks, the routines. She accepted it at first, and when you were born she seemed to finally understand the necessity. But that didn't last. And so the woman that hated ultimatums gave me one."

Carlos lifted an eyebrow. She had asked him to walk away from Rangeman? His mother must have been hurt by his answer to her challenge.

Ric laughed once at the look on his face, a short, hard, humorless sound. "You're wrong. I'd already lived without her beside me for two years and I didn't intend to do it any longer. While we were gone, we bought a house in St. Martin. I started making arrangements to break up Rangeman and transfer parts of it to others. I flew to New York to meet with the corporate lawyers and she flew home. She dismissed the guards and ripped the control panel of the security system off the wall. She was happy; she'd won. But she left the two of you completely unprotected. It wasn't even two full days before you were taken. If I had known what she had done…"

They looked at each other, silent for a moment.

Ric turned away with a sigh and lifted both his hands to the back of his neck, stretching. "After she died, I wanted to go through with it anyway. Take you to St. Martin and we would live the way she had wanted us to. But I couldn't. I had to have the work, the order, the routine, or I couldn't function." It wasn't easy to confess weakness and especially not to his son. But the words he had used were an inadequate description of how he'd felt, the physical numbness, the black despair that had threatened to overwhelm him.

There was silence for several minutes as Carlos digested what his father had told him. That his mother might bear some responsibility for what had happened had never crossed his mind. In his mind, she had always been the only completely innocent victim of that day. And his father, unable to cope with a situation? He struggled to accept it, but knew his father wasn't lying to him. "So where does that leave us?" he eventually asked.

"You will return with me."

Blue eyes stared unflinchingly at Ric, hard and unyielding. "Why?"

"Because you belong with me."

"Belong." Carlos snorted. "Do I? And what will I do when I return?"

Ric felt his temper rise under that direct blue gaze. "You're a minor. You haven't finished school."

"I haven't set foot inside a school since I was ten, you've just hired flocks of tutors. No. After she died you put me under a glass dome. Protected. Safe. Shut in from the world and shut out of your professional life. No more work at home, no meetings, everything had to be at the office. Which meant you were at the office. I didn't have her and I didn't have you." He stood up. "I'm done with it. I'm not going back with you."

Ric rubbed his eyes, trying to soothe away the tiredness and temper. His business had been difficult to conclude and he hadn't slept on the flight on the way over. He felt as though the thinking parts of his brain were still several time zones back. And discussing her death had brought back all of the pain and emptiness that life without her held. "Apply to the university, then, and work part-time for Rangeman..."

"No. Rangeman is you, not me."

"What do you want, then, Carlos? To stay with Dante?"

"No. I don't want to stay with anyone. I want out. I want to live my own life."

Ric froze, feeling Carlos's words as a physical blow. He sighed. There was no way Carlos could know that his mother had used exactly the same phrase when she had chosen to leave him the first time. Ric admitted, if only to himself, that the circumstances were somewhat similar. He was trying to bend Carlos to his will, form him into a shape of his choosing, and Carlos wasn't going to allow it any more than Stephanie ever had.

He stopped for a moment and eyed Carlos. He knew he still had power and influence over his son and could, with enough effort, force him to do what he wanted. But he'd made that mistake enough times in his life.

"We'll discuss this in the morning, Carlos."

His son lifted an eyebrow. "Dismissed now, am I?" He nodded his head once and left the room, his dark shadow rising from the floor just outside the doorway and following him silently.

Ric watched them go. He had been wrong and Dante had been right.

Tomorrow, he thought, I will make it right with him tomorrow.

---

Dante sat in deep shadow on the low second terrace, staring out at the crescent moon hanging low in the inky sky, its light silvering the water below. Waiting was something he did well and he had no doubt that his wait would be rewarded. He sipped the wine slowly, savoring the rich feel in his mouth and swallowed, letting his eyes close and his head fall back.

Eventually he heard the small sounds he had been waiting for – the swing of the terrace door and the sound of the latch re-engaging, the sound muffled as though through a cloth. Very important, not to forget those small details. Dante approved. He watched as a tall figure, carrying a large pack, slid noiselessly across the larger, upper terrace and descended to the second terrace. The figure had moved past his hiding place when he poured himself another glass of wine, letting the neck of the bottle clink gently against the rim of the glass.

The figure stopped, shoulders slumping. "Dante," he sighed, without turning around.

"Carlos," Dante softly replied. "Leaving?"

"You knew I would be."

"Where are you going?"

Carlos's head lifted and he looked toward the sea. "Away."

"You will be careful. You will check in with me." Dante's voice was cool, remote.

"Oh, very good, Dante." Carlos laughed softly. "Phrase it like it might be my choice. Too bad it doesn't sound that way."

Dante shrugged. "It is your choice to check in with me or not."

"You won't get rid of me that easily. I think of this as my home-away-from-home now. Remember, that is my room, with my stuff in it. Don't rent it out or anything."

Dante took another sip of wine and tilted his head. It was a weak attempt at humor from the young man, but he understood the underlying sentiment. "Arrogant puppy."

Carlos's smile flashed in the night. "Maybe, but I'm your arrogant puppy."

Dante sat silent a moment before closing his eyes and stepping in to the heart of the problem. "You chose not to speak to your father."

Carlos tensed and looked away. "We spoke last night. That was enough. I don't want to talk about this, Dante."

"Your father cares about you. Deeply."

"I don't doubt that. But he overshadows everyone and everything around him and he doesn't even know he does it."

"He is a leader. Most men naturally follow him."

"I don't want to be led. I don't want to just follow." He moved restlessly. "And he can make me. I can feel myself falling in line, just like Tio and Lester and all the rest of them. I left him a letter, asking him to let me go. Not to look for me. I know he could find me in a week or so, no matter where I go or what I do, but I asked him not to."

Dante thought that a motivated Ric could find him in considerably less than a week. "And did you leave me a letter?"

"Of course I did. Pointless now, though. And one for Sasha."

"He seeks to do what he thinks is best for you."

"Yeah, well, the problem with that is that half the time he looks at me and sees a scrawny ten year old with her eyes and what he thinks is best for me is to keep me wrapped up and tucked away." He ran his hands across his hair. "I know it sounds like I'm whining. He's always given me what I needed – or what he thought I needed – I've had the best private education money can buy, I live in a huge house with a private beach and every convenience and advantage possible. But… sometimes it's like I don't exist. Only someone named "my son Carlos" exists. I want to make the decisions for Carlos now."

"What decision will you make for yourself now?"

Carlos laughed. "Well, for my first decision, I have no clue." He shrugged. "Keep moving. See new things, new places. Meet new people." He hesitated and then spoke again, his voice low. "It won't be the same, traveling without you, Dante."

Only Kris would have recognized the smile Dante gave the young man. Only she had seen that warm, rich, slow smile before; a smile without the shadows that marked Dante. "It has been… unique, Carlos."

He was rewarded by Carlos's chuckle and bright smile as he acknowledged Dante's humor. "And some day I will get you to tell a real joke, Dante."

Dante was not deceived by his light tone. The young man was leaving with very little, his worn leather pack was too small to hold much. "You have funds?"

"I took half of what I've made working the last few months. I left the other half for Fayed."

"Does Fayed know you are leaving?"

Carlos's head dropped. "No. But I'd already been making arrangements for him to stay in the village with the Kalikian family and go to school with their children. I called them tonight and it's set. I left a letter for Fayed, too, trying to explain it to him." He smiled ruefully. "I doubt he'll like it, but it's the best I can do on short notice."

On the main road, slightly over a mile away, they heard the sound of a car driving slowly up the road. Carlos shifted and resettled the pack on his shoulders. "I have to go."

Dante rose, setting aside the wine, and clasped Carlos's shoulders. "Fare well, Carlos. Do not hesitate to call me. I will come."

Carlos swallowed hard, dropped his head, and looked away. "Thank you, Dante. I... thanks." The car on the main road drifted to a stop, engine idling. Carlos turned away, his head still lowered, and began to walk toward the road, slowly at first and then picking up his pace.

Dante watched him jog away, toward the road, and then turned his head slightly. "Fayed," he said, voice cool. "You may come out now."

The boy slipped out of the shadows to Dante's side, gesturing nervously. "I was not spying, Great Uncle, I was... I was..."

"You were following him."

"Yes." The boy hung his head and waited for Dante's pronouncement on his punishment.

Dante eyed him and permitted himself a small smile. "Remind me to teach you to do it without making a sound. It will be useful when you are old enough to join him in the wide world."

The boy looked up hopefully. "I will stay with you, Great Uncle?"

"No, you will do as Carlos wishes. But you will return to me as time permits and I will continue to teach you the skills he will need at his back. And when you are ready I will send you out to watch over him for me." As Sasha does even now, he added silently.

The boy nodded. "Yes. He will need me." Even in the dark, the boy's eyes looked in the direction Carlos had gone. His fingers gripped the hilt of the knife hanging from his waist lightly. "I am his haressin."

---

Since his return, it had become Dante's custom to sit on the terrace at sunrise and sunset and salute the sun with thoughts of Kris. Often Carlos joined him for a few minutes. Neither of them spoke at those times; words weren't necessary. Then Carlos would withdraw and leave Dante alone with his thoughts, as he knew Dante wished to be.

On that particular morning, he knew, however, that the light footsteps behind him were not Carlos's. Carlos had left in the night, taking his first steps alone on the path of his life.

"Where is he, Dante?" Ric's low, quiet voice was cold and remote – he was truly and completely furious. Turning his head slightly and angling his eyes upward, Dante saw that he held a letter in his hand.

Answering Ric's question, Dante was careful to keep his voice uninflected. "He left Athens early this morning on a passenger ferry bound for Naples."

"And you know this how?" Ric's tone was accusatory, his arms were folded and his eyes narrowed. Ric at his most intimidating. The memory of Carlos standing in the same stance, trying to mimic his father's presence, almost made Dante smile.

"Sasha called me."

"You helped him leave in the middle of the night." It was not a question but a statement.

"No." Only a few times before had Dante seen Ric as angry and it had never been directed at him. It made his own temper rise. "I sent Sasha out to watch for him because I suspected he would leave, that you would mishandle him and his leaving would be the result."

Both men stared at each other for a tense minute. Ric turned to enter the villa. "I will find him and take him home."

Dante let out a frustrated breath. "Ric. Wait. He asked you not to follow him." Ric stopped and turned back to him, face set and wary. Dante closed his eyes and tried again. "You could find him and force him to return. And then what? He would only resent you more." Dante sighed. "Let go, Ric. The rest of his life is not for you to decide. It is for him to live. He is ready. I spent almost four months on a sailboat with him in daily company – I know how he thinks, how he makes decisions, how he reacts. I saw him in dangerous situations, in fear of his life – you would have been proud of the courage he showed."

"I don't want him to be courageous, I want him to be careful. He is my son, Dante."

"Ric," Dante said softly, "he wants to be his own man. It is the struggle between most fathers and sons, which the father must eventually lose. Let him go." Dante was aware of the irony in this statement – a lecture from him about the relationship between father and son given his own relationship with the thing that had been his father.

He watched as Ric let out a long, resigned, breath and opened his hands, as though releasing his temper. "He is so young. So headstrong and careless and occasionally foolish."

"We were all headstrong and careless and foolish at least once."

Ric snorted. "At least." He looked at Dante and sighed. "So your counsel is to let him go – lose track of him?"

"That I did not say. We will watch him, you and I. From a distance, perhaps, but we will watch."

Ric gave Dante a long look. He was surprised at the feeling of relief it gave him to know that Dante would share the responsibility with him. Finally he nodded and held out his hand. Dante smiled and grasped his forearm in both hands.

A small brown hand appeared on top of theirs. Both men looked down to see Fayed, his expression grave, staring back up at them. "You will teach me. I will protect him." Ric studied the boy, taking in the knife – one of Dante's if he wasn't mistaken – strapped to his waist and the obvious sincerity in his eyes. He was intrigued by what Dante had told him of the boy.

A faint smile creased Dante's lips. He reached out with his right hand and gently tousled the boy's hair. "Yes, haressin. We will teach and you will learn."

---

Dante listened to Ric and Fayed converse in a mixture of English and Arabic as Ric gently pulled details about Fayed's life from him. Dante had known it would be horrific, that the boy was a survivor of a childhood not much better than his own, and that was enough for him. Both Ric and Carlos felt the same need for details and information about people and events and it was a strength and a weakness in them.

The phone rang and Ric raised an eyebrow at him. Dante checked the incoming call identification and nodded, transferring the phone to speaker mode. "Sasha," he greeted his brother.

Sasha did not waste time returning the greeting. "You won't believe this. Fuck, Dante, what is it about that kid? How does he do it?" Dante and Ric exchanged a glance.

"Sasha…" Dante's tone stopped just short of promising violence.

"He spent the morning sitting on the lower ferry deck, just at the waterline, staring out at the sea. Off by himself. Didn't really even move. Thinking, I guess. After five hours of watching Carlos watch the water, I went up to get some food, and when I came back, there was a woman sitting next to him. Gorgeous little blond thing. Or she would have been, if she hadn't been crying. Anyway, Carlos starts talking to her and after awhile she stops crying and sits up. Not ten minutes later, they're both talking and laughing like old friends."

"About a half hour later, three cut-rate goons show up. One of them grabs the woman by the arm and yanks her to her feet. Carlos looks at him, raises an eyebrow like Ric always does, and says something. Don't know what, but I'd be willing to bet it was seriously sarcastic, because the guy dropped the woman and turned on Carlos. I don't think Carlos took him very seriously until he got the first hit in and split Carlos's lip – that seemed to piss him off." Sasha was enjoying telling the story. "So then he got serious about it. Not very good odds, three-to-one, in a close space, but once he got down to business, he took care of things. Did a good job, too – he really paid attention to the lessons we gave him. Very effective fighter – and dirty." There was admiration and pride in Sasha's voice.

"And then," Sasha's voice took on an aggrieved tone, "then she takes Carlos back up to her cabin, up on the top deck. They stay there for a couple of hours. The boat docks and no one is allowed off. A team of armed guards – professionals, private, with a military look – come on board. Next thing I know, Carlos and the woman are being escorted off the ship by four of the guards. They walk them down the boat ramp to a big limo - stretch, diplomatic plates, whole deal. More guards down by the limo and a tall, white-haired guy. You know the type, he's either a statesman or a butler – that stiff, overdressed look. The woman starts talking fast, pointing at herself and then at Carlos a few times. Then a couple more guards walk the goons Carlos trashed down the ramp and into the friendly arms of the carabinieri. The white-haired guy starts shaking Carlos's hand and patting him on the back and gesturing to the limo. Carlos takes a look at the guards, the girl, the limo – and gets in. The guards get in their cars and then the whole motorcade drives off. Leaving me still stuck on the ferry."

"So you lost him?"

"Like I said, the car had diplomatic plates. I made a few calls and it belongs to the Swiss ambassador to Italy. It was his daughter and she was trying to get away from some Russian Mafia boyfriend. Carlos is at the embassy with them right now, being treated like the hero." Sasha laughed. "I really don't think we need to worry about the kid landing on his feet, Dante. I think he'll do very well on his own."

- the end