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The River

Part Thirty: Messages from the Dead

Methos was standing at a porthole, his hands in his pockets, his shoulders rounded in their usual slouch that made them look so much less formidable. He was looking out at the snow and wondering if it would ever stop. He had a moment to be grateful for yesterday�s shopping expedition, there would be little chance of many stores being open today, or tomorrow for that matter, if it kept on like this. Yesterday, how long ago that seemed now. Only a few hours ago he�d been happy. Yesterday there had seemed to be a future with Duncan and now�what was there now? The endless prospect of taking care of an Immortal madman? Duncan had given up on himself and Methos had to admit that Duncan�s behavior was certainly less than sane. If MacLeod *was* losing it what was there that could be done?

He heard Duncan moan and turned to see him moving under the blankets. He went to the bed quickly, he�d been expecting the nightmares to return, along with the crying and thrashing in his sleep. But when he reached him Duncan moaned just once more, softly, then settled and was quiet. He had only changed position, turning on his side, his hand half-closed near his face. Methos stood over him and looked down on Duncan�s face, soft and tranquil in sleep. He looked more at peace than he had for a long time. Methos thought it must be the sedation, that would explain why Duncan was sleeping so peacefully, untroubled by bad dreams. He wanted to reach down and caress Duncan�s cheek, but was afraid of disturbing that serenity.

Instead, Methos leaned over to gently tuck the covers back around Duncan�s shoulders. He sighed and asked himself, �Can I do this? Can I stay and care for you if you�ve really lost it?� An image surfaced in his mind from a time when the insane were thought to be entertainment, a filthy man, chained to a wall, raving and screaming, pulling on his chains until he bled.

Duncan might become like that, however Methos thought he probably would go the way almost every other Immortal Methos had ever seen lose their mind had gone, withdrawing into himself exactly as Duncan had been only a few days ago. For a moment Methos� pain was actually physical, a deep ache in his chest as he thought, �I�ve seen Immortals ground down by the friction of relentless time until there was nothing left of them but hollow shells. I�ve seen them lose their minds over the centuries, broken by the grief of living too long and losing too much. You fit that profile too well, Duncan.�

The hard truth was that Duncan had not been quite himself for a long time. The slide had started with the murder of Darius, then Tessa, and the loss of more than one old friend. Then there was the horror of Richie�s death. Toss in a dark Quickening and an apocalyptic fight with a demon, and Duncan had been so beaten down that he�d almost given his head to an old enemy come for revenge. MacLeod had left Paris after Liam O�Rourke. He�d gone back to his island, alone, and had pared his life down to the barest essentials; even close friends hadn�t seen him for two years. Duncan lived up to what he said when he almost gave up his head: that no one else would die because of him. And after O�Rourke no one had. Until Connor had forced him to break his word, he�d not taken a head in all that time.

�Why is it always the good ones that break down?� Methos asked himself. The answer was obvious. The bad ones didn�t care, killing was a pleasure to them and there was nothing they gave a flying damn about except themselves. It was the caring that made it so painful, and Duncan cared too much, leaving him open to all the grief that came with it.

He�d only come back to Paris after Connor�s death, and why Paris Methos hadn�t known, still didn�t know for that matter. Unless it was for the convenience of having a friend with a bar here. Methos had seen that before too, the dulling of pain with alcohol, and the concurrent blunting of the ability to fight that lead to losing your head. Which may have been the point, after all. Most Immortals he�d seen get to this place where nothing mattered dealt with it simply by losing. It wasn�t difficult when you *wanted* to die, all it took was a slight miscalculation, a missed beat. Dying was the easy way. There were harder ways. He�d seen them, those who only knew they were living because they were in pain, so they withdrew into immobility and blank stares until someone took pity and a blade, and ended their suffering for them.

Methos thoughts went on with merciless clarity, �You tried to die. Maybe we should have let you; maybe it would have been kinder than what is coming. I�m afraid, Duncan. Afraid that you�ve finally been hurt too much, afraid that you�re losing your mind, and I�m afraid that I can�t stick it out for the long haul, that after a few years of watching you lose yourself in madness I�ll run away in despair, leaving you to�to what? Surely not Sanctuary, I don�t think I could bear the thought of you clamped to a metal table, drugged out of all hope of lucid thought for as long as they keep you alive. But can I do any better? Does the difference between cold steel and a soft bed matter when you�re too far gone to know where you are? I�ll have to keep you sedated if you become dangerous, would it make any difference who is sedating you? How long can I stand a deathwatch over your living body?�

Methos shivered, turned away, and went down the steps, crossing the bare floor to the fireplace where he added more wood to the fading fire. In five thousand years he�d learned to see himself clearly. That didn�t mean he always liked what he saw. He would try his hardest, but in the end he knew he�d have to leave Duncan. It wouldn�t be the work, or even the risk of having to defend him. It would be the unbearable pain of watching him deteriorate into a mindless shell in the image of Duncan MacLeod.

Methos would survive. As someone had once said to him, it was what he did best. But at what price? Would he be afraid to look in a mirror, afraid of seeing that look in his eyes? The look Connor had before he disappeared, the look Duncan had last night: the look of absolute despair.

He turned to the couch to check on Ash, thinking, �Would you stay with him? Could you give yourself up to the willing martyrdom of caring for a mad Duncan indefinitely?� Methos remembered finding her once, in a convent not that far from here, living the ascetic life of a devoted nun. She certainly had the capacity for self-sacrifice. He pulled down the afghan and sheet to see how far the healing had progressed. The wound was closed, the blood at the cut edges reabsorbed, she should return to consciousness before long. He unbuckled Duncan�s belt and pulled it slowly from under her body. It would need cleaning. Cleaning, that reminded him of the one chore he�d forgotten. The swords.

They lay where he left them, behind the fireplace, in the shadows. Methos picked up Duncan�s katana and took it to the kitchen where he rinsed the blood from the beautifully carved hilt, thinking, �Such a lovely thing for so deadly a purpose.� He used a damp towel on the blade, cleaning off all traces of gore, then made sure it was completely dry before he looked for a place to hide it. He put it in the back of the wardrobe with his own blade.

He then wiped off Duncan�s belt, returning it to the belt loops of the discarded pants and laying them back on the chair. He wasn�t sure what to do about Ash�s swords, which were stuck in their blood-clotted sheaths. He left them for her to deal with; he knew she could be very particular about her falcatas. That left him with the stranger�s sword. He wiped it off, then stood, undecided. Methos finally bent and shoved it under the couch.

Methos glanced around at the barge. It was still spartan, but not as bare as it had been after Duncan�s return from the monastery. He�d brought back some of the furniture after pulling the barge out of dry-dock. The couch sat in its usual spot facing the fireplace, a large trunk in front acting as a table. The desk sat against the far wall, on its top a small lamp, its chair pulled out as Methos had left it. The dining table and chairs had returned to their places. One easy chair, a small table that held another lamp, the bed, night table, and wardrobe, plus a few more trunks and a couple of bookcases scattered against the walls were all there was. There were few decorations, the painted brass plaque on the wall near the bed, the chess set on the trunk, an incense burner and some candles left over from the Zen phase. It was as if Duncan hadn�t really intended to live here, it was merely a set where he would play out the last of his life.

Methos sighed deeply and sat down at the desk. He began to poke around in the drug box, taking a quick inventory of the sedatives. He was shuffling the vials around when he noticed there was something blocking their free movement. In the bottom of the box, tucked under the vials, were two envelopes. He took them out and turned them over in his hands. They were Duncan�s stationery but the handwriting on them was not Duncan�s, it was an odd combination of flowing curves and sharp angles and it looked familiar. One was addressed to Duncan, the other was addressed to him, and Methos noticed something else, the one addressed to him was sealed, but the one addressed to Duncan was not.

Methos hesitated. He remembered how he�d caught Ash hiding this box and began to wonder if it had been as much of an accident as it had seemed. Was the unsealed envelope an invitation to him to read the contents? Methos decided it must be, and he pulled out the single sheet of paper inside to read:

Duncan,

I�ve already forgiven you. Please forgive yourself. You know how much I love you, and you must go on for both of us.

Ash

Methos could only sit and stare at the words. He was trying to understand exactly what they meant, and could only come to the conclusion that Ash had known Duncan would try to kill her. And more than that, she had accepted her death at his hands. But why?

There were no answers in his mind, but there might be in the second envelope. He tore it open and pulled out four pages of undated, closely written words that he hoped were some kind of explanation.

Methos,

If you are reading this, then I am dead. It was Duncan that took my head, and he�s in shock needing sedation. I hoped for enough time to prepare him, to make it easier for him to bear my death, but there may well not have been. I�m so sorry, but there was no other way to save him.

It went on about a manuscript, and some kind of covenant that could be made with the darker forces. Methos had heard tales of this, and had disregarded them. But what mattered was her interpretation of what was wrong with Duncan, and what she had done about it. She believed that Jacob Kell was able to hide himself inside Duncan and was attempting to drive Duncan insane so he could take over his body. She had planned to remove Kell by entering Duncan and taking him with her, the only problem being that Duncan had to kill her so her Quickening would be free to act as the vehicle for her transfer in, and her death as the transfer out. But she hadn�t died. Where did that leave Kell now? And that was providing Ash wasn�t mistaken about everything.

Methos wanted to believe it. It was better than the alternative, hopeless insanity. At least there could be some hope of removing Kell�s malevolent influence, and it would mean that it hadn�t been Duncan who had beaten him, that it had been Kell trying to drive him away so he could further prey on Duncan�s mind, driving him to drink to drown out the constant subconscious stream of what he�d thought was self-doubt and guilt. Methos wanted to believe this too, for so many reasons, not the least of which was that it would mean that he hadn�t pushed Duncan into an unwanted relationship and the abuse had not been Methos� fault. There was another reason that skimmed over his awareness so quickly that it almost didn�t register, that it hadn�t been his fault in another way, that it hadn�t been the part of himself he�d worked so hard to bury so deep that had invited the brutality.

A small part of him wanted to be angry at Ash, for hiding what she believed was the truth from him. But telling him wouldn�t have helped. It would have been almost impossible for him to stand by and let Duncan kill her, and there was one undeniable fact that made anger impossible. Methos sat down on the trunk next to the couch thinking, �I never knew you loved him so much you�d die to save him.� There was another thought that tried to follow this one, but he wasn�t ready for it and diverted himself with memory.

He sat looking at Ash, remembering another time he�d sat waiting for her to come back. It had been a boat then, but not a barge on a river. It had been a ship at sea, a cramped dim cabin filled with the scent of wet wood, raw hemp rope, and the blood that had seeped into the cloak Ash was wrapped in. The boat they�d taken from Ostia, the port of Rome, leaving the gladiatrix behind, forever dead on the arena sand. She�d awakened in shock then, and Methos believed she�d come back in shock now. She had fully expected to die both times.

Methos remembered the look in her eyes when she�d realized she was alive, the grief that had overwhelmed her. He�d given her wine mixed with poppy extract to make her sleep, hoping she would adjust if eased into the truth. He�d kept giving her the drugged wine for most of the voyage back to Greece. Methos recalled the captain of the ship had become suspicious, believing him to be abducting Ash against her will, but he�d done nothing about it. She was not the captain�s concern, he�d been paid three times the going rate for their passage, and he was selectively blind where profit was involved. And she was only a woman after all.

Ash had stayed with him. She hadn�t much choice, especially at first. She�d spent most of her life in as a slave in gladiator training and had no idea of how to live in the real world, and in that world there was no secure place for a single woman on her own. Even with her earnings from the arena it would have been difficult. There were only two main occupations for women, wife and mother, or courtesan. When she left Methos, she�d made the only choice possible.

Ash had done well, opening a fine upper-class establishment, moving from city to city as needed when time passed. They had found each other a few times, then he hadn�t known anything of her for centuries, until he found her by accident in the convent. He was a wet hungry wanderer looking for shelter and had been directed there by a farmer he�d met on the road. Convents and monasteries offered lodging in those days of the Crusades when inns were scarce. Nothing fancy, but usually reasonably clean, at least by the prevailing standards, and the food wasn�t bad, though it could be a bit meager during Lent.

It was at mealtime he�d sensed her. He was in an alcove in the refectory used for visitors, to keep them apart from the nuns. He scanned the room, but shrouded in wimples and veils it was hard to recognize a face. When she walked by in a small group Methos had caught a glimpse of her. He�d known it had to be either Ash or a new or even pre-immortal, that faint signal could only be one or the other. Her eyes had met his, and he had seen the recognition in them.

She found him later that night, in his room, and he had convinced her to leave with him. They spent a few decades hopping from city to city, Paris, Florence, Venice, even London, but then she�d disappeared for the first time. He woke to find her gone, he�d never known why, and Ash never explained. Not that he�d asked her to, or that she would have if he�d asked. There was always Aren between them.

Methos dropped the letter on the trunk and went back to the porthole. There were no answers in the tiny taps of the flakes against the glass.

Ash woke to pain, and a sense of confusion. The pain was the usual residual ache of a severe now-healed injury, though worse than usual. The confusion was more profound. Her head was turned toward the fire, when she opened her eyes she looked into flames and for a moment she thought she was in hell, but then she realized she was only alive again. She was supposed to be dead, she remembered the bite of the katana on her neck, and her hand found the new scar where her neck joined her left shoulder.

�Duncan turned the blade.� Methos moved the letter and sat down on the trunk.

Methos� voice startled her. Ash tried to recall exactly what had happened, and Methos remained silent, to let her think. She remembered the pain, and rising up, out of her body. �I left too soon,� she thought. She could remember being inside of Duncan, a memory as beautiful as the one of clutching and holding on to Kell was hideous. But then�

�I was holding him. I had him as I went out, I know I did.� Ash spoke softly, her eyes closed, straining to remember what had happened on the edge of death. But other than pain and the darkness closing in there was nothing more.

�So what do we do now?� Methos picked up the letter.

Methos� voice was neutral, neither blame nor accusation in it. Though Ash seemed to hear one or the other as she said, �I�m sorry.�

�You have no reason to be sorry. You certainly were willing to give your all to save him.� Methos felt a stab of guilt and refused to recognize it.

Ash sat up, wincing at the sensation of the sheet stuck to her back by dried blood, and said, �All we can do is wait. It�s possible I was able to pull Kell out and he moved on to the next phase of existence.� Ash didn�t believe they could be that lucky.

�Or you never got him out and he�s still in Duncan.� Methos gestured with the letter in his hand and said, �I�ve heard of this thing, only then it was called what would loosely translate as the Metamorph. The legend was that it would change itself to suit whoever it was trying to tempt.�

�Perhaps that�s a better name for it, it certainly is more descriptive of what it is.� Ash fell silent, her mind considering another possibility of where Kell could be that was too unbearable to speak of. When she did speak, she said, �All we can do is wait. We�ll find out soon enough where Kell went.�

Now they both fell silent, thinking their own thoughts. Methos broke the silence with an attempt at lighthearted banter, saying, �Well, while we�re waiting you could do something about the way you look. One would think you�d just come back from the dead.�

Ash smiled and batted the ball back to him with, �Being beautiful has become such work. I remember when all it took to be beautiful was a smile with no missing or rotten teeth.�

Methos countered with, �Ah yes, around the time when proper etiquette demanded you not scratch you fleabites in public. Standards of hygiene and beauty are much higher these days, at least in most places. I haven�t had a fleabite in years, not since I last visited Tibet.�
�I thought yak butter played hell with your digestion.� Ash was almost laughing, getting into their old game of verbal jousting.

�I was just checking, and it still does.� Methos smiled back at her, all the years between them coming back, all the love there had been, still was, and still could be. There was always time. That could be a good or bad thing, depending on the circumstances. He abruptly felt very old, and very weary.

Ash knew him too well. She saw the change in his mood and suggested, �Why don�t you lie down and rest awhile. I�ll be in the shower for a very long time, judging by how badly this sheet is stuck to me.�

�I am tired, I had only a few hours sleep before�� He didn�t want to finish that sentence, it brought back the memory of Duncan�s whimpering in the blackness under the bridge, and he could only repeat, �I am tired.�

�Go rest, then.� Ash�s voice held the barest hint of that persuading tone, and Methos sighed, then stood and went to the bed.

He undressed down to his underwear, then lay down on his side facing away from Duncan and covered up without touching him. Methos didn�t want to risk disturbing him, though the thought he�d previously diverted himself from rose up to disturb his own mind. �I wasn�t sure I could take care of him and you were willing to die for him. Do you love Duncan more than I do, Ash?�

He was distracted from this thought by Duncan turning over and molding himself against his body from his feet to his back. Duncan�s hand was warm on Methos� chest as he pulled him closer, and Duncan�s breath was tickling the back of Methos� neck. If it hadn�t been for this distraction his pragmatic mind might have come up with a counterpoint possibility that could have made things clearer. Perhaps it wasn�t that Ash loved Duncan more. It could just be that she loved living less.

Wrapped in Duncan�s body heat Methos found himself growing sleepy. Worn out by troubled thoughts he let go and drifted off, lulled by Duncan�s soft rhythmic snoring, though on the edge of sleep his last conscious thought was an uneasy, �Should you be the one in his arms instead of me, Ash?�

Ash stood before the big cheval glass in the bathroom, looking at her first new scar in almost two thousand years. She ran her finger over it, feeling the slight indentation. It was very odd to find an alteration in a body that hadn�t changed in so long, and unsettling. Ash looked in her own eyes for a long time, as if trying to see deep into her own mind. At last she broke off, and then for a moment examined the mirror that held her reflection, one of those big freestanding antiques that tilt. She ran the same finger over the dark wood, thinking, �A woman put this here.� Ash knew her name, Tessa, knew what she had looked like, tall, blonde, and strikingly beautiful. Suddenly Ash couldn�t stand her own bloody reflection, and she retreated to the shower.

Duncan�s coat lay on the floor of the stall and she moved it, dripping, to the tub. Ash stepped into the shower and turned the water on, letting it pour down on her and slowly peel the sheet from her body. She kicked it into the corner and picked up the soap to wash herself, but dropped it. Her hands went to her head and held the pain inside it between them. She had been fighting the blackouts and had succeeded in keeping them at bay, but this time she lost. Ash slipped to the floor of the shower, dried bits of blood flaking off her skin and whirling down the drain.

As the world shifted she heard a voice clearly, a known and despised voice that haunted her. She heard it so clearly she wasn�t sure if it was real and outside or inside her aching head, part of the return of her waking nightmares.

�What have you done now, you stupid bitch,� it snarled.

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