ALWAYS A WOMAN
The sleeve of
Duncan's robe
droops into the butter on your toast. The robe is not at all your
style, but considering the circumstances, you will make it do. You fold
the sleeve back, but the crushed terrycloth doesn't hold. You shake it
up towards your shoulder and try to make the best of it.
You've been alive
too long to
easily confuse form for power, but the worn bathrobe makes you feel,
well, a bit inadequate--especially in front of Amanda--although you
would die a thousand and one painful deaths before you would confess
such a thing to her.
The robe is not
made to
flatter flesh, although to your annoyance, you have to wonder if works
on Duncan better than it does on you. You tell yourself that true power
comes from the mind, not from the corporeal, and with renewed
confidence, you reach out for your cup. The sleeve droops toward the
toast again, but this time you're ready and you raise your arm in time.
You do hope that
your clothes will be dry soon.
"Your clothes
will be done in about another hour," says Amanda, returning to the
table. "Denim takes extra time to dry."
Amanda's eyes
play over you,
laughing as you wallow in Mac's robe. With you or at you, you never
know. After five thousand years, you are pretty good at reading men and
at reading foes of any gender, but women--real women as women--are
another story altogether. You are not sure that there is enough time in
all of immortality to understand them.
You jerk your
head backward, toward the open bedroom door. "Keep it down."
"Mac's still
asleep?"
"He didn't get
much last night." Why do you sound so defensive?
"Well, neither
did you or I,
and he's the youngest one of the bunch." Her voice is flip, but lowered
almost to a whisper and she is careful not to make noise repositioning
the chair as she joins you at the table.
She takes the
last piece of toast.
"I was going to
eat that."
She shrugs and
smiles and munches with a hearty gusto that speaks volumes in its
wordlessness.
There is a
certain irony, you
reflect as you sip your tepid tea. As Adam Pierson you were privy to
hidden details of her life, yet you have no earthly idea what she
really thinks of you. Oh, she's told you, of course, but she lies with
the easy ingenuousness of a bright child at play, who unconsciously
hides the line between truth and make-believe until she can no longer
find it again when she tries.
For example, you
knew about
the troop of soldiers she sent to death by wooing the order-courier
with her eyes. Nothing she could be convicted of in court, but yes, he
killed them all the same. One hundred fifty--no, one hundred forty nine
soldiers were slain. It's not fair to count the courier's first death.
Sure, she killed him too, but if they come back, you figure that makes
it a wash.
A dozen times you
almost told
her about it yourself, but you the words stuck on your dry tongue each
time. Since Fielding appeared, you are so glad you were not the one to
do the deed. As he evinced, that would have been cruelty draped in the
robes of pragmatism, and the world has already endured far too much of
that disguise. She was--still is--the only person breathing on this
earth who has ever seen you cry, and you supposed that merited some
consideration.
A very great
deal, in fact.
"You died for me;
I won't
forget that," She'd said in those sickly hours of your failure before
your plane left for Geneva and Alexa.
You crossed your
arms before your chest. "I had to. I had to stay to find a way to get
the stone."
Amanda is not one
to give in.
"You could have been killed dead; they knew how to do it." He'd never
told her how close he had come to what he almost did to her. Perhaps
there is a divine justice after all.
"Amanda, it was a
bullet; I'd
take dozens of them, even cheerfully die a few times if it would get
you out of my hair." You aimed for blase, paused, and continued with
what you trusted was just the right punctuation for effect. "But I
won't lose my head over you."
Amanda rolled her
eyes. The problem with immortality is that one tended to run out of
fresh punch lines.
You hoped she'd
heard the joke
and not the lie, but things hadn't been going your way recently and
Amanda is no fool. Apparently that favor was too much to ask. She spent
days not believing you when you all but begged her to, but then she saw
straight through you to the truth that could, in the end, cost you
everything.
She kissed you,
then. Not like she kisses Mac, but like she meant it all the same.
You glance
through the doorway
to Mac, where he still sleeps in the hopeless tangle of sheets. You
aren't accustomed to wanting things you cannot obtain, but that seems
to have changed as well.
Amanda is nothing
if not effective.
That day you
raised your sword
to her neck, driven by pure, unfettered rage for the first time in....
Well, you can't remember when. That she could make you so without even
trying terrifies you. Rage makes one strong, but also blind and stupid
and that is a classic recipe for self-destruction.
You don't intend
to let anyone
take your head, but if someone does, you would much prefer it be
despite your best efforts and not because of them.
The secret of
longevity is to
always be thinking--to maintain control of oneself no matter how
circumstances blow around you. Especially the more they blow. Anyone
who can make you forget that is more dangerous than the immortal
wielding a tangible blade.
Minutes later
you'd fallen
unarmed into her embrace and let her hold you like you needed. And the
truth is, you did die for her. Temporarily, albeit, but your heart was
in it--alive and hurting like it hadn't been in dozens of centuries.
And if they had used that bullet to buy a chance to take your head,
well, so be it. You owed her something in reciprocity for what you had
been all-too-ready to do to her.
You think that
thought likely stuns you even more than it does her.
No, women never
had been your
thing. One might think that a smart guy would learn. Sixty-eight
marriages, and not a damned sight closer than the day that you were
born.
And yet, some
people do say that sixty-nine is a lucky number. Maybe if you play your
cards right....
She brings out
the best and
the worst in you, you note. Perhaps they are two sides of the same
extreme. At least you hope that that moment was the worst you still can
be. For all of your sakes, you fervently hope that you get no worse
than that.
"Tea?"
"Hm?" It appears
that you missed something.
"I may have a few
centuries to
spare, but I'd rather not spend all of them holding this damned pot."
Her voice is still soft, but distinctly less patient now.
"Thanks." You
extend your cup.
Maybe it's time to move on. It's impossible to get a decent pot of tea
anywhere but England or China; at least you two agree on that. It's not
much, but it's a start, and tea's important. It's been the lubricant of
choice for hundreds of billions of social affairs around the
globe...and it's torn at least one country apart.
Powerful stuff,
that.
You've met her
before, though
you didn't know it at the time. It wasn't like you were properly
introduced. "Adam" found the recounting some time ago and the rest came
roaring back. The chronicles say it was 847. That sounds right about
right, although amidst the drama of the Norse, that night was merely a
blip.
It was a typical
cold and
foggy English night. You felt a pre-immortal somewhere near. Curious,
for future reference, you searched the street and alley. You saw a
shapeless shadow.
From the voice,
you heard it was a girl.
"ere, now, sir. I
'ave something you need." She lifted her stained skirts clear up to her
forehead. You never saw her face
You came toward
her and seized
her wrist. Her body was nothing then; you wanted to memorize her face.
But quicker than lightning, she raised her knee. You fell. She cut
loose your purse with a bodice dagger and slashed your side in the
process. You doubt that it was out of carelessness; the gash is too
deep for that. As the wound sealed itself, you listened to her laughter
and watched her back as her running footsteps faded away. Your shirt
was ruined as well as your night.
Women never have
been your thing.
Twelve hundred
years and
things haven't changed much. She is still tempting you with paradise,
and when you reach back for it, she kicks you in the balls for pure
delight.
And you keep
coming back for
more, to her--and him. Duncan and Amanda. Amanda and Duncan. You need
to think of them together when you consider the problem at all. If it
weren't for the one, there would be no problem at all--at least, that's
what you tell yourself at night. Not for the first time, you wonder
which of you has the real behavioral dysfunction, or if this kind of
wound ever seals itself, even for--especially for--immortals.
Infinite time can
bring infinite joy, but also infinite pain.
She pours with
grace. She does
everything with grace. Whatever else, you must acknowledge that. You
watch the curve of her arm and the wave of the wrist as the tea seems
to pour from an extension of her body and not from a separate thing at
all.
You accept the
offering; it is
much better warm. Powerful stuff, that is. You thank her, since you are
both being so polite today.
Love wasn't
something you
thought of much. Before Alexa, you hardly thought of it at all in
hundreds of years. But Alexa reminded you that there is no point in not
dying if you don't intend to live, and you would not dare to trivialize
her memory by eschewing that lesson now.
After all these
hundreds of
centuries, you probably lost out only by a couple years. If you had
acted before they reunited this most recent time... Well, there is no
point in rehashing all that now. You have too much perspective to fail
to see the black humor in the irony; you have too much humanity to be
able to find it funny yourself.
"Do you want
anything?"
"Pardon?" She has
risen and is standing beside you now. You search to play back what she
said.
"I'm going out;
can I get you anything?"
Your face must
give away your thoughts. Amanda rolls her eyes. "Shopping, you know,
like, with money. Francs."
Reflexively you
reach to check your wallet. Of course it's not there; you're wearing
Duncan's robe.
"My money," she
stresses. "Honestly, don't you trust me yet?"
"Not like that,"
you say.
She beams. "Good
! I like to keep you on your toes.
"I'll make it a
surprise," she
adds. She runs her fingers through your hair and kisses the top of your
head. Then she takes her coat and designer matching pocketbook, and
before you can say "immortal," she is gone.
You check your
watch. Your
clothes won't be dry yet. You decide that a little more practice never
hurts and you cross the floor to retrieve your sword prepared to head
topside.
As you do, you
glance to their
cabin. Mac sleeps with one arm thrown out, as if saving the spot for
its owner's return. He looks so peaceful--beautiful. The sound carries
straight down from the top deck. No, you won't risk waking him.
You drop your
sword and take up the couch instead. Sleep is not nearly so elusive as
you had suspected
You wake to the
shock of something landing on your middle. You startle and reach for
your sword, which isn't there.
"Nice," she says.
Grabbing the
edges of the robe, you cover yourself.
"The jeans, I
meant," she
said, holding them up. "Although that's not half bad either. You're
finally developing a sense of style."
You gather
yourself. It was
your shirt, now fresh and dry, that she tossed onto your stomach. You
sit up and work it on, taking care with the lower half of the robe.
"I have style,"
you say.
"Yeah, but it's
from the last decade." She tosses the jeans and your briefs over to
join the shirt.
As you prepare
for the
acrobatics of changing beneath the robe, she goes to over to Mac in the
bed and turns her back. Now you have your privacy, which was what you
wanted, right?
As you dress, you
realize what
was nagging you. She came in and walked right up to you, and you didn't
wake to the sense of her presence.
That is not a
survival trait.
It alarms you how
familiar you
have become with her--with her and Duncan. It is so easy--so
tempting--to forget the lessons of a lifetime. You have spent that
lifetime fine-tuning how not to die. It had not occurred to you to
decide how you wanted to live. All this has sapped your faith in what
you thought you knew. Five thousand years of training have been eroded
by a measly three.
If it's true that
in the end,
there can be only one, before there can be only one, there must be only
three. And the end may be a very, very, very long time away. They are
immortals; they can wait as long as they care to.
Duncan he is sure
of, but Amanda, it's only if she wants.
And before there
can be only
one, there must be only two. You think of all the permutations of that
conclusion and what they mean, and you no longer know what it is that
you want. The one who is left standing will be ultimately alone and you
are no longer sure that you would consider that to be a win.
These are
dangerous thoughts to have, for the body follows wherever the mind
leads--not always to the body's good.
Perhaps it is
time for you to leave.
"Methos." Duncan
stands in the
bedroom doorway, pushing the retreating sleep away with a hand across
his face. "I forgot to tell you; I saw Walter Graham in town yesterday."
"Who's Walter
Graham?" asked Amanda.
"It's a long
story," said
Duncan. "Better let Methos tell it." He stands aside, ushering you in.
He sits on the edge of the bed, leaving a blatant space for you.
It is a long
story, but one thing you have in abundance is time. You drop your coat
and sword on the couch and go to them.
Maybe you'll
leave tomorrow.