(The Chaos Chronicles continue)

Thomas Cross  bowed low to the toddler, Mary MacLeod, and respectfully bid her "Good day," adding also how well her riding skills were developing. He bent lower still and whispered in her sweet little pink petal ear, "And I am so proud of how brave you were to come back and see me after the fight here. I would be scared."          Mary fairly beamed at the attention alone. With a graciousness beyond her years, she replied, "You made it all better, Horse."

            Dr. Lindsey, standing behind her daughter, with baby Sean in her arms, sighed. She'd tried to explain to Mary that HorseMaster was a title, not a name, and that "Horse" was an improper nickname for Mr. Cross, but Mary would not be dissuaded. Cross seemed rather to like the designation, and there was that indefinable animal something about him, so trim and sleek, which reminded Anne of some desert stallion.

        Standing in Cross' magnificent barn quadrangle, Anne had to agree with little Mary. He had made it all better. There was no sign of the terrible struggle wherein Adam's stallion had killed Ram and vice versa, the bloody, violent scene still tended to haunt the place, but more in the nature of memory and not nightmare. Even the old sorrel gelding, Red, was especially quiet and bidable this day, their first day back at the scene of the crime, as it were.

        And the sojourn was over, as peacefully as it had begun, a warm sunny day, a riding lesson with the HorseMaster and a wonderful "snack" afterwards up the hill in Thomas' magnificent house. Thomas' idea of a snack usually consisted of three different pastries and an array of fruits, nuts, juices and light spring wines. Mary's favorite rice pudding and butterfly cookies were always set at her special table and there was even formula and pureed something or other delightful with biscuits for Sean to teeth on.

        "Thank you, Mr. Cross," Anne reached out her hand. "I'm sorry Duncan could not come. He would have been thrilled to watch Black God's progress. He is stunning. I think perhaps Adam is not ready to return--"

        "No," Thomas sighed softly, "he does not have your daughter's fine heart. And, please, Anne, call me Thomas."

        "Yes, of course," Anne shifted Sean to her other hip and reached for the car door.

        Thomas was there before her, holding the door, and then the baby, who still couldn't stop cooing and chattering about Cross' dark skin tones, the first black man the baby had ever seen. He handed in the baby and then helped Mary into her "big girl" car seat. "Give Lucille my love," he said.

        "Horse," Mary's face took on a solemnity that was formidable.

        "Yes, Little Miss?" Cross replied.

        "I think Red is getting a belly on him," she said slowly, precisely--something she'd heard one of the stable boys say.

        "Oh, dear," Thomas said in all seriousness, "I will check his feeding schedule this very eve and correct that situation."

        "Well," Mary's lower lip pushed forward. "I don't want him to be hungry."

        "I will see to it, Miss Mary," Thomas reassured her. "And if you bring him an apple when you visit, I am sure he will never suffer."

        Anne reached for her purse and went digging for her checkbook, only to find Cross' hand settling on her forearm as he reached through the window shaking his head, "Please, Anne, do not insult me. There is no fee to my friends."

        Anne smiled, put her hand on his, and looked up. Cross kissed her full on the mouth. She almost expected him to taste like dark chocolate, but he was sweet nonetheless.

        Then he stepped back from the car and waved them through the gate.

        Dr. Lindsey would think about this for some time to come. She would never have done such a thing ordinarily, but in the context of the moment, it was the perfect response. She was not embarrassed or indignant or put upon or anything at all, except flattered. Settling into a rather ascetic old, married, lady role, she hardly expected such attentions any more.

---

        Chores done, supper dishes washed and put away, the boys sent off to the movies, literally, with orders to stay in town overnight, Thomas locked up his house and engaged the intricate alarm system. Then he set off back down the hill to the barn complex. Through a door at the back of the feedroom, he entered the stairway down to the fallout shelter and descended.

        At the bottom of the stairs he took off his barn gear and padded down the hallway to an enormous subterranean bath-slash-grotto that was his single most favorite place for peaceful meditations and bright ideas. Ram had drawn the tub and set out towels and soaps, oils and a soft robe. She had timed it perfectly for his arrival, the bath was just the right temperature, but the lady herself was absent. Off somewhere, doing something that would be both irritating and fabulous, no doubt.

        "I would hate to disappoint you, HorseMaster," Ram appeared at the door with a tray in her hands, "but I was only making coffee in the galley." She set the the tray on the rocky tub, or more accurately, pool side. The rough-finished grey marble made everything in this bath appear to be hewn out of solid rock. Dipping her pale hand into the water, she agreed with a nod that it was right.

        "You could join me?" Cross offered.

        Ram looked down, "I don't look clean?"

        "You look wonderful, Ram," Cross replied. "I was thinking of a less utilitarian purpose for this fine warm pool."

        "Joe has decided it is over between us," Ram commented. "He was going to think about this as if I had run away and it was my fault, but then he knew I was with you, and he was glad for that, because I scared him when I killed that horse of Adam's. Joe knows what I am, but he's never had it thrown in his face so blatantly before. And he is thinking if we stay apart, he will become mortal once more and die." Ram shrugged. "I think it will be a long time before we are together again. A very long time."

        "I am still offering," Cross suggested. "And I have noticed you didn't find any use for those clothes I dug up for you."

        "It's just warm down here," Ram mumbled, pouring the coffee and plopping in sugar lumps, many more than either of them used.

        Thomas Cross knew better than anyone the precious worth of the moment, The Moment. Had his own dear teacher, the First Whisperer, not taught him the value of the perfect moment? "Can we do something else instead?" he asked. Thomas knew even more acutely, the wisdom of waiting for just such a moment.

        Ram answered "yes" without thinking. She was in that much of a quandary about becoming intimate with the Master of the Cross Estates.

        "Tell me about your people, Ram," Thomas reached for a large natural sponge and poured peach soap into it.

        "All right," Ram knelt down beside the tub edge, took the sponge and began on his back. "What would you like to know?"

        "I am told you have different forms, I am not exactly clear on this point, but Adam alluded to this," Thomas tried to recall exactly what Lucille had said when she came to order the chains from him, "But Lucille says you are a Nike, a Winged Victory? I am confused, because I am sure Mr. MacLeod said you were some kind of a dragon, and at some point, you seemed to be a man. I was hoping you could sort that out for me."

        "Well," Ram sighed and rubbed the bronze skin harder, "I might be able to start the explanation in the bath, but if you stay here till I'm finished, you will be older and colder and wrinkled as a prune before I am done."

        "Oh, I do love a long story," Cross purred. "Start here, and then we can take it into the study by the fire. Mmm, that is nice, Ram, a bath for the body and a story for the soul. What could be more sublime?"

        "Indeed," Ram replied, knowing full well what Thomas was thinking could be more sublime, "Where would you like me to start?"

        "At the beginning, of course," he tipped his head back and Ram began to run her strong fingers over his scalp. "Tell me how you were born."

        Dead silence.

        "Ram?"

        "It's just complicated, Thomas," Ram replied. "I am trying to think where to start. All right, there are five races of The People, and five forms of each..."

        "Yes?" Thomas took back the sponge and soaped up his arms and face.

        "But most of the time, The People exist as men, human males. That is their essential form on Earth. Was. They are all dead now, of course. But there were stories about a past when we all stayed in the higher forms, all the time."

        Thomas rinsed off and reached for a towel, climbing out of the pool. "You don't make a very convincing man, Ram."

        "I suspect not many men do in comparison to your own endowments, Master Cross," Ram quipped, staring.

        "And I thought you were only fond of my superior backside," Thomas laughed, settling down by the coffee tray and reaching for a cup.

        "You are superior in so many ways, Thomas," Ram took his cup back, dumped the too-sweet brew into the tub water, and rebuilt him a proper cup of coffee. "You made me nervous. I put in too much sugar."

        "So why are you not a man, Ram?"

        "I am, most of the time. Except for the two decades and two years around Adam's birth and the past thirteen years, I have been a man--or very like," Ram paused, she could wake Malak and have him explain. He was so much better at this sort of thing. "I am not exactly the same person as my other self."

        Thomas peaked out from under the towel he was drying his hair with, "Say what?"

        "See, I told you it was complicated. Why don't we take the coffee into the study as you suggested and I'll get a big piece of paper and make you charts and graphs and..." Ram picked up the tray, waited for Thomas to give her back his cup and left the stone quarry bathroom, rustling the silk ferns in her wake.

        Cross joined her in the study before the fire with the composite logs which flamed, but never burned. The metaphor always bothered him somehow, an allusion to hell, he thought. Ram sat before the fire, a large piece of paper, as promised, lying before her on the rug, a large marker in her hand. She really was going to draw him pictures. He would place these in the vaults, along with her marvelous painting when she had left him at last.

        Ram drew a five-sided figure in the center of the paper. "This is the entire explanation," she said.

        "You're a polyhedron?" Thomas laughed, pouring another cup of coffee from the service on the low table behind them.

        "You don't believe any of this, do you?" Ram crossed her arms.

        "Honestly?" Thomas poured her a new cup also. "No. I know there's something very odd about you, something wonderful. I know this makes your various friends think of you in different fabulous terms. Hey, pentagram works for me, Ram. I shall think of you as such if you wish."

        "If you do not believe what you have been told, then do you think I am insane?"

        Thomas set his cup on the floor and reached both of his hands out to rest on her knees. "I think you have been through a serious psychotic episode wherein you believed you were in hell. Adam had quite a bit to say about that."

        "Then you only asked me to tell you about my people to see the extent of my delusional ideation?" Ram studied him intently, the grey eyes never leaving his.

        "That sounds a bit harsh, Ram, but it is essentially correct," Thomas replied.

        Ram sipped her coffee and thought about this. "Why should I go to all this bother, then?"

        "Because you won't have sex with me," Thomas said evenly, "yet," he added. "And I like the way your voice sounds. And even the baldest lie has much to say that is true about the liar."

        "And all of this just might be true," he continued. "I am surely open enough to consider it in any case."

        "You know that I am not an Immortal," Ram began.

        "You think you are not an Immortal?" Thomas asked.

        "Oh, I see," Ram hummed, "Because you can hide your own aura, you think that I can do so as well."

        "I thought as much, yes, Ram."

        "But you don't hide your 'buzz,' Thomas, not really," Ram commented.

        "I don't?"

        "No, you are just so empathetic you can mirror the aura of whichever Immortal is in your proximity," Ram said. "You surely have noticed I don't do that."

        "How do polyhedrons hide their auras?" Thomas asked, stretching out on the thick Rya rug and tracing the pentagram with his finger.

        "They don't have one to hide. I am not an Immortal," Ram replied.

        "Well, you surely seemed dead to me after your go with Adam's stallion. And now you seem very much alive and healed, Ram."

        "But I have had two sons and Immortals are barren," Ram continued.

        "That is the one thing in all of this which I cannot explain," Thomas admitted. "I said you were odd."

        Ram shook her head and started to rise. "You have no idea."

        "I am sorry, Ram," Thomas pushed up to sitting. "Don't leave. Tell me anything you wish and I swear upon the Father of All Horses that I will believe you."

        "If I tell you a really good story, will you take me to your club?" Ram asked.

        "Certainly, Ram," Cross agreed. He hadn't even thought how he was going to persuade her to come with him, if only once, to the Drieg. Thomas could not believe his good fortune.

        "All right then," Ram settled on her side and began her tale.

---

        It is the time before there is writing in the World of Men. I live with my people in the alabaster courts and spires, towers and keeps of The City. My own cell is a simple affair, a single room off a sunny courtyard where a fountain of cool water plays over crystal chimes night and day, playing many songs, none of them ever the same. I began my life several centuries earlier in the great pools of the Nursery, the marble Balneary in the northernmost area of The City.

        I spend hardly any time in my room now, nor have I for many decades, but I have an affection for this place, my home, even though I spend most of my time on the fields of battle against the emerging hostile armies in the herds of Men. I am Field Marshall General of the Danaan forces, the youngest of my kind ever to hold this post, but my wits are keen, my tactical abilities without peer. I am courageous to a fault and I am the finest swordsmen in the entire City.

        I am not immodest, but my brother, Marak, says I should learn to practice humility before I enrage the rest. I often argue with him about this. Why, after all, should I pretend to be less than I am, just to make others feel falsely elevated? Marak only shakes his head and lumbers away. It is clear he can see I am right. Have I not brought The Crown victory after victory against the vicious hordes of beastly Men?

        You have asked about my birth and I answer you, thus: I was too young to remember. But I have often been told about this, though I have in truth, never seen such. Shortly after my clutch was delivered, there were no more Danaan born. Our clutch was one of the last delivered, but I will tell you what I was told and you can decide for yourself if it is true.

        The King takes a consort with each new moon, if he is so disposed, but it is more likely he will bed only three or four kyr in each new year. Kyr is the form of breeding, what the World of Men sees as female. Among the Danae, few attain this form. It is an office of high honor to bed the King, as you can imagine, and even more of an honor to bear a clutch. A clutch is--there is no equivalent of this in your world, being the Danae are oviparous--a clutch is the term used to denote the offspring of a brooding kyr, five brothers delivered as soft, clear eggs, crystal children, in the fifth or sixth month of brooding.

        They are matured in warm sea water pools in the Nursery for a season until Hatching, when they escape their crystal globes and swim free as merdrags for the ensuing decade. Merdrags are a little like the mermaids of old sailors' tales. They are not as human-appearing as described, but similar.

        I do remember my childhood in the wombish water of the Balneary, growing and learning with my four brothers, Marak and Kyrin and Makar and Barad'n. I remember the first day that I awoke, choking from my nap on the bottom of the middle pool and how The King, my sire, pulled me onto the marble floor and helped me clear my lungs and breath the land way. I remember weeping when I looked down to find my fine golden tail was gone. I remember laughing when I first learned how to walk.

        My brothers and I were all closely watched as we acquired the skills of the field and the yard and the lists and the library. Ours was the product of a perfect pair, the mating of two Gelcindrakes, and it was thought we would be a perfect clutch. A perfect clutch is one each of the five facets that make up the races of the Danae. This meant that one of us would prove to be a Gelcindrake also and heir apparent. I always knew that would be me.

        And when we came to our Knighting, all that was expected of myself and my brothers came to pass, and I was indeed manifest as the next pretender to The Crown. In the next century, I moved up through the ranks to my current position as Field Marshall and so I have remained for over a century now.

        I will explain about the pentagram. It represents the five facets, the five races of the Danae. I am a Gelcindrake, what, in the World of Men, is called "dragon," though we are, in truth all dragons. Brother Marak is a Geldrake. These are the ursine, leonine, and canine dragons, that Men call "were" or "sphinx." Marak is a Bear. Even in mandragor, the form indistinguishable from human males, he is so obviously a bear, that he is often called such, even by his human friends who do not know his true nature.

        Brother Barad'n is a Cindrake, fluid as living water, a sea-dragon. Brother Kyrin is a Lithdrake, the bird dragons, phoenix, amphisbæna, roc, and such. Brother Makar is a Pendrake, a horse, though in his case, Sha'adavar, a winged deer, but related to pegasus and hippocamps.

        We were the perfect clutch, each of us a different facet: Cherubim and Seraphim and Domains and Virtues and Powers, or Gelcind, Gel, Cind, Lith, and Pen, respectively.

        You asked if I was happy with my life in The City and in my high office and I can only reply that I am content. But I must confess to a certain melancholy at times. My brothers and my people resent me, my powers, my skills, my position in line for The Throne, even as they all rely heavily upon all those very charisms which they despise. That, and the fact I declined ascendancy after my Knighting, something that had never been done in all the history of The People.

        I have set myself apart from The People and they do not understand this at all. I would willingly explain, but they will not listen. I am fine of frame and fair of face and many had waited my adulthood that they might ply their affection for me in more carnal terms. That I will not accept any of their propositions, that I even refused the bedding attendant with the ascendancy ritual, infuriates them. My people thought this tantamount to pissing on The Throne. Even a century later, it has become something of a game with them to devise all manner of devious schemes to part the Field Marshall from his onerous virginity.

        I suppose I cannot expect them to understand, but sometimes I find myself more cut off by their hatred than by my vow of celibacy. Still, I am content with my life. I am needed, if not honored, obeyed, if not loved, and on the field of battle, there is no one who does not look to me for their protection. Since I do not involve myself with any of them, particularly, I am available to them all, and they know I will show no favoritism, because I have no lovers among them.

        I am content. Still, there are dark moments, when only the edge of my blade can hold me in the world. It is a bothersome and nasty habit, born of the more noble practice of blooding before the battle, cutting yourself with your own sword so that you will not be stunned by the first cut of the enemy. And perhaps I am just readying for some greater battle that lies ahead when I am finally King.

---

       Thomas listened quietly to Ram's story. She was from an ancient tribe of Immortals, that much he understood. They ascribed to the various dragon totems and so totally did they worship that Beaste of a Different Order that their considerable powers of persuasion made it seem they actually were the beings they worshipped. It was all so lyrically sad, so poetically tragic somehow. He found himself moved, nearly to tears, with her wondrous accounting.

         "Brother, but I was some piece of work," Ram snorted, "No wonder everyone hated me. What an unmitigated ass I was."

        Thomas stared at her judgment. "You really think so?"

        "Oh, I was competent enough--but God Almighty--thoroughly insufferable," Ram laughed. "No wonder they conspired to make me consort and take me out of my office as General. I am convinced they would rather have lost every battle than put up with my overblown sense of myself one more day."

        "They made you become a woman?" Thomas wondered at how easily he fell into the delusion with her. What did it matter in any case, since she surely believed this and his only purpose was to know her.

        "Suffice it to say, I could not refuse such an honor," Ram's smile twisted into a smirk.

        "And that's how you got Adam?" Thomas asked.

        "No," Ram's head slumped forward. "No, that happened later, when I finally ran away."

        "Ran away?" Thomas prompted when the room grew too still with her moody silence.

        "Yeah," Ram gathered up the coffee tray and walked towards the door. Clearly, the audience was over. "I got tired of getting raped every night."

        "Oh," Thomas remembered the Malak journal tales Adam had recounted to him when they spoke together about their respective teachers. Thomas had spoken of the Father of All Horses. Adam had told him about Malak.

        "Ram?"

        "Yes, Thomas," Ram stopped at the door and turned around.

        "What happened after you ran away?"

        Ram's smirk twisted further into a snarl. "Well, I stumbled onto a camp of five mortal brothers who were out raiding. They offered to improve my education, after a fashion. Such things as would make fine scenes for those special nights at your club, Thomas. Quite a variety of acrobatics, really, if a bit senseless in presentation."

        "Oh, Ram," Thomas rose to comfort her, but she backed away. "So you never meant to have Adam?"

        "I would think someone of your perceptiveness might have guessed that just knowing Adam," Ram said bitterly.

        This took Thomas aback. "What do you mean, Ram?"

        Her argent eyes flashed in the false fire, always burning, never consumed. "Behind the arch affect and wittiness, the sly judgments and cynical perspectives, you must have seen the desperation of an abandoned and battered child."

        Thomas' neck stiffened. "You beat him?"

        "No," Ram's eyes closed and she shook her head sadly, "no I never hurt him. I was never cruel to him, never harsh or ill-tempered. When he was twenty, I killed him, but that was more or less an accident. A fortunate accident," she added.

        Thomas' eyes rounded, golden and awed.

        Ram explained, "Because his Immortality was revealed, but also and more importantly--"

        "Yes?" Thomas hissed when she did not continue.

        Ram sighed, "Adam finally had something to blame that made sense to him. He could reject me because I had murdered him and he could stop searching for the real reason I made him feel so sad."

        "Oh," Thomas said and the air went out of him as if he were in physical pain as he understood what Ram was saying.

        "I have always been kind to him. I have cared for and nurtured him. I have protected and died for him. I have suffered for him beyond imagining, and if I could, I would amend what is wrong between us, but I cannot, no matter how unjust it may be."

        "Because you hate him," Thomas said softly.

        Ram was beyond answering in words. She nodded curtly, biting savagely down on her trembling lower lip.

        "And that is why you will have nothing to do with your second son," Thomas did not know if she heard his final commentary, above the crash of the tray and her desperate retreat.

The sun had already passed its zenith when Duncan MacLeod remembered something had been said the previous day about meeting at the Cross Estates. Without looking up, he groped for the bedside table and the cellular phone, punching in Anne's numbers, home, then car phone, then pager. She wasn't answering any of them. Damn! What had gotten into him!

           A gentle snore behind him on the wide loft bed reminded him all too clearly what the answer to that question was. This thing between himself and the Eldest Immortal was verging rapidly on the ridiculous, all the more so, since Duncan could not seem to find it in him to be disturbed about the situation. They had finally given poor Joe back his bedroom, changing the linen and apologizing for taking advantage of his kind hospitality. They had hardly made it back to the loft in one piece. Neither of them seemed to be able to find the reserve to even pretend they weren't--what? Duncan couldn't decide. In love? In heat? In madness? Maybe all three at once?

        Duncan laid the phone down softly and rolled back onto the bed, turning to study this man who had so taken over his thoughts, his flesh, his heart. I am not some drooling schoolboy, Duncan thought. Well, he was sure he had drooled, but the truth was he'd never seen the inside of anything like a school until he was already full grown. In mortal terms, this relationship could be seen as incest, though, Duncan had to admit, that would probably get lost in the greater perversity of gender and such, not to mention the discrepancy in ages.

        Just what were they going to do about this? Bora Bora was looking ever more inviting, all the time. Duncan could only be certain about what they weren't going to do, what they couldn't do. Well, he couldn't move Adam into the house north of town as a second wife. Anne would have both their butts in a sling he was sure. He couldn't see Adam as "kept mistress" in some pricey townhouse in the city. They surely couldn't "out" the situation without jeopardizing the custody of the children, even were Duncan of a mind to do so. Which he wasn't. Duncan had seen what Adam had gone through after the hearing and the splashy coverage in the Couver supermarket rag. Even now, nearly half a year later, he'd had his nose busted just for being gay, when he wasn't even that...yet.

        Well, Adam had been keeping house with Thomas Cross, and before that, whatever he was doing with Cronos. Duncan watched Adam stir in his sleep and root the side of his dear face into the pillow. Why couldn't you have been born a woman, Old Man?

        Adam's voice floated up from the pillow. "Tell me you aren't watching me sleep, Duncan."

        Duncan thought about lying. Adam's eyes were still closed.

        "So sue me," Duncan grumbled. "Have you no sense of romance at all?"

        "Nope," Adam rubbed his face in the pillow, "None whatsoever. And I've been meaning--" he rolled onto his back and stretched his yard's worth of arms high over his head.

        "Meaning?" Duncan asked.

        "What?" Adam grabbed a corner of the top sheet and wiped off his tongue, ignoring Duncan's disapproving look.

        "You said you meant to--something," Duncan prompted.

        "Oh, yes," Adam focused. "We have to talk about comportment."

        Something about the tone, or the words, or the "Class will now come to order" look on the Eldest Immortal's face, rolled Duncan over on his side with a deep bout of laughing that hurt his ribs.

        When he'd caught his breath again, Duncan looked up to see Adam glowering down on him. "Well, all right then," he cleared his throat and sat up beside Dr. Piersen. "Yes," he tried to attain a serious attitude, "what did you want to discuss about--" Duncan pressed his full lips together hard between his teeth, "comportment."

        Adam looked sideways at the Highlander, his long nose bent down over his pursed lips. "Well, we need to think about how we will act when we go back to the outside world," Adam began.

        "And how's that?" Duncan asked.

        "We have to stop--um--when we're with other people, you are going to have to stop--"

        "Groping you with my eyes?" Duncan suggested, starting to giggle.

        Adam banged the crown of his head against the tapestry behind them. "We aren't children, Duncan. We have responsibilities and duties and--"

        "Oh, God," Duncan fell off the bed, laughing so hard, he was more gasping than speaking, "Stop, mercy, Adam, stop!"

        Adam rolled onto his stomach at the edge of the bed and looked down at Duncan, rolling around on the floor, holding his sides and nearly crying, he was in such hysterics. "Duncan!"

        "Not another word, Adam, you'll kill me," Duncan panted as he levered up on his elbows. "Yes, we'll stop mooning around in public. Yes, we will find a way to work something out that won't be hurtful to anybody, ourselves included. But, God be my witness, Adam, I can nay take another instant of your being sober and adult and responsible unless you first promise to be merciful and take my head before I choke to death."

        Which commentary precipitated a snit of phenomenal proportions on the part of the Eldest Immortal.

        "I'm not saying you never do anything responsible, Adam," Duncan knew he was in for it now. "I was just kidding. It's just so unlike you to--" and on and on, he went sticking his feet further down his gullet and getting nowhere with Adam who sat immobile on the wide bed, doing his best imitation of a rain-spattered hen.

        Duncan gave up and went to take a shower. They would have to at least visit the children and probably babysit tonight. Time to descend from the cloudy mountains. The warm spray beat his face and focused his senses, bracing his return to the real world.

        "I'm sorry," there was a splash behind him and familiar fingers perched on Duncan's shoulders.

        Well, maybe one more time around the summit before the trudge back down to base camp.

        "I'm sorry too," Duncan replied, turning around. "You just caught me by surprise."

        "I'm going to have to make myself go out to the Cross Estates," Adam continued. "I could drop you off at Anne's and then join you there later."

        Duncan felt his back stiffen suddenly, unexpectedly. The image of Adam in Thomas Cross' arms made him seethe.

        "Duncan MacLeod!" Adam said in the very same tones the Highlander's own mother had used when he'd done something really out of hand, "You are jealous!"

        "No," Duncan answered too swiftly, then, "Yes, yes I am. I don't want you to go alone to the Estates. Partly because I know how badly you will feel going there, but more because I know how badly I will feel."

        "There is a difference between you and Cross," Adam said, moving forward to line the Scot's bronze skin with his own. His green eyes closed with the pleasure that just this proximity gave him.

        Duncan brushed Adam's forehead with his lips. The electricity made his teeth tingle. "We should probably get washed and dressed," he said lingering over the smooth, pale skin, "It's a long drive out to Anne's."

        "We do need to get ready," Adam agreed running his fingers over Duncan's broad back.

        Duncan sank a little as Adam's talented touch reached an especially wonderful spot. "You aren't helping," he commented, broadening his stance so he wouldn't fall.

        "Maybe if I turned around," Adam demonstrated.

        "No," Duncan tried to measure his sudden inrush of air, "didn't help at all. In fact--," Duncan knew he would never make it out to the bedside table and the almond oil and back again. He sensed that soap would be far too harsh.

        "Here, maybe this will help," Adam handed him a clear bar of soap from the collection in the sea shells at the tub's edge. "It's Castille," he explained.

        "Which means?"

        "It's made out of pure olive oil," Adam explained.

        "Are you sure?"

        "No skin off your nose if I'm wrong," Adam said.

        "It wasn't your nose concerned me," Duncan replied.

        "You surely do talk a lot for the strong, silent type," Adam snuggled his rump into Duncan's all-too-appreciative crotch. "You said we didn't have a lot of time to--Oh, dear lord."

        Duncan had effectively silenced the Eldest Immortal with some well-placed suds fore and aft. Then he slid into the silken join of Adam's delicious body, that was also his body, the more so each time they came together. He just hoped Adam would have the sense to brace them both because the footing was precarious at best, the water splashing over them like a warm tropical cataract.

        For all he had protested they hurry, Adam slowed them, achingly so, taking Duncan deeper and deeper inside, tightening around him in an exquisite grip that gave the Highlander all he could do not to howl like a mad wolf. Then Adam's slim frame arced upward against Duncan's chest and both men went down to crash their knees on the hard porcelain bottom of the tub, gasping and laughing.

        "Adam?"

        "Yes, I'm all right," Adam replied, "and yes, I finished, somewhere on the way down, I suppose. And you?"

        "Why do you think my legs went out from under me," Duncan laughed. "No, I wanted to ask what the difference was between Cross and me." He held out a washcloth and more soap, turned off the shower and started to fill the bath.

        "You really want to know?" Adam asked, coyly.

        "Yes."

        "I don't love Mr. Cross."

Thomas Cross picked up the coffee tray and followed Chaos down the the dark corridor towards the galley. He was a HorseMaster and not unaccustomed to the point in the lessons where a horse seemed to lose all its training, to go galloping back to some past insult or injury. Surely, this was his fault. He had pressed Ram too hard, though she seemed outwardly unmoving as the granite out of which this deep shelter was made.          There was no help for it now, except to create a quiet and safe corner in the fabric of the world and let the woman find her own balance again. Who could say what balance existed in such a spirited and lyrical madness as this creature displayed? Her point of rest might be upside down from the ceiling for all he knew. Well, descend de mans, he reminded himself with the term from dressage which meant simply lower your hands, or let the horse go freely to find his own collection.          When Thomas reached the galley, he found Ram at the sink, doing dishes as if nothing had happened, except that every muscle in her back and legs was set in high relief, lined with an electric tension, partly rage, partly willful stillness.           Thomas settled himself into the leather curved bench of the booth across the galley. "Would you like to talk?" he offered.

         "I should think you would be tired of this," Ram replied evenly.

        "I did not mean to hurt you, Ram."

        "Yes, you did," Ram grumbled, up to her elbows in water and suds, the tap running in the second sink. "Or at least you meant to test the extent of my madness."

        "There is that," Cross agreed. All her movements were tight and deliberate. He missed the ease and grace he usually associated with her. She had been in the barn too long. She needed out for a good long run in the wind.

        "So," Ram's husky alto seemed to have gotten stuck in an emotionless monotone, very grating. "On a scale of one to ten--?"

        "I'd surely like to see the text that contains your breed standard," Thomas laughed softly. He tried to think, there was a new warmblood American breed whose standard went something like: Dynamic in presence, Brilliant in motion. That was close. "I would say you are perfect for what you are, Ram."

        "And that would be?" Ram's single note had lowered by two steps, but was otherwise tuneless.

        "A Fabulous Beaste," Thomas replied.

        "Long-leggity, bump in the night?" Ram asked.

        "Exactly," Cross wondered when they would indeed be such a beastie together, bump in the night and all. Funny as the comment was, Cross had had more animated conversations with his computer system. As he watched, Ram's shoulders jerked suddenly and she began to tremble, fine tremors, shoulder to heel, while all the while she kept working in the sink. Something was amiss. Some aura, no smell, some odd, but familiar smell wafted his direction.

        Cross jumped up and dashed to grab the woman around her torso, pinning her upper arms to her sides. "Drop it!" he roared, "If you are to be hurt in my Keep, it will be under my command, and ONLY then. Drop it, now, Ram!"

        The paring knife clattered to the bottom of the second sink where the running water had carried a large amount of her blood down the drain. Cross tried to remain dispassionate as he wrapped what was left of her forearm into a clean towel and led her over to the curved bench, pushing the table out of the way. She was nearly bled out by the mutilation, having uncovered the deeper vessels, and the bone, along the length of her left forearm. When he released her, she slumped over sideways.

        He would have to act now. He would have to be excellent. Father of All Horses, help me, he prayed. Some ponies just took all you had and then some. She was certainly such a one.

        "I am very disappointed in you, Ram," he began.

        Ram glanced up blankly from her sideways position on the bench. She looked as if she'd heard this lecture a thousand times. Probably had.

        "That you should bring such an unimaginative and amateurish bit of torment into my fine home. I mean, really! If word were to get out that my guests were dithering about, stumbling through haphazard butchery on their own, I would be out of a job in an instant. You shame me with this childish display!"

        The dazed silver eyes narrowed, uncomprehending and suspicious. "I am open to suggestions, HorseMaster," she said.

        Cross sighed, "Oh, I suppose." He settled himself down on the floor even with her face. "You understand this is something of a busman's holiday? Let's see, well, all my paperwork is upstairs in the office, so we'll do you an abbreviated client intake. First, Name? By which I mean the name you wish to be called if it isn't 'Ram.' Ram? Well, all right then. Title? Slave, Master, Lord? No? No title. Age? No, we'll leave that blank, the computer will lock up if I try to input that. Session length? We'll leave that open. I don't usually do boarders. Unless they are very, very special," he paused and smiled, but getting no reaction, he continued, "We'll waive the medical exam and release. Except for the iron, you're not allergic to anything you know, are you? I'll put 'no.' Do you crave depth of injury or intensity?"

        "Ram, you have to answer some of these or I shall judge you the rudest guest I ever took under my roof."

        "Kidnapped," Ram corrected, pushing up to sitting, sort of, propped back against the stuffed leather of the booth couch.

        "The rudest person I ever kidnapped," Cross amended.

        "Intensity," Ram answered, her lids floating down as she yawned.

        Cross noted the tremors had stopped. Her blood volume was restoring itself to sufficient pressure. "Anatomical preference? Shall we stay with inner forearm? I admit it's a good choice, accessible, sensitive, but not too. Yes. Then, we want a bright, intense, sharp note with deep aftertones, yes?"

        Ram's full lips curved upward, "Yes."

        "Would you consider heat or cold, instead of laceration and incision?" Thomas asked.

        "Burning is good," Ram replied as if she were playing make-believe with a child.

        "All right, then," Cross stood and started pacing round the kitchen letting his hand trail across the different surfaces of the galley fittings. "Being that we are in the galley, mmm, something with a culinary theme. Ah, yes, I seem to recall someone saying you liked chocolate." He rustled in a far cabinet and brought forth a beautiful copper fondue set, placing it on the kitchen table. Then he gathered the semi-sweet squares, heavy cream, and sterno. Out came three bowls and a double-boiler and Thomas set the bottom part of the double boiler on a back burner while he whisked the cream and sugar.

        Ram unwrapped her arm and let it finish healing in the air, while Master Cross hummed and fussed, totally absorbed in whatever he was doing with the chocolate. "Aren't you going to ask me why?" she complained. They always asked why.

        "Excuse me?" Cross dipped his finger in the soft cream, shook his head, added a little more vanilla and a lot more Kahlua and started whipping again. "Oh, why what, Ram?" Cross set the bowl down in another bowl he'd filled with ice and crumbled the three kinds of chocolate into the top of the double boiler. "Here," he said, giving her three bars of white chocolate and a grater, "We need some tiny shreds for topping and decoration. And don't go cheating and scuffing your knuckles, just because you think I won't notice."

        Ram forgot the original question. "What are you doing?"

        "Treating you to the talents of the finest scene master on the continent, if not the world," Cross bowed. "If you are going to be practicing The Art under my roof, Ram, then by The Father of All Horses, you'll being doing it in proper style, or you won't be doing it at all. Do you understand me?"

        Ram's silver eyes opened wider, "No."

        "Well," Cross went back to the stove and started blending the chocolate, adding just a dab or two of butter. "You will understand. This is what I do for a living, Ram. You will have to trust me on this matter."

        "I suppose," Ram shook her head dubiously and tested the healing tendons by carefully flexing her left hand before shredding the chocolate.

        "And no tasting," Cross warned without turning around. "I want it all shredded and none of it bloodied."

        Ram's prominent nose wrinkled up. It was a more difficult request than it had appeared to be on first blush. Three chunks of chocolate. The problem being part of the chocolate pushed the rest by the grater blades until you got close to your fingers, then you could use the second piece to push the remnant of the first and the third to do so with the second. But that left you with the remnant end of the third piece and all those tiny sharp crescents too close to your knuckles. That's the piece you usually got to eat, but the HorseMaster had said no, and it seemed important to him. Ram worked with the last piece, paying attention to keep her fingers extended. The smaller the piece got, the harder the task became, until she was left with a tiny fragment, tediously working it over a single slot in the grater with exquisite concentration on one single notion, that she not cut herself. It took her as long to grate the topping as it took Cross to finish the fondue and bring it, steaming, to the table.

        Thomas held out his hands and Ram placed hers, without thinking, into them. He inspected them, all sides, all fingers, and pronounced that she had done exactly as he had asked.  It hurt him somewhere very deep inside how much this simple praise lit her angular features. Does no one ever thank you? He wondered.

        He sprinkled the white chocolate over the rich brown fondue, stirred in a filigree design and lit the sterno. Then he put his hand up. "Wait," he said, going round the galley cleaning the counters, stacking the pots and pans, turning down the lighting and gathering up five large candles and some matches. These last he set on the table by the fondue set, lighting their artfully different heights and colors.

        "All right," he said, pulling a chair up to the table across from Ram. "Put your right arm on the table, palm up, and we will practice so we won't be wasting any of that lovely chocolate.

        Ram was diverted smelling the liqueur and the rich cocoa blends.

        Cross picked up one of the candles. "Ram?"

        "Yes?"

        Thomas tipped the candle. The melted wax poured and out dribbled down her pale forearm.

        The dark center of Ram's silver eyes dilated briefly, but that was the extent of her reaction. He hadn't been able to catch her enough off-guard and her battle-trained insensitivities had kicked in.

        "No," Cross sighed. "That will never do." She was going to have to help him with this. Her will and her discipline were too strong to serve in this instance.

        "I don't understand," Ram said, staring quietly at him.

        "There is a difference between being epicurean and being gluttonous, Ram. You have become gluttonous and you have all the palate of a maggot."

        He brushed the wax away. "I'm going to do this again, more slowly, and I want you to think of your skin there the same way you thought of your fingers with the grater. Do you understand?"

        Ram's brows curved together in the center of her forehead. "I will try. Wait," then she nodded.

        Cross dripped the wax again. Nothing. Her control was superb and she could not loosen it enough to feel or react. Ram's shoulders slumped. It was clear she did not fail often enough to do it with any grace at all.

        Cross reached for another candle, the yellow one, beeswax. He brought it over her arm and upended it. Ram's face went gray and beads of sweat sparkled across her upper lip as her breath stopped for an instant and then erupted in a whole chorus of ancient epithets as she pulled her arm back and rocked it close to her belly.

          "Ah, then we have some parameters to work with," Cross said, waiting for Ram to put her arm back on the table. He never used the beeswax. It's melting temperature was far too high. Her arm was second and some third degree burns beneath the wax and she fussed the tiniest bit as he removed it. "I think the blue will serve us just right, Ram. But then I will have to readjust the temperature on the chocolate. Well, first things first, let's give this arm a rest and use the other." He waited for Ram to change arms.

        "Different colors?" Ram asked, putting her left arm on the table, palm up.

        "Yes, I am told some Masters can tell the melting temperature of each paraffin by its feel alone," Thomas explained, "I myself am not nearly so clever. When I pour my candles, I color code them: red is the lowest temperature, blue the highest and each color is for a different temperature in between. I don't color code the beeswax since it is poured without pigment. It is so different from the others by feel, and it's not generally used..."

        "Except on the really dense clients," Ram finished the thought.

        "You really have a remarkable pain threshold, Ram."

        "Believe me, I have need for it," Ram grumbled.

        "Well, you have a need now to set that talent aside for a bit."

        "I don't understand why," Ram commented.

        "You will," Cross said, running his hand along the smooth new skin of her healed inner arm. He kept his touch light enough that her senses had to reach for him. He kept talking about the candles and the pigments and how restful it was dipping racks of wicks and setting them out to dry. And then when she was settled, he drizzled the blue candle down the line he had drawn with his fingers and she yelped, but did not move. "And?" he asked.

        Ram closed her eyes, "that really hurt."

        "Perfect," said Cross and he picked up the fondue, trundling it back to the stove where he melted in another cup of sugar, tested it with his finger and then brought it back to the table again.

        "Ready?" he asked.

        "I could answer that if I knew what I was supposed to be ready for," Ram complained.

        "You hurt yourself," Cross started calmly, "because you do. It doesn't matter why. You start thinking about why, then you have to think about why not, and then I would be out of a job. All I am saying is you waste your pain simply because you are ashamed of it. You gobble it up without tasting it, hardly feeling it at all--with no appreciation for its finer points. You glut yourself on some butchery which would shame a knacker's talents and then go on your way, unsatisfied. And I am asking are you ready to savor your pain properly?"

        "I guess," Ram answered dubiously, watching the HorseMaster like a raptorous bird.

        Cross picked up a tiny copper ladle from the set and dipped into the hot chocolate. He ladled a small dollop onto her arm and waited for her to stop hissing. Then he bent his head over her arm and lifted the solidified chocolate gently with cool tongue and teeth and lips.

        Ram purred like a great cat in the crook of an ancient tree.

        "Very good," Cross complimented her, licking the burn until it was pale and cool again.

        "Do I get some?" Ram asked.

        "Certainly," Cross ladled a slightly larger line down her forearm. This time he saw she neither fought, nor feared the searing pain, she just relaxed and let it wash through her. A most excellent pony, this one, brave enough to learn a new way, even after all this time.

        When the wave had passed, Ram put her arm up to her mouth and took the sumptuous chocolate off her arm with more voracity, but every bit as much enjoyment as Cross had done.

        Cross repeated the process again and again, finishing with ice packs for both her arms and wrapping her in a soft blanket he garnered from the bedroom next door. Holding her on his lap and rocking them both slowly, he asked, "Did that suffice?"

        "No," Ram answered, sighing sadly.

        "It never does," Cross replied. "It never does. But if you promise to forego that savagery, I shall promise to come up with any number of  alternatives to suit you."

        "But why do I do it?" Ram's voice broke on the last word. "It doesn't--" Then she broke down completely and wept in great, gulping sobs that shook her entire frame.

        "That is why," said Thomas in a still, calm voice, as he rocked her to sleep in his arms.

"Hello?" Duncan dived for the cellular. "Yes, I know. We, um. Yes, Anne, that's about it. We're just now getting--Oh, well if that's okay with you. Yes, we'll drop over and check on Joe," Duncan paused. "Yes, I love you too."          Adam looked over from tidying up the kitchen nook and smiled. "I guess that would be the sound of a bell tolling?"          "Not necessarily," Duncan combed his fingers through his wet curls and buttoned his shirt, pulling on one of his enormous collection of Erin sweaters over his head. "Anne says she and Lucille are taking the children east to her mother's for a vacation and antiquing the whole of next week."          "Antiquing?" Adam asked.          "Amounts to hitting all the farm estate auctions," Duncan explained.

       "She also wants us to stop by and check on Joe," Duncan added. "She's worried about him. He isn't answering his phone."

        "I'll drive," Adam offered, heading for the elevator.

        Duncan laughed, "Thanks, but no." He immediately regretted the comment. He wasn't such a jerk he couldn't see that this winding down phase shouldn't be initiated with derogatory comments about Adam's lack of driving skills.

        The ride down in the elevator was chilly. Damn, Duncan thought, this was not going to be easy, but then again, you dance all night and the piper must be paid come morning. Bring on the piper.

        The ride over to Joe's was equally silent, each man lost in a multitude of memories that might so easily become regrets. Except for Joe's customized car and the weekend's worth of garbage waiting for Monday pickup, the alley behind the bar was empty. Duncan shut down the T-bird and put the key in his pocket. Their swords were in the trunk. Adam made no move to retrieve them. Duncan agreed. While not exactly Holy Ground, the bar was something of a sanctuary, if more temporal than most.

        "Well," Adam said wryly, "Back from Neverland."

        Duncan chuckled, "You lost boy, you." Then he took a deep breath and they stepped through the door together.

        The room would have been absolutely dark except for the blue neon lights below the bar. Both men felt other presences in the room, waiting, hiding. Damn! They should have brought their swords. Without conscious thought, their two backs found each other and they stood against whatever awaited them here.

        "It's been fun," Adam said goodby to the Highlander.

        "Whatever happens, I love you," Duncan said suddenly, thinking he might not have another chance.

        They were clearly outnumbered and he felt the unmistakable buzz of a very strong Immortal with them. "Cut down in a bar ambush. Who would have believed it? Immortal at nine o'clock," Adam announced.

        "Right," Duncan leaned into his lanky friend.

        "And I love you," Adam added.

        The lights came on suddenly, blinding them.

        "And if we knew what to pronounce you, we surely would," Joe's throaty blues singer tones shimmered through the room. "But consider yourselves official."

        Cries of "Surprise!" rang around their ears as the two men blinked back into focus.

        "Dadahm!" Sean squealed. It was his "buzz" Adam had felt, strong as a full Immortal and he only a year-old pre-immortal.

        "Unka Dunk!" Mary giggled.

        Then the "ambush" gathered around them, with hugging and congratulating and kissing of the bride, both of them. Adam took Sean and they went happily on a tour of the party fare, balloons and presents and tables pushed together, covered in bright cloths and a gigantic dinner, the centerpiece a two tier chocolate cake with crossed swords buried in the rich frosting. A little too apt, he thought, but Sean judged the frosting in excellent taste nonetheless.

        Duncan crouched down on his knee and listened attentively to Mary's happy recounting of Red and her new program on the computer and their latest trip to the zoo. He ducked his head solemnly as she shook her little finger and gave him serious "what for" about being gone from them so long. Duncan thought if his grin got any wider it would split his face. After suitable apologies to Mary and her mom, all was forgiven, it seemed and Mary jumped on his back for a much-delayed pony ride.

        "What is this all about, Buddy?" Duncan swung Mary down to the floor so she could go and scold Adam about messing up the frosting on the cake, and before they'd even had supper. Really.

        "Reception?" Joe suggested, "Hell, Mac. I don't know. Lucille thought of it first," he pointed his silver beard towards Her Luscious Self, sorting the rest of the "family" out at the table. "We want you to know--something you know already," Joe shook his head and offered his hand, shaking Mac's warmly. "Couldn't happen to a nicer Immortal," he said. "Either of you," he added.

        "Presents!" Mary announced from the table.

        Anne handed the first present to Mary and leaned over whispering in her ear and pointing towards Adam. Then she read the card, "Mr. Thomas Cross sends his sincere regrets that he cannot attend, but he sends a token of his affection and his very good will and congratulations for your continued happiness."

        Mary walked around the table and handed the thin box to Adam. "And he sent me rice pudding and that big ham," she pointed at a beautiful glazed ham at the head of the table.

        Adam lifted the top off and gave it to Sean who proceeded to teeth on one of the corners. Inside were two pieces of paper. It took the Eldest Immortal a moment to understand what these represented, then he had to leave the table suddenly.

        Lucille watched Adam disappear into the hallway and the men's room. She picked up the pages but they made no sense to her so she passed them up the table to Duncan.

        "Oh," Duncan read them and explained. "This first is a copy of a lab report on one of Thomas' mares, Roselyn of Avalon. It says she is pregnant. The second is a genealogy list of the parents and grandparents of the colt that she carries and the name of the sire, the father," he added for Mary's benefit. "The father is Adam's stallion."

        "The one who died?" Mary asked bravely.

        Duncan nodded. "And there is a promise at the bottom of the second page to give the colt to Adam when it is born."

        Mary went back for the next present, and the next. Thoughtful little symbols, tender and funny and dear beyond believing.

        Anne handed Duncan a large manilla envelope. "I didn't have time to wrap this," she said shyly.

        It was a collection of contracts and plans. Duncan shrugged. "What is it?"

        "Well," Anne looked down, "the house is lovely, but with the children and all, and Lucille coming to visit and my mother and--well, it just isn't big enough, so we are adding on a second house on the other side of the garden. Um, a guest house," Anne stammered. "I don't exactly know what you have in mind, Duncan, but knowing Adam and how he likes his privacy--and--"

        Duncan reached for her, "Oh, Anne. It's perfect. Are you sure you're all right with this?"

        "No," Anne pulled back, "I can't say I'm sure about anything any more, but I guess I will always love Mary's father and there's no point pretending it will be any different now that he is dead. I could be alone, struggling to manage on my own, but you have always been there for me, Duncan. The least I can do is be there for you."

        "We really are going to visit my mom with the kids after the party is over. They laid the foundation Friday and they'll be framing and plumbing and whatever this next week. They swear it will be done by the end of the month. In the meantime, you can stay here at the dojo, and we promise not to drop in unexpectedly," Anne ducked her head and flushed the most becoming pink.

        Duncan was glad when Adam finally returned, composed. The weight of all this affection was far too much for him to bear alone. Then it was time to eat and they dug happily into the feast before them.

        Duncan was not especially hungry. Seated at the head of the table, he luxuriated--wallowed, if truth be told--in the sheer comfort of his very odd clan, laughing and joking with each other, a most excellent collection of warm hearts and gentle folk. He had worried for nothing. They were as much his shield as he was theirs. Family, he thought, loving family. Mine.