The buzz hit him, not with the elusive feel of an Immortal sneaking up on him or tentatively approaching to see who he was, but with a slam of someone hurtling close.  Methos bolted but was caught by his right arm and spun into the alley.  A hand like iron locked his lips shut bruisingly as the other Immortal slammed him against the brick wall.  Stars sprang around his sight.  He was  pinned, the Immortal’s other hand locking on his sword arm, using a heavier body to hold him flat. His vision cleared and he found himself cross-eyed, trying to identify the Immortal whose nose touched his.

          The other drew slightly back, allowing a clear view of his features.  Clean cut, with an aquiline nose.  Fascinatingly high cheekbones and firm lips pulled back slightly over rather ordinary teeth.  The eyes were a brilliant gray, almost silver.  The hair was like Dawson’s, salt and pepper leaning more toward salt.

          Before a stunned Methos could make up his mind to react with indignation the other released his lips, trailing fingertips along them.  The old Immortal was beset by a very different fear at open appraisal in the gray eyes.

          “Challenge,” the other stated softly.

          Methos nodded his head jerkily.

          “Not for your honor,” the other added, bringing his left cheek near enough that Methos could feel the tiny hairs on their skin brush each other.  “Simply, challenge.  After all,” he spoke so softly now that Methos had to strain to hear, “there can be only one.”

          “I’m Adam Pierson.  I can’t fight in this position,” he said unsteadily.  He could feel the hard strength of the other man, the heat of his body where he was pinned.  His heart hammered as the other slowly pulled away, deliberately sliding his cheek along Methos’.  Goosebumps rose along the
length of his body.

          The other slid gracefully back a meter, lips twitching with suppressed amusement.  He gave Methos space to steady himself..  Their eyes met again and Methos was further shaken.  He was unaccountably reminded of Silas.  Not as he last saw him - in a berserk fury over Methos’ betrayal - nor in the resentful eyes that haunted his sleepless nights.  There was humor in the silver-gray eyes, an enthusiasm for life and joy untempered by time.  He seemed just shy of two meters tall, with broad shoulders.  The sword he now held was a simple Battlesword, with no obvious markings to betray an age older than when those swords were initially made.

          “In this language, I am Grey,” the other identified himself.  He tilted his head, body language inviting his opponent to see the humor in his name.  Almost without willing Methos found himself smiling.

          Then Grey’s laughing eyes went dark with serious challenge, and Methos answered it with his sword.  The first blows were less than determined as the two sought to gauge each other’s ability.  The pace picked up rapidly until the ring of their swords seemed unbroken.  In a fight you do not divide your attention, especially when your life is at stake.  Methos was trying to recall anything about Grey that could help him, as the Immortal’s name was familiar from the Watcher’s chronicles.  He learned the names of all the more deadly ones.  An ache was running from his arms down into his chest and his breathing was coming sharp with a faint taste of iron.  Suddenly his right leg cramped
up, and Methos was falling.

          He barely had time to think that at least it was not a monster Immortal who would take his Quickening.  Then he hit the bar of Grey’s arm in front of his chest.  He dared not move, feeling the sword against the back of his neck.

          Grey waited until their harsh breathing had eased somewhat.  Allowing Methos to lean against his arm he brought his head close enough again to tangle hairs.  His lips brushed Methos’ ear as he spoke.  “You fight well, but without conviction.  That will kill you unless  you are very lucky.”  His soft voice seemed to surround Methos, who held on to the peculiar comfort it offered.

          “I don’t... I do not want to die,” he replied.  His chest hurt, but the pain was already fading even as the adrenaline rush from the fight was leaving him.

          “Not today.  You cannot defend yourself adequately.  I don’t kill the helpless.”  Grey squeezed Methos’ shoulders and flowed to his feet in one motion.  He paused to smile warmly at Methos, then vanished from the alley, slipping out between one sunbeam and the next.

          Early evening customers were just beginning to trickle in to the bar.  Up on the stage the band was running through some tune-up drills, the subliminal thrum of the bass guitar setting up a resonance in the listener’s bones.

          Joseph Dawson, full-time Watcher and Proprietor, had already relaxed into his evening routine.  Thoughts of a certain person were far from his mind.  He deliberately kept it so.  He only pondered upon the missing man when he was off work, late in the dark of night.  Thus it was a full breath before he recognized the troubled visage in front of him, Pierson!

          For a moment questions clogged his throat.  He pushed them forcibly aside in light of Pierson’s pasty complexion, tightly compressed lips and the way he pressed his palms flat atop the counter.  Dawson pulled some sleight of hand and made a bottle of the old Immortal’s favorite beer appear on the counter.  An involuntary smile escaped Pierson’s lips, his hands relaxed slightly as Dawson  poured the drink. The Immortal downed his beer in one gulp and held out his glass plaintively for more.

          Joe Dawson already had the report from Duncan MacLeod.  However traumatic it was, the Four Horsemen incident was weeks ago.  Something must have happened recently.  Dawson took the glass and set his hand on Pierson’s wrist.  He gazed firmly for a moment into the haunted brown eyes which acknowledged his meaning with a brief flicker.  The Immortal nursed his second drink slowly.

          The Watcher retired to serving other customers in some relief, reasonably sure that at closing time Pierson would still be coherent.

          “Can I help?” Pierson asked.  Dawson looked up from wiping down the tables.  With a wordless smile, he tossed the cleaning rag over and sat down.  A twinge of his normal humor came back to the Immortal, “I said ‘help’, not do it FOR you.”  He began wiping at tabletops in a manner more concentrated than the task called for.

          The Watcher studied the other man for a few minutes, taking in the way in which Pierson rested his weight forward.  A man who wanted to run, but was not certain where to go.  Dawson pulled himself to his feet and moved around the bar, checking to see that no customers remained in the restrooms.  He did not disturb the Immortal until after he secured the doors.  Then he came back to the table he was at earlier, caught the other man’s attention with a wave.  “Sit down, Methos.  Tell me what’s happened now.”

          Methos stopped his wiping and turned a disquieted gaze upon the mortal.  “You know something I really like about this bar, Joe?”  The Watcher tilted his head quizzically.  “Both the entrance and exit are positioned so that if an Immortal comes in, those already here will detect him.”

          “Is someone hunting you?”  Worried, the Watcher leaned forward to better see the feelings in those troubled eyes.

          “Oh, no.  Not me.  No.”  He shivered abruptly, then moved forward to slump into the chair across from Dawson.  He spent another moment studying the whorls in the wooden table-top.  Finally he met the Watcher’s eyes again.

          “Today I met Grey.”

          “Grey?”  The word was so innocuous, it took Joe Dawson a minute to connect it with Immortals and Watcher’s records.  “Well,” he finally began then stopped.

          “Yes, and I managed to convince him I was what I appeared to be.”  Methos’ mild, ‘I’m Just a Guy’ routine was very deceptive.  At times he practiced it so deeply that even those who knew the secret harbored some doubts. MacLeod would have fallen for it if Methos had wanted to fool him.

          “This had to happen someday, I suppose,” Dawson said at last.  “The Four come to challenge Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod.”  As earlier, he leaned forward and laid his fingers with gentle, yet authoritative pressure upon Methos’ wrist.  “Tell me what happened.”

          The Immortal gazed blankly into the darkness behind Dawson.  He took a slow, deep breath and began.  “I was walking here.  I had to see you, Joe, before I see MacLeod.  We... did not part on the best of terms.  Though there are worse terms to part on.  I was just a few minutes away from here
when I felt another Immortal...”

          As he related the story, Methos relaxed.  The troubled look faded from his eyes to be replaced by the introspective humor Dawson was used to.  His body slipped into its usual pseudo-couch potato attitude.

          “He called you ‘helpless’?  It didn’t sound like you did THAT badly.”

          “Ha ha,” growled Methos.  “No, it was in his Research Summary.”

          Dawson whapped him with a napkin.  “Give, boy!  Give!”

          The grinning Immortal ducked away.  He resettled himself more comfortably, torso draped along the table top, body only halfway in his chair.  “When a Watcher dies or retires from a long-term assignment, we researchers go through the recent chronicles of their Immortals.  It helps the new Watcher.”  Dawson nodded, remembering the summary atop MacLeod’s chronicles when he was first assigned to the Scotsman.  It told him where to look for information about swords, particularly good friends or deadly enemies.  Of course he went through the chronicles, but the summary took care of immediate questions.  “Grey was described as a man who loves the fight but  hardly ever kills.  He only takes heads when his opponent forces him to.”

          “That’s an awfully thin thread on which to base your strategy.”

          “I know.  When the duel ended I thought it ended for me.  I’m not as resilient as MacLeod.”

          Now that he had released the fear and general sense of bewilderment the fight had left him with, Methos had gone into relaxed mode.  Dawson caught the familiar half-sleepy expression and sighed.  “So you’re all right, now?”  Methos looked puzzled by the question, then his face cleared.  *Well, thought Dawson, after five thousand years he must be used to putting things behind him.

          “I do want to know why he attacked me, though.”  He gazed steadily at Dawson, no trace of sleepiness in his eyes but instead a shy hope.

          “Oh really?”  Dawson looked left, but only met the darkness of the walls.  He looked right but that scene was much the same.  He finally looked at Methos from under lowered eyelashes.  “You don’t suppose he just wanted a date?” he teased.

          “I don’t have room in my life for an Immortal lover,” Methos said too quickly.

          Joe Dawson choked back a laugh.  A few snorts escaped but he finally could hold a straight face.  “Tell you what, I’ll ask the Four’s Watcher to come here tomorrow evening and talk to us.  But you have to do something for me.”

          Methos looked suspiciously at the mortal.  “Ah.  What?”

          “Tell me what happened in Paris,” Dawson said gently.  He felt a pang of guilt as Methos’ face went pale.

          The Immortal swallowed visibly three times before the color came back into his face.  “Oh, yes.  I can do that.”

          As it turned out, the Four’s Watcher could not come the next evening.  But she could come the day after, around nine in the morning.  Dawson and Methos both groaned but decided they would have to get up anyway.  (“You know, this is really why I quit the bookstore and opened the bar - so I  wouldn’t have to get up before noon!”)

          The two men sat drinking coffee and watching the door.  At about ten to, it opened and an understated young woman stepped through.  For a moment they saw her easily.  Then, disconcertingly, they found they had to stare intently to see her.

          She was a perfect field operative.  When she moved she fit utterly into her surroundings.  When she stopped, she stopped so completely she faded into the woodwork.  She would have to be good, to watch four alert Immortals.  She moved again, crossing the floor to the two men who stared wide-eyed at her as if afraid to take their eyes off.  A hazel-eyed woman in her  mid-twenties with shoulder length, wavy brown hair.  Her face was round and entirely normal looking.  No one could look that normal, thought Methos.  He vaguely remembered some television show recently, a sci-fi one about people like her.

          She became immobile again just a foot from them.  The silence stretched and finally Dawson broke it, clearing his throat and leaning forward.  He opened his mouth but Adam Pierson spoke first.

          “How do you DO that?!”

          At his question she smiled.  With that smile she was somehow suddenly present, connected to them rather than the space around them.  “You must be the researcher,” she said.

          Joe Dawson levered himself to his feet.  “Melinda Krager, this is Adam Pierson, our top Methos-researcher.”

          She nodded and Pierson returned her nod.  She turned her now-quiet  expression to Dawson. She had to be curious, but her body-language and expression provided no hint as to her feelings.

          Dawson threw out all the stories they had come up with in the last thirty hours.  He chose a variation of the truth.  “I asked you in because Pierson witnessed Grey fighting another Immortal Thursday evening.”

          The sun burst from behind the clouds and made all things visible.  In a flash she pulled a chair over, had her recorder out and was all ears for Adam Pierson.  Dawson, temporarily forgotten, sat back down to see how the Immortal would field this ball suddenly thrown to him.

          Pierson shot the Watcher a dirty look.  He rubbed his face and quickly changed mode to tell his tale as a third-person observer.  “I was coming here, and there was this guy walking about a block in front of me.  Suddenly this other guy grabs him and drags him into the alley.  So I ran to help, but I  wasn’t going to just barge in and get myself shot.  I looked cautiously ‘round the corner....”  Pierson pursed his lips, thinking about just how to describe the situation.  “The big guy had the other guy pinned against the wall.  Their position was... was....”  He shook his head violently.  “I wasn’t sure if  I was looking at a seduction or a potential rape.  Then the big guy stepped back, saying he was Grey. And I realized they both had to be Immortals.”

          “Which sword did he have?”

          “Oh, an ordinary looking Battlesword.”  He paused to run over his story in his mind again before continuing.  “Then they fought.  I’ve never seen Immortals fight close up.  They started fast, then... well they got faster.  The sound - you couldn’t - I couldn’t tell at one point...” he stumbled over the description, shaking his head.  “They were so fast... and then the other Immortal lost his footing.  I was sure Grey would take his head, but he just caught him.  Suddenly it wasn’t a fight, but again a potential seduction.  I couldn’t hear what they said, but Grey let him go and left the alley.”

          “And the other Immortal?”

          “Oh, he went the other way.”

          “Was he very handsome?”

          Pierson blinked, caught off-guard by the question.  Then he felt he should not have been, considering.  He stumbled over his answer.  “I wouldn’t know THAT!”

          Dawson was shaking with laughter.  Krager was actually having trouble keeping a straight face.  She finally said, “Even straight men make value-judgments about their competition, Mr.Pierson.”

          Playing the young researcher, he ducked his head in an agony of embarrassment.  “Must have been.  He was tall and thin, with short brown hair.  I really wasn’t close enough to get a good view.”  Dawson practically fell out of his chair.

          Krager turned her head to gaze quizzically at the older man.  He straightened up, drew a few deep breaths and said, “I’ve been remiss!  What’s your poison?”  At her startled blink he clarified, “Coffee, tea, or something alcoholic?”

          She quirked a smile at him.  “How’s about a Strawberry Daiquiri?”

          “You got it.”

          While Dawson mixed her daiquiri, Krager continued to question Adam Pierson.  She drew details from him about Grey, the other Immortal, the way they fought.  By the time they were finished, Pierson had a splitting headache from trying not to give himself away as one of the combatants.  He had downed two shots of Scotch and was just getting pleasantly buzzed to counter the headache. Through that faint buzz came a very different buzz....  He carefully kept any reaction from his face, but stared at Joe Dawson trying to catch his eye.  Even as he sought to warn the Watcher, he sought also to quench his faint wish that the Immortal would be Grey.  He felt guilty.  He really wanted to see MacLeod and would be glad to see him.  *But will MacLeod be glad to see me? he wondered.

          When the doors opened it was someone entirely different who came in.  It was a measure of all three people’s experience that none of them reacted in a particularly unusual way.  A boy was at the door.  He was clearly of Asian ancestry, with jet black hair, brilliant dark eyes and a rounded square face.  He stood straight, no hunching of his shoulders, seeming very mature.

          Dawson glanced over at him, apparently perturbed.  “I’m sorry, kid.  We’re closed.  Besides, you’re underage so you’ll have to go.”

          The boy came farther in. He gazed steadily towards the other two people in the bar.  Then he reached into his pocket and drew forth his wallet.  Opening it he showed its contents to Dawson.  The Watcher’s eyebrows shot up as he looked at the displayed I.D.  “Well,” he finally said.  “I’m afraid we’re still closed.”

          Adam Pierson and Melinda Krager were doing bewilderment really nicely.  They blinked back and forth between the other two.  “You’re telling me he’s legal?” exclaimed Pierson.

          Dawson closed up the wallet and gazed a question at the young-seeming Immortal, who shrugged indifferently.  “It’s a medical condition.  Regardless of how he looks, he’s an adult.”

          “Oh, I know!” Krager exclaimed.  “It’s like Gary Coleman.  So how old are you?”  She leaned over to look closely at him.

          He drew back slightly, annoyed by her intent scrutiny.  “I am twenty- five years old.”  His voice was cultured, a British boarding-school accent.  “I simply wanted a cola.”

          “Coke or Pepsi?” Dawson asked.

          The small man smiled appreciatively.  “A coke if you please.”

          Krager leaned back and Pierson leaned forward until the two were almost touching each other.  “You just want pop?” they chorused.

          He shot them an irritated glance.  “I do not drink at this hour.”

          “Don’t annoy a paying customer,” Dawson told them.  They both shot him hurt looks, sipping their drinks.

          Taking his coke the “young” man moved away from them, and sat on a barstool facing their direction.  The men knew he was trying to decide which of the three of them was the other Immortal.

          Dawson turned back to the others, amused to realize he was the only person in the bar who knew what and who everyone there was.  The newcomer’s I.D. said “Tran Nguyen”, making him Tran of the Four.  Krager would confirm his assumption, he was sure.  The question was, how much danger was Methos in of being exposed?  Speaking of which, he took a good look at Adam Pierson.For all his cool attitude, the line of his jaw was sharper than usual.  Krager, for her part, kept catching Dawson’s eyes with hers.  Yes, this was THE Tran. First Grey, now Tran.  The other two would probably show up when there was no one around to identify them.

          Tran’s attention suddenly transferred to the entrance, even as Pierson shifted in his seat, eyes clinging to Dawson’s.  The Watcher began to steel himself for the very real danger of an Immortal fight within the confines of his bar.  It was unlikely, given their penchant for privacy, but you could never be sure.

          One door swung open, and a tall form was silhouetted against the bright afternoon light, hair turned molten.  He took a step farther in and his soft voice drifted their direction.  “It’s time to go, or we’ll miss the service.”

          Tran Nguyen nodded and finished off his coke.  He headed for his friend, who straightened up and gazed steadily at the occupied table.  “Hello again, Adam Pierson.”

          Krager turned a quizzical gaze on the researcher, whose face was a study in conflicting emotions.  He finally settled on embarrassment, lowering his eyes for a moment, then raising them again.  Golden-brown met liquid silver.  “Mr. Grey.”

          Grey’s lips twitched then slowly blossomed into a delighted smile.  Nguyen, who had been staring in surprise at Pierson assessed the situation.  Clearly amused, he caught Grey’s arm and began to bustle him out.  “As you said, we’ll miss the service.”  The doors swung shut behind them.  This time, Dawson went to lock them.

          Melinda Krager’s quizzical expression changed to a demanding one.  “You didn’t say he saw you!  Or that you spoke to him!”

          “Grey came out the alley on Adam’s side,”  Dawson responded, for the other man was still staring somewhat dazedly at the door.  “He caught Adam and searched him.”  He realized this excuse was somewhat lame and the look on Krager’s face showed that she thought so, too.

          She turned to Pierson again and did a double-take at the expression on his face.  She reached out and tapped his shoulder, bringing his attention back to her.  Studying his eyes, she said gently, “He has been known to take mortal lovers.”

          Dismay flashed across Pierson’s face.  The look in his eyes turned bleak.  “I can’t.  I’d have to give up the Watchers.  You know, we took the same oath.”  The oath, never to interfere in an Immortal’s life, never to tell them that you were there, watching them and reporting everything you knew they did.  Never ever to let them know you were not alone.  The oath that Joe Dawson had broken with his assignment, Duncan MacLeod.

          “You wouldn’t have to tell him you are a Watcher.”

          A hollow laugh was drawn from him.  “No, perhaps not.  But it wouldn’t be fair to him.  Immortals who take mortal lovers...” he closed his mouth and looked at Dawson, eyes asking for help.  The older Watcher encouraged him with a nod.  “The older Immortals especially tend to lose track of time passing.  Personal change for them is a slow process, they have the weight of years in one mode to counter a mode they might wish to assume.  So when an Immortal falls in love with a mortal, he becomes conscious of time rushing by.  However old the Immortal is, he knows the maximum number of years he’ll have with a mortal.  So he makes himself part of her life, involves himself deeply with his lover, because that person will change so quickly and so soon be lost to him.  And he cannot bear not to have as much to remember as he can.”  He ended his small speech, staring at his upturned palms on the tabletop.

          Krager studied his hands, too, noting the slight tremor in his fingertips.  “You sound like you speak from personal experience.”

          “I do.”  He closed his eyes to hold in the tears.  His voice choked at times.  “I met this woman here.  Alexa.  Absolutely lovely, a face like the Madonna.  But she rarely smiled and usually it was just a polite smile.  Except she really smiled at me.”  He turned a questioning glance on Dawson, who  nodded agreement.  “I loved to see her smile.  She had a wistful beauty about her.  When I asked her out she turned me down.  But she looked so sad when she did, I couldn’t let it go.  Finally Joe took me aside and told me that she was dying.  She had cancer, and the treatments weren’t stopping it.  She didn’t have quite a year left.”  He remembered how astonished Alexa was, that someone as young as she thought he was would be willing to tie himself to sharing her painful last year of life.  But if he was going to know her at all, he would have to do it now.  There would be no second chance.  “I took a sabbatical, and we followed the paths some of Methos’ Watcher’s followed.  That gave me an excuse to take Alexa all over the world to see any place she wanted to see.  Methos got around a lot.  Paris, Greece, Egypt.  I tried to fill her last months with all the things she never had a chance to do.  Yet when the cancer finally incapacitated her, I found myself willing to do anything to save her.  There just had not been enough time....  I wanted her to be an Immortal too.”  He stopped suddenly, realizing that while talking about Alexa he had come very close to breaching his cover.  “I’m sorry,” he murmured.

          “And now you find yourself attracted to an Immortal, and you want to know more about him because he, too, can be lost.  Though there are no clues as to when.

          At her words, Pierson looked up to see if she mocked him.  She seemed serious and even sympathetic.  Nor did she seem troubled much by breaches of Watcher protocol.  “I suppose so.”

          The woman stood, then re-settled cross-legged on the floor.  She rubbed her hands lightly on her cheeks and closed her eyes for a moment.  Opening them, she assumed a wise and semi-secretive expression.  “Listen then, my sons.  To the tale of the Four- who-were-Three.  Gather ‘round and listen, I shall tell this tale to thee.”

Part 2: Riding Into the Chronicles

          Once upon a time...

          Achmed Al Khazar watched his assigned Immortal meet his end.  Ibn Al Sur and the strange Immortal had been fighting for nearly an hour.  They were well matched, both of extreme experience and skill.  The stranger was beardless, and from this distance Achmed could only identify him as being tall, yet of Mongol ancestry.  He had watched Ibn for almost fifteen years, and never before had the desert Immortal met someone he could not defeat within minutes.  Now Ibn fell, and the other Immortal’s sword swooped down, separating head from shoulders almost without a sound.  Achmed felt a moment of profound sorrow.  This was how life was for Immortals.  You fought and  lived as long as you could, against that one terrible moment when you failed in your fight, and the accumulated energy of your lifetime leapt from your body to weld itself into the victor’s soul.  The victorious Immortal stretched his arms up into the sky, mouth open wide as the light of Ibn swirled around him.  Lightning arced from fingertip to fingertip, and a whirlwind obscured the scene with  flying sand.  Though it only went on for a few moments, it seemed to go on forever.

          The sand floated down.  The strange Immortal knelt next to Ibn’s body.  Achmed recognized the attitude.  He was praying for his enemy.  Now he moved away into the early evening.  To Achmed’s dismay, there was no way to follow him without being noticed,.  He would have to go to a settlement and send his report, and try to find a way to get a Watcher on this Immortal.

          Waiting to be reassigned, Achmed took employment with a rich merchant, Saddam Ben Sur,  and soon regretted his choice.  The man was a sadistic tyrant.  Every slave in his household carried  scars from beatings.  Most of his employees were safe, though the less fortunate of them were forced  to endure humiliations.  Achmed was ready to give his notice of resignation and work for  considerable less money just to be away, when he discovered the Immortal.

          One of the house-slaves had grown into a stunning beauty.  Her hair was long and lustrously  black.  Her eyes were dark as a desert moonless night.  Her skin was as fair as Corinthian alabaster.  Since she had matured, the master decided to take her for his own.  The girl, her back criss-crossed  with scars from childhood beatings, stared at him in plain terror.  She was unable to do anything but  huddle far away from him.  The master was furious with her lack of appreciation for his generosity.  He told his men to beat her to death.  When they finished their bloody work, they threw her body out  into the courtyard for the vultures.  This was too much for Achmed.  He and three others went to  give notice.

          It was at the moment they passed by that the girl awoke.  The others gaped then began  shouting.  Achmed tried to interject, “A miracle!” while the other men went on about djinni and  family curses.  The commotion attracted Ben Sur.  When he and his men came into the courtyard,  they stopped short upon sight of the girl.  Ben Sur stared at her and a smile of utter smugness spread
across his face.

          “Allah akbar!  I am rewarded!” he shouted joyfully.  He strode forward and scooped up the  girl.  Laughing, he threw her struggling form over his left shoulder and strode back inside, sliding his  right hand up between her legs.

          Every single man in the courtyard was too astonished to speak.  Mouths hanging open they  stared after him.  Achmed broke the silence.  “By Allah, the man’s insane!”

          This changed everything for Achmed.  Sending in his report on the new Immortal, he stayed  with the household to keep an eye on her.  In the meantime almost everyone who could resigned.  Some who could not fled.  Ben Sur was neglecting his business in favor of his new toy.  His own  family avoided him.

          Despite his natural thoroughness, Achmed began to be vague in his reports.  He admitted that  Saddam Ben Sur was constantly torturing the girl.  He would leave her exposed in the courtyard  until she died of hunger or thirst.  He would flay her and watch as the skin healed.  Almost the worst,  in Achmed’s opinion, was when Ben Sur stabbed the girl and raped her using that hole.   Achmed  mentioned this, but could not bear to go into detail.

          Achmed began going out into the settlement.  He whispered about the girl to musicians and  travelers.  He was sure that as the tale spread it would attract an Immortal.  The girl would be freed,  one way or another.  He wrote in one report, “I find it horrifying to imagine that this is all her  chronicle will contain.”  Eventually, it seemed, his efforts had their desired effect.

          Foreign traders always arrived with the spring caravans.  Saddam Ben Sur broke out of his  obsession with the girl to carry on business.  The courtyard was filled day after day with merchants  and their attendants.  It only cleared briefly three times a day, when the devout said their prayers to  Mecca and the prophet Mohammed.  At first the two men and their servant did not stand out  particularly.  They wore the clothing of the region, they spoke the language fluently.  Then the local  merchants learned what they brought to trade.  They had with them five mares of the finest  horseflesh known, Caspians.  Merchants stumbled over themselves to get the foreigners to trade withthem.  Yet they seemed most inclined to deal with Ben Sur.

          Late one day they brought the mares to his courtyard.  There were few people present, as most  of the business of the day had been concluded.  The men had told Ben Sur that they did not want  large groups of people to upset the mares.  The horsemen who advised him ran their hands gently  along the small mares’ long, straight backs, feeling the silky coats.  They admired the vaulting shape  of the skulls, the wide nostrils and delicate in-pricked ears.  The men’s servant took the horses  through their paces.  All who watched admired their smooth grace.

          One of the horsemen whispered, “These are the horses King Darius of Persia carved into the  walls of his own palace, fifteen-hundred years ago!”  Everyone knew that if Ben Sur had these mares,  he would have an excellent bargaining chip to win himself real rank in the royal circles.  For the  Caspians have always been the horses of royalty.

          Goods changed hands and bills of sale were signed.  The previous owners asked to stay to see  the mares bedded down for the night.  Ben Sur gladly agreed, providing them with the finest food  and wines for their pleasure.  And in the night, silence and stillness settled upon the rich man’s home.

          Days later Achmed sent in his report.

          In the dead of night, the two men and their servant dropped their act.  The three Immortals  slipped into the main household.  In silence they killed the guards.  In silence they entered Ben Sur’s  chambers.  Then in a flurry of movement they caught hold of him, gagging him and tying him  spread-eagled on the floor between four posts.  The European and the small Immortal stayed withBen Sur.  The third went for the girl.

          Ben Sur had left her chained naked in the garden, shivering in the night air.  When she felt the  other Immortal she fled to the end of the chain, whimpering and quaking.  He stopped where he was  and unwound the cloth from his head to reveal his face.  The girl made a choked sound and stared at  him.  He moved closer, within the range of her chain.  Kneeling, he rested his weight back on his  heels and allowed her to see him in the moonlight.  An Asian, his black hair fell in thick waves to his  shoulders.  In this light the cast of his skin was not noticeable, but thick dark eyebrows winged over  black, wide-set eyes.  Full lips were in perfect balance with the rest of his features, though his jaw was  just ever so slightly off-kilter.  Moving slowly, he held his right hand out to her.  “You’re safe now,  night-flower.”  His voice was gentle and soothing.  Drawn in spite of her terror, she came close  enough to reach her own right hand out to touch his fingertips.  She closed her eyes and edged closer  until his arms encircled her ever so gently and she was pressing into his robes, which fluttered slightly  in the night breeze.  She felt his head tilt and lips brush her hair.  “I’m going to remove your chains  now, night-flower.”

          She would not open her eyes.  This had to be a dream, a handsome prince come to rescue her  from the devil.  The imprisonment of metal on her left wrist was replaced by cool night air.  Now the  man slipped his arms back around her and gathered her up with him as he stood.  “We have Ben Sur  alive for you,” he whispered.  “You may do as you please.”

          He removed his outer robe, sliding its sleeves onto her arms.  She felt dizzy with relief every  time she looked at him.  It was disorienting to walk beside him.  A  lifetime as a slave insisted she  should crawl before such a lordly man.  They were almost at Ben Sur’s quarters when the feeling hit  her, a double-impact of hair-raising scratching insects upon her skin and skittering in her empty  stomach.  She reacted immediately, fleeing the way they had come.  The man caught her, using up  the momentum of her dash in a spin.  They wound up against the wall some distance down thecorridor, that feeling gone.  Terrified that he would be angry with her, she peeked up at his face.  Hewas smiling at her.  “We are your brothers, night flower.  As you feel us, so we feel you.”

          “You cannot die?” she asked, realizing what he meant.

          “We do not die easily,” he corrected.  “You have much to learn.”

          “I wanted to die,” she told him and saw the set of his face become grim, the warm eyes turn  cold.  He only nodded.  “Where are our parents?” she suddenly asked.

          She had surprised him.  He gazed back at her for a moment before shrugging.  “We have none.  We are your brothers because we are alike.”

          “Do we have names?” she prodded.

          His eyes warmed again.  “I am Dige.  What is your name?”

          She dropped her eyes.  “A slave’s name.”

          “You can choose any name you like, night flower.”

          His simple statement was like the removal of chains from her heart.  She straightened her  shoulders and took a step away from him.  Turning, she gazed emotionlessly at her former master’s  doors.  She took a hesitant step, then another and soon was walking swiftly, Dige following with a  spring in his step.  She walked into that strange doubled-feeling again, but this time chose to ignore  it.  As she opened the door it faded into the background just as it had when Dige came to her.

          Her courage almost failed her at the sight of the two strangers, one tall with the pale skin of the  distant crusaders and eyes like metal, the other just a boy and Asian like Dige.  Both nodded a polite  greeting to her.  Past them on the floor lay Ben Sur, and she was shaken by sheer hatred at the sight  of him.  The boy had a mangled fruit he was eating off the end of a lovely dagger. She edged over to  him and asked shyly, “May I use your dagger?”

          He considered the dagger, then looked over his shoulder at Ben Sur’s form.  Turning back to  her, he slipped the fruit off and held out the dagger.  “Afterwards, I will show you how to clean and  sharpen it.”

          The hairs rose on her flesh again.  She quelled her unease.  “Dige said I have much to learn.

          She began with his favorite instrument of torture.  She slit the skin on his penis until it hung in  strips.  Then she cut open his scrotum to remove his testicles.  Her intent was to skin him, but the  dagger kept slipping in her  hand.  The boy came and showed her the proper angle.  She had to reset  her hold several times before she kept it automatically.  Saddam Ben Sur was no longer trying to  scream through the gag.  He simply made sounds.  She cut off his toes, then his fingers.  Moving to  his face she met the mad, pain-filled eyes.  “Allah akbar, I am rewarded!” she hissed through her  tears.  She took his nose, his ears and sliced holes in his cheeks.  Finally she removed the gag, soaked  as it was in blood.  He was making inarticulate noises.  She did not feel quite finished.  After a long  moment’s indecision, she sliced out his tongue.
 

          Mariah’s sword training was at first primarily Tran’s duty.  Since he was small, he could teach  her to prevent a battle from becoming a matter of strength.  Within a year it expanded to include  Dige and Grey.  Between the three of them they taught her to fight under a variety of conditions.  When not fighting, Mariah and Grey both spent a great deal of time with Achmed.

          Achmed often suggested ways they could improve their moves.  He also called upon his  knowledge of Immortal history to suggest some more bizarre situations they might want to be  prepared for.  Grey was impressed with Achmed’s ingenuity, and they soon became fast friends.

          ”Shush.  I had to lay a foundation first.  You’re a child of our time, all right.  Always  demanding instant gratification.”

          Then Grey died in battle.

          When he rose, his tribe realized their foundling was a god.  They were pleased, for they had  taken such good care of him the gods would undoubtedly reward them.  Even the shaman bowed  before him.  Consumed with his own arrogance, he took over the tribe.  In the space of a few years  they became even more ferocious warriors.  Within a century they ruled their neighbors.  They no  longer had to forage, they had slave-tribes to do it for them.  They became fat and lazy, except when  they worshipped their private god in the stone circles and sacrificed slaves to him.  He was the soul of  his people, strong and alive.  Because of him they maintained their traditions and sense of self.

          Eventually another Immortal came across him.  This other Immortal spoke of the world, even  other parts of the island where cultures had developed farming and were developing writing systems.  He taught Grey about the Game and the tantalizing unknown but much guessed at Prize.  Grey,  towering over the other, challenged him.  Laughing as he related the tale to Achmed he said, “I  didn’t stand a chance.  My size didn’t intimidate him.  He had speed and agility and experience I  didn’t.  I asked him after, why would I want to leave?  Other people were making these advances, my  people would do the same.  I will never forget his answer.”  All laughter was gone from him.  “He told  me my people would never advance with me present.  As long as I was there, unchanging, they would  refuse to change.  But the rest of the world would keep on going, and my people would die, unable to  compete for a place.  Change or die.”  When he looked at his people he realized it was true.  Even  before his first death people were always coming up with new ideas.  Now nothing new had beeninvented in three generations.  Grey finally left with the other Immortal and never came back.

          He loved the short-lived horses.  Sometimes he did not remember which horse was which,  thinking they were the same as ones hundreds of years before.  Still it was easier in this remote land.  Without his heart being attached, he was not disturbed by the changing world around them.  “It  isn’t easy,” he confessed.  “We leave sometimes.  If we don’t we could never keep sane.”  He directed  his words to Mariah, who listened thoughtfully.

          “I did not like my life.  It will not disturb me if it vanishes.”

          “You’d be surprised.”

          In the passage of time Khazar weakened.  He assembled a package, addressed it and before he  died gave it to Mariah and made her promise to send it after his death.  The package contained his  final report to the Watchers.

          She shrugged.  “That was the closest Watchers ever got to them.  From then on their chronicles  read more like other Immortals’.  A little less so, because they live alone at the ranch.”  She unwound  her legs and straightened up, stretching her arms toward the ceiling.  She settled primly into a chair  at the table.  “Once every hundred and fifty years, the Four travel into Vietnam, possibly to Tran’s  birthplace.  There’s always one Watcher among the people hired to care for their horses while  they’re gone.  Sometimes Dige and Mariah leave together and socialize with other Immortals.  That’s  how they locate someone good enough to challenge.  Since the invention of cars, planes and electricity  they leave more often, every few years.”  She leaned her chin into her palm, elbow on the table.

          Pierson dropped his chin on his hands and regarded her thoughtfully.  Fixing his golden eyes  on hers he muttered, “There’s something you aren’t telling us.”

          She looked straight back at him.  “There’s something you’re not telling me.”

          The two men had remarkably similar expressions on their faces.  Pierson started to speak three  times before settling into a trapped silence.  Dawson pursed his lips and pulled his chin down to his  chest.  Creatively, he gave her his best imitation of Duncan MacLeod’s hurt-puppy look.

          It cracked her up.  She caught her breath quickly.  “All right, keep your secrets.  There were  never any tales told about Mariah.”

          She let that statement hang in the air until they could not bear it. “So how did they find her?”  Dawson asked.

          “Khazar led them to her.  Dige was the Immortal who killed Ibn Al Sur.”  She allowed them  some time to digest this.  “He put it all in the report Mariah sent.  I don’t think he told them about  the Watchers because they never seem to have noticed any of us.  We do keep inconspicuous, after  all.  That’s why we know in such detail what she did to Saddam Ben Sur.  He was there.”

          “Why did Grey attack this Immortal, then?”

          She leaned down and met Pierson’s gaze directly across the table, but addressed her words to  Dawson.  “Does MacLeod come to your bar often?”

          “Uh, when he’s in town.”

          She nodded her head slightly.  “They’ve staked out the bar.  Grey probably thought that other  Immortal was MacLeod or Ryan.”  She lifted her head and turned her gaze upon Dawson.  “Would  you like to know why I chose this time to come to the bar?”  Both men nodded.  Dawson set a fresh  Daiquiri in front of her as a bribe.  “Today is the anniversary of Achmed Al Khazar’s death.  They  go to Holy Ground this time every year to pray for him.”

          “Of course.”  Pierson nodded.  Even as he remembered Alexa, Mary and all the other mortals  who were important in his life.

          “Actually, I can tell you something about Grey that’s more recent.”  She leaned  conspiratorially toward Pierson, who was all ears.  “He loves the play ‘Joseph and the AmazingTechnicolor Dreamcoat’.  He goes to it every three years.  After the first time he went and had all hisI.D.s changed to read Joseph Grey.”

          “Why does he like it so?”

          “I wouldn’t know.  Maybe he knew Joseph.  Next time you see him, see if you can work it into the conversation.”

          Pierson pulled back.  “What makes you think I’ll see him again?”

          She looked amused.  “I am his Watcher.  And I think you are just his type.”