Highlander fic

[rurounihime]

Title: Methos' Mistake
Author: me
Pairing and fandom: Methos/Duncan, Highlander
Rating: hard R
Summary: Methos' latest choice has heavy consequences.
Disclaimer: Duncan, Methos, and the Highlander realm belong to Panzer/Davis. I only claim responsibility and ownership for two original characters.

A/N: Thought I'd post this before I went on vacation... For all who are interested, this is the fic I was griping about earlier. ^_^ This does contain spoilers for the television series so if you haven't seen it yet, beware.

Also posted at AO3 and HL Fiction.

...

Methos' Mistake


Methos had long been aware that mistakes– sometimes the randomness of it all was intriguing, but often enough his mistakes especially– had a way of catching him up far, far down the road and trying to yank his careful, systematic composure up by its roots. There had been many, springing to life after years of being trampled under the tide of time, but he was much too old for the luxury of naïvete. Sometimes the results of mistakes he couldn't even remember making waved their colors in his face, or in his rear-view mirror, and he just assumed they were his for lack of evidence to the contrary, and because there was nothing better to do. If he were a less moralistic person, he might have cultivated the strange ratio of mistake-to-consequence-to-century, until he could predict when the next Kronos or Kalas would crawl from the ashes and remind him of his wasted existence, in their eyes at least. He had yet to see it their way.

There had been that early period of untimely death after untimely death, broken and destitute in the ruins of a fallen dynasty that was bleeding slowly into its successor, when a single oversight had gifted him with starvation and servitude for forty years instead of the velvet life on the other side of a reborn Egypt's grandeur.

He'd watched Byron fall slowly through the years, until he couldn't watch anymore and left him to do it alone instead, never quite figuring out when or where his original mistake had occurred, and if there might have been some particular wrong turn that he could have avoided. Changed it all.

The inevitable moment when Cassandra arrived and Methos had been surprised enough– and sorry enough– to let her take her pound of flesh, had she been able to get close enough to do it. He could no longer remember the exact sensation he'd felt that day, seeing her glinting eyes after so many millenia and knowing that he'd paid his way across the Styx ages ago, and the boatman, or woman, in this case, was only waiting to collect. The fear, the resignation of that day, were long gone, wrapped in the folds of an unlikely ally and another few years of coming to his senses once again. Methos had begun to feel the presence of his mistakes like a companion, steady at his shoulder; they were made everyday, and had been for as long as he'd been alive.

He had a feeling that he was about to make another one.

He didn't entirely consider it his fault, however. Walking the darkened tunnels briskly, holding a half-empty bottle in one hand and the case it had come from in the other, he'd not expected to feel three Immortals where there should only have been one achingly familiar presence, or to hear the distant ring of metal. His life of what probably actually amounted to upwards of six-thousand years when all was said and done had not been the proper mentor for walking around a corner and finding Duncan MacLeod knee to knee with a man who was just as bloodied as he was, katana carving a small niche into the stranger's shoulder as they pushed and grunted and grappled with each other. Duncan's throat glistened crimson in an arch that sent an uneasy turn through Methos' innards. He dropped his beer with a crash, and only then did the third Immortal standing in the shadows turn to him.

She was young, fingers itching for the weapon at her side, and for a moment the two combatants wrenched themselves apart and stared at him. The girl's instructor was a man, elegant in all the right places, with the closely cropped hair and heavy longsword of a crusading knight, and Methos searched for a flash of recognition that never quite came.

Realized a moment later that he didn't care in the slightest.

Duncan brought his katana up in a lightning arc, and metal met metal as the longsword came crashing down. The knight eyed Methos, bearing down on Duncan's sword, and Methos knew in an instant of instinct much older than any concrete recollection… that Duncan was losing.

The girl shouted a warning in ancient Syrian, jerking from her stance, and Duncan shoved himself away from his opponent with an audible grunt and raised one reddened hand. "No. No, he'll stay out. It's alright."

It wasn't. It... wasn't. Methos became aware of the sour smell of beer, the spilled liquid soaking through the bottom of his left trouser leg. Duncan circled, attacked, and the man parried as evenly as his massive sword would allow. Dark splashes decorated the ground; the knight's black shirt was slashed open in several near-fatal places. Perhaps they had been fatal, and the fight had lasted longer than any fight should have due to old, ridiculously out of date ideas regarding fairness and etiquette. Duncan's muscles flexed, bared from the numerous rents in his own clothing, and Methos sucked in a breath before he could avail himself of his long-cultivated self-possession. Duncan's scent filled his nostrils, jarring Methos back into warm darkness, the soft give of a bed beneath his body and wide, tanned hands over his own pale skin. A lazy kiss, a request for more beer, or maybe something you won't consume in five seconds flat, Old Man, only two hours old, for fuck's sake, his ancient life had not prepared him for the day he would come upon Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod stumbling through his own blood and losing a fight.

Alas, Mac, I'm afraid I've nothing else to do but drink all your beer. The trials of clan life.

Maybe I should just give you something else to do with your mouth, then, Methos.

Yes, do th—

At last Duncan put more space between himself and his opponent, and Methos opened his mouth. "MacLeod," he said in a sharp voice that was not his own. Duncan looked at him, wearing a thin smile that did not reach his eyes. His chest heaved in the dim, fluttering light off the water. The knight shifted stances and waited. Honorable, this one. The perfect one to take Duncan's head. Methos wanted to laugh, a horrible, scalding rush that rose in the back of his throat. He let go of the case of beer and barely heard the bottles inside shatter.

MacLeod was going to die, not fifty yards from his own barge. Their barge. While Methos had gone out to gather the means to satiate his second-most important addiction.

Methos saw the mistake coming on like a freight train.

He looked at the girl and found wary green eyes trained on him. "How long?" he asked in her dialect.

"Half an hour," she said after a moment. Her eyes flickered. There was knowledge in them, perhaps some sixth sense that, if she knew what to look for, would tell her exactly who she was facing. What she was facing, and the centuries upon centuries of weight behind it. As it was, her fingers curled around her sword hilt and she took him in with an uneasy expression. "You are his friend?"

Methos nodded, never drifting from her eyes. She blinked and looked back at the fight. Hunched her shoulders. Uncomfortable with his presence, but it was enough for her that he was the Scotsman's friend. Methos' mouth opened with an incredulity he felt through a fog. Honor begat honor, and they already trusted Duncan enough to trust him as well?

My god.

Duncan dropped to one knee and deflected a crushing downward swing from the longsword. The blade skated over the katana and cleaved into his shoulder; the knight twisted on his feet and jerked his weapon free with enough force to send Duncan rolling. The katana hung from lax fingers and the Highlander rose to his feet, circling grimly. Methos saw the feint through the eyes of one who had used it many times– I've not lost my sword, and you've no idea if I've lost my mobility– and swallowed the bile that rose. Damn MacLeod for all his blasted chivalry, it was nothing in the face of the future Methos was staring at, a time, an existence he thought he'd left behind in the dust of years and bad memories. He couldn't even remember how he'd managed the loneliness, and there wasn't a year of his life that hadn't been touched, in his recollection at least, by some premonition of Duncan's mouth on his– six-thousand-odd years of skewed logic. Duncan MacLeod had not existed then, and yet somehow he always had, as if he'd been engraved upon Methos' body and blood and sins and penance, just waiting for the right moment to take shape and mend him– moving, god, sweat-slick in firelight, the scent of smoldering coals and spilled wine, and, and him all over Methos' body and within his veins, painrightcompletecompletegods, lips breathing lost Gaelic, rising, rising on a tide that terrified him, but rising, grasping, clenching, needing and much more than needing, here was a sublime language that was older than he and not yet dead, and Duncan pulled him closer to human than he'd been in centuries, pulled him closer, closer, and held and took and rocked and gave and Methos cried out because there was no way to say it, and lost himself in Duncan's lipstonguetaste. Gods, lost himself utterly.

He still had not been found, not hours nor weeks nor years later, lost over and over again in pieces readily given up, lost every damn night, and he had no desire to reclaim himself.

His sword was in his hand before he'd turned, and Methos moved with a calmness he thought he'd abandoned to blue paint and corpses and an age of mistakes.

Duncan had dropped to both knees, and the knight's longsword was up, the light from the water trembling across its silver surface. There would be two blows, one before the katana fell and one after. Methos strode up and kicked the knight hard in the small of the back, hearing the distant snap of bones. The man staggered, and Methos dug fingers into his shoulder and jerked him around, slamming an elbow into his throat. The girl cried out and Duncan's eyes became two huge, dark hollows in his face, mouth open, good hand reaching. The knight dropped, one knee twisting oddly, and Methos drove his sword through the man’s back until the tip peered like a shining star from the center of his chest.

"Adam!" Duncan shouted. Methos stepped over the twitching knight and kicked the katana safely away from his lover's fingers. Turned to find the girl bearing down, a Saracen sword arcing through the air in her slender hands.

She was shouting something about honor. Betrayal.

Her blade clashed into his and Methos shoved her away almost effortlessly. "Brave new world," he rasped. It was a tongue before Syrian, before ancient, never uttered for the ears of this age. The girl's eyes shot wide, she blanched, but he did not care if she recognized the language or the name. Perhaps she would see the truth of him before she saw darkness. He raised his sword; the light glinted off the blade keenly. "Adapt. Or be consumed."

He swung hard and her head spun from her shoulders. The prickle of Quickening crawled up his arms almost immediately. She was older than he'd thought, but not by much. He turned from her before her body even had a chance to fall and moved back to the knight’s side. Raised his sword again and let gravity and the power now beginning to jolt through him do the rest.

Years... heads. Thoughts Methos recognized, recalled from eons ago, and newer, younger innocence, if Immortals could ever truly be called innocent. Consciousness after consciousness spun past him, ripped through him, the swell and heave of people he knew intimately and did not know at all, old Rome, fallen Byzantium and sweeping Africa, China's violet dawn and the drench and swell of the sea islands, furies, wailing, billowing, seeking a new home. Methos gasped for air and felt his lungs close. Felt his knees break as he hit the ground. Bowed as the light and strength and chaos of two Quickenings lanced through him and took him to earth.

He might have died and revived a hundred times before the tremors eased.

White light speared through his eyes; Methos convulsed. The girl jagged through him like a shard of brimstone, and he understood the depth of her feeling for the knight. Recognized it. Knew it intimately. The two presences intertwined, clawed at him, and he wrenched their voices away and plunged into himself. Pointed with one shaking finger. Look, look there. Understand.

Duncan was a dark blot in the blanket of burning light. Methos saw him curled on the ground, riding the waves of the Quickenings along with him, the aftershocks of a connection forged long ago in the south of France. Breathing. Healing. Alive.

Look, and understand why.

They knew him before they fell screaming into the torrent. Not Adam Pierson, but him. Methos' head hit something– the ground? the wall of voices?– and he shut his eyes. They would all know him. All become him. Up was down and he could see nothing, hear nothing but their rising insanity as they saw him at last, for all he was and ever had been. Thousands of years, all at once; the montage of blood and cracking stone, cracking faith. He reached for what had been his head and grabbed it to keep his skull from flying apart. The ghosts tore at their new cage, quailed from it, worshipped it, and spun round and round until there was only down. In. Oblivion.

Methos tasted blood on his lips. He coughed, was wracked again by the fit of souls. He had no idea what they saw, what drove them all to scrabble at his innards like beasts, to deafen him with their screams, and then to fall into awed silence. To enfold themselves into him. It would take time; it always did. Sometimes days before whatever was inside him calmed them at last. Energy sparked through his limbs. He wanted to laugh, and the sound shredded his seizing throat. He was no saint. Surely that could not be what set them to rest.

Perhaps they finally met Death there in the darkness, and succumbed.

Perhaps... they met Duncan.

Methos became aware of cold, wet stone under his fingers. His ears thudded with twisting sound, not quite voices, not quite anything. There was blood on the ground before him, drops of deep rouge in his bleached sight. Methos blinked and licked his lips, catching the next drop before it fell. His tongue had already healed. The delicate glint of his sword echoed like a fairy light along the edge of his vision, and he dropped to the unforgiving stones, catching himself hard on one shoulder and sprawling on his back. The walls were dark with scorch-marks, shafting overhead like racing clouds caught against a gray sky. He could sense movement to his right.

Duncan.

Methos pushed himself back over and half-crawled, half-dragged his body to the nearest wall. He slumped against it, trying to find the capacity for normal breath, normal thought. Memories that were not his eddied through his brain: a woman with flowing ebony hair and eyes like fire; five men swaying drunkenly in a crowded room; a sated lover with the body of a god sprawled across satin bed sheets. A hundred-thousand excruciating deaths and disorienting revivals. Methos groped for a familiar image– dark, wavy hair, stately jaw and hooded eyes the color of chocolate, a high, noble brow and the quirk of a beloved Cheshire smile– and held onto himself there, in Duncan's lean form and heart-shaped face. That was his. They could not take that and call it their own, muddle it or drag it down. That soul and emotion were his alone, and he clung to them as if they were breath. Treasured them beyond treasures.

When he opened his eyes at last, it was to see Duncan shivering on the ground. The Scotsman eased one elbow beneath himself and then, as if the effort were too much, he lay there half-risen from the stones, head hanging like some forlorn puppet on a broken string. Methos found himself wondering what vision Duncan used to steady himself against the shrieking host, if it was him that the other man pinned his sanity to. The darkness threw Duncan's shadow into the mesh of light bouncing off the river; his breath was an eidolon cloud in the cold air. Methos' body ached. He felt as if he were going to be violently ill. He reached, laid a palm over the mass of pain and confusion in his belly, and pulled it away again when his head spun. He leaned the back of his head against the welcome chill of the wall and watched Duncan through slowly clearing eyes.

The distance between them stretched, enormous and limitless. The tumbled bodies made for opaque obstacles in the strange glow from the water and Methos was suddenly yearning to move, to crawl closer. Knowing it was impossible; his body would never stand for such idiocy at the moment. But he needed... to be closer to Duncan, to put himself between his lover and the dead yet again. Hide them if he could, just move... But then Duncan raised his eyes and it was too, too late.

The emotion in those familiar irises thudded into Methos like a tremendous heartbeat. Duncan pushed himself upright and took in the bodies, the discarded swords, and Methos all over again.

He might... have been in Bordeaux once more, in that darkened warehouse with his past eddying around his feet in a deep and turbulent pool. It didn't matter that it wasn't Kronos and Silas lying between them. This was the Duncan of that night, and the air was thick with the smell of pain. Methos swallowed and wished it were an hour earlier.

A year earlier. A century. Millenia. An exercise in futility. What he would change, he could not. Methos broke Duncan's gaze and squeezed his eyes shut.

The scrape of a blade over stone echoed; Duncan had risen, perhaps, and found his katana. Methos passed a hand over his face and reached for purchase against the wall. His ears still clamored and he just barely kept himself from throwing up, but in the end, he made it to his feet and stepped away from the wall. Duncan stood there, katana hanging at his side. Methos could not see his face in the darkness. He staggered over to the nearest body– the girl– nudging his own fallen sword out of the way with one shoe. He knelt at her side and eased the Saracen blade from her limp grasp. Pushed at her until she rolled off the edge and into the river. Turned to locate her head and found Duncan's legs very close, blocking the view.

"Stop," came the low voice, quivering on the edge of something tumultuous. Methos glanced up from the body to somewhere around the vicinity of Duncan's knees, and exhaled.

"I don't think so."

Duncan's hand flexed around the hilt of his sword. "What did you do?" It was the hush of disbelief, the hope of a nightmare from which he could force himself to wake.

Methos sat back slowly and raised his eyes to Duncan's. Grew annoyed at the wide expanse in them. "You know what I did," he shot back. "You bloody well felt them."

"They were my battle." The words rushed out, clipped by uncontrolled feeling. Duncan's entire body heaved as he drew breath. "It was my fight!"

"And now they're dead," Methos muttered. He reached around Duncan's legs and grasped the girl's hair. Her eyes stared blankly, all their personality gone. Trapped in him. Two thousand years ago, Methos would have found it funny. Now it was only the truth. He tossed her head into the water and dragged himself to his feet.

"Stop it, look at me," the other man growled. Methos stopped, wheeling exasperatedly toward Duncan. A strong, familiar hand grasped him by the arm, but there was nothing familiar about this touch. Nothing he cared to remember, anyway. Nevertheless, Methos couldn't stop himself from dropping into the memory of the last time Duncan had grabbed him like that. The agony that welled up was appalling. He grimaced and shook himself free, then bent to retrieve his sword. The blade was stained crimson. Methos made his way over to the knight's body and knelt once more, wiping the blade clean on the man's shirt.

"You're just going to roll him into the river too?" Duncan's voice cracked, too frenzied for the control he usually kept.

"Would you rather I leave him here?" Methos gritted out.

"He shouldn't even be dead," Duncan hissed.

Methos spun around on his newly healed knees, nearly sending his head reeling, and glared at the other man. "Oh, and you should be? You would be, MacLeod."

"You don't know that."

"No, you fucking know it!" Methos pulled himself upright and advanced on Duncan, adrenaline giving him a strength that by all rights he should not have possessed for another few hours. He jabbed a finger hard into one of Duncan's shoulders, sending him back a step to regain his balance. But Duncan's strength was greater. He grabbed the back of Methos' neck with one hand and tugged him forward.

"That was not your fight!"

Methos stumbled, caught himself. Wormed out of Duncan's grasp and backed away, staring at him levelly. "No. No, it wasn't."

He went back to the knight and shoved the man's sword against his chest. Thought about closing muscle-less fingers around the hilt. Ridiculous and sentimental. But Methos tried it anyway. He was not strong enough to wield such a massive weapon and the idea of trophies was old and worn through. He reached for the man's head and settled it in its former place, looped the man's belt around the blade of the sword, and then took a deep breath and pushed. The body rolled, leaving the head behind. The sword clattered over the ground. Methos pushed again and the body fell out of sight over the edge. A splash; he grabbed the head and tossed it in after.

There was nothing to be done about the puddled blood. The cobbled stones were a patchwork of shadow and dim light, damp with river water and the chill of the tunnels. Methos turned away from the haphazard gleam of red and yanked his coat to rights. He walked over to his sword, passing in front of Duncan as he did, and picked the blade up off the ground. Methos wiped it down once more with the edge of his coat. He ran a hand through his hair, scruffing a little more violently than he'd intended. Wondering at the filth he might be leaving behind.

Duncan was standing over the girl's discarded sword and staring at him. Methos glanced down at the elegant, curved weapon, and then up to meet his lover's eyes. The demand in them was plain.

"Leave it, if you must," Methos said wearily. He turned away, catching himself on his sword as if it were a cane. He righted himself and began to walk. "I'm going home."

He didn't know what Duncan did with the girl's sword in the end. Did not look back to see.

********

The barge was warm and comfortable, immediately taking the edge off of Methos' chill. He sloughed his coat and dropped it on the floor beside the door, suddenly unconcerned with wrinkles. He had time to iron them out later. Hell, he had all the time in the world. His lips tried to curve on their own and Methos sighed and rubbed his face. He leaned his sword upright against the wall and took a moment to lean himself there as well.

The buzz of Duncan's approach grew stronger and Methos stood stock still, suddenly faced with the difference. It was the same tingle, the same comforting recognition, like a second heartbeat, but now it incited something new. Challenge. Toward Duncan? Or was Methos feeling challenged? He couldn't stop the shameful recoil that Duncan's presence sent through him. By all the gods known to mankind. It had changed, perhaps permanently. What had he done?

"My god, Methos, what in hell did you just do?" Duncan's anger was a third presence in the barge as he stalked in through the door, slamming it behind him with enough force to bow the metal bulkheads. He threw his coat down on top of Methos' and banged his sheathed katana onto one of the bookshelves. It was a tribute to how badly he'd been upset; Duncan's sword never received such rough treatment. Methos moved away toward the kitchen.

His head was not yet his own; strange sounds, breaths and sighs, the rushing of lives, tumbled through his thoughts. Duncan's voice rose over the top like some crazed leviathan, ringing in Methos' ears. "What in God's name were you thinking? How could you—"

"Shh. A moment," Methos muttered, one hand pressed to his forehead against the echoes. His skin felt itchy, as if it were trying to shed itself. He opened the refrigerator and retrieved one of the remaining beers, popped the cap, and set to work drinking it down. If he was truly going to fall back into his old existence of solitude tonight, he wanted to be sufficiently drunk when it happened.

Duncan's anger had cascaded into full-out fury by the time Methos slumped onto the couch. The ancient Immortal wondered if he had given too much ground in exchange for the few degrees of composure he’d reclaimed in the last few seconds.

"Well," he said, the tang of beer coating his mouth like an old friend. "Say it, MacLeod. Get it over with."

"I don't know what to say," Duncan spat. Methos swirled his beer.

"I'm sure you'll think of something," he said mildly.

The last vestiges of Duncan's control cracked almost audibly, and the taller man whirled on him with a vengeance Methos had not witnessed for years. "You murdered those people!"

"Possibly." Methos' beer no longer tasted as good as it had. He set the bottle down.

But Duncan wasn't finished. He strode across the room and Methos had to fight to keep from jumping off the couch and putting more distance between them. "You didn't even pretend it was a fair fight, you just walked up and cut their heads off! They weren't there for you, but you did it anyway!"

Methos finally gave up and rose, trying to keep his movements steady. He looked Duncan in the eye.

"You call it what you will," he intoned, "and I'll call it what I will."

"There's only one name for it, Methos." Duncan’s entire frame was shaking with pent up anger. Methos should have been afraid, but he still could not sort his own feelings from those zinging around inside him. Though it was getting easier.

"And that is?"

"Murder." The word cut like a knife this time. Methos winced. Duncan's jaw ticked. "There was no honor in that."

Methos sighed and pushed past the other man, moving toward the door. "We've been through this, MacLeod. More times than I care to count. Please refrain from rehashing old squabbles; we're adults now after all."

The sound of Duncan's hand slamming down onto the table stopped him where he stood. "This is not a rehash. Damn you, Methos! You slaughtered that man when his back was turned. And then you turned around and killed his student. She wasn't even part of it!"

"I wasn't planning on giving her the time to change her mind," he countered, and Duncan's eyes fired brightly.

"It— was not— your battle— to fight." Duncan advanced, his words punctuated by the tread of his feet. Methos moved backward, unable to stop himself. In a surreal instant, he heard similar words, but in his own voice. Years ago, when Duncan MacLeod's face was still imprinting itself upon his memory. Not the static pictures of a Watcher's files, but the living, breathing intricacies of the Immortal that had caught first Adam Pierson's fascination.

You can't fight my battles for me, he'd said.

But he would damn well fight any of Duncan's that he chose. The hypocrisy could not be alarming; he'd lived with that trait for too many centuries to be humbled by it now. Everything was subjective– it was one thing that his mind-bogglingly long expanse of existence had taught him– and this wasn't just about Duncan, this was about himself once again, and Duncan, and he had long since written his own rules. Finally including the Highlander in them had been the earth-shattering event of this century, and it had cemented his own capabilities and self-indulgences more firmly in his mind than anything ever had. Not the Horsemen, not Richie or Christine Salzer, or even Alexa Bond. That at least had come with a limitation. Alexa had been spared the knowledge of past sins; whether it had been for her sake or his own was still unclear to him. But he'd not been able to prescribe that limitation on Duncan MacLeod. Damn it to all nine circles of hell, he'd opened just about every door with this man, doors he'd kept shut and locked and hidden behind vines for centuries. Doors that should never have seen the light of day again, but they had, and for some unfathomable reason, Duncan had not seen fit to slam them all in his face.

Apparently, though, there were still some doors he had yet to open.

Duncan halted at the bottom of the steps, one hand splayed over the top of the nearest counter. His muscles worked even in his stillness, twitching beneath the skin as if trying to keep him in one place. They probably were, Methos thought detachedly. Duncan wanted to hurl himself in every direction, but mostly in his direction, and claw an answer from him. Perhaps claw his way back to a time before any of this had happened. If it were possible, Methos would have let him shred his soul to get there.

"Yes," he said quietly, at last. "It was your battle. But I fought it. It's done, and you're still alive."

Duncan turned away abruptly, leaning against the counter and gripping it with both hands. "You have no idea if the outcome would have been any different."

"What— Of course I do!" Methos stalked to the edge of the stairs. "You were losing. Any fool could see that. Another second and you'd be rolling at the bottom of the Seine instead of standing here having this lovely argument with me!"

Duncan's throat worked. He still did not look at Methos. "If I was going to die, then so be it. I told them you wouldn't fight. Methos, I trusted you to stay out of it, and you—"

He cut Duncan off. "Don't ever presume to speak for me, MacLeod. You know better than that."

"Yes, I do." Duncan's eyes sparked darkly as they fixed on him at last. "So sorry I let my feelings for you, my trust in you, get in the way."

Methos halted, wordless. Of course. The side he hadn't even looked at. Duncan had expected him to do what was good for Duncan, as he had. But their ideas of what that entailed were still very different, and Duncan had trusted Methos to know what his were. To act on them instead of what he himself felt. Methos' chest ached for one horrible second. But he still could not find regret anywhere within the tangle of emotion. Sadness, yes. But no regret, not even a glimmer of it.

His foot landed on his crumpled jacket and when he moved, his leaning sword slid to the ground with a clatter. Duncan's shoulders jerked at the sound, and suddenly Methos was struck by how appropriate the situation was, standing there with his coat crushed under his feet, sword rocking back and forth on the ground. It hurt.

"Aren't you going to kick me out, Highlander?" Methos threw his arms wide and a sound forced its way from his throat. It might have been a laugh, the laugh of the injured or insane. He didn't really remember making the sound, but knew it had come from his throat. "Isn't that what you need from me right now?"

Duncan's eyes slid shut. He clutched at the countertop with bloodless fingers and didn't answer.

For a moment, Methos was lost again. He stood with his arms out, sword at his feet, and tried to make sense of the condemnation he hadn't heard. He'd been so sure... It was Duncan's way. Or it had been. And he himself knew he was just looking for an excuse to do what he did best and leave. Perhaps break back into his old, still-vacant apartment for the night and sort himself out in the sobering light of day. But the world, despite romantic notions to the contrary, was certainly big enough for the both of them. There were miles and miles of space he could lose himself in if it came down to either that or seeing Duncan MacLeod whenever he turned the corner of a city street. Duncan liked the cities. Methos could like the opposite for a time, whatever that might turn out to be.

But Duncan was not responding, and the razor edge of the moment was slipping slowly into the past. With each passing second, Methos wanted less and less of the world outside the barge's walls.

Finally, Duncan stirred. When the words came they were not the banishment he'd expected.

"You used me. As a distraction. Didn't you?"

Methos took a breath and looked ceiling-ward, still trying to adjust to not having to leave. "It was not my first intention. But yes. In the end, they were both concentrating on you."

"Not her." Duncan's head shot up and he glared at Methos balefully. "She was concentrating on him."

Well. Methos really had no answer for that. His shoulders hunched slightly. "She was his student, Mac."

"For years!" Duncan said abruptly. "She was far older than a student, Methos, you know she was."

He didn’t respond. Saw no need for it. Her damned age was still coursing through his veins like boiling water, reminding him. Duncan would have felt it too, even if he didn't feel it now.

The Scotsman's shoulders slumped. "She loved him. They loved each other."

"Oh, good. So glad you were paying attention."

Duncan stared at him, wounded, and Methos' control very nearly snapped. "I love you. I love you, MacLeod! Can't you crawl past your precious ideals for once and—" He stopped himself and shook his head. "Never mind. If it didn't matter then, it still won't."

"Methos—" Duncan was trying for some semblance of calm. He dragged a hand through his hair. "One love— it doesn't negate another!"

Methos swept his hands out again, facing Duncan at last. "But one is more important to me! Forgive me, Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod, for playing God once again. But I'd do it again in an instant, and I will not apologize for that."

Duncan's dark eyes glittered with something unnameable. "So this is where we are, where you are? Back to killing people on a whim?"

The words struck Methos like a blow to the chest. He jerked back.

"Oh, yes, Mac," he spat. "Because that's just what I was doing, killing people on a whim. Of course." Real fury rose in him for the first time, white-hot and disparate, and Methos let himself ride it. "Fine. If you want to see it that way, fine. Go ahead. I can't possibly stop you, and I'm not even sure it's worth it anymore."

He pushed past Duncan yet again– all this striding back and forth across the barge was going to wear holes in the bottom of the boat– and snagged his beer from the coffee table. Took one swig and abruptly hated the drink entirely. He went to the galley sink and dumped the rest down the drain.

Duncan spoke, and he must have followed Methos rather silently, because he was close enough to startle him. "It wasn't a whim then. But it was still the wrong reason, and nothing you can say is going to convince me that that isn’t true, Methos. You killed a person who should have been mine to fight, and then you killed another person who was uninvolved. My life is not more important than another's, and yours certainly isn't! You were the one who taught me that!"

"Things change," Methos whispered, all too aware that they did and they didn't. That sometimes... his lessons conflicted with each other, even supplied different answers to the same question. Sometimes the ordinary routine of someone's life was just what made that person unique enough to be superior. To be worth saving. Worth loving.

And fuck it all, that wasn't even taking into account the human side of his decision.

Methos, the man who had wiled and cheated his way into survival through the endless stretch of possibly six millenia, knew that he was both equal to another person's worth and superior to it. He was worth saving, worth keeping alive, in his own opinion; that had long been the way of things. But he was also nothing special. He was just a man. A man who was thousands of years old, but still a man. No more or less important than any other man.

But Duncan was more important even than himself. He'd learned to live with that because it was that which allowed him to live. And Methos had not felt alive for centuries.

"Yeah, well, apparently they don't change enough," Duncan said forcefully. Methos stiffened, glaring at his lover.

"Just say it, MacLeod, get it all out in the open," he ground out. "You've been dying to say it to me for years, why mince words now? It's a lovely night for it."

"You are not him, and I refuse to sit here and watch you become him all over again!" Duncan seethed. "Not over me, not over anything!"

"Him," Methos spat distastefully. "Come on, Highlander, you can do better than that."

Duncan actually growled. "Death, Methos, you are not Death anymore. He's gone, he's dead, he belongs where you bloody well left him, so leave him there and let him rot!"

"It's who I am, MacLeod!" Methos cried, slamming his fist into the wall. The sudden pain grounded him. "It's always been part of me. And don't you ever pretend you didn't know that!"

"Yes, I knew it," Duncan retorted. "God, how could I not? It was spilled right in front of me over and over. But you also made it clear that it's not the sum of all your parts, no matter how you try to twist it. He does not rule you."

"And, of course, you're certain of this."

"If he did, Methos" —Duncan reached over and jerked his arm— "then I would never have let you into my life and you know it."

He stared at Duncan, so close and yet so far away. He did know it. As well as he knew the advantages of playing the devil's advocate. Such a ploy had kept him unanchored many times throughout the years, given a multitude of people the excuses they needed to disappear from his life. Given him the reasons to disappear from theirs. Why in fuck was he doing it now?

"Why..." He swallowed and tried again. "Why must you insist on being so fucking noble?"

"It's who I am," Duncan said, each word clipped with emphasis. "And you knew that, too. So don't act so wounded." He was pulling away, putting a safer distance between them, but some faint light sprang into Duncan's eyes and he wheeled on Methos once more. "You did know it. And you did it anyway. Knowing what I would do, what I would say—"

Methos yanked his arm free of Duncan’s grasp and stepped back. "Sometimes the scales tip far enough in one direction for me to take all of your chastisements in stride, MacLeod. Not often, but there are moments when it's worth the excruciating agony."

Duncan stilled completely, just looking at him.

Ah, and now you've spilled all your secrets, have you? Not that there were any big ones waiting to be spilled anymore. But finally Duncan was seeing it from his angle, and Methos wasn't ready for that awareness. He dropped his eyes and tried to find something that was still his, belonging solely to him, but found his coffers empty.

Duncan was now weighing that scale, between his own anger and the importance of his existence itself. He was doing it with far more precision than Methos had a half an hour earlier, and Methos wanted to scream with the injustice of it. Judging, MacLeod, you're judging again. Judging me, what's important to me, but not by my standards. How dare you.

"If I..." Duncan's shoulders rose and fell. "Methos. If I could have avoided that fight... If I could have won it, I would have. If I could have walked away— I would have done it. But I couldn't. You know I couldn't."

Anger bloomed afresh inside Methos, sudden and infuriating, matching the frustration he felt for everything Duncan MacLeod was. His mouth opened before he could think about what might come out.

"So that's it, then, is it?" He laughed tonelessly. "The day will come, and you'll just merrily meet your death head-on because it's the right thing to do, and somewhere out there, there's someone who's better than you, who'll give you an honorable death, a warrior's death! Well, fuck your honor! All your nobility, MacLeod! Have you even thought about what it will do to me?" A tear slipped down his face before he could stop it and he turned away. Squeezed his eyes shut.

Duncan's response was quiet, heavy in the stillness. "Yes, I have."

And he had. Methos could hear the truth in his voice. But it still wasn't enough. Methos sought for words, a weapon to turn the tide of this battle, something... and found nothing. Because Duncan had most likely given it thought, hours upon hours, and his ideals had come out the stronger. The ideals Methos both hated and loved him for, both admired and shied away from for fear of what they could do to him. In the end, it was not Duncan's ideals he was mad at, but the damage they wrought and the narrow, lancing pain they could potentially leave in their wake.

He’d already felt that pain once this century, and it had been far, far beyond anything he could ever have remembered or imagined.

Could he truly give voice to how it had felt to lose Alexa? The vastness of that loss still stretched his insides, vacant and echoing. There were no words to do it justice. But it was more than the inadequacy of the spoken word that silenced him, tying his tongue into coils that strained deeper until they bound his very heart. How could he give voice to the fact that he had let Alexa die? That he hadn't been strong enough– resolute enough, for all his incredible thousands of years, to reach the thing that could have saved her. Another mistake etched upon his soul and into his nightmares. Waking again and again having accomplished the task that had been laid upon him, only to find that he had not, and she was still dead.

Could he truly give voice to the howling inside him that screamed never, never again?

Never will I let that happen. Never will I be the instrument of my lover's destruction. With all my power, my life and my Immortal soul, my final breath, I will stop it from happening.

"Whatever may come," he murmured.

"What?" Duncan asked, and Methos blinked. Shook himself free from that dangerous, familiar cowl.

"Nothing, Duncan. I..." He looked around the barge, seeing all the well-known angles and colors, the paintings and tarnished candlesticks. The bottles of wine resting in their nooks and hollows and his own books settled into place along the walls of shelving. He shut his eyes. "I'm going to bed."

Duncan grabbed his shoulder. "No. Not yet, you're not going to bed until we've dealt with this," he said sharply.

Methos turned and looked at him. "You don't have to join me."

Duncan's hand twitched and fell away. His eyes were wider than normal, far too luminous. Methos didn't want to see everything swimming in them, because half of it would hurt, and it was meant for him. Because of him. Because of what could not be changed. He wouldn't change it, not after all this time. It was who he was, for better or for worse, and he had long ago learned not to negotiate with certain aspects of himself. He'd done nothing tonight that he would take back, but still the consequences, the changes, clove their way inside him, deep and aching, to be counted as yet another mistake.

Methos wasn't sure if he was the one pulling his shirt off, or if it was some ghost from a former life. He dropped his clothing on the floor and crawled into bed. His hands plumped the pillow, his legs arranged themselves– routine of a million million nights, damn it, didn't some things ever just go away? He could not see sleep in his future. Just a turbulent darkness of staring at the ceiling and thinking of... nothing. What would Cassandra have said to this? That he had changed and not changed, that she still hated him, and now he couldn’t even counter that with the knowledge that at least one person in his life didn't despise him for some reason or another. Knew all of him and still did not choose to hate some part of it. He wondered if he'd grown too complacent. If he’d ever really been able to say that about Duncan.

The barge was much too quiet. Methos tried to drift in it, but even that was impossible. The steady lapping of the water outside attempted to comfort, but he was as far from that mood as he could get. Comfort did nothing. Was there really any comfort for someone who could not die and yet still feared the day when death would finally catch up to him again? Comfort... was what one made of it. That in and of itself had been enough of a reassurance to quiet his dreams; if he only determined to be comforted, he would be. But like everything else, it required a state of mind he did not possess tonight.

Once lost, how did one find it again? Was it like overcoming the death of a loved one, where eventually the pain would fade until what had been pushed aside could slip back in and begin the process of spinning a soul back together? Maybe it was unique, finite and changeable, and once a certain catalyst was lost, the ability to comfort and be comforted would never return.

Maybe all Methos had to do was wait for another of his mistakes to find him again and turn on its head whatever life he had left after this latest catastrophe. There certainly had been plenty of reawakened mistakes to choose from lately.

Methos frowned at the ceiling, and the twist of his own face felt odd to him. What had resurfaced in the last few years hadn't felt as random as usual. Such a strange feeling; Methos knew what it felt like to be hunted, and there were elements of that. But mistakes did not hunt one down, they simply trailed along, biding their time until they could show a person that true escape was just a demon's spell, as liminal as fog. These mistakes, though... They were precise, calculating. Cassandra and Kronos and Alexa, gods, Alexa, they wove and wove around each other as if they somehow belonged together. They threatened everything he had recently come to call his own. Everything he'd been given, and he knew better than anyone that he’d certainly done nothing worthy of such a reward. They threaded through it all, not always advertently, but in a landslide of cause and effect until he could barely separate the strands. And they all... threatened Duncan. Not just the man who made the choice every day to share his home with Methos, but Methos' very existence at his side.

Methos stopped breathing. He'd never seen it in that light before. To have a person taken away by circumstance was one thing, and hard enough on its own. But to have an entire existence pulled apart at the seams along with that person... Perhaps that was why he now railed so desperately against all of his ghosts.

He'd never cared enough before. Methos felt a prickling at the back of his throat and wondered when everything had changed on him. But he could already name the day: the first time he'd felt what had become the most familiar and comforting presence in his life. Call it otherwise: it had been many things. Agonizing. A yearning he could not find a way to express, even to himself. Sweet, perfect ecstasy in the blue light between night and dawn, with the sheets and their owner’s legs twisted around his, and the dip and swell of his body toward that living, breathing fount a mere outward symptom of the exquisite thrall in which he was held. Duncan embodied nearly every emotion Methos was capable of feeling, and he had felt them all. And when his past deeds had risen up to wrench it all from him again and again, he'd fought tooth and nail for the first time in eons.

Methos swallowed. He felt like the grand culmination, as if everything in his life had been building and building to one sublime moment, testing, winding round and round, waiting for Duncan MacLeod's arrival. All his mistakes and every deed that would come back to bite him later on... They were all in preparation for Duncan, for this night, and for every moment he spent with the man. Shaping him into something made up of little pieces of everything. Perhaps that was how a person became who he was, who he was meant to be: tangled up in the interdependent knot of his own countless mistakes.

It was a long time before he felt the bed dip next to him. Methos didn't look; what good would it do? If Duncan wanted his attention, he would have it, no matter what Methos did. It was the one perfect truth of their relationship: Methos did not wish to escape Duncan. And if the Highlander didn’t want his attention, then the silence would hold more than enough depth into which Methos could sink. So he stared at the ceiling and waited.

"You're not asleep."

Methos didn't answer. It wasn't a question anyway, and it required nothing from him. He couldn't read Duncan's voice, however, and the absence of any clues as to where they stood was daunting. It was humorous in the worst of ways: he had lived longer than almost anything else on this planet, and he was still afraid to confront another human being, a disgruntled lover? If Duncan was anything, he was more than disgruntled, but Methos had no idea anymore.

His bedmate gave an exasperated sigh and shifted violently, jogging the mattress. "You could answer me."

"Why?" Methos muttered warily. "You already... already know I'm awake."

"So? Say something," Duncan grated.

The anger was gone. Methos blinked, stomach churning. No. Too much for it all to have disappeared so quickly. He didn't like it, this calm, the feeling of Duncan next to him in their bed when by all rights he should be on the couch refusing contact. Refusing words and thought. The proximity was too close, and his heart began to thud. There was still danger in the air but not in Duncan's voice, and Methos couldn't cope with the discrepancy. Couldn't take the nearness without the flash and fire to go with it. Duncan's fury did not die; it smoldered and burst forth again, and charred as it erupted. Methos had seen the collateral damage it visited on the surrounding world and he knew how to handle it, but this... This was not right.

Without the anger, there was nothing left to stop the other, more hazardous things from surfacing.

"And what shall I say, then?" he burst out suddenly. Duncan was staring at him, the hard light of brown eyes too deep for a man in his thirties. The slightest flicker of annoyance danced through his irises and Methos' heart jumped. Already he could feel his own face changing, hardening into something inhuman. It was a familiar fit and he welcomed it with the desperation of a starved man. "I'll apologize, yes? That should fill the void quite nicely."

"Methos," Duncan growled, and Methos felt himself swell under the rush of building irritation. It was so close; he could tease it out into the open, coax it into something much larger and more destructive. Bury everything else under it.

"What did you do with her sword, MacLeod?" he asked, and watched the injury flash across the other man's face. Duncan's entire body shifted, a restless movement of extreme distaste. There was no need to go further; Duncan was already tracing over whatever he'd done in his own mind, and soon it would spill out and roll over them both.

But Duncan refused to rise. It was a struggle, one Methos observed with a detached sort of disappointment. His gut twisted uneasily, jarring in on itself, and he drifted momentarily back into the tender ache that was fighting for dominance. He wanted Duncan furious; it was something he knew very well, and yet knew almost nothing about controlling. But he could ride it. Forever if he wished, or for as long as it took for Duncan to remember himself and cast him from his sight. If necessary.

The thought jolted him and he bit more words out in haste, watching the awareness flit over his lover's face. "It was an old sword. A gift, perhaps. From a loved one."

Still, though the edge rushed forward, Duncan refused to fall over it. The closeness, the heat of the other man's body pulsed over him and Methos felt himself beginning to shake. For one interminable instant, he longed to be standing again, shouting lethal words back and forth at each other across the space of a stairwell or a kitchen counter. Duncan's anger eddied on the edge of his consciousness and Methos felt his eyes begin to sear again. And at that moment, Duncan reached out and touched his arm.

"Don't," Methos snapped, yanking his hand away. He lurched upright and towered over Duncan, furious beyond belief, at him, at the condescension, at the transparent and far too easy grab for peace. "I do not need your pity, Highlander. Give it to yourself."

"Believe me, Methos, I know better than to pity you. You don't deserve anything of the kind." Duncan's voice was flatter than death and tottering on the edge of that precipice at last. Methos felt himself spinning out, stung by the words even as he welcomed them– he didn't want pity, that fucking superior ass, he didn't need it from him, he didn't need anything from him. He was Methos, and that was enough. It had always been more than enough. He would push him right over the edge and then they would both fall, to meet whatever lay below on the rocks.

He grabbed Duncan's bare shoulders, pressing him down onto the bed, and leaned in so close he could feel the harsh breathing of the other against his cheeks. He sneered down into the startled face below him. "Damn you, get angry. I don't regret an instant of it."

Duncan grabbed for him, squeezed painfully, and Methos wrestled the man back into submission. But Duncan was stronger, and the sheer heat of his body arced up into Methos' chest like a volt of Quickening. He blinked hard, struggling to locate himself again, to find the safety of his anger, and instead found Duncan's hands tight around his wrists, the firm muscles of his lover's body exerting all their might against his own flesh, the fierce light in expressive, earthen eyes. The sudden, stark reality of what he'd almost lost that night to the knight’s sword was overwhelming. Methos inhaled and caught a lungful of Duncan's scent– musk and sweat and anger and ache– and felt the beginnings of the collapse inside him. Duncan heaved upward, trying to throw him off, and Methos could not fathom being apart from him, but Duncan wanted it, he was trying for it with all of his strength, and there was nothing beyond it but an emptiness Methos had felt the brittle edges of for his entire life.

He could feel the tears seeping from his eyes, absolutely helpless to prevent it, and he hated himself for such a loss of control, for giving in so completely.

"I will not lose you to them!" The loathing in that single word held all the poison on earth. "Not to them, Duncan, you fucking self-righteous bastard, I will not watch them kill you right in front of me because you think it should be so! I can't lose you like that, do you" —his voice was breaking, splitting like dry wood, breath coming much too fast— "do you fucking hear me? I can't lose you, even if I have to pay my way with my soul, I’ll—"

Duncan surged up and flipped him onto his back. Before Methos could gasp, his lover was attacking his mouth, parting his lips with his tongue and delving deep. Methos squeezed his eyes shut as something cracked apart inside him, and wrenched Duncan closer with both hands and legs, drowning in the sudden heat. He sought for air and found Duncan's lips again, silencing his own pain in another harder, bottomless, searing kiss. Oh god, he was sobbing, he couldn't breathe. Duncan pressed his own body down onto his, clutching frenziedly at Methos' shoulders, arms and wrists and hips. Thighs, knees, pulling his legs up further, sliding more firmly between them, and Methos' vision went white at the first touch of Duncan's arousal against his. No... no space... He writhed, couldn't control himself, and Duncan thrust once against him, hard and thorough and fervent, until his head fell back and he was blinking.

Duncan's arms tightened around his back and his thigh, and he was moving, lifting them both, scrabbling awkwardly for his own trousers. Methos felt the sheets slide over his naked body, and then the cool mound of his pillow was beneath him and Duncan was again pressed against him, completely naked now, somehow, moving in short, smooth thrusts not designed to bring him over, only to remind him that he was there, that he existed, that Duncan MacLeod knew who he was and what they were both doing, had done, and that he'd made a decision. Methos bit his tongue and cried out, tasted blood, and Duncan sealed lips over his own and possessively sucked the taste away. His hand worked over Methos' length between them, never settling, skirting up and down, then beyond, pressing against him and sending sparks shooting up through his hips and into his legs. Methos clenched his thighs around Duncan and tried to breathe past the tears that were still falling.

"I can't— lose you— Dunca— oh—"

Duncan's kiss was bruising, marking his throat, and at the same instant, his fingers pressed inside Methos' body and Methos forgot about the shame of tears and simply grappled for his lover, not close enough, they weren't close enough, could never be close enough to quench the thirst Methos had for this man, but he would try. Damn everything, he would try with every iota of himself that he still possessed.

"I know," Duncan rasped. Tendrils of almost-pain, of more than the word ‘pleasure’ could encompass, were flooding Methos' body in steady rivulets, winding through his thighs and legs and back, climbing higher. Sweat dripped from Duncan's forehead and ran over Methos' cheek, and their mouths came together again for one piercing instant. Duncan pulled away and whispered, cheek slick against cheek, "I love you. I know."

Methos tried to speak, but it came out meaningless, a broken sound he hadn't known he could make. His body convulsed, clenching around Duncan's fingers, and he couldn’t stop the moan it pulled from him, or the even more violent shudder. Duncan's mouth was a tight ring of heat at his throat, his chin and jaw, his lips, over his forehead. He jerked one hand free of its wild clutch over Duncan's arm and wove his fingers into the soft, sweaty hair above him. Tightened his grip and pulled, pushed with his hips, thrust up and along Duncan's body, and felt Duncan give in and undulate against him wildly, dangerously hard. His lover let out a soft cry, bowing his head as much as Methos' grip would allow and burning his mouth in a frenzied kiss.

Duncan's fingers were gone before Methos could comprehend. Hands gripped his hips and held him still, kneading bruises into the tender flesh, and then Methos felt the familiar pain crawling up his spine and through his innards. It was glorious, stretched and taut and vibrating helplessly into pleasure. Duncan stilled for a moment, shuddering with the effort, and Methos clenched his thighs involuntarily, simultaneously trying to arch away from the pain and into it. He pressed Duncan forward, felt him slide further in, and bit at his lip. Duncan's tongue laved the tiny hurt. He gathered Methos to him and entered his body fully, rocking up and into him with an easy, practiced ripple.

Methos' head fell back, every thought and sound and voice escaping him. The Quickenings he'd taken– they'd taken– made one final bid for freedom, flowing up like the tide and sending every nerve tingling into a red-hot mass. Methos moaned helplessly– must have said Duncan's name, because his lover was suddenly there, riding the jolts with him, pulling the worst of it in toward himself. Duncan sought his hand and entwined their fingers, pressed their linked hands over Methos' head into the mattress, and thrust. Long. Gradual. Infuriatingly precise. Methos' toes curled so painfully he almost whimpered, and Duncan did it again. He was whispering utter nonsense in Methos' ear, perhaps only he could understand what he was saying, but it didn't matter because there were other languages, other ways to speak. Methos squeezed the fingers entangled with his own, and Duncan's motions changed, sped up, touched deeper.

Gods. But… gods. Methos gasped, rose and fell to the steady rhythm, curling his own body into it and driving Duncan past the point of any sort of coherency, until his lover was breathless and moaning into his throat, rasping harshly in and out of kisses. His insides were curling too, reaching for his lover and pulling warmth and completion back down into his very core. Methos had never felt as young as he did when he was within Duncan, when Duncan was inside him. As if the world were just beginning again and they were both there to see it, without all the death and secrets and happenstance it had taken them to get here. None of it mattered; he knew who he loved, who he would live and die for in those moments, and it was never, never himself.

Never.

Duncan's hand inched between them, pressing into heat and slick and sweat, and Methos was blinded with it. He curled, arched, sped away and then back again in an instant, and came with some strangled word he couldn’t remember. The moment was achingly long, riding over the world's laws into something archetypal. Methos rode it without thinking, feeling only need and want and here now. It rolled through him steadily, the best kind of quickening. Not alone. No voices clamoring, but not alone. Every one of Duncan's muscles shivered; he thrust forward and Methos clutched at him, burying his face against his lover's shoulder, and felt each of Duncan's staggered thrusts echo his own climax through spent nerves. He gasped aloud, heard Duncan make some helpless sound, and then his lover came, hard and sudden, pulling him so tightly to his body that Methos didn't care where either of them ended and the other began. It did. Not. Matter.

He became aware of the tears again before he knew the stillness. They were slipping down his face. Salt in his mouth. Methos reached, found, and tilted Duncan's head toward his lips, breathing in the gentle satin of his hair, pressing a desperate, ageless kiss against the damp, curling locks. Kissed him again. Again. Duncan's body tightened around his, surrounding him. His tears vanished into Duncan's hair, mingling with the sweat and scent. Methos drew a long, trembling sigh.

And felt something deep within begin to quake uncontrollably.

He blinked against the rush and the ceiling blurred overhead. His lover's breathing was deep and sharp, rocking both of them in a miniature parody of what they'd just finished. Methos wove his fingers once more into Duncan's hair and summoned his voice.

"My days are numbered," he whispered, in the same ancient Syrian dialect he'd spoken earlier. By you, by what I will eventually do for you. The words wove a faded and well-known tapestry over his tongue. He brushed Duncan's ear tenderly with his lips. "Yours don't have to be."

Duncan was too far gone to react, to hear him at all. Even if he could have understood. He would never have known the place he held behind Methos’ words, the fear and solace that whorled equally around him. Not the full extent of it anyway. Methos wasn't even sure he knew himself just yet. He let his gaze drift up to the ceiling, listening to the quieting rhythm of their breathing, and saw no mistakes.

~fin~

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Whew! Thanks for reading!