HA SATAN (THE ADVERSARY): An Elena Duran/Corazon Negro Story 10/12
Vi Moreau (vmoreau@directvinternet.com)
Tue, 17 Sep 2002 13:47:30 -0400
HA SATAN (THE ADVERSARY)
An Elena Duran-Corazon Negro Story 10/12
vmoreau@directvinternet.com & divad72@prodigy.net.mx
Glenfinnan, Scotland
MacLeod's farm
March 26, 2013
They met again at the edge of the redwood forest, their clothes tattered and
bloody, their eyes tearing from the wind. Methos stood to the right of
Zarach. And from the house across the clearing, Corazon Negro came toward
them. Silently, he embraced them.
"Son of the Wolf," Zarach said. But his voice had no vitality. Exhausted, he
looked past Corazon Negro toward the lighted windows of the house. He sensed
a great hidden dwelling within the mountain behind the visible structure
with its peaked and gabled roof.
And what lay there waiting for him? For all of them? If only he had the
slightest spirit for it. If only he could recapture the smallest part of his
own soul.
"What's wrong?" Corazon Negro asked, looking directly into Zarach's
two-colored eyes.
"I'm sick from the journey and Naema's attack," Zarach answered with low
voice. "Let me rest here a moment longer. Then I'll come inside."
"Naema? She attacked you?" Corazon Negro asked this time looking at Methos.
"An ambush," Methos explained. "We had a traitor inside the Ancient
Gathering; it was Naema."
Corazon Negro appeared not to like the news, but he accepted it. "I trust
the traitor is already dead."
"Dead," Methos answered him touching his shoulder. "Are the others ready?"
While Corazon Negro and Methos talked, Zarach closed his eyes. He had been
defenseless against Lilitu last night, on that night of all nights; and he
now needed to feel the earth under him, to smell the forest, and to scan the
distant house in a moment of uninterrupted quiet. His golden hair was
tangled from the wind and still matted with dried blood. The simple gray
wool jacket and pants Methos had dressed him in barely gave him warmth. He
pulled the heavy black cloak close around him, not because the night
required it, but because he was still chilled and sore from the wind.
Zarach stood still, listening, thinking. He could feel the last bit of
healing in his body; it rather amazed him that he was once again whole. Even
as mortals learned year by year that they got older and weaker, so Immortals
must learn that they were stronger than ever they imagined they could be. It
was a maddening notion at the moment.
Scarcely a couple of hours had passed since Methos had helped him from the
state of mind he'd been in; then there was their battle against Naema; and
now it was as if he had never been there, crushed and helpless, for two days
and nights, visited again and again by the nightmare of Lilitu. Yet nothing
could ever be as it had been.
Lilitu. Mother. The red-haired Immortal was, as always, in the world,
waiting, plotting. Reawakened. Playing her Endgame. Zarach knew it. The
Ancient Gathering knew it. But where was she? And why did he not now want to
know the answer to that question? Why was this the blackest hour he had ever
known? His body was fully healed, no doubt about it; but what was going to
heal his soul?
The Ancient Gathering, of all places, in the Highlander's home at the base
of the mountain? The Ancient Gathering after all this time? All of them,
reunited again. No, not all of them, he forced himself to remember. Naema
was dead.
Methos was studying him. "They are waiting for us," he said. "At last, the
Ancient Gathering." For once his tone was respectful, not cynical or
impatient.
And out of the great bank of memories that Zarach carried forever with him,
there came a long neglected moment, starling in its purity-he coming toward
Lilitu in the contented years after his first death, when he had know such
happiness. Strange how vivid, the smell of her, the smell of the bonfire,
the smell of the rottenness of things, of the dark and putrid waters of her
soul revealed themselves to him.
Zarach stared at the house, and his world trembled as he thought of them,
the Ancient Gathering. The emotions he felt were suddenly as bittersweet as
music, the blended orchestral melodies of the millennia, and the tragic
strains of hate, which he had come to love.
But this was no time for cherishing this reunion. No time to feel the keen
warmth of it, to be glad of it, and to say all the things to the Ancient
Gathering he so wanted to say. Bitterness was something shallow compared to
his present state of mind. Maybe Mother should destroy them. Perhaps Lilitu
should destroy them all.
"Thank the Gods," Corazon Negro said reading his face, "that she will not."
"And why not?" Zarach demanded. "Tell me why not?"
Methos shuddered. Zarach felt his student's arm come around his shoulders.
And why did that fine gesture make him so angry? He turned sharply toward
Methos; Zarach wanted to strike him, push him away. But what Zarach saw
stopped him. Methos wasn't even looking at him, and his expression was so
distant, so soul-weary that Zarach felt his own exhaustation all the more
heavily. He wanted to weep. The well-being of Methos had always been crucial
to his own survival. He did not need to be near him-better, for Methos' own
sake, that Zarach was 'not' near him-but he had to know that Methos was
somewhere, safe, alive and continuing, and that they might meet again. What
Zarach saw now in Methos, in his beloved Kadosh-had seen earlier-filled
Zarach with foreboding. If Zarach felt bitterness, Methos felt despair.
"Come," Corazon Negro said, "They're waiting," he said with courtly
politeness.
"I know," Zarach answered. But he didn't want to go inside.
"Ah! What a pair we are!" Methos whispered suddenly. He was obviously spent,
hungering for sleep and dreams, yet he tightened his grip on Zarach's
shoulders protectively.
"I can walk unaided, thank you," Zarach said with uncharacteristic
roughness, and to this one, the one he most loved.
"Walk, then," Methos answered. And just for a second, Zarach saw Methos' old
warmth, even a spark of his old humor. Methos gave him a little shove, and
then started out alone toward the house.
Acid. Zarach's thoughts were acid as he followed. He could not be of use to
this Ancient Gathering. Yet he walked on with Corazon Negro into the light
streaming from the windows beyond. The Highland forest receded into shadow;
not a leaf moved. But the air was good there, warm here, full of fresh
scents and without the stench of death.
After twelve millennia-the Ancient Gathering!! It made Zarach want to weep.
Then he saw Elena appear in the doorway. Elena Duran, a sylph with her long
black hair catching the hallway light. Zarach did not stop, but he felt a
little intelligent shame, because he felt pain now in the figure of Elena
Duran in front of him.
Methos stopped at the bottom of the steps, looking up at the female
Immortal.
Zarach went past him and up onto the porch. He stood before Elena, marveling
at her height. He hadn't seen her since that night long ago in Alamut, when
a crazy assassin had poisoned her. Considering all the pain she had borne,
the woman's vigor astonished him. It gave her an air of flexibility and
overwhelming menace, just as with Corazon Negro. Zarach could see her
strength as if it were incandescent light. Yet he could sense an immediate
informality, the immediate receptivity of a clever mind. How to read her
expression, however? How to know what she really felt? Did she still hate
him for taking away Corazon Negro almost three decades before?
"How are you, Elena? Nice to see you again," Zarach whispered, waiting.
She considered for a long moment before answering, her only eye moving back
and forth between Corazon Negro and Methos who drew close to Zarach now.
"I'm glad you're alive, viejo," Elena said suddenly, smiling at him.
It was a better answer than Zarach had expected. One either liked or hated
Elena Duran-there was no middle ground with her. And it was impossible for
him not to like her. On the other hand, this was merely the beginning. And
her answer wasn't the whole truth. But Zarach couldn't help smiling. He
liked her manner, the bone-hard way in which she spoke. It had been Zarach's
experience that all Immortals were irrevocably stamped by the age in which
they were born. And this was true also in Elena, whose words had a savage
simplicity, though the timbre of her voice had been soft.
Behind Elena, Aylon appeared, his giant figure almost blocking the light
inside the house. Zarach looked at him as Aylon nodded.
"I'm not myself," Zarach said hesitantly. "I haven't endured all this as
well as I should have. My body is healed-the old miracle," he sneered. "But
I don't understand my present view of things. The bitterness, the utter-" he
stopped.
"The utter darkness," Aylon finished for him.
"Yes. Never has life itself seemed so senseless," Zarach added. "I don't
mean for us. I mean-to use your words-for all living things. It's a joke,
isn't it? Consciousness is a kind of joke."
"No," Aylon said. "It is not."
"I disagree with you, old brother," Zarach answered. He thought again in his
imprisonment hours ago, the memories hurting him, the pain shooting through
his limbs. He thought of the Immortals he had killed, and the ones he had
let die through the centuries.
Aylon reached out suddenly and caught Zarach's right arm gently. It was
rather like being held in the maw of a machine; and though Zarach had
inflicted that very impression upon many young Immortals over millennia, he
had yet to feel such overpowering strength himself.
"Zarach, we need you now," Aylon said warmly, his black eyes glittering
above the blue ritualistic tattoos on the lower part of his face.
"For the love of heaven, why?"
"Don't jest," Aylon answered. "Come into the house. The MacLeods made a
great meal-you know, the Highlanders' tradition of hospitality-and we must
talk while we still have time."
"About what?" Zarach insisted. "About why Lilitu has allowed us to live? I
know the answer to that question. It makes me laugh. We were spared because
she wants witnesses to her ultimate triumph. You realize this, don't you?
Twelve millennia ago I cared for her, protected her, worshipped her, and she
has spared me because she wants me for her own diversion."
"Don't be too sure of that," Methos said suddenly.
"No," Corazon Negro agreed. "It's not her only reason. But there are many
things we must consider and discuss."
"I know you're right," Zarach said. "But I haven't the spirit for it. My
illusions are gone, you see, and I didn't even know they were illusions.
Naema's death has shown me that. I thought I had attained such wisdom! It
was my principal source of pride. I was the eternal being. Then, when I saw
Lilitu standing within my mind, I knew that all my deepest hopes and dreams
were a lie! She did it so easily, while I played the warrior, the
everlasting tracker, and the trainer of the new Dreamer! And I was never
worthy!"
Zarach closed his two-colored eyes. Why try to explain it? He only saw
Lilitu's vicious smile, her mocking words to him, the blackness falling. The
cold darkness afterwards. And her final warning: We will meet again, at my
final Gathering. That was the heart of it as much as anything else, and it
occurred to him suddenly that her warning had cast a spell on him. He should
have questioned this before now.
Zarach looked at Aylon, and the dreams seemed to surround him, to take him
out of the moment back to those stark times. He saw lighting; he saw the
dead body of Yenkril, Aylon's stepfather and the original ruler of the
Ancient Gathering, twelve millennia ago in the city of Tell Halula, in the
region of Mach'azareel, the place mortal men knew as Eden; he saw the
Ancient Gathering cursing him forever. So many mistakes.
"And now, she is free again," Zarach whispered suddenly, thinking again that
he had been so defenseless against her.
Aylon looked at him for a long moment before answering. Elena moved to
Corazon Negro and held him, hiding her face in his chest, afraid of Zarach's
doubts.
"This I will tell you, brother, insofar as I know. But you must calm
yourself. It's as if you've got your youth back, and what a curse it must
be," Aylon said.
Zarach laughed. "I was never young. But what do you mean?"
"You rant and rave. And I can't console you."
"And you would if you could?
"Yes."
Zarach laughed softly. Then, very gracefully for such a large man, Aylon
opened his arms to him. The gesture shocked him, not because it was
extraordinary, but because it meant that Aylon had forgiven him. Aylon was
forgiving him for letting Lilitu kill Aylon's Immortal father.
"Put away your pain, brother. Come into the house," Aylon said into Zarach's
ear.
Zarach was on the edge of total despair. He remained poised and somewhat
collected, but his face was badly stricken, and then he pulled himself
together, and looked to Aylon to speak, but no words could express what he
felt. Finally, almost helpless in his despair, Zarach hugged Aylon back,
hard, and for the very first time in many centuries, Zarach cried in the
arms of his old friend.
The pain Zarach felt was crushing. Moments passed in which he could do
nothing but feel the immensity of the injustice done to Aylon. At last, he
forced himself to move his limbs. Zarach was as bitterly sad as he had ever
been. He was as without hope as he had ever been. The mortality of all
Immortals seemed as real to him as his life had ever seemed. And indeed both
seemed miraculous in the extreme.
As if he were in a trance, Zarach saw Aylon turn and lead the way. Connor
MacLeod's home was beautiful, with a large picture window looking out onto
the dark hills, and he felt the urge to touch its walls. How positively
remarkable that he could be distracted by something so earthy at this
moment, something impersonal, and that it could make him feel all right; as
if nothing had happened; as if the world were good. He beheld the shrine
intact again; the shrine at the center of his world. Ah, my idiot human
brain, he thought, how it seizes whatever it can. And to think the others
were waiting, so near.
The rest of them were waiting for him in the next room, the ones who had
detected his presence. A figure stood behind him now. And as Aylon went
taking Methos with him, Zarach understood what was about to happen. To brace
himself he took a slow breath and closed his eyes.
How trivial all his bitterness seemed; he thought of this one now next to
him whose existence had been spent, unbroken for centuries, researching. How
many times over the centuries had he dreamed of such a reunion, and he had
never had the courage for it; and now on this battlefield, in this time of
ruin and upheaval, they were at last to meet again.
"Myrddin," Zarach whispered. And reaching out he felt the touch of the Mage'
s hand. Then another Immortal walked toward him, and Zarach felt
Heru-sa-aset embrace him.
Zarach couldn't help himself again. He was weeping. He opened his eyes to
see the figures standing before him. He tightened his arms around Myrddin
and Heru-sa-aset. "The others are waiting, aren't they? He asked. "They won'
t give us more than a few moments now, and. I lost Naema as well!"
Without judgment, Myrddin nodded. In a low, barely audible voice, he said,
"It's enough. I always knew that we would meet again. I'd only whish that
Quetzalcohuatl, Nakano, Ramirez, Roderigo and Darius could be with us in
this moment. How proud they would be."
Then the two Immortals moved apart as Cassandra walked toward them and
looked into Zarach's eyes, then pulled him into her arms. "Even in moments
of the greatest jeopardy," she whispered in his ear, "I knew we would meet
once more before I would be free to die."
"Free to die?" Zarach responded. "We are always free to die, aren't we? What
we must have now is the courage to do it so, if indeed it is the right thing
to do."
"I missed you, old friend," Cassandra said kissing him gently on the cheek.
"I know, child. I whish that I could believe in anything other than
hopelessness at this moment," Zarach whispered.
Some small sound interrupted them. Connor and Duncan had come to the door of
the dining room. Beyond them Zarach could see a large kitchen, with such
wonderful smells emanating they made his mouth water.
"Well, Cassandra," Connor said looking into Zarach's two-colored eyes. "You
must introduce us your friend," he said. "Isn't that so, laddie?" he asked
his kinsman.
"Aye," Duncan answered.
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