2002-04-09 at 8:32 p.m.

Highlander: Thy Will Be Done

Part 7: Trial By Pyre

He woke to consciousness in a room little more than a stone pit in the cold earth. The only flickering light available came from the barred window. Shaking his head free of the last vertigo, he staggered over.

A pyre had been built in the middle of the square. Now Connor knew where he was -- in the tiny church's cellar, conveniently turned dungeon. Someone was already tied to the central stake. Connor squinted and craned to see but people kept crossing in front of him, gathering around the condemned and obscuring his view.

Then a voice rose above the murmur of the crowd, recognized in an instant, sending flesh creeping up and down his spine.

"The curse that afflicts one generation will invariably pass its mark onto the next," came Jakob Kell's fluid tones. "The ties of blood cannot be severed by word or deed, if in fact your blood is that of your son..."

A shift in the crowd revealed a nightmare -- his own mother was the victim of this pyre!

"No! No!" Connor screamed, and was not heard.

Kell made the sign of the cross over Caiolin's breast and read from the parchment in his hand. "Through the infinite compassion of our Lord God, you are entitled one final opportunity to renounce all that is unholy, to declare Connor MacLeod not of your loins and help put an end to the darkness that has been cast upon this land. How say you, Caiolin MacLeod?"

His mother lifted her lined but striking visage and looked him calmly in the eyes. "If your god should persecute me into the next world," she said, her voice reaching even Connor in his dank pit, "then I shall simply have to find myself another." The crowd rippled, scandalized.

His gaze red with rage, Kell ripped Caiolin's simple silver crucifix from her neck. "You won't need this where you're going." He stomped away to be replaced by the village blacksmith, now her executioner. "Black powder," he murmured as he gently draped a small leather pouch around her neck, hiding it against her chest. "To ease your suffering. I am so sorry, Caiolin. I could not stop them."

"See what manner of men they are," she whispered back. "Do not stay and watch. Leave with your family as soon as you can... There is worse abroad tonight than my death." He nodded solemnly and faded into the crowd, quickly disappearing away from the square. Connor now fought with the aged iron bars desperately, twisting them in their rotting mortar. Suddenly, as if a miracle from heaven, one came loose in his hand, the force of his tug flinging him to the floor.

Immediately he leapt to his feet once more but too late! The corpulent old priest had laid torch to the pyre. The flames ate the summerwood eagerly. Connor tried to manuever his long body through the hole he'd created but his man's frame was too large by far to fit. Almost mindless with desperation he chopped with the dislocated bar at the ones remaining, striking sparks from the stone.

The pyre was enveloped in flame in the next minute. Connor chopped with greater frenzy, attracting the attention of his four guards. Quickly they unfasten the heavy door and filled the doorway of the room, swords and axes at ready.

He was no child to fear their might, however. He was a highlander, immortal, and the adrenaline had taken hold. The first townsman fell with the iron spike through his head. Connor caught his sword as it fell and with it neatly slaughtered the second. The man with the ax overswung and found himself gripping a weapon buried deeply in the aged wooden beam of the ceiling. Without a word Connor ran him through, and turned to the fourth with fury in his eyes.

The man ran.

Connor emerged into hell itself. The pyre was now fully ablaze, forcing the voyeurs backwards from it. His mother, twisting and moaning in agony, met his eyes over the flames. He could not stand that last look, of love and farewell. He charged the pyre with bloody sword and the crowd parted before him. Some were hit as he forcefully scattered the blazing logs with his bare hands.

And then he was there! His mother slumped into his arms as he fought with the cords that bound her, oblivious to the flames now licking and crawling over his clothes. Freed at last, Caiolin crumpled against him. The black powder at her chest caught fire and exploded with a thundercrack that split the night, separating the two of them for the last time. Connor's immortal body was undamaged... but Caiolin...

He howled at the night, mad with grief and rage. Clothes still flaming, he stepped down from the pyre -- Satan's own huntsman released.

Most ran for their lives. Connor divided the quick and the dead, cutting down those too slow or too stunned to escape him. Father Rainey lurched into his path, wielding only his cross. In the last instant before the thrust a dark part of Connor felt a rich sense of amusement (Where is your hateful god *now?*) at his puny gesture, and then realized too late what he'd done as the blade sank home in the old priest's heart.

Shaking his head like a huge bear surrounded by angry buzzing bees he wrenched free his sword and continued on, scattering the townspeople like livestock before his wrath.

Kell fell to his knees by the huge man, all his smooth confidence gone. "Father... Father, please..." he plead as he pressed his robe over the fountaining wound.

"Who are you...?" croaked Rainey, his eyes blank.

"Your son, Father. It's your son Jakob!"

The old man stared beyond him, eyes wide as if glimpsing something he'd never dreamt of before -- and the sight filled him with terror. "Who are you?" he demanded again.

"I'm your --" He fell silent, choked with disbelief.

The balding head lolled back against the raw earth.

Blood pounding, Kell turned to where Connor now bent over the body of his mother. A scream of Highlander rage accompanied his mad rush as Kell snatched up a sword and charged Connor. But Connor turned at the sound, his own sword stretched out length.

Kell looked down in horror at the length of steel impaled through his chest.

As if that last act had spent the rest of MacLeod's rage, he opened his hand and let the hilt slide through his fingers as Kell crumped where he stood.

"Connor," the dying Kell croaked. "Don't you want to be inside me?"

**********

Connor awoke to the sound of his own hoarse scream. Meggan was on him instantly, her arms forming a protective cage. "Connor, you're dreaming! It's okay!"

"Kell!" he cried, gripping her with mindless, hurting hands. "He's coming for me."

"He'll have to go through me first," Meggan growled in a voice so powerful it reached through his terror. She cradled him to her body, rocking him in her strong smooth arms. How childlike he felt now, she thought. She could feel his fear... how did this man reach him so deeply?

She pressed her lips to MacLeod's perfectly shaped ear, kissed it gently. "With Connor in this fateful hour," she whispered,

"I place all heavens with its power,

And the sun with its brightness,

And the snow with its whiteness,

And the fire with all the strength it hath

And the lightning with its rapid wrath

And the winds with their swiftness along their path..."

Connor lay utterly still against the slow beat of her heart, enchanted by her words.

"And the sea with its deepness,

And the rocks with their steepness,

And the earth with its starkness,

All these I place

By my Goddess's help and grace

Between us and the powers of darkness..."

He breathed a deep shuddering sigh. "Is that a spell?"

"Anything's a spell, Connor, if you do it right."

Her hands were in his hair, gently finger-combing it, spreading it out on his pillow. Again he'd fallen asleep in the same bed with her... there seemed to be no reason to be apart.

"Why are you doing this, Meggan? Why are you taking care of me, putting me back together?"

"What else is there for me to do?" The tender touch of her hands was hypnotic.

"You could have taken my head."

"I would never do that."

"Why not?"

The motion never ceased. "Because I love you, of course," Meggan replied in an even tone. "Didn't you know?"

Silence stretched in the darkness. He listened to her breathe like the primal rocking of the tides. She was an ancient thing.

"If I took your head, I would have the strength to defeat Kell."

"Yes you would," she answered, unruffled. The stroking never stopped. "Why don't you?"

"Because I love you, of course." The hand that had gripped her arm now slid up to her shoulder and down her back. "Didn't you know?"

She eased into his mind... he shivered to be entered so. It stirred up memories of Kell. He clamped his teeth around his nausea but she merely sat there in his soul, waiting and inviting. Connor reached back to her. They entwined and pierced almost as a yin-yang.

"Do you know how long I've waited for you, and wanted you?" she asked, both silently and aloud. "No one has come into me as you have."

"I never knew it could be done."

She nuzzled down his face, like a kitten; drew the line of his lips with the tip of her nose and then kissed him lightly, longingly. He responded to her but did not move... they spent a glorious moment simply exploring. The bond between them swelled like the ocean.

"Wow," he gasped when the shuddering waves parted them at last and he surfaced for air.

She smiled in the monochrome of the night. "Wow indeed."

Now he gently took her face in his hands, kissed her again. Her tongue flickered into his mouth as she stroked his mind from within. Now he felt no revulsion, only joy -- she was no Kell to rape him. She was Meggan; she was completely and only herself. She was his, to do with as he pleased. Meggan felt the realization come to him and acknowledged it. Nothing really mattered now -- she had given herself up to fate, to Destiny. Nothing was wrong now, nor could it ever be again.

The bell now rang inside both their minds, challenging the doors of time.

He felt her tiny hands slip under the t-shirt he wore to sleep in, pulling the hem up with them. Silently he shrugged out of it, and she tossed it to the floor. Lips met again in slowly flowering hunger as her hands roamed his muscled chest. He touched her soul as he kissed her forehead, her cheeks, the tip of her nose, the corner of her lips. He heard her gasp when he stroked her with those mind-fingers, feeling them merge into her, losing his cohesion, his sense of self...

She lightly twisted his nipples between her fingertips as he kissed up and down the column of her throat, causing him to groan softly. "Oh, not fair!" he managed between kisses. His hands came up to mold and cup her breasts, her silken nightgown sliding between their flesh. Now her tongue rimmed his earlobe, the delicate wet point tracing it, arousing him further. One by one he undid the buttons of the gown until it spread apart to reveal her chest.

The soft skin there was like velvet to his touch, and underneath his fingertips the darker areolas puffed and tightened, erect with need. When he bent his head to her, Meggan gasped aloud, then cradled him against her like a child. How beautiful, she thought; him, suckling there, long golden-brown curls floating around his face. He pulled on her greedily as she smoothed his hair back. He wanted to nurse at her soul, to draw that necessary essence from her body and let it fill his mouth so sweetly, swallow it into his being. He switched to her other side and delighted in hearing her hoarse, quickened breathing. The pulling, laving sensation on her nipples seemed to burn traces of fire directly to her groin.

Connor pulled away long enough to unbutton the jeans he wore and slid them down to his ankles, where they were kicked to the floor. She ran her fingers over the aching hardness straining the front of his boxers. His whole body stiffened for a moment under a current of ecstasy, then he relaxed and with gentle hands stripped her gown away.

Now he lay between her tight thighs with nothing separating him from her but a pair of white cotton bikini briefs. Connor cupped his hand over her mons, felt her feverish heat, felt the wet spot developing there. He hooked his fingers into the elastic of the panties and pulled them down and away. Her dewy lips spread in the night air, slick with her arousal and immaculately shaved.

"Oh my," he said, and stroked the beautifully naked labia.

She arched her back like a cat. "The better to feel you with, my dear."

"Oh, you will..."

Connor spread her further still, enjoying the scent, the slippery juices flowing over his fingertips. There at the top of her petals was the little nub he sought, the center of her pleasure. The first gentle stroke of his tongue against it elicited a deep groan and her hands sank into his long mane.

He had to smile, even as he pleasured her with nose, lips, and tongue -- some women he'd made love to had pressed him into their genitals as he did this, nearly suffocating him in search of their own pleasure. But the hands laid on his head were lightly genteel, almost excrutiatingly polite... she wanted him so much but would not force him to get it.

He applied more pressure, now that she was acclaimated to his touch. Her hips writhed in his grip, the hands in his hair now clenched desperately. He wet his fingers in her juice and when he felt her true spasms he slid two of them inside her, somehow knowing he wouldn't hurt her. She cried his name, shuddered all around him. Slowly he stopped his stimulation -- experience had taught him that excess could hurt her -- but kept the warm comforting presence of his fingers filling her passage as he rose up on his knees to kiss her.

"I want you now," she whispered against the soft flesh of his cheek.

"You have me," he replied, and groaned when her hands sought his erection. Still held in check by his boxers, his arousal was made evident by the tiny wet patch of fabric against his tip. She pulled the boxers down past his knees and stroked him, getting herself used to his size and girth; then she slipped down between his legs and fit as much of him as she could into her mouth and throat. The warmth of her embrace gave him a jolt. He felt more of his thin fluid slip out of his tip, knew he wouldn't last for long if she kept on as she was, thrusting him in and out, wildly circling his head with her tongue.

"Oh, Meggan," he said, cupping the back of her head briefly -- and for one mind-shattering instant was buried up to his hilt in her throat. Slowly he withdrew, his brain feeling like it beat with the pulse in his cock.

"I want you *now*," she repeated, and guided his huge, hot member to her waiting mound. Their bodies fit perfectly; on the first try his questing head found the slick folds of her vagina and slid in. He held himself for a moment on elbows and knees, gripped by vertigo. Very clearly he felt her damp silky muscles around him, but layered on top of that sensation was the feeling of something long and throbbing-hard slipped into his body.

She reached up and touched his face, stroked his feverish cheeks. "It's only you and me, Connor. Share your pleasure with me."

Convulsively he moved and felt that mirror image still. Even as his body thrilled to the neurons firing inside his cock, somehow it also felt the quivering, tickling sensation inside the walls of the womb gripping him. He stroked again and the tension tiwsted a bit higher... she was going to come again!

He felt the sweat bead on his shoulders as he now made love with abandon, his world narrowed down to the dual pleasure he was sure Meggan shared. She was eager, and also a bit closer to the edge than he -- and when she took her climax, growling, panting, then crying her release, it was nearly too much. Her legs wrapped around his waist even as her beautiful quim quaked around him. He clenched her in his arms desperately, burrowed his face into the velvety curve of her throat and groaned as he came... yes, oh god yes...

It was a chain reaction that neither could stop: the warm filling sensation of his seed bursting against her aroused cervix made her orgasm suddenly again; her cries of pleasure and surprise coupled with the renewed quivering of her cavern pulled another petit climax from him, which made her come again, each feeling the other, riding each other's ecstasy unmercifully until Connor felt the last dregs of energy leave his body with the very last of his seed and truly understood the meaning of the word "spent". He was wrong... *he* had been the one to pour his essence into her, give her his vital self, and with her make sex a powerful sharing it had never been before.

Darkness enclosed him as he panted for breath, felt her breasts heaving against his chest as she did the same. Their heartbeats spiraled back down from the heights. He still could not think after this tiny death, suffused with a satisfaction and fulfillment he had never known before, and a drowsiness he would not surrender to.

For she was here! She was everywhere in his mind, flickering and shining like a school of brilliant golden fish in his dark, quiet depths. There could be no fear where she was, and he would never let her go, not until the very end of time or after.

**********

It was quite a while later. At some point he had withdrawn from her, gazing into her eyes the whole time to maintain that precious connection. Now he was curled up around her, cradling her in his arms, neither one quite yet willing to sleep while they could still gently test and taste the bond between them.

"You weren't a virgin," he said softly.

"Neither were *you*." She smiled.

"You know I didn't mean it like that." Connor stroked his hand down her sleek side.

"I know."

"I was worried that you'd lost it... in a bad way."

"No, not really." She yawned and stretched a little. "It was Methos."

*That* made his eyebrows go up. "Oh really?"

"Yeah. We don't talk about it much."

Silence unfurled again.

"You're dying to know," she said at last. Meggan was smiling in the dark, he could feel, but her voice was tinged with sadness.

"Well... yes."

Her hand rested lightly on his cheek. It seemed in his mind's eye that she beckoned to the little golden fishes, and one detached from the school and came to her -- but as it drew close, he could see it was a memory.

The seventeenth century... Methos was there, looking impeccable in suit and cravat, his eyes still holding that ancient wildness. He was a primitive god in modern costume. She was there in a dress of ivory and green, hair pinned high, regal and utterly feminine, utterly desireable.

He had taken her dancing. Candlelight had set glowing until the early hours the faces of beautiful young men and women, flirting and promising with the set of their fingertips, the flick of their fans. The dances were all intricate, beautifully choreographed; an excuse for pairs to touch ever so briefly before being swept apart again. The undercurrent of sexual energy and desire fueled the body as much as the delicately spiced wine.

They finally left at nearly three in the morning, and Methos summoned the coach with Meggan on his arm. "That was wonderful!" she said in delight when he helped her into the perfumed carriage.

"No, *you* were wonderful," he corrected her gently, and something in his voice made her look up into his face as he got in with her and shut the door. The perfect opening, for he knelt on the seat beside her and cupped her face in one hand, then kissed her deeply as the coach rattled off into the night, heading for his estate.

"Methos," she said as he broke the kiss. He really was too good a friend to have their relationship confused with extraneous emotions...

He took her hand and gazed intensely into her eyes, everything in his posture earnest and longing... he was too close... his aura hung all around her, caressing her where his hands had not yet gone.

"Meggan, we're not like them, those children whose beauty we wear. No one owns our bodies. No one else controls our destinies. And no one will be expecting us safely in our beds tonight. We are free to do as we wish."

"It's not that, Methos..."

"Do you not love me?" The dramatic phrase was spoken without intonation; a query for information only. Still, something in his eyes frightened her, *drew* her.

"I love you, Methos. You are my dearest, closest friend."

"Then what holds you back? I..." He stopped, dropped his eyes in embarassment and lavished his affection on her slender hand, holding it in both his own and kissing it tenderly until he regained composure. "I want to give you pleasure."

She touched his cheek gently; he pressed his face into her palm like a kitten, starving for her caress. "I just don't know what would happen to us afterwards."

"Just tonight," he promised, his voice low. "Just for tonight, Meggan my love, and we are back to being friends. I swear it."

"Is anything that simple?" Meggan asked plaintively. Methos was her only immortal friend -- her *only* friend, really. Everyone else faded away with age and died, or came at her as a foe and died. She met with him often, up to two or three times a year, even; coming to bask in his wit, his manners, his infinite gentleness, his massive power -- and yes, even in his protection. She had long suspected he had feelings for her, but never knew they ran this deeply.

"It will be, for you and me." And he gave her no time to question before he pulled her into a kiss again. She felt a familiar jolt inside her, down beneath her voluminous skirts, a sensation she'd never given rein to. Who could she love, when all would see her as a freak, an abomination? What mortal man could she dedicate herself to, knowing he would live and die in the blink of an eye for her? What immortal could she cherish, knowing that someday he might turn on her, and try to kill her?

For some reason she'd never feared Methos. She knew for a certainty that her strength added to his would be like adding a fly's power to a dragon's. The bloodlust had lost its attraction for him; now only a lonely, debonair, intense man remained.

His lips somehow made it down the point of her chin and onto the sensitive skin of her throat. Meggan found herself lightheaded and breathless. Some carnal sensation began pulsing in her belly, refused to dislodge itself for logic or reason.

"Methos," she breathed, and the name was nearly a groan. "Only tonight."

"Only tonight," he echoed, his face against her throat. "My love, my beautiful one..."

Methos made love to those paltry inches of her exposed flesh as the coach traveled on, gently sucking on her throat, stroking and caressing the nape of her neck, lightly kissing the rounded tops of her breasts. He was relentless in his worship, and she could do no more than lay in a near faint against the cushions, panting for air in her arousal and tight corset.

When the carriage arrived, he was spryly out the door, then turned to help her down. "Your face, my dear," he murmured as he tucked her beneath his arm and spirited her into the house, away from the chuckling coachmen, "your face is glowing as brightly as the moon."

"I wonder why," she gasped. "In case you haven't noticed, you've drawn a different sword tonight."

He glanced down at the erection tenting his trousers in the marble hallway and laughed.

Once in his comfortable room he lit a single large candle and placed it by the bed. With a familiar ease he freed her from the trappings of her gown and undergarments. The feel of his long slim fingers on the busk of her corset, unfastening it, nearly undid her as well. When he had her standing in her thin shift, he let down her hair and then stripped himself down to the flesh. Arms crossed over her chest in a crazy sense of modesty, she studied him. Tall and thin, a figure of sinew and bone, hewn down to the very essence of a man... he was not quite handsome but striking, his black hair long in the fashion of the time and bound back at the base of his neck with a ribbon. Because he was bent to remove his hose he did not see her face at her first glimpse of his nakedness... he was *quite* a man, unarguably so. When he finally straightened, she had gained back her composure but a fiery blush still crossed her cheeks.

Gently he eased her out of her shift, drew her hands away so that he could view her body completely. Desire flashed in his eyes. Gently he picked her up in his arms and stretched her out on the bed, then followed her onto the coverlet.

What followed was a strange blend of ravishment and worship. Need colored and fed his every movement -- once she was dizzy from the feel of his hot lips on her throat he moved down to her breasts, gazed on them for a moment as if they holy relics, then lowered his head and plundered them, caressing and squeezing, pinching and licking and gently biting the nipples. He trailed fiery kisses down her abdomen and onto her mound, in this time swathed with honey golden curls that were wet with arousal. Then Methos spread open her folds, ate and drank her with his mouth. He was relentless; she cried like an angel in his grip, coming over and over again.

But when he slid his fingers inside her he drew back, startled. "My god," he whispered.

"What?" she asked, dazed.

"You're a virgin, my love."

She only nodded, gazed at him with desire-clouded eyes.

Solemnly he wet his palm with saliva, covered his erection with it until it glistened in the candlelight. Watching him, with his huge cock tame in his hand, Meggan felt shudders of longing. Methos eased his tip into her tight passage, stroked it back and forth while his thumb danced lightly on her clitoris. He was so big, his entrance stretching her so far -- she writhed underneath him and he steadied her body with a hand gripping her hip, still fingering her, still slowly pushing in, millimeters at a time. As he had with his fingers, he met her barrier only a few inches inside. There he waited, his tip pressed against that thin door, stroking her, kissing her, suckling her nipples until he felt her rise of passion. Then as the crest took her he pierced her as well, sinking to his length inside her.

Meggan gasped with pleasure and pain, shuddering. He clung to her body, fought it for her, thrusting, taking her until the pain faded completely and there was only that warm presence within. Now she strove with him, intent on only one thing, quivering with desire until she got it, got him, felt him tremble in the length of his frame. His arms tightened around her, his beautiful eyes glowing when he locked them into gaze with hers and did not let go, all through his orgasm, until he had emptied himself within her.

He withdrew then, held her with warm hands on her abdomen until the residual ache had soothed. He did not let her sleep then, though, but crawled back between her thighs and cleaned away the blood, nibbling, kissing, licking her most sensitive areas until she cried for him again.

He took her over and over in the night, until the candle finally died and the sky lightened in the window. When at last he was nearly spent she teased *him* with gentle fingertips, stroking his cock, his testicles, the silky flesh behind them and even the dimpled gate of his asshole until he shuddered with desire, parted her again and found her still ready, still slick from their lovemaking. She drained him, sated him, loved him completely one final time. "I love you," he whispered, again and again in the grip of his climax, and she answered him with her own love, as much as she could.

He fell asleep then after kissing her a few last times, curled up in her arms, a hand possessively cupping her breast. Meggan did not sleep, but lay there in the false dawn and thought *I know that there is more. I know that there is more to this.*

And when Methos woke that afternoon, she was dressed and had brunch ready for him. She was nothing more nor less than his friend. After the initial shock (how could she not desire him after that awakening the night before? How could she not want him as much as he wanted her?) he seemed to accept that things would be thus always.

"Wow," Connor said, cradling Meggan closer still. "I was not quite so demanding, or needing... I feel a bit unequal..."

She ran her fingertips across his lips, over his temples, and again he felt the shimmering in his mind, the glory of her presence, the deep joy of not being alone, never alone again.

"*That* is what I did not feel, Connor. I didn't meet him as an equal, nor did I pleasure him... he spent the night worshiping me and it put me at such a distance. I would never touch his mind as I have touched yours. I would never feel with him, making love to him, as I felt with you tonight. I cannot tell where you end and I begin. I felt such pleasure with you, such shared delight. I felt everything."

He rolled in the bed, pulling her on top of him. She was a tower of alabaster and gold in the remains of the night. "Do it again," he begged, demanding now, his hands so tender on her breasts even as he felt her hand encircle his growing erection. "Make me feel it all the way, one more time."

"All of my life, my beloved," she replied, bending to kiss him deeply. "All of my life."

On to Part 8.