Date:         Fri, 12 Jul 1996 00:06:02 -0500
From: Carrie Krumtum <carriek@EARTHLINK.NET>

Hi gang,

Well, the war has been postponed. You all know what that means...
Yep, more fanfic from me. <g>

Enjoy,

Carrie


This is a story based on characters created by J. Parriott and B. Cohen
for the TV series Forever Knight.

Inevitabilities (Part 1)
by Carrie Krumtum
c.1996

        "If you came this way, taking route, starting from anywhere, at
any time or at any season, it would always be the same: you would have
to put off sense and notion. You are not here to verify, instruct
yourself, or inform curiosity or carry report. You are here to kneel
where prayer has been valid. And prayer is more than an order of words,
the conscious occupation of the praying mind, or the sound of the voice
praying. And what the dead had no speech for, when living, they can tell
you, being dead: the communication of the dead is tongued with fire
beyond the language of the living." --T. S. Eliot, Little Gidding from
"Four Quartets"


        "Do you know why you are here?"
        A strange question, he thought. Did he know why he was here? No.
If he were to be completely honest, no. But then, he didn't need to be
completely honest. "Yes."
        "I will require payment."
        Payment. To one of his station. The thought nauseated him. He
took a deep breath. He had come so far, too far, to allow the thought of
payment to dissuade him. "I will pay you whatever you require."
        "Good. I will see you tonight. Then I will let you know my
price."
        He nodded. "Until this evening."
        "This evening."
        He left the flat on the south side of Rome and headed back to
his hotel suite. It had taken him years to find this man. There was no
turning back now. Not that he wanted to. There would be a price to pay.
He had always known that. A price beyond meager monetary sums. The price
of inhuman folly, the sum of soullessness.

        The day passed slowly, as it should. The sun trailing across a
Roman sky. He spent the day watching the sun's progress from the shadows
of his room. This sky was not so different from the sky he remembered.
He had walked the streets of this city so long ago. Why had he never
returned before now? In all of his traveling, why had he avoided this
place? The light began to fade from the eastern horizon as the western
horizon began to drip with blood. The colors of sunset had never
appeared thus long ago. The atmosphere then was purer, the color bland.
It took the defiling of the planet to create the beauty he now
witnessed. That was how it had always been for him. Desecration
begetting beauty. Always? Well, not quite always. There was one...

        The room remained as sparsely furnished as it had been the night
before. He sat in a simple chair while his host stood at the window
bathed in the moonlight. It was right for him to stand in the light,
what little light the night could offer, he thought. He waited. Once a
question is posed, the answer should follow.
        The silence permeated the room, the street below, the night. It
was a collective silence. A waiting. He waited. There seemed to be no
other occupation at the moment more appropriate. He had waited. This
night was the culmination of a long wait. He had waited on his own
decision. Odd, he hadn't been aware of his indecisiveness until
recently. The concept of such a thing would have angered him if
broached.

        "I want you to tell my why."
        He looked up at his host. "I will pay you whatever sum you
require. I will not expound upon my reasons. They are mine alone to
bear."
        "That is my payment. I never said I would ask for money. What
need do I have of such lucre. The payment I will exact is the knowledge
of you reasons."
        He stood. "And what if I do not wish to tell you my reasons?"
        "Than you must find what you are looking for elsewhere."
        His eyes narrowed and began to burn. Anger, he was angered. The
insolence of the man. How dare he demand such a payment? What right did
he have of the knowledge he demanded? He had not walked the years, the
night, the emptiness. The low growl he allowed to escape brought his
host's attention.
        "You think yourself ill-used? The price too high? I did not seek
you out. You came to me."
        He closed his eyes. This was all true. He HAD come to this man.
HE had told him he would pay whatever the price. These were his choices.
Choices. He had come to value choices. He valued these he had made. Why
not give the man what he asked? Would it not be better to leave this
small legacy behind? Perhaps that was the purpose of exacting this
price.
        When he looked up again, he noted that his host was scrutinizing
him. "It will take time."
        "I have time. Nights unencumbered. You may take all the time you
need."
        Reseating himself, he thought of how to begin. When had he first
begun his journey down the road to this destination? He wasn't sure.
When was the beginning? That, he would guess, was the moment of his
birth. Others may have argued that it was the moment of his death that
marked the beginning of the journey. He didn't agree. His was a journey
that had been molded as much by his mortal life as it had by his latter
existence.
        The silence surrounded them as he attempted to order his
thoughts. A useless exercise. The reasons were many, and none. He was
there because he had no other option. It, like so much else in his long
existence, had been inevitable. Why that was true was hard for him to
define. Choices? Had he actually believed he had choices? He had chosen
to come here, to seek this. He had chosen to live in the face of certain
destruction. He had chosen. But did he ever really have the choice, the
right to choose? That was the question he could not answer and yet, he
knew what the answer must be.

All comments and virtual chocolate to
--
Carrie Krumtum
The Nurse is a hampster
"...the greatest of these is love."
carriek@earthlink.net

Hi gang,

I have to thank my beta readers, Nancy Taylor and Allison Percy. They
are both just terrific people in general, and really good friends to me
in specific.

Enjoy the rest of the story, or as much of it as I can complete before
the war breaks out.

Carrie


This is a story based on characters created by J. Parriott and B. Cohen
for the TV series Forever Knight.

Inevitabilities (Part 2)
by Carrie Krumtum


        "I am not eager to rehearse my thoughts and theory which you
have forgotten. These things have served their purpose: let them be. So
with your own, and pray they be forgiven by others, as I pray you to
forgive both bad and good. Last season's fruit is eaten and the fullfed
beast shall kick the empty pail. For last year's words belong to last
year's language and next year's words await another voice. But, as the
passage now presents no hindrance to the spirit unappeased and peregrine
between two worlds become much like each other, so I find words I never
thought I should revisit when I left my body on a distant shore."--T. S.
Eliot, Little Gidding from "Four Quartets"


        How like the mortal man to ask of the dead payment that was
ill-suited to the task of remuneration. Yet, it would be an unburdening,
would it not? Perhaps a transition was in order.
        The truth. That was what must be given. A lie would suit no
purpose whatsoever. He took a deep breath before beginning. "I was born
in this city. It was a different place then, a time of conquerors and
deceits. The last gasp before the toppling of corruption. I longed to be
a part of the last breaths taken by the monster, to indulge in my share
of the power.
        "Power, indeed. It was as seductive to my young heart as any
physical lust could be. It was my right by birth and station. I had
learned the means of self-importance and abhorrence of all other
cultures from my father, the value of lies and manipulation from my
mother. The rising of my star was meteoric for its day; commanding
armies while very young, crushing enemies while heady with the wine of
my power, oblivious to the nature of the poisoning of my own soul.
        "By the time I had reached the pinnacle of my career I had lost
the capacity to care for another living being. Oh, I had feelings,
certainly. But only of a self-gratifying nature. How would he or she
assist my career, advance my goals, meet my needs? I had become my own
god. Then, the bowels of the earth opened up and the world came to an
end..."

        His host had stood motionless throughout the night. This mortal
was the most self-possessed and controlled man he could ever remember
meeting. Standing at the window in his suite he thought again about his
payment. How many installments would it take for the bill to be paid in
full? Until he reached the end? Until he had explained the reasons? All
of them?
        "You must tell me about them," his host had remarked.
        "Who?"
        "Your parents."
        "Why?"
        "Because I demand it of you."
        It had taken every ounce of self control he possessed to keep
from killing the man right then and there. His host had not moved. If
the mortal had sensed his peril, he did not show it. The silence that
had followed this exchange served only to punctuate his own discomfort
with the situation.
        It amazed him, how easy it was to unbalance him. He was not
aware of losing his control. Perhaps the truth was that he had never
really been in control but had only maintained an illusion of it.
Whatever the reality, it had been a hard night for him to pass. The
memories of his parents had been difficult to verbalize. The hours spent
speaking of them seemed like centuries. He waded through them as if
through the darkest mud of the most putrid bog.
        His mother was of common visage, possessing no amount of
physical beauty. She was born of the aristocracy, high station and
wealth. The marriage to his father had been arranged specifically to
advance his father's military career. Beyond the necessary form of
bonding required to conceive a son, no love was shed on the
relationship. He was the sole and only heir. After the success of his
birth, the couple spent no more time in each other's company than was
necessary to conduct the affairs of the household. His mother had her
male servants who attended to her needs, his father had his favorite
houses of pleasure. The arrangement was equitable, nothing more.
        Learning the art of manipulation was easy. He witnessed his
mother's use of this skill to obtain her desires from a disinterested
husband. Learning the craft of leadership was equally as easy. His
father simply killed those he could not intimidate. Treachery and
deceit. By adolescence he had the most common techniques of both
mastered.
        Being raised by the servants of the house, he remained isolated;
tutors and soldiers his only companions. His father desired that he
should be groomed from a young age. By thirteen his skill with the
weapons of war was a match for most men twice his size. His mind was
quick and agile, suited for the logistics and strategies of war. He had
been able to distinguish himself early in life and sustained favor by
skillful manipulation of local government to keep his name and
accomplishments ringing in the ears of the key members of the Emperor's
council.
        He was only eighteen when his father was killed. Assassinated,
actually. It took him four days to track the plot to the roots and take
revenge. The ferocity and swiftness of the retaliation instilled the
appropriate amount of fear in the hearts of his family's enemies. With
the blessings of the Emperor Himself, he had been given a station in the
growing metropolis of Pompeii. For twenty-six years he served the
leaders of Rome. For twenty-six years he advanced, took pleasure in his
lifestyle, his accomplishments, his acclaim, his wealth. For twenty-six
years he nurtured the bonds that would lead him to the senate and,
perhaps, beyond.
        For twenty-six years he had asked himself if his life was full
enough, if the power was power enough, if the horizon was hopeful
enough. He had a daughter, the gem of his secret horde. He had never
lost a battle, not one. He was envied, feared, respected, revered and
even worshipped. None of it mattered at all.
        In the end, it all proved to be nothing but folly. Dust in the
balance of human affairs, wiped from the face of the earth by the winds
of fate. All the preparations, the schemes, the planning, the effort,
the battles, the scars, the secret dreams...all of it was pointless.
Swallowed up by the darkness of the night and swept into history without
ceremony. What use had he, after the advent of death, for the trappings
of mortality? Foolishness and folly, meat for the weak and doomed.

        The sun was at its zenith. He was tired. Sleep would not come to
him. It had not come to him in some time. He decided to lie down anyway.
He would give himself every opportunity to rest. He knew that he would
not. That did not matter now. He left the window as the sun continued
its trek across the sky above. A trek he had forgotten that he enjoyed
witnessing, until now.


All comments and virtual chocolate to
--
Carrie Krumtum
The Nurse is a hampster
"...the greatest of these is love."
carriek@earthlink.net

Hi gang,

You should know that this portion of the story, and most likely the next
several portions, contain spoilers for AtA and LK.

This particular portion generated a lot of discussion from my beta
readers. I hope you find it as thought provoking. It was a hard piece
to write. Those of you who write fanfic will know what I mean when I say
that this portion of the story was a real labor.

Enjoy.

Carrie

This is a story based on characters created by J. Parriott and B. Cohen
for the TV series Forever Knight.

Inevitabilities (Part 3)
by Carrie Krumtum


        "There are three conditions which often look alike yet differ
completely, flourish in the same hedgerow: attachment to self and to
things and to persons, detachment from self and from things and from
persons; and, growing between them, indifference which resembles the
others as death resembles life, being between two lives - unflowering,
between the live and the dead nettle. This is the use of memory: for
liberation - not less of love but expanding of love beyond desire, and
so liberation from the future as well as the past." --T. S. Eliot,
Little Gidding from "Four Quartets"


        "Tell me of your daughter."
        He remained silent. The night was steeped in black. A clouded
sky obliterated the moonlight that had illuminated the face of his
tormentor at their previous meetings. The silence was not what the
mortal was after.
        "You killed her."
        "Yes."
        "Explain."
        Damn him.

        The places, faces and races of peoples and nations destroyed by
his armies played out in his words like the scenes of playwrights
performed for audiences of the dead. He alone knew the true reality of
those terrors; the death, destruction, desecration of all that was holy
about a people. Their temples, their women and children, their old and
wise, their palaces and leaders, their young men of promise, everything
would be wrested from them and all, torn to pieces. He had made the very
streets run with blood, heard cries of anguish that made him laugh with
a pleasure that had ceased to surprise his contemporaries. He would have
marched to the ends of the earth in his quest to accomplish the
Emperor's goal of world domination. The more ruthless his attacks, the
more glory he acquired. Each new campaign, each new land he invaded,
each new culture crushed made him want more. He longed for the next
battle, the next foe to vanquish, the next nation to bring to it's
knees.
        Through it all, he longed for the improvement of his personal
estate. And it did improve. With the victories came rewards. Pleasures
to enjoy, riches and power to accrue, alliances to build and guard. The
games of mortal men. Conflict and conquering, villainy and intrigue. It
was how he defined the measure of his life.
        She provided the smallest of counterbalances. Her birth had
staked out a place of warmth in his heart that seemed unable to cool to
stone, even at the peak of his career. The time he spent with her was
time he had treasured like the finest of wines or silks or waters. She
was a reward as well. It was a matter of politics, of practicality, that
prevented him from proclaiming her paternity. All his concern was
wasted, he had realized. Her paternity would never be questioned.

        "You loved her."
        "I was her father."
        "You loved her."
        Damn him to hell.
        "Yes."

        The chair seemed even more uncomfortable now than it had the
night before. Why must he continually seek details? Why the details that
caused the most pain? Tore the largest holes in his cold heart?
        The answer was known to him. It was the real payment -- true
agony as payment for services to be rendered. Perhaps this was the
training ground for eternal damnation. Yet, he doubted that any pain
from damnation could be worse than the ache these remembrances caused
him. An ache so overpowering it terrified him with its depth. Fathomless
and black.

        "Tell me."
        He told him. "Divia was my child. Her laugh was light and her
spirit was free. She had her mother's beauty, not the plain visage of my
ancestral strain. The sight of her was enough to elicit true joy from a
warrior's heart.
        "Of course, I could not claim her as my own. She was the product
of a union that would not stand the light of my position and prospects.
That did not change the fact that she was mine. She was a true treasure,
the one thing from my mortal life that carried into my existence after.
It was because of her that I survived at all. I still do not know if it
was out of love or hatred that she saved me that day. Perhaps I will
never know.
        "I suppose that speculation on the matter is pointless. The life
I had lived, the power I had attained, the notoriety, the conquests --
all paled in comparison to the gift she gave me, the curse she inflicted
on me, the glorious darkness.
        "And, in the end, she proved to be every whit my progeny. That
is the horror, the tragedy of it. When, at the end of her existence, I
looked into her face, I found only my own evil there. All the evil I had
propagated during my mortal life. It was all there, in her dying face,
her dying cry."
        He noted that his eyes were closed. He did not remember closing
them. Opening them, he was surprised to find that his internal visions
seemed darker than the black of this room of inquisition.

        "She brought you over."
        "Yes, she saved me."
        "You consider what she did a salvation."
        "No."
        "What then?"
        "A liberation."
        "Then you have lied to me."
        "Why do you say that?"
        "You do not know why you are here."

        He walked back to his suite. Against his will, his thoughts
returned to his tormentor's challenge. It was the truth, he did not know
why he had come to this place. The stones passed beneath his feet as he
made slow progress away from the southside flat. He walked slowly, like
an old man would. This morning, he felt old.
        The life Divia had given him was, at first, the sweetest of
existences. All the things he had coveted were his to take. No more
victories to win, no more mindless superiors to impress, no more vain
men to lie to. He was his daughter's creation and she his. Together they
walked away from mortality and into eternity. Those first years of
discovery and exploration were the most exhilarating he had ever
experienced, before or since. And she paid for them with her life,
twice.
        When faced with the reality of her soullessness, the legacy of
his own impression on her, he had been so horrified that the destruction
of the monster was the only solution he could think of. The beast of his
making finally killed by a good that would not be destroyed at his
hands. One child a demon, the other so different. Both gone.
        He walked slowly and the sun began to rise.

All comments and virtual chocolate to
--
Carrie Krumtum
The Nurse is a hampster
"...the greatest of these is love."
carriek@earthlink.net

Inevitabilities (Part 4)
by Carrie Krumtum


        "History may be servitude, history may be freedom. See, now they
vanish, the faces and places, with the self which, as it could, loved
them, to become renewed, transfigured, in another pattern." --T. S.
Eliot, Little Gidding from "Four Quartets"

        The discomfort from his wounds had vanished quickly. The
blackness of his heart had nearly blinded him to his danger until he
felt the burning. The day had been spent in sleep. The first sleep he
had been granted in weeks.
        He stood staring out at the dusk.
        Tears. How long had it been since he had shed tears? It was a
reflex, a physiologic response to the pain. The dead are not supposed to
experience pain. Lies, untruths. It was far more than reflex, and the
dead and cold heart hurts every bit as much as one of warm flesh.
Perhaps even worse, in that the rewarming of long cold tissue is an
excruciating operation. Like the recovery from frostbite, so this
renewing of his pain tore at his resolve and threatened to end the
endeavor altogether.
        The thought of his own cowardice sickened him. What he was, what
he had been, everything that defined him found his willingness to walk
away now...shameful. Yet, he entertained the notion.

        "You have come back."
        "Yes."
        "I didn't think you would."
        "I almost did not."
        "Do you know why you are here?"
        "No."
        "Then we are ready to proceed."

        It was raining. The sound the drops made on the roof of the flat
drummed in his ears. He waited for his host. The mortal had taken a seat
this time. The chair he occupied opposed the window and he searched the
wet night with piercing eyes. His host did not ask nor suggest direction
for the discourse tonight.
        He decided to begin where he felt some measure of comfort and
safety. "It was several centuries before I brought anyone across. There
was much to learn, to understand about the nature of who I had become.
Mastery demands study. I wanted to be the master. Having no creator to
look to for answers, I sought them myself.
        "After learning from others of my kind, by witnessing their
failures and successes, their anger and joy, I decided to begin my own
family. There were not many of us at that time. Mankind could not
support a large population. I learned the importance of choosing my
material wisely. The strong of heart, the bright of mind, the determined
spirit, that is what was necessary to make the transition, or so I
believed.
        "I have learned that I was a fool. I had become master of
nothing."

        "How many have there been?"
        "Many."
        "How many survive?"
        "None."
        "Are you certain?"
        His eyes narrowed as he regarded the mortal. How could he not be
certain? He took a deep breath. There was an annoying incredulity that
afflicted mortal men in this regard. The nature of his relationship with
those to whom he had offered eternity was far different from anything
known to them. "Yes."
        "Tell me about their deaths."

        The first person he had brought across was a young man, a
musician in Paris. The young man was dying from a disease of
indiscretion. The decision had been based on the pleasure the musician's
skill with the stringed instruments had given him. Unfortunately, his
young friend had been too careless and managed to get himself killed by
the husband of a woman he was attempting to bring across. The stake had
taken him quickly.
        The time that they had shared together was brief, only
eighty-one years. Still, in that brief time he had grown accustomed to
the companionship and had learned to like the role of mentor. Over the
next three centuries he brought across two more young men. One, a
soldier who had distinguished himself with honor. The other a defrocked
priest, the perfect irony. The soldier was taken from him by another of
their kind after an argument. He had killed the offending immortal
immediately. His creations were not to be trifled with, by anyone.
        The ex-priest had been unable to deal with his new nature and
had walked into a sunrise. The irony in that situation was long gone.
        His next creation was his first true success. She had been the
companion he had longed for. A woman, a prostitute, born of noble blood
with a fire of hatred in her heart and a desire for revenge. Janette had
proved to be so much more than the others he had made before her. She
was anxious to learn, obedient to his wishes, lovely beyond the gods and
willing to walk the centuries with him. He would have done almost
anything for her, given her anything she desired.       In fact, that is
exactly what he had done. Given her the desire of her heart, and it
eventually destroyed her.

        "You gave her Nicholas."
        "How do you know about him?"
        "I know a great many things."
        "Nicholas was a gift to her. She desired him."
        "You desired him as well."
        He paused. This had been hard for him to see. For centuries he
had wanted to believe that bringing Nicholas across had been a mere gift
for Janette. By now, he knew that was not true. He had seen the noble
heart, the anger at injustice, the weariness from battle and too long
witnessing man's inhumanity to man in this crusader, the turmoil. He had
also noted a desire to know the darkness, a willingness to be seduced by
it. All these qualities had attracted him to Nicholas, and more. "Yes."
        "Tell me about him."

        How does one talk about the light that would not be
extinguished? The noble soul that would not die? Betrayal of the good
that refused to be vanquished?
        It was conceit. An experiment of sorts. A new conquest.
Subversion, that is what he attempted. But, how dark does the darkness
have to be to put out the smallest light? What he had found was that
there wasn't darkness enough in all the universe to accomplish the task
he had set before himself. He had come to understand that there never
could be. Not in any eternity.

All comments and virtual chocolate to
--
Carrie Krumtum
The Nurse is a hampster
"...the greatest of these is love."
carriek@earthlink.net

Inevitabilities (Part 5)
by Carrie Krumtum


        "Whatever we inherit from the fortunate we have taken from the
defeated what they had to leave us - a symbol: a symbol perfected in
death. And all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well by
the purification of the motive in the ground of our beseeching." --T. S.
Eliot, Little Gidding from "Four Quartets"

        "It was an attempt at corruption, really. An attempt. Nothing
more. At one time, I would have insisted that I had been successful. It
would have been a lie. But then, I had grown accustomed to my own brand
of self-deception.
        "You see, it was an attempt to extinguish the light, to entice
the noble soul to step out of the light and into the darkness. I was so
great a fool as to believe myself accomplished in this particular
matter. Now, I am alone.
        "The real problem arises when one attempts to subdue the soul of
an honorable and noble spirit. It is a task that cannot be accomplished.
Not by my kind. Not by me. Not with him. All the signs of my ultimate
defeat where there, from the very beginning. I was too arrogant to see
them, to recognize them for what they were. Over the years, it was so
easy to lose sight of the truth in the midst of the struggle. For that
is what I did, struggle, in vain. Attempting, for the sake of my own
vanity, to force the noble soul to accept the darkness, to reject the
light, as I had. Folly, pure and simple.
        "It was the nature of his soul to be unable to relinquish the
light. He did not have that much darkness within him. I have come to
understand, far too late, that his light was his soul. It was the nature
of who he was. His very spirit depended on its glow. The darkness could
beckon to him and there may have even been a part of him that wished for
the darkness, but not his very soul. For him, it was the pain of too
much death, battle, regret, betrayal...life. He was merely weary, no
more. It is when we are weary that we submit to seduction. When we lack
the strength of will to fight any longer. He still possessed some
measure of will. His seduction was never complete. He was never able to
relinquish his light, nor to extinguish it.
        "We tried, he and I, sometimes as allies, sometimes as
adversaries. We tried to rid his soul of the light. The light in him
would not die, could not die. Its death meant his death. It was only at
the end that I knew this to be true. Perhaps he became aware of this as
well, at the end. I fancy that he did.
        "His was a soul full of the guilt caused by his weakness and
vulnerability to the seduction. Guilt compounded by our attempts to
extinguish his light. An impossible task that only fed the monster of
his guilt, until that guilt finally consumed him. Consumed them both,
really. You see, he could not live without his light. He could no longer
suffer the darkness. What pain those long centuries of struggle must
have been for him. What pain the conflict must have wrought on the very
fabric of his spirit.
        "The conflict impacted so many others as well. Janette, his
mortal love..."

        "You."
        He paused.
        "You loved him."
        He swallowed. It amazed him that his heart did not burst within
his chest, so strong was the ache.
        "You must tell me."
        "I will tell you," he whispered. The rain had stopped but his
face was wet.

        Eight centuries was less than a third of his memories, yet this
time burned the brightest for him. So much of what had changed him had
happened in those centuries. He had learned more about himself, about
the nature of his kind, about the truly noble heart, about Providence.
All that had gone before and come after seemed to him dull and lifeless.
        There had been brief periods of tranquility. When he had brought
Francesca across he had sensed a kindred spirit in her. Even that
relationship was overshadowed by Nicholas. Nicholas had killed her. The
callous way she devoured the brightest of mortal souls had sickened and
repelled his son. That incident was so indicative of the nature of
Nicholas' difference from others of their kind. He knew what he was and
could not continue to ascribe to the morality that permitted the
butchery, the mindless killing.
        And Janette. She had been consumed by the idea of redemption.
Her light had been rekindled and then taken from her by the flame. The
soul she had seduced had turned out to be the true seducer. He had
called the darkness back into the light.
        He had brought others across since Nicholas -- the Barber,
killed by a hunter; Rasputin, killed by his son in an attempt to save
the life of a nation; the young Daniel, killed by a carouche whom Daniel
had taunted; the Vietnamese, who had ended his struggle and then ended
his existence; the young Dr. Holme, who had refused to live as a vampire
must and lived only a year in the darkness; the old Don, leader of a
crime family, brought across to set a grandson free, he had died during
the plague of his people that nearly killed all of his family as Alyce
Hunter, the museum curator, and Alexandra had been. That plague had very
nearly killed him and his son as well.

        "Your son."
        "Yes."
        "You call no other that you have made by that name."
        "No."
        "You loved him."
        "Yes."
        "You killed him."
        "Yes." He took a deep breath. "It was an act of mercy, of
friendship, of love. It was my last gift to him."
        "And it hurt."
        "Yes."
        "Would you do it again, if asked?"
        Would he give Nicholas his wish? Would he allow his son his
faith? Would he rip his own world apart to set his son free? "Yes."
        "Then you have learned much."

        He had learned much. He had learned that he had played at
omnipotence but had been nothing but arrogant. He had believed himself
superior but had found himself wanting. He had believed that his
existence was desirable but had found it to be wearing. He had believed
that eternity was a blessing but he had found it a curse. He had
believed that the darkness was preferable but had found it was not. What
he had learned was that he had been a fool.
        As he stood watching the sun sweep away the dark clouds of the
night and herald the light of day, he nodded. Now, he had finally
achieved a measure of comprehension. The irony of his ancient existence
was that the one soul he could not vanquish had understood all along.
The one goodness he could not overcome had finally won the battle.
Nicholas had known. Providence will not allow the darkness to reign
forever. The light of love and benevolence will always be victorious.
Inevitably.


All comments and virtual chocolate to
--
Carrie Krumtum
The Nurse is a hampster
"...the greatest of these is love."
carriek@earthlink.net

Inevitabilities (Part 6)
by Carrie Krumtum


        "The dove descending breaks the air with flame of incandescent
terror of which the tongues declare the one discharge from sin and
error. The only hope, or else despair lies in the choice of pyre or
pyre- to be redeemed from fire by fire. Who then devised the torment?
Love. Love is the unfamiliar Name behind the hands that wove the
intolerable shirt of flame which human power cannot remove. We only
live, only suspire consumed by either fire or fire." --T. S. Eliot,
Little Gidding from "Four Quartets"


        As soon as the dusk deepened into night, he was out on the
streets. He felt no desire to hurry. The stars shone with a renewed glow
after the previous night's rain. The air was crisp and the odors of the
city grew faint in the light breeze. The stars spoke to him like they
had not for long years. He neared his destination and noted a light in
the window where there had not been one before.

        "You were in love."
        The light that the candle cast on the face of his host played
across his expression and reminded him of a family now gone. It must
have been the suggestiveness of the subject of tonight's installment,
for he thought he could see hints of her in the face of his host. He
closed his eyes briefly to clear his thoughts. "Yes."
        "Tell me about her."

        He stood at the window and looked out at the stars. They were
constant companions, like the memories. Sweet, perfect. Illusions of
light. Most of the stars whose light he now saw had burned themselves
out millennia ago. The brightest of them burned out the soonest, he had
heard once. That was true. For the stars of humanity, anyway.
        Hers was a spirit as gentle as the first flowers of spring. Like
the softest of rains, fresh and full of the promise of life, of love.
Pure, innocent, free. Everything he was not. Everything he desired. She
was everything...
        That was the worst aspect of all. The fact that she filled
places in him he had never known needed to be filled. Her loss had left
an emptiness that had never been there before. An emptiness that could
never be filled. He could never go back. He would not go back! He had
turned his back on his mortality.
        The lie of his existence stared him in the face. The promise of
her love had called to the flesh of his humanity and he had answered.
His immortality had nothing to offer him that he could wish beyond her,
so complete was his need. What was done could not be undone, the chasm
between them was too vast.
        He had wanted to bring her across. She would have walked away
from the light, for him. That knowledge thrilled and excited him. A
creature of such beauty, willing to destroy her very soul to be with
him. How could such a thing be possible? It was wonderful and terrible.
It was wrong.
        Nicholas had understood that as well. The beauty of her
innocence would have been destroyed. Darkness does that to a soul. The
moment the honest report reached his ears he knew it to be true. What
his desire had nearly done was destroy the only pure loveliness he had
ever been granted.
        Her love for him was pure and lovely, open and free. And he
walked away from it.
        The rage he had felt at the situation was directed at the one
and only witness who was wholly without fault. How many times had he
made his son pay for heralding truth?
        As flowers do, once cut from the nourishment of the vine, she
withered and passed. He had watched the evolution of her mortal life. He
had witnessed her death. His son had fulfilled his office of protector
well; Fleur had lived without memory of him, of their love.
        She had known joy and sunshine, she had brought life and light
to her family. All of that would have been lost to the world if he had
fulfilled his desire. The reality of her life was good and its end
lacked the tragedy it would have had otherwise. He should have been
happy. He had not been. Instead, he had been bitter.
        It was the way in which he had dealt with all such discomforts.
What he could not change he avenged. The very antithesis of her heart
was what he became. Cold, bitter, unforgiving and relentless. He pursued
his ends with single-mindedness and relish. The need to appease his own
conscience drove him to accuse the object of his revenge of the very
thing he now knew he suffered from himself. Nicholas had tried to free
himself from the darkness. His son's attempts at reformation were
honest, his setbacks engineered. The battle raged over the centuries and
now, he wondered if the sweet spirit of his Fleur did not, even now,
look down on him with disgust and loathing. He was deserving of such
recognition.
        He shook his head. That was not what her spirit was like. Nor
her brother's. At the end, when Nicholas had had the right to stand in
accusation and hatred he had called him a friend. Forgiveness and love
was what his son offered to him. Fleur would have done the same. Grace
from the wronged. Grace for the wicked. For him.

        A silence had fallen over the room. He did not know how long
they had shared it. He did not remember ceasing from his dialog. The
stars remained as they had been. The light in the room had ended with
the flame's consumption of the last of the candle's wick. His host
remained motionless. He had no desire to answer any more questions, to
expound upon his reasons, to spend one second more in the presence of
humanity. He took to the air...

        Snatches of life assaulted him as he sought escape. The sounds
of the lives of the humanity that inhabited the city of his birth
reached him as he flew. Laughter, angry shouts, cries, moments of
passion, death rattles and birth pangs. Life.
        His flight had been aimless and his escape unsuccessful. There
was no way to escape the bonds of mortality. Not in a world so full of
life.
        Landing on the balcony of his hotel suite, he stood and listened
in earnest. Life was happening all around him. He had failed to
appreciate it in his own mortal lifetime and he had lost his reverence
for it in his darkness.
        He thought again of his Fleur. She would not have been able to
relinquish her love for the humanity that surrounded her. Such a thing
would have annihilated her spirit. He was glad, truly glad that he had
not taken her for himself. The emptiness in his heart was not filled by
the admission, but the bitterness was swept away by it.
        "You were right, Nicholas."
        The night air carried his whispered words away.

All comments and virtual chocolate to
--
Carrie Krumtum
The Nurse is a hampster
"...the greatest of these is love."
carriek@earthlink.net

Inevitabilities (Part 7)
by Carrie Krumtum


        "We die with the dying: see, they depart, and we go with them.
We are born with the dead: see, they return, and bring us with them. The
moment of the rose and the moment of the yew-tree are of equal duration.
A people without history is not redeemed from time, for history is a
pattern of timeless moments." --T. S. Eliot, Little Gidding from "Four
Quartets"


        He awoke with a start. Odd, he did not remember falling asleep.
        The sun had not yet set. The evening was gray. The clouds had
returned.
        He showered and dressed. Tonight he would make whatever last
installment was necessary to complete payment. There would be no more
after that. In truth, he had no more to offer.
        As soon as the sun had set behind the clouds, he took to the
air.

        "Why did you leave?"
        "To escape."
        "From what?"
        "Humanity."
        "You cannot."
        "I know."
        "Do you know why you are here?"
        "Yes."
        "Why?"
        "To escape."
        "From what?"
        "The darkness."

        He looked at his guest as if seeing him for the first time. The
legend of this one had not prepared him for the reality. This was the
oldest of their kind that he had ever met. It was very rare for any of
them to survive so long. He had assisted dozens of them.
        His dealings with them had afforded him a knowledge of the most
prominent of their kind. The ancient ones were feared and revered. Over
and over he had heard the story of one particular vampire. Nicholas de
Brabant. He was a vampire who had believed that redemption was possible,
that it was possible for a vampire to become mortal again. He had even
tried to live as a mortal, participating in their world, not as an
antagonist, but as a mutual participant in the life that went on around
him. He tried to give back to the world a measure of the good he
believed he had taken from it. He had been killed by his master, or so
the story went. Now, he knew the story to be true.
        Universally, the ones who came to him for help had spoken of
this one being. It was like the ripples in an ocean. Although he had
been dead for half a millenium, Nicholas still managed to touch the
hearts and minds of others of his kind.
        Now, they came to him. What he offered was a release. Pure and
simple. There wasn't another priest in all the world who offered to them
what he offered. Perhaps there wasn't another priest in all the world
who could.
        It had been years before he understood who Nicholas' master must
be. The irony of the situation struck him. He smiled.

        He noted the smile on his host's face. It was the first show of
emotion he had seen from this mortal. That smile seemed familiar,
somehow.

        "Do you know who I am?"
        "A priest."
        "Yes. But I am more. Much more."
        "What has that to do with me?"
        "Everything and nothing."
        "Your answer is enigmatic."
        "So are you."

        They regarded each other. He had to admit that what he had asked
and paid for would seem like an enigma. What would make a twenty-five
hundred year old vampire want to escape his fate? The answer had been so
simple it had nearly eluded him.

        "I accept your payment."
        He nodded to the priest. "When."
        "Tomorrow night."
        "Until tomorrow."
        "Until then."

        Reasons. He had explained all of them that there were. His whole
existence shouted the reasons. There really only was one reason. Life.
        As death follows life so must life follow death.  Life always
finds a way to conquer death. The light would always find a way to
overcome the darkness. That was the way of all of creation. It was
inevitable.

All comments and virtual chocolate to
--
Carrie Krumtum
The Nurse is a hampster
"...the greatest of these is love."
carriek@earthlink.net

Hi gang,

Well, here it is, the ending. Whew, what a ride for me. This was an
incredibly tough story for me to write and, interestingly enough, for my
beta readers to work through.

I have to thank them again. Allie, Nancy, you two are terrific. I
couldn't have asked for better input.

I wrote this story because I had been asked why I had never written a
LaCroix story before. The truth of the matter is that I really didn't
have much to say about him. Now, it seems, I have volumes to say, and
I've said it, for better or for worse.

Enjoy,

Carrie

This is a story based on characters created by J. Parriott and B. Cohen
for the TV series Forever Knight.

Inevitabilities (Part 8)
by Carrie Krumtum


        "We shall not cease from exploration and the end of all our
exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the
first time. Through the unknown, unremembered gate when the last of
earth left to discover is that which was the beginning; at the source of
the longest river the voice of the hidden waterfall and the children in
the apple-tree not known, because not looked for but heard, half-heard,
in the stillness between two waves of the sea." -- T. S. Eliot, Little
Gidding from "Four Quartets"


        The sun rose with glory. The day was filled with the sounds of
hope and joy.
        He stood in the shadows of the room and watched the life
happening in the streets. His thoughts were of them. Their lives, their
hopes, their dreams. The day passed and he remembered for the very last
time the ones who had loved him. A love that he had been unable to
destroy...

        "Are you ready?"
        "One thing..."
        "As you wish."
        "Tell me. Who are you?"
        He smiled again. "My name is Andre."

        He stared at the priest in wonder. Why had he never seen it
before? The resemblance was obvious to him now. "Yes. I see her in you."
        "And him."
        A tear slid down his face. "Yes."
        "You loved them."
        "Yes."

        It was the last declaration he made before the tip of the
yew-tree bolt struck his heart.

        The pain was not so excruciating as he had imagined it would be.
The light seemed to fade into the darkness and then into the light. The
aim of the missile had been true. He saw their faces before him. The
tear-streaked face of his son on the last night of his life. The
tear-streaked face of his love on the last night she would hold memory
of him. They had known, as he now knew. The end of all death was in the
life and love of its successors. How appropriate that he should meet the
end by the hands of their blood. Providence is kind, after all.

End
--
Carrie Krumtum
The Nurse is a hampster
"...the greatest of these is love."
carriek@earthlink.net