An Evening at Joe's (37 page)

"Ergh," he grunted, removing the bottle from his mouth. "Here... ah... 1535. Vlad's alleged great grand-son, Ladislaus Dracula de Sintesti, receives a patent of nobility from King Ferdinand of Hungary for his distinguished service at the siege of Vienna. A couple of years later in 1537, our lad Lad..." He grinned up at Dawson, who dead- panned him with an expression of thinly-worn stoicism. "Ah... sorry. Anyway, Baron Ladislaus meets with the famous Doctor Paracelsus who had claimed to have discovered the Philosophers Stone, the fabled key to eternal life."

"That's pretty sharp," mused Dawson. "Here it is 61 years after he loses a crown. Finally, he gets a title back again. Maybe he'd want to stick around for a while to enjoy it. What better way to explain why you don't seem to be aging than to claim some miraculous potion from a famous alchemist?"

"Perhaps," replied Methos, "but Paracelsus was ostracized from court for his claim and Dracula disappears a few years later. However"—he rooted into another nest of paper, emerging triumphantly with a green-bound manuscript—"about forty years later, a person referred to as the 'dark stranger' shows up at Castle Csejthe in Hungary. I don't know if you recognize the name..."

"Sure—play gigs there on weekends."

"Cute," grimaced Methos. "Actually, it was the home of Countess Elizabeth Bathory. Now, the Bathorys were always archrivals of the Dracula clan. In 1537, Ladislaus was suing Count Stephan Bathory, Liz's uncle, for ownership of Castle Fagaras, which had been the hereditary seat of the Dracula family. Stephan claimed it because his grandfather was appointed successor to Dracula—Vlad Dracula— after he was 'killed' in 1476. Dracula, on the other hand, held that the title and estates were successive, not appointive. He was right, but Bathory bribed the royal tribunal, and Drac got screwed out of his homestead. Stephan's last son dies as King of Poland in 1586. Now, out of the blue, a 'dark stranger' turns up at the house of the only living blood relative."

"So the 'dark stranger' is..."

"... wearing a signet ring containing a very distinctive crest. A red shield bearing a sword laid overtop of three wolf's teeth. It's the Bathory device. It's also the personal device of the Draculas."

"So she thinks this guy's a relative? That's convenient."

"Yeah; especially since Elizabeth's husband is a famous soldier, and always off somewhere beating on someone. So, rumour has it, she and the stranger had a lengthy affair right up until her husband is killed in battle. Now, the stranger disappears, and it starts to get a little weird."

"Oh, right!" snorted Dawson, "Like it wasn't already."

Methos ignored him. "Elizabeth is obsessed with losing her beauty, and somehow got the idea that bathing in the blood of virgins was a full-body Oil of Olay. She was finally caught and tried for murder and witchcraft, and walled up in her own bedroom, but only after she'd killed over 650 girls. There was talk that the 'dark stranger' had instructed her in the black arts and he's described in considerable detail in the trial manuscripts by both Elizabeth and others. He
is
Ladislaus Dracula right down to the eyes."

Dawson whistled. "Whoo... get your final revenge on your enemies without having to kill anyone yourself. Slick... very slick."

Methos stirred some papers about. "There's precious little else after that. In the 1600's, a Count... uh... Magnus de la Gardie," he muttered, thumbing through another file, "bears a close resemblance to Dracula, supposedly an alchemist and student of Paracelsus. Lived for over seventy years but never appears to be much over forty. Killed at the Battle of Poltova after taking a cannonball through the chest."

"Yeah, that'd do it," winced Dawson.

"That's that," concluded Methos, tossing the folder aside. "From there on everything's apocryphal. Elvis has more reliable sightings." He took a pull on his beer.

"So when did all this 'vampire' nonsense start getting associated with Dracula?" puzzled Dawson. "I don't seem to have heard or read a single thing indicating he actually drank blood."

Methos smiled toothily. "Obviously because he never did. Vampire legends have inculcated almost every major culture for over 2,000 years, although the actual word 'vampire' wasn't coined until 1734. Dracula was described in Romanian and German accounts as 'wampyr' and 'würtrich' but that simply means 'bloodthirsty,' as in 'right nasty bastard.' Bram Stoker did a lot of research before writing his novel, but nobody really thought he mistook the word 'wampyr' to mean vampire."

"Why not?" reasoned Dawson. "Sounds like an honest mistake."

"Because," answered Methos pedantically, "the Romanian words for vampire creatures are Moroi, Strigoi and Vulkodlak, and he would have known that. No, he just liked the ready-made story; and the exotic location—Transylvania—chock full of gypsies and howling wolves, appealed to the Victorian sensibility, and their penchant for gothic horror. Actually, Stoker cribbed a lot of
Dracula
from a novel by John Sheridan le Fanu called
Camilla.
" He crossed his legs methodically. "Did you know I wrote a vampire story myself?"

"Sure—and I used to publish under the pen-name E. Hemingway."

"No, really. It was called 'The Vampyre'..."

"That's imaginative... ."

"...and it ran in the April edition of the
London New Monthly Magazine,
in 1819. Of course, I was known as Doctor Polidori back then. But, owing to some lamebrained balls-up by the editor, it got printed under the name of Lord Byron. He almost went off his nut when he saw it." He smiled smugly. "Especially when it was reviewed as the best thing Byron had ever written."

"No kidding? Ain't fame a bitch!" Joe leaned back in his chair and thought for a moment.

"I wonder what the real Dracula thought of Stoker's novel. And then all those movies. I'll bet that's a type of immortality old Vlad never counted on."

"Oh, I don't know," said Methos, sitting up. "In a way it'd actually help obfuscate your past. You know the old saying about the best way of hiding something is to stick it right out in the open."

"Like you becoming the Watcher in charge of finding yourself," suggested Dawson.

"Something like that," replied Methos, thoughtfully. "I kind of wonder if Dracula didn't think about it himself; he is said to have had a rather twisted sense of humour."

"Whaddya mean?" queried Dawson with a narrow look.

"Oh... probably nothing," rejoined Methos, pushing back into the cushions with a sigh. "But... have you ever seen the portrait of Bram Stoker? It's in the London Stock Exchange, of all places. Anyway, it's a very Victorian piece, highly romanticized. Stoker's depicted as a medieval warrior, wearing a helmet and chainmail. But the really remarkable thing about the work is the depiction of his face." He paused and looked at Dawson. "He has the most amazingly brilliant green eyes..."

"METHOS": Peter Wingfield

When the role of Methos, the world's oldest Immortal, was created in the season 3 episode of the same name, the possibility of a continuing role for the character was immediately apparent. But we'd tried before to create wise, advisor-type characters to fill the void in MacLeod's life left by the death of Darius (and tragic death of the actor who portrayed him, Werner Stocker), without much luck. Methos would survive his first appearance, but whether he would return—or just return in order to die—depended on the on-screen spark of the actor portraying him.

I think by now everyone's heard the rest of the story. How Welsh- born actor Peter Wingfield's performance as Methos made us cancel development on a story that would have ended his life, replacing it with the storyline that would become the two-part episode "Finale." Peter was back on the set in Paris filming his second and third appearances before "Methos" had even aired in the United States. Suddenly the Highlander family had a new member, both on- and off-screen.

In his story "Time of Innocents," set thousands of years ago when Methos rode with The Horsemen, Peter takes a look at on unexamined aspect of Immortality, from his own unique perspective.

The shock of the air surging back into lungs that should have permanently suspended their rhythmic ebb and flow caused him to cry out involuntarily. And an unformed howl of frightened incomprehension it was, one that echoed his first sound in this world.

The air that newly filled him disturbed more than it refreshed. It was rank. It hung thick and foul with the putrid stench of decay and death.

He blinked his eyes, trying to shake off that undiscovered country from whence no traveller
should
return, and his gaze alighted upon...

What?

For try as he might, he could make no sense of the sights that he beheld. The white and the pink; the red and the scarlet; flesh and bone and bruise and gore. Torn cloth, broken steel; wood and stone and dust.

Nothing human stirred.

The only sounds were the patter and plop of claw on carcass and the gentle swooshing of the air under the wings of the vultures, methodically going about their macabre business.

High above in a dispassionate sky, the sun blazed down, mocking and scorching all below.

He lay spluttering for a few moments, trying to reorientate. He wanted to sob, to wail his pain and loneliness to the heavens, but he was too shocked to utter a sound to disturb the eerie peace. His gaze absently took in the bodies around him. They seemed so much a mirror of himself: small, pale, broken children, wrapped in shredded cloths, scarlet stained and torn. Why were they so still and silent when his heart thumped so loud within his chest?

But with a sickening chill he realized the thunder was not inside him. It was in the earth. The whole world was beginning to shake and tremble beneath him. And in a dizzying whirl, they were upon him. Wild, dark figures, racing across the earth, seemingly stretched from earth to sky, all limb and cloak and double head. Long, spindle legs, stampeding the ground, kicking up a suffocating black fog of dust. And the cries! Blood curdling shrieks that filled the air with hatred and anger and lust.

The Creatures spattered and pounded the ground with their many legs as they eased to a halt before him. Then they split majestically into halves, one wild, masked head separating from another, the fear- some, painted Devil-Heads still screeching and cackling as they tugged at the mouth straps of their anxious, four-legged charges.

And the Devil-Heads began to approach the mass of former humanity from where he viewed their progress. They kicked and prodded the heap, body by body, closer and closer to the spot where he lay, still dazed and disjointed, paralysed with fear, barely able to release the breath from his newly animate chest. Until finally they were rifling the corpses a mere embrace away and he could hold his tongue no longer. His tiny lungs let forth the only noise they knew. He howled!

A howl that screamed for succor to all the powers of eternity!

A howl of fear and frustration; of utter incomprehension.

A howl that vented the pitted anger of his betrayal, and loss, and undefended, impotent vulnerability

The Creatures stopped in their tracks, momentarily stunned into inaction. Then he heard their calls once more. Low and short and hesitant at first, but quickly gathering confidence. Building in pace and pitch and volume until they were shrieks once more, the shrieks and cackles which had accompanied their arrival.

And suddenly he was in the air. Wailing and flailing. Helpless. Exposed.

One of the Creatures was holding him high above the ground and all he knew now was terror. He screamed and screamed to make it stop. And for a second he was flying, parodying the black birds that patiently waited their turn on the barren branches a dozen yards away. Now he was caught in another calloused hand, shaken and bent like a rag doll and tossed carelessly once more into the fetid air. And again he was in the clutch of a Demon Creature. It poked a strong, angular finger into his defenseless belly and he could smell the rancid breath from its savage mouth. And as he cried and pleaded anew to feel the half-remembered warmth of his mother's breast, he saw the glint of sunlight on steel. And all he felt was the coldness pass through his soul. And the pain was gone.