Highlander: The Measure of a Man

by Nancy Holder

  Joe marveled at the way the Immortals one-upped each other: who was better at swordplay, who had taken more heads, who was older. Even Immortals who were friends spent a good deal of their time together sizing each other up. You never knew whom you would face next in a fight to the death.

  “Did you know he was a tournament-level chess champion in the nineteenth century?”

  In response, MacLeod gestured lazily to the many chessboards. The light dawned. “You’re in contact.”

  “Via e-mail. The game on that big board is the one we’re actually playing. P-K4, P-K4, P-KB4, PxP, B-B4, Q-R5ch. What part of the nineteenth century?”

  “I don’t remember. It’s in there, though.”

  “What does Machiavelli want from you, Mac?”

  “I was hoping you could tell me. He wants me to go to Tokyo, for one thing. I don’t know why. I’m certain he wanted me to know about his connection with NKS and Ken Iwasawa. He’s the CEO.”

  “Ah, so you know about the alliance with NKS, too. Maybe you could tell me where Mari Iwasawa is? They’re worried about her at HQ.”

  MacLeod cocked his head. “You talked to them about this? You told them what’s going on?”

  Joe imitated MacLeod’s lazy sweep of the chessboards. “Relax, Mac. I told them a cock-and-bull story about research and cross-referencing. You’re not the only one who’s good at strategizing. Although poker’s my game, not chess.”

  Joe pulled out a folder. “Here. Look at this. This is Mari Iwasawa’s most recent report.”

  Subject took girl friend and others to dinner. Dinner remarkedly uneventful.

  Mari Iwasawa.

  Joe pointed to her name. “She goes by Mari, but she always refers to herself as Mary in Watcher correspondence. I don’t know why. And this entry isn’t like her others. She’s usually very thorough. She would have put in the name of the restaurant, every person who attended, and what they ate, that level of detail.” He looked at MacLeod. “Machiavelli must have written it.”

  MacLeod shook his head. “Samantha wrote that. See the word, ‘remarkedly’? She uses it when she means to say ‘remarkably.’ She did it earlier today. I almost mentioned it, but she was already plenty mad at me for correcting her Japanese.”

  MacLeod pointed to the file. “What about the rest of the reports?”

  “They sound like Mari, but they don’t say anything. He runs a major multinational corporation, and all of a sudden he might as well be bird-watching for all the activity she’s reporting.” He sighed. “Something’s going on, Mac.”

  MacLeod regarded him. He nodded slowly. “Something very bad.”

  “Tell me what to do, and I’ll do it.”

  “I’m going to try to handle it privately. But if I get in trouble, Dawson, you’re going to have to bring in a lot of people. FBI, CIA, NSA.”

  “What if they find out about you guys in the process?”

  MacLeod said nothing, but Joe could read the turmoil in his hunched shoulders and tight features. MacLeod literally had the weight of the world on his shoulders.

  “And I tell them what?” Joe asked.

  “That you believe Machiavelli has installed a way to capture and alter any kind of electronic messages relayed on any system in the world. That Nippon Kokusai Sangyo is providing him with the hardware he needs, and Alan Woodrich is, or was, the one who gave him the software. That he had the senator killed.” MacLeod looked speculatively at Joe. “Because Woodrich told the senator what he had done.”

  “That’s a good guess,” Joe said. He wiped his face. “This is bad shit, Mac.”

  MacLeod sighed. “What frightens me is that if he can do it, someone else could. So even if he dies…” He shrugged. There seemed to be something more he wanted to say. But MacLeod, being MacLeod, kept it to himself.

  Maybe it was about the girl. What a powder keg that was. Joe leaned forward, concerned. “What are you doing with Samantha August, Mac? You should be treating her like rat poison.”

  MacLeod sighed. “Don’t worry. I’m not the same wide-eyed boy I was in 1655.” But his expression said otherwise, and he must have known it, for he laughed and put his hands on his knees. “I wish I could tell you it’s all a ploy to get her to trust me so I can use her to get to Machiavelli and take both their heads.”

  There was the sound of a door shutting. It had to be the bathroom, since it was the only door in the house.

  They looked at each other. “She’ll have to learn to be quieter if she’s going to improve as a spy,” Mac said. He sounded disappointed.

  Joe was sorry for him. He started to put the file away. A photo fell out. “Oh, this is Mari,” he said.

  MacLeod looked at the beautiful woman who had brushed past him in the lobby bar of the Capitol Hilton.

  “No,” he said, “she’s the card-carrying trollop with ‘Umeko Takahashi’ on her business cards.”

  They looked at each other. Joe asked, “Why is he doing this?”

  “It’s all about the thrill of the game for him,” MacLeod answered tiredly. “He believes he’ll win, so that holds no interest. What he enjoys is moving the pieces across the board. The elegance of his victory is all-important.”

  “What are you going to do?” Joe asked.

  “I have to get to Japan,” MacLeod replied.

  “Mac, no. It’s what he wants you to do. We don’t know enough yet.”

  “Samantha will tell me.”

  “She’ll lie to you, Mac.”

  MacLeod shook his head. “She’ll tell me, Dawson.”

  Joe knew better than to press.

  Moving numbly, Samantha stood in the center of the bathroom and shook. “It’s all a ploy to get her to trust me so I can use her to get to Machiavelli and then take both their heads.”

  That was all she had heard. But it was enough.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Cause division among them.”

  —Sun Tzu, The Art of War

  MacLeod and Dawson talked for hours, trying to sort out what was going on, watching another news report about Senator Beauchard’s murder. There was oblique talk of a newly discovered fingerprint at the crime scene, but no other information. Dawson wondered aloud if it might have been planted.

  “This is creepy, Mac,” he said as he left. “I can’t help but feel he knows everything we’re doing, and he’s counting on us to do it.” MacLeod nodded. “You have to take his head.”

  How could he tell Dawson that he couldn’t because he’d made an oath three hundred years ago? That his honor required that he find another way, when the necessary solution was so obvious?

  Dawson finally left after three in the morning. MacLeod cleaned up the tea things and put away the bottle of Macallan they’d opened.

  “Yeah, right,” he muttered. He needed to focus, and then he needed to sit Samantha down and make her come clean. He needed whatever information she had.

  But he was going to hate hearing from her own lips that she was working for Machiavelli.

  He crossed softly to his sleeping area and looked down on her. Her eyes were closed but it was clear she was not asleep. Huddled beneath his blanket, she looked as if she were waiting for someone to shoot her.

  She opened her eyes.

  He raised his brows, said, “Samantha? Are you all right?” Wordlessly, she fingered the edge of the blanket. “We need to talk.”

  “Yes,” she agreed, staring at him with huge eyes. “Let me have a minute.”

  Restlessly he walked back to the kitchen. Her terror had been palpable. Was she afraid he would take her head, now that Dawson had told him about her?

  He laughed harshly at himself. Had he learned nothing since Venice? Thirty years she’d been with Machiavelli. She must be a consummate actress. She was probably plotting her next move. For all he knew, she was on a cell phone to Machiavelli right now.

  There was a noise at the window. He looked across the kitchen.

  A man stood on the fire escape. Woodrich.

 
; MacLeod grabbed his sword and flew through the loft and into the freight elevator. Praying that the noise wouldn’t spook the man, he lifted up the door as soon as possible and raced outside.

  Woodrich was still on the fire escape, either looking into the window or trying to break into the loft.

  “Down here,” Duncan called.

  Woodrich whirled around. From his vantage point, he gazed down at MacLeod and held out his hands.

  The man was terrified. MacLeod said tersely, “How did you find out where I live?”

  Woodrich almost smiled. “MacLeod, give me some credit. I work for the NSA.” The weak smile faded. He raked his hair with his fingers. “Please. You’ve got to help me. They’re after me.”

  “I told you they would be.”

  “I know, I know. They killed Tony. They’re making it look like I did it. My fingerprints are at the scene.”

  “Come down. Now.”

  “Yes.” He scrambled down the stairs and joined MacLeod on the ground. “Okay.” He took huge gulps of air. “Okay, I’ll have to trust you.”

  “You’re right.” MacLeod waited.

  “I’m sorry I bolted. I just panicked.” He paused. MacLeod kept silent. “After I, ah, left you and Joe, I went to my apartment. I was followed but I waited them out. It was the same two guys who beat up Joe. They eventually left. I went inside and got this.” He held up a shiny CD-ROM. “They had torn my place apart, but they didn’t find it.”

  Too easy, MacLeod thought, a frisson of tension dancing up his spine. They would never have allowed him to get the disc. They would have burned the building down first.

  Machiavelli’s men must be nearby. He had no doubt they’d allowed Woodrich to get the disc and lead them to him. Killing two birds with one stone.

  “Where was the disc?” MacLeod asked, and then realized that that was the wrong question. “What’s on it?”

  “The software update Macchio needs. I lied to him. And you. It’s ready to go. We’ve beta- tested the hell out of it, and it’s nearly perfect.”

  “If you’ve got a disc, it’s on a hard drive somewhere. That means it’s accessible. He’s probably already got it.”

  “No.” Woodrich actually smiled. “It was created on a laptop that ran only off batteries. It was never, ever linked up with anything else, including a modem. When I downloaded it onto the disc, I destroyed the laptop. This is the only copy in existence.”

  “You’ve lied to me before. I have no illusions that you’re telling me the truth now.”

  “All right.” Woodrich shrugged. “There is one more copy.”

  “Why did you bring this with you?” MacLeod demanded. “So you’d have something to bargain for your life with?”

  Someone was here. An Immortal.

  “Run,” he told Woodrich.

  Outside Tokyo

  Mari leaned back in the ofuro and sighed contentedly as Nick coiled himself around her like a snake. The villa’s bathhouse had been featured in several international architectural and design magazines. The size of an Olympic pool, it looked like a tropical lagoon, with lava rocks, palms, orchids, and pikake flowers, and two waterfalls that cascaded over love seats carved from the rock. Nick loved to lounge here, unwinding from the pressures of his life.

  She kissed his cheek, his mouth, and rested her head against his shoulder. “Are things going as you had hoped?”

  “Yes, my love. You’ve done so well.” He stroked her wet hair. “When you came to Japan, you were so right to suggest the creation of a conspiracy to kill me. We’ve ferreted out everyone who was disloyal.” He sighed happily. “Only a few remain, and they’ll be dead soon.”

  “She, as well?”

  “She as well.” He chuckled. “She never learned who her last Watcher was, did she? Some no-account mortal who would write whatever I asked?”

  “No, she never knew. She hated having a Watcher.”

  “Well, he’s dead. And she will be, too. They all will.”

  Mari closed her eyes. “And then?”

  “Yes, then.”

  She shivered with anticipation and a little fear. “And I’ll have everything I deserve?”

  “Yes, everything. Riches. Power. Everything Ken kept from you. And of course, your place at my side.”

  She knew he could see the eagerness in her eyes. The love for him, too.

  She was the one who had come to him, approaching him when she was Umeko’s Watcher. Arranging things so he would do business with her brother. She knew he had killed Umeko because the Immortal had been helping Sammi. But he had also killed her so that she, Mari, could be his own Watcher. She had served him well, deflecting all interest and all suspicion from him. Now it was her turn to be served. “I can’t wait.”

  “Be patient, my angel. All things come to she who waits.”

  The hot water cascaded, the flowers bloomed.

  Woodrich began to run. MacLeod watched him, then turned his attention to an approaching figure. The man was not Immortal. MacLeod pulled his sword.

  “Good evening, sir,” came the voice, as the figure walked from the shadows. He began to lift off his hood.

  “Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod.” Barefoot, and in his bathrobe.

  “Satoshi Miyamoto.” The hood was off. In his right hand he held a revolver. “One of Machiavelli’s knights.”

  “Don’t come any closer,” MacLeod said.

  There was a sharp crack like the breaking of a stick.

  MacLeod looked down at the bloom of blood on his bathrobe sleeve. Miyamoto had shot him in the arm.

  Miyamoto said excitedly, “Get him.”

  The other figure was Immortal, and he was not masked. He made a courtly bow and smiled at MacLeod.

  “Buona notte,” he said.

  “Ruffio.” MacLeod raised his sword with difficulty. “It’s been a long time.”

  Ruffio, the cruelest and most vindictive Immortal, Machiavelli’s favorite of his Venetian Beauties. MacLeod should have realized he would still be alive.

  Miyamoto raised the revolver again, but at that moment, someone shouted in the distance, “Woodrich’s getting away.”

  “Go help them,” Ruffio said to Miyamoto. He drew his sword. “I’ll take care of MacLeod.”

  MacLeod said, “I don’t think so,” barreled forward, ran Ruffio through, astonishing Miyamoto, then raised his sword to take Ruffio’s head. Miyamoto raised his revolver again, shot again.

  And missed.

  Ruffio rolled to the right as MacLeod arced down his sword, wounding Ruffio severely in the shoulder. Ruffio shouted with pain.

  “Stop,” Miyamoto ordered, brandishing his revolver. He pulled the trigger. The gun was empty.

  MacLeod ran toward him.

  Ruffio and Miyamoto flew into the shadows.

  Woodrich screamed, and MacLeod increased his pace.

  There was nothing more beautiful than a Japanese sunset at cherry-blossom time.

  Umeko and Samantha rested beneath a canopy of snowy-white and frosted-pink blossoms, toasting spring, their friendship, and the fact that Samantha had bested Umeko in battle for the very first time.

  “Soon, you’ll take your first head,” Umeko crowed.

  Samantha was silent. The thought chilled her. She had lived passively for so long: standing in Machiavelli’s shadow had definitely had some advantages. No one dared come after her. No one thought she was worth the danger. Though Machiavelli called her his queen, in reality she was a lowly pawn.

  “Jails can be fortresses,” she said quietly.

  “Not for you.” Umeko regarded her fondly. “Your wings are unfurling. Someday others will notice the regard you have for yourself and then they will want you.”

  “Want my head,” Samantha said bitterly.

  “Or your heart.” Umeko sighed. “I know you don’t love me in that way, but I wish you did.”

  Samantha nodded and covered Umeko’s hand with her own. “In my way, I’ll always love you.”

  “B
ut you have yet to love, in your way”

  “Yes.”

  In the sunset, in the spring, among the cherry blossoms.

  Ruffio was nowhere to be found, but Woodrich was inside the abandoned bakery on MacLeod’s jogging route with at least two other mortals. The ghost-scent of bread permeated the night.

  MacLeod surveyed the building, fully expecting Ruffio and his henchmen to leap out at him.

  Samantha, he thought with a chill. Ruffio had gone after her. To rescue her, or to take her head?

  “No, no,” Woodrich begged in the distance.

  They would be watching all the entrances. He must go in by another route.

  There was a tall fence that stretched between the main building and a Quonset hut about twenty yards to the left. MacLeod jumped onto the fence and climbed quickly to the top. Using the tightrope skills Amanda had taught him long ago, he negotiated the length and reached the bakery exterior. He shinnied up a drainpipe until he reached a row of broken windows.

  There he stopped and, protecting his fist inside the sleeves of his robe, pushed slowly but firmly on the nearest broken pane, pushing the shards inward. He hoped they didn’t make too much noise as they fell.

  When he was satisfied that he had cleared enough glass away to prevent serious damage, he climbed through, grimacing as the remaining pieces sliced his legs and hands. He landed softly on more glass and clenched his jaw, holding in the pain.

  Below, there was a muffled cry, followed by the unmistakable crunch of bone. Staying focused, MacLeod moved through the darkness, feeling for walls, a door, stairs.

  Another cry.

  A door. He gingerly walked through it, trying to imagine the layout of the bakery. Conveyer belts? Stairs left or right?

  There was a thud.

  He moved left for about two minutes and hit a wall. He retraced his steps and nearly fell down a flight of stairs.

  The stairs were warm. He stopped and inhaled a vague hint of smoke.

  The bakery was on fire.

  Venice. 1655. The palazzo of the Calegri.

  The attempt on his life.

  The futile attempt to save anyone else.

  He took two more steps. Flames crackled beneath him. Tiny flames like a burning garden poked through the next stair.