by Raine Wynd
Disclaimer and Notes: Inspired by a scene in one of the Raven episodes ("Immunity", if anyone's paying any atttention.) In any case, consider this a general SPOILER alert for all the eps up to "Passion Play." Kolenka is a figment of my own imagination. Thanks to Molly McGowan for the beta-read.
Torago — Late August, 1998
Nick paced the solarium restlessly until finally, Lucy tired of watching him from her position at the intricately patterned stone table in the center of the solarium.
"Sit, Nick," she ordered, her German accent stretching the words.
The athletically built man paused his pacing and sighed, running a hand through his dark brown hair. "I should be doing something. I should be there. You heard Amanda say that this Kolenka's a headhunter."
"Nick, you can't interfere," Lucy reminded him sternly, sounding every inch the middle-aged matron she was. "It's not for us mortals to be a part of the Game." She sipped calmly at her tea.
Nick shook his head and turned away. He paced a few more steps, then turned again to face Lucy. "But whoever wins the Prize gets the power to rule the world. That's us mortals. Who thought this crap up anyway?"
Lucy shrugged. "I don't think there's an Immortal alive who can give you the answer to that."
Nick snorted. "Figures. It makes just as much sense as street gangs killing each other for wearing the wrong colors."
Abruptly, he crossed the small room and took a seat at the table. "You've known Amanda a long time, haven't you?"
"Decades," Lucy informed him vaguely. "And like I told you once, it never gets easier and you never get used to it." She smiled, a rueful, fond smile. "There have been years when I've wondered if Amanda was still alive. Then she'd breeze back into town, or call me, or I'd get a postcard, and I'd be caught up in her world all over again."
She studied the younger man a moment. "Nick, you can't fight her battles for her. Kolenka's challenge was to Amanda, Immortal to Immortal. That's the Game, and mortals aren't a part of it."
He sighed and rose from his chair. "I just wish I knew — "
"Knew what?" Lucy interrupted. "Some way to stop the Game?" Her voice hardened. "The killing's been going on for millenia. It's not going to stop until there's only one Immortal left. That is the point, after all." More gently, she added, "Amanda's a survivor, Nick. She lived through the Plague and through times when just being a woman was a risk. Just because she prefers to be a thief doesn't mean she can't wield a sword."
Nick shot Lucy a look. "You're pretty good at lying to yourself, Lucy. You're just as worried about Amanda losing as I am."
Lucy chuckled and lifted her head airily. "My privilege. I've known her longer," she said unrepentantly.
He half-laughed at her words. Lucy took advantage of the pause in conversation to finish her tea. As she poured another cup, she silently offered to pour Nick a cup. He refused with a wave of his hand.
"What would you do if — " He swallowed past the lump in his throat and discovered he couldn't complete the thought. He was surprised to find Amanda had become so important to him. She was a thief, nothing more. Okay, an Immortal thief, he amended silently. A beautiful, sexy, beguiling, and thoroughly frustrating Immortal thief, but still a thief.
Lucy understood what Nick had meant. "Grieve. Then I'll hunt the son of a bitch down and chop off his head myself."
"I thought you said mortals couldn't interfere."
Lucy smiled grimly. All traces of the vibrant, theatric, and cheerful matron Nick had come to know disappeared, and he realized suddenly that he didn't know Lucy Becker well at all.
"You understand justice, don't you?"
Nick held her gaze a moment and nodded. "I'll be right there with you," he told Lucy.
Just then, the front door opened with a loud crash and Amanda stumbled in, looking tired and disheveled. Twin sighs of relief could be heard before Lucy asked the question on both her and Nick's minds.
"Kolenka?"
Amanda smiled wearily. "Darling," she said brightly, "don't tell me you were worried, were you?"
"Of course not," Lucy reassured her, blithely ignoring Nick's disbelieving grunt. "Nick was, though."
Amanda turned to Nick and sent him her best charming smile. "Oh, how sweet of you."
Nick recognized the power of that look and steeled himself against it. It was very hard to resist the wattage behind that smile, and his frustration for failing showed in the way he snapped out his response. "Amanda, about the other Immortal?"
She pouted at his refusal to be charmed. She'd hoped for a little post-Quickening sex. "Dead," she informed Nick. "Surely," she drawled, "you had faith in me."
"I do. I just..." He faltered as he tried to come up with a way to express his feelings. "You're okay, though."
She smiled, apparently understanding the concern he couldn't express verbally. "Never felt better." She paused. "Lucy, would you get the champagne? I feel like celebrating."
Nick returned the smile, suddenly feeling more relaxed than he had in a while. For the moment, Amanda was safe, and everything suddenly felt right in his world.
— Finis —