your name is conor?
juan cid romirez. chief surveyor and alchemist.
i am from spain. and i would like a moment of your time.
please go to no trouble.
your back, it would seem perhaps you were injured in battle?
your marks would suggest great injury.
but you lived.
and but for a mark you are well as any man, no?
i should imagine that your recovery must have alarmed your fellow villagers, perhaps giving them reason to invent an explanation. and a solution.
and now you live in a small village miles away from all you knew.
first food, no? a good meal makes conversation so much easier.
hmm, que rico. what is it you call this?
you scots have a way with game. it still has life in it. spirit. back home the food is so. domestic.
i was sent by his majesty of spain to inverness as a con- sultant on matters of metal.
in my travels i heard the story of the macleod boy struck down and brought from the hand of death by powers not of this earth.
it was time for our paths to cross.
you see this?
when i was a boy a cart driven by a drunken fool crushed me. all thought i would die or be maimed for life. but i healed quickly. and like you i paid the price for being different.
do you ever feel a flow, as if some- thing were pushing against you?
does it change with me in the room?
you feel you know me.
we are brothers.
some cling to sanity through time with the one continuity and trad0 ition their lives have known: the game. you and i conor, we are different from all others around us. you know this, you can feel it. we are flesh and bone like any man, but unlike our neighbors we are rather difficult to injure, permanently.
you are still so very young.
not even a single lifetime.
conor, you and i, we cannot be killed.
we are immortal.
it is as you are.
listen to me. hear the words.
it is the truth.
three days you've laid there. it's time you ate.
you are not dead, boy. accept it.
you'd have to die first. aqui.
you will live. survive.
you have done nothing wrong conor macleod.
you recall how i spoke of the push you feel and how i make it less?
it is always less with my living. far or near. but if i were to die the push would become stronger than ever before. there is power in this. and as long as you and i live, the knight can never have it all.
there is an imperfection. for all your healing, if your head ever leaves your neck, you are dead. you can survive anything but steel against your threat. then it is over. the end.
hide. run to the ends of the earth till you learn. you must learn to defend yourself. in this i can help.
we are brothers. and you are a defense- -of sorts.
concentrate!
harder. concentrate harder.
again. try again.
harder! you swing like an impotent cow!
oh, the boy has a mouth, now if only he had an arm.
muy bien!
here my boy, from vineyards as sweet and smooth as a young girl's thigh.
it will take less effort as you learn.
you have a gift. one you must protect.
the fabric of life. the spark that allows the passing of existence from one generation to another.
come. enough sword play for an afternoon.
point conceeded, mr. macleod.
all living things pay dues, conor. they must be respected for that.
as they age they contribute to a sum that is the kindling from which all future life comes. to feel it, to know it, is to be in touch with the will of every living thing.
it does not feel nearly as frightening as it sounds. but the consequences of such feelings can be very frightening. for it gives you great strength. the strength of _knowledge_. the ability to stand between the giving of what has always been to what will always be.
you have not been fully trained. but you will learn. and you will be good, i can feel that. you have apt- itude. this is why our friend is so concerned.
this power is divided amongst you, me, and others like cuts in a pie. but the cuts are not equal. some, like you and he, have more. much more.
i am a small player. but if by helping you i can keep that monster from being the last, then perhaps my life has meant something.
you must be. you have responsibilities. you must learn the rules. you can never attract attention to yourself, never show the side that will draw others to you. you will always know when you are in the presence of another. beware. but more importantly conor macleod, will be your battle against time. in the coming years you will see kingdoms rise then rot like wheat. people will become a transitory, pathetic lot. the only constant you will know will be the others and the tradition their greed and quest represent. but life without morality, without the ability to truly taste the sweetness of wine and love, is no life at all. that is how the others exist. nothing more than walking corpses living only to slaughter each other in an insane quest to be the last. keep your soul sewed to the earth. do not become one of them.
you are young, inexperienced. you do not know what time can do. how it can sap all pity, all love.
with the proper tools, conor, a naive man can be much more dangerous than an evil one.
go ahead, senor. i have my friend to keep me company.
madonna!
oh, santa maria!
demonio!