Author: Daydreamer
Date: 30 October 2005

The Painting - Part 2

Whoever and whatever this Blair might be, James thought as he watched the confusion and distress in the younger man's face, he was unlike anyone he had ever met.

He was beautiful, a term he had rarely used for another man. He was fresh, natural; his complexion was clear and his hair... James sighed. Shades of brown and gold and dark red all mingled and shone together. His fingers twitched from longing to bury themselves in those soft, thick curls. Blair wore it loose, not pulled tightly back as most men did and it was a constant temptation to lose himself in just looking at it. Blair's gaze was clear and straightforward, with a marked absence of either suspicion or distaste. He was young; a heavy beard shadowed his face and yet James knew he could hardly be more than twenty. He was comfortable with his body and seemed to have no problem with the looks James could not keep himself from giving.

Blair made him, against his will and in spite of his better intentions, want to get close to him. There was fragrance in his hair and an erotic appeal about the sturdy chest that tapered to a narrow waist beneath the voluminous nightshirt. When he had held the younger man so briefly, there on the balcony, the reaction had been immediate, intense, and so obvious he was afraid it had been noticed. It had been all he could do to stop himself from sweeping the mysterious young man up and putting him back to bed, then joining him there. With those deep blue eyes and full, pouty lips, Blair was apparently destined for a marvelous career in his chosen profession.

And yet, if he were an amante, he could not have been in the business long. There was nothing jaded about him, no hint of scars or disease about the smooth-skinned body he had seen as he gazed on the smaller man's nakedness while he was unconscious. Blair made no effort to attract him, seemed in no hurry to conclude the transaction with him so he could be gone.

He had been injured, of course, perhaps more than his procurer had intended; his manner and comments had been quite dazed at times.

A sudden need to find the man who had hurt Blair, and beat him senseless, knotted his fists. How the blackguard had brought himself to bruise such tender flesh passed understanding. Even less obvious was how he could permit another man to possess the boy.

Of course, the man was probably not his lover. He was probably not even a lover of men. He might have been a father or a brother, instead. Such things happened when people were hungry enough, and the on-going flood of immigrants from Ireland were often desperately hungry.

Excuses. If Blair would not make them for himself, James would make them for him. The next thing he knew, he would be trying to save the lad from his bleak future prospects. It was a sign, if any were needed, of his own desperation.

And his folly. Blair hadn't seemed frightened or disgusted by his affliction, but rather curious and inclined toward practical remedies. For that, he was grateful. Still, it was unlikely that even a starving puta would be willing to stay with him for more than a few hours. That being so, it would be as well if he made full use of the time available to him.

His voice carefully even, he said, "I seem to have neglected my duties as host. Perhaps you would care for something to eat, a little broth and bread or a light custard? Or Maria could make you a tisane."

Blair stared at him for a moment before he said, "A tisane for my head?" When James nodded, Blair went on, "I'd appreciate that. I've got the mother of all headaches." He smiled up at James, then added, "Thanks."

James moved to tug the bell rope. While he waited for Maria to appear, he said, "Where do you live?"

Blair opened his mouth to speak, then apparently changed his mind. "You wouldn't know the area."

"You might be surprised."

Blair moved one shoulder in a small shrug. "I have a place down by the water."

"A place?"

"A big room. Rented."

"Ah, you are a boarder." James hesitated, then asked anyway, "You live alone?"

Blair smiled. "Except for an ape named Larry."

The flippant, almost mocking, quality in the other man's voice flicked James on the raw. It was as if there were hidden meanings in Blair's answers which he was not supposed to grasp. Or perhaps, it was as if it were information he should already have. "What of the man who brought you here? Will he be awaiting somewhere for you?"

"I told you, nobody brought me here," Blair said with a flash of irritation in his blue eyes. "As for the man you saw, I suppose you scared him so he won't stop running until he crosses the mountains."

"Unlikely," James responded.

"You don't think so?" Blair asked. "Look at your hands."

As Jim held them up, he noticed their stiff soreness. The knuckles were grazed; one on his right hand was split as if it had landed against bone.

"I think," Blair said with soft emphasis, "that you did some serious damage to him."

"Good," James said in clipped satisfaction. He paused, "Unless he is the kind who will take it out on you?"

Blair closed his eyes and sighed. "Why should you care?"

He could not tell. By good luck, he did not have to since Maria came into the room at that moment. He turned to give orders for a light repast to be brought, as well as the tisane he had first suggested. Maria disapproved; he could tell by the flounce of her skirt when she turned and took herself off again. He would try a reprimand if he thought it would do any good. But it wouldn't. She had practically raised him after his mother died; had taken care of him and his house for as long as he could remember. It was her nature to be protective. The trouble was, his housekeeper seemed to think he was responsible for the condition of his guest, and that his intentions were less than honorable, which she surely saw as a sad lapse back to his old ways of sin. She ws convinced the petit mal was God's judgement for his preference for men. Still, he mused, when he looked at Blair, it was possible she was right about him slipping back into his sinful ways.

Then it happened. Behind him, he heard Blair Sandburg speak his name, the name that was not his.

"Jim --"

He turned back, and a small breeze through the open window blew the scent of the man in the bed to him, the mind-stopping fragrance of some spicy fruit he had no name for. He met Blair's watchful gaze and saw there a look of such doubt and longing that he felt his heart turn over inside him.

Then everything slipped away.

Suddenly, he was lost in shadowy remembrance of the most persistent of his petit mal illusions. A young man came toward him with sure steps and clear, smiling eyes. Dressed in strange clothing, he was everything James had ever dreamed of wanting. He completed him. He made the strange reactions to food go away, controlled the uncontrollable headaches; made loud noises, soft; harsh smells, tolerable; rough, rash-inducing fabrics, bearable. And most of all, he banished the petit mal seizures and gave him back his life.

James held out his arms and the young man melted into them, lifting his lips for a kiss. He picked the smaller man up, carrying him to a bed that magically waited, and together they sank down into its softness. Free and open, they gave themselves to each other, removing clothing, touching, holding, gliding together in such perfect harmony that their blood sang with its wonder. A voice whispered soft requests and he answered them in perfect rapport, attuned to every nuance of meaning, giving every ounce of strength he possessed.

This was his man, his partner. He would know him any where.

He had thought the dream Blair a chimera, a dream that came both asleep and awake, one sent to relieve his unbearable need to be accepted, to be held with simple human warmth, and with passion. What if he had been wrong?

Madness. He must be very near the edge. It was always a possibility with his malady. It was not the disease itself that caused it, of course, but the despair of being always set apart, always alone.

A voice spoke next to his ear, soft soothing words.

"Come back to me, James."

A hand, rough with calluses, yet infinitely soft, stroked his cheek. He turned his head slightly and breathed deeply of a spicy, fruity scent overlying a deeper, masculine musk.

"It's all right," Blair said with infinite tenderness. "It'll be all right now."

And somehow he believed. Freed from the trap of his body, he reached out and crushed the younger man against him, finally allowing his fingers to bury themselves in that mass of wildly disobedient hair. He breathed again, then opened his mouth and words he had not intended, could not recall forming, emerged on his tongue. "Stay," he said. "Don't go back to wherever you came from. You have been injured and I feel in some way at fault. It will be my pleasure and my honor to care for you."

Blair pulled away slightly and looked up, his gaze assessing, yet shaded with something near wonder. "You say that, even thinking I'm no better than a -- what did you call it -- a puta? Or are you saying it because of it?

"My motives may not be pure," James said with irony, "but you have my word that you will be free from attack until after dinner."

Blair lifted an eyebrow. "That was actually a joke," he said in soft amazement. "At least, I think it was?"

Was it? James hardly knew. "You will remain, at least for a few days?"

Blair looked away from him. "I don't know if I can."

"If you wish it, I will undertake to keep you safe." James led him to the bed, saw him settled in it.

A faint smile twitched at the corner of Blair's mouth. "I expected nothing less. After all, you always have --" He stopped.

"Yes?"

"Nothing. You kept me from harm before."

Blair glanced at him, and his gaze locked with the other man's. He was unable to look away. The need to step to the bed and pull the younger man to him, fitting every inch of their bodies together, was so strong that his head swam with it and he felt perspiration break out across the back of his neck. Fear of another attack, right there in front of the man he wanted to make his own, made him wrench backward toward the door.

"Don't go. Please, don't go." Blair's words were quiet, but James heard the fear and hint of panic nonetheless.

It was that fear and panic in his voice that stilled James' own emotions. He could feel the fear fading, feel his equilibrium returning. If the mere sound of Blair's voice could drive back the demons so successfully, how would he ever bear to part with the man? He released the breath he had been holding. "You should try to rest."

"Yes, but I would rather -- everything is so weird, and I'm not certain I want to close my eyes in case this is just a dream and the nightmare will still be there when -- when I wake."

James understood very well what Blair was trying to say. He sometimes felt himself that he would prefer to live in his delusions.

There was a chair on the near side of the bed where Maria had been sitting before. He moved to shift it, pulling it closer and seating himself where Blair could see him. "Rest," he said quietly. "I'll keep the nightmares at bay."

The tension eased from the younger man's face. Still, Blair watched him for long seconds. "You'll share the dinner you ordered for me?"

James hated broth; he had had enough of it in his days as an invalid to last several lifetimes. But for this man, he would eat it. Maria would be amazed. The news would undoubtedly cause considerable speculation later in the servant's quarters. He would hear about it from his man in the morning.

And so...

"Yes, certainly," he replied.

Blair hesitated. "Maybe I shouldn't have asked. You look as if you're dressed for a night out."

"You mean for an evening's entertainment? No. Don't, please, let it concern you."

"There's no one waiting for you then?"

"Waiting for me?" he asked, uncertain of Blair's meaning.

"A date? Whoever else is going to the party?"

James smiled with a decided curl to his mouth. "There is no party."

"You live alone then?"

"Quite alone, other than the servants, or during the holidays. Then my brother and his wife, with their family and various nursemaids and cooks, arrive from their ranch to the east."

"Ranch," Blair repeated in blank tones.

James inclined his head in agreement. "Steven, my brother, raises horses. My sister-in-law feels the confinement of the country. While Cascade is not Boston or New York, not even Saint Louis, or San Francisco, it is more 'city' than she normally sees. Hence the yearly trip to drive me to distraction."

"No date, either?" Blair asked.

"I am not sure I understand this word. I thought we had agreed on the day of the month."

Blair's glance slid away to somewhere beyond his shoulder. "I was -- referring to a friend, perhaps a liaison for the evening."

"I was not going out," James said shortly. "There is nothing to prevent me from keeping you accompanied."

"That's all right then."

James made no answer. It might not be all right, but he did not intend to let that stop him.

There was baked chicken and fresh bread, asparagus vinaigrette and a bottle of wine, as well as the broth. Maria was, perhaps, more attuned to his needs than he had imagined. He permitted her to serve Blair and himself, then sent her away. He preferred to be unobserved while he was watching his unexpected guest. The pleasure was too singular to allow distraction.

Blair appeared to have little appetite, though he drank the broth and ate a few morsels of chicken. Sipping the tisane, he made a face. "I don't suppose you have any chamomile, do you?" he asked with a droll look in his eyes.

James repeated the unfamiliar word, then shook his head. No doubt it was an Irish herb. His eyes were drawn to Blair's chest, where the small circular shadows that were his nipples barely showed through the cloth, yet rose and fell as he sighed.

"I thought it might be a problem," Blair said.

With an effort, James removed his gaze from Blair's chest and said, "Perhaps if you could describe it --"

"No," Blair answered in quick denial as he drank again. "Never mind. This is fine."

There was a long pause. The tisane, James suspected, has been laced with orange flower water, which in turned contained laudanum, the extract of the opium poppy. He was certain when Blair's eyelids drooped and the cup in his hand tilted at a precarious angle. Maria had her methods of making sure a person rested as he well knew, having been subjected to them himself until he was old enough to circumvent them.

Rising to his feet, he rescued the cup, then lifted the tray from Blair's lap. The drowsy man murmured something and his eyelids drifted shut.

James set the tray aside, then returned to perch on the side of the bed. Blair was fast asleep, his lashes making dark, curling shadows on his pale cheeks.

James' lips tightened as he reached out to brush the bruise at his temple with his fingertips. He could feel the heat of the bruise from inches away, and gently confirmed that the bone underneath was intact. Blair might have a headache for a day or two, but he would be all right. The bruising would fade, and hopefully, the memory of the attack as well.

The silky brown curls seemed to cling to his fingertips as he threaded through them. Disturbing their soft strands brought that faint hint of spicy fruit and heavier musk that tightened his loins. He wanted to bury his face in that scented softness, but that would be tempting fate and also his command of his baser instincts.

Blair's lips were beautifully shaped, smooth, moist at the line of their joining. He would taste of broth and orange water and his own unique flavor.

Did he dare? No.

His dark nipples showed through the white nightshirt in a compelling fashion. Something hard, and round lay beneath one and James fought not to touch the shape. He could trace it without, quite, touching. A ring! What a curious thing! His groin leapt at the thought of tugging at it. Would Blair wake, he wondered, if he closed his hand slowly, took the nipple between his forefinger and thumb and rolled it as delicately as he might a small and incredibly luscious berry?

His eyes felt like hot embers in his head; his brain was simmering in his skull. Never in his life had he wanted someone so much.

"I'm not for sale!"

Blair had flung those words at him, and he had been astonished to hear them, but not unhappy. Now he regretted them. And wondered how they could be tested.

Tomorrow, if Blair was better, he would find out.

Discretion and honor were fine things, and he had no wish to be a dupe. But still less did he feel like accepting the martyrdom of useless self-denial.

Blair's hand lay on the coverlet. Picking it up, James uncurled the lax fingers and brought it to his mouth to place a kiss in the palm. The skin there was soft and he could not resist a single brief touch of his tongue to taste.

Lowering Blair's hand again, positioning it just so beside him, he let it go. He stepped back from the bed and turned, leaving the room. The door closed soundlessly behind him.

Blair entered the parlor, then came to an abrupt halt, overcome by a sense of disorientation. The plaster medallion he had last seen shattered in pieces on the dirty floor was pristine white and attached to the ceiling above a crystal and bronze d'or chandelier. The draperies that had been faded and ragged now hung in heavy, silken folds at the windows. A parlor set in sea green velvet edged an Aubusson carpet woven in luminous shades of green and rose and gold.

There were two men seated at a table placed near the open window where lace undercurtains wavered in the morning breeze. As he hesitated in the doorway, the men rose to their feet. One was James. The other was a slender dandy with sandy blonde hair and a mustache, and a smile that crinkled the corners of his warm brown eyes.

"Oh, excuse me." Blair began a quick retreat.

"No, wait," James said. Coming toward Blair, he gently cupped the younger man's elbow and led him into the room.

"Oh, James, you devil, who have we here?" The other man moved forward with amusement and interest on his face.

"Permit me, Blair, to present my good friend, Rafael Van Ryf. Rafe, Mr. Blair Sandburg."

This was the man James had suspected of having brought him to the house. Blair felt his face congeal as he reached out automatically to shake hands.

"Delighted, young fellow," Van Ryf said, taking his hand in a firm grip and shaking it. "Ellison, he has potential."

There was no amusement in James' face. He was watching the two of them with measuring eyes. Blair knew James had brought him into the room for the express purpose of seeing how he might react to Van Ryf, and Van Ryf to him.

"Please don't let me interrupt your discussion," he said, struggling to manage a small smile. "I was only looking for something to read."

"You read? But I thought --" James stopped as he saw the look on Blair's face. "Forgive me. What books I have are only in Spanish, French, or Latin. In English, there is only the Holy Scriptures."

Blair had forgotten he was assumed to be an Irish catamite, and therefore illiterate. He had spent the last three days sleeping, eating the small, delicious meals that were brought to him, and generally regaining his equilibrium.

And in between the meals and naps, he'd talked with Jim, told him more about sentinels and guides, even gotten him to do a few tests. It had been enough to convince him that Jim's seizures were more likely zone outs, and there was no question, the man was a sentinel.

Blair was drawn to him, pulled in a way he seemed to have no control over. When Jim -- James -- would grow agitated after Blair had him look out to see and describe the ships he could see, all it had taken was a touch from his hand to calm the older man. The slight tremor, the beads of perspiration, that James had said precluded a petit mal episode would recede at the stroke of Blair's hand across Jim's arm.

And when James was gone for any period of time, gone from Blair's sight, from his touch, nausea and dizziness would rise up and threaten to overtake Blair. Yet a touch from Jim, sometimes just a word, could set the world right again.

It was clear -- they were connected.

But Blair had no idea what to do about it, or where to go from here.

The afternoon before, he had been visited by a tailor and his assistant bearing bolts of material, a set of fashion plates, and one or two fashion dolls. When he had protested at the necessity of having clothing made, James had pointed out with great reasonableness that he could not wear a nightshirt forever, his own clothes would be far to large for the smaller man, and there was no other way to achieve clothing of any quality. Still, he had dithered, unwilling to make a choice. James had finally lost patience. Indicating several bolts of cloth in rapid succession, he had instructed the tailor to make two day sets and a set for evening wear, using his own discretion as to which of the selected material would be for which set. Swift work, James had promised, would be well rewarded.

With one thing and another, Blair had almost begun to feel comfortable in the house, and in his role as guest. Now, suddenly, despite the connection between them, despite the fact that he knew James was beginning to rely on him to hold back the spells, despite the fact that James was beginning to understand that he wasn't sick -- he had a gift. Despite all that, suddenly that comfort was gone. The new leather shoes, the soft, dark blue trousers, the stiffly starched white shirt, all chosen and paid for by the man beside him and delivered not an hour ago, all felt as if they were made of lead.

"Never mind, then," he said, his voice stiff. He didn't think it would be wise to reveal that he read and spoke Spanish fluently, could read Latin with passable aplomb, and was also well-versed in Greek, along with Arabic, Hebrew, and half a dozen archaic South American Indian dialects spoken only in the rain forest. Oh, and his Portuguese wasn't too bad either. What he did say was, "I'll just go sit in the garden and enjoy the sun. It's a beautiful day."

"We'll bring our wine and come with you," Van Ryf said. "I feel the need of fresh air."

Had the offer been made in a polite attempt to ease the awkwardness that hung in the air? Or was it from curiosity? So bland was the smile that went with it, Blair couldn't tell.

It made no difference, in any case. James moved to the door and held it open, then reached out to again support Blair's arm as if he were still fragile. He was ushered across the central hall to the side door which led into the courtyard garden.

It was place of warm sunshine, gentle pastel colors, drifting flower scents, and shadows moving softly on the brick walls. The water bubbling up from the fountain and pouring from its bowl made a soothing murmur.

There were wrought iron chairs in a grape leaf pattern placed under the limbs of a flowering dogwood. The three of them moved in that direction. Blair choose a chair and sat, watching as James waited until Van Ryf had also been seated before releasing Blair's arm and sitting down himself.

"So tell me, young master Blair," Van Ryf said, "where do you come from, and how long will you be here with us in Cascade? Are you related to James that you are visiting with him? And is there anything I can do to make your stay more pleasant?"

Blair searched his mind for nice, noninformative answers to the spate of questions. While he hesitated, James answered for him.

"Blair knows not where he comes from, nor how long he will be staying. For his relationship to me, there is none. I found him, insensible and quite naked, on the floor of my bedchamber."

Blair felt the hot color begin somewhere in the region of his navel and rise in a wave to his face. James' purpose was, no doubt, to shock in the hope that one of them, either Van Ryf or himself, would say something to indicate prior knowledge of each other. The effect, however, was to expose him to James' friend. He felt the betrayal like a slap in the face. It hurt, not the least reason being because it was unexpected.

"Fascinating," Van Ryf said in soft amazement as he rested his gaze on James' taut features. "You found him, and so you kept him."

"What else was I supposed to do?" The words were curt.

"Shout hosanna, I should think," Van Ryf answered in musing tones. "He is just what you have always talked of, right down to the hair. It isn't every day a man is given a gift from the gods. Even you, who scorn my offers to assist you, seem to recognize that much."

James gave him a dark look. "Wouldn't you agree the gods owe me a gift or two?"

"They aren't known for paying their debts. And what will you do with him now?"

Blair sprang to his feet, ignoring the pain that shot through his head and the nausea that filled his belly. "He will do nothing with me," he said, his voice shaking and his eyes bright with anger as he stared from one man to the other. "I don't belong to him; I belong to me. I decide where I go, and when. And I have no intention of staying here while the two of you talk about me as if I were a -- a two-bit whore on a slow Saturday night!"

He whirled and took a quick step away from them. Suddenly, there was a spinning sensation inside his head. Darkness crowded near. He gasped, swaying, clamping his hands to his eyes.

James was beside him in an instant. "What is it, Blair? Tell me!"

James' voice was solid, something to hold on to in the whirlwind. His hands on Blair's arms were steadying. The blackness receded. The spinning slowed. Wobbled. Stopped.

"I think," he said indistinctly, "that I had better go and lie down."

"Yes," James agreed. "I'll get Maria."

"No! No, I think she went to do the marketing. Anyway, I don't need her."

Maria would fuss and mutter and give him something to make him sleep. He had come to appreciate James' housekeeper, but he didn't want her now.

"Then I'll come --"

"Stay with your friend," he said. "I'll be perfectly fine."

James let his hands fall away, but he did not move. Behind him, Van Ryf stood watching.

Summoning a smile but no real warmth, Blair managed to incline his head toward the other man. With a trace of irony in his tone, he said, "A pleasure, Mr. Van Ryf."

Rafe Van Ryf bowed slightly. "Until next time, Sir."

"If there is a next time," Blair returned and felt a grim smile curve his mouth as he saw James stiffen.

Turning from them both, he walked away.

But there was no rest for him in the bedchamber. For one thing, he was too disturbed. Not even meditating helped. It was still James' room even if he had been ousted by Blair's injury. There were reminders of him everywhere.

One of the most potent of these was the scent of linseed oil. It had nothing to with furniture, he had discovered that morning, but came from the tower room.

The connecting octagonal chamber was James' retreat. There he kept the medical books of his grandfather who had been a physician, also the household records and ledgers pertaining to the family ranch to the east. In addition, one corner was cluttered with easels and canvases, with oil colors and brushes and all the other paraphernalia of painting. The linseed oil, used for thinning the colors, was among these items.

There were a number of canvases in various stages of completion. One was an ocean scene, another a somber view of a Indian funeral procession. Yet another depicted a huge black cat, staring hungrily at a small wolf, an intriguing combination if he'd ever seen one. The largest, set on a low easel in front of a full-length mirror, was a half-finished self-portrait.

Blair wandered into the tower now to stand staring at the painting of James. There was technical skill in the execution, an exacting color sense, and more than competent brush work. The clothing, the stance and background were the same as in the one he had seen in the derelict mansion. And yet, there was something not quite right about the painted figure. He thought it was in the eyes. They were too blank, the expression passionless and barricaded. It kept everything inside, gave nothing away.

At some point between this moment and the twenty-first century, James had learned to do much better. He knew, because he had seen the final work. But for now, the portrait appeared very much like the artist, a man locked inside himself.

It hurt him to look at it.

He turned away, moving back down to the bedchamber. There, he stopped. And standing there in the middle of the room, he felt a sudden, terrible need to get out of the house, get away, run, search for something, anything to hold on to that was real and solid. To search, perhaps, for the future.

He had felt the urge hovering inside him from the moment he suspected the truth, even while he rested and regained his strength. As long as James was nearby, offering stability and comfort, it had not reached the stage of action. Hearing him discuss him as if he meant nothing made him realize that this man, this James, was not, could not be, the Jim he had created, that he was basing his whole security on no more than foolish fancy.

He would go. Now.

He struggled with the cravat, then donned his topcoat and grabbed his hat. He wore these things not because he wanted to, but because he wanted to be inconspicuous. It would be bad enough to be outside the house alone; that much had been impressed upon him in his three days here. Despite the layer of civilization on Cascade, it was very much a thin veneer and most of the town was typical rough and ready western frontier mixed with all the dangers of a port city as well.

There was no difficulty leaving the house. Maria was gone. James and his friend were still in the courtyard garden; he could hear their voices coming from that direction. The downstairs maid was out in the kitchen wing behind the house, talking to the cook as she prepared the noon meal. A houseboy who was polishing the brass door knocker opened the door for him, then bowed him down the steps.

He moved slowly at first, staring around him, looking for the familiar. But nothing was the same. Streets were more narrow, front entrance areas wider. Curbs and sidewalks were of brick and stone or were missing altogether. There were no street markers against which to check his bearings. Houses appeared stripped of detail, when in reality they had not yet received their late Victorian embellishments.

A farm wagon loaded with vegetables and pulled by a raw-boned mule passed him. He saw a boy bowling a hoop running along in front of a black woman who puffed after him. A carriage came toward him. In it was an ancient female in shiny black faded to purple at the seams, looking desiccated and bored.

By degrees, as he moved closer into the city proper, closer to the harbor, his footsteps quickened. His heart beat high in his throat. His head began to throb. He saw a pair of sailors coming toward him with long, greasy hair tied back in a queue and wearing striped jerseys. He crossed the street, shuffling crab-like to avoid the worst of the clumped mud in the road.

Another block, and another. He crossed another street and rounded a corner. Sluiskin Park. There it was before him.

Only it wasn't there. Rather, it was an oddly bare stretch of land a few blocks from the water. There were no flowering shrubs and winding paths, no statue of the famous Indian guide, no small interpretation hut. It was only a grassy and bedraggled space with a few trees and a wide beaten path that led through it down to the piers.

The harbor itself had changed, seeming to be several blocks further away. Erosion? Gone were the warehouses like the one he called home. Surprisingly small ships by his future standards, like so many floating leaves in a river, were drawn right up to the piers, jostling each other as stevedores heaved sacks on brawny shoulders to take them up the gangplanks and rolled barrels back down. From that direction, drifting on the still air, was the sickly smell of raw rum and molasses, rotted fruit, fish, and mud.

And the Catholic church, old St. Anne's, which faced the sea and the naked Sluiskin Park, had lost its spires, or rather, had not yet gained them. With its rounded bell towers, it had a Spanish aspect that made it seem completely foreign. The buildings on either side were in bad repair and without the mansard roofs that would be added in a few years from now in the face-lift provided by the wealthy and scandal-ridden Duchess of Lancastershire.

Standing there looking around him, Blair felt bereft and suddenly afraid. He had tried to ignore the evidence, not to mention the simple facts as James gave them to him, tried to pretend it didn't matter. He could do it no longer.

He was standing here in Cascade in the year 1868. He was here, with the paving of ballast stones from arriving ships under his feet, the sun shining on his head, the bodies of people he had always thought of as long dead moving around him. By some means he could not understand, much less duplicate, he had transcended time and space and matter to reach this place, this year, this day.

Now what?

The dizziness, the darkness, was crowding him again. He needed to sit down somewhere out of the sun. Or maybe he needed to lie down, to sleep and possibly dream another dream from which he could wake.

"There you are. I knew I'd find you."

The words were rough-edged, grimly self-satisfied. Hard on them, his arm was taken in a firm grasp and he was dragged around.

How did you find me?

James flushed, then leaned forward and breathed deeply. "Scent."

Scent. It as all too much. He'd always wanted to find a sentinel, but this...

James's face swam before him. Blair reached out to clutch his coat with both hands, holding tight.

"Is something wrong?" James asked in a totally different tone as he looked down into Blair's eyes. "Are you faint?"

"Yes. No. I don't know. Jim -- James," he almost cried in despair, "everybody and everything is gone -- my mother, my friends, my home and town, my place in them. I don't have a penny to my name, have nowhere to live, nowhere to go. What on earth am I going to do?"

James' face changed, softening. "Come home with me," he said.

Blair loosened his grasp to wipe at his eyes. "How can I? You can't decide what I am and you don't want the kind of person you think I am in your home. I have to find work."

"The kind of work a lad like you is likely to find, you may as well do for me."

Blair drew back further. There was a tight pain in his chest as he said, "Are you suggesting --"

"Be my guide. If I am really this mythical sentinel you speak of, then guide me. Be the one who completes me and unlocks my gifts. Stay with me, be mine, and I will take care of you as long as you can find it in your heart to remain. When you go, as you must and surely will, you won't be poorer for it."

It was a bald proposal made on the street under the observance of several curious onlookers. He might have been insulted if he'd been of the same time, and was, maybe just a little even so. But, a chance to work with a sentinel! To have his own sentinel! To guide him! He lifted his head and looked at James, saw his set stance, the tension in the corners of his mouth, and the suspended look in his eyes. He saw and was touched by the courage required for him to speak those words.

James expected a refusal, perhaps with horror and loathing. He might even expect the physical retaliation of an open-handed blow, the offended one's traditional slap.

The breath Blair drew was deep. He said, "You may think you know what and who I am, but you don't. There are things I should tell that you might not believe or understand."

"There is nothing you can say that will change my mind. I thought I had lost you just now, and I nearly went out of my mind. I understand more than you may believe. Your independence, for instance. You said that you are not mine, and I accept that, as much as I might wish it otherwise. I am asking, most humbly and with all due respect, if you will give yourself to me for whatever time there may be."

This was the man he had known in a thousand dreams, his lover and loving companion. His friend, his confidante, his sentinel. This was his Jim. Or at least as close as he was going to find, as near as he could bear.

He could not refuse; he hardly considered the possibility. It wasn't desperation, nor was it gratitude for the offer of basic necessities. It was, rather, that James wanted him, needed him, and he finally understood something of importance.

"Yes, of course I will." He answered James quietly but with confidence. "Why else am I here?"