Expert: Summer Summer Lei Shidler - 9/16/2004

Question
"Never.  Again. Never Again."  Never again what?  What exactly is getting forsworn here?  Never again offer up his head?  Never again associate with anyone and potentially put them in jeopardy?  Never again take someone else's head?

And what are we supposed to think happened afterward?  Is the champagne reception on the barge, later that evening, supposed to be a final farewell?  Are these the words spoken by someone with a freshly awakened appreciation of the people around him, or someone on his way out the door?

And how exactly does that last minute profession of love jibe up with either him storming off into the fog, or her taking up with the cop?

Deliberate ambiguity, or did I just completely miss the point?

Answer
I can't give you definitive answer, since the ending is deliberately ambiguous (as you surmised), but I have always felt that he meant never to let himself get close enough to other people that they could be used against him, or him against them.  Which, oddly enough, seemed to be the opposite of what Fitz kept trying to tell him.  The Duncan at the end is a man who intends to say his farewells, in my opinion.  

As far as the love thing, I never really got that part either, but the last episode is(admittedly) not the best episode ever :)  

Let me know if you have any other questions!