Prisoner of the Gypsies

December 28, 1482

Paris in the morning was just as busy as ever. The blacksmith was making new weapons, the baker was putting out freshly made bread, the market was swarmed with people, the guards were patrolling the area and of course the gypsies were either singing, dancing or telling stories to earn money. Other then that nothing really new was going on at least not till this morning there wasn't.

For just entering the gateway into the town was a girl that hadn't been to Paris for a long time. This girl was a little past her mid-twenties and at first glance someone could confuse her of being a gypsy. Her skin was just as dark as any other gypsy that wandered the streets and with her raven hair, held back in a low ponytail and dark brown eyes; it was amazing no one had arrested her as soon as she entered the town.

But at second glance you could tell she wasn't. Since most gypsies probably didn't wear heavy set armor with a black cloak that she wore around her shoulders along with a sword that hung around her waist and had a white horse walk beside her. No, surprisingly this girl was actually a soldier. She was only here in Paris because had been summoned from the wars to come here, personally she would rather be helping back in the wars, but this task had been given to her after the man who was suppose to do this named Phoebus said he was unable to do it at the time. And as a token of his gratitude for what she was doing for him, he let her use his horse to get here. Besides since this task sounded a little interesting, she decided to give it a shot.

Of course it wasn't going to do her much good if she couldn't figure out where she was suppose to meet the man who had called her here. Her eyebrows were furrowed in frustration as she stared at the worn out map that she had been given. Finally, she along with her horse came to a stop in the middle of the street and with looking at the buildings with confusion one last time; she crumpled up the map into a little ball and threw it over her shoulder.

"Achilles, you leave your hometown for a couple of years and they just go off and change everything." She said to her white horse

Just then she noticed some guards passing by her, she decided to ask them if they could help her "Excuse me, gentlemen. I'm looking for the Palace of Justice would you…?" She realized they weren't even paying attention to her "Hmm…I guess not."

She grabbed the Achilles' reins and continued to walk down the street. Just then her ears were starting to pick up what seemed to sound like music and when she turned the corner her theory proved to be correct. There was a gypsy man sitting on a crate playing a flute-like instrument that created music that sounded like he should be charming a snake. Not too far from him was white goat that had a large gold hoop in its ear, galloping and prancing around a purple hat and then finally there was a gypsy girl that was dancing while playing the tambourine.

Finding the dance and music amusing, the soldier girl threw in three coins into the hat that was on the ground. As she did the gypsy girl stopped dancing for a moment and smiled gratefully at her. The girl smiled back at her and took a moment to examine the women before her. With no doubt the gypsy girl was the most beautiful women she had ever seen. Much like herself, the women had dark skin and hair; she was wearing a white blouse with a blue-green and yellow corset along with a long purple skirt. The women's eyes startled her the most they were a bright emerald green.

Snapping out of the slight daze she was in, the soldier girl smiled politely back. Just then there was the sound of someone whistling above them. The gypsy girl gasped while her goat picked up the hat and tried to make a run for it, but while running the coins fell out of the hat. The goat bleated at the gypsy girl, who quickly ran back and started scooping the coins back into the hat, but then some guards appeared before her.

The soldier girl listened in on their conversion, it seemed the guards thought that the gypsy girl had stolen the money that she had earned and were trying to arrest her. Unfortunately for the men, the gypsy's goat head-butted and kicked them, giving the two of them enough time to get away. The soldier girl saw that the guards were about to go after her, but she quickly pulled her horse so that they ran into him. The tall and slim guard fell behind her horse and into the mud.

"Achilles, sit." She quickly ordered

Her horse did as he was told and ended up sitting right on top of the guard. As some people laughed at the display before them, the girl started to feigned an apology "Oh, I'm so sorry. Naughty horse, naughty." She lightly scolded Achilles "He's just impossible, I can't take him anywhere."

"Get this thing off me!" The guard pleaded to his friend

The second guard that was more short and stout then the first glared at her "I'll teach you a lesson, peasant." He pulled out a small dagger from his pocket

The girl almost rolled her eyes at the weak threat, but instead she pulled her cloak back, revealing her dark blue armor underneath it before drawing out her sword and pointing it towards the guard, flashing him a charming smile "You were saying, lieutenant?"

"Oh, C-Captain Jena…Ow!" The guard tried to salute, but ended up hitting his head. He quickly straightened himself back out though "At your service, ma'am."

The soldier, Jena, bet down and brought her sword down near the first guard's face, whose body was still trapped under Achilles, and cut off half of his moustache "I know you have a lot on your mind right now, but the Palace of Justice…?"

After letting the guard out from under Achilles, the two guards proceeded with leading Jena to the Palace of Justice. Along the way however, Jena spotted four coins on the ground so she bent down and picked them up. She then noticed there appeared to be a beggar wearing a purple cloak and smoking a pipe, sitting against the wall with a familiar purple hat not too far away from where they were sitting. Jena knew who the person probably was, but she pretended not to notice and just threw the coins into the hat as she walked by.

Following the two guards, Jena looked at the large and somewhat ominous looking building that was coming into view. She was starting to get a bad feeling about this place, especially when she heard the distant sound of a whip cracking.

'The Palace of Justice? The Palace of Torture sounds much more accurate.' Jena thought as she opened to door to the next room. When she entered she saw two men talking, the first man was tall and old wearing a black and red outfit with a large hat on his head. The man next to him was shorter wearing an all black outfit and carrying a whip. If what she remembered correctly from the letter she had received that taller man was probably the one called Frollo.

After talking to the man next to him, Frollo seemed to finally notice her presence in the room "Ah, you must be Jena." He gently took her hand and planted a kiss on it "It's a pleasure to finally meet you, my dear."

Jena felt her skin crawl from where his lips had touched her hand, but she resisted the urge to flinch or wipe her hand on her pants "It's a pleasure to meet you as well, sir." There was a bit of silence before Jena remembered something she had forgotten "Sir, Monsieur Phoebus wished for me to inform you how he apologizes for not being able to make it to your request, but he had a bit more urgent matters to intend to."

Frollo gave a slight wave of his hand "I'm not that concerned, my dear. I've read some of your records and I'm sure you'll be able to handle the job just as well as Monsieur Phoebus would have done. I must say I'm impressed how a young lady such as yourself is quite the warrior. You must have had a remarkable teacher."

Jena nodded "Thank you, sir. My father actually taught me everything I know." Jena felt a small pang in her heart at the thought of her parents. They had been dead for almost five years now and it was still a little hard for her to talk about it.

"Yes, but be aware that I expect nothing but the best from you, Captain."

"And you will have it, sir."

"Good, you know my last captain of the guards was a bit of a…disappointment." Just then there was a sound of a whip cracking followed by someone moaning in pain, it made Jena feel slightly uneasy "Well, I'm sure you'll whip my men to shape."

Shaking off her nervousness, Jena managed to reply "Yes, I'll…uh…do everything in my power to make sure that happens, sir."

Frollo and Jena walked out of the dungeons and went outside onto one of the balconies before Frollo started to talk again "You come to Paris in her darkest hour, Captain. It will take a firm hand to save the weak minded from being so easily mislead."

""Mislead, sir?"

"Look, Captain," Frollo gestures with a wave of his arm to the city below them "Gypsies…the gypsies live outside of the moral order, their heathen ways inflame the people's lowest instincts. They. Must. Be. Stopped."

Jena allowed herself a moment to take all this information in before giving the minster a puzzled look and asked with a hint of annoyance in her voice "I was summoned from the wars to capture fortune tellers and palm readers?"

"The real war, Captain is what you see before you," Frollo gestured again towards the city "For twenty years, I've been…taking care of the gypsies. One…by…one." Jena noticed that as he said this Frollo was using his fingers to kill some ants that were roaming along the railing of the balcony. "And yet for all my success…they had thrived." Frollo lifted up a loose stone panel, revealing many more ants underneath it "I believe they have a safe haven within the walls of this very city…a nest if you will. They call it the Court of Miracles."

"And what are we going to do about it, sir?" As she finished asking that, Frollo smiled cruelly before placing the stone panel back onto the railing, making a sickening crutch as he killed the entire ant colony, which made Jena feel slightly nauseated "You make your point quite…vividly, sir."

Frollo smiles and places a hand on Jena's shoulder "You know I like you, Captain. Shall we?"

Jena followed Frollo back inside, trying to ignore the cries and yells of pain from prisoners as the minster started to give her new orders "Your first order of businesses is I would like you to take some of my men with you to do a night patrol of the city."

"A night patrol, sir?" Jena tried to sound interested

"Yes, those gypsy vermin have a tendency to come out only at night when they think there are fewer guards around to stop them. But I'm sure someone of your status will be able to handle it."

Luckily, Frollo had his back turned to Jena otherwise he probably would have seen her slightly frown. Jena was getting very concerned about this man, he kept talking like the gypsies were more like animals or a disease then actual humans. Of course Jena didn't view the gypsies that way; she just saw them as ordinary people who were just trying to get by in the world like everyone else. And their so called magic was nothing, but innocent fortune-telling and harmless parlor tricks. So why is it that they seemed to be such a big threat to Frollo?

"Here," Jena snapped out of her thoughts as Frollo had stopped walking and handed her small slip of paper. Jena took it and before she asked what it was, Frollo answered "I took some time to find you a place to stay while you're off duty. This is the address to your new home, I hope you find it too your liking."

"Uh…thank you, sir." With that Jena took her leave and as soon as she exited the Palace of Justice, she allowed herself to relax, not realizing how relieved she was to be out of that strange place. Walking down the steps, she saw that the two guards that had helped her earlier were still there, watching over her horse. She took Achilles' reins before asking the guards "If it not too much trouble, could you help me find this address?"

The taller guard took the piece of paper from her hand and looked at it for a moment before replying "Follow us, ma'am."

…

As Jena continued to follow the guards, she couldn't help but look at the city around her. Jena was born in Paris, but her family moved when she was only two years old so she really didn't remember anything about it very much. The weather was surprisingly warm for it being December, it almost made Jena want to remove her armor and put on a more fitting attire, but she reminded herself that she was going to be on duty soon, so the armor would have to stay on. She couldn't help but notice a few passing citizens stopped what they were doing and stared at her in awe. She smiled when she realized that the people of Paris were staring at her because the way her blue armor gave off a brilliant luster in the mid-afternoon sun and after all since it had been such a long time since she was last here, Jena was certainly considered a new face in the unknowing populace and with her dazzling outfit was indeed a sight to behold to those who had grown accustomed to the dully uniformed local soldiers.

Just then Jena noticed that they were passing Notre Dame and she couldn't resist taking a moment to look at it. It truly was beautiful, the sun shined on its front, giving it an almost heavenly glow. Gazing up at the tall twin towers that seemed to reach the heavens, her eyes widened slightly as she thought there was some kind of moment happening upon the stone walls of the large cathedral. Jena tried squinting her eyes and see if she could make out what the figure was, but alas it was too far away for her to see.

Focusing back on following the guards to her house, they soon arrived at a small two story building. Jena thanked the men for they help before getting off of Achilles and taking him to the small stable that was on the side. She removed the reins along with the saddle and her bags on his back, placing some oats into the food bin before saying to the white horse "Eat up and get some rest, boy. We have a long night a head of us."

Jena carried her bags inside the house and took them up stairs to her new room. After exploring the house and getting herself something to eat, Jena looked at the clock to see she still had a few hours before she had to go on patrol, so she decided it might be a good idea to take a nap before she left, since she didn't want to end up falling asleep on the job. Stripping off her armor and putting on her nightgown, Jena went back up stairs to her room before collapsing onto the comfy bed.

…

Several hours later…

A sudden knock at the door woke Jena with a start. She jumped out of bed, put back on her uniform, grabbed Achilles' saddle and reins and then ran downstairs to answer the door. When she opened it she saw one guard standing in the doorway along with five other guards behind him on their horses.

The guard in front of her quickly saluted, Jena gently ordered "At ease, soldier."

"Captain, are you ready to go on the night patrol?"

Jena nodded "Yes, just let me get my horse and we can leave."

Jena went back to the stable and put Achilles' saddle and reins back on, she petted the horse's head "You ready for this, boy?" Achilles nodded his head in response causing Jena to smile before hopping onto his back "Good, let's go."

As Jena came back out riding Achilles, all the soldiers stood attention; one of them asked "Your orders, Captain?"

Jena began to speak in a military tone "Minster Frollo has ordered us search the city and keep an eye out for any suspicious activity. If you find anything, I want you to report it back to me as soon as possible. Do I make myself clear?"

All of the men nodded "Sir, ma'am."

Jena pulled out a map-a much more new map then the one she had been given-from out of her satchel that was around her waist and then started to give the men their posts. After everyone knew where they were going to be, they all headed out into the town to start their patrol.

…

About two hours later…

Jena didn't have a clock with her, but she was pretty sure that it was a little past midnight and so far the patrol had been going pretty well. None of the other guards had came to report to her any news, so Jena kind of figured maybe tonight wasn't going to be as bad as she thought.

But there was still a long night ahead of her so Jena kept herself ready to go into action. Her ears were perked up in alert, listening for any sound that didn't belong to her or Achilles and her sharp eyes darted back and forth, taking in everything that passed her, looking for anything that looked like it didn't belong or any sudden movements.

Jena was glad that she had brought her cloak along as she anticipated the night was cold, but not too cold. Not that it really bothered her, after all as a soldier she had been through more horrible weather conditions then this, compared to her pervious encounters with harsh weather conditions, tonight actually felt pretty nice.

Jena pulled Achilles' reins to a stop as she jumped off of his back and lead him towards a small tavern. Just because she was on duty doesn't mean she could take a little break. She took Achilles to a small bin filled with water, which thankfully it wasn't frozen, and tied the rein to the small post beside it.

Jena gently petted his head "Drink up, boy. I'll be right back."

Jena opened the door and stepped inside the tavern, taking a moment to look at its surroundings. The candles on the walls give it a warm glow, most of the chairs were empty, but there were still several men sitting at the tables with mugs in their hands. A few men were sitting in the back of the room, intensely debating about something and finally there was a heavy set gypsy man washing dishes in the center of the room at the bar table.

A few heads looked up to see the commotion Jena had caused, one man sitting by the door, playing cards looked at her intently for a moment before looking away and turning back to his game. Jena simply ignored their gazes and walked up towards the gypsy man at the bar. His back was turned to her as he hummed a tune she didn't recognize while scrubbing some dishes.

"Excuse me," Jena said, clearing her throat

The man, slightly startled by her voice, jumped and spun around to face her. His greasy face almost glistened in the candlelight, he had a scruffy bead, a stained apron and a red bandana wrapped around his head. He smiled at Jena, revealing he was missing one of his front teeth before asking "How can I help you, madam?"

Jena sat down in one of the empty seats near him "I'll just have a glass of water, please."

The gypsy man nodded before he turned to get her drink, he stopped for a moment to examine her appearance "You walk around the streets dressed like that?"

"Only when I'm on duty, monsieur." She replied simply

"You are a soldier?"

Jena nodded in response; she really didn't feel like making conversation with anyone. The man in front of her reached for a pitcher on the table and poured her drink into a cup before passing it down to her.

"Thank you." Jena said politely before taking a few gulps of her water

As the gypsy turned back to cleaning the dishes, Jena was left alone to her thoughts. Everything was pretty quiet besides the few scattered voices, but other then that everything continued on as if she had never entered the room. This was weird to Jena, since for a while now, she kept getting this feeling that something bad was going to happen.

As Jena finished her drink, she got up and tapped the man on the shoulder "I'm done."

The gypsy man grinned "That will be five francs."

Jena reached into her satchel, pulled out her money and dropped it into his dirty hand. She got up from her seat and turned to leave, but when her hand came upon the door handle, she heard the gypsy's voice call out from behind her "One more thing, mademoiselle! May I have the honor of knowing who I was serving tonight?"

Jena turned back to face the man again, it seemed innocent enough to give him her name. After all what harm could possible come of him knowing who she was?

"Jena Moreau, captain of the guards."

A haunting silence suddenly came upon the room, every conversation stopped, the gypsy man's smile grew wider and all eyes turned to young girl near the door.

"That's what I thought."

Jena tensed slightly, she was getting a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach and the little voice in the back of her head was practically screaming for her to leave right now. Trying to act like what the man said unaffected her, Jena as calmly as she could just opened the door and left.

Jena undid Achilles' reins that were around the post before hopping onto his back "Come on, Achilles. Let's go." With that they headed down the street a little faster then Jena had attended, but as long as it meant getting away from the tavern, she didn't really care. After a little while Jena tugged gently on the reins bring Achilles to a stop. Jena allowed her a moment to breathe in deeply and forced her muscles to relax again.

What the heck was that all about? Jena asked herself. Achilles snorting in concern brought Jena out of her thoughts; she reached out and petted him on the neck "I'm fine, boy. Just a bit of frazzled nerves that all…come on we need to get back to work."

But just as Jena and Achilles started to head off down the street again, there was a sudden noise that echoed throughout the empty streets. Jena didn't know what it was, but whatever it was, Achilles was freaking out because of it. Jena tried to talk to him to calm him down "Achilles, easy boy. Eas-Ahhh!" Achilles paid no attention to her commands and ended up bucking Jena right off of him. She hit the ground with a pained grunt and listened to the sound to Achilles' hoofs on the cobblestones as he ran away.

Jena got back up and rubbed the back of her head, she looked to see that Achilles was gone before looking around to see if she could find out where the source of the noise came from, but strangely there was nothing there. Letting out an annoyed sigh, she put up the hood of her cloak "I guess I'm walking home."

After a little while of walking, Jena ducked herself into an ally to rest for a little bit. There was still a least a few blocks before she got home, but at least she didn't have to worry about those gypsies from the tavern coming after her. Jena pulled off her hood and rubbed the temples of her forehead, mumbling to herself "Great job, Jena. First night on the job and already you have a bunch of people chasing after you. That's got to be a new record for me."

Jena allowed herself to rest for a few more moments before deciding it was time to leave again. She wondered if Achilles was going to be okay by himself, but more importantly she wondered what she was going to tell Frollo about what happened tonight. After all without Achilles, finishing up the night patrol wasn't going to be very easy, but she couldn't just leave while she was on duty. What if something happened and she didn't know about it?

Pondering her choices, Jena finally decided that maybe it would be best if she just went home. She could always make up a lie to Frollo and besides she didn't really feel comfortable just walking around all by herself in the middle of the night on foot. Pushing herself off the wall, Jena turned to leave, but just as she did she felt something grab a hold on her arm and drag her back into the ally.

"Hey, what the-." Jena felt a black gloved hand come up and clamp over her mouth, cutting her off in mid-sentence and muffling her protests. What the heck?

Jena could feel her captor lean in close to her, his warm breath hit the back of her neck causing the hairs to stand up on its end. The sinister yet playful voice of the man whispered in her ear "Mon Cherie, I believe you should think twice before wandering the streets of Paris at night."

Jena felt a sharp blow to the back of her head and in a flash, darkness claimed her vision.