An Unlikely Hero: Part 1

Disclaimer: As much as I'd love to have Joren chained to my bedposts, everything but the plot belongs to Ms. Tamora Pierce and her publishers. In short, don't sue me. Thank you kindly.

Rating: PG-13

Summary: The night before his Ordeal, Joren of Stone Mountain goes missing. Six years later, after Tortall has been conquered by a Carthaki dictator, Kel is rebuilding her shattered life when Joren reappears asking for her help. (hopefully will also feature Daine and Kaddar in a major way)

A/N: Well, look at poor ambitious me! Starting a new fic when Fallen Idols is just coming to a climax? Tsk tsk, I know. But this just popped into my head, and while I've had K/J plots bubbling around and developing for quite sometime, this one just seemed quick and easy to write while I was stuck with FI. To do this, I was forced to reread the part of SQUIRE when J dies and it was quite traumatizing, so I hope you like it. Anyway, its only a short beginning, but please tell me what you think. – T.B.A.

*

Joren of Stone Mountain knelt quietly in the same place hundreds of squires had spent countless hours brooding about the Ordeal in it's chapel. Unlike the majority of his year-mates, he had never before come to sit in the Chapel of Ordeal until that day. And the next day he would enter the Chamber and become a knight.

It's about time, he thought to himself with a chuckle. Four years of abuse from The Stump and another three playing lackey to Paxton. And all for what? He found himself asking. A Shield? A life of service to a King I don't respect and an obligation to a code of chivalry I couldn't care less about?

Joren closed his eyes and sighed. It felt as if all his life he was doing nothing but what he was told to do by others. Go to the palace and become a page. Bully the girl. Accept the position of squire to Lord Nond. Propose to Lady Rosalind. Pass your Ordeal.

Well, he'd be a knight by this time the next day. And he'd marry the girl his father had chosen by the end of the year. And then his father would leave him alone. And that's all he wanted, really. He may love the art of fighting, but he could care less about being a knight.

Refusing to feel sorry for himself, he sighed again and stood, walking up to the doors of the revered Chamber. What's the big deal anyway? He thought, sniggering. It's just a room, really, and I'm a better warrior than so many of my fellow squires. Why are they all so scared?

He'd seen the girl squire here just days ago, kneeling silently as he had just minutes ago. She had reason to be afraid—even if his bullying, Wyndlon's tough training, and the border patrol hadn't destroyed her, surely the chamber would. He grinned cockily and traced a finger over the carved door of the Chamber of Ordeal.

Sir Paxton carried a tall, thin body in his arms as he came down the steps in front of the chamber. White-blond hair cascaded over the front of the head, covering a face—a face he recognized when the hair was brushed away to reveal skin that was even paler than usual. Pale as death. Someone was screaming in the background—shrieking inconsolably. Gasps and cries of some emotion—surprise, perhaps—broke out all over the chapel.

Dead.

Joren his hand pulled away from door with a gasp for breath. His heart was pounding a mile a minute. He squeezed his eyes shut and breathed deeply. In. Out. In. Out.

Somehow, against his will, he leaned forward and touched the door again.

His father was smashing through a door, yelling and banging like a maniac. His mother was clinging to him, begging, it seemed, and his uncle was behind them. "Bitch!" he heard his father's voice yell with rage, and a dog was barking and biting his father—and were those—birds? He recognized the dog as the ugly mutt Keladry was often trailed by. "Trollop, you killed my boy!" his father yelled into the dark.

Next he knew, his mother was speaking to Lord Raoul, "He is distraught," her voice broke, "My Lord, please, Burchard is out of his mind with grief."

"My nephew is dead," his uncle cried wildly, "The Chamber of Ordeal opened on his corpse!"

Joren finally was able to yank himself away from the doors. He stared in horror at the grand Chamber doors for a moment and then bolted from the Chapel of Ordeal without even closing the doors.

*

Sir Paxton sat with Joren's other knight's mentor, Sir Deric, waiting for his squire to join them after his ceremonial bath so that the young man could begin his vigil before the Ordeal.

"Joren sure is taking a long time in there, don't you think, Deric?" The knight asked his companion.

The larger man shrugged. "Leave him for a little while longer," the knight advised, "He's probably just working out his nerves."

Sir Paxton snickered to himself. He'd rarely seen any trace of nervousness in his reserved, yet cocky squire, and didn't expect him to be nervous at all about his Ordeal in the least. And until that morning, he hadn't thought the boy to be nervous at all. True, all day the boy had been even paler than usual, and quiet even when spoken to, but he attributed that to a realization of the gravity of the Ordeal.

"I don't think Joren is capable of being nervous, Deric." Paxton said after a moment.

Deric sighed and shook his head. "He is quite confident and seems in control. He will make quite a knight, from what I've seen, once if his nasty streak of animosity is ever overcome."

"So even you've seen that side, then?" Paxton asked, raising an eyebrow to Sir Deric.

"Somewhat." He answered. The other knight knew very little of Joren, having only seen him at the young man's home in Stone Mountain and several times at court when he was visiting. He was a close friend of his father, Lord Burchard, but had still heard of and even witnessed some of the boy's callous behavior. "I've heard more then I've seen of Burchard's son in actuality." He confessed.

"He's not a bad kid, really." Sir Paxton offered in defense of his squire. After few more moments of silence, Joren's knight master said, "Nerves or no, that boy is taking much to long in there."

"Go call to him, then."

Sir Paxton rose and did just that. When there was no answer, and no splashing noises—in fact, no noises at all—coming from the room with the pool, Sir Paxton called out again, and then stepped cautiously inside.

He grimaced after a moment. There was no doubt about it. Joren of Stone Mountain was gone.

*