So, look, there are times when you put pen to paper and you just can't really think of anything in particular to draw, you know? It's seriously, seriously not a big deal. It happens all the time, and then you just doodle some dicks and think about something funny, and before you know it, there's a whole sunset on the page, full of majestic colors and sweeping emotional vistas. And, of course, the sun looks just like a butt.
It happens all the time. Sometimes you just have to wait a bit before your hand remembers how do to it right. It's okay. He'll wait for you to get it right, definitely. He doesn't get bored, definitely. He just wants a friend, and if you stop, he definitely, definitely won't get mad at you and never come see you again ever at all forever and ever.
Jester knows this. Jester hasn't drawn anything since the abduction.
It's not that Jester feels any different. It's just that everybody else is being super duper weird, is all.
Nott watches her with big, wide eyes, like Jester's something amazing she doesn't quite think is real. Fjord looks at the ground a lot of the time, and he's always quiet and angry, but never at any of them. Molly and Yasha and Frumpkin are gone. Caduceus makes dead people tea.
When Beau puts a hand on Caleb's shoulder and Caleb leans into the comfort of a friendly touch instead of flinching away, Jester has to blink back the tears that pool in her eyes and make the back of her throat all scratchy, because that's weird. That's too weird. That's too different. That's too much time, too many things happening. Too much that she missed.
Her chest aches like she's sick or something. She pulls out her notebook and stares at the words on the page: why didn't you come? She hopes it doesn't sound like she's angry, because if it sounds like she's angry, maybe he'll get sad and go away. She wants to clarify, because four words can't get a lot of information across, but in the end she just traces over the words with her pen and then closes the book and goes to sleep.
She hopes it doesn't sound like she's angry.
"Hey," Beau says, crouching down next to Jester's bedroll. Her voice is a bit too loud, considering everyone's sleeping nearby, but it's the first time they've had to set a watch since the Shepherds, and Jester's pretty sure everyone else is awake anyway. "You good?"
"I am really good," Jester says, slowly, like she's testing out each word.
Beau snorts. "That's convincing." But she winces after she says it, like maybe she knows it was a bit harsh. "Nobody's going to get you. Okay? We're all paying attention. We're all keeping close. Caleb set his string up. We've got the cool bubble thing. It's not going to happen again." There's an awkward silence, and then Beau puts a hand on her arm and says, "Besides, if it does? We'll all be with you, this time."
"Thanks, Beau," Jester says, then turns on her side to look up at her. "That's kind of messed up, though. I don't really want you all being tortured and stuff."
"Oh! Yeah, no, uh, I really maybe didn't think that one through."
"Lots of yelling and cursing and manacles."
"Right, yeah, sure."
"Super uncomfortable when you're trying to sleep at night."
"Uh-huh. Yeah. No, I can see that."
Jester sits up, drawing her knees closer to her chest. "It kind of made things better, really, knowing that you were all okay. Once we figured out it was just the three of us. Once we knew you weren't all super dead, like if they slit your throats while you were sleeping or something."
"Fuck," Beau says. "I hadn't even thought that you wouldn't know if we were okay."
Jester shrugs. "You weren't, though. I mean, all of you weren't okay, though."
It looks like Beau's about to say something, but then she thinks better of it and just sighs instead. "No. We really weren't." She shifts so that she's right in Jester's eyeline and drops a heavy hand on her shoulder. "Hey. Get some sleep, roomie. I'll see you in the morning, okay?"
"Okay, Beau." Jester manages a smile, then swipes away the tears she hadn't even felt falling. "Don't get captured or carried away by awful slaver dudes or tortured or anything, okay? Promise?"
Beau grins bigger than she has in a long time. "Promise."
Nott leans into her a little more than could be explained by just the lurching of the wagon, but Jester doesn't mind, cuddling closer without trying to be too obvious about it. Nott gets jumpy, sometimes, about closeness, no matter how badly she seems to want to be near her friends. That much hasn't changed.
"I'm glad you're back," Nott says, breaking a silence they'd been keeping up for hours. "You're always so kind. I think I got worried, after Molly, that we maybe weren't going to get to keep kind people around."
"Beau is kind," Jester says, giving up on subtlety and pulling Nott closer, leaning her chin against the back of Nott's head. "She's weird about it, but she's getting better."
"She's grumpy," Nott says, holding up a finger. "An important distinction. Fjord's still scared. Caleb's wonderful, but I think maybe he's scared, too. Mr. Clay's weird. But you? You're kind. Right from the start, you were always kind to me."
Jester blinks a couple times and realizes that she's about to cry. Lately, it feels like she's always about to cry. "Is that what you would have said about me if–" She chokes the words off and sniffles, trying not to get snot on Nott's hood.
Nott squirms in her half-hug, turning back to look at her, and her eyes are wide, again. Scared. Awed. "If what?"
"It's nothing," Jester says, sniffling again. "It's just nothing. It's stupid."
Nott looks at her just a bit too long, then sighs and settles back into the hug. "Of course I would've said nice things about you, if you hadn't come back. We all would have. And they would've all been true." She clings a little tighter to Jester's arm. "And I'm so glad that now you're here to hear me say them."
"You don't have to pretend, you know," Caleb says. He'd been doing his fish impression, the one where he'd stand a bit outside of her normal conversational space, not quite staring, just opening and closing his mouth without actually deciding to say anything, so Jester's a bit surprised when he manages to force the words out. "I think the rest of us understand better than you think."
Jester pauses midway through pulling a blank notebook off a shelf—something with the leather cover dyed bright and colorful that makes her feel a little warmer inside—and stares at him. "You're being weird, Caleb. Even for you."
His cheeks flush, and he turns on his heel. "Never mind. Forget I said anything."
She sighs, snagging his sleeve before he can storm off. "Come on, Caleb. You always start a conversation and run off. Don't be a dick. Just say something."
He freezes, and for a second she thinks maybe she got through this time, but he just shakes his head and yanks his arm free.
With a heavy sigh, Jester turns back to the book she was looking at... and finds herself face-to-face with an orange spotted cat sitting like a bookend at the edge of the shelf. She darts a glance at Caleb, standing stock-still further down the aisle of books with his back to her, and then looks back at the cat. She blinks, slowly, and is delighted when the cat blinks back.
"Aw, Lumpy! I didn't know you were back!" She scoops him into her arms, and he claws his way up to her shoulder, butting his head against her cheek, coiling his long body and tail scarf-like along the back of her neck, purring against her so loudly that her teeth are practically vibrating in her skull. "Little lumpy Frumpkins," she coos, reaching with one hand to smoosh his face against hers, and giggles as he swipes a sandpaper tongue against the tears on her cheek. "I missed you, too."
Caduceus gives super good hugs. He's big and warm, and when he laughs a little, his voice echoes, bassy and comforting in his chest. She clings to him a little longer than she needs to, probably, but he doesn't seem to mind, bringing a big hand up to ruffle her hair, still chuckling to himself. When she finally pulls back, he grins crookedly at her. "Glad I could help."
She looks down at the faint white scar that is the only remnant of what had been a deep gash along her shoulder and collarbone, aside from a few still-crumbling bits of whatever weird fungus stuff Caduceus used to do his healing. Rolling her shoulder, there's no hint of pain. "That's kind of amazing."
He beams back. "You do some amazing things yourself, from what I saw in the fight back there. Really cool stuff. Really cool."
"Well," Jester says, waving a hand regally, "I'm pretty great, mostly. The Mighty Nein are all pretty great."
His smile gets a bit vague, and he takes a step back, giving her space. "Now, I'd been meaning to say, I'd understand if you're not comfortable counting me as part of that group just yet."
She folds her arms and considers him, keeping a serious face as long as she can, then shrugs. "Well, that's a really nice thing to say, but we literally pretty much always just add new people to the Nein whenever we meet them, mostly. Nice people, anyway."
His smile brightens again. "And you consider me a nice person?"
"Honestly? Kind of scary-nice." Jester drops her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "Nott and I were maybe sort of betting that there was a chance you'd turn out to be a vampire or a werewolf or something."
"Oh." He pauses, apparently digesting that. "For some reason, I'm feeling like I should maybe apologize for the let-down."
She giggles. "No. Not really. It's good that you're nice. I think that's starting to become what this group is all about."
He nods, slowly. "You know, I'd noticed that. Even the people who were just with us for a bit, at the beginning. The little one who was scared but led us into the dungeon anyway. The big one who was so dedicated to saving her people. The guy with the little bird who was opening cages, too. Just all people who are clearly in the habit of doing nice things, coming together to do much bigger nice things. It's, well. It's nice. The Mighty Nein are mighty nice."
"I think so, too," Jester says, then looks up past him. "Oh. Do you think we should maybe be calling for help or something? I think I can hear them yelling our names up there. They probably didn't see us fall in the pit trap, probably."
He laughs, patting her on the back. "I didn't want to interrupt your train of thought, but that seems like a really great thing to do."
She finds Fjord on the roof.
It's a quiet little inn they're staying at, with a tavern that takes up most of the building, leaving the sleeping quarters jammed up in the rafters. Not the finest establishment the Nein have ever graced with their presence, but far from the worst. Mostly, Jester just likes how tall it is, stretching up toward the stars, so when everyone else goes down to grab a late dinner at the tavern, she shimmies her way out the window and onto the sloped roof, staring up at the sky.
"You just scared the absolute shit out of me," Fjord says, practically from underfoot.
"Fjord!" She plunks down next to him, delighted. "What are you doing up here–" She lowers her voice, dramatically. "–on this romantic, moonlit night."
"It's, uh, it's mostly just clouded over right now, looks like."
She follows his gaze up to the sky, and sure enough, the few stars that are visible are quickly being overrun by patches of cloud. "Aw, man." She glances at him sidelong. "What are you even doing up here, anyway? I thought you went down with the others."
Fjord shrugs. "Wanted to think a bit. Seemed like a nice night for it. You too?"
"Me too." She bumps him with her shoulder, feels him start to move away before visibly stopping himself from flinching. "How're those nightmares? Still all terrible and death-y?"
He clears his throat. "No, mostly just the usual type. Minus the seawater, I mean. Lots of open ocean and just, you know, floating."
"Hmm," she says, and pulls out her notebook, pretending to take notes with an invisible pen. "Mm-hmm. Very interesting. Floating or drowning?"
He narrows his eyes at her, but she catches the faint smile at the corners of his mouth. "No, no more drowning. Not lately, anyway. It's almost tranquil, if I didn't know what was going to happen next."
Jester chews on her invisible pen. "Yeah, but that just sounds peaceful. How do you know what's going to happen next?"
"Well," Fjord says, slowly, like he's explaining something to a little kid, "I drown. Or something bad happens. That's how this works."
"Yeah, but it might be different this time."
"It probably won't."
"Yeah, but it might."
She watches the tension crawl back up into his shoulders as he looks away. After a moment, he inhales sharply. "Did you see that?"
She blinks, follows his gaze, and watches another distant flicker of lightning cut a jagged swath across the sky. "Pretty far away."
Fjord tilts his head to one side, listening to the distant rumble of thunder. "Yeah."
Jester straightens, leaning forward, straining her eyes at the distant storm. "You think she's there?"
"Could be."
She smiles, pulling up her knees and cradling her notebook closer to her. "I hope so. I missed her so much."
With a sigh, Fjord curls his own legs up to his chest. "Me too. Feels better to know she's with us. Feels better to know she's safe."
And just like that, Jester feels her whole body jolt with the remembrance of the sounds Yasha had made in the cell next to theirs—raspy not-screams, harsh intakes of breath that spoke both of pain and of the terrible effort expended to suppress that pain. She remembers looking at Fjord, then not looking at Fjord, overwhelmed at seeing her own expression reflected in his face. She remembers her heart hammering so hard her fingers were twitching with the rhythm of it, she remembers breathing so fast against the gag in her mouth she thought she was going to choke, and more than anything, she remembers the anger, the rage, hot and unfamiliar and terrifying in its intensity.
Why didn't you come?
The first drops of rain splash cold against her forehead, and she blinks, breathing rapidly. Fjord hasn't moved from beside her, and she can't bring herself to look over at him, so she watches the distant storm instead, the zigzag of nearer lightning, the faint muffled flashes of bolts farther away. "I hate this so much," she says, hoarsely. "I don't like it at all. I don't like that this is what I feel like all the time."
"I know," Fjord says, his voice rough. "I'm sorry. I should've been stronger, should've–"
She grabs him by the arm, then pushes his shoulder hard enough that he's forced to turn to face her, eyes wide and startled. "Stop saying that. You know it's not your fault. Stop saying that, because if you weren't strong enough, that means I wasn't either, and that means nobody else was, and– and that's a lie. That's wrong. We were strong enough, we were good enough, we were smart enough, and this still happened, and now we all have to deal with it together. Okay?"
"Yeah," he says, too quickly, casting his eyes down again. "Yeah, of course, Jester."
She backs away a bit, glancing over to find that her book must've fallen off her lap with her quick movement. It's probably getting wet in the rain. She doesn't care, not really. "Fjord, I don't want to do this without you."
He doesn't look up, doesn't meet her gaze. His words are almost lost to a louder rumble of thunder. "I'm not going anywhere."
"You really, really are, though." When he doesn't reply, Jester reaches out for her book, feels her throat close up at the way the pages are sticking together. She can see some ink running from the inside. It's stupid. It's just a book. It's–
"Molly's dead," Fjord says, dully, but when she looks up he's staring up at her from beneath a furrowed brow, meeting her gaze head-on for what feels like the first time in months. "He's dead, Jester. This whole thing, right from the start, he was like a kid in a candy store, just having the greatest fucking time, and we went and got him dead and buried. We can't do much worse than that."
Her fingers tighten on the book, white-knuckled. "It wasn't us."
"He's still dead."
She slams her book down against the rooftop tiles between them, sending up a little shower of water droplets, just as thunder booms somewhere nearby. "And we're still alive!"
The rain patters against the rooftop around them, cold enough that Jester can see her breath in the air, cold enough to mask the way she's shivering, shaking with fear and fury. Fjord slowly brings a hand up to his face, swiping the rainwater away from his eyes.
"We're still here, Fjord," Jester says, more quietly this time. "We can't change what happened. The only thing that matters is what happens next. And I want all of us to be there. We should all be there."
"Yeah. We should." He straightens, pushing to his feet. "We should probably get out of the rain before we get struck by lightning up here."
Jester doesn't move. "Fjord."
He looks at her, and something in his face softens in a way she's not sure she's ever seen before. "I'm not going anywhere," he says, again, and this time she believes him. She decides to believe him, maybe.
They stay like that, in silence, for a long while, until the booming of the thunder gets loud enough to shake the tiles of the roof underfoot. Still clutching the sodden remains of her book, she scrambles to her feet and slips back through the window, Fjord comfortingly close behind her. "Not going anywhere? Well, you're not going anywhere except out of the storm. It's probably a bad idea to get struck by lightning, probably."
"That's what I was just saying–"
"Really, Fjord, it's basic safety. I thought you were more practical than that."
"No, see, that's not what I meant. It was a callback to the thing we were talking about earlier–"
"All that training with seamen."
"Now, hold on."
"Long hours alone at sea, nothing but your weird wet dreams to keep you company–"
"Jester."
Jester sits, cross-legged, a short distance from the campfire and the rest of the party, and opens a fresh notebook on her lap.
It's her first time taking a watch in a long while, and certainly her first time venturing this far from the group at night, but she feels good, feels comfortable with the way the forest breathes around her. "I am watching you and I am super powerful," she says, just in case any evildoers are close enough to listen, then hunches over the page and starts to draw.
"This isn't for you," she says to the air, this time speaking to someone else entirely. "Not because I'm really mad at you anymore, but just because it isn't for you. You can see it if you'd like, and I think you'll probably enjoy it, but it's not for you."
She starts with a light sketch, tweaking poses and positioning a couple times before settling on a skeletal outline. It's one of her more ambitious projects, and she's not sure she's going to be able to get the details just right based only on harrowing memories and a couple of brief descriptions, but it'll be good enough.
She draws the Nein. She draws Beau, mid-strike, staff swinging around to counterbalance the arrow she's snatching out of midair before it can strike the figure beside her: Nott, hunched low to the ground, firing bolts with her crossbow and weaving a quick magical distraction to protect the figure beside her: Caleb, Frumpkin on his shoulder, fire blazing from his hands, mouth open to shout a warning to the figure beside him: Caduceus, quietly intent, a swarm of beetles crawling from one hand, the other clapped in a healing touch against the figure beside him: Shakäste, Grand Duchess at his side, summoning a powerful spiritual weapon to save the figure beside him: Keg, yelling her rage, weapons a blur, blocking all attacks against the figure beside her: Nila, eyes narrowed with focus, summoning bolt after bolt after bolt of lightning.
She draws Yasha, resplendent, with wings unfurled, a flower cradled gently in the palm of her hand. She draws Fjord, straight-backed and confident, spinning his falchion around to summon magic from its hilt. She draws herself, giant lollipop and all, grinning and gleeful in the chaos of battle.
And she draws Molly, beaming, flaring a handful of cards in one hand, a glinting sword in the other, standing between his friends and harm.
She pauses for a long while after she finishes, considering her work, then very carefully draws a dick in the corner. It's one of her better dicks. Real veiny.
Satisfied, she sits back on her haunches and pens the title: They Came Back.
She stretches her arms over her head, then pushes to her feet. She's definitely worked past the end of her watch shift, judging by the faint glint of rising sunlight in the east, but the others deserve a chance to rest, and she's feeling more awake than she has in a long, long time. There's a warmth in her chest that wasn't there before, only she thinks maybe it was always there, after all, just waiting for her to remember it.
She glances down at her work, making a show of frowning appraisingly, then nods. "I think it's pretty much the best," she says, to the air. "I'm a pretty amazing artist, you know."
Somewhere, just over her shoulder, she hears a faint chuckle and feels a gentle wave of amusement.
Jester pockets her notebook and makes her way back to camp, back to watching over her friends, back to waiting for the first light of morning.