They were cold, the stone floors underneath her bare feet, as she ran through the passageways. Her mind was a blank. It kept trying to decide what to do next, but all she could think about was the cold floor. It was a good thing she was following Mary, otherwise she'd be lost in these walls forever. Why wouldn't her mind work? She knew why. Narcisse. He'd stolen the regency right out from under her. They'd accused her of poisoning Francis. How could anyone think such a thing? Her own son. Then he'd just swooped in and offered himself as regent. That venomous son-of-a-bitch. He was a quick thinker that's for sure, or had he planned this all along? The thoughts pouring from her subconcious kept her from doing what she did best. She was usually so good at this. Covering up secrets. And oh what a secret this was.
She was only trying to help. Honestly. The one time she goes into a situation with nothing but good intentions, and this is what happens. She just wanted Mary to have the best alliance possible. To get the help that she couldn't give her from somewhere else. The best chance of that was Spain. Which meant marrying Don Carlos. There was only one problem, Don Carlos had a bit of a strange way in the bedroom, and Mary, quite frankly was just not that kind of girl. He'd asked her to whip him. Okay, so it wasn't really her thing either, but you have to do what you have to do. She figured if Mary could just get through it this one time, she could figure out a way out of it later. So they blindfolded him and Catherine did it for her. Then, Mary, being the sweet, kind girl she is, couldn't even take that. She'd asked her to stop, alerting Don Carlos to her presence, and before they knew it, he'd fallen off his contraption in a panic and ended up stumbling through the halls with a piece of wood protruding from his skull. Lord only knows how he wasn't dead. In this particular instance it might have been better for them if he had died. What if he tells them what they did?
So here they were, fleeing through the passageways, praying that no one had seen them come out of Don Carlos's room. She felt like they'd been running around for hours, but she just kept moving. All of the sudden, Mary stopped and abruptly turned, almost plowing Catherine over.
"What is it?" Catherine asked.
"I thought it was this way, but maybe we took a wrong turn back at that fork." Mary said, panicked.
"I thought you knew where you were going." she said.
"So did I, but now I'm not so sure." she replied.
"We have enough problems right now, we don't need to add 'lost' to the list." she groaned.
"We don't even know where we are running to, how can we be lost? Oh Catherine, what are we going to do? If he tells them..."Mary started as she put her hand to her head.
"He won't. He would have to tell them why we were there and that would give his secret away as well. We just need to get back to our rooms and clean up, then find a way to get that contraption out of his room before anyone sees it." Catherine explained.
"How are we supposed to do that? We would need help. It's too big for us to move on our own, and for all we know they've already seen it." Mary's tone grew increasingly panicked with each word.
"We can only pray that they are too preoccupied with tending to Don Carlos wounds to have checked his room, but you're right about moving it." she tried to calm her.
"Who could we possibly trust with something like this?" she wondered.
"Only one person I can think of."...
...When Mary creaked open the panel from the passageway to Bash's room, she bounded in without thinking, only to find him in a...compromising position.
"Oh! Oh Lord! Bash, I'm...I'm sorry..." Mary gasped while covering her eyes and turning around. Bash quickly flipped off of Delphine and tried to cover himself and her.
"Mary what on earth are you..." he started as Catherine came in behind her. "Catherine!" he yelped as he pulled the blanket up higher, uselessly, as Catherine got a fair glimpse of his backside, raising an eyebrow at the sight. She surprisingly liked what she saw. "What the hell is going on?"
"Oh I'm terribly, terribly sorry. We didn't think...It's an emergency and...I'm so sorry." Mary stammered, still covering her eyes. Catherine on the other hand didn't seem embarrassed at all, she shook her head, trying to get the image of Bash's rear end out of her mind.
"We do apologize for the intrusion, but we have an extremely dire situation that we require your aid in." Catherine said.
"You could have knocked on the door." he said.
"Actually, we couldn't. That's the dire part of the situation...there's really not much time to explain." Mary said.
"If you don't mind untangling yourself from your lady friend, our lives may depend upon it." Catherine elaborated. Bash looked down at Delphine with an apologetic face.
"Delphine, I...I'm sorry, I have to." he said. She only sighed and gestured that he should go.
"Ah, so this is Delphine. I've heard so much about you." Catherine said, almost sarcastically. Bash looked at her irritated.
"I was only trying to break the tension." she explained. They stood there a beat and Bash didn't move. "Well, are you getting up?"
"If you don't mind turning around first." he said.
"Oh." Catherine said as she turned. Oddly, it hadn't occurred to her to turn around. Bash quickly pulled on his pants and shirt, not bothering with a jacket.
"Alright, Is anyone going to tell me what's going on." he said.
"We will explain on the way." Mary said they turned back around. She and Catherine then practically shoved him into the passageways as Delphine looked on confused.
They charged down the corridors as quickly as they could, trying to remember which way they had come from.
"I don't hear anyone explaining." Bash said after a moment of silence.
"Well, we may have accidentally mortally wounded the Prince of Spain." Mary said. Bash immediately looked to Catherine.
"Why are you looking at me?" she asked, insulted.
"Oh, I don't know, maybe it's the blood on your dress." he said.
"It's not her fault. She was only trying to help me." Mary said.
"Help you with what?" he asked.
"Would it be entirely too much for you not to ask any questions?" Mary said embarrassed.
"You barge into my room in the middle of the night, unannounced, and shove me into the passageways, and you don't want me to ask any questions?" he asked angrily.
"If you don't mind." Catherine said. Bash looked at them with a furrowed brow, mouth open in disbelief as they quickened their pace, leaving him to catch up.
When they got back to the scene of the crime, Catherine slowly opened the panel on the wall and peeked inside. The sex horse still laid on the floor, untouched, surrounded by a puddle of blood.
"The coast is clear, it doesn't look like anyone has been in here yet." she said, opening the door wider and letting Bash and Mary in.
"I still don't know what you need me to...what is that?" Bash said as he entered. Catherine searched her head for a less embarrassing answer.
"It's...a chair." Catherine said.
"It doesn't LOOK like a chair." he said, already knowing it was most definitely NOT a chair.
"Could you just pretend it's a chair?...Please" Mary said, praying he didn't push the issue.
"Can we discuss whether this is or isn't a chair after we have removed it?" Catherine said urging them to hurry. They bent down, each taking a corner.
"Alright, on three." Bash said. "One, two, three." and they started to lift it. As they were moving toward the passageways, they could hear voices in the hall.
"Oh, no." Mary whispered.
"Move faster." Catherine said. They struggled to move quicker, as the 'chair' was quite heavy. They could hear the voices getting closer as they attempted to shove the thing through the panel. It got stuck.
"Oh, now what?" Catherine asked frustrated.
"Let go and stand back." Bash said. They did as he said. He steadied it up against the opening and then took a slight running start and kicked it right in the center, cracking it just enough to get it through the small opening. Catherine looked at him, impressed.
"We need to put something in it's place." Catherine said. Bash grabbed a chair and broke a leg off of it, setting it where the sex horse had been.
"Now they will think he fell off of that instead." he said, as the voices got even closer.
"We have to go now." Mary said. They ran to the passageways, shoving the pieces of wood out of the way as the door started to creak open. Mary went through first and then Bash, deciding Catherine wasn't moving fast enough, grabbed her around the waist and pushed her through, pulling the panel shut behind him just in time.
Sorry this chapter took so long, but I wanted to change a few things after watching the last episode, strangely enough, Francis being poisoned was in there before I saw the episode. I must be psychic.
