01/21/07; 7:30 a.m.

Standard disclaimers apply. Story and characters ain't mine. No point in suing me.

The Secret Ball

By Ninetails

Chapter 3: Quatre's Escape…

After weeks of chipping away at the opening, Quatre finally managed to squeeze his shoulders through the narrow break in the wall and finally drew his legs through to the other side. He stood and gazed at the giant pines surrounding him, feeling like a baby, newly born into a wonderful, wide world. He breathed deeply, drawing in the pungent fragrance of pine needles and bark, moss and mud.

He had walked forward into the forest, calculating that he had about an hour before he would have to return. He'd told his siblings that he would be practicing his forms out in the back garden so he wouldn't be joining them for awhile.

"Why show interest in your forms now?" his twin, Duo, had questioned. "You always say that violence should never be bestowed upon another human."

Quatre shrugged. "I'm bored of reading books that I've read countless time, twin-of-mine," he answered. That much, at least, had been true.

"I heard that you, Duo, were asking Rasha to teach you to cook!" their sister, Sumire, said breathily. "'Tis a bit too surprising of you, yes? but I'd love to have guests over and feed them and have big parties in the evenings. That's what I dream of. Oh, but father never lets anyone near us. He's too frightened that a guest might sneak out with one of us hidden under his cloak."

"That venture would not be too successful if you manage to cook yourself," added her twin, Nozomi. The guests wouldn't come, for fear of dying upon tasting your cooking…"

Quatre smiled at recalling his sisters' antics, then took one more step and remembered that he wore the silk slippers his father had commissioned for them from a shoemaker in the nearby village. His father said the material was made by worms that spun it in far off Oriental lands. It had been brought by ship and cost him dearly.

The slippers were beautiful, made in shiny, deep, jewel tones, edged with trim embroidery that managed to not be too feminine for him. They were wonderfully comfortable , but they were not suited to outside wear since they tore easily and showed every bit of dirt. Since the siblings never went farther than the slate-tiled back gardens, they were fine. But a walk in the forest would destroy them and would reveal that he'd gone out. Removing the slippers, he stuck one in each cloak pocket and continued on, barefoot.

Without the benefit of shoes, Quatre had to pick his way carefully over rocks and fallen branches. He walked until he felt certain he could not be seen from any high manor window, then, shrugging off his cape and hanging it on a branch, he crawled up onto a large flat boulder that was drenched in sun and stretched out.

The rock was warm and felt good against his skin. He pushed up the long sleeves of his shirt to feel more of it against him.

Closing his eyes into the sun produced dancing flashes of orange, red, and yellow bursts behind his lids. An insect chirped and the repetitive sound lulled him hypnotically. Soon he lapsed into a half sleep, and a scene took form behind his closed lids.

Hundreds of armed men and horses battled on a field. Swords clashed and arrows flew. He was peering out of eyes that were not his own. A veil of blood splashed before him as a soldier crumpled to the ground. An anguished cry of pain grabbed his attention and spun him around. "Noooo!" someone shouted, and he had the feeling he was the one who had spoken.

Then he felt himself seem to lift into the air. Glancing down, he saw the whole panorama of the violent battle, and directly below him, he saw a soldier. His armor was sprayed with blood. As his knees buckled beneath him, he threw back the metal visor of his helmet and gazed upward, torment written across his one visible green eye…

Quatre's eyes snapped open. Once again he was in the tranquil forest, but his heart was pounding. He searched in every direction, looking for signs of battle. Only the gentle noises of nature surrounded him.

Feeling unnerved by this violent vision, he slid off the rock, grabbed his cape, and hurried back to the wall. Once back in the courtyard, he pulled a potted tree in front of the opening to conceal it from view and put his slippers back on.

When he entered the sewing room where his sisters were, he sensed Iria scrutinizing him. His eldest sister was keenly observant so Quatre was especially careful to appear normal and happy, joking with his sisters about Duo's cooking and betraying nothing.

"How was the practice session?" Saens asked.

"Smelly," Quatre answered. "Don't come near me, I must reek of sweat and dirt."

At supper that night, the siblings joined their father, as they always did, at the long table in the high-ceilinged dining hall. The meal went on around him as he mechanically put food in his mouth, only half-aware of the lively conversation his sisters were having regarding a new eight-foot-long tapestry, featuring a castle and a royal forest, that his father had had imported from Siuan. "There's a prince depicted on it who is so manly," Eleanor gushed enthusiastically.

"He's fine, but I like the adorable unicorn that walks alongside the princess," Ayame offered.

Duo, who up until now was savoring the meal he cooked in peaceful silence, answered with a mischievous glitter in his eyes. "'Twould be better depicted if said prince was saving his princess from a vicious forest creature and all the blood and gore are scattering – "

At the chorus of "DUO!"s from his various sisters, he wisely stopped his runaway mouth and turned to his only ally, his twin brother. Expecting to find the same mischievous grin, Duo grew silent and a pondering look entered his amethyst eyes at the half-worried, half-absent look in his twin's eyes.

"Where will the tapestry hang, Father?" Gayle said, valiantly trying to rescue their conversation.

"I was thinking of putting it right here in the dining hall," her father replied.

Ayame frowned. "I was hoping the prince could be in our room."

Sir Maxwell raised an eyebrow and cast a wary glance at her. "I'd sat it's definitely going into the dining hall."

Quatre liked the tapestry, but he was unable to care much about it. The soldier's face that he had seen in his vision haunted him. It was as if, in that moment, they had exchanged something mysterious and deep.

How could he feel so connected to a man he had never met?

TBC

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A/N:

Well that was short. Heh. Duo - cooking! ... The first one to guess who this mysterious soldier is will receive a box of (imaginary) strawberry-flavored pocky from me! Whee! Pocky overload! Gah, I should stay away from pocky. Makes me like this. (collapses from the sugar high)