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Meditation is her only salvation. It has kept her alive and mostly sane for the past months, down here in the dark. She sits, and she does not move, conserving energy and waiting. In this way, she has become finely attuned to the breathing of the building around her. She can hear the crash of the sea at the cliff base, the cannibalistic rantings of the man in the cell beside hers, the quiet sobbing of Mary Godwin, high above. Sometimes she even thinks she can hear Theresa, whispering in her ear and telling her that all will be well. She need only have patience.
It's because of her meditation that she can tell instantly when it all changes.
The lunatics down here in the Pit feel it too. The mad always feel these things first. And they go silent. The first time she can ever remember it being quiet here. Something is about to happen.
When he hears the first bark, it makes Logan's heart leap into his mouth. That mutt, that stupid, loyal-to-a-fault mutt … She never goes anywhere without him, never has done, not since the first day of giving her that puppy …
But when the dog appears, it is not with Elsbeth. In fact, the dog's fur is matted and dirty, his claws (too long) clip on the stone path as he races towards the former King – it's clear no one has cared for the canine in some time. At the last second, the dog remembers that Logan has not always been his ally, and skids to a halt. His tail is now tucked between his legs, he is bent low to the ground, and his lips peel back from black gums and yellow teeth.
Logan sheaths his bloodied blade, since there are no guards in the immediate vicinity, and crouches also. He stretches his hand out to the dog, and doesn't move. Inch by inch, the mutt comes to him. Excruciatingly slowly it seems to Logan, but the dog could be the one chance he has of finding Elsbeth, so he has no choice but to be patient. Finally the dog is within sniffing distance of him, so he sniffs, recognises that it is Logan, and then is joyfully licking his face and hands, barking and jumping up, tail whisking from side to side in indescribable joy. He's never really liked the canine, but right now, they are the two beings in the entire world who want the Queen back, so Logan shares in that happiness, fussing the animal around the ears fondly.
"Do you know where she is, boy?" he asks lowly.
She is on her feet half a moment before the cell doors in the Pit begin to open with a scream of rust. It probably saves her life – when the first lunatic comes in, armed with the leg of a mattress, Elsbeth wields two. Sharpened and whittled to deadly points. She slams both of them into the side of his head, probably fracturing his skull. She could not care less. She steps over his twitching form and out into the hallway. She goes on the offensive – she has to, because she simply does not have the strength to defend herself. So she stabs the next one, possibly breaks the neck of the one after him-
And then she is surrounded.
All of them armed. And all of them mad. Even mad men know she is a woman. That's the one thing Milton has never done, has never allowed to happen. Dropping the makeshift shivs, she pulls together every scrap of Will she has. It is not much, perhaps enough for one strong spell. She summons the simplest piece of magic should can: fire. She curls her limbs inward, pulling the energy from her centre, pulling and pulling until her hands are full of flame. And then she pushes it out. The Will works. It radiates out in a scorching ring, knocking lunatics off their feet and then sizzling them to a crisp.
But then more come.
And exhausted as she is, all Elsbeth can do is slump to one knee, and wait to die. At least it is an end.
He is in the nick of time, and sees enough so that he has no hesitation (if he ever did) in cutting them all down. His sword shines, blood flows, and then there are dead lunatics; one King, one Queen left alive.
She stares at him as though he cannot possibly be real.
"Beth," he breathes.
Her face crumples, a sob immediately shaking her. "Logan …"
He drops his sword and pulls her towards him, kissing her passionately. He does not mean to, hasn't been sure he wanted to, but now she is here he has no choice. Elsbeth responds with equal fervour and desperation, clinging to him with sobs still shaking her. He pulls back, kisses her hair, her face, hugging her to him tightly.
"Logan, I thought -"
"Hush," he whispers, pressing another soft kiss to her mouth. "Don't think about it."
She nods, still crying. "Thank you …"
She is thinner than the last time she was in his arms, her collarbones clearly visible and her arms now straight lines and angles. Her hair is greasy, hanging in ratty strands around her face, and long. She has never looked less beautiful in her life, and there can be nothing further than the image of a Queen, but Logan does not care. She is here, she is alive, and he will not leave without her. They can make everything better now—reclaim the kingdom from the imposter together, he might even be redeemed in the eyes of their people-
He forces himself to stop these thoughts where they are. Too dangerous and too hopeful by half. His only responsibility is getting Elsbeth out of here and back to Bowerstone.
He kisses her forehead again and takes her hand. "Come on. There's a small beach I found on the other side of the island that we can camp on for tonight, and we'll work out a way back to the capital from there."
She lets him lead her from the Keep without objection, without comment, without thought, even. She is like a child clinging to the hand of a parent, blindly following and simply trusting that where he's leading her is the right direction. The only sound she makes is a cry of shocked delight when the dog comes lolloping up to them, his tail wagging so hard that it appeared a mere blur. He still stinks, and his fur is still matted, but he is hardly filthier than his mistress, and the euphoria hums from them both as they are reunited. The dog licks at the wounds he can reach, and then leads them onwards with a soft whine.
Logan encourages him with a quick rub of the ear, and takes them on a slow, stealthy route that avoids the sight of anyone at all. Within an hour, they are down on that beach, and he sets his sister down by the fire while he sets what booby traps he can. When assured that they are reasonably safe, he goes back to her. She is staring into the flames without blinking. She looks like a transfixed corpse. She is not responding to the dog, either, who has laid his head in her lap.
"Beth?"
"Do we have to?" she asks suddenly.
He frowns. "Do we have to what?"
"Go back."
He puts his flask down. Has she somehow been brain-washed, he thinks suddenly? Not only physically tortured, but mentally as well? "You don't want to?"
"It would be easier not to," she says.
"Easier for whom?"
"Us."
He reaches out and strokes down her cheek, his heart hammering. "Is there an 'us'?"
She looks at him for a moment, then tears well from her grey eyes, rolling down her cheeks. When he moves to pull her into his arms, she puts a hand up for him to wait until she gets her words out. It is clearly a struggle.
"All I've thought about … for months is you. Th-there are so many things I've wanted to tell you, Logan, so many things I …" she sniffs and wipes ineffectually at her cheeks. "I haven't missed the castle or anything else—I've missed you. And I want to be with you, truly, without anything getting in the way. I know it will be hard and perhaps impossible, but it's all I've craved. I had so many pointless dreams and visions, but that was the one that never seemed pointless. It kept me fighting, kept me alive. You kept me alive." Her piece done, she gladly comes to him, settling onto his lap with a sigh, her head pillowed on his chest. "Did you make your choice?"
He nods. "Though not until I found you were … not you."
"How could you tell?" she asks.
"It was obvious. She—he—looked the same as you, sounded like you, but so clearly wasn't you. It was horrifying."
He remembers entering what he thought was the Queen's presence, a few days after docking in Bowerstone. She received him with barely concealed rage, which saddened but did not altogether confuse him. It might be natural that her anger with him surfaced after being repressed for so long. And considering what they had done, perhaps she felt abandoned. But a few moments with her alone was enough to convince him that something was not right. He could not have pinpointed it, put it into words or writing. But there was something. Perhaps it was the dog being gone. Hobson, he could easily imagine Elsbeth herself dismissing. But the dog, she would have grieved. It was the short work of one morning to realise that it was not his sister. And then, he knew better than anyone else there was only one place that she could be effectively hidden for long. A few bribes confirmed it: the 'Queen' regularly took trips by ship to an unknown destination. It gave hope enough to Logan that Elsbeth might still be alive. He had needed only to stow away.
Elsbeth nods her understanding, shuddering again. "The kingdom?" she asks. "What has he done to that?"
"Little, except begin to empty the treasury. He quashes any dissenting voices against that."
"He said he would turn it into a republic."
"Then the lure of power proved too much. He spends it on nothing but his own pleasures," Logan says, pressing a kiss to her hair. He lets loose a deep sigh. "Beth, there is nothing I wish for more than to go somewhere and build a life with you."
"Yes, then let's do that!" she says, suddenly enthused. "No one would know us. We might have to go beyond Albion, perhaps, but there must be lands past this one! Logan, we could do anything. We could be together without suffering the stigma and ignorance of others. We could even …"
"Have a family?" he asks, feeling his heartbeat spike at the very idea.
"If you'd like to," Elsbeth says, suddenly looking a little embarrassed, though she has thought about it too.
She will need to become a mother sooner or later if she is to continue their line, as is her duty. She can imagine her body swelling to accommodate their child, raising him or her to do nothing but be happy, teaching nothing but how to laugh. She wants it more than she can say. It cannot, of course, happen. Even if they did conceive a child together, they can never be an ordinary family. Any child born to her will never call Logan Father. But that, of course, is not the real problem with the scenario of abandoning the throne. It means abandoning the people, too. And that, they both know, is something beyond her. She is not Queen for herself, she never has been.
Logan slowly takes her hands. "I would like nothing more, Beth."
He doesn't need to say 'but', because she can hear the following conversation without either of them speaking.
"Then … we cannot go to Bowerstone. Not immediately. I'm in no shape to lead another revolution or even an assassination at the moment, and it's too risky to go there and think we can hide for any prolonged period of time. We have to go somewhere else."
"Where?"
She shakes her head, unable to think clearly at all.
"Aurora," Logan hits upon it.
"Can we make it that far? We couldn't stow away, it would have to be under our own steam."
"We can make it, if we've the right type of ship. But not tonight. You need to eat something and then sleep. Anything else can wait."
She stuffs whatever food he gives her into her mouth without chewing or even swallowing much. It looks like she might simply be inhaling it, which he cannot blame her for. She vomits quickly, her stomach unused to such quantities now. He silently and gently chastises her and then gives her his rations to nibble on, some water to sip. It stays down. When she is ready to sleep, Logan does as she knows he will, and lays her bedroll out beside his, arms open to receive her.
"I'm afraid, Logan," she whispers.
He kisses her forehead. "I know, dear one."
She curls herself up like a foetus in the womb, and blacks out.
