Transition Plan Chapter 29: First Homecoming Part 16 - The Guests that Wouldn't Leave
Back to Tarzan and Jane's current time – Castle Greystoke
Archimedes finished his story. Jane was completely in tears, "Daddy, you didn't have to do that for us."
"Oh yes I did, Jane, dear. Do you think it wise to endanger the family with overeager researchers and other exploiters worse than John Clayton? I think not, dear daughter. And what about you and Tarzan, Jane, what kind of life would you have together as someone's specimens? And me, Jane. I did it for me and Kala, too. Do you think anyone would understand an interspecies relationship?"
Jane said sadly, "But Daddy, you and I know it isn't that manner of love. What you have is sweet and tender companionship, not physical."
"Yes dear, we all know that is correct, but publishers are always looking for sensationalized headlines to sell newspapers. Whether it is true or not."
"I agree, Daddy. But why can't you go with us now?"
"Right now I must not, Jane dear. I have to keep the affairs of the Barony going, especially if it is a long time before you come back from this adventure. It has to be in good hands to be solvent for yours and Tarzan's' future when you eventually do return to civilization for your inheritance for you and your children."
"Oh Daddy, don't say that."
"I'm not going to be here forever, Jane dear."
She hugged him, still sniffling, "How can I be so happy and so sad at the same time, Daddy?"
"It's just the way being an adult is all about dear daughter. You already know that far too well. And far too early in your life."
"Oh Daddy, thank you so much for protecting us and the family. I love you."
"I love you too, now go find your husband and celebrate this amazing year. You two have to kiss at midnight you know. I don't even see mistletoe up, my dear."
He hugged her and walked away to mingle with the other guests. He did exactly what d'Arnot had requested of him, but it was so very hard to push his own daughter away so he could carry out his special part of the plan. And while he was gone, his children would get their private, natural time together with their gorilla sisters and brothers.
Tarzan started toward Jane, grateful to be rid of three of young women – Hazel, Greenly, and Eleanor - who were swooning for him, despite him emphasizing he was married and a father to be. Jane had warned him about her so-called socialite 'friends'. Some aspects of English society puzzled and disappointed him. Most animal mates bonded for life and sought no other in the jungle, and other animals never challenged another to take their mate.
He saw his wife in tears, and rushed to her, asking, "Jane? What's wrong?"
As he wiped her tears, she explained, "Daddy isn't coming with us right away. He has to stay back. Your mother will be crushed."
"I will explain it to her. She will understand. I need him too, Jane. I need to learn how to be a good father from him. He's been such a good second father to me and showed me so much about how to be a good English man and husband to you…"
She smiled in admiration at him, gave him a quick kiss, and in an attempt to change the mood a bit, she smirked, "I see you got to meet my old 'friends'."
"Uh… yeah. They were… umm… interesting people…" he fumbled to be kind about them.
Having caught a glance of the three women pawing and ingratiating themselves to Tarzan in a corner of the great hall - to his great discomfort - Jane noted, "Now you know at least one of my reasons for never wanting to come back here. They had to come here to see what kind of man I married and see how rich the peerage is that I married into. Aggravating…"
"They know now. A faithful husband. And a very rich peerage," he grinned.
She giggled and kissed him, as he continued to shake his head about the English socialites.
The party became even more festive at midnight with lots of noise, fireworks, more champagne corks popping everywhere, and a lot of bad singing, despite Elisabeth and the carolers trying to keep the guests on key. It all fascinated Tarzan, who knew no tradition of the passage of the years. Every day was just another day to the gorillas in the jungle. Jane and Tarzan clinked and consumed glasses of sparkling cider since she was pregnant, and they did find the mistletoe in his library and shared a very tender kiss, that no one dared interrupt, but admired their devotion.
It wasn't long after that everyone headed home or to the local inns or the Castle's guest houses for those coming from far out of town. The last of coaches carrying everyone for the special charter train from London that brought all the Clan Porter guests, Archimedes, James, and the embassy people departed too. Jane begged her father to stay overnight, but he couldn't, being the sponsor of the Porter charter train returning overnight.
…
Two hours later, the Castle, with hundreds of guests earlier, appeared empty and quiet.
But it wasn't.
Three shadows moved toward the Count and Countess' bedroom, dodging guards who quietly walked the halls. Their sets of formal attire were shed and left behind deep in the Castle hallways, and jammed into a trash can. The dark-clad shadows came as welcomed guests, but now were unwelcome intruders.
Jane and Tarzan were in their bedroom. The intruders heard Jane and Tarzan's New Year's lovemaking, a tradition for English lovers that both were enthusiastically enjoying, celebrating the end of the very successful Holiday party.
The lead assassin whispered, "When they peak, we shoot. Their screams of death will be mistaken for cries of ecstasy. They have a reputation for being loud, so I have learned from a drunken waiter. No one will want to disturb them until morning. And then the deed will be done. And we get the heir too – since the Countess is pregnant."
"That's brilliant. This'll be a climax they'll never forget," one of the underlings joked.
"Shut up, fool," the leader growled.
Midway through their lovemaking session, Jane heard the faintest door click above the rhythmic creaking of their old bed.
Jane whispered in the language of their gorilla family, so they would not be overheard. To human ears, their whispers would sound only like the murmurings of their intimacy, "Tarzan, there is someone here. In our bedroom."
The drapes to their canopy bed were drawn and they were blind to the threat in their room, but neither Jane nor Tarzan panicked. They knew that if it been planned to be an immediate assasination, they'd be dead already.
He was about to stop, but she whispered, continuing in the gorilla language, "No… don't, if you stop they will know we heard them, and we will surely be attacked."
They did keep going, and despite their continued passion for each other, Jane, with Tarzan's help, carefully reached above them and noiselessly removed the huge shield hanging over the bed, bearing an inlaid Greystoke coat of arms, and covered Tarzan's backside with Jane underneath him. It would protect them from an initial attack, but Tarzan had another idea too.
He whispered in gorilla speech and pointed to the upper canopy between gasps, "We're going up."
He grasped the strong tassels on either side of them, and without breaking their cadence, got into a crouch with her tightly in his lap, ready to leap upward, both still protected by the shield. That shift of position actually heightened their feelings.
He whispered in his gorilla language, "I am almost ready, Jane. Wrap your legs and arms tighter around me."
With a worried smile, she tried to reassure him with a breathless kiss, "Everything will be all right, dearest."
Neither could believe they were forced into an impossible life or death situation - simultaneously moments away from physical ecstasy, and yet they knew their very lives depended on how they protected themselves during their most intimate moment.
The pressure of Jane's tight double clutch around Tarzan caused them to climax together. As they both cried out in ecstasy, he leaped and pulled them up on the tassels high above the sheets and they flipped up and over and he perched, unseen to the assassins, silently on the sturdy rail above the bed canopy, with Jane still clinging to him firmly at the height of their intimate embrace. They remained silent, despite the intense urge to do otherwise, which would have drawn the killers' fire to their safe perch above the bed.
High above their mattress, they heard the triggers on three crossbows release and rip through the curtains. But as the three fletchettes hit the coat of arms shield, they ricocheted off the shield, rather than imbed into the mattress – or their intended targets. Two bolts passed through the other side of the bed curtains and hit the opposite assassin. The final round fired from the foot of the bed bounced off the bottom of the coat of arms shield and returned directly back to the assailant there.
Jane remained completely wrapped around Tarzan safely atop the bed canopy, but shook with fear and relief, and they looked over on the carnage below. On their bedroom floor lay all three assassins. One had a bolt in his brain, another had a shot through his jugular vein, and the third lay prone with the round imbedded in his heart, and was bleeding out profusely. He groaned and was still. The assailants were all ironically dead by their own hand due to the couple's quick thinking with the shield. There would be no extended fight. The thought crossed their minds they may not be the first Count and Countess to protect themselves from death with the shield.
Jane felt Tarzan still at his peak. She soothed and kissed him, feeling his warmth internally. Tarzan finally caught his breath, and put his head on Jane's shoulders, totally spent from their near-death experience as much as their lovemaking, with the sudden leap upward with both of them still joined together to escape being killed.
"We're safe now, Jonathan," Jane comforted Tarzan, continuing in his language.
"Thanks to your quick thinking."
"And yours too, Jane dear."
"More important, our baby is safe too."
He hugged her as tight as he could without hurting her. Their joined bodies symbolically protected their unborn child between them. They were still quaking from it all, but as usual they went for a lighter moment to calm themselves from the second attempt on their lives in a little over a week. If they could survive Naima's attacks, they could survive this.
"Somehow, my dearest, our intimate times together will never quite be the same again I think," she said wryly to break the mood of their frightening experience.
"Just the same, I hope we never get to try this 'people way' ever again, Jane," he retorted to her quip.
She really could not contain her laughter at his humor, despite the graveness of what they just experienced, and ran her hands through his long hair, "I do love you so, ape man!"
"I love you too, Jungle Woman."
"We need to get Edward and Elisabeth. And the Constable…" Tarzan urged.
"Shall we dress first, love?" Jane reminded him of their condition.
"No. Not yet. I need you close…"
"Me too… "
But Tarzan and Jane weren't ready to separate, and continued in their oneness. They had been too near to death a second time only days apart, and really wanted to remain locked in their embrace with no distance between them, not bearing to part. She tightened her legs and arms around him. It took awhile for them to gain comfort and calm enough from each other to climb down from the canopy, separating only when Tarzan couldn't sustain their union any longer.
Once dressed in their nightclothes in their bed and covered by the heavily damaged shield, Tarzan nodded at Jane. She screamed as loud as he had ever heard her.
A dozen of d'Arnot's personal guards rushed to their bedroom, plus Edward and Elisabeth. Jane's childhood attendant stared in horror at the bloody scene of death surrounding the bed, pulled back the punctured bed canopy curtain in absolute fear of what she might find, but saw the unharmed couple wrapped tightly together in each other's grasp under the shield, shivering with relief and fear, and Elisabeth fainted into Edward's steady arms.
The faithful Greystoke family servant Edward recalled his knowledge of family history when, in 1650, the Count and Countess Clayton of that era had used that same shield to successfully protect themselves from Oliver Cromwell's forces' invasion of the Castle. It had hung above the bed since, in remembrance of the event, a story Jane and Jonathan did not yet know. It was never intended to ever be used again.
Author's notes: Hope you enjoyed Tarzan and Jane's unorthodox escape from death. Many thanks to my long time internet friend Sueanoi for the brilliant idea for Tarzan and Jane to talk in 'gorilla speak' as code to thwart Cedric's assassins, which I added to the story at the last minute. And yes it was a historical fact that British dictator Oliver Cromwell did invade Scotland in 1650-51, which borders Castle Greystoke. So I tied a fictional attack of Castle Greystoke against an earlier Count and Countess by Cromwell to Tarzan and Jane's unexpected use of use of the family shield in their bedroom to protect themselves in a similar story. One could say that it's imbedded in the Greystoke genes. :) I also included another 'tip of the hat' to other Disney movies with Jane's three girlfriends from Tarzan and Jane direct to video movie of 2002. I haven't seen that movie, only know a bit about those characters, nor did I incorporate any of that movie into this story, but thought you might enjoy their appearance!