Worlds Away - Chapter Five

Chapter Five: Lord Marmion & Lady Jadina

Jade Weston swore that she would never, ever set foot on another ship ever again. She made a promise to herself that the minute her feet touched land again, she would remain there, on land, for the rest of her life. A life that it seemed would be relatively short if she did not stop leaning over the rail of the ship as her body attempted to expel her insides. She coughed and gagged, heedless of the cold stinging rain which lashed at her heated face, and her grip on the wooden railing tightened as the ship lurched and heaved yet again, tossed about by the angry waves.

As if it wasn't bad enough that the entire world — correction, the entire universe — had been turned inside out in the blinking of an eye, she now learned first hand that she did not have the stomach for sea travel. Suddenly being plucked from the safety and warmth of the beach and rudely deposited on the bow of a ship she might have been able to handle. Suddenly being deposited on the bow of a ship and discovering that she was about to lose her breakfast, lunch and dinner was another matter entirely.

"Come on kid, there can't be anything left in there," Megabyte's voice at her side was a small bit of comfort in a world that no longer made any sense. It reminded her that she wasn't here alone — wherever here was — and not being alone made things easier to bear. It would be nice to not be alone when she heaved up her intestines and finally expired. At this point in time, even that nickname that she hated wasn't so terrible to hear.

"Megabyte," Jade coughed, "I think I'm dying."

"No, just sea —"

The rest of his words were lost as the ship — and her stomach — heaved yet again.

When she at last gained some semblance of control over her body, she pulled back from the rail and leaned heavily against Megabyte, whom she was more than a little surprised to discover was still at her side. The rain continued to beat down on them, but she didn't really care. She was soaked through to the bone, and thought that she would never be dry again.

She also was considering never eating again, just to be on the safe side.

"Megabyte, where are we?"

"I don't know. But if you're done hacking up over the side of the ship maybe we can find someone to tell us."

"You know, it's not my fault," Jade sulked. Her throat burned, and her body trembled as cold began to seep into her bones. She sulkily pushed a few strands of hair from her face and peered up at Megabyte through the haze. "I didn't know I got sea sick. I didn't even know we were going to be on a boat."

"I know the feeling." Megabyte gave her a sympathetic hug, and then turned and began hurrying her towards the center of the boat. She was about to ask where they were going when she saw a door open to the decks below and — General Damon? — raced out, tossing a cloak over Jade and ushering them both inside.

"Poor thing," General Damon directed his words at Jade. "Don't fret Jadina. You'll be fine when this storm settles down a bit."

"Oh, Bial, please." A woman stepped from a nearby doorway, shaking her head at the General. Jade recognized her as Megabyte's mother, but some nagging feeling told her that these weren't really Megabyte Damon's parents. They may have looked like Megabyte's parents, but they were not. From their mannerisms to their style of dress to — what was that name the woman had called the man?

"She doesn't need to hear your rationalizations right now. She needs to be warm and dry." The woman slipped an arm around Jade's shoulders, but directed her words to Megabyte. "Get yourself clean and dry as well, Marm, I'll see to Jadina."

[Jadina?] Jade felt Megabyte's voice in her mind, echoing her own question.

Megabyte opened his mouth to speak, but was cut off as the man who looked an incredible lot like his father, led him away, muttering something about, "Women's matters."

The woman's voice was soothing, her arms providing a motherly comfort to Jade's tired and ravaged body as she ushered Jade into the nearest cabin. "See there, Jadina. I told you that Marm cares about you more than you know. Your husband will turn into a gentleman yet."

Jade Weston had never fainted before. However, as the world began to recede away from her and she felt the floor rushing towards her, she realized that there was a first time for everything.

*****

[Adam?] Megabyte reached out telepathically, knowing that it was both futile and a waste of energy, but he went through the motions anyway. He had been attempting to contact Adam for the last hour, without any success, but it was the only thing that he could think of to do. Adam would have the answers; but Adam wasn't responding, and it was becoming quickly apparent that he and Jade — or Marmion and his wife, Jadina — were on their own.

Married. Now there was the unexpected. From earth to — wherever — to find himself married. Not just married, either, but married to Jade. All right, so she was actually supposed to be some girl named Jadina and he was supposed to be someone named Marmion, and the man and woman who looked like his parents, but were nothing like his parents at all, were Marmion's parents and —

He was giving himself a headache just thinking about it.

But . . . marriage? Megabyte was certain that someone somewhere was having a very good laugh about this. Not that he would have minded being married, but he would have preferred someone . . . someone a little less Jade. The kid was nice and all, but he had never looked at her that way. Somehow, the thought of being married to her and all the things that marriage entailed . . . well, the word incestuous came to mind.

He rapped his fingers on the desktop, his eyes traveling the length of the small cabin to rest on the girl's sleeping form. She was sleeping soundly, curled up on her side in the one — single — very small bed that occupied their cabin. He envied her that sleep, although he had to admit he wasn't sure that he wanted to deal with the sea sickness that came before, but at least if he had been asleep, he wouldn't be thinking. And if he wasn't thinking, he wouldn't be giving himself a headache.

There was however, nothing else to do but think.

Well, there was a satchel of books to read, written oddly enough in English. No, then again, that wasn't so odd considering that everyone around him spoke English. Or maybe they didn't, maybe his brain was just processing everything as English —

Stop it, Megabyte chastised himself, feeling his thoughts heading towards another endless spiral.

How had this happened anyway? The last thing he remembered was arriving on the beach with Jade, just in time to see this incredible vortex moving towards Adam. He remembered beginning to run towards his friend and feeling the entire world shift into slow motion. The sand beneath his sneakers was like quicksand, and the wind beating at him was like a shield that he could not penetrate. Then, in the blinking of an eye, Adam was gone.

In the next heartbeat, he and Jade were standing on the bow of a ship that was being ripped apart by a thunderstorm.

Now, he was Marmion. Correction, he was Lord Marmion Ruele of House Ruele, the Third House under the Lion Throne of Stiborn. That was the information he had managed to discern by going through Marmion's — now Megabyte's — things. It was still a lot of fancy titles that meant nothing to him, but it was more than he had known when he first found himself chasing Jade across a slippery top deck in a torrential thunderstorm.

Raking his hands through his hair, Megabyte returned his attention to the small leather bound journal on the desktop. It was Marmion's journal; the one thing that told him anything at all about the person that he was supposed to be. He had found it in a pocket of the satchel with the books, tied with a leather cord, and he was as hesitant now as he had been then to read it.

It was from the journal that he managed to figure out who Marmion was, and that was where he had stopped. Not out of respect for the young lord's privacy — after all, some twisted logic told Megabyte that he had every right and reason to read that journal — but rather because he had not liked what he had read in those first few pages.

Megabyte didn't think that he liked Marmion all that much, and he wasn't certain how anyone else did either.

He brushed his fingers lightly across the soft leather cover, torn between the morbid desire to lift the cover and read the eerily familiar scrawl that covered the pages and the equally strong desire to shove it back where he found it. Then he could pretend that he never had found it, and didn't know how much of a shallow, egocentric ass Lord Marmion Ruele was supposed to be.

On the other hand, if he didn't read it, he would be ignoring the only obvious source he had for information and answers.

The lesser of two evils, Megabyte mused and opened the book.

"It seems that I am doomed to my accursed fate." He began reading where he had left off earlier, settling to a more comfortable position in the high backed, hard wood chair.

"Come next month, I shall no more have my independence than a tree is independent of its roots. Father wishes me to think this is his doing, his with the blessing of His Majesty (and I shall not go on about that at this time), but I know better. This is Mother's doing, it has her handiwork written all over it — right down to the child she has chosen to be my wife. She has the ear — and the undivided attention of our gracious Queen — and so this has come to pass. Thank you, Mother.

"It is not that I am adverse to being married. Perhaps in another ten years I would have chosen this path for myself. But with a bride of my choosing. Preferably a buxom maid who is capable of speaking softly, if at all, and would outshine the prettiest of the kingdom, and of course, entertain all my counsels in bed. But this — this child would never have been my choice.

"She is not simply a child — and plain, mind you — but she is an annoyance like none I have ever encountered. I have lived my life around her and constantly prayed for the day that she would be married off so that I would not have to hear her shrill voice, her shrewish chastisements and her ever so overbearing attempts at coy flirtation. I suppose this is fate's idea of a joke, and I am the butt of it. I wanted Jadina Zenil married off — the sooner the better — and I have gotten my wish.

"Again, I thank you, Mother."

Megabyte stopped reading with a disgusted grimace. He actually felt bad for poor Jadina, if this was the man she had been chosen to marry. He looked up, his eyes focusing again on Jade, and felt the stirrings of guilt. He wasn't so much disgusted with Marmion as he was with himself; he knew that there had been times when he had echoed the lord's sentiments.

But Megabyte didn't dislike Jade. Actually — and he would never tell her this, not even on the threat of death — but he was fond of her. She was one of his closest friends, and she was more like a sister to him than his own sister was. Mostly he pushed her aside because it was too difficult to deal with her crush on him. It was awkward and embarrassing, and it would be easier on both of them when she outgrew it — and him. That didn't make his attitude any more excusable he knew, but at least he felt that it put him one step higher on the evolutionary ladder than Marmion.

Flipping a few pages, Megabyte jumped ahead a few entries. "Adam says that I should —" Megabyte paused and started again. Yes, he had been right. The name was Adam. Of course, there was no way that Marmion could have been referring to the same Adam, but the coincidental appearance of a name so familiar to Megabyte gave him chills.

"Adam says that I should stop whining and simply accept my fate. As though he is one to speak of such things. Still, it is not a subject that I shall broach with my royal cousin again; he did not much like it when I challenged his words. I often forget myself around him, I forget that he is more than a man I hunt beside, more than a boy I chased foxes through the mud beside. He wears the medallion of state, the stole of duty across his shoulders and too often I forget that these days he is first the prince of Stiborn and second, my best friend and cousin.

"We had gone riding, as is our want and I wished to let off steam. With my nuptials less than a sevenday off, I needed to open my soul. I had forgotten that I am not the only one afflicted with the ailment that is known as an 'arranged marriage.'

'Stop your whining and accept it, Marmion. You've been off your mother's apron strings long enough that you can stop acting like a child,' Adam said to me.

'Yes, and you are one to talk of accepting fate? I do not see you dancing for joy at the prospect of marrying your promised bride.'

He stopped riding, and the way his eyes narrowed as he gazed at me darkly, I knew that I had gone too far. Adam's betrothal is something that is seldom discussed; it is not a situation that he is happy with, but one that he accepts because he is the prince and his marriage is a duty.

'Consider yourself fortunate, Marmion. You, at least, know Lady Jadina. Perhaps you have no choice, but you are not going to be wed to a foreigner from a foreign land simply to assure control of ocean routes, and import tariffs, and a growing navy.'

He pulled his horse in close, his words dark, 'No, cousin, I am not happy, but unlike you, I accept my fate because it is my duty and my destiny. It is for the good of my people and my kingdom and I will do whatever I must for the good of the kingdom. And if I can accept a woman that I have never met, a woman who, by the gods, is a Damiar, then you can at least have the courtesy and respect for your parents and House Zenil to accept Lady Jadina with good grace.'

"Our ride was quite short today."

Megabyte smiled as he finished the entry. It was a good sign if there was someone who would dare to speak his mind to Marmion and put the man in his proper place. He was actually looking forward to meeting Prince Adam — provided Marmion had not done something to put himself in the prince's bad graces.

Skimming back, he made note of the word damiar and decided to make it his priority to find out what the meaning of it was. Something about the emphasis that Marmion put on the word told him that it was important. Possibly just a royal title in a foreign land, but somehow, Megabyte didn't think so.

He continued reading for a while, growing alternately disgusted and amused by Lord Marmion Ruele. His marriage to Lady Jadina of House Zenil was — at least for the time that Megabyte read — a chaste one. She moved into Elspera Keep, Marmion's family's home in the Elspera province of Stiborn, and was assigned a lady in waiting and her own quarters. Marmion and Jadina lived like two strangers, rarely even seeing one another at meals. For his part, Marmion kept himself busy running the land while his father served as one of the king's advisors at the palace. He made monthly trips to the Palace and spent time with Adam, and another of their cousins, Hagen — and of Jadina, he said very little. Except that she kept her own counsel, and that she was quite the lady of the keep.

Megabyte was only three quarters of the way through the journal when his eyes began to water and he was forced to put the book aside. Yawning and stretching to work some of the tightness out of his muscles, he stood with indecision beside the bed for a long moment. There was only one bed — a little fact he had forgotten while being caught up in the life and times of Marmion Ruele.

Jade was still out like a light. Sprawled on her stomach, one fist bunched up near her mouth, blonde hair falling like a veil across her face. Megabyte wondered briefly how someone who had such a terrible reaction to being on a boat could actually sleep while the ship bobbed and rolled, making him grab the bed posts so that he didn't stumble and fall on top of her.

The bed was small, Megabyte noted. It wouldn't have been so bad if Jade hadn't positioned herself quite neatly in the center of it. But she had, so there was no way he was going to be able to tackle getting into that bed without coming into contact with her.

Of course, it was just a bed. And they were just sleeping. And it was only Jade. Which was the problem: it was Jade.

He could pretend that he was Marmion and that this was wife, Jadina, but that didn't work either. One, he had no desire to be Marmion, and two, Marmion probably would have no problems sharing the bed with her — and ignoring her the whole while.

There was always the floor. He could possibly manage to work one of the blankets from out of Jade's death grip and make himself comfortable on the floor. On the cold, hard, damp floor that would probably allow a rat or two the chance to nip at him. He hadn't seen any rats, but that didn't mean they weren't there.

Megabyte realized that he must have been considering his options too long — or perhaps too loudly — as Jade slowly shifted, coming awake. She pushed hair away from her eyes, blue eyes staring up at him with a mild mixture of annoyance and tiredness.

"Megabyte."

"Yeah?"

"Just get in bed already." That said, his fellow Tomorrow Person promptly rolled over, snuggling as tightly as possible against the wall. "It will look really stupid if someone finds you sleeping on the floor."

Having no argument for that logic, Megabyte followed her order. He climbed into the narrow bed, his back to her as he clung tightly to his side as possible. "Good night, Jade."

"Good night, Marmion." There was a bit of a giggle in her voice as she said it.

Megabyte vowed to get even with her in the morning. He never quite figured out how he was going to do that though as sleep crept in and claimed him.

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