Worlds Away
By Michele Mason Bumbarger
Chapter Twenty-Nine
The halls of Elspera Keep were eerie at night. Megabyte walked quickly, despite his tiredness, his eyes darting anxiously in all directions. He knew, logically, that nothing would dive out of the long shadows and reach for him, knew that this was not a game of Dungeons & Dragons ™ -- although it would certainly make things a hell of a lot easier if it had been -- where monsters lurked and conspiracy waited in every dark nook, but he was cursed with an overactive imagination. And said overactive imagination liked to kick in at times like this.
Tugging the fastenings of his jerkin a loose, he quickened his pace to keep as close to Legan as possible. His valet walked with confidence, as though the thought had never occurred to him that there might be a bandit lurking just ahead, or a haunted suit of armor behind him. But that was probably because those thoughts really had never occurred to Legan.
They came to a halt outside of the bedchamber, and Legan turned to him, politely for once. "Will my lord be needing anything else tonight?"
Megabyte shook his head, "No."
Legan nodded, "Then I shall see you in the morning."
Megabyte slipped into the bedchamber, and noting the darkness of the room, wondered if Jade had already gone to sleep. More than likely, she had. After all, he was up and about later than normal, and with her busy schedule, Lady Jadina normally turned in early. Of course, after dealing with that shrew of a ruler, the Damia Reina, all day, Megabyte imagined that if he had found himself in Jade's position, he would have taken refuge in sleep as often and as early as possible too.
He sat on the sofa and removed his boots, casting occasionally glances towards the sleeping chamber. Before he settled down on the sofa, he knew that he would end up in there, standing over the bed and checking on Jade before he finally settled down for the night. It was silly, really; a silly habit that he had gotten into during the time that he'd been forced to share his bedchamber with her. A silly habit that he knew he would receive no end of teasing from Adam about if the elder Tomorrow Person got wind of the behavior.
A silly habit, but one Megabyte did not even try to break.
Shoes off, he wiggled his toes in their new found freedom and scooped up the nearest oil lamp. A few moments of his time, and then he would allow himself the luxury of sleep as well.
"I want to go home."
Jade's voice, carrying from the far darkened corner of the sitting room startled him. Megabyte gave a yelp, nearly dropping the oil lamp. He spun to face her, ready to light into her about scaring the living daylights out of people carrying combustible materials, but the scathing words died on his lips as he took in the sight of her.
Seated in one of the high-backed ornately carved arm chairs, Jade looked very lost and very, very small. She was buried beneath the layers of her nightdress and robe, her arms wrapped around the knees that she hugged to her chest. Blonde hair cascaded loosely over her shoulders and she rocked slowly back and forth, her attention focused on some tiny spot on the floor.
"Jade?" His voice colored with concern. Depositing the oil lamp on the table, he crossed over to her, tentatively reaching out to touch her hand. As he did so, he kicked something, noting peripherally that it was her hairbrush, either dropped or placed on the floor by the chair. "Jade, what's wrong? Did something happen?"
She shook her head and heaved a sigh. "I'm just tired, Marm. I want to go home. To earth. I'm tired of trying to please Lady Margot, or the Damia Reina, or Damiar Roleran. I'm tired of being Lady Jadina. I want to go home and I just want to be Jade."
He knelt down beside her, really looking at her for the first time since Ami had arrived. There were dark circles bruising the delicate skin under her eyes, eyes that were more bloodshot with fatigue than blue. Her body was trembling from head to toe. From nerves and not any stray wind, he realized. Her sunny smiles had wilted, the corners of her mouth drooping. For one split second, Megabyte thought of Jadina, and wondered if she had moments like this. If he -- no, if Marmion -- was the cause of those moments where she was concerned.
He should have checked on her sooner, should have paid better attention, he berated himself. But Jade had seemed to be handling things so well, better than any of them really. She seemed to take it all in stride, and it never occurred to him that she might be a better actress than they gave her credit for. It was the search for and resurfacing of Ami and the politics of two nations that were binding their two best friends together more neatly than their shared powers that had taken over his mind. . .not just his, but just about ever single mind in the Keep, the Palace and the kingdom. When Lady Margot had pressed Jadina into service waiting on the Damia Reina and the rest of Ami's entourage . . .Well, to be perfectly honest, Megabyte hadn't even thought to check on her, to see if she needed any help. Oh, no. He'd been too busy playing royalty with Adam or fending off Sarena to inquire as to his wife's well-being.
Wife. The word brought him up short, reminding him once again of how used to this world they were becoming. Part of him feared the acceptance of that word, that acceptance would somehow lead to the inevitability of their stay here becoming permanent.
But on so many levels, acceptance had already crept in. It was hard for him to remember that Adam was not his cousin and prince, but only one of his best friends and the leader of the Tomorrow People. Some mornings, when he joined his father to ride into the village proper or oversee the fields, it took a while for his clouded brain to recall another man he called father, who wore the stars of a General and whose busy schedule kept him away from his son.
Shaking his head, he pushed the thought aside. Now was not the time to start getting morbid and dour.
Megabyte rose to his feet. Very gently, he nudged Jade's feet to the edge of the chair and then beyond, encouraging her to stand. "Come on, Jade. You need to get some sleep."
"I'm not tired." The protest was clearly made solely for the sake of protesting. She stared at him sulkily, but did not offer any resistance as he guided her to her feet and turned her towards the bedroom door.
"Right, I'll bet that you're not," Megabyte wrapped an arm around her slender waist, his words soft. She leaned into him, her hair tickling his neck and jaw from where her head rested comfortably on his shoulder. She smelled faintly of mint and juniper, and Megabyte idly wondered why he was even noticing such a thing.
"Marm," she murmured, her words nearly indistinct and heavy with the slur of sleep, "Why are you being so good to me?"
Her words gave him pause, the feel of her drowsing against him as he led her to bed stirring strange tendrils of emotion in him. Without thought, or maybe perhaps in spite of it, he nuzzled into her hair, his words muffled by the action, "I guess it's because I like you, Jade. Sometimes."
"Since when?" Jade yawned and stumbled, nearly falling to the floor as her feet somehow tangled in the hem of her bedclothes. Megabyte caught her, both arms sliding around her waist from behind, and held her upright.
Megabyte eased her onto the bed, smiling bemusedly as she caught and steadied herself before she toppled over backwards. "Since always, kid."
"Nice to hear," she yawned. "Thought you couldn't stand me. You always said so."
Megabyte flinched. Yes, there was truth in her words. There had been a time, not too long ago, when he hadn't been able to tolerate Jade's presence without Adam or Ami's steadying influence. She was just a kid, one of those annoying little girls like his sister Millie. Only she wasn't. She could be immature sometimes, certainly. Then again so could he, so he couldn't precisely fault her for that. There was more to her than that. When she wasn't being an annoying little git, Jade was actually a lot of fun. And kind-hearted and sweet as well; perhaps too soft and too sweet for her own good. It was the sort of kindness people like Sarena or the Damia Reina could never understand save for the chance to exploit it.
Just thinking about Sarena made his stomach knot. He was glad Jade was ignorant of the truth behind her maidservant. She would never forgive him if she thought he was playing around with her and there was no way he would be able to convince her otherwise. Not with Legan glaring daggers at the two of them every time Sarena cornered him. Or Sarena's blatant attempts to get him out of Adam's company and into the nearest alcove. Why should she believe him? Before coming here, Megabyte had been perfectly clear in how he felt and thought about Jade and he had made that perfectly clear to her, too.
That was in one world and this was another. They were different people here with different roles to play. Yet in this world as in the other one, Jadina was as alone as her counterpart. Until coming here, he had never really considered out of the loop Jade must have felt sometimes. He and Ami and Adam . . . they'd been together for so long and with Jade . . .
Well, she was the baby of the group, everyone's baby sister, to be played with and then left behind when there was real work or fun to engage in. All she was expected to do was grin, give a bit of cheek and comic relief. And she had played her part admirably. Until now, Megabyte had never thought of it in those terms. Until now, Megabyte had never considered what a lonely place that might be.
But here . . . here she wasn't just Jade Weston; she was Lady Jadina, expected to ensure the smooth running of the Keep under Lady Margot's care. She was Jadina, a daughter of the House of Zentil, who was supposed to handle with equanimity cranky foreign queens and the intricacies of a woman's court, the diplomacy of which Megabyte knew he would never understand. Jadina, who put the servants at ease with her kindness and easy manner while they still stiffened around her uncertain "husband." Jade had not only taken on the role she was required to play in this place, she had immersed herself in it, trying to be an anchor for him. And as usual, he had taken her for granted.
Why hadn't he seen that until now?
"Things change. People change. Come on, you really need to get to sleep," he nudged her aside enough to pull down the quilted covers.
"What things?" Jade laid back on the pillows, stifling another yawn behind the palm of her hand. Blue eyes squinted up at him, struggling to remain open and alert.
"For someone who was practically falling asleep standing up, you sure are talkative tonight." Leaning over her, Megabyte pulled the quilts up over her shoulders.
"What things?" She repeated, not in the least bit deterred by his teasing or his attempt to end the conversation. Jade could be stubborn like that; he was just surprised that stubbornness won out over the need for sleep. "I'm still Jade."
Realizing that Jade probably didn't intend to let this go, and in fact would resist the call of sleep until she had an answer, Megabyte sighed and sank down to the bed besides her reclining form. Possessed of a will of its own, or perhaps a will that Megabyte was blissfully unaware of, his hand snaked out, gently pushing several honey-gold strands away from her cheek. "No, you're not. Not really, not anymore."
Then if I'm not Jade, you're not Marmaduke Damon. Even her telepathic voice was drifting, full of marked tiredness.
The name, his name, his hated name since birth, sounded almost foreign to him, and even stranger coming from Jade. He may have been Marmaduke Damon, but he was not the same person that he had been before coming here. This world, and everything he encountered and experienced here changed all that. Even when … and he still did cling to the idea of seeing home again someday . . . when they got back to earth, he would never be that person again.
He continued to stroke her hair, "Maybe I'm not."
She never heard him. Megabyte could tell from the way she stilled beneath his hand, her breathing becoming slow and regular that she drifted off to sleep. He smiled, and then leaned forward and pressed his lips to her temple. "Good night, Lady Jadina."
End of Chapter Twenty-Nine
