Disclaimers: These characters do not belong to me, they
belong to Tamora Pierce. Please Read
and Review. Thanx. ^_^.v..
By Hendy
A small girl stood on the bow of an imposing ship, easily maintaining
her balance with the rise and fall of the ship on the current. Her features
were a little too close together to call her pretty but she wasn't ugly. She
had large green eyes and a small nose and a full mouth set in a tanned, narrow
face that was sprinkled with freckles. She was dressed in a ragged tunic with a
vest pulled over it, a pair of faded breeches and the ankle boots of sailors on
her small feet. Her long, white blond hair was pulled under a sailors cap a
size too big.
A large callused hand settled on her shoulder, making her look up at a
wizened old sailor. Her eyes lighting up at this signal that she waited for
each day, she raced to the captain's cabin. Straightening her worn out tunic,
with a quick knock, she walked in.
"Hela girly."
"Hela Cap'n." turning, Captain Rilart stood and ordered her to close
the door. She did and was swept into a bear hug.
"Hela Rue."
"Hela papa" she answered happily. Her father set her down on a
chair and got their supper off the small oven in his room. Rue stared at her
father and was certain that no one in the whole world could have a better, more
perfect papa.
Rilart stood straight and tall at over 6 feet; broad, with striking
white blonde hair and large blue eyes set in a tanned face, he was the focus of
attention in almost any room he was in. With an elaborate court bow, the
Captain put the food on the table. Giggling, Rue curtsied and her father mussed
her hair laughing. The two went on to eat super and discuss their day, politics
and whatever struck their fancy at that moment. Finishing up, there came a
knock on the door. Rue jumped up and opened the door and then wished she
hadn't. In walked a tall gangly boy with a colorful head of many reds hair and
blue eyes so dark that they were almost black.
"Ah, Nick. Welcome. Come to give me the evening report?"
"Evening Captain. Yep." Nick's eyes stayed on the half eaten
supper and ignoring his daughters' gasp of horror that there special hour of
the day would be interrupted, the Captain asked him to stay. By concentrating
on both children, the Captain got both his daughter out of the sulks and Nick
to relate his message and to stop stuffing his face.
Later that night Rue prepared for bed. Her watch was over and the day
had been long. About to pull off her vest, a hand clamped over her mouth.
Desperately, Rue tried every trick she knew but the body at the end of the hand
seemed to know her every move. After too little air for too long, her eyes
rolled back in her head and she dropped unconscious. How much time passed she
didn't know but her waking up was a sudden thing. Rue immediately knew she was
not in her closet of a cabin on her fathers ship, the Independence. In fact,
she wasn't on the sea at all. This, more then anything, terrified her.
In all her nine years of life she could count on one hand the number of
time she had spent a night on land. Her parents had never let her off the ship,
saying that the inns on land were worse then the ship and the few times she had
slept in a inn had convinced her that they were right. But looking around now,
she realized that this room was no disgusting inn room. Having been around
people who pinched pennies her whole life, Rue mentally tallied up the prices
of the thick mattress where she had been sleeping, the nightclothes she was
wearing, the draperies, carpeting, bedstead and her mouth dried up at the
number of digits the sum had.
Rue shed the fancy nightgown, noting with disgust that it had lace and
was silk- two materials that Rue believed to be the epitome of wasteful. Donning her old clothes, Rue began to walk
around the room, looking for a door or any sort of crease in the wall that
would denote an opening. She found none but kept looking, reasoning that for
lack of anything else to do, she might as well do something constructive.
"Rue." came a quiet voice. Rue spun around, startled by a
voice after this long period of silence. She judged she had been in this room
for about 5 hours since awakening.
"Rue. Are you hungry?" Getting her nod (because she was and
saw no purpose in denying it), the voice continued "Good." Suddenly,
behind one wall draping, came a short, smiling portly man, who was balding on
top. Rue smiled, and though she didn't know it, the smile gave away her every
thought. It showed her confidence in knocking the fat man out and making a run
for it. He shook his head and told her to not bother.
"I am a knight trained- I don't use it much, but I do remember it."
Raising her eyebrows, Rue snorted. "A noble, huh? Well, that should make
you a proper dickhead." Judging from the man's expression he hadn't been
expecting something that she had done- only problem was that she didn't know
what it was that had shocked him. If she had, she would have kept on doing it.
"Who are you?" Rue asked and the man smiled and replied that
he was a friend of her fathers. At
this, Rue jumped up and shouted for joy.
"You can tell the Cap'n where I am! He's probably so worried about
where I might be by now!" She scampered toward the hanging from which the
man had emerged, but a hand touched her shoulder and Rue turned around slowly.
He was pale and shaking, however it was not from fright or nerves but more from
anger.
"Your father didn't tell you?" he asked. Suddenly anxious all
over again, with a bad feeling in her stomach, Rue began to shout.
"Who are you? Where is my papa??" "Rue, your father
brought you to me. He knows you're here." Staring at him, Rue saw that it
was entirely possible. How else had she
been taken so easily? Her father had trained her-of course he would be able to
block her! And he had been talking lately about what a big girl she was, and
had been asking how she liked land. Rue groaned. She should have seen this
coming. But, but she couldn't believe her father would give her up so easily to
some fat, balding stranger! Her eyes filled with tears and the man kneeled down
next to her and made comforting noises.
"Oh, don't cry! Your
father gave you to me so you could become a proper young woman! That's all...he
had something very important to do for me and it was too dangerous for you! He
didn't want to risk you, Rue. Otherwise he never would have given you to my
care. He loves you very, ver-".
That was when Rue hit him on his neck with her fist and before Sir
Miles' unconscious body hit the floor, she was out of the door behind the wall
hanging. The only thought she spared after that for him that he was a fat,
balding idiotic stranger if he had believed those tears.
