Chapter 13 - On the Road Again
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Zidane drummed his fingers on the table absently, glancing once again at the door. He was currently in Leander's massive dining room, seated in a heavy, high-backed chair pulled right up to the gleaming mahogany table, easily as long as some streets Zidane had seen were wide. To his left Dagger fidgeted nervously, carefully avoiding looking at their host. The young man smirked knowingly. From the way her cheeks were glowing pink amid the curtain of dark hair falling over her face, she was recalling the...more than slightly compromising situation Raff-Riff had found them in earlier.
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As it had turned out, taking that moment to relax and make daisy chains had been a better idea than either had anticipated, proving to be just the thing both needed to raise their recently flagging spirits.
Unfortunately - if one chose to view it that way - the moment of relaxation was all that the two had needed to regain energy, and completely forget why they had been slightly miffed at one another. Dagger had slid a flower into Zidane's hair, Zidane had teasingly slid a flower into the neckline of Dagger's low-necked fluffy white blouse, his hand lingering a moment or twelve longer than was strictly necessary, Dagger had slid a hand into Zidane's hair while her other had meandered down his back to stroke his tail, which had intrigued her for rather a long time, and the two had gone from there.
When Raff-Riff had happened past, he had found the two nice young people lying on the ground, or in Zidane's case, on top of Dagger, both enjoying themselves, and each other, hugely, although both had reflected that there were far too many clothes in the way.
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And thus was the source of Dagger's current embarrassment. Grinning a wicked grin, Zidane leaned over, with his mouth next to her ear.
"Don't worry, Dagger; we can continue later where we had to leave off."
"I should hope so!" she began to whisper back emphatically, then thought better of it and simply smiled seductively at him.
"So," Leander spoke up suddenly from the head of the table, "your friends should arrive any minute now, hmm?"
"Yeah, I hope so," Zidane sighed, suddenly feeling rather guilty at the knowledge that he hadn't spared his friends, possibly lost and in danger somewhere in this bizarre house, a thought since running into Dagger.
Dagger, as well, looked rather sheepish.
"Yes, I hope they haven't gotten into any trouble."
"Not to worry," Leander laughed. "Raff-Riff will have kept them out of...ah...anything best not seen."
"Now, THAT makes me worry," Zidane muttered to Dagger.
"Me, too," she replied emphatically. "Especially with the talent Steiner has for getting into trouble."
"Not to mention Vivi," Zidane added. "At least we know that Freya and Amarant probably didn't get into any really stupid situations."
Dagger frowned.
"We ARE talking about the two people who, in three days, managed to get themselves handcuffed together, get stuck on the floor between two beds, severely injure themselves in battle without coming in any contact with the enemy, and...get a strange-looking polka-dotted creature stuck to Amarant's arm," she finished slowly, eyes trained on the spectacle just across the table from them.
Raff-Riff had just entered the room through its high polished wood double doors, and behind him had stalked a very annoyed Amarant with a rogue weasel-bunny still hanging off of his arm by the teeth. Attached to him was, of course, a very tired-looking Freya, who shot Dagger a weary, long- suffering smile. Dagger returned it sympathetically, suppressing a giggle at the firm shake Amarant gave his arm every couple of seconds, trying unsuccessfully to dislodge the tiny creature.
"I hate everything," he grumbled as the two sat, by necessity, in chairs placed side-by-side.
"Yes, you've mentioned," Freya sighed, grasping the little creature by the tail and yanking it off of his arm.
"Ow!" he shrieked, thus earning a strange look from everyone in the nearby vicinity, and several who weren't, as the weasel-bunny, teeth still clamped tightly shut, took a sizeable chunk of his arm with it.
"S-sorry," Freya murmured, choking back a laugh as she tossed the little polka-dotted creature over her shoulder.
The next second, another pained shriek echoed out behind them, considerably higher in pitch.
"Ow!"
"Oh, no! I've hit Vivi!" Freya exclaimed, horrified.
"N-no, you didn't," the voice of that same tiny mage informed her, quite confused.
She frowned, turning around.
"Well, then, who-"
She stopped abruptly at the sight of Steiner's hulking, armor-clad form looming in the doorway, a weasel-bunny attached to his nose by the teeth.
Trying very, very hard indeed not to laugh as she did so, Dagger climbed to her feet and pried the little creature off of the knight's nose, which she then proceeded to heal.
"Hmph!" Steiner exclaimed, quite offended amidst the laughter of everyone in the room, save for Amarant, Raff-Riff, and the less humorously inclined portraits gazing down on the merry little scene from the walls. "Beatrix would never laugh at me!"
"That's what you think!" a familiar voice called out from somewhere, snickering slightly.
"Beatrix?" Dagger asked, scratching her head.
"Yes, my queen," the voice replied.
"I must say, I'm very impressed with your lung capacity," the young Alexandrian ruler commented, shaking her head in disbelief. "Not everyone could make themselves heard all the way from Alexandria."
"You're too kind, Your Highness."
"Hmph! Unlike some other people, who think nothing of laughing at those in pain," Steiner muttered pointedly.
"Oh, cut that out, Adelbert," Beatrix's voice implored. "You know I love you. You just looked too adorable with that...thing hanging from your nose."
"Weasel-bunny," Freya added helpfully.
"Flying, polka-dotted weasel-bunny," Amarant corrected, less for the sake of being helpful than for showing the rat plainly that she didn't know everything.
"Yes, one of those," Beatrix's voice agreed, laughing softly again. "I'll see you soon, Adelbert?" she continued hopefully.
"Yes, just as soon as we can get Amarant and Freya un-handcuffed and make our way back to Alexandria," Steiner told her fondly, completely missing the frantic waving of both parties involved not to reveal this embarrassing situation to anyone else.
"I hate you, Steiner," Amarant muttered.
"I thought you hated everyone," Freya said airily.
"Shut up," he growled.
However, it seemed that luck was finally beginning to hesitantly creep over to their side, as Beatrix gave no sign that she had heard them, falling silent at last.
"Th-that was weird," Vivi commented, quite summing up the feelings of all the readers.
"I quite agree, my dear small fellow," Leander said, smiling beatifically at everyone seated around the table. "At any rate, shall we have dinner now?"
"Yeah!" Zidane agreed heartily. "I'm starving!" Then he leaned over. "And anyway, we've gotta get our energy up for tonight," he murmured to Dagger, grinning wickedly as she blushed brightly.
Leander smiled indulgently at both of them.
"I suppose you must all be tired from your...search?"
"Yeah," Zidane sighed. "I didn't think it'd be so hard."
"My dear boy," Leander chuckled. "Did you really think I would just leave the most important, rare, and powerful book in existence lying out where anyone could find it? Certainly not. It is necessary that the one who comes to be the book's next owner first prove himself by...finding...it."
He trailed off, frowning at the utterly confused expressions of six weary travelers.
"What book?" Dagger asked slowly.
"Why, the Mrin Codex, naturally! The prophecies within this priceless volume are certainly not accessible to just anyone, but the man who is able to locate it within this house clearly possesses the skills to decipher what would seem to anyone else the ramblings of a madman."
"Speaking of the ramblings of a madman," Amarant muttered to Freya.
"Now, now, let's see exactly where he's going with this," she muttered back.
He glared down at her.
"I can see where he's going with it. The damn innkeeper's sister isn't here. Which means we have to go look for her. Which means we're stuck in these damn cuffs even longer."
"Yes, I do see your point," Freya sighed.
Leander watched this exchange, reflecting suspiciously that something seemed to be wrong.
"Er, Zidane," he began slowly, "you ARE here to seek the Mrin Codex, are you not?"
"Sorry, man. I don't even know what that is," the fair-haired young man replied apologetically.
What?!" their host exclaimed, losing his air of unflappable composure at last. "This whole time, you never bothered to tell me that you weren't looking for the book?!"
"You didn't exactly give us a chance, Mr. 'Ooh, I'm One Big Enigma!'" Zidane shot back sulkily.
The tall, thin man looked devastated for a moment, then sighed.
"So, what ARE you looking for?"
"Is there an innkeeper here?"
"A...who?"
Zidane rolled his eyes and tried again.
"An innkeeper."
"Not that I know of," Leander replied thoughtfully. Then an evil smile spread itself across his face. "However, who is to say how many have become hopelessly lost within these walls?"
"Right," Zidane sighed, rubbing his forehead. "Well, if there's nothing else, I guess we'll-"
Here, Zidane was interrupted by a pounding at the front door of the manor. Without a word, Raff-Riff bustled off to answer it. Or perhaps 'slogged' is a better word than 'bustled.' For there was nothing bustling about Raff- Riff's movements, as there seldom tended to be.
At any rate, whatever it was he was doing, he did it until he reached the door.
"Good evening!" the voice of a woman floated into the dining room when Raff- Riff had presumably opened the door. "Might I borrow a cup of sugar? My brother's staying with my husband and I, and I thought I'd bake some muffins. He's rather low in spirits, after all, with his tavern having just been blown sky-high by a tiny redheaded sorceress."
"Poink!" went Zidane's ears as they stood up on end.
"WAAAAAAIT!" Zidane and Steiner howled in unison as they bolted as one from the dining room.
Suppressing a sigh, Dagger climbed to her feet and ran after them.
Grumbling, Amarant stood and stalked from the room.
Suppressing a startled noise, Freya went with him.
Vivi simply blinked in adorable confusion.
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"Hi!" Zidane was meanwhile greeting the stoutish elderly woman standing awkwardly in the grandly decorated front hall while Raff-Riff was off seeking the necessary dextrose sweetening crystals. "Uh, we couldn't help but overhear that you've got a brother who owns a tavern. Or, at least, pieces of what used to be a tavern."
"Why, yes! Yes, I do," the woman beamed back at him, patting a stray wisp of grey back into the soft bun resting at the back of her neck.
"She's a little too happy about her brother's livelihood having just been blown sky-high, if you ask me," Dagger murmured to Freya. "I don't know if I trust her."
"Maybe she's just uncomfortable around new people and over-compensates by smiling too much?" Freya suggested.
"Or maybe she's just damn loony, just like everyone else we've met in the last few days," Amarant grumbled.
"That could very well be," Dagger agreed sadly.
"Oh, that's terrible!" the woman was meanwhile exclaiming in horror. "You poor children, joined at the wrist like that!"
'Those poor children' exchanged uncertain glances.
"Uh, thanks, I guess," Amarant shrugged.
"Yes, it HAS been a hardship," Freya sighed as Amarant crossed his arm and leaned against something - her. Rolling her eyes, she shoved him off, and then gave a frightened squeak as he toppled to the ground and, predictably, took her with him.
"Geez, are you two at it again?" Zidane snickered. "You're worse than, like, Steiner and Beatrix!"
"Bite your tongue, Zidane!" Steiner admonished. "Beatrix is a lady, and I treat her as such!"
"Do you think this would be a bad time to tell him about the picture she took of him while he was getting out of the shower - before he could get all that armour back on?" Zidane muttered to a wildly giggling Dagger.
"I think so," she replied. "That wasn't very ladylike of her, was it?"
"Nope," Zidane grinned before turning back to the woman, who had watched this exchange rather bewilderedly. "So, would it be, like, a big problem if we all came with you to talk to your brother?"
"Certainly, you're welcome to come with me! The more, the merrier!" she chirped.
"We're all gonna end up sharing one bed, aren't we?" Amarant muttered to Freya.
"If so, I vote that we just give it to Zidane and Dagger and be done with it," she muttered back. "I'd rather spend the evening in a haystack than with those two in the same bed."
"The name's Margie, by the way," the innkeeper's sister was meanwhile saying. "Now, shall we be off? My husband and I just live down the hill, but the hill is awfully long."
"Alright!" Zidane chirped, already bounding out of the house and down the long walkway.
With a simultaneous sigh, Dagger, Steiner, Amarant, and Freya followed him. Then, halfway down the walkway, Steiner stopped.
"Something's missing," he noted, frowning beneath his helm. "Something...little and blue and yellow. And just a little pointy. But whatever could it be? Ah, well. I'm sure it is just my over-active imagination, just like that earlier exchange with Beatrix." His eyes grew wide and shiny as he clasped his hands beneath his chin in girlish adoration. "Ah, how I miss you, my love..."
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"U-um, Leander," Vivi spoke up hesitantly from his seat at the massive dining table. "Do you think they're coming back?"
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Twenty minutes later...
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"Geez, Vivi, we're sorry we forgot you," Zidane said fervently. "But why didn't you say something?"
"Because I was inside, and you were all running for freedom," Vivi snapped back, for once too incensed to stutter.
Zidane scratched the back of his head sheepishly.
"Well, anyway, you've got to meet Margie. She's the innkeeper's sister we've been looking for. Margie, this is Vivi."
Vivi suppressed a whimper of annoyance as Zidane picked him up by his hat and waved him before Margie's eyes.
"Oh, what a little sweetie! How could they forget a cute little thing like you? Poor child. Ah, well. Don't you worry. Margie'll whip you up a cup of tea right as soon as we get home," the elderly woman assured him, moving to pinch his cheek, but not sure of exactly how to get to a cheek beneath that massive yellow hat.
"Is that her cure for everything?" Zidane muttered to Amarant.
"Think so. She offered you one after you walked into that cow."
"And she offered one to Dagger for her headache after you walked into the cow," Freya added.
"And she offered one to Steiner for his...affliction," Amarant added, smirking.
"Oh, Beatrix, my love, I miss you so!"
"And then," Freya said, feeling it safest to skip right over Steiner's unexpected outburst, "as if that weren't enough, she offered to pour a cup of tea over the handcuffs to see if they would come off that way. I still don't understand how she expected that to work."
"Oh, well," Zidane shrugged. Then he pouted. "This is taking too long! Hey! I know! Let's skip to the next scene!"
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And they all lived happily ever after, except for the Magical Mr. Mistoffeles, who is to this day in the afterlife, being teased mercilessly about his rhinestone-studded suit.
The end.
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"Uh...I think that's a little too far," Zidane noted, rubbing the back of his head, this time less sheepishly than dismayed at the true strangeness of the author. "How about we just skip the rest of this walk?"
"Fine," Rhianwen pouted from the sky, and the next instant, a gigantic hand reached down and delivered a mighty power-flick to Zidane's backside, which sent him tumbling down the hill.
"Hey!" Dagger shouted up at the sky. "Were you touching my Zidane's posterior, mysterious gigantic hand? If you were, you'd better watch it! I've got an Odin, and I'm not afraid to use him!"
"Like he could hit me, anyway," Rhianwen scoffed. "He couldn't hit fish in a barrel."
"Rrr!" Dagger growled. "First you grope my boyfriend, and then you disparage my Odin! Prepare to die! MEGA FLARE!"
"Uh-oh. Odin may miss, but Bahamut don't," Rhianwen said in as butchered of grammar as ever English teacher cringed at, and the next moment, the hand withdrew back into the sky, to be seen no more.
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Unfortunately, as Rhianwen was also the force behind the telling of this tale, the remarkably ill-fated Chapter 13 met its end here, forcing the mismatched band to fend for themselves the rest of the way down the hill, which they did, doubtlessly more successfully than they should have, had a narrator with a cruel streak been guiding them.
Once at the bottom of the hill, they happened upon a slightly mangled Zidane. Steiner slung him roughly over his shoulder, ignoring the young man's squawk of pain, and they all trooped into the large farmhouse that Margie and her husband, whom, it had been discovered, was named Larry, occupied with their two children, four dogs, twenty-seven cats, and four very nervous canaries.
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"Ooh..." Zidane groaned painfully as Steiner set him gently on the floor with a resounding thud.
Dagger and Margie bustled over to supply healing spells and tea, respectively.
It is safe to say that Zidane appreciated the latter much more, particularly as, when Dagger leaned over him to recite the healing spell, her...feminine charms, still with the flower tucked into the neckline of her blouse, brushed enticingly against his face.
"Wow...thanks, Dagger," Zidane said gratefully. "I feel better already!"
Dagger blinked, confused.
"But...I haven't recited the spell yet!"
"Oh! Uh, right. Heh-heh-heh..."
'Nice save, buddy,' Zidane congratulated himself.
'He's a twit,' Dagger reflected, smiling fondly down at Zidane, 'but I love him.'
Both their internal monologues were the next moment interrupted by the peal of a dinner bell, and thus began, as everyone gathered around the dinner table, a peaceful, relaxing, and altogether delightful meal.
Yeah, right.
Tune in next chapter to see just how much Rhianwen is lying!
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End Notes: Whew! Chapter 13! I, in my superstitiousness, was dreading the writing of this chapter. And my goodness, it was a silly one, even for this story!
So, I know I've been promising this for quite some time now (at least the last four chapters), but I really will get back to the plot next time. For now, please review often and generously. ^_^
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Zidane drummed his fingers on the table absently, glancing once again at the door. He was currently in Leander's massive dining room, seated in a heavy, high-backed chair pulled right up to the gleaming mahogany table, easily as long as some streets Zidane had seen were wide. To his left Dagger fidgeted nervously, carefully avoiding looking at their host. The young man smirked knowingly. From the way her cheeks were glowing pink amid the curtain of dark hair falling over her face, she was recalling the...more than slightly compromising situation Raff-Riff had found them in earlier.
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As it had turned out, taking that moment to relax and make daisy chains had been a better idea than either had anticipated, proving to be just the thing both needed to raise their recently flagging spirits.
Unfortunately - if one chose to view it that way - the moment of relaxation was all that the two had needed to regain energy, and completely forget why they had been slightly miffed at one another. Dagger had slid a flower into Zidane's hair, Zidane had teasingly slid a flower into the neckline of Dagger's low-necked fluffy white blouse, his hand lingering a moment or twelve longer than was strictly necessary, Dagger had slid a hand into Zidane's hair while her other had meandered down his back to stroke his tail, which had intrigued her for rather a long time, and the two had gone from there.
When Raff-Riff had happened past, he had found the two nice young people lying on the ground, or in Zidane's case, on top of Dagger, both enjoying themselves, and each other, hugely, although both had reflected that there were far too many clothes in the way.
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And thus was the source of Dagger's current embarrassment. Grinning a wicked grin, Zidane leaned over, with his mouth next to her ear.
"Don't worry, Dagger; we can continue later where we had to leave off."
"I should hope so!" she began to whisper back emphatically, then thought better of it and simply smiled seductively at him.
"So," Leander spoke up suddenly from the head of the table, "your friends should arrive any minute now, hmm?"
"Yeah, I hope so," Zidane sighed, suddenly feeling rather guilty at the knowledge that he hadn't spared his friends, possibly lost and in danger somewhere in this bizarre house, a thought since running into Dagger.
Dagger, as well, looked rather sheepish.
"Yes, I hope they haven't gotten into any trouble."
"Not to worry," Leander laughed. "Raff-Riff will have kept them out of...ah...anything best not seen."
"Now, THAT makes me worry," Zidane muttered to Dagger.
"Me, too," she replied emphatically. "Especially with the talent Steiner has for getting into trouble."
"Not to mention Vivi," Zidane added. "At least we know that Freya and Amarant probably didn't get into any really stupid situations."
Dagger frowned.
"We ARE talking about the two people who, in three days, managed to get themselves handcuffed together, get stuck on the floor between two beds, severely injure themselves in battle without coming in any contact with the enemy, and...get a strange-looking polka-dotted creature stuck to Amarant's arm," she finished slowly, eyes trained on the spectacle just across the table from them.
Raff-Riff had just entered the room through its high polished wood double doors, and behind him had stalked a very annoyed Amarant with a rogue weasel-bunny still hanging off of his arm by the teeth. Attached to him was, of course, a very tired-looking Freya, who shot Dagger a weary, long- suffering smile. Dagger returned it sympathetically, suppressing a giggle at the firm shake Amarant gave his arm every couple of seconds, trying unsuccessfully to dislodge the tiny creature.
"I hate everything," he grumbled as the two sat, by necessity, in chairs placed side-by-side.
"Yes, you've mentioned," Freya sighed, grasping the little creature by the tail and yanking it off of his arm.
"Ow!" he shrieked, thus earning a strange look from everyone in the nearby vicinity, and several who weren't, as the weasel-bunny, teeth still clamped tightly shut, took a sizeable chunk of his arm with it.
"S-sorry," Freya murmured, choking back a laugh as she tossed the little polka-dotted creature over her shoulder.
The next second, another pained shriek echoed out behind them, considerably higher in pitch.
"Ow!"
"Oh, no! I've hit Vivi!" Freya exclaimed, horrified.
"N-no, you didn't," the voice of that same tiny mage informed her, quite confused.
She frowned, turning around.
"Well, then, who-"
She stopped abruptly at the sight of Steiner's hulking, armor-clad form looming in the doorway, a weasel-bunny attached to his nose by the teeth.
Trying very, very hard indeed not to laugh as she did so, Dagger climbed to her feet and pried the little creature off of the knight's nose, which she then proceeded to heal.
"Hmph!" Steiner exclaimed, quite offended amidst the laughter of everyone in the room, save for Amarant, Raff-Riff, and the less humorously inclined portraits gazing down on the merry little scene from the walls. "Beatrix would never laugh at me!"
"That's what you think!" a familiar voice called out from somewhere, snickering slightly.
"Beatrix?" Dagger asked, scratching her head.
"Yes, my queen," the voice replied.
"I must say, I'm very impressed with your lung capacity," the young Alexandrian ruler commented, shaking her head in disbelief. "Not everyone could make themselves heard all the way from Alexandria."
"You're too kind, Your Highness."
"Hmph! Unlike some other people, who think nothing of laughing at those in pain," Steiner muttered pointedly.
"Oh, cut that out, Adelbert," Beatrix's voice implored. "You know I love you. You just looked too adorable with that...thing hanging from your nose."
"Weasel-bunny," Freya added helpfully.
"Flying, polka-dotted weasel-bunny," Amarant corrected, less for the sake of being helpful than for showing the rat plainly that she didn't know everything.
"Yes, one of those," Beatrix's voice agreed, laughing softly again. "I'll see you soon, Adelbert?" she continued hopefully.
"Yes, just as soon as we can get Amarant and Freya un-handcuffed and make our way back to Alexandria," Steiner told her fondly, completely missing the frantic waving of both parties involved not to reveal this embarrassing situation to anyone else.
"I hate you, Steiner," Amarant muttered.
"I thought you hated everyone," Freya said airily.
"Shut up," he growled.
However, it seemed that luck was finally beginning to hesitantly creep over to their side, as Beatrix gave no sign that she had heard them, falling silent at last.
"Th-that was weird," Vivi commented, quite summing up the feelings of all the readers.
"I quite agree, my dear small fellow," Leander said, smiling beatifically at everyone seated around the table. "At any rate, shall we have dinner now?"
"Yeah!" Zidane agreed heartily. "I'm starving!" Then he leaned over. "And anyway, we've gotta get our energy up for tonight," he murmured to Dagger, grinning wickedly as she blushed brightly.
Leander smiled indulgently at both of them.
"I suppose you must all be tired from your...search?"
"Yeah," Zidane sighed. "I didn't think it'd be so hard."
"My dear boy," Leander chuckled. "Did you really think I would just leave the most important, rare, and powerful book in existence lying out where anyone could find it? Certainly not. It is necessary that the one who comes to be the book's next owner first prove himself by...finding...it."
He trailed off, frowning at the utterly confused expressions of six weary travelers.
"What book?" Dagger asked slowly.
"Why, the Mrin Codex, naturally! The prophecies within this priceless volume are certainly not accessible to just anyone, but the man who is able to locate it within this house clearly possesses the skills to decipher what would seem to anyone else the ramblings of a madman."
"Speaking of the ramblings of a madman," Amarant muttered to Freya.
"Now, now, let's see exactly where he's going with this," she muttered back.
He glared down at her.
"I can see where he's going with it. The damn innkeeper's sister isn't here. Which means we have to go look for her. Which means we're stuck in these damn cuffs even longer."
"Yes, I do see your point," Freya sighed.
Leander watched this exchange, reflecting suspiciously that something seemed to be wrong.
"Er, Zidane," he began slowly, "you ARE here to seek the Mrin Codex, are you not?"
"Sorry, man. I don't even know what that is," the fair-haired young man replied apologetically.
What?!" their host exclaimed, losing his air of unflappable composure at last. "This whole time, you never bothered to tell me that you weren't looking for the book?!"
"You didn't exactly give us a chance, Mr. 'Ooh, I'm One Big Enigma!'" Zidane shot back sulkily.
The tall, thin man looked devastated for a moment, then sighed.
"So, what ARE you looking for?"
"Is there an innkeeper here?"
"A...who?"
Zidane rolled his eyes and tried again.
"An innkeeper."
"Not that I know of," Leander replied thoughtfully. Then an evil smile spread itself across his face. "However, who is to say how many have become hopelessly lost within these walls?"
"Right," Zidane sighed, rubbing his forehead. "Well, if there's nothing else, I guess we'll-"
Here, Zidane was interrupted by a pounding at the front door of the manor. Without a word, Raff-Riff bustled off to answer it. Or perhaps 'slogged' is a better word than 'bustled.' For there was nothing bustling about Raff- Riff's movements, as there seldom tended to be.
At any rate, whatever it was he was doing, he did it until he reached the door.
"Good evening!" the voice of a woman floated into the dining room when Raff- Riff had presumably opened the door. "Might I borrow a cup of sugar? My brother's staying with my husband and I, and I thought I'd bake some muffins. He's rather low in spirits, after all, with his tavern having just been blown sky-high by a tiny redheaded sorceress."
"Poink!" went Zidane's ears as they stood up on end.
"WAAAAAAIT!" Zidane and Steiner howled in unison as they bolted as one from the dining room.
Suppressing a sigh, Dagger climbed to her feet and ran after them.
Grumbling, Amarant stood and stalked from the room.
Suppressing a startled noise, Freya went with him.
Vivi simply blinked in adorable confusion.
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"Hi!" Zidane was meanwhile greeting the stoutish elderly woman standing awkwardly in the grandly decorated front hall while Raff-Riff was off seeking the necessary dextrose sweetening crystals. "Uh, we couldn't help but overhear that you've got a brother who owns a tavern. Or, at least, pieces of what used to be a tavern."
"Why, yes! Yes, I do," the woman beamed back at him, patting a stray wisp of grey back into the soft bun resting at the back of her neck.
"She's a little too happy about her brother's livelihood having just been blown sky-high, if you ask me," Dagger murmured to Freya. "I don't know if I trust her."
"Maybe she's just uncomfortable around new people and over-compensates by smiling too much?" Freya suggested.
"Or maybe she's just damn loony, just like everyone else we've met in the last few days," Amarant grumbled.
"That could very well be," Dagger agreed sadly.
"Oh, that's terrible!" the woman was meanwhile exclaiming in horror. "You poor children, joined at the wrist like that!"
'Those poor children' exchanged uncertain glances.
"Uh, thanks, I guess," Amarant shrugged.
"Yes, it HAS been a hardship," Freya sighed as Amarant crossed his arm and leaned against something - her. Rolling her eyes, she shoved him off, and then gave a frightened squeak as he toppled to the ground and, predictably, took her with him.
"Geez, are you two at it again?" Zidane snickered. "You're worse than, like, Steiner and Beatrix!"
"Bite your tongue, Zidane!" Steiner admonished. "Beatrix is a lady, and I treat her as such!"
"Do you think this would be a bad time to tell him about the picture she took of him while he was getting out of the shower - before he could get all that armour back on?" Zidane muttered to a wildly giggling Dagger.
"I think so," she replied. "That wasn't very ladylike of her, was it?"
"Nope," Zidane grinned before turning back to the woman, who had watched this exchange rather bewilderedly. "So, would it be, like, a big problem if we all came with you to talk to your brother?"
"Certainly, you're welcome to come with me! The more, the merrier!" she chirped.
"We're all gonna end up sharing one bed, aren't we?" Amarant muttered to Freya.
"If so, I vote that we just give it to Zidane and Dagger and be done with it," she muttered back. "I'd rather spend the evening in a haystack than with those two in the same bed."
"The name's Margie, by the way," the innkeeper's sister was meanwhile saying. "Now, shall we be off? My husband and I just live down the hill, but the hill is awfully long."
"Alright!" Zidane chirped, already bounding out of the house and down the long walkway.
With a simultaneous sigh, Dagger, Steiner, Amarant, and Freya followed him. Then, halfway down the walkway, Steiner stopped.
"Something's missing," he noted, frowning beneath his helm. "Something...little and blue and yellow. And just a little pointy. But whatever could it be? Ah, well. I'm sure it is just my over-active imagination, just like that earlier exchange with Beatrix." His eyes grew wide and shiny as he clasped his hands beneath his chin in girlish adoration. "Ah, how I miss you, my love..."
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"U-um, Leander," Vivi spoke up hesitantly from his seat at the massive dining table. "Do you think they're coming back?"
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Twenty minutes later...
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"Geez, Vivi, we're sorry we forgot you," Zidane said fervently. "But why didn't you say something?"
"Because I was inside, and you were all running for freedom," Vivi snapped back, for once too incensed to stutter.
Zidane scratched the back of his head sheepishly.
"Well, anyway, you've got to meet Margie. She's the innkeeper's sister we've been looking for. Margie, this is Vivi."
Vivi suppressed a whimper of annoyance as Zidane picked him up by his hat and waved him before Margie's eyes.
"Oh, what a little sweetie! How could they forget a cute little thing like you? Poor child. Ah, well. Don't you worry. Margie'll whip you up a cup of tea right as soon as we get home," the elderly woman assured him, moving to pinch his cheek, but not sure of exactly how to get to a cheek beneath that massive yellow hat.
"Is that her cure for everything?" Zidane muttered to Amarant.
"Think so. She offered you one after you walked into that cow."
"And she offered one to Dagger for her headache after you walked into the cow," Freya added.
"And she offered one to Steiner for his...affliction," Amarant added, smirking.
"Oh, Beatrix, my love, I miss you so!"
"And then," Freya said, feeling it safest to skip right over Steiner's unexpected outburst, "as if that weren't enough, she offered to pour a cup of tea over the handcuffs to see if they would come off that way. I still don't understand how she expected that to work."
"Oh, well," Zidane shrugged. Then he pouted. "This is taking too long! Hey! I know! Let's skip to the next scene!"
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And they all lived happily ever after, except for the Magical Mr. Mistoffeles, who is to this day in the afterlife, being teased mercilessly about his rhinestone-studded suit.
The end.
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"Uh...I think that's a little too far," Zidane noted, rubbing the back of his head, this time less sheepishly than dismayed at the true strangeness of the author. "How about we just skip the rest of this walk?"
"Fine," Rhianwen pouted from the sky, and the next instant, a gigantic hand reached down and delivered a mighty power-flick to Zidane's backside, which sent him tumbling down the hill.
"Hey!" Dagger shouted up at the sky. "Were you touching my Zidane's posterior, mysterious gigantic hand? If you were, you'd better watch it! I've got an Odin, and I'm not afraid to use him!"
"Like he could hit me, anyway," Rhianwen scoffed. "He couldn't hit fish in a barrel."
"Rrr!" Dagger growled. "First you grope my boyfriend, and then you disparage my Odin! Prepare to die! MEGA FLARE!"
"Uh-oh. Odin may miss, but Bahamut don't," Rhianwen said in as butchered of grammar as ever English teacher cringed at, and the next moment, the hand withdrew back into the sky, to be seen no more.
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Unfortunately, as Rhianwen was also the force behind the telling of this tale, the remarkably ill-fated Chapter 13 met its end here, forcing the mismatched band to fend for themselves the rest of the way down the hill, which they did, doubtlessly more successfully than they should have, had a narrator with a cruel streak been guiding them.
Once at the bottom of the hill, they happened upon a slightly mangled Zidane. Steiner slung him roughly over his shoulder, ignoring the young man's squawk of pain, and they all trooped into the large farmhouse that Margie and her husband, whom, it had been discovered, was named Larry, occupied with their two children, four dogs, twenty-seven cats, and four very nervous canaries.
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"Ooh..." Zidane groaned painfully as Steiner set him gently on the floor with a resounding thud.
Dagger and Margie bustled over to supply healing spells and tea, respectively.
It is safe to say that Zidane appreciated the latter much more, particularly as, when Dagger leaned over him to recite the healing spell, her...feminine charms, still with the flower tucked into the neckline of her blouse, brushed enticingly against his face.
"Wow...thanks, Dagger," Zidane said gratefully. "I feel better already!"
Dagger blinked, confused.
"But...I haven't recited the spell yet!"
"Oh! Uh, right. Heh-heh-heh..."
'Nice save, buddy,' Zidane congratulated himself.
'He's a twit,' Dagger reflected, smiling fondly down at Zidane, 'but I love him.'
Both their internal monologues were the next moment interrupted by the peal of a dinner bell, and thus began, as everyone gathered around the dinner table, a peaceful, relaxing, and altogether delightful meal.
Yeah, right.
Tune in next chapter to see just how much Rhianwen is lying!
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End Notes: Whew! Chapter 13! I, in my superstitiousness, was dreading the writing of this chapter. And my goodness, it was a silly one, even for this story!
So, I know I've been promising this for quite some time now (at least the last four chapters), but I really will get back to the plot next time. For now, please review often and generously. ^_^