This chapter may be short, and if it is, my apologies, but it is exactly 2:07 in the morning so I'm tired. Okay. That's done.

Disclaimer: 2,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 from 2,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 and that's how many characters I own. NONE!!!

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A noise outside her window woke Keladry almost immediately, although she did not know it was that which woke her.

Grumbling, she rolled over, the bed groaning from the movement. And that was when she saw the shadow.

Kel bolted straight up in bed, her eyes fixed on the window, and she saw it move discreetly from vision. Quietly, so as not to wake her maid Lalasa, she kicked the covers off and swung around. The wood planks were cold beneath her bare feet, and she shivered. She slipped on her robe, and tiptoed across the room to the window.

The shadow came back, and its shape reminded Kel of a person. Eyes narrowing and heart thudding, she slowly opened the window, feeling the night air on her face, smelling the freshness, and for a moment she thought that she had imagined the shadow.

And then it moved again. Caught off guard, she felt rough hands grab her shoulders and shove her back. Kel stumbled, opening her mouth to shout for help. Abruptly a hand covered her mouth. Her eyes widened in horror as she realized the person's intent. They almost popped out of her head when a knife was held up to her eye.

"Come quietly, and I won't hurt you," a very soft, quiet, masculine voice whispered. "Fight me, and you will die."

As though to make his point, he prodded her in the corner of her eye. He meant it. The man really meant it. So she stood up very slowly, the man still holding the knife, and made to try a sneak attack on him when his grip relaxed. With deadly carelessness and boredom he flipped the knife over and hit her over the head with the butt.

She dropped to the floor, out cold.

~*~

Damn it, why can't I sleep? It's not like they're going to kill her tonight!

Unless she doesn't come quietly. Knowing the Lump, she'll fight him…

So??? I don't care. I don't care. If I keep telling myself that I'll believe it. I don't care. I don't care. I don't care. Gods damn it all, I don't care!!

I'm experiencing the strangest sensation. The last time I felt like this was when I was four and had tied a weight to my best friend's cat…was my best friend name Akeem? Oh shit, it wasn't Vinson was it?! Oh well…And then I dropped the cat in the lake. Heh, it was kind of funny, watching it struggle desperately and look up at me so pitifully. When it died ten minutes later I felt…bad?

It's what I feel like now.

OH SHIT! I know what this is!!!!

IT'S MY GODS-FORSAKEN CONSCIENCE! ARGH! IT'S REUTNED FRO THE…DEAD?!!

Joren bolted up in alarm. He had thought he lost his conscience a long time ago. Why, he was frickin' four when he had a conscience last, and then it disappeared altogether.

Well, whatever it is, I don't like it.

"So what do I want to do?" he mused out loud. "I want to go back to sleep…but then I guess it would only be fair if I went to her room and woke her up and told her…the assassin could not have possibly gotten her now…"

With that in his head, he jumped out of bed and out the door, dressed in nothing but his loincloth. It took him about five minutes to reach the pages' wing before pausing at Mindelan's room. He tried the knob, and found it locked. No matter. He pulled a ring off his finger and broke it—it was given to him by some lady who fancied him a year or two ago, completely worthless, nothing but cheap metal and glass—so that he could stick it in the lock.

He yelped when some foul smelling liquid shot out at him.

What the fuck?!    

Incensed, he was about to march away when a voice on the other side of the door said,

"If you leave now, I won't hurt you." It was deep and quiet, the latter with practice, and deadly honest.

Joren swallowed, forgetting all about his current, smelly state.

"Uh, I'm Joren of Stone Mountain," he whispered hoarsely. "I'm the guy who paid for Mindelan's assassination."

The voice chuckled. "Yeah, right," it said softly. "Master said that the Joren who paid for it was excited. He told me he was the kind of guy who would never go back on his word."

"Well, 'Master' was wrong," he said fiercely.

The voice just laughed, still quiet, and Joren heard the rustle of clothes as he walked away. There was a pause and then some extra rustling, as though he was carrying a sack…or a body.

Joren exhaled gustily then straightened.

Okay then. That's fine. Mindelan will be taken to Carthak or wherever the fuck I sent her, but I don't care. I don't. Really.

As he went back to bed, a thought popped uninvited into his head.

Since when have I become such an awful liar…?

~*~

Muaha. Well, what do you think? The kidnapping was painfully short I'm afraid, but…at least it's there. Should this fic go up to rated R? It seems Joren has a bad mouth. Heh. But that's how my hubby is. *hugs a pained-looking Joren* Review!