THE KNIGHT & THE MAIDEN

CHAPTER 4

Disclaimer: I don't own the X-Men. If I did, Madelyne Pryor would still be alive, along with Peter and Illyana, of course.


She looked out the window and took a deep breath, taking in the thick, humid air that was so familiar. Even before her eyes fought through the harsh white glare of the morning sun, Rogue knew she was in the South. She just didn't know why.

Last she remembered, she had been exploring the caves under Braddock Manor. Then there had been the room with the stone and then the walls closed up and the light came and now there was this. She had awakened to find herself dressed in a tank top and pajama pants, and there was orange juice, fruit, scrambled eggs, and bacon sitting on a platter next to her bed. The windows were already open when she woke up, looking three stories down at grass and a cluster of junipers. Wherever Rogue was, it didn't seem all too hostile, but she had no intention of staying put. She tried the door and, in finding it unlocked, decided to make a break for it.

Rogue flattened herself against the wall, peering around the corner, only to find the hallway empty. She had made it all the way to the stairs without any trouble when someone grabbed on to her bare hand. Their touch was gentle, but their grip was powerful enough to cause her to stagger backwards. "Big mistake bu-" she managed to say before her words died in her throat. A sinking feeling settled into the pit of her stomach as she realized her captor's hand was gloved. "Figures," she muttered. She should have known. They had redressed her; if they hadn't already known about her powers they must have figured it out. Rogue slowly turned to look her captor in the eye, finding herself starring straight into the last face she'd ever expected.

"Bonjour, Chere."

Rogue paused for a moment, trying to decide if the memory absorption that would come with the brief physical contact was worth it. Watching the Cajun's grin widen at her hesitation made her mind up for her. Looking straight into his eyes, Rogue clocked Gambit right in his smug face, then turned and stormed off.


Gambit rubbed his aching chin and smiled, despite the pain. It was nice to know she hadn't changed.

He caught up with Rogue at the bottom of the stairs where she had stopped, trying to figure out which direction she should go in. "If you lookin' for da door, it's dat way," he told her, gesturing with his arm to the right. Rogue went left.

"You know," he continued as he followed her down the hall, "when a gentleman say hi to a lady, the polite thing for her to do is t'smile at him, at da very least. Not punch him."

"Ah'm not a lady, Ah'm an X-Man. Unlike some people," she retorted.

They came to a dead end.

"Told you to go right," Remy said smugly.

"Ah apologize. For some reason Ah had a notion thieves were untrustworthy," she snorted as she wrenched open a window, determined to get out.

"What'd you hafta go and do dat for? Is dat anyway to treat da man who rescued you?" he asked, an exaggerated wounded look on his face.

"Rescued me? Kidnapped is more like it!"

"Oh, non, non, non. We be da Thieves Guild. We don't kidnap, we steal. Kidnapping is wrong. Besides, no one in dere right mind would take you. You be far too much trouble."

"And why should Ah believe you?" Rogue asked, stopping halfway through the window.

"No reason," he shrugged. "But you're the one climbing out da window when you could be walking through da door."

Rogue rolled her eyes and grimaced, knowing he was right. She climbed back in and turned to face him, sitting on the window's ledge.

"Fine," she breathed, a little more calm. "Then you tell me why one minute Ah'm in England and the next Ah'm alone in your house in the damn swamps," she demanded.

"Someone made all your wishes come true?" he guessed. She turned and continued to climb back outside. "Wait, wait," he hastened, grabbing her elbow. "Yesterday, Louis found you on the bank. He saw da "X" on your uniform and knew what team you were from, so he brought you back to the manor so some of da filles could get you dry and change your wet clothes-"

"So they could search my pockets?"

"We are thieves," he explained. "But dey didn't know who you be, so dey weren't careful with your skin, and dey touched you-- he grabbed her hand and held it-- so if you happen to have any flashes of a woman with a penchant for Bourbon and a talent at hustling tourists down in the Quarter, you know where it came from." He smiled conspiringly at her. "Took Marie-Ange hours to wake up from that little mistake," he said in a low voice, as though they were sharing a secret.

Rogue ignored his flirtations. "How'd Ah get here?"

"I really don't know. I told you everything, I swear. I had thought you'd be able t'tell me. And I had hoped that m'be you were on your way down here for a visit. Chere," he drawled, looking deep into her eyes.

"So how long was I asleep?" she questioned, seemingly unaffected by his charms.

"Almost two days," he threw out, a look of frustration clouding his face.

"Two days," she muttered, looking back at Gambit. "So Ah'm really not bein' kidnapped or held for ransom?" Rogue asked skeptically. His story had a lot of holes in it, but she overlooked those. There was a part of her that couldn't help but want to believe him.

Gambit held up his right hand and tilted his chin up slightly. "Thieve's honor," he promised.

"Real reassurin'," she sighed. She wasn't sure what was going on, but she knew she wouldn't find the answer here. Especially with all the distractions around her. "I want to call the X-Men," Rogue said quietly, looking away.

Gambit's confident expression faltered slightly.

"And leave so soon?"

"Ah have a duty to my team," she said firmly, refusing to meet his eyes.

Gambit nodded silently. Rogue followed him into the next room where he handed the phone to her.

"Thanks," she murmured, dialing Moira's number.

"Yeah, well we didn't find any com equipment on you. That's not safe, you know."

"I know," she agreed as she waited for someone to pick up on the other end of the line.

"H'lo?" a young voice answered.

"Rachel? It's Rogue."

There was nothing but silence in response.

"Look, I need to speak to the X-Men."

Again, there was silence.

"Are they even there? Alright, listen Rachel, this is very important. You need to get Moira to call Scott on the com link and tell him Ah'm at the Thieves Guild with Gambit in Louisiana, and Ah'm ok, but Ah need someone to come get-"

"I don't think I should be talking to you. Daddy always says I'm not posta talk to strangers. Bye."

"Rachel wait! She hung up on me!" Rogue complained as she slammed the phone down after hearing the dial tone. "You know, this would have never happened with the Avengers. They have Jarvis," she fumed.

"She's just a little girl."

"Please. She's young, but she's not stupid. She just hates me."

"How could anyone hate you?" Remy asked, trying to comfort her.

"Because she can't stand that Scott and I are- that were friends," she finished, noticing the look on Gambit's face.

"You an' One-Eye. Dat's, dat's unexpected," he stammered, for once at a loss of words.

"Yeah, well, he's a decent guy. For awhile he was so lost. He needed a friend," she explained.

"That all the two of you are? Friends?" Remy asked, a dazed look on his face.

"With mah powers, Ah can't really be anything else, even if Ah wanted to," she reminded him.

"I never wanted to be jus' friends with you," he told her softly, placing his hands on her shoulders.

Rouge twisted around, turning her back towards him.

"Ah need to get back to the X-Men."

"Chere..."

"Don't."

"Why not spend a few days here, catch up with an old friend. The city's less than an hour away. We had fun there once."

"Remy, that was a long time ago, you left a long time ago, almost six years. In the X-Men, you learn not to look back. Because when you fight for a dream you have to keep focused on it. And if you look at the past, sometimes it makes it so the future doesn't really seem worth fighting for anymore. The pain is too- damn! how can all the lines to Muir be busy? I tried all five and... and she took all the phones off the hook. I told you she hated me," Rogue grumbled, looking down at the phone in annoyance before dialing another number. "Hi, New Orleans Airport, please." She paused for a moment as the operator connected her. "Hi, Ah need the soonest available flight to as far north in Scotland as Ah can get. Aberdeen? Alright, Ah-"

The line went dead. Rogue looked up to see Gambit holding down the button on the phone hook.

"Whadya do that for?"

"We not goin' to Aberdeen," Remy told her simply.

"We?" she challenged. He put a gloved finger to her lips to silence her, taking the phone from her hand.

"Bonjour, Mademoiselle. Pleased to meet the acquaintance of someone with a voice as beautiful as yours. If you can arrange it I need two tickets to Westchester County Airport as fast as possible. Merveilleux. Merci." Rogue stayed silent as he gave the ticket agent his information, her fingers tapping against the table irritably.

"Mind lettin me in on what's goin' on?" she snapped as soon as the phone was back in it's cradle.

"Fastest way to cross da Atlantic is the Blackbird, non?"

"The Blackbird is already across the Atlantic, you idiot."

Gambit raised an eyebrow at her sudden outburst, an amused smile spreading across his face.

"Are you sayin' dat with all da X-Men's money dey only got one jet?"

"We do have the Aurora, but it's just the backup."

"So we go back to da mansion."

"Why we?"

"I can't in good conscience let you fly da Aurora over dat big ocean all by yourself now, can I? Besides, once you be at da mansion you can contact Muir. Dey might not even need you to make the trip, which would give us some time to spend in that big mansion all alone."

"Or I could just fly to Aberdeen now. Alone."

"How you plan to get on a plane widout I.D.? Or money? Your face is pretty, chere, but even dat can only get you so far. And your personality falls somewhere far from charming. You can be, what's the word I'm looking for? Difficult."

"Yeah, well get used to it. It's a three hour ride to Westchester. You'll get to see just how difficult I can be."

"Then I'll just have to be extra charming to make up for it," he said, his confident smile returning to his face.

"You're incorrigible," Rogue snapped.

"And you, Chere, are beautiful. What can I say? You have the prettiest scowl in the world," he told her, walking away. Despite herself, Rogue found a grin pulling at the corners of her lips. "Oh, and Rogue," he continued, stopping in the doorway, his back still facing her, "your smile is even prettier."


Peter woke up. The early morning sunlight streaming in from the wide windows filled every crack of the large room, feeling warm and comforting on his skin, forcing him awake from his dream. His eyes fought to adjust to the light, mind still hazy from sleep. He rolled over, turning his back to the sun, finding himself looking at the empty space next to him. For a moment a feeling of loss and regret washed over him, remembering the days when he would wake up and look next to him to find... someone...someone he couldn't quite remember. Then the feeling was forgotten.

He turned onto his stomach and buried his head in the pillow, trying to drown out the light, but the dull pounding in his ears made it impossible to get back to sleep. Peter got up and sat down on the bed- his bed- and put his head in his hands, trying to sort though the chaos in his brain. It was as though his mind had suddenly gone topsy-turvy, with conflicting memories and truth's battling for control. But in the quiet his world started to take form, make sense. That confusion or whatever it was must have been nothing more then some weird combination of too little sleep the night before and leftovers of that strange dream he had. It had been a nice dream though, at least most of it was. There had been a girl. That was all he really remembered.

Not feeling like going back to sleep, Peter wandered over to the bathroom, tripping over the laptop laying on the ground along the way.

He stood in front of the mirror in his boxers, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. From the corner of his eye he noticed a blur of movement behind him in the fog covered mirror. A pair of delicate hands wrapped around his waist and traveled up to his chest, their owner's warm bare body, still wet from the shower, nestling against the back of his so closely that he could feel every one of her curves.

Morning," she murmured, kissing him lightly on the arch of his back.

Peter took her hands in his and pulled her in front of him. Taking her by the waist he lifted her up onto the edge of the sink, bending down to kiss her tenderly, placing one hand to support her back, letting the other rest on the soft skin of her upper thigh.

"Morning, Katya."


Okay, there's the first bit of Romy! And if you liked it then you'll be happy to know there's more in the works, since those two will be taking up some of the next chapter as well. This is my first time writing an entire conversation between just Rogue and Remy, so please leave a review to help me know if I'm writing them correctly! I really don't want to mess them up. And big, big, colossal sized thanks to everyone who reviewed!

SperryDee- I felt bad about Illyana, but the poor girl had to die. But you never really know, she could show up again in some way, shape, or form. ;)

KagInuLuv- Sorry to have made you cry! I cried while I was writing it, just cause I really like that little girl so much. But it made for such good angst.

epona04- Thanks so much for the compliments! I glad you enjoyed it. I really like your user name, Celtic mythology always interested me. Anyway, here's the Romy. I know it seems a little short, but they'll have more meaningful conversations in the next few chapters.

KittieKat8- I don't know why I kept Cyclops alive when I hate him and killed off Illyana whose my third favorite character of all-time. I really would like to kill off Scott, but I just can't seem to fit it in the story anywhere that makes sense. Maybe at the end of the last chapter I'll throw in a little p.s. Scott died. His death was slow and painful. The X-Men threw a kegger in celebration. Yay!

B - Chapter 3 made me very sad. And the inspiration for Illyana's death came from the Limbo arc, but they weren't necessarily in Limbo... and the whole story hasn't really been told. ;)

DemonRogue13- Glad you liked it. I thought after having made everyone wait so long for romyness, it was only fair that I wrote what had been going on. :)

ishandahalf- Shiny things amuse me too! And colorful things. Last week I drove one of my friends to LAX and there was a blue plane and I got all excited. It reminded me of Big Bird from the Muppets movie when they dyed him blue. Sadly, no one else seemed to share my joy over colorful airplanes. And I had to mention the princess bride, because I love that movie and because when I was watching it on tv when I started writing the outline for this story, so it had a lot of influence on it. Oh, and I watched Passions the other day and I was so upset. Why does Fox not see he's supposed to be with Theresa? Whitney belongs with Chad, not him, unless of course they resurrect that old plot line where he might be her half brother, cause then it's just wrong. Oh well, at least Beth's mother's monkey has stopped having romantic daydreams about Luis. Wow, there's a weird sentence I never thought I'd write. Oh, and a quick clarification on the last chapter that should make you happier: Kitty thought that Rogue might want to be with Scott, Rogue herself never said it. Rogue will go into a little more detail over her relationship with Scott soon, probably in the next chapter, which can only lead to, you guessed it, more romy!

The Uncanny R-Man- I'm glad you like the story! And yeah, Illyana's dead. Wheter she's Gwen Stacey kind of dead of Jean Grey kind of dead remains to be seen. Poor girl, she was born into the unluckiest family. The Rasputins are like the Romanovs of comics. Which is kind of ironic.

Lucas'sgirl- Well Peter might not have to get all jealous over his girl, but Remy may end thinking he has a little competition. And Kitty might end up having to deal with some issues of her own soon....

RikaTabithaStarr- Here's your romy! Hope you liked it!

Thanks for reading! Hope you all enjoyed it!