Alrighty, in this Chapter, Alanna makes up with Jon over their little spat, and goes down to the city to visit George. Still asking (not begging) for plot and/or character suggestions beyond "A/J forever!"
Thanks to~
Tenken no Miko- Thank you so such for the poem that will be used next chapter. A few things were altered but it could never have been done without you.
Cytosine- My, we have turned into a babbler haven't we? Still unsure about romantic content, I now slap people instead of kick shins, and I have something incredibly exciting and important to tell you but I'm not allowed to.
Queen's Own-Wind to thy wings too!
Bloodless- keep your heart, without it you can't live and write me more reviews!
To all others; Thank you thank you thank you thank you. Any suggestions on anything you want to see beyond a vague concept would be helpful!
Chapter the Seventh
Taking a deep breath, Alanna stepped inside the room and closed the now-compliant door behind her. Jon's back was to her as he reviewed and remarked on the plethora of papers spread across his mahogany desk. Now was the pivotal moment, the time that she would have to make the most crucial choice in this, their first big fight. She had the easy option of walking right back through the door, (Providing, of course, that it would open) and pretending she'd never even come back. She could ignore him and quietly go into her own room, leaving before he woke the next morning. Or, she could take the hero's choice, the choice of the foolishly brave. She could attract the prince's attention upon herself, risking his temper to try and restore their fr-"
"I do know that you're standing there." Jonathon said, not even pausing in his scribbles as he interrupted her redundant and pointless train of thought. "and unless you intend to put down roots and grow there, I suggest you take a seat so we can talk.
"Besides," he added, putting down his pen and spinning the chair around "you'd not only block the door, you'd ruin the carpet, starting an international incident because that carpet," he cocked a finger at the rug in question, "was a gift from the Tuisane ambassador to show that he took no offense at your beating his champion."
Alanna hesitantly smiled back to his tentative grin. Joking was good, joking was very good. Joking meant less yelling and a very much decreased chance of flying projectiles.
She opened her mouth to tell Jon how sorry she was, when she was cut off.
"I just wanted to apologize Alanna. I don't know what made me react like that."
"Love, or lust," Alanna interrupted. "It doesn't really matter which. But you know that I would never use people like that. Especially not someone you cared about like Delia." Not to mention I think that she's a power-hungry manipulative whore.
"So we're still friends? Because I swore that night at Persopolis that we would always be friends."
"Yes, we're friends." A brief pause followed Jonathon's affirmation. "Do we hug?"
Laughing and shaking her head, Alanna stepped forward into her friends open arms for a friendly embrace. A very long friendly embrace Alanna realized as she lifted her head away from the sound of Jon's heartbeat.
"Um, Jonathon, I'm glad we're friends and all, but I'd like to stay friends with my stomach too, and it really wants some food right now."
"Oh, sorry." Jon's hold abruptly slackened and he stepped back a pace. "I'd join you, but there's another banquet tonight. A celebration for the new Baron of Mindelan's son's engagement to the one daughter of old Lord Gaylin."
"Well, at least you get better food.' She headed towards the door but turned back after. "You promise that we'll always be friends?"
"Ever and always," Jon smiled.
"Good, 'cause if you didn't, and I died, I swear that I'd come back as a squirrel and run up your pants on your coronation day." With these words she smiled sweetly and then slipped out the door.
~*~*~
Alanna jogged down the last part of the hill, stubbornly refusing to look at the grove of trees where Palace Way changed to Temple Way. As far as she was concerned, all that had happened that night was a letter from Thom, collecting the presents for Jonathon's birthday, and nothing else. Even so, she took a few deep breaths and flared at her suddenly wobbly knees as she neared the familiarly-shabby door of the Dancing Dove. Hearing the noise from within, she didn't bother to knock, and just cracked to door open against the crush of noise and people, and slipped inside.
To be greeted by a cold, if not exceptionally sharp, blade at her windpipe. "What's one of your kind doing down here at night boy," whispered a hoarse voice near her ear. "Come to laugh at the common people and their fun?" His breath (she was fairly sure it was a him) was slightly sour with beer, and the raspiness seemed mostly artificial, a cover for the youth Alanna suspected.
I really should have changed she thought ruefully a silk shirt and riding leathers in the prince's colors does stand out a bit around here. Even as she thought, she leaned into the boy's arm, away from the knife, knocking him off balance. As he stumbled, she hooked her foot around his and yanked, knocking him flat to the floor. Before he could move, she let herself fall after him, right knee falling roughly into his chest, the other on his wrist as her hand grabbed the fallen knife to hold its point against his throat.
Or at least that was what she had intended. Even as she landed on top of him, his hips twisted and his legs swung up and around with near-unnatural flexibility, knocking her to the side, his legs pinning her down at the waist.
Well two can play that game. She half sat up, right fist flying to his jaw as her other hand grappled for the knife. His legs slid sideways as his head snapped back and Alanna rushed to a standing position just in time to meet a solid kick to her abdomen. Her hand gripped his fist tighter, the blade cutting the webbing between thumb and forefinger as she fought gravity's hold.
"Now what is this?" George's light voice cut through to Alanna's senses. Glancing up, she saw that the other patrons of the Dove had drawn back, watching her and the strange man-boy fight with lively curiosity. "One of my subjects fighting with one of my friends?"
"Sire!" the boy burst out with an appalled glance at Alanna, "you cannot be-"
"Silence, Dago," George called over him, the "regal" authority evident in his voice. "and stable mucking duty for the week for not being able to hold a hostage in the first place."
The boy's jaw shut with an audible snap, and with one last glare at Alanna, he turned sideways and shoved his way through the crowd in the direction that Alanna knew contained the stables. As the crowd around them dispersed without entertainment, she followed George up the ladder to his private rooms.
"He was certainly," she paused, "enthused."
George let out a bark of laughter. "That one? Well I guess that's one way to put it. I'd go with 'chip-on-his-shoulder-the-size-of-a-horse' myself." He paused for a moment to unlock and open his door before waving her in before him.
Glancing around the room, Alanna's lips quirked. Brilliantly scarlet throw pillows ornamented one of the couches and a painting of a group of ridiculously clad women in a field of flowers that Alanna thought she recognized from one of the Lord Provost's reports adorned the wall behind it. Opening her mouth, she turned to George.
"Yeh don't want to know." He said with a grin to her unspoken question as he swiped a roll of gauze off a side table.
"What makes you think you knew what I was going to say?" she challenged, more amused that affronted, and slightly curious about what exactly his Sight showed him.
"I don't need the Sight to know that, lass." At her open-mouthed surprise, he laughed and waved her into a seat on the couch before sitting next to her and preceding to wrap up her bleeding hand. "Or that. You came in, you stared at my pretty, new things, that turned around with that silly 'noble and honorable' look of yours." Her mouth worked as she tried to decide between being amused and offended. "Besides," he continued, grinning at her dilemma, "you always ask that."
Laughing, she chucked one of the crimson pillows at his head, surreptiously scooting a bit farther down the couch. "Oh, you must know me so well then. What am I going to say next?" She waited, watching an expression she stubbornly refused to identify flit across his face.
He grabbed her hand back, and frowned, brows pulling together as he stroked his chin in a mockery of profound thought. "I think that you are...going to tell me about... the ride with Gary and Raoul."
Her jaw sagged. "That is one hell of a network," Alanna muttered. "Remind me never to think I can hide from you."
"And then," he continued, ignoring her mumbling. "You were going to tell me about how you and Jon finally made up from that little spat." Another expression flickered across his features, one Alanna was to distracted to analyze.
"How in Mithros' name do you know that? That was barely an hour ago and I came straight here! How the bleeding he-" She stopped, staring at his laughing eyes as understanding dawned in her own. "Stephen has messenger birds." She chorused along with him.
After their chuckles had died down, Alanna sat straighter, again moving a bit to the side, as it seemed the distance between them had shrunk. She jerked as the bandaging now wound around her hand hit a sensitive, ticklish spot. He glanced up at her through lowered lids.
"Sorry, I'm almost done." And a minute later, "there, better?"
She gently disengaged her hand, turning it around in front of her. "Good as new. Or at least it will be in a few days. Now, I don't suppose your knowledge of other countries is as complete of that of the palace?" she hinted delicately.
Sobering, he leaned his head back. "No lass, I'm sorry but that'll take two weeks more at the very least. But my people'll keep lookin', I promise."
"Damn it! I just know they're up to something. The dreams..." her voice trailed off, face a mask of uncertainty and guilt.
"Dreams?" his head hadn't moved, but one eye was open and staring at her. "What kind of dreams are we talkin'?"
She started, glancing around the room like a frightened deer. "I don't want to talk about it." Seeing him open his mouth again she cut him off with a wave of her hand. "I don't think I can talk about it."
George closed his mouth and nodded, remembering what his mother had told him three years ago, after he had Alanna to her in her moments of panic. Continued nodding as he thought about the similar burden that lay in his own chest.
"Alright then lass," he said, cutting his eyes sideways to her. "Are there any other dreams you'd like to tell me about? Any in which I might feature a leading role?"
"There might have been a cameo," she answered, the stuck out her tongue at his raised eyebrows. "What's the story on that guy who attacked me downstairs. Dago, I think."
George let out an exasperated sigh of amusement and exasperation and Alanna wasn't sure which was for her and which for Dago.
"Dago stumbled into the city about three weeks ago and decided to try his hand at being a bullyboy." A snort from Alanna interrupted the story but was quickly shushed. "Well, obviously I can't have that, it would lead to anarchy in the streets! So I sent a few of my own boys down to... take care of him." He sent a quick glance to Alanna's face but saw no overt reaction. "That should have taken care of it but a few hours later there were Malek, Smokar, and that slip of a boy at my door. He'd not only convinced them not to kill him, but to take him to me as well!" Best damn smooth-talker I've ever seen, and my new protégé. He's a half-decent fighter too, though he seems more comfortable with a sword than knives."
"But you know nothing of him, or where he came from?" Alanna queried. "Only nobles and guardsmen are taught to use a sword."
"He's got the accent of the lakelands to the east, and from the opinion he seems to have of nobles, it would be damned odd if he was one."
"True, do you know what set him that way? Assuming that this evening's excitement wasn't something against me personal."
"So far, one of the many things he won't talk about. But we'll be working on him. Why?"
She shook her head slightly. "I don't know, something just doesn't feel right."
"Well, if you find out, tell me. In the meantime," he stood, reaching out a hand to pull her to her feet. "You need to get back to the palace and sleep lest you're so tired tomorrow you think the riding master is your horse again."
"How did you..." She asked, trying to turn around as she was propelled to the door.
"Stephen has messenger birds.
And that is it for today folks! Next chapter was supposed to be the title focused but because of a hand that won't listen to me and a chapter that was looking to be twenty pages long before completion, the next one will have the famous poem of Jon's.