Disclaimer: This isn't mine. Ok, and I'd like to note that I changed the name, because I didn't really like it and then someone reviewed and said she didn't like it either (and I bet you people like then new one even less, but I'm not good with these kinds of things. Actually, I'm exceptionally bad at titles. I apologize for anyone out there who just read the title and rolled their eyes. Myself included And if anyone out there wants to flame me just for that, well, go ahead. I agree with you. Suggestions are welcome if anyone's got a better idea.). Ok, enough rambling, on with the story!
Kai woke early the next morning, as she had every morning for as long as she could remember. Unlike her room in the city, though, this one was quiet, without the noises of shouting in the marketplace or horses pulling carts beneath the second story window, and in the stillness of predawn, she could hear the muffled sounds of the household staff scurrying around in the secret passageways that were said to be behind the walls.
Resisting the urge to put her ear to the wall and listen for people behind them, she got up and did her routine stretches. By the time she was done, she had bumped almost every wall in the tiny room, had bruises on both her arms and her legs, and had had to skip several of the stretches for lack of room. Finally she left the sanctuary of her new room, wondering what she would find outside the door, and if the previous day had been simply a dream.
Silently slipping out the door, she was surprised to find Faleron standing idly about, constantly glancing at the door, and appearing to be waiting for something. He looked up with a quickly masked expression of relief as she walked out.
"You're up early," he commented, offering her an apple from a bowl on the table. "Eat something," he ordered, thrusting the fruit into her hands anyway.
"It's only dawn and I'm not hungry," she protested, putting the apple back on the table. "I've been up for an hour."
"Rearranging furniture or building new stuff?" he asked sarcastically.
"Oh, I didn't know it was that loud," she said, feeling her face heat up. "I was stretching."
"You weren't that loud, the walls are just thin." He briefly looked puzzled, before, he seemed to remember something. "Oh, right, I keep forgetting what you do for a living," he said with a grin. "Why didn't you just come out here?"
"I didn't know if you were awake. And it's not much bigger in here," she replied with a glance around the cramped room. "I didn't want to get impaled in the process."
He followed her gaze to the cluttered weapon rack, shrugging. "So you want to do that every morning? You'll be too bruised to do anything eventually, and I'll be reported to the Lord Provost for mishandling my staff." He grinned at her expression.
"So you're suggesting that I do it in the halls?" she asked with a hint of sarcasm, annoyed at his comment. "It's kind of narrow out there too."
"No, the maids do dislike residents doing activities like that out there," he said with an experienced tone. She found herself fighting a smile, surprising her. When had they become able to joke with one another? They had been strangers at this time yesterday. She snapped back to what he was saying. "…Should go to the practice courts. No one will be down there this early."
"Don't people go down there to fight?" she asked with a shudder at the stories that she had heard.
"No…well, yes, but mostly it's for practice," he assured her, but she was not so assured when her ears picked up on the 'mostly'. At her expression, he told her, "I'd go with you but I have classes in an hour and before that I have to go to breakfast, where I am routinely forced to eat disgusting green things," he said, and she hoped he was joking, or else she might have to eat in here. "I'll be back around noon, I think. Then I'll have to leave again until later tonight, but normally there's a group of us who study together, so you pretty much have the day to yourself. Oh, but the staff around here will expect to see a slight improvement in my room, so if you could clean a little before they come an hour after noon, it would help," he added.
"All right," she agreed reluctantly, wondering how she'd get around the huge palace with a guide, but she was sure that she'd find someone to point her in the right direction.
"And if you want to go to the practice courts, you have to eat or else you'll faint down there and I'll have the entire court after my blood." He gave her the apple again, and this time, now wary of the servants' mess, she took it.
Only a few minutes later, she had been directed to the practice courts by at least four different maids, all of whom seemed certain, but then Kai would get to the place where she was supposed to turn right and find a blank wall, or a locked door, or something similar.
Stopping, frustrated at yet another wrong turn, she thought back to the directions that she had been given. She had followed them correctly, so why was she still coming up at dead ends?
"Lost?" a familiar voice asked from behind her. She whirled to find the tall Bazhar that had been talking to Faleron the other day standing there, smiling as if he had just heard a particularly funny joke.
"No," she said, trying to sound certain. Something told her that this would not be a good person to show a weakness to, or to rely on for directions.
"So, where are you going?" he asked smoothly. She stepped to the side, intending to slip around him to the empty hallway beyond.
"None of your business," she replied, annoyed as he stepped in front of her.
"I'm your superior," he snapped. "Hold you tongue." He slid closer, and Kai instinctively brought her leg up, kicking him in the face. Attempting to spin away, she felt his arm slide sickeningly around her waist. "Don't," he warned her. Now who did he remind her of? She wondered. Then she instantly felt herself slip into the past, when someone else was holding her captive and told her not to move.
"You're his friend aren't you?" she asked. "Joren's?"
"Of course I am," he replied. She heard the hiss of metal being taken out of a sheath. "And I'm not going to let some little twit of a commoner chase him away like a coward. That would ruin all our plans. You and the others will never tell anyone what you heard, trust me."
She struggled to free herself, but his grip was too strong. She got her elbow free and slammed it into his face, feeling his hold loosen. Taking the opportunity to free herself, she spun away, racing down the hall.
She didn't know where she was anymore, didn't care. Running past shocked maids, who all stood petrified in the doorways, she finally found a familiar hall. She thanked the gods that her pursuer was a slow runner and that she had often participated in the recreational races through the streets in the autumn.
Out of the corner of her eyes, Kai saw yet another door open, but the maid in this one didn't freeze as the rest of them had. She darted into the corridor, flinging a blanket over the tall squire as he passed the door.
"Kai!" she heard from behind her. Turning, she saw her savior, Lalasa, giving her a concerned look. "How did this happen?" she asked, pulling Kai into her room.
Kai explained it as quickly as possible, but leaving nothing out. "Please don't tell anyone," she begged at the end.
"Of course I have to tell someone. Kel and Faleron should know, and his," she indicated the sound of shouting in the hall," knight master, though I doubt that the duke of Kingsport will care," she added dryly.
"Why do they all have to know?" Kai demanded.
"Well, Kel still does feel responsible that you're stuck here in the first place, and Faleron actually is responsible for you, and they've all been looking for an excuse to gang up on him anyway."
"Why?"
"Him and two others were always causing trouble during the page's years. They haven't been friendly ever since. Where were you going? I think breakfast is over by now."
"The practice courts. I wanted to see if I could get there before everyone else does, but I don't think that'll happen now. I kept getting bad directions, too."
"Who was giving you directions?" Lalasa asked with a slight edge to her voice.
"I can't remember. I just asked some maids who happened to be passing in the hall."
"They just 'happened' to be there?" Lalasa repeated suspiciously. "Gods, they may actually have a plan. Or spies in the staff. Or both. This can't be good."
Kai was blaming herself, that she had led her attacker this way; otherwise, Lalasa wouldn't know about this, there wouldn't be what sounded like a war between the staff, and no one would think that she actually was in danger. Now I'll never get back to the streets, she couldn't help thinking.
A bell somewhere, not he usual ones from the temples in the city, tolled the hour, two past dawn. It's that early and already too much has happened, she thought. "Did you ever get to eat anything this morning?"
"I was forced into eating an apple," she said wryly. Lalasa smiled at something that Kai apparently had missed, since her comment was far from that amusing.
"Well, then, you won't mind if I force you into eating something else, would you?" the taller girl asked, pushing a handful of rolls at her. Kai took one and shoved it into her mouth, but only because she had an odd feeling that she wouldn't be allowed to leave if she didn't eat something. "Do you have any plans for the day then?"
"Not really," Kai admitted after a long period of difficult chewing. "Faleron gave me almost the whole day off. I have to go back and do a little cleaning before noon though."
"For the palace maids?" Lalasa asked with another smile. "They do hate cleaning up when they don't have to. They're underpaid," she explained. "Why don't you go clean, and I'll meet you at your room in two hours? I have some chores to do too."
Kai agreed, and, after having Lalasa repeat the directions to her room, which were only a few halls down, she set off. And to her surprise, found herself where she had started this morning! Exalted, she opened the door, grinning at the thought of what her friends would say if they actually saw her cleaning; she was an infamous packrat with no organizational skills whatsoever.
As the bell tolled four hours past dawn, she sat up from where she had scrubbed the floor, after having a great difficulty clearing it, and carefully skirted past her carefully arranged piles that towered over the bed and the already-cleaned parts of the floor. She'd have to come back before Faleron, because she could imagine his expression if he saw all his precious weapons in the floor, however painstakingly stacked.
There was a knock at the door, and she opened it, expecting to see Lalasa, but instead she was surprised to see a group of familiar faces, grinning at her from stage maids' outfits.
"Kai, we're here to save you!" announced Hedi.
A/N: I'm sorry; I had to end it there! It begged to be a cliffhanger. And the last chapter wasn't one, right?
Thanks so much to my three reviewers! Ha! Who would have thought? And someone out there actually liked my not-so-cliffhanger-like cliffhanger in chapter one! (Did that make sense?) Are there people out there who really enjoy cliffhangers? I am shocked. And I'd just like to point out before you all go asking me if I think Joren's gay, when Zhahir (is that how you spell it?) said plans, he meant evil ones (not to run away together or anything). Ok, now that I've wasted all the time I possibly can, (there's twenty minutes you'll never get back) tell me if you like the new name or hate the entire thing or you were bored to death (I enjoy death as much a the next person, I guess) or if everyone was OOC and you'd prefer it if the entire world came crashing down around the characters' ears (for all the pessimists out there), REVIEW!