CHAPTER 29
Dread

He hadn't slept. All night, Jester had lain on the stone, staring at the jagged cave's ceiling above with a growing sense of dread. His chest felt tight, suffocating amidst the crush of people crammed into the slave holding. One thought pounded behind his temples, persistent as a forge.

This was not part of the plan.

His sister, here, was not part of the plan. At the citadel, perhaps. Finding her there should have been manageable at the least. But not now. Not before. Not when he had to figure out how to keep her safe, and how to keep them both together. And how to fill Maurus in on the shifting tides without alerting the guards. The latter two filled him with dread.

Jester grimaced, but beneath the knotted emotions, there was a definite and strange sense of gratitude and calm. At least she's alive, a little voice within him seemed to say. That was something. The thought flickered, like a candle in the dark. But just as swiftly, something seemed to snuff it out. The feeling was hollow and heavy – a deep, quiet sort of panic that threatened to claw up from his gut into his chest – as he wondered the same about Godric. He wished he knew. All night, the rotating guards had maintained the enforced silence, preventing the questions that hung on the tip of his tongue. How had Maia gotten here? Where was Godric? What had happened?

Jester needed answers. Soon.

Beside him, Maia was curled up in her filthy cloak, fast asleep. There were dark rings hollowed around her eyes, and her nose was almost certainly broken. Altogether, she looked worse for wear than her brother had ever seen her over the past weeks, and Jester was half torn between wanting to go up to the bars of the slave pen to either scream for a healer or to demand for some sort of one-on-one combat with the brigand who had struck her. If only he were more like Gunther, he thought with the tug of a faint smile. Magnus' son might have wheedled something out of their captors. But the smile faded quickly. Gunther would have been smarter than this. He would have known what to do, what with all of his training. Jester closed his eyes, listening to the shallow breathing of the captives around him, wishing away the nearing dawn.

Had Maurus seen her on her way in to the encampment? Was he even still here? The raucous laughter of the slave traders' voices had long grown quiet. Every now and then throughout the evening, though, Jester had caught a whiff of brandy from the other side of the slave pen's gate, until the voices had trailed off into what was presumably the comfort of their sleeping rolls.

Lucky Maurus, Jester thought with a pang of envy. First the horse, then the food, and finally a warm bed. He had the easier lot, that much was sure.

But then Jester took a steadying breath in the early morning light, quelling the envy. This was his choice. There was nothing to complain about, miserable as the conditions were. He remembered his words the night before to the child Marley.

One way or another, he would find a way. For all of them. All he could do was hope.

Sooner than he wished, Jester heard the click of the key in the lock and the growing rustle in the camp. Metal and stone, leather and voices, the hiss of flames and the scent of reheated jerky warming over an open flame. Were those eggs he smelled? He closed his eyes against the unwelcome cacophony, as the enclosure gate rasped open with a clank. He could feel the shroud of fatigue, grey and haggard, that carved into his features in the weak morning light. The dread raced across his skin, and he felt as if his flesh were one with the stone of the cave. Like some weighted statue.

"Morning, my beauties," a man said gruffly. The guard, Jester presumed. His voice was hard, devoid of all sweetness and mirth. His head was shorn to the scalp, save for a ruddy goatee, and his black eyes glinted like frozen onyx. The leather scaled armour he wore was scarred and battered beneath an open tunic, and there was a wicked looking blade fastened at his hip. Jester felt small and frail before him. This was no ragged brigand, but some fallen warrior, he was sure. He carried himself with the grandeur of a knight, and there was a pin shaped into a sigil Jester could scarcely recognize that fastened the cloak at his shoulders. "Rise and shine. We march today. So you best be prepared to meet your new Master. Or your Maker. Your pick." He smiled, and Jester had the impression of mountainous snowcaps – both unforgiving and unfeeling. Crag-like, even.

With wordless resignation, like the last trickle of snow consigned to melting, the captives rose and assembled into a line. Clearly after weeks on the road for some of them, they knew what to do by rote. The rest simply mirrored their example. There was no fight left in them anymore. The proof could be found in the discoloured marks that patterned their flesh. Hastily, Jester donned his now thoroughly bloodstained tunic, and pulled his boots back on. They were still damp and near on frosty, and he shivered involuntarily.

"Jester," Maia urged quietly, dragging him by the arm to the very back of the line.

"What are they doing?" Jester murmured. He watched as each of the prisoners extended their wrists before them like some kind of upturned offering. Maia shook her head.

"I was only with them a day or two, but it's for transport. We'll be shackled together in a line so as they don't lose… cargo." The word rolled uneasily on her tongue. Maia's voice was hushed and quick. She touched her nose gingerly, and winced.

"That needs mending," Jester said. Maia snorted, which only made her cringe even more.

"There's nothing I can do without my supplies," she said with a sniff. "Hurts like the devil. But, I earned this fair and square. Thank God."

Jester arched a brow quizzically.

"Earned it? You mean, on purpose? Have you gone soft in the head, sister?" he asked.

Maia shrugged, a proud smile toying at the corner of her mouth. But it froze and faded just as quickly as it appeared. With a wary expression, she eyed the man who had begun to bind the wrists of the prisoners at the front of the line. His handiwork was quick and efficient. Meticulous, even. It was clear he had done this before.

Maia made a face.

"Truth is, brother, I didn't much like the look of that one," she said coolly, jutting her chin towards the red-bearded man. "And I reckon it's better in these situations to make oneself as… uh… unappealing as possible. No man brings a troublesome girl into his bed." Her brow furrowed and she shook her head. "Unless you're unlucky, that is. But in that case, not even warts and two heads will help a girl. Or a lad."

Jester stared at her with a sick feeling roiling in his gut.

"Maia, what happened?" Jester asked. The guard was moving further down the line. "How did you end up here?"

The blonde girl seemed to grow distant.

"It's my fault," she said softly. "I was… arrogant. I thought my gift would save me. Foolish, of course. But it did, at first, or so I thought. I… well, I just didn't see clearly. I didn't expect Cliff's men to intersect with Godric's path." She smiled, a weak, sad smile. "Apparently, I don't know everything. A great shocker, I know. And… and then it was too late. They took him. Cliff's men took Godric of all people. They just bound him and carted him away, Jester. It was horrible. It was like a watching a beast walk into a snare, or like a dream where you scream and no sound comes out."

It was then that Jester could see the cracks forming in his sister's façade. She laughed, a sound that was both sweet and acrid, as if to push away the lump at her throat. But her eyes were rimmed with a telling red that ran deeper than mere sleeplessness.

"Maia," Jester breathed. "I'm sorry."

She shook her matted head.

"It isn't your doing, Jester. It was my choice, and my fault. I followed after him a day or so. I kept… seeing him. Godric. So clearly, I thought, it was as if he was before me. But I mustn't have been seeing anything clearly at all. Not truly. Just… wishing. Because I didn't see them when they closed in on me," she indicated towards the guard. "And now here we are."

Jester laid a hand on her small shoulder, squeezing gently.

"We'll find him. We've a plan."

"We?" Maia asked.

"Maurus and I. He's to take me to this King Baltor himself. A personal tribute. I am the great gift of peace from Kippernia."

"Maurus?" His sister repeated slowly. Confusion colored her voice. "So he is here, then. I thought I saw him, but I didn't trust my own eyes." She made a face, and Jester found himself uncertain as to whether she was referring to her eyes or her gift. "You trust him?"

The boy shook his head.

"Not in the slightest, but our dear cousin will do what he must."

"Well, count me in to help how I can, then. The sooner we find Godric, the better." Her gaze grew distant. "What of Jane?" she asked.

The knot in Jester's stomach seemed to tighten.

"I left her resting. Safe. I… I left her a note," he added, feeling a half a fool. Maia hit him in the arm. Hard. "And a map," he added weakly.

"For all that's true and holy, you left her a note and some barmy scribbles?" Maia hissed. "After all she went through?" Her blues eyes looked horrified. "While I appreciate the gallantry of coming after my love and I, brother, your lady's been through a trauma. You could have at least told her in person where you were going."

Heat colored Jester's cheeks.

"I… I tried. She wasn't ready. To speak, that is. And I couldn't risk the others knowing. But… well, she's strong," he said simply. "She'll know what to do."

"I bally well hope so," Maia said, her brows drawn. "I heard them whispering the other night. This tyrant king… he's no laughing force, Jester. They say he has an army gathered 100,000 strong, near on ready to fall out on the march. Danes as well as taken men. This Baltor imagines himself a great conqueror. It's either bend the knee or death."

Something cold coiled in Jester's chest.

"How many of those men are there of their own volition?" he muttered. Vaguely his mind's eye flashed to their own family, presumably held by this madman's decrees. Would the brothers he never knew stand in those military ranks? He shuddered in horror, imagining such a horde descending on Kippernia's walls.

God forbid.

"When it's life on the line, especially your loved ones, you'll do near on anything of your own volition," Maia replied. "Jester, I just—"

But Jester didn't get to hear what she thought. The rough hands of the bearded guard interrupted them, the transport bindings held firmly in their grasp.

"No talking," he barked. "Present yourself." With thinly veiled hatred, Maia held her wrists out. The man looped the rope around them, pulling the cords taut in a complex knot. Then, with one finger, he lifted her chin. "Stubborn thing, aren't you?" He eyed her broken nose, turning her face to the side. "Pretty enough beneath this grime I imagine, even so, but stubborn. We'll remedy that in time, no doubt. There is no room in the empire for insubordination among his Grace's subjects."

Maia spat a thick glob in his face.

For a moment, the slave pen seemed to grow still. The child Marley's eyes grew wide with an unspoken fire a few rungs up the transport, and there were a few curious looks from the praying man and the young brothers, all bound up ahead. But then the guard merely wiped his face with a gloved hand.

And promptly dropped the glove at their feet.

"Careful girl. You don't want to be making enemies so soon, do you? You never know when you could… need a friend." He stared her down, head to toe, his eyes lingering in places. It was enough to make Jester's blood seethe. "I imagine you'll be looking to make amends." It wasn't a question, and sparks seemed to fly like the crash of crossed blades meeting between the blue and onyx eyes. "Fetch my glove, girl."

Maia scowled. A beat seemed to pass, but begrudgingly she knelt to grab the gauntlet.

"Good," the man said. "Now, while you're there, kiss my boot, girl." Each word was slow. Intentional. It rankled of a callous kind of glee. Maia's face contorted, as if in an unspoken retort, but before she could say a thing, suddenly the man had her in an iron grip by the hair at the back of her head. "I said: kiss. My. Boot," he growled.

"Let her go!" Jester heard the words escaping his lips before he could catch them, horrified by the sight.

The guard merely laughed.

"A hero emerges! Does he think he'll make it easier for you, girl? Let's make sure he sees you submit to the authority of King Baltor's Fist."

With furious, helpless eyes, he pushed her low. Maia struggled, but at last bent down to kiss the dust from the man's boot. Anger welled in her eyes. And then, satisfied, it was done. The man roughly hauled her to her feet.

"That's better." He pushed her back in line. "Now, as for you," the man turned to Jester. "Present yourse— oh. It's you. The special case." He said the words scathingly, as if he were anything but surprised. "Nobility is admired in his Grace's courts, my boy. Oh, yes. But interference?" There was an explosion of light and pain across Jester's vision, followed by a quaking echo in his skull, as the guard slapped him full across the face. "Interference will be crushed." Then the man snapped, summoning an attendant, and fresh bindings were tied at Jester's wrists.

"You may take him to the gypsy," the guard spat the words with an imperious tone. "Maurus is to bring him to his Grace. Personally."

With wide eyes, Jester scrambled to glance behind him.

"Maia!" he called.

"Don't worry about me, Jester. I know how to get myself into trouble," she replied. There was a flat look to her gaze, and the words set a sinking feeling in Jester's gut.

If anything, that much was true.

Author's Note:

Five chapters in one day. *Brushes sweat from brow and peels my-still-PJ-clad self off of my computer chair* My penance for the long absence is real and heartfelt. I've missed you all and hope you enjoy the rest of the ride!