The square that the Battle of Roses took place in was the last square of disputed territory, meaning that in the next block, they would be in the Red Queendom (though Lily would have to travel one more space to achieve promotion).
The squares of Chess were not actually identical in size. Unless Time was insistent on playing the same trick, the squares bordering the Red and White Queendoms always took longer to travel across than any other blocks, and were thus assumed to be larger. That was why pawns often chose to travel two squares as their first move rather than one; the first square after leaving was a tedious travel. In some regions of the border, the queendoms invested in railway systems to help the pawns move those two forward spaces, and allow them to skip the dizzying affair that Lily and Tweedledum had gone through when they first left the rural Betou.
Hiking through the border square of the Red Queendom this time, Jest could also blame the never-ending drag of their current square on his fatigue from walking, rowing, running, and fighting all night and day. It didn't help that he had poor sleep and little to eat.
Walking just a little behind and letting Lily, for once, lead the way, Jest could feel his shoulder throb. His white uniform had already been stained with the blood of his wound, and the bandage his sister had secured on him was preventing any more blood from leaking, but a pang of pain would still shoot through his shoulder whenever he tried to move it. He was certain it was swollen. And along with the millions of tiny scratches that the roses had given him, the rest of him hurt as well.
His head throbbed too. It was getting tiring fighting off discombobulation, likely achieved from concussion.
And his heart throbbed.
Its beats were quiet inside him. He was certain minutes passed between them. Yet, with every infrequent whisper his heart made, his heart felt like it was dropping like a heavy stone.
He kept letting people down, after all.
He had failed to protect his sister. Lily seemed more distant without his sister's presence too. She didn't say it, but Jest sensed she recognized the betrayal that lay in his failure.
He hoped so much that his sister would be okay. He comforted himself with the thought that if she couldn't be saved, she'd at most be enslaved.
Which was a terrible thing. But not death.
Though perhaps for Jacquie, it would feel like torture.
It was torture for him, too.
His Jacqueline had already been as free as a kite stuck in a tree— now, she would be a kite tugged to the ground, shredded and torn.
He did that to her.
She had felt an obligation to protect a mother's child, and he exploited that. He exploited her worry and care.
He might have felt it was unfair that she resented him.
But Chess knew he hated himself.
His hands clenched, his gloves being the only prevention from crescent-shaped punctures. He hated himself so much.
He was so selfish.
His selfishness hurt her.
And yet, if he had listened to her and had been a little more selfish, selfish all along, he could have saved her from this journey in the first place.
But there was a contradiction in acting for himself, as he had so often been instructed to do, and it enraged him knowing that just as easily as he could be pinned for fault, he could be excused. Being filled with such harrowing venom, he could not help but spit the questions that invaded his mind.
Did simple love allow simple people to be selfish? Did it allow their every action to be made without consideration for broader consequence?
That heaviness, a burdened pressure on his chest and shoulders reminded him why he resisted domestic selfishness in the first place.
He was Jest– he was extraordinary.
He did not deserve the ordinary.
There were greater things in store for him.
A greater purpose.
A more imminent duty.
If he was clever, he would tell the people he left behind that he was leaving them, leaving to fulfill his greater purpose, because he loved them. It was for their sake that he saved the world and broke their hearts.
But seeing the consequences of beloved neglect… if his heart hadn't been tucked away, it surely would have fractured too.
It was all his fault.
He did so much. Yet never enough. And never what he should have actually done.
It was getting windier as the sky grew darker, brooding and gray, and the leaves of the trees nearest to him pelted like red raindrops. It was getting colder these days– it was autumn, nearing winter. And it did snow in the winter, but between the seasons, it always rained the coldest rain. Even as the world itself cast itself in intense, ambient reds, the vibrancy of the redwood trees that caged them was as comforting as a pet icicle. Red was so cold.
Seeing Lily shivering, Jest asked if she packed another coat, besides the one she wore. She said she had something of the sort. Borrowing his hat, she retrieved a blue cape from it, and snapped it with a pendant at her collarbone. Her cape was moderately long, only reaching her knees, but had a tall, pointy collar which could block the winds from her face. She asked him if he was cold. Jest said he was, but that he preferred to stay dressed as he was.
Lily nodded once at this, but Jest could tell she was still intrigued by the rugged state of his clothes. His dusty pants and bloodied shirt. The orange threads that zipped together the once torn sleeve at his shoulder. The red heart that replaced the black one he was more fond of on his cheek.
He took the time to brush his hair as he walked; from his hat he retrieved a comb, and he used its bristles to dislodge the leaves and dirt that the wind had trapped in his curls. Afterwards, he was confident that his hair was not as greasy and disheveled as it had looked before. He was a gentleman, and he did have his pride.
Jest glanced at Lily ahead of him. Lily hadn't said much of a peep, her face locked in an expression that, if she had been thinking of Jest, would have made him quite worried for the certainty of his future.
Her brow was hard. Her eyes were focused, but distant. Her lips were pressed tight, her jaw harsh and clenched. But all still watered down, of course. None of her expressions were very strong, and a passerby might have simply thought she was in deep thought.
Jest thought it looked like she wanted to kill someone.
And not in an unprepared, messy way, too.
Jest respected the distance Lily kept from him, until he found to continue doing so impossible. She was walking so slow after all.
He fell into step —slow step— beside her.
"Is everything alright?"
She halted to a stop, angling her head to him. Her eyes scanned the sky. "I don't believe so. Sir Raven said that Prince Carmine left the White Queendom this morning, and I wonder why."
Jest hesitated. The woods felt so quiet, now that it was just him and her. "It took us a full night and day to get this far."
Lily too spoke hushed. "That is because we had to rest, and were constantly interrupted. At this moment, nothing stands in Carmine's way to us. Sir Raven has gone after the Red Queen. Tweedledee has left to find his brother and your sister. Sir Arthur is busy protecting the border. And the Aged Man is…" her nose wrinkled, "unreliable."
"But we concluded that the Red Queen isn't particular about who… kills you. She has other pawns, rooks." Jest found himself becoming uneasy too. "It is possible that Prince Carmine could have left for other reasons."
Jest knew he was wrong. Lily too shook her head, unconvinced.
"Not having to sleep would give him ample more time to catch up with us, just as it did for Raven and Tweedledee. Not to mention that Prince Carmine could cut across the land diagonally." Lily paused. "Though Raven and Tweedledee did make it to us before him, despite leaving after he left."
Then considering the Red Bishop's location on the map of Chess when Jest first encountered him…
Jest stood straighter, recognizing that over the course of the day, he had been slouching.
"The Red Bishop would not be able to make contact with this square. His diagonal movements do not align with it."
"Really?" Lily twiddled with her gloves. "But we still have two squares forward left to travel."
"yes, but" —Jest brightened— "the Forgetful Forest is in this region too. From what I've seen documented, it often lingers in between this row of squares and the next. Carmine would have to risk crossing through it to reach us."
Lily considered this. " Good. I hope he becomes caught, if he indeed intends to go after us."
"Yes, it would be useful if he forgot who you are," Jest agreed, as they resumed their pace. He stayed by her side though.
As they walked, wine colored leaves crunched under their boots, birds tweet-a-dee-dee-dee-ed in unseen places, and trees creaked as a breeze rippled through their uppermost branches. A minute or two passed this way— and perhaps Jest could have focused on these noises if he hadn't found himself focusing on the tense silence that passed when neither of them were speaking. The silence made him restless.
So he broke it.
"Your highness, I have a question for you. It is of the more personal nature, however."
Lily nodded solemnly. "I was expecting this. But," she looked at his hat, "no. I don't think I could manage it. You'd have to do it instead."
Jest quirked a brow. "Do what, your highness?"
She answered calmly. Coolly. Deadly. "Kill him."
Both his brows shot up. "Kill him! Kill Carmine?"
Her arms twitched to fold across her chest. "Yes. I… don't feel right about it, no matter what his intentions for me are," Lily said. "I'd like to keep my sword tucked away for the rest of this journey, if possible."
They had stuck the Vorpal Sword and Lily's old sword in Jest's hat for safekeeping. The hat felt much heavier on Jest's head with the Vorpal Sword in it.
"Oh… then I…" Jest looked away, a cough clogging his throat. He couldn't help his chin's wrinkle. "I could do that for you. If the situation calls."
"Of course, only if the situation calls," she agreed. Noting his soured expression, she bit her cheek. Her shoulders were rigid as she asked, "Was that not what you wanted to know?"
Jest dipped into a light bow, never breaking his stride. "Unfortunately, whether you were willing to kill your ex-lover had never crossed my mind."
Lily flushed. With such a faint pinkness, however, it was difficult to tell whether it was from anger or embarrassment.
"Fine. I know I've kept a lot to myself, but understand that, for a majority of my life, to myself was all there was to keep something to. What do you want to know, anyway?"
With earnest Jest began, but right away found himself trailing. "Well…"
He had a lot of questions for her. From what she said, there were probably very few who knew her well enough to know the answers.
He himself hardly knew her at all, which made an opportunity like this extremely valuable.
He was courting her, after all.
Even though in his mind, though he would not say it, the nature of the courtship had changed.