Cloak and Dagger

With wide eyes, Jacqueline tried to seek out Josephine's gaze. The point of pressure on her back increased with her hesitation. She sucked in a breath and gave a single nod of acknowledgment to the threat, then allowed herself to be shuffled out of the crowd. Josephine would have to notice her leaving with some stranger, she was sure of it. Once they were clear, her abductor moved in close behind her, drawing her nearer so that it might look as if she were merely being escorted away.

Jacqueline grit her teeth as she was led away, her fists clenched defiantly. How could they have been caught so quickly, and by whom? She didn't dare look back in case that caused her abductor to become more aggressive. It was best, she hoped, to comply for the moment. When they turned the corner and started down a street in the opposite direction of the guard post and jail, she felt her heart fall into the pit of her stomach. Josephine would know she was in trouble. She would find a guard and it wouldn't take long. A guard...idiot! Her gaze quickly flicked over passersby to see if she spotted the telltale white cloaks of the Quila guard. To her dismay, she didn't see a single one in sight before she was pulled down an alley which curved into a dead end behind a couple of buildings.

A firm shove caused her to trip and land solidly against one of the stone walls which seemed to close in around her. She glared defiantly towards her abductor and was startled to see that he had not bothered to hide his appearance at all. He was young, not much older than she and Josephine were, if she she had to guess, and was only a few inches taller than she was. He wore brown and cream colored traveling clothes, and she notice a few pieces of boiled leather which likely offered him some protection against attack. He had hooked his hands behind his back so that he could stand at his full height. His black hair was slightly shaggy and framed his dark eyed glare in a way that made him look deranged, and the cocky smirk he bore wasn't helping matters in the least. Jacqueline glanced around quickly to see if there was a possible means of escape aside from the blocked end of the alley, her panic starting to rise.

“Let's have a chat,” he cocked his head to the side as he spoke and she could hear the crack of vertebrae with the movement. Jacqueline glared back up in his direction and snarled which only managed to illicit a cold laugh from her abductor. “You aren't in any position to threaten me, girly. I know exactly what you were up to and if it weren't me that caught you, would have been someone else...which is bad for business.”

“I don't know what you're talking about.” Jacqueline spat at him, her eyes wide as she drew back from the wall and gathered herself together.

He stalked closer to her, chuckling darkly. “Don't play coy, girly. I know what you were hunting for. A pretty little mark that wouldn't miss a shiny piece until later in the day, too late to do anything about it. I could see you coming a mile off and believe me, no one would have let you get too far looking like you do. You'd be in jail before your could blink, and that's bad for business, bad for me. You see, right now, no one's on edge or worried too much about a wolf in the midst, but as soon as one's spotted, the sheep get nervous. And when sheep get nervous, it's harder for wolves to hunt.” He put a fist against the stone wall beside him and leaned in closer to her. “I don't like difficulty hunting, and you don't want to get in my way.”

Jacqueline shifted uncomfortably and tried to keep from moving away. She didn't want to back herself any further into a corner just now. “I can take care of myself. And...”

“No. You can't.” He gestured with his free hand towards her, motioning to indicate her apparel. “You're dressed to well, so you don't need to do this. And you were sloppy. What was that, your first time? And you're wearing a hood up in this weather; sunny, clear skies, even with a slight chill you're out of place. You are, without a doubt, the most clueless pup I've ever seen. I'd leave you to the guards, but like I said, you'll put them on alert and that's bad for business.” He drew back to his full height again and mused to himself as he regarded her. “Look girly, you've got two options right now, and I recommend taking the first: go home like a lost dog and keep your head down.”

“And what if I don't want to do that?” She tried to keep her tone neutral. It had occurred to her that she had realized he wasn't holding a weapon, wasn't trying to hurt her, and seemed like he might be about to let her go. What did he want? It couldn't just be to give her some advice.

He snorted at her retort and crossed his arms. “Join the guild and learn a thing or two before you get hurt.”

Moment of Truth

Jacqueline came to the end of the alley not long after Josephine disappeared. A few people in the street had already taken to watching Josie maneuver through the crowd while she played a lively tune. Several children had begun to follow her, laughing and darting about as they tagged along. Jacqueline smiled as she watched the display. Her friend had a gift when it came to music, and she was equally blessed with a fair appearance that was unusual to this part of the kingdom. Combine that with her sweet disposition, and she was starting to feel a twinge of guilt for Josie's involvement.

With a shake of her head, she left the ally and slowly navigated the throng of people on the street to catch up to Josie. It wasn't too late to back out now, but she was committed. Besides, she thought as she eyed the crowd, I suppose a bit of guilt was always going to be a natural result of this game. Jacqueline made her way into another alley as she neared the clearing.

Josephine had already made her way to the well and was quickly gathering the attention of those nearby. They had both hoped that with the increase in travelers to Quila, they would avoid local trouble altogether. However, to her dismay, Jacqueline was noticing far more people she recognized coming to support Josie as she played than she had hoped. Her friend seemed quite at ease with the commotion around her and that gave Jacqueline some joy to see. While she couldn't claim that Josephine lacked confidence, she was overly modest and tended to come off as shy at times. Yet if you put a lute in that girl's hands, she became a different person; controlled and at ease, perhaps even a bit commanding if the right mood struck her. She had noticed other people were as drawn to Josie too, and had taken it upon herself to keep an eye on her, especially when they were up to something ridiculous like today.

Josie's gaze flicked up and stopped on Jacqueline when she spotted her. She smiled and then struck up the signal tune. It caught Jacqueline a little off guard as she would have preferred to wait for a different sort of crowd, but she decided not to question her friend's judgment. With casual strides, she joined the crowd while Josie sang the first few lines of her song. Her heart was hammering in her chest while she worked her way into a tightly packed group of people. By picking a song which was a local favorite, they had hoped for audience involvement which would make it easier for Jacqueline to pick a target or two for her first attempt at theft. These people just didn't seem that interested in joining in, and Jacqueline was quite certain that there were more than a few eyes turning in her direction. At least one, a plump older woman with dark greying hair tied up in a bun, kept glancing her way.

As the song played on, Jacqueline was starting to get a little panicky. There were a few people she had spotted that she didn't recognize. The plump woman who kept frowning at her, not a good target her. A moderately well dressed man who might be a merchant towards the edge, too far to maneuver there naturally. A young man, perhaps a little older than they were, who was clearly enraptured with Josie's singing? That would do.

Just as she made up her mind to creep in closer to her target, she felt a hand snatch at her forearm and pull her up short. Something jabbed against her back and a low voice muttered in her ear, “Sloppy work. Let's take a walk. Now.”

In Time and On Tune

Quila was a relatively quiet town in the Maricocho province of the kingdom of Esquivedra. Its proximity to the Beltasar River and the Carina Mountains made it an ideal place for farming. Much of the kingdom's grain and corn supplies were produced by the farmers of the town. A special breed of goat known as Vicbu had also been painstakingly bred specific to the region. The Vicbu grew to be nearly the size of deer. They were covered by a soft pelt of fleece with a distinctive black and grey dappled coloration which had come to be coveted by the locals and visitors alike. A cheese made from the milk of Vicbu, called Quila for its town of origin, was considered a delicacy throughout most of the kingdom and made trade all the more advantageous in the region.

Twice a year, the townspeople held festivals to welcome trade, once in the spring after the snow had thawed, and once in the fall just before the passes would become largely impenetrable. Aside from the summer season, Quila could be largely cut off from the rest of the kingdom for months at a time as snow and rains could make the passes difficult to travel. This was precisely why Jacqueline had decided upon today, a few days before the fall festival, for a trial run with Josephine.

The streets were growing crowded with the number of visiting merchants and travelers coming to Quila. Townspeople were hard at work putting up tents for the festival, decorating storefronts and streets, harvesting crops, gathering wares to sell, and appeasing out of towners along with all the other preparations necessary for hosting such an event. With all the chaos, Jacqueline had to dance her way through the crowd to find her way to the meeting place. Despite a restless night, she had overslept, and Josephine was already waiting for her when she finally arrived.

Josie was casually leaning against a waist-high stone wall in an alley near to the apothecary shop. In her hands was a wooden lute, which she was meticulously tuning with deft, delicate fingers. She was wearing a bright orange and yellow dress which had been crafted to mimic motley in appearance. Her golden hair cascaded in gentle curling rivulets around her shoulders and her crystalline eyes glittered with joy when she glanced up to spot Jacqueline's approach. In contrast, Jacqueline had dressed in comparatively drab traveling clothes designed to obscure her appearance. She wore a pair of brown breeches tucked into brown leather boots, and an oversize olive green shirt beneath a petite similarly colored cloak. Her dark brown hair had been carefully back beneath the cloak's hood in an effort to further disguise her appearance.

“I was wondering when you would get here.” Josie strummed her fingers across the strings of her lute and smiled, apparently satisfied with the instrument's tone.

“I'm not that late, and you can hardly blame me. There are so many people here today. It's perfect!”

The smile faltered from Josie's face and she turned her gaze down the alley to the passing throng of people on the main thoroughfare. “I suppose...are you sure you want to do this, Jaqi?”

Jacqueline frowned and placed her hands on her hips. “Yes,” she hissed in clear disapproval of Josie's question. “Listen, I can't do this without you and we already talked about it. It's foolproof! You'll see!”

Josie glanced down a her lute and then back up to Jacqueline with a pleading expression. “We can get in serious trouble if we get caught, Jaqi.”

“Then we don't get caught. Let's just...go over the plan again, okay?”

Josie nodded and began to play a gentle tune on the lute.

Jacqueline nodded her approval. “Good! Now we'll do it just like we said. You'll play through the street until you come to the well. Settle there and draw a crowd to you with a song or two. I'll watch the crowd for a couple of minutes while you play. What's my cue to enter?”

Josie sighed and started to play a river shanty on the lute, a jaunty tune with bawdy lyrics which was a local favorite. “When I sing 'Joame'.”

“Right! And what's my cue to leave?”

Josephine's fingers danced over the strings, “When I repeat the chorus twice and bridge into an instrumental. Jaqi...”

“You'll do great! You'll see! We can't fail at this Josie. Besides, you don't want to stay in Quila forever, do you? You're wasting your talent here, you know?”

Josie sighed again and ceased her playing. She set the lute against the wall and gave a hard look back to Jacqueline. “I do want to leave. But if we get caught, we won't be going anywhere.”

“Then we don't get caught! Just do it like we discussed. It's fool proof!” Jacqueline held her breath as she watched Josie's resolve wavering. She knew her friend well enough to know that she would typically come around if left alone, but Jacqueline had also never asked her to do something like this before. “Come on, Josie, just give it a try. If it looks like it'll be too risky, just end your playing before 'Joame', okay?”

“Okay.” Josephine retrieved her instrument and flashed an uncertain smile towards Jacqueline. “Okay. Good luck, Jaqi.”

Jacqueline watched her companion heading down to the end of the alley and called out, “I'm counting on you, Josie,” before she got too far away to hear.

Josephine turned around at the end of the alley where golden rays of sunlight surrounded her, giving her a distinctly angelic appearance as she smiled fondly to her friend. “I won't let you down.” With that, she turned to walk into the street and began to play her way through the crowd.

Restless

The shrine was one of Jacqueline's favorite places. There was an otherworldly beauty to it that had always stuck with her, despite it being little more than ruins. The forest had grown in thick around the temple, sending out creeping vines and moss in an effort to reclaim the fieldstones for itself. The ceiling had collapsed at some point, sending stones and debris into a chaotic, impenetrable jumble within. Often times, Jacqueline would peer through one of the remaining windows, her gaze searching through the rubble and her mind at work imagining what the temple must have looked like when it had been in use. Were the long stones the remnants of altars or benches? Was this one big room, or had there been more? What had it been used for and why was it abandoned? In all the time she had come here, these questions had never been answered.

The outer gardens still held a small collection of basins with pools of water gathered within them. At times, rays of sunlight would filter through the thick canopy of trees overhead, dancing across the surface of the water and causing it to glitter like hidden treasure. The thick green leaves of the trees held a magic of their own, lending the area an eerie green illumination most of the time which made her feel as if she had stepped into one of her grandmother's fairy stories.

A pedestal still remained in the middle of the garden, entirely untouched by the elements over time. Whatever rested upon the pedestal was dark and squat, and had some manner of curvy silhouette to its appearance. This part of the garden was always shrouded in golden light and was easily the most beautiful part of the shrine as far as Jacqueline was concerned. It was also the place which she disliked the most.

For as long as she could remember, she had explored every part of the ruins in the woods. She had played along the fieldstones and splashed rocks across the surface of the pools of water. She had danced through the rays of sunlight, while the clack and crunch of her boots on the grimy stonework echoed throughout the shrine. She had even spent countless hours observing the figure on the pedestal from a distance, tantalized by what it might be, what secrets she could glean from it. Yet every time she had tried to cross the distance to investigate the lone altar, she would wake up.

Jacqueline lay awake in bed in the last remaining hours before dawn. While her eyes were adjusted to the darkness, she was barely aware of her sparsely furnished bedroom. Her mind's eye was still going over every detail of the ruins in the woods that had plagued her sleep since she was a little girl. The dreams were becoming more frequent lately. She was finding it harder and harder to avoid knowing what the statue was, and where this shrine could be found, and was this even a real place or was it all in her mind?

“Tomorrow,” she murmured to herself trying to reign in her thoughts, “Tomorrow is an important day. I need to sleep.” She blinked back the dream and refocused her attention on the darkened, shuttered window to her left. “I don't have time for dream temples anymore. Probably. At least not for now. And besides,” she yawned, “we've planned too much to back out now. Josie's counting on me...tomorrow...”

Journey - post 1 (a circle story)

(This is the first post of the continuing story I talked about earlier.  Kris and I can both add to the story so who knows where it will end up.  I'm putting a complete version of the story as a separate page in the blog so that when the story gets longer, it will all be in one place.  Here goes nothing!)

Miss Frances sat still on a park bench.  Her demeanor was stiff and serious.  Occasionally a person or two would pass by her on the walking path and give her a brief side eye before walking a little faster away from her.  One person, unconcerned with societal politeness, even asked her what she was looking at to which she responded with a dismissive "nothing" before they walked off with a confused look.  No one asked about the fish.  Until Ann showed up.

Ann was pretty used to Miss Frances by now so she had no problem probing into her seemingly illogical mind.  "Hey Kat, whats with the fish?" she asked before taking a seat next to Miss Frances.

"I needed someone to keep me company" she said, as if explaining the obvious.

"Why?" Ann asked, afraid of the answer.

"Because I've been waiting here for two hours, Ann."

"But you said to meet you at four."  Ann looked down at her phone to make sure she had the time right.  "It's 3:54.  I'm 6 minutes early."

"I have other bench appointments, Ann.  You're not the only person in my life"

"With who?" she asked, feeling skeptical that Miss Frances was capable of normal human interaction.  Of course there were other weird people in the world.  Perhaps she had met one?

"Herbert," said Miss Frances picking up the fish bowl.

"So you had a two hour meeting with a fish that you brought with you to keep you company while you waited for our 4 o'clock meeting?  Fantastic.  Can you just please tell me why I'm here, Kathryn?"

"I'm glad you asked," said Miss Frances as her whole face lit up.  "We're going to fly into the sun."