Cole woke.
Nika was wrapped tightly in his arms, deep fatigue keeping shadowed eyes shut. Cole thought he'd go back to sleep.
Then what had woken him happened again. A soft hand on his shoulder. He shifted his eyes as slightly as he could, so as not to wake Nika or give away his wakefulness, and saw an only half-remembered face which slowly acquired a name.
Dilis.
The somber man stared down at Cole steadily, saying nothing, then looked towards the cell door pointedly. Then he walked away.
Cole turned back and saw again that Nika was in his arms and all of his concern faded.
But luckily his mind was waking. He brushed a soft hand against Nika's cheek, and watched him jump, recoiling automatically before his eyes opened and he saw Cole.
Cole smiled at him. He smiled back. Then he shut his eyes again and started to fall asleep.
“Nika...” Cole kissed his cheek and carefully drew him awake again.
Nika stared silently at him for a very long moment. The dungeon was still dark as if the air itself were turned to coal, no light but that faintly glowing from some source out the door and around the wall; there was no way to tell what time it was, no sounds of birds or change in the constant drip of the water of the tunnels. They could tell nothing from the grainy way their eyes stung with lack of sleep or rough awakening, because it seemed as if no amount of sleep would ever be enough to wash the last few days from either of them. They could not hear the stomping feet of soldiers or shouts of battle, but it hardly would've taken either battle or soldiers to come and kidnap one or both of them.
But they could see each other.
Nika whispered, “Are we done now?”
Cole didn't think about his answer, though he looked around at the cell, dimly lit by the lamp Dilis had left. He kissed Nika's forehead.
“Yes.”
Nika sighed as his body started to wake to his pain and kissed Cole back. His arms were weak; he struggled to get up and Cole helped him to his feet. They scavenged some of Cole's uniform and one of the blankets from the haversack to dress him as comfortably as his wounds would allow.
Dilis reappeared in the doorway.
“Should we bring the supplies...?” Cole asked, his voice sounding far too loud, and the man shook his head. There was not time – whatever arrangements Guy and Faer had set up needed to be put into action; he had likely waited until the last minute to wake them at all. Dilis frowned, looking down the hall. Obediently Cole and Nika followed, hand-in-hand.
Getting out of the dungeons proved as tiring as getting down, though it seemed to Cole that Dilis brought them a different way out than in. Nika, his face set with grim determination, struggled silently to keep up, his feet and legs working as poorly as his arms did. Every step gave him pain, but he merely frowned and stepped again.
The sense of urgency with which Dilis moved was catching as the hallway's twists became less familiar and the air became lighter and easier to breathe. It was not the time for questions, nor the time for noise – if they lost Dilis around a turning, they would be lost forever. The man moved with absolute silence.
They turned a corner, and stopped before a door which leaked sunlight. Nika was blinking already, breath raspy and heaving. Cole tightened his grip on his hand, and the obvious fatigue on his face was dashed under a resolute smile.
Dilis opened the door, and the flood of daylight was almost unbearable. He scouted out into the brightness while Cole and Nika blinked furiously to clear the blaze from their eyes. Though the angle of the sunlight betrayed the earliness of the hour, the sun seemed not to be taking its time with the day either, and shone with noonday fury. Dilis' wobbly shadow appeared in the doorway and motioned them on.
Still acting like sneaking escapees (which they might've been, Cole couldn't be sure). They followed Dilis through disturbingly wide gardens, beautifully cultivated rows of bushes and trees and soft, still-wet grass. Though stumbling Nika smiled; the soft grass felt wonderful, and the dew washing his soles left less and less clotted red in his footprints as he went.
Cole's mental map if the Capitol proved lacking for this particular setting, but he knew it wasn't the Academy – the gardens were too tilled, too lush rather than slightly wild. He was starting to narrow it down when Dilis led them to a high stone wall with a small, inconspicuous doorway cut into it – the back entrance of a building...
The back entrance of a wing of a building – the back entrance of the Palace.
Dilis opened the door, nodding them in like gatecrashers.
Nika and Cole stepped into a high-roofed room whose walls crawled with fine-veined fire-colored agate, as if it were slowly and temperately burning. Gold-touched columns and lines of filigree went up the walls, where the arched roof was rather reservedly tiled in gilt-and-black squares. Their feet moved over cool, intricate stone patterns on the floor as they stepped inside.
A small crowd waited inside, to see who would make the first move. A line of quiet maids, duties betrayed by their uniforms, stood so still, they wouldn't have been noticed had they not revealed themselves to be living when one looked at Nika's blanket-skirt and clucked. Another showed her approval with a smile. Their gray-haired leader pinched them both to behave and they fell into a deep and silent, in-unison curtsy that came with only the best of servants. Dilis stepped in after them, shutting the door quietly behind him. He nodded to the little crowd.
Like flights of geese, they came in waves of hospitable assault.
All within the glory of the fine room, Nika and Cole were cared for. The maids helped bathe them; the bath seemed to free Nika of a half-hundred pounds of dirt and pests and blood, and he sighed with obvious pleasure at every new wave of warm water, even though some of it must have hurt, providing the maids with more at which to blushingly giggle. They took their soiled clothes, providing new ones of plain but fine material, only slightly in need of tailoring, which they set-to while the two men were busy with the doctors.
A fat little surgeon, with his bag of tricks and skinny assistant in tow, took a look at Nika with the graveness of their office. They splinted and set and cleaned and dressed and there was hardly skin to be seen that was not on Nika's face anymore. He turned away when they peered concernedly into his mouth, but watched through the corner of his eye as they tested his shoulders, trying to catch their whispers while he was shaved of two-day's-worth of unruly dirty-blonde stubble.
Everyone whispered. They whispered and they moved quickly like stage hands during a show, changing sets between scenes. If it weren't for the giggling of the maids, who obviously found the whole situation adventurous (and, if one or two looks were any indication, somewhat enticing), it would've been like some kind of pagan cabal of barbering.
They came out like new men. Though his face was still thin, and his eyes still shadowed, Nika looked like Nika again, some of the lithe danger coming back into his limbs though Cole knew it was only show. Nika was able to touch with only a small grimace the place where Cole had twitched under the barber's blade and received a nick – though the sound had been muffled in a set of exceptionally fine pillows, he'd still jumped when Nika shouted as they made sure of the relocation of his shoulders. Letting his arm fall, he smiled at Cole. They took hands again and disappointed all the maids and the surgeon's assistant.
Dilis, who had stood silently by the door for the duration, now took them in tow again. Leading them to a narrow passage disguised behind a panel of the gilded wall, he took them through to another door, this one opening to a hallway, more like the normal Palace than whatever private suite they'd been barbered in. The silence of the morning finally broke.
Nika stepped into the arms of his family. The quick streams of Midraeic flew back and forth like the flitting of birds through branches of a tree as they came together, embracing and weeping and embracing again. Cole could see Guy, standing in the back of the hallway, talking concernedly to someone he could not see, but grinning down the hall all the same. A little past Nika's crowd stood Cole's father, standing every bit as awkwardly as Cole would've expected him to. He waved and burst into happy tears he quickly tried to hide.
Cole waved back. Laeta caught his hand and dragged him into the bundle of Nika's family, babbling to Nika so quickly in Midraeic in seemed even Nika was having trouble following. The other girls were breaking into her stream at intervals, Ursula's interruptions usually followed by violent gestures; Cole realized they must have been recounting the rescue.
Nodding along with every word, Nika caught his eye. The grin he shot Cole was so mischievous, so knowing...
So much Nika's own. He realized he was grinning back before he had thought about it. Nika, broke the look, turning to touch Cole's knife, still at Paciano's side, with teasing laughter in his voice. Paciano responded, and if his tone was any indication, his words were every bit as sharp as the knife he wore. Nika ruffled his hair, then pulled his little brother in to kiss the top of his head. Though Paciano blushed, as well, they both smiled.
Cole felt a tug on his sleeve. He turned, and Nika's mother looked up at him. She raised her hands to his face, and as she had before, kissed either of his cheeks. She went to her daughters, sending them each in turn to do the same. Paciano took his wrist, handshake firm as a man's should be and obviously accompanied by all of the strength and manliness he could muster. Cole was duly respectful and serious in response.
Nika's father was last. He grasped Cole's hand in both of his, turning his eyes up, and muttering quietly to heaven. When he was done, he took Cole's right hand in his, meeting his eyes.
“Erasmus Constantinus,” he said, and followed it with another quick and ritualistic sentence of Midraeic, crossing Cole's chest horizontally with gently curled second knuckles three times. Finished, he squeezed Cole's hand in a proper handshake. Without explaining, he left Cole to turn to his son.
He grasped Nika as his mother had, kissing either side of his face before they embraced one another, father squeezing his son tightly to his chest. Nika shut his eyes, weakened arms holding as tight as they could. They muttered short words, so low only one another could hear.
They were saying goodbye again, as father and son.
When they released one another, Nika took Cole's hand again. Cole's father, cheeks apologetically red, took their joined hands in his, looking at Cole again only when he could hold it off no longer, and throwing a quick embrace around him. Turning his face away he draw over to where Nika's family waited, trying very unsuccessfully to hide that he was crying again.
“You had to get it somewhere,” Nika muttered to him.
“Yes, well, explain yourself,” Cole muttered back. “Oh,” Cole paused, “I have a story about that you won't believe.”
Nika grinned, and in spite of all the family watching and the press of time, Cole pulled Nika close so he could kiss the grin he missed so much. Nika blushed, but the color coming to his face was a welcome change from the pallor left from the dungeons.
“Do not tempt fate,” Nika said. “It would be embarrassing to force my father to disown me again.”
“Can you do that twice?” Cole asked, but he went back to holding Nika's hand. “He seemed pleased enough, whatever he was saying.” Cole hesitated, “What was he saying?”
“You don't want to know,” Nika chuckled at him. He glanced back at his family, watching his sisters giggle and point, and relented to Cole's slight frown with an explanation. “The Blessing of Union is... explicit. But I am certain he wasn't asking God to keep my womb bounteous and full.”
Cole froze and looked back, and Nika's laugh roared out down the hallway to join the high laughter of his sisters, who no doubt knew exactly what their father was saying (and what Nika was now describing) and waved at Cole with highly suggestive pantomime. Even Nika's mother grinned, covering her own giggles, as she half-heartedly pushed at their hands to try to get them to stop.
They moved on to where Guy waited, the woman at his side done up in a simple, but finely made green and yellow dress. Guy shook each of their hands, and Nika bowed to the woman, in spite of the popping of his bones it caused. She curtsied back, sardonic smile on her face, and Cole took in the fineness of the gown, the slashes of yellow appropriate for a mourning unmarried girl, the pin of a silver otter, no doubt actually worked of silver, gamboling on her shoulder, and the otter couchant pinned peacefully on her other shoulder, with feminine deferral.
It took him a little longer to catch up, but he bowed as well, suffering through Nika's superior smile at having been more polite than he for once. She laughed.
“Forgive me,” she said, before Guy could begin introductions, “I merely wished to meet you both, and express my admiration for all you've done...” she let her eyes linger on Nika, “All that the both of you have done. It's best we're not formally introduced.” She wrinkled her nose, and managed to do it prettily, eyes sparkling. “There's limits to even what I think I can get away with, and we don't need to garner undue suspicion.”
She said 'we' and looked at Guy, who, may Fate smile upon him, missed it entirely. She allowed him to kiss her hand, and disappeared into a side passage, with Dilis watching warily at her back. Guy looked after her with the delighted smile of a man who thought himself luckier than he could ever be, whether he knew what was going on or not.
Nika and Cole exchanged a glance. They both had the suspicion he hadn't the slightest clue just how much his luck exceeded his expectations.
“Well,” Guy said, turning back to them. After a moment he even managed to contain his silly grinning. “Uhm, yes, well... they're her coterie... it's remarkable she was able to call up so many to help, but I guess th– she's quite well-regarded.”
Clearing his throat, Guy led them towards the door at the end of the hall. “I guess, uh... I guess I probably don't have to tell you what's going on,” he said, but all the same, he looked up with hangdog eyes. “It seemed like the best way.”
“It's the only way,” Nika said, before Cole could. His haggard face held no sadness in it – just staunch resolve. “We have to leave.”
“We're working on a quick return, uh, Faer and I and...” Guy's grin came back with full force, “... and well, you know.” He glanced back towards the hidden door into which the Princess Aodhnait had disappeared with Dilis. “She's... uh... she's just...” He sought the word for a moment, then caught both of them in his gaze and hastily cleared his throat, putting on a very serious face indeed. “Cole, your father has agreed to house Galen's family until we can get them set up somewhere on their own. Faer is working on it, but he says he can guarantee full legal protection, and your father stepping in looks good for the broadsheets. Durante shouldn't be able to get to them, even if he wanted to.”
Nika glanced back over his shoulder to where his family still watched. Cole frowned. “What about the King?”
“Well...” Guy's brows raised, “Actually, the King is less of a threat than Durante. His Highness profits either way – if he'd gotten you as Consort,” Nika's head whirled around to glare, probably at the cost of some pain, “he'd have more power over the Military, but if he lets Durante hang for bungling so much as to put Galen into enemy hands, the Military looses face, and thus power, anyway. He appears to have backed out of the whole affair. He's been downright helpful,” Guy frowned and shrugged and amended, “You know, for him.”
Nika was still glaring, though Cole was very carefully not looking at him. “Yes,” Nika muttered, “for an idiot.”
Cole gave him a shy grin, and he settled into mere untouched disapproval instead of affront.
“Anyway...” Guy took a few quick steps, prompting them to follow. He stopped at the doorway, “Though we should be able to clear you, there's no telling what sort of things Durante will pull in order to keep his career from sinking. It's best you aren't here to be targets...”
“But we'll be fugitives,” Cole said. “If I know Durante. That's why the sneaking and creeping through passages. We'll have to leave quickly, and stay hidden.” He frowned at Nika, who was already putting on an expression of determination. He was in no shape to ride like being fugitive would require, but he would, if that's what it took.
Guy's grin returned, but this time, filled with expectant pride, “Yes, well, that's why I said we'd made 'arrangements'.”
Like a showman pulling the curtain, he opened the door. All three walked into the bright space of a stable yard, where stood a large carriage, the curtains and material covering it all marked over the crosses and colors of Adineh. Cole hardly cared, though–
“Roisin!” His mare was tied to the back, done up in the silly harness of an Adineh show horse, but happily wuffing her breath at him anyway. She danced toward him, pulling on her harness – unlike her human rider, fully rested with a few hours sleep and a bag of good oats. Cole went up to stroke her nose, and the carriage door opened, a woman in a man's traveling clothes stepping down from the box.
“Finally, I am to address you, and I am passed up for a horse,” she said, dark eyes showing the same constant amusement as her finely turned lips. “How very... Ainjir.”
“Yes, well,” came another voice, stepping out of the box after her. “As far as I know, he's only shown good taste once in life.”
Faer moved his lawyers' robes aside to light on the ground. He and Nika stopped to grin at once another, before sharing a quick embrace.
Guy approached the group, “Galen, Cole – may I introduce Ambassador Hawath.” She bowed to each of them in turn. “Thanks to certain...” Guy glanced back at the Palace, “... mutual acquaintances...”
“And my exceptional charm,” Faer butted in.
“And certain exceptional people,” Guy amended, “Ambassador Hawath became aware of our situation and has offered to provide transportation east. She is returning to Adineh anyway to discuss all the recent changes in Ainjir with her superiors.”
“And, of course,” Nika said, keeping his gaze on the ambassador cool, “Adineh has a vested interest in what happens to the military leaders of Ainjir.”
Hawath, though her smile was unfailing, bowed her head in acceptance of this aspersion. “I'll take your suspicion as a simple precaution on your part rather than any condemnation of my interest.”
“Diplomatic of you,” Cole said, though it wasn't without a sideways look to Nika. He seemed oddly unsurprised at this whole development with the Ambassador.
“Indeed,” she answered, raising a brow. “But it is my diplomacy that will protect you on your flight. No one,” she said, her eyes glittering with iron surety, “would dare question me on my way out of the country, even if my coterie should look somewhat familiar. Ainjir is no position to cause a stink over the departure of its notable personages towards Adineh anyway.”
Nika and Cole exchanged a glance, each of their thoughts a matching shade of dark.
Guy stepped in. “Ambassador Hawath's generous offer comes less weighted than you might imagine, at least after last night. As you can see,” Guy patted Roisin, who just as happily lipped him as Cole, “Your Elites apparently took something of an exception to being left behind. They arrived last night...er... early this morning... and filled us in on certain important aspects of the rescue,” Guy said. “Aspects which include a lead on where we can find the Comid Hierarchy, or at least those who know where the Comid Hierarchy is.”
“They asked me that,” Nika said. He put his hand out to the horse, who after a moment's sniff decided he was as likable as every other living creature, which was very likable indeed. “But I never knew where the Hierarchy was, unless they were near me. Gaius is a threat that cannot be overlooked; it was him, from the start – and at the end. He is dangerous. All the other officers knew to keep the Hierarchy away from me. Gaius never trusted me.” He frowned, anger flashing across his face. “Very wise of him.”
“I leave as soon as you do to start the hunt for them,” Guy said, letting the moment pass. “With a lead on where they were hiding out during the war, we might be able to chase them down, at least well enough that we can root out any Comid holdouts.”
“With the Comids taken care of,” Cole said, turning his gaze to Hawath, “Ainjir can turn her attention to the barbarians in the West.”
Hawath bowed her head again, this time to Cole. “And if Ainjir can focus on the barbarian problem, there is no need for Adineh to intercede, which would be costly and wasteful for both of our peoples. Adineh as a whole and her sovereign prefer that the Six Nations stand together.”
“And, of course,” Nika said, now facing a full assault of Roisin's affections as he stroked her nose, “a change in regime in Ainjir's military, for, say, one more cooperative with Adineh as well as with the royalty of Ainjir, doesn't hurt. Catching Gaius and the Comid Hierarchy would be a very commendable thing for an officer to do, especially one considered mostly unproven.” He raised a brow at Guy.
Guy folded his hands behind his back, a small smile touching his lips, but said nothing. Cole tried not to let his pride show, but Nika made no such effort – it seemed the good Lieutenant could finally 'possess' his rank.
“Where, exactly, would you be taking us?” Cole turned to the Ambassador.
She raised her brows. “East. Don't tell me you suspect we would try to turn you on Ainjir?” Nika and Cole exchanged a glance, and she laughed with genuine amusement. “Adineh is neither as combative nor as foolish as that. Or at least I'm not – and I will persuade my sovereign not to be. Forcefully. Especially after this profound mess. No, it suffices the peace of mind of Adineh to bring you as far as possible from any significant military force as we possibly can. Adineh would rather not this sort of thing happen ever again. It doesn't hurt, either, to flatter ourselves with the thought that should you come in contact with a sizable military force, you will at least think well of Adineh, and remember her good assistance to you when you were in need.”
Cole frowned; Nika's hand, returned to his, squeezed and twitched.
“So we will go to Adineh,” Nika said, voice low.
“You will,” she replied, voice solid as stone, then opened her hands to them in a shrug. “From whence you may depart in whatever direction you wish. We have no intention to imprison you, but we would like you where we can see you, at least in the near future. Ainjir has gone through many changes, and we expect her to go through many more. You are powerful lines, and we cannot predict the way of the wind, but we may change the set of our sails.”
“Riddles,” Cole snorted, “the stock and trade of Adineh.”
“At least Adineh's 'stock and trade' is compact,” the Ambassador returned, raising her brows, “and unburdened by the need to rhyme. You will be guests in Adineh, allowed to go where you see fit, even to the great trade fleets of Wulsh or the deep desert, should that be your desire. We simply want you out of Ainjir, away from barbarians and fanatics with armies and grudges. Though should you find yourself in need of employ, Adineh has found itself with an influx of Midraeic refugees, and a great eagerness to avoid the mistakes of our neighbor.” She raised her brow speculatively at Nika, whose scornful frown did not discourage her. She smiled, while it wasn't entirely peaceful, nor was it in particular hostile – just a friendly showing of teeth. “Adineh has no wish for wars.”
“I have assurances,” Guy said, staring her down, “that if things should clear up here, there will be no interference in your return.”
She bowed to him, before setting her glittering dark eyes on Cole and Nika again. “Yes. As intimated, we expect changes in Ainjir, but cannot guess their extent or purpose. Should those changes be in your favor, you may return. But until then, if you so much as piss in a westerly direction, Adineh wants to know.”
Cole and Nika looked at one another. “There is no guarantee we will work for you,” Cole said.
“And we do not respond well to threats,” Nika added.
She shrugged, looking up at the sun to gauge the time. “I am aware. But it is a long journey east. There will be plenty of time to talk, and I said, 'away' suffices.”
Bowing deeply to the company, she helped herself into the carriage. Faer, Guy, Nika and Cole, looked at one another.
“We'll take good care of everyone,” Faer said. “Legally, too,” he added with a grin.
“As always,” Nika said, “you inspire confidence, Faer.”
“I got you out of this,” he said. “If they gave lawyers medals...”
“You can have some of mine,” Cole said, “I don't think I'll have time to pack them all.”
“I'll keep 'em,” Guy grinned. “You know, just until you're back.”
Laughter loosed the weighty moment; they didn't have time for true theatrics, or belief in the finality of this goodbye anyway. They shook hands in turn, trading quick respectful embraces 'like only fellow treasonous plotters can' according to Faer.
Though offered, Nika refused a seat in the carriage box; he'd had enough of enclosed spaces of late. With his arms still unable to pull his own weight, Faer helped him into the footman's seat at the back as Guy double checked Roisin's harness and gear and insisted on holding her for Cole to saddle up, like a man getting one last chance to practice before a tournament.
“You're going to need aliases, at least for a little while,” Guy was saying, nervously triple-checking his own work, which being his work, hadn't needed the double-checking.
“Just send word to me, under whatever name, whenever you get where you going,” Faer said. “I'll make sure it gets to your family, and no one else.”
“We have already been given aliases,” Nika said, leaning back in the little seat, so as much sun could hit his face as possible. Cole raised a brow at him. Nika cocked an eye open to look at him.
“Erasmus Constantinus,” he said softly, “my father named you – my steadfast beloved – as you named me, First Year, when we met.”
“'Nike',” Cole whispered back – the word from which he'd taken his lover's name, changing it for his own use to deny him victory absolute as they played in their arrogant youth. “'Victorious.'”
They said their goodbyes, Nika's sisters escaping their hiding place inside each in turn to wave and shout for their safe travels. With a quiet tut to the horses, they left, passing at once from safe return to new journey.
First the towers fell behind, their great shadows stretched behind Cole and Nika as if to mark their journey away. Next passed the city, the only city Cole had ever known, the one Nika had conquered, shaken, and escaped. They reached the walls, the gates, and though Cole had the thought, he did not look behind as the shadow of their arch passed.
Only once they were on the road, out of the walls, where not even the city could hear, did Cole trot his mare up close enough to Nika's seat to ask. Nika basked in the sun like a lizard.
“Nika, how much did you know?” When Nika's only response was to raise an eyebrow, Cole frowned at him, putting his hope for a serious answer into his voice. “Some could be planned for, yes, some guessed, the outline laid, but not even you could've planned this all. How much was your plotting? How far back did it go?”
Nika opened his moss-colored eyes and held Cole in his sun-narrowed gaze for a few trotting steps of silence before he answered, settling back to bask.
“'Nika' means 'victorious' too, 'Ras.”