Sliding along feeling the thick rope beneath her feet, she drew deep breaths, focusing on the point where the rope ended and became a solid stand again. She moved with grace and skill honed by many hours of training. The taut rope felt solid to her now and she pivoted midway along her route to the gasps of the watchers. Below her, the others in her troupe prepared the finale, a spectacle of tumbling, juggling and fire, while she held the audiences in rapt attention with small wobbles and feigned unbalanced movements as she spun and twirled her way across the rope above their heads.
Eventually she was given a signal from the giant Alec. With a cheeky smile and a wink to the audience below she dove off the rope, the cries of those watching singing in her ears as she spun mid air to be caught by the giant. After acknowledging the cheers and applause from the crowd for a moment she tumbled away in a series of back flips to join the troupe in the finale. She smiled widely genuinely enjoying the fast paced movements and intricate series of tricks she was involved in as the show came to an end.
Rapturous applause greeted them as they moved forward to bow ostentatiously signalling the end of the performance. Leaving the small arena in place the troupe began to mingle with the crowd. Maurice the troupe leader was in his element. He took all the accolades as his own and she smiled as she watched him soak up the spot light. Quietly, she wandered to the edges of the crowds and onto the tent housing the harvest feast. She was always famished after a performance, her nerves making her unable to eat the day before. These were good people. They had become her friends and family as they travelled through villages and towns, the anxiousness of ever letting them down gripped her deeply.
The feast was sumptuous and she ate her fill sitting demurely in a corner her face bent to the food not inviting any conversation from those around her. Alec came to sit beside her. The giant had become her closest friend, mostly because he was as quiet as her. He didn't waste his words,, he said what he meant and never tried to pry into her past or what haunted her. She looked up at the man whose strong arms caught her safely every time she flew from the high rope and smiled.
"Good food." He said between mouthfuls, "You should eat more you are too skinny. My arms could catch three of you easy."
"I have eaten plenty, look," she giggled as she poked out her belly rubbing it, the small rounded bulge showing clearly under her good dress. "Any more and I might do you damage when you try to catch me."
Alec snorted in amusement taking a honey cake from his mound of food and placing it before her. "Eat," He said simply.
Laughing she picked up the cake and took a bite, "Okay but don't complain when I'm so heavy I break your arms when try to you catch me."
He rolled his eyes at her, happy that she was eating more. They sat in companionable silence as they finished their food. Finally he looked at her, "Ale?" he questioned.
"No. I need some fresh air but I will walk with you as far as the tavern."
As the revellers in the village continued to celebrate the end of the Harvest Season and the coming of the Season of Frost, Honey farewelled Alec and continued on to the edge of the village, walking quietly through the moonlit meadow near their camp. She looked up at the full moon smiling, reaching her arms out wide she spun around feeling the effects of the goblet of mulled wine she had had with her meal. "Life was good," she thought. It was not always so and she revelled in her good fortune of being able to join this troupe as it passed through a village she had been hiding in many moons ago.
Flopping back into the long grass she stared up at the moon, the harvest moon. Her mind wandered to the same harvest moon so long ago when she had fled her home. Her father, the Duke of Martizen, drunken and full of bluff had lost heavily playing dice with well to do visitors. He had put her freedom up as his stake in the end and lost once more. She was supposed to be delivered to the man who won her the following day to be wed. That was the day she ran away.
She remembered with a shiver the man she was to marry, Kade. His serious unsmiling face, the way others seem to fear his moods and she knew she would be trading one tyrant for another. She felt no regret at what would happen to her father when she fled. He had been demanding and brutal since the passing of her mother into the evermore and, try as she might, she could not find a fond memory of him. Nor did she want to, so she roused herself and slowly made her way back to camp.
Expecting most of the troupe to still be at the celebrations, she made her way to the tent she shared with Maurice. Seeing her pack safely tucked under her bed, she berated herself for becoming complacent. She had stayed longer than was safe with these people but she finally felt like she belonged somewhere. From the pack she took out her dark blouse and a pair of pants fashioned to seem like a skirt so they would pass a cursory glance but give her freedom of movement if she needed to run once again. Stowing her one good dress back into the pack with her few precious belongings she lay down to sleep in the dark garments.
As dawn was breaking, she was roused from her sleep by Maurice. Ostensibly the others saw her as his mistress and this was how she had able to join the troupe so easily. The reality was that Maurice liked men, pretty young men even better. Villages mostly frowned on this type of love and she gave him the appearance of respectability if any questions were raised. When he was unlucky in finding love he would rouse her like now. It was the sacrifice she made for her freedom and life here with Maurice was far more preferable to that from which she ran.
