Author's Note: There's going to be some gory stuff here. Not sexual at all, but wow it will be gross. I'll try not to describe it in too much detail but... yeah. I thought I should warn you.
***
Oh... freezing night...
How grave it was to the unfortunate maidens, with their long hair tied up and hidden under leather caps, with their warm silks replaced with coarse wool, with their lost warmth and discovered quiet turmoil.
The trio followed closely to Ammas as he led them close to what he claimed was a secret passageway, but when he realized that suspicious people were gathered there, he led the girls away to find a different route. When that failed too, he decided to try using the most obvious routes, as if they were leaving the castle normally, but still keeping to the shadows. Only once they were close to an obvious exit did they take a turn and look for another passageway.
All the while Ammas had to keep looking back to make sure Oksana was still there.
Sometimes she seemed to be more distant, even possibly walking away, and Ammas had to go collect her. She always gave the excuse of being too frightened to go anywhere.
No. Ammas found suspicious people at the next passageway too.
So, he went off to the shadowiest place he could find, and to the shadowiest window in that area. He checked for any guards that could notice them. Then he softly told the girls to climb through. He'd help them.
Yana and Gabriella went first. Ammas grabbed Oksana by her waist, which made her gasp and squeak. Then he carefully climbed out the window with the girl attached to him. "To keep you from being too frightened," he'd murmured to her.
Once everyone was safe on the ground outside, they moved through the shadows again. Ammas held onto Oksana's elbow as if he thought it would float away.
Over to the three walls. They went one by one, luckily finding passageways the suspicious people hadn't been occupying, or often using not so secret passageways in the stealthiest of ways. Finally, after a time, Ammas was convinced they were outside the great castle. He knew there would be footprints in the snow. They could be tracked that far. Still, now they were in the capital, where there were much more roads free of snow. Tracking would be more difficult.
Ammas stopped to buy some horses, but he took one less than expected.
Not because he wanted to keep that little princess on his horse with him.
He knew he needed to keep Oksana with him.
Once everyone was saddled up, and a fidgeting Oksana was right in front of Ammas, both of them on the same horse, it was time to move again.
They moved at a gentle pace. Going too quickly would have more people notice them. As far as Ammas knew, not a single dangerous person knew that they had left at all. It was best to keep that head start in mind.
Suddenly, as Oksana tried to whine about something, Ammas put an arm over the girl's torso and roughly whispered to her, "Do you think I don't know you want to flee to your new Madam?"
Oksana wasn't just stuck dumb. She was made still too. Ammas couldn't know her expression, but he imagined it wasn't a very calm one.
"I'd assumed you'd cut the Empress' locks long ago, Girl," Ammas said. "I believe she'd thought the same. It was best for her to wait and see what you'd do, and now I have all I need to know. You want to go on to the one that instructed you. You don't think you have to go into hiding. The truth is, you do. Your new Madam doesn't need you. Your purpose was met. You have nothing more to give her. If you go to her, you'll be abused until you die."
Suddenly, the blonde girl interrupted with a high-pitched, "No."
"No?" Ammas' nostrils widened. "No to what? The world? The world will not change for you. You aren't special. You are only a fool that betrayed her Madam, the woman that fostered and protected you. What lie did your new Madam give? Did she say she could force me into marrying you one day, or some other stupid thing you childishly pine for?"
Her little fingers rose and sunk into his arm, but he barely felt it.
"Why," she whimpered, "why won't... why won't you accept that idea? I come from a good family. That Empress is only a doomed foreigner with no future."
"The one with no future is you," Ammas told her with a sort of tone that implied there would be no more comments on the matter.
Odd thing, though. If there could have been anymore comments, there wouldn't be any time for them, because soon the small group was halted by a larger group of mounted men with an unmarked carriage. Ammas simply couldn't recognize it. The men didn't exactly seem to be threatening, but Ammas didn't want to be caught by anyone. He tried to urge the other girls to hurry away with him.
But then...?
***
Rahela couldn't bring herself to rise from her seat.
Gazing at her weary reflection in a small mirror on a table, a sheet of parchment with a bowl of ink and a ready quill pen before her, Rahela was lost in her own mind.
She didn't want to die.
Tears came again, warm and tickling her skin.
No, she didn't want to die.
But neither did she want to be captured and endure whatever torture was in store for her. Perhaps they'd even take some time to strangle her with braids of her own lost hair, which might've been kept for that purpose. Why not?
There was never meant to be a life for her child. Never. As much as she wished the world could be kind, could at least let her child go free, it didn't matter. Even living as a feces collector for a dirty city would be better than whatever would come next!
The child...
Rahela broke again, weeping even louder than the maids locked away in her bathing chamber. She couldn't see her reflection, couldn't see anything but liquid. Her head lowered and her hands pressed into the tears.
But what else could she do? Wait for the takeover? Wait to be humiliated and murdered?
She sniffed and blew her nose in a kerchief. She used a different one to wipe her face and eyes. Then she tried to write.
Point in ink. Wiping away excess on some spare cloth. Very well. Hovering over the parchment.
Her arm lowered, the quill held between her closing fingers. The ink was dragged across the parchment.
As an empress, she should be able to write a suicide note, at least. Something noble, something even her enemies would treasure. There it is! She admitted defeat! Let us keep this precious letter for the scholars of the future to wonder over!
Her arm moved again. Another long stroke of ink was made, cutting through the first. Then more lines, and more, until the quill was only scratching the paper without leaving any ink behind.
She let the quill clatter down, and she rested her head on both arms on the table.
Goodness, those maids certainly didn't want to hush. Would they ever give up?
Rahela hoped there were still jars of clean water in there.
Rahela didn't know how long she stayed there, listening to the chambermaids wail. When most of them finally tired out, she forced herself up and thought she didn't need a letter. Nobody did. A wordless death was much better. Yes!
A few confident steps... then they slowed... and then there was none. She halted.
This had been so much easier when she was a defeated little queen of Testoa!
After all this fighting, all this desperation, there was truly no other course?
She went down to her knees and cried into her hands.
She got back up and started pacing. Was there any way to fake her death?
Perhaps...
No.
No.
But...?
No!
Her candles were shorter than when this lonely adventure began, with maidenly screams and weeping serving as her only companionship. But she still couldn't imagine how much time had passed.
A knock on the door!
Rahela didn't turn to look.
She heard some cracking and creaking, then heavy pounding, as if someone was using a small battering ram to break through!
Had a guard been bribed or killed?! Were they coming already?!
A surge of both terror and antipathy furnished her muscles. She heard the crashing and snapping. The voices too. Loud, male voices. A good deal of her energy was needed just to open one of the doors leading to the balcony. No time to hang herself or slice some vital vein, not anymore!
She felt the quick but heavy weight of rather manly footsteps behind her, many of them! She knew they were calling out to her but she didn't know what they were saying. All she knew was she needed to get over the balcony's railing and have her head split onto the earth below.
"Rahela!!"
Her waist was seized. She was snatched practically from the air, or so it felt.
She landed right on her backside, on the hard floor, and it sent pain down her legs and up her back. Most of the pain stayed in the obvious points of contact, though.
Her back was against something solid and fairly warm except for something cold dusting it. Around her there were two long limbs mostly covered by cloth stockings and boots, with a bit of what might've been a shorter tunic too. Arms were about her torso, keeping her in place.
"Unacceptable, Little Bacon. Don't go on to your death so easily."
Her breath froze for a moment as her brain tried to sort everything out.
"Majesty, Ammas was right. She's locked her chambermaids in her bathing chamber." That sounded like Borys.
"Why would he have been wrong? He has no reason to lie."
"I certainly did not, Your Majesty." Ammas?
What?!
Rahela tried to look around, but she was tightly kept.
