“How’d you know that’s Alanna?” Jon asked.
“Well isn’t it?”
“Yes, but she has a black wig on.”
“We know that and that she’s Lady Lanna,” Raoul told him.
“You do?”
“Yeah, we’ve known she was Lady Lanna since we first saw her, almost.”
“But the two of you decided to flirt with her anyway?”
“Yeah, it was fun,” Gary told him grinning looking at Raoul to check that he was smiling as well at the look on Jon’s face. Jon hit Gary in the arm. Then when Raoul laughed he hit him to.
“It’s not fun flirting with my girlfriend,” he said walking towards the young woman in the marketplace.
“My Lady,” he said tapping her on the shoulder. She spun round surprised and when she saw that it was Jon, relaxed. He took her hand bowing over it and kissing it.
“Mistress Cooper, how nice to see you again. How are you?” she curtsied and replied then nudged Alanna.
“What?”
“Curtsy!” she hissed. She glared at Eleni then at Jonathan and finally curtsied to him. When she rose she saw that Gary and Raoul had joined them. Alanna made the introductions.
“Well, I must leave you now. It has been a pleasure to meet and see you all again. Alanna Ill speak to you soon.”
“You don’t have to go.”
“I feel old in the four of yours company. I have things to do. Farewell.” She turned and walked away waving to them as she went.
They talked for a while in the market before deciding what to do. Jon offered his arm to Alanna and she took it. All four of them walking away talking and laughing like normal.
What they didn’t see though was a small group of noble women.
“Well, that must be her. Wait a minute it’s Lady Lanna.”
“Oh really Cressidda? Oh wait it is!”
“I thought you said that it wasn’t Lanna, Dafeenie?”
“I didn’t think it was, remember she told me she was taken and so was Jonathan. They could just be friends. Really good friends, I’m talking about best friends, perhaps.”
“Admit it Dafeenie, you are wrong. It’s Lanna.”
“But they’ve not known each other long. When, think about it he was like that before she even came along. It’s been like that for almost a year and a half and she only appeared about 2 months ago.”
“But look at them together, and the same thing happened last time she was here. They couldn’t keep their eyes off each other last time.”
“Fine, I still think that it isn’t her but if you all think that then fine. Let’s go!” Dafeenie said pushing past the rest of them to go see stoles at a stall. The rest of the women followed Dafeenie after a smug look exchanged between all of them before following her.
At the Dancing Dove…
“George!” Alanna called going over to his “throne” by the fire with the others following.
It’s you!” George said laughing. “In here, in a dress. I’d watch out for some of the men, looking like that.”
“You’ve got her blushing now.” They all laughed apart from Alanna who went even redder. She flumped down into one of the chairs at the table George was at and the others did the same.
“You feeling alright after that fall now? I haven’t seen you much.”
“Don’t worry I’m fine now.” Jon coughed into his hand, which sounded like liar. She glared at him.
“Yeah, she is lying.” Gary told George.
“I am not!”
“You are. You’re a lot more tired now. After you spend an hour on the courts you go and have a nap. Where you end up sleeping for over an hour.”
“Well, ok I’m just very tired all the time but apart form that, I’m fine.”
“Mmmh mmmh, so how is everything at the palace.” George laughed, “You keep getting sly glances from the men and glares from the women.” Jon scowled, while Alanna blushed and Gary and Raoul laughed.
She went and leaned on Jon resting her head on his shoulder, he put his arm round her and smiled smugly. George looked around the room inconspicuously; he was a thief after all. It got the desired effect that they wanted, the women around at that time were smiling and the men were scowling.
They stayed for a few hours before having to leave for dinner.
“So who was that George?” Marek asked sitting in a chair opposite George while some others did the same eager to hear what George had to say.
“A friend.”
“Does she have a name?”
“Alanna, and she is out of your league by a long way. She’s a noble and look who you’d have t’ b’ up against.”
“Yeah, lucky git Johnny is isn’t he?” They all laughed.
“Yeah, as long as he’s in the picture no one has a chance so I wouldn’t try because either her or her friends would beat you up and that includes me,” he warned them threatenly.
“Ok, ok. Who is she exactly?”
“Alan’s sister.”
“That’d explain th’ eyes. Such pretty eyes, and everything else.” They all laughed again apart from George who gave them a look to remind them of what he said. They all shut up pretty quickly after the look.
“Will we get t’ meet her again?”
“Probably,” George said smiling.
“Jon I have 2 nights till my ordeal, Gods! I’m scared what if I don’t pass? It’ll seem like I failed because I’m a girl, then they’ll think that girls can’t fight!”
“Shh, you’ll be fine. No one has failed in years and you are a better fighter than most and you’re smarter than a lot as well. You’ll be fine.” He drew her into a hug and kissed her head to calm her pacing.
“But what if I do?” she fretted.
“You’ll pass. Don’t think about it.” He tilted her head up and kissed her swiftly and fiercely.
“That might be hard. You are going to have to distract me a lot.” She kissed him matching his fierceness from the previous kiss.
“I think I might just be able to manage that.” He blew out a candle and pulled Alanna down onto the bed.
The two of them woke up to banging on Jon’s outer door.
“What is it?” Alanna asked groggily.
“Someone’s knocking on the door,” he said rolling over putting his arm round Alanna. He was still half asleep and had the intention of going back to sleep.
“Get up!” she said shaking him awake.
“What? What?” he said startled as if he was just waking up.
“Someone is banging on the door. Go get it! I can’t can I?” Jon sighed and rolled out of the bed to find some breeches to put on.
“Just coming!” he shouted and the banging stopped. He stumbled out of his bedchambers closing the door behind him. He went to the main door and opened it.
“What is it?” he said yawning.
“I’m sorry your majesty but, but I was told to get Squire Alan but he isn’t in his rooms. His Grace told me to wake you your highness. He thought you might know where he is.”
“What?” he said frowning. “Oh, you want Alan. He isn’t there.”
“My Lord Prince?”
“Yeah? Oh, right I’ll send Alan along to his grace when he gets back. He might be about an hour. Send my apologies to his Grace, I had to send Alan on an early morning errand, to keep him busy you know?”
“Yes, my Lord. I’ll tell his Grace, and I’m sorry for waking you.” The servant bowed and Jon closed the door yawning. When he bowed his hat fell off. He sighed and bent down to pick it up. He thought he heard voices from inside the room. Although they were muffled he could make most of what was said. The door hadn’t been shut properly.
There’s always lots of gossip about the Prince now and there was a few years back after he became a knight but now even more so. He’d had one girl after another until about a year and a half ago. There hadn’t been any gossip about him in that area apart from that everyone suspects he has a girlfriend or boyfriend. Imagine if he knew if he did! He heard a woman’s voice calling through. “Who was it?”
“Someone for Allan. He has to meet the Duke in an hour. I said he was on an errand for me.”
“I can get some more sleep then. Come back to bed.”
“Gladly.” The voice got quieter then he heard a woman’s giggle. That was enough for him he knew what he had to know, quickly he closed the door quietly. Then straightened up and almost jogged away from the Prince’s rooms. This is going to be an interesting story for everybody.
“Your Grace?” Bowed Alanna.
“Ah, Alan. I was expecting you an hour ago. But never mind now. I just wanted to speak to you before the ordeal. Wish you luck before it. You’ll do fine. You’re one of the best fencers I’ve seen. When you first started out with the sword I would not of thought you would be this good, but you worked hard and managed to master it, juts like anything else.” He chuckled. “You’re certainly the smallest boy I’ve ever taught as well.” She laughed trying to cover her blush at what the Duke had said.
I’m one of the best he’d ever taught and I’m a girl! It’s hard to believe that the Duke said that about me. She thought.
“Thank you, your Grace. You’re to kind.”
“No pert remarks Alan? What’s wrong with you?”
“I couldn’t think of any your Grace. And I mean that your Grace.” Just then
Timon knocked on the door and came in and bowed.
“Your Grace. You have to meet the King in five minutes.” Duke Gareth nodded in agreement to Timon and nodded a dismissal to Alanna.
“Thank you Your Grace.” She bowed and left.
She started walking away from Duke Gareth’s door back to her rooms.
“What did Uncle want?” She jumped she hadn’t seen Jonathan when she left the office.
“Don’t do that! You gave me a fright!” Jon laughed and fell into step beside her.
“So what did Uncle want, squire?” she glared and then smiled nervously.
“He just wanted to wish me luck before my ordeal.” She swallowed hard and Jonathan noticed.
“You won’t need it. Come on we’ll go down to the Dove.”
“We spend it seems half our lives there you know?”
“Yup. I wouldn’t have it any other way.” He grinned and put his arm around her shoulders leading her away out of the castle down to the city.
“You will never guess what I heard this morning!”
“Come on tell us, what did you hear?”
“Duke Gareth sent me to find Squire Alan this morning, so I went to his rooms. He wasn’t there so I looked other places. Then I went and knocked on the Prince’s room. After a long time just before I was going to go he shouted he was coming, so I waited. He came to the door only in breeches yawning and not really listening to me. I told him I was looking for Squire Alan and he looked at me blankly then told me he was out on an errand. So he closed the door but he didn’t close it right. When I bowed my cap fell off, when I bent to pick it up I heard a woman’s voice! She asked who it was so he said that it was for Alan. So she said, “ good I can get more sleep then. Come back to bed.”
“Really? You not just making this up now are you?”
“No I’m telling the truth! He said gladly and then I heard giggling. I closed the door pretty quickly after that.”
“So he does have a girlfriend. Come on Amyas! Pay up!”
“What!”
“ I said I bet you he doesn’t have a boyfriend and he doesn’t so you owe me 5 nobles.”
“Yeah, you did but you never said he had a girlfriend.”
“Who has a girlfriend?”
“Otti!”
“What! All I heard was that you never said he has a girlfriend. So who does? Tell me, please? We have a right to know!”
“Yeah, come on tell us!”
“Zanty, not you to.”
“Just tell us and we’ll give up or you won’t find out anything from us in future.”
“Alright it was the Prince. Tenebris heard a woman tell him to come back to bed so she could get some more sleep and then he said happily or something like that and then he heard lots of giggling.”
“So Tene you win the pool.”
“Yup,” he said grinning widely. The five servants were in the servants’ mess. Zanty leaned to the table behind her and told one of the servants there. A few minutes later she turned back round to their table while the woman she was talking to turned to the person next to her.
“I wonder who it is?”
“Well we’ll all know soon enough. It’ll go all round us then to our lords and
Ladies and Tene might hear her voice again. There’ll be rumours going round upstairs who it is and someone down here will find out who it is which will go round. The palace is great for finding out things, you all know that.”
“It’s Squire Alan’s night in the chamber. I hope he does alright.”
“Of course he will. He’s one of the best squires we all know that. Look how he’s saved the Prince’s at least 3 times; the Ysandir, the Sweating Sickness and we heard from Gary how he saved him during the Drell Valley campaign. We all saw how well he could fight, Dain remember him?”
“And he’s nice. He’s always polite and nice to us.”
“Cressidda, you’re just saying those things because you want to become Lady Trebond.”
“So what! And because he is all of those things.”
*NEW**
“Ah, Myles, Coram, something wrong?” he said smiling. How do I get out of this? he thought, hoping that he looked calm on the outside. He could just hear his father saying, after the lecture on how to act properly for a Crown Prince, to do with women, that it would be the perfect opportunity to practise being calm. Jonathan didn’t think it was working. It wasn’t.
“Jonathan, sit!” Coram growled.
“Okay,” Jonathan replied meekly sitting down quickly on the closest chair.
“Perhaps you should explain,” Myles said standing up and crossing his arms with Coram mirroring him. Jon squirmed in the seat and moved further back in the chair.
“Well,” Jon stumbled. “ We had been talking and well, she fell asleep and so did I.”
“What was wrong with her room?”
********************************************
“What’re they saying?” Raoul hissed.
“If you shut up then I’d tell you.”
“What are the two of you doing?” The two of them jumped.
“Lanna don’t sneak up on us like that!” Raoul hissed again. Before turning back towards the door leaving Gary to explain. He moved out the way and Raoul moved into his vacant position by the door. Gary steered Alanna away from the door. She wrapped her blanket around her a little more.
“Jon’s in trouble from Coram and Myles in the father sense.”
“Oh, Oh!” she said realising what was happening. She walked quickly over to the door. “Move over a bit to let me in,” she whispered getting infront of Raoul. She sat on the ground and leaned her ear next to the door.
Learn from the master, Faithful said stalking past them all touching his paw to the door. A small patch of the door went see through allowing them to see what was happening in the other room. They could also hear what was being said easier now.
*************************************
“Nothing was wrong with her room. Just we were talking in my room and she fell asleep and I wasn’t going to carry her. I probably would of tripped and we’d of gone flying. Then I’d get my head bitten off.”
“So nothing’s going on?”
“She is my best friend.”
“Jonathan, do you think we’re stupid?” Myles asked.
“Do you want me to answer that?” The four behind the door stifled a laugh.
“So how long has it been going on? I seem to remember an incident during the Drell River Campaign, before then?”
“No, after.”
“So something is going on?”
“Shit!” he cursed.
“What incident?” Coram asked.
“Yeah ‘Lanna what incident?” Gary whispered. She elbowed him.
“No, you didn’t. The cat used to keep a running commentary on who was coming towards our tent.” Jon pointed out. Then quickly added, “Not that anything did happen.”
“Then what did I interrupt?”
“Just two friends talking.”
“One who happened to be bright red the other pale. With one of them picking up a book since it looked like they were doing something else. You can tell when you interrupt something you know? Then the way you acted when she was taken, you were a lot more worried than a friend would be and you know it.”
*********************************
“You’ve gone bright red again just like Jon has now,” Raoul whispered to Gary and Alanna. She hit him softly in the stomach.
**************************
“Your Highness, if you admit it quickly we’ll get the speech over and done with,” Coram told him moving closer to Jon in a threatening way. He could be seen swallowing.
“Okay, okay, I’ll admit it. I’m in love with Alanna.” There was a very heavy silence, which lasted for several long minutes.
“Say something!” Jon muttered. Gary and Raoul turned from looking at Alanna back to the door.
“I hadn’t expected that answer. You’re in love with your former squire?”
“That sounds bad. That mistake has been made before. Instead say, “You’re in love with a woman who was your squire.”
“Enough with that. If you upset her in anyway remember, it would be a former soldier, a mature knight and a mage of the master class who will make sure you get lots of pain. Because don’t doubt us we’ll get Thom involved and he can make sure there’s be no trace of anything that would connect it with us.
“She’s like a daughter to us, and imagine how a father feels when they find out that she is sleeping with someone?”
*************************
The four behind the door smothered another laugh and leaned against the door. The door suddenly gave way. The three humans fell over, through the doorway and were sprawled on the floor. Jon, Myles and Coram looked at them.
Jonathan gave them a look of gratitude. Alanna smiled at him briefly in return and got up quickly. Raoul and Gary were both getting up and Raoul offered his hand out to Alanna. She took his hand then smacked him on the side of the arm.
“Raoul!” Gary and Alanna chorused. The two of them turned and looked at him as though it was his fault.
“What! It wasn’t just me!”
“I’m too light to knock that door open when it’s shut, so it must have been one of the two of you,” she stated crossing her arms.
“Ah hem,” Coram coughed. Alanna and Gary turned round towards him and smiled sweetly.
“Oh, do you hear that? Coming Faithful!” Jon said not waiting for an answer. He quickly got up and walked briskly out the room. Alanna, Raoul and Gary collapsed laughing, as soon as Jon was out of sight. They saw him go out a door into the corridor. The three of them turned round towards Coram and Myles and froze.
“I don’t know why your laughing we still have to speak to you!” Myles told her.
“Oh, no, you're not having that talk with me! You should leave that talk to my mother,” she told them stubbornly crossing her arms.
“Alanna your mother died.”
“I know that but my substitute mothers have told me all they should of so, no need for the two of you to tell me,” she said brightly with a cheery smile. “So if you’ll excuse me? I’m going to get changed.” She walked across the room to her bedroom door and went in, closing the door behind her before anyone else was able to say anything.