When Xena had shot a look in her direction, after she had laid out her hulking opponent, Gabrielle had twitched her a brief smile, but she could tell that her friend had not really registered it: she was looking to see if there was the faintest chance of breaking free of the snare they were caught in.
She had swallowed hard as she felt the cold metal of the knife pressed tighter to her exposed throat. Xena's eyes had been on that dagger and, with it pressed against the bard's life, she had forced herself to relax and allowed herself to be re-chained. Gabrielle's heart had gone out to her best friend. The Warrior Princess was enduring humiliation and suffering at the hands of her oldest and deepest enemy, all because of the love she bore for the bard, - Oh, Xena, - she thought helplessly, - this is all such a mess. -
When Xena had been escorted from the pit, Caesar had dismissed her and her guards without a second thought. She had no importance to him, other than as an instrument of control over the Warrior Princess. As she was roughly shoved towards the side door from the gallery, she had heard Lucullus's bid to buy the dark haired warrior.
- So now she's to be bartered over like some ... some ... slave! - brooded the bard angrily as her hand reached towards the collar at her own throat. - But that's the problem, isn't it? To him, and the Roman world, we are slaves. Property to be bought and sold like cattle. - The thought disgusted her. They might not be treated like conventional slaves, but the collars proclaimed their status to anyone who cared to look.
As she was marched back through the prefecture's corridors, she allowed her thoughts to dwell on Caesar's intentions for them. She doubted that there was any price high enough to make him release Xena. He would never trust her out of his control. Besides, if this evening's wager was anything to go by, he could make a fortune in betting on combats. The bard felt a growing certainty that that was Caesar's intention. Xena would be condemned to a life as a 'prize' fighter, giving Caesar his vengeance and winning him a fortune.
Gabrielle shook her head in frustration. She couldn't allow that to happen. Yet while she was held hostage for the Warrior Princess's compliance, that was exactly what would happen. She had a choice here. If she could remove herself from Caesar's control, then Xena would have her own freedom to choose.
Depression descended upon her. Even if she were able to escape, or failing that, end her own life, what would Xena do? - She'd go after Caesar and kill him, even though it would almost certainly result in her own death, - shaking her head again, she knew she was as chained as the Warrior Princess, - I can't allow Xena to waste her life in that way, - she told herself with forceful determination. - There has to be a way out of this .... There just has to be! -
When they reached the storeroom door, she was shoved roughly inside. It was dark and airless, for they had given her no light and there was no window. She felt her way cautiously to the pile of grain sacks that she had used as a bed before she'd been taken to witness the fight in the pit. Slumping onto them despondently, the bard curled up into a tight ball and allowed the tears of anger, frustration and helplessness to flow down her cheeks in quiet testament to her misery. Gradually, a restless sleep claimed her and she descended into the painful world of guilt ridden nightmares that assailed her whenever she was parted from Xena.
Gabrielle screamed!
She was alone. The shifting grey and purple of the impossible
landscape swirled around her
adding to her unease. She stood naked, but for the bright silver
neck. With nothing else to do, and weighed down with a sense of
hopelessness, she started to
walk.
Nothing changed, no one came, she was alone.
Feeling the tears burn hot tracks down her cheeks, she dashed
them away with frustrated
anger. Where they fell tiny flames sprang up. As she watched in
mesmerized fascination, the
flames grew and writhed together becoming a solid fountain of
She backed cautiously away from what she perceived as a threat to
her ... to everything she
held dear. To the very existence of the world.
A thick, snaking, tendril of flame lashed out at her, plucking
her from her feet with startling
ease, throwing her high into the air above the core of it's
existence. She hung there
helplessly, wrapped in the fiery intensity of malevolent evil.
And then ....
AND THEN!
A naked, scar clad form launched herself into the heart of the
fire, laughing at the evil that
she found there, and delivered the trapped form of the dreamer
from the flame's grasp,
throwing her to safety.
As she watched, her rescuer was gripped by the furnace heat which
slowly melted away all
that had been of the woman, all except the vivid memory of a pair
of piercingly cold blue
eyes and the glitter of a silver slave collar.
Gabrielle Screamed!
She was alone. The disturbed roiling of the purple and grey
landscape made her feel sick as
violent orange streaks shot through the striation adding a
further level of unreality to the
place.
She stood naked, except for a silver metal collar fastened around
her neck, and a bracelet
that seemed to fade in and out of her sight as she looked at it.
As it solidified she could hear
a groan of desperate pain, that faded as the bracelet became
insubstantial.
She stood puzzled as to what it could mean. That the bracelet was
precious to her she had no
doubt, but it seemed to be an abstraction of a lost reality,
something she had and had lost all
too soon.
As the thought loomed in her mind, her memory folded and she
stood witness as a coldly
determined woman drove a sword through the chest of a familiar
man.
"Perdicus!" she shouted in crazed grief, "No!"
The blonde haired woman shot her a look filled with psychotic
hunger, "That'll do!" she
said maliciously before dissolving into nothingness.
She ran to the man who died in her arms. Another face hovered
close to her own. Dark and
strong, compassion filling her blue eyes as she gazed down.
And then she strode away and was seemed to be chasing after the
insubstantial form of the
murderer. She watched the progress of the chase with eyesight
enhanced by time and
memory. She saw them both tumble down a sand dune and into ... a
cage!
Borne down with chains the dark haired woman knelt before a
tarnished god ... no a man!
He reached out with a strong hand and grabbed the woman's hair. A
silver collar glinted at
her throat.
The dreamer raised a hand to her own ....
A hand slashed down and the golden skin above the collar was
sliced to release a fountain of
gushing crimson that smothered the dreamer as she watched.
Gabrielle screamed!
She was alone! The landscape around her swirled in a nauseating
mix of grey, purple,
orange and crimson. She was naked except for the collar she wore
at her throat. She stood
staring into nothingness, unchecked tears running unnoticed down
her face.
Wild images of destruction, pain, fire, death, pain, deceit,
jealousy, hatred, pain ... above all
pain, hers and another's, gripped her mind as she struggled to
make sense of what she saw
before her. To make sense of what she needed to do to make it
right.
She felt the cold metal appear in her hand and looked down at the
sharp blade of the knife.
With infinite slowness she raised the dagger until it hovered in
front of her chest. It's sharp
caress could end all the suffering, all the torment. All she had
to do was plunge it into her
heart and everything would end.
She looked up and saw the dark woman standing in front of her.
A sad look in the ice-blue eyes.
"It's for the best, you know," she told her through her veil of
tears.
"Without me you'll be free."
"Without you I'm nothing," came the soft reply. "Don't do this,
Gabrielle. I won't survive without you."
Her voice was hard with the certainty she spoke.
"Xena, without me he cannot hold you," she told her friend
fervently.
"But who will hold my soul, Gabrielle? Who will be my light?"
came the pleading answer.
"Xena," she sobbed.
"I love you Gabrielle .... Don't leave me!"
Gabrielle .... awoke!
The room was pitch black when she opened her eyes. She had no idea what time it was: the fuzzy yellow light that slid grudgingly under the thick door did not help her to judge. She could hear the occasional comment from one of the guards beyond the heavy wooden door, but they gave her no clues either.
She scrubbed miserably at her face, smearing away the dampness she found on her cheeks. She hated nightmares. Her occasional gift for prophecy often allowed glimpses of the future creep into her dreams, but her nightmares were nearly always formed from the awfulness of past doubts, guilt and fears.
Normally, she had a strong pair of arms to cling to when she awoke from such torment. A friend that would hold her until she stopped shaking and could make the nightmares vanish in her calm certainty. This time she was alone! She shuddered at the vivid images that the thought conjured up in her mind, clinging to that last desperate plea that rang in her memory as she awoke. Whatever happened, she would not abandon her friend if she could help it. However ill used they were at this time, however much she felt the guilt of chaining Xena to her captivity, she could not relinquish her friend to her darker self. For she knew in her heart that, whatever the Warrior Princess had promised, grief would drive her into the arms of the darkness that she had struggled so hard to leave behind.
She hugged her knees to her chest and rested her head on them as she waited to see what morning would bring. She could not face returning to sleep in case the nightmares returned to claim her. She stifled a yawn as she held herself in her uncomfortable position as slowly, her heavy eyes drifted shut once more.
That was how Patroclese found her some candlemarks later. He entered the bard's makeshift cell, with a lantern to pierce the darkness, and found her huddled against the far wall, jammed in amongst some grain sacks. Her face was smudged and stained with the trail of the tears she had shed and, in her sleep, it made her seem so very young, innocent and vulnerable. - Maybe, just maybe, Xena's past deeds have earned her the fate she's now living, - his mind told him, - but Gabrielle is a different case altogether. Her only crime is that of being the friend of the Warrior Princess! - the thought made him feel sick. He put the lantern down onto a clear space on one of the shelves that lined the walls of the storeroom, and moved over to the bard, whom he gently shook into wakefulness.
Gabrielle returned to consciousness with startled disorientation. She had not intended to let sleep reclaim her, and the fact that it had been dreamless did little to compensate for the fact that she felt stiff and sore from the position she had drifted off in.
"Hey," he asked kindly, reaching out to touch her cheek, "are you okay?"
Crabby from nightmares, poor rest and an aching back, she slapped his hand away and demanded, "What do you care?" She desperately wanted to be with Xena, to talk to her and be comforted by her. It would be difficult in the wagon, surrounded by prying eyes. But it would be better than nothing.
"When are we leaving?" she asked grumpily as he handed her a soft roll of nutty bread for her breakfast.
"Caesar and the VIIth will be heading north within the candlemark. I just dropped in to wish you a good voyage." he told her.
"Voyage," she asked a little bemused, "Where's he sending us?" she asked, hopes rising that once away from Caesar, Xena might be able to figure a way to get them out of their trouble.
"You're going to Rome," Patroclese explained quietly, "Brutus will be commanding your escort. Xena will be going north with Caesar."
Gabrielle looked at him blankly, unable to take it in for a moment. After all Caesar had been at great pains to use her against Xena's indomitable will. If he sent her to Rome, then surely his grip on Xena would be loosened, "Why?" she asked in confusion.
"Lord Caesar feels that now Xena knows that he has you, there is no need to keep you quite so close. He can, after all, get a messenger pigeon to Rome long before Xena could get to you there." He did not spell out his meaning, he didn't have to. He knew the bard was smart enough to see the threat.
"Can I see her?" she asked quietly.
The healer shook his head, "My Lord sees no sense in risking another eruption like the one in Nemausus."
The bard looked blankly at the wall, misery plain to read in her eyes. She sniffed, bringing herself back to the reality of her present and asked quietly, "Who are you going with, Patroclese?"
"My Lord has commanded that I accompany him," the healer told her.
"Does he intend to make her fight again?" she asked dejectedly and grimaced at his nod of ascent. She sniffed again, "Will you give her a message for me?" the bard asked.
Patroclese smiled kindly and said, "Of course."
"Tell her not to take any chances, and that I want her to keep her promises," she told him, "It's important." A tear escaped and traced a crazy pattern down a cheek streaked with dirt and other tears.
The healer half held out a hand to comfort the young woman, before letting it fall back to his side. Gabrielle hadn't seemed to notice, but he feared another rejection, - After all, - he thought wryly, - I can't blame her for that can I. I hardly deserve her trust now, do I! - "Gabrielle," he said in a voice almost to quiet to hear, "I'm sorry."
The look she gave him was filled with anxiety and pain. She stared at him for the longest time before she grudgingly replied, "You thought you were doing the right thing .... You were only following His orders. I forgive you, and I'm sure Xena does too."
The words twisted like a knife in his gut. How could she say that after all he had put her through ... put both of them through. His certainty about the justness of his actions had been so strong. Yet from his first meeting with the Warrior Princess, that certainty had been slowly eroded. And now ... - And now it was to late to do anything about this mistake. - He felt lower than a worm! He stumbled, unseeing, from the storeroom, leaving the bard to munch with disinterest on her breakfast as she awaited the arrival of the guards who would escort her to Rome. The soldiers outside on duty, swung the door closed on her.
