Fools, these Mortals

Sebastien Chapter Fourteen

"They don't." Nick was clearly insulted, by the violent blush.

"Then last year's accident wasn't stage fright?" Starveling joked.

"It was the crucial death scene of my character after a very long soliloquy and in my research, bodies make such sounds as miasma leaves the body upon death." A blushing Nick handed us coarse towels. Starveling mouthed that Nick had farted on stage. Perfect, my newest ally was a weaver with irritable bowel syndrome.

"So how we getting in?" Nick whispered, eager to change the subject.

Antonio's gaze held mine with a cock of a questioning brow. We nodded in agreement. "I can puddle jump us most of the way. But not into the actual palace. The border can't be entered unless one walks in holding onto me."

"You won't tire?" A small part of me shrivelled at the guilt for using Antonio this way, but needs must. Securing a random iron blade from a tableside into my street-stained breeches, it was perfectly reachable. Now I was armed and somewhat clothed. My fate had landed on wining heads. "Antonio, you lost consciousness the last time."

"I will never slow you down, Roger," Antonio promised, holding my shoulder close to him. "None of the water sources here are poisoned like Prospero's well, the vampires wouldn't risk their stock."

"How much water do you need?" Nick frowned.

Antonio nodded to the clean, fresh clothes in the weaver's hands. "Bag them up tight, travel will soak us. That way, we'll be presentable to the court without raising too much suspicion." Nick nodded in agreement, folding the clothing into a large leather satchel.

"What will you say, Nick?" Starveling urged his friend, pulling loose hair from his bushy ginger beard, anxious for an answer. "Please don't condemn us to public enemy number one. We had a good thing here; we can still tell the truth."

Nick frowned with a hard blush through his trimmed brunet beard. "I will get a vow of promise."

"A vow from a Goodfellow?"

Nick held out his hand, expectancy shone in his eyes. Starveling's answered grimace prompted Nick to glare harder. Fetching a small paper bag, filled and crumbled, Starveling handed it to Nick, reluctantly. "You shouldn't, Nick." Starveling mumbled. But Nick bested him by putting the paper bag into his satchel.

"When confronting a Goodfellow, I need all the confidence I can get." With a brief whisper and a nod from Nick, Starveling acknowledged and the descended stairs. Through the thin beam floorboards, the tailor had struck a conversation with the black jerkined guard, Demetrius. "Distraction." Nick winked leading our escape.

Reluctance made Antonio hesitate. "I need the well. The further we travel, the more water I need," Antonio explained, striding with purpose to the window's edge.

Below a crash of broken equipment sounded and a grumbling snarl. "That's the signal." Nick hurried us out of the studio, ordering his apprentices to not breathe of our disappearance.

"Signal?" I gasped after being shoved through an open second story window at the back of the townhouse. A moment of flightlessness assaulted my senses until I was caught by a bale of rotten hay slouched against the town house.

Nick chuckled, lowering himself from the window ledge and jumping into the hay beside me. "What did you expect? A whistle or bird call? Far too suspicious. An actor thinks outside of the stage, Roger."

I didn't wish to correct Nick in that he was a simple town's weaver, not an actor. Though I wasn't in any position to crush a man's humble dreams, even if my father had delt me that hand. A free life with Viola was the dream and he tarnished it. As a trio we scurried away from Nick's townhouse, sticking to the daylight by his suggestion. His clogs clashed to ring loudly in the square. The well was guarded by a multitude of townhouses framing the square, and from the sparse decorations, an event will happen here.