The headline Crowns Demand Devoes Step Down, or Rumored Hostility Between Royals never came. The headline that did stare up at them in thick bold letters, only a week after the murders were announced, was Devoes Declare Long Lost Heir. Which no one saw coming.
The article told (in vague detail) of a child produced after a one night stand King Clovis had twenty years ago, with a woman he met during a royal tour of Nescio. There was no mention of the supposed child's name, their location, or what they looked like. Naturally the country quickly ran with the news.
Girls from every county were lined up at the gates of the Devoe estate, with stories of how they were related to the royal family. How they had the same pale hair, blue eyes, or some other trait of the families.
So far the family had yet to accept one of the many girls clambering outside the metal gates. Clearly there was something they were looking for, or they were faking the whole "lost child thing" as Robert announced over that morning's paper. She couldn't tell yet.
They were in the middle of discussing the likelihood of a mystery heir when a series of raps came from the front door. Robert practically fell out of his chair trying to get to it quickly, which made Finn choke on his coffee. While she cackled and passed him a towel, she heard Robert thanking whoever it was at the door before it creaked shut.
"Who was that?" Finn called as he shot her a dirty look for whipping the towel at his head.
"Somethin' I've been waitin' for all week." Robert shook a yellow envelope as he came back into the dining room, and set it down in front of Finn's half-eaten plate of rice and eggs.
"What's this?" he asked through a mouthful of food.
"That, is a back up plan," Robert sighed as he rubbed a hand down his tired face. Paranoid and tired Robert looked a lot like the man that opened the door on her first night on 1229 Bell st, wild, unkempt, and tired. She wondered when the last time he actually got a full eight hours of sleep.
While Finn nodded and stared steadily at the envelope, Davina asked "back up plan for what?"
"Ah, don't you worry. Just the paranoid musings of an old man. You finished?" When she nodded he picked up her plate and his and walked towards the kitchen. The sputtering of the kitchen sink could be heard a moment later, and that was all he would say on the subject. When she turned to Finn to ask what the sun was that?, all he could do was shovel another forkful of rice into his mouth and shrug. Men.
Two days before Finn's new crew was set to sail out of port, Davina once again found herself on another "emergency" errand. Robert, with his scheming mind, had found more complex ways to keep them out of the house. For example, they were currently on a hunt for dried senna leaves- not crushed, exactly 11 oz no more no less, which wouldn't be too hard except that the only seller who carried the damn leaves only sold them in 10oz bags. And Mrs.Coffret would sooner cut off one of her arms before she'd allow them to add another ounce to the prepackaged baggies. And Robert was smart enough to only give them enough money for one bag.
After hiding behind a nearby stall for far too long strategizing, the only plan they could come up with was for Finn to distract the woman with his "rugged good looks" (his words), while she snuck a few leaves into their bag while the woman's back was turned.
The plan...well it didn't not work. Finn was able to distract Mrs. Coffret, but only because she pointed out a splotch of dirt on his nose and chided him for his poor hygiene. Once the woman batted them away from her cart for "blocking potential customers" did Davina realize that in her haste the few leaves she managed to pinch in between her fingers were the wrong kind. But hey, maybe Robert wouldn't even notice? It wasn't like he actually needed senna leaves in the first place, he just wanted us out of the house. Which she couldn't understand.
Though he masked everything with sarcasm or gruff responses, he had genuinely seemed excited to show her what he did for a living. He answered every one of her questions, and if there was an answer he was unsure of he'd take the time to research the topic for her. The daily testing on facts, classification techniques, and uses of plants was something she looked forward to each day. So why had he stopped? Everything had been fine until she saw broken-finger-guy. Maybe she had done something wrong? But wouldn't he tell her?
"Whatever you're overthinkin', stop. You're given' me a headache," Finn whined.
"Ha! Well that isn't hard to do."
He scowled at her out of the corner of his eye, "at least I would have known to grab green leaves instead of-" he stopped, staring at the bag in his hands, realizing his mistake.
"Instead of what?" she mused. "What other color leaf should I have grabbed?"
"Shaddup."
"Just stuff the rainbow leaves down towards the bottom so he doesn't say anything." She ignored him mumbling you stuff it in a bad impression of her under his breath as he pressed the few oval shaped leaves in with the dried oblong ones.
They tossed the small bag onto the coffee table as they removed their layers of sweaters, scarves, and jackets, once home. The bag rested besides yesterday's jar of arnica cream that Robert "had to have", and the other miscellaneous things he sent them out for but never touched. Amongst the metallic clanging of pots and pans, Davina could make out the familiar melody of Robert humming in the kitchen.
There wasn't even time to hang their coats on the hooks beside the door, before it slammed open with a loud bang, and a swarm of red flooded the house.
Finn was fast. The gray sweater clad arms pulled her behind him in the same breath that her brain registered that there were weapons hidden under those long red coats. The motion of something curved and metal-looking coming unhooked of a belt drew her eye. She knew what a gun was, in theory. The sisters talked of "gun-wielding men, willing to slay their best friend if they got in their way of gratification". She had no idea how they worked, but she knew enough to fear them. The sound of clanging metal and angry voices from the kitchen made her blood run cold.
"Robert," she gasped, trying to move around the wall that was Finn. Before she could fully duck under his arm and sprint to Robert's voice, Finn's arms were pulling her back into his chest. It was no gentle hug.
The sight of guards surrounding Robert, whose hands were bound behind his back, had her throwing elbows and thrashing wildly in his arms. There was no hearing his pleas of "Raine, stop", "stay still", or the curses he grunted out as her elbow landed in his gut.
The clipped voice of a guard was what made her still. The man stared blankly at Robert as he loudly announced, "Robert J. Stokes, you are hereby under arrest for suspected disloyalty to the crowns." Without another word they led/ pushed him towards the front door.
"Wha-no!" Finn's grip was like iron.
The guards filled out of the house two at a time, Robert sandwiched in the middle of them, his head hung in exhausted defeat. This can't be happening. The last guard to leave gave her a long calculating look before shutting the door behind him. A sweaty and surprisingly red-faced man, one that she had seen before. The same one she had let through that very door just the other day.
⟴
Finn didn't relax his grip on her until he was sure the guards had left the block. When he let go all her brain could focus on was how cold her skin was and how deathly still the house was. Sliding onto the floor, her legs felt like they had been replaced with noodles, her hands shaking slightly as she clutched them to her chest.
After bolting the door and shutting the blinds, Finn finally seemed to let go of the breath he had been holding.
"Why didn't you do anything? We..we could have helped him." It came out as a pained whisper, but it was all the energy she could muster. She couldn't even look at him, her eyes stared unseeing at the leg of the coffee table.
"I-we couldn't." Had her brain not felt as though someone pounded at it with a chisel, she would have heard the raw heartache in his voice.
"Why?" Robert trusted him more than anyone else she knew, but he couldn't be bothered to explain to a few guards that he was never disloyal to the crown. Or was he? The way Garrett, if that was even his real name, had looked at her screamed you're next. Was what they were doing, helping those who couldn't afford crown appointed doctors, viewed as anti-crown?
"We knew this was coming." That she hadn't expected.
"What?" she gasped, staring into his face. He was still standing next to the front windows, his eyes slowly darting back and forth as if he were reading lines from a book. "Bobby thought something like this would happen, that's why he's been on edge the past few days. He was waitin' for the other shoe to drop."
Other shoe? "How'd he know?" Searching the piles of her scattered mind she couldn't think of anything out of the ordinary happening.
"That guy you two saw, the one with the messed up hand-"
"Garrett" she hissed, "he was here. He was the last guard to leave."
He nodded solemnly, "yeah I noticed. Bobby said his story and injury didn't match up. Said those fingers of his looked stepped on instead of closed into a door."
Her eyes widened in wonder, how had he been able to tell that from just looking at the man's hand? She had looked and all she could tell was that they were definitely broken. "So that's what made him think Garrett was a guard?"
"No he said they guy started askin' questions when you left the room. How long he'd been a healer, where he learned it all, things like that. Most people in town already know those things about Bobby, and they certainly don't call him 'Robert'." He ran his fingers through his hair and looked at the front door once more before pulling her to her feet. "Come on, we've gotta get movin'."
"What? To where? What about Robert?" she demanded.
His fingers didn't loosen around her wrist as he led her up the stairs, their feet thunderous in the quiet house. "They can't hold someone long on suspected disloyalty, a week or two at most," he stated as they reached the landing.
She didn't know what he was doing as he twisted open the handle to Robert's room and stepped inside. He didn't bother looking back when she tugged her wrist out of his hold, refusing to cross the threshold, but she watched with perplexed eyes as he methodically opened drawers and lifted books.
"What are you doing?" He was clearly looking for something, but why he chose a time like this to do so she couldn't tell.
His hands didn't halt in their mad dash but he did angle his head towards her in reply. "Bobby said that guard took an interest in you, heard how he was teachin' you how to heal. He thinks they at come after you next, which is why he made a plan, if I could only find the damned thing." He kicked the frame of Robert's bed and she felt the burn of bitter regret slide down her throat.
He had been a literal wall of strength and composure while the guards had forced someone they lived away from them, he had kept her safe even, preventing her from clawing their eyes out. The man in front of her now was quickly unraveling. He'd run his hands through his hair so many times that sections of it stood up on end, and she'd never seen his steady eyes more frantic.
She shouldn't have accused him of not caring for Robert. If anything, he cared for him just as much as she did, maybe even more. That realization was what forced her feet past the doorway and caused her to wrap her arms around him. Face pressed into his back she told him everything would be okay. She felt his hurried movements still, and after a moment one of his hands rested on the arms she had wrapped around his middle.
"Thanks D," he muttered. Without even trying he'd managed to make her feel better. No one had called her D in what felt like years, and it reminded her of nights spent sipping warm milk with Sister Zinnia after nightmares. It made her feel safe.
She unwound her arms after a moment, face burning slightly when she realized she may have clung on a little longer than she thought.
"So ugh, what exactly are we looking for?" she inquired, turning away from him.
"He said if anythin' like this happened to him that there was a plan in his room. 'Cept he didn't tell me what it was or where it was."
Nodding, she looked around the room seeing all the potential hiding places they would have to check. "So we're fucked, huh?"
When he barked out a shocked laugh she jumped and turned back to see him staring at her in disbelief. "Well I'll be. I never thought I'd live to hear the day you started swearin' like a big girl."
"Shut it, Guppy," she half growled and half laughed.
"But yeah, we're kinda screwed here. He didn't exactly give us any clues." His bedroom wasn't that different from hers, it was about the same size, there was the same window, only the bookshelf and bigger bed was different. Well that, and a photo of Robert and Anne standing in front of a sign that said Welcome to Idela.
"Hey Finn," she called over her shoulder, "come look at this. Something is...off about this photo."
Looking over her shoulder Finn clucked his tongue in shock before reaching over her to pull the frame from the wall. "Huh, or maybe he did leave us a clue." It was a photo of the couple, but one she already knew. It was the same one that was hanging up in the hallway just outside. Someone had made a copy of it, cut them out, and glued them onto an actual picture of the Idela sign.
Flipping it over in his hand, Finn carefully removed the backing from the frame. A white letter fluttered to the floor, the words IN CASE THINGS GO TO SHIT were written across the front. How very Robert. They smiled at each other before she hastily bent to pick it up.
Tearing it open they bent their heads together to read the note.
Kid, Boy,
Knew something like this might happen. Depending on what they've arrested me for I can be held for two weeks to a month. I've got a place in the city that a friend has kept in decent shape, I'll meet you there when I'm out. Pack enough not to draw attention, there's papers under the garlic, key is in the rosemary.
Don't worry, I'll see you soon.
-RS, B
⟴
The papers hadn't been too hard to find, the only garlic they owned was in the pantry and an envelope full of thick papers wasn't that hard to miss. They figured Robert kept the instructions intentionally vague in case someone other than the two of them found the letter, but they were struggling.
"Okay so clearly the old man wants us to go to Ideala, but does he have any idea how much Rosemary he has?!" Groaning for the second time, they were covered in flecks of rosemary. "Ground rosemary, rosemary oil, dried rosemary, the man has an issue." It was safe to say that after an hour of searching, they were both a little cranky.
"Alright, so it's not in any of the office jars, or in the pantry, what other plants are there in the house?" They were laying on the hallway floor, Finn having joined her after she flopped onto it in a huff of surrender.
"Do we even need this key? I mean I could just break the damn door down?"
"Not like I haven't thought of it," she grumbled. Holding the letter over her head she read and reread the last line, hoping something would jump out at her. "Key is in the rosemary" she repeated, not for the first time that night, to no one in particular. "He doesn't happen to know anyone named Rosemary does he? Or Rose? Or Mary? But why would he have written in?" She turned to stare at the side of his head, his eyes jumping open when she asked her question a little too enthusiastically. "You don't think they swallowed it do you?"
"What? No you nut, that would be weird."
"Well, I don't see you coming up with any ideas, Mr. Idea-killer." His eyes slowly closed again but she got a breathy chuckle out of him. "It's not like he'd be kind enough to just grow the stuff in the-" her eyes grew wide. "Sweet sun!" Scrambling up she almost tripped over the half-awake Finn in her hurry to run downstairs.
Ignoring the groggy questions that followed her as she ran, Davina dragged one of the chairs from in front of the dying fire towards the mantle. There, on the second highest shelf was a fuzzy light green plant. She had complained to Robert several times about why he'd put a plant so high up if he expected her to water it, but whenever she moved it to a lower shelf it would be in its original place a few hours later.
"What are ya-? Oh." Seeing her standing on a chair organizing shelves was the last thing Finn thought she'd be doing, but when he saw her face as she held up an old brass key, he was wide awake.
"I guess we're going to Idela after all," she beamed.
⟴
As it turns out, Idela would have to wait until the next morning.
Both too exhausted to do anything else, they agreed on three hours of sleep before packing. Thankfully sleep came easy that night. Maybe it was the events of the day catching up to her, or the Gods of sleep finally taking pity on her, but no nightmares greeted her that night.
True to his word, Finn woke her up three hours later. A battered trunk was tossed onto the foot of her bed, and a cup of tea placed on her bedside table.
"We can't pack too much, but I don't think anyone would look twice at two people boardin' a train with a small suitcase each. So don't over pack alright?"
Throwing off the many sheets she'd buried herself in during the course of the night, she scoffed. "Please, I'm not the one who has a mountain of sweaters and hats that take up a bunch of space."
"Shaddup," he rolled his eyes, "I won't be needin' them that much anyway. Ideala isn't as cold as Bridlo," he shook his head exasperatedly and left the room, giving her space.
As she stared at the clothes in her drawers, she couldn't shake the feeling of déjà vu. She had already done this, packed a bag in the middle of the night so she could run from one life to the next. Folding a dress into a tight roll so she'd have more room, she tried not to feel sorry for herself. She needed to focus on making sure her family, her brand new family, would be okay. So what if she never saw this room again? As long as they were all together anyplace would be home to her. That didn't mean she looked around the room wistfully as she packed.
Her mind replayed the moment she saw the mound of colorful clothing on a bed that wasn't brown, hard, or scratchy, as she rolled and folded them into the trunk. It recalled nights spent huddled under covers as she reread A Flock of Sweet Spiders, as she placed it at the bottom of the hard-lined case, eventually adding The Solitary Portrait in next to it. Flashes of the first glorious shower sent goosebumps down her arms while she packed a spare bar of strong-smelling soap and the hair hair wash that would always remind her of home.
She stopped dead in her tracks when she saw the framed pictures smiling at her from their place on the wall. The many frozen moments of Robert and Anne that she may never see again. Their ghostly smiles were stuck to the back of her eyelids as she finished packing. What if we really don't come back? Staring down at her full case she decided she could make room for memories.
That was how Finn found her after he finished packing, scattered by empty picture frames, stuffing pictures in between the pages of her books. Instead of saying anything, he helped her remove the backs of frames and wordlessly handed her their contents, understanding her desire to save them.
Finn stepped out of the house while she did a final sweep of the rooms, making sure they hadn't forgotten anything important. He was slislipping his key to 1229 Bell st under Marcel Simmons' shop door, with a note asking if he could keep an eye on the place. They didn't explain why, but he assured her that Simmons would do just about anything for Bobby without question. "Hell," he'd laughed, "watchin' a house is probably the tamest thing that man has ever done for Bobby." Before she could ask what that meant, and boy did she want to know, he had slipped out the front door and into the cold night.
They had each packed enough clothes for two weeks, wearing their thicker clothing for the walk to the station, that she was not looking forward to. Her Christmas boots clomped satisfyingly along the wooden floors as she made her way through the house. The framed clue was returned to the wall in Robert's room, they didn't take any of his things with them once Finn said that from the letter it sounded like he would come back to the house before he joined them in the city. Finn had checked his room before leaving, so she shut the door with a soft click before walking past it. If she were to look into her room again she'd probably talk herself into packing up another two trunk's worth of clothing and objects, so she let her eyes gloss over the already shut door. One last look around the bathroom led to her sliding an overlooked comb, and an extra stick of deodorant into her coat pocket.
By the time Finn returned, her pockets were jangelling with miscellaneous objects. The comb and deodorant had been accompanied by two seashells from her beach outing with Finn, a needle and thread, two small jars of aloe vera and coconut oil, and a handful of her favorite teabags. When Finn asked why her pockets were bulging, he just chuckled once before opening his own bag that still had some space left in it, and let her pile of assorted junk join his neatly organized belongings.
⟴
The walk to the station wasn't as bad as she'd imagined it to be.
Finn kept up a casual conversation that helped to distract her from the fact that every step she took was another farther from home. He joked that maybe he should grow out his hair and grow a mustache to change his appearance, which the mere thought of had Davina in stitches. They imagined shapes in the indigo morning clouds, and Davina wanted to hear every detail of what life at sea was like. Their two hour walk flew by faster than either of them would have liked, the red brick of the Bridlo train station coming into view.
Since he had experience with traveling between counties, Finn went inside to purchase their tickets. Davina went to place her Nescio id in his hand, but stopped when she saw his. In newly printed letters she read Phineas Hake Elpel, 0416 Stone Way Lumby,Hilrock. That package Robert had gotten was filled with false papers and ids for Finn. She wasn't sure how much of the information was true or not, like if he was actually from Lumby, Hilrock, or what his last name was, but the moment she read the name she stared up at him with wide eyes.
"Phineas?" she practically screeched until he motioned for her to keep her voice down. Other people, waiting for trains to take them into town for work, or traveling businessmen gave them harsh glanses before returning their gazes to their cups of coffee or newspapers. "Your full name is Phineas?!" the surprise and curiosity not lost in her excited whisper.
He rolled his eyes once dramatically before sighing and pulling the id out of her hand. "Yes, if you must know that is my first name. But the rest of it is Bobby's doing," he insisted. Cursing quietly he pointed to his id, "the damn man named me after a fish! Who names their kid Hake," he mocked, the disgust in his voice making her laugh a little too loudly for the grumpy people around them. "At least he didn't say that I was thirty or somethin'," he shook his head again. Listed under his name was information she at least knew was true, hair color (brown), eye color (green), height (6'2), date of birth (Jul 11, X228). She tried to commit his birthday to memory.
"Hey," she joked, "just be glad he didn't write that you were shorter than me." He barked out a laugh before walking into the building. The Bridlo train station wasn't much to look at. It was a squat one story brick building that looked as if it were older than time. Two sets of metal tracks sat below the concrete platform she was standing on, a wooden sign with arrival and departure times on it hung next to the station's entrance.
Finn came back a few minutes later, with two steaming cups in his hand. He passed one to her before fishing her ticket and id out of his pocket. She had tried coffee before, she didn't particularly like the bitter taste that sat on her tongue, but Finn had added milk to it which made it easier to sip on as they waited. And waited.
The sky was a bright gray by the time their train was due. They had watched people come and go for hours, and had studied them long enough to note that the grumpy businessmen got on trains that moved to the left, and people who were dressed as factory workers went to the right. She hoped they wouldn't be going left. Their train went left.
The shrill whistle of the train both terrified and thrilled her. Gripping the slightly overpacked trunk so hard her knuckles were white, Davina stood beside Finn to join the small crowd of people as the train slowed to a screeching halt.
Having only ever seen trains within the pages of books, it was much much larger than she could have ever dreamed. The locomotive was a brilliant shiny black that still somehow glistened under the overcast Bridlo sky. Behind it were ten passenger cars, each a soft green with windows almost as wide as Davina was tall. Another whistle from the magnificent metal beast and the doors opened.
A worker in a crisp black uniform ladened with circular gold buttons climbed down the train's steps and began helping passengers on board. Stepping in line behind a tall gentleman smoking a cigarette, Davina's heart worked twice as fast as she got closer and closer to the train's door.
"Ticket please." Craning her head around the tall man, she could see him handing the worker his own "Bridlo Express" embossed ticket. The ticket was promptly ripped and handed back to the smoking man who then climbed the train's first steep step. Again when the man asked "ticket please", she was suddenly glad that her pockets were empty of shells and sewing needles, as her fingers still managed to fumble for the ticket. The thick paper was ripped, and handed back to her by a man whose smile didn't reach his eyes. She waited on the bottom step of the train until Finn had his own ticket back and was soon climbing up behind her.
Her eyes drank in every inch of the train's interior. Walking past rows of soft dark green seats, wide windows overlooking the platform she had just left, and high wooden walls, she would have stopped walking to simply stare had there not been people behind her trying to get to their seats. The pair walked up two full car lengths before finding two empty seats that were next to one another.
Another whistle, and the train lurched to a slow crawl. With their trunks shoved not-so-gently under their seats, they settled in for the long journey ahead. Finn had explained that a normal train from Bridlo to Idela would normally take three hours, but because this one was cheaper, theirs would take around six and a half, stopping at every station along the way. While they had waited for the train to arrive he had pointed out a map of Nescio, one covered in crisscrossing colorful lines that connected the six counties to one another. Following his finger as he traced a green line, it looked like their train would be making a stop at the edge of the Bridlo border, two in Port Malden, and one at the edge of Ideal, before they reached the heart of the city.
Finally sitting down, safe, and aboard a warm train, the previous night's lack of sleep caught up with her. Seeing her drooping eyelids and swaying head that was close to slamming into the window, Finn pulled a spare sweater out of his bag, balled it up, and rested it on his shoulder. "Come on," he nodded towards the makeshift pillow, "before you leave drool marks on their window."
Too tired to overthink the action, she rested her heavy head on his shoulder while mumbling how she didn't snore. With the smell of coffee and salt in her nose, Davina's eyes were closed.