Traitor's Luck

Xenia realizes how lucky she's been in learning how being both royalty and a traitor to the Crown can have dire consequences.

    The children proved surprisingly helpful. Everything was ending up in the right place. The very few clothes Xenia decided were practical to bring along went in one pile, those she'd donate to a girls' orphanage in another. Intermittently, they'd ask questions like "should we fold these?" or "is it okay to have these together?" in unnecessarily worried voices. "That's fine, I'm not fussed" was her most common reply.

  Yet again, a tentative voice broke the silence. Once again, it was about how to tell what might be good for travel. She'd forgotten how much young children needed things simplified. "Just have the ones that look like they're meant to get messy aside so I can decide which to bring. Think about what your parents WOULDN'T be angry about if they were to get mud on them. Nothing too fancy-looking. And no dresses. Hard to move around in those." She laughed at the stunned look on their faces. "It's traveling, not feasts and balls. Those can go with donations also," she said as one of the children held a dressy pair of shoes aloft. The idea of walking a long way in formal shoes  made her shudder. "We'd better sort the food next. We'll definitely need to bring all we can of that. Extra clothes I can do without. Food... not so much."

The food was quickly removed from the larder. Some, mainly what would spoil if left unpreserved and unprotected from the elements too long, would be left for the Foxtrot siblings to eat. She’d already invited her brother to help himself while she got her affairs in order. The rest was to be sent back to the pastry shop with the children.

                “Here, bring this food to the shop,” Xenia said, giving each of the children one of the sacks into which the food had been sorted. Beside her, Folco flopped into a chair at her table, chomping on a carrot. “After that, would you mind bringing those clothes,” she pointed to the ones that were unfeasible for long journeys, “to Saint Yuri’s Home for Girls- do you know where that is?” They shook their heads no. She located a piece of spare parchment and drew a map for them to follow, handing it to the child who seemed to have the best head for maps, an erudite girl of nine. Once the children left with the food and the instructions to return for the clothes, she began contemplating her furniture and bedding. Would it be an inconvenience or a boon to leave it behind? On the one hand, he could keep it, or sell it, or charge extra to a future tenant for the convenience of not needing to buy furniture, but on the other, if he did not want it, or wanted to use the space for something else, it would be a nuisance.

                Ten minutes later, just as Folco was polishing off the last her cheese, there was a knock at the door. “Back already?” Xenia commented as she answered, surprised by how fast the young hobbits had returned. She wondered whether one of them had forgotten something. It was not any of the hobbit youngsters though, but Kiran.

                “I thought I might give you two a hand,” he said as he stepped inside and wiped his feet on the elf’s doormat. Meanwhile, Folco tossed the parchment that had covered her cheese into the rubbish bin, picked up a banana and began to eat that. “Do I need to take my shoes off?” Kiran asked, reaching down towards her boots. Xenia shook her head no, raising her own shod foot to prove her point. “Excellent. What else have we got here?”

                “Just furniture. But that’s all staying. I just need to double-check and attend to some things and then I'll be all set.” One of those things was dishes- she’d need to wash whatever Folco produced. He'd have at the very least his knife and a plate considering he was currently smearing jam all over the massive hunk of bread he’d broken off for himself. The coverings for the cheese, now empty, were crumpled into balls on the table, and he'd left the tops of a carrot in a pile.

 Xenia stared at him. “You eat a lot," she said, picking up the tops of the carrots and depositing them into her composting bucket. 

                Folco, hitherto immersed in his feeding frenzy, blinked as though coming out of a daydream. “But it’s so good!” the young hobbit declared, biting off a corner of jam-covered bread and wiping the sticky fingers of his left hand against his trousers. 

 

                Xenia smiled, shaking her head. She did not want to imagine what one of their parents would say if they saw him doing that, particularly  since he was in the presence of someone who was not a family member. “And to think that one was chubby when last I saw him five years ago,” she commented, her eyes raking over her rail-thin brother. “Teenage lads… oy. If I ate like that, my steps would make the earth quake from my weight.”

                “I wasn’t chubby!” Folco protested through mouth full of bread. His cheeks resembled those of a chipmunk. 

                Xenia snickered. “Well, you weren’t this lanky little thing you are now, I seem to remember chub here,” she indicated her stomach, “and here,” she pressed her hands against her cheeks, “and here.” She gripped her arms. She glanced over at their friend to notice that for some reason Kiran looked ill at ease.

                Folco made a strange face, actually pausing in the middle of picking up his toast. “It was baby fat, I'll have you know! And I'm not little. I'm taller than you  now in case you haven't noticed.” 

There was an off note to her brother's voice that she could not decipher.  Deciding that he was simply unsure of whether to play along or turn the tables on her in the round of  friendly sibling ribbing, she said in the most skeptical voice she could pull off, “sure. If you say so.” Either way, you weren’t this skinny,gangling fellow.”

                Folco shrugged. He drew in a long breath. “Well, I suppose I am a bit thin. I wasn’t fed much. I’ve gained most of it back, though, right?” He turned beseeching eyes to Kiran, mouth a grim line. The paladin's visage communicated a mixture of concern, bitterness and a few harder to read emotions.

                Xenia stared between the two, thoroughly mystified. Folco's pleading glance changed to a white-faced expression redolent of a cornered beast. “He means when he was imprisoned,” Kiran said quietly. "Up in Dremeadow." 

                Comprehension crashed upon her like a tidal wave. Xenia exclaimed, “Folco? In prison?” Her brother nodded sullenly. She could not say which came as more of a shock, his apparently not being fed enough or the fact he’d even been put in the lock-ups to begin with. It was obvious he'd been in trouble, or at least in some sort of altercation, at some point. She had not expected, however, to learn that he had actually been put in prison, let alone maltreated, especially in his own land. Who would dare? “Oi, and everyone thought I would be the family member in there at some point." She punctuated her dark humor with a laugh. "Though, I have had that oh-so-lovely Wanted poster of me for quite a while.”

                “That is correct; we were fortunately able to get him out of there before it was too late though," answered Kiran quietly. "And yes, your brother thought you looked familiar even without that painting of you."

Xenia managed a wry grin. “Congratulations on being the first person I’ve ever seen smiling in one, by the way.” Without any explanation, she dropped to her hands and knees and began to count the floorboards in her room.

                “I doubt he even knows how to be in a mug sketch,” remarked her younger brother, frowning down at his older sister. "What're you doing?

                Xenia  looked up to smirk before she removed a flat tool from her pocket and stuck it between two particular floorboards underneath a chair.  “And then you have me. Honestly, they couldn’t have done a worse one of me if they tried. Couldn’t be any more obvious I didn't sleep or eat right. Awful enough my dark circles got that bad without a painting to prove it.” She wrenched the floorboard in front of the wedge up, revealing a velvet green bag. Extricating it, she opened it to reveal a full bag of platinum and gold coins. Pocketing this bag and replacing the cover, the princess began counting boards again.

“ At least you weren’t being tortured in yours,” Folco mumbled. 

 

The paladin froze. It took several seconds for what was just said to register in Xenia's brain. Then the battered and bruised hobbit depicted in the Wanted poster came to the forefront of her mind, along with her brother’s name. mingled horror and anger washed over Xenia.  She suddenly felt silly, foolish, and most of all self-centered in insensitive. 

She straightened to look at the other Foxtrot, bumping her head against the underside of the chair. rubbing her head, she backed out and stood up. As she stared at the prince, a shadow seemed to fall across her younger brother’s face. “Folco…” she began, unsure of what to say. 

                Her brother's shoulders quivered slightly. He looked her directly in the eye. “I’d really prefer not talking about it,” he said succinctly.

                “Folco... I’m sorry…”

                “No matter. Not your fault.” The prince's voice was terse and clipped.

 

"I forgot..." Xenia said, remorse crashing over her.

 

"Well, now, aren't you fortunate. Wish I were so lucky." Xenia gaped at him. “Just leave it, okay?” Folco snapped. 

                “As you wish…” Xenia said, startled by the harshness of her younger sibling's tone. Behind him, Kiran shrugged his shoulders, casting Xenia an unfathomable look. 

  The palpable tension was broken by the sound of a door opening. The elf had returned. Folco, immensely relieved, recommenced picking his way through Xenia’s food.

                “Hello,” he said, looking around the room in surprise. Xenia could not blame him; she could not recall the last time she had visitors other than people dropping off orders of laundry, groceries and other such items. The elf seemed to have no family or friends either, so anyone in here other than Xenia or him was a highly unusual situation.  “Will you no longer need  to use the kitchen then?”

                Xenia laughed; the elf knew her hobbity habits much too well. The kitchen, not the sitting room or even the very room in which she slept, would be the very thing to ask a hobbit about. “No. By the way, I have my final rent payment.” She handed over the moneybag.

                “Thank you, young ma’am,” the elf said, tucking the bag into his pocket. 

It was fortunate for the elf that she was honest, Xenia thought. If it were her, she would have immediately counted to ensure the amount of a tenant's final rent payment was accurate. Instead of commenting on his carelessness, however, the hobbit gestured towards the furniture. “I don’t need this stuff anymore either. I’d just be throwing it out- unless you want to keep it or sell it or something?”

                “Of course. I’m sure I can find a use for it. There are people with children, or I could end up with another halfling or a gnome as a tenant.”

                Xenia snapped her fingers. “Excellent. Then it’s settled." Deciding she could  not bear to let such a kind and helpful elf continue that over-trusting attitude attitude, she pointedly asked "do I have the right amount there?”

                The elf rifled through the gold coins, counting under his breath. He extricated one and held it out. “You left an extra in there.”

                The hobbit shrugged her shoulders. “Oh, I  know, that’s for dealing with the furniture for me.”

                He smiled. “Well thank you, young ma’am. Please feel free to stop by if you’re in the area again.”

                “I shall, thank you. We should be out soon.”

                “No hurry, no hurry, take as long as you need,” said the elf before retiring to his room.

                Kiran smiled down at Xenia. “You’re a very honorable person, you know that? Now I’m even more sure you’d be an excellent addition to what your brother, I and others are doing for Drémeadow, if you consented to it.”

                Xenia stared in confusion. That was not usually the sort of thing people said to her; they by far more often said exactly the opposite even before her expulsion from university- or her exile from Drémeadow. What had made Kiran say that? “Er, thanks,” she said awkwardly, wondering if she ought to be repaying the compliment.

                “Really. I mean it. Are you two ready to go? We ought to get Xenia settled in where we are.”

                Folco shoved the remainder of the food, which was barely anything, into a bag. Xenia took her final look around, knowing in her heart this would be her last time in here forever. "I'm ready. Let's go." Whatever was coming would come. She would have to greet it with her head high.

Author's Note

Please let me know of any improvements I might make that occur to you; I wish to be a published author one day and thus embrace constructive criticism

If you wish to know more about what Folco's deal is, read "Fallen Ones." The book "Democracy's End," as it continues, will provide much more information about events leading to Xenia's fall from grace and flight from Dremeadow.

Reviews

[NoelHC]

The attention to detail, the instructions as to what clothes to take, how the food to bring was planned, etc, all good touches that are often missed in stories, off the heroes go, and you wonder how they will survive the elements and feed the throng. Well done.

[SpeedyHobbit Armstrong]

Thanks! Yeah, they need to pay attention to such details or the refugees could be rather screwed!

[Craig2591]

"His cheeks resembled those of a chipmunk, there was so much bread in there. " I would drop the second half of that sentence. It's not needed. The sentence just before it already says he was stuffing his mouth with bread.

You missed capitalizing the beginning of several sentences. Otherwise, no problems.

[SpeedyHobbit Armstrong]

Chipmunk sentence fixed! Gotta love the results of letting adolescent boys near food and inviting them to as much as they want, haha. Especially when said adolescent is highly active. And a hobbit. And is still recovering from illness/injury/other such fun.

As for the capitalization, I got some, but got sidetracked in the opening paragraphs shortening and altering sentences and deleting repeated ideas. I've been away for this long enough for things needing tweaking to show more to me [=

What'd you think of the pacing, content and the like?

[Jennie Baron]

Exactly the right way to start the characters off on what is sure to be a great adventure!

[SpeedyHobbit Armstrong]

Thanks! (= I hope Xenia's shock, horror and anger that is her motivation for going with them after five years in hiding and making a semiconfortable new life is coming through!

[Jennie Baron]

Yes, just when you're (semi)comfortable and have it all sewn up, live throws you a curve. That makes a good story.

[SpeedyHobbit Armstrong]

Most definitely! I think every reader has experienced that in some way! With Xenia, just eeesh talk about turbulent twenties brought to a whole new level!

[Sue Hart]

The review from Robby Tusiltala should tell you what you need to know. I admire him taking so much time to hand you advise that an editor would charge you for. If you haven't read his work, do. He is one of the best. As to my review, I think it has great possibilities. Work on it and iron out the kinks and then repost.

[SpeedyHobbit Armstrong]

I admire Robby as well. He is an amazing writer and an amazing person and deserves the world for going so out of his way and devoting so much of his time to help his fellow authors. I shall definitely be working on revisions here once Fallen Ones revision and inserting chapters between some of the ones I.already have is done!

[Kaira_Writer]

This chapter or story was very interesting.

[SpeedyHobbit Armstrong]

Thank you!

[kumars]

nice carry on...,,............

[SpeedyHobbit Armstrong]

Thanks! (:

[FlatLineBeauty]

I enjoyed this chapter and how creative you are between all the characters and the plot. I could really see your work being published when it is finished. The only thing I suggest is like Raconteur is just a little bit of proof reading. Hope all is well with you hun. :) xo Winter

[SpeedyHobbit Armstrong]

Thanks for the review! Life is complicated but things could definitely be worse! Hope all is well with you as well!

[Robert Tusitala O'Neill]

I will trust you that you want honest criticism and help. First off, proof-reading I noticed it should be "were" and not "was" in "...the very few clothes Xenia decided WERE practical..." I would break up the last sentence of the third paragraph into two lines...I love long sentences, but this gets a bit confusing with many commas, at least to me. I really appreciate your excellent use of great diction here. I think some of the interchange between Folco and Xenia can be combined into larger paragraphs. I also have a general comment that is meant to inspire. This is a great write up of the goings on in this world, and very detailed. However, there isn't quite as much interplay between passive reading and active reading as I would think would really serve it well. I would intersperse more passive tangents into it, by say, going on a bit longer about scenery in one place, and other places kind of crowd the stage direction part of it...like this guy going there and doing this thing...Folco eating, etc. It is hard to understand this, I know, but when you read something like Tolkien, there is a LOT of description. I would say it is almost too much. In your case you are giving good description, but you know how some soups are better lumpy? I would say that writing is like that. Sometimes you want it to be chunky and have areas of deep description, and then other areas you want thinner, easier to read bits. It gives the work texture. I am really not complaining about your writing, but in a VERY superficial way I think it would do well with more texture. If I read it a few more times I would get deeper into it, and I might miss that and not care about the texture, but sometimes making the reader aware of your skill at writing is not bad. You have to skill to show off! I really like your good use of vocabulary too though, I want to emphasize that. You are using the perfect words in all the right places. I would just think more in "scenes" -almost like camera angles. You are describing well, but in a good movie there are some times the director will put something in-between the camera and the actors intentionally...Like you will be looking through a bush at what is going on, or a window lattice. It adds "dynamism." I think your writing could have dynamism. It isn't a flaw to occasionally make the reader work a little harder to understand. It is actually fun for them. Since you write well, I am telling you the things I think you could do to kind of be flashier, to make people take notice of your writing more. If you were a musician I would be telling you that you play your instrument beautifully and now you just need to put on a more flamboyant show on stage...you know? Work the crowd a little. This is a beautifully written framework, now just work in a little more flash! I hope you take this as positive and constructive and get what I am saying. I am kind of saying, "Expand!" Don't remove anything, just add a little more in the way of extended imagery and such, taking off from what you have already written.

[SpeedyHobbit Armstrong]

This is a very belated thank you, but thank you so much! I shall definitely contemplate the scenery around the characters and launch into some description!

I'll also fix the typos you indicated and others O find. I've finally had time away where my mind won't autocorrect what's there and make me miss them!

[Robert Tusitala O'Neill]

That time away is an essential part of the writing process for me. I wholeheartedly support letting your writing age like a fine wine and be presented when it is actually ready...There may even be a few stages to the process...For example, you not only age wine but you also open the bottle and let it sit or decant it before drinking. You must wait for it to be ready. I think your writing is maturing and I am proud of you.