After a stressful day of avoiding the prince at the academy, it was finally time to head to the palace. Mary and I would make the announcement there, and then we would either get chased out by an angry heir to the throne, or escape quietly before he puts things together. It was not a pretty plan, but neither was it a complex one, so that would hopefully save us some complications. Chella was taking a carriage off to the side which we would hopefully be able to escape to, so Mary and I were sat in the most ostentatious thing I was able to rustle up. It practically screamed undeserved wealth on the outside, but at least it was also the most comfortable thing that I had ridden in yet. Clearly, no cost had been cut with the suspension system so that it could handle the weight of all the extra decoration and flare. The most important part though, was that nobody who laid eyes on it would forget it any time soon. Anyone the prince was likely to send to harass us would hopefully just wait next to the carriage and miss us completely.

Personally, I felt over dressed for what was purported to be just a tea party, but Mary had insisted that I be wearing the formal robes of court nobility. They were soft sure, but they were also black and trapped heat like a down jacket. With the sun beating down in the full force of early-afternoon, I felt like I was going to sweat more liquid that I'd be consuming. Mary on the other hand got to wear a beautiful emerald green lace dress that was definitely less sweltering and probably easier to move in than the swaddle that I was wearing too.

As we pulled up to the main entrance I was greeted with just how large a tea party could be. A circus of colors had taken over the street and an army of guards were checking in guests. Even with all of the chaos going on, there was a noticeable parting to make way for us. I climbed out first, but was somewhat chagrined that Mary didn't wait for me to rearrange my robes and offer her a hand before she got out herself. While there were definite benefits to being a man, the opportunities to escape from stoicism were few and far between. To lose out on one of those moments because this world had found a way to make clothes more inconvenient than the apparently not yet invented high heel was infuriating.

After seeing what we had rode in on, the guards were quick to let us through. The inside of the palace was the same as it had been depicted in the game. A grand corridor leading to an audience chamber with portraits of previous kings along the walls. The huge doors that led to the audience chamber were propped open to allow guests to come and go as they pleased, but it wasn't hard to pick out the guards who still watched the entrance from the partygoers. The most ridiculous part though, was that a tea party had a crier assigned to announce the arrival of each new guest. When it was our turn, I couldn't help but cringe from the boy who was near screaming just an arm's length away. There were about a dozen tables set with food, but at least this was appropriate to the occasion. A couple servants were wandering around with still steaming kettles, but all in all it looked more like a ball than a tea party.

When the prince approached us I started into a slight bow, but Mary just stood her ground without giving the slightest show of respect. This didn't seem to surprise him. Rather, he didn't break his stride as he reached out, grabbed her hand, then kissed it.

"I'm so glad that you came, Marilynne."

"Of course, your highness. With you personally inviting me, how could I refuse?" Mary said. "I also happen to have an important announcement to make, so could I borrow the crier to get the attention of all those in attendance?"

"There's no need for that," the prince said with an ever-broadening smile. He clapped his hands in the air and the guards stationed on the periphery of the room slammed the butts of their spears into the floor with a resounding thud. All the guests in attendance turned to look at the prince who in turn yielded to Mary.

"As I'm sure all of you are aware, my engagement has been a topic of contention for some time now."

The murmuring started, but was quick to die down when the prince raised his hand. His smile was starting to look more and more smug as I watched it. It wasn't a side that he revealed in the game, but it probably would've been more surprising if the crown prince didn't end up with an inflated sense of confidence and entitlement. Nevertheless, this wasn't exactly a good sign for how he would react to what was coming.

"And I have recently come to a decision."

The murmuring erupted once again, but the prince wasn't as in a hurry to stop it this time. He let himself bask in the attention for a couple seconds before finally stopping them. I was tempted to start my shuffle toward the side door that would be our exit. It shouldn't have been necessary to draw this out and snub the prince like this.

"Just last seventh day I entered into a formal engagement with––" and she dragged me forward, almost making me trip on my robes, "––Darren Masler."

The clamor was almost deafening. The prince just stood there with a look of confusion and the guards watched on impassively. I did my best to walk with confidence while at the same time not tripping over myself, and together with Mary we made our exit. Mary had been fairly confident that the prince would do something colossally stupid like try to arrest us, but we made our way to the unmarked carriage without trouble.

We were barely seated by the time Chella got us moving toward the Wellsworth estate and away from the palace. It was still bright out, so it didn't at all feel like the night chase that I had built up to be in my mind. It didn't help that Mary was giggling to herself.

"Was that entirely necessary?" I asked her.

"Don't act like you wouldn't have done the same. I still remember that time with Lorn in the classroom. And it looks like we got away with it."

"You got away with it, I had nothing to do with it. I only vaguely remember getting that money out of Lorn, but it definitely wasn't nearly as dramatic as that."

Our banter was broken up by a rough patch in the road and the carriage coming to an abrupt stop. I could make out some shouting through the sound insulating frame of the coach, but none of the words were clear enough to understand. I crept up to the door to try and see what was going on. Judging from the rocking, something was still going on, but I couldn't see anything out the door. Mary was fumbling with a knife in her off-hand, but it looked more likely that she would cut herself than anyone else, so I tried to wave her off. Without looking back, I slowly opened the door and poked my head out.

The street was completely empty. The handful of stands that should've been hawking wares were left unmanned and the doors to shops were all closed. I shed the outermost robes to gain a bit of freedom of motion. The sound of a struggle was coming from the driver's seat at the front of the carriage. Luckily, it hadn't but particularly hard to hide a sword in the flowing robes. I slowly drew it from its sheath, trying not to let it scrape too noisily on its way out. The tang of blood reached my nose and I fought to keep my breathing quiet and steady. I hopped down from the carriage with the sword held out in front of me. The struggle had apparently ended, so I didn't try to wait for an opportunity. This would be the best I got.

There were four of them, all wearing the same brown cloaks with the hoods up. Chella was bound and gagged, and the scent of blood seemed to be from a wound on her head. They clearly weren't just here to talk, so I charged in. The closest one of them had their back turned, so they didn't react until the blade was well through their chest at which point they coughed and then sagged to the ground. I pulled back to free my sword, but the other three were already on me. I was barely in time to dodge out of the way of the first already bloody club, but the second caught me on the shoulder as I spun. I soldiered through the pain and swung my sword in a low arc with my spin and felt it catch against something. My momentum carried the cut through and I heard a wet grunt above the throbbing in my shoulder.

Two down and two to go. The one who I had dodged was somewhere behind me and the last one was circling around toward the still open door of the carriage. Mary would have to fend for herself. I turned around, barely in time to catch my assailant's downswing with my sword. Rather than disengage, I let the sharp steel of the sword dig into the hard wood. Even with the disadvantage in leverage, I was making progress in pushing the club off to the side. Then pain blossomed from the back of my head. Stupid.

***

I awoke in the dark. It smelled like mold and sitting water. The rope chafed against my wrists and legs. I wasn't gagged, but that just made it even less likely that any help would be forthcoming if I did try to call out. I waited like that, silent, for what seemed like quite a long time. Maybe they were trying to get a ransom out of Duke Wellsworth, or maybe they hadn't even figured out who we were yet. We were dressed richly enough, but the whole point of our carriage switch had been to disguise the obvious affiliations. The problem of course, was that run-of-the-mill kidnappers wouldn't be going after wealthy horse-drawn carriages in the middle of the afternoon.

I heard the click of a lock being unlocked, and then saw a hint of light the shape of a door frame. The hinges of the door were well-oiled enough that they didn't make a sound as the door swung open. I watched as the two surviving cloaked figures stalked into the room. They flanked a gaunt looking woman of probably fifty years. Short blonde hair fell down to her shoulders and blue green eyes took in my trussed up form.

"You're awake I see."

"Yup."

"So, Darren Masler, heir apparent to House Masler, why do you think you've been brought here like this?"

I held my silence and it stretched on for a while. The two cloaked figures shifted uncomfortably, but the woman just watched me, unblinking.

"Ma'am, he isn't talking," said the cloaked figure on my left.

"No, he isn't. Let me explain then. Your father had quite a few debts. The trouble is, it's hard to seize collateral when the loan isn't the type that you can bring to a court. That means that we really only have one choice when we want to collect. And since you didn't respond to our missives, we took a more direct approach in getting you here."

The splinter that I had found on the back of the chair was both strong and sharp. I had managed to line it up with the rope securing my wrists, but using it to saw against the rope also sawed it against my wrists. I couldn't work at it while keeping a straight face in front of my interrogators.

"We're well aware of the scale of your operations, so it isn't an issue of whether you have the assets to seize. We were the ones who bankrolled those in the first place, so we should know. No, the issue is that they seem to have disappeared. And now, you're going to tell us where they went."

"You picked the wrong time to get me if you wanted this quiet. I wouldn't be surprised if the inquisition was breaking down every damn door in the city right now."

"You think we took the Wellsworth girl too?" she laughed, "We left a couple calling cards, so I'm sure that your Chief Justice is taking what he can get and leaving well enough alone. I doubt your little engagement will last out the week."

The rawness of my wrists just made the pain worse. There was no sign of them numbing even as I felt a trickle of blood seep into the rope. I winced involuntarily at the agony of it, but my interrogators took it as my reaction to the news that I wouldn't be getting help any time soon.

"Now if you aren't going to tell us while we're being cordial, we can of course give you some appropriate incentives if that is your preference."

"I just told them to hide. I have no idea where they might be."

The woman smirked at that. She brought out a familiar looking pouch and waved it in front of me.

"I'm sure you know what this stuff is. You've been selling this poison for long enough that I'm sure you also know what it does to a person. How much they start to need it, and what always ends up happening. But you think that you're a noble, so your will is strong enough to resist, right? Don't worry though, there's nothing special about inbred blood. You're the same as the rest of us in all the ways that really matter."

I stared at the pouch of kiff. She was right and she was wrong. I knew exactly what it did to a person.

"Brave. Hold him."

The cloaked figure who had spoken up got behind me and clamped down on my shoulders and then the other forced open my mouth. I put up token resistance, but didn't put much effort into it. The woman held my nose and poured the drug down my throat. The dose was far more than what was remotely safe, though safe wouldn't be the word that I would use to describe kiff.

It didn't take long for the stuff to hit me and the colors started to spin. Everything was saturating and blurring together. I didn't even try to focus it, I just let the high wash over me. The relief was everything that I knew.

***

I was starting to come down from my incapacitating high. My interrogators had left sometime while I wasn't paying attention, so I was once again in the dark. Everything still spun round and round even without any light to see. I tried once again with the splinter. I could feel the sensation of it cutting away at my skin, but it didn't come with the pain that it had. It made it easier to wear away at the still somewhat wet rope.

When I was sitting in a hospital bed, it had been inevitable that my pondering would eventually stray into the realm of medicine. I had spent one particularly boring day theorizing about the mechanics of reincarnation. If one assumed that magic didn't exist, then how would it work? In theory, the human nervous system, more specifically the brain, is responsible for consciousness. That means that your thoughts, your very existence, is made out of some combination of chemical reactions and electrical signals. Then is it enough to transplant the brain from one body to another? But there are also hormones made elsewhere in the body which affect brain function, so how much of personality is linked to those factors not directly located in the brain and how much is going to be taken along?

Thankfully, it didn't seem like my tumor was brought along for the ride when I was reincarnated, so whatever happened was at least somewhat selective about what it took. On the other hand, whatever controlled that selectivity either couldn't be bothered to separate out some other less desirable parts, or it had deemed that my dependences were more closely linked to my personality that I would like to think. In particular, since I was a terminal patient, the doctors hadn't felt the need to limit my painkiller intake. It hadn't taken long before I started to feel the need for more even after reincarnating. Some of my tolerance must have come as part of the package too. With how much they poured down my throat, I should've been convulsing for the better part of the night, not basically lucid long before they returned.

I felt the rope finally snap and my hands were free. I took the time to roll out my shoulders before I got to work at untying the knots keeping my ankles bound together. It didn't take long before I could move around freely within the cell that they were keeping me in. I still couldn't see much of anything, but I was able to feel my way around and get a sense of the place. The room was a square of about three strides a side. The walls were made of carved out stone, so this was somewhere underground.

In a way, I felt like a secret agent. Caught by an evil organization, I would break my way out and then foil their plans. The woman who had interrogated me would have been the perfect mastermind if she hadn't looked like she was still recovering from malnourishment. I was even a little disappointed that they hadn't taken Mary too. Way to not live up to your role as the evil organization. At least they had admitted to being what amounted to loansharks, so they weren't completely without the need to monologue.

I was only able to locate the door based on the crack between the edge of the door and the wall. On this side at least, there was no handle. It didn't swing outwards, so I tried my luck digging my fingers in, but all that left me was a couple broken nails. I hadn't even noticed they had broken off until the blood had made my grip slip. That just left waiting for them to come back for another round. Funnily enough, the ever-spinning darkness just felt like home.