At the bottom of the staircase, Zaria stopped to look around. She knew that to the left, she would be able to get to the servant's quarters and likely into the main body of the first floor, but she wanted to leave. A light touch on her arm, and she was jumping to the side, whirling around with her hands up and ready to hit someone. She stopped when she saw Gu Cheng, his free hand falling to his side.
"I came in from the right. We are not far from a door in that direction."
"I know, that is the door that I escaped out of the last time. I was wondering if I should try and find the Duke's office to get my bracelet back. He said it was in his safe there..."
Gu Cheng sighed. "I don't know if there are a lot of guards deeper in this building. I will buy you another one when we get back."
"I guess he can't use it to track me anymore anyway," she muttered,turning to the right. A little round figure was standing just inside of the side entrance, wringing their apron between their hands. Zaria approached her hesitantly. "Matron Teague?"
The old woman looked up, and her face eased in relief when she looked at Zaria's face before sliding back to the man following her. "Oh, thank goodness you found her."
"You two have met?" Zaria eased herself along the wall and inched toward the door.
"She helped me escape the cells and told me how to get to that man's room." Gu Cheng walked up and nodded at the old woman politely. "Thank you." His eyes wandered back to Zaria, a painful lump in his throat. He could tell by the way that she was refusing to be too close or even look at him, that she still believed he had left her. That by itself would hurt, but the worst part was that she hadn't seemed angry. As though it was expected. Whether she thought that he would leave because of her actions or because he was that type of man, he didn't know. They needed to talk. "Matron Teague, did the Duke have a car stashed somewhere, or a motorbike?"
The old woman looked at him in confusion, then over to Zaria to translate. Zaria sighed and rested her hand on the handle of the door. "They don't have anything like that here, CEO Gu. We walk."
"You can take horses. I imagine that some of the guards won't need theirs anymore..." her voice trailed off and she began to wring her apron again. Her eyes fell on Zaria's feet, and she seemed to get some strength back. "Let me get you some shoes. You can't go out like that."
Zaria tried to protest, but the short figure was already hurrying down the hallway toward the servant's quarters. She shrugged and turned the handle of the door.
"Miss Joseph, please let her bring you some shoes."
She looked up at him suspiciously, and he swallowed the cold and angry words that wanted to come out. "She helped me escape because she felt guilty about letting everything happen. She couldn't have done anything differently, Miss Joseph, but she does not see it that way."
They waited without speaking until the frantic figure came rushing back, a pair of maid's shoes clutched in her hands. Matron Teague dropped to her knees and helped Zaria slip them on her feet, shooing the girl's hands away when she tried to take them from her. After attaching the last buckle, she stepped back against the wall. "I'm sorry." She said, tears in her eyes.
"You helped as well as you could, and you didn't have to. Thank you. "Zaria took one last look at her and walked out into the rain. She did not make a sound when Gu Cheng pushed her against the wall, his head moving back and forth quickly looking for threats. The visor of his hat protected his eyes from the rain, but Zaria had no such protection, so she leaned against the wall with her eyes half closed. When his hand reached out as thought to grab hers, she jerked upright and moved away, her hands clutched to her chest. Her eyes would not meet his, but a second later she was moving, following him closely as he led the way toward the front of the building.
They rounded the corner, and Zaria moved toward the gate, stopping when a hand was thrown out in front of her. Gu Cheng silently gestured toward the far side of the estate, and a large building that she could tell by shape must be the stables. The two gate guards moved to intercept them but were put down quickly, and there was no more opposition on the way there. Inside, the strong smell of animals hit them, noses wrinkling. Minutes later, Gu Cheng led a saddled horse outside. One foot went into a stirrup, and he launched himself into the air and onto the saddle. His knees tightened to hold himself in place before he reached his hands down to pull Zaria up. She frowned at him but relented and let herself be pulled up.
"We could have taken two," She argued, raising her voice to be heard over the sound of heavy rain.
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"Then we would have had to feed two." They rode out of the gates but stopped almost immediately, just past the edge of the outer wall. Gu Cheng dismounted and dashed into the trees, returning a few minutes later with a backpack on his back and a messenger bag slung across his body. A sword and scabbard were clenched in one hand. The pistol was back in it's holster and no other weapons were at the ready. He handed the sword up to her and then hauled his body up into the saddle.
"Those look like my bags." Zaria said it as a statement. He did not respond, and they set off, riding at a steady pace into the night. With the rain, it was hard to listen for the sounds of pursuit. As the night wore on, the storm wore itself out, and as the sky lightened with the dawn, there was only a drizzle. The one time she tried to lean and look around him to see she was barked at and told to sit still.
"Does the rain ever stop?"
"It might, soon." Zaria pressed her lips together, but he could hear the yawn she was trying to stifle. "The duke's curse made his magic go wonky, which caused the constant rain. He's dead now, so..."
The leather belt of the scabbard went around her waist to keep it from slipping from her fingers. It seemed looser than she remembered when she wore it during her mad dash over the wall. 'At least it won't fall off if I am sitting,' she thought to herself. The strain caused by trying not to bob back and forth with her legs flung over the side of the massive beast was making her thighs and back ache. Gu Cheng seemed to be consciously avoiding letting his arms knock into her body between them, and she didn't want to make it harder for him.
High overhead, a tiny break in the clouds let sunlight through, illuminating a large section of the road ahead. "Let me down, please," she requested as politely as she could when they reached the edge. Gu Cheng did not argue, dismounting first to help her down. His face grew dark, and the air picked up a sudden chill when she hesitated to fall forward into his outstretched arms.
"I can get down on my own," she said through chattering teeth. To demonstrate, she grasped the pommel of the saddle and held on tight as she lowered herself down and dropped to the ground. Her feet landed squarely in a large puddle. Mud splashed up onto her dress and oozed into her new shoes, and she wondered if she would be colder with or without the sodden jacket. She walked past the expressionless man, her tired feet shuffling slowly through the mud until she stepped into the bright patch of road. The jacket came off and went onto an even patch of road, and Zaria Joseph sat down on it in the sunbeam. The thought crossed her mind that purring would be appropriate, but she was satisfied with just closing her eyes and tilting her head up toward the sky.
A squish and a splash alerted her that someone was approaching from behind, and when she felt goosebumps rise up along her arms, she knew that it was Gu Cheng. She kept her eyes closed and tried to enjoy the sun but a pervasive chill leaked through the thin fabric of her mostly wet dress and she sneezed as she tugged the thin, wet fabric of her dress down over her bent knees to pull it off of her skin. Her clothing that she wore in the dungeon cell was never returned, and she was suddenly very self conscious of the fact that all she was wearing was a thin night dress that wanted to cling and show off the lack of panty lines beneath. When she sneezed again, a cold voice came from not far behind her.
"We should find somewhere to set up for a rest. You need to get out of your wet clothes."
Zaria sighed and opened her eyes, squinting against the abnormal brightness of the sun after so much rain and thickly clouded skies. "I just wanted a moment in the sun. I haven't seen the sun in...I don't know how long." She wrapped her arms around her knees and leaned her head against them. "Would you please turn away so that I can get up?"
A low voice responded, "Alright," and she listened for a moment as the footsteps moved farther away. Then she stood up, picking the now mud covered jacket from the ground, and slid her arms inside. The hem came half way down to her knees, and even thought it was soaked and she immediately felt the weight pressing her feet farther down into the mud, it provided coverage that she needed at that moment. Muddy velvet armor.
Ahead, she could see Gu Cheng standing with his back to her on the side of the road, his hands clenching and unclenching at his sides. She sighed and shuffled back toward him. "I'm alright now, thank you for letting me have that moment."
When Gu Cheng turned around she could see the muscle ticking in his jaw but the cold that seemed to come from him when he was angry was gone so she did not hesitate to try and get back onto the horse.
"Stop," he said, his voice low and difficult to hear from where he was standing several meters away. She paused and watched as he moved up alongside her, taking the reins and pulling them up and over the horse's head to lead it. "We need to head into the woods, I don't want to set up the tent where we are so visible."
They walked along the grassy stretch at the side of the road for a while before turning to pass beneath the trees. The trunks were spread far enough apart that the horse had no trouble picking it's way between them. When they encountered a large, slow flowing creek, they walked upstream through it, just as Zaria had done a week before with a creek who knows how far away. Her feet were numb, and several times, she stumbled in the water, righting herself before Gu Cheng could come back for her. The thin purple skirt of the nightdress wrapped around her legs, trying to trip her and drag her down into the calf deep water.
They finally came out onto soggy land. Gu Cheng led them another hundred meters through the woods before he stopped at a small clearing with a tiny stream running along the edge. He let go of the reins and let the horse graze on the green grass beneath their feet as he removed the bags and began to set up the tent. Zaria stood in another sunbeam shining down through the gap in the trees for a moment and then dug through the backpack until she came up with the black canvas package that held the alert system. Without rain and wind beating down, it might be able to do it's job and tell them if anyone was coming too close. By the time she was done stringing it up along the surrounding trees, the dark grey tent was pitched, and Gu Cheng was watching her with serious, dark eyes.