Heart's Key
FIVE

The sound of someone sneaking was as likely to get Leander’s attention as the sound of someone running, or the sound of someone pounding a war drum in his ear for that matter.

He awoke with a start. It was still dark though vibrant moonlight spilled into the room lighting the stones of the floor like each one of them was illuminated from within.

Leander rolled over and saw the trouble immediately.

The boys from the first row clearly worked in the blacksmith’s forge. They had fashioned a long pole with something on the end. They had placed it between the bars of the cage.

Leander sat up with interest. What were they doing?

When he realized what they were doing, he sniggered. The guys in the front row were really sore losers. Sure, they had scared all the other guys away, but none of them had been able to get the Maiden to choose them and take them away.

They had made some sort of grabbing hook and they were using it to first remove her blankets. They looked like they had tried to pull the hem of her dress up, but had been unsuccessful. One of them was hissing. “We’ve got to get the top button undone. That’s what all this has been for. Who cares about her legs?”

Leander got up, regretted sorely that Blueleg had made him enter the castle without his armor or sword, and then sauntered up to the cage. He leaned against it. “Whatcha doing?” he asked in a whisper.

They had hooked their instrument into the buttonhole of the dress and were tugging on it, trying to make the hole open up enough to swallow the button.

None of them appeared to notice him. With each tug, a finger width more of her cleavage came into view, only to disappear again when they were unsuccessful.

“That’s a really smart tool,” he said, a little louder.

They stopped collectively and turned to glare at Leander.

“This doesn’t concern you,” Agrite hissed aggressively.

“I just think you’re doing this all wrong,” Leander said, lowering his voice. “Can I try?”

“No! You just got here. Get lost,” Koe stormed. He was the one holding the hook.

“Okay, but I just want to ask you guys why you aren’t picking the lock instead of pulling at her clothes. What are you guys going to say to her when you scratch her beautiful bosom and she wakes up angry as a big scorpion? And what if she scars? Why aren’t you picking the lock and running off with her in the night?”

“Uh… that wouldn’t be a good idea,” one of the smaller fries contradicted.

“Why not?” Leander pressed.

“If we left the castle like that, all that we’d get would be a moat full of razor blades and three days through Spiknit Woods to still be in the middle of nowhere.”

Leander gawked unpleasantly for a second. How many times had he gotten lost in Spiknit Woods? It had taken him a week to reach the castle. It was three days for someone who knew where they were going? He kept his groaning inward and clenched his jaw on the smile he wore before he jumped into combat.

“Okay. Decide which one of you gets her beforehand, open the door, and let him take her. Everyone step aside and let Blueleg balloon you to wherever you want to go. Isn’t that how this normally works?”

The guys stepped away from the cage and started listening to Leander more carefully.

“How would we decide which one of us got her?” Agrite asked hesitantly.

“Like men?” Leander suggested, touching his nose. He had broken it twice. The first time had made it crooked and the second time had straightened it out.

“You’re saying we should fight over her?” Koe asked, like the idea was more alien than Leander—a grown man who had arrived at a glorified orphanage.

“Of course,” Leander said as though it was the most natural thing in the world. “How do you think we solve things in the real world? We have a disagreement and we fight over it. We champion the woman we want to bed, get it sealed with a holy kiss, and live happily ever after. Sometimes things get out of hand and we fight whole wars over land, over crops, over mines, over rivers, and best of all, over women. Don’t be fooled. If she chose you tonight, you’d have to fight for her honor repeatedly wherever you settled. She’s such a delicious morsel that if you married her, you might have to fight every night of the week just to stop her from becoming a sudden widow. Every man around her would want her to become a sudden widow… if you get my meaning.” Leander winked at them.

The men had suddenly lost a bit of their appetite.

“Every night?” one of the smaller boys asked, repeating what Leander had said.

“Definitely. I’d fight you tonight just to switch beds with you. Isn’t yours this one with the great view?”

“It’s mine,” Agrite said gruffly.

Leander smirked. He knew it was Agrite’s. “I’m just teasing, but I’m not joking about deciding between us who should get her and then picking her lock. From what I’ve heard, she’s had plenty of time to make up her mind. If she wasn’t going to decide for herself, she should have had her mind made up for her. Besides, whoever heard of a society where the women decide who they’re going to marry? That’s a man’s job.”

The guys were looking around amongst themselves. Leander noticed that it wasn’t just the knot of guys in the center. They’d woken up more and other men were sitting up in their beds listening.

“Hey,” a guy from the back yelled. “I’ve been holding back, but if you guys are going to duke it out, I want it on it. I could beat Agrite on his own, but not the whole posse.”

“We should set up a tournament!” Leander yelled in reply. “We’ll make rules and do this the gentlemanly way!”

During the next two hours, Leander busied the men by organizing heats. Someone brought him a slate with a white stone to write on it. Leander dropped the slate and instead started scratching white onto the wall. He made each man a symbol with which to represent himself since none of them knew how to write anything much beyond a few notches and numbers.

Occasionally, Leander looked over at the Maiden. The first time he looked, she had covered herself with her blanket. The second time, she had pulled her nightcap over her eyes. The third time, she had turned away from them and was looking for all the world like a prissy woman who was done with every single man she’d ever known.

Had she been awake the whole time? Was that why those idiots hadn’t been able to get her skirt up? She’d been consciously holding her hem down with her toes? That was probably why they hadn’t been able to get her top button off either. And here he thought he was saving her from a fate worse than death by keeping the men entertained when he was supposed to be sleeping.

Ugh… fecking waste of time.

The men weren’t ready to fight right away because nothing kept a bunch of men entertained as much as setting up the rules for a sporting match. They argued about the rules and who should fight who and in what order.

Mostly, Leander thought they were excited to think about literally anything other than the Maiden.

Finally, they agreed that the match would be over once someone hit the floor. They didn’t need to be unconscious, or dead, just on the floor. Leander thought that was a great idea.

So, they got their first two competitors ready. Leander bellowed through his fist like it was a bugle and started it.

The noise was amazing as all the men had utterly forgotten to whisper and now they were yelling advice to the fighter they bet would win.

Leander wasn’t looking at the fight. He was looking at the cage. Was their little maiden going to keep her head under the blankets and pretend that what was happening wasn’t really happening?

At that moment, a spectacular arch of blood spurted from the face of one of the fighters. Through the bloody arch, he saw her. She was standing at the bars and she wasn’t looking at the fighters or the blood spray. She was looking straight at Leander. Her green eyes were huge as saucers. Her stare was so wide, it was like he could see the reflection of her soul through her eyes, like seeing what was under the surface of the water. Whatever effect Leander had hoped to have on the Maiden, it was too late to choose now. She thought something and she thought it very strongly. Her fingers were white as she clasped the bars.

He smirked again, a beautiful feeling inwardly if not a beautiful expression outwardly.

Even if her falling in love with him was something he fantasized about before falling asleep, he did not need her to fall in love with him.

The guys in front of them were getting bloodied up. When one hit the floor, there were cheers of glee from half the men and groans of frustration from the other half.

“Oh, relax,” Leander said with a wicked grin. “It’s not like you had any money on that.”

“Well, something is on the line,” Stocking whined, before glancing back at the Maiden.

She was back in bed. Had any of them noticed her standing?

“Yeah, well, it’s not like you want either one of them to win that,” he said, turning her from a woman into a trophy with one word.

They were about to set up another match when Leander saw a little light breaking from over the window. “I’ll catch you guys tomorrow night,” he said as he flopped back on his own bed. “I’m wasted. Gotz to sleep.”

Without the ringmaster, the others didn’t know what to do. Some of them stayed up talking, but it wouldn’t have mattered what they did short of throwing Leander in the pond. He could sleep through most things and a bunch of his friends getting rowdy was one of them.