What am I doing? Divya thought, letter in her hands and feet carrying her towards the closest occupied table. This is mad. Only an absolute looney would come across a mysterious letter and actually go through with what it says.
"Hi!" She all but squeaked, likely scaring this poor man sitting in front of her.
Divya was already beginning to feel lightheaded from all of the adrenaline that was probably rushing through her veins. She continued despite her heart hammering in her chest. Her brain, mouth, vocal cords — all moving against her volition.
"This is gonna sound a wee bit strange," she prefaced before pushing on. "I found a letter in this book, and it has a sort of... task in it? A simple challenge, really. Along with a handful of questions to answer."
She held it out for him to examine — physical proof that she wasn't approaching him out of the blue for no reason at all.
"It's all put together in the name of encouraging — from what I gather at least — people to take a break from prolonged periods of time in the library... which, of course, is a bit counter-productive because isn't it a place meant for that?"
An awkward chuckle bumbled out of her mouth in a shaky breath.
"Anyway, I was wondering... on the off chance that you're bored in the midst of what I'm sure is very important work, that you might be open to sparing an absolute stranger 15 minutes of your time to go on a bit of a cheeky side quest?"
Remind her to ask Oona what they call those machines used to euthanise livestock. She wanted one ordered to her door immediately and for her friend to administer the kill shot. This was all her therapist's fault... telling her to take risks and "get out of her comfort zone". Did she ever consider that the side effects of that might be Divya's death? Because she was sure the speed at which her heart was racing right now warranted medical attention.
Is this what the fortune teller meant? Divya wondered as she dangled thirty feet above the ground from a rope made of her bedsheets. This feels very familiar.
The soft scrape of fabric against stone drew her attention. It wasn’t her, she knew how to muffle her movements. A glance upward calmed her racing heart – no one was leaning out of the window of her guest suite, ready to call for the guards. Turning while hanging from a twisting bedsheet wasn’t easy, but she managed to get herself oriented, and discovered the source of the noise.
“Hey,” the shape a few feet over and a story down said. The dark hid most of the person’s features, but the voice sounded male and about her age.
She sighed. “Duke Adrian, I presume?” The castle was full of guests for tomorrows wedding, but there was only one young man her age in residence.
“I’m not likely to be duke of anything after this,” he said. She looked closer and saw what the darkness had hidden. He too was clinging to the side of the castle, but he seemed to have lost his grip on his rope, saved only by the window ledge he was now hanging from. “Would you mind perhaps kicking that rope a little closer?” he asked.
She swung her foot at it, missed, and swung again, her foot making an unpleasantly loud noise against the stone, and finally nudged the rope (actual rope, stronger than her bedsheets but not as easy to grip, evidently) into his reach. His hand, when he caught it, shook.
“How long have you been there?” she asked, shimmying down a knot in her sheets. Her feet were now level with his head.
“Long enough to start wondering if I should just jump the rest of the way,” he said. His tanned skin was white knuckled around his rope, but he wasn’t moving from the ledge. She slid down another knot so she could look him in the eye. His dark hair was more tousled than it had been when they’d been introduced that morning. Well, their parents had been introduced. They had stood demurely two steps behind, sneaking the occasional glance at their future spouse.
“You’d break your legs, if not your neck,” she informed him. She had carefully calculated how many bedsheets she needed to request from various servants in order to safely make it to the ground, so she was fairly confident in this assertion.
“That would spare me the indignity of being discovered frozen here in the morning,” he said.
“Nonsense,” she said briskly, climbing a bit below him. “It’s not cold enough for that. I’m sure they could thaw you in time for our nuptials.”
“It’s certainly a good bit colder than I’m used to,” he muttered distractedly, taking a shaking breath and stepping from the ledge, putting his weight on the rope.
“Speaking of, what exactly was your plan?” she wanted to know. “Your school is the first place they’ll look for you, and while I don’t know what kind of education young men get, I doubt it includes evasion and wilderness survival.”
“The plan is not well thought out,” he admitted. “I may have panicked a little. I thought perhaps I could be a farmer.”
She snorted, but that was close enough to her own plan that she thought she shouldn’t judge. She reached the last knot in her bedsheets and released a slow breath, preparing to drop.
“I should assume you’re just out for a midnight stroll, then?” he asked, his voice tight as he lowered himself. His descent involved a great deal more scrambling than hers had. “Thought you’d familiarize yourself with the castle via the outer walls?”
“My plan had to be hastily constructed after your mother informed me of her expectations of a daughter-in-law,” Divya said, grunting quietly as she hit the ground. She wished she could take at least one of the bedsheets with her, but the blanket she had stuffed into her bag would have to suffice. “You’ve had weeks to think of something better.”
“My father also took me aside to instruct me of my ‘manly duties’,” Adrian said. His path had taken him to another window, and he gratefully stood on the sill. “Until then I thought we could make this work.”
“What, you’re that repulsed by me?” Divya asked, a smile playing on her lips.
“I assure you, my repulsion had less to do with you and more to do with the things he believes will be required to ‘break you to heel’.”
Divya’s gut clenched, but she nodded briskly even though he couldn’t see her. “Yes, that was the impression I got from your mother. If I’m to be married off to the highest bidder, I’ll not be treated as a second class citizen in my own home.”
“Not everyone here thinks like they do,” he said softly. He looked like he was trying to make himself start climbing again but couldn’t quite manage it. “Cook was thrilled to have an Ashralan to cook for. She was so disappointed that you hadn’t brought any spices for her to play with.”
“That’s very kind of her, but still a little racist,” Divya said. “You guys know I haven’t even been to Ashrala? Also, are you coming down anytime soon? Patrols could find us at any moment.”
“You could leave without me,” he said, but he cautiously stepped from the ledge and squeaked as his rope spun wildly.
“We might not have managed to get married, but I think we may as well be in this together.”
“Cool. Great. So glad I’ll be able to look you in the eye after you’ve seen me like this.”
“Oh, don’t be so dramatic. You’re almost to the ground, anyway.” He wasn’t, not really, but since she’d decided to keep him encouragement was necessary.
It took much longer for him to slide the last ten feet than her entire descent had, but eventually he had both feet on the ground, followed quickly by both hands. “I’m never leaving you again,” he told it.
