Jesmaine Polliet's Point Of View

Why... why did this happen? Even after I had concluded that things could have gone better with Lily if we had just properly looked into things.

Why didn't I apply that to Jacques?!

'He really just wanted to talk with you,' Helena had said.

I didn't want to believe something like that. I didn't want to believe that the one hour question sessions had in any way been just about talking.

No... more than that... I didn't want to believe anything Helena was saying... because it would make me a terrible person.

I would have told people that got their families kidnapped and killed that the killer wasn't so bad. I would have tried to convince them that he was a good guy... and I... I complained to the handmaidens about Jacques for so long. I never said anything good of him, and I called him more evil than the one causing the deaths in their families so certainly. That's why they had been shocked. That's why they'd tried to convince me afterwards to reconsider my words while being unable to look at me.

I don't want that. I don't want to be the mean ignorant person. I'm not that kind of person.

It had to be a lie... but the letter was nothing like what Helena told me. The villain... my capturer, my fiancé... let me go. The one thing I never thought he would do because I was his possession. Helena was in just as much shock as I was for a moment, but then more... because she didn't know anything but Catarina's words.

She had never been there when Jacques visited me and I never spoke to him first or elaborated in what he asked me. Even... even if I try to argue that it was an interrogation and not a conversation, I never responded a lot. I never gave him the chance to talk. I never asked things back either. I don't know how his days went or what he spent them on. I don't know his hobbies or his family relationships. I don't know if he has friends, nor anything about him.

Every time I baked and he would appear I always did the same. He would at times if he could taste, but I didn't want to let him so I always used an excuse. Then I called him evil straight to his face and in front of the people under him. I humiliated him even though he told the truth. Doesn't that make me the evil person? There's no way he would stay with someone like that.

...but...

Why would he not tell me?! If he knew I was misunderstanding things for that long, then why would he not tell me?! Why would he let me hurt him and everyone around me for so long?!

The door to the room open and some of my handmaidens step in. Banishment. I was no longer an interest to the crown so I couldn't stay, and Jacques wouldn't see me. At this point the last thing I said to him would have been accusations and cruel words!

I want answers!

I turn from where I had been standing and run for the window in the cream colored lace dress. As the fabric hits my legs I vaguely remember having been angry at Jacques when I thought he tried to buy my love with it. Streams of memories run through my mind with these pointless things I notice. Even the flat shoes from when I told him I dislike high heels. I'd been planning this escape for a long time now, so I know I can just barely squeeze through the vertical bars because of my body's small frame and the corset the handmaidens insisted I wore underneath the dress. Jacques never bought me these. Had I told him I hated them? My leg, shoulder and head passed through fairly easily. The problem came after that, and the handmaidens were dropping their things in a panic.

I wriggle and twist to get through and my breasts are almost squished flat rather painfully, but I get through. I do have one more trick up my sleeve, and it's two spells I worked quite hard on perfecting while I was at the academy.

A good deal of our magic lessons as nobles is spent on 'research'. That is learning and developing new spells.

You can cast spells always, no matter what is around you, but if you cast and use elements in your surroundings then the mana cost is drastically reduced. Another important thing is the range for this. Jacques placed me all the way up here so that the ground would be out of range, so that I would spend most of my mana trying to get down, and wouldn't be able to get out. Though, that doesn't matter anymore. I don't need to run, I just need to find him.

I focus on the spell structure while wriggling my butt through the bars. Everything clicks into place as it should like a puzzle or a clockwork, and I determine the size and direction and blast the spell from above me and down to the ground.

I gave it the misleading name 'Stone Javelin'. In reality it kind of works like that, but the javelin size can be so big that you can practically use it as a fire pole. That was my plan. I glance back to the handmaidens grasp at my dress and then grasp the pole and jump onto it while pulling the hem of my dress away with them. I clamp my thighs around the pole and place an arm so the pole is in the hook of the elbow. I use the last hand for balance and begin to slide down, ignoring the calls of the hand maidens from up above.

I look below me and honestly expect guards to come running from the cloister below and catch me sliding down. Should I stop at a floor above and attempt to get inside there? Perhaps if they don't know I've been banished yet, they'll let me go? Jacques is obsessive with security and control over who is doing what and who is at the castle at all times.

I slide past the window. He will tell the guards around him and they will spread out. I should have at least a couple of minutes before things start moving and security becomes aware of what is happening. I just about reach the ground when someone steps out of the cloister and stops by the pole... looking up at me...

My heart sinks dejected at first at the thought of it being a palace guard, but it isn't. It is Jacques.

There is a bitter rush through my body as I clench harder onto the pole and reach a standstill just out of his reach if he jumps.

But... with his face there in front of me it all wells up again and it all bursts out. The months of waiting with no answer. The shock of the truths I had just found out, and the anger that he had kept me ignorant for so long.

"Why didn't you tell me?!"

I stare at him and try to read his expression. Did I ever look at him directly? Seeing that calm expression makes me sure I did, because it makes my chest burn with frustration. Never surprised. Never flustered. Never off his game. That's the kind of man he is. He doesn't answer for a while so I yell at him again for some sort of answer.

"Why?! Why would you let me hurt you and everyone around me for so long?! Why would you let me stay ignorant? Am I that untrustworthy?! I kept my secret for so long, I would never have told anyone! I could have helped you and we could have been close! Why?"

He watches me calmly and then steps up to the stone pole, grabbing it with a hand.

"You would have suffered more," he responded in a perfectly calm voice as though it obvious and reasonable.

"You don't know that!" I yell back down at him. His shoulders lift and then sink. Did he just sigh?

"Don't sigh at me! This is your fault for not telling me! If you'd told me everything would have been fine! I wouldn't have hated you. I wouldn't have been mean to you. I wouldn't have distrusted you. I-"

"Jesmaine!"

He snaps at me, but I'm not done.

"No! I'm not done! I will make you listen this time! I won't let some-","Jesmaine!","-thing like this happen again! I will be good! I won't hurt you again. I'll make sure not to get tricked again. I won't complain about the guards or the handmaidens again."

"Jesmaine!"

"No! I did some horrible things to you. Even though you cared I always treated you coldly and-"

Everything just bursts out on its own as warm tears begin trickling down my cheeks and my voice slowly begins to distort with sobs. My view goes blurry and I wipe my eyes with a free hand as I prepare to continue. Though, when I look down to where Jacques was before, he's now gone and instead he's in front of me, holding himself up by the hands and what I assume to be his feet to let me cling onto the pole too.

His eyes stare straight into mine, but when I try to speak he gently covers my lips with a hand... for some reason I hadn't noticed till now... but his brows have furrowed in sadness and frustration as well.

"It is fine. Jesmaine," he says softly with this frown on his lips.

"No it isn't!"

He moves his hand back to hold him up and press his lips into a line... then sighs and... kisses my forehead just once. A light peck, but the most gentle gesture he's ever given. Yet... the pained look in his eyes is still there... why would he do something so kind if he was hurting? Why is he saying things are fine?

"Jesmaine... even if you saw me as a villain when you came here, you have known me for eight years... My wish to protect you became imprisonment, isolation, stalking and domination. Presents, necessities- anything I gave to you became bribes to you. Most importantly, the time I spent with you was something you hated... during these eight years nothing I have not been able to make you consider even once that I was not the villain you perceived me to be. The life in a castle is not one for you, Jesmaine, and I am not the person that should stay at your side for the rest of your life. There is nothing wrong with that. It is fine."

What am I supposed to reply to words like that? He's not lying, but the truth he tells hurts. I don't want to hear it. I don't want to be reminded of everything that has happened and how I've ignored it all. I don't want to hear the pain he's in though I was the one to say it first... yet, when he looks at me like I took his heart out of his chest and carelessly tossed it to the side I cannot look away and ignore it. I never wanted to hurt someone and yet... without thinking... but why is he the one comforting me? I should be the one to comfort him and tell him that he has not done things wrong. Is it because I still feel that he did me wrong? That I cannot let go of what I thought of him till now?

"I was planning to send you off for a while to somewhere you'd be happy. Seeing as you enjoy the mountains and their vegetables, I found a good place quite far towards our northern border. It took a while to find, but you will have Helena by your side to make you smile. You two should be safe from the wars and Gilbert's people there until the end of the war," he says gently in an almost soothing and warm voice as if to make me imagine the gentle mountain breeze.

Wait... no... don't go that direction again.

"I can help! Don't shut me out!" I burst out as I realize what he is trying to do. My tears don't stop rolling, but Jacques' weak and forced smile doesn't disappear... The pain in his eyes makes my stomach twinge.

"I am sorry, Jesmaine. You are not suited for the horrors of war, and neither is Helena."

I puff up a bit at his words and feel more tears pouring over. 

"But Catarina is?!"

She's a woman too, and Helena said she went to the battlefield. In the end he just wants to push me away, but I want to help. If I can help make peace, even just a little, then I will.

"Catarina was a guy in his previous life."

...eh? The words were said without the slightest bit of hesitation. There's not a hint of a joke or lie on his face, just the same look as when he says something I don't want to believe. My mind flashes to Catarina, but before I can properly consider the consequences of the words he just said, I feel a hand on my head as he gently rubs it for a few moments... then withdraws it awkwardly.

"One day you will have someone good for you, Jesmaine, and so will I, but that time is not now. When the war is over we will need to rebuild connections with Ristaze I will call upon your help to work on this. Until then I need you away from here somewhere safe where Ristaze won't reach you. Your time to help and bring peace will come once the storm has settled. I promise."

My stomach sinks at his words as he gently, but firmly settles in stone that he will not negotiate the annulment of the engagement nor the banishment. Despite that I feel like I have seen more of him than ever before. Hints of a weak side to him that I thought he didn't have... yet after saying those words it all fades away like he blocks it back up in a dam. Bitter regret lingers in my chest.

Perhaps he had shown me before but I'd never noticed. I'd never properly looked him in the eyes other than when I was irritated with him. I've been a shameful excuse for a fiancé, and a cold person. Even if just once, I should have taken the chance to look at him properly as he followed me around rather than regret it now.

"I am sorry... Jacques..." I slip out before bursting into tears. I feel my grasp on the pole lighten, and one of his arms wrap around me tightly as we slide slowly to the ground. When we reach the ground he lifts me into his arms for a moment and lets me cry out on his shoulder until Helena arrived.

He pushes me back gently and lets Helena take me from his arms.

—-*—-

Jacques' Point Of View

I had Jesmaine and Helena sent away from here about an hour ago.

I don't want to even lift a pen for the rest of the day, but as expected such luxury is beyond my grasp with everything going on. Be it the war with Ristaze, the ghostly information reports that need to be sorted and dealt with, Catarina and of course... that...

"Jacques~"

Catarina. The exotic beauty known as a wise tyrant... but a tyrant none the less.

"What?" I try to reply calmly while determining what to do about the corrupt boatman that is shipping in Ristaze spies at the coast.

"Where is Jes-chan?"

I note that I visibly twitch at her words and grab myself in nearly rubbing my arm.

"I sent her away. She won't be coming back."

Remember how I told you that Catarina was a pain because he believes he knows everything about every character in his game?

"...so you locked her up in the basement with Helena? You really go too far. She won't forgive you for this you know."

Look.

I decide not to look up from my papers and just ignore him while holding in another sigh. I don't want to think about what happened with Jesmaine. The less Catarina mentions it the better.

I wasn't going to meet Jesmaine until one of the ghostly handmaidens said Helena went against the order of not telling Jesmaine almost immediately. At that point I figured Jesmaine might try to do something like try to track me down and yell at me until she had her fill. As much as she usually just sucks it up, she blows her fuse when everything gets too much... and I ended up being right. I said what I needed. She is free now.

You think I should have stayed with her? There was nothing there to save. Even if her preconception is gone and I keep giving everything, the place where she belongs is somewhere more peaceful than at my side. She will fly from this gilded cage that is royalty and probably find a better life in the mountains. I've arranged for everything she will need there and a witty young handmaiden to stay with her to keep her out of trouble. When this war is over, she will no longer be connected with the royal family.

The clouds are drawing together. It's probably going to start pouring soon.

Do I have regrets? Of course I do. I wish that I had noticed the degree to which she despised me sooner... and I wish that I'd gotten to taste one of her pastries just once. The look of the guards eating her pastries when I came to visit her with this guilty expression hit me quite hard the first time, since she always refused to even let me taste. Perhaps I should have noticed there? Or perhaps I should have noticed when she always kept a certain distance from me... 

Today was the first time she even allowed me to do something so intimate, and in the end it was for a goodbye. It feels more like I took advantage of her weakness and guilt... just as she tried to stay with me just to clear her guilt away... for other than guilt there was nothing like friendship or love. In the end I redirected her purpose. It was the best thing I could think of for both of us.

I've confirmed multiple times that Catarina's knowledge can fail. He may have things right for the most parts, but there are a lot of side effects to each thing that he has not considered. For example, I may be obsessive in protect those that matter to me... but that doesn't mean that I cannot see reason or cease to obsess over someone.

"I took care of that matter," Catarina says with a smile.

"Good. I assume he was not hurt as according to plan?"

Catarina groans for a moment.

"You should just have gotten rid of your father. He will never forgive Ristaze. It's easier that way."

Again, he forgets to consider extremists and people loyal to my father.

Mmm? You weren't told about this? How did you think I took control of the army or prevented my father from tearing Jesmaine apart after she called me those things? He intended to have her executed immediately which sped the plans up a bit. My father has no forgiveness towards anything from Ristaze. My younger brother was two years younger than me, and I was made to watch as father beat him to death for being the son of a female spy that had infiltrated as a concubine. Catarina only knows half of that story and its effects... 

I had my father put in house arrest surrounded by ghosts loyal to me, to prevent his ghost field from being effective and to keep him from Jesmaine. There might be civil war when it gets out that I took the throne from my father by force, though non-lethal, but before that House Salender will come at us directly. This castle is going to be crawling with spies, assassins and soldiers within a couple of months.

Your time to act is limited, Gilbert Salender. I wonder if you can kill us and prevent treason at the same time.