FIC: The Sapphire Monkey Job part 2/3

[jadaryl]

Eliot groaned as he opened his eyes. He threw an arm over his face as the daylight blinded him and frowned. It had been so long since he’d seen the sun. his mouth was so dry, his tongue felt like wool. His head spun as he sat up. He squinted at the sky, sighing at the warmth of the sun‘s rays. The sun had started to move down toward the horizon. He felt along his belt. His sword and knives were back in their places. He checked his purse and grimaced. Of course the rich bastard had taken everything. This was the one hazard of his work that he truly hated. Stealing random cac from one rich man for another did not bother him. They could afford it and sometimes it actually helped someone. Stealing from poor, hardworking commoners just because his heartless, mún air meisce balgair of a client robbed him blind was a different story. On the other hand, at least Damien had left him his tools of the trade. Nate had given him this sword. He didn’t want to have to replace it.

He pulled himself to his feet and looked around. Eliot gave a quiet, bitter laugh. The buidseach had dumped him exactly where he’d found him. He looked down at his hands. It was a good thing they didn’t hurt anymore. He wondered what his face looked like. Damien may have ended the spells, but Eliot seriously doubted the megalomaniac sadist would heal the physical wounds he’d dealt out.

Eliot walked toward the street in front of the pub. He almost wished it was a few hours later. It’d be easier to find some drunk stumbling into or out of the pub. A bhidse, it would be easier to find a game to bet on. He tripped and winced as he stumbled against the wall. Apparently that much of the spell had been real, even if the knives were not. He pushed away from the wall and kept walking. He’d worked with worse. Nothing Damien had done was intended to be fatal.

He sighed as he walked into the tavern and sat at a table in the corner. The familiar ambiance alone made him feel more at ease, more in control. A few men sat at tables around the room already. His lips twitched slightly. That left him less exposed should any of the king’s soldiers come in.

A presence at his side had him gripping his knife. He looked up and took a breath. She was just a serving maid. She handed him a pint of beer with a smile.

Eliot shook his head and tried to hand the cup back. “I can’t…” he began.

“On the house,” she interrupted quietly, tucking a strand of red hair behind her ear. “You look like you could use it.”

Eliot met her blue eyes. “Rath Dé ort, múirnín,” he whispered, his lips twitching again.

Girlish chatter drew his attention. He looked over toward the door to see two girls walk into the tavern. No, he corrected himself, one girl. The other looked like a young woman, for all that she carried herself as just a girl. He frowned slightly. Where were their parents? Surely any father would know better than to let his young daughters come to a place like this. Unless they worked here, but that did not look to be the case. They looked too unfamiliar for that.

The barmaid smiled at Eliot. “Well, it looks like I have my work cut out for me,” she said, following Eliot’s gaze. “Most of the men here know to respect a woman, especially the ones that come round this early. There’s always a couple of ùmaidhean air dàir to cause trouble, though.”

The serving maid walked back to the bar. The older of the two newcomers, the brunette, fidgeted with a wooden disk as the blond pulled her toward the bar. She talked to the serving maid for a few moments before both newcomers retreated to Eliot’s corner with a cup of wine.

“I hear you’re the man to go to if someone needs a… discreet bodyguard, Eliot,” the younger girl said quietly.

Eliot stared at her for a moment. How did she know who he was? He knew he’d never seen her before. He’d come on a job and had taken extra care to blend in, to not be recognized. He remembered Damien’s threat. This had to be a set up. “I think you have the wrong person,” he said finally.

The girl glared at him. “Really?” she asked, her voice taking on a belligerent tone. “It took you that long to decide you’re not Eliot Spencer? That’s odd. Odd enough to make me question your denial. You‘re either the man himself or you really wish you were.”

Eliot couldn’t resist a smile. “Or I don’t know who I am,” he retorted.

The girl just gave a look that screamed “I know who you are and I can see cac five furlongs away.”

He sighed. “All right, you got me,” he said. “Thing is, I already have a job and I generally don’t work for two clients at once. Tends to get messy.”

The older girl sighed, flipping the wooden disk. Looking closer, Eliot could see a leather cord dangling from one end. “I need to leave town,” she said quietly. “Today. I don’t care where you’re going as long as it’s well away from here. I can pay. Just let me come with you and drop me off in some town along your way.”

Eliot tried to catch her gaze but she seemed too focused on her charm. She was obviously hiding something. Something that troubled her. He looked over at the younger girl. That one had a protective streak a mile wide. He’d have to be blind not to see it. She was also a schemer. He looked back at the brown-haired girl. She looked ready to jump and run at any minute. “What are you running from, m'eudail?” he asked quietly.

She bit her lip and glanced at the other girl, then seemed to make a decision. She looked up and met his eyes. “Too much to discuss here,” she said. “But if I don’t leave today, everything will become more complicated.”

He smiled at her. “Then we’d better get ready to leave, mhúirnín,” he said quietly.

That brought a smile from her. “I am ready.”

He couldn’t resist a chuckle. She reminded him of Sam, so child-like and eager. “And what do you expect to eat on the road?”

She flushed slightly as she smiled. “Oh. I thought you’d just hunt on our way to wherever.”

“Coin bhadhail is clann dhaoin eile,” Eliot muttered with a chuckle.



Eliot looked over at the girl that walked beside him. “So it would make things a lot less awkward if I knew your name,” he commented. “Since we’ll be traveling together until I can get you someplace safe.”

She looked over at him. “I’m…” She paused. “Call me Parker.”

He raised an eyebrow at her choice of words. “You’re renaming yourself?” he asked. “You know, that’s a little risky. If someone calls your new name and you forget, it’s bound to raise questions.”

She shook her head. “It’s not a new name, exactly. When I was little, one of my father’s friends used to take me to the park a lot. I liked it so much, he said I should live there when I grew up, become a park-keeper. Called me Parker, said it fit me.”

Eliot stared at her for a moment before smiling. “I used to love the park by Abhainn Àirde as a child,” he said quietly.

“The one by Dùn an Tuile has the prettiest trees,” Parker replied. “The bark’s almost pure white.”

“White birch trees,” Eliot explained. “They’re rare here but they have whole forests of them in Ruschik.”

Parker looked up at him. “You’ve been to Ruschik?”

Eliot smiled. “M'eudail, it’s more a question of where I haven’t been.”

“Tell me about it,” she asked, reminding him of Sam.

“It’s cold, dark. You can travel for over a week without seeing a village. But I’ve never seen the stars shine brighter than they do there in mid-winter. The land is covered in forest with each village carved out of it. The snow piles up over the door frames in some places.”

She frowned. “How does anyone live there?”

Eliot chuckled. “Well, it’s not winter all the time, of course. They have farms. And they hunt bear, small game, and some deer.”

“Bears?” Parker asked with a shiver. “That sounds dangerous.”

Eliot shrugged. “They’re not as dangerous as the wolves.”

“But aren’t bears bigger?” Parker asked with a frown. “And stronger?”

“Of course,” he replied simply. “But they won’t attack unless provoked and they are usually fairly solitary animals. Wolves travel and hunt in packs.”

She shivered slightly. “They both sound scarier than horses,” she muttered.

Eliot stopped walking and stared at the girl. “You’re afraid of horses?” he asked.

She nodded. “I saw one kill a werewolf.”

He blinked. “A werewolf?” he asked. “Parker, werewolves aren’t real.”

“No, he was definitely a werewolf,” the girl insisted. “He had to be. He didn’t look human. He was bent over like they are when they change and he had fur.”

Eliot sighed. She must have been young, too young to know the tragedy that some people are born to. “Parker, muirnin, he wasn’t a werewolf. He was a man. Just a man.”

“Then why didn’t he look like one?” she persisted. “People don’t look like that.”

Eliot sighed. “Sometimes people are born…” He trailed off, trying to find the right words to explain deformity to the naïve girl. “Sometimes a baby doesn’t form right. He’s still human but he looks different. They’re not werewolves.”

Parker looked at him and laughed. “You’re funny.”

He shook his head and started walking again. “There’s something wrong with you,” he muttered with a slight smile.



Parker sighed happily as she pulled her cloak tighter around her arms. “Where are we going?” she asked. “Not that it matters but it would be nice to know.”

“Abhainn Àirde,” Eliot replied. “I have a… trusted contact there. He’ll help you find your way, whatever you want to do.”

She pursed her lips. “You grew there, didn’t you?”

Eliot pulled out his whetstone and began sharpening one of his knives. “What makes you think that?”

“Well, you said you liked the park there when you were young. You told me that days ago.”

He laughed shortly. “I was very young then. Just a child. It was a long time ago.”

“So did you?”

“Did I what?”

“Did you grow up in Abhainn Àirde?”

Eliot sheathed his knife and put another branch on the fire. “So’re you ever going to tell me what you’re running from?” he asked. “It’s not like I’d tell anyone. Never find work again if I did that.”

Parker frowned. “I said in the beginning that it was complicated,” she said.

“I don’t mind complicated,” he said with a smile. “Makes for a good story.”

“Thought you said you wouldn’t tell anyone?”

Eliot could not hide his smirk. “I won’t, but I like listenin’ to a good story. Yours sounds like one in the making.”

“My father thinks I’m a lure for his allies.” Parker shrugged. “Father wanted me to meet someone new. I’m tired of it. I can’t face another betrothal just for it to fall apart before the wedding.”

Eliot’s breath caught in his throat. He turned the rabbit on the spit before turning back to the girl. “Seen that happen before. No wonder you left.”

“Did she ever marry?” she asked in a small voice.

Eliot nodded, letting his hair hang forward and hide his face. “Yeah, she did. Last I heard, happily, too. Him? Not so much.”

“So the baiting finally stopped, then?”

“She only went through it once, thoir taing dha Dé, so yes. And he’s a good man, despite how he married her.”

“Tell me more,” Parker asked.

Eliot pulled the rabbit from the fire. “Sin sin, níl aon scéal eile agam,” he muttered as he cut off a portion and put it on a plate. “Why don’t you tell me more about yourself instead.”

She shrugged slightly as she accepted the plate. “There’s not much to say. I have a younger sister. I pretty much grew up in Àillidh Carragh. We moved there when I was five.”

“Where did you live before that?” he asked.

“Near Abhainn Àirde,” she said. “But I barely remember it.”

Eliot raised an eyebrow. Suspicion made his spine tingle. “Who’s your father?”

Parker sighed. “He’s the king,” she said quietly. “My real name is Alice.”

Eliot sucked in a short breath. He wondered why he hadn’t seen it before. The girl, the princess, looked so familiar, had since the beginning. Even more so since that odd brown dye had washed out of her hair. Now it made sense, of course.

“Eliot? Are you still in there?”

He jerked. How had he not heard her? He couldn’t afford to be off his game like this. “What?”

“You weren’t answering me,” she said. “I thought maybe you died.”

Eliot shook his head. “No, I was just thinking.”

“What about?” she persisted. “Is something wrong?”

“No.” He shook his head. “My foster-father named his daughter Parker. He told me she was never happier than when he and Maggie took her to the park near their estate.”

“What is she like?” Parker asked.

Eliot shook his head again, wondering why he felt the need to tell her so much about his second family. “I don’t know. I’ve never met her. She disappeared when she was two. Nate doesn’t talk about her much anymore. Ever since Sam and Maggie died. But her mother’s hair was almost the same color as yours.”



Eliot sat by the fireplace, playing with the wine in the bottom of his goblet. “I like her, Athair,” he said quietly. He looked up at his foster-father. “I mean, I really like her. I hope you don’t mind.”

Nate frowned at Eliot. “Why would I mind?”

“I think she’s your Parker.” Eliot sighed. “We’d just left Àillidh Carragh. She said she was renaming herself Parker because one of her father’s friends called her that when she was little. Said she liked him taking her to the park so much, he thought she’d grow to live there. She wouldn’t tell me who her father was until right before we got here. He used to be a friend of yours. Lived near here, even, mac an donais.”

Nate’s fingers tightened around his own goblet. “Who?”

“He was Lord Sterling back then,” Eliot admitted quietly. “Now, well… He’s the king.”

Nate tossed back the rest of his wine. “I wondered at first if that wasn’t why he started distancing himself around that time. Then the king and queen were ambushed in the park. Their son vanished off of the face of the earth. James took the throne. I also found out then that he’d also just had a daughter. She’d been born a month early. I changed my mind, thought he must’ve started planning the assassination back then.” He laughed humorlessly. “Besides, if he was planning to take the throne, why would he take my daughter rather than someone’s son. A bhidse, why would he risk abducting anyone’s child?”

Eliot shook his head. “If he was going to kidnap a child to raise as his own, why not take the prince a few years earlier?” he mused out loud. “Hardly anyone knew what he looked like. He was still some years away from his introduction to the court. It would make more sense.”

“No.” Nate shook his head. “He would want his own son on the throne. Or grandson. The bigger question is why any child. Parker does look a bit like Maggie.”

“She said the king’s been using her as a political bargaining chip,” Eliot mused. “Not her little sister, though. And they’re close, Parker and Olivia. Like sisters. I’ve met her. She’s blonde but she’s as fiery as a red-head. Perhaps Parker was meant to replace Olivia in case she didn’t live to grow up?”

Nate nodded as he stared into the fire. “Very likely.”

“What are you boys brooding about tonight?” Sophie asked, walking over to them.

Nate looked up and reached for his wife’s hand. She sat down beside him and looked over at Eliot. “Well?”

“Parker,” Eliot admitted.

Sophie looked at Nate and sighed. “Oh, Nate… She reminds you of your petite fille, doesn’t she?”

“Eliot thinks she may be my little girl all grown up,” Nate replied.

“What? How do you figure, Eliot?” she asked.

Eliot looked at the floor. “Just some things she’s said, a story she told me about when she was very young. It was almost identical to something Nate told me about Parker.” He shrugged. “A lot of little things just make more sense that way.”

Sophie looked Nate in the eyes. “I really hope you’re not going to tell her until you are absolutely certain. She’s just learning to live away from the palace. She doesn’t need any ‘who’s my father’ craziness.”

He nodded. “Of course not, mo mhúirnín. She barely even knows us yet. But we will do the spell soon. Just so we know.”

Sophie nodded and lay her head on his shoulder. “So how long before you have to take another job, Eliot?”

Eliot sighed and sipped at his wine. “I’m actually on another one now. Home was on the way. But I can’t stay. Tha mi duilich. Have to leave tomorrow. It’s not safe for any of you. Damien… I have a month to get him the Sapphire dàmhair Monkey or he hands me over to the crown. I can‘t be near here if I don‘t get it in time. I can‘t bring any of you into that.”

“That merde embulante!” Sophie exploded. “Is he completely daft? Is that bloody Monkey even real?”

“Oh, it’s real, all right, Sophie,” Nate admitted. “I saw it once many years ago. Whether any of the legends about it are real is an entirely different question.”

“What do you know about the warding and other protections on it, Athair?” Eliot asked. “What do I need beyond my usual gear?”

“Not much,” Nate admitted. “It was a long time ago at a marketplace in Ruschik. Near Zanzibar.”

Eliot nodded. “So you don’t know who has it now?”

“I heard rumors that it was just north of our border,” Nate replied.

Sophie nodded. “I heard that, too. Not that I paid too much attention. If I had a stone for every time someone told me they knew where the Sapphire Monkey is, I’d have enough to build a house.”

Eliot grimaced. “Very true. But at least it’s somewhere to start.”



Nate frowned as he heard something scratching above the fireplace. He sighed. He would have thought that the squirrels would have learned to stay out of the chimney by now. He turned back to his desk. There was more scratching, this time accompanied by falling soot.

He stood and walked over to the fireplace. He knelt and looked up the chimney. Instead of the expected animal, he discovered the silhouette of the girl Eliot had brought home that night. “Carson a chiall are you climbing around in my chimney?” he called, a frown forming between his eyebrows.

The blond-haired girl let out a surprised squawk and dropped to the floor. “Tha mi duilich,” she replied. “I didn’t know anyone would be in here.”

Nate had to stifle a laugh. “So I see,” he said. “However that does not tell me what you’re doing in my chimney.”

She shrugged. “I was curious. I figured I’d be less of a bother this way. No one would feel they’d have to show me around.”

This time, Nate could not hold back his laughter. “Parker, caileag, is duilich leam believe that you would think we’d rather you climb around in the chimneys than show you around the castle.”

She grinned. “Perhaps not,” she conceded. “But it’s more fun this way. Anyway, I was hoping this was Eliot’s room. I wanted to talk to him.”

Nate sighed. “He left already. He… has a job to do.”

She frowned slightly. “When will he be back? What kind of job is it?”

“If all goes well, he’ll come home in a few weeks. People hire him to find people and items that they can’t get for themselves and bring them back,” Nate explained. “Much like when you hired him to bring you here.”

“So if he hadn’t brought me here, Father might have hired him to bring me home?” she asked.

Nate nodded slowly. “Yes, perhaps.”

“So who is he looking for now?”

“It’s not a who, this time,” Nate replied. “It’s a what. The Sapphire Monkey, commonly believed to be a legend, rumored to be the most unique magical artifact in existence.”

“If it’s not real, how will he find it?”

Nate put a hand on Parker’s shoulder and led her into the hallway. “It is real, so it can be found,” he explained. “However finding will definitely be quite challenging. I saw it twenty years ago in a city in Ruschik. Where it is now is anyone’s guess.”

Parker sighed. “It seems stupid, though. To send someone to go buy something you’re not sure exists.”

Nate smiled sadly. “You’re right, it is. Except that in this case, it’s actually not. Because of what he does, there are people who want to see Eliot dead. I can’t think of a better way to destroy him than to force him to do something that cannot be done.”

Parker sighed and looked at the floor. “So he might not even come back,” she said.

Nate did not have an answer to that. The simple truth was that Eliot had to come home somehow. Eire could not afford to lose him. If it came to it, he would speak to the Council of Lords before he found a draoidh skilled enough and trustworthy enough to prepare the boy, but only if it came to that. For Eliot’s sake. He led Parker down the stairs to the ground floor of the castle.

“It’s strange, actually.”

Nate looked up as Parker spoke. “What’s strange.”

“This castle,” she replied. “It reminds me of a castle I used to dream about when I was little. Ní tha seun ar an nursery ceiling, an dta air? To make it look like the sky?”

Nate swallowed thickly. “Not anymore,” he said quietly. “Nine years ago, there was.”

Parker frowned. “There was one in my dream. And this baby that cried a lot.”

Nate forced himself not to react. His mind flashed back to what Eliot had said the night before. It seemed as though his foster-son must be right. “Parker, do you still want to talk to Eliot?”

She her smile practically shone. “Of course.”

“If you leave after breakfast, you should be able to catch up to him by tomorrow.”

“Really?”

Nate nodded. “I’ll have the cook pack some food for you. After your little adventure in the chimney, I think you could probably help him.”

Parker grimaced. “I really am sorry about that.”

Nate shook his head with a smile. “Don’t worry about that. As long as it’s warm and we’re not using the fireplaces, I’d rather find you crawling down my chimney than the squirrels!”

Parker’s laugh rang out down the stairwell. “They’re actually where I got the idea,” she admitted.



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