Big Bang Fic: The Red Leather Trousers Escapade (14/17)
Title: The Red Leather Trousers Escapade (14/17)
Author: wingedflight21
Rating: K+
Word Count: ~24K
Disclaimer: The Chronicles of Narnia do not, never have, and most likely never will belong to me.
Possible Spoilers/Warnings: Occurs in an AU of The Silver Chair.
Author's Notes: A huge thanks to snitchnipped, rthstewart, and especially accidentalsquid as well as anyone else who helped me through these last few months and numerous chapters.
Summary: An assassination attempt gone wrong sends Jill and Eustace off to solve the mystery behind the attacks, all while playing dead. SCAUverse.
-X-
Chapter Thirteen
-X-
It really was bizarre to break into the home of Halua’s most influential council-woman with a complete stranger. Or, well, Eustace knew that it wasn’t really the maid who was leading him and Isak through the halls, that is was the magic of Jill’s chain that had changed her appearance. If he concentrated enough on her, he could even see through the enchanted disguise, although it was like looking through a shimmering wall of water and gave him an instant headache.
Another maid passed on their way up the stairs. Jill gave her a brisk nod, easily mimicking the character of the woman she was impersonating. The other woman barely gave a second glance before continuing on her way.
“Teriko said there was a room that looked like a study at the side of the house, third window down,” Jill was whispering. She paused in front of a portrait on the wall, tipping her head to study the features of the young man.
“Lanukah’s nephew,” Isak said, “Come on.”
Without another look, Jill moved on down the hall. She considered one door carefully before moving on to the next. Her hand closed around the doorknob. “Lion, don’t let anyone be in here.”
She opened the door, peered in through the crack, and pushed it wider. The three of them fell in quickly, shutting the door behind them again as quickly and quietly as possible. Isak had crossed the room immediately to begin rifling through papers on the desk. Jill hesitated, then moved towards the cabinet beside the window.
This was Eustace’s least favourite part of the plan and it was all because of the vagueness. “Find the incriminating evidence” was all well and good in theory, but incredibly unhelpful in practise. Just about anything could be incriminating when viewed in a particular light, and in the same sense, any actual evidence could appear irrelevant and passed over. Just where would one hide “incriminating evidence,” anyway? Were it he who had hired the assassins - a ridiculous concept, because that would either mean he was trying to kill himself or thwart his own plan for danger-seeking thrills - he would have hidden any evidence among the legitimate business. Which meant he should go through the files.
He didn’t want to go through the files.
Unimpressed by the fact that neither Jill nor Isak had decided to look in the important place first, he hurried over to the desk and opened the bottom-right drawer. Sure enough, there was a stack of thick ledgers. There wasn’t enough time to go through them all now, line by line as he would like. Neither could he take them from the house, for someone would realize they were missing and know there’d been intruders.
He sent a silent prayer of thanks to Aslan and Father Christmas and reached into the messenger’s bag that hung at his side. The book he withdrew had a heavy, musky red binding and creamy, blank pages. He lay it out on the floor, open to a random page. Next, he lifted the ledger that had been sitting on the top of the pile and flipped through it to get a sense of the dates. Sure enough, it was the most recent, and so he set it atop his own book. What he could still see of the corner of his book’s pages immediately filled with lines of careful pencil markings. And when he had lifted the ledger again, a perfect copy of one of the pages stared up at him. He flipped the page to check and saw that the lines of numbers continued there.
That accomplished, Eustace replaced the ledgers in the drawer and closed up his book. He would have copied more, but he knew there was a limit to the amount of information his book could hold and he didn’t want to risk copying over what he already had. So he slipped his book back into his bag and rifled through the rest of the drawers. There wasn’t anything there to catch his attention, although that could very well just mean he had passed the “incriminating evidence.”
“Scrubb!”
Jill had pulled a box out of the cabinet to the floor. The lid was open, although he couldn’t see what was there until he had crossed the room to her side. It was full of coins, all Haluan currency: Shells and Fins and others, as well. There were also jewels and a small, black leather pouch tied with gold string. Jill held the pouch out to him and Eustace peered inside. The contents were more coins, but these were familiar Narnian Trees and Suns. There was a folded page inside the pouch as well; Eustace pulled it out and opened it carefully.
“What does it say?” Isak asked from where he was still searching the top of the desk.
Eustace scanned the words, a sense of unease running through him. “It’s a letter of recommendation - for emigration - this could have been how the assassins were to leave the island.”
“But it looks like Akili Lenukah wasn’t the one behind the attack,” Jill whispered in horror, “As if she was paid off by someone else. Someone with… Narnian currency.”
He stared at Jill, unable to believe what she had said. Who could have wanted them dead? But although he ran through the members of the delegation twice over, he couldn’t think of anyone to properly suspect.
“They could have used Narnian currency to throw us off the trail,” he suggested weakly.
Isak had moved up behind him. “Except no one knows you need to be thrown off,” he reminded. “I think we’ve found all that we can, here. We should get out before -“
He stopped, all three of them hearing the ominous sound at the same time. There were footsteps in the hall, growing steadily louder.
“They won’t come in,” Jill whispered, but her voice was thin and uncertain.
It was Eustace who snapped out of it soonest. “Hide!” he hissed, and dove towards the desk. Jill was right behind him, about to crawl underneath beside him when she stopped in horror. “The lockbox!”
“I’ll get it,” Isak hissed, and turned back.
“But it wasn’t just in the cabinet. There’s a hidden compartment at the back!”
“Got it.”
“But you didn’t lock it!”
Busy wiggling behind the chair to get into the furthest corner under the desk, Eustace almost missed what Jill had said. “Wait - it was locked?”
“Yes, and I picked it. But you have to - “
“No time!”
Jill crawled up beside Eustace, her face uncomfortably close to his. Isak tried to worm in beside them, but there wasn’t enough room. Jill wiggled closer, and Eustace moved back only to bite off a cry as he pressed his right shoulder against the wood. The footsteps paused outside the door.
Isak had given up on trying to hide beneath the desk, dashing half across the room and back. “There’s nowhere - ”
“Here.”
Jill reached out a hand and passed something to him. Eustace peered out between the legs of the chair and saw Isak fumble with something at his neck. A moment later, and he was gone, replaced by a young man with thicker shoulders and shorter hair and a rounder face.
The door opened.
The maid shrieked when she saw that there was someone in the room. She clutched at her chest and stumbled backward.
“Came to see my aunt,” Isak mumbled, for it was him under the disguise of Jill’s chain.
The maid shrieked again and fled. A moment later, Isak was helping Eustace and Jill out. “Hurry,” he told them, “We can’t have much time.”
“But why was she so scared?” Jill asked as they fled the room.
Isak chuckled darkly. “The Akili’s nephew was lost at sea two years past. A mean trick but it worked.”
Prologue | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12 | Chapter 13 | Chapter 14 | Chapter 15 | Epilogue|
Author: wingedflight21
Rating: K+
Word Count: ~24K
Disclaimer: The Chronicles of Narnia do not, never have, and most likely never will belong to me.
Possible Spoilers/Warnings: Occurs in an AU of The Silver Chair.
Author's Notes: A huge thanks to snitchnipped, rthstewart, and especially accidentalsquid as well as anyone else who helped me through these last few months and numerous chapters.
Summary: An assassination attempt gone wrong sends Jill and Eustace off to solve the mystery behind the attacks, all while playing dead. SCAUverse.
-X-
Chapter Thirteen
-X-
It really was bizarre to break into the home of Halua’s most influential council-woman with a complete stranger. Or, well, Eustace knew that it wasn’t really the maid who was leading him and Isak through the halls, that is was the magic of Jill’s chain that had changed her appearance. If he concentrated enough on her, he could even see through the enchanted disguise, although it was like looking through a shimmering wall of water and gave him an instant headache.
Another maid passed on their way up the stairs. Jill gave her a brisk nod, easily mimicking the character of the woman she was impersonating. The other woman barely gave a second glance before continuing on her way.
“Teriko said there was a room that looked like a study at the side of the house, third window down,” Jill was whispering. She paused in front of a portrait on the wall, tipping her head to study the features of the young man.
“Lanukah’s nephew,” Isak said, “Come on.”
Without another look, Jill moved on down the hall. She considered one door carefully before moving on to the next. Her hand closed around the doorknob. “Lion, don’t let anyone be in here.”
She opened the door, peered in through the crack, and pushed it wider. The three of them fell in quickly, shutting the door behind them again as quickly and quietly as possible. Isak had crossed the room immediately to begin rifling through papers on the desk. Jill hesitated, then moved towards the cabinet beside the window.
This was Eustace’s least favourite part of the plan and it was all because of the vagueness. “Find the incriminating evidence” was all well and good in theory, but incredibly unhelpful in practise. Just about anything could be incriminating when viewed in a particular light, and in the same sense, any actual evidence could appear irrelevant and passed over. Just where would one hide “incriminating evidence,” anyway? Were it he who had hired the assassins - a ridiculous concept, because that would either mean he was trying to kill himself or thwart his own plan for danger-seeking thrills - he would have hidden any evidence among the legitimate business. Which meant he should go through the files.
He didn’t want to go through the files.
Unimpressed by the fact that neither Jill nor Isak had decided to look in the important place first, he hurried over to the desk and opened the bottom-right drawer. Sure enough, there was a stack of thick ledgers. There wasn’t enough time to go through them all now, line by line as he would like. Neither could he take them from the house, for someone would realize they were missing and know there’d been intruders.
He sent a silent prayer of thanks to Aslan and Father Christmas and reached into the messenger’s bag that hung at his side. The book he withdrew had a heavy, musky red binding and creamy, blank pages. He lay it out on the floor, open to a random page. Next, he lifted the ledger that had been sitting on the top of the pile and flipped through it to get a sense of the dates. Sure enough, it was the most recent, and so he set it atop his own book. What he could still see of the corner of his book’s pages immediately filled with lines of careful pencil markings. And when he had lifted the ledger again, a perfect copy of one of the pages stared up at him. He flipped the page to check and saw that the lines of numbers continued there.
That accomplished, Eustace replaced the ledgers in the drawer and closed up his book. He would have copied more, but he knew there was a limit to the amount of information his book could hold and he didn’t want to risk copying over what he already had. So he slipped his book back into his bag and rifled through the rest of the drawers. There wasn’t anything there to catch his attention, although that could very well just mean he had passed the “incriminating evidence.”
“Scrubb!”
Jill had pulled a box out of the cabinet to the floor. The lid was open, although he couldn’t see what was there until he had crossed the room to her side. It was full of coins, all Haluan currency: Shells and Fins and others, as well. There were also jewels and a small, black leather pouch tied with gold string. Jill held the pouch out to him and Eustace peered inside. The contents were more coins, but these were familiar Narnian Trees and Suns. There was a folded page inside the pouch as well; Eustace pulled it out and opened it carefully.
“What does it say?” Isak asked from where he was still searching the top of the desk.
Eustace scanned the words, a sense of unease running through him. “It’s a letter of recommendation - for emigration - this could have been how the assassins were to leave the island.”
“But it looks like Akili Lenukah wasn’t the one behind the attack,” Jill whispered in horror, “As if she was paid off by someone else. Someone with… Narnian currency.”
He stared at Jill, unable to believe what she had said. Who could have wanted them dead? But although he ran through the members of the delegation twice over, he couldn’t think of anyone to properly suspect.
“They could have used Narnian currency to throw us off the trail,” he suggested weakly.
Isak had moved up behind him. “Except no one knows you need to be thrown off,” he reminded. “I think we’ve found all that we can, here. We should get out before -“
He stopped, all three of them hearing the ominous sound at the same time. There were footsteps in the hall, growing steadily louder.
“They won’t come in,” Jill whispered, but her voice was thin and uncertain.
It was Eustace who snapped out of it soonest. “Hide!” he hissed, and dove towards the desk. Jill was right behind him, about to crawl underneath beside him when she stopped in horror. “The lockbox!”
“I’ll get it,” Isak hissed, and turned back.
“But it wasn’t just in the cabinet. There’s a hidden compartment at the back!”
“Got it.”
“But you didn’t lock it!”
Busy wiggling behind the chair to get into the furthest corner under the desk, Eustace almost missed what Jill had said. “Wait - it was locked?”
“Yes, and I picked it. But you have to - “
“No time!”
Jill crawled up beside Eustace, her face uncomfortably close to his. Isak tried to worm in beside them, but there wasn’t enough room. Jill wiggled closer, and Eustace moved back only to bite off a cry as he pressed his right shoulder against the wood. The footsteps paused outside the door.
Isak had given up on trying to hide beneath the desk, dashing half across the room and back. “There’s nowhere - ”
“Here.”
Jill reached out a hand and passed something to him. Eustace peered out between the legs of the chair and saw Isak fumble with something at his neck. A moment later, and he was gone, replaced by a young man with thicker shoulders and shorter hair and a rounder face.
The door opened.
The maid shrieked when she saw that there was someone in the room. She clutched at her chest and stumbled backward.
“Came to see my aunt,” Isak mumbled, for it was him under the disguise of Jill’s chain.
The maid shrieked again and fled. A moment later, Isak was helping Eustace and Jill out. “Hurry,” he told them, “We can’t have much time.”
“But why was she so scared?” Jill asked as they fled the room.
Isak chuckled darkly. “The Akili’s nephew was lost at sea two years past. A mean trick but it worked.”
Prologue | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12 | Chapter 13 | Chapter 14 | Chapter 15 | Epilogue|