The Harlot and the Harlequin
The following story is an entirely original work of fiction. All characters portrayed are fictional. Any resemblance to real persons either living or dead is most definitely intentional.
In a clearing not far from the road that cut through the forest, the troupe of minstrels had set up camp. The sun had already descended below the horizon, dinner eaten in a quiet haste - unusual for the minstrels, who were usually quite jovial and merry - and lots drawn for the various watches of the night. Even in these relatively peaceful times, the roads and woods were not safe from the dangers of bandits and wild animals.
Jezebel had volunteered for the first watch, and with a sigh she sat down at the fire, while the others retreated to their tents and wagons for the nights slumber. Discontentedly, she began to polish her sword, letting her short, raven-dark hair fall into her face. Already it had been nearly a month since she left Brough, and well over two years since she first wandered into the Raven’s Nest Inn, no memory of who she was or where she came from. Since then she had become the most sought-after prostitute on the eastern bank of the River Datura.
Now look at me, she though bitterly. A renegade. Living on the run, in hiding. I used to have the finest rooms at the Raven’s Nest. Walls draped with silks and tapestries from the furthest reaches of Talún and Averros, frankincense and spices burning in an elaborate brass censer, vases of orchids. And the finest lavender oils for my bath and perfumes.
But at least she had her freedom. Her fame as a prostitute had spread as far as Lethe, and wealthy merchants and the sons of noble houses had begun to call upon her. She had by then become so wealthy that she would often decline men her services, because she did not like them or simply because she could. That had piqued the interest of Prince Eoin, and now he wanted her to himself.
Men of the royal court had brought him rumors of Jezebel’s beauty and skill, and how men would clamor for her attention, hoping to be acknowledged by this strange woman who had the prestige to choose her clients. A woman with hair as black as night in a country of flaxen hair and coppery curls, with eyes the colour of the deepest lake that could pierce a mans heart and soul with a single glance. A woman who was not afraid to lie with other women.
And that’s when Cailean, Knight of Talún, head guard of the Palace of Lethe, and come for her. He had given her an ultimatum: go with him to the Palace willingly, or in chains. A man of average height and sturdy build, with hair that was neither blonde nor auburn, but somewhere in between, and clear blue eyes, Cailean possessed every personality trait that Jez hated in a man. Pompous, arrogant, and self-important, he believed that his pretty face and skill with a sword allowed him to lord over everyone he thought to be beneath him. Had he been a prospective client, Jez would have turned him down on the spot. The way he carried himself suggested he thought little of women in general. As it were, he had not come to her rooms for a fuck. He came to escort her to a life of luxury and servitude to a spoiled prince.
She had fought him initially, and very nearly decided to take him up on the offer of going in chains. But she decided it would be better to leave behind her life in Brough with whatever semblance of dignity she could manage. Besides, it would be easier to escape him if he thought she was going willingly.
Suddenly the sound of a rustling in the bushes broke Jez from her reverie, and she stood with a start, sword in hand, ready to challenge anyone that may have been trying to approach the camp in secret. However, it was only Harlequin, the jester, come back from a pre-bed piss.
“Damn you, Harlequin. I thought you were a bandit, or perhaps a coyote,” she cursed him, sheathing her sword.
“Alas! It is only I, a poor jester, and poor company,” he responded dramatically. Of the entire troupe, he was the only performer who did not shed his role once he had left the stage. He never removed his motley garb or his absurd mask with its comically long nose. If he had ever had a true name, no one knew it now.
“What are you even doing, still up at this hour?” Jez inquired, sitting back down by the fire. Harlequin took the spot opposite her.
“I cannot sleep when the moon is so bright,” he offered simply, although the moon was nowhere to be seen through the dense canopy above them.
“Alright, be that way if you will. Care to finish up the watch with me?”
“’Twould be my pleasure, dear lady,” came the sarcastic reply.
Jez smirked. She liked Harlequin’s company. His cheeky attitude was refreshing, and he was a good listener. After a few minutes of silence, he spoke up again.
“Your fair brow is wrinkled as a witch. Tell me what troubles that mind of yours.”
“It’s just - I don’t know,” Jez sighed. “Sometimes I wonder how I even got here.” She paused, expecting a thoughtfully sarcastic response from Harlequin, but when none came, she continued. “I just can’t help but feel that I don’t belong here, as though I’m from somewhere else. I get a vague sense of - home - whenever I try to think about what my life was like before I came to Brough, but I can never remember the details. And then he has to come along and make things so much more complicated.” She glared at the tent she knew Cailean to be sleeping in.
“Yes, you never did explain to me how a harlot convinced one of the kings guard to turn rogue. I am simply shivering with anticipation to hear your wily ways, your cunning crafts, your seductive schemes.”
Jez chuckled darkly. “Believe you me, there was no cunning or seducing involved. Never in a thousand years would I want to stand within spitting distance of that man.”
“So what happened, then?” By now Harlequin was genuinely curious, his dark eyes glittering keenly. His tongue darted across his thin lips expectantly, and as he leaned towards her the light from the campfire cast strange shadows across his sharp cheekbones, turned his fair curls into a sort of halo.
Jez waited a moment before continuing, trying to gather her thoughts. “He was humming. The first night after leaving Brough, as he was tending to his horse, I heard him humming. And the tune was so strange, so unlike anything I had heard in Brough, yet so familiar, and for a moment I almost remembered the words, but then I realized that I had never had heard the song in Brough, and I knew I must have heard it from before, from when I don’t remember.” She paused, unsure of how to continue, recalling the strange feeling that had come over her when she had heard the song. Happiness, familiarity, mixed with something different. Nostalgia, a sense of something lost that could never be gotten back.
“So I asked him what it was, and he confessed he wasn’t sure, that he remembered hearing it quite a bit as a child, in a strange land far away filled with magic unlike any that he’d encountered in Talún. A place with buildings tall as mountains, a place where people could soar above the trees or dive to the depths of the oceans, where people controlled the elements and lived like kings and queens. And as he described his vague, childhood memories, they sounded beautiful. They sounded familiar.
“When I told him as much, he became quite excited, and asked me to tell him what I remembered. But other than the words to the song - which he confirmed were correct - I could remember almost nothing. Everything is too vague, and trying to remember gives me headaches. I told him how I got here, a rather dull story in its own right. I simply woke up in the old forest south of Brough, no memory of who I was or where I was from. Wandered into town, made a few mistakes, and ended up a whore. Then he told me his story.”
“And what was his story?” Harlequin’s head was cocked to the side inquisitively, and his eyes glowed in the firelight as he wetted his lips, almost hungrily.
“He told me that while he was still a child living in this strange country, he was taken seriously ill, and the greatest physicians came to try and make him better. Eventually his parents - at least he thinks they were his parents - decided to take him to a physician who lived far away. Sometime during the journey his fever made him delirious, and when he woke up, it was in the home of Lord Caledon. A servant had found him wandering out on the moors of Lord Caledon’s estate, and it was supposed that brigands had ambushed his family on the road, and he had managed to escape. After that, Lord Caledon was kind enough to adopt Cailean as his own, and sent him off to squire in the royal palace as soon as he was old enough.”
There were a few more moments of silence as the Harlequin digested what he had heard. Somewhere in the forest a coyote howled, and an owl hooted restlessly. Jez shivered, and drew her cloak more closely around her shoulders.
“What exactly was your mistake?” Harlequin asked finally.
“What?” Jez had not expected the question.
“What was your mistake? How did you transition from a lost, lonely girl in the woods, to the most successful prostitute in Talún?”
“I - it was stupid really,” Jez started. Harlequin nodded encouragingly. “I spent my first night in Brough begging for scraps, for a warm place to sleep. A handsome merchant’s son saw me and took pity on me, well I suppose it wasn’t really pity, was it?” she smiled ruefully.
“He took me back to his house and fed me, listened to me try and piece together who I was. It had been raining, and I had begun to shiver, so he instructed that I take off my wet clothes, and we sat on the couch together. He held me and kept me warm, stroking my hair. He kissed my forehead…” she trailed off.
“I was foolish enough to think it was love. We went to his room and had passionate sex, and I spent the rest of the night in his embrace. When I woke up, he was gone. A servant had been instructed to give me a new dress and a bag of coins, and send me on my way. I suppose, after that, he must have told his friends what a good fuck I had been, and the word must have spread because later that day I was approached in the street by Thom, the owner of the Raven’s Nest. Said I could have the best rooms for free if I did my business there. It would be good for his business, he said. Attract more customers. I was mortified at what he was implying, and turned him down. But when I tried to go back to the home of the merchant and was turned away, I realized that the young man saw me simply as a prostitute. I was ashamed, and after spending the night on the streets, I went back to Thom and accepted his offer. After that, the rest is history.”
Jez finished her story and gazed into the embers, willing away the tears that had begun to well up. She hadn’t cried in years, and she was damned if she was going to cry now. Harlequin was polite enough to pretend he hadn’t noticed.
“So what are you going to do now?”
“I don’t know. Cailean thought perhaps we should seek help from the elves in the Forest of Nadir. It is rumored they have the gift of prophecy, so he hopes they can tell us where we come from, and what our destiny is. In the meantime, he’s posing as a knight from a small, unimportant family, and I as his squire.”
“I’d be careful, if I were you,” advised the Harlequin, his voice suddenly low and unnaturally serious. “The elves are not as peaceful a folk as some would think, nor do they look very fondly upon mankind, after the last war. They will be wary of a knight and his squire wandering around Nadir, and will not easily trust you.”
“You speak as though you know from experience.”
“I was not always as I am,” was the mysterious reply. Suddenly his voice was once again jovial and cheeky. “Whatever happened to the young man?”
“Hmm?”
“The merchant’s son, who set you up for such success.”
“Oh, I don’t know. Probably married some respectable young lady from town. Or perhaps he made his fortune in Averros. Damned if I know, and gods know I don’t care, either.”
“Ah well, perhaps one day you will meet a man worth falling in love with again, one who will love you back.” There was a note of whimsy in Harlequin’s voice. Jez laughed scornfully.
“Trust me, Harlequin. I’ve fucked enough unfaithful husbands and ardent boys to know that love doesn’t exist. It is a delusion of the naïve.”
“Yes, yes. I suppose you are right. But what would I know? I am, after all, only a fool.”
“Wisest damn fool I’ve ever met.”
The two laughed together until Djaq, the Averrosian knife-juggler came to take over the watch, and then they each retired to their respective tents.
“Who woulda thought?” Djaq muttered to himself, shaking his head. “The harlot and the harlequin.”
So this is the first thing I've written in a very, very long time. The idea for the novel has been kicking around my head for a while, but since I've been having such a hard time getting it started, I decided to write a short story in medias res. Hope you liked it, please comment/review!
In a clearing not far from the road that cut through the forest, the troupe of minstrels had set up camp. The sun had already descended below the horizon, dinner eaten in a quiet haste - unusual for the minstrels, who were usually quite jovial and merry - and lots drawn for the various watches of the night. Even in these relatively peaceful times, the roads and woods were not safe from the dangers of bandits and wild animals.
Jezebel had volunteered for the first watch, and with a sigh she sat down at the fire, while the others retreated to their tents and wagons for the nights slumber. Discontentedly, she began to polish her sword, letting her short, raven-dark hair fall into her face. Already it had been nearly a month since she left Brough, and well over two years since she first wandered into the Raven’s Nest Inn, no memory of who she was or where she came from. Since then she had become the most sought-after prostitute on the eastern bank of the River Datura.
Now look at me, she though bitterly. A renegade. Living on the run, in hiding. I used to have the finest rooms at the Raven’s Nest. Walls draped with silks and tapestries from the furthest reaches of Talún and Averros, frankincense and spices burning in an elaborate brass censer, vases of orchids. And the finest lavender oils for my bath and perfumes.
But at least she had her freedom. Her fame as a prostitute had spread as far as Lethe, and wealthy merchants and the sons of noble houses had begun to call upon her. She had by then become so wealthy that she would often decline men her services, because she did not like them or simply because she could. That had piqued the interest of Prince Eoin, and now he wanted her to himself.
Men of the royal court had brought him rumors of Jezebel’s beauty and skill, and how men would clamor for her attention, hoping to be acknowledged by this strange woman who had the prestige to choose her clients. A woman with hair as black as night in a country of flaxen hair and coppery curls, with eyes the colour of the deepest lake that could pierce a mans heart and soul with a single glance. A woman who was not afraid to lie with other women.
And that’s when Cailean, Knight of Talún, head guard of the Palace of Lethe, and come for her. He had given her an ultimatum: go with him to the Palace willingly, or in chains. A man of average height and sturdy build, with hair that was neither blonde nor auburn, but somewhere in between, and clear blue eyes, Cailean possessed every personality trait that Jez hated in a man. Pompous, arrogant, and self-important, he believed that his pretty face and skill with a sword allowed him to lord over everyone he thought to be beneath him. Had he been a prospective client, Jez would have turned him down on the spot. The way he carried himself suggested he thought little of women in general. As it were, he had not come to her rooms for a fuck. He came to escort her to a life of luxury and servitude to a spoiled prince.
She had fought him initially, and very nearly decided to take him up on the offer of going in chains. But she decided it would be better to leave behind her life in Brough with whatever semblance of dignity she could manage. Besides, it would be easier to escape him if he thought she was going willingly.
Suddenly the sound of a rustling in the bushes broke Jez from her reverie, and she stood with a start, sword in hand, ready to challenge anyone that may have been trying to approach the camp in secret. However, it was only Harlequin, the jester, come back from a pre-bed piss.
“Damn you, Harlequin. I thought you were a bandit, or perhaps a coyote,” she cursed him, sheathing her sword.
“Alas! It is only I, a poor jester, and poor company,” he responded dramatically. Of the entire troupe, he was the only performer who did not shed his role once he had left the stage. He never removed his motley garb or his absurd mask with its comically long nose. If he had ever had a true name, no one knew it now.
“What are you even doing, still up at this hour?” Jez inquired, sitting back down by the fire. Harlequin took the spot opposite her.
“I cannot sleep when the moon is so bright,” he offered simply, although the moon was nowhere to be seen through the dense canopy above them.
“Alright, be that way if you will. Care to finish up the watch with me?”
“’Twould be my pleasure, dear lady,” came the sarcastic reply.
Jez smirked. She liked Harlequin’s company. His cheeky attitude was refreshing, and he was a good listener. After a few minutes of silence, he spoke up again.
“Your fair brow is wrinkled as a witch. Tell me what troubles that mind of yours.”
“It’s just - I don’t know,” Jez sighed. “Sometimes I wonder how I even got here.” She paused, expecting a thoughtfully sarcastic response from Harlequin, but when none came, she continued. “I just can’t help but feel that I don’t belong here, as though I’m from somewhere else. I get a vague sense of - home - whenever I try to think about what my life was like before I came to Brough, but I can never remember the details. And then he has to come along and make things so much more complicated.” She glared at the tent she knew Cailean to be sleeping in.
“Yes, you never did explain to me how a harlot convinced one of the kings guard to turn rogue. I am simply shivering with anticipation to hear your wily ways, your cunning crafts, your seductive schemes.”
Jez chuckled darkly. “Believe you me, there was no cunning or seducing involved. Never in a thousand years would I want to stand within spitting distance of that man.”
“So what happened, then?” By now Harlequin was genuinely curious, his dark eyes glittering keenly. His tongue darted across his thin lips expectantly, and as he leaned towards her the light from the campfire cast strange shadows across his sharp cheekbones, turned his fair curls into a sort of halo.
Jez waited a moment before continuing, trying to gather her thoughts. “He was humming. The first night after leaving Brough, as he was tending to his horse, I heard him humming. And the tune was so strange, so unlike anything I had heard in Brough, yet so familiar, and for a moment I almost remembered the words, but then I realized that I had never had heard the song in Brough, and I knew I must have heard it from before, from when I don’t remember.” She paused, unsure of how to continue, recalling the strange feeling that had come over her when she had heard the song. Happiness, familiarity, mixed with something different. Nostalgia, a sense of something lost that could never be gotten back.
“So I asked him what it was, and he confessed he wasn’t sure, that he remembered hearing it quite a bit as a child, in a strange land far away filled with magic unlike any that he’d encountered in Talún. A place with buildings tall as mountains, a place where people could soar above the trees or dive to the depths of the oceans, where people controlled the elements and lived like kings and queens. And as he described his vague, childhood memories, they sounded beautiful. They sounded familiar.
“When I told him as much, he became quite excited, and asked me to tell him what I remembered. But other than the words to the song - which he confirmed were correct - I could remember almost nothing. Everything is too vague, and trying to remember gives me headaches. I told him how I got here, a rather dull story in its own right. I simply woke up in the old forest south of Brough, no memory of who I was or where I was from. Wandered into town, made a few mistakes, and ended up a whore. Then he told me his story.”
“And what was his story?” Harlequin’s head was cocked to the side inquisitively, and his eyes glowed in the firelight as he wetted his lips, almost hungrily.
“He told me that while he was still a child living in this strange country, he was taken seriously ill, and the greatest physicians came to try and make him better. Eventually his parents - at least he thinks they were his parents - decided to take him to a physician who lived far away. Sometime during the journey his fever made him delirious, and when he woke up, it was in the home of Lord Caledon. A servant had found him wandering out on the moors of Lord Caledon’s estate, and it was supposed that brigands had ambushed his family on the road, and he had managed to escape. After that, Lord Caledon was kind enough to adopt Cailean as his own, and sent him off to squire in the royal palace as soon as he was old enough.”
There were a few more moments of silence as the Harlequin digested what he had heard. Somewhere in the forest a coyote howled, and an owl hooted restlessly. Jez shivered, and drew her cloak more closely around her shoulders.
“What exactly was your mistake?” Harlequin asked finally.
“What?” Jez had not expected the question.
“What was your mistake? How did you transition from a lost, lonely girl in the woods, to the most successful prostitute in Talún?”
“I - it was stupid really,” Jez started. Harlequin nodded encouragingly. “I spent my first night in Brough begging for scraps, for a warm place to sleep. A handsome merchant’s son saw me and took pity on me, well I suppose it wasn’t really pity, was it?” she smiled ruefully.
“He took me back to his house and fed me, listened to me try and piece together who I was. It had been raining, and I had begun to shiver, so he instructed that I take off my wet clothes, and we sat on the couch together. He held me and kept me warm, stroking my hair. He kissed my forehead…” she trailed off.
“I was foolish enough to think it was love. We went to his room and had passionate sex, and I spent the rest of the night in his embrace. When I woke up, he was gone. A servant had been instructed to give me a new dress and a bag of coins, and send me on my way. I suppose, after that, he must have told his friends what a good fuck I had been, and the word must have spread because later that day I was approached in the street by Thom, the owner of the Raven’s Nest. Said I could have the best rooms for free if I did my business there. It would be good for his business, he said. Attract more customers. I was mortified at what he was implying, and turned him down. But when I tried to go back to the home of the merchant and was turned away, I realized that the young man saw me simply as a prostitute. I was ashamed, and after spending the night on the streets, I went back to Thom and accepted his offer. After that, the rest is history.”
Jez finished her story and gazed into the embers, willing away the tears that had begun to well up. She hadn’t cried in years, and she was damned if she was going to cry now. Harlequin was polite enough to pretend he hadn’t noticed.
“So what are you going to do now?”
“I don’t know. Cailean thought perhaps we should seek help from the elves in the Forest of Nadir. It is rumored they have the gift of prophecy, so he hopes they can tell us where we come from, and what our destiny is. In the meantime, he’s posing as a knight from a small, unimportant family, and I as his squire.”
“I’d be careful, if I were you,” advised the Harlequin, his voice suddenly low and unnaturally serious. “The elves are not as peaceful a folk as some would think, nor do they look very fondly upon mankind, after the last war. They will be wary of a knight and his squire wandering around Nadir, and will not easily trust you.”
“You speak as though you know from experience.”
“I was not always as I am,” was the mysterious reply. Suddenly his voice was once again jovial and cheeky. “Whatever happened to the young man?”
“Hmm?”
“The merchant’s son, who set you up for such success.”
“Oh, I don’t know. Probably married some respectable young lady from town. Or perhaps he made his fortune in Averros. Damned if I know, and gods know I don’t care, either.”
“Ah well, perhaps one day you will meet a man worth falling in love with again, one who will love you back.” There was a note of whimsy in Harlequin’s voice. Jez laughed scornfully.
“Trust me, Harlequin. I’ve fucked enough unfaithful husbands and ardent boys to know that love doesn’t exist. It is a delusion of the naïve.”
“Yes, yes. I suppose you are right. But what would I know? I am, after all, only a fool.”
“Wisest damn fool I’ve ever met.”
The two laughed together until Djaq, the Averrosian knife-juggler came to take over the watch, and then they each retired to their respective tents.
“Who woulda thought?” Djaq muttered to himself, shaking his head. “The harlot and the harlequin.”
So this is the first thing I've written in a very, very long time. The idea for the novel has been kicking around my head for a while, but since I've been having such a hard time getting it started, I decided to write a short story in medias res. Hope you liked it, please comment/review!