Venture Unbroken

by R. H. Russell

“Oh, Jade.” Flora pulled out a chair for her. “It’s not your fault.”

  Jade sat down. She slumped onto the table. “What now, Flora? What do we do now?”

  “I don’t know,” Flora threw her hands up helplessly. “Bust Venture out?” She laughed off a tear.

  Jade froze. Bust Venture out. She lifted her head. “Flora . . . what if we did?”

  “What?”

  “If I could get in to see him, how closely do you think they’d search me? You could fashion me a blade, disguised somehow . . .” She shook her head. “It’s crazy, isn’t it?”

  “Maybe.” Flora pulled up a chair next to Jade. “Maybe not. If he could get out,” she warned, “he’d have to leave the country.”

  Jade nodded. Surely even exile was better than the lockup. Better than being broken, as Dasher had put it.

  “I don’t know, Flora. I don’t know if he’ll do it. The actual breaking out, I mean. He’d have to do more than threaten the guards in order to get out of there.”

  Would Venture Delving, who always wanted to do the right thing, kill a man in order to be free? What would he think of her for asking him to do it? The tears came again, the tightening in her throat. What was she doing? What was she becoming?

  Flora said, “Maybe we can figure out a way, so he won’t have to. But you’d have to get in there and see what the . . . arrangements are, so that we could plan.”

  “You’re right. We don’t need all the answers right now. But I have to get in there.” Not just for information, but to see him. To let him know somebody out here was doing something.

  #

  Chance heard them rummaging in the cupboards and came in to help the girls make a tray of wine and cheese. Dasher seemed truly grateful for the glass of wine Flora offered him, but Earnest looked at Jade as though he was surprised she was still there.

  Jade sat down on the couch next to Earnest and pushed the plate of cheese closer. “Earnest,” she said carefully, “At least help me get in to see him. Father’s requests have gotten nowhere, but you have friends—”

  “I just got permission to see him. Tomorrow.”

  “You did?”

  “I’ve been trying to get in there all this time, and they just told me yesterday. There’s no way they’re going to allow him two visitors, and I’m not going to risk them canceling my visit by asking. Besides,” he said softly, “It’s been seven months, Jade. He won’t be the same.”

  “Maybe they’ll let a lady in. They’ll see me as less of a threat.” In spite of the horrible, aching fear growing inside her, Jade added, “He’ll still be Venture. He’s strong.”

  “Yes, he’s strong. He’s being strong in there, probably for you. So how do you think he’ll feel if those guards try anything while you’re there? You think they won’t try anything with you?”

  “They wouldn’t dare.”

  Earnest snorted. “Right. You think they won’t make him think they have, after you’re done talking to him, even if they don’t dare?”

  “Earnest!” Dasher snapped, and Jade half expected the wine glass to snap in his hand as well. “That’s enough.”

  Earnest ignored him. “You go in there,” he told Jade, “and all you’re going to do is help them mess with his head even more.”

  Even more? What did Earnest know? As a trainer, he had connections to guards. Guards who knew guards who worked in the lockup. Guards who might know something about the two out-of-towners who were guarding Vent. Who might even have relieved them on occasion. Seen Venture.

  Earnest got up, plucked Jade’s cloak from the hook by the door, and held it out to her, his jaw clenched in determination. Jade folded her arms and leaned back into the couch, equally resolved. She wasn’t going to leave here without a plan to do something, anything, to help Venture.

  Dasher let out a long, controlled breath. He finished off his glass of wine in one swallow, then got up and took the cloak from Earnest. “I’ll show the ladies out.”

  Jade didn’t budge. Dasher’s smooth manner wasn’t going to work any better on her than Earnest’s rudeness. Dasher put a hand on her shoulder. “Come on,” he said tenderly.

  Earnest shot Dasher an accusing glare and banged into the kitchen.

  Jade thought she caught the faintest flush of embarrassment on Dasher’s cheeks, but she blinked and his expression was as calm as usual. She was seeing things, feeling things, that made no sense. Suddenly she was exhausted. She pushed her glass away and got up.

  “Let’s walk Flora back to the smithy,” Dasher said, “and then I’ll take you up the hill.”

  “I rode to the smithy,” Jade said.

  “Then I’ll ride back with you.” Dasher leaned close. “We’ll talk. Just you and me.”

  There was hope in those whispered words, hidden from Flora by the swish of Jade’s cloak as Dasher draped it over her. Hope, and something else that made her shiver. Feeling weak in the knees, she let Dasher take her arm. Dasher offered the other arm to Flora. Flora frowned at it and widened her eyes at Jade in perplexity. Jade gave her an encouraging nod and mouthed, I’ll talk to you later.

  Flora rolled her eyes at Jade, then accepted Dasher’s arm.

  Chapter Eleven

  On the third day after Venture fell apart, as he lay on the floor facing the stone wall, a different voice pronounced his name.

  “Vent. Vent, it’s me.”

  It couldn’t be Earnest. The voice was just in his head, he was sure of it. He didn’t want to look up, didn’t want to turn around, didn’t want to see that Earnest wasn’t really there.

  “I told you,” Hardy said. “He’s lost his mind.”

  “Shut it, fathead,” Earnest growled back.

  Venture heard the thunk of a small sack of coins against the guard’s muscled chest, then the sound of it being caught up in his hand.

  “Go buy yourself some better entertainment and leave us alone.”

  Hardy grumbled something, but then walked away, the coins clinking in his pocket as he descended the staircase.

  Venture sat up and regarded Earnest. Earnest looked good. Tired, but good.

  “Hey,” Earnest said.

  Venture said nothing.

  “Fathead do that to your face?”

  Venture shrugged.

  “What have those two have been saying to you? Vent? Listen to me. There’s a reason they’ve got you up here all by yourself. There’s a reason why the other guards never see you. Everybody loves you, Vent. Do you hear me? Those two are the only ones sick enough to be trusted to treat you like this. Talk to me, Vent. Say something.”

  Venture glowered down at his hands, locked tightly together, his knuckles whitening. Those blasted guards were letting Earnest see him—even leaving Earnest alone with him—because he’d finally given in and rewarded them with his tears. Because he was too broken for it to be a risk. How many times had they said, Aren’t you lonely in here by now? Come on, I know you want to do it. Just cry. Just cry like a baby and we’ll let you see your friends.

  Now Venture couldn’t even look at Earnest, couldn’t ask all the questions that had played their tormenting game in his mind through the countless silent hours; he could only think of what he would do to Reed and Hardy if he ever got the chance. Sometimes, when he thought he might just rather die than live another day in this place, the thought of living to have his revenge on them was all that kept him from giving up altogether.

  He listened to the gentle patter of a light rain dribbling down the window above him and tried to decide whether he was glad to have Earnest here or not. He knew he needed someone, yet it was so humiliating, and he was beyond help.

  It was obvious from both the look on Earnest’s face and his silence on the matter, that he hadn’t brought good news. Whatever his friends had been working on had failed. There was no pardon in the works. He was going to have to sit here and eat Reed and Hardy’s spit and sleep in Reed and Hardy’s spit and be constantly covered in his own reeking filth for seven years, f
ive months, and three days longer.

  “Never mind. Vent, I’m not going to lie to you. Things don’t look good, but we’re not going to give up on this, I promise you. And,” he swallowed visibly, his dark eyes glistening with unshed tears of outrage, “I’m going to see what we can do about these conditions. This . . . “ he gestured at the cell as though it sickened him. “Have they given you anything we’ve sent?”

  Venture let out a hoarse, humorless laugh.

  “I didn’t think so.” Earnest paced back and forth in front of the cell a few times, running his hand through his hair. He stopped and locked eyes with Venture again. “Vent, I’m sorry. This is my fault. I should have seen it coming. I should have . . .”

  “You should have what?” Venture’s voice started out a as a low, rusty grumble, but it grew in clarity, in forcefulness, in volume, as he rose. “Tried to stop me? Do you really think you could have?” Venture shook his head at Earnest’s apology, unable to speak again for a while. At last he said, “I’m dying in here. I can’t do this. I wasn’t made for this.”

  “No,” Earnest said quietly, “you weren’t made for this. No one was made for this.”

  Earnest leaned closer, his hands on the bars. He gazed into Venture’s face with his deep brown eyes, just the way he’d always done when he was talking victory into his exhausted fighter by the matside. “You’re the strongest person I know, Venture Delving. You can survive this, made for it or not.”

  I told you you have what it takes. You have more, Vent Delving. More than what it takes to be a champion. You have what it takes to deal with the rest of this. You’ve come a long way. Don’t let them take you backwards, Beamer had said when he stepped off that stage at the Championship.

  But he had. He’d let them take him back where he’d been, and then some. He was no champion now. No man of honor.

  “I’m sorry,” Earnest said. “I know it’s bad. Worse than I can know.”

  But Venture wasn’t looking at him anymore. He was leaning against the bars next to Earnest, staring intently at the wall behind him. And his eyes betrayed his thoughts. I have to do something about this. He felt Earnest’s hands on his shoulders. His friend had reached through the bars to him.

  Earnest leaned in close and whispered fiercely, “Don’t do anything crazy. You winning the Championship didn’t change the rules. Not yet,” he added wistfully. “You know I don’t want to have to tell you this, but you have to just stick it out. Dash and me are still trying to figure something out.”

  “I didn’t get to the Championship by following the rules. I’m not going to be with the woman I love by following the rules. The rules said that I didn’t get to make my own choices unless my master felt like it, because of a choice my mother made for me when I was a little kid—because she didn’t want me to starve! The rules say if I defend myself, and a lady’s honor, it’s all right, unless I was a bondsman at the time and the bastard happens to be Crested. I’m done with the rules.”

  “Vent, you can’t.”

  “Yes, I can.”

  “They’ll kill you.”

  “This is killing me.”

  “You’re nineteen years old. You’re still young—”

  “I know how old I am! I know how old I’ll be when I get out of here. Don’t you dare tell me how young twenty-six is! That’s not good enough! It’s not.” Venture brought his hands to his face and turned away.

  “Vent! I know it. I know it, all right? Listen, I’m going to talk to Dasher about this. We’ll find a way to help you do it. You’ll never make it out of here on your own.”

  Venture lowered his hands. He was listening all right. He nodded, feeling, for the first time in months, an inkling of hope. It was far-fetched, the idea of busting out of here. His chances were next to nothing. But next to nothing was still something.

  #

  Jade crept down the hall, boots in hand. She lowered her foot onto the step, shifting her weight slowly, willing her father and grandmother not to wake. She slipped through the kitchen and into the washroom, then out through the servants’ door in the adjoining courtyard. The cool black of the night greeted her, and her breath caught.

  The last time she’d stepped out this door and into the moonlight, the last time she’d sneaked out in the middle of the night, it had been to meet Venture. Sweet Vent. Jade’s throat ached to form a cry, but she forced it back. She didn’t have time to dwell on the past, to cry over something that might never be. Dasher was waiting for her.

  Footsteps padded beside her, and Lightning’s cold, wet nose rubbed against her palm. After they took Venture away, Father had tried to give Lightning to Justice. Lightning always was really Venture’s dog. But Justice had looked at Jade, not with blame, but with a different sorrow added to his own. Compassion for her, for what she and Venture once had together. What they’d wanted together. Justice insisted Jade should have Lightning nearby, looking after her. “It’s what Vent would want,” he’d said.

  “There’s my good girl,” Jade whispered to Lightning as she pulled on her boots. “Want to go for a ride with me? A lady shouldn’t ride alone. It’s dangerous.”

  Lightning’s ears perked up. Instead of doing her usual dance at the prospect of being included in one of Jade and Sunrise’s rides, she cocked her head at Jade skeptically. Even the goodnatured retriever knew that neither of her masters—Grant Fieldstone by right, or Venture Delving, the master of her heart—would approve.

  Jade knew the right things to murmur to the horses as she opened the stable doors. She knew how to keep them whickering soft greetings. She saddled up Sunrise and led her out of the stable and onto the grass. She didn’t steer her horse onto the road and mount until they were partway down the hillside that led to Twin Rivers Town, in the valley below.

  Lightning bounded alongside Sunrise. She circled the horse as Jade slowed and dismounted. Jade tethered Sunrise to a tree on the outskirts of town. Riding was faster, but hooves on cobblestone would draw too much attention. She tried to stay in the shadows of the buildings’ eaves until she reached the yard. A few trees in the yard offered some cover, but eventually she had to sprint through the open grass.

  Just as she neared the front steps, Jade froze. Were those footsteps? Her heart was beating so fast, she couldn’t be sure. She glanced around her anxiously. Where was Lightning?

  “Lightning?” she called softly, coaxingly.

  She sensed a flurry of movement behind her. Too big to be Lightning. Just as Jade’s mouth opened to form a scream, a hand clamped over it.

  “Hush.” Dasher’s voice was ever smooth, even in a breathless whisper. His arm wrapped around her, pulling her to his chest. “It’s just me.”

  Jade relaxed, and Dasher lowered his hand, but her heart was still thudding. Dasher’s arm held her tight. A part of her wanted to turn her face to his chest and hide there, safe in his arms, and pretend none of the events of the past several months had ever happened.

  She pulled away. Nowhere was safe anymore, and she could never forget Venture.

  Dasher took her hand and led her to the door with a couple of swift strides. “We don’t have much time.” He let go her hand and fished the key out of his pocket. Sensing her hesitation, he paused. “What’s the matter?”

  “Nothing,” she lied.

  Dasher frowned, and Jade could tell he didn’t entirely believe her. Venture wouldn’t have believed her at all.

  “No one saw you?”

  She shook her head.

  Dasher turned the key in the old lock. The click was so loud in the stillness of the night. Jade cringed, but Dasher didn’t seem to notice. “We will be careful. We will be quick. No one will know.”

  Venture would know, eventually. And if he found out about Dasher’s part in it, he’d kill him. Jade followed Dasher into Beamer’s Center. She was going to learn everything she could, and she was going to get Venture back, no matter what the cost.

  “Is Flora coming?”

  “She should be h
ere.”

  The door eased open, and a woman slipped in. Even draped in a cloak and shrouded in darkness, Jade knew it wasn’t Flora.

  “This is the woman I told you about,” Dasher said.

  The woman startled. She took a step back and cocked her hooded head at Jade. “You didn’t tell me she was going to be here, Master Glen.”

  “Well, she is here.”

  “Dasher, who is this?”

  “One of my sources.”

  That was all Dasher had said every other time Jade asked him about this woman he told her was coming to meet him, this woman who knew something about Venture.

  The woman frowned at Dasher.

  Dasher said firmly, “I wanted Miss Fieldstone to be here to hear whatever you have to say. She deserves to know.”

  “Yes, I suppose she does.” The hood fell back, revealing shoulder-length hair, somewhere between dark blond and light brown. “But I warn you, it will not be easy to hear. As I told you,” she said to Dasher, “there have been some changes since we last spoke.”

  Was that sympathy in the strange woman’s eyes? Jade’s heart sank. Dasher had told her this woman might know something that could help them get Venture out. But even the night shadows couldn’t hide the hopelessness in her expression.

  “Go on,” Jade said. “Please.”

  “They’re going to kill Venture Delving.”

  “Who is?” Jade demanded, giving up all pretense of patience.

  “I can’t say who, and I don’t know how they plan to carry it out, but they are going to find some plausible way to get rid of him, and blame it on someone else. Perhaps place him with the general population in the lockup, and arrange for a prison fight.”

  “But why? Why now?”

  “Because they know they’re losing,” Dasher’s voice was hoarse. “Because I’ve been too successful in building up popular support for him.”

  “It’s not your fault,” the woman said. “But I’m afraid a change of tactics is urgently called for if you want to see Venture Delving alive again. In order to prevent the public sentiment against them from growing, they might have to release him soon—too soon for him to be . . .” Her eyes flicked to Jade as she hesitated.