Chapter Text
“I am so fucking tired , I couldn’t give a shit where we sleep at this point.” Beau groaned. “I would sleep in the manure with the horses if that was the easiest available option.”
“Right. Cool. Let’s not do that.” Fjord muttered.
The Mighty Nein had been walking non-stop since they woke up that morning, and they were all exhausted and not just a little grumpy. The sun was hot, despite the cool air, and there were only so many conversations and mind-achingly annoying songs to sing before everyone was ready to call it quits. They had been hoping they would come across an inn or something so that they could actually sleep in a bed that night, but the sun was inching closer and closer to the horizon, and Jester could feel everyone, including herself, resigning themselves to another cold night sleeping on the ground.
“Oh, hey,” Caduceus said. “There’s a building up ahead.”
“What! Where? I don’t see anything - let me up there, I can’t see anything!” Nott started scrambling up Caduceus’ leg, Caduceus not seeming to mind all that much.
“I just saw what looks like the glow from the lights of a building just beyond the crest of this little hill, is all.” Caduceus said mildly, as Nott pulled herself up to stand on his shoulders, peering into the distance intensely.
“I think I see what he’s talking about!” She shrieked from her new seven foot high vantage point.
“Perhaps it’s an inn,” Caleb murmured. “Let’s at least check before we settle down to camp, ja ?”
The gang marched on, and not five minutes later, they had reached the two-story building that was definitely an inn or tavern, the name The Weary Nook engraved in the wood above the door.
They made their way inside, entering a small but warm and clean tavern, with tables and fireplace and bar behind which stood a tiefling woman, who greeted them with a warm smile.
“Welcome to the Weary Nook, friends! My name’s Kindness, but you can call me K. What can I help y’all with this evening?”
They talked to her for a moment, and she informed them that they could buy food, drink, and rooms for the night here, and that they were less than a day’s walk from the city that was their destination.
“And, we’re about five minutes from a crossroad of sorts, if you head in the direction of the city, so you’ve found yourself a very convenient spot. You won’t find a better place to eat your fill or a cozier place to sleep the night away for miles and miles.” K smiled, and gave them a wink. “So do be sure to stop by again, and tell your friends!”
They promised they would, then ordered themselves all a big, hot dinner and settled down at a table. Within 10 minutes, another woman, an elf who introduced herself as Lia, swept by the table and gave them their meals. Having fresh, hot food after the days they’d spent on the road was fantastic .
“Not that our food isn’t so so awesome, Caduceus,” Jester amended after her initial excited outburst at the plate of hot food. “Our stuff is definitely the best, definitely, but like, this is just a nice change or something, you know?”
Caduceus smiled that warm, slow smile of his nodded, chewing steadily.
“No, really, our food is definitely the best, for sure, right? Yasha?”
Yasha looked up with a start, mouth stuffed full of food, a slightly panicked look in her eyes at being put on the spot.
“Ergh,” she swallowed with difficulty. “Uh, yes, I would say so, uh. Yes.”
Jester smiled brightly at her, and Yasha gave her a tentative smile in return. Success.
They finished eating, and after a couple minutes of halfheartedly discussing their plans in the city and so on, Jester threw her hands in the air, tilting her chair back on two legs (Beau and Fjord both sort of lurched towards her like they were afraid she would fall, which was hilarious), and groaned, loud and exaggerated.
“Let’s go to bedddd, I’m tired, this is boring, we’re all tired and bored, so bored, bedddd .”
Fjord sighed.
“Yeah, you’re probably right, Jester. Bed it is. Who wants to room with who, now?”
There was a long pause while everyone kind of glanced at each other, before Caleb piped up.
“How about,” he said, leaning forward over the table with a ridiculously serious expression on his face, “we all get our own rooms, for once? The room here are fairly inexpensive, we have a good amount of gold on us, and frankly, I think we all could perhaps use a little privacy after nearly a week on the road with absolutely no walls between us, ja ?”
“Huh,” Beau said, leaning back in her chair to mirror Jester, “never thought I’d see the day where Caleb Widogast suggests we spend more gold instead of save it.”
Caleb grumbled something inaudible under his breath, looking down at the table, before Beau laughed and slapped him hard on the back a couple times.
“I’m joking, man!”
“ Oh ,” he wheezed, sounding like the breath had been knocked out of him.
“I think that sounds like a pretty good idea,” Caduceus said mildly, Yasha nodding slowly next to him, and Nott nodding energetically next to her.
“Alrighty then,” Fjord stood up and made his way over to the tiefling proprietor. “Seven rooms, please, Miss Kindness.”
“Comin’ right up,” she gave another hearty wink and whisked off to get them their keys to the second-floor rooms.
About half an hour later, everyone had said their goodnights (Jester had made the rounds three times for each person, just to be extra thorough) and settled down for evening. Jester found it simultaneously very nice and very lonely, to be sleeping without a roommate for the first time in… Gosh, she wasn’t even sure how long. Months? Either way, it had been quite a while.
She lay quietly for a long moment, wide awake, trying to ignore the discomfort at this new isolation.
Ah! She knew what she could do tell quell the loneliness. She could do what she had always done before.
Jester sat bolt upright in bed, clasped her hands together dramatically and closed her eyes.
“Oh, Traveler,” she sang, “Oh, Traveler, oh dear, I am just sooo lonely right now, it’s so sad, you know. If only I had a super cool super best friend who’s magical and could totally keep me company right now, that would be super cool.” She counted to five before she peeked, opening one eye to glance around the room. Empty. She sighed.
“Oookay, well, I guess you’re super busy with something super important or something, don’t worry, I totally get it. I’ll just break into Beau’s room if I get super super lonely… Anyway… Goodnight, Traveler!!”
And with that, she flopped herself back down into the bed, and closed her eyes. Despite the vague sense of loneliness wiggling in her stomach, Jester managed to drift off to sleep after only a few minutes.
Less than an hour later, as dreams of tiny unicorns and figures clad in green began to drift through her sleeping mind, Jester’s window shattered open, glass flying inward as the butt of a shortsword smashed through.
Under normal circumstances, the sound of breaking glass would have snapped Jester awake. Perhaps even Beau, in the room next door. Almost definitely Caduceus, as perceptive as he was, despite the fact that his room was fairly far away from hers.
However, no one, not even Jester, heard the crash. The Silence spell cast only seconds before the break had made sure of that.
One by one, four humanoid figures climbed into Jester’s room, brushing glass away from the sill to avoid cutting themselves. Not one made even the slightest sound.
They moved slowly, deliberately, encircling her bed. One, taller and wider than the others, was holding a wide, thick strip of cloth. Another was holding what looked to be a length of rope. Another stood at the foot of Jester’s bed, hands outstretched, fingers slowly twirling, tracing arcane symbols in the air.
After a moment, this magic-user nodded once, sharply, and the shortest one held up their hand with three fingers raised. They counted down.
3
2
1
The magic user clapped their palms together, and a flash of purplish arcane energy burst from their hands. Jester awoke as the light flashed past her eyelids with a startled yelp. Not a sound escaped her lips.
Groggy, confused, she moved to lift a hand to her throat. And then she tried again. And again. Oh shit, oh fuck , she couldn’t move. Why the fuck couldn’t she move?!
And then, she saw the figures standing over her in the darkness. Four of them. One of them, bigger than the others, leaned over her and stuffed a gag into her mouth, rough and careless. She nearly choked, tried to scream, and yet again, not even a squeak was heard.
Two of the other figures reached over and yanked her stiff arms up, pulling her wrists together, and started tying them rope, wrapping even her hands and fingers. The bindings were tight, so tight , she could already feel scratches start to ooze blood, feel them start to go numb. She realized with increasing horror that they were trying to restrict her hands so she couldn’t cast any magic.
She tried, one last time, to scream. To fight. To move , just move at all, even a little, god fucking damn it! Nothing. Nothing. Tears welled up in her eyes, spilling hot down her cheeks.
It’s happening again. She thought, her mind exploding with panic and fear and frustration, remembering a dark night on the road not all that long ago. She felt like couldn’t breath, she could hardly think. It’s fucking HAPPENING AGAIN .
She felt one, the big one, reach under her, start to lift her up into their arms, and Jester felt like she was going to burst.
No, she thought. NO!
And the spell that held her snapped . She could move. Her eyes went wide. She could move!
The big guy’s head was right above her now, as he leaned over to pick her up. She could see him clearly. He was ugly, for one thing. And, she felt herself grin in spite of everything, he was about to get fucking uglier .
Before any of them could react, she lurched upwards, with all her strength, and headbutted him right in the fucking nose. She felt, rather than heard, a satisfying crunch of bone, and the sudden wet warmth of blood. Nice .
He reared back, dumping her back on the bed, mouth wide open in a silent scream of pain and rage, stumbling backwards into the side table, knocking it over as he flailed.
One of the other figures dove at her, arms outstretched, and Jester rolled out of the way, right off the bed.
She hit the floor hard, feeling the wooden floor rip into the skin of her knees, and scrambled awkwardly to her feet, her bound hands making everything more difficult.
She’d barely gotten to her feet when she caught movement out of the corner of her eye, and turned just in time to see the bed come sliding towards her, fast , one of them must have shoved it, she couldn’t get out of the way in time-
It cracked into her knees and she staggered backwards with a silent grunt of pain, slamming into the opposite wall.
She took a breath, with difficulty through her gag, and gave herself one second to reorient herself, and take in the situation.
To her left, the big guy, who she could now see looked to be human, was still holding his bloody, broken nose, flailing, but he looked like he was starting to recover. Not good. A ways in front of her, on the other side of the newly relocated bed, were two of the other assholes. One tall and lithe, pointed ears, probably an elf? And the other was short, maybe a gnome or a halfling? They both appeared to have drawn knives. Just behind them was a shattered window. And finally, to her right, was the door out. Between her and the door was the skinny-looking human guy who she noted was the one with the magic.
After another split-second moment of consideration, she decided her best bet was the skinny guy and the door. She thought her chances of getting past him weren’t bad, and even though she couldn’t use her hands to open the door, she decided maybe, just maybe , if she hit it with enough force, she could break it open.
The big guy on her left shook his head and focused in on her, a horrible, bloody sneer on his face. It was now or never.
Jester sprinted towards magic bitch and the door. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see the big guy moving towards her and the two on the other side of the bed coming at her as well. She focused on the magic bitch.
He had stepped forward, was raising his arms - how about nope .
Jester sprinted past him, swinging her bound hands towards his face and connecting solidly with his temple. He staggered out of her way and she barreled forward, eyes trained on the door.
Nearly there . She could see the other two closing in on her, feel the big guy on her tail. Why did this room feel so damn big all of a sudden?
Nearly there . If she hit the door with enough force, right by the handle, there was a chance she could force it open, get someplace where she could make some fucking noise, get her friends. She could do this. She could do this.
Her left calf exploded with pain and she screamed soundlessly through the gag. Her leg gave out beneath her - no, FUCK - and she it the ground hard, yet again. She glanced down and could see a knife stuck deep in the meat of her calf, up to the hilt. Shit .
Jester grit her teeth and struggled to stand, putting all her weight on her right leg, and barely got off the ground before she was tackled, full force, from the right. It was one of the other two from the other side of the bed, the tall one, the elf?
The crashed to the floor together, and Jester felt her head hit the ground hard . The world went white. She could feel that same person on her, trying to pin her limbs down now. Jester kicked out desperately with her good leg, and felt it connect with something that felt like a cheekbone. Nice .
And then her limbs locked up, and she was frozen again.
No, no, NO!
Her vision was slowly clearing from the impact. Her head felt like it was full of molasses, and she swore she could feel something warm and hot congealing in her hair. A similar warmth was pooling beneath her leg, burning hot with pain.
Fuck .
She struggled again, or tried to. Nothing. Nothing. She was helpless, again. It had happened again .
She watched through fuzzy vision as all four of these dicks gathered around her, felt them tie up her legs, as well as doubling down on her arms and hands. Most of them were bleeding from one spot or another in the facial region. They also all looked absolutely livid.
Jester took a brief moment of pride in this. And then the big fuck punched her in the face, and the world went dark.