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Geez, turn by back for a couple days to take an exam and my little sister has?  completely restarted this wild ride?

M’kay.  If that is how she’s gonna play it…

~#~#~#~

Grimme wove through the crowd of Pawns carefully, keeping her maid-outfit as prim and proper as possible.

White and black of course.  Like a proper piece to a chess board.

This was a chance – a ridiculous, ludicrous, promising chance.

It was hope.  She hadn’t hoped since Wy…

She held out the tray of alcoholic beverages.  They were NOT anything her father served at his balls.

The smell and taste reminded her more of the times she worked at her brother’s forge, covering herself with blue-iron dust, getting color in her hair that wouldn’t wash out for months.

Her mother hated her “most un-lady-like behavior.”

Grimme maintained her carefully blank face and – wow – she didn’t realize until right now how good a mask servants needed.  It was exactly the same as the one required when she was dolled up in ball-gowns and make-up (both of which, someone else had to put on her).

“I should have come as a boy.” she muttered.

The butler frowned at her, before subtly winking.  She smiled back – “Softly darling.  No one needs to see your teeth.  Save those smiles for the special people in your life.”

In a foreign castle, she didn’t expect her personal ghosts.

“Yes, I own quite a few mines.” drawled one drunk Pawn, patting his swollen belly and fine vest.

“On the contrary, this new power will bring us to the new age.” argued another – very much sober – Pawn.  He was leaning closely to a woman who was leaning away.

Grimme frowned as she saw her symbol – the battle-ax surmounting an anvil – was stitched into both Pawn’s clothes.

“No.” she whispered.  “Even you aren’t that cruel.”

But Oaken-Door was.

She always would be.

Grimme wondered if she should sneak back to the greenhouse.  Maybe the others were ready to play this game?  They would be good alleys.

Pit-vipers, even the evil scientist was better.

She studiously avoided the new-comers.  They wouldn’t know her.  She knew enough about them.  And she didn’t want to.

This wasn’t her castle.

She wasn’t supposed to have this power.

Not here.

But she did.  And the flashes of information from the assassin/bounty-hunter were more than she wanted to deal with.

“Pull yourself together.  You’ve hired worse.”

“How could you do this?  You murdered him in cold blood.”

“Better him than me.”

“He had a wife.”

“He had a mistress, 10 concubines, and 15 slaves.”

“I don’t even recognize you anymore.”

“What would Mom say?”

“She would say… ‘Why did it take you so long?'” Grimme stared intently at the punchbowl.  She shuddered as one of the Pawns walked through her.

“Basically a ghost now.” she smirked at her reflection in the pale red liquid.

“Alright Oaken Door.  Play your games.”  She looked up, tipping her head.  “I’m done for the night.”

Her head snapped back, her eyes glowed blue, and she truly vanished.

Far away, beyond sight of the castle, hundreds of electric-blue eyes opened.  The Warning and Message rose and hundreds of legs took ponderous steps forward.