Inheriting Rebellion Chapter 2

A Story of Emre

Author’s Note: I’m sorry it took so long to get this chapter out. I promise to publish these more consistently going forward. Thanks for sticking with me.

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If you missed Chapter 1 - Start Here

Inheriting Rebellion Chapter 1

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Chapter 2

Jullanes tried to keep herself busy the rest of the day, but her thoughts constantly returned to Belle. What does she need to tell me? Did something happen in Barna? Why did she seem scared? Her stomach churned into knots, her head ached, and her sweaty palms made stitching almost impossible. 

"Are you alright, dear?" Alistair said as he inventoried a new shipment of fabric. 

Jullanes poked her finger with the needle. "Almost done, sorry, sir," she said, grimacing.

"Al, and I didn't ask if you were done. I asked if you were feeling alright. You look a little pale," he said, touching her forehead with the back of his hand. 

Jullanes's hands trembled as she set her needle down. "Just some... feminine issues," she lied. A lie she didn't like to use, but it usually stopped Alistair's questions. 

Alistair pulled his hand back slowly and narrowed his eyes. "Ah, yes. Well, if you need anything," he trailed off, his hands fidgeting awkwardly near his chest. "Why don't we call it a night? Rylanes is cooking supper."

"Can I skip supper tonight? I think a walk would make me feel better," Jullanes said. 

"Do you think that is a good idea?" Alistair said, scratching his nose. 

"I'll be fine, Al. Nothing bad happens in Malar." 

Alistair shot her a dismissive glance and continued to protest. "You're too skinny to skip supper." 

Jullanes mimicked his look, tilting her head forward to convey her weight as a forbidden topic. 

Al took the hint and sighed. "Fine, but at least take some bread with you."

Jullanes smirked and stood up from her desk. "Thank you, Al. I won't be out too late." 

She had almost reached the door when Alistair called out to her. "Bread," he said, pointing to the kitchen.

Jullanes slunk backward like she was pulled by an invisible leash. She retrieved a loaf of freshly baked brown bread while ignoring her brother's irritating and childish faces as he stirred a fishy-smelling stew.

She playfully waved the bread at Alistair as she left. 

Malar's shop district was eerily quiet as she walked past a row of vacant merchant carts on the cobblestone street. Vast, slow-moving cumulus clouds drifted through the sky, leaving streaks of fuchsia light in their wake. Jullanes nibbled on the bread and kicked loose stones while she wandered the town, watching the rocks bounce across the road. She shuffled after one of the stones, noticing it glimmered strangely in the twilight. The silver, grape-sized rock had a narrow vine of crystal running through it horizontally. Jullanes picked it up and examined it closer. She didn't think it was worth anything, but she liked how it looked and felt, so she dropped it into her apron pocket. 

Once the bread was gone, Jullanes began sucking on one of the sweets from Belle. The candy helped distract her from her intrusive thoughts about what happened in Barna. She watched two children play around the fountain in the center of the district; their mother was clearly not pleased with their behavior. She envied their innocence. The happiness was almost contagious, but then her sweet melted, and the bitter aftertaste reminded her of home and Belle's concerned expression.

Jullanes needed another distraction and decided to window shop at Thasia's Tales at the edge of the square. Thasia's only had a few books, but the owner reminded her of the shopkeepers in Barna, who were not too friendly but extremely knowledgeable about their craft. She even had bards in from time to time. 

Jullanes peered through the window. She couldn't see much in the dim light. Just the cloudy spines of the meticulously organized books on the outer wall. The cascading leaves of several ferns and spider plants drooped over multi-colored pots. No candles were allowed in Thasia's Tales, so it was always the first shop to close. 

"We're closed," a harsh voice said. 

Jullanes jumped and felt her heart drop into her stomach. "I know. I apologize, ma'am. I was just trying to see if you had any new books on your desk." 

A grin crept onto the woman's face. "Not many of the girls in Malar bother learning to read." 

"My mother always said learning to read will save your life," Jullanes said defensively. 

The woman seemed to look at her with renewed interest. "Your mother sounds like a smart woman." She paused. "I've seen you around before. Are you the girl Alistair took in last summer?" 

"Yes, ma'am." 

"Where are you from again?" She asked, squinting her eyes.

Jullanes clenched her fist to stop them from shaking. "Yimser, ma'am." She looked away, pretending that she had an itch on the back of her head. She was a terrible liar. 

"Yimser. You must have been born on the right side of the bridge then with all this ma'am talk." 

Jullanes swallowed a lump in her throat. "Yes, ma'am. Alistair is a stickler for formality as well." 

This answer satisfied the shopkeeper. "That he is." 

A gust of wind blew Jullanes's unusually loose hair into her face. She tied the tangled mess of hair into a sloppy but satisfactory bun, trying to use the distraction to distance herself from the shopkeeper. "Have a good night, ma'am."

"I did get a shipment of books from Barna the other day. Come by in the morning if you want something new to read," the shopkeeper said, turning away. 

Books from Barna, Jullanes thought. Maybe the usurper is selling my collection. The prospect of getting a new book lightened her mood, and the thought that it could be one of her old books was a more than welcome distraction. What if it's Maiden's Tales? Or Swindlers and Foes, or Thieves of Hope? She rattled off a list of dozens of books that she hoped had made their way to Thasia's as she left the shop district behind.

Only the faintest streaks of greenish-blue light were visible beneath a canopy of emerging stars. One of the few things Jullanes liked about Malar was how visible the stars were each night. She didn't see them in Barna very often, not that they weren't there, but more because she didn't notice them. She took those things for granted. Her only concerns were with thwarting her father's attempts to marry her off to elderly merchants just because she was the second born daughter and Aluranes had always had her father's favor. 

The sour smell of the river released her from her reverie. There was a stark difference between the shop district at closing time and the dock district by dusk. People were bustling about everywhere. They seemed to appear with the darkness like stars. Whispered conversations floated on the breeze, bringing an incoherent, spine-chilling murmur to the area. Most of the people flocked toward Malar's only tavern, The Blue Crow, but a handful of individuals lurked in the shadows. 

Jullanes tried to ignore them, but each stare lingered longer than she was comfortable with, and she was accustomed to over-extended looks. She hurried past three terrifying men. Belle and Jullanes had been meeting under the bridge for more than half a year, but always during the day, when they could steal a few moments from their new routines. Their meeting point was only a few paces away, but another group of men lurked between her and Belle. 

Her palms were sweating despite the rapidly cooling air. It felt like a mouse was trying to claw its way out of her stomach, but Jullanes pressed on. 

"What are you doing out here?" A savage-looking sailor said. His friends laughed, dark, sinister cackles that caused the hairs on the back of her neck to stand up. Jullanes ignored them and continued toward the bridge. The men didn't follow her, but their continued laughter chased her faster than Ry ever could. 

She reached her destination, practically gasping for air. Her breath hissed shakily through her teeth as she regained her composure. Just as her breathing returned to normal, a hand grabbed her shoulder. 

"Jules," a soft voice whispered. 

Jullanes sprang away as if she had been stung by a bee.

"It's me, Jules." 

Belle's soft, kind face appeared through her haze of fear and doubt. "Gods, Belle. Did you need to sneak up on me like that? It's bad enough being out here this late." 

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to scare you."

Jullanes took a deep breath, the river's bitter stench flooding into her nose and down her throat. Belle grabbed her hand and squeezed tightly. Jullanes looked down. An enormous rat scurried along the riverbank a few paces away. Its light, pitter-pattering footsteps harmonized with the gentle, lapping current. It would have been peaceful in the morning, but now it just added another layer of fear to the rapidly expanding pool of anxiety in her gut. 

"I know. Everything feels different tonight," Jullanes said, squeezing Belle's frigid hand in return. 

"What do you mean?" 

"I don't know. It just does. I have a terrible feeling that something bad will happen," Jullanes said, dropping her conspiratory whisper lower with each word. 

They locked eyes for a moment, but Belle's almost fully black eyes bounced from hers to somewhere in the distance. Her mouth dropped open. 

"What is it?" Jullanes asked, turning around. 

Belle put a finger to her lips and made a shushing sound as she looked around Jullanes's head toward the docks behind them. "I thought I saw someone," she whispered, tilting her head sideways like she was trying to listen. 

Jullanes glanced over her shoulder. "What did you want to talk about? I don't want to be here longer than we have to."

Belle surveyed the area one more time before meeting Jullanes's gaze. She quickly looked away and twirled a finger through her hair, an old nervous tick that Belle had never outgrown. "He," she paused. "He's looking for you."

It felt like the air had been sucked from her lungs. Her limbs were frozen. Belle didn't need to elaborate; Jullanes knew who he was–Rotaar Elcaryn, her father's usurper, well, the man who took control after her father was killed. The legendary Dinardo was truly to blame for her father's death and her current social standing. 

Jullanes stepped backward, releasing Belle's hand. "Are you sure?" Several scenarios sprang to the front of her mind, all of which ended with her and Rylanes dead. She hugged herself tightly to stop her jaw from quivering, but the tension only exacerbated the tremors that had spread to the rest of her extremities. 

Belle put a hand on Jullanes's cheek. "There are bounties up all over Barna," she said, reaching for something inside her dress. She pulled out a crumpled, damp piece of parchment. "I had to grab it quickly without Adalynn seeing me." 

Jullanes grabbed the parchment, carefully unfolding it. The word "bounty" was printed in large script above a drawing of a girl and boy—Rylanes and her. The picture of Ry wasn't accurate. He had done a lot of growing up in the two years since they left the capital, but Jullanes's picture might as well have been a mirror. She had kept her long, wavy brown hair tied in the exact same bun tonight as it was on the bounty. Her family's notoriously thick, angular eyebrows furrowed above her narrow, slanted eyes, and even her chin had the slight dimple that her sister used to tease her about. 

She didn't know what to say. Jullanes could feel her jaw hanging open; only a slight "ah" escaped. 

Belle broke the silence. "Jules," she said softly. 

Jullanes shook her head. "It looks just like me." 

"I know." 

Below the picture the reward was listed–10,000 marks, an astounding number. "We're as good as dead. Every bounty hunter in Emre will be after us once the word spreads." 

"No one knows you here, Jules," Belle said.

"Not yet, but they will." 

Belle's eyes widened. A shriek escaped her lips as she pointed behind Jullanes. Jules turned just in time to see a short, dark figure on the only visible dock. Its face was cloaked in shadow. 

"It's probably a sailor or dock worker," Jullanes said, trying to convince herself as much as Belle. 

Belle grabbed Jullanes's hand. "Right. Probably."

The shadow figure twitched. It's a bounty hunter, Jullanes thought, swallowing hard, wishing that she had more of the sweets with her.

"Yes, a sailor. It has to be," Jullanes said, reaching into her apron and pulling out the stone she had picked up earlier. "But just in case."

She tested the stone's weight in her hand and threw it. The rock sparkled in the darkness as it flew through the air. The figure didn't move. The stone passed through the gloomy silhouette, clunking onto the wooden dock. Belle gasped. Jullanes blinked and rubbed her eyes. The shadow was gone. "Let's go, Belle." 

Belle nodded quickly. "Yes, please," she said.

Every shape and sound became threatening. The jagged stones along the riverbank looked like dragon's teeth. Belle's moonlit shadow appeared to move of its own accord like a ghostly assassin preparing to strike.

Jullanes led Belle through the dock district at a pace closer to running than walking. They ignored several cat calls near the Crow. She could feel the sweat on Belle's palm as a white-haired man offered to buy them a drink in return for a favor that seemed more disgusting than sexual. Belle yanked Jullanes in a different direction as three younger men wobbled out of The Grumbling Giant, a notoriously raucous gambling den; at least, that's what Alistair told her it was. She had doubts.

Jullanes hadn't been so frightened since the day her father died, and they fled the city; she felt like her heart was in her throat, like her stomach could burst at any moment until they rounded the corner and saw the welcoming blue-tinged lanterns of the shop district. 

They both sighed and sat on one of the stone benches surrounding the fountain in the square. The soft tickle of water behind them was soothing. Jullanes focused on that sound as she caught her breath. "Alistair is probably worried. I should get back," she said, staring absently at a crack in one of the paving stones. The crack morphed into a blurry, sinister face as she lost focus. She blinked several times before Belle responded. 

"Me too," she said. 

Jullanes watched Belle's legs bounce up and down as she twirled a tight knot into her hair. "Belle."

Belle shivered and looked up. She pulled her finger out of her hair but didn't say anything.

"Thank you for telling me. I know you risked a lot by grabbing this," she said, holding up the folded bounty. "And you risked even more by telling me." Jullanes could feel tears welling in her eyes; she sniffed them back. 

Belle didn't have the same restraint. She wore her emotions on her sleeve; tears were already streaming down her rosy cheeks. "I'd do anything for you, Jules. What are you going to do?" 

Jullanes swallowed back another wave of tears. "I'm going to talk to Alistair." 

"Are you sure that's safe?"

"He's the only person in Malar I can trust other than you and Ry. He took us in when nobody else would. He's still loyal to my father. He can help." 

Want More Stories of Emre?

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