Lee chapter 42
Sep. 9th, 2008 07:49 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
maculategiraffeNot too much later, Bran fell asleep with his arms around Lee, his breath catching heavily in his throat, thick with tears. Lee wasn't at all sleepy, but he guessed he'd fall asleep eventually, if Bran didn't wake up and have other ideas. In the meantime, he didn't mind lying still, watching Bran sleep, and thinking.
Bran's face, swollen and pink with tears and sleep, looked so-- well-- not young, exactly, or childlike. Lee wasn't sure what the word was for what Bran looked like, but he thought it was making him feel protective, which was a strange feeling. He'd attempted to protect Bran once before, of course, when Bran was talking back to the master, but it was different when you were trying to protect someone brave and strong from their own insane excesses of bravery; Bran didn't look at all brave or strong right now, he just looked very, very tired, and Lee wanted to stand guard over him and keep anyone from waking him up.
He'd always known, of course, that Bran had belonged to Lord Dunaev, that Lord Dunaev had done the same kinds of things to Bran that he'd done to Lee, even if he'd managed not to leave any actual scars on Bran. Bran hadn't had to be taken to the hospital. But neither had Lee until the very end, and there had been a lot of time before then, and it was bad enough remembering that for yourself, without thinking about strong sweet gentle beautiful Bran-- crying. Bran cried. He would have cried when Lord Dunaev did things to him. He would have fallen asleep, afterwards, in the basement room, bruised and looking like this, and not safe.
And Lord Dunaev might have another slave by now. Another kid like Lee-- like Bran. That was what Miss Robin meant when she said the cause-- she meant that shouldn't keep happening, not to kids like Bran and Lee and whoever was sleeping in the basement room tonight.
Lee was half still thinking thoughts like these, half asleep and uneasily dreaming, when a soft knock came at the door. Lee startled and hesitated, not prepared to call out, as he'd heard free people do when a knock came at a closed door, "Come in" or "Who is it?" The first amounted to giving orders, which Lee didn't have the right to do to anyone in this household, and which would be unimaginably impertinent if it turned out to be the master or mistress; the second was even worse, suggesting that Lee might deny entrance to anyone. Before he could figure out how to acknowledge the knock with appropriate deference to whoever was knocking-- he was considering just "Yes?" but that still sounded too haughty, as if he were expecting the knocker to justify himself to Lee-- the knob turned, and Lee's eyes flicked shut reflexively. It was still safer to pretend to be asleep.
The door opened, and closed again, and footsteps approached the bed; a man's hand brushed over Lee's forehead, and Lee opened his eyes and looked up into his master's face.
"Hi, sweetheart," the master whispered. "Is there room for me?"
Lee nodded, pulling himself carefully out of Bran's arms; Bran was sleeping too soundly to wake as the master climbed into the bed between the two of them and slid an arm around each, pulling them close against his body. He was still wearing his tunic, but had taken off his belt and boots; he turned and kissed Lee's forehead.
"It's not that I don't think you'd take good care of him," he said softly, smiling at Lee, who smiled back. "But I don't think I'd sleep much tonight if I weren't with him. And with you. Are you nervous about tomorrow? The article coming out?"
"No, master," Lee whispered.
"Good," said the master, and yawned. "When did he fall asleep?"
"No," said Bran, waking suddenly, and then, blinking, "Oh."
"Hey, you," said the master.
"Hey, you," said Bran, and put his head down on his master's chest, and went back to sleep.
Lee woke up to the sound of the telephone ringing, and went back to sleep. Then he woke up to the sound of it ringing again, and went back to sleep again, and woke up again, and looked at the master, who looked back, apparently wondering the same thing Lee was.
"Why?" Bran asked with his eyes closed.
"That's an excellent question," said the master. "Let's go downstairs and find out."
"Ragnarok," said the mistress, slumped against the wall in the passageway as the telephone rang again. She picked it up. "Jamesen and-- yes. Hello, Lady Anna."
"Why are the curtains drawn?" the master asked Yves, who was in the foyer, peering through a sunlit chink in the curtains at the front lawn. Greta was craning her neck behind him; Jer was leaning with his back against the door and a long-suffering expression.
"Because the place is under attack," said Yves. "Look for yourself, master. Reporters, photographers, looks like the whole press corps out on the front lawn. The phone's ringing off the hook already, and most nobles probably haven't even had breakfast yet. Word's spreading quickly."
"I appreciate that, my lady," the mistress was saying to the phone. "Your support will be invaluable. Yes, I'm aware not everyone will feel the same way. We'll just have to deal with that as best we can. Thank you so much."
The phone rang again.
"Jamesen and Larssen," the mistress said. "Oh. Hello, Nikol."
Greta and Jer both stiffened. The master went back into the passageway to stand next to his wife.
"I'm aware of that," she was saying into the phone, leaning against the wall. "Yes, I know what he said about you. Why, is it not true?"
She rolled her eyes at the master, who shook his head as the angry voice came unintelligibly from the telephone.
"What does that have to do with anything?" she asked. "We're not talking about how you treated me, we're talking about how you treated-- Of course I'm taking his side, whose side did you expect me to take? --No, you never understood that, did you?"
She straightened up suddenly, her cheeks flushing, and said in a low, cold voice, "You leave her out of this."
The master stepped forward and took the phone from her unresisting hand.
"Fuck off and die," he said into the receiver, and hung up the phone, turning to his wife. "There, see how easy?"
She sighed and slumped back against the wall. "Thank you. Gods. He's really furious."
"You expected him to be pleased, maybe?" The master put his hand on her shoulder, and she moved to lean against him. "Jer had a few choice things to say in that interview."
"So did you," said the mistress.
"I thought I was very decorous."
"A decorous version of the ugly truth is still too much truth for Nikol Argounov," said the mistress. "I ought to know."
"Breakfast is ready," Fox snapped, putting her head out of the door to the dining room. "And if that mob out there keeps me from getting home after I clear up, I expect overtime. I got grabbed at on my way in here-- and there weren't half as many of them then."
"Of course," said the mistress distractedly. "Come eat, everyone. I'll take the phone off the hook."
No one ate particularly heartily, but everyone managed to eat something, except Lee, who couldn't shake the sickening feeling that all this hubbub and disruption was somehow his fault. The master noticed him poking at his food with a shaky fork and held out a hand to him; Lee dropped his fork and came obediently, and the master pulled Lee into his lap, holding him tightly against his chest.
"It's okay, Lee," he said. "Nothing bad is going to happen."
Yves and Jer groaned in tandem.
"Don't say that," said Jer.
Yves agreed, "Because now it will."
"Don't be superstitious," said the master. "Even if we go out of business or accidentally say something horrendous to the press, nothing bad will happen to Lee, that's my point."
Lee buried his face in his master's shoulder, and his master stroked his back as Jer said, "I'm just hoping all we get is angry phone calls. Some people aren't going to be content with yelling down a wire, and if the press could figure out where we lived--"
"I hope no one's harassing Val," said Greta, worrying her lower lip. "Shouldn't we put the phone back on, in case she tries to call?"
The mistress got up immediately, and Greta followed her out into the passage. Fox came in, glowering, to clear away their plates.
"Miss Valor can take care of herself," said Jer irritably, and then, more thoughtfully, "Wonder what's up with Harper and Robin."
"Look," said the master, "I think it's best if we all just go about our business and do what we'd normally be doing-- except Alix, who I guess is in charge of answering the phone non-stop for the next week, and Fox, I'm sorry, but if you don't want to be hassled, you should probably stick around until those people get bored and leave. And of course we'll pay you overtime. Do you need to use the phone to call anyone?"
"No," said Fox, "not yet," and went back to the kitchen, looking slightly mollified.
"Bran," said the master, "why don't you go help her out in the kitchen?"
Bran nodded peaceably and got up to follow Fox. "Yes, master."
"And Yves, if you think you can concentrate," the master added, "there are some accounts that need doing."
Yves smiled a little, and went without saying anything.
"I'm not going anywhere," said Jer before the master could speak, "so don't think you're going to send me along to play out of mischief-- master."
"I wouldn't dream of trying to take your mind off anything," said the master, raising his eyebrows at Jer. "What are you going to do?"
"Sit on the steps and watch the front door," said Jer.
"And hold off the invaders by sheer force of will?"
Jer got up, his face grim. "Just in case."
The phone was ringing again, and the master was saying something in a low voice to Jer, when Lee heard a car outside; he went to the window, knelt on the sill and peeped out through the tiny crack in the curtains. A cab had drawn up amid the waiting press phalanx; as Lee watched, Miss Robin and Mr. Harper got out of it and came running up the path to the house, looking more alike than Lee had ever seen them-- both flushed, with identical expressions of nervous, thrilled excitement. Miss Robin hammered at the door.
"Lee!" Jer snapped from behind him. "Get away from that window!"
Lee, clumsy with shock at Jer's harsh tone-- he'd never yelled like that at Lee before; nobody had yelled like that at Lee since he'd lived here, except Miss Robin-- moved too fast and fell off the sill and to the floor, where he knelt, staring up wide-eyed at Jer. The older slave came up to him so fast that Lee cringed away when Jer dropped to his knees, too, and reached for him.
"I'm sorry," said Jer, his voice gentle again. "I'm sorry I yelled. I'm not mad at you. I just got scared when I saw you at the window. I was worried somebody would see you and want to hurt you. Who's at the door?"
Lee couldn't answer right away. Miss Robin, or somebody, banged on the door again.
"Who is it?" the mistress asked, hurrying in.
"I don't know," said Jer.
"Miss Robin and Mr. Harper," said Lee softly, and the mistress went swiftly to the door and bundled them in, quickly, slamming the door shut again behind them and shooting the deadbolt home.
"Did you see that?" Miss Robin shouted. "This is big, this is really, really big, hi, Jer!"
Her enthusiasm was infectious; the house still felt besieged, and the telephone was ringing again, but it seemed a little exciting now, as well as frightening, as she went on, "I bet your phone's been ringing off the hook, tell us, tell us!"
"Everyone's been calling," the mistress confirmed, while Jer carefully guided Lee to sit down next to him on the steps, keeping a protective arm around him. "A few angry, some thrilled, most just... interested. We've been answering questions as best we can. Excuse me."
She went to answer the telephone again, and the master said, "What she means is she's been answering questions. For some reason she doesn't trust me with potentially sensitive telephone conversations. I can't imagine why."
Mr. Harper laughed and Miss Robin smirked as the master added, "I don't know what to do about that press phalanx out there, though."
"Eventually you'll want to make a statement," said Mr. Harper, his fair face pink with excitement. "We can bide our time on that, though-- think through what you want to say. Keep them on their toes for a while. This is-- really exciting, though, isn't it? I didn't know-- I mean, I hoped, of course, but this is-- big."
"Yeah," said the master. "I guess it is."
"As long as you people are paying for my time," said Fox, coming out into the foyer with her apron on, "can I get anyone anything? Something to drink?"
"Anything's fine," said Miss Robin affirmatively.
"Tea, maybe," said the master, as Miss Robin sat down unselfconsciously on the floor of the foyer, planting herself almost at Jer's feet. Jer looked down at her with a sort of long-suffering amusement, as if she were an unruly puppy. The master sat down a step below Jer and Lee while Mr. Harper, considerably more awkwardly than Miss Robin, maneuvered himself to sit down on the floor. Lee looked up at Jer, who leaned forward as if to kiss him, then just brushed a cheek against his instead.
"Don't worry, kid," he said, not looking at Lee. "It'll be okay."
The master was trying to persuade Lee to sip some tea when something crashed against the door, beat at it furiously, a sound that scared Lee half to death and made everyone else look up, startled. Bran, Yves, Greta, and the mistress all came hurrying into the foyer.
"Trouble," said Jer succinctly, as the mistress went to the window and peeped out the crack between the curtains.
"Dunaev," she said, just as shortly.
Everyone except Jer suddenly looked at Lee, who was trying to blink away a sudden dizzying blurriness of vision. Jer, still with his arm around Lee, glowered at the door.
"I fucking knew this would happen," he muttered. "Didn't I tell you, master?"
"Alix, call the police," said the master, and the mistress vanished into the hallway as the pounding continued. "Jer, listen-- all of you, Yves, Bran, you too. If the door gives way, let me do the hitting, okay? I don't want any of you jumping in to fight, except in self-defense, and even then I'd rather you ran and hid."
"What?" Jer was furious. "Why the hell?"
The master spread his hands apologetically. "I'm on safe ground legally if he does actually break into my house, but I don't want any of you to be test cases on whether a slave can legally beat up an invader to his master's home. Don't get me wrong-- if you do jump in I'll swear in court that I threatened you with painful death if you didn't hit him as hard as you could. But unofficially, please make it easier on me and don't, because I don't want to be in court with any of you."
Yves was scowling, too. "So we're just supposed to stand around while he hammers on you?"
"No, while I hammer on him," said Holden. "He's big, but he's out of shape, and I doubt he's fought anyone who hit back for a while-- unlike me." He grinned at Jer, who cracked a small, reluctant answering smile. "Anyway, let's just hope the door holds until the police get here or he gets tired and goes home."
To hurt his new slave, Lee thought.
The mistress came back in and said, "They say they're on their way."
"I guess we just wait it out, then." The master leaned over and put a gentle hand on Lee's knee. "You okay, kiddo?"
Lee nodded, and there was a silence, broken by another bout of furious pounding on the door, followed by a round of screamed obscenities and threats in Lord Dunaev's voice, in which the master's name figured slightly more prominently than Bran's and slightly less prominently than Lee's. Lee couldn't stop himself from shaking; Jer pulled him closer. There was more pounding, then quieter yells, as if Lord Dunaev had turned away from the door; maybe he was yelling at the reporters.
The master had Bran's hand in his, squeezing it convulsively. Lee leaned his head on Jer's shoulder. The mistress and Greta were at the window, the mistress' arm around Greta's waist. There was a silence, except for the noise at the door.
"Oh," said Miss Robin suddenly, after a while, and looked at the master. "You know what-- you should go out there!"
"Are you out of your fucking mind?" Jer asked her, and Lee stole a quick look at the master, who didn't look at all inclined to reprimand Jer for talking to a free citizen like that.
"No," said Miss Robin, who didn't look inclined to reprimand him either-- just to argue. "Don't you get it? The press is outside. They've got cameras. I got as many shots as I could of what that bastard did to Lee, but a shot of him actually swinging his fist-- that would be solid fucking gold."
"You are out of your mind," said the master. "I'll fight him if he breaks into my house, but at my age, I'm not getting in any fights I don't absolutely have to."
"You don't fight back," Miss Robin explained, as if to an idiot. "We don't need shots of you hitting people. Just him."
The master stared at her. "So why don't you go out there and get yourself beaten up? Actually, I'd kind of like to see that."
"I would, if I thought he'd hit me for the cameras," said Miss Robin, "but he doesn't even know who I am. He'd just push me out of the way and come beat you up inside the house, where it wouldn't do us any good. Or beat Lee up, or Bran. Don't you get it-- we need someone who's going to make him mad enough to haul off right there in the yard."
The master rolled his eyes. "Look, Robin, the article was one thing, and I'm not sorry we did it, but I am not quite deeply enough invested in your cause to let some sadistic psychopath punch me around for a photo op, okay? No matter how deeply it might move the hearts of the voting public."
"So you aren't willing to take a few bruises for the welfare of thousands of kids?" Miss Robin demanded.
Lee wasn't trembling any more, and he wasn't thinking of thousands of kids, but of Bran, and of the kid back at Lord Dunaev's-- the boy, or girl, waiting in the basement room. He was thinking about how Bran had been smart and brave, everything Lee wasn't, and it hadn't saved him. Luck had saved him-- luck and the master, who was only one man and could only do so much, after all. Couldn't do as much as pictures could. Miss Robin was right.
But the master shouldn't be the one to stand there and be hit; it wasn't his place, he wasn't used to it, and for all the times Lee had been beaten for no better reason than his own clumsiness and worthlessness, for no reason at all, this was--
"Lee?" said the master, as Lee got up, and then as he started moving, fast, "Lee, no--"
Lee was already at the door-- the master couldn't move fast enough to stop him-- and unbolting the deadbolt, and opening the door. He was several steps out the door when his former master, looking bigger than ever and crimson with rage, who'd stepped a little away from the door and was standing in the yard yelling at the crowd, turned on Lee with an instant's disbelief, an instant before his hand pulled back to hit, and in that instant something else was between Lee and the fist as it swung.
Some other body took the hit, and then someone was dragging Lee down, covering him, all around him-- he couldn't see, could only feel the muffled blows and kicks through the other body as he huddled beneath it, hear a deep voice ordering in his ear, punctuated with gasps as the hits landed, "Stay still-- don't move--" and around the same time it filtered through to Lee's shock-numbed brain that it was Jer's voice, that Jer was shielding him, passively taking the pummeling intended for Lee, the pummeling stopped.
A woman screamed-- Lee was lying still, his body sluggish, miles behind or ahead of his mind-- and there was the sound of a blow landing, but not to Jer's body. Dunaev's voice yelled out as if in rage or pain, and then Jer yelped and fought for breath as something slammed into his side with a sickening cracking sound, and wheezed again to Lee, who had finally started to struggle, "Stay still, damn you!"
Lee froze, paralyzed into obedience by Jer's angry voice, however breathless with pain.
"I'll fucking kill you!" someone yelled at someone else, and something heavy hit the door behind them, and Lee's arm was crushed against the ground as something hit Jer again and for an unbearable moment the sound of his painful, ragged breathing stopped altogether. Then dragged in again.
"Freeze!" shouted an amplified voice. "Hands in the air, all of you!"
Bran's face, swollen and pink with tears and sleep, looked so-- well-- not young, exactly, or childlike. Lee wasn't sure what the word was for what Bran looked like, but he thought it was making him feel protective, which was a strange feeling. He'd attempted to protect Bran once before, of course, when Bran was talking back to the master, but it was different when you were trying to protect someone brave and strong from their own insane excesses of bravery; Bran didn't look at all brave or strong right now, he just looked very, very tired, and Lee wanted to stand guard over him and keep anyone from waking him up.
He'd always known, of course, that Bran had belonged to Lord Dunaev, that Lord Dunaev had done the same kinds of things to Bran that he'd done to Lee, even if he'd managed not to leave any actual scars on Bran. Bran hadn't had to be taken to the hospital. But neither had Lee until the very end, and there had been a lot of time before then, and it was bad enough remembering that for yourself, without thinking about strong sweet gentle beautiful Bran-- crying. Bran cried. He would have cried when Lord Dunaev did things to him. He would have fallen asleep, afterwards, in the basement room, bruised and looking like this, and not safe.
And Lord Dunaev might have another slave by now. Another kid like Lee-- like Bran. That was what Miss Robin meant when she said the cause-- she meant that shouldn't keep happening, not to kids like Bran and Lee and whoever was sleeping in the basement room tonight.
Lee was half still thinking thoughts like these, half asleep and uneasily dreaming, when a soft knock came at the door. Lee startled and hesitated, not prepared to call out, as he'd heard free people do when a knock came at a closed door, "Come in" or "Who is it?" The first amounted to giving orders, which Lee didn't have the right to do to anyone in this household, and which would be unimaginably impertinent if it turned out to be the master or mistress; the second was even worse, suggesting that Lee might deny entrance to anyone. Before he could figure out how to acknowledge the knock with appropriate deference to whoever was knocking-- he was considering just "Yes?" but that still sounded too haughty, as if he were expecting the knocker to justify himself to Lee-- the knob turned, and Lee's eyes flicked shut reflexively. It was still safer to pretend to be asleep.
The door opened, and closed again, and footsteps approached the bed; a man's hand brushed over Lee's forehead, and Lee opened his eyes and looked up into his master's face.
"Hi, sweetheart," the master whispered. "Is there room for me?"
Lee nodded, pulling himself carefully out of Bran's arms; Bran was sleeping too soundly to wake as the master climbed into the bed between the two of them and slid an arm around each, pulling them close against his body. He was still wearing his tunic, but had taken off his belt and boots; he turned and kissed Lee's forehead.
"It's not that I don't think you'd take good care of him," he said softly, smiling at Lee, who smiled back. "But I don't think I'd sleep much tonight if I weren't with him. And with you. Are you nervous about tomorrow? The article coming out?"
"No, master," Lee whispered.
"Good," said the master, and yawned. "When did he fall asleep?"
"No," said Bran, waking suddenly, and then, blinking, "Oh."
"Hey, you," said the master.
"Hey, you," said Bran, and put his head down on his master's chest, and went back to sleep.
Lee woke up to the sound of the telephone ringing, and went back to sleep. Then he woke up to the sound of it ringing again, and went back to sleep again, and woke up again, and looked at the master, who looked back, apparently wondering the same thing Lee was.
"Why?" Bran asked with his eyes closed.
"That's an excellent question," said the master. "Let's go downstairs and find out."
"Ragnarok," said the mistress, slumped against the wall in the passageway as the telephone rang again. She picked it up. "Jamesen and-- yes. Hello, Lady Anna."
"Why are the curtains drawn?" the master asked Yves, who was in the foyer, peering through a sunlit chink in the curtains at the front lawn. Greta was craning her neck behind him; Jer was leaning with his back against the door and a long-suffering expression.
"Because the place is under attack," said Yves. "Look for yourself, master. Reporters, photographers, looks like the whole press corps out on the front lawn. The phone's ringing off the hook already, and most nobles probably haven't even had breakfast yet. Word's spreading quickly."
"I appreciate that, my lady," the mistress was saying to the phone. "Your support will be invaluable. Yes, I'm aware not everyone will feel the same way. We'll just have to deal with that as best we can. Thank you so much."
The phone rang again.
"Jamesen and Larssen," the mistress said. "Oh. Hello, Nikol."
Greta and Jer both stiffened. The master went back into the passageway to stand next to his wife.
"I'm aware of that," she was saying into the phone, leaning against the wall. "Yes, I know what he said about you. Why, is it not true?"
She rolled her eyes at the master, who shook his head as the angry voice came unintelligibly from the telephone.
"What does that have to do with anything?" she asked. "We're not talking about how you treated me, we're talking about how you treated-- Of course I'm taking his side, whose side did you expect me to take? --No, you never understood that, did you?"
She straightened up suddenly, her cheeks flushing, and said in a low, cold voice, "You leave her out of this."
The master stepped forward and took the phone from her unresisting hand.
"Fuck off and die," he said into the receiver, and hung up the phone, turning to his wife. "There, see how easy?"
She sighed and slumped back against the wall. "Thank you. Gods. He's really furious."
"You expected him to be pleased, maybe?" The master put his hand on her shoulder, and she moved to lean against him. "Jer had a few choice things to say in that interview."
"So did you," said the mistress.
"I thought I was very decorous."
"A decorous version of the ugly truth is still too much truth for Nikol Argounov," said the mistress. "I ought to know."
"Breakfast is ready," Fox snapped, putting her head out of the door to the dining room. "And if that mob out there keeps me from getting home after I clear up, I expect overtime. I got grabbed at on my way in here-- and there weren't half as many of them then."
"Of course," said the mistress distractedly. "Come eat, everyone. I'll take the phone off the hook."
No one ate particularly heartily, but everyone managed to eat something, except Lee, who couldn't shake the sickening feeling that all this hubbub and disruption was somehow his fault. The master noticed him poking at his food with a shaky fork and held out a hand to him; Lee dropped his fork and came obediently, and the master pulled Lee into his lap, holding him tightly against his chest.
"It's okay, Lee," he said. "Nothing bad is going to happen."
Yves and Jer groaned in tandem.
"Don't say that," said Jer.
Yves agreed, "Because now it will."
"Don't be superstitious," said the master. "Even if we go out of business or accidentally say something horrendous to the press, nothing bad will happen to Lee, that's my point."
Lee buried his face in his master's shoulder, and his master stroked his back as Jer said, "I'm just hoping all we get is angry phone calls. Some people aren't going to be content with yelling down a wire, and if the press could figure out where we lived--"
"I hope no one's harassing Val," said Greta, worrying her lower lip. "Shouldn't we put the phone back on, in case she tries to call?"
The mistress got up immediately, and Greta followed her out into the passage. Fox came in, glowering, to clear away their plates.
"Miss Valor can take care of herself," said Jer irritably, and then, more thoughtfully, "Wonder what's up with Harper and Robin."
"Look," said the master, "I think it's best if we all just go about our business and do what we'd normally be doing-- except Alix, who I guess is in charge of answering the phone non-stop for the next week, and Fox, I'm sorry, but if you don't want to be hassled, you should probably stick around until those people get bored and leave. And of course we'll pay you overtime. Do you need to use the phone to call anyone?"
"No," said Fox, "not yet," and went back to the kitchen, looking slightly mollified.
"Bran," said the master, "why don't you go help her out in the kitchen?"
Bran nodded peaceably and got up to follow Fox. "Yes, master."
"And Yves, if you think you can concentrate," the master added, "there are some accounts that need doing."
Yves smiled a little, and went without saying anything.
"I'm not going anywhere," said Jer before the master could speak, "so don't think you're going to send me along to play out of mischief-- master."
"I wouldn't dream of trying to take your mind off anything," said the master, raising his eyebrows at Jer. "What are you going to do?"
"Sit on the steps and watch the front door," said Jer.
"And hold off the invaders by sheer force of will?"
Jer got up, his face grim. "Just in case."
The phone was ringing again, and the master was saying something in a low voice to Jer, when Lee heard a car outside; he went to the window, knelt on the sill and peeped out through the tiny crack in the curtains. A cab had drawn up amid the waiting press phalanx; as Lee watched, Miss Robin and Mr. Harper got out of it and came running up the path to the house, looking more alike than Lee had ever seen them-- both flushed, with identical expressions of nervous, thrilled excitement. Miss Robin hammered at the door.
"Lee!" Jer snapped from behind him. "Get away from that window!"
Lee, clumsy with shock at Jer's harsh tone-- he'd never yelled like that at Lee before; nobody had yelled like that at Lee since he'd lived here, except Miss Robin-- moved too fast and fell off the sill and to the floor, where he knelt, staring up wide-eyed at Jer. The older slave came up to him so fast that Lee cringed away when Jer dropped to his knees, too, and reached for him.
"I'm sorry," said Jer, his voice gentle again. "I'm sorry I yelled. I'm not mad at you. I just got scared when I saw you at the window. I was worried somebody would see you and want to hurt you. Who's at the door?"
Lee couldn't answer right away. Miss Robin, or somebody, banged on the door again.
"Who is it?" the mistress asked, hurrying in.
"I don't know," said Jer.
"Miss Robin and Mr. Harper," said Lee softly, and the mistress went swiftly to the door and bundled them in, quickly, slamming the door shut again behind them and shooting the deadbolt home.
"Did you see that?" Miss Robin shouted. "This is big, this is really, really big, hi, Jer!"
Her enthusiasm was infectious; the house still felt besieged, and the telephone was ringing again, but it seemed a little exciting now, as well as frightening, as she went on, "I bet your phone's been ringing off the hook, tell us, tell us!"
"Everyone's been calling," the mistress confirmed, while Jer carefully guided Lee to sit down next to him on the steps, keeping a protective arm around him. "A few angry, some thrilled, most just... interested. We've been answering questions as best we can. Excuse me."
She went to answer the telephone again, and the master said, "What she means is she's been answering questions. For some reason she doesn't trust me with potentially sensitive telephone conversations. I can't imagine why."
Mr. Harper laughed and Miss Robin smirked as the master added, "I don't know what to do about that press phalanx out there, though."
"Eventually you'll want to make a statement," said Mr. Harper, his fair face pink with excitement. "We can bide our time on that, though-- think through what you want to say. Keep them on their toes for a while. This is-- really exciting, though, isn't it? I didn't know-- I mean, I hoped, of course, but this is-- big."
"Yeah," said the master. "I guess it is."
"As long as you people are paying for my time," said Fox, coming out into the foyer with her apron on, "can I get anyone anything? Something to drink?"
"Anything's fine," said Miss Robin affirmatively.
"Tea, maybe," said the master, as Miss Robin sat down unselfconsciously on the floor of the foyer, planting herself almost at Jer's feet. Jer looked down at her with a sort of long-suffering amusement, as if she were an unruly puppy. The master sat down a step below Jer and Lee while Mr. Harper, considerably more awkwardly than Miss Robin, maneuvered himself to sit down on the floor. Lee looked up at Jer, who leaned forward as if to kiss him, then just brushed a cheek against his instead.
"Don't worry, kid," he said, not looking at Lee. "It'll be okay."
The master was trying to persuade Lee to sip some tea when something crashed against the door, beat at it furiously, a sound that scared Lee half to death and made everyone else look up, startled. Bran, Yves, Greta, and the mistress all came hurrying into the foyer.
"Trouble," said Jer succinctly, as the mistress went to the window and peeped out the crack between the curtains.
"Dunaev," she said, just as shortly.
Everyone except Jer suddenly looked at Lee, who was trying to blink away a sudden dizzying blurriness of vision. Jer, still with his arm around Lee, glowered at the door.
"I fucking knew this would happen," he muttered. "Didn't I tell you, master?"
"Alix, call the police," said the master, and the mistress vanished into the hallway as the pounding continued. "Jer, listen-- all of you, Yves, Bran, you too. If the door gives way, let me do the hitting, okay? I don't want any of you jumping in to fight, except in self-defense, and even then I'd rather you ran and hid."
"What?" Jer was furious. "Why the hell?"
The master spread his hands apologetically. "I'm on safe ground legally if he does actually break into my house, but I don't want any of you to be test cases on whether a slave can legally beat up an invader to his master's home. Don't get me wrong-- if you do jump in I'll swear in court that I threatened you with painful death if you didn't hit him as hard as you could. But unofficially, please make it easier on me and don't, because I don't want to be in court with any of you."
Yves was scowling, too. "So we're just supposed to stand around while he hammers on you?"
"No, while I hammer on him," said Holden. "He's big, but he's out of shape, and I doubt he's fought anyone who hit back for a while-- unlike me." He grinned at Jer, who cracked a small, reluctant answering smile. "Anyway, let's just hope the door holds until the police get here or he gets tired and goes home."
To hurt his new slave, Lee thought.
The mistress came back in and said, "They say they're on their way."
"I guess we just wait it out, then." The master leaned over and put a gentle hand on Lee's knee. "You okay, kiddo?"
Lee nodded, and there was a silence, broken by another bout of furious pounding on the door, followed by a round of screamed obscenities and threats in Lord Dunaev's voice, in which the master's name figured slightly more prominently than Bran's and slightly less prominently than Lee's. Lee couldn't stop himself from shaking; Jer pulled him closer. There was more pounding, then quieter yells, as if Lord Dunaev had turned away from the door; maybe he was yelling at the reporters.
The master had Bran's hand in his, squeezing it convulsively. Lee leaned his head on Jer's shoulder. The mistress and Greta were at the window, the mistress' arm around Greta's waist. There was a silence, except for the noise at the door.
"Oh," said Miss Robin suddenly, after a while, and looked at the master. "You know what-- you should go out there!"
"Are you out of your fucking mind?" Jer asked her, and Lee stole a quick look at the master, who didn't look at all inclined to reprimand Jer for talking to a free citizen like that.
"No," said Miss Robin, who didn't look inclined to reprimand him either-- just to argue. "Don't you get it? The press is outside. They've got cameras. I got as many shots as I could of what that bastard did to Lee, but a shot of him actually swinging his fist-- that would be solid fucking gold."
"You are out of your mind," said the master. "I'll fight him if he breaks into my house, but at my age, I'm not getting in any fights I don't absolutely have to."
"You don't fight back," Miss Robin explained, as if to an idiot. "We don't need shots of you hitting people. Just him."
The master stared at her. "So why don't you go out there and get yourself beaten up? Actually, I'd kind of like to see that."
"I would, if I thought he'd hit me for the cameras," said Miss Robin, "but he doesn't even know who I am. He'd just push me out of the way and come beat you up inside the house, where it wouldn't do us any good. Or beat Lee up, or Bran. Don't you get it-- we need someone who's going to make him mad enough to haul off right there in the yard."
The master rolled his eyes. "Look, Robin, the article was one thing, and I'm not sorry we did it, but I am not quite deeply enough invested in your cause to let some sadistic psychopath punch me around for a photo op, okay? No matter how deeply it might move the hearts of the voting public."
"So you aren't willing to take a few bruises for the welfare of thousands of kids?" Miss Robin demanded.
Lee wasn't trembling any more, and he wasn't thinking of thousands of kids, but of Bran, and of the kid back at Lord Dunaev's-- the boy, or girl, waiting in the basement room. He was thinking about how Bran had been smart and brave, everything Lee wasn't, and it hadn't saved him. Luck had saved him-- luck and the master, who was only one man and could only do so much, after all. Couldn't do as much as pictures could. Miss Robin was right.
But the master shouldn't be the one to stand there and be hit; it wasn't his place, he wasn't used to it, and for all the times Lee had been beaten for no better reason than his own clumsiness and worthlessness, for no reason at all, this was--
"Lee?" said the master, as Lee got up, and then as he started moving, fast, "Lee, no--"
Lee was already at the door-- the master couldn't move fast enough to stop him-- and unbolting the deadbolt, and opening the door. He was several steps out the door when his former master, looking bigger than ever and crimson with rage, who'd stepped a little away from the door and was standing in the yard yelling at the crowd, turned on Lee with an instant's disbelief, an instant before his hand pulled back to hit, and in that instant something else was between Lee and the fist as it swung.
Some other body took the hit, and then someone was dragging Lee down, covering him, all around him-- he couldn't see, could only feel the muffled blows and kicks through the other body as he huddled beneath it, hear a deep voice ordering in his ear, punctuated with gasps as the hits landed, "Stay still-- don't move--" and around the same time it filtered through to Lee's shock-numbed brain that it was Jer's voice, that Jer was shielding him, passively taking the pummeling intended for Lee, the pummeling stopped.
A woman screamed-- Lee was lying still, his body sluggish, miles behind or ahead of his mind-- and there was the sound of a blow landing, but not to Jer's body. Dunaev's voice yelled out as if in rage or pain, and then Jer yelped and fought for breath as something slammed into his side with a sickening cracking sound, and wheezed again to Lee, who had finally started to struggle, "Stay still, damn you!"
Lee froze, paralyzed into obedience by Jer's angry voice, however breathless with pain.
"I'll fucking kill you!" someone yelled at someone else, and something heavy hit the door behind them, and Lee's arm was crushed against the ground as something hit Jer again and for an unbearable moment the sound of his painful, ragged breathing stopped altogether. Then dragged in again.
"Freeze!" shouted an amplified voice. "Hands in the air, all of you!"
