The Prior

POV: Cass Abbot

Belle and Max return to their room, leaving Elliot and I alone. Elliot leans against the wall, staring right into my eyes. This is probably a fatal error of mine, but I think I actually might trust him. Or, at least, I trust him enough to get him to help me crack down Max’s story. I don’t believe his forensic scientist bullshit. Not after that perfect shot in 1800.

“So, now what?” he asks me.

“Let’s explore the fort?” I suggest. He nods and opens the door for me. We wander down the hallway, towards the staircase we went up earlier. There’s paintings all throughout the hallway. At the top of the stairs, a Spaniard smiles at us.

“You speak English?” he asks. We both nod. “Ah, you’re some of the guests passing through. Why don’t we have some wine and chat a little?”

“Of course,” Elliot says. The man takes us to a small dining room and sets out some wine and cups.

“So, where are you traveling from?” he asks us, pouring the wine. I stay quiet, knowing the question was directed to Elliot. You know, the patriarchy. Elliot says something about traveling for work. I take a sip of the wine and glance at Elliot. He doesn’t seem to notice. It’s strong. Tastes more like vodka than wine.

They talk a little bit more about the fort. The Spaniard gives us some history facts, which is strange because ‘history’ is just 10 years from the year we’re currently in. I try not to think too hard about the fact that the guy we’re talking to, in our world, is a skeleton completely buried into the ground.

“You’ve a beautiful wife, sir,” The Spaniard says. I shudder in discomfort. He has got to be 40 or 50. Not to mention how much I hate attention.

“Yes, sir. She is quite beautiful,” Elliot says with a smile. I look over to him. We make eye contact for a second, his brown eyes locked into mine. I know it’s all pretend, but my heart still flutters a little. He takes my hand and breaks eye contact.

The man keeps offering us more wine. I’ve had maybe 2 full glasses. I can’t tell because every sip I take, he refills it. I don’t think I’ve had much water since this whole thing started, so anything to drink is better than nothing. I might have had too much. Elliot’s off his face too, slurring his words and everything. At some point, we must have stumbled back up towards our room. I don’t really remember much.

–

I wake up to bright sunlight. My face is pressed against Elliot’s bare chest. I sit up and my vision goes black. My head’s throbbing. A glass of something is pressed to my lips. Water. Crisp water.

“This’ll help with the hangover,” Elliot’s voice says. I suck down the water, it’s neutral texture softening the numbness of my tongue. I look over to him, once I’m able to somewhat open my eyes. My vision is still blurry. I’m either still a bit drunk or having the hangover of Hell.

“What happened?” I ask him after a moment. He shrugs.

“I don’t remember. Drunk me kindly left us two glasses of water. No clue where they came from because there’s no sink or water in here. I also wasn’t able to find my shirt. Not really sure what happened to it,” he says. I was asleep on top of him. I don’t know when he had time for any of this.

“How long have you been awake?”

“Maybe 20 minutes. I didn’t want to wake you so I just stayed in bed. I’m sure my shirt is around her somewhere, I haven’t actually gotten up to look for it.” he gets up and walks around the room. He’s capable of walking, much unlike me.

I look around our room. My dress is on the floor. I glance down, which rushes blood to my head. After wincing for a second, I’m able to look at what I’m wearing. A white, men’s dress shirt. My heart does a summersault.

“Elliot?” I say.

“Yeah?”

“I’m wearing your shirt.”

He looks over at me and sighs, “So, we did have sex,”

I nod, “It appears that way.”

“I’m sorry. Can we agree to not make things weird? I really liked how things were...” he asks, staring at me. Oh, good.

“Neither of us remember and were both off of our faces. Not a big deal,” I say, blowing it off a little more than I probably should have.

I unbutton his shirt a little and realize that I truly am only wearing his shirt. Elliot immediately looks up at the ceiling when he realizes the same.

“It’s fine. See me naked once, I don’t really care if you see me naked a second time. Even if we were drunk. Plus, you need to help me get into my dress. I’m not going to figure that out myself,” I say. He looks back at me and walks to collect his shirt.

“You’re beautiful,” he says, while buttoning the shirt, glancing not at my exposed body, but my face instead. I pull the sheet up to cover myself. Why didn’t I start with that?

“Let’s not make things weird, remember?” he nods and looks at the floor.

“Uh, just so you know, there’s a condom on the floor, so we were safe,” he mutters, awkwardly. Where did that come from?

I nod, “Good, uh, where did we get that?”

A moment of panic rushes onto Elliot’ face, or at least I think it did. The room is spinning a little afterall, “Well, sometimes, when I need things, they just appear.”

“Huh?”

“Like, when I was at the constitution, I thought to myself, I need a bottle of water or I’m going to choke to death and then one just appeared,” he mutters, “It must come from the CIA or something.”

I raise an eyebrow, mildly confused by that. My brain isn’t functioning at full speed. I glance at the floor and catch sight of its wrapper. It’s not the US Army / Foreign Service issued ones. I’ve seen those. Trojan brand? Since when does the US military provide name brand condoms?

“Since when does the US Government spend their money on name brand condoms?” I ask him. His face flushes red.

“Not so sure. That is kinda weird,” he mutters.

“I’m telling you. Don’t trust everything. I’m not convinced that we’re being told the truth. You know, about why we’re here or what we’re really doing.” I say as I slip on my under-tights and undershirt. He makes eye contact with me, seemingly processing what I tell him.

“Help me?” I ask Elliot. He nods and buttons up my dress. We meet Belle and Max in the hallway. My head is still throbbing; I try to manifest an Advil, as Elliot stated, but it doesn’t appear. I wonder what the criteria for that is.

The four of us take to the woods, trying to find this man.

“Cass, you okay?” Belle asks me. I nod.

“The Spanish had some strong-ass wine. Just a bit hungover,” I say. Belle snickers.

“Why didn’t you invite us to wine night?” Max asks me.

“Belle’s not old enough to drink,” I say. Max doesn’t fight back. We exit the fort and head towards the wooded area. Last night, Elliot gathered some intell from the Spanish about the Seminoles. I’m trusting him to remember that, though. I certainly do not.

We find some men, dressed as I’d imagine indigenous Americans would be.

“Belle, give me the photograph. I’ll ask him in English and then try Choctaw. We’ll see what works,” Elliot says.

He speaks to him and it appears that he understands the Choctaw. Elliot and him make friends. Elliot turns back to us and waves for us to come closer.

“He knows where Micco, the man in the photo, is. He is Holata, but since we’re English we can call him Joseph,” Elliot says. He points to me and asks a question. Elliot answers positively. I assume he said ‘yes’ to whatever it was.

After walking in silence he whispers in my ear, “You’re my fake wife. He was trying to set me up with his daughter. Also, Belle and Max are now married. Max was the second choice for the daughter.” I laugh and go along with it. I inform Belle and Max of their new marriage and continue along.

Finally, we find Micco. He’s a respected leader of the group and it appeared that Joseph had to pull a lot of strings to get us a meeting. Elliot goes in alone while the rest of us stand outside. He eventually steps out of the covered area.

“Cassidy, c’mere for a minute?” he requests. I follow him into the sheltered area. It’s cozy but warm and inviting. Micco is older and has kind eyes. Elliot introduces me to Choctaw, but Micco turns to me.

“I understand English, too. But, language is better,” he says. I nod and smile, but I’m careful to keep my mouth closed. I still remember my cousins having a Native American doll whose mouth was not showing teeth as it was considered rude. No clue if that applies here, but better to be on the safe side.

I’m not quite sure why I’m here, but they continue to talk in the Choctaw/Seminole languages. Elliot said that the Seminoles just thought he was an English man who made a valiant effort to learn the Seminole language, but in reality, he was just speaking modernized Choctaw. Eventually, Elliot slides next to me and puts his arm around my shoulder. I’m just tolerating it at this point. I mean, I already had drunk sex with the man, what’s a little bit of fake marriage romance?

Eventually, everything is sorted out and we get to eat lunch with the tribe.

“Belle, do we know how this guy dies?” Elliot asks. She shakes her head.

“I think I only have the photo, but I’ll re-evaluate the paper....It says he dies tomorrow night. Doesn’t say how,” Belle says.

“So, what? We hang around here until then? Try to get extra security? We have no details,” I comment. Max shrugs.

“If he was supposed to die in an attack, we would be fine to save him, but if he’s sick...I don’t think we can really do anything,” Elliot reasons. Micco walks over to the table we’re sitting at and joins us. Elliot and him talk for a little while, but then Elliot turns to the rest of us, giddy. I wait for the explanation.

“They’re planning an attack on the Spanish fort tomorrow. He asked, since we’re colonists to help plan,” Elliot says. So that’s how he dies.

We agree to help, knowing the layout of the fort and willing to help in any way. Elliot and Max focus on planning while Belle and I are introduced to some of the women. A few speak a little English, so we tried our best. A girl just a little older than Belle teaches us about tending to corn and squash plants. Afterwards, we meet up for dinner and then sit around the fire. They sing a little; I think it might have been to show off their culture to us or welcome us. It’s getting late. I find myself leaning against Elliot. His shoulder is soft, cushioned with muscle. I’d like to pretend that I didn’t notice his good personal fitness this morning, but it’s hard to miss. I find comfort in leaning into him and eventually drift off to sleep.

He wakes me up after a while and we all go into a tent-like room and go to sleep. In the morning, I wake up second, just after Max.

“Morning. How’d you sleep?” I ask him. He shrugs.

“Fine. Why’d you sleep on Elliot’s shoulder like that?” he asks, blunty. I’ve gathered that Max is just a direct and confrontational person, but his forwardness still surprises me.

“I don’t know. Just tired. Why?” I say, a little too defensively. He stares at me. It’s like I can feel his eyes on my soul.

“No reason, Cass.” he says. We get off to talking about something else, but I don’t want to give anyone the wrong impression. I scoot away from Elliot, who I happened to be sitting next to. Once everyone wakes up, we go out of the covered area and greet everyone. The battle will take place today.

“What do we do?” Belle asks us. No one answers.

“I think,” I say, “We need to go with them and protect Micco at all costs. We have guns. We blend in.”

Elliot nods first, but after a moment of consideration, we all appear to all be in agreement. I walk with the woman from yesterday, Hachi. She’s kind and motherly despite being younger than I am. The four of us enter the fort and prepare to protect. I wish we could all have a gun. I worry about Belle’s safety, unarmed. I surrendered mine to Max, after the Seminole’s insistence. After his shot in 1800, I trust him with it, too. Micco enters last. We remain close, just a ways ahead. Elliot stays directly next to Micco, but the rest of us spread out to look for possible attackers. At first, I think that the Spaniards may not know we’re with the Seminoles. I let my guard down a little.

I remain at the top of the stairs, getting a bird’s eye view. I don’t focus on the people around me. Instead, I watch Micco. Someone grabs me from behind. I react immediately, elbowing him in the stomach. Then, I catch it. A man on the steps is aimed at Micco. I don’t think anyone else sees it. Belle’s too far and unarmed, anyway. Elliot has another man in a make-shift chokehold and Max just got knocked down. My gun was given away, so all I have is bodily force.

I run down the four stairs between us and throw myself on top of him. We both go tumbling down the stairs. I’m not really sure what happened after that. I must have blacked out. The next thing I am conscious for, I feel myself being carried. I look up to see Max carrying me out of the door.

“What happened?” I ask.

“You saved Micco. You fell down the stairs tackling this guy and eventually they got the prisoner of war they wanted and so it was time to go, but you were passed out so I grabbed you,” he says. I nod.

“You can put me down now,” I say.

“That’s not a good idea,” Belle says from my right. I didn’t realize anyone else was by us.

“Elliot told us not to let you walk until he makes sure you don’t have a concussion or anything broken,” Max explains, “It’s okay. You’re really light and I lift weights, you know.”

I laugh a little. I’m not certain that he was trying to be funny, but the fact that he’s trying to impress me while I’m only half conscious is gold.

“Oh, thank you,” I comment, still smiling. He kisses my forehead, which should have been weird, but it felt good to be in someone’s comfort. He’s a nice guy, as much as I want to pretend that he’s not.

After what felt like eternity, he sets me down on a patch of pine straw. Elliot crouches next to me and performs a concussion test of sorts. Micco wasn’t supposed to succumb to his injuries for another hour or so, but Max and Belle stayed near him to make sure he didn’t die. Elliot finishes the test and seems happy.

“I don’t think you’re concussed, but you still need to rest, okay?” he says. I nod. “Do you want to walk? No, never mind, don’t answer that. I’m going to carry you.”

He scoops me up. His hold is much tighter than Max’s and less shaky.