[Basically, there's been an attempt to break out the Phantom, and now the little crew is trying to escape while guards are searching for them.]

Jateyani was in the middle of his plate of food when alarm cries sounded throughout the keep. Lord Ralkaien, eating with him in a rare burst of friendliness, lept to his feet.

"Boy, grab my sword!" he shot at Jate as he rushed to pull his coat on. He snatched the broadsword from Jate's hand and buckled it around his waist, and then left the room with the door crashing behind him. Jate was not far behind. Not even bothering to grab a coat, Jate flipped a dagger into his hand and felt to be sure the others were safely tucked into various places about his person. He rushed out of the room and into the hallway, and stopped a passing guard.

"What's going on?" he asked, raising his voice over the din.

"Phantom escaped! Heading to the east gate! M'lord," the guard added after a quick glance at the ring on Jate's finger. "Uh, pardon m'lord, but might I go?"

Jate barely noticed the question. Escape? He needed to talk to the man more! The Phantom couldn't escape! He still had questions! Jateyani rushed toward the east gate. Near one of the windows, he looked down into the courtyard. Guards milled around it, rushing after one shadow and the next. No one will be on the ground in that, Jate thought to himself. So where to go? He realized his hand was resting near a length of rope. In from the top, out from the top? he asked himself.

Quickly climbing the steps two at a time, Jate found himself running along the outer wall. A flicker of motion to his right caught his eye, and he turned. Someone had just been there, he wasn't imagining things. Thankful for the soft boots that made no noise, Jate ran along the wall toward the movement. As he rounded a darkened area, he had only enough time to realize people were standing there before a hand was over his mouth and steel was pressing in his back.

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going on a journey through my old claims

The steel was one of Eledhe's many shurikens, but the hand belonged to the Phantom. "Not a sound, boy," he hissed, and nodded to the female mercenary, who was hugging the shadows and peering warily around corners as they carefully navigated their way out. The illusion was running wild somewhere west of them, having been left to his own (doubtful) devices.

Eledhe turned with a hssst of displeasure upon seeing the Phantom and his unexpected captive. She coolly flicked through options inwardly. Kill him (easiest but least likely to fly with this crowd), knock him out (possible), or let him go (out of the question). Her mind selected the most likely of these, but in the split second of time it had taken for even Eledhe's mind to come to this conclusion the Phantom had already acted.

He slung the limp body over his shoulder. "Right, all clear?"

"Leave him here, why don't you?" Eledhe gave the grey-cloaked figure a perplexed look.

"Not a chance, he knows nobles. With a little persuasion he could be valuable."

Eledhe's expression was singularly doubtful, but in another moment her attention was occupied as they came to the inner gate. "Kjan, keys?"

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"Ever at your service, milady," Kjan replied, attempting to bow gallantly as he produced the keys with a flourish.

"There is a stable about a quarter mile east of here," he continued quietly as Eledhe worked on the gate. "We should have no problem borrowing a few of the horses....Unless, of course, you were planning on walking all the way back to the Keep with the spoiled noble brat slung over your shoulders."

First, Nataniel had been rudely informed that, "'is lor'ship th' 'onorable Re-gent ain't at 'ome." He had called the maid every name in the book, but the bloody wench wouldn't let up. And so, he took matters in his own hands, hoping to be duly rewarded later.

The guards at the western side of the city, off duty at the time, had taken only a little persuasion, and not nearly all the names in his book, to lead them from their booze. Within a few moments, a whole troop of them was speeding towards the prison.

Nataniel spotted the little group moving out from the prison, but said nothing. It would be better to catch them unawares. The guards and he followed at a considerable distance.

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<center>
"The piano is able to communicate the subtlest universal truths by means of wood, metal and vibrating air."

The lock clicked open and Eledhe was through, a shadow merely joining with the night outside. The Phantom followed, steel-grey eyes never lingering long in one place but shifting constantly. Horses, now - and then they could be gone, assuming they weren't caught by then. The illusion still seemed to be leading a merry dance across the grounds, but best to not take its limited power for granted.

"Ash, Threng, you ride double," he hissed upon entering. "Takes too long to steal one for each of us. I'll take this noble brat - and Eledhe can ride with Kjan."

This served to deepen Eledhe's scowl, but nobody noticed in the dark as they scattered to do their leader's bidding.

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Kjan worked quickly to open up the stalls, trusting the others to get their respective horses saddled and ready. It felt a bit odd to be in these stables again, but he brushed off the feeling easily enough. For some strange reason, people often seemed look to him for the transportational parts of escape plans. Why this was, he had no idea, but the fact remained that they had had no means of outrunning the guards. This was one of the only stables he remembered how to get to besides those of the Regent himself, and so it had been the only logical destination.

He'd almost finished saddling up his own horse when he caught Eledhe glaring daggers at him-- or maybe shurikens, in her case. Either way, he wasn't sure he was too keen on the idea of sharing a saddle for several hours with an emotionally disturbed woman bearing sharp objects. With this in mind, he hurriedly went over to the fourth stall and came back out with a sleek black horse. "This one belongs to one of the ladies of the house," he informed her quietly, stroking the horse to keep it calm. "She's not the prettiest thing to look at, and she can be quite a spitfire at times, but occasionally she'll be nice." He started to turn back to his own horse, only to whirl around and add as an afterthought, "Her horse can be kinda nasty too, sometimes."

Hoisting himself up onto his saddle, Kjan looked around and waited for the others to do the same. He did feel slightly guilty for borrowing these horses without permission, but years as a thief enabled him to shrug it off casually. After all, he'd always thought Father Dearest needed a lesson or two in generosity.

((EDWBSO! Emotionally Disturbed Woman Bearing Sharp Objects! Heh...found that quite amusing...))

Eledhe knew very well how to handle a horse, but refrained from making some cutting comment to that effect. She had to admit it was - what was the word? Perceptive? - of him to pick up that she was about as keen on riding double as she was on impaling herself on one of her own shurikens.

In any case, when the Phantom was ready with his own horse, predictably a grey stallion, she was entirely prepared and the black mare was innocently docile. He glanced about the stable, checking that they were ready, and stealthily peered outside. Noise was increasing - and someone fumbled at the gate they'd just come through.

"Now!" he hissed at the waiting group, and swung himself into the saddle, the unconscious captive noble in front of him.

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Cato walked his horse down the street. Maybe the Phantoms imprisoned? he supposed. Quite accidentaly he noticed someone working away at a stable door. The vigilante decided to ride a few meters farther away and watch this suspicious activity.

Ash ran into the stables after Kjan, quickly scanning the stalls. He choose a horse that looked strong- a dark grey stallion- and pulled a bridle onto it. He quickly saddled the horse as well and mounted. "Ready?" he asked Threng.

Threng nodded and hoisted himself up behind Ash. The horse beneath them figited;he wasn't used to having more than two riders, but the war horse blood in him calmed him down considerably.

Either the Phantom simply didn't like him or Eledhe had more input than he thought, but either way Jais was finding the position of rear guard to be a seriously wearying task. The guards' helms were exuding pleasurably musical rings as they went down under the pommel of his scimitar. He was in the midst of producing quite the symphony when his first nail broke.

For Jais, the little layer of fingernail hanging off the tip of his pointer finger might as well have signified the end of the world.

Scalding tears of acerbity and rage - chilling as ice and scorching as fire, with all the poignant pain of a wart outbreak - were just forming at the corners of his eyes, when he noticed the commotion in the courtyard had died down. The bogus Genius was in the stables along with Eligible Damsel #2...

... who just happened to be the one maintaining the illusion... but if she wasn't there, then how could the illusion be...?

Jais's amazingly amazing powers of observation were just piecing 2 and 2 together when he noticed the illusion's perspicuous absence. By the time he came up with 4, he found himself faced by an entire courtyard's worth of less than congenial guards, angered by the trick and thirsting for justice.

It couldn't hurt to be nice anyway. Twirling a throwing knife in his hands and plastering on a winning smile, he slowly began backing out the gate towards the stables. "Greetings to all - schoolgirls and idiots, hermaphrodites and ocelots! I am your attractive, intellectual, and highly sophisticated Bonbon who would very much like to be your friend."

Crickets chirped. The guards stared in abject confusion.

Jais's cheeks were beginning to hurt, so he let his smile abate if only for a bit. Suddenly he pointed at a randomly conceived pinpoint. "Look, a bird!"

The guards did look but not at the nonexistent bird. Instead, they released communal battle cries and charged.

Screaming like a girl half his age, Jais took off at a careening scamper through the gates. He intercepted his wonderful group of friends and leaped/barreled/hopped/oofed into the saddle behind the CQS, nearly knocking Kjan off the horse. "Sorry!" he exclaimed with questionable sincerity, before kicking his heels into the steed's flanks and sending it into a frenzied gallop that almost dislodged them both.

The legion of ugly guards in hot pursuit behind them was making matters just a little bit difficult.

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Ash let out a quick curse as most of the fortress's guards came rushing towards the small group trying to escape.
"Hold on." he said over his shoulder to Threng, and kicked the horse. It broke into a gallop, keeping ahead of the guards.

Eledhe deftly maneuvered her mare into a position that, when vacated, resulted in two or three of the foremost guards prostrate on the ground, and unlikely to get up again in the immediate future. Then she hurtled towards freedom.

The Phantom, hampered by his limp captive, experienced a split second of clumsiness before getting himself organized and clutching at the air for the reins of his skittish stallion, which had by then outrun the guards of its own accord. Convenient, that.

His appreciation was somewhat diminished when said stallion leaped into the air clean over a standing trough of water and nearly dislodged both passengers. Normally he would have glanced behind to do a head count of the little party of rescuers, but due to the horse's proclivity towards the unexpected, he discarded this course of action.

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Cato saw his chance. He galloped his horse after the escapees with all due speed and prepared to draw his sword on them.

Kjan was just about to take off on his own when he suddenly found his saddle uncomfortably occupied by a second person and his steed taking off with a will of its own. Whipping around to see Jais staring wide-eyed back at him only confirmed his suspicions as to who said second person was. Muttering an oath that would have no doubt made his mother smack him senseless, Kjan turned back around and grabbed the reigns of the frantic horse. It took several minutes of alternating between pulling on the reigns with all his might and attempting to soothe the horse verbally, but he finally got the panicked animal somewhat under his control.

Pulling up next to the Phantom, he shot him a lop-sided grin. "Next time we do this," he shouted over the thundering hooves, "remind me to leave you in your cell!"

"Consider yourself reminded," was the Phantom's response, and he ducked as a pair of arrows whistled above his head. "I have a strange feeling I've worn out my welcome."

"Astonishing, how you've noticed," snarled Eledhe from his other side. Her horse's ears were laid flat back on its skull - possibly due to the fact that a crossbow bolt had taken off the tip of one of them. "I've gotten us this far. Your turn!"

Without further discussion the Phantom deftly heaved the limp noble's boy in front of him in Eledhe's general direction (where she did an admirable job of tugging the limp body half over her saddle) and turned sharply, bringing his horse to a skidding halt. "Why, gentlemen, I'm surprised," he declared, ducking a lone arrow. "Do none of you know an illusion when you see one?"

And quite to the astonishment of everyone present, he disappeared into thin air.

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