Gabrielle couldn't fall asleep. She was on dawn patrol and knew she needed to get up in a few hours, but for some reason knowing that made her even more tired and even less able to fall asleep. She tossed fretfully, unable to get comfortable, while vivid thoughts of the evening tramped through her mind and entangled with each other obnoxiously. They kept jerking her awake with imagined sounds, Nyosa laughing, Suleiman shouting about protecting the Queen, Xena lecturing about the proper way to wrap a Sumerian gown, Eve crying out softly for some unknown reason...

Gabrielle pushed herself up, blinking, still half-asleep. No, it wasn't a dream, she did hear that noise. She...It wasn't Eve, she realized. It wasn't coming from Xena's room.

It was Joxer.

She scrambled to her feet and stumbled, sleep-blinded, to his alcove, not knowing why. So he was talking in his sleep, so what? But something about his tone frightened her. It didn't sound like a normal dream, or even a normal nightmare.

It wasn't. He hadn't put out the lamps before he'd gone to sleep. In fact, he'd left several burning where one would have sufficed, and the multiple flames laid wild, flickering lights and shadows across the room. He was twisted up into a knot, clutching the shredded blanket in white-knuckled hands, and crying out again and again in a soft, steady moan half-choked back into his throat. "Joxer," she said aloud, ran to his side and grabbed his shoulder. "Joxer, wake--"

He screamed. It was a short, choked-off scream, but a scream nonetheless, and he threw himself away from her to crouch against the headboard, panting, eyes wild and glazed with fear. "Joxer!" Gabrielle yelped, almost as startled by his reaction as he'd been by her. "Joxer, it's me. Easy now."

It took him a few seconds to recognize her, a few more for his gaze to drop. "Gabrielle." He sucked in great gasps of air, as if he'd been running. "I'm sorry. Was having...a dream."

"Some dream." She reached for him, and he flinched away from her hand. She froze in mid-motion, not knowing what to do. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"No." Joxer shook his head and sat up straight. Gabrielle sensed Xena enter the room almost noiselessly behind her, and Joxer looked up at Xena and something closed down in his face. "It was just a dream. Nothing to worry about."

"Are you su--" Gabrielle started to say, but Joxer looked at Xena again and said, "Nothing."

Gabrielle turned to look at Xena as well, saw the warrior nod almost in--approval? and turn and leave as silently as she'd entered. She turned back to Joxer, but he was looking away from her and had perceptibly folded in on himself. If she pushed him, she could find out what was wrong. If she pushed--but she didn't want to push, didn't want to hurt him. So many things she did hurt him without intention. She didn't want to add any more to the list through deliberate action. "Okay," she said quietly. Something flickered in his eyes when she spoke, but it was indecipherable. "Okay," she said and got to her feet. "See you in the morning." She paused at the door and looked back at him once more, to see if he'd changed his mind, but he was looking away from her, into the light of the lamps, somewhere she couldn't reach.

-----

Joxer heard the curtain fall behind Gabrielle, the soft rustle sending the same cold despair into his gut as if it were a dungeon door slamming into place. She was so distant lately. Friendly but distant, and it must be because she knew already what he'd done, what he'd been dreaming about. Would he have been as ashamed, he wondered, if it had worked? He pushed the thought out of his mind, but there it was again, its soft traitorous whisper in his head: he'd done that all for nothing, they'd been safe all along, and hadn't he been a fool for--

"No!" He spoke aloud, not meaning to, and feared for a moment someone would return but no one did. No. He'd had no choice. He couldn't have known, and he couldn't have not done what he did. Xena always said never second-guess yourself, never dwell on the past. Xena always said--Well, when Xena used to say things to him, anyway.

He pulled his knees up to his chest and stared into the lights of the lamps. No more falling asleep. He didn't want to fall asleep any more. Not tonight, anyway. Bad dreams could find their way back if you went back to sleep right away. Wait until tomorrow night, and then maybe they'd be gone. Maybe.

His head fell on his knees, and when he picked it back up again his neck was stiff and it was light outside. He remained still and quiet, listening for sounds in the apartments outside; when he was sure it was safe he got up, washed and dressed, and left to wander the palace grounds once more. A good walk would clear his head, and maybe he'd go out to the garden.

But the walk didn't seem to help much. He felt more exposed than usual today, felt the stares of the Sumerians on him as he aimlessly roamed the halls, heard the giggles and the whispers. He had gone back to wearing pants because he felt too uneasy in the dashikis, comfortable as they were, but only servants dressed the way he did. Servants... or slaves. Or Gabrielle, he told himself firmly, or Gabrielle, who wore the same kind of shirt and a short leather skirt, and nobody laughed at her because she was Gabrielle, a Queen in her own right and so sure of herself and her place in the world. But him they stared at, him they laughed about, the pale, softskinned foreigner whom Hassim had--

He shoved the thought away, and his steps quickened, almost into a run. He wanted--well, he didn't know what he wanted, but he did know it had nothing to do with remembering about Hassim. Maybe if he--

"Good morning, softskin. And how are you today?"

Joxer yelped aloud, instantly ashamed of himself for being so startled. He hadn't heard anyone come up behind him, he hadn't smelled the musk and spice that suddenly invaded his lungs and made his head spin. He turned to face the dark vision, and had for a moment a feeling almost of glimpsing a goddess, that instant reaction of danger and dark fear--"Ny.. Lady Nyosa," he stammered. "Good morning."

Nysoa smiled. She wore a dark overwrap with subtle stains of rust and ultramarine worked into it, a dying procedure that Joxer already recognized as being highly regarded and very expensive. She wore a collar of polished jet and the same clanked in bangles along her arms, and it was as if she was sucking all the light out of the hall just by standing there. All the light out of the hall, and all the air out of him. He instinctively took a step away, and his back pressed up against the wall. "Softskin," she said and pulled a theatrical pout. "You've been avoiding me."

"No. No, I haven't, I..."

"Oh, I've been so wishing to get to know you better, too." Nyosa took another step closer, and Joxer tried to retreat, but there was nowhere to go. "I've heard so much about you...from Hassim." He saw the pleasure in her eyes as he flinched at the name, and for a moment he was frozen, unable to move. Get up, his mind raged at him, she's not going to attack, she isn't a bacchae, for gods' sakes, just step aside and walk away! and yet he remained pinned by her gaze, by that look of pleasure in her eyes at his pain, that look that was so much like--

"Nyosa!" It was a short, sharp snarl, and even Nyosa looked up to see Nebula bearing down on them, looking like she was in one of Xena's own bad moods. "Leave him alone! Go play with one of your own pets if you want to pull one of your stupid games."

Nysoa stepped back, but her expression was unfazed. "I'm sorry," she said blandly. "I didn't know this one was taken."

"Go on, get off," Nebula snapped, and even Nyosa was unable to put up a pretense of objection any longer. She turned and walked off without a word. Joxer found himself able to breathe again, which after a few ragged gasps he decided was a good thing. "Take my advice, studmuffin," Nebula said. "Stay away from that, you don't know where it's been--Hey, you okay there?"

"I'm fine."

"You're not fine." She took his arm and pulled him to a door, nodding at the flanking Guard who pulled it open and allowed the Queen to pass. The room was cavernous, filled with scrolls and bright with lamps lit on braziers set by the tables in the middle of the room, the flames safely away from the parchment. "Come on, sit down," she said, pushing him into a chair. "Tell Aunt Nebula what's wrong."

"Nothing." Joxer couldn't seem to catch his breath. "Nothing, I just..." Nebula didn't press him, and he found himself saying, "I didn't sleep well last night, I was having a lot of, y'know, dreams, and I was going for a walk and..." He pulled himself up short.

Nebula hissed. "What did she say to you?" He didn't answer, and she sighed, an anger behind it that was not directed at him. "Jox, listen." He looked up, a little surprised--only Xena ever called him that--and saw Nebula was looking at him not with annoyance or pity, but with genuine compassion. "I know the kinds of things Nyosa and her circle get up to. Not so much Khalil, but Nyosa, Rasheeda...Hassim." She touched his shoulder gently as he flinched at the name. "They're useless. They like to hurt people, it's the only thing that ever brings them pleasure. Don't let them play their games with you, and just walk away from them if they try. You're my guest, you've got a right to be here, and if I had my way they wouldn't. And they know it, too. So don't worry about them. They can't do anything to you. You got that?"

Joxer listened to her words, the ones she spoke, the ones she didn't, and found no recrimination behind them. No shame. With Nebula, there was no shame. "Yeah," he said slowly. "Thanks."

He had a feeling she listened to what he said in the same way. "No problem." She cuffed him affectionately on the shoulder. "What are you up to this morning?"

"I... don't know. Was just going to walk, I guess."

"You know what I think you'd like? Why don't you go upstairs in the gallery of the Great Hall and watch the Council session? You see these people around here as they really are, squabbling like a bunch of idiots, and you'll have a much easier time sneering at them the way they deserve." Her laugh was merry. "And come downstairs after the session's over and into the Hall. I'll invite you in to lunch."

"Sounds good." Joxer stood up. His breathing seemed to have returned to normal, and whatever it was that had been threatening him a few moments ago had backed off. "Xena'll kill you she sees you walking around without an escort."

"'Xena will'," Nebula mimicked back at him. "Not 'Suleiman will', eh? Well, first of all, screw Xena." She elbowed him in the ribs. "It might get her to loosen up a bit, anyway."

"Hey!" Joxer was unable to hide the laugh behind the protest.

"And second of all, screw Xena twice, 'cause I do have an escort." She linked her arm through his. "Onward. To the Hall."

"To the Hall," Joxer agreed cheerfully. To the Hall, away from Nyosa, away from the dreams. Worked for him.