As people shouted at the knights, Lucas strummed his guitar absently. He didn't want to be here anymore, but a paycheck was a paycheck, and his sister needed the money. Besides, as much as he wanted to leave, this could still be exciting. He smiled slightly.

Curiously, Lucas only recognized one of the knights, a cute guy named Jenson, who was also arrogant and mouthy (and impressive with a sword. Lucas enjoyed watching him practice at times, when he wasn't tending the horses). He noticed with amusement that Jenson's nose was broken, and he grinned, thinking it made him look more rugged anyway.

Jenson probably wouldn't think that, though. He was far more likely to be angry because his face was "messed up", but Lucas knew from experience that there was an easy (but painful) way to straighten the nose again. Maybe he could give Jenson some pointers, or even be the one to straighten his nose, though deep down he knew Jenson would never agree to that.

As the line grew, people began to be more desperate. They figured the offer wouldn't continue for all of them, as it was far more generous than anything any of them had seen. The news was spreading fast, it seemed; for every person who left, five more replaced them.

Lucas could see realization dawn on Jenson's face, mixed with panic as he encountered screaming from all sides. The knights were struggling to push the villagers into a line again, telling them to hush and threatening with swords, but that only seemed to make them rowdier.

Changing his mournful song to a fast-paced, sharp-sounding jig with a spicy hint of danger, Lucas watched with fascination as the crowd began to devolve into chaos. Soon it was all a jumble of legs, arms, blood, and indistinct screaming, all accompanied by Lucas's guitar (and his pet ferret's "singing". Snow thought she could sing, but it was honestly just her normal chatter).

He opened his mouth to sing a verse about fighting, in the hopes of propelling people to attack more and scramble less, but a chair flew out of nowhere and broke against the wall behind him. Ducking, he curled around Owen (his guitar) and backed off the small stage into a corner. Drama wasn't worth having Owen complain about a scratch for weeks.

Someone who was about a hundred times the size of Lucas stumbled into his corner; his mustache was coated in blood and his eye was nearly swollen shut. He tripped on a piece of the broken chair and fell to his back, only three feet in front of Lucas. Obviously, it was hilarious, so of course Lucas laughed.

"Excuse me?" the man growled, standing rather quickly. He wasn't as drunk as Lucas had assumed.

Lucas pointed at himself, looking around dramatically. "Who, me?"

"Did you just laugh at me?"

"Ah, no, you must be confusing me with another devilishly handsome bard," Lucas replied with a nervous laugh. "I wasn't even over here."

That made the big man pause as he gave Lucas a confused look, and Lucas took the moment to bean him over the head with Owen as hard as he could.

Given that he could barely reach the man's head, Lucas had to jump, which he figured must have looked pretty stupid, but it did the job, dazing the man so Lucas could move.

"Is this all I am to you?" Owen snapped, speaking for the first time all night. He had been angry at Lucas for something or other earlier (honestly Lucas couldn't even remember why Owen had been mad), and so he had been giving Lucas the cold shoulder.

Owen continued as Lucas ducked behind the Bearded Mouse's bar, crouching beneath it. "A guitar meant to be played one second and then used as a battering ram the next? I'm fragile, you know, and I deserve better than this."

Lucas patted Owen's tuners. "You're not that fragile," he said with a smile. "I'd never hurt you, Owen, you know this."

"What about that time you dropped me out of a tree?"

"I'd never hurt you on purpose." Lucas flinched as a bottle of beer soared over his head and crashed against the wall, scattering shards of glass across the wood floor. "That was completely accidental, and you know it."

Someone fell in front of Lucas, causing him to drop Owen with a shriek.

The someone pushed himself up to his hands and knees, shaking his curly head and blinking hard. As the fancy stranger oriented himself, Lucas managed to calm himself and he picked Owen back up, absently strumming Owen's strings.

He looked up and gave Lucas a huge grin. Lucas swallowed hard and fought to not say something completely stupid.

"Sorry to barge in," the man said. Fortunately, the man was hot. Unfortunately, the man seemed to be at least ten years older than Lucas.

"I'm not busy," Lucas said with an eyebrow waggle. It didn't work like Lucas wanted it to; the man just laughed.

"I'll be on my way, kid. Stay safe."

The man messed with Lucas's hair like a smooth bastard, only it was like a smooth bastard teasing a child, and Lucas pouted as the man vaulted back over the bar.

"That was awful," Owen said. "You really must learn how to talk to people without fucking it up like that. It's not surprising that you don't have any friends, to be honest."

"I have friends!" Lucas frowned, strumming a chord particularly hard. "And watch your language you son of a bitch."

Lee flew back into the fight with a laugh, tripping someone and taking a drink from an empty table. He grabbed a barmaid and dipped her, giving her a quick peck on the cheek, then punched a man in the mouth and took his scarf, nimbly tying it around his own neck. He was like a hurricane in human form, seemingly in five places at once, and then gone a second later. For most people, a crowd of this size in a pub this small would be a hinderance, but he seemed to float through it like it was merely a pond and not the rapids of a river.

He easily snatched a loose bracelet off a boy with dark hair as he went past, but someone grabbed the back of his tunic and yanked, causing Lee to trip over the leg of a chair and fall to the ground in a heap. Whoever jerked him back seized the bracelet and gave him a good kick to the ribs, hard enough to bruise but not hard enough to break.

Lee tried to catch the thief's foot as he leapt over Lee but he missed, only grasping at air. Bewildered but not truly upset, Lee clambered back to his feet and let out a sigh, wondering how he'd find something as valuable as that bracelet in the crowd of broke villagers (not that it absolutely, truly mattered, though. He was enjoying himself in the fight without stealing, but, to be fair, money never hurt a man before).

Then he spotted the room behind the bar, full of food and a trapdoor, leading down to the cool cellar, where pubs like this one stored their wine and other expensive drinks.

He smiled.

Adrian tightened his grip on Marcia's wrist. Even when he wasn't looking at her, he could practically feel her desire to join in the fighting, and he squeezed her wrist once to remind her not to blow their cover.

There was a high chance that some people that participated in the fight would be arrested, and he desperately needed that not to happen. There were ways to make people talk, and he didn't want that to happen to Marcia, or anyone in their party. Thankfully, the only rebels in the pub currently were him, Marcia, and one of the knights, though it would be awful if the knight were to be found out. He would surely be killed, and then the castle would begin looking for rebels among the staff.

They had been slowly recruiting people in the castle and getting the castle to hire some of their own, and if he or Marcia got caught that would be a great threat to their survival. Who would lead in his absence? And if they managed to crack one of them, then many, many people would die.

Marcia would tell him that he was thinking about it too much, but he just wanted her to be safe. She was like family to him, and since he didn't actually have family anymore, that meant a lot.

He ducked a punch directed toward him, preferring to not draw attention to himself. A second later the guy was knocked out cold from a cleverly aimed kick by Marcia.

"Nice," Montgomery called from the back, one hand on her saber and the other in Marcia's.

Marcia giggled. "Did you see that?" she asked as Adrian pulled her in the direction of the door.

"Amazing," Adrian said absently.

He could feel her pouting and he rolled his eyes. He'd congratulate her later.

They were only two tables back from the exit when Adrian spotted two knights standing on either side of the door. They had their swords out and murder in their eyes, two corpses already at their feet. They hadn't spotted Adrian yet, so he stopped quickly, causing Marcia to run into his back and making Montgomery let out a string of curses.

"Shit."

Adrian turned at the second curse to find himself face-to-face with a dark-haired man about his age, who had turned from the knights to Adrian at the same time. A hooded redhead was next to him, his face pale, holding the other's shirt in a white-knuckled grip as he stared at the knights.

"Know how to get out?" Adrian asked, startling the redhead who hadn't seen him yet.

"A window?"

Adrian looked at the window closest to him, observing it with great skepticism. Maybe Marcia could get out that way, but not him.

"Too small."

"Maybe for you," the redhead said. The brownhaired one smacked him, but he just shrugged. "I've been through tighter."

"You guys would need to stand on a chair to reach it," Adrian pondered.

Marcia gave him her "mom" glare when she heard him, recognizing the change in his voice. "I'm not leaving you."

"I can find my own way out. I won't fit."

An arrow soared through the air above them and Adrian instinctively ducked, even though it had already hit the wall. It stuck above the doorway, quivering, and it was probably to make a statement, but the mob was panicking too much to notice. Too many were stuck in a small building, with all the exits blocked. To a lot of them, this was a repeat of yesterday, which was bad enough on it's own.

That meant only the four of them noticed the arrow. The redhead pointed at a table a second later, where a man stood in full ranger garb. He already had another arrow notched, though he didn't seem like he wanted to use it.

"CEASE THIS NONSENSE," the ranger boomed, his voice flowing through the bar quite nicely. "Haven't you already broken enough yesterday? Haven't enough of us died from our own stupidity?"

Out of the corner of Adrian's eye he saw the darkhaired man flinch, and he turned his focus from the ranger to the man.

"Citizens like you own this tavern, and they will have to pay for your heedless fighting. How will this help us find the criminal who ruined our market yesterday?"

This time the darkhaired man didn't flinch, but he noticed Adrian's glare and turned to him.

"What do you want?" he snapped.

"It was you, wasn't it?"

Adrian wasn't sure, but this was quite possibly the best way to test his theory.

"What?"

"You started all of this. You threw the rocks. Why did you do that?"

The redhead opened his mouth, but the darkhaired man interrupted with a furious "it wasn't me, I swear!"

Adrian grit his teeth. "Do you know how much trouble this has cost me?"

By now, the others were no longer watching the ranger; they were watching Adrian and the darkhaired boy, hungry for a person to blame for their actions.

Instead of addressing Adrian, the boy muttered, "Phoenix, go." And before Adrian could figure out what that meant, the redhead and the darkhaired boy were slipping away through the crowd.

"He's over there!" Adrian yelled, pointing. "He's got dark hair and white tattoos, and he's going towards the bar!"

Jenson was glad Voronwe had chosen this day to eat at The Bearded Mouse, for Voronwe was extremely close to getting the crowd to calm down. Jenson's nose ached something awful, and he was tired of running around and gaining nothing for his troubles.

And then there was a shout, "he's over there!" which made the crowd explode.

It seemed everyone wanted to be the one to bring the tattooed criminal to Jenson, and he was okay with that since it made his job easier. He climbed up on the table Voronwe was still standing on to give the crowd someone to aim for and he smiled, waiting as the crowd pushed and shoved the riot instigator up to him.

A couple of people were holding the rioter's arms (though one was holding his hand), and they yelled "I got 'im for ya!" "I get the prize, right?" "Here's your prisoner!"

Jenson jumped off the table and grabbed the rioter, thanking the people who held on so that they would let go. He gave the rioter a big grin, watching as the boy paled before his very eyes.

"Finally," he said, "I can repay you for the nose."

He pulled his arm back, but someone caught it before he could let his punch fly.

"It wasn't him," the person said. "It was me."

Lucas peeked over the bar, holding Owen tightly. His eyes were wide as Jenson pulled his arm back to punch the stunning, brown-haired, intensely-freckled, wonderfully-tattooed, practically glowing and perfect in every way boy. A small, teeny-tiny part of him wanted the drama to continue, but the rest of him wanted to run up and stop Jenson from hitting the future love of his life.

Is that dramatic?

Maybe.

All Lucas knew was that that boy was amazingly adorably hot.

Just before Lucas was going to get up and stop him (really, he was going to do it!), someone caught Jenson's arm. Lucas could only see the boy's broad back and bright red hair, but as soon as he spoke, Lucas knew who it was.

Without thinking, Lucas strummed the first chord in the song he'd written for Phoenix a couple of months ago, but then he realized what Phoenix had said ("it was me"), and he nearly fell over. Snow chattered in her angry tone, so Lucas patted her as Jenson let the other boy go to grab Phoenix. A knight leapt into action, yanking Phoenix's arms behind him with perhaps more violence than necessary. With a loud crack, Phoenix's head snapped back as Jenson finally got revenge for his nose.

"Bastard," Jenson snarled, shaking his hand out. "Take him to the castle."

They tied his hands behind his back, and then shoved him toward the exit, not even remotely trying to keep him safe from the vengeful peasants who lashed out where and when they could. The rip of his shirt here, a punch to his gut there, a yank of his hair now and then. Someone tripped him, and the knights watched as he fell against a table and then to the floor with an oof.

The angel from heaven was watching near the bar, his face so pale it almost seemed translucent. Lucas saw his chance (even if it was bad timing), and he tucked Owen under his arm with a confidence he didn't truly feel.

"Did you know him?" Lucas asked, already feeling the butterflies swarm his stomach. The angel jumped and whirled around.

"'Did you know him'? What kind of fucking introduction is that?"

Lucas ignored Owen, watching the boy's face drop a bit.

"I sort of knew him," he replied, turning back to the place he saw Phoenix last. "And now I owe him."

"You owe him?" Lucas gave the boy a strange look. "All he did was take the blame for his actions. He deserves this."

Even as he said it, Lucas wondered if it were true. He hadn't been there for the riot; all he knew was what others had told him. And from the boy's face, he figured maybe he didn't know everything.

"The townspeople started the riot," the boy said, scrunching his nose in disgust. Something lit in his eyes, both a blaze of anger and an ocean of sadness. "He was only standing up for something, which is more than I can say about a lot of us."

Lucas opened and closed his mouth a couple of times, unsure what he should say.

Owen snorted. "You look like a fish."

Finally, after a long, somewhat uncomfortable silence, Lucas held out his hand. "My name is Lucas."

"You can call me Sparrow."

Sparrow shook his hand, his grip firm, and Lucas couldn't help but smile, feeling just a little bit better.

Okay guys, I know I said I needed to edit but I didn't. So. Y'know. Feel free to critique! Though if you're too mean I'll cry myself to sleep and bathe in my tears and then hire my hit mouse Lenny to go kill you (but you'll easily dodge, because he is only a mouse. Just pretend he hurt you, he's kinda insecure).

Anyway, thanks for reading! I did have a lot of fun with this chapter. Thanks for trusting me with your characters, it truly is a lot of fun >:) I love them all so much. I promise your character will get their chapter soon if they haven't! I'll need a bunch more of these chaos chapters, cause our darlings are so chaotic together and I love it. Also yay I didn't kill off an innocent child!

PS sorry if I published like five times, I was having trouble with the tagging

CHARACTERS

Lucas Avftyr ~ sapphire10fun

Phoenix ~ idk

Jenson Falkaner ~ DURMSTRANGG

Adrian Strider ~ Toilken4Life

Peleus Vikari ~ TheExplosiveCyborg

Marcia Juavez ~ epicredpenn

Lilith Montgomery ~ Calliopes_Muse

Pan/Sparrow ~ dr0wning_in_w0rds

Voronwe Tar-Minyatur ~ WingedWarrior1731