Dream if you can a courtyard

An ocean of violets in bloom

Animals strike curious poses,

They feel the heat, the heat between me and you

-When Doves Cry by Prince

"Where are you going, Prince?" Wilheim called.

"To find the damn castle, what do you think, you useless baboon!" Ludwig called over his shoulder as he trudged through the haze of flowers.

"Hold up!" Lisette cocked her rifle and pointed it at the back of Ludwig's pretty head. "You got us into this situation. How do you propose we get out of it?"

"Me? How did I get you into this? You drank the damn potion, you graceless gunslinger!" Ludwig half-screetched, turning around and whipping the gun out of her hands. In a fit of childish fury, he brought his knee up, karate-style, and broke the weapon over it.

Lisette stared at him like a child who'd just had her favorite doll smashed. "You metrosexual moron," she finally murmured faintly, shocked.

"Alright, alright!" Wil called hastily, scooting between the two. "Now is not the time to be trading clever insults. Fact of the matter is, we're all dead for all intents and purposes. And we have forty-eight hours to be dead. So I think we should all use this time to our advantage."

Lisette lodged her foot up his butt. "Use it to our advantage?"

"My ass!"

"Sorry." She yanked her foot away. "I just..."

"Save the apologies for later," Ludwig interrupted tactlessly. He tossed the remains of her beloved gun aside. "I'm finding the castle. You two can do whatever the hell you want."

* * *

Even when she closed her eyes, even when she was sure she was asleep, memories still came back to haunt her. She could almost feel the thorns dragging against her flesh, grating and tearing her into a thousand pieces. The pain was excruciating, sending every nerve in her body on edge. She thrashed and fought against the agony, but the brambles thickened and clutched her tighter, ripping her clothes away, scratching her porcelain cheeks.

And then suddenly it was gone. Instead, a faint, floral smell filled the air, soapy and relaxing. A young man stood at the foot of the castle and looked up. But he was no starstruck lover. There was a sneer on his lips, a naughty twinkle in his eye.

The bastard! She sent out tendrils of thorn to mangle him, but he used his gun to slice through the vines. His neatly manicured hands were cracked and bloody, but he licked his fingers clean seductively, all the while keeping his eyes on her.

Stupid...self-centered...bratty...

She launched herself off the castle's highest turret towards him, but then she remembered his words.

"Don't you get it, Sleeping Beauty? Your looks, your brains...everything was yours, by birth."

At the time she had hated his cold-heartedness, but in a way, she knew he was trying to comfort her.

And she felt herself dissolving into tears.

"I've set in motion the time that you stopped. Not that I care about all those men who died," he tossed out off-handedly. "Besides...I don't think you'll have a better man come for you."

That idiot...

She let her eyes flutter open, the last dregs of sleep drift away. Here in the land of the dead, she had created the castle again, for old time's sake. And now that he was here, he would surely be looking for it.

But what would she say to him? What would they do, after all that had happened?

His feet padding up the stone steps...

She groaned and pressed a pillow to her face.

Him, kneeling by the bed, pressing his lips gently to hers...

Reaching out and touching the bleeding me...no one has ever truly done that.

Idike could remember perfectly the look on his face: still a mask of that smugness, still that twinkle, but it was all forced. There was a different kind of light dancing in his eyes now. Happiness, maybe?

***

"So...the land of the dead." Wilheim shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other.

Lisette was glaring at the ground.

"Anyone you want to visit?'

She shook her head, brow furrowed like a grumpy infant's.

"Oh, I know! What about your parents?"

"My parents?"

"Yeah! I bet you haven't seen them in awhile."

"Wilheim, I KILLED my parents! They tried to SELL me!"

"Oops. Yeah, sorry..."

Lisette booted him in the stomach. He toppled to the floor and rolled into a fetal position. She knelt down beside him, and he tensed, prepared for another attack.

Looking up, he realized she wasn't even facing him. She had fallen to her knees, and was staring at some fixed point above the line of trees.

"Lisette..."

"You just don't know, Wil..." she murmured. "You...you don't..."

"I don't know what?"

"I can't be here...I've killed so many people and I feel like they're all watching me...my parents...everybody else..."

"Lisette, calm down..."

"I'm calm. I'm fine." She grabbed his hands. "Do you know what?"

"What?"

"Let's visit my parents. Now."

"H-how?"

"We're in the land of the dead. We'll figure it out somehow."

"Alright..." Wilheim scratched his head. It had been his suggestion in the first place, but he wasn't quite sure if he had meant it.

The grass rustled, flower petals floating around their shoulders. Voices seemed to whisper.

Call upon the Shadow Maid...the Shadow Maid...

"The Shadow Maid?" Wilheim repeated, confused.

"You called?" a cool voice replied. Lisette was on her feet in a second, her hand reflexively reaching for her crippled rifle. Wil jumped three feet in the air and landed on his much-abused hindquarters.

A young girl, perhaps twelve or thirteen, perched on the high branch of a tree. Her irises were gray as marble, without a single fleck of vein of any other color. No pupil interrupted the gray. Her skin was so white it looked slightly blue, her hair the color of rice and straight as a stick.

"I'll take you anywhere, for a price."

"What's the price?" Lisette asked, trying to sound tough.

"I need to feed."

"F-feed? On what?" Wil repeated.

The Maiden leaped from the branch as demurely as a cat and landed on the poor manservant's shoulders. Her tongue shot out, the muscle black as ink, and stayed there, tasting the air.

"What are you–AAAAAH!"

With a deft motion, the girl's mouth formed an o, and she made a sucking noise. Wil thrashed about, the area around his head shimmering like the air surrounding a fire.

"What are you doing?" Lisette screeched.

The Maiden sucked for a few moments more, and then pulled away. Wilheim, white as linen, flopped to the ground, gurgling weakly.

"There. I have fed on half a human soul. Now you may go where you wish."

A/N: Yep, there's now officially a problem, Houston. Review or I won't put the next chapter up.

LUDWIG: Is there going to be a sex scene in this fic?

ELLE: Maybe. Why?

FRIEDERIKE: I'm fifteen and he's nineteen. That's statutory rape.

ELLE: This was set in the ancient times. Nobody cared. REVIEW!