Hi everyone! This is a whole new story of mine, again based on One Piece, which I don't own by the way. The story is set during the Dark Ages, meaning there will be castles, soldiers, Kings, and maybe even mystical things! Although it is based on One Piece, I am mainly only using the characters, since the setting is COMPLETELY AU.

Title: Dark Ages

Synopsis: Taking place during the Dark Ages. Luffy is a child with a dark past, taken in by Rouge. This meeting will change his life forever, but will it be for the best? Or for the worse? And how will Ace's appearance change all of this?

Main Character: Luffy

Rating: T for now, rating may change to M in later chapters mainly for violence.

Have fun reading it!

The boy was starving. He didn't know where he was, but he knew it was cold, way too cold. His stomach had been empty for a couple of days already, and the pain in his belly was getting harder and harder to ignore each passing minute he spent without having the luck to feed himself. The lack of food had weakened his body considerably. His muscles were sore after all those days of constant walking through the mud. His skin felt like ice under his dirty and tattered clothes, impossibly heavy after absorbing a great quantity of rain water and sweat. He was completely exhausted. The raindrops, still falling on his curled up body leaned against a stone wall, felt like pointy pebbles digging through his scraped skin, damaged after his too many falls. If only he could find shelter for the night... At that thought, he looked at the grey ceiling floating above his head, seemingly mocking him. He had to get up, walk, and find food. But he was tired. He was so sleepy. And his body refused to move. His chin was slowly falling back to his chest as he felt his consciousness fade away. Before closing his eyes to take a nap, maybe his last, he saw a huge stone building straight ahead. How could he have missed that? It was right in front of him. If only he had seen it earlier... but now it was too late. The boy forced his eyes open one last time, gazing at the possible shelter, before letting his body fall to the ground with a silent thud.

Pushing the needle through the white fabric tensed with the tambour's help, the woman proceeded to make a subtle-looking knot with the thin red thread, finishing the flower pattern she had sewed on the cloth. She admired her work one last time before folding it neatly and lowering it down gently on the smooth surface of the wooden table, which was decorating the room beside the comfortable beige couch she was sitting on. She looked at her personal handmaid who was embroidering her never-ending landscape-designed cloth. The older woman had been serving her ever since she was a naive teenager. Over the years, the two had become inseparable friends. It wasn't too long ago that the older woman, Laura, had become her secret adviser, fully caring for her well being, both physically and emotionally. She had grown stout ever since those times they were talking about handsome and mysterious men to have secret love affairs with.

The Queen let her gaze fall on the fireplace from where a yellowish orange light illuminated the windowless living room, her thoughts lingering in the past for an instant. Before long, she stood up, Laura too focused on her difficult task to notice her movements. The Queen headed for the door, leaving her finished embroidery behind.

The woman wasn't surprised to see a guard standing beside the door she had silently closed behind her. Yet, she stilled, her hand unmoving from the door knob. She always felt secure when that man was near: he had always served her whole family with so much loyalty that she couldn't help but think of him as a part of it too. He was never far away, always promising love and security. However, she knew that they were both getting old, and him even older, and that his usual task were starting to become a little more difficult than before. She turned to face him, the man she respected so much, and smiled at him with a tenderness she would only show when she was worried about him.

"Sweetheart..." She started in a low whisper. The man returned her smile, greeting her and wordlessly giving her permission to continue at the same time. "You shouldn't have to stand still in this deadly cold of the corridors, Rayleigh." The Queen looked directly into the man's deep blue eyes, who simply laughed at her comment.

"It is my job to watch for your safety, your majesty." She gave him a reprimanding glare, and the knight proceeded in correcting himself. "Rouge."

"Better. Whenever we're alone, my friend. You can drop the formalities. I think we know each other well enough to say whatever we want without building a wall between us with titles and useless greetings created only to hide the real person hidden behind those royal masks." The Queen said, her tone above a whisper, letting her soft yet strong voice flow like spring water at the swordsman's ears.

I know, Rouge. It has only become a habit." She signed in acknowledgement. They had too few private moments to talk to each other freely. Even she at some point started to call this close friend of hers 'Sir Silvers', which made the older man wince every time, unused to be called that by this gentle voice.

"It's pretty cold here, you could have come inside to warm up near the fireplace."

"Rouge, you're fully aware that I am not allowed to go in your quarters except for emergencies." He responded, a hint of seriousness in his tone hidden behind small chuckles. The Queen's eyes dropped to the stone ground beneath them, unable to hide her unexplained worry.

"I still could have ordered to bring down a seat and a blanket for you, at least to keep you from freezing and from locking your knees from standing still so long..." He wanted to tell her that it would only bring his guard down and even make him doze off, which would make his presence rather useless, but seeing the blond-haired woman looking so worried, so sad, so tired, all he managed to do was to cup her cheeks within his big protective hands and land a tender kiss on her forehead. He cared for her, truly, and he wished he could do something more to make her feel better. But all he could really do now was show his love for her and make sure no more tragedy happened in her life.

"You should go to bed, Rouge. It's pretty late already, and you need your rest." He had taken a step back, his hands now resting on her small shoulders. His stare lingered on her auburn eyes; a beautiful mix of fiery red, a tender flame wavering with the wind that was her emotions, and of a dark brown, a strong earthy colour promising balance, stability and support, like the queen she was and was forever meant to be.

The Queen stopped dead in her tracks, shocked and confused at the sight in front of her. She had changed into her long and fancy nightdress and let her blond hair fall loose on her shoulders, with the goal of going to sleep in mind. She had closed the window her handmaid had seemingly forgotten to close, water from the rain soaking the soft carpet covering the stone ground. She had added wood in the fireplace to receive a fair amount of heat throughout all the night, to protect her from its coldness. She was heading toward her comfortable bed when she saw something unusual. There was a lump under the red covers, and it wasn't a pillow. The lump was rising and falling at an even pace, the only sign of life coming from the bed. Only a black turf could be seen near the pile of cushions.

Rouge stayed unmoving for a while, wondering how the animal got in there, before remembering the window that had been left open. She slowly removed the cover, not wanting to scare it. Her eyes widened in surprise. It was nowhere near an animal that had been in her bed: it was a child.

The young boy was curled up on himself, clutching his ripped off clothes with a hand and wrapping his other arm around his stomach as if to ease some kind of pain. He looked way too thin for his young age, and the Queen felt her heart tighten up with motherly instinct. It seemed like his life wasn't all play...

She sat on the bed beside the child, her eyes embracing his now-shivering frame. She pushed his wet dirty bangs away from his eyes to take a closer look at the boy's features. The eyelids coverings his eyes were decorated with long dark eyelashes on which dust was sticking to, his lips were completely dry and cracking and his skin was sickly pale, although a light blush was colouring his cheeks. A deep-looking cut was still bleeding, situated underneath his left eye, and Rouge wondered how he could have gotten it. Her hand caressed his forehead and the heat she felt confirmed her doubts; he had a fever.

"Rayleigh." She called from behind her quarters' door, making sure not to raise her voice too much to avoid waking the child. "I need your help." She continued, more softly. "Please, come inside." Seeing as he made no moves, she changed her approach. "Come inside, Rayleigh. It's an order." She heard him sigh, knowing he was about to break one of the rules the King had set, but it was an order and he had to follow every order.

The knight overly frowned when he saw the small body resting beside the spot where his queen sat. She was now in her nightdress, completely oblivious of the fact that she was of royal rank while he was simply her serving warrior. They were of completely different classes, yet she insisted on staying the same as she was when he had first met her: free. Although her fate was already chosen by her parents at a very young age, she never changed who she was. Wild as ever, she made a sentence with five simple words. Words, with a meaning Rayleigh didn't understand at first as his mind processed what she had said.

"I want to keep him." Right. He knew she loved children and that she had always wanted to have at least one. A heir. But wasn't this going too far? Sure, the boy had snuck who knows how into the castle and was now sleeping soundly on the queen's bed, probably oblivious as to where he really was. Sure, Rouge may be this kingdom's queen and had to make decisions and give orders. But wasn't this going a little too far? After all, the child was probably just lost in the rain and took shelter under the first roof he saw. He most likely had a family currently plucking their hair out while waiting impatiently for his return. Wait, why was he even thinking about something like this? It was Rouge, surely he had misunderstood something.

"I mean, he's definitely tired and cold, and not to mention he clearly has a fever. We can't just kick him out while there's this huge storm rampaging outside in the middle of the night, right?" Her voice was no louder than a whisper, her eyes lingering on the tiny body beside her. He thought he saw something flicker in her gaze, and he knew what she was thinking about. What she was painfully remembering. He sighed, coming to a quick decision.

"Stay here and watch over him." The knight said softly, Ray talking to Rouge and not Sir Silvers talking to the Queen. The blond-haired woman nodded in response, her fingers gently playing with the boy's hair unconsciously.

The knight came back a couple of minutes later, Laura on his heels. He opened the door for her but stayed behind, resuming his task. He wasn't needed for this. His queen's handmaid, who already raised all five of her children into fine adults, knew more about this than he did, so he let her do what she was doing best. However, if he had hoped to simply keep watching Rouge's door for the rest of his evening, those hopes were crushed instantly as Laura and the Queen started giving him orders to fetch this or that, apparently all used to try and lower the child's fever. It couldn't be that bad, right? What surprised him the most though was when Rouge softly asked him to go fetch a nightdress from the heir's room. His heart sank a little at this request, but he did not oppose her. If it was a sign that she was finally getting over it, then it was certainly a good thing.

The woman came back in the Queen's quarters, tidying the whole living room. She stored the books back in the brown extensive library, hiding most of the beige wallpaper decorated with maroon flowers delicately stretching on every wall near the pristine white ceiling. Softly humming an old happy song, she opened the shutters, a gust of fresh morning air bringing the nearby sea's salty smell to the old woman's nose. She smiled a little, remembering a memory of a young cheerful girl walking along the shore, hand in hand with a sweet-talking man with quite the handsome body. Chuckling a bit at the image, she proceeded with her tasks: chasing the dust away from every furniture and every corner of the area, washing the wooden floor with lavender-scented waters, scattering fresh herbs everywhere to erase the non-existent bad odours, replacing the cushions on the couch to make it look more tidy, and finally setting down their previous embroidery works on the small table across of it.

After opening the door leading to the bedroom to continue her job, a smile crept up on her lips at the sight before her. The boy was sleeping soundly in the way-too-large-bed-for-him, the covers reaching his neck to protect his body from the night's cold. His breathing was even, much to the woman's relief, since he looked like having trouble getting air in his lungs the previous night, and that had her worried for his health. Sitting on the ground next to the bed was the Queen, her head on her arms which were resting on the mattress next to the child. Her hair was a complete mess of gold and her nightdress would surely need some washing today, to erase every trace of dust clinging to it. The older woman knew Rouge had watched over the boy during most of the night. She must have been truly exhausted to fall asleep there. The handmaid's eyes came back to the child's face, gazing at his now-treated wound under his eye, then she took notice of the well-folded clothe on his forehead. She walked next to her majesty, where a bowl of water stayed unmoving on the floor. Laura crouched and touched the water, taking its now average temperature. Noting to change it with fresh water, the woman headed for the wardrobe where she retrieve a soft-looking purple blanket. She gently put it on Rouge's shoulders, hoping not to wake her up from her peaceful slumber, then she grabbed the bowl and turned back. She stopped at the bedroom's door frame, looking at the adorable sight, before walking out, humming softly once again.

When Rouge finally woke up, she took a bit of time to look around her in an attempt to comprehend the situation. She was lying on the couch, a blanket covering her body, still in her nightdress. The room was highly illuminated by the now setting sun, its orange light pouring freely in and caressing everything, including her own face. She closed her eyes to protect them from the brightness, seeing spots of colours painted behind the walls of her eyelids. A soft breeze ruffled through her already dishevelled hair. She remembered staying by the child's side for most of the night, but she couldn't recall going to sleep in the living room. She assumed it was Rayleigh who brought her here, slightly blushing as an old memory made its way to her mind for a small moment before pushing it away. The boy was sick and definitely famished; it was no time for daydreams.

She had expected to see Laura, but to her surprise it was a black haired man with a moustache sitting on a chair next to the bed. He was in the process of changing the cloth for the child. He didn't stop when he heard the Queen enter, placing a now cold wet clothe on the boy's forehead to lower his body temperature.

"He didn't wake up yet, but he does seem to be getting better according to Laura." Rouge smiled at this because she knew the man knew she would be worried about the child when she woke up and would want to know about his condition. She stood behind the man, hugging him tenderly from her spot.

"Thank you, darling." She whispered in his ear. They stayed like this for a while, enjoying their rare privacy, both of them eyeing the small body lying in the bed.

"He... looks like him, doesn't he?" He had closed his eyes, as if trying to remember something, an almost invisible frown appearing in his face. Subtly, Rouge moved in front of him, crouching to get to his eye level. The man opened his eyes when he felt two slim arms pull him into a delicate embrace. The Queen leaned forward and delivered a soft chaste kiss on her husband's lips, trying to cheer him up. In return, he gently grabbed her waist and let his head fall on her shoulder.

That's when they heard a small gasp coming from the bed. The couple stood up and their eyes met with grey orbs. They were a little hazed, probably because of the fever, and surprise and confusion were clear as day while the boy looked around him. However, when his gaze settled on Roger, his whole body language changed; his muscles tensed, his jaw locked, his fists clenched, and his eyes, never looking away from the King for a split second, were filled with so much fear that is was painful to watch. Rouge had never seen a child so wary of strangers, and this sudden change in his emotions startled her. Oblivious to it all, Roger crouched beside the boy who instinctively backed away as much as he could without falling off the bed. Seeing this odd behaviour, the man frowned, then forced a big toothy smile in order to avoid scaring him further.

But all he could see was the smile.

A shiver went up the child's back at the sudden memory, and he couldn't help but let out a whimper as the unknown man started to close the gap between them slowly, yet way too fast from the boy's point of view. The King stopped moving when he heard the small sob coming from the youth. The grey eyes kept staring as his hand stretched toward him. Sure, the boy was confused as to where he was and who Roger was, but why fear him? It's not like he could eat him! Ignoring the child's behaviour again, he took a hold of the tiny body. He heard a high shriek at his contact and the kid squirmed in his grasp, yelling and crying out as panic overtook him completely. He was scared; that much was visible, but now that Roger was holding the boy in his arms, he couldn't just drop him on the ground: he could hurt him.

Suddenly, the bedroom's door swung open, Rayleigh at the ready for an enemy attack and sword in hands. It took him a while to comprehend the situation, and when he did, all he could do was stare, mouth agape. As soon as the youth noticed the second man in the room, his blood ran cold. He began trashing around, punching his captor with as much little strength he could muster, screaming bloody murder while tears were freely flowing out of his eyes. Roger was again taken aback by the child's reaction, too confused to do anything, and his wife was looking at the ground, her golden bangs shadowing her face as her clenched hands trembled with either sadness or powerlessness, the man couldn't tell. That's why, when the Queen finally snapped, he almost fell on his back out of surprise. She was angry. The red fire in her eyes revealed it.

"Get out..." She hissed from behind her tightly closed jaw. Both Rayleigh and Roger looked at her in astonishment. Rouge was one whose patience could overthrow the world, but here she was getting pissed - no - furious at the men because an unknown child was throwing a tantrum over nothing. Seeing as none of them made a move to obey her, the child still trashing about in the King's arms, she took a deep breath.

"GET OUT! BOTH OF YOU!" Her lungs emptied at her shout and she was left panting. The black haired man slowly put the boy back in the bed before making a run for it together with the knight. Rouge was a lot scarier than any monsters they had fought against when she was angry. As soon as the men disappeared from the room and he felt no more arms restraining him, the child instantly calmed down. He was gasping for air that had rapidly left him during his panic attack and a few tears were still sliding down his cheeks, but he was definitely calmer. Rouge crouched beside the bed, not moving too fast so she wouldn't scare the kid any more than he already was. She shushed him softly, whispering to him that it was okay now and that he didn't have to worry anymore, that she was here now.

And he saw a flash of red, and fear took hold of him again.

To the blond's bewilderment, the boy jumped toward her, his arms trying to surround her body as he buried his face in her chest, letting his emotions out. He started crying, from fear and sadness, but also from relief, because he finally felt secure again. Recovering from her stupefaction, Rouge returned the hug, the tiny arms squeezing her more as if to stop her from going away. She petted his head, her fingers gently ruffling through his black locks. That simple gesture eventually brought an end to the tears and sobs, and the child mumbled something between two sniffs that made the Queen's heart warm up a whole lot. Some kind of flicker danced in her eyes as a strange mix of sadness and happiness made its way into her heart.

"Mother..."

SOOOO HOW DID YOU LIKE THAT? Please drop a review, let me know what you thought of this fic XD It's only my third fic, but I promise you the story will get complicated, and I promise several other chapters are coming this way x3 Be free to take a look at my 100 themes challenge which I am updating weekly every Friday. It is easily found on my profile, on which I published a poll concerning it, about a bonus theme :P

To all of my Broken Promise readers... I am definitely sorry for all the wait I'm putting you through... I wish I could tell you it won't take too long anymore to update it, but I can't seem to get over this stupid writer's block that constantly harass me when I try to work on the 7th chapter... Please forgive me T_T

As for Dark Ages, I will try to update weekly too, but here again, I prefer not to make any promises. Don't forget to leave a review!

THANK YOU HONEYDEE FOr YOUR CONSTANT SUPPORT! And for always giving such reactions that I enjoy so much. You helped me out a lot with the planning of this story, and like I already told, simply talking to you bring forth great ideas, like this one, which started with a simple conversation about me moving out and having too many notebooks with one that contained this first story that I wrote as a kid.

Anyway, thanks to all of you readers and reviewers for giving me constant support!

MemoriesOfVoxei