[aphrodite]

You quickly change your clothes and meet Kalira outside of your bedroom.
"Ready for the grand tour?" Kalira asks you, her mood improving greatly.
"I suppose." You reply as you feel yourself still wanting to cry. Kalira begins walking down the large, stone hallway and you follow closely behind. The walls are bare, only posessing small candles that hang on the walls to light the hallways. You look to the floor to find a little color. Spread out across the hallway are several long rugs. You assume they cover most of the hallways. The castle is cold and dark, a very un-inviting place to be. As you continue down the hall that seems to last forever you notice that there are tons of doors on either side of the hallway. Suddenly you hear the frantic screaming of a young woman from behind one of the doors. You stop suddenly and try to detect where the noise came from but Kalira grabs your hand and roughly makes you keep walking.
"What was that?!" You ask her, knowing she heard it to.
"A nightmare." Kalira replies simply. You stare at her questioningly. Kalira tries to ignore you, but can not shake your stare.
"The only rooms you are aloud to enter are the rooms I will show you. This castle is very dangerous. If you wish to enter any room outside of the ones I will show you, you must enter them with Master by your side. No matter what you hear from behind mysterious doors, you MUST NOT open them." Kalira tells you, though she still does not answer your question. You finally reach some long, winding stairs that lead down to somewhere unknown. Kalira takes the stairs and you hesitantly follow.
"This will take us to the first floor." Kalira explains, noting your suspicious look.
"This floor is the one the servants and slaves use the most. Though Master only comes down here when he has business to attend to." You nod your head in response, pretending to whole-heartedly understand. You suddenly stop and gasp in wonder as you reach the bottom of the stairs and look upon the sight before you. A beautiful, shimmering, chandelier hangs from the ceiling of an ornatly decorated room. Large, lounging chairs are placed everywhere, and huge rugs lavish the ground. The walls are covered with paintings and photographs. "This is everyone's favorite room. Except Master's." Kalira says proudly. Kalira leads you through the room, as you let your imagination wonder. Kalira takes you to the far corner where a fairly large archway stands. She leads you through it and shows you into a huge ballroom! You put your hand to your mouth this time, utterly entranced by it's beauty. The walls are adorned with banners and more pictures, the ceilings decorated with more chandeliers, each a different shape and decorated differently. Kalira does not allow you to imagine the room filled with dancing couples for long before she leads you to the left wall where another, smaller archway stands. You walk through it to find several very large tables set up. You can tell they would be used for buffets as well as seated eating. You smile at the thought of hundreds of people eating and chatting, simply having a good time. Kalira then opens a large door within the eating room that leads elsewhere. You soon find that it leads into the kitchen. The kitchen is huge, though not nearly as large as the ballroom. It is filled with counters for chopping and kneeding, as well as filled with several old fashioned ovens. You note that there are no cooks currently in the kitchen. As a matter of fact, nobody is around.
"Where is everyone?" You ask Kalira.
"Most of the servants prefer to keep the Master's schedule of sleeping during the day and being awake at night. But those who don't really keep a certain schedule are most likely out shopping for goods and such." Kalira explains. "I have one last place to show you. Follow me." Kalira leads you back into the lounge room and straight across it. She takes you beneath the winding stairs where a wooden door sits. You note as you are walking across the lounge room that the front door sits just a few feet away. Kalira takes you through the small door and unexpectedly, it leads outside. You breathe in the fresh air, the sweet smell of the outdoors a welcome surprise. You walk out onto a fairly large patio. There is railing all along the patio, which you assume is to keep people within the castle walls. Flowers in pots decorate the patio while a quaint little table and chairs occupies the center. There are only chairs and room enough for two. You walk towards the railing and look out. Beneath you, you see a vast garden of immense beauty.
"The garden." You say anxiously. "Can we go in the garden?" You ask, hoping despertely that Kalira would say yes. You knew from the first glance at the garden that if only you were able to, you were sure that garden would be your salvation time and time again.
"Nobody enters that garden." Kalira tells you firmly, instantly crushing all hope that you could ever find peace there. Kalira sees your disappointment and searches for something to cheer you up.
"Perhaps if you were to find favor with the Master, someday he would let you." Kalira tells you. That thought would have put hope in your head. If not for the part about having to find favor with Devarion. You never, ever intended to do that. You put your hand to your lips as you yawn, your eyes beginning to close involuntarily. Crying so much had made you sleepier then you had thought it would. Kalira smiles at you and takes your hand gently in hers.
"I'll show you how to get back to the bedroom. Then you can sleep some more." Kalira tells you as she takes you back inside and leads you back up the stairs. You then begin your long travels down the hallway.
"Just remember that the bedroom door has the inscription of a key in the middle of it. No other door has that." Kalira tells you. You nod, smiling slightly, thankful that Kalira gave you a way to remember where your bedroom was. You reach the door sooner then you had expected. Going to the stairs had seemed like a much longer journey. "Sleep well. I will see you when you wake up." Kalira tells you giving you a side hug. You hug her back, thankful to have at least one friend. You enter the bedroom and close the door behind you. You find the nightgown on the floor where you left it and decide to put it back on. Seeing as you find it very uncomfortable to sleep in jeans. You change quickly then get ready to snuggle under the covers, but you suddenly freeze. Someone else is on the farside of the bed, and you know it immidietly to be Devarion! You thoughts rush to 'Did he see me changing?!'. You look at him through the dim light and realize he is fast asleep. You sigh at this. You contemplate for a moment what you should do. If you try to find Kalira chances are you would get lost before you found her. If you yelled for her, Devarion would wake up and most likely kill you. You shake your head in discontempt as you look at the stone floor mentally saying hello to is as you lay down on it. Stone floors aren't so bad, right? Wrong. You try and try to get comfortable on the floor but it's so cold and hard that you just can't. You try to figure out why Devarion is in here if this is your bedroom, but you come to no sensible conclusions. You look at the bed, then you look at Devarion. It's an awfully big bed. We probably won't even be near each other. You think as you slowly lift the sheets on your side of the bed and climb in. We'll never even get close. You re-assure yourself. You look over at his face and think to yourself how innocent he looks right now. Not like the cruel, heartless man you know him to be. Your eyes trail down his chest which is shirtless (he's wearing pants, though <.<). In the darkness you can still notice that his build is utterly perfect. Muscles and all. You swear at yourself for thinking such thoughts as you bury your head in the pillow and almost instantly fall asleep.

After what seems like only minutes of sleep, though was probably hours, something unknown stirs you awake. Your eyes slowly open as you look around to see where you are. You identify that you are still in the bedroom but something isn't right. Then you realize that something is resting on top of your back at an angle. You can't figure out what it is. Then your eyes dart down to your pillow which doesn't even seem to be a pillow. It's rather white, but much harder, and higher, then a pillow. And it's moving. Up and down, up and down. Slow and steady. Suddenly our eyes grow wide as your head look slightly up. It's Devarion's face. You top half was resting on top of Devarion's chest and his arm was around you! You mentally start screaming as well as panicking. You then start swearing at Devarion for moving over. Then, as you look around, you realize that Devarion hadn't moved at all. It was you who had moved. At this point, you start swearing at yourself instead of Devarion. You had always been prone to sleep with a pillow or teddy bear. Maybe your body instinctively moved towards him in the middle of the night. Either way, you wanted to get away from him. You slowly try to slide yourself up and off of him, but his arm suddenly tightens around you. You look up at his face to yell at him but you realize he is still asleep. He wasn't even aware you were there. You try to slide away again, but his arm only holds you tighter. You try again, only this time trying to wriggle harder. His arm tightens again, and you watch his face begin to twitch. You suddenly stopped dead in your tracks. The last thing you wanted was for him to wake up right now. You yell at yourself again as you lay your head back down on Devarion's chest. Your only option was to go back to sleep just the way you were and in the morning, deny having done this intentionally. You close your eyes and surprisingly enough go right to sleep.