Dusk stirs on the horizon, the sun flaring its wispy tendrils amongst the dimming luminescence of the stars. I no longer see the city that I lived as Rapunzel in; I don't know where we are, but I can't find it in myself to care. All I care about is him.

    He hasn't muttered a word since I got into the car, but that doesn't stop me from staring. The light has a purple-ish hue as is enters the car, but I can't stop myself swallowing him while in my memories. His eyes are green, green as the olives I put on my pizza. And his jaw looks softer, still adorned by youth somewhat. But what surprises me most is that he is beautiful, but not like the sea or the stars. Like a hurricane, like he can destroy me and everything I stand for with just a mere blow, a whisper of the wind that clouds my clarity and enchants me with his pure wickedness.

    "What?" He asks, his knuckles clenching the wheel appearing like the whitest of spiders upon his skin, his eyes not leaving the road.

    "You haven't killed me yet," I say, repeating the thought that has surprised my every nerve.

    He smirks, smugness overtaking his expression before fading back into the same intense creature. "Obviously."

     His reply irks me. "Well, thanks."

     "Are you drunk?"

     I raise my brows at him. "Excuse me?"

    "You went off with someone you thought would kill you, without telling anyone," he reasons. "You're either drink or stupid and I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt."

    I gulp, out of annoyance more than anything. "You really don't know how to talk to people, do you?"

    "My people skills are perfectly acceptable, thank you," he replies.

    "In a prison. No wonder you're friends with Grace."

     And once again he stiffens, any sort of feeling that has arisen in him snapping back as if to feel is an effort and being a monster is natural. His voice is of cigarettes and hospitals and cemeteries. "What do you mean by that?"

    "Grace has the same sort of struggles you do," I tell him. I don't know why I'm challenging him, especially when I know he is so protective of her. However, I can't help but egg him on. "Grace is like the favored trapeze artist at a circus . . . the world is no circus. The world mocks the circus. Because all those that dwell within are freaks, not proper members of society-"

    "Shut up." His eyes, although green, cackle with electricity. "Shut up."

    I don't, although I admit inwardly that the violence in his tone startles me. I ask him, gently, "Why do you care about her so much?"

    "That's none of your business," he says.

    "I thought you wanted me to help you," I insist.

    He spares me a glance so cold I worry I freeze on the spot, however a moment later I discover I still have the ability to move my limbs. But I have something for he just states a simple "yes" without any unnecessary hostility.

    "Why do you want my help?" I question.

    He ignores me.

    "Why me and not her?" I demand.

    Still nothing.

    "I thought you loved her-"

    "Shut up!"

    And suddenly he is a lion and he is roaring at me. He is a storm striking lightning at me. He is a nightmare, flaring to life in the birth of the day. And I know that any reassurance I had felt, thinking that he would no longer hurt me was false. It is false. Because death hangs in his every fibre. It is his bones that support him, in his veins that stretch through him, in his blood that runs through him. He is everything I have ever feared.

    I don't even know his name.