"What gives Ari? Before you called me by name and you were easier around me. Now it's only my title you call me by and talk mostly only when talked to." Grey asks annoyed at her short answer.

"You've made it very clear general that I'm your prisoner. As such it is inappropriate for me to call you by name. As for the other, I just no longer have anything to say," Ari shrugs again. There is something she would like to ask him, but she no longer dares.

Grey stands up. He decides he isn't going to wait for Jeshua to get back. "Towels are over there." Ari says tonelessly.

Grey grabs a towel not as comfortable being naked in front of her as she is in front of him. He wraps the towel around him. He goes back over to where Ari is and just stands there with his hands on his hips. "What the hell is going on Ari? You've known from the start that you were my prisoner. That didn't stop you before."

Ari shrinks back against the vanity table. Her eyes wide with fear once more.

Seeing this Grey lets out a few oaths and backs off. When Ari calms down he says in a calmer voice, "I just don't understand what changed."

"My understanding I guess." Is all Ari can say. "Tomorrow you can hand me over to the judges and your work will be done. At least with me." Ari has no delusions though. The judges won't just keep her locked in a room. She can't help the sadness that leaks into her voice.

"The hell I will. You are under my protection until after the trial," Grey says angrily.

"Now that the dungeon is cleaned out you should lock me in there," Ari says softly. Although she could escape from there if she wanted to she doesn't want to. Life has gotten too hard. Even harder now then with the Aelven.

"If I locked you in the dungeon you'd kill yourself even before I left wouldn't you?" Grey demands as he takes another knife away from her.

Ari laughs humorlessly, "Tonight, tomorrow the day after what does it matter? At the latest I'll be dead in three days from agonizing pain of the poison." She looks over at Grey, "Is it so wrong to not want that?"

She stands up and carefully edges around him. "I'll wait in the other room." Unshed tears are in her eyes but no sound of them is in her voice. "I've become a damn cry baby." Grey hears as the door shuts.

He really should go after her. Since there are no guards she could leave. But he knows that she won't. For a minute there he'd wanted to grab her and kiss her silly, until the idea of killing herself was gone for good.

"Should the girl be left alone like that sir?" Jeshua says a short time later. Grey hadn't even finished drying himself off.

"She's not going anywhere and if she wanted to harm me she would have done so by now."

"She didn't hear me come in and she was inspecting some bruises on her upper arm. Looked to me like a hand where someone gripped her too hard. She was wincing as she moved her arm too. With the bruises from her falls and the fresh bruises she's sporting the tribunal won't have any trouble thinking that you've kept your reputation intact,"Jeshua says carefully.

"Dammit!" Grey throws the towels down. He hadn't even realized that he'd hurt her. "Why didn't she say something?"

Jeshua isn't sure if that's a rhetorical question or not. He decides to answer, "Maybe because she's terrified of you?"

"What?" Grey says and whirls around to face Jeshua. He hadn't done anything to the girl. Other than leave bruises on her arm and knock her unconscious.

"You mean to tell me you haven't noticed how much you terrify her? She hides it well most times but sometimes she shrinks or flinches. Most times she just keeps that stony faced facade to hide what she's thinking. But I also see that she looks for safe places to hide in. She's had plenty of chances to run away, and she hasn't so those safe places are to hide from you," Jeshua explains. "I'll go wait out with the girl."

Grey thinks about things as he slowly gets dressed. Ari had shown signs of fear of him, but only when he showed how angry he is. Then he really starts thinking and remembers that there have been times when she reacted to how he was feeling and not showing. She had compared him to the Aelven, more specifically to her cousin the prince.

His shoulders slump. The prince had alluded to a likeness as well, but he'd been kinder than she had. Her's is more realistic. Most of the stories about him have been blown way out of proportion, but there is truth.

"Thank you Jeshua," Grey says entering the other room. He waits for Jeshua to leave then takes a chair facing Ari and her current hiding place. She doesn't change position and remains staring at the wood of the bookcase, hitting her head on the wall behind her.

"I'll make a deal with you Ari. I'll take you to your cousin's room after dinner if you don't try to kill yourself anymore." Grey had scraped his brain looking for something to keep her from trying to kill herself. She stops hitting her head against the wall.

"What else general?" Ari asks tonelessly. She still doesn't look at him.

"I want you to call me Grey again." Grey is astounded that she picked up on that.

She goes back to hitting her head against the wall. "I can't do that general." She stops hitting her head and rubs her eyes. "I'm so tired. Do you want to go somewhere? If not I'd like to sleep."

She stands up and passes out. Grey's getting rather tired of all the passing out. He doesn't manage to catch her this time and she knocks her head pretty hard against the bookcase. He checks her pulse to make sure she's still alive and is reassured by the steady heartbeat.

He calls Jeshua back and picks Ari up and lies her down on the bed. He undresses her, thinking that the skirt wouldn't be very comfortable for her to sleep in.

When Jeshua returns he sends him to get Jaylen and the nurse Alexis. Jeshua stares at the now unconscious girl and gives Grey a reproachful look. "I didn't do this. She stood up and fainted. Since she was half way across the room from me I didn't get to her in time to stop her fall."

Jeshua leaves but Grey isn't sure that he believed him.

Grey doesn't care if he does or not. He goes into the bathing room and wets down a cloth. Going back into the bedroom he puts the cloth on Ari's head. She doesn't move even as water slides down her face.

Ari opens her eyes, that other world is too painful to watch. She stares unseeing in the room. Grey comes into her line of vision. He says something but it's too much trouble to figure out what he said.

Her lack of response seems to worry him and he frowns. She doesn't know why. She's ignored him before.

What seems like a short time later Jaylen comes into her view. She shines a light into her eyes. That hurts and annoys Ari but it's too much trouble to do anything about it. Jaylen asks her questions too, but Ari doesn't care. She's just so tired. She closes her eyes.

"Ari, Ari wake up. If you want to go to your cousins room you need to wake up," Grey is almost frantic. It's been hours and he hasn't been able to wake her up.

"Stop shouting general, I'm right here. What do you want?" Ari says irritably.

"I want you to wake up. I'm having dinner sent here. If you want to go to your cousin's room you need to wake up and eat." He thinks that last bit was pure genius on his part.

"Food," Ari says and that says it all. She doesn't want any. Grey figured she wouldn't that's why he made that a condition of going to Hatchi's room.

"Jaylen is sending a special meal for you. Something that shouldn't upset your stomach too much. She's not happy about the idea of you getting out of bed either, but since I made a promise we'll go. If you eat," Grey says. He's not going to push the issue with her calling him general instead of Grey.

"Fine," Ari says and moves to get out of bed. "Where are my clothes?" Flashes of waking up without clothes go through her mind.

"On the chair beside you. That skirt doesn't look like it would be comfortable to sleep in. And since the top comes off easily enough I figured you'd rather not have it all wrinkled."

Flashes of Grey taking her clothes off take her by surprise. The panic attack that comes with the flashbacks doesn't. She reaches for the top and puts it on hoping that will help the panic lessen, it did, a little.

The skirt she can't put on without standing up. Grey stands up as well and steadies her. She puts the skirt on without taking her eyes off Grey.

"I've had women stare at me before, but not because they're scared of me. What can I do to keep you from being so terrified of me?" Grey truly is at a loss.

His reputation as a womanizer is also very extensive. She shrinks back, and he frowns but takes a small step away from her. He'd thought they'd gotten past that.

He helps her to the other room. He sits her in the single chair so that she knows he won't sit next to her. Instead he goes over to the window. The fire he had his men set on the pile of moldy vegetation from the dungeon is still smoldering. He heats it up, trying out his new abilities.

He watches as one of his men jumps back as the flames shoot up. He silently apologizes to the man.

Ari takes the time to try something of her own. Soon she has a bunch of little lights zooming round her head. Holding out her hand some land and it makes her giggle.

The sounds grabs Grey's attention. He sees the lights zipping around her and is fascinated. He watches as she matches up the lights into pairs. Recognition hits as the lights do the dance he'd seen her do with the prince. Pain hits him although he doesn't understand why his heart hurts.

He walks up to her on silent feet and makes sure that he doesn't interrupt her. When the dance is finished he says, "That's the dance you did with your cousin earlier isn't it?" Ari wipes her eyes before looking at him.

"Yes." That's all, but at least there is no fear this time.

Grey keeps the frown to himself. "If the queen made you sport why then go to the dances?"

"By the queen's command I had to go to the court dances. I had to learn all the latest steps. She used the dances as a way to show me off to potential rapers. She always called on Hatchi to dance with me first. Trying to get him interested I guess. Or maybe she suspected him of caring for me. It doesn't matter anymore I guess." Grey frowns at her words. Even worse than her trying to kill herself was this lack of caring.

Music floats in the air. The lights line up and start dancing again. Grey is a fast learner and memorized the steps earlier that day, he stands before her and bows. "Would you do the honor of dancing with me Ari?"

Ari looks up at him startled but shakes her head no. "It wouldn't be right general. Besides I'm a bit dizzy still."

Grey is hurt that she doesn't want to dance with him, and he's dumbfounded that he even asked.

There is a knock at the door. Jeshua bringing dinner with Alexis's help. They get busy setting things up and Grey returns to the window to watch the fire burn.

"What are they burning Grey?" Jeshua asks Grey.

"Just the rotting vegetation from the dungeon. I'm burning it hot so that it burns completely. There's other matter mixed in with it that is better to be burned." Grey says tiredly. Life is getting complicated and he doesn't need or want complications. That's part of why he goes through women like he does, he doesn't want to deal with the work it would take for a real relationship. Even his mistresses were relatively short term.

Speaking of which, "Did you get the information out about the trial tomorrow?" Grey asks Jeshua.

Jeshua looks up from what he's doing, "I told the officer of the day. He put the information down. All those not on duty will be there I'm sure."

The dancing lights had fascinated Alexis and Alexis fascinates Jeshua. Now Jeshua is watching while Alexis coaxes Ari to eat a little more food.

Grey laughs to himself. Jeshua is a man after his own heart, down to and including being a womanizer. Although if push came to shove, Jeshua is far nicer than Grey is. He wishes that things were different.

Grey shakes his head. Life is what it is and what one makes of it. Ari is correct in her estimation of him, he is very like the Aelven. He can be cruel. He has been. He's sure that she's heard some of the stories about his cruelty. How cruel does one have to be to make the Aelven run?

He looks at himself and is sickened. Perhaps it's not too late to change. But does he want to change? That's the question. But he is changing, has changed. He's not the man he was before he went into the vault. Since then his life has turned upside down.

But what of Ariele? Her life hasn't been very good from the beginning. She was hunted and captured how many times, a thousand, two thousand more? She was beaten and worse only to rise again and again. Now, here she is in a situation that she can't arise from. She needs him and what is he going to do? Let her die an agonizing death from the poison? Let some sicko get his thrills on as she writhes in pain from torture? Or will he let her die in dignity and mercy? Because that's really what this all comes down to.

Impatiently Grey gets up and paces around. The others watch him with varying amounts of curiosity or fear.

He goes near the food and is turned away by the smell. He's not hungry and won't be able to eat.

Ari drops her fork onto her plate as tears fall. Immediately Alexis in kneeling before her. "What's wrong? Are you hurting somewhere?"

"No." She looks at Grey, "He's dead." Then she can't look at him anymore.

 Jeshua exchanges looks with Alexis. They both are confused and wondering what they should do now. Grey makes it easy for them by shooing them out. "Come back in an hour for the dishes. Ari won't be staying the night here so you don't need to worry about that. Jeshua I'll see you in the morning."

"Yes, sir!" Jeshua says saluting then helping the confused nurse out the door. All the while he continues to shoot the two looks of half understanding and half confusion.