I'm happily addicted to this pairing. Hooray for me!
Also, since everyone else is making up their own names for our lovely Lavender Eyes, I decided on Lavendel to be mine until a shorter canon name is established. (It's German for lavender. Clever, nein?)
Hm, I made little Lavender Eyes like a little DG, and little Ambrose is like little Az... That's probably why she liked DG so much more, because she reminded her of herself. XD
Disclaimer: I do not own Tin Man. But, if noone else wants it, I'm claiming the word lavendel as my own. Actually, I want the whole German language. Ha, take that.

Note: Taken down and edited a bit, thanks to insight from my bestest buddy Liz-Beth, who should really be my beta...

"This is a horrible idea, Della."

All Lavendel could do was smile up at friend. "Oh Ambrose, don't you have a sense of adventure anymore? We have never traveled this far into the woods!" she said, pulling up her dress as she jumped over yet another log.

The boy grimaced and stared at his muddy shoes. "It is unbecoming of a princess to act like a disobedient boy." he pointed out, repeating something he had heard his mother say many times before.

She paused for a moment. "Hm, that is a good point... Oh well, too late to turn back now!" she said cheerfully before continuing on.

"Della!" he whined, slamming his foot down in frustration before he could stop himself. Accidentally landing in a muddy puddle, he watched in horror as his pants became dirty. "My mother is going to kill me..."

"Not if mine kills you first for allowing me to go this far."

"Della!"

She laughed, a twinkling sound that made his face turn a dusky red. "There's supposed to be a river somewhere over that hill. You can get clean there, and maybe after that we can pick some poppies. You like poppies, don't you?"

"Do you like poppies?"

"Yes, I adore them."

"Then I like poppies, too."

"Good. Well, come on!" she said gleefully, running off towards the hill. He groaned in exasperation, not knowing whether to tear his hair out or follow his friend. In the end, however, he followed. He always did.

"Oh Della, please don't run too far ahead!... Della? Why did you stop– ACK!" he asked rather loudly before being pulled onto the ground. He fought off a blush when he realized the princess was lying so close to him, peering over the edge of the hill. "What did you do that for?" he snapped.

"There are people there." she whispered. "An entire town."

"That's impossible. There's nothing but woods here, according to all the maps..."

"Are you calling me a liar? Take a look for yourself!"

"Fine, I will!" He raised his head slightly to get a better look and, gods help them all, there was a town. A small village that looked as if it had been built only recently, but a town nonetheless. "Well, I take that back. How curious..."

"I'm going to go take a closer look."

Now Ambrose reallyfelt like tearing out his hair. "Your mother is going to have me banished to the moon..." he whined, but he followed her anyway.

The town was busy, with men and women alike diligently building new shacks, cleaning clothes, and various other menial tasks. Young children chased each other around, laughing and smiling. Even though the townsfolk seemed too occupied with their work to notice them, Ambrose still remained close to the younger girl, frightened of losing her in the crowd.

Suddenly, his concentration was broken when something hard and round smacked into the back of his head.

He turned around angrily, rudely ignoring the concerned shrieks of his friend in his search for the perpetrator. He found them in the form of a band of teenagers, apparently led by a boy in a brown hat. The boy waved at them. "Hey, kid! Throw it over."

Ambrose picked up the ball and walked over to the boy, roughly handing it over to him. "You should be more careful next time. You could of hit her." he said through his teeth.

Della hid behind Ambrose, glaring up at the much older and much taller boy. "Who cares if it could of hit me, Ambrose, it hit you! Apologize to him!" she snapped.

The others chuckling behind him, the boy simply crossed his arms and smirked. "Well, I could apologize, little miss, or I could ask you what you think you're doing here."

Ambrose was shocked at the boy's audacity. "Little Miss?! Just who do you think you are?"

He mock bowed, tipping his brown cap and revealing short blonde hair. "The name's Wyatt Cain. May I have the honor of knowing yours, milord and lady?" he said with feigned politeness.

Della seemed to care less about Cain's rudeness. "You still haven't apologized to him!" she said. Pushing Ambrose forward a bit, she said, "Come on, Ambrose, hit him!"

His jaw dropped as he turned his head around to stare at her, his eyes frantic. "What?!"

"Come on, you know you want to!"

Cain's friends were in hysterics, except for one sandy blonde haired girl who just seemed annoyed. Cain just shrugged. "Don't disappoint your little girlfriend there, scarecrow." he taunted with a sneer.

Della gasped with indignation. "Scarecrow? What a terribly mean thing to say! You... You mean boy!" she shouted, storming forward and giving him a little shove.

The push that he gave her was only supposed to move her backwards, but Wyatt didn't know his own strength and accidentally knocked the girl off her feet. She wasn't hurt, not at all, but she was so surprised when she fell onto the dirt that tears started to form. The boys all started roaring with laughter, and they only stopped when Ambrose, red with fury, roundhouse kicked Wyatt in the face.

Cain stared at him in shock, holding his bleeding nose. "Y-You kicked me! Damn bastard, you kicked me!"

Ambrose grinned haughtily. "I've been sworn to protect her." he said simply, eyeing Della fondly as he helped her up. Eyes widening, he noticed that some of the adults had noticed the commotion and were heading over.

With shotguns.

"Uh, Della? Maybe we should–"

"RUN!" Della said with almost impish glee, grabbing her friend's hand and running as fast as she could for the hills.

One of his friends, another boy with slightly darker blonde hair, snorted with laughter. "You got beat by that little girly man, Wyatt!" he said as the others joined him.

Cain leered at his friend, grimacing. "Oh can it, Zero!" he snarled.

Still laughing, the group dissipated, leaving to restart their ball game. Only the annoyed girl remained. "Hey, Adora, can you go get me a handkerchief or something?" he asked softly, starting to feel a little lightheaded.

"Maybe a little bloodletting will change your attitude." she said wryly, leaving him to pass out on his own.

Meanwhile, a good distance away, Ambrose and Della finally stopped running, having reached the river they had been looking for in the first place. "It's getting late. Your mother is going to kill me." he said as he slowly walked into the shallower part of the stream. "And then those people are going to find out who I am, and then they're going to tell my parents what I did. Then my parents are going to revive my dead body, and then kill me again."

Della sighed and sat on the riverbank, idly picking some of the flowers that grew there. "Do you remember what Tutor always says to you during lessons?" she asked.

"'Ambrose, get your head out of the clouds and start paying attention to your studies'?"

She giggled. "No, not that."

"Then what?"

"He's always telling you to be more optimistic! You're always so worried about getting into trouble that you never have any fun!"

He paused, staring down at his now-clean feet. "... If I'm bad, my parents will send me away. Then I won't be able to see you ever again." he said softly.

Smiling, she waded through the cool water towards him, a bright red poppy in her hand. "Ambrose, that'll never happen." she said, gesturing for him to bend down to her level.

"And what makes you say that?" he said, allowing her to place the poppy in his hair.

"Because I'm a princess, and I'll make a law that says that you're to never leave my side, for as long as you shall live."

"You don't need to make a law like that, Della."

She furrowed her brow. "And why's that?" she asked.

Smiling, he chastely kissed her on the forehead. "Because I never plan on leaving."

They played together for the rest of the evening, and he returned home muddy and breathless and filled with a sense of victory. His mother earned another grey hair at the state of his clothes and his father reprimanded him for being late and sent him to bed without supper, but, for obvious reasons, he just didn't care...

"Cain..."

"Cain."

"Cripes... Wake up, Cain!"

Cain nearly fell out of his chair, shocked into consciousness by Glitch's irritated yell. The man simply grinned at him, as if he hadn't nearly given him a heart attack. "You fell asleep right in the middle of the speech. Doctor Dillamond had a fit over it... Oh, I rhymed!" He frowned and blinked a few times, struggling to get his mind back on track. "Well, did you have a nice dream, at least?"

"I guess so. It was more of a memory than a dream."

"Memories are good. Was it a nice memory?"

"It was from a while back, back when I was a teenager... I was such a bad kid, then this weird kid and this little girl wandered in and he punched me in the nose... After that day, I started being really good, in case that kid ever came back, so that I could punch him in the nose and say, 'Ha, take that!', and smirk... Even became a Tin Man, just so I could have a better chance of finding him."

Glitch frowned. "Sounds like that guy was a real jerk! Do you remember his name?"

"Yeah, it was really weird, too. Ambr–" Cain froze and gaped at a confused Glitch. Then he grinned. "Yeah, I remember his name. I remember his name perfectly."

He backed up slightly, his friend's actions scaring him. "Uh, Cain, are you feeling alright? You look a little, uh, psychotic right now, so maybe I should– OW!" Glitch dropped to his knees, holding his nose and rocking back and forth in pain. "Son of a... Cain, that really, really hurt!"

Cain smirked. "Ha, take that." he said in triumph, walking away.

"Cain, where are you going? What did I do to deserve– Hey, why is my nose bleeding? Oh, right... CAIN, DON'T YOU DARE WALK AWAY UNTIL YOU TELL ME HOW I GOT THIS WAY– Oh look, I rhymed again... What was I doing? Oh, right... CAIN!"

All Cain could do was smile as his confused and bleeding friend followed him through the castle, yelling at him. Adora was right. Revenge was indeed a dish best served cold.