A traditional fairy tale with quite about of twist! the characters are mine, except Hansel and Gretel themselves. Any similarities to a real person is completely by coincerdence, hope you enjoy!

My hands were red raw by the time I got down to dinner that evening. Hester had done next to nothing in my absence, leaving me to finish the job of cleaning the bathroom floor. Honestly, I felt like reporting her, and making sure she gets the sack. The master bathroom had a bright white marble floor, six metres by ten metres. It normally took two people three hours to clean it, but today, it took us five, because of her lack of responsibly and capability. I huffed down the servants staircase, grumbling to myself, whilst I tried to soothe my blistered hands from the constant friction of the splintered scrubbing brush. I hadn't realised Hester had been walking down behind me, neither had I realised I had been speaking aloud, harshly about her. She looked at me, her eyes filling up with tears, and legged it towards the kitchens. I felt bad for a second, then remembered how useless she was, and my moment of weakness was gone. I was in too much of a bad mood to try and help other people problems.

Plonking myself down onto the cold bench in the kitchens where we ate, bowl of soup in hand, I remembered what had happened on the way back from Mrs Henrings room.

I had been dallying, caught up in some fantasy or another (the other girls called me Dappy Daydream - the amount of types I've got into scrapes because of my imagination) when I suddenly slammed straight into a solid wall. This snapped me back to reality, and I slowly lifted my head up, honestly unsure of what I had walked into head first. It took a moment before it registered in my mind that Hansel Elvedean was growling over me, his thin face red with anger. I gasped and rose my hands in surrender, stepping backwards.

"I am so, so s-s-sorry Sir," I stuttered, nervous of his reaction.

"what the hell are you doing here?!" he thundered. Hansel wasn't one of the tallest people I had ever met, only around five foot, thirteen inches. I was five foot, seven , so it felt like he towered over me, intimidating.

"just h-heading to the master

b- bathroom" I replied, sweat starting to pour down my face, but instead of carrying on towards the bathroom , I turned tail and ran. I couldn't explain my immense fright, I just was. Ever since I started working at the House, I was terrified of any encounters with Hansel. This added to my annoyance at him, because that scared feeling in the pit of my stomach, always made me feel unbelievably sick, and I knew it was his fault. So I blamed him.

I pondered this as I slurped up my cabbage soup, realising how pathetic I was going to be with him in the woods. If I was this frightened now, how would I cope an entire day of just Hansel?

I still couldn't figure out how I would survive when Zachary, the groom, slipped onto the bench beside me.

"Cheer up ol' girl! It might never happen!" he said, pinching my arm lightly. I smiled. Just the mere sound of his voice made me smile these days. I was met with a cheeky grin as I turned around; his brown eyes sparkling from beneath his thick, dark eyelashes. His hair was all over the place, little straggles of hay entwined with the brown strands of hair. I smirked, and pulled out some hay, waving it in front of his face.

"I didn't realise you had golden hair now Zach!" I laughed, causing him to laugh too and try to take it back.

"Nice to see you smiling again Gret," he said softly, when he caught the hay from between my fingers. "You've looked awfully miserable recently." My smile fell, instantly reminded again of my rubbish life.

"Hey, keep the smile please! It's all I want!" he begged, before nicking the last of my bread from my hand, and pushing it inside my laughing mouth. Then, quick as a flash, my now free hand was enclasped in his, his thumb slowly running up and down.

However bad I felt inside, Zach was always there to make me smile again. He considered it his personal job, because apparently I'm 'much to sad for my own good'. We had been secretly courting for a few months now, and I really felt like I'd met my match. We balanced each other out. Of course, servants weren't allowed to court, but many did, including us, and everybody turned a blind eye, even Edward, an old foreman, who was very strict on rules. Only Mrs Henrings didn't know, because she was even bigger on rules and crime than anyone else.

I swallowed down the hard bread and turned my while body around to face him.

"Zachary, I've got some bad news," I began, and watched his face lose it's grin too.

"Bad news? Well you'd better tell me then"

So I told him everything about what Mrs Henrings had told me earlier. I tried to make it sound a little better, by adding in positives like, 'I get a day off work!' or 'I will get more money.' Zach didn't seem to buy my attempted enthusiasm, and he gripped my hand tighter.

"it'll be fine." he said reassuringly,"I'm sure you can cope, your extremely strong you know. You have just got to believe that you can get through it!" and as soon as he said it I believed it. I would trust Zachary Pitt with my life, with my mothers life, so whatever he had to say, I absorbed it, and played by his rules. In fact, my own personal rule to get through life is to trust what Zach says, and do it. It's worked so far, it can work again.

The next two days, nothing else happened to do with the hunting trip. I washed carpets, tidied rooms, and did little errands around the House, much like normal. It wasn't until the third day that I got another call from Liza during lunch, announcing that I was needed in the drawing room. The people who didn't know about me going hunting (which was most; I had only told a few people) looked at me confused, but nobody asked any questions. A lot happened at Elvedean House, and a lot we learn to ignore, so it is not a distraction.

I walked to the drawing room briskly, wishing I was allowed to dawdle. I was on edge, no idea how this would play out. Slowly, I pushed open the large door, and peeked around. Mrs Henrings, George and Lord Elvedean were all present, the Lord seated comfortably on a plush chair, the others standing nearby. Mrs Henrings saw me first, and beckoned me in, her strict face plastered there, thin lips not moving an inch. I went in and stood near her, unsure how to hold myself. I guessed we were waiting for Hansel, unsurprisingly. By the time he finally came in, around half an hour later, I had completely lost my free fifteen minutes of lunch. I was starving, and my stomach gave me away. Mrs Henrings gave me a sharp 'shh' and we watched the door swing open, followed by the gangly heir. His eyes searched around the room, until finally coming to rest on me.

"A GIRL?!" he shouted, obviously furious. He started to stalk towards me purposefully, but George bravely managed to intercept, and tried to calm him down.

"yes, a girl. You were disobedient my son, and for that you must learn you lesson." His father replied cooly. He made a quick gesture for me to approach Hansel, and I did so, afraid. I didnt take my eyes off him, and his stayed trained on me too. When I was within a suitable distance from him, I stopped, and curtsied as daintily as possible, trying to hide my disgust at him.

"Now, I want you to get to know each other." said Lord Elvedean, " so we shall leave the room, and see how you two get on." I choked, trying to make it sound like a cough. Leave me alone with this maniac? Were they absolutely crazy? They must have been, because I watched them leave the posh room. I could feel Hansels eyes on me, burning through my soul. I avoided eye contact for as long as possible, but as soon as even just my eyes flicked over his, he started to move stealthily toward me. For some reason, I stood my ground and squeezed my eyes shut. But when nothing happened, I pulled one apart, and squinted up into... Darkness. This shocked me, how had it got dark? The shock made both eyes open wide, and as soon as they did, a heavy blow struck across my face. Something metal had indented into my fletch, so I was bleeding instantly. The pain shot through my entire body and I screamed in pain, as loud as I could so the Lord would hear me. U saw his hand move again, and this time strike across the other side of my face. This time, the metal dug in more, so I was bleeding quite heavily on both sides on my face, screaming in agony. The force of this blow knocked me clean off my feet, as I lay sprawled on the floor. It was as Hansels hand rose for the third time, and I admitted defeat, that Lord Elvedean, George and Mrs Henrings burst into the room, greeted by the sight of me now cowering beneath his raised, metal ridden fist.

George scooped me up in one arm as quick as possible, and shoved hansel out of the way with the other He started to run, shouting 'Doctor!' very loudly and breathlessly. Behind me I heard some extremely loud shouts and swears before I was whisked out of earshot and towards the House infirmary.

Well, that had gone well.