Authors note: sorry for the long delay, but I just started working so I'm getting trashed every day out there. Ah well you what they say another day, another dollar.

Chapter 7

Yuri lays the unconscious blond on the bed in their shared room. He then pulls a blanket over wolfram and sits by his side in a chair. The blonds eyes opened in slits and Yuri smiles down at him "hey there sleeping beauty".

Wolfram gives him a sleepy smile "hey you". The blonds eyelids begin to close again.

Yuri smiles at him and gives him a kiss on the forehead "get some rest, you might need the energy later".

Wolfram struggles to keep his eyes open; he hated leaving his husband all alone to face this but at the moment he had no choice. His eyelids betrayed him as he slowly slips back into the darkness of sleep.

Suddenly there was a knock on the door and a gentle voice was heard on the other end, "yoohoo, your majesty, everything alright?" Yuri perked up a bit, it sounded like the sweet voice of Lady Celie, trying to get him to open the door.

Yuri smile and went to the door "just a second". He goes up to the door and puts his hand on the door knob but then he looks down and notices what looked like the tip of a snakes tail poking impatiently underneath the cracks of the door. Yuri frowns down at it then looks at the locked door "actually Lady Celie, wolfram needs some rest so I'm going to leave the door closed for now and let him sleep".

There was a small thud on the floor outside as if someone was angrily stomping their feet "very well your majesty, but as I'm sure you already know, the key to making sure every child recovers from an illness is the warmth of a mothers love would you agree?" He could sense her walking closer to the door and pressing herself against it "please your majesty, let me in, let me love my baby boy"

The way she said that gave him the absolute creeps, he sits on the bed where wolfram is slumbering then looks at the door "no, I'm not letting you in". He can hear hissing and the sound of her punching the door, so he knew he had struck a nerve "so what are you and what do you want with wolfram?"

The fake Lady Celie laughs the creepiest laugh Yuri had ever heard and leans against the door "now, now you cannot ask a lady to reveal all her secrets. You will find out soon enough my dear, you cannot hide in there forever". She then slithers away and her shadow disappears from the door.

Yuri breathes a sigh of relief "that was the most disturbing thing I had ever witnessed in my life", he thought as he stares warily at the door. He then looks at Wolfram sleeping next to him "why are they after you?"

Meanwhile in Greta's room

The little girl wakes up and sits up in her bed, she then stretches out and yawns, she's had such a wonderful rest, she now felt refreshed rejuvenated and ready to take on the world. She gets out of bed and scratches the marks on her neck which were now slowly fading into her skin. The manipulation of her dreams hand taken a toll on her, she was believing that she belonged with the dark master and that all the shadow serpents inhabiting the castle were now her servants. Her fiance told her in one of her dreams that as long as they were in this world they had to do whatever she said. She slowly made her way out of her room and looks around. She then sees Conrad walking towards her, she smiles and walks up to him"you there, wizard in the borrowed body, why hasn't my fiance arrived yet?", She was able to see into their soul at who they really were so she knew this was not the real Conrad.

The Fake Conrad rolls his eyes, he would love nothing more then to kick the little bitch through an open glass window, but he knew the master would have his head for that "we are trying to retrieve the Phoenix son your....majesty".

Greta looks up at him frowning and started nagging "please try harder, it should not take this long for you to capture one blond".

Conrad sighs and looks down, his mind dwelling on how easy it will be to step on her like a cockroach "you know your assistance would be of some help to us, you are the only one that can get close to them enough to lure them into a trap. It would be nice for you to do something that didn't involve getting sick and sleeping all fucking day". His temper had gotten the best of him as he talked to her.

Greta looked at him as if she were already their Queen "you know it's not very smart to test my patience. You will respect the wishes of your Queen", She then narrows her eyes "or would you rather answer to Master Judas instead, I'm sure he will not be happy to hear how his staff is treating his new bride".

Conrad felt threatened over the fact that this little girl truly would be the death of him "as you wish your majesty". He then walks away from her seemingly more somber then he was before.

Greta walks down the hall smiling a little, but deep down she knew she would have to interfere at some point "but why am I so hesitant, if I truly love him with all my heart then I should be willing to do anything for him" she thought. She continues to walk down the hall until she saw Yuri and Wolfram's room, she then smiles at her own good fortune "if I am going to be taken seriously as a Queen and bride of the vampire lord then I must show everyone that I am not afraid to get my hands dirty". With that thought in mind she walks up to the door and knocks on it, she didn't hear an answer at first and was beginning to wonder if anyone was inside. She then heard some muffled noises and the unsheathing of a sword. At this point she decides to make her presence known "Papa Yuri? It's me Greta".

Yuri opens the door and smiles down relieved at Greta. He then scoops her up into a hug "Greta I was worried about you. I'm glad your not taken over". He then paused and hugged her body again , the warmth that he usually feels there was gone now. He looks at her for a bit "are you ok? Something feels wrong".

When the dark master manipulated her dreams he programed her to love only him, but she knew that if she didn't act accordingly the double black king would sense something is wrong and investigate. She smiles a little at him "no I'm just fine papa". She then looks over at wolfram and thinks to herself "so that's where the Phoenix son has been hiding. Everyone has been looking in the wrong places for him".

She quickly changes her pleased look with a look of utter shock "oh no, PAPA WOLFRAM". She runs over to the bed where he is laying unconscious "what happened to him?"

Yuri chalked his feeling into one of simple paranoia "we were attacked by some beast, it was after wolfram, he's going to be ok but I have to keep track of him to make sure he wakes up".

"So the retriever did arrive" Greta thought to herself as she looked at wolfram. She then looks up at Yuri "papa wolfram is lucky to have you around to protect him".

Yuri grins a little and rubs the back of his head " well lets just hope he sees it that way. You know wolfram, when the wimp is the one protecting him you know somethings wrong".

Greta smiles up at him thinking "this is too easy, he's like putty in my hands". She then looks back at wolfram "i wonder how far I can go with this". She slowly climbs on the bed and lays down next to him, on the outside it looked like she was simply providing comfort, but in reality she was surveying his condition. They needed him alive in order to open the gate, so she had to make sure he was still breathing.

Just then Avery walked into the room, closing the door behind him "hey hows everyone doing so far?"

Yuri looks over at him "fine, he's still sleeping". He then gestures to Greta on the bed " I don't believe you have ever met my daughter, Greta".

Avery looks over at the girl and instantly brightens up, he conjures up a lollipop and holds it out for her "AWWW well aren't you the cutest little thing on two legs, yes you are, YES YOU ARE".

Greta instantly slaps the lollipop out of his hand and gives him a serious look "DON'T PATRONIZE ME. I am not in the mood to pretend I like you right now, or to pretend that annoying gesture is cute". She then blanked out at that moment, in her annoyance she hadn't realized she was about to blow her cover. As the two shocked males looked at her she decided to think of something quick "after all you are the mean man who tried to break up papa Yuri and papa Wolfram, I saw you at the ball dancing with Papa wolfram so don't think you can dance your way out of this one".

Avery blinked for a second, then he smiled softly at her. He takes her hand in his and kisses it causing Greta to blush instantly "you're right and even though we never met till now, I'm truly sorry I offended you princess. It was never my intention to break up your family. It was simply my way of bringing you guys closer together. I know it may not seem that way now but when you get older and experience love for the very first time you'll understand exactly what I mean". Avery winks at her continues to smile.

Greta's face continues to turn red and all she could do was lay back down next to wolfram and pull the blanket over her head "that bastard, he may have been able to charm papa Wolfram but he will never charm me. My heart belongs to Master Judas" she thinks as she lays there.

Yuri looks at Avery apologetically "it's been a rough day for all of us". Avery waves it off smiling, Yuri smiles also and looks around Avery for a moment "so where's Quatre?"

Avery instantly frowns "he went to patrol the area, I wanted to prove to him that I trust him to take care of himself so I had to let him go survey the castle".

"i know it must be hard for you to leave him alone" Yuri said reassuringly "but he'll be ok".

Avery sighs "i hope so, I really do".

Meanwhile

Quatre keeps his hand on his gun as he walks through the halls. He notices that he hasn't seen one single person since he started looking around. He makes his way down and notices the door to one of the rooms is open. Curious he inches over to the open door and pulls out his gun. He then hurriedly walks over to stand at the entrance, ready to shoot anyone who passes through. Suddenly someone walks up behind him and speaks "what are you doing?" Quatre becomes startled and turns toward the voice only to see that it was a woman with long red hair and blue eyes staring dead at him "oh I'm sorry I thought you were someone else".

Lady Anissina walks a little closer to him, her curious inventive eyes look directly at the gun in his hand " and what is that in your hand young stranger?"

Quatre instantly puts his gun away "I'm so sorry, I assure you I wasn't going to shoot anyone".

Anissina grabs the weapon right for it's holster on his side and analyzes it in her hand "what an interesting little toy you have here?" she then looks at him with a glint of excitement in her eyes "will you let me take it apart?"

Quatre grabbed the gun from her "please be careful with that". He then hears someone shout in Anissina's office and gets in front of her to protect her "what was that?"

Anissina grins mischievously "just a little something I am working on". She finally notices Quatre's strange attire "you are not of this world are you stranger?"

Quatre sighs "you don't have to keep calling me stranger, my name is Quatre".

"Well Quatre" Anissina said "i am Lady Anissina von karbelnikof". She shakes his hand but pauses "hmm since you are from another world perhaps you can help me with my newest project".

Quatre blinks and starts to move away "actually I really should get going". He instead feels himself being dragged the opposite direct.

Anissina drags him to her office "one thing you will learn about me Quatre is that I never take no, for an answer". She then drags the troubled boy into her office and closes the door behind her.