Gwid: The idea with Rand is interesting, but I really have no idea how I would write that...

youknowwho: I also want to be able to work that in somehow, but I don't see any oppurtunity in the coming chapters. Maybe in the future :)

ValekPOV:

"I have a mission for you." The Commander leaned back in his high backed chair and regarded Yelena and I with his eyebrows raised.

"What is it?" Even I could hear the impatience in my voice.

"I need you to go to MD-5. No doubt you already know, Valek, but General Brazell has been up to some kind of mischief and I want you and Yelena to get to the bottom of it. Speaking of him, he also sent me this yesterday."

The Commander hauled out a lavishly decorated box from underneath his desk. I looked at it distrustfully. I had learned the hard way that the worst kind of packages often came in the most beautiful wrapping. Beside me, Yelena leaned forward to take a better look at the box, making a small sound of appreciation.

"What's inside?" she asked.

With a dramatic gesture, the Commander slowly opened the lid to reveal rows and rows of small brown cubes made of a substance that resemabled wax.

"This, according to the note that Brazell sent me with this, is Criollo. Apparently, it's a new recipe that his cook, Ving, created and Brazell wanted me to have a taste,"the Commander explained.

"Where's Oscove? He should taste it first." A sudden thought occured to me. "You haven't already eaten some, have you?"

"No," he assured me, sending Yelena to fetch Oscove.

Oscove came and left, reporting that there was nothing exceptional about the cubes. Nothing exceptional as in poisonous, that is. When he had put one after another in his mouth, his eyes nearly popped out of his head and when he had finished his four cubes, he even licked his fingers to save any residue. This was very strange.

Before the Commander could take one, I took the box out of his surprised hands and popped one in my mouth. After a minute of careful tasting, I could not see what the fuss was about. Yelena leaned over my shoulder to grab one, her hand brushing slightly against my cheek as she did so. Intense heat suddenly flooded me, and she blushed. Why was she blushing? Was it because...but no, she had turned away and I couldn't scrutinise her face and tried to hide her embarassment by tasting her cube.

Meanwhile, the Commander's sharp eyes missed nothing. I groaned internally. I really did not want to be kept back again to talk about what he liked to call "interesting developments".

Yelena gasped with surprise, bringing my thoughts back to her. Her eyes were closed and her face held an expression of utmost happiness. Ambrose shook his head in confusion and grabbed one, and within moments, his face matched Yelena's in expression.

"Valek, don't you feel that this dessert is..." the Commander broke off as he popped another morsel in his mouth. I had never seen him savour a piece of food like this in years.

"Unexceptional at best." I could not believe this.

Yelena and the Commander both looked at me like I was crazy. Great.

"Enough about this...dessert. Just tell us about the mission." I crossed my arms over my chest.

The Commander looked mournfully at the box of cubes and reluctantly closed it. "Well, I will need you and Yelena to go to MD-5 and do some reconnaissance there. Don any disguises and make up any cover stories that you deem necessary. You're dismissed."

As Yelena and I walked back to the training ground, I thought up potential disguises for both of us. As we faced off in numerous matches, I revised and rethought dozens of suitable disguises. In the end, I decided that we would travel there as a man and wife. We would need a fake marriage certificate, as well as the papers needed for travelling to another military district. We would need supplies for travelling there, obviously, and some money for shelter at night or during bad weather. Plus, I would need all my little knick knacks and surprises. I would need to get some for Yelena as well.

That would involve a visit to the Commander's special blacksmiths. I suppressed a smile as I remember how frightened they had been when I expressed my displeasure at receiving my weapons late. They would never make that mistake again, I made sure of that the last time.

I hadn't realised that I was just standing outisde my office like an idiot while Yelena waited for me to open the door with the key that I was holding out towards the lock.

"What are you doing?" she asked, frowning at me.

"I have a plan."

Yelena POV:

"Plan? What plan? For what?" Confusion swirled around in my mind.

"For our mission." He finally stepped inside and held the door open for me. I crossed the room and plopped down lazily on the two-person on the far side of the room. He had had it brought into his office about a week after my arrival. I stretched out so that there was very little space left. He sat down anyways, sitting down very close to me. There was that feeling again. One of these days, maybe after the mission, I would definitely have to go to the library to see what it meant.

"I'm waiting," I hinted impatiently, tapping my boot on the floor.

"Our disguise...we are going to travel as a husband and wife visiting a cousin in MD-5. It's perfect!"

"HUSBAND AND WIFE?" I choked and stared at him. Was he joking? But no, would an assassin joke?

"What? What's wrong with that?"

I squirmed uncomfortably. "Well, you know, we're obviously not married and well...we haven't even known each other for a long time."

He grinned at me. "Then wouldn't this be a good time for us to get to know about each other?"

I looked at me, shocked. No sound made it past my lips except for a small squeak. Really? Could it be possible that...

His face then turned cold, hard. He went to sit at his desk, picked up a book and began to read, totally ignoring me. I couldn't let it end this way. For some reason, I just had to fix this situation.

"You're right! After all, I'm your second now, aren't I?" I winced. My voice had been too chipper, bright, and obviously forced.

He only glanced at me and nodded, but I could feel some of the ice wall melt away. My heart warmed with that darn feeling again. What the hell was it? I shifted uneasily in my chair. He hadn't told me to do anything so I was just sitting there. I might as well go to the library now.

"Ah...could I go to the library if you don't mind? I want to do some...research."

He looked up, curiosity etched in his face. "What kind of research?"

"Um...just ...female stuff..." There. That ought to scare him off.

"Ask me. Maybe I can help." He gave me his whole attention, putting down the book and leaning towards me. His hand brushed against a statue on his desk that I hadn't seen before. A beautifully graceful butterfly, poised as if to take flight. I looked at it for a moment, wondering why he had chosen to display that particular statue and trying to think of what it could mean to him. A gift from someone special perhaps? Or, maybe he bought it or something to remind him of someone he loved. Who would he love though?

He shifted in his seat and I realised that I hadn't responded to him yet.

"That's alright, I'll just go..." Without waiting for a response, I slipped out the door hurriedly. Good thing I didn't give him a chance to say anything, or I would have probably poured everything out to him, and I was obviously reluctant for that to happen.

Just outside the door, I was surprised the encounter a very happy Ari. "Ari?"

He turned around and laughed in a carefree way, picking me up and twirling me around. Something was definitely wrong. Ari was usually more serious, more reserved than Janco, and now he was acting more like Janco than Janco, if that made sense.

"Dilana...Dilana!"

"Dilana decided to be with you?"

He grinned and put me down, then walking with me. "I was just going back the the barracks so I can tell Janco. Apparently Rand was involved with a leader of a criminal orgainisation. I think her name was Star. Anyways, he was helping her with some illicit deeds and they got caught. Both are locked away in the Commander's dungeons now, awaiting questioning."

Rand? Star? So Rand was the one who probably sold me out to Star? I didn't know how to feel about that. We hadn't been really friends, maybe aquaintances at most. I didn't feel really betrayed at what he did but I was definitely very angry. He had caused the dinner with James to go wrong and had caused me to attain a lot of painful bruises. If Valek was the one that questioned them, well...they were in for a rough time. I smiled in fierce delight.

Ari then said goodbye and ran back to the barracks to break his good news to Janco. I couldn't blame him. After all, he had found a happy ending to his love story.

After taking a few wrong turns, I ended up the in the vast, luxuriously decorated library. Basically everything was dusty with misuse, including the furniture. Except, I noticed, one chair towards the back. It was so obviously devoid of dust that somebody or more than one person must have used it recently. I crossed over and sat in it, resting my arms on the chair.

A warm, musky smell covered me as I leaned back. Mmmm...the chair smelled kind of like Valek did when he had his arms around me. Could this be his chair?

I got up and went through the maze of shelves, trying to find what I was looking for. Which was pretty hard because I didn't exactly know what I was looking for. I had just expected to find a shelf on the topic of feelings. All I could find on feelings after I searched the shelves several times was a section on love. Love stories written by the Queen when she was alive, to be precise. Sighing, I picked out a book at random and brought it back to Valek's chair. Even though it wasn't exactly what I had been looking for, it still had to do with feelings and I couldn't afford to be picky now.

I read for a what seemed to be a very long time. Perhaps hours, perhaps only for a few minutes, but all that I was aware of as I read, was that I was in love. Truly in love with Valek. And yet, like the heroine in the book, he didn't love me back. Life was full of painful cliches, I was very convinced of that fact. When I was done, I put the book onto the table beside my chair and slipped down to sit on the cold marble floor, wrapping my arms about my legs and leaning my head down on my knees. What was I going to do?

Before I could think about that, I heard the library's door slowly creak open. A streak of light from outside streamed across the floor of the dark, silent library. Quickly, I ran as quietly as I could into the maze of shelves. I didn't know why, but it felt somewhat forbidden to come into this old library and I didn't want to be caught, especially near Valek's chair.

Peeping around a corner of the shelf containing books on gems, I confirmed my suspicions. It was indeed Valek. He walked to stand in front of the chair and just looked at it, as if he suspected I had been there. Being who he was, he probably already knew. Then, he turned around and scanned the shelves, as if he already knew where I was. Which, he probably did. With a sigh, he sank into the chair and reached for the book that I had left on the table.

He frowned at it for a few moments, as if he was confused by the topic. Then to my surprise, he opened the book and began to skim through it! I groaned in frustration. How and when was I ever going to get out of here?

Apparently he had heard me, even though I had tried to be silent, and started walking towards me.

"Why are you hiding from me?" he asked with an amused expression on his face.

Uh oh. "Ah...I'm...um, not," I said lamely, fidgeting. I let my gaze wander to the door to hint that I wanted to get going.

He smiled."You're not getting away that easily. I just wanted to tell you that tomorrow, we will be leaving for MD-5, so tonight, it would be best if you packed just the bare necessities. Meet me at the castle entrance an hour after midnight."

"Why so early...or late?"

"Because this is a reconnaissance mission. We don't want any snoops like Rand to find out where we went. Also, because you're going to act as my wife, we'll need to able to pass a married couple when we go to inns or any public areas. Which means we're going to have to practise our husband and wife act."

I snorted. "What do I have to do? Be obedient and docile, while fawning sickeningly over you?" I spoke sarcastically but he responded with enthusiasm.

"Exactly. Most of the farmers in MD-5 are quite...stern on their opinions on what women should and shouldn't do, even though the Commander has been trying for the last 15 years to correct this. If circumstances call for it, you will even have to ki-" He broke off, and stared away.

"Kiss you?" Not that I found him repulsive, quite the opposite, in fact, but for some reason, I had a sinking feeling about this. How would I be able to kiss him if he didn't love me at all? If he was totally oblivious to my presence? But recently, he had been acting more and more...I didn't know. Sensing danger, I immediately snuffed the hope that had bloomed in my heart. Face the facts, Yelena! The man doesn't love you and never will. He's an assassin!

He nodded slowly, his face expressionless. "As well as other...ways of showing affection."

I gaped, my heart stopping. He couldn't have meant...

"No, not that," he said hastily, realising his mistake. "I just meant things like...er...intimate embraces and faked private conversations."

"Oh." For some reason, I felt slightly dissapointed. I inched towards the door. "I'll meet you an hour after midnight then! Better get some sleep now!"

He caught my arm before I could dash away and escape. I froze instinctively and stopped breathing. I turned back partially to look at him. Half of his face was shadowed by the bookshelves and his sapphire eyes gleamed in the darkness.

"Not yet, Yelena. We still have to practise this to make sure that when the time comes, our disguises will not be endangered."

I could feel, rather than hear, my breathing become more quick, shallow, and rapid. "W..what should we practise?"

He leaned in, and I saw an expression in his eyes that I had never seen before. Whatever it was, it warmed my body and I relaxed slowly. I was suddenly aware that he had his arms around me, holding me close. I looked up again, and he leaned in to kiss me. I closed my eyes and felt contentment seep through me. In a small corner of my mind, I knew that this was all a ruse, that this was just practise to avoid endangering the mission, not a true kiss.

As his lips almost brushed mine, that part of my mind took control. I stiffened and wriggled out of his embrace. Without looking back, I ran through the library door and towards my room.

As I left, I could feel his forceful gaze following me.

To make things more clear, yes, Reyad is still alive. And yes, the orphanage exists.

Nice ideas guys! They definitely gave me something to think about...