From what I can tell, there's only going to be two chapters after this, both of which are pretty much AUish because they're dealing with events that haven't happened yet. If I publish an end to this, I'm not changing it, no matter what happens with the series.

I could also just put this fanfic on hiatus until the series has ended and write the ending then. But if Break dies...I don't think I could bring myself to write an ending for this if he dies.

Gah, I'm going to depress myself if I think about him dying. I swear, I'll write my favorite cracked theory into this ending if I decide to go ahead and write it. It's crazy, but I can't think of any other way to save him. Not with the manga as it currently stands. I hope you all can forgive me for its crackedness.

Feel free to state your opinion on what I should do (AUish ending with a cracked theory, or wait until the series is done before finishing this) either in a review for this chapter, or on my Tumblr blog (same name as here on FF). I'm not sure if I'll go with the majority or not, but it might help me figure out what I want to do.

Oh, and one more thing...in this story, I've referenced scenes from PH, with an occasional direct quote. I've tried to reword some of the direct quotes a bit (like when Gil is chewing out Break), but there's a few short ones that I couldn't avoid putting in as they were. Just so you know.

Anyway, on with the story.

I am blind...milady.

Sharon is proud of herself. She held back her tears. In spite of his admission, she holds out her hand for him to take. One more attempt at a dancing lesson.

It's a failure from the start. They both know this. He is unwilling to lead and has no sense of rhythm outside of swordplay. It's a trial of her patience, no matter how one views it. And yet...

She revels in the feel of his arm around her. Though it tears her apart that Break's Chain has left him sightless, she lets it go. After all, she's known for years, and it's only his sight. It could have been his life. Instead, she focuses on the feel of his strong shoulder under her palm, on the fact that they are rarely this close for this long, and on the fantasy that tonight he has managed, for once, to see her as a woman. In spite of her body. In spite of his memories of her.

Even her dress is no longer the prim dress of a child, but of a woman. I chose it, because I had hoped he would see it, she thinks. She hoped he would see it and think she was beautiful.

This is enough, she tells herself. If all else falls apart, this is enough for now.

It's with those thoughts that she looks up and sees him looking down at her. "I thought you said you were blind," she says.

"It's not total darkness," he explains. "The world has become a blur. I can still make out vague shapes, especially if they're moving. Details and colors escape me."

"I see." Somehow, they've begun dancing closer.

Still, he looks at her. Something changes in his gaze. He opens his mouth to speak, then pauses. "Milady..."

Her voice is that of a woman enchanted by the man she loves when she speaks. "Yes, Break."

His smile is gone. Their "dancing" slows until neither one moves. Still, he holds her. She feels his hand on her waist tense and waits, breathless, for whatever he seems struggling to say. "I-"

There is a scream and both of them turn to the sound. Whatever had begun to form between them is lost in the massacre that has just begun. The Headhunter. The Baskervilles. Isla Yura's plan. And soon she is working to protect Oz's sister, Ada Vessalius while Break goes after the Headhunter.

.

.

.

"You fought," Gil yells at Kevin, "and you gave up without even once asking for help from anyone!"

Kevin thinks of the Rainsworth woman who didn't cry when he told her he was blind. No one should do anything for me, he once told her. But those were words he'd said to a child. A child who really, he could finally admit to himself, no longer exists.

Just as the Kevin Legnard he'd once been no longer exists. That Kevin Legnard had no friends, no one who would have gladly risked their life to save his. No one who would have thought the life of someone with red eyes was worth saving.

But I'm still a murderer, he thinks. And a murderer is only good for one thing.

Blood spatters the front of his white dress shirt, and makes dark spots on his black coat. If he uses Mad Hatter too much...even once more might be too much. But he has to take the risk. For the sake of the promise he made to the Intention. For the sake of the woman Lady Sharon has become.

Still, it's difficult. "Gilbert. Please help me."

.

.

.

He's in the forest, she's been told. Running faster than when she was a child and her mother had fallen, Lady Sharon races from Yura's mansion to the forest outside where Break has been fighting the Baskervilles.

Behind her the men call out for her to stop, wait, don't look. But Break's body is dying. This might be the last time she sees him.

He's sitting on the ground, hunched over from exhaustion. Gil stands next to him, tired as well, but still able to move easily.

Break though...he's not coughing, she tells herself as she runs. Even from this distance, she can see the dark, slick outline of blood on his clothes. Perhaps it's not his own, she thinks, and tries to move faster.

Too slow. Everything right now is too slow. "Gilbert! Break!"

"Sharon!" Gilbert calls out.

Break looks up. Blood coats his chin, and she knows that although he isn't coughing now, he has been. But she will not cry. Not this time. She will be a true Rainsworth woman.

He looks at her, then looks away. He calls out to Reim, who stumbles out of the forest, hurt even more than Break, if that's possible. She watches Break stagger to his feet and walk toward his friend. There is no energy in his step now, no strength. Each step looks like an act of will, and her heart aches for him.

Focus, she tells herself, and quickly gets Reim to safety through Equus.

There is much still to be done. Before long, Gil has raced back to the side of Oz Vessalius, and Sharon tells the men who followed her to go back inside and help the survivors escape. Only Break and herself remain.

Be angry, she tells herself, though what she feels is closer to relief. Madness, that feeling. He's wounded, deeply wounded. "Gil helped you." She wished it could have been her, but she's glad he's safe and that she was able to help somehow.

"Yes." He leans against a tree, briefly, then continues walking. If it can be called that. And he can't even see where he's going.

"Lean on me," she says.

He shakes his head.

You think you're still dancing alone, don't you? she wants to say. Instead, she lifts his arm and wraps it around her shoulders. He makes a noise that almost sounds like a cry. "Did I hurt you?" she asks.

He shakes his head again, and she can't tell if he's about to laugh or sob. "Are you hurt?" he asks, and lets some of his weight fall on her shoulders. Not all, but just that small bit make Sharon feel like crying for joy.

"No." She's been lucky. Nothing hurt her, nothing came close. "We're almost there," she says, then stops.

Yura's mansion is on fire.

"What is it?" Break demands.

She tells him what she sees. "Take my coat," he says. "There should be a well or a pond somewhere nearby. Dip it in the water, then cover yourself with it."

It feels like every minute is stretched into hours, but she does so and quickly at that. She doesn't need to ask what comes next. Still leaning on her, the two make their way through the mansion to the lower-levels. "I think," Sharon says as they pass the more combustible parts of the great house, "I shall use Equus to transport everyone to a safe place."

"Not me."

She looks up at him in surprise. His smile is bitter. "I don't think I could withstand the strain."

His tone is different now toward her. It's been different ever since he confessed he had lost his sight. But only now does she realize what that tone means. Her fantasy has become partially real: he's treating her as an equal. "Besides," he continues, this time with less misery, "your mother would kill me if I left you alone in a place like this. Very unfit for a lady."

She basks in his appreciative smile, in spite of the building burning around them, but only for a moment.

And yet, this is the memory, no matter how brief, that she treasures the most. It's the one she holds on to after they return and Break collapses. A full week he sleeps, and Sharon remembers what it was like before her grandmother shooed her away from her mother's side. I could have easily lived my life never leaving her room. She knows because the same is true of Break. And so, now and then, she forces herself to take tea in her sitting room. She speaks with Gilbert about the horror of what they saw.

She prays in her heart for Break, and swears that, before he dies, she will do something that will show him the depth of her devotion to him.