Disclaimer: All characters belong to Lewis Carroll, Tim Burton and the Disney Corporation.

Unsurprisingly Mirana hadn't gotten much sleep that night. She was furiously debating whether what she saw had been a simple dream or just a memory. It wasn't exactly unusual for dreams to take the names of people you know. Perhaps it was all simply a misunderstanding. She could live with that.

She couldn't remember Stayne ever living in the palace. To be fair she couldn't remember much at all but surely she'd remember that. It made sense she supposed, it would explain how he knew Iracebeth, it would explain how he got the opportunity to break into the palace to cut her father's head off.

She felt a familiar surge of sorrow and anger when she thought of her father's death. She had barely turned twenty when the guards came into her room in the middle of the night and told her they were under attack. It had been one of the scariest moments of her life even though no-one had actually tried to attack her personally. Later when she was told her father had died she'd been practically inconsolable. When one insensitive guard mentioned that his head had been cut off and they didn't know where it was she had gone into serious shock. At least her mother wasn't alive to have her husband die before her. She had died several years before. Mirana couldn't imagine how it would feel to lose your husband.

She looked over at Stayne who was currently leaning over some water carefully using slime and his knife to shave his face. She wondered why he didn't just let himself grow a beard, surely it would save him a world of hassle. True, he looked pretty good cleanshaven but who could he impress out here?

One he finished they began their daily trek. They were still walking adjacent to a large cliff face but they were almost at its end. After a short while she spoke up determined to get answers.

"Stayne were you ever a servant?"

He raised an eyebrow. "Why are you asking?"

"Just curious," she said as innocently as she could.

"Looking for another reason to look down on me?"

"No," she snapped. "I think that you killed half my family is plenty of reason enough."

He still looked rather suspicious but in the end simply answered "A very long time ago."

Alarm bells went off in her head as the dream slowly fit into reality like the pieces of jigsaw.

"When you were a kid?" she pressed anxiously.

He frowned a familiar expression of irritation and wariness she saw when she brought up the past which clearly touched a nerve. "My past isn't really your business princess. It's long and complicated and private. If you'd done anything interesting in your life I'm sure you'd have things you'd want to keep to yourself too."

"Hey!" she said moodily. "I've done plenty of interesting things."

"No, you've ordered other people to do interesting things for you," he said shaking his head. "It's not the same. Let's get going."

She wanted to stop and put up a proper argument but the Cheshire cat's words of demons hunting her spurred her on and frankly she couldn't think of anything particularly spectacular she'd done by herself anyway. She had decided to carry her spear which, unsharpened, still just looked like a stick really and debated the consequences of poking Styne in the leg with it.

She kept glancing back half expecting them to be being pursued by demons but nothing appeared on the horizon.

"Where are you going to go in the future, if we get out of here," she asked trying to take her mind off her fears.

He looked at her. "You really think I'd tell you?"

"Why not?"

"Well since I mentioned I killed your father you've been pretty moody. No offense but I still don't put it past you to have me arrested once we get out here. I quite enjoy my head attached to my body thank you."

"You're thinking of the way Iracebeth used to do it," she said. "There is no capital punishment under my rule."

"Well rotting away in a dungeon isn't much of an improvement."

"Stayne I'm serious I won't have you arrested. I'm not saying I'll give you a pardon either but I won't tell anyone I met you. As far as they'll know you'll still be stuck out here with my sister."

He smiled. "Listen princess. I think you're the only one who managed to kid themselves into thinking the Red Queen would live this long."

Mirana felt a pang inside her. She wished she could rewind time and not banish her sister. It seemed such a vile thing to do now. It was pretty much capital punishment in itself. The only real mercy she'd given her sister was attaching her to Stayne so he could give her a quick death.

"So you refuse to tell me where you'd go?"

He was silent for a moment. "I'd change my identity and go south. As far south as you can go. To the City of Thieves."

Mirana's mouth fell open. "The City of Thieves!"

The City of Thieves was the last piece of Underland you could set foot on in the south before you hit the Endless Ocean. It was the one place in Underland no regent had ever been able to control. Several had tried but all had failed the reason simply being that everyone who lived in the city had to be extremely tough to survive, so when attacked they could build their own army out of the common people all of whom knew how to fight dirty. They had by far the largest black market of weaponry and dangerous beasts in the whole of Underland and unlike the rest of Underland they didn't obey the law restricting the practise of dark magic. In honest truth simple thieves were the least of your worries if you went there. Even Iracebeth, who held sway over a jabberwocky, hadn't dared tangle with them.

Stayne just shrugged. "I've been there before. It's a tough environment no question there but no-one will give a damn who I am and what I've done and those outside the city who would probably won't risk looking for me there. Ironically, the City of Thieves would probably be the safest place in Underland for me."

That was one miserable thought. Still she wasn't going to give a pardon to the man who'd killed her father and sister, that went against all her morals and loyalty to her family.

She debated asking him if he really had asked to kiss her when they were kids and, in fact, if they'd ever got round to it. Could Stayne have really been her first kiss? Now there was a thought. Surely you wouldn't forget your first kiss...hmm. She found herself vaguely wondering what it would be like to kiss Stayne...

She was snapped out that absurd train of thought by Stayne stopping abruptly.

"What?" she said suddenly very alert. She followed his gaze to what looked like a large white stone sticking out from behind the cliff they had been walking besides and had just come to end. She felt her brow furrow there hadn't much of anything white here up until now.

"What is that?" she asked walking forwards a few paces.

"Nothing we need to see," Stayne replied. "Let's carry on."

"But what is it?" she pressed curiously.

He rolled his eyes. "Fine, take a look."

He led her round the edge of the cliff and didn't look the least bit surprised at what he saw there. Mirana on the other hand gave a yelp as she looked at the skeleton of the largest creature she had ever seen and that was including the jabberwocky.

"Oh...wow," she said breathlessly looking at it. She'd never seen so much bone. Its empty ribcage was gigantic, all flesh picked clean long ago. Its head larger a carriage. It was like a monument in itself.

"Yeah. I've spotted some of the bigger one's skeletons, now and then," Stayne said not seeming at all astonished at it. "Some of them just don't seem to want to crumble away."

She walked round to its head, she was about the size of one of its many teeth. "What do you think this was?"

He shook his head. "I really don't know. Some kind of demon? Still, they say the larger they are the less intelligent they are."

She looked up. "Who says that?"

He smiled walking over to her as she put her hand on one giant tooth. "I have travelled all over Underland and hung out with people are...well, not that desirable to put it lightly. You'll find in life that some of the least desirable people are the ones with the best stories. One story I heard from a drunken bandit was that smaller demons are smarter. The bigger ones are just brutes. Probably just the ramblings of a drunk, guess we'll never know."

"I see," she said imagining the creature in the past, alive and moving. It was a frightening image. She hoped she never had the opportunity to test his bandit's theory. "What do you think killed it, an even bigger creature?"

Stayne shrugged. "Perhaps. More likely thirst, starvation or maybe just time. Life isn't meant in a place like this. Everything dies here sooner rather than later. I guess that's how it's always been."

I was here when these lands were beautiful.

"I don't think so," she said without thinking. "I think there's more to this place."

Stayne gave her a puzzling look and she shrugged offhandedly trying not to give anything away.

He looked up at the skeleton. "Well it was kind of doomed anyway. This place is a death trap and if you're stuck in it long enough you're enough your fate's sealed."

Ironically the City of Thieves would probably be the safest place in Underland for me...

If Stayne tried to live there surely even he wouldn't last long. That place was a death trap too. If she let him out of the Outlands and condemned him to a life in the City of Thieves how was it any different to when she'd banished Iracebeth?

"Stayne..."

"Yeah?" he said absentmindedly looking around.

"I think maybe, perhaps...I could get you a pardon for...all the many things you did," she said on some level already regretting her words.

He looked round at her his face expressing utter confusion. "What? Why?" She'd clealy taken him by surprise.

"Well, if I don't you'll end up dead in that city and it'll be my fault because I could have saved you. I mean after all...you saved me..."

"Yeah well you shouldn't have been riding a demon should you?" he said then shook his head walking up so he was leaning on a bone right next to her. "Honestly, princess it wouldn't matter. I've killed a lot of people, some I regret, some I don't. But even if you did get me a pardon, which would look kind of strange, there would be a mob at my door for the rest of my life. These feelings don't just vanish easily, people naturally want revenge when they can get it. My options of escape are fairly narrow now."

"I'm their queen. They won't attack you if I don't want them to."

He actually laughed. "You really are very innocent to revenge aren't you? Real revenge. Listen princess, when you lose everything, the chain of command means nothing, the limitations of your position mean nothing, you will literally tear the world apart to get the vengeance you deserve."

At his words Mirana suddenly felt useless all over again and a little frightened.

"However," he said with a slight smile. "I do appreciate the offer. Still, It'll be far safer for me if Underland thinks I'm dead. Pretend you never met me and let the name Ilosovic Stayne die here."

That didn't seem fair to her at all but she saw the logic in his words. She tilted her head looking into his face and felt a wave of sympathy. Inside she knew he didn't really deserve her sympathy after everything he'd done but she couldn't imagine living a life where you had to run and hide from the world. That wasn't much of a life at all.

"Stayne...I'm sorry."

He shrugged. "It's life. You can't go back so you just have to go forwards and survive. Speaking of which we're not getting any further forward sightseeing. We don't want to end up like our friend here." He pushed himself off the dead creature's tooth. He walked past her leaving her leaning on the creature feeling oddly...disconnected.

She stayed there for a moment then turned to watch him walk away. She tried to understand the weird feeling inside her. It wasn't hard to figure out. She shut her eyes and put a hand to her head. Oh great, this was just what she needed.