AN~ Heck yeah wrote this all in two days so I could get it up on time for y'all!

QotU: Best vacation ever and why?

Old QotU Winner: Dunwannalogin's jelly beans inside a chocolate bunny. Because that's just awesome.

"Those are my parents!" Daphne half-shouted. Then she clapped her hands over her mouth, eyes wide. She didn't know what the right thing to say was, but she was sure that wasn't it.

"Doggies don't-" Red started, turning to Daphne with that scary-big smile. Then what Daphne had said sunk in and her face twisted into something monstrous as she yelled, "No! They're my parents! You can't take them!"

"Daphne," Ms. White said softly, backing away from Red, "I think it's time to leave, now..."

"No!" Red shouted, reaching out for Snow. "Stay!"

Daphne's eyes widened in terror. Red had heard her. This little girl had suddenly gone from mildly disturbing to absolutely horrifying, and they were in her home- with her monster. She understood why Pinocchio- she was too afraid even to feel pain at the thought of what he'd done to her- why Pinocchio hadn't wanted her to stay out of this place.

Red was crouched protectively in front of 'her' parent's bed, her eyes narrowed into slits and her hands curled into claws. One hand still stretched out towards Ms. White, reaching for her without moving forward. Above her, the monster growled. A ring on Red's hand sparked color.

"Daphne," Ms. White said, warning in her voice, not bothering to keep her voice down now, "You should go now."

"You promised!" Red shrieked, her voice rising at least two octaves. "An hour, you said! It hasn't been an hour!"

Her eyes turned to Daphne, narrowing even further. Daphne could have sworn they glowed. "It's your fault," she hissed, her voice dropping to the other end of the vocal spectrum, deep and dark.

"Run!" Ms. White yelled at Daphne. "We're close to the exit, if you can-"

Daphne was already running, almost sure she'd gotten the right direction, but not positive, hoping, hoping-

Red's monstrous Kitty appeared in front of Daphne, and she fell into a foot-first slide that Sabrina would have been proud of, scuffing her way between the thing's legs. She got a brief view of its surprised face above her, and a large drop of drool landed nearly on her head, hitting her braid with a smack, and then she was behind it again. The tunnel was narrowing a little. She could tell because she'd run into the side much sooner than she ought have, ending her slide with an abrupt crash into the wall that scraped her knees and did even more damage to her dress than the slide had- so much for that outfit. Too bad, she'd liked it, too.

She pushed herself off the wall, ignoring the pain in her knees and shins as best she could, and took off running away from the monster again, hoping that Ms. White was following her, or could get herself out. Ms. White could take care of herself, right? Of course she could. She was strong, and brave, and capable, and smart, and- She'd be fine. Daphne was sure of it.

She shook the image of Red's twisted face out of her head and ran on.

Behind her she could hear Red screaming something indecipherable, and the pounding of the thing's enormous feet on the rock of the floor. She was surprised it didn't shake the cave to bits.

There was a beat, and suddenly the cavern was much lighter, and Daphne could definitely see that it got narrower as it went on, which meant she must be going in the right direction but-

But the thing that was making the cave light up was fire, coming from the monster's mouth, and she was going to die. That was it. Her life was going to end today. She fell into another desperate slide, this one face-first, in an adrenaline-fueled attempt to keep herself from being roasted. Now her front was as scraped up as her lower legs, but the pain meant she hadn't been burned to death, and she could get up and running again.

Daphne ran and ran, dodging and ducking and jumping sideways in a furious attempt to not die until she was exhausted, the tatters of her skirt singed, bleeding in more places than she thought she could count. The cavern had gotten narrow enough that the thing couldn't follow her, and shortly after that, it had turned, so she was safe from the monster. Safe and alive.

She leaned against the wall, panting heavily. The realization slowly sunk in that she wasn't honestly much better off than before. She was still alone, in the dark, surrounded by people who wanted to kill her, in the center of a mountain with no friends and no way to get home.

She sank to the dark floor of the cave, and, for the first time since this whole mess had begun, Daphne began to cry.

This was it- Puck was sure. It had been nearly a week since Snow had left, and Sabrina still hadn't made her move. But she was going to. He knew her well enough to be sure of that. He'd been watching her, and he might not be as good at that observing thing as she was, but he saw the anticipation in her eyes, her jerkiness, and he knew she was heading out tonight.

He'd sort of wondered if he ought to make his move earlier, before she went to leave, but he figured- well, he ought to be sure first, right? He didn't want to do anything drastic if he didn't have to. It went with that nice thing he was trying to work on sometimes. And she'd definitely hate him after this. So he wanted to be absolutely positive it was necessary.

He had his plan all worked out. That was a good thing, since he was pretty close to positive Sabrina had her plan even more worked out- unusual for her, but she'd taken a week to do it, so she had to be planning something. It only made sense. She was the only person he knew who could plan to be thoughtless.

He was waiting for her outside her bedroom window, leaning against a respectably solid palace wall in the shadows of below her most likely exit point. He'd thought about this long and hard- she wouldn't go out through her door because there were guards and things there, and this window had a big tree next to it, giving him the shadows to hide in. And if he had shadows, she had shadows. So she would come out this window, down this tree, and he would be there, waiting for her. And she'd be surprised. Because if she heard him when he moved, the solution was obviously to be in a place where he didn't have to move. He grinned. This plan was awesome.

Now he just needed Sabrina to hurry up and get out here so he could spring into action.

He waited.

And waited.

And waited.

Finally, there was a rustling noise above his head, and he turned to look at it. A figure in a very difficult to distinguish dark outfit was descending from the tree- Sabrina. Realizing that he'd seen her, he blinked a few times, surprised. Was this how she noticed things all the time? It was pretty neat, actually. A bit exhausting, though.

He also realized that he'd been right about where she'd be coming out, and he grinned. He'd gotten it right! Show her! And his mom!

She was on the ground, now, with a soft 'whump,' and it was time for him to make his move. As she straightened and moved to walk off towards the outer wall, he stepped forward and asked, "Where do you think you're going?"

She jumped, spinning around with eyes wide in the dark. "Puck!" she hissed. "What do you think you're doing?"

He grinned. He'd gotten that right and he'd surprised her! Tonight was going great. "I'm keeping you from getting yourself into something stupid," he said, in answer to her question. "What do you think you're doing?"

"I'm going to get my sister back!" Sabrina snapped. "Now let me go!"

Puck, who hadn't been holding her at all up until now, decided this was a good idea. He took three long steps forward and grabbed her by the arm, hoping she wouldn't pull some crazy Sneak move out of her bag of tricks and break his arm or something. She didn't, and he said, "Grimm. Don't be stupid."

She snorted and said, "Like you're one to talk."

"Exactly," he said, nodding. "Learn from my stupid. Don't do this."

"Why not?" she challenged.

Good. She'd given him an opening- that was what he'd been hoping for. Stage two of his plan, after stage one: surprise her, was to reason with her and hope she'd listen. Stage three was where things got ugly. So he said, "Just think about what you're doing for a minute, okay?"

"I have thought about it," she said. "I've done nothing but think about it for the past week! And I have to go after my sister."

"Sure," Puck said, "Go running off into a country you've never been to, a country that's ready to declare war on you if they get any more incentive, to rescue a girl who's already got friends and a rescuer in the country who actually know what they're doing, who've seen the place, and who are way older and more experience than you are. Fine. That's okay. Because she's your sister, so this obviously makes you a billion more times qualified to go after her than anybody else."

Sabrina gaped at him, her expression getting angrier and angrier. "You know what?" she snapped. "I don't have to listen to you!" She yanked her arm away from him.

Puck's grip held. Barely. He sighed. So much for stage two. Now it was time for stage three: force.

Puck wasn't stupid. He knew he'd never be able to take Sabrina in a fight, except maybe with a sword. She was better trained, faster, and lighter, though maybe not stronger- not anymore. So he knew if he wanted to keep his promise to the Old Lady, he'd need to resort to what he did best: trickery and gadgets.

A friend of his back in Trickster had invented a nifty gadget made out of two iron bracelets connected by a chain. The bracelets sealed with a key, and only the person with the key could open them. He had a set, and he'd brought them with him now. He was fairly certain Sabrina could pick locks, but he ought to be able to keep her from doing that for long enough that she'd see reason.

He pulled the things out- cuffs, his friends had called them- and slapped them onto first Sabrina's wrist, then, while she was trying to figure out what he was doing, onto his own. They closed with a click in the silent nighttime. That was it. No going back now.

"What did you do?" Sabrina wailed in an intense half-whisper of astonishment, anger, and dread. She was pulling at the cuffs, twisting them, trying to find a way free.

He flashed her a smile that was mostly bravado and said, "I'm making sure you stay here."

"I can't go rescue Daphne now!" Sabrina wailed again, her voice louder this time. "You ruined everything, Puck! You always ruin everything!"

Puck didn't say anything. His retort of "well, duh, that was kind of the point" had died when Sabrina's later words had spilled out of her mouth, and now he was silent, all his comebacks dead on his lips.

"Let me go!" she demanded. "Open them!"

"Not until you see how stupid you're being," Puck said stoically.

She growled and kicked at him. "I hate you!" she snapped.

He managed, just barely, to dodge her kick, and said, "I know. So will you agree to stay here?"

"Fine," she said immediately, her voice flat and hard, her eyes on his displaced shin.

He flashed her a lopsided grin. "Come on, how dumb do you think I am?" he asked. "You're gonna have to mean it- or at least fake it better than that."

She was silent, fuming.

"Can't, can ya?" he asked, grin widening into something resembling symmetrical. "Figured."

"Well, it's not like you're going to believe me whatever I say!" Sabrina snapped, jerking her wrist away from him again.

Puck held in a wince. No way he'd show her how much it hurt when she dug that metal into his skin- not until she showed it bothered her, at least. Probably not even then. He realized, then, that he'd have to keep her away from lockpicks, and anything else she could use to break herself out. This might be a bit harder than he'd thought. She was a stubborn girl.

He pulled the key out of his pocket and dangled it in front of her. "Come on," he cajoled. "All you got to do is admit it's crazy to go after the princess and then stay here. It's not that hard."

She snapped her hand forward, snatching for the key, but for once he was quicker- he'd been expecting it- and held the key up higher, well above her reach.

"Give- me- that!" She said, each word coming out in a spurt of breath as she jumped for the thing.

"What's the matter?" he asked, smirking. "Too short?"

He decided too late that that hadn't been the right thing to say. She stopped jumping, eyes sparking angrily, and spun, whaling a punch towards his gut. It connected in a spasm of pain, and he doubled over, key now clenched in his fist. She had a heck of a right hook, he realized, wide-eyed, his breath leaving his lungs in a whoof.

As soon as her fist left his chest she was already turning to his fist, her hands scrambling to pull his fist apart. "Give it to me!" she demanded, her voice rising, for the first time that night, above a passionate whisper.

He pulled his fingers tighter together, burying the key completely inside his fist as he tried to get his breath back together enough to talk. Because maybe if he could make enough noise he could get someone else out here, someone with sense. These people were light sleepers. They'd hear and wake up. And they'd tell Sabrina she was being stupid, and help him keep her here.

He straightened, finally, but when he tried to lift his hand back up above her reach, she clung to it, dragging him back down, fingernails digging into his skin.

She was a vixen! That was the third time she'd hurt him in the past fifteen minutes! "Stop it," he said, peeling her fingers off of his free hand with his other. "You're bruising my delicate flesh, shorty."

She snarled and raked her removed hand towards his face.

"Whoa-hoa-hoa!" he said, jerking his head backwards. "Chill, you crazy cat lady!"

"Give me that key!" Sabrina demanded. "Now!"

"Heck no!" Puck said. "You just scratched me! I'm a king! You don't do bodily harm to a king!"

"I'll do whatever I want!" she hissed.

"Okay," he said, grinning. "Didn't know you were into that."

She growled at him. "Not like that, you-"

"What is going on here?" a voice Puck had never heard before asked, sounding bewildered and a bit angry.

Sabrina and Puck turned simultaneously. Sabrina dropped her hand, and Puck pulled his back up out of her reach. Standing near a piece of castle that was not nearly as solid as Puck's chosen bit of wall was a small group of people, all gaping at the spectacle made by the two teenaged royals.

"He stuck me to him and won't give me the key!" Sabrina snapped, jerking her head at Puck. "Help me get it so I can get free!"

"Your majesty, why do you have so much gear?" someone else asked. Sabrina was certainly well-laden, with bags and belts dangling from several places on her slight frame. "I didn't know you were going on any mission..."

"She wasn't," Puck said grimly, jerking his wrist in warning as Sabrina tried to unattach some of the bags from her clothes surreptitiously.

Someone slipped away, back into the castle.

"What was she doing?" someone else asked.

Puck looked at the crowd warily. They didn't look like they trusted him, quite, but they didn't look outright disbelieving, either, so he said, "She was sneaking off to rescue her sister. Which she promised not to do." He glared down at Sabrina meaningfully. Breaking promises wasn't a very good thing, in his book.

She glared right back at him rebelliously.

"Your majesty?" someone asked timidly. "Is this true?"

"Oh come on!" she snapped. "Who are you going to believe? Your queen or that... Trickster?" she said the last word like she'd say snake, like it was dirty. Like he couldn't be trusted.

That bothered him. After all the time she'd known him, she'd still act like that? Sure she was mad, but that was a low blow. There was nothing wrong with being a Trickster. He told her so. "I joke about little things," he said. "Not stuff like this. That's slander."

Normally she'd have made some snide remark about him using a big word like slander, but this time she just rolled her eyes viciously and said, "Sure you wouldn't."

Puck ignored the way her tone hurt, forcing himself to remember what he'd done to her. He'd known this would make her angry. But he'd had to do it. And she was just talking to make a point, to hurt him, because she was angry. She didn't meant it. He hoped.

"What are you waiting for?" Sabrina asked her subjects, turning back to them. "Help me out here!"

Her subjects looked at her and didn't move. Puck had to look at them twice to make sure he was seeing straight. There was doubt in their eyes. He knew because he recognized it from his childhood, when he'd told his mother his side of an argument with Mustardseed. They weren't sure Sabrina was telling the truth! This was amazing!

"What do you think?" one person asked another, voice low. Puck had to strain to hear it. He didn't think Sabrina heard it at all.

"She has done this sort of thing before," the second person said, voice just as soft.

"But that was years ago," the first Sneak reminded the second. "She hasn't been that foolish in... nearly four years, I'd say."

"She hasn't lost a family member since then," the second pointed out. "She'd do anything for her sister."

"Even something this foolish, though?" the first asked.

"I don't know," the second said. "But look at the Trickster. He doesn't look like he's lying."

Sabrina was still watching, her eyes getting wider and wider, her body beginning to jitter. She knew they weren't about to help. She saw it just as well as he did. And she needed their help. Puck was too prepared for her to win this on her own. He smiled the tiniest bit when he realized that- he'd won, basically.

He could let her free now, he supposed. With all these people up and moving around, she couldn't exactly go running off tonight. Nah, he decided. Not until she agreed. Because right now she was acting stupid enough to leave as soon as he let her free. He could see her in his mind's eye, sprinting off into the blue-gray night of the courtyard, yelling some farewell backsass at everyone who tried to chase her.

The person who'd gone back inside came out, then, leading the Old Lady with him.

The Old Lady took in the situation in an instant and said, "Sabrina, I'm disappointed in you."

"Disappointed in me? What about him?" Sabrina demanded, pointing at Puck.

"Puck did what I asked him to do," the Old Lady said. "I hoped you wouldn't try to run off, but I thought you would, so I asked Puck to keep an eye on you. And he did an excellent job."

Puck nearly glowed with the praise.

Sabrina collapsed a little and muttered, "All right, so he stopped me. Can you make him get me out of these things now?"

The Old Lady shook her head and said, "I'm sorry, Sabrina, but until you see reason, you're staying right how you are."

AN~ I think my favorite thing about third person is that it lets me get away with doing things like using 'surreptitiously' in Puck's POV.

Feature: "Whispers in the Dark" by KrissM3
This is one of the stories I beta, so I'm a little attached to it, but even if I wasn't betaing it I'd still think it's an awesome story. It's the only one I've seen of its kind in the category, and it deals with a lot of adult issues that could stem from Sabrina's childhood. It's very real, kind of dark, and beautifully written. Go read it. Srsly. (Only if you're over like thirteen, though.)

Some Review Replies:

Dunwannalogin: :) Yeah, Daphne did have a long wait. QotU: Wow. I've never heard of that before.

Kingsvillereader: You may not have liked this chapter altogether much, then...

Meow: See, MAGIC exists. But you don't need Everafters to have magic. This is an AU, so I don't need Everafters. Does that make sense? I'm glad you liked the chapter, it was fun to write. :) (I'd actually love to be an author.) QotU: Chocolate is quite tasty.

Nello Orella: QotU: Chocolate is always awesome. Previous stuff: I... don't like cold very much. Chapter: Yup, Ms. White is totally royalty.

Randomchick: No, I'm not dead. I went to Georgia. I'm pretty sure the break was only a little longer than usual, though... I promise I'll make it very clear when the story's over, okay?

RUDOD: I try. :) QotU: Well, that's too bad. My family is fun when we get together. Except that my one aunt and my mom don't get along too well.