Blake remained alone for the long two days that followed.

She had managed to get herself up and out of bed to use the bathroom….but that was far as she felt able to go by herself….exhausted by even that.

The bandages around her broken and bruised ribs and around her sprained wrist were checked and changed by Doctor Carson, formally of the Hilltop people…who looked slightly stressed and frazzled.

And apart from that, a meek-looking Saviour, who only looked about fourteen, brought her three meals a day without fail.

But this pair were the only people she had seen. Even the hallway outside her room had been empty each time she had passed through it.

Since Blake had awoken, she had had no contact with Negan or any of his close lieutenants. No Dwight, no Eugene, no Simon and no Arat. Even the few she didn't know by their names hadn't come near her either…and Blake knew that this had to have been on Negan's orders.

She had heard the anger in his voice when he had spoken to her….felt the disappointment in his glare…

He had of course expected her to betray David…but Blake couldn't do that. For she knew what would happen if she did.

She had to remain loyal…..to the man she loved….

Or at least the man she used to love.

Blake's brain since having woken, had been going a mile a minute.

She was in pain. But this had nothing to do with her bruises or her broken bones.

Instead, this had everything to do with what David had done to her…not just three days ago…but over the last six months.

Even when she had been in Alexandria she had felt like a prisoner. Afraid to put a foot wrong. But back then she loved him. She doted on him. He was her fiancé after all.

But since getting here, to the Sanctuary, things had changed….David had changed…..he was not the man she had met and fallen for all those years ago.

The tears had barely stopped falling these last couple of days….her eyes red and sore….and dried up…

She had nothing left to give. No energy left to spend.

Blake had just taken a long shower. It was late afternoon and today had been the first day she had felt strong enough to stand in the shower….letting the water wash the dried blood from her hair….washing carefully her three large stitches that remained on the very back of her head…as well as the dirt and grime from the rest of her body.

Blake hadn't showered or changed her clothes since before she had left for the run…

But now standing here, in just a fresh pair of plain black matching underwear…looking into the long mirror that hung on the back of her closet…did Blake realise just how terrible she looked.

Her skin all over was bruised….and the bruises that were no longer bright purple like the ones across her ribs and her neck, were now green and ghastly-looking.

Her eyes were red, as predicted...with deep purple bags beneath them.

Her hair was damp and wavy, and even despite running a hairbrush through it, it looked limper and more lifeless than before.

Blake took in a half-sob before she could stop herself, clutching suddenly at her mouth, the pain of the sharp intake of breath shooting through her sore ribs.

This is what she had become. A mere shell of herself.

And she knew who all this was down to.

Blake hung her head, staring down at her feet.

But she had had her chance. Had her chance to blame him. And she had instead lied. Defending him to the bitter end.

And even Negan, who had had her back since getting here, had turned against her…sick of her lies too..

She knew now that he must think of her, just like David thought of her…with disgust….

Blake had almost expected Negan to hit her too….while he yelled at her. And it had surprised her when he hadn't. But was that because that was all she expected now from men in her life? A punch here…a poisonous word into her ear there?

Blake let out a shaky breath and stared up at her reflection once again…before her gaze, instead, drifted to the window behind her…shining in, a warm late afternoon sunlight….that caught on the dust particles that drifted through the air…making Blake think of a dreamy place…..a place where perhaps she would have been had she not woken up two days ago…

She gave a painful gulp.

Her throat was still sore...the bruises still littered there.

But as Blake grasped up a soft grey jersey sweater and a pair of navy pants, slipping them on, she knew that for the first time in days she just wanted to be outside in the fresh air…Even if only for a moment.

Wanting to feel alive.

She stepped into her pair of low-topped tennis shoes, chancing one last change at her reflection, before slamming the closet door and heading straight out of the room.

Out in the corridor she looked this way and that. It was of course, silent again, with not a soul in sight.

Blake wondered now to what Negan was doing right now…or David for that matter…

She wondered if Frankie was still giving him massages…or whether he was lurking around the corner once again to finish the job to kill Blake off completely.

This thought alone made her nervous, and Blake couldn't help but give yet another gulp as she turned right at the end of the hallway, making for a different way down to the outside areas….not wanting to see the staircase she had fallen down. Not yet anyway.

She turned the corner, pushing open a door and stopping at the top of a small, this time, stone set of stairs that led down to the lower levels.

Blake gripped onto the railing tightly and let out a nervous puff of air as she walked gingerly down the steps one at a time.

It wasn't a minute later that she had gone down two flights of the staircase, coming out on the first floor….finding herself in a familiar looking corridor….

In a place she had not seen in days.

She blinked slightly, frowning and peering down the long gloomy hallway.

It was quiet, and as Blake tentatively walked down the corridor her footsteps echoed loud and clear, she remembered back to less than a week ago, when she was first brought here, to the Sanctuary, and placed a cell.

And that cell, was in fact, right there, third door down, straight ahead of her.

But there was nothing to be afraid of now…right?

Would Negan really shove her back in there?

But actually after what happened between them…she wouldn't put it past him now.

Blake's fingers trembled nervously as she walked…heading past the closed cell door hurriedly…heading towards the door at the end of the hallway, that she knew led all the way down towards the large, open balcony outside.

But she had barely moved a few feet past the looming cell door, when a sudden, quivering voice called out.

"P-Please…..i-is someone there?"

Blake recognised it instantly…her face paling.

"Please..." it came again, sounding desperate. "…I'll d-do anything!"

Blake turned and took a slow and tentative step towards the door, giving a hard gulp.

"David?" she murmured…her voice wavering slightly as she spoke.

What was he doing locked up in there?

But she obviously knew who was responsible for this….of course Negan had seen right through her lie….

But she had never expected him to do this to David. To lock him up…to keep him in there.

"Blake?" uttered the voice of her fiancé. She could hear him shifting against the inside of the door.

But Blake stopped nervously just a foot or two away…clenching her sleeves in her hands tightly.

The last time she had heard David's voice, she had been looking into his bright blue eyes….full of hatred and disgust…as he had pushed her backwards.

But yet something…something in his voice seemed to pin her to the spot…unable to move…to run…to flee.

It was as if he had a hold on her…a hold she just could not escape from.

"Blake," David uttered once more, his voice full of urgency. "You have to get me out of here. I haven't eaten or drunk anything since they threw me in here. I-I can't take it anymore. Please, Blakey…sweetheart, you have to help me."

Blake tugged at her lip worriedly….right now feeling so weak-willed…

"I don't know…I-I-" she began as her words trailed off, her eyes darting this way and that up and down the corridor. Almost waiting for someone to come and disturb the two of them…to give her a way out.

"What the fuck do mean, you don't know?" snapped David suddenly from behind the door. He sounded irritated. His words bruising her more than his fists had. "After all these years we've been together, and what? You're just going to leave me here to rot? Is that it?"

Blake took a step back, shaking her head.

"N-no, no.." she said in a quiet tone of desperation.

What he had done to her…

He had tried to kill her. Of course he had.

But even so, right now, Blake felt wholly like she was the one that owed him. Guilt flooding over her, causing panic to fill every fibre of her body.

She heard David give a sigh.

"Blakey," he began, speaking slowly. "If you loved me. If you really loved me, you'd go and talk to Negan. You'd get me out of here. I mean, you do still love me, don't you, Sweetie?"

Blake breathed hard, tears pricking at her eyes.

"Y-Yes," she blurted out before she could stop herself. Not knowing whether the words spilling out of her mouth were entirely true.

Did she love him? After everything he'd done to her…she knew she shouldn't…

But it was almost as if she desperately needed to please him. To feel his love….

Because without him, who else would she have in this world?

"Then I need you to go and find Negan," David said in a careful tone. "I need you to explain to him that I had nothing to do with you falling down those stairs."

That was a lie.

And Blake knew it.

She hovered there for a moment. Feeling almost unsteady on her feet.

"And if you do that….if you get me out…" continued Blake's blue-eyed fiancé. "…you and me, Blakey…we can be together again….just how we used to be…"

Blake's mouth went dry.

That was all she wanted in the world.

She felt herself trembling. Every inch of her body telling her to leave him there for good…inside his prison where Blake and everyone else around her could be safe from him.

She pressed a hand to the cell door closing her eyes and breathing in and out…so so aware of the bruises, right now, that covered her body.

"I don't know if Negan would even listen to me-" she started, shaking her head.

She certainly did not want to beg Negan. She knew what he was capable of. And right now she was not really in his good books. She would likely be risking her life trying to reason with him.

But David continued, his voice sounding close now and softer than before-

"Blakey, I've seen him around you. If anyone can convince him, it's you. Promise me you'll do this for me, Blakey."

Blake felt so frightened right now.

She squeezed her eyes tightly shut at his words, pursing her lips sadly and leant her forehead against the cold steel door.

"I-" she began….the words disappearing from her mouth as she spoke. "I-I'll try…"

She know she had to.

She couldn't lose David. Let him down. He was all she had.

"I love you sweetheart," David uttered in a loud voice.

But Blake blinked her eyes open, looking down at the floor.

"I-I….I love you too…" she whispered finally…with purpose, pushing herself from the door.

She knew she had to do this.

For David.

But she couldn't help her heart ache with overwhelming sadness.

If this had been anyone else…she'd have screamed at them….yelled at them for being so stupid. But here she was….and from the inside, looking out at all this….it was far more difficult to navigate that one would first believe.

She was defending the man who had tried to kill her...who had pushed her down the stairs… who had spoken to her with so much poison in his voice.

And yet now….it seemed like perhaps he had changed…perhaps he regretted what he had done...

He had told her he loved her. And that was all Blake wanted right now. Someone she could hold onto in this hellish world.

She gave a dry gulp…as she walked swiftly down the long hallway, head bowed low before turning the corner and beginning to head up the large, steep staircase that led up towards Negan's quarters.

The Sanctuary was quiet up here, with no sound exept from the muffled echo of Blake's footsteps as she headed around the maze that was the upper levels, turning right, then left, then right again….finally finding herself…before she realised where she was. Now, right outside Negan's door.

Blake took in an unsteady breath, clasping the sleeves of her sweater tightly in her hands once more, before letting them god and smoothing them down.

She looked up and tried to calm herself.

She needed to do this.

She needed to…

And so, raising her hand, Blake gave a slow and steady knock, her heart pounding as she did so.

There was a long pause….long enough for Blake to search the door before her with frightened eyes and turn on her heel….supposing (or at least hoping) that Negan wasn't inside.

But after a long few seconds there came an answer. An answer which Blake had hoped would never come.

"Come in," came the commanding voice of a person she recognised so well.

The man…that dangerous man…who had given Blake everything in the short time she had been here.

She let out a small, nervy puff of air and turned the handle, opening the door…

Her eyes searched the large room for him, as the door swung wide open, only for them to finally land on the wide leather couch, were Negan was sat, one leg propped up across the other, writing in some sort of large notebook with a ballpoint pen.

He had on his black leather jacket, with grey t-shirt just peeking out from beneath it, his boots and his dark grey pants, and he looked like he had been there, sat on the couch for quite some time, with Lucile propped up against the coffee table before him.

Negan looked up at Blake with darkened chocolate eyes, as she took a step nervously into the room.

A frown twitched its way between his brows as he opened his mouth to speak.

"Can I help you?" he asked with a low growl, looking up at her incredulously.

His tone with her was so unlike what Blake had had from him before.

It was scathing, irritated, and gave nothing away.

Blake took a step into the room, staring over at him defiantly, raising her chin….trying to be the person he had seen her as before.

But inside Blake was doing all she could to stop herself from shaking with fear.

"You have to let him go," was all she could manage to say, her voice almost braking as she spoke, her green eyes meeting with his.

She tried to stand up straight, but right now she felt like a tiny mouse….an insect that Negan could oh-so easily squish if he wanted to.

Negan paused for long a moment, staring back at her, not saying a word.

The room filled with a thick sort of silence, and Blake was convinced that her heart was pounding so hard that both she and Negan would surely hear it.

It was a long few seconds before Negan replaced the cap back on his pen, and shut the notebook in his hands, placing it silently down beside him. All this while not breaking eye contact with Blake.

She gave a painful gulp, the bruises at her ribs aching.

The tall, dark-haired saviour got to his feet with a short, stiff sigh, his eyes narrowing at her as he did so.

Even though Blake was tall herself, as Negan moved across the room towards her, it was hard not to be intimidated in his presence.

But why?

This was the man she had cuddled up to for warmth just a couple of days ago… the man who had given her anything she wanted….even going as far as to hand-deliver pizza to her door just because she wanted it.

But right now, Blake's breath hitched painfully in her throat, as Negan closed the gap between the pair of them, coming to stop just a mere breath away from her.

He reached a hand up, grasping her upper arm firmly and tugging her into him gently.

"Now why would I wanna do that? Hmmm, Peaches?" he uttered, in what was a husky, low whisper, his lips lingering near to her ear. "You give me one good reason why I should do that, darlin', and maybe…just maybe I'll consider it."

Right now everything felt so far away for Blake…the whole world, including David, seeming distant to her….as she stood there, turning her face, so that her eyes met with Negan's dark ones.

He looked back at her, almost plying her to tell him the truth….to say what she had been keeping in for so long.

But Blake's heart broke as she realised the truth.

That she would never be free. That she would never be allowed to make that decision. She would never be the queen that Negan thought she once was.

Blake's lip quivered for a long moment, before she let out a shaking breath and shook her head.

"Because I love him…" she uttered, her shoulders dropping tiredly, as her eyes lingered on his, full of pain and anguish and heartbreak.

Negan gazed back at her for a long moment, that frown line still there…before he gave a sudden blink…his lips parting slowly….

But before Blake could say another word Negan had dropped his hand from her arm, turning around and striding back over to Lucille.

He snatched up his barbed-wire covered baseball-bat unceremoniously, before advancing on Blake once more, suddenly grabbing her hand in his, and pulling her towards the door.

Blake looked startled…gaping.

"What-" she began…" W-Where are we going?" she uttered fearfully, as Negan tugged her out into the corridor, walking ahead of her with long-legged strides.

Blake had never seen the leader of the Saviours like this before…so determined and so purposeful. He was usually the first to fool around. To make light of even the darkest of situations….whether it was appropriate to do so or not.

But now he seemed angry…..his shoulders tensed beneath his leather jacket…

She gave a gulp, trying as hard as she could to pull herself from his grasp, but Negan was strong, not giving up his grip on her hand.

At the end of the long corridor, before the pair reached the stairs they were met with a frowning Simon who looked up at them a little confused.

"Boss?" he began, a little unsurely, as they reached him.

But Negan's jaw was tensed, a muscle in his bearded cheek ticking furiously.

"Go fetch that piece of shit from his cell and bring him outside," he ordered in an angry barking tone, that usual Negan smart-mouth now gone, leaving only a man who Blake had heard about in fearful hushed words around Alexandria.

This feared leader who had bludgeoned innocent people.

Blake trembled, as Negan tugged her harshly towards the stairs, and as Simon nodded, disappearing through a pair of double doors at the far end of the hallway hurriedly.

But Blake gave a hard tug on Negan's arm.

"Stop," she said demandingly, breathing hard.

And Negan finally obliged.

Turning around to look at her, a scowl across his long, bearded face.

"Please don't do this…" she said shaking her head and looking back at Negan with pleading eyes.

And Negan, for the briefest of moments, stared back at her, with something other than anger in his features.

Something full of warmth and desperation, almost imploring Blake…

But it didn't last long.

And with that…without another word from the tall Saviour's lips, he turned on his booted-heel once again and pulled Blake down the steps…

…down into the unknown…

Sorry…was that chapter a bit tedious? I'm just really trying to convey the obvious turmoil Blake is feeling right now…I think being in a highly abusive relationship would make anyone feel confused and just ready to give up like she's feeling right now. I know to some, Blake might be being so frustrating, but that's what it's like, being so caught up in convincing yourself you're doing the right thing by sticking by someone, you can't see how horrible the situation really is. But like I said in the last chapter, there is light at the end of the tunnel… and it *might* just come sooner than you think….

Thanks to JudithMosalii, Xmidniteangel15X, elljayde, bhanna, Keward2592, Dollfacex94, Guest, leahscil, FriendsWithTheMonster, A Wonderer, rawbsten, whereshadowplays and Guest for reviewing.

Would you like me to carry on?

Please review! :)