Miguel watched through the doors of the arena, and he winced at Iris's every shriek. His heart broke for her when he heard her broken sobs. He jumped back when he saw Dilandau turn towards the doors with Iris in his arms, but Dilandau had already seen him there.

"Miguel," he called.

"Yes, Dilandau-sama?" Miguel answered.

"Hold the door there, then run ahead and tell the medics to prepare for a new patient." He said, never even looking down at the battered girl in his arms.

"Y-yes, sir." Miguel stammered, holding the doors open so his master could walk through while holding Iris's limp body.

"An Miguel," Dilandau said, as he walked past.

"Sir?"

"If I ever catch you ease-dropping or following me again when you haven't been ordered to, I will slice off your ears and feed them to the dogs. Understood?"

"Yes, sir." Miguel said, his head down.

"Good, boy, now run to the medics like you were ordered to."

Miguel murmured another 'yes sir' and took off towards the medic room.

*****

Dilandau stood in the doorway of Folken's quarters and sighed in boredom.

"Folken, we've been through this before. She was insubordinate to me, she fucking attacked me. Something had to be done. Disciplinary action had to be taken, so I took it."

"Yes," Folken said coldly. "And now one of your soldiers is in the medic room with an almost punctured lung and broken ribs. I think you may have over done it a bit this time, Dilandau."

"She hurt her lung herself, the healers said so. By dragging herself around, she scraped the broken bone against-"

"But it was you who broke her ribs, was it not?" Folken stated, slamming his papers down onto his desk.

Dilandau raised his eyebrow. It was not often that Folken showed harsh emotions.

"Don't you feel any remorse at all?" Folken asked, incredulous. "Can you feel remorse?"

Dilandau narrowed his eyes. "I am a soldier. What possible use could I have for such weak emotions?"

"They are human emotions, Dilandau. Typical human feelings."

"Well, I am not a typical human," Dilandau growled and left the room.

Folken sighed tiredly and stood, walking to a window. "Understatement of the century…"

*****

Dilandau strode to the medic room and tossed open the door. Two frightened nurses looked up sharply.

"Lord Dilandau, you should not be here. We have orders not to let the princess be disturbed, and you, sir, will most likely disturb her." On of the nurses said quietly.

Dilandau looked down at her. He narrowed his eyes. That is all it took. The nurse gasped and left the room, pulling her assistant along with her.

Dilandau rolled his eyes, then walked slowly over to the bed where Iris lay. He cocked his head to the side as he examined her. The bruises on her cheeks made her look gaunt and sick. He pulled the side of the sheet up and examined her side. Her ribs were an angry purple color, and he could see in her thin stomach where each of the brakes was.

Something suddenly tightened inside of him and Dilandau blinked at the sensation.

What had that been?

Perhaps this was that remorse that Folken spoke of, but why should he feel it. After all, she had been the one to attack him first.

Although. A corner of his mouth rose a bit. It hadn't been entirely unprovoked…

Iris suddenly moved and moaned as her pain plagued her in even her sleep. Dilandau stepped back from the bed, suddenly reminded of a familiar scene.

I kissed her last time she was like this, and now I feel as if I want to kiss her again. But why? Dilandau wondered, unconsciously moving back to her side. She's certainly not at her most attractive, bruised and laid up like this, yet, it doesn't seem to make me want to kiss her any less.

Dilandau pondered this while his face came ever closer to hers.

Iris suddenly opened her eyes and they slowly came into focus. Dilandau had pulled his face back by that time, and was smiling strangely at her.

Iris jumped a bit, then cursed herself. She'd come to her senses, and had been completely embarrassed at the way she'd reacted to seeing him when she's finally awakened in the arena.

Iris looked away from his horrible smile, and cleared her throat so she could speak.

"Come to admire your handy work?" she whispered, refusing to look at him.

"Something like that." Dilandau responded, tracing a bruise on her cheek with his leather gloved hand.

Iris flinched away. "Don't," she said quietly.

"Now that didn't sound convincing at all. If you want a man to stop, you'll have to be more enthusiastic about it than that." Dilandau chuckled.

Iris closed her eyes as a tear ran down the side of her face. Damn. She'd sworn never to cry in front of him, hadn't she? Oh well, too late now, the floodgate had been opened.

"What's this?" Dilandau asked, touching her tear with his finger. "Weakness?"

"Pain," Iris answered, still not looking at him.

"Like I said, weakness." Dilandau straightened. "I hope you patch up quickly, I expect you back in training in three days at the most. Understood?"

"You-you mean I'm still-"

"Is that understood?" Dilandau repeated.

"Yes, sir." Iris whispered.

"Good," Dilandau turned to walk out of the doorway.

"Wait, Dilandau-sama?" Iris called.

"What is it?" He called back.

"My brother…" Iris asked carefully.

"He's being well taken care of. You needn't worry about him."

"Can I…can I see him? I need to speak to him."

"You don't want him to see you like that do you?"

Iris closed her eyes as fresh tears threatened to spill over. "N-no, sir."

"Then we'll wait until you're healed. Sweet dreams, princess." Dilandau smirked and shut the door; Iris cried herself to sleep.

*****

"Eric, you need to eat something. If you get sick and die, I'll probably get into a lot of trouble with Dilandau-sama." Viole spun the chair around backwards and sat in front of Eric, his arms crossed over the back of the chair.

Eric looked up at Viole slowly. "Why do you always do everything that guy says?" he asked quietly. "Don't you know that he is totally nuts and a bad, bad person?"

Viole smiled a bit. "Well, I think all of us knew he was a bit…off, from day one, but he's or leader, our captain. We are his subordinates and we follow his orders to the letter, or we answer for it. And believe me," Viole shook his head. "You don't ever want to have to answer to Dilandau-sama."

Eric sighed sadly, then looked down at his oatmeal. Suddenly, he picked it up and threw it across the room in a rage. "Obviously Iris does!" he shouted. "What is wrong with her? Why doesn't she know what she is doing? She's leaving me alone, that's what she's doing. I hate her for that! I hate her!" Eric screamed and pushed back his chair, knocking it over as he ran from the mess hall.

He ran out into the hallway and smacked straight into a person heading the other direction. Eric grunted as he fell to the floor.

"Hey!" he yell, outraged. "Why don't you watch were you're going you big jerk?"

Suddenly, the front of his shirt was grabbed and he was lifted up and off of the ground, and right level with Dilandau's face.

'Why don't you watch whom you're talking to?" Dilandau asked quietly.

Eric stared for a second, then began kicking Dilandau in the chest, and clawing at his hands. "Let go of me, you…you…sister stealer!" Eric cried.

Dilandau had to chuckle at that. "Sister stealer am I? Do tell," Dilandau put the tyke down, but held his head so that Eric could not reach him as he continued to swing and kick.

"You, ugh, brain-washed her or something! I know you did, arg, because my sister, ugn, would never join up with you! Never!" Eric continued to swing until he exhausted himself.

"Brain-wash? Now why do you think I would have to stoop to something so low? You don't believe she follows me because of my dashing good looks?" Dilandau grinned.

Eric made a face and stuck his tongue out in disgust. "Yuck. Iris would never like someone like you. She had her choice of all the princes in the providence. Why would she ever pick you?" Eric spat, still struggling between breaths.

Dilandau smiled and shoved the boy down, not harshly, just hard enough so that he would fall onto his backside. "That sounds like a challenge to me." Dilandau sighed when Viole finally came to take a still wriggling Eric away. "A very interesting one at that."

Dilandau walked to his room and poured himself a glass of vino. He stared out of his window, sipping from the wineglass. "Every prince in the providence," he mused. "Why indeed would she pick me?"

Dilandau's smug smirk faltered, but only for a mere second as he finished his wine and left his room.

****

"Gods, Miguel! You almost killed me! What has gotten into you today?" Chesta held his neck and stood up. The slayers were all in the training room being put through a rather rigorous workout, and were paired and sparing at the moment.

Miguel was breathing hard, and his eyes widened a bit as he looked at his sword and saw blood on the tip of it, Chesta's blood. If Chesta hadn't been so quick and hadn't jumped back, well thank the Gods that Chesta was quick.

"I…I'm sorry, Chesta. Dammit, are you ok?" Miguel looked closer and pealed Chesta's hand away from his throat. A thin red line was there, just below his jaw line, and it seeped blood. "Shit, Chesta. I didn't think I'd swung that close…"

"You shouldn't have swung at all, Miguel. This is sparing. You don't go for the kill in drills, Miguel. Jeez, we learned that our first day!" Chesta said, clamping his hand back over his wound.

"Ches, I really am sorry. My mind just must be somewhere else today."

"I should say so. You've been acting weird all day, Miguel. Did something happen this morning? You seemed…off… at breakfast, that's when I noticed it." Chesta asked, watching Miguel's face closely.

"Something distracting you, Miguel?" a silvery voice rang out from behind the two. The both turned around and mechanically inclined their heads to him. Dilandau smirked and walked past them both, pausing to flick a finger at Miguel's ear on his way by. "Perhaps it was something he heard. Rumors are quite unsettling, you know." His cold garnet eyes slid like daggers to Miguel's, another reminder of his earlier warning to Miguel:

"If I ever catch you eaves-dropping again, I'll slice your ears off and feed them to the dogs…"

And an implied a new warning, not to speak a word of what he had seen or heard.

Miguel pulled his eyes away from Dilandau's icy gaze. "Yes, sir," He mumbled, letting Dilandau know he understood the warning.

Dilandau smirked and walked off, observing his other slayers, and instructing them in their sword fighting.

"Miguel?" Chesta asked as he watched Miguel's frightened eyes follow his leader. "Miguel?"

"What?" Miguel jumped, his eyes back on Chesta.

"Are you ready to go again, or are you still distracted?" Chesta tried to grin, for Miguel's sake, but Miguel lowered his sword, and shook his head.

"I think I'll go down to the obstacle course and clear my mind a bit." Miguel placed his sword back in its scabbard and left the room, leaving a confused and worried Chesta to stare at his retreating back.

*****

Dilandau sat in his room later that night, going over war strategies and land maps, when the feeling hit him again.

He closed his eyes tightly in hopes that it was just a migraine from lack of sleep, and pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger.

The feeling only grew, however, and when the quiet crying started up again, Dilandau swore and punched the desk, knowing it was not just an ordinary headache that plagued him.

The quiet crying turned into sniffled words and broken phrases, all the same he's heard before. All the same that had driven him crazy for months now. He didn't recall exactly when it had started anymore, and he had no idea what it was, only that it scared him.

And that royally pissed him off.

He'd heard stories of people who heard voices, and they always ended up in Zaibach's streets, or finally, in Zaibach's lock down. When he'd been younger, and had still been going through his schooling, he'd been taken out of his class by a strange man, and old man, and had been escorted to the streets of inner city Zaibach. He'd been exposed to the homeless, the ranting, the disease and all of the other things the other school children weren't 'strong' enough to experience. It made him worldlier, and it also made him quickly learn that a child's view of the world was wrong. Dead wrong.

Dilandau had been frightened then of the people who roamed the streets at night talking to no one and everyone all at once. He'd been frightened of them then, and was only annoyed with them now. They were a waste of space and air in his opinion, and whenever he was in an especially black mood, he would go out into the alleys and ghettos of Zaibach and hunt them, momentarily quenching his thirst for bloodlust.

Ashamed that he may now have become one of them he told no one of the voice he sometimes heard crying in his head.

Snarling as the voice continued, Dilandau stood and threw everything from his desk in one violent sweep.

"Shut up!" he raged, holding his ears, but the crying continued.

Don't leave me alone…

Dilandau laughed at that. How ironic, he thought a little unsteadily, the voice doesn't want me to leave her alone, and all I want is to be left alone.

Please…

Dilandau took deep breaths as he stood in the middle of the room. Sometimes when he calmed himself, he could reason with the voice, he could speak to it.

"You know I can't leave you alone, you're inside my head." Dilandau spoke quietly. "It's you who won't leave me alone."

The voice stopped sniffling for a moment, and sighed. You never speak to me. You never play with me. You just leave me locked up in this dark place. You're mean! The voice insisted.

"I didn't put you in there. I don't know what did, but maybe if you'd get out you could find someone to," he spat the word. "Play with if you'd leave me alone!"

The voice began to cry again.

Dilandau clenched his fists in frustration. 'Stop that! Stop your goddamned crying! You annoy the hell out of me! Why the hell are you in my head?" Dilandau screamed.

The crying stopped, and now the voice was older, and angrier, but still the same girl.

How dare you speak to me like that when it is I who gave you the means for life? It wasn't my choice to be put in this dark place for all these years. But you were created out of my darkness. And out of my kindness, you still live. I see what you do, the evil things that you think, and yet I still allow you to live. The question is not why am I in your head, dear Dilandau, but why are you still in my body? The voice screamed back.

"Just what the hell are you talking about? No one allows me to do anything. I do and think what I please and when it pleases me!" Dilandau narrowed his eyes and his iris's began to glow a brighter red as his anger rose.

You were not conceived, but created.

"What?" Dilandau's eyes went wide. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

You were not conceived, but created.

"Shut up," Dilandau whispered angrily, disturbed now.

You are not real…you are not human…

Dilandau's pupils shrunk as the voice went on.

…But I am…

"NO! SHUT UP! Shut the fuck up right now or I will fucking hunt you down and kill you!" Dilandau raged, unsteadily unsheathing his sword.

Now the voice laughed again. A tinkling laugh, like the sound of shattering glass.

You could sooner kill yourself than me…

"Where are you? I swear when I find you-" Dilandau began madly tearing his room apart.

I'll gladly tell you where I am, Dilandau.

Dilandau smiled, his eyes twitching wildly as his body shook a bit. "Then tell me where you are, so I can end this…"

You only need to look in the mirror to find me, dear Dilandau…

"The mirror?" Dilandau narrowed his eyes and his eyebrows lowered over them. "What kind of game are you playing?"

The mirror, Dilandau. Look into the mirror…

Dilandau turned and walked to the full-length mirror that stood in the corner of his quarters. He stared into it, and gasped. "No, that can't…it's not possible…who are you?" Dilandau asked, stretching his fingers towards the glass.

A woman stood in the glass in place of where his reflection should be. She was a beautiful woman with wavy blond hair and a pale green dress that flowed over her feet to touch the floor. The woman copied his every movement just as his reflection would have done. He reached up to touch his face, so did the woman. He turned his face to the right, and ran a finger down the length of his scar, and the woman repeated his movement, only she had no scar.

You Dilandau, I am you.

Dilandau's eyes widened in anger. "I am no woman. How dare you imply as much about me? I am Dilandau Albatou, captain of the elite group of Dragonslayers under the rule of Emperor Dornkirk himself." Dilandau demanded.

The woman in the mirror shook her head sadly, and lifted a hand of her own accord, and pulled it down in front of her face, revealing Dilandau's face beneath her hand.

Dilandau gasped.

The woman pulled her hand back up, and her own face was restored in the mirror.

'Witchcraft," Dilandau gasped, paler than usual. "You're a goddamn witch…"

The woman laughed at this.

If either of us is to be considered anything close to the product of witchcraft, it should be you, Dilandau.

"What is that supposed to mean?"

You are a product, not a person.

"No…"

You were created, not conceived.

"Stop it."

You are an experiment,

"Stop…"

You were built, not born.

"I SAID STOP!" Dilandau screamed and grabbed the girl around her neck. He strangled her, watching her horrified face in the mirror, not even realizing it was his own neck he was squeezing, only watching the reflection as her hands wrapped around her neck.

Dilandau choked and gasped, mistaking his own sounds for hers as he tightened his grip.

The dragonslayers had been awakened by his screams earlier, and were not outside his door, yelling for him when they heard sounds of struggle from within.

They finally kicked the door down and ran in, only to be shocked by the sight of Dilandau's hands wrapped around his own neck as he sank to the floor, slowly passing out because he would not let himself breathe.

The slayers called out to him, begged him to stop, and tried to pry his hands off of his neck. Finally, When Dilandau grew weak because of lack of air, the slayers immediately pulled his hands from around his neck and all gasped at the horrible bruises on his throat.

"Why did he do it?"

"Do you think he was trying to kill himself?"

"Why would he do that?"

"Dilandau-sama would never leave us like that."

"Was he attacked?"

"Is he possessed?"

"I don't understand…"

"Shut up, all of you. The 'why's' and 'how's' aren't important right now. What we need to do is get Dilandau-sama to the medic ward and fast." Miguel put his hand to his mouth, quickly analyzing the situation. "Chesta, hold his head. Be careful, he make have hurt himself badly. Dalet, grab an arm, Viole, get his legs, Guimel, get his other arm, and I'll carry his torso. Lift him gently. On my count: one, two, three, up. Slowly, good. Watch his head, Chesta. Ok, medic ward three. Let's go."

The slayers carried their fallen leader to the medic ward without another word, and left him there without answering any of the nurse's questions.

"Just heal him," was all they would say.

"Now, back to bed. If he's up and around, tomorrow. Not a word, ok? No questions, no nothing. Just go about your orders as usual. Got it?"

The other slayers nodded at Miguel, grateful he had taken charge like that.

"Good. Now, back to bed. There are still four hours until first light."

The slayers all filed back into the dorm and lights were put out again one by one.

But little sleep was caught as all the slayers lay awake and wondered what had happened to their leader.