Okay! Here is chapter Four! Thanks for reviewing Ms Manga Yuro-Kage and Moonlight2 I Really appreciate it! And of course Me! Thank you very much to you as well!

Hope you enjoy the next chapter!

My Fairytale.

Chapter Four.

Time passed in the little town as time tends to do. The other children urged by Quatre, and Heero finally got over their mistrust of Trowa and welcomed him into the little community.

The tall rusty haired boy had lost the unnerving silent quality that had so alienated him from the other children as Quatre had quiet successfully managed to prove that it was possible to make his new friend speak, and had proudly announced his name to any of his friends who cared to ask.

Trowa still didn't speak very much to any of them, if they asked him a question that he decided was worth answering, then he would answer, there were times however when he seemed to find what they wished to know irrelevant, and ignored them. This, though it was a minor annoyance to the more mouthy youngsters, Jimmy black included, gave them no real reason to find him offensive, also, the discovery that he was almost the same age as Wufei deterred the younger ones as well.

Quatre always felt a very slight glow of smugness however, for, where as Trowa often seemed callous to some, he was always pleasant to the small blonde at the very least, and Quatre was also secretly happy that he was able to see the tiny little flickers of feeling that danced across the tall boys face that all the others seemed to miss, how they missed them he didn't know for they seemed perfectly clear to him.

Trowa himself began to familiarise himself with the town itself quickly and soon he knew exactly where everything was. The doctors, the Thatcher, the tanners and the Smithy, he knew all of the places and no longer needed Quatres help, but that didn't mean he rejected the blondes company. If anything they spent more time together than before.

When lessons finally ended for the summer there was a distinct feeling of jubilation in the air as all the children in the town were freed from the boredom of the classrooms, but this was, in many cases short lived, for where there had been lessons there was now a continual stream of jobs that their parents seemed to be able to find for them to do.

Quatres eighth birthday came and went and he settled fairly happily into a routine of helping his father at the Inn. He would work in the stables, and when all was in order there he would retreat inside and clear up in his mother's kitchen.

Wufei was almost always in the general store during that summer, as his time in the school house was very nearly over. Jimmy spent a good portion of his life up the various chimneys in the town and Sue-Ann and Jed were tied irrevocably to the farmyards. Duo would have been kept in to assist in the church, had the old priest managed to keep him there, a task he failed at on most days, and Heero had no real vocation to fill, and so it was that the two spent their summers in each others company either fishing or exploring the woods in an effort to out of sight and sound of adults who may try to put them to work.

Trowa had no real work to do either, but he was happy enough to help Quatre out where he could. When Quatre was clearing the stables he tended to stay out of the way, usually perched on the yard gate or somewhere else close by, but when Quatre was down in the kitchen washing pots or something similar he would help by drying them for his blonde friend.

Some time after Quatres' birthday, in the early days of August, Lian Archer the Blacksmith and Suzette Rose, the lady who worked in the General store with Wufei and his father announced their engagement and set the date for the wedding at the end of the following October.

An enjoyable veil of excitement swept through the village at that point. Dorothy, Hilde and Sue-Ann Simmons had been selected as Bridesmaids and they spent a goodly deal of time at Cara Catalonia's shop having their dresses designed with the young bride to be.

It was perhaps three weeks after the announcement of Lian and Suzettes engagement when the one of the assistants from up at the manor house rode down into the town and begun making inquires regarding an assistant for the stable hand Wesley Sharpe, due to the fact that the Lord's two children had recently acquired a colt and a filly, thus increasing the number of stables in use each day.

Duo would probably have been chosen for the job, had he and Heero not vanished off into the woods again that day, even Heero might have been a possibility, but due to the lack of them the position eventually fell to Trowa, who accepted it with a show of near indifference. Quatre was reduced to tears at the news his friend was to be working up at the manor, but was consoled when his mother said that she would see to it that Trowa could remain is residence at the Inn.

The children of Lakewood still found time to play together despite the work they were now all engaged in. This time was usually the late afternoon or the early evening.

This particular day, a Friday, Quatre and Trowa, at the blonde's request, had absented themselves from the other children and had spent the day swimming in the top end of the lake near to the fruit patches of farmer Andrew Forrester.

When they returned to the square, their hair dripping wet, they were greeted with a sight that made Quatre blink. Everyone was running about like a group of headless chickens, and they appeared to be kissing each other, well, the town girls appeared to be attaching themselves to the boys and kissing them at any rate. It was rather bizarre in his opinion.

Trowa cast the children what Quatre could only describe as a sick look.

"Come on Trowa." Quatre murmured quietly "Lets go-" he paused as Duo tore past with Hilde hot on his heels "Let's go home. I think I'd rather papa gave me some work to do this afternoon."

Trowa shrugged in a negligent way, and set off across the square, with Quatre trailing him.

A squeal from his right made Quatre pause, a fatal mistake, not three seconds later he was face down on the floor with Dorothy settled across his back. He squirmed "Dorothy! Get of me!" his voice was rather weak, she was bigger than him, and she was rather constricting his breathing.

"Nuh uh Quat!" she proclaimed, a rather smug little smile on her lips "I Caught you, now I get to kiss you! It's the rules of Kiss chase!"

He blinked for a moment "But, Dorothy, I wasn't pla-"

He was cut off as she seized hold of his light gold hair, pulled his hair back and kissed him square on the lips. That done, she got off his back and ran after Jimmy Black.

Trowa, with a very slight frown on his lips. Held out his hand to Quatre and pulled him to his feet.

"Are you okay?" he asked quietly, his eyes showed the very slight worry that they had expressed on his first day in the town once more.

Quatre nodded "Yes Trowa. She just hurt my head a little when she pulled my hair, but it's okay really, now, come on, before anyone catches you as well."

The pair hurried off toward the Inn once more, resolving to find a new way home if they ever saw their friends playing kiss chase.

Three or four days after the incident by the General store, Quatre was finishing up his daily jobs in the kitchen of the Inn on his own for Trowa was working up at the Manor house now, when his mother informed him that Duo was here to see him.

There had been many disagreements between the two boys since the arrival of Trowa. Sadly, since Quatres' trust of the rusty haired boy was so profound and visible, Duo had been subject to the occasional surge of jealousy, and the irrational actions that he sometimes performed often caused Quatre some upset.

Putting down the final pot, now all clean and brushing his fringe of hair out of his eyes Quatre nodded. "Yes mother, I'll be up in a minute."

She smiled happily at him; her own black hair had been neatly trimmed a few days before and hung neatly by her chin.

It took Quatre a few minutes to empty the large basin of water, but he was eventually able to leave the kitchen, and the inn altogether to meet his friend in the yard.

Duo looked the same as ever. His hair was neatly braided, and his black clothing was mud stained in the customary places such as his elbows and knees. There was however, a long strip of green fabric tied about his head, lifting his fringe in a comical fashion. This was of course, testimony to some crazed game he must have thought up earlier that day.

"Quat!" Duo proclaimed, bouncing over to him with an excited wave.

The blonde smiled and giggled despite himself "Duo! You look funny!"

His friend shot him a lopsided grin "Don't I though?"

Quatre giggled again "What do you want Duo?"

His friend shrugged "Oh nothing rally…. Well…. something actually…."

Quatre lightly poked his arm.

"Okay, okay. No need to get excited!" His friends grin was large "Bracken just turned up in town; he's sitting on the steps down in the square."

Quatres mouth dropped open.

"Dun worry." Duo said in a placating tone of voice "He didn't tell us any stories yet, 'fact he sent me to fetch you, said you might like to hear the rest of that story about that prince he was talking about, Tro wanted to come, but he sent me instead!" Duo looked rather smug about this and Quatre couldn't help but sigh at the strange rivalry between the pair, well, on Duo's half anyway. Duo had nothing to worry about, and his pestering often got on the blondes nerves.

"Well." Quatre looked thoughtfully back at the door into the kitchen "Mother might let me off…. But papa really wanted me to clean out the end stable today…."

Duo rolled his eyes "Do you always do what you're told Quat?"

"Yes." The blonde replied firmly "I do Duo, now, wait here, I'll go and ask mother." And with that, he moved back into the kitchen and up to his parents' room on the third floor.

Neither of Quatres parents minded at all that he wanted to go and hear the travellers' story in the slightest. It turned out that Bracken had taken a room with them for the night this time and the prospect of money always seemed to put his parents into a much better mood than they were sometimes in.

Happily Quatre followed Duo down to the town square and was warmly greeted with a "Good day to you master Quatre!" from Bracken.

As soon as the blonde settled down just to Brackens right, he felt someone else settle down beside him, and was unsurprised to find it was Trowa, he was surprised to see Heero just to the taller boys left, but he offered him a happy smile none the less, which Heero returned, if much less enthusiastically.

Trowa on the other hand was looking at him in a slightly worried way, and seemed to be trying to ensure that Quatre was blocked as much from Duos' sight as was humanly possible. Quatre sighed inwardly. Maybe their little contest wasn't quite so one sided as he had thought, what had gotten into the two? Quite pointedly, he rose to his feet and went and settled beside Heero, which earned him a chuckle, and a sly wink from the story teller, which confused him slightly. The look Trowa sent his way was slightly hurt, but for once Quatre felt he needed to be away from the quiet boy and his best friend both.

Once the group was settled, Bracken, after a quick recount of the happenings in the first part of his tale, told his avid audience the second part in the tale of the Serintian Prince.

"Now, Like I told you the last time…." He began in the resounding voice that seemed a necessity of all good storytellers, "The king of Serintia was deliriously happy about the birth of his young son, and they gave him a beautiful name, though, sadly, no one now knows what that name was."

"Why not?" Piped up Jimmy Black, always needing to know everything.

"Because!" Bracken stated firmly "They never told anyone aside from his family what it was, rather unusual to be sure, but then, royalty is often whimsical." He grinned at his audience, nearly all of whom grinned back at him.

"Any way, like I was saying, the king was very happy with his son, and the kingdom was happy as well. But happiness doesn't always last."

His face became sombre. "Eight years ago, almost to the day in fact, the king of Serintias' neighbouring country Kroen became very jealous of the wealth and grandeur of Serintia, and resolved to claim it for his own.

"This king, quite mad they say he was, massed a very large army, thousands and thousands of men, infantry and Calvary alike, and began to march them up and over the mountains that separate this land from theirs.

"Now, the king was very scared. He knew that his capital Serrindor was well defended, he had assured that when he had chosen to build his castle there, but he also knew that it only took one man to kill a whole family, and he feared for his young son."

Bracken paused for a moment and took in the rapt attention of the children gathered about him, his eyes lingered for a moment on Heero and the small blonde seated beside him, but he made no comment to them and instead proceeded with his story.

"The King was massing his own army, easily as large as that of the mad king who sought to attack him, but this is not all he did. In the dark of one night, in the company of a widow woman and he young boy-child of barely two the king sent his only son, the crown prince of Serintia off into the world to live as a commoner a until such time as he would be safe.

"Now. As it turns out, this wasn't necessary. There is only one pass through those mountains, a fair wide one and long at that. Now, while the army of the mad King of Kroen was traversing that particular pass, there was a rather bad avalanche."

There were gasps from the children.

"The mad king and fully half of his army were killed. His son, a far more practical young man assumed the throne, and apologised to the King of Serintia for all the trouble his father had caused. That is why little is known in towns such as this of the war that so nearly happened."

Many of the children, Duo included, cheered at that.

"Now," Bracken continued. "The king wanted his son back. Messengers were sent throughout the land, charged with finding the woman and child who had been given the task of looking after the baby prince. And this, dear children is where my story becomes vague, for there is more than one ending to it. One ending tells how the king found his son, but was so fearful that now the people knew of his babe, they would try to find someway to over throw him, and thus he now, to this very day, keeps the child locked away in the castle in Serrindor. But others would tell it differently, they tell us that no matter how many messengers and hunters the King sent out to find his boy child and his carer, no trace was found for some years, and, when it was found, all the found was the remains of what was thought to be the woman who had been charged with the child's softy. No sign of the Prince and the woman's young son has, to this day been found."

Hilde and Dorothy looked shocked and Sue-Ann was crying.

The story teller's eyes had fixed once again briefly on Heero and Quatre, before they drifted to Trowa, where they encountered nothing more than negligent indifference.

"Now children." Bracken said more quietly "I'm not going to tell you which ending to believe, but I do not think the king ever found his little one, his little lost prince. But, and this is an important but, I think that one day he will find his son, and the rejoicing shall be felt throughout this land!"

He pulled quickly a little lute out from behind his back and began to play a happy little melody on it, that soon had all of the children capering about the square in what they felt was dancing. Heero and Trowa however stood resolutely at the side, and now amount of coaxing from Duo could move them.

In the end they did move a little, surprisingly easily. Quatre had asked them, very quietly to stand with him, and neither of the two had resisted.

Bracken watched the small exchange from where he sat on the steps. The shorter of the two boys, the lad Heero, had complied with Quatre as if compelled to do so by a power greater than his, but the new one, the rusty haired lad had complied of his own free will, and it seemed to the old minstrel that as the blonde had looked into the taller lads face, he had seen something there that escaped the rest of humanity, for to him, the boys expression had remained neutral throughout the entire time he had been in the square.

There was music and dancing in the square for nearly all of the afternoon and then much of the evening as well. The adults of Lakewood joined with their children, some even bringing instruments of their own along, and the night became something of a festival.

The sun had sunk low behind the trees when Quatre, finally tired with the gaiety decided to head back to the Inn. He sought out his mother, and, in the company of Polly the chambermaid, he left the square.

Polly was happily humming as they walked, but Quatres mind was elsewhere.

There was something about the minstrels' tale today that bothered him, something that seemed uncannily familiar, but he couldn't put his finger on it at all.

As he walked he dwelt on the story more and more.

Somewhere, lost in the world was a young boy, about his own age it seemed; who was quite without a family, Quatre couldn't imagine how that must feel as he loved his own family very much.

He totally rejected the fact that the young prince was locked away in the castle, the idea was too much like something out of a fairytale, but then, he reasoned, the tale of the lost prince was something of a fairytale in itself.

Maybe that was all it was, maybe Bracken had just made the story up to give him and his friends some amusement, but some how he just couldn't agree with that.

It was with some surprise that he saw Polly was opening the gate to the Inn yard; they had gotten home so much quicker than he had thought they would.

Quietly, though it wasn't really necessary for the Inn was empty of all but Bracken on this fine summer night, she let him in through the back door which led into the kitchen, and closed it firmly behind him, with a click that made the blonde jump. Polly was nice enough, but she often found having to defer to a young boy very annoying.

Quatre looked around the kitchen, it was very dark. The windows had been shuttered for the night, and the fire banked, only the last few embers remained glowing.

Shivering slightly, despite the fact he didn't feel cold, Quatre edged his way across the dark room. His footsteps echoed hollowly, and he was rather happy when he felt the cool metal of the door-knob beneath his outstretched hand. A single twist was all that was needed to lift the latch, and a wide beam of yellow light from the oil-lamps hanging in the hallway lightened the kitchen considerably.

As he closed the door to the kitchen again, Quatre shivered at the chill feeling he had gotten from the room, and he really didn't want to have to go back in there again. He knew it was irrational; he had been in and out of that room nearly every day of his life, so why should he fear it now? It felt to him as if something had changed, been set in motion, which, once again were big thoughts for a small boy, so, it with a slight feeling of unease that Quatre climbed the winding staircase up to the second floor of the inn.

With deliberate slowness, Quatre opened and closed his bedroom door. Once again he knew it was silly, the Inn was empty, but maybe that was the very reason he felt he needed to be quiet.

He readied himself for bed as quickly as he could, his earlier tiredness all but gone now, and buried himself beneath the covers.

He was scared. Darkness had filled the kitchen, and it now filled his bedchamber. It had been dark on the upstairs landing, and the light had been dim on the stairs. Quatre knew now that when he was alone, he greatly feared the dark.

Goosebumps stood up on his arms as a gust of wind moved the curtains, and the young blonde squeaked audibly when he heard the gate bang.

How he wished that someone was here with him, his mother, his father, Polly even, one of his friends, Duo, Heero…. Trowa. Just somebody so he wouldn't be alone.

Below his room he heard the kitchen door bang noisily shut, and heavy footsteps traipsed out of hearing, and then gradually back into his range as someone climbed the stairs. The footsteps were muffled by the carpet, but in the silence of the inn they could be heard clearly. What if it was a thief come to steal his parents things? Quatre quailed under the realisation that he was alone in the Inn with someone who may not be a very good person creeping through the halls.

The knock on his door, though quiet startled him badly, and he curled the covers tightly about him as he trembled.

His eyes widened under the fabric of his quilt as he heard the click and creak that let him know that the door into his room had been opened, he really wished his father would deal with that creak. Footsteps were crossing his carpeted floor.

Quatres fear mellowed slightly, tinged with confusion as he felt the edge of his bed tip as someone else's weight was added to it.

"Quatre?" His fear was extinguished as he recognised the voice, "Are you still awake?"

Still trembling slightly, Quatre threw the quilt off of him, sat up and wrapped his arms round his friend neck "Oh Trowa I was so scared, everything is so dark!"

The rusty haired boy blinked for a moment before be brought an arm up around the still trembling blonde "Don't worry Quatre. All you had to do was turn the light on…."

Quatre blinked over at the doorway at the moment, and saw the golden light of the oil lamps pouring into his room. He flushed and released his hold on his friend "I've been terribly silly, haven't I?" he asked quietly, feeling slightly ashamed of himself "I thought you were a thief come to steal mothers jewellery."

Trowa smiled his tiny smile "The dark plays tricks on us all Quatre, it never hurts to be cautious, but next time try lighting the lamps." The blondes flush darkened a little and he settled back against his pillow, drawing the covers up around him.

He could feel the edges of sleep tugging at him, when Trowa's voice cut through the daze "You aren't mad at me any more, are you Quatre?"

The blonde blinked tiredly "Why should I be mad at you Trowa?" a small yawn followed the taller boys' name.

"Earlier, you moved away from me and sat with Heero, I thought I had made you cross Quatre."

Quatre smiled "No, I just annoyed myself, you and Duo have-" he yawned again "Been bickering without words, it was annoying for a moment, but don't worry."

Trowa smiled "Go to sleep little Quatre, the day has tried you out."

It was, Quatre registered vaguely, the second time Trowa had called him little, and he seriously considered objecting to it, but before he could his eyes felt heavy once more and he fell almost instantly asleep.

Trowa remained in his smaller friends' room for a few minutes after the boy had fallen asleep.

The taller boy had a strange expression on his face, like there was something that he couldn't –no matter how hard he tired- manage to understand.

He sat where he was and stared vacantly at his sleeping friend before rising, considerately lighting an oil lamp, lest his young friend should wake and fear he dark once more.

After that he left the room, shutting the door slowly and quietly as he could and making his way calmly down the hall to his own room, the shadows lurking in corners not really bothering him for a moment.

please leave a review if you have a moment to let me know how i'm doing! This one is fun but hard work! lol