CHAPTER 3

Quatre, Prince of the Silver Myst Elves, was half drowsing in bed, dreaming of his wonderfully handsome human lover. Even in slumber, a sleepy smile that would have resembled an idiotic grin if he was fully lucid curved the soft lips of the prince. Apparently his dreams took a turn for the not so good as creases started to form along his smooth creamy forehead. The prince frowned as another person entered his once perfect dreams, namely his sister, the Princess Duoviele.

Duoviele, or Duo as she was called affectionately by her family was, Quatre had to grudgingly admit, a very good sister, though a tad over protective. And it was this over protectiveness that drove the prince up the wall. Of course, Quatre understood his sister was older than him but only by a mere fifty years, that wasn't even a blink in the life of a long lived elf. Who was she to think that she could rule his life and make all the decisions for him?

Quatre's pleasant dream was turning into a veritable nightmare as his sister stalked into his wonderful dream in the middle of a rather erotic scene involving cream and some form of drippy, juicy, sticking fruit screaming about Trowa putting him in a spell. Then Duo proceeded to brain his lover with the uneaten fruit, screaming all the way.

With that horrible sound, Quatre jolted to full awareness, feeling slightly disoriented. Unfortunately, the screaming still went on and on. The prince leaped to his feet, recognizing where that sound was coming from.

Duo's room.

Quatre grabbed his sword and dashed out the door, toward the sound. The sibling's room was situated far away from the main body of the palace; their father had deemed them too noisy for the rest of the household. Whenever the royal siblings were together, glass breaking and loud sounds were inevitable, hence the King's decision to put them in quarters as far removed from the clan as possible. Since the two were well accomplished warriors, there was little that could endanger them, well, except each other.

"Duo!" Quatre yelled, tearing down the hallway, sword bared and burst through his sister's bedroom door.

The sight he met caused his already large aquamarine to widen to epic proportions. A nearly naked male elf was standing in middle of the room, screaming his head off; Duo was no where to be seen.

"Where is my sister and what have you done to her?" Quatre yelled, pointing his sword at the elf threateningly.

~*~*~

Duo stared down her body, and screamed long and loud.

This wasn't her body! Panicked, she ran to the mirror, ripping off all her clothes and stared and stared and stared some more.

This is a nightmare, this isn't happening, this isn't my body! The same litany ran through Duo's head over and over. She stared at the male body in the mirror and resisted the urge to scream again. Gone was every part of her that was female and replaced with everything predominantly male.

This is a nightmare, this isn't happening, this isn't my body! Her breathing hitched, as a vice closed around her lungs as she started to pant wildly.

The door exploded inwards, emitting her brother, still tousled from sleep, his sword drawn, pointing it at her. "Where is my sister and what have you done to her?"

Turmoil ran through Duo's head. Her own brother didn't recognize her? Spirits, she had to say something to him before her brother ran her through.

"Quatre, it is me, Duo," she yelled, only, that wasn't what that came out.

"Well, little lover boy, ready to get some spanking?" She saw her mouth move from the mirror and heard the words spilling out.

His brother's eyes widened at the suggestion and lunged at Duo, his arm extended.

"Hey," Duo squawked, scrambling for her sword by her bedside. She barely managed to blocked her brother's attack.

"Where is my sister?" Quatre pressed, rage burning in his eyes. "If you have hurt her in anyway. . . ." He left the threat hanging. He took another swipe of the sword at Duo.

Duo backed away, in her haste, stumbling over some hastily discarded clothes. "Stop it, Quatre! I'm…" Another block. "Going to make your sweet, young, little body all mine!" One of her hands clamped over her mouth as she groaned inwardly. What the hell was wrong with her? Why couldn't she say what she meant to say?

"I am going to kill you!" Quatre thrust the sharp sword at Duo, unrealising he was about to commit murder. "Tell me where Duo is!"

Almost ready to scream in frustration, Duo tried once more. "Damn it, Quatre, Duo is… the sweetest little piece of ass ever to grace this earth." Shit! She gave up trying to explain and just plain dove for cover as a flurry of sword thrusts came in her direction.

"Nobody touches my sister and gets away with it," Quatre fumed, diving in the direction of the fleeing brunet. "You coward, get your ass back here like a man!"

"I'm not a man," Duo screamed, not wanting to engage her brother in battle. While she was touched at Quatre's protectiveness, this was getting to be a pain.

That stopped Quatre for a while as the blond stared at Duo in confusion. Not a man? Well, this was all some elaborate trick to throw him off balance. He had seen the elf nearly naked. That was no maiden. "Get back here coward and give me back my sister!"

A well aimed cut of the sword tore the remnants of the pants off Duo, leaving her completely unclothed as she squawked in indignation, leaping for a blanket. She hastily wrapped herself in it and turned angry eyes at her now stunned brother. Striding toward Quatre, she slapped him across the face.

"Don't you ever do that again, you hear me?" Duo pushed her brother aside, rushing to the closet to get more clothes to cover herself.

The blond stood pole-axed, having seen something that could not belong to any other but her sister. Standing out in stark contrast of the elf's pale hip was a tattoo of the royal house of the Silver Myst elves, and next to it, a scar that Duo got saving Quatre from a falling tree branch when they were younger.

There could be no mistake, this elf maiden was Princess Duoviele, Prince Quatre's sister, but this elf was also blatantly male.

Duo, in a midst of pulling on some clothes heard a dull thud from the middle of the room. She turned to find her brother, Crown Prince Quatre with normally nerves of steel, fainted dead away.

~*~*~

Quatre woke to the not so gentle slapping across one cheek and from that motion, he recognized it as his sister's less than subtle method of waking her 'baby' brother up. With a frustrated growl, the young prince slapped at his sister's hand.

"Lemme alone!" He mumbled turning away from the blurry form of his sister's long haired, purple eyed visage.

"Wake up," a voice deeper than Duo's called out to him.

"Uhm…" Quatre mumbled, trying to draw the covers up over his head. "Had a weird dream. You were a man."

Silence for a spell, before a rather forlorn voice said, "Yes, I am."

Blue/green eyes snapped open, taking in the long chestnut hair and deep amethyst eyes. "DUO?" Quatre yelped.

Those eyes shimmered with unshed tears and laden with fear as Duo nodded. Her features were now turned slightly more masculine, but still maintained the beauty that made her the most sought after elf-maiden in Silver Myst. "What happened to me, Quatre? I'm male." She hugged her knees forlornly, staring at her brother's wide eyed gaze, wishing desperately this was a bad nightmare.

"But. . . but. . . ." Quatre stammered. "How did this happen?"

That seemed to be the straw that laid the camel's back flat. The tears that Duo was so bravely suppressing overflowed. "I. . . . d-don't k-know. I w-woke up li. . . .like this…"

Quatre gathered his brother. . . . no sister in his arms and tried his best to comfort him… her, feeling how uncomfortable it was to hold another man besides his Trowa like that. This sobbing male -- no damn it, it was Duo, not another male, it was his sister Duo! -- this sobbing elf was nothing like the bright spirit Duo usually was and desperate to make her smile again, Quatre said the first thing that came to mind.

"Well, I have always wanted an older brother."

Duo's head came up abruptly, staring at Quatre, gaping. For a moment the prince thought Duo was about to burst into tears again, only to hear a full bellied laugh echoing around the room. The blond was rewarded with a playful, yet painful punch, reminiscent of his tomboy sister.

"That was so uncalled for," Duo wiped the tears away, seemingly in control of her, well, at this point in time, his emotions once more. "Honestly, I have always wondered what it was like to been a male."

The siblings stared at each other and burst into laughter once more. The merriment was cut off abruptly when two dozen guards burst through the closed door, fully armed.

"Returned our princess to us, intruder!" the captain of the guard yelled. "Or suffer the pain of death."

tsuzuku

Yatta! How was it? Did ye people like the chappie? Duo is finally a man! (good sign for all the shonen ai fans out there) Alrighty, well Annie's fingers are freezing so this is gonna be short but....

ARIGATOUS! (by yours truly, Annie Maxwell)

Shin-chan: Very good guess, you are right. ^-^ But you won't officially find out for another .... well a bunch more chapters we aren't sure exactly how many....

Shadowclone: Wow! That was an awesome review. Yes, it is great how Heero can be so blind. I guess thats where the term "loving blind" came from . . . . or maybe not.

Wolfgirl333: There was like gospel in you review (1x2 and 3x4 rocks and Elves rock) We totally agree with you!

Plastic Tree: Love the screen name. . . . I have one, of sorts, though I suppose it might be more like a nylon tree... or something. ^^

White Destiny: No more dressing in drag. . . . FOR NOW! cackles evilly Okay, yea I'm good.

Enna Namo: oops, sorry thats not what the lock of hair was for, we shall have to change the wording a tad. Hmm, the hair comes into play later. Thanks for pointing it out!

Lunar Heart: Thank you so much for your review and opinion.

Patty 40: Thanks for the encouragement, you're always so steady and ... encouraging. A great constant to dorky fanfic authors like us! ::Glomps:: Arigatou!

Calencoireiel: Whats so great about your name, is I write it so often (b/c you are just such an awesome person) that I barely need to worry about spelling it correctly adds name to spell check

Wow! That was so awesome! Its odd, ff.net was on the fritz and so some of the reviews got recorded on the site, but some didn't. We are assuming that we got all of the ones emailed to us, if not we are really REALLY sorry.

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~Annie & Tsu