Chapter 7

"Dun dun dun dun dun dun dun." Endymion hummed to himself eating his pitiful servant's lunch. He sat at his table minding his own business. When he heard the most ditsy and empty laugh behind him, accompanied by another similar high pitched laugh. He rolled his eyes and tried to concentrate on his sandwich.

"Oh my god Milly, there he is. He is so handsome." He bit down hard on his sandwich, trying to ignore the two obnoxious girls that had entered into the room. "Too bad he is a mute." the one he believed to be named Tara said. And yes he lied, but he thought it would be easier if they all believed he was a mute and they thought of it themselves, after he had spent his first days not speaking to any of them, so it wasn't exactly lying.

"Tara, he is mute not def." Milly hit Tara up the head. "Oh, that hurt." She cried.

"Hey Darien." Tara said as she passed him. Okay maybe he lied about that. He wrote it on a piece of paper and gave it to the ugly guard at the gate. He couldn't exactly tell them that he was the prince of earth. They would of called him mad. Or worse, believed him and killed him.

He nodded in recognition as the other girls went on their way. Thank God. He needed some alone time to think. How was he going to get Serena out of this big mess.

Maybe he could use the Luna transformation pen and change himself into a prince and pick Serena for his bride. But how would he build the background he couldn't say he was a prince from some random place or planet. All of them had already been here. By the look of the new potential husbands the queen was quickly running out of options.

He huffed at his sandwich. "What am I going to do?" He whispered to his sandwich when no one else was around. Lucky for him he finished his sentence when Mariah walked in. She looked flushed as always. She did the hardest work, but she was quite pretty, he guessed. She was actually with the guard he spoke to at the gate, which when he saw them felt like a funny match. They were in love, but that didn't stop her from hitting on Endymion, or any other guy in the castle for that matter.

"Hello Darien." She said in her seductive voice. She put down the load of clothes she was carrying and walked over to him taking half his sandwich and took a huge bite. "Thanks." She laughed.

She sat up on the counter and ate the sandwich right in front of him. Her neck line, he couldn't help noticing, was quite low. As she laughed they began to bounce, and even with all the will in the world he couldn't help but watch like a vertical tennis game.

"Darien lets get straight to the point..." She turned on the counter so her bare feet were on his legs, glad that he had not taken a bite of his sandwich thinking he may have choked on it. "I know you want me." Ha ha funny he thought she was the one that hit on him ever since he arrived at the castle.

"Ever since the day you walked in you couldn't keep your eyes off me." 'Maybe because there was so much of you exposed.' he thought. She bent over to have her face right in front of his and his heart became all scared and thumped inside his chest as she pulled him to her and put a rough kiss on his lips, sloppy and tasting of ale.

He tried to pull away but he chair leaned back and with both of their weight it ended up falling over onto the floor. She smiled from on top of him ready to go into another kiss. "Oh God." He gasped and she jerked back. "You talked." She gasped, and he smiled hoping she would forget about it.

"Darien!" She yelled. "Mariah!" A husky voice yelled from the door way and she shot off of him. "Orc!" She gasped and there he was. The guard that could probably kill Endymion in one hit. Finding his woman on top of our poor hero.

"You touched my woman!" Orc took Endymion by the neck and held him up off the ground. "I'm going to kill you!" Endymion tried to pull his hands from his throat, but the man's grip was only comparable to that of a bears, and he was losing strength due to the fact that he couldn't BREATH!!

"Orc, Smooky, don't do this it's not his fault he can't keep his hands off of me. He just has good taste like you." She pulled on his arm. 'I'm doomed.' Endymion knew he was going to die, but he was surprised that he was dropped to the ground his lungs still struggling to fill with air, him trying his best to catch the breathe he oh so missed for the past few seconds.

He panted for a while. "Don't let me catch you with my woman again!" Orc stormed out and Mariah followed after him and Endymion laid on the ground trying to catch his breathe from his near death experience.

He was just sitting up when two more servants walked in. Both guys. "Well tonight is the night." They didn't see him behind the counter and he was curious about their conversation so he kept it that way. "The princess is finally getting proposed to." 'Oh god.'

"Yeah I never thought that day would come, what dope would marry her anyway?" Endymion slid against the counter to help him with stand the conversation. She was getting married soon, and there was nothing he could do about it. He felt his heart slowly plummeting to the bottom of his stomach. "Well I hear it's our prince. I hear Diamond had his eye on her since they were born." Endymion spent the first few seconds not believing what the man had said, but after that he couldn't believe that he ahd not seen this coming.

He felt his limbs become numb and his stomach begin to turn, which made it hard to stand but some how he managed glad to find no one there. The slam of his fists against the counter echoed through the crimson kitchen startling someone in the next room to drop a dish. He looked around and saw bows running across the stone walls, bloody and gaudy, trying to hide the cold stone behind it. This meant the queen was expecting company.

His mind was in such a twist that he felt the pain in his toes and then he felt a clarity. He had to get her out of here. It had been a month since he had entered the castle and he had his body shrank from the lack of light and hope. He could only imagine…

These thoughts made his feet work, virtually, by themselves. Every step he took was forgotten and it seemed he got to the staircase leading to her room much quicker then he had planned. This fact startled him so he stayed in the same place for a moment to calm himself down so he would not act stupid and get himself caught.

As soon as he began again he felt himself slow down and finally the twitch in his fingers stopped, and the feeling in his limbs had returned…for the most part.

And as he continued his trek up the stairs he quickly realized that this had already been a mistake. He had already gotten two feet away from the queen's door. His heart began to pound again as her screech of a voice reached his ears. He felt almost in need of protection for his ears but as soon as he heard Serena's name in her one way conversation he knew that he had to hear the rest.

She began to speak of the crystal and he knew that, that was the reason that Serena was still alive. Serena refused to give up the crystal. If his heart wasn't swallowing his throat he would be able to laugh at this thought.

And then like he had feared his mistakes continued out of his need to reach Serena. For he had took a step on the stairway giving away a pound of his foot on the step.

The voice was silenced and he knew it was not because she was done talking. He quickly found himself a suit of armor to hide behind and did so. The cobwebs almost suffocated him but he stood completely still, not even letting his chest rise when he let in a breathe. Soon he heard the steps of the queen come and go, and as soon as he felt that it was safe, he stepped out, and began to walk in the opposite direction. He knew now that saving Serena was not a rash action, but something that was going to take immense planning.

So he decided he would avoid all clean up duty and begin to plan their escape, as the rest of the servants cooked dinner for the event that he so wished to avoid, for him and Serena both.

Unfortunately Endymion only began to plan their escape when it was time to begin the feast, and there was no way to avoid that. So he decided to dedicate half of his brain on serving and the rest of it saving Serena from this world.

When the night began it seemed the typical feast that the queen had every night, except Serena was made to come early and sit at the head of the table on the opposite side of the queen and right next to Diamond.

"Wine?" he asked them both, aiming his eyes at Serena's hoping she would receive some kind of comfort from his gesture. But she would not meet his gaze, and simply shook her head as Diamond gave him his cup.

Endymion wondered if Serena even knew what tonight meant. She seemed a little tense, but of course she was the head at forty person table, who would not be shy.

It was sad to think of the days Serena used to laugh in conversation when she was at the table. And now she just sat there like some piece of wax fruit.

It was not even half way through the night when the queen stood awaiting to make a toast. With all the people in the room it took five giant, annoying coughs for all of her audience to be giving her attention. She began with a big smile, that made most dogs growl, and then she began to speak.

"Serena has been a gracious guest for a long time now, I have treated her like my own daughter…" Endymion was laughing in his mind, and then he noticed that it had escaped his head and leapt into reality, but when he looked up, he noticed they were looking at Serena. She was laughing.

Endymion's eyes widened trying to see both the queen and Serena at the same time. The queen began to laugh along. "Inside joke…" and this set the whole room laughing, which then caused Serena's laughing to seize.

Then the queen continued. "I like a dutiful mother have been trying to find her a husband and it has been an…interesting task…" As she continued Endymion felt his nails rip into his skin as his fists grew tighter and tighter.

"But now I have seen that her husband has laid underneath my nose…" 'More like her thumb,' Endymion thought. "And now I have realized that my son Diamond is the perfect husband for Serena, and they have both agreed to marry!" This announcement sent the room into a polite roar until it was time to return to their meal. But as the people watched the food on their plates Endymion watched the frail wife to be run from the room. Hoping not to be noticed. She wasn't.

He wished for the same luck as he slowly followed after her. Trying to pretend like he was aiming for the table and mistakenly taking a wrong turn onto the stairs. He began his ascent slowly at first and then he began to jog up the steps knowing that no one would be there. He had lost his caution until he reached the hall that her room was found on.

He went up to hear and there she lay face down on her bed. The sound of muffled cries filling the room. He stood there at the doorway watching her back heave up and down from the pain. Then as she began to turn on her back he quickly jerked to the side so he would not be seen. Her cries became less and less frequent and finally she fell silent. He looked into the room and she fallen into sleep and remembering how heavy a sleeper she was he felt no need to be cautious. He almost ran to her, anxious to feel her skin under his hand. He laid next to her and she stirred slightly. He ran his fingers through her hair and in some miracle he saw a glimmer in her locks return. His heart jumped. This was the image of hope.

She began to groan. He put his lips next to her ears. "It will be okay Serena, I'm going to save you." The smile on Serena's face appeared for just a second and then she began to cry in her sleep. He put his lips on her forehead and let them trace down her nose not letting his lips leave her skin. But right before reaching her lips he left her skin. Not wanting to wake her.

He became worried when her body moved toward him, but she was still asleep and he knew that it would be long before he could be here for again. And they both needed each other, so he reached for her gloved hand and removed that kept her from reading his thoughts, and interlocked his hand with hers. "Endymion…" Her voice was sad in the way that it seemed to reach for her old high bubbly tone. "I will never leave you Serena, I am right here." He wanted so bad to prove this to her. He wanted to wake her and let her see that he was there. He longed to kiss her, to hold her…but her life was in danger and she would become unpredictable, and may he say stupid if she knew he was with her.

He left her with the three words he spoke to her every night, with or with out her presence., and quickly left, knowing she would soon wake up in dread of not seeing him there in the real world. Still it broke his heart not to pick her up and just keep running.

But he knew he could not, it would be impossible so he would wait for her sake.

So instead he stood there watching her in the dark. She repeated his name over and over, but one time stuck for it was not her that had said it. Instead this voice gave him a sick feeling in his stomach.

He turned to see the demon of his current situation. "Prince Endymion, I presume?" The queen stretched skin smiled back at him.