Disclaimer: I think I may finally be running out of semi-clever ways to tell you people that I do not own anything in these fics but the ideas themselves!

A Brief Author's Note: 8th in the LJ 10_prompts community's Table 11. We have another thousand words and this is heavy stuff. It's not smut, though there are sexual references, but there's some masochism, sadism, and enough of it that I think this warrants an M rating.

8 - Tender

Tarrant found that, sometimes, had to be hurt, just to remind him of reality. He needed her to hurt him, to remind him that she was real. She hated to hurt him, despised it with all that she had inside her, but, regretfully as sin, she did it for him when he asked. On bad nights, it went as far as making him bleed… But one thing surprised him every single time: Alice Kingsleigh – his Alice – could hurt him tenderly. In the back of his mind, he actually – in a sick, twisted, oh-so-very-mad way – looked forward to the nights that it came to this.

"Tarrant, please," she tried to reason with the madman in his mind. "Not tonight, not again…"

She could see the ache in his gaze, the green almost melting with the pained heat building inside him. And she knew, if she didn't do this for him, he would end up doing it himself another time, and he couldn't be trusted not to cause real harm. Not that he'd admit it – she would just find a new, deep scar the next time they made love. The first time it happened, she had been too stunned to say anything. Second time earned him a cuff about the head and a sound tongue-lashing. After the third time, when an inadvertent scratch during a passionate interlude caused bleeding, they came to their present agreement. Yes, she would hurt him… but she would never cause him harm.

"Alice, it hurts," the broken man inside him cried. "It is so very cold in here."

And, biting her lip almost hard enough to draw blood, she dragged her fingernails down his back, very slowly, watching the angry red welts spring up on his pale skin. He groaned, wrapping one arm around her waist and hiding his face against curve of her shoulder. Her fingertips, not her nails, then trailed back up the lines, soothing the immediate sting and sending a deeper burn into his skin. It made his flesh crawl, so he held tighter to her and whimpered as she crossed that set of welts with new ones. Soft lips found the tendon where neck met shoulder, caressing the spot and distracting him from the pain.

"I'm so sorry," she whispered in his ear. "I don't want to hurt you."

The Hatter, poor half-mad creature, gritted his teeth against his insides' gnawing.

"I know," he acquiesced. Truly, it pained him to request such treatment from her. "But please, Alice… Remind me how real you are?"

She disentangled herself from his arms and smiled at him, though her eyes shone funnily, as though she might cry.

"You silly man," she chided gently. "Still think you're dreaming?"

He cocked his head to one side, brow furrowing as in deep thought.

"Part of me wishes very much that I was." He gave an odd, twittering laugh. "Although I believe that part may be my back!"

His smile turned manic, the same frightening smile that she knew she must pull him back from. Words could not reach him – she tried them first anyway – so she steeled herself for what she knew she would have to do next. The Hatter continued to giggle, the sound profoundly disturbing. Alice murmured an apology, brought her hand back, and delivered a sharp slap to his cheek. He yelped and pressed his own hand to the place of impact, looking very confused.

"Not sure I deserved that," he growled in his Outlandish burr, reminding Alice quite a bit of a pirate.

She shook her head, still smiling so sadly.

"You never have," she assured him, carefully moving his hand so that she could stroke the print that stood out, scarlet, from the pale skin of his cheek. "No one deserves to be hurt repeatedly by the one who loves him…"

A new grin spread over his face, this one of mischief and something she couldn't quite place.

"Though some might enjoy it," he quipped, still in his burr. "Please Alice… hurt me. If you can…"

Oh, now he had done it! He always did this! The damnable madman knew that the best way to get her to do something was to tell her or imply that she couldn't do it. Her eyes glittered back into his and his grin turned triumphant. Alice's cheeks turned brilliantly red – he just had to con her into this! With him pulled back from her, she had access to his bare chest, but she knew better than to immediately take advantage of that. Face blazing, she leaned in and placed her lips by his ear.

"You know I rise to the challenge every time," she purred, her voice having dropped by half an octave.

Loath as she was to admit it, even to herself, she couldn't help but thrill a bit at inflicting such pain on him – the majority of it came from knowing how he loved it!

"Oh, indeed you do, love," he agreed, one hand steadying him by stroking her blonde curls.

His lover, his tormentor, nipped his earlobe a bit harder than normal, causing him to wince and he moaned as she soothed this small hurt by sucking on it before pulling away. Her mouth found his in a bruising clash of lips and tongues. She pulled back to suck on her teeth when they clacked against his – he did the same. When they met once more, those teeth of hers caught his lower lip, hard enough that, for the first time that night, she drew blood. He growled against her lips as, while one hand wrapped firmly 'round the back of his neck, the other scraped its nails down his chest.

He loved how she hurt him. She hated having to. But either way, they both needed it. Only Alice could hurt him so very tenderly. And Alice knew she only trusted herself with such a delicate task. And as they fell asleep later on, both exhausted in every sense, they smiled as one.