A/N: I'm really sorry. I wasn't allowed on my iPad for WEEKS now because of a stupid test in math that I botched really badly...I am now happy to report that I am officially BACK!

I hope that you enjoy the chapter! A little shorter than usual, but there's a lot happening. I've been reviewing this story, and I realized that it had a lot of potential, so expect a lot down the road! Even past the Cinderella storyline; it'll go way farther than that.

Enjoy!

Gong!

Cass's eyes jerked open and she lurched back in surprise, leaning away from Loki, stepping suddenly away from him as she realized what was going on...and what had almost happened.

Oh no.

Gong! Gong!

Please no.

But her fears were confirmed as she whirled around wildly, towards the sound resonating from inside the ballroom. Nine more gongs rang out clearly across the gardens, cutting through the crisp spring air and shattering the calm Cass had managed to maintain in her heart.

12 o' clock. Her time playing dress up had come to an end. She couldn't pretend to be Beatrice anymore. Now she was just a slave, a slave that had broken sacred laws and would be punished severely if her crime was discovered. Her heart plunged and settled like a block of ice in her stomach...or a lead weight.

Instantly her nerves came back, bolstered tenfold by the mental beating she started to give herself. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Did you really just try to kiss your prince!? Shame washed over her, so hard and fast that she wanted to laugh- the idiotic chatter of a person who had been gripped with terror.

The perfect peace that had descended over the two had shattered like glass in a storm. The almost-kiss that had been suspended in the air between them had turned to tension; tension that was now grating on Cass's nerves like a knife on a sharpening block.

"Beatrice?" She was jerked out of her thoughts as Loki called her faux name, green eyes regarding her timidly. If her heart had not just jumped out of her chest, she might have noticed the lightest of blushes coloring his pale cheeks (a characteristic he still retained from his childhood) and realized that her face was probably brilliantly red as well. Either that or pale as death. "Are you alright? You look like you've seen a ghost."

The small, distracted part of her brain that wasn't freaking out noted that he was already regaining some of his confidence, already recovering. Unlike her. Which made their distance as slave and prince so much more palpable.

But she didn't have time to dwell on that. The rest of her mind was calculating how much time she had before Lenora would arrive back home.

If she was right, there definitely wasn't much.

"I...I have to go." She tried to jump down the steps to the gazebo but was stopped by one of his hands around her arm. His skin was infectiously warm. Or maybe her skin was just cold.

"What? Now? Why?"

Of all the times to be stubborn! Cass thought in desperate frustration as she struggled to break free but was unsuccessful. She unconsciously noticed how strong he had grown. When they were children she had been able to break his grip much easier...or she would have been able to squirm out of it. Not anymore. "I just do. Let me go."

His voice was firm, and she could tell that there would be no reasoning with him if she went on in this manner. "Not until you tell me why."

Obstinate mule! "What if it's none of your business?" she snapped, suddenly all venom. She figured that the sudden hostility might cause him to listen to her. It was a desperate tactic, and one that she regretted using seconds later.

Surprise at such an outburst flickered across his face, and then guilt. it was a dirty ruse that she used, but one that guaranteed results. "I - I am sorry." His grip slackened and then he released her altogether.

Cass drew her wrist back and rubbed it gingerly. Now that she was free, though, she was reluctant to leave without another word. That would have been just cruel. She had to justify herself, she decided. She couldn't leave him on terms such as this.

Before she could start talking though, he spoke first. "I just...I just wanted..." Here, he hesitated, the pink coloring in his face becoming more pronounced. Had she not been fearing for her life, Cass would have thought it endearing.

She knew what he wanted. She wanted it to. I just wanted you to stay.

For the first time in her life, Cass cursed her social standing.

Before she had never really been bitter about it. She accepted her slavehood and accepted that there was nothing she could do about it. She tried to make the best of it; if she never got over how terrible her life was, it would be that much worse. Wishing the days away would just make them seem that much longer. But now it seemed like such a cruel joke of fate- her heart belonged to someone she could never call her own...or vice versa.

What she would have given then and there to actually be the noble she had donned the guise of- to become Lady Beatrice of Asgard and never look back at Cassiopeia Marianne Quintinsdottir, slave to Lady Lenora, former best friend of the Dark Prince. What she would have done to be a beautiful noble lady; someone that Loki would never have to be ashamed of. Someone that he would be able to wear proudly on his arm.

But then the moment passed and Cass knew exactly what she had to do.

"My father and mother are expecting me home." Sentimentality was gone, and the lies sprung easily to her lips. She took a step back and then another, farther and farther away from someone she would never see again.

Each step broke her heart. But the lies kept on coming. "They will worry if I have not returned."

His green eyes - how could she never have realized that they looked like twin emeralds? - fell to the floor, and she could tell that he was disappointed. "I see."

He had grown so tall. Probably even taller than Thor now, even though his brother seemed much more muscled. He was even more of a silver speaker than ever, and it was obvious that he could make the king's war strategies team without batting an eye.

All in all, he wasn't the child she had once known. Not the little prince that had followed her around, like he was a lost puppy. She might never recover, but he would move on and forget her. He would marry some beautiful noble lady and become Thor's right hand general when his brother became king. He'd become the god of all things clever and sly and gain the respect of his court and go down in history for all time.

Loki wasn't her little boy anymore. He had grown to be a strong, independent young man. And, for that reason, Cass felt strangely proud. He didn't need her.

Who was she to mess with that?

It was time she stopped chasing the past.

And Cass was about to turn away from him for the last time and start running away when he said six words that changed everything.

"By the way, you dropped something."

She whirled around. To her horror, he bent over and picked a silver handkerchief up from off the floor. As he did, the knot in the corner came undone and out came...

...an ivory chess piece.

And not just any chess piece. A white queen.

He started to hand it to her, and for a second Cass thought it would be over like that.

And then he froze.

He pulled his hand back suddenly and examined it, turning the piece over in his fingers as if he couldn't believe what he was holding.

Cass was frozen with terror.

Then he looked up, and shock was written all over his face. Disbelief.

It woke Cass up like a bucket of cold ice water. She didn't say anything. She didn't try to get her chess piece back- the only thing she owned that was truly hers. She turned and ran.

She could tell he snapped out of it quite soon afterwards because he ran after her immediately, and he was screaming her name. Her real name. "Cass! Cass!"

No, no, no, stop, just leave me alone!

She didn't turn around, even though every fiber of her body wanted to stop. She just ran. A scraggly branch scratched her face, raking ugly red marks across her exposed cheek. She didn't stop to feel how bad it was, even when she felt a droplet of blood slide down her skin. She just ran.

Suddenly the distance from the gardens to the ballroom seemed like a mile, whereas before it had only been a short walk. She stumbled on her dress; Cass pulled her skirts up as much as was socially appropriate to free her legs.

And then the run was over and she was back in the brightly lit ballroom, which made her cringe after the dim lighting in the garden. People were laughing, talking, dancing. Before it had looked surreal, but now it all just looked fake. Fake and menacing. Each one of these people could condemn her right now, if they knew how such a rat had slipped in amongst them. She dove right into a crowd, hoping to disguise herself as Loki ran and stopped in the doorway, searching the room for her figure.

"Cass! Cass, please come back!" His voice was barely heard over the din of music and chatter.

But Cass could hear him, and he sounded desperate. Desperate for her to just stop, for her to just turn around and face him.

And for a second she hesitated. She didn't turn completely around, but she swiveled her head ever-so-slightly so that she could just barely see him out of the corner of her eye.

Could she really go back? Could she really turn around and fall into the arms of her prince again? She bit her bottom lip, cursing herself for such weakness, but knowing that she couldn't stop herself from thinking about it. Could she really get to know him again, become his friend, perhaps become...more? More than just a friend? More than a little slave girl? He obviously hadn't forgotten her. He obviously wanted her to turn back.

So could she really just go back?

Could she really do that?

But before she could come up with an answer that didn't completely confuse her, there was a hand at her elbow, and Cass looked instinctively over.

Lenora.

Fear made her blood freeze in her veins. Panic gripped her heart and made it race, and she knew is she had been recognized, even a prince wouldn't be able to save her from the punishments that would await her...

But no. Lenora's neat, manicured nails dug semi-circles of scarlet in Cass's exposed arm. Her eyes were vicious slits behind the studded diamond mask, and she knew the expression as that of a woman made desperate by rejection. It scared her, even though she knew that Lenora could do nothing to her here, in front of all these people, if she didn't know who she really was.

"Maybe you got his attention this time, you little quim." Cass had been called worse, but the word still cut her all the way down to her core. It reminded her again of her social standing. One that could stand by and watch as her being was degraded, blackened, turned into something wicked by the perceptions of others. "But that prince is mine, you hear? Mine."

"Cass!"

Despite everything, Cass felt tears burn behind her eyes, and she blinked furiously to keep them from falling, wrenching her arm from the girl's grip. This was too much. No. She couldn't go back. How could she? It was foolish to have ever believed otherwise.

She was a slave. Cheated from a life that might have been good to her, cheated from a friend that had been good to her, and now cheated from her prince. Could she find no relief? The tears built up so fast that her vision blurred.

Her nerves had been frayed to nothing. Her heart had been shot to pieces. "Take him." And she couldn't stop twin tears from tracing their way down her cheeks.

"I never want to see him again."