"No." Major Swift scribbled his signature onto some papers, not even looking at me.

I breathed deeply, trying to contain my anger. "Major, please I am fine. I need to get back to Princess Annabel-"

"Try walking over to the end of this tent without bleeding or falling over," Interrupted Swift, who was still concentrating hard on a long and detailed letter.

I turned around, and then placed one foot in front of the other, being as careful as possible. But before I made it to the end, my side began to feel piercing pain and I fell to the ground with a loud groan of pain.

Major Swift sighed and scratched his moustache. He came over and helped me back up. "You need to be careful, Miss Emily. There are people who care about you, and want to see you get better, and you can only do that by taking things slow." Swift was a kind, gentle person underneath all that facial hair, who genuinely cared. "I can see that the men have taken a fondness to you, especially after the music last week."

I blushed for probably the millionth time. "Thanks," I replied, "But I think they only like me seeming as I am the only female here now."

"Nonsense!"

I laughed, and then grimaced at the pain. Swift called Captain Finn into the room. He saluted before saying, "Yes Major?"

"Could you take Miss Emily here back to the medical tent for me please?"

Ben smiled his devilish grin. "It would be my honest pleasure." He very carefully put his arm around me for support, and we hobbled back to the tent, which now had a brand new injured person in it. It was last night's attack, and a hollow man- although their numbers were lowering- got a lucky shot at Grove's leg. I placed myself onto the bed, being sure not to pull anything and got myself comfortable.

"So he said no?" asked Ben.

"…Yeah."

"Well this is good news!"

"Why?"

He smiled his devilishly handsome grin. "Because you, my friend, get to spend more time with the incredible me and my many wonderful tales."

I groaned. I was going to be there for hours.

"Well, since you can't go anywhere now, I can act out more of my autobiography, and you can do nothing to stop me," he winked. Out of his pocket, he pulled out more papers like the ones I had picked up at the Brightwall tavern. He tossed them at me to read.

I made a mock sigh, and let him go on with his story, whilst I read the paper copy. There were a lot of mistakes in the spelling and grammar, so using the ink and quill on my bedside table, I went through it and corrected all the errors, all the while Ben continuing to tell his tale he had perfectly memorised.

I had just finished correcting the mistakes when he had finished, so I threw the pages back at him. "It's good," I said, "Lots of mistakes though."

"Hey, you can't expect a guy to be perfect."

I had to laugh at that one, and so did Grove. "Well you'll have to be perfect for the princess!"

"Ah, the princess, how much I would love to have a piece of that."

"Hey!" I said sternly. I may not be her mother or sister, but I was still close to her. "Don't talk about her like that, you should understand why."

Ben cleared his throat, and quickly went out of the room, trying to avoid my gaze. Men. I rolled my eyes at him. Even as a creepy pervert, he was still kind of cute- wait no. I didn't think that. I DID NOT think that. But now it's all I'm thinking of. Uh, crap.

"So, Emily, where did you learn to sing like that?" Grove asked, pushing himself up into a sitting position.

I shook my head. "It was never something I learnt; I guess I just had it. People use to say my Mother had a nice voice, so… I don't know."

He smiled at me. Grove seemed like a really great guy. For one, he didn't stare at me like I was a rack of ribs, and for another he didn't seem obsessed with his own bodily fluids. Like spitting and seeing who can piss the furthest in grass. In the days I had been there, I had seen so many things I wish I could erase from my memory.

"So do you want to get something to eat? Because I don't know about you, but I'm starving!" Grove said. Putting a hand on my stomach, I checked to see if I was hungry. I was slightly peckish, so I thought I might as well get something at least before the fighting began, if there were any. Recently, there had been close to no hollow men waking up each night, which was a relief to the exhausted men. Nights were mostly just a couple of men dealing with some wandering skeletons whilst the others stayed on watch and chatted to each other.

Slowly, Grove and I headed back over to where the food was, talking all the while a bit about each other. I found out that he was born in Bowerstone Old Quarter, where his mother still lives, and he joined the army two years ago. He has a wife named Hannah, and at first, he was stationed in Mistpeak Mountains to deal with the mercenaries before being at Mourningwood ever since. As we sat and talked, we ate the same food that was available the day before and sat in an area where we would be out of the way, in case a stray hollow man began to wander.

We hadn't realised it, but Grove and I had been talking all night, and the sun had just begun to peak its head out of the horizon. There had not been a single undead monster, and thank Avo for that. I noticed Captain Finn climb down the ladder from the barely standing watchtower and head over to where Grove and I were sitting; now with a pint each of bitter ale that was being freely handed out.

"Well, well, don't you two look like a pretty picture," Joked Ben as he accepted a pint one of the men had offered to him.

"Easy Ben, you know there's the woman at home."

"Ah yes, how is Hannah?"

"She's well, still working at the bloody inn, no matter how much she wants to quit."

"Still the problems of too many soldiers on leave wishing for a bit of fun?"

"I seem to recall you being one of those soldiers once."

"Hey, I was drunk, you can't pin anything on me I don't remember."

I laughed at the banter before standing myself up and using the wall as support to push myself along towards the tankard of ale. I didn't quite reach the ale, however.

"Open the gates immediately! The King has arrived!" called the man at the watchtower.

I gasped, and my heart began to rapidly beat as I panicked. Logan was here in Mourningwood, and he'd recognise me for sure. The gates were about to open and let him in, when Major Swift hurried over to me as fast as he could.

"You and Captain Finn go to the shooting range and hide. I'll keep Logan away," he smiled kindly, and I instantly felt calmer.

"Thank you," I said sincerely to Swift, before I hurried to Ben and relayed the Major's orders. The gates were still being slowly opened, so we quickly hurried to a hidden spot by the practice area, and watched the events unfold through a hole in the crumbling fort wall. The space we were hiding in was small and uncomfortable for two of us to be hiding in. we were so close, I could feel his breath tickle my neck as we both tried to see through the broken wall.

Two carriages pulled up and King Logan walked out of one, with half a dozen of his purple armoured men coming out of the other. He looked different; older in fact. It was clear he hadn't had much rest or food. He marched straight over to Major Swift whilst his men held back, standing still with rifles in hand.

"Don't they look friendly," Ben said sarcastically, and I nodded in agreement.

We could just about hear the conversation between Swift and Logan. "Your majesty, what a surprise to see you here," Major Swift shook Logan's hand, even though Logan seemed completely uninterested.

"I heard a rumour that hollow men numbers were dwindling, and wanted to talk about resituating these soldiers to Millfields; we're quite low on numbers there."

"I am pleased to report that there were no hollow men last night, and I would recommend our removal out of Mourningwood Fort."

"Agreed. Your men can begin packing, and moving to Bowerstone, where further orders will be given."

Just then, a piece of paper with writing flew past Logan's feet. He picked it up and examined it, mumbling the words out loud, "wrong order… put 'Army' here… wait. This is Emily's writing…"

"Shit!" Ben swore, patting his pocket. "It's my autobiography; one of the papers fell out!"

Logan knew I was there. I could see him pulling out his sword. "Where is she?!" Logan yelled, grasping Swift's shirt, but the Major refused to talk. Logan turned to him men. "Find her, and kill anyone who tries to stop us!"

Ben held onto me tighter, trying to pull us closer into the gap we were hidden in. "Don't worry; we'll get out of this. We wait until the guards are distracted." He handed me my pistol and sword. "You need to get that blade sharpened, by the way."

We watched as Logan's army searched the fort. Fear was keeping me pretty still, not to mention the fact that it was an impossibly small space that we had to both fit in. The men turned over every table, emptied every tent and were looking in every nook and cranny. Swift's army couldn't do anything, for they'd be shot in an instant. Silence swept across Mourningwood fort. I squeezed my eyes shut.

Footsteps.

I heard Ben sharply intake air, and try to pull himself more into the gap. One of Logan's men had come into the shooting range. His boots clicked and clacked on the stone floor, trying to find any clue as to where we were. He was only a couple of feet away now. There was no more space for us to move back. To the right of where we were, a stone had come loose, and clanged to the ground.

"Oh fuck," I sighed, as the soldier walked towards us.

He leaned down to face us. His smile was menacing and cruel. "Got you."

~Authors Note~

Hello again! So I thought I'd stray from the storyline path a bit, to make things interesting ;) It's been pretty hectic, but now it's the summer holidays, so I should be getting more chapters up soon.

Annabel, Walter and Page should be in the next chapter. Maybe. Depends on how long Emily is with Logan.

Anyways, thank you for following and please review! I would really appreciate it :)

Bye!