The capital buildings where Relena had most of her official meetings and the Cinq Castle were separated by either a round-about city walk or a stretch of hills and open country.   The hills themselves overlooked New Port City itself and were only sparsely decorated with trees and paths, but it was perfect riding country.

Except for the weather, it would have been perfect: heavy clouds and a feel of thunder.  But as dusk fell over the Cinq Kingdom, Damion chanced the storm warnings and heavy rain when he borrowed a horse he had grown rather fond of and rode to see Relena at the conclusion of the day.

He wondered if she saw him as a person or as a prince.  It was so rare to find the former, but he suspected she saw everybody as real people, and that made him almost giddy with elation.  She treated him like a real person and right now, the only reminder he had that he was anything different was the ceremonial knife that he carried whenever he was out of his own country.  It had his seal carved into the bottom of the hilt so that he could approve documents with a signature stamp.  But more frequently he used it as a letter opener.  Still, it was an honorable heirloom, and had been worn by princes for generations.

He dismounted at the gates, tethered his horse, and walked in.  After seeing Quatre and Duo, he had changed to casual clothes, loose jeans and a short-sleeved summer button-up shirt and leather coat, so he felt a little underdressed as he passed men and women in business suits carrying briefcases.  But it didn't bother him, and he soon found the room Relena had told him she would have her last meeting at.

"Damion," she said with a smile as he knocked on the wall before entering.  The door was open and everyone but her was gone.  He returned her smile, but she must have caught the serious look in his eyes.  "What?" she asked.  "Did something happen?"

"No," he said soberly.  "But what can you tell me about you and Heero?"

She sighed and sat down.

"I'm sorry," he said.  "I wouldn't ask, except..."

"I know," she said wearily.  "You don't have to apologize.  He came to see me today and I figured it out.  I...never would have suspected he'd do anything like that."  She shrugged uncomfortably.

"Everyone keeps telling me he's kind," Damion said truthfully.  "But I don't see it.  I think he's dangerous.  I've been taking advice and avoiding him all day, but anything you can tell me might help."

Relena put a hand to her head.  "Heero," she said quietly to herself.  Then she raised her voice to him.  "I... it's hard to explain.  He's a gundam pilot.  When we first met I accidently learned his secret and he told me he would kill me but he never did."

"Quatre and Duo said something about that," Damion said.  He didn't understand this.  How did something like that form a relationship?  He would think that would be scary and drive a permanent wedge between them. "But I don't understand."

Relena shifted uncomfortably.  "He was just so strong, so filled with purpose, and I wanted to be like that. And I wanted to help."  She waved a hand.  "It doesn't matter, really.  It's hard to explain.  I thought there would be something between us once, especially when out of the blue one day he kissed me."

Damion's eyesbrows rose in surprise, but she continued in contemplative calmness, not looking at him.

"But it was a stressful situation.  He never explained and we never talked about it.  I didn't see him again until Mariemaia and since then hardly at all.  And when I did see him, he showed no interest in me personally and all we talked about was business, if that.  So I figured it was nothing."  She picked up her folders and papers and smiled wanly at him.  "I don't really understand his behavior recently, Damion.  I wish I did."  A lost look came to her face and she shook her head.  "But it doesn't matter.  I'm with you now."

"Really?"  he asked, feeling warm.

She smiled and took his arm. "Really, but I lied about being able to spend time together tonight.  I have so much to do."

"That's okay," he said hastily.  "Do you have a way home?"

"Pargan's waiting for me with the car," she said.  "But can I see you tomorrow?"

"Yeah," he said, feeling pleasant in spite of everything.  "Tomorrow."  He kissed her lightly on the lips, smiled and escorted her to the back doors.  She smiled at him over her shoulder as she walked down the steps, looking elegant and lovely and professional in her short-skirt business suit.  He watched her go and then turned and walked back down the hall to where he had left his horse.

The sky was looking nasty.  As soon as he gathered the reins and turned his horse about a light rain began to fall.  Thunder rumbled in the distance.

"There is going to be a storm," he muttered, stroking the horse's muzzle.  "Let's get you and me back, eh?"  He swung up into the saddle and took off at a light trot.
 
 

 

Heero walked wearily from the city gates to the hill and the tree where liked to sit and think.   The sky looked like lightning and rain and there had been many storm warnings, but he didn't care.  He'd sit in the rain and drown.  Maybe it would cool him off.

He wasn't sure if he was hot with rage or desire, but both were wrong.  He had tried to tell Relena how he felt, but again he couldn't do it.  He had rehearsed it. He had promised himself he would just say it and be done, but as soon as he looked into her eyes he found he couldn't say anything at all.

And then she accused him of being a horrible person.  She was tired of him.

Would she have still said that if she knew how he really felt about her, about all of this?  He supposed it depended how she felt.  She liked Damion, she said, but Heero loved her.  He loved her with every breath in his body.  He couldn't breath when she was near, couldn't speak; he couldn't say her name for fear that she would hear the caress in his voice.  And God, how he wanted her.  He wanted to touch her body, her face more than anything else, almost anything, and the thought of it maddened him.  His blood was on fire all the time.  He was consumed in flames and he could do nothing about it.  If he had her, he thought he could tame those thoughts and be content to just hold her, but she was with Damion now.  And soon, he didn't know how long, but too soon Damion would be able to touch her, if she let him, and the thought of it threw Heero over the edge.  And what if he touched her when she didn't let him?  There were those rumors, and his own fevered imagination gave them life and darkness.

"Relena," he gasped aloud, stumbling into the trunk of the tree at the top of the hill.  Why hadn't he moved sooner?  He had had so much time to make her his, so much time, and he wasted it all.  He watched her from the shadows, protected her from danger, kept the world hostage in order to keep her safe, but all that time she was far away.  And now he could feel her slipping away from him like a dream, like water through the cracks in his fingers when he was dying of thirst, and it was Damion, a man who had everything, who would have her now.

He hated himself.

Thunder roared in the distance, a rumble like dragons in the sky, followed by a ripping, spine-chilling crash.  Heavy droplets of rain began to fall, splashing his arms, his head, his fevered face.  Heero stood straight-backed as night descended, plunging the world into graying darkness as dusk enveloped the world and heavy, rolling clouds and sheets of rain obscured the sun.

It fit his mood.  He felt death in him, cold and chilling and fueled by anger and self-loathing.

And that's when he heard the sound of horse's hooves.

Damion rode low over the neck of his horse, soaked to the bone as rain poured like buckets from the sky, drenching his hair, his clothes, his horse.  His jeans stuck to his legs and slipped on the saddle, his coat was ruined, he couldn't see through the storm.

He thought he caught the glimpse of a figure rising before him from out of the shadows.  It was little more than a dark blur, but suddenly his horse squealed as the reins were wrenched from Damion's hands.  Thunder rumbled and crashed in the sky, louder as it drew closer.  In a flurry of rain and mud and shouts of surprise, Damion was thrown bodily from the saddle.  He hit the ground with a squelching thump, landing in grass and mud and growing puddles of dirt and rainwater.

Swiping wet hair from his eyes, he sat up with a moan, in time to see his horse bolt down the hill in fright.   It was well trained.  He hoped it wouldn't leave him here and return to the safety of the stables, but if so, the walk was easily manageable, even in this squall.

Lightning flashed, illuminating the area around him for a moment, and he saw Heero, standing before him, arms loose, but his eyes were terrifying.

Damion leaped to his feet with a shout, rain rolling in rivlets off his face.  "What do you want!?"  he screamed into the wind and rain.  He could barely hear his own voice through the storm.  "Why are you doing this!?"

Heero's face was like stone, hot brimstone.  "I love Relena," he said in a normal tone, but somehow it carried.

"Bullshit!" Damion yelled back.  "What do you want with me?"

"I don't trust you!"  Heero shouted back.  "Leave her alone!"

"You don't trust anybody!  Leave us alone!"  Damion roared.  Thunder crashed over their heads, multiplying his fury.  "She's with me now! You missed your chance!  You're dangerous!  You don't deserve her!"

There was a moment of silence as lighting struck again, sheathing them both in crackling white light.

"I burn for her!"  Heero cried, and there was unmistakeably lust in his eyes.

Damion's eyes and heart flared.  He leaped at Heero without hardly thinking and hit him at hard as he knew how in the jaw.  Heero reeled, but he wasn't out.  When his head came back around, his eyes blazed.  Damion felt the blow to his stomach shudder all the way up his torso and explode in a fountain of fiery pain in his head.  It only enraged him further.

They fought savagely, aiming punches and blows mindlessly at the other.  Heero could fight, but Damion could too, and both surprised the other.  Heero's eyes widened as Damion came at him with viscious intensity, blocking blows and having his own blocked in return.  And they both resorted to kicks, and then to barroom grappling, throwing each other in the mud, raining blows on their opponent.  Soon both were bleeding from the nose and tears streamed from their eyes.  Damion somehow ended up on top and thought he might have cracked one or two of Heero's ribs, but his own chest ached, and he could feel the blood mix with the rain on his face.   Suddenly, he was somehow kicked in the head and fell over. Heero pounced on top of him.

"Why do you hate me?"  Damion demanded as he rolled aside from a fist aimed at his head.  "I've done nothing!"

"I love her!"  Heero shouted, but there was so much rain and noise and darkness, Damion could make nothing out about his face.

"She's mine!" Damion hissed fiercely, and a sort of calmness enveloped him.  This would not be settled by a fight; this would be settled by Relena, and she had just told him that she was with him now.  "She told me so!  It is meaningless to take this out on me!  She doesn't love you!  You just want to..." and he squeezed his eyes shut, mind filled with alarming visions.

Heero stared at him, kneeling over him with one foot straddled over his chest and braced into the ground, fist poised above his face.  The meaning behind Damion's unfinished sentence seemed to strike home in his eyes and his face fell apart as he merely breathed, shivering in the sheet rain.

"You just want to sleep with her," Damion finished, choking, gulping for air.  He was trembling all over.

A haunted look crossed Heero's face.  "That's not true," he whispered, almost beyong hearing, and there may have been tears on his cheeks, if it were not just the rain.  Then his statement changed to something else.  Damion caught it in his eyes before it happened, but trapped as he was, he had no way to react.  Heero snarled, his face changing to a look of pure rage and hatred.  Damion's eyes widened and he wriggled, pushing backward out from under Heero's hold until he was in a crouch, ready to rise, stand and fight.

But he wasn't quick enough.  A sound completely unhuman ripped from Heero's throat and his hand snaked in close to Damion's body.

And he drew the ceremonial knife sheathed in Damion's belt.

Thunder erupted around them in a hollow boom, shaking the ground.   The tree behind them crackled, shivered, and split down the center.  Lighting flashed overhead, jagged beams of electricity, charged with killing force.

But not more deadly than Heero's.

As the lightnings came, lighting up the hilltop, Heero struck.  Damion gasped and then screamed as the blade plunged into his side, tearing through his skin, sinking into his body.  He coughed, sputtering blood, feeling its metallic warmth in his throat.  His own ceremonial knife... He was a prince...  "I've done nothing wrong," he mumbled hoarsely, and tears choked this throat.

Heero loomed over him, but the rage and hate had vanished from his face like fog.  There was fear in his eyes now, and desperation.  He caught Damion by the shoulders, the knife falling to the ground from a hand spattered with blood, forgotten.  "I'm sorry," he whispered.  Damion's eyes fluttered.  He felt numb.  "Damion?" Heero gasped out.  "Damion!"

Heero made as if to lift him up, to help him, but the sound of his own name voiced with concern from this killer's lips lent new strength to Damion's body.  He jerked spasmodically, slapping Heero's hands away.  The pain came back, overwhelming him, engulfing him in its fire.  Tears welled up in his eyes, but he fought back, kicking until he was kneeling on the grass, one hand pressed tightly to his side, struggling to breathe.  He brought the other hand to his face and whistled as clear and sharply as he could.

There was a responsive whinny from just over the hill and his horse came trotting up through the rain and mud, head up and ears perked forward.  The saddle sat lonesome on his back, the stirrups flapping.  Damion stumbled to his feet, wincing in pain, a cry escaping his lips.  But somehow he managed to grab the horse's mane and heave himself up in the saddle.  Blood flowed down his side as the movement ripped his skin, and he cried out, but he managed, lying low and broken in the saddle, gripping mostly with his knees.

Heero remained kneeling in the grass, his statement hidden by the rain and his soaking hair, as Damion urged his horse into a gallop, toward New Port City.

He did not look back, and soon his head was too foggy with pain to remember where he was going.
 
 

 

Terese busily filed Relena's papers into their appropriate folders and chatted away as Relena sat curled on her couch, wearing pajamas and a robe.  She had just showered and gotten herself a cup of warm tea before preparing herself for more work when the door to her room burst open.

She and Terese both turned in surprise and alarm as the thunder and lightning from the storm outside entered their quiet room.  And then Damion stumbled in, crouched over and soaked and muddied from head to toe.

Relena dropped her tea on the couch and leaped to her feet.  "Oh my God,"  she cried, bending over him.  She got a look at his face and gasped. There was blood on his cheek and lips, his hair was not just wet, but wild and caked with mud and grass.  His shirt was torn.  She followed the tear to the hand pressed to his side and noticed the blood oozing down his side from beneath his fingers.  "Oh my God!" she cried again,  "Damion, you're bleeding!"

He nodded wearily, his eyes glassy, stumbled and fell to his knees.

"Terese!  Help me get him to the couch!"  Relena commanded.  Terese leaped to assisstance and together they managed to help Damion to the couch.

He waved them away. "I'm okay.  I'm okay," he insisted, but there was pain on his face.

"Like shit you are!"  Terese said, tucking black hair behing her ears.  "What the hell happened?"

"No, really, I think I'll be all right," Damion said, half to himself.  "He wasn't aiming to kill after all."

Relena knelt beside him, pushing the hair away from his eyes.  Then she stopped, hands freezing in place.  "Heero," she whispered.

Damion looked at her. "Relena..." he began.  "It's not..."

"No," Relena said, horrified.  "This is not okay.  God, are you going to be all right?  Terese?" she said.

"Yeah?"  Terese said.  "What can I do?"

"Apply pressure here.  Call an ambulance..."

"No!" Damion yelled.  "No one finds out about this who doesn't have to!"  And then he closed his eyes tight shut, breathing hard.

"Then call Manny, Terese," Relena said.  "Tell him Damion's been injured, not to tell anyone and to bring medical supplies.  Do you have the number?"

"I'm the secretary for the ex-Queen of the World,"  Terese muttered confidently.  "I have everybody's number."

"Good," Relena said, tying her robe shut and throwing a rain coat around her shoulders.  "Take care of him until Manny gets here."

Terese looked up in surprise.  "Wha...?  Where are you going in this weather?  Relena, you can't!"

But Relena didn't answer.  She merely opened the door and flew out into the night.

Rain beat upon her face and coat as she pounded barefoot through the street to the hills behind.  Damion had been riding today.  He would have had to pass through the hills.   As she ran she grew carless of her hood and it swept back from her face.  Her hair was soaked in minutes, lying lank about her shoulders.

"Heero!" she shouted into the night as she reached the hills.  "Heero!!"

Only the rain and thunder answered, but she had a funny feeling he could hear her, wherever she was.  She ran up the next hill, slid in the mud, and came to her feet again.  But she could see nothing in the storm.  She searched for twenty minutes, calling out his name.  All the while she thought of Damion, lying beaten and bleeding on her couch, stabbed in the side.

At last she came to a hill with a tree at its crest, the trunk split down the center.  A body was huddled under the branches, soaking and yet not seeming to notice.

"Heero?" she called.

The figure rose, turned to face her.  His statement was haggard, his eyes were dead.  As she stared at him, anger stirred in her gut.  She had never been this angry at him in all her life, and it hurt something deep within her.  She felt she was going to break down as a result, and tears were already rushing up into her eyes.

He just looked at her for several long minutes of anguish.  She clasped her coat closed in front of her chest as he approached, tears streaming down her face.  He came within a hand's width of her and touched her face with hesitating hands, fingered her wet hair.  She shivered, though she wasn't sure if it was from his touch or the cold rain.  "I'm sorry," he rasped.  "It was an accident."

She stopped and stepped back.  An accident?  Her voice grew cold.  "I don't believe you," she whispered.  "You aren't capable of accidents."

He stared at her through the rain, and nothing in his statement denied it.

"Then why, Heero, why!"  she demanded, and cried.  Her words were broken, her face was red and scrunched and unpretty.  "WHY?!" she screamed, and hit him in the chest with her fist.

He pulled away, letting her go, stepping backward.

"How could you do that to him?"  she screamed at him.

"Relena," he began brokenly, and his voice trembled.

He said her name... and stabbed a man who really liked her.  Lightning crashed.

"Relena, I love you!"  Heero yelled, but at that moment thunder ripped through the sky, absorbing the words until Heero himself couldn't hear them.

Relena heard nothing but the thunder.  "I hate you for this!  I hate you for doing this to Damion!  I hate you!"  Each time she said it, it came out bolder, higher.  It was raspy by the end, pulled out of her throat with a hook.  "How could you?" she cried, losing herself in her anger, her saddness, her love.  "How COULD you!  I don't want to ever see you again!  I can't stand to see you!"

And then he was gone, vanishing in the rain and the shadows on the night, leaving her alone on the hilltop in her pain and tears.

She fled home, heedless of the storm or the mud caked to her feet or her wet hair.  She ran to her home and shut the door and ran inside to the couch where Damion still lay.

"He's feverish," Manny said when she burst in.  "But I think he's going to be okay."

"Relena, look at yourself," Terese pleaded. "Please take a shower and get warmed up. Everything will be okay," she added soothingly.

Relena leaned over Damion and kissed his forehead and held his hand.  She thought of Heero and what she said, and what he had done.  Damion looked so pale.  And Heero was gone, out of his mind and out of her life.  She kissed Damion's hand and held it to her cheek.  It was cold.  "No.  Nothing will ever be okay again," she whispered.

She felt at fault.

Duo leaped to his feet when Heero banged on the door and then opened it and burst in before Duo could answer it.

"What the hell happened?"  Duo demanded as Heero shut the door and sunk against the wall, shivering with cold, soaked from head to toe and covered with mud and grass.  There was blood on his face and on his hand.  "Heero..." he said.  Then it dawned on him.  His eyes widened.  "Heero, where's Damion?  Heero!!"  He panicked when Heero didn't respond, merely staring at the knife he held flat on his palm, extended toward Duo.  Duo swallowed, eyes wide as he stared at the other gundam pilot.  "Heero, what have you done?"

Heero dropped the knife.  "I didn't kill him," he said feverishly.  "I don't think so."

Duo stared.  "But you stabbed him, didn't you?  Oh, God, Heero!  This is not okay.  You've stabbed a prince?"

"I know," Heero said quietly, head on his knees.  "I think I meant to stab myself.  It... it just happened."

"Is he going to be okay?"  Duo asked in a hushed whisper.

Heero looked away. "I think so," he said almost inaudibly.

Duo let out a breath he hadn't known he'd been holding, knealt down beside him and put a hand on his shoulder.  "Hey, now, you don't know what's going to happen," he said, managing a weak grin. "Can we be a little optimistic?"

"She hates me," Heero said, and Duo stared when tears formed in Heero eyes, the first he had ever seen.  "Oh, God, I've totally screwed up.  I'm in love with her and she hates me!"   And he began to cry.

Duo had no idea what to do.