"We can do this the easy way or the hard way".

Arthur studied the girl in front of him as she brushed the dripping blood off her cheek and glared at him with murder in her eyes, "I think I'll go with the easy way".

"Good choice" her gaze didn't falter but he did catch the slight tremble of her hand, even though the grip on her knife remained steady.

"Small issue though" he really hoped the guards were on their way because he was about to piss off the only person in the room with a lethal weapon and he wasn't sure he was going to survive the next ten seconds, "the door's kind of locked from the outside".

She didn't say a word, but she took a step towards him, and he instinctively took a step back. To his surprise, she made a beeline straight for the door and threw her weight against it. There was a loud thud but as he'd thought, the door remained shut.

She turned towards him, "how do you open it?"

He shrugged, "I don't, I'm kind of being punished right now and part of the punishment is being locked in here till my father feels like letting me out".

She cocks her head, "what's the other part?"

He winces, "the apology letter, it has to be about three paragraphs and 800 words long with exemplary grammar, spelling and punctuation."

She lowers the knife, "doesn't sound that bad".

"I'm dyslexic"

She cracks a smile, and he can't help feeling like maybe being locked in here with her and her knife isn't the worst thing to happen to him.

Almost immediately she turns back towards the door, "I need to get out of here".

He settles down on a chair, "how did you get in here in the first place?"

She shoves the door half-heartedly, "I had a job and I got bad intel".

"A job like roof repairs?"

She looks at him exasperated, "look we both want to get out of here, right? You know this place better than I do, are there any weak spots that I can break out of?"

"I mean the roof is..."

"If you say anything about roof repairs, I swear I'm going to take you up there and throw you off".

"I meant the roof hasn't been repaired yet so there could be some weak spots up there".

"Right"

She looks down, breathing heavily, "I can't leave without finishing the job".

He stands up, "maybe I can help with that".

She studies him for a moment and then shakes her head, "no you can't".

"Try me"

"You need to get your dad to open the door".

"That's your job?"

She takes a deep breath, "that will make my job easier".

He bites his lip, "there's one thing you may need to know, uh, my dad doesn't really like me all that much".

"Yeah, the fourth-grade punishments he gives you kind of gave that away"

Arthur makes a face, "he probably has a good reason".

She shakes her head, "or maybe he's just a sadistic piece of-" she stops, "so are you going to help me?"

"I'm thinking about it".

She twirls her knife in her fingers, "do you want some more incentive?"

He smiles brightly, "I think you just helped me make up my mind".

She holsters her knife, "So what's the plan?"

"Uh" he looks around, "I guess I could make him think that you're attacking me, but then he'll know you're here".

He couldn't properly decipher the expression that crossed her face, but it looked a lot like pity.

"Are you sure you want to do that?" she asks, seriously, "you could tell him there's a sphinx bomb in here".

He chuckles, "What's the difference? He'll come anyway".

She bites her lip, "a sphinx bomb would blow up the entire palace, including him".

He shakes his head, "he'll come for me".

She nods and takes a step away from the door, leaving space for Arthur to flatten himself against the large keyhole. He looks at her once, takes a deep breath and closes his eyes, "Dad! There's someone here, she has a knife, she's going to kill me, let me out please!"

He pushes himself away from the door and faces her, "he'll be here".

She doesn't say a word and she doesn't meet his gaze either.

Ten seconds pass and Arthur moves back towards the door, "Dad! Help me, please, you got to get me out of here".

He doesn't look at her this time, "Dad?"

The room is silent, and Arthur finally knows why she looked at him like that. She knew, just like his mother knew and his stepbrother knew. The truth that everyone knew but Arthur refused to accept. His father would never come for him, not now, not ever.

He closed his eyes again, not even trying to hide the shakiness in his voice, "Dad! She has a sphinx bomb with her".

Five seconds later, there is a grinding sound, and the doors swing open. Arthur stares numbly at his father's frantic face, "where is she?"

"Here" she lunges towards him, and Arthur realises what's about to happen a split second before it does, "No"

His father yells in pain as the knife gets embedded in his shoulder. She pulls it out almost immediately but not before a guard's spear slashes across her side. She flinches but still punches him in the face before taking off down the hallway.

Arthur hesitates for a second before going after her, his father's angry roars getting more and more muffled. He was going to be in a lot of trouble, that was for sure, but he needed to find her.

It wasn't a very challenging task considering the hallway was littered with drops of her blood. The trail ended in a storage room at the end of the hall, and he sighed in relief, she hadn't gotten very far.

He pushes the door open and is met almost immediately with a knife to his throat, "make a move and I gut you like a fish".

He swallows, "it's me".

"Back away"

"I can help".

She glares at him, but he knows that it's taking an incredible amount of strength for her to stand up, and possibly more for her to maintain her menacing look but she wouldn't be able to keep it up for long and was in real danger of bleeding out, "I can help you get out of here".

She hesitates and he shakes his head and takes her hand slowly, removing the knife from his throat, "you obviously have trust issues, but we seriously don't have time right now."

"Double cross me and this knife will end up in your chest".

He rolled his eyes, "can you cool it with the threats? My dad is going to kill me anyway".

Her grip on the knife loosens, "where are we going?"

"My room, there's a secret entrance that I use sometimes when I need to get away"

He holds his arm some distance from her waist, "may I?"

She nods and he tightens his grip, "okay if we run into anyone, just keep your head down and let me do the talking."

She reaches for the cloak to cover her head but winces at the movement, "fuck".

"Hold on" he carefully lifts the hood and places it over her dark hair, pushing the loose strands behind her ear, "better?"

"yeah" she says softly.

He carefully pushes open the closet door and leads her out, his arm firmly around her waist and her free hand pressing against her side.

There's no one in sight in the long corridor and Arthur silently thanks whichever higher power was responsible for it. "You okay?" he whispers to her.

"Hmm" she mumbles, which is his first clue that she's not.

"We're almost there" he says, catching sight of his bedroom door, "just a few more steps"

She doesn't reply and he quickens his pace, almost pulling her along now.

"Sire?"

He stops short at the familiar voice, wincing, "hey".

The boy is looking at her curiously, "do you need some help?"

"Yes actually, could you drop off some bandages to my room? My friend here kind of scraped her knee".

The boy's gaze moves to the unbroken skin on her knee, then to Arthur.

"The back of her knee" Arthur says, hurriedly, "just scraped the skin clean off, not a pretty sight".

The boy nods and takes off running as Arthur leads her into the room, "how are you doing?"

"Who was that guy?"

"He works for my dad but he's really young and you know, sweet".

She gasps, "is he fast?"

"Uh" Arthur raises an eyebrow, "why?"

She removes her hand, now covered in dark red liquid, "I really hope he's fast".

Almost immediately, there's a knock and Arthur runs to the door. He takes the basket from the boy with a quick thanks and shuts the door. When he turns back towards her, he finds her in the corner of the room, her back towards the wall. There's blood on the floor and sweat on her brow and her face is scrunched up in pain. He carefully sits down next to her, holding up the white bandage, "it's here".

She holds out a shaky hand and he gently pushes it away, "could you just let me help you? please?"

She looks down, "I don't suppose there's some needle and thread in there".

He rummages through the basket and holds up a spool of thread in triumph, "got it".

"I'm going to need to...." She stops, "uh, stitch it up".

He hesitates, "I can, I think I can do that".

She meets his eyes, "it's alright, I can do it".

He chuckles, "I really don't think you can, you can barely hold yourself up".

"I've been through worse".

He carefully threads the needle, "I'm sure".

"Why are you doing this?"

He carefully inserts the needle into her skin, "doing what?"

She doesn't even flinch at the sting of the needle, "treating me like a person".

Arthur doesn't even look up, concentrating on the precision of the stitches, "because you are a person".

"I tried to kill your father" she watches as he dabs at the blood to get a better view of the wound, "almost made you an orphan".

"But you didn't" he says, as he ties off the thread, "you hesitated".

He looks up at her, "why?"

She looks away, "I didn't want you to carry the burden of being a part of your father's assassination, even unwillingly."

He smiles at her and wipes off the rest of the blood, "See, you're a good person".

She smiles back, "no, you are."

Prompt retrieved from thefakeredhead.com