Panic froze me to the seat. My leather leggings clung to my legs in the cloying morning heat. I smelt of sweat. I realised then that I was drenched in it. But there was nothing to be done, for I could not move my body at all.

My eyes were fixed on him, only him, nothing else. His curly brown hair fell over his cheeks, which looked painfully hollow. A brushed, thick beard covered them to some extent. He looked older. The skin I could see was pale, it had an almost blueish tinge. Gavrila's eyes, downturned to his fingernails, looked far too small, sucked into their sockets. He looked so ill. In fact, his head didn't at all match the luxurious dress uniform he was wearing, though perhaps it did match his boots, which were halfway undone. His hands shook in his lap.

My tongue was frozen, though I didn't know what to say anyway.

Gavrila spoke instead. "What the hell, Evie?" He muttered it so quietly. His empty, skeletal eyes looked up to mine for an explanation.

I still couldn't talk.

"I waited months, months, for you to come and save me, to take me away from all those monsters. I did what they told me to because I knew you would rescue me, because if I didn't comply then they would kill me. But you never came. Then I come here, I find out that you're dead." He laughed then, a hoarse, empty sound devoid of the richness he normally had. "They tell me you're dead, and for the first time in months, my heart heals a little bit, because I know that you didn't abandon me, you didn't get hurt as a result of me, you just got knocked down by some careless bastards. And, however painful, that's the end of our story. Then this morning we were riding through your town, your home, a place where I had managed to feel like myself for the first time in ages, and your own staff humiliate me because of - because of something I didn't even do wrong!" Gavrila cried, furiously going at his left boot. "But I know you have nothing to do with it because you're dead. And if you were alive you would put a fucking stop to it. My wife accused me of being paranoid when I came up here. But I swore I had seen you on your horse, I swore I'd smelt your perfume in this room. So here you stand, the picture of fucking guilt. I've been without you for months and this is how I see you again?" In a swift and primal motion, the Prince yanked off his boot and hurled it at me, though it merely hit the window beside my head. "Why didn't you come for me, Evie?" Gavrila whined. It broke my heart when he spoke my name, the desperation scraping through his voice.

And yet still, I could say nothing. My eyes were fixated on his, though they seemed to be in the wrong body.

"Come home, Evie." Ganechka whispered, his words floating on the stale air.

Before he had time to soften again, the door banged open. A well dressed man with black hair and eyes like a shark's stood in the doorway. Something about his face sparked off a little recognition which I couldn't place. The man frowned at me, momentarily, before turning to Gavrila. I actually felt like a ghost, unable to move or question or run or scream.

"Rioters are downstairs." The man with black hair murmured to his prince, who got up wearily.

Even when Gavrila brushed past me, reclaiming his lost shoe, I couldn't touch him.

The prince walked solemnly to the door, only slightly turning his head back before he left. "Tie her up. She's coming back to the palace with us." Then my prince padded down the corridor, leaving me to look up into the snide face before me.

The young man rolled his eyes, looking around the room for a restraint.

For the first time since I'd sat down, my joints unlocked themselves and I launched myself on him.

The man swore as I leaped onto his back, grabbing the heavy book from my seat in my descent. As soon as one elbow was around his neck, I started to bring the book down heavily on his head again and again and again, all of his curses and attempts to bite my arm only spurring me on.

In the next instant I was rocketing up and then down so heavily. My floorboards knocked all the air out of me as the black haired man landed on top. He jumped back up, punching me once in the nose so hard that it made my eyes start to water. Standing to his full height, the man lifted his solid boot, bringing it down heavily onto my stomach.

As I coughed and spluttered on the floor, a trickle of blood inching down to my lips, the man ripped the rope decorations from my bed. I was still too exhausted to move as he flipped me over onto my face, pulling my arms behind me and pinching them together with the rope. There was more to spare on my legs apparently too, he laughed as I tried to kick him away, each kick weaker than the last.

When he seemed quite satisfied that I couldn't move, the man stepped quietly away to inspect Gavrila's sword.

If I screamed, would anyone save me?

It was too late anyway, as the young man lifted me up into his arms, a hold too reminiscent of my escape from the first ball. He took me leisurely down the corridor, Gavrila's sword - my sword - bouncing at his hip.

"Eva?" I heard someone ask frantically. It was Perry, he was crying. Somehow we were out on the courtyard already. Jon held his son back. I couldn't see Amelie.

Then I heard hushed bickering and tried to turn my head to see. Gavrila and his wife were speaking in quick, hushed tones. They stood in front of almost all of my staff, who were laying flat on the ground.

I had since supposed that they were dead.

"Where we gonna put her, Gav?" The man who was holding me spoke again, turning me to face my prince, who looked down at me in fatigue.

"In your carriage. Keep her alive until we get back to the palace." Gavrila murmured quickly, before turning back to his wife, away from me.

Without reverence, I was shoved into a carriage. Across from me was a girl with very bright hair and a sneer which had followed me all through the season.

"Well hello there, Bence." Angel Kent sang, the last thing I remembered before waking up at the palace.