Where Alaric once stood is now a large, gaping hole.

"Alaric!" Cecilia cries. "Are you all right?"

"I am fine!" Alaric hollers.

Cecilia treads cautiously on what remained of the floor, using all of her wits to discern which parts are more stable. She eventually gets close enough to peer inside the opening. Alaric is standing atop the rubble, patting himself free of the dust and seemingly uninjured.

"Hold on; I'll get you out of there," Cecilia says.

Alaric looks up at her, a calm expression on his face.

"No," he says. "Come down here."

"What?"

"Grab onto my arms; I'll help you get down."

For a moment, Ceil looks back at Alaric with a blank expression. She relents anyway and joins him in the hole.

She sighs. "So, what will we do now?"

Alaric's blue eyes have a determined glint in them. "We can go anywhere in the castle with this," he declares, his hands gesticulating at the air about him.

Cecilia's green eyes finally adjust to the darkness. 'The tunnels,' she observes. There are torches on the walls, and a few of them are aflame.

"Still, if the castle is unstable, we could get caved in," comes Cecilia's final protest.

"I thought of that too," Alaric replies. As he leaves the wreckage and walks on flat ground, Cecilia notices him limping slightly. "But, to be honest, I can find my way easily in the tunnels."

Cecilia is intrigued. 'Would he ever have a reason to use the tunnels frequently? How long has he known about these passages?' Alaric helps her get down from the rubble, and he grabs a lit torch from the wall.

Ceil wastes no time. "You hurt your foot, didn't you?" She says, rushing to stand ready by Alaric's side. "Lean on my shoulder a little."

"But you—"

"I told you not to mind me too much, didn't I? Best not to get that foot any more swollen."

After a few seconds of consideration, the prince smiles at her. "Thank you."

They walk side by side, down the tunnel's depths.

True to Alaric's word, the two arrive at their destination with some minutes of walking and a few turns. They stop at the foot of a staircase that appears to lead towards the ceiling. Alaric pushes a seemingly random stone protruding from the wall, and the ceiling opens. They climb up a stone staircase leading to the hall above. Once out, Alaric steps on a misshapen tile just beside the opening, and the floor closes, looking as nondescript as any other patch of flooring in the hall.

The halls look messy, with doors left open and some rubbish scattered about, but the place is still bare. The two keep walking at their slow, limping pace until they reach the only closed door in the hall. Alaric makes no motion to open the door; instead, he leaves Cecilia's side to pick up a drawstring bag dropped a few steps ahead.

The titian-haired girl runs up to Alaric and crouches down beside him. "What did you find?" She asks, looking over his shoulder.

"I found what I'm looking for," he simply says. He stands up and slings the bag across his back. Cecilia returns to support him. Together, they exit the hall, out to the gardens.

At the sight of Margaret's rose garden, Alaric's memories come flooding back. It has only been a few days since that evening. But no, not even the passage of time can make him forget her shining violet eyes, the scent of her amber hair, and how she looked as she ran back to the castle, the hems of her dress bunched up in her hands. Right at this moment, his heart aches for her. His grip on the drawstring bag tightens.

Cecilia sees it all.

He is leaning on her side, his arm across her shoulders—her heart drumming the lovesick rhythm she knows so well, their limping walk not quite catching up to it. She is looking straight at him; he looks straight ahead, searching beyond the roses, to someplace unreachable. Her presence forgotten, nonessential. She wants to call out to him, but will it be for his sake or hers?

"Alaric, over there."

He blinks rapidly, chased out from his thoughts. Cecilia's presence is a reminder of her absence. He glances at her. "Are you tired?" he asks, spotting the white gazebo at the middle of the garden.

His voice is a mix of concern and guilt, and Cecilia smiles ruefully at it. 

"You are. Why don't we rest for a while?"

"Your ankle needs to be treated," says Cecilia as soon as they reach the gazebo. She fishes out bandages from a small satchel she brought.

Alaric can't help but chuckle at Ceil's strange preparedness. "Why on earth do you have those?"

Ceil rolls her eyes. "I thought we'd need it, and now look at you. Sit down." She gently pushes Alaric towards the seat and sets out to work on his ankle.

"No, no—I'll do it," Alaric interjects, taking the dressings from Cecilia's hands. Feeling awkward, the young lady stands up and sits on the gazebo bench beside the prince.

'He still feels guilty, it seems,'  she assumes. As he treats himself with practiced movements, her green eyes gaze at his ashen brown hair, his face, his abstracted eyes. 'And, he's lost in his thoughts again.'  With green eyes, she watches him.

He finishes bandaging his ankle, and leans back on the bench. He turns to Cecilia, as if he is going to say something. He glances down, seemingly in search of words. Thinking better of it, he diverts his eyes elsewhere and maintains his silence. Cecilia stares at the floor. She decides to focus on one of the floorboards, the one with the paint chipped off from it.

"Won't you look inside the bag?" she asks in a quiet voice, her eyes still fixated on the unpainted wood.

"I will, once I return home."

'He doesn't want me to see. That makes sense, I suppose,'  Ceil thinks, not without pain. She does not know what to say next. 

She opens her mouth but Alaric speaks first. "Thank you for coming here with me."

Cecilia smiles in spite of herself. "I was about to thank you too, but you beat me to it."

Alaric's mood appears to lighten somewhat. "You can still thank me."

Ceil narrows her eyes in disapproval. "But now that I think about it, you brought more trouble than good today."

Alaric grimaces. "I can't even argue with you on that."

Ceil laughs softly. 

"Well, at least I had fun with you," she says at last without thinking too much.