Even with as exhausted as the party had been, sleep did not come easy for the group in the Minstrel’s Dance due largely to the amount of nervous tension they all carried, but when they finally fell into that sweet embrace, it was nigh on divine.  Henry and Zhou Mi convinced Eun Mi to accompany them to allow Kharin and Eunhyuk at least some privacy since they had been separated for days now.  Eun Mi conceded largely because she knew it was good for their emotional and mental health, which was just as important as their physical health.  In room number 7, Zhou Mi opted to take the floor to allow Henry and Eun Mi the beds.

                While there were two beds in room number 8, Kharin and Eunhyuk curled up on just one of them.  They fell asleep facing each other, hands still loosely entwined and heads nearly touching as they curled slightly towards the other.  For all that they normally shifted in their sleep, the pair slept in exactly the same manner the whole night through.  If they happened to move just a bit closer in their sleep, who was to say they minded?

                Eunhyuk woke first with the realization that Kharin was still sleeping, her head tucked almost under his chin so that a few strands of hair tickled his skin lightly when he shifted carefully.  For the first few moments of waking, he simply looked at her as she slept, watching her eyes flicker while she dreamt and noting the weariness that one good night of sleep had not been able to wipe away.  She was wearing different clothes than the last time he had seen her and those she had on were stained from the road.  A glance at his person showed he wasn’t in much better condition.  He noticed that stray tendrils of hair had escaped her braid and fallen into her face while she slept so he carefully reached out to trace the threads gently behind her ear.

                At the tender touch, Kharin murmured softly in her sleep and stirred, green eyes fluttering open as she tried to identify what had disturbed her.  Almost immediately, she looked up and saw Eunhyuk smiling sweetly, blonde hair unwrapped and half-way falling into his soft brown eyes.  Uncharacteristically, she blushed slightly and gave him a shy smile.  “Hey,” she murmured somewhat awkwardly.  It wasn’t that she was unused to sharing a bed or even that she was sharing it with him; it was just different and…quite enjoyable.

                “Morning,” Eunhyuk smiled, returning his hand to clasp hers lightly.  “How did you sleep?” he asked softly, his voice barely more than a whisper.

                “Better than I have in days,” she admitted with a breathy laugh, shifting to prop herself up on one elbow, fingers threaded through her hair, leaving her other hand in his.  “You?” she asked while she took a moment to reach back and remove the tie from her hair.  She would have to redo the braid later as it was simply falling apart at this point.

                “The same,” he admitted with a bright smile, propping himself up to mirror her position and watching as her thick chestnut hair slowly unwound to hang like a satin curtain just above the bed.  The pair spent a moment in silence where they heard the general noise of the tavern coming to life in the floor beneath them as the cooking staff must have been getting ready for the day.  Quiet voices drifted in from the outside, foretelling the start of the day in the city as well.  “I’m glad you’re alright,” Eunhyuk finally spoke as he reached up his free hand to caress the side of her face tenderly.

                Kharin closed her eyes and reveled in the feel of his touch, so grateful that she had found him.  She could not have hoped for better and while they were both worried sick about the others, they had found each other, against all odds otherwise.  “Mostly,” she admitted and opened her eyes, meeting his gaze evenly.  “But I’d imagine you would say the same.”

                Eunhyuk nodded slowly.  The past few days had not been easy by any means and he knew her path had probably been just as difficult, if not more so.  There was so much that had happened in the time since they had been split up that they didn’t really know where to begin.  “I wanted to search for you,” he admitted at last, looking away as he remembered that first day when the construct had nearly wiped them out.  “I can’t even…  I can’t tell you…”  Eunhyuk struggled to put the words together, to tell her how hard it had been to leave the river that day without knowing she was alright, but he just couldn’t get them out.

                “Shhh,” Kharin soothed placing a finger over his lips as she felt a lump appear in .  “I know,” she told him instead.  “We did what we had to do that day,” she spoke for both of them in a very small voice.  “You were right, to go with Summer,” she told him firmly, not wanting him to doubt his choice that day.  “And someone had to take care of Leeteuk,” she laughed, though there were tears in her eyes.  She had gotten him so far and then just lost him…and Siwon.

                When she looked in Eunhyuk’s eyes, she saw tears there as well and forced a smile.  He responded in turn, “At least we know where they are.  Don’t we?”  He knew about Summer and Hangeng, though she would have no idea who he was.  He recalled Eun Mi mentioning Siwon and she had mentioned Leeteuk, but maybe they had an idea what had happened to Kyuhyun and Eleanara as well.

                Slowly, over the course of the early morning hours, the pair filled in the gaps of what they hadn’t been privy to so far apart.  Eunhyuk detailed how he had met Summer’s family and made Kharin laugh at his explanation of her siblings.  She was amused at his suggestion that she would get along with Kangin and would probably laugh at Hangeng’s speech, as he didn’t quite have the knack of all the right words yet.  In turn, Kharin told of how she and Leeteuk had made their way towards the port city.  He was distressed to hear that Leeteuk had broken his ankle but impressed with the solution and their bravery.  None of them had thought to study medicine extensively as they’d had Eleanara but for all that, Kharin had done remarkably well.

                When she was finished with explaining everything they had to go through to get to Eun Mi’s cabin, Eunhyuk definitely felt that she had a more difficult journey than he did.  Especially since they’d had to evade a patrol and find their own food.  It was also distressing to learn that they had just missed Eleanara and Kyuhyun when they had been captured but he was alternately happy to hear that they had found Siwon in the cabin shortly thereafter and befriended his rescuers in turn.  Yong-Soo sounded like a very interesting fellow and he was certainly curious to know about Eun Mi, since she had accompanied Kharin this far.

               Kharin relayed what Siwon had seen in the scrying bowl of the others and couldn’t resist poking fun at him for dancing with Summer in the manor.  He took the teasing well and simply grinned, grateful for the happy memory.  When she went on to explain what Eun Mi and Yong-Soo had told them of the Order of the Elements, he listened intently until she was finished, trying to draw connections with what he had been told.  When she finished, he offered his story in turn.  Kharin was most interested in the tale that Myung Hee had told them of Sinrielle and she sat enraptured as he explained it as best he could.

                Curiously, she pulled out the amulet that she had kept beneath her shirt for the majority of their journey and inspected it as Eunhyuk had.  “There is an indent,” she agreed softly as she traced her fingers over the smooth spot they hadn’t really noticed before.

                Eunhyuk nodded and then his expression turned puzzled as he regarded his own amulet in thought.  “Sinrielle gave the stones of power to the Order of the Elements and Enrhyll came from them too…  Do you think…?” he started to ask and then shook his head.  “It can’t be, can it?”

                Confounded, Kharin just looked at him for a few seconds and then blinked once.  “That’s impossible…  But it makes so much sense,” she grimaced as if she had swallowed something bad.

                “But how?” Eunhyuk asked, as troubled by the thought as she was.  The stones had been powerless when she gave them over.  How would he have gained their power?

                Kharin shook her head in confusion and shrugged, “I’ve no idea.  Maybe the others can help us figure it out,” she mentioned with a glance at the door.  When no one came through as they half expected, the pair shrugged and agreed to inquire when the others woke.  For the time being, they continued to fill in the gaps of their absence from each other.

                Eunhyuk told of how Henry and Zhou Mi had ended up in the manor and how Sang Kyu had relented in sending them fully prepared to the capitol and both recounted their battles with those blasted constructs in agitation.  Both were impressed with each other’s battle strategies and Eunhyuk’s ability to call down vortexes and fly definitely caught her attention.  He was equally impressed with her abilities to effectively destroy them as well as to make others forget she was even there.

                “I’ve got a construct too,” Eunhyuk admitted when there was a break in their conversation.

                “What?” Kharin exclaimed.  “You captured one?” she asked in confusion.

                “No,” Eunhyuk laughed lightly.  “I created one.  He…it’s still outside actually.  I can feel it above the tavern.  It sort of just follows me around,” he shrugged in amusement.

                For a moment, Kharin just stared at him, dumbfounded, before she started laughing.  “Oh, that was brilliant,” she grinned, piecing together what she had seen of the other constructs.  “You faked your own capture didn’t you?” she mock chided.

                Grinning like a little kid, Eunhyuk nodded.  “It worked too.  And I’ll bet you walked right in, didn’t you?” he asked with a knowing smile.  He hadn’t spent much time in the shadow realm but he knew what she could do.

                “Of course,” she winked easily.

                They would have said more but a quiet knock on the door made them both look over.  “Hello?” Eunhyuk called out as he stood up, somewhat stiffly, and made his way over.  When he opened the door, he saw Zhou Mi standing outside patiently with a tray of food and cups and a pitcher of water, presumably.  “Mimi,” the elementalist smiled.  “Come in,” he waved, grinning when he saw Henry and Eun Mi not that far behind, the former still rubbing sleep from his eyes and a hand through sleep mussed hair.

                “I’m sorry to interrupt but we heard you talking and figured it was safe enough to see if you were hungry,” Zhou Mi offered as he set the tray down on the side table before offering the empty bed to his companions and pulling up the lone chair.

                “No.  Thank you,” Kharin smiled softly as she sat up and accepted the wooden mug that Eunhyuk handed her first.

                “So?” Henry started, already passing out the breakfast rolls and chewing on the one in his other hand.  “Do we have any ideas for today?”

                “Henry.  Don’t talk with your mouth full,” Zhou Mi chided in amusement.

                “Sorry,” he murmured with a mischievous grin around the same mouthful, causing his companion to sigh in exasperation.

                “Not quite,” Eunhyuk shrugged.  “We were just filling in the gaps really.”  Quickly, the two sketched out a brief overview of what they had covered that morning, promising to fill the minstrels in with more detail at a later date and completely forgetting to inquire about the stones of power in light of their next task.  Right now, time was not their friend.

                “It would appear that we are still at square one,” Eun Mi sighed, just as stumped as the others as to how to get into the palace.

                “I could probably shadow walk there, but if any of the doors are closed, I’m rather stuck…” Kharin admitted with some annoyance.  Her inability to manipulate moveable objects when in the shadow realm was incredibly frustrating.

                “That would be problematic,” Zhou Mi agreed with one hand resting on his chin in thought.

                Like the rest, Eunhyuk was trying to think of something to help them get in, but nothing was coming to him either.  Not only that, but on the edge of his senses, he kept feeling his construct move around and it had been doing so more only recently.  It was bothersome as it seemed mildly agitated and he had no idea why.  “Pardon me,” he excused himself as he extricated his person from the conversation and headed over to the closed window to see if he could glimpse anything.

               Upon opening the portal, he saw the wall of the building immediately across from them but when he stuck his head and upper body out, he could see up and down the alley to get a better view and noticed near the front of the building, the tail end of a fairly large patrol passing by with a couple of them pointing up in the sky at something.  Eunhyuk looked up to see what they were looking at and he blinked uncomprehendingly before he realized they were taking note of his construct.  “Umm…” he murmured nervously as he closed the window and pulled himself back inside.  “I just saw a patrol pass by,” he mentioned nervously.

                “There are small patrols that travel all over the city,” Zhou Mi shrugged, unconcerned.

                “They were, sort of…ummm, pointing at my construct,” he admitted, embarrassed.

                It took but a moment for the other four to realize what that meant and Eun Mi stood up suddenly.  “They know you’re here…”

                “I thought you sent it away,” Henry stated, glancing at Eun Mi and then focusing on Eunhyuk.

                “I did,” he explained.  “I thought, anyway.  I don’t know how to banish it,” he explained quickly as he threw his hands up in helplessness.

                “Calm down,” Kharin urged as she hopped to her feet too.  “The question is what are we going to do about it.  Is there a back door we can go out?”

                “Probably on the first floor,” Henry murmured dejectedly.

                “You can’t fight them off,” Eun Mi stated bluntly, negating that idea as quickly as possible.

                “We can if we have to,” Kharin told her firmly, daring the healer to challenge her on that one.

                Eunhyuk stepped between them and raised his hands in a calming gesture.  “Easy.  Isn’t there something else we can do besides fighting?  I think we’ve all done plenty of that lately,” he stated, glad that no one argued with the thought, though Kharin’s eyes were still flashing slightly.

                Zhou Mi stepped closer to the door and peeked out to judge how much time they had left.  He didn’t see anyone immediately and he wasn’t sure how much time Dong-Min would be able to buy them, if any.  “I’ve an idea,” he started, focusing on Kharin, “but you’re not going to like it.”

                “What?” the four asked in unison, looking at each other fretfully.

                “One way or another, they’re going to know that we were with you.  Someone will tell them so there’s little chance of us escaping,” he admitted and Henry nodded along in agreement with that sadly, a fact that scared Eun Mi based on the expression that flit across her face.  “But you two can still walk right in,” he added with a raised brow.

                For a moment, Kharin and Eunhyuk looked at each other and then the shadow elementalist shook her head.  “You can’t expect us to just let you get captured and escorted to the palace…”  When they just looked at her expectantly, she sighed and shook her head, “Or maybe you can.  You’re right.  I don’t like it,” she stated flatly.  “And we’re not leaving you.”

                “Of course you’re not,” he grinned.  “You’ll be right there with us the whole time,” he winked with a glance at his shadow.

                “You don’t have much choice,” Henry admitted with a shrug.  “We’re going to the palace one way or another,” he forced a laugh, putting on a brave front.  “We’d just rather you be free when you get there.”

                They all jumped as they heard a loud banging outside the door.  “Zhou Mi.  Henry,” a powerful voice called as the door across the hall was pushed open.  The group looked at each other nervously and Zhou Mi made sure the door was locked before he looked at the elementalists nervously.

                “I don’t like it any more than you do,” Eunhyuk stated as he grabbed Kharin’s hand in his reassuringly, “but it’s your choice.”

                As a knock on their door suddenly rang out, she met Eunhyuk’s gaze and then looked at the others, seeking a better answer.  “Open the door, Zhou Mi.  Henry.  We know you’re in there,” that same voice called as something heavy thudded into the closed portal.

                “We’ll be fine.  Just go!” Zhou Mi urged quietly before he stepped closer to Eun Mi and Henry, taking the former’s hand in his and patting it comfortingly, oblivious to the knowledge that she was Enrhyll’s half-sister.

                In helpless frustration, Kharin balled her other fist and growled before she pulled Eunhyuk close and took a deep breath.  As the door thudded behind them again, the pair fell through the floor and into the shadow realm.  She held her breath as she watched the new lights break into the room and gather up the three they had just been with.

                “It’s going to be alright, Kharin,” Eunhyuk assured her with a comforting squeeze to her hand.  “Come on.  Let’s just make sure we can keep up,” he encouraged, pressing her to follow gently when the white pools of light left the room en mass.

                Effectively, they placed themselves in the middle of the group and made sure they were surrounded at all times.  The pair found that going down stairs was rather eerie in appearance but otherwise just the same as in the real world.  Doors she would not have been able to open were seemingly moved of their own accord allowing them to step out with the rest of the party.  Even when they were outside, keeping track wasn’t as difficult as they had initially thought it might be since the patrol was given a wide berth and they had little difficulty in getting the regular people to move out of their path.

                Despite their misgivings about the suggestion, the elementalists had to admit that it was worked surprisingly well.  They could only hope that it would continue to hold.  It wasn’t until they made their way through the front doors of the palace that they started to become really nervous.  Whether they were ready or not, they were here…

~~~~~~

               In the dungeon, even long after the screams had stopped and Enrhyll and those with him had left, if seemed as if Hangeng could still hear the sounds bouncing off the walls.  For a long time, he laid where he was on the floor, curled into a ball and wishing the horrible sounds to go away.  He was filled with a vague sense of loathing since he was actually glad that it had not been him cuffed to the wall…  At the same time, he would have rather no one have to go through that ever.

                Once even the echoes of the screams died down, silence reigned.  He couldn’t hear anything from the elementalists and there were no guards in the immediate area so all he could discern was the sound of his own breathing.  Eventually, he became aware of a strange whimpering sound and it prompted him to uncurl and figure out what it was coming from.

                The lighting in the dungeon was not great, but it was more than enough to see them by.  Both had been left in their cells and attached to the wall.  Their clothes were in bloody tattered shambles and to his embarrassment, he saw that Eleanara had not been covered decently when Enrhyll had finished with her.  The remains of her robe littered the ground around her, though her pants remained relatively whole, which was exactly how Kyuhyun’s had ended up too.  Except for his arm, there wasn’t a mark on either of their bodies to show what horrors they had endured, though they were both liberally covered in their own blood.

                While Eleanara seemed to be unconscious, Hangeng noticed the sound was coming from Kyuhyun who was still hanging from his one arm.  He appeared conscious, for all that his eyes were open, but his gaze was unfocused and he didn’t seem aware of much of anything just then.  Every so often, what was left of his shoulder would twitch and the sound would falter but then he would settle again and resume his strange intonation.

                “Hey,” Hangeng called softly, trying to see if he would get any sort of reaction.  “Kyuhyun!” he tried again, a bit louder this time, but the effect was the same.  The elementalist just kept staring off into the air, unaware of anyone else nearby.  With a wince, Hangeng shifted his attention to the young woman.  “Eleanara?” he questioned hesitantly, unsure what reaction he would garner from her.  They were in the cells across from him and as such, he was able to see when she came to.

                The same sound that had gained Hangeng’s interest aded Eleanara’s awareness and she slowly picked her head up to see what was going on, feeling a dull sensation of pain throughout her body, remembering acutely every cut and burn she had endured.  It didn’t stop her from flinching at her own vulnerability now or the tears that came of their own accord as she focused on her person.  Her first deep breath was shaky as she struggled with trying not to cry outright.  This was not the time…and what was making that noise?

                Her tears threatened to intensify when she saw Kyuhyun’s vacant expression and heard the piteous whimper.  “Kyu?” she called, her voice feeling raw and raspy and she wondered if Enrhyll had missed healing that.  When he did not react at all, she couldn’t stop the sobs that took her then.

               Mired in the depressive reality of their dual conditions, she did not even realize there was another person present until a few moments later.  With a start, she realized that the man in the cell across from them had been calling her name.  It took her a few seconds to recognize who he was.  “I…kn-know you,” she hiccupped softly.

                “Please don’t cry,” Hangeng asked quietly from across the way, his hands gripping lightly to the bars as he watched her.  “Eleanara,” he tried again as she looked up to meet his gaze.  “Don’t cry,” he urged, bravely putting on a smile.

                “But…” she started to say, annoyed that she couldn’t even wipe the tears away as they trailed down her face.

                “But you is alive,” he reminded her persistently.  “And so is he.”

                Eleanara shifted her gaze back to Kyuhyun with a hiccupping sob.  He was alive, which she was grateful for, but he wasn’t there.  The Kyuhyun she knew and had grown up with was not that man chained to the wall in the cell next to her.  But…that didn’t mean that he wouldn’t come back.  Of all the wounds she’d healed thus far, they had all been physical and certainly he had sustained a terrible injury, but she knew it was something to do with his mind.  “H-he’s lost,” she finally murmured around her tears with a long look at him.  It was the only way she could describe it.

                Hangeng looked at Kyuhyun in turn and his brow furrowed at the vacant expression there.  “Can you help him be found?” he asked at length, not sure how one would get lost in a dungeon in the first place.

                “I d-don’t kn-know,” Eleanara admitted as she wracked her brain for some sort of answer.  It wasn’t as if she could touch him to feel what was wrong.  Maybe if she tried something he was familiar with…but what?  She had a great many memories of him and the others, but nothing jumped out that she felt would be striking for him until she remembered listening to his voice.  That pure, angelic voice it felt like she had not heard in far too long…

                He could sing anything really, but his talent had truly come to life in ballads and the type of songs that regularly made her cry.  One in particular came to mind; a ballad he had found in the music room not that long ago really.  He had only sung it a few times for them, but it was beautiful.  Now how did it go…?  Slowly, she closed her eyes and started to sing in her raspy broken voice:

“It doesn’t matter if I’m lonely. Whenever I think of you
A smile spreads across my face.”

                She did not remember all the words, or even the order of the verses, but she sang what she knew and as she sang, she poured into it her wish for Kyuhyun to be okay.

“For me, hope is a dream that never sleeps.
No matter how many times I stumble and fall
I’m still standing like this.”

                In the opposite cell, Hangeng listened as best he could.  How was a song supposed to make him found again?  Not that it wasn’t a pretty song, though her voice wasn’t very good right now.  When she finished the last line, she paused and he could tell that she was struggling to find the words.  Both were startled when a new voice picked up the next line, the tone quiet and raw, but pure and focused.

“I only have one heart.
When I’m tired you become my strength.”

                Kyuhyun finished up the song that Eleanara started and finally looked up from under his disheveled bangs to focus his pained but clear gaze on her.  “Maybe you shouldn’t sing anymore, Nara,” he murmured with a ghost of his usual humor.

                Too happy to be even remotely hurt by the words, she just grinned and had to blink tears out of her eyes again.  “You’re back.”

                His face darkened as he glanced at his aching shoulder and then he leaned back and rested his head against the wall as he forced his expression to relax.  “Yeah, but what do we do now?”  No way was he going to admit he wouldn’t be able to endure that again.  It had almost broken him…  Another sidelong glance at his arm prompted him to add the thought that it had almost broken him in more ways than one.

                As it was impossible to tell how much time had passed since they’d been down here, they had no way of knowing what time it was.  Hunger may have been a good indication but neither was hungry in the least and Hangeng seemed as unable to tell the difference in time as they were.

                Eleanara finally gained control over her tears and Kyuhyun pushed the phantom ache in his arm to the back of his mind.  He didn’t know what he would feel or how he would act when he saw Enrhyll again, but he was going to pay.  As his mind wandered down that dark path, Hangeng relayed his thanks to Eleanara for saving his life and told what he knew of the others.

                For now, it was enough to know that the others were alive.  The only one they had no confirmation of was Siwon, but if the rest of them were alive, then he had to be as well.  For the time being, all they could do was cling to their sanity as best they could and pray for just a little luck.

(a/n:  Yay!  Hello to my wonderful readers!  I hope you enjoyed this update.  It was really very pleasant for me to write with just a little bit of fluff.  ^_^  I particularly enjoyed using the song in this update as well.  It wasn't one that I'd heard before and if you haven't seen it (silly I know) it's called Hope Is A Dream That Doesn't Sleep.  I thought it sort of fit the scene, romantic leanings aside.

I know the past couple updates were a bit on the dark side so I'm hoping this one helped to lift the spirits just a bit.  If you're inclined, I would love to know what you think, otherwise, just enjoy reading!  Thank you to my readers, silent and otherwise and especially to my commentors.  <3  Your words mean so much to me!  Take care and have an awesome day/night!)