Okay, I’d like to dedicate this next piece to Sonya…I’m not even entirely sure who she is, I just remember reading the guestbook and seeing that MY insanity was her favourite story. So, in tribute to this lovely person whom I have never spoken to – you may now know that this is dedicated to you and you alone! Arigatoo, Sonya-sama!

by Celeste Goodchild

The King and Queen had offered them all accommodation in their castle, and after few minutes of silent deliberation, Kunzite had accepted for all of them. They had all been roomed separately, but in rooms that were joined by a lounge room which all their rooms opened off from.

The night had passed without incident, and the guests were fed well before being informed they were appointed to see the king and queen that afternoon. Lunch would be in the great hall, before they would be lead to the audience chamber in the castle.

Until then, they were free to explore the castle grounds, and indeed, all of Avalon.

Kunzite wandered through the beautiful gardens, all of a sudden aching desperately for Zoisite. He couldn’t help it…any thing of beauty he saw, he thought of Zoisite. He compared it to Zoisite, to see which was more beautiful…and there was always one winner.

Well, maybe the single voter’s kind of biased, he thought to himself, chuckling slightly. He picked the rose, and inhaled its gentle scent.

"They’re beautiful, aren’t they?" asked a voice at his side, and he turned to face the speaker. The voice was tinged with a thick Scottish accent, and was female, and held wisdom and age. As he looked at the speaker, he recognised her as one of the unusual ensemble whom had been present at breakfast. "Princess Katharine, it is wonderful to see you again."

She smiled, her kind old face only slightly lined by age. "You too, Lord Kunzite…or is it King? I am unsure how to address you…"

"Just Kunzite will be fine, your highness," he replied, and she laughed merrily, her cloak moving as she gestured with her arms.

"Then you must simply call me Katharine, Kunzite. Otherwise, it would not be proper. So, what do you think of Avalon’s gardens?"

"They remind me of my greatest love."

She raised an eyebrow, and he saw a wave of sorrow cross her face. "Did I say something wrong?"

"No," she murmured, still appearing melancholy. "You just reminded me of a great friend…the Magus. To tell you the truth, you actually look a little like him…"

The voice of the aged, regal woman wore off, and he felt a tug at his heartstrings when he saw the great sadness that was enveloping her like a cool blanket.

"I’m sorry…"

"For what?" asked Katharine, looking up. "You didn’t mean to look like the Magus…and it doesn’t matter that you brought the subject up, either. I like to be reminded of him…he was a true and wise friend…"

Katharine now seemed lost in another world, another time. Kunzite quietly stood, and moved further into the gardens.

"You are Lord Kunzite?"

He turned to find a woman with china-blue eyes in a china doll face, her hair a such a pale blue it was almost white. She smiled tentatively at him, and extended a hand in ritual greeting. "I am Florence, Lady of the Lake. I am one of Oberon’s children."

Kunzite nodded, shaking her hand. He was surprised at the bolt of electricity that shot up his arm at her very touch. "It is nice to meet you, fair lady."

She nodded faintly, and walked away, leaving Kunzite alone.

g g g

Usagi and Mamoru, still dressed as Selenity and Endymion, wandered the opposite side of the gardens, hand in hand. "This place reminds me of the Moon Kingdom…well, what I can remember of it, at least," said Usagi in a whisper, her eyes wide.

Mamoru chuckled at the innocence of the younger girl – and for not the first time, he wondered how on earth it was that he of all people had ended up being the one the reincarnated Moon Child had fallen in love with. He knew that though he was basically good-hearted, there was a purity in this woman that he could not match.

Sometimes, he wondered if his own slight darkness affected her in any way. He didn’t think he could live with himself if this were true. "It is beautiful…"

Usagi smiled beatifically at the other man, and began to hum to herself. It was at this point the pair were startled by a voice from behind them.

"Good morning, children."

Turning about, they saw an amused-looking woman regarding them with her pale eyes, three familiar figures at her back.

Mamoru instantly pulled a hasty bow, his bangs falling in his eyes as he did so. "Your Highness, forgive our rudeness…"

Usagi was a little taken aback, but she inclined her head forward slightly, looking at Mamoru out the side of her eye as she did so.

A low chuckle from the woman caused them to look up again. "Really, Prince Endymion, Princess Selene, you don’t have to be so formal. It is I who interrupted your morning stroll, not the other way around. So, it is I who should apologise to you."

Mamoru smiled slightly, still unnerved by the woman’s natural gentility and grace. He had scarce memories of his own regal lifetime back on ancient Imperial Terra, and those memories were mainly of Selene, not how to behave in front of other regal sovereigns. "My queen, you can…you can just call us Mamoru and Usagi, if you like. Endymion and Selene are our old names, like Kunzite’s name of Adonis."

Titania nodded, her eyes smiling though her lips never moved. She turned back to her three companions, the until-now silent Weird Sisters. "Luna, Selene, Phoebe – leave us. I do believe that it is your turn to watch over the Puck."

The three nodded, and vanished a second later. Usagi had to giggle. "Why can’t we ever get rid of those three that easily?!"

Titania laughed, a high, fluted sound. "I take it you don’t have a very good relationship with my three children. That’s not to unusual I suppose. Most humans have trouble dealing with them, though I don’t think they mean to be so antagonistic."

"I would sincerely hope not," Mamoru remarked dryly, and luckily, Titania didn’t seem to take offence at the comment. Seeming to ignore it, she inclined a slender hand outward, towards the gardens. "Have you had much time to look about the gardens, Mamoru and Usagi?"

"No, not really, but they’re very beautiful," Usagi said excitedly, and Mamoru smiled affectionately at the younger girl. She had such a buoyant personality, it was hard to be around her and not feel…alive.

He took her hand again, squeezing it tightly. She cast him a brief adoring glance before looking back to the queen, her blue eyes wide and shining. "Queen Titania-sama, may we look over all of Avalon?"

"Why, surely," Titania replied in her dulcet tones, her lips finally curving into a smile to match that of her piercingly cerulean eyes. "Treat my home as you would your own, little Princess Usagi. After all, you and your friends are honoured guests in my land. You are quite welcome to tour my home as you wish."

"ALL RIGHT!" screeched Usagi suddenly, in a manner definitely not befitting the calm and restraint of a princess. She raced off down the avenue before the castle, running surprisingly well in her high heels, that were hidden beneath the graceful folds of the silken dress. She suddenly halted, and powered back up to where Titania and Mamoru still stood. Mamoru noticed at that point that even though he was a tall person himself, he was still only just eye level with the fairy queen. Titania literally dwarfed the petite Usagi, though the queen was indeed much shorter than her husband.

Usagi, forever the hurricane, grabbed Mamoru’s hand and shrieked "Mamo-chaaaaaaaaaaan! Come on, I want you to come see the gardens, too! They’re beautiful, I just know they are! And it’ll be so romantic! Just you and me, no Luna spying on us, no Rei-chan interrupting us whenever things get good…"

Usagi’s incessant babble faded as she yanked the man further down into the castle compound, and Titania watched them leave, shaking her head ever so slightly. Children…

g g g

All in all, it was actually very difficult to see where the next few days actually went to. The mornings so swiftly became the afternoons became evenings, evenings became mornings…it wasn’t until the third morning that Kunzite finally, rather belatedly, realised that in the course of their stay, he hadn’t actually done anything towards finding what had happened to Nepheline Syenite.

Shocked by his own lack of motivation, he could only stare at his reflection in the mirror for about five minutes. The sunlight poured in through the windows, casting warmth over his bare shoulders, but still, a small seed of doubt had been planted in his mind.

He didn’t know if he was being silly or not. After all, the stress of the last few months had been a real downer, and this sojourn in Avalon had been like a mini-vacation…it was no wonder he was getting side-tracked.

But it’s not a vacation, and surely that’s the problem…I’m not thinking straight.

The realisation hit him hard – truthfully, he hadn’t really dwelt on the problem of Nepheline Syenite or her new situation as Circe in any noticeable way. Sure, he had thought about her, but he had always brushed it off. Some member of the Third Race was always about, wanting to talk, wanting to demonstrate something or have something demonstrated to them…

Thinking about it, it was really very odd how he always had something else to do here on Avalon, rather that what he had come to do. It was just a tad coincidental, actually…

A small gasp escaped his throat as he realised that it was far from coincidental. It was stupid, he suddenly realised. Just plain carelessness – he was slipping. Being out of the Kingdom meant he was losing his touch, he was losing his paranoia, his insight. Usually he had been able to see right through people and their false motives, but this…this was proof that he was most definitely slipping.

As he conjured up a new outfit, he did have to give himself one excuse – without the influence of the strangely disturbing world of the Dark Kingdom, a world of fear and treason, it was hardly surprising he was losing his insight. After all, trust was rampant here. There was no need for the misguided suspicions he had once entertained on a daily basis…

"Is something wrong, Lord Kunzite?"

He almost jumped at the voice that sounded from behind him, before turning quickly, his eyes narrowing. "Florence?"

The china-doll girl nodded slightly, a small smile playing on her pouted lips. "Yes, that is I."

"How did you get in here?" he asked cautiously, his hands clenching and unclenching in slight nervousness. He couldn’t pin a label on it, but, somehow, this girl disturbed him.

It wasn’t like she was at all threatening, either, he thought as he looked at her. She was a tiny, slender girl, with hair as pale as his own, eyes china blue. Her long, flowing dress almost seemed to be a part of the air – she seemed no more than a shimmering mirage.

Yet, he was still unnerved by her. It wasn’t like the way King Oberon unsettled him – it was different, more subtle.

It wasn’t until she moved forward slightly and placed a long, well-formed hand on his shoulder that he realised why she almost frightened him.

The shock of the realisation almost made him cry out loud – it wasn’t possible, it wasn’t!

The girl’s voice was soft, almost gentle. "You don’t look well, my Lord. Would you like to come outside with me? I think the fresh air could do you good."

"I don’t need fresh air," he said, somewhat harshly. "What I need to know is where Nepheline Syenite has gone to, and just why it happened now…why not punish her during the infamous Gathering, when all the children of Avalon were recalled to his paradise? Why now?"

Florence appeared somewhat perplexed by the question. "What does Circe mean to you, Lord Kunzite? She’s a child of Oberon , she is not of your kind."

Kunzite sighed heavily, not knowing how to respond. The truth was, his interest in Nepheline Syenite’s were not of a friendly nature, out of genuine concern for the welfare of a comrade. No, it was something else – a gut feeling that, somehow, Nepheline held a key to the whereabouts of his mysterious son.

Florence had moved over to the window, and was gazing over the quiet island. Kunzite joined her with slight apprehension, but there was something severely intriguing about this woman. "Do you know where Circe is?"

She looked up to him, and he couldn’t help but meet those luminous, china-blue eyes. "What does it matter anymore? Aren’t you happy here?"

A small sliver of doubt began to grow in his heart. "What do you mean to say by that?"

Florence smiled slightly, looking sad. Keeping her eyes locked on his, she moved one of her slender hands upward, to touch the silver hair belonging to the former king. "I meant what I asked. Aren’t you happy here on Avalon?"

"What does that matter?" asked Kunzite, genuine worry in his heart. However, on the outside, he appeared more angry than anything else. "I came here to see the King and Queen about gaining access to Circe…however, it seems to me that I’ve been subtly blocked from doing anything…stop that."

"Stop what?" asked Florence mildly, continuing to gently stroke the side of his face with her long, sensitive fingers.

"You know what I mean," he growled deeply, raising a hand to his face to lay it over Florence’s much smaller hand. He tightened his grip, not removing his searching eyes from her delicately pretty features. Thus, he saw Florence’s tiny smile grow as she moved in slightly closer to the taller man, her voice dusky and light. "Don’t you miss it?"

"Miss what?" he asked cautiously, his silver eyes narrowed once more. He didn’t like the way this Lady of the Lake seemed to be playing a manipulative game with him.

Her breath was on his cheek as she stood on tiptoe to lean in closer. When her lips were but an inch from his ear, she murmured softly; "Don’t you miss the company of someone who adores you for what you are? Someone who never questions you, who loves you and knows you love them without having to be told repeatedly? Don’t you miss it?"

Kunzite shifted uncomfortably, moving backward slightly. She was too close for his liking. "I hardly think that’s any of your business, Lady Florence," he said shortly, almost angrily.

However, it hardly brushed her off. She only leant in further, and said huskily in his ear "If you had me, you wouldn’t miss that anymore…"

"Well, if you aren’t the damndest woman!" he exclaimed, trying to push her away. But she was remarkably strong, for her slight size. She merely smiled.

"I am not exactly a mortal woman, Kunzite. However, I too grow lonely on this island…why don’t you stay and play? You and your friends liven up this place…why don’t you stay?"

With those words, she finally moved up closer to him, brushing her lips over his in a feathery soft manner, one that made him tremble inside. She certainly knew how to begin, with an enticingly soft kiss such as that…

* * *

"Need I hear more?" asked Zoisite bitterly. "I think I have a good idea of what happened next."

Kunzite couldn’t deny the implication, though he would if he had been able. He would have if he had been able to do it without lying further to the little sakura.

* * *

The late morning sunlight continued to stream through the castle windows as Kunzite stared at the ceiling, the woman drowsy and contented next to him.

He wanted to hate himself for what he had done. He wanted to feel guilt, he wanted to feel as if he had betrayed that other half of his soul he had left behind in the Frigid River Conservatory.

She stirred beside Kunzite, opening those remarkably cerulean eyes. "Is something amiss?"

"I do believe so," he replied coldly, still staring at the ceiling. "Can you explain to me why we just did what we did?"

"I think you know already," she murmured quietly, before propping herself up on one elbow to look at him intensely. "You’ve guessed, haven’t you?"

He nodded slightly, finally sparing her a direct look. "You’re trying to keep us here, aren’t you? And distract us from thinking about Circe in the process. In keeping us here, you also separate us from the others we left behind, the others who would tell us to persist in this search for Nephrite’s half-sister."

"I always knew you were perceptive," she said, and though her tone was admiring, it was almost melancholy. "The question is, however – how much do you care?"

"I want to know what happened to my son," he replied in a hard tone, his eyes flint solid. "My son is the only thing I truly care about – I need to know where he is, and I need to know now."

Florence nodded slightly. "I suspected as much…Kunzite, you don’t know what it is you ask, but…as you have already guessed, Circe has something to do with the whereabouts of your son, yes indeed."

"Then why can’t I see her?" he asked, looking irritated. "If you want to help me, why don’t you take me to her?"

Florence chuckled hollowly. "Dear Kunzite, you know I came here only to keep you amused, yet for some reason, I want to help you. I’ll do some things for you – but I won’t do that."

"Then what was the point of my coming here?" he asked, beginning to feel more angry than ever. "Are you going to help me or continue to play the games with me that your kind seem to love so much?"

She shifted languidly. "Kunzite-sama," – he winced at the title – "you seem to realise that yes, there is a connection between Circe and Alexandrite. Yes, there is a nexus there, one like that of the Puck and Alexander Xanatose.

"Circe has always loved human children…and she always wanted a child of her own, though she was always physically unable to do so. That was one reason she left Avalon, to find some kind of occupation in the human world in which she could spend time with children.

"The Silver Millennium obviously wasn’t the best place for it, but if peace had reigned there as it should have done, there would have been children Circe could have played nanny too…however, the peace of the Silver Millennium was not to last.

"She was taken to the Dark Kingdom, made sister to the only man she loved so that Beryl could keep her in line, and was cheated once more out of any chance of having a child of her own. Which is why she turned to Alexandrite, your son.

"He only lived a short time, yet Circe grew so attached to him, becoming as much of a mother to him as Morganite. Then, Morganite took the child away, and hid him deeply in the human world…

"There is only one person who knows what happened to Alexandrite. Morganite. And only Circe can restore him once more, to act as a kind of mother to him…for to restore Alexandrite, Morganite must die." She shrugged. "Those are the rules, Kunzite-sama. Circe is the only one who can protect and serve Alexandrite as he needs it, and only Morganite’s life and death can bring him back."

"Why Circe?" asked Kunzite curiously.

"There are reasons," she replied off-handedly, though she didn’t seem on the verge of going into any depth about these "reasons." "She is the one who has been chosen to be the Mother to Alexandrite. She may not have been instrumental in his creation, but Queen Titania has her reasons, and Circe will only be released from her incarceration here on Avalon when there is reason for her to be free. And that reason is the preservation of Alexandrite’s life."

Kunzite stared at her for a moment. "Alexandrite is the answer to what question…?"

g g g

As he finished the story, Zoisite gave him the oddest, most silent look he had ever seen coming from that volatile personality. Her head was cocked to one side in an almost canine manner, her eyes opaque and unreadable. "Is that it?"

He nodded, returning Zoisite’s polar glare with his own brand of frigid silence. "That is all."

"So, we need to talk to Morganite, hmm? To discover where your dear son is, the one who seems to be the answer to so many questions no-one else could answer? Forgive me for not leaping for joy. I’m afraid of appearing too enthusiastic."

Kunzite simply ignored Zoisite’s sarcastic remark, instead choosing to stand quietly and invoke a doorway. "Are you coming?"

"Where are we going?" asked Zoisite suspiciously, even though it sounded to Kunzite as if it were actually Morganite voicing this misgiving.

"We are going to return to the Dark Kingdom in order for us all to have a little…discussion. As Florence said, by invoking a separation spell there, we should be able to have a nice five-way conversation, all in our old forms."

"And we’re inclined to believe your little floozy, are we?" asked Zoisite, her voice bitterly acidic.

"I trust her," Kunzite returned sharply, as another doorway warped into existence beside him. From it stepped a well-dressed business man and a slightly younger man dressed in an indefinitely more casual manner.

"This is one Hell of a way to spend a Sunday, if you ask me," Nephrite snapped, running a long fingered hand through his mess of auburn hair. "If I may be so bold as to ask…what is the bleedin’ POINT?!"

Jadeite sighed, and pulled the lollipop out of his mouth to answer Nephrite. "Relax, would you? You’re going to give yourself an aneurism…why don’t you have one of my chupa chubs?" He whipped other lollipop from his pocket, and offered it to Nephrite, who could only stare at it, completely gob-smacked.

Zoisite continued to glare at Kunzite as the other two kings conversed, and Kunzite began absently praying that the volatile little sakura wasn’t planning on a castration. Worse, he hoped Morganite wasn’t going to get violent. It wasn’t really her style, but you could never tell with the unpredictable general.

"So, what are you waiting for?" snapped Zoisite suddenly, though the cultured, slightly accented tones indicated that Morganite was speaking. "If this little…regression is going to help us discover just where our little friend Alexandrite is being kept, so we can release Circe to his care, can we just bloody well get on with it?"

"Why don’t you just tell us where Alexandrite is?" threw back Nephrite heatedly. Kunzite wondered for a moment just why the auburn-haired king seemed so…loathe to find the incarcerated spirit of the young Dark Kingdom denizen by digging through old memories.

Zoisite had remained silent, and Morganite was obviously in control of the body at this point in time, anyhow. "Because, you drunken idiot, I can’t remember where I left him. I faded my own memories so that I wouldn’t be able to harm him by bringing him back to this lousy world of lies and injustice!"

"Yet, you never forgot him," Kunzite remarked quietly.

"No-one ever forgets anything around here," Zoisite suddenly spoke up with surprising bitterness, the verdant eyes clouded with anger and pain. Morganite, however, abruptly snatched back physical control of the body. "Shut up, Zoisite. Kunzite-san, can we just get this farce started so we can all go back to our own lives and just forget we ever met?"

"Impossible," Zoisite spat out, and Morganite hissed back with "What would you know anyhow, hari-chan?"

"Hari-chan?" asked Kunzite, cocking a pale eyebrow. This earned him a glare from the body, though he was not entirely sure who was directing it. From the plain intensity of it, however, he had the unsettling feeling that somehow, it was both of them.

"He was always a thorn in my side," replied Morganite finally, and then threw her arms wide. "Look, Kunzite-san, if we’re going through with this…"

He nodded slowly. "You all understand that to do this, we need to go back to the Kingdom? And that we’re all going to revert to our King states?"

"Well DUH," muttered Jadeite, still sucking on his lollipop. He still felt insulted that nephrite hadn’t taken his advice.

"Don’t worry," Morganite mocked, in a none too friendly manner. "We have ADULT supervision, don’t we?"

Nephrite shook his head ever so slightly, but since no-one was paying him any attention anyhow, no-one actually noticed the deep feelings of foreboding that the starlight king had.

For he had the universal stars on his shoulder, whispering him words of caution and warning, telling him that no good can come of this…

No good can come of this.

Okay, note: "Hari" means, as far as I know, "thorn." Morganite uses it as a nickname by putting the child honorific "chan" on the end of it. Yes, despite what I say later and have said already, Morganite speaks a fair bit of Japanese, she’s just not particularly fluent in it, nor does she desire to be.