Stay With Me (Robin + Maria)

Rocks and Rats

*Robin's POV*
We trekked through the woods for a while, well I was trekking... Maria, on the other hand, was stumbling over rocks in front of me. My arm was still dripping blood, but at least I couldn't really feel the pain from the tourniquet.
"Ohhhh!" Maria squealed and pointed at a large castle. "Let's go this way."

"Not unless you wanna get eaten by crocodiles." I smirked and continued on my straight path to who-knows-where.

"But, look!" She leaned over the edge of a small cliff to take a better look at something.

"We don't have time for that." I didn't look at her. We really were running out of time, chances are, someone would find us eventually and we would be completely vulnerable. Vulnerable, in our case, is not good. Definitely not good.

"But there's a castle down there!" She inched forward and leaned further over the edge. A few rocks began to slip over each other and most of the cliff began to shift. Her eyes were worried and she looked to me for help but I couldn't get there in time, though I ran and tried to help her. Boulder sized rocks tumbled down on her and she fell to the earth below the cliff along with the rocks. I heard her horrified scream.

"Maria!" I leaped off the remains of the cliff and bent my knees just before I hit the ground so I wouldn't break any bones that I didn't want to. I couldn't find her under the massive piles of the cliffs remains and I was starting to get really nervous. "Maria, where are you?!" I shouted and rummaged through the rocks I could manage to pick up. I heard her groan softly from somewhere to my right and I could see the fabric of her old, nearly destroyed dress from under a stack of pebbles. I got on my knees and started to dig her out when I finally saw her face that was as white as a ghost. Shaking her gently to try to wake her up didn't work so I looked around. My eyes finally set upon the castle that she was originally was pointing at. It looked kind of empty but maybe it still had food and medical supplies.

I lifted her carefully, being sure to not hit her head on anything. Maria's body felt light in my arms like a life size doll. My right arm held her legs and my left arm held her upper body as I carried her princess-style to the old, faded-purple castle just a few hundred feet away from us. Few carriages were parked just at the gates but they were over grown with weeds and the horses were kept in the over grown stalls just to the side. Maria shifted slightly in my arms and opened her eyes and started to panic. "Shh, Maria, you're fine go back to sleep." I hugged her closer to my body even though my arm felt like it was searing off of the rest of my body. Pushing the gate ajar slightly with my back since my arms were obviously full, we started to the large doors of the castle. The cobble stone pathway didn't seem to be over grown with weeds or anything, if at all, it looked like it just had been landscaped. In fact, everything within the gates was perfect and spotless of anything that shouldn't have been there. Pink and yellow flowers sprouted just at the end just before the gates and the few outside the gate were rotten and brown from lack of water.

"It's like everything around this place dies but inside is the health place." I mused and looked around curiously as I kicked open the already unlocked door. It's like it was waiting for us to arrive, the castle. "Hello?!!" I called instinctively. There wasn't a direct response, but I could here the nearly silent padding of small feet with claws that scratched against the tile floors. I inched in further cautiously but didn't see anything I be worried about.

Many rooms encircled us with labels just at eye level. 'Library', 'dining room', 'kitchen', 'study', 'medicine'. It's like it was labeled for visitors... Or for its own memory. I stepped soundlessly over to the door labeled 'medicine' and shoved the door open wide. The room was rimmed with jars with weird items inside and tubes filled with different colored liquids; green,pink, fuscia, yellow. I laid Maria down on a metal doctors table and rested her head on a folded towel for a pillow, her hair draped elegantly over the side of the table. I searched for something that could possibly work on Maria but came up empty handed. I placed a cloth under an unsteady flow of water from a rusty sink then placed the damp cloth on her forehead. Her color began to return to her cheeks but she was still motionless.

"Oooh, a girl, haven't had one of those in a while." A rusty voice chuckled and hacked. I spun around to find the culprit but no one was there. "Perhaps she's just as sweet as she looks." A clawed hand ran over her pink cheeks and scratched her dirt-covered skin slightly, drawing a little but of blood. A ratty face with whiskers and sharp teeth smirked and examined her body, not seeming to notice that I was there. "Master will be very pleased." I stepped closer to the creature to see exactly what it was. I haven't seen anything like it before. It looked like a little troll. "Take another step and ill skin her right in front of you." It glanced up at me then back at her.

"Who are you?" I stuttered, unable to think if anything else.

"Bugsley, and you're Robin De Noir." It grinned like a fool and scraped its claws together.

"How do you know who I am."

It's lip curled up wickedly and it's red, beady eyes seemed to bore into my soul. "Your kin is famous around here."