Yesh, love. I cannot swim but it's a lake so I'm guessing it isn't that deep…but then again, I've never seen a lake before in my life. :C

"We need to research more about this then." Emily spoke softly.

Casey and Emily were sitting into a library, where Casey was trying to Google Kassandra's name, but was very slow in typing since the device was new to her. Her eyes widened as a page popped up in white. Casey clapped. "Look, Vera, it—it's amazing. I love this thing."

Emily laughed. "Yes, I presume so…"

"Emily, are you really a witch…?"

Silence roamed between them.

"My parents were of the witch-wizard ancestors…but me, I can't get past the limit…I'm fully human but I can still practice some spells, they aren't strong but they are strong enough to work most times." Emily's hand ran through Casey's hair. "And for one thing, I'm not allowed to be around witches or wizards that may have the potential to change me…witches can't change a being from one form to the other and nobody trusts me."

"Oh…" Casey's voice was soft. "…and what about the black smith job?"

Emily grinned. "I love it. It may be for money sometimes but most times, it's like…I'm being paid to do what I love the most. I don't usually use spells in the ones I make but I was tempted to…I wanted to know your deepest heart's desires, to make them come true right before your eyes…"

Casey just stared at her. "And you…? Do you want love? Can't you marry a wizard?"

"I'd have to." Emily sighed, trying to look down at her shoes and then stared up back at Casey, both of them forgetting the reason they were there in the first place. "But I'm in love with a human girl."

Casey's eyes searched through Emily's baby blue ones.

"…I'm in love with you."

Casey just stared at her and started blinking, then tears gathered into her soft eyes, and in seconds, Emily wiped them away, kissing the soft flesh of her cheek. "I love you." Emily said, in a breathless whisper. "God, I love you…"

Casey's eyes just burned with tears. "…but-but-you can't marry…"

"A full witch may be able to marry you, we'd still have witch children but I have so little of my genes in me…and they want me to birth witch babies. I have to…I can't just smear my family's honor but I wish…that somehow…you were a witch…" Emily's hand went to Casey's amulet. "Maybe in a year's time…"

Casey's face enlightened. "A year."

"A year." Emily agreed.

In seconds, both of their lips touched, soft and sweet, the taste of Casey's lips against hers…was like a magical taste of unicorns and rainbows and all of these things that seemed so childish. Suddenly, they were ten again, holding each other's arms as they ran in fields of carnations and daisies and lilies, the flowers tickling their skin…then Emily pulled back and Casey looked at her. "I love you." Emily said once more, with finality.

Casey just nodded her head, holding onto Emily's shoulders. "Emily… I wanna go home."

"Then we have to finish this." Emily reassured her, looking at the page that had opened for them and they read off slowly, trying to find a hidden meaning behind every word, trying to think of every possible meaning behind it. "…this just states what we already know." Emily said.

Casey nodded. "That Kassandra killed Sam…but Sam's descendants…actually, my descendants found peace with Kassandra's descendants after Kassandra died? As if the feud was finally over?"

"Yes."

"Kassandra doesn't have to kill Sam! This was all fixed in peace…maybe when we go back, Kassandra doesn't have to fight—"

"You can't alter time. Even the simplest thing that might be done can change the entire future." Emily said, sternly, staring at Casey who looked back.

"Then what do we tell Sam? That one day, Kassandra is gonna bisect her for no apparent reason?"

"Not a no-apparent reason thing." Emily laid her head onto her knee, her eyes shut softly as she took off her hat. She rarely did that but right now, she was sweating…sweating badly to the thoughts that entered her mind, to the thick fabric that she wasn't used to wearing. "…you see, Kassandra didn't just get into the battles for no reason. There was a reason… they say that they challenged her and she accepted. No. This bisecting thing had been going on for a while…before Kassandra was known for being the strongest soldier in all of Europe, there was something before that. When her parents used to own a clothing store and Kassandra's job was to fix the mannequins."

Casey tilted her head to one side. "Continue…"

"You see…" Emily took a soft sigh. "Mannequins took a lot of time to be made. They had materials such as fiberglass, wood, plaster, wax…and it took a helluva time to just make one…you can imagine. She used to be given pictures and she had to make the mannequin prettier than the female in the picture… the body was supposed to be made with every single curve right, the mannequin had to look human."

Casey's eyes widened. "Fiberglass?"

"You know…fiberglass molding…like putting all the pieces together and molding and melting them to make plastic…and there was a bit of wood around the core so that the base would hold while she had to use a ton of plaster and plaster and then cover it with fiberglass then with a smooth layer of wax. This wasn't easy at all but yes…did you notice that when her opponents hit her upper arm, she has not as much as effect as her leg or her stomach? That's 'cause of that…the exercise she's giving her upper shoulders when she works on them…me as well. A black smith that has a few extra muscles looped in her arms." Emily grinned.

"Back to the story…" Casey tried to rev Emily out of her thoughts.

"Hmm…oh yes." Emily sighed softly. "That was what she was. She was just that. She made mannequins…that seemed to be it for her. That was the only thing she was classified as but she was the best as what she did and they all knew it. It came to the point where she had to make more than 10 a day."

"But that seems impossible!" Casey exclaimed.

"Exactly." Emily said, looking down at the floor. "I blame the pressure but she snapped. You know what she did? There was this one girl called Tamara that walked into the shop…and she was asking for a mannequin from her. Kassandra just stood up and didn't slap her, didn't punch her, didn't even speak to her, she grabbed the knife and—"

"Oh God no." Casey muttered under her breath.

"Threatened Tamara."

"Oh…she didn't kill her?" Casey had a sense of relief wash over her. "Then what happened?"

"…then she told her to live underneath the cellar. You know how mannequins are, incredibly thin…Tamara starved to death. Kassandra could use the body as a base…plastered it…and painted it over then the plastic and then the wax…painted over the face so that it didn't look like Tamara…it was her face structure but the face was different."

"She killed her." Casey repeated.

"Yes. And she kept on doing it until—"

"Daddy found out." Casey finished the sentence.

"Gave her the most brutal form of punishment. The battles…she's fighting for her life and people don't even realize the background stories of these people that go into these battles." Emily played with a huge tuft of her hair. "…Casey?"

"…I wanna know," Casey shut her eyes, 'if Kassandra enjoyed any of that…?"

"She liked it. She liked stripping them…she didn't do necrophilia but she did a lot of gruesome stuff to the corpse. Like cutting it open and she also froze to death, Tamara froze to death. She had to stand and freeze to death and Kassandra had to warm up the flesh at the arms to move them into any position she wanted…didn't you notice that her mannequins kept looking more and more…" Emily tried to look for a word.

"Disturbed. Like as if they've been killed…" Casey stared at Emily. "How do you know all this?"

"'Cause I work as a black smith. Her family was well known to get my witch-infested jewelry…and I snuck in a look. I could notice the difference between these 'new' mannequins and the 'others'. Hid out for a while but there is humanity in this girl. It's obvious there is…it just needs to be released from her. Besides," Emily grinned for a moment. "She knows she can kill your father…there's that humanity in her that keeps her from doing it. It's not that she's scared that the entire Roman court will turn against her…the law does state that if the father is assassinated, then she'd come into royalty. And she didn't need to fight him. She was smart…she just didn't do it."

"The question is why didn't she do it?" Casey asked. "My Father has been treated peasants like her like shit for years…"

Emily nodded her head. "True." She simply shook her head. "She's not afraid of running an empire. She isn't. She's not afraid of anyone assassinating her. She just doesn't want to sacrifice that little piece of humanity left in her…"

Casey's eyes were soft with life. "…maybe there's hope for the world after all."

Emily nodded. "Oh, you have no idea, dragonfly."

Sam's eyes slowly peered open to see the eyes of Kassandra, who was pacing here and there. They were still in the woods…somewhere in a cavern…and God, it was so damp…Sam's eyes peered towards the exit. "Hmm?" she asked, looking over at Kassandra who was grinning a smirking grin.

"…how did you sleep, child?"

"…you knocked me out."

Sam pressed her head towards the cavern's stone…looking down at her body, which was adorned by a thick blanket… "Can I have clothes?"

Kassandra threw a bunch of clothing towards her. "I'm not leaving."

"But—"

"…then stay that way."

"…you're not very nice." Sam spat out once more, staring down at the clothing.

"Nothing I haven't seen." Kassandra's smirk widened.

Sam's eyes widened as she hid under the blankets, trying to hide the heat that was rushing badly to her face. Sam peered out of the blanket, where Kassandra was looking over the cavern, as if being a lookout for a moment. "If Emily and Casey aren't looking for you, then I'm guessing that we can stay for two days…but if they are, then I'm guessing we can last until daybreak."

"What are you going to do to you?"

"…what am I not going to do to you?"

The way she said it made the hairs on the back of Sam's neck stand… two set of eyes meeting each other in the dark.

"Why?" Sam asked.

"Because I simply can." Kassandra sighed, sitting down beside her. "Not very smart, are we?"

"…I just don't want to use my head…just because I simply can." Sam replied, in the same tone that Kassandra used. "How can you take joy in this?"

"It's the ability to be powerful. That's the best part…you are now my creation, my mannequin, and I will make you mine."

Did that just make sense only in my head? XP. Oh well. :3