Hello! You don't understand my pain.

Whoa, that was sudden. I didn't mean to blurt that out so sharply, but YOU DONT UNDERSTAND MY PAIN. I got into this series last August, ironically I caught up just as the last episode to season 1 aired. Then I read the manga about fifteen times. I love this manga, and the anime just as much. It's tied off at my all time favorite anime with Fairy Tail, no joke. I get so inspired by this show and these characters to do something with my life. But I never get inspired to do a fanfiction for it, which bugs me to literally no end. Because I ship Zen and Shirayuki more then I ship Natsu and Lucy. Which, if you know anything about me and my otps-that's a big deal. So I lost many hours of sleep trying to imagine different scenarios, and I've got a few-but those don't have any essence or background, they're all basically drabbles. BUT GUESS WHAT THIS IS? ITS A FANFICTION! GUYS, I DID IT! I had the idea while rewatching Magi and then I think some book that I'm forgetting which one it was. It can't be the one I'm reading now, as that one didn't mention anything about slaves...ah getting off topic, sorry! Anyways, this is a bit of a darker thought I had. It's an AU where Shirayuki is a slave in Tanburun, and she ends up being saved by Izana and of course, falling for Zen. I ship these characters so much, but be warned as their are mentions of rape and I don't want anyone reliving anything so god-awful. I hope you enjoy, look forward to future chapters, and remember, REVIEW!

Shirayuki's life was horrendous.

But that was the life of a slave, after all. She had to accept that reality and just try to keep going on, no matter how hard things got at times.

She couldn't keep going on like this, though.

So, she saw two choices.

She could end her own life. It was ridiculous how easy it was. She saw ways to do it everyday, and it would be so simple. She could jump in her master's pond during the winter, when it was half-way covered. If the cold didn't kill her, she would drown by staying underneath the cover. Or, she could take one of the many butcher knives in her master's kitchen and slit her own throat. She could go just beyond the boundary of her master's field into the forest and eat the Rosary Peas that grow. She wouldn't even be missed until the sun went down and her master wanted her in his bed again.

The other option was to run away.

She was terrified of running. She had been whipped and tortured for simply being late to her master's chambers one night, the price for running could mean literally branding-burning her skin in a pattern so much she would have the scar forever. Shirayuki hated burns most of all. She could treat herself with herbs, but she'd have to crawl to the woods for that. Once, her master had thought she'd somehow managed to cut away all of her beautiful hair at first glance, as it was tucked into her shirt. He'd thrown the wax of a candle at her, which had hit her on her side and seriously injured her. It'd burned away her clothing and left a nasty gash on her side. She'd healed the wound the best she could, and maybe just in time. She was hoping the scar would fade in a few years.

If I live that long. She thought. She gasped as she stumbled, her face pressing into the back of a knight's cape. She had tripped over her own chains again.

The knight turned and promptly swung his hand out, smacking her across the face harshly. "Do not sully my clothing with your wretchedness, slave girl!" His voice was loud and echoed throughout the chamber.

Shirayuki froze, her head leaning towards the left, staring at the corner of the floor and the wall. Her cheek stung and her eyes watered, but she blinked them back and looked forward again. "My apologies." She murmured.

The knight yanked harshly on her chains and she was pulled forward. The horrible chains rattled, connected to a collar around her throat and her two wrists, both cuffed. The chains were all just one big loop, perfect for dragging her around, but so much extra length was given that she tripped over them often. They had been put there so many years ago, back when she was just able to stand. Her memories of her life before a slave weren't many.

She remembered a warm smile, a hearty laugh, and a dull red color. She remembered the faces of her grandparents, and she remembered how their faces had looked after they both had succumbed to sickness. The nearest Shirayuki could figure, she must have torn through every medicinal book in the house to help her grandparents, as they couldn't afford actual doctors. It would explain how she knew so much about herbs. Then, of course, her first master had been lovely. A wonderful noble, she had offered Shirayuki fresh clothing and fresh food, not the crumbs of a single loaf of bread like her other masters. She also let her read, and Shirayuki had studied medicinal herbs very hard. Now Shirayuki healed the other slaves who had been beaten whenever she could, and had to consume a regular amount of Queen Anne's Lace, which also grew in the forest.

Shirayuki heard the rumble of thunder not far away. The forest. She closed her eyes as she walked, then opened them against sharply as fear of another slap for tripping again struck her. But she still imagined the forest during this storm. Shirayuki would rather go take shelter under the big leaves of the Elephant Ear plant then stay sheltered in this noblemen's home. The leaves rattling in the wind, the splatter of the rain drumming everything else out. And the scents! The fresh dirt, the mud…Oh, how she wished she were there! Soon, she consoled herself, very soon I will be.

The chains rattled, the torches lighting the way to her master's chamber eerie and sobering. They illuminated the big wooden doors Shirayuki had come to despise. As the knight knocked, Shirayuki steeled herself. Tonight. Tonight is the last night he ever does this to me.

The next morning, Shirayuki was forcibly awakened when her master roughly shook her shoulder. "Under the bed, girl!" He hissed, his breath fetid.

Shirayuki fearlessly rolled straight off the mattress. She had been sleeping on the edge of it anyways, trying to be as far away as she could be from her master. She hit the floor hard, but stifled her gasp and rolled backwards, the sheets brushing against her bare form gently. A laughable contrast to the hard, creaky wooden floors.

She heard the swing of those mighty doors. "Please pardon me disturbing your rest, good sir." An unfamiliar voice said. It was slow and creepy, the voice drawled like it was faintly amused. Shirayuki didn't recognize it, which worried her. She knew every voice within her master's stronghold. It was a tactic she used to know which were enemies and which were allies. But this one was unfamiliar. She glanced down, trying to see around her own body carefully. She saw a pair of gray boots, and a long white cape that missed the ground only by a few inches.

"Uh, no, no. It's quite alright." Her master said. The bed shifted above her as he shifted. "Although I would appreciate some time to get properly dressed."

"I only wish you to listen. I come from the royal castle of Tanbarun. Prince Raji Schenzade has ordered you kindly give over that red-haired slave girl you are holidng to his majesty."

Shirayuki's heart stopped.

"Wh-What?! Wh-Why?"

"The Prince has taken a liking to her, and would like to make her his concubine. This is not an request."

There was a silence. Shirayuki reached up slowly, her hands trembling, and grasped a lock of her red hair. She brought it towards her face, the excess dangling down and pooling on her cheek. Her hair…Then she closed her eyes. It was happening again.

A concubine.

"A concubine?!" Her master's yell made her flinch and she dropped her hair, the strands resting against the bridge of her nose. "She's not worthy of such a thing! Hell, she's barely even worthy of the grime under my boot!"

Shirayuki was of course damaged by his words, but she had learned how to bottle her emotions properly long ago.

"The Prince believes otherwise. Make no mistake, she is still a slave. But slaves are not treated to such…ah, grimy settings as this." The jab at the nobleman's home was smug. The boots shifted until the heels connected. "The Prince expects this girl to be delivered to him by no later then the end of this month. That is all. A good day to you, sir." The boots turned and walked out of the room, the doors closing behind him.

Shirayuki's heart raced. Raji Schenezade. First Prince of the Royal Tanburun family, and possibly the biggest threat the kingdom had to face. Raji was spoiled, rich, and got whatever he wanted. He was no doubt, a horrible, horrible slave owner. Before she could think to do anything, the bed shifted rapidly and her master clutched her arm firmly. "Get out from there, you wench." He snarled.

Shirayuki closed her eyes as she was pulled from underneath the bed and across the floor harshly.

Shirayuki took a deep breath. She lifted her gaze, staring at her reflection. The mirror the slaves shared was broken down one side, a long crack running through the left side of it. Shirayuki was dressed in the most the slaves' had-which wasn't much. The older slaves had helped sew pants, as she could not travel with a skirt. They couldn't cover her chains, no matter how hard they tried. But Shirayuki wasn't worried about the chains. She thought she could try to hold the metal over a flame until it snapped, but she would do that when she was a safe distance. She had a sash of old cloth that the older slaves had helped her fashion in to a sling.

They had given her so much, so she had repaid them in the only way she could. While they were all outside now, working extra hard to cover for her absence, she had given each of them a pile of medicinal herbs. She was afraid of what her master would do to them once she was gone-whether it was because of Raji or it was because of her own disappearance. They all had a poultice to heal bruises and burns, birth control that she had been using for the females, a way to calm nerves and stop panic attacks or any trauma attacks, and even some for things like the common cold. She left a long pad where she wrote how to make these cures, and then a book on reading she'd stolen years ago from an old master's. She hoped it was enough.

Staring at herself in the mirror, she realized something was left. She carefully lifted her arms, her fresh bruises aching, and gathered her hair, pulling the bright red locks down to one side of her shoulder. Even in the dim lighting of the candle, it shone like a perfect apple. She looked to the top of the mirror, where the crack had made a jaggedy V shape. She plucked at the edge of it carefully. She winced as it bit into her skin, but she managed to pry it free. She studied the extremely sharp edge as it glinted in the candle light.

She pulled all her hair into her fist as high as she could take it, then pressed the mirror to the base of that hair. "It's not your fault, though." She murmured to it, softly. Then, swiftly, she slipped the mirror through her hair, cutting the threads completely free. She watched with resignation as the hair flowed slowly downwards through the air, pooling down on the floor by her bare feet without a sound.

Shirayuki released her fistful of hair and looked at the mirror again. Her hair was now slanted, longer on her right side then her left. It just passed the bottom of her ears. She sighed, then turned and stared outside determinedly. "I won't be his toy." She murmured. She took a step forward. The storm from last night hadn't completely passed over yet, and it was gently releasing drop by drop onto her master's plantations. "I won't be anyone's toy." She murmured again. She took another step, her toes squishing in the mud around the entrance to the slave's small shed. "I won't be a slave to him ever again." She promised. She stepped forward again, and a single drop of rain fell on her head.

She heard a shout and gasped, turning and staring up at her master's manor. She could see the silloutte of a knight being shouted at by her master through a window a story up. She turned away determinedly. She took a few deep breaths, hoping the herbs she had forced herself to eat would give her enough strength and stamina.

And so, she ran.

***Several Days Later***

"Whoa!" The call stirred Izana. He looked up from his reports just as the card stopped moving. The horses whinnied and snorted, the sound of their hooves stopping abruptly.

Izana's servant looked up from his reading as well. "Well, that's odd." He stood and opened the curtain, sticking his head out. "Excuse us! Is there a…Oh. Oh…" He looked back at Izana in confusion. "It appears as if a girl has collapsed on the road in front of the cart."

"A girl?" Izana stood and turned. He slipped out the carriage and walked forward until he saw what his servant had spoken of. A young women was lying directly in front of the horses. Her body was ragged and thin, and her attire in shambles. Izana's eyes were drawn to her bright red hair, which was a short rat's nest on her head. Her head was faced away, and she wasn't moving. As Izana got closer, ignoring the driver's urge to be cautious, he saw a chain tangled around the girl's foot.

His servant and some of his aids from the carriage behind his own ran up, their hands on their sword hilts. "Stand down, men." He ordered, his words relaxing the guards' stances. "She's no threat."

"Your Majesty, I think she's a slave." One of his aids pointed out, gently nudging a piece of cloth out of the way to reaveal a cuff around her still wrist.

"So she is." Izana looked around. They were at the bottom of a small ravine. Based on the few disruptions in the grassy hill side to the left, and the chain tangled around the women's foot, he guessed she had slipped. "Is she still alive?" He asked, as he couldn't visibly see her chest moving.

One of his aids leaned down and put his hand under her nostrils. He nodded. "Her breathing is shallow, but she is alive."

"What shall we do, sire?" Another of his aids asked.

His servant snorted. "She's obviously a runaway slave. We should return her home, back to where she came from, and be on with it."

"Hold on a minute." Izana held up a hand. He knelt. He carefully took the hand of the slave girl, and pulled her arm out towards him gently. As it was brought into the light of the gray sky day, so were all of her bruises, cuts, and injuries. The sight filled him with revulsion. There were no slaves in Clarines for this reason. The idea of slavery sickened him, and most of his subjects and those underneath him.

He noticed a unnatural shimmer to her skin near a cut. Surrounding one of the cuts on her arm, some sort of sticky gloop sat around it. Curiousily, Izana poked a finger at it, then brought his finger back and sniffed. "Smells like…" He sniffed again. "Grass?"

"Your Highness, if I may." One of his aids knelt and took a swipe of the gunk from her arm. He sniffed it as well, then blinked. "This…is a poultice. I recognize it from the one time Garack had to give me some for a cut I got during practice."

"Interesting." Izana thought. Finally, he stood. "Alright. We'll take her back to Claines with us."

His aids blinked at him.

His servant gaped at him. "Your Highness…why?"

"I'd like to test my brother one more time, if you don't mind." Izana said with a sly grin.

His aids glanced at each other bemusedly. They knew him well enough at this point.

"Besides. If she possesses talent in the medicinal field, she shouldn't put those to waste. And she obviously doesn't want to return to her home." Izana added.

"Will she survive the trip?" One aid asked, looking over her thin frame concernedly.

"We're only about half a day away from the castle." Another pointed out.

"Then let us make haste. We'll give her some food and water, then continue on."

"Sir." The aids saluted and went to work while Izana and his servant walked back to his carriage.

As they settled again in their carriages, his servant asked; "Izana, are you sure about this?"

Izana's lazy smile melted as he stared out the window, at the trail down the ravine the girl had left. "I am. I need Zen to understand the rulings of our neighboring countries. This girl should help him do this."

"He will not like it. Zen hates the concept of slavery more than you do, if I may."

Izana nodded. "Yes, I know. It is a test of his will as well, then."

The servant looked unsure, but then finally sighed as the carriage began to rumble into motion again. Behind them, the other horses for the other carriages rocked into motion as well, based on their hoof prints. "As you wish, Your Highness."

Zen wasn't sure what to expect. He paced back and forth in his brother's room, occasionally glancing out the wall of windows to see the progression of the storm clouds cover the Capital. His cape fluttered behind him annoyingly, he wished he could just be rid of it. He had been sitting for about two hours, and then he stood for about an hour, and now his pacing had lead him back and forth for fifteen minutes.

Finally, the door creaked open.

Zen turned. "Lord Brot-" He cut himself off as a girl with red hair was tossed into the room.

"Zen. A present." Izana said from the doorway. "This girl is a runaway slave, found at the border of Tanbarun. She's in pretty bad shape."

Zen studied the girl while taking in his older brother's words. While the color was bright and beautiful, her hair was a tangled mess on her head, unevenly cut as if it had been slashed off. Her face was gaunt, her eyes open but dulled and dim. They looked up at him pitifully and resigned, the depths of green haunting. Fresh clothing given to her by Izana, no doubt, hung off her frame like a curtain. A loop of chains connected a collar on her neck to a single cuff on each wrist. She didn't bother to get up. She looked at Zen, then down at the floor.

Zen's shock gave way to horror when he saw the tear run down her face. It slipped off her chin and hit the carpet, leaving a dark stain in its threads. "Lord Brother! What is the meaning of this?!" He shouted, his voice echoing around the hall. The girl winced, and he rushed towards her.

"It is as I said. She is yours to do with now, Zen." Izana said. "I've still got work to do. I'll talk to you later." With that, the First Prince of Clarines turned and closed the door behind him.

Zen knelt in front of the girl. He stared up at the door in part anger, part disbelief, part shock. "What…How can he…" He shook his head and tried to clear his head of anger. He looked down at the girl. "Are you alright?" He lifted his voice, being gentle. He reached down, wanting to help her stand. He stopped when she winced away from his hands, however. "I won't hurt you, I promise." He murmured. He carefully gripped her bony shoulders, and carefully lifted the girl.

She winced as he did so, pulling her up to her knees by pushing on her shoulder gently. Her chains rattled. She kept her eyes closed and her face averted from him.

"Are you hurt?" He insisted. He wiped her tear away with his sleeve gently. He was tempted to brush her hair behind her ear, but he stopped himself, figuring that that was too big of a step to take with her at the moment. She was obviously terrified of him, though he wished he knew why. Part of him also hoped he never found out the truth.

She still did not respond.

"Please, at least tell me your name." He begged.

She slowly lifted her eyelids and looked at him from the corner of her eyes.

Zen sighed. "Can you stand?" He reached down slowly and grasped her elbows.

She winced and closed her eyes again.

"No, no, it's alright. I'm just helping you on your feet." He promised. He began to stand, slowly lifting the girl with him as he did. She looked to be about his age, although it was really hard to tell, she was so malnourished. As he lifted her, his eyes darted all over her body. He saw bruises, cuts, and so many more marks. "You need medical attention." He deduced once they were standing. "Urgently. I will call for a healer immediately."

She stared at him, her eyes wide and not understanding.

Zen realized how close their faces were and blushed. "Ah." He leaned back and turned his head to cough. "C-Can you stand on your own?" Carefully, he began to let her elbows go. For a shaky moment she stumbled, but Zen caught her elbow again. "Easy, now. Don't strain yourself." He released her elbows again and hesitated. When she didn't show signs of falling over, he let go and stepped back.

She brought her hands close to her chest, her chains rattling. She stared at him in confusion.

Zen's gaze hardened at the sight of her chains. Without thinking, he unshealthed his sword. He lifted his sword high over his head, wrapping his hands aroung the ivory hilt, the emblem of Clarines brushing his thumb. He swung down heavily.

The girl stepped back with a whimper of fear, but then froze as a piece of metal gently tapped against one of her wrist collars. She stared in awe, as her chains loosened. The link Zen had broken clattered to the ground, leaving two pieces dangling. One was about a foot away from her wrist, the other was slowly slipping through the loop on her neck.

There was the sharp zing of Zen's sheathing his sword again. "Sorry, I didn't mean to frighten you." He stepped forward again and began to carefully pull the chain through the hoop in her collar. "I just can't stand the sight of these chains."

Behind them, against the window, raindrops began to splatter.

The girl stared at him, her eyes wide as he pulled the chain free. He frowned at her collar. "I'm afraid I myself can't do anything about the collar or the cuffs. But Makoto can. He's the royal locksmith. I'm sure he can free you easily."

The girl grasped his hand, her fingers thin and soft. She didn't grasp him harshly. "Th-" She stopped, and swallowed, then tried again. "Thank you." Her voice was hoarse and dry. "I-My-My name is…Shira…Shirayuki."

"Shirayuki." Zen repeated, shocked she'd even spoken. "It's beautiful." He breathed.

Shirayuki blushed and looked down, releasing his hand.

Zen realized what he had just said and blushed. "Ah, AH, sor-sorry! I didn't, um…" He shook his head. "I mean, um…"

Shirayuki stared down at her cuffs.

"We'll get those off as soon as we can." Zen promised, seeing her hands start to shake.

"I…" Shirayuki looked up at him, but then she started to tilt. "I just…I…"

"H-Hey! Hang on!" Zen lunged to catch her as she fainted.

Zen managed to catch her, his arms wrapped around her upper back and her waist. Her head lolled. "Jeez." He muttered. He adjusted her and grasped the back of her knees, lifting her princess-style. Her head lolled against his chest, her breath ragged and rough. She was so light, it was like holding a pillow. He stared her, his eyes narrowed in worry. Then he finally turned and marched towards the doors. "Guards!" He called.