"Right. I'll keep that in mind myself then." Ronan replied about the difference between a reward and being spoiled. "Though Lancelot didn't even do anything; I was the one who picked him up and put him in the basket." he gave a small pout.

Ronan chuckled lightly as Pandora explained a Muggle phrase that she had learned from her tutor. It was like talking like a Muggle was a foreign language to her. "Brilliant. Let's get on it then." he said and led the way out of the flat and towards the street to hail the Knight Bus to Lovegood Lance

End of Scene

New Scene

Ronan arrived back at his apartment with a small crack and a big deep breath of the air that had contracted from his entire being for a few moments there. He waited quietly for Pandora to arrive and thinking about his little Lancelot all grown up (sniff sniff) and staying at someone's house for the first time.

His hands went to his pockets and he began to hum a little tune waiting for his girlfriend so that they could get to packing his clothes for their impending trip to Venice.

Pandora appeared in Ronan's living room with a discreet crack. She took a deep breath and then hugged her arms to her. She looked at Ronan, framed in the doorway.

"Do you think they'll be okay? Maybe we should have asked someone else to take them, I mean, Dora is pregnant..."

She hugged her arms to herself even tighter. Suddenly it felt like a mistake.

Trying to distract herself she asked, "So what first? Packing, planning or lunch?"

Ronan watched as Pandora appeared in his living room and wondered why she was suddenly having second thoughts about leaving the animals at Dora's.

"They'll be fine there Rose. Besides, it's not like Dora is all alone in the house. She's a spunky woman, I'm sure she and Silas can handle them." he countered with a reassuring smile.

'So what first? Packing, planning or lunch?'

Ronan was still a bit tied over from the pancake breakfast. And he had always liked to get the hardest tasks done first so he decided on the first option. "Packing. I don't have much, but I would like to get it out of the way."

Pandora nodded. "I'm sure you're right, it's just that I don't think she even told Silas I'd asked her to take them."

She crossed the room and wrapped her arms around his waist, reaching up on her tiptoes and kissing him gently on the lips. "Packing it is then. Does anything need washing?" She kissed him again.

"Well he didn't seem to upset by the whole thing." Ronan insisted thinking back to Silas' relaxed behavior when he had arrived from home.

Ronan grinned as Pandora kissed him once, asked him a question and then kissed him again. He thought back to the last time he had actually washed his clothes and nodded. "Yeah, it probably should be done. Haven't had much time to do a bit of any of it this week." he replied with a nod of his head.

"Do you want me to make you a cup of coffee?" he asked her with a warm smile.

Pandora smiled. "Why don't you sort out what wants washing while I make the coffees?" She kissed him again, deeply, pressing him against the doorframe, her hands in his hair.

Eventually she stepped back, blushing. "Yes, umm, sorry. Coffee."

She walked away into the kitchen without looking back. She made the coffee, scouring the kitchen for biscuits. She found some and sighed slightly disappointed that there were no ginger newts. She carried the coffee through to the living room and set it down and then went to find Ronan.

"Sweetheart? It's ready." She called.

Ronan was taken aback by Pandora's forcefullness. He had never seen her in such a way and it enticed him. Hair messied up a bit, all Ronan was able to do was nod his head at the young woman and stay in the exact position he was in leaning against the door.

Finally breaking his stupor, Ronan walked off to his room to sort out the laundrey that direly needed to be done. When he heard Pandora's voice he went into the living room where she had placed the mugs and biscuits and felt his face flush.

"Sorry if those biscuits are a bit stale, I haven't cleaned out the cupboard either." Ronan apologized sitting down at the table.

Pandora flopped onto the sofa. After two nights of little sleep, one happy and one not so plus the drama of getting Tajma in his cage and travelling on the Knight Bus twice, she felt quite exhausted.

"Hmm? Oh it's just the force of habit. Coffee comes with biscuits."

She held out her arm to him, "Aren't you coming to join me?" She asked, eyes twinkling.

Ronan sat on the ottoman opposite Pandora with his cup of coffee. "I don't want to ruin the furniture with my clumsiness." he replied with a raise of his cup and taking a sip.

"Ahhhhhh, there's not too much laundry to be done." he mentioned in a happy sort of tone so that he wouldn't have to deal with cleaning any more. That's one of the things that Ronan hated the most. He knew it had to be done, but he sure hated doing it.

Pandora cradled her coffee cup. "Clumsy? That's not something that I've noticed about you." She gave him a sad smile. She was sure that she must have dark circles under her eyes. All she really wanted to do was curl up on the sofa with him and talk.

"What do you want me to do, pack or wash?" She sipped her coffee.

Ronan noticed how tired Pandora looked. At this rate, the two would be so overworked that they wouldn't have enough energy to do anything fun on their vacation in Venice.

"It's a flaw that happens with hot beverages if you've noticed." Ronan replied thinking back to when he had had too much Firewhiskey that it burnt his throat. And that time when he was in a bad mood and burnt his tongue with the coffee.

"Rose you look so tired, why don't you rest for a little bit and I can start doing my own washing and packing." he suggested with a faint smile. He reached out to rub her cheek with his thumb.

Pandora smiled at him. "Well, I put the Firewhisky incident down to it being so strong."

She shook her head. "Darling if I stop now, I don't think I'll get going again. Let me do something." As he stroked her cheek she turned her head and kissed his palm.

"Yes, well I wouldn't want to ruin the furniture." he insisted.

Ronan listened to what Pandora had to say and replied, "Well I still think you should relax before our trip." He grinned kindly when she kissed his hand. The icyness that usually defined who Pandora was had completely melted whenever she was around him and Ronan quite enjoyed that fact.

"Just relax and let me take care of everything until we need to figure out the planning." he said leaning forward to kiss her forehead before heading into the kitchen with his empty cup and put it into the sink.

Pandora rolled her eyes. "Fine, I give in. You win." she told him as he kissed her forehead. She watched him walk away, taking a sip of her coffee. She put her cup on the coffee table and twisted around, reaching behind the sofa to her shopping bag and pulled out a guide book for Venice. She made herself comfortable, kicking off her shoes and putting her feet on the arm rest. After a few pages, her eyelids began to droop.

She fell back into her nightmare...

... Pandora grabbed his hand and ran to the huge, ancient ash at the bottom of the garden. She clambered onto the bench below it and started to climb. Just as she had done before. And just as before there was a howl. She looked up and saw that the moon was full. She climbed in earnest now and then turned to Ronan. “Hurry, please!” Ronan scaled the tree with ease, as though he were a ten year old boy who spent every spare moment up trees. He helped her up to the next branch as another horrifically familiar sound crashed into her ears: the sound of a werewolf running towards them. “Climb Rose, climb!” Ronan shouted to her. She turned to pull him onto the same branch as her, grabbing his arm at the elbow as the werewolf lunged and Ronan was gone, pulled from her grasp.

“NOOOOOO!!!!!!” She screamed. “NOOOOOO!!!! RONAN!!!!!! NOOOOOO!!!!”

She twisted, falling off the sofa and onto the floor. She swore under her breath.

Ronan grinned when she said that he won. 'Finally.' he thought to himself with a wicked glint in his eye. He walked into the bedroom which was devoid of Lancelot and it felt weirdly empty without him. Grabbing the laundry basket and putting what clothes needed to be washed in it, he dropped it when he heard the screams of Pandora from the other room.

Ronan ran into the living room when he heard Pandora screaming. 'Not again...' he thought as he rushed to the young woman's side seeing that she had fallen off the couch and onto the floor.

Hugging her close he kissed the top of her head gently. "I'm sorry Rose, this was all my fault." Ronan apologized knowing full well that without her calming potion she would always have that nightmare.

Pandora clung to Ronan, her nails digging into his flesh once more. Taking a shaky breath she said, "It's not your fault, how could it be your fault? I was reading and I drifted off, how is that your fault?"

She hated that he felt guilty about it. No-one was at fault, it was just something that happened. "We, we should g-get on with the packing. C-can I help?" She just wanted to be near him, so that she knew he was okay.

"I insisted that you sleep and I didn't even think about the fact that you didn't take your potion." he said wincing slightly at her nails in his skin. Ronan leaned forward to kiss her forehead finding any way of comforting her.

"Yes, here come into my room with me." he insisted taking her by the hand and leading her through his flat to his bedroom. For some reason, Ronan's mind flashed back to two nights ago when Pandora had slept over for the first time and she had had the same nighmare. The sheer fear he had seen in her eyes had haunted Ronan ever since.

Taking out his clean clothes and laying them on the bed, he began searching for his suitcase in his closet listening for Pandora to make sure that she was alright.

Pandora clung to him tightly. "I've been taking it for six weeks. I should have stopped by now, I could end up addicted to it." She whispered this, embarrassed by her weakness. "I really don't know what I'm going to do." She smiled as he kissed her head. "I'm just so glad that I have you."

She followed him rather meekly, the nightmare having sapped her strength. She sat on the bed and folded his clothes by hand. She didn't trust her magic at that moment.

"I'm hear to protect you always Rose." Ronan said quietly giving her a smile that would hopefully make her smile back at him. "It'll be alright." he insisted.

Turning after finding his rather beaten up suitcase and placed it in front of Pandora's feet. Taking the clothes she had already folded he started putting them as neatly as he could into the trunk looking up at Pandora every chance he got to make sure that she was going to be okay.

Pandora folded all the clothes as Ronan loaded them into his suitcase. She had noticed the worried glances that he kept sending in her direction and she smiled softly. When she had finished folding she pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around her legs, hugging them to her.

"Have you got shoes, socks, underwear, that sort of thing?" She asked, glad of something to focus on. "I went to Gringotts yesterday and got some Italian Muggle money. The goblin told me they were call Euros. Isn't that an odd name?"

She had noticed the battered condition of his suitcase. "Exactly how long did you spend travelling darling?"

Ronan went to his drawers and pulled out his under clothes and then looked into his closet for some shoes that he would bring grabbing about four pairs including a nice pair of leather shoes, sneakers for if they decided to go hiking.

"Well they use the money all over the continent so it's like universal currency so they don't have to transfer every time they go out of the country." he explained. "But I suppose if Muggles heard such names as Galleons and Sickles, they would think those names weird as well."

'Exactly how long did you spend travelling darling?'

Ronan looked up at Pandora seeing that she was looking down at his suitcase.

"Bout ten years." he replied placing the shoes in the suitcase.

Pandora smiled. "That's a good idea, I suppose it saves a lot of time and confusion. I've never really been into the muggle world, not outside of Britain anyway. I'm really excited about this." She didn't sound excited, she simply sounded exhausted.

"Bout ten years."

His answer didn't really invite any further questions. Pandora wondered if he had spent those ten years away simply to defy his father's expectations. Changing the subject she said, "Have you packed your wash bag? Soap, toothbrush..." She blushed. "You probably don't need me to tell you how to pack, do you?"

She stared at the dark berry coloured polish on her toenails.

"You'll love it, I'm sure of it Rose." he said quietly capturing her lips with his own for a brief moment before continuing to pack.

Ronan then disappeared into the bathroom to grabbing things such as his razor, a toothbrush, some hair gel. Bringing them into the bedroom, he said, "They usually have shampoo and soap at the places one stays at." Ronan thought that downsizing how much they packed would save them room and all.

"Anything else you suggest I bring?" he asked, genuinely grateful for her help.

When Ronan kissed her, Pandora smiled. "Of course I'll love it, I'll be with you." She said quietly.

Pandora wrinkled her nose at the thought of using hotel soap and shampoo. "I can't do that, I have to be careful what I put on my skin, I can end up getting bad reactions. It can be really uncomfortable."

Returning his smile, she said; "Well since that little grey madman caused me to break my bottle, I think dittany would be a good idea, just incase. Maybe the bruise paste too?"