Title: Shot of Poison
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: Ianto Jones/Tenth Doctor
Fandom: Torchwood/Doctor Who
Rating: PG-13
Table: VRD challenge - Red, 5_prompts
Prompt: Poison apple
Disclaimer: This is entirely a product of my imagination, and I make no profit from it. I do not own Ianto Jones or the Tenth Doctor. Please do not sue.

***

"I really hadn't expected Shakespearean times to be so .... friendly," Ianto told the Doctor as the two of them walked along the cobbled street. The young man looked around them with interest, trying to see everything at once.

"Oh, they were very friendly -- especially to handsome men," the Doctor laughed, agilely sidestepping a dog that was running through the street. "I've seen the way women -- and men, too -- have been looking at you, Ianto. They'd like to be more than friendly."

"Well, I don't like the way some of them have been staring at you!" Ianto laughed good-naturedly. "If I catch anyone trying to flirt with you, I could very well challenge them to a duel," he told the Time Lord, slipping an arm around the other man's waist.

"Don't do that!" the Doctor said, looking alarmed. "Ianto, these people are very good shots. They're used to fighting duels -- you're not. And don't even think about challenging anyone to some sort of swordfight. I don't want to risk your being hurt."

"Don't worry, love, I won't," Ianto told him, pulling the Doctor close to his side. "I'm not that silly. I know that any of these men could probably make mincemeat out of me with a sword. I'm not going to risk that. If they flirt with you, I'll grit my teeth and deal with it."

"Care for an apple, sir?" A girl had stepped into their path, carrying a basket full of bright red apples on his hip. Smiling, she held one out to the Doctor and then to Ianto, her dark eyes darting between the two of them. "Ye look as if ye could use some refreshment."

Ianto studied the apples in the basket for a moment; something about them didn't look quite right to him. They were so large, so red .... and so very tempting. His mouth watered at the mere thought of being able to bite into that crisp freshness.

But there was something holding him back. Some memory in the back of his mind .... something from his childhood. It hadn't actually happened, had it? Ianto furrowed his brow, trying to dredge up a long-buried memory and bring it to the surface.

The Doctor was reaching for one of the apples, hefting it in his hand. The girl stood back, watching him with bright eyes, a slight smile on her lips. A smile that Ianto, for some reason that he couldn't quite put his finger on, didn't trust at all.

"No charge for them," the girl said, her voice soft. Her eyes were on the Doctor, as though she was just waiting for him to bite into that apple. "Try one. They'll take the edge off any hunger you might have," she urged, her gaze intent on the Time Lord.

Her eyes were fixed so intently on the Doctor, her red lips curving in a smile. She glanced at Ianto for a moment, her look calculating and somehow chilling. Ianto watched, mesmerized, as she raised a hand to brush a strand of jet-black hair out of her face.

And that was when it hit him. The ruby lips, the hair black as night, the pale face -- and those long, curved nails, painted dark vermillion. Nail polish like that wasn't something that had been around in this time period -- at least, he didn't think so.

Ianto wasn't taking any chances. With a cry, he grabbed the apple from the Doctor just as the Time Lord raised it to his lips, pulling his lover away from the girl and wishing that he had a gun, a club, some kind of weapon to protect them with.

"Ianto, what in the world --?" The Doctor's voice trailed off as the girl, with a snarl of contempt, dropped the basket of apples, picked up her skirts to her knees and whirled around to run through the crowd. She had disappeared into the throng within seconds.

He breathed a sigh of relief as he saw that the Doctor wasn't reaching for the apples; the Time Lord was merely staring after the girl with wide eyes before he turned to Ianto, shaking his head and moving away from the scene as quickly as he could.

"Those were poison apples, weren't they?" he murmured, so softly that only Ianto could hear him. The people around them didn't seem to be paying much attention, anyway; they were still walking by as if there had been no interruption to their day.

Ianto nodded, letting his breath out slowly by degrees. "It didn't hit me until I realised that the pale skin, the red lips and the black hair were exactly like the fairy-tale stories of the evil stepmother in the original Sleeping Beauty tales," he said, feeling limp with relief.

"And there was the red nail polish, too," the Doctor mused, his eyes narrowing as he scanned the crowd in the direction that the girl had disappeared. "I knew there was something not quite right about her, but I didn't make the connection until I saw that."

"The only thing I could think of was that you would actually take a bite out of that apple -- and if you had, I'd have lost you," Ianto whispered, unable to control the shudder that ran through him at the thought. "I'm just glad I stopped you in time."

"I wasn't going to eat it!" the Doctor protested, shaking his head. "I wanted to make her think that I would. I'd planned to grab her before I actually took a shot of poison. But I'm afraid that now she's alerted to the fact that we're, as they say, onto her."

Ianto sighed softly, feeling like a fool. "I'm sorry, Doctor. I shouldn't have interfered. I just thought you didn't realize what was happening ...." His voice trailed off; he looked down at the ground, feeling like a small child about to be scolded for misbehaving.

But the Doctor shook his head, sliding an arm around Ianto's waist and pulling his young lover close to him. "I'm glad you did, love," he murmured, brushing his lips against Ianto's cheek. "It shows that you're paying attention to what's going on around us, if nothing else."

"Oh, I was paying attention, all right," Ianto said. "I just didn't expect to be more or less attacked by a fairy tale. It seems that the Master is learning how to disguise himself a lot more craftily now. We'll have to be on our guards even more than usual."

"I think you're right about that," the Doctor told him, taking his arm and leading him away from the area. Ianto looked back once, wondering if the girl was watching them from the safety of the crowd, but he saw nothing other than people trampling those poison apples into the cobblestones.

***