CHAPTER ONE
FAIRY CELEBRATION
The music was light and airy with a subtle primitive beat. The lights were rainbows mirroring the kaleidoscope of flowers all around the room. Mira had outdone herself making the guild a fairy paradise. Tonight was the first day of spring and Everyone was healed up from the dragon invasion at the Grand Magic Games. It was a perfect time for a party. At least that's what Mira had decided and when the she-demon decided it was time for a party, well who in their right minds was going to argue.
Yes, it was a perfect fairy wonderland and Evergreen was wearing the absolute perfect fairy queen dress.
She stood in the doorway ready to make her perfect entry into the fairy wonderland when she saw it.
Erza, also known as Titania, sat in a flower encrusted throne wearing a divine dress of greens and browns that actually bloomed at the shoulders and wrists. Her hair was woven into a flower encrusted intricate red crown around her head.
Evergreen's nails bit into her palms. Always...ALWAYS, Erza one upped her.
Erza had won Pandemonium single handed. Erza had taken out Minerva on a near broken leg which was still not healed, probably the reason for the elaborate throne...Mira would be trying to keep her old rival off that leg until it fully healed.
Although everyone had suffered during the dragon invasion, the five that had faced off in the free for all were still the worst for wear. Laxus still flinched when he breathed too deeply, going toe to toe with a Wizard Saint was not something one got over in a week.
If only Evergreen had been on one of the Fairy Tail teams, if only she had arrived earlier...if only she had beaten Erza during Laxus' regrettable attempt to take over Fairy Tail...if only...if only everyone would see her for the fairy queen she knew herself to be.
But...even her friends sometimes referred to Erza as Titania and, honestly, who could blame them. Evergreen hadn't even been chosen for the S-Class trials and Erza had been S-Class for years.
Erza was the strongest female wizard in Fairy Tail...but why did she have to be the Fairy Queen. She didn't have the feminine grace of Evergreen. She acted more like one of the boys...but...she was queen and Evergreen was what?
Evergreen turned away, her interest in the party drained.
"What are you doing leaving? You were standing there so long, I figured you were going to make some kind of grand entrance."
Evergreen gasped and spun around, her feather edged fan snapping out to smack the speaker.
Long fingers wrapped tight around her slim wrist, bringing the strike up just short of the fading bruise on Gray Fullbuster's sharp cheekbone.
Dark blue, almost black eyes, narrowed. "What the hell? Why'd you try to hit me?"
Evergreen's face went from mildly warm to flambé. "I...You surprised me!"
"And your first reaction to a surprise is to take a swing." Gray's face relaxed and his left shoulder lifted in a shrug as he leaned back into a more relaxed stance. "Huh, well can't really get mad at you since that's usually my reaction too. Besides, you got Bixlow on your team and he's got a pretty serious prankster rep."
Evergreen's shoulders tightened. "Bixlow is not a bad guy!" Couldn't the Thunder God Tribe EVER live down Fantasia? Did they have to pay for the rest of their lives?
"I never said he was. When did being a prankster make someone bad?" His voice deepened and he bent his head forward, looking at her through his bangs. "Do you always work this hard to find something to be mad about?"
Evergreen pulled back, feeling the sting of the words like a slap on her cheek. "How dare you!"
"Because everything I've said you take in the worst possible way and all I wanted to do was see if I could help." His bangs shielded his eyes except for glinting slivers of deep blue and the shadows obscured most of his expression but his voice was serious with an edge an annoyance.
Still, she had tried to hit him and he was being nice enough not to mention that she hadn't apologized for it, even going so far as to blow it off as no big deal. "You're...right. I'm annoyed and have been taking it out on you. I'm sorry." The words were like ash on her tongue but she owed them to him. Now, if she could just get out of here without embarrassing herself further, this would only rank as one of her top twenty worst nights rather than one of the top five, ranking just below the night she had helped Laxus almost kill their guild mates and the night Laxus was thrown out of Fairy Tail.
Smoothing back her long caramel hair, she moved away from the entrance.
"Why are you leaving?"
Evergreen didn't pause, just threw a, "I don't have to explain anything to you," over her shoulder.
"Ice make fence," growled behind her as silvery spikes grew from the ground and entwined into an elaborated wrought iron, well ice, fence barring her way.
She spun around to face him, hand going up to her glasses.
"Try it and I'll wrap you in ice and leave you." His stance was ready and blue white power flashed over his fingers.
Maybe she was faster than him and maybe not but the way her night was going she'd end up an ice sculpture.
Her hand dropped to her hip. She didn't need to court ridicule on top of being out done by that hussy Erza. "And you're keeping me here, why?"
"Because I see a nakama all dressed up for the party, looking like she's about to make a big entrance suddenly turn around and leave without having even one minute of fun. Doesn't make sense to me. You obviously spent a lot of time on that look so why aren't you in there showing it off?"
The honest concern pulled at her. She brought up her fan and rested the ends against her chin. "Why do you care? Shouldn't you already be in there destroying furniture with your flame brain teammate?"
His face lifted enough for her to see his customary smirk. "Not this early in the party. Mira and Erza would kill us. As for why I care, you're nakama and something's stopping you from going in there and having fun. I wanna know if I can help."
"Nothing you can do." She tried to play it off hand and clenched her fist at the audible catch in her voice.
"Maybe, maybe not but just 'cause something is impossible doesn't mean I won't try it." He stepped closer with a wry grin.
Her own lips raised in response. He had a point. For team Natsu, impossible was a dare not an obstacle. Still, she shook her head.
"Does this have anything to do with Erza?"
Her eyes widened and she quickly spread her fan to cover up her expression. "I don't know what you're-"
"Save it. You've never hidden wanting to be queen of the fairies so I figure you looking like that and refusing to go in has something to do with that stupid overdone chair they set up for her...it's pretty throne like."
"Throne like?!" Evergreen closed her fan with a snap. "It's not throne like, it IS a throne. After all, the great Titania couldn't possibly sit on a regular chair during a fairy wonderland party." The bitterness flooded out of her into every word but she couldn't seem to stem the flow. "No, not the queen of the fairies. She just has to…" The image of how royal and perfect Erza looked flashed through her mind's eye draining her anger into a gorge of despair. "How can I compete with that?"
"You don't." The matter of fact tone was accompanied by a careless shrug.
Anger drowned out any other emotion. "How dare you? Oh, wait, of course you're on her side. We may be nakama but she's your teammate so, of course, no one could possibly compete."
His head lowered again, shaggy bangs shielding a deep ocean blue glare. "That's not what I meant! Why does everyone miss the point!"
The intensity of his frustration was underscored by the rough growl his voice had taken on. She had never seen him like this outside of battle. In the face of it, Evergreen lowered her own voice, unwilling to provoke him further. "What do you mean then? Just who is everyone?"
"You, Sabretooth, Lyon, Laxus-you all miss the damn point. It pisses me off."
Evergreen moved to lean against the wall, her fingers resting near her glasses...just in case. "Ok, since you don't seem to be willing to let me leave until you've said your piece, what is this point I'm missing."
"This whole stupid 'I have to be the best, I have to be the strongest', it doesn't mean anything. Lyon just had to be better than our master Ur and wasted years of his life melting down the last remnant of her to free a demon of Zeref cursing a whole town of innocents and for what? A title Ur never even claimed? Sabretooth called brutality and sadism power. Threw out a guild mate for one failure, tortured Lucy for fun and, in the end, they were proven weaker than us. Laxus wanted a stronger guild according to his rules and what did it get him? Nothing but guilt and pain. You're all chasing something that you think you have to take from someone else. You're only better if you beat someone, you're only powerful if you can beat someone up or exclude them. And in the end all that came of it was pain and guilt when it turned out they were all wrong."
"But, that doesn't apply to me. Erza had the title of fairy queen."
He huffed and pushed his fingers through his hair. "She doesn't use it and people only gave it to her because of how many solo missions she finished successfully. Up until a year ago, well a year to us, all she did was train and go on missions. Our team has only been together for a short time. While she was doing that, you were making good friends, having fun and going on team missions. If you'd been doing the solo missions and all day training Erza was, you probably would have the title of Titania. I mean, come in, you use fairy magic so you would probably already have fairy law and fairy glitter if you wanted it...but is that what you want? Training and missions alone and nothing else?"
Evergreen's hand was no longer near her eyes but instead rested on her heart, covering the stabbing wounds his words were inflicting. "You...you really believe I could have…"
"If you had done the solo missions and training? Why not? But would that title have made up for not being with the Thunder God Tribe? Even to Erza, that title doesn't mean anything because that's not why she does what she does. She does it to be able to protect her friends, her guild and innocent people. As long as we're safe, her sacrifices are worth it to her." His lips lifted in a smile. "Besides, if you want to be a fairy queen so much, why not just be one and be done with it?"
"You just said I'd have to work as hard and as alone as Erza to get it. You're not making sense now to say, just be it."
Long fingers ran through shaggy black hair again making Gray's hair even more of a mess than usual. And hadn't he been wearing a jacket when he first started talking to her? "Look, if you want to be a fairy queen then why wait? Don't let others tell you who you are. No one told me I was powerful enough to beat Rufus. Master Mavis wasn't even sure I could but I went in and I beat him. No one told Fairy Tail we were the most powerful guild when we entered the Grand Magic Games. We knew what we were and we went in and showed them. So, if you really want to be a fairy queen, stop waiting for someone to tell you who you are. Be a fairy queen and ignore anyone that tries to tell you different."
