So, chapter 450 am I right? SPOILERS follow. This is just one interpretation of what was going on, and I'm not sure it's one I necessarily feel myself. But it's just the way the fic turned out. Also some speculation for what happens afterwards.
Title from Saying Your Names by Richard Siken.
Held within the circle of his arms, Mavis wasn't breathing.
For a long time, afterwards, Zeref didn't want to breathe either. He had lived for centuries without kindness, until Mavis found him the first time, and called her illusory animals to his side. He had lived without company until she approached him a second time, one year ago, cursed to live while others died around her.
And when Mavis offered him hope, he had loved her with intensity born of desperation. There was no one else he could have loved, all these centuries gone, who wouldn't be leeched of life in moments. Hope was intoxicating to a man who hadn't felt it for so very long.
It had also been an illusion, like Mavis's powers.
He didn't know how long he kneeled on the forest floor, inhaling the scent of her hair, head tucked into the crook of her neck.
The world returned in small increments: the coolness of Mavis's skin now that her life was gone, then the roots digging into his knees, and at last, Zeref raised his head at the eerie silence around him.
When he'd first approached her, the forest had been thriving. Now, in every direction as far as he could see, the trees were skeletal, leafless, lifeless.
It didn't surprise him. You didn't grieve, after all, unless you valued the life that had come before.
And Zeref was, indeed, grieving.
He encased her in crystal.
There had been no logical reason, no deliberation. However much he didn't want to face it, Mavis was dead. But Zeref couldn't quite accept that he would never see her face again, so he raised crystal around her to preserve her body, that he might return and find it again one day.
And anyone who dared attack the crystal would find themselves drained of energy, then of life. This was no static crystal; it absorbed any energy cast its way.
"I knew," Zeref said to her lifeless body, his fingers on the crystal's surface. It was smooth and unyielding to his touch, and as cool as Mavis's skin when he'd kissed her cheek for the last time.
Zeref could almost feel Mavis's presence beside him, her inquisitive, sad eyes. Knew what?
"That the spell might curse you," he said, half to himself. It felt different, felt like it mattered, now that he was admitting it out loud. "You're not the first I taught it to, but everyone else who used it died. When I met you, and you were so strong and kind despite your age, I thought you might be the exception. I hoped you wouldn't have to use the spell, but part of me hoped you did."
That had been torture. He wouldn't have wished the curse on anyone. But he'd also craved the possibility that someone would be able to walk by his side.
There was a whisper of air to his right, a hint of life, and Zeref turned, startled. But there was no one around him.
"The question," he said, once he'd made certain he was indeed alone, "is why your curse lifted, but mine didn't."
He thought back to their second meeting, one year ago, when he'd first realised Mavis had cast the spell. She had been so bright, so determined, wise and yet curious, and he'd felt warmth curling in his heart. And that had been all. But when his forehead had touched hers, Zeref had seen the way her eyes closed, the flush that crept up her cheek, the way her lips parted as though expecting a kiss.
He hadn't loved her, then. Had she loved him?
Love. The One Magic, the source of magic, the strongest of all. That was, of course, why the curse had broken.
"But was it because I loved you," he asked the empty air, "or because you loved me? Is it more important to love, or be loved?"
He had addressed his question to the crystal and to the ground, and hadn't expected an answer.
But there was one.
Inside the crystal, Mavis's was beginning to glow.
She was still dead.
Zeref cracked the crystal open, to make sure. Mavis's body was as motionless as a sculpture, her heart unbeating, her lungs without breath. But her skin flared softly with golden light, brightening and dimming in gentle waves, gathering in sparks in the curls of her hair, in the folds of her smock.
The feeling he'd had before of being watched reached an excruciating peak, raising the hairs on the back of his neck. It was eerie; it was also familiar.
"Mavis?" he tried.
Another whisper of air at his cheek; a faint murmuring, as though someone was trying to speak, but their words were torn away by the wind. Try as he might, Zeref couldn't hear it, but he knew she was there. With that knowledge came a surge of emotion so strong, he would have destroyed the forest again if it hadn't already been lifeless. His robes billowed in a sudden gust of wind.
"You shouldn't have loved me," Zeref said, once he'd regained control of himself. It was difficult, even after hundreds of years fighting for distance from the world. "You should have let me die instead."
A strange sharpness in the air. Zeref wasn't sure what it meant.
But with the words he'd spoken, another piece of knowledge came to him. An unexpected one.
He raised his head, and spoke where he thought he could feel Mavis's presence. "I'm sorry. And thank you. I know how to die now."
His curse had become deadlier, yes, but his life had been more fragile when he felt love, and so he'd need to raise the one he loved most. Mavis, unfortunately, had loved him even more than that. It couldn't be her.
Before Zeref left the clearing, his grief masked by determination and by centuries of practice sublimating his emotions, he sealed Mavis's crystal again. This time, he added a twist of power; there was a crack in the crystal, but only Mavis herself would be able to get in and out.
If he wanted to die, his killer would have to be the one he'd loved most. It would have to be his brother.
As a boy, he had become cursed trying to bring Natsu back to life. The gods couldn't curse him again.
He had nothing left to take.
This time, he would succeed.
- fin