It's only natural that leafs fall into the river of time and make far stretching ripples that effects us all. But when one frost covered leaf never falls as it should and create the waves it was destined to the world will suffer the consequences for this lapse in judgement. Sometimes lesser evils exist so as to keep an even greater ones at bay.


Garden Of Winter


I

The Girl from Among the Trees


Gray Fullbuster

Gray liked to think that for his age he was pretty smart yet he'd be lying if he claimed to understand what was going on as he awaited his master's return.

The morning had started like most others, Ur had awoken both him and Lyon before the sun had even shown any signs of rising before the three of them had gone outside to being that days training. It had been nothing out of the ordinary, the same tedious warm-up exercises before Ur even teased the idea of maybe starting on a new technique but before they could really get into their training a branch snapped behind Gray's teacher among the thick cluster of trees and to his surprise a girl in rags came tumbling out from among them as if pushed by an unseen stranger.

Ur had thought nothing of the snapping branch at first, thinking it must have been a wild animal and only looked to see what had thoroughly captured the attention of her two students so completing when it was obvious that neither were listening to her instructions. Gray didn't need to be a genius to realise Ur seemed to recognise this girl, who clearly panicked at being discovered and tried desperately to back pedal and rush for the cover of the trees.

"Stop!" Ur shouted at the girl in rags as she turned and fled, pleaded with her. "Stay here," she ordered her students over her shoulder and Gray could only blink as his teacher went running off after the girl. The moments ticked by and whilst Gray stayed put as he was told, glowering in confusion and annoyance Lyon merely scoffed and stomped his way back through the snow towards the cabin they lived in, presumably to read one of Ur's old books to make up for the lack of lessons that would ensue in the wake of this strange girl's appearance.

In took a total of ten minutes for Gray's mentor to finally come into sight again, the girl held tightly against her even though she was seemingly fighting with all her might to escape the woman, screaming at the top of her lungs - shrieking words that made no sense or held any rhyme or reason. It was when Ur finally got within a few feet of Gray, face stained with tears that her knees finally gave out from under her, that the young boy finally realised just who this girl was as his master whispered words into the girls ear as she finally became to weak to struggle, "I've got you. Oh god, Ultear I've got you now. I promise,"

This was Ur's daughter. Her supposedly dead daughter

This was Ultear.

Yet here she was, and she looked anything but dead.

The pair of them stayed like that for some time and Gray couldn't bring himself to look away despite knowing he should, that this was a private moment he was invading upon. Something inside of him, like angry jealousy stopped him though. How? Why? What made this girl so special that she seemingly got to come back from the dead. Of all the people in the world, why this girl? How was that fair?

Eventually Ur regained some sense of composure and managed to get herself back onto her feet and carried her seemingly returned daughter towards the house, "Come on, Gray," she said quietly as she passed by, voice suddenly hard with a clear expression of anger on her face as she cradled her daughter's head in the crook of her neck. Gray looked up, watching his master's retreating back for a brief moment before he scrambled forward in the snow to catch up to the woman who had give him shelter and his magic.

Inside the cabin Lyon had predictable pulled out one of Ur many thick books in an attempt to learn something new after their lesson had gone awry, whilst Ur headed straight for her own bedroom to put her daughter in a real bed to rest. Gray spent the hour which Ur was shut away in her bedroom with her daughter going through some of the routine exercises they'd be taught, largely the creation of small simple objects like little ornament-style pieces, to help them with things like their cast time and creation stability.

When Ur finally did come back out of her room, she paid her two students no mind as she grabbed her coat, slipping it on as she headed for the exit.

"Boys," Ur had said as she stopped at the door, "I'm going to be gone for the next few hours and I need you to promise me that you'll keep an eye on Ultear whilst I'm gone and make sure to stop her if she tries to leave."

"Where are you going, Ur?" Lyon had the audacity to demand as he finally looked up from his book before pushing away from the table as he stormed over to their mentor.

What happened next was something that would burn itself into Gray's mind for the rest of his life - Ur half turned to look at the two of them, her expression thunderous and her eyes burning with a fury that singled there were slow deaths to come in the near future. What terrified the boy most of all at the time however was what Ur said, or rather how she said it, with a quiet, tranquil fury and no hesitation: "To punish the ones responsible for this."

And with that Ur left the two of them alone.

Neither Gray or Lyon were idiots: they knew exactly what their teacher meant by punish and yet somehow the state in which Ur returned well into the early hours of the next morning still shocked and horrified Gray; who had waited patiently for his master to returned, seated on his favourite chair by the fireplace. The dark haired woman was sported some minor new cuts and scratches with one pant leg slightly torn and shredded whilst her jacket had be charred and burnt, her face caked with dirt and dried blood, almost none of which was her own.

"Gray," Ur turned to see him as he had tried to desperately sneak away without being seen. It was strange to watch how her stoned faced expression softened almost instantly at the sight of him and so her eyes were flood with shame as she cast a downward glance as her bloody and bruised hands. "I didn't think you'd still be awake. I really didn't want either of you boys to seem me like this,"

He didn't look up at her though, a part of him was scared too because maybe that would make it more real. Gray had never thought of his teacher as someone who could take the life of another, it just seemed so against everything she seemed to stood for. Or maybe he'd just created a pedestal far to large for his own good. He'd been so afraid to look up at Ur though he'd backed himself into the wall without realising it and now she kneeling down in front of him there was no escape.

"I'm so sorry you ever had to see this side of me, Gray," he could only nodded mutedly for a brief moment before his eyes returned to a particular interesting spot on the floor near one of his feet. Ur sighed, though it was not one of anger or frustration it was a more exhausted, more regretful sound. "I'm so sorry," his teacher whispered as she wrapped him up her arms and hugged him tight for a moment and whilst Gray did not return the hug he could feel something went dripping onto the top of his head.

Ur was crying.

He'd done that - he had made her cry.

A sense of guilt washed over him now too and without really thinking about it, he finally returned his master's hug.

"I never though anything like this would happen. God, how could this be any more screwed up?" Ur let out a slight, hollow laugh as Gray started to cry too as he burried his face in the crook of her neck.

"I'm sorry,"

"Whatever for?" Ur asked as they pulled apart, the older woman cupping Gray's face bring his gaze to meet so she could wipe away his tears with her thumb. Only to stain his check red with blood, "Look at me, now I'm getting you covered in blood; some role model I turned out to be." Ur laughed again, this time with a slight smile as she shook her head and looked away for a moment. "I'm the one that should be sorry."

"But I was afraid of you," Gray said and Ur looked as though what he said physically hurt her.

"Stupid boy," she admonished him as she hugged him close again, "being scared is nothing you should ever apologise for. Fear is a natural thing and it can save your life so don't you let anyone ever tell you that being afraid is wrong. If anyone is in the wrong here it's me, as your teacher, as your guardian I should never make you feel that way."

"Ur, did you kill those people? The ones that hurt your daughter,"

"No," Ur replied slowly, purposefully, "God, I wanted too. I wanted to so badly but the one that took her from me wasn't there any more. That man is the one that has to die, the rest were just pawns in his game. Willing pawns admittedly, so I hurt them - I hurt them a lot, but no. No I did not kill anyone tonight." Gray wouldn't lie, hearing that seemed to lift a weight from atop his heart as he felt relif knowing that his master still wasn't a killer but merely a woman, a mother, protecting her daughter after years of denial. Ur was still a good person.

"Now Gray, I need you to look me in eye," Ur murmured as she put her blood stained hands on his small shoulders. Mustering his courage, he looked up at the woman who had taken him in, her face dirt ridden and covered in scratches and blood. "Thank you, Gray. Now I need you to listen very closely to what I'm about to tell you because it's extremely important,"

"There it is, now we're getting somewhere." Gray could only groan as he suddenly seemed to jerk back to reality, his vision blurred to the point where all he could make out was a figure knelt at his side, his head caught in the vice-like grip of whoever cast the shadow with his mind still lost in a fog of memories he had always remembered but never recalled. Throwing up his right arm feeble he tried to swipe at the arm of the person who held him, only for his had to slap harmless against jagged ice and drop to his side having achieved nothing.

Another long moment passed, the sounds of approaching footsteps echoed off in the far distance as Gray's vision slowly came back into focus and the Ice-Make wizard realised that the person who held him captive was no human, but a demon. A monstrous creatures made of glimmering white ice and crystallised blood with great forearms and clawed hands that could've crushed his head like a nut if he made one wrong move, curled ram horns caught the glow of the nearby hovering candles scattered around the edges of the summing circle as the thing stood up pulling Gray with it and leaving him to dangle helplessly in the air as shards of ice cracked away from the demon's body only to instantly regrow as the creature from hell looked into the depths of his soul with silver eyes that burned in the harsh light of the grim stone chamber.

"I take it you've found it then, Deliora?" A man asked as he came around the demon's side to look up at Gray's limp, bloody form: the upper left side of his body burnt a twisted black as the flesh had shrivelled up and died whilst the vain hadn't been destroy but instead seemed to have begun to glow a faint blue, a strange crystal starting to grow out of the back of his left hand as the bones in his formerly started arm started to repair themselves.

Though Gray had never seen him before, he knew who this man was. He knew what this man was. He was the Definitive Demon of Zeref's dark collection: Mard Geer - the King of the Underworld. And though Gray wanted to break free and blast the smug look from the demon's face all he could was hang helpless from Deliora's unbreakable grip.

"Yes, Your Majesty,"

"Excellent, then we may finally begin. Welcome to our little family, Gray Fullbuster." Mard Geer's twisted smirk was the last thing Gray saw before he was pulled back into the twisted depths of his own mind and forced to re-watch his life play out as the demons sought something he had. Something they would get. And Gray was powerless to do anything about it.


Because damnit I need to write some GrayTear because there isn't enough of it and Fool's Advance isn't going anywhere soon by the looks of things. For a first chapter this sure turned out longer than intended, but I'm going to take that as a good sign. Catch you guys soon with the next one.