among the fields of gold
Characters: Gildarts Clive, Ur Milkovich, Ivan Dreyar, Laxus Dreyar
Summary: They were ancient but their hearts still broke.
Even in the moonlight, the armours shone.
The man's armour was golden, contrasting with his reddish hair and his black coat. He was tall and his stature was intimidating. Compared to him, the woman in her silver armour seemed nearly frail. However, they were known as two of the strongest warriors of the city of Fiore, the city of Immortals.
Shield and Sword of the Council, they had been called in the past.
And this what they still were, even after oh so many centuries that had passed. They still were tasked with the most dangerous assignments, they still fought on the frontlines of each and every war the city of Fiore under the leadership of Makarov Dreyar and his council of elders led. And so, they had come to the Forest of Truth to receive just another order.
"Eliminating?" the woman repeated and her voice trembled. She was Ur Milkovich, a woman who was not affiliated with one of the four main districts of the city. Her loyalty had been doubted until the fateful day when she had nearly fallen in the war Fiore had led against the town of Brago where she had battled the other town's king, Deliora. But this was an old story, one that was to be found on a page long turned. For a long time afterwards, she had been the favourite pawn on the great field between the cities of immortals not that there were all too many, these days because even immortality was not a free pass to avoid death. She had been the favourite pawn because she had had hardly any friends (and the friends she had had were all playing the same part) and those who had no friends had no one to say goodbye to.
"I am sorry," the short man said, bowing his head. "I am aware what I ask from you."
She raised her hand and shook her head. "No, it's quite alright," she said slowly. "It's far too late to save him and he has to be stopped." The moonlight that illuminated her face casted ghostly shadows onto her pale skin and her jaw was clenched. "And the boy deserves to be saved."
She could not turn back time, could not fix the old mistakes. She could not even ask for forgiveness for the sins she had piled up in the name of the council. But although her path had never been determined, she had no idea where she had headed to, what would be at the end of her journey (and she was rather sure that her time on the field was nearly over.)
"Gildarts?" the leader of the council asked, looking up to the man in the golden armour.
The man exhaled, pressed his lips together. His path was clear, had always been. He was one of the Fairy district, he was fiercely loyal and this was what he had to be because otherwise, he would have long followed his old friend down his path. Loyalty and humbleness kept him going, even after the tears, even after the betrayal. (And he had the scars, scars she had not.)
He nodded, then. "Can we even kill him?" he asked because he had been asked to complete this task before and back then, he had realised that killing Ivan Dreyar, Makarov's only son, was not as easy as it might have sounded at first.
(Then again, truly killing an immortal without knowing his weakness was nearly impossible.)
"You tell me," Makarov said and wondered how he could order the death of the man who had once been his joy and pride. But Ivan had long fallen and killing him meant to save him even though he still not wanted to believe this. As long as the man was alive, the shadows inside his heart would grow, grow, grow – like weed. No one could afford this risk, no one.
Ur shifted her feet, sighing after a moment. "I have an idea," she said softly and her raven eyes were empty, just as empty as they had been a century ago in the Desert of the Red Rain where the blood of old battles had died the sand red. (Their kind might bled golden ichor, humans did not.) Ur had been Ivan's sister-in-arms, his weapon sister. She had hoped to see him again, even after his betrayal, even after he had backstabbed Gildarts.
And now, their reunion would be when she would fight him.
Makarov noticed how absurd all of this was and he pitied her greatly for this.
"Okay, then," Gildarts muttered as he turned around. "Let's go, then. The faster we get this done, the faster all of this will be over, right?"
He had known Ur for an incredibly long time, he had found her when he had visited another town (the town where she had grown up in, a town long destroyed by now). She had been the granddaughter of the town's leader but rather than being a brat like other heirs and heiresses of towns and cities (which were really small kingdoms), she had been a humble one, willed to train her abilities in order to be able to protect her people one day.
After her city's destruction, she and her grandmother had come to Fiore where they had easily fitted in as both of them easily made new friends. Her grandmother had been a member of the council before she had left Fiore not too long ago to rebuild her own city again. (Which had been a good idea because while Fiore had always been the biggest city by far, they had gained many new citizens along the past few years and now, free space inside the walls was rare.)
No matter what, Ur and Gildarts had grown up together, had made friends with Ivan during their late school days and so the three of them had visited the Academy together to hone their abilities. They had counted the passing centuries together, proud of themselves and their achievements because for the moment, it all had been more than perfect and they had found happiness in a time where it had been rare because of the many wars Fiore had led.
Together, they had build castles of dreams, perfect ideas of a future full of laughter.
And then, Ivan had betrayed them both and the entire city as well. Gildarts could not forget the day when it had happened, ten years ago. Ivan's mortal wife had died in childbirth and their friend had lost it entirely. He had ran away and no one ran away from Fiore. Fiore was home, whether one wanted it or not. No one betrayed Fiore, no one.
(Not even Ivan Dreyar.)
It had been a terrible day from what Gildarts remembered. The three of them had stood by the window on the highest tower along with Layla Heartfilia, the city's most famous astronomer, and they had talked merrily about Fiore's future because this had been their biggest concern at the time. They all had wanted to lead Fiore into a era of stable peace where children could grow up at their own pace, without being rushed through the schools and then the academy.
(The topic had been especially important to Ur who had been pregnant at the time.)
And then, all of a sudden, Ivan had started to giggle. The sound had been far more terrifying than anything else Gildarts had ever heard. Ur had turned her head, the same sort of shock written on her face Gildarts had felt and then, Ivan had spoken, his voice cold and harsh. "If only the two of you would live to see such a future, no?" And then, he had pushed Ur out of the window before he had backstabbed Gildarts, literally. It had been a miracle that they had both survived relatively unscathed. Ur's fall was broken soon enough by a young woman with the ability to levitate objects and people so that neither the woman nor the unborn child suffered from the fall and Ivan had forgotten about Layla who was quite adapt in first aid so that she patched him up the best she could before she rang the alarm.
Gildarts remebered waking up in the hospital bed, Ur being in the bed next to him and countless others in surrounding beds because there had been a nasty battle and Ivan had played his former allies like pawns on the chess board. Thankfully (and it had been a miracle, too) everyone had survived the fight.
Afterwards, everything the Sword and Shield of Fiore had done was to fight Ivan. His lackeys appeared everywhere in the country and usually, they were swiftly deposed off. Sometimes, they had let one get away so he could tell Ivan that they would come for him one day as well. Because his betrayal still hurt. They had been friends and they had done everything they could after his wife's death. Ur had taken care of the baby between her assignment and Gildarts had listened to Ivan's drunken ramblings whenever the man tried to drown his sorrow in beer.
And this was how they had been tricked, how they had been deceived.
Gildarts had sworn to avenge each and every tear that had been cried over Ivan's betrayal. He could not save Ivan, no one could, but he could – hopefully without making himself his own worst enemy. (Because that would seriously be stupid.) And he would stay in Fiore, would not leave because Ur was bitter and this hurt because he had been the one to sit down next to Ivan at lunch so all her pain, the fact that she could have lost her child and everything else … it had all been his fault.
Finding Ivan's place was easy, especially since it was not the first mission of this kind that led them to the dark castle hidden well in the mountains. Everything was the same as usual, nothing had changed since the last time they had been there.
It had been four years since Ivan's betrayal, four years since he had disappeared from Fiore along with his son, it had been three and a half years since Ur had given birth to her daughter, it had been two years since Gildarts had gotten married and it had been one year and five months since Ur had gotten the divorce from her cheating husband.
It had been an eventful time for both of them, this was for sure.
"Time for some action," Ur muttered, her hand pressed against her forehead. "You think he knows we are here already? I would prefer to have the element of surprise on my side."
"You are shape-shifting?" he inquired although the situation made as much rather obvious.
"Like I said, I want the element of surprise," she shrugged, finishing her transformation. Long red hair spilled down her back and her armour had been replaced by plain black clothes. Ur had never been a master of transformation and she had never gotten it quite right but for a change, the result of her work looked different enough from her usual appearance that she would not be recognised instantly. (Which had happened before.)
For her, there was a lot of bitterness in this entire situation. Ivan had played her like a card, all those years ago. She was not over this betrayal and it was to be doubted that she would ever trust as easily as she had trusted him again. But thankfully, there was a ray of light. Because it had been so easy to trick her, Ivan would certainly assume that she was stupid enough to fall for his web of lies and deceit again. However, she was smarter than that. If she was as stupid as he certainly thought her to be, she would be virtually useless and would be unable to get even a single job done for the council.
The betrayal had hardened her, this was obvious. She had difficulties to trust anyone she had not trusted beforehand and who had not proven worthy of her trust yet. During the assignments she completed, Ultear usually stayed with Gildarts' wife because this was one of the few she trusted.
"Element of surprise, huh," he said with a sigh. "I guess he will be surprised at you wearing a dress more than about you managing to change your appearance like that."
She pressed her lips together and snorted. This reminded her a little too much of her former husband who had not only cheated her but also constantly put her down for her inability to arrive at time when she had been working beforehand. That normality did not exist in her field did not matter to him, not at all. She had ignored these words because she had been told far too many times that she was skilled and pretty when she had grown up in her old hometown, the town that still lay in ruins.
"Ready to go?" she merely asked as she lifted her hand and rested it against the rough wall of the castle. "Because our time is short and I really wish to get back home before the sun is up."
"You know that he knows that we are here, don't you?" he asked quietly. "He would have to be a fool if he would think that the Old Man lets them do his stuff and don't counteract. Ivan may have a superiority complex but even he knows that Makarov is long done waiting for him to improve."
Her jaw clenched as the illusion dropped the moment she could no longer focus on upholding it all. "I know," she said slowly as she bit her lip, "but we have still one advantage."
"I'm listening."
"If he knows why we are here and we can assume that he does," she begun, "he will think that you will come for him and that I will go for the kid. That will be his downfall. You and me both know that while you are more of a fighter, I have advantage over him right now."
"Because you have a plan," he said, remembering her expression in the forest.
"That I do," she said as she phased through the wall without making a single noise.
Sneaking into Ivan's castle had been more difficult before, Gildarts mused as he phased through the wall at another place and quickly gained the advantage (Element of Surprise, indeed) over one of the confused guards. Knocking the man out carefully, he walked down the hallway, keeping an eye open for both Ur and Ivan. He had no idea what she was planning to do but knowing her and her bitterness, it would hardly be pretty.
One of the evil lords had once called her an ice-cold bitch when she had stabbed him within the blink of an eye and although Gildarts respected her, he sometimes simply had to agree. But he always felt guilty for this because he knew what had made her so cold and so bitter.
And no matter what, they were partners and so he was supposed to be able to handle her foul mood. (And to claim that she was never ill-tempered would be a nasty, nasty lie.)
Nonetheless, he had to trust in her because otherwise, he would have to admit that he did not rely on her and then they would have another argument like the one they had all those years ago and he really, really did not want to repeat this.
He sighed as he made his way through the hallways, avoiding further confrontations with guards because the last thing he needed was to get caught by Ivan. It was not that he was scared of the man, not in the slightest. That Ivan had managed to injure him the last time around had been because of the surprise at the sudden betrayal and because Gildarts had never ever believed that he would have to defend himself against an attack from the man he had called his friend for such a long time. (So maybe Ur was right when she called the Element of Surprise a crucial factor when it came to the kind of fight they fought.)
Without meeting more guards, he made it to the room where he felt the little boy's energy. He had met little Laxus only a few times because he had been more or less busy trying to help Ivan after his wife's death while Ur had been the one to take care of the baby when Ivan had been unable to do so.
The idea of the boy having been subjected to Ivan's non-existent mercies for the past years did not sit well with the man and so he hurried up a little, moving through the shadows and phasing through a few walls because he had to hurry up. Ur had said that she wanted to be back before the sun went back up because she missed her daughter dearly whenever Ultear was not around and Gildarts knew better than not to take his partner seriously for it rarely ended well.
Finally, he made it to the room and opened the door, freezing on the spot. Laxus was in his bed, the golden hair bright even in the darkness, but Ivan was there as well. The information they had gotten was either wrong or the mole Makarov had sent to his son's castle was just another traitor which was something they could hardly afford at the moment.
"Oh, let's look at what the cat dragged in, Laxus," Ivan cooed and the false tenderness in his voice let shivers run down Gildarts' spine. "Well, if that is not your dearest godfather, Uncle Gildarts."
"There is no need to put up a show like that, Ivan," he replied, inching closer and closer to the bed. If he could get Laxus and phase through a wall, he might at least fulfil his part of the job.
"You think so?" the other man chuckled. "I have to disagree there, you know? On the other hand, you and Ur have put up quite the entertaining show for me, I have to say as much. I would never have guessed that she would have the nerve to take over the elimination part of the job rather than the less dangerous kidnapping part. I must have underestimated her guts and her anger. Silly me, really, really."
"She always had way more guts than you," Gildarts said although he really should know better than to react to their enemy's taunting words. Then again, this was Ivan and Ivan had always known how to get under everyone's skin and make them listen in spite their better knowledge.
"Perhaps, perhaps," the man replied. "So, tell me, Gildarts, what will be the next act of this drama? Will you attempt to go through with your plan or will you step back and wait for the knight in shining armour to barge in and save you and my pitiful son?"
And in all honesty, Gildarts did not know.
She moved through the shadows with the grace of a cat, avoiding to be seen. The usual guards Ivan had hired to protect his castle would not last more than a few minutes against her anyway but she had no interest in fights that were not necessary. She had to fulfil her duty, had to do her job to preserve the peace of Fiore and Ivan had become a threat to this peace.
She had no regrets about what would happen as soon as she would confront the man. He was no longer her brother-in-arms because his betrayal had rid him of this position. She had no more qualms over fighting him, over having to kill him. (Because this was no murder, this was maybe even some twisted form of salvation, nothing more.)
But Ivan was not in his throne room where she had expected him. She bit her lip and held back a curse as she twirled around, taking up running. She did no longer care about avoiding fights because Ivan being not in his golden room meant that he was somewhere else and this could only mean that he had expected them and that meant that Gildarts was in trouble.
Her heart beat faster and faster as she ran and she heard the blood rushing inside her ears.
The guards that spotted her never got the chance to call out to their co-workers because her ice was fast and it froze them before they could even open their mouths. They would learn to fear her, there was no doubt, and she was indeed a terrifying sight as she dashed through the hallways, her armour gleaming and her purple coat swishing behind her.
She meant war.
Finally, she managed to feel Ivan's rotten life energy and she followed the trace because this was all she could do and she had a plan and she would not fail simple as that. She never failed. She simply could not afford this because how would she ever be able to explain Cornelia what had happened? Or Makarov? Or anyone else who had ever trusted in her?
Running up another set of stairs, she stopped and exhaled.
"…what will be the next act of this drama? Will you attempt to go … with your plan or will you step … and wait for the knight in shining armour to barge in and save you … my pitiful son?"
She smiled to herself, if Ivan was feeling like it was the time to hold speeches, then the situation had not escalated yet. She lifted up her leg and kicked open the door before she rolled over the floor like she had learned in training, effectively dodging the missile of paper dolls.
"I am sorry, Ivan," she said as she jumped back to her feet and lifted her hand before she phased it through his armour and into his chest, closing her eyes because she did not want to see this. "Freeze," she commanded as her voice nearly broke and the ice obeyed, stopping Ivan's heart and freezing his blood and body.
"Just on time," Gildarts said as he picked Laxus out of his bed. "Is this permanent?"
She shook her head, wiping the golden blood off her hands. "No," she said. "But it's the best I could come up with and it will take him about a century to unfreeze and to regain his power. This may not have killed him but it will have killed his pride, as much is sure."
And this was the best they could do at the moment which was kind of disappointing.
"Let's go, then," Gildarts said after a moment of consideration. "You take the kid."
"Laxus, Gildarts, his name is Laxus," she scolded as she accepted the child. "Hello, I am Ur."
He stared up at her with wide eyes. "Madam Ur?"
She raised her eyebrow, unsure as of what to say about this. Madam Ur was hardly a name Ivan would have ever used, this was a name the members of the council would call her by when they felt the need to address her properly and with the right amount of decorum. Hence, it was rather obvious that it would have been Makarov's mole to call her by that name.
"Yes," she said after a moment. "That's me. And, um, let's hurry up and get you away."
Without further ado, they dashed down the hallway and it looked well for them, until a bunch of Ivan's more capable grunts made their appearance.
"Go on," Gildarts urged. "I will get rid of them."
"You sure about that?" a man wearing a mask asked smugly. "They say that Fiore's mighty sword has gotten dull lately, that holy matrimony hasn't been good for him."
Ur sighed, boredom appearing on her face. "Really?" she asked. "Now you made him angry."
"I repeat myself, I will be enough for you," Gildarts growled. "Get him to safety."
"Alright," she shrugged as she continued her run, Laxus still in her arms which would make fighting a little more problematic than she would like it to be.
"Flare, you go after the ice bitch," the masked man ordered.
"Very well, Obra," the red-haired woman said. "Fire beats ice any day after all."
Ur cursed under her breath because the apparent fire user was right. She was the strongest ice user in hundreds of years and she had passed her Tactics and Battle class with a perfect score but when she was on elemental disadvantage, there was not much she could do.
Her purple cloak went up in flames and she scowled as she unclasped it, shifting Laxus' weight to her left hip before she looked over her shoulder to aim and hit the flame woman square on the chest with her ice attack. Ur might be on disadvantage but her strength was still greater. She could still win this and this would remind everyone of her strength.
In the theory, this was a good plan but sadly, the reality was different.
The next blow, her armour heated up to a point where she could no longer stand it and pressing her hand against the plate, she cooled it down too far, scattering it.
"Feeling not so great now, no?" the red-haired woman taunted and Ur twirled around, anger written onto her face. What was the woman's problem, anyway? The fight was over. Ivan had been defeated and there was no use in holding loyalty to a man who had dropped like a fly. Ur did understand the concept of loyalty but not to the point where it contradicted rationality.
"This is useless!" she called over her shoulder as she shielded Laxus's eyes with her free hand. "There is nothing you can win out of this. You can defeat me, yes, but for what reason? Ivan has been sealed away and not even you can unseal him without damaging him greatly."
"YOU GODDAMN BITCH!"
Ur saw the flames and her eyes went wide because she was ice in all she did and ice could only lose to fire. But she would not surrender, not today, not tomorrow, not ever. She had been tasked with the protection of the boy and she had never even considered to refuse a mission, to let fate take her down. She wrapped her arms around the boy, holding him close to her chest and she conjured a firm layer of ice around them, praying that her shield would save them.
And she wondered, wondered if she would bleed the golden blood of their kind, the golden blood that had stained her hands far too many times because she had been the council's shield and sword, depending on what had been necessary. She had accepted this entire assignment because she had not been a sword in a while and she had gotten wary of the endless protection tasks. Now, she was ending up protecting someone again.
Maybe this was truly what she did best, she would not know.
But as the flames approached, licking on her shield and turning it into water, she wondered if the same would happen to her body, if it would simply melt away, if all that would be left of her would be sea water, clear but salty. It would be a tragedy, clearly, but she had seen this coming for years. It had been an ancient promise that if she ever was to raise her hand against the man she had once called brother, that her life would be lost.
She looked up, looked through the ice and into the flames, saw the silver of her destroyed armour. There was beauty in tragedy, indeed. (Not that she needed to be told this.)
"Ma-" the boy started, looking up to her with terror in his eyes.
"Close your eyes," she whispered as she cradled him to her chest. "You will be fine."
And she knew this because she had employed chain magic. If her ice and her body would fall victim to the flames, the counter would be merciless. She would be forever remembered as a sore loser but she had a reputation to lose and her reputation said that she never truly lost.
And then, the flames' roar was upon them and she closed her eyes as well and she wondered if her last moments (because she would die, would she not?) would also be her most peaceful because what did she once hear? ("A dying star burns the hottest.") She had not been who she used to be for a very long time but this hardly mattered because she had gained wisdom on her travels and although she regretted, she had grown on her ways.
And all of a sudden, the flames no longer roared.
Her eyes opened and she lifted her head, her lips finally easing out of the sneer. Her heart missed a beat or maybe two, then, she rose to her feet, reshaping the ice around her. Today, she would not learn if she would bleed golden ichor or salt water, it seemed. Because her own shield had finally made his appearance.
Of course he had arrived on time, if barely.
She remembered vaguely the old stories they told in Fiore about Gildarts, about how he was a ray of light in each battle that seemed to be lost already. She would never deny his skill in battle (simply because that would be pointless) but his timing simply sucked.
(This was why she had shoved her hand into a man's chest to freeze his heart so many times.)
"Took you a while," she stated as she finally rid herself of her fear, of the deceitful impulse to curl up and just accept her death. (She knew her clock was ticking, she knew, she knew.)
"I'm sorry," he said as he bowed his head. "You were holding up well, weren't ya?"
She glared, pressing her lips together. "She would have killed me," she said, looking at Ivan's red-haired lackey. "Leave her," she added, holding out her hand to Laxus. "You knocked her out, this is enough for now."
"She got you cornered, didn't she?" he asked as he looked at the remains of her armour and the singed cloak a little away. "My, my, if I tell this the guys back home. The Great Ur who can take out Ivan but fails with little fishes like that redhead. Oh dear, they will be shocked."
"I highly advise you to keep your mouth shut about this part of the mission," she said dangerously soft as she looked at him. "Or I may let slip that you were entirely helpless as you stood face to face with Ivan and that I had to barge in and save you."
"Oh, shut up," he growled. "And let's hurry, okay?"
"Right, we should get Laxus back to Fiore before Makarov can send out a search party," she nodded. "Say, Laxus, are you looking forward to coming home and seeing your grandpa again?"
"How come you are so damn nice to him and you bully me?" Gildarts asked.
"Try being a toddler and I might be nicer," she said drily.
"Grandpa?" Laxus asked with wide eyes. "Gajeel says grandpa is great."
Gildarts frowned as he looked at Ur. "Seems like we finally worked out who the mole is," he stated drily. "You think the old man will call him back. I mean, we pretty much ruined Ivan and his shabby crew for the next hundred years or something like that, didn't we?"
"We did, she said as she walked down the hallway. "Anyway, how about you bring Laxus home and I will make the detour? I have not seen home since I came to Fiore," she added, quietly. "Also, it might serve to get rid of possible followers. No offense but most people would assume that I would take the kid and leave you to deal with any disturbances."
"What happened to being at home before the sun goes up?" he asked as he accepted the toddler.
"What happened to travelling faster than the wind?" she replied as she took up running. Without the weight of her armour, she was indeed faster than the wind and her footsteps were light on the ground. Her way led her up north, up into the mountains were the snow painted everything white with a dash of silver.
If the situation would have been different, she would have stopped to marvel at the scenery's beauty but tonight, she did not leave a single footprint as she dance over the mountains and through the valleys until she finally spotted the ruins of her old hometown.
She remembered when she had been princess of this kingdom, the kingdom that had been isolated from all this madness. She remembered sitting on her bed and listening to the howling winds inside the valley. She remembered her fellow ice users … and she remembered their screams in the night when their kingdom had been burned down, when she had been wrapped in her grandmother's arms, too young to fight for her homeland.
Her childhood had been over that day.
Childhood, they said, was a kingdom where no one ever died.
And in that night, ninety perfect of her town's population had simply vanished in the flames. Ur remembered the agony on her grandmother's face but she had been leader and leaders did not fight unless the council told them to and there had been no council to permit her to fight as the first attack had been specifically against the council.
The charred ruins were the last witnesses of the tragedy and Ur felt a tear run down her face. She had not been back in quite some while but she had always promised herself that one day, when she felt like she had succeeded in understanding her ancestors' ways, she would return.
Not permanently, no.
No matter how much she longed for the land of ice and snow, no matter how much she longed for her homeland, the past was in the past and she could not live here anymore, never again. She had returned to say goodbye properly and so she stood over the rubble and the tragedy of her fallen, of her tragic kingdom.
Around her, the storm howled like every day but this did not bother her.
Neither did the cold.