Faith to the Dark Chapter 4, a black cat fanfic

In the clearing where Wiley had fallen into her slumber, Train and Jenos paced. Both of them were on edge and ready to attack anything that moved. They were still revved up from the fight with Creed, the one who attacked the village. Lynelle was watching them, and occasionally looking at the ground to see who was going to wear a rut into the ground first.

"If you two don't stop and sit down, you're going to make ruts in the ground. People will think that we're going to start a new farming community here. Your ruts will be mistaken for irrigation canals." Train smirked at Lynelle and sat down on the ground behind her. Now that they had slowly started to become friends, Train could tell where she was. Eventually he would know how she felt, but that wasn't until the height of their partnership.

Jenos heaved a sigh and let his body fall onto the ground. He was on his back and staring up at the sky. Even though just moments before the sky had been filled with smoke and the air was filled with screams, here the sky was clear and the clouds were definitely fluffy. It was odd to think that somewhere people were screaming as they ran around their destroyed town, but here, in this clearing, it was one of the most peaceful places Jenos had ever been to.

"Didn't Wiley say that this was where her village used to be?" Train asked. Lynelle nodded her head. "I thought that she grew up with you in that village."

"Wiley came there when she was young. It was the closest village to where hers had been. It was destroyed, probably the same way mine was. Why?" Lynelle asked as she fixed her multi-colored eyes on Train.

"I was just thinking," Train answered. "If we're going to be dragon and rider, we have to know almost everything about each other. Since we're going to work as a team the same idea extends to everyone. I figured that while we were sitting here, we might as well start bonding. Though, I have to admit, food sounds really good right now." Train added. As if it had been cued, his stomach growled loudly. Train looked down at his stomach and felt a slight blush of embarrassment flush across his cheeks.

"I agree," Lynelle said. "Let's go find some food." Lynelle stood up and brushed off her butt of leaves and grass. She turned her attention to Jenos. "Will you stay here and look over Wiley?" Lynelle asked. Jenos nodded his head. With a nod of acknowledgment Lynelle motioned for Train to follow her. It would be a simple thing to get fruits out of the forest. Meat on the other hand, was another matter. No one had a bow, Lynelle only had a sword, but that wouldn't work very well against a deer that could run at least twice as fast as she could.

"Back in the village, I felt a huge burst of magic. It was your magic," Train added. "If any elf had released that much magic, they would be dead. Completely exhausted of any energy that they had, but you're not." Lynelle ignored his inquiry; it was a subject that she didn't want to talk about. "We're going to be partners," Train said. Lynelle stopped and sighed. She crossed her arms over her chest, as if she was trying to protect her body, and turned to Train.

"If you really want to know," Lynelle muttered. "I'm not an elf. I'm part elf, that's why I have magic, but I'm not completely an elf. The elders of the town kept my family and me hidden. Generations ago my very distant grandmother gave birth to a half elf half human. Over the generations the elf blood was diluted because my grandmother was killed in a battle. Her child went with the father, and the half child ended up marrying a human. Since then it's been the same until my parents came here seeking help. They didn't feel the same way about elves that most humans do. Since we have elf blood, even if it is just minute my parents were allowed to stay and were sheltered. They made us to look like elves, but I don't know how long it will last now that we're not in the village. Being mostly human is why I can't control my magic. I also have an odd abundance of magic, more than the elves now. No one knows why, but I try to hide it as best I can. In order to help me do that, Wiley made me this ring." Lynelle held up her hand to show Train. Train looked at the ring and probed it gently with his magic.

"It's just a ring," Train commented as he pulled his magic back to him.

"No, there magic all over it, trust me. Wiley is very skilled with her magic. If you aren't wearing it, I doubt that you would be able to tell that her magic is there. Wiley is the sneakiest person I know. If there's a back door through a spell, you can bet your life on it, that she'll find it, not only in record time, but she'll be inside of the spell before the person even knows. She's very good at what she does," Lynelle reiterated.

"Well apparently she's not that good, I can tell that she isn't completely elf either," Train commented. Lynelle looked at him. Wiley was as elf as they came. The only difference was that her eyes were metallic orange and they glowed. Lynelle's eyes widened. The only creature whose eyes glowed of their own accord, without reflecting light back, were demons. Could Wiley be part demon? "You mean you didn't know?" Train asked.

"Why wouldn't she have told me?" Lynelle asked. "It doesn't matter, Wiley is Wiley and her not telling me doesn't matter. Let's find food and get back. We can have our 'share' time with everyone when Wiley wakes." Lynelle started walking, at a faster pace, to the fruit trees. Train jogged to catch up with her, nearly tripping on the uneven ground. The fruit trees were easy to find.

Train grabbed the bottom branch of the tree and started to pull up into the tree. Lynelle rolled her eyes and looked at him. Instead of following his lead, Lynelle kicked the tree. The tree shook and dropped fruits into Lynelle's out stretched magic. The fruit landed gently in the dip of magic that she had created, the fruits didn't bruise and none of them dropped to the ground.

"Cheater," Train muttered as he dropped down from the tree and took off his shirt. Once he had made a bag out of his shirt Lynelle dropped the apples into the bag with a smile. Once all the apples were placed into Train's shirt, Lynelle looked into the trees. They had apples, now another fruit would be good.

"Aha, here is a plum tree," Lynelle said as she leaned against the trunk to stare into the branches overhead. Once again Lynelle kicked the tree and the fruits fell. Instead of placing the fruit into Train's shirt, Lynelle let them hover in the air in front of her. "Ready to go back?" Lynelle asked.

"Yeah," Train answered. They walked through the woods, back the way they came. No doubt that Jenos would be pacing again. Wiley might even be awake. After using all the magic that she had, Lynelle knew the other girl would be hungry.

"Oh, Train?" Lynelle asked.

"Yeah?" Train asked.

"Don't tell Wiley that I'm not an elf, she doesn't know. I want to be the one to tell her," Lynelle added. Train smiled his understanding. "Thank you. Feel free to eat an apple if you want it." Train looked at the red apples in his shirt that he was carrying. After a moment of debate Train decided that he would wait to eat an apple. It also didn't help that his hands were keeping the neck of his shirt closed so that the apples didn't fall out; he had tied the arms together to make sure that if apples went into the sleeves they wouldn't fall out.

The rest of the walk was quick and in silence. Instead of a tense silence, where you could cut the tension with a knife, it was a content silence. Even though neither had voiced their apology, the fact that they both knew the other was sorry, it was enough. Proper apologies would happen when they had the time and the means. When they were in sight of the clearing Lynelle saw that Wiley was awake and walking around, the walk was slow and tired, but at least Wiley was awake.

"Look, Wiley is awake," Lynelle said. Train looked up into the distance and saw that Wiley was indeed awake. He also noted the worried gait that she had.

"I think she's worried," Train commented.

"I have no doubts that she is," Lynelle laughed. "She hates if when she falls asleep and I'm there, but gone when she wakes up. It's really funny how I'm the older of the two of us. Let's hurry up before Wiley eats Jenos and spits him out." Lynelle broke into a flat out run, leaving Train to catch up. With a muttered curse and a roll of his eyes, Train watched her go. He already knew that it was pointless to try to stop her when she had her mind set on something. It didn't help that she had taken off at a dead run, and that was impossible for him while he was holding the shirt in his arms.

"Lynelle!" Wiley called. Lynelle heard the tone of relief in her voice. Wiley had been worried, but Lynelle had already known that. "Don't do that to me! You know that I hate it when you just disappear without saying something. You're supposed to stick around until I'm awake! What's wrong- Are those plums?" Wiley asked.

Lynelle laughed as she answered, "Yes, Wiley, they are plums. Would you like one?" Before Lynelle had even finished her sentence Wiley was grabbing several plums to eat. "They're for everyone, feel free to eat one, Jenos," Lynelle said as she moved the bag a few inches away from Wiley and closer to Jenos. "Grab one before she eats all of them," Lynelle hurriedly added. Jenos looked at the plums piled in Wiley's arm, and the huge bite that she had just taken out of one, and agreed. He took a few and moved off to the side before Wiley could think about stealing his.

Lynelle let her magic lower the plums to the ground and then sat down so they were in front of her. By that time Train had caught up to her and let the apples spill gently to the ground from his shirt. Lynelle caught Train's torso out of the corner of her eye. His chest was nothing but well defined muscle and smooth skin. Before the blush could cross her cheeks, but not before the picture was engrained into her mind's eye, Lynelle looked away and busied herself with eating a plum.

"Thanks for offering some help," Train commented. Lynelle grinned at him, plum juice dribbled down her chin as she paused in her chewing. "Lovely," Train laughed. Lynelle wiped the juice off her chin with her sleeve before taking another bite.

"These are delicious," Jenos commented.

"They used to be part of an orchard. Without the constant upkeep from my village, no doubt that the forest grew up around the trees and killed some of them off. I remember there were a few of our trees that had ended up cross bred with the wild versions. Those are probably the ones that are still alive. A lot of people loved our fruit," Wiley added. She looked down at the plums in her arms. The ignited a sense of loss in her heart that she hadn't felt in years. Nostalgia came soon after, but both of the emotions were easily pushed away.

"Well," Lynelle said, trying to change the subject from Wiley's lost childhood, "Train made a point to me earlier. If we're going to function as a team, and then as partners, we had better start telling each other everything, no matter how much we don't want to," Lynelle added. She'd known Wiley long enough to know that even though they were supposed to share everything, Wiley was going to keep her mouth shut when it came to something close to her heart. "Since it was my idea, I'll go first. I'm not an elf," Lynelle said. "I have elf blood, which allows me to use magic, but I'm not a full blooded elf, by any means. I have trouble controlling my magic, but Wiley had created this ring for me in order to help." Lynelle held up her hand to show everyone, technically the only person that didn't know was Jenos, but it wouldn't have been nice to single him out.

"I'll go next," Train said. "I have a deep seated rage, a killing rage when it comes to the man who attacked today. He killed everyone I cared about, and then demanded that I be his dragon. I fled from him since I wasn't strong enough to kill him. One day, I will kill him, and I will enjoy it." Jenos looked surprised; he hadn't realized that Creed had wanted Train to be his dragon. Everyone knew that dragons couldn't pair with humans. It just wasn't possible, however apparently humans didn't know that.

"I am able to send out wires of orichalum. They are indestructible and they cannot be escaped from, also I am terrified, and I mean literally terrified, of spiders. When I was younger I wandered into a cave, even though countless times I had been told not to. It turns out that the cave was infested with spiders, but those spiders were spiders specially adapted to killing and devouring dragons. They were larger than I am now as a dragon. Since then I have not been able to see a spider and not freak out," Jenos admitted. Slowly all eyes turned to Wiley. She scanned them and then looked down at her hands; she obviously didn't want to speak.

"Wiley," Lynelle started gently, "I know that whatever you want to tell us is painful, but if you tell us, we can help you. If you don't tell us, then you have to carry that burden all by yourself. You're weakest by yourself."

"There is a reason I am always alone," Wiley whispered. Before she continued, Wiley took a deep breath to calm her nerves. "I'm not an elf," Wiley said. "I don't have a drop of elven blood running through my veins. I look like an elf, I act like an elf, but I'm not an elf. My parents weren't really my parents. They found me in the woods one day and brought me into the village, they already knew what I was, but they still took care of me like their daughter. We were the ones who planted the trees and took care of the orchard. We did that because the rest of the village didn't care for me to be around them. I'm a demon, a full blooded demon. That's why I'm sneaky; I have a natural camouflage that allows me to look like what I want. If I was in group of dragons, in human form at least, I would look like a dragon. The thing that sets me apart is the color of my eyes and they glow." Wiley had closed her eyes as she spoke. Slowly she opened them and saw that no one had left while she was speaking.

"Congratulations," Train said. "We all have confessed deep dark secrets and none of us have been rejected. Now let's eat some more of this amazing fruit," Train said with a smile. He took a large bite of an apple and chewed. Jenos followed his lead and Wiley took a few, small, bites of another plum. Lynelle put a reassuring hand on Wiley's shoulder.

"Remember, we have each other. We're strongest together. You're not alone anymore. Even if you are a demon, that doesn't mean that you're not our friend," Lynelle said with a smile. Wiley smiled back and nodded her head in agreement.

"We're strongest together," Wiley whispered.