CHAPTER 4
ON THE WAY TO THE WINTER'S MOUNTAIN
There must had been passed hours since they left the Guild. The team that was escorting Frostie had left Magnolia and they were walking outside of the main city. They were passing vilagges and rivers and small forests, but they still had a long way to go.
" Can you get more boring than this?" Frostie finally spoke annoyed of the huge silence that existed between all of them. No one responded. Everyone looked so annoyed. Juvia was walking right next to Gray and Erza was standing next to Natsu along with Lucy so that she could keep an eye on him. Frostie was standing in the middle while Jellal was leading the way holding in his palms the cold thick metal of her chains.
Frostie rolled her eyes in boredome. As for Lucy... She wanted so badly to go talk to that girl, but she was afraid so she remained at her place.
" Gray- sama..." Juvia's voice got heard. Frostie turned all of her attention upon the girl. She was waiting to hear what she would say to him.
" How is your hand?" she asked shyly. Gray smiled at her and reassured her that he was fine. The most pain had gone away.
" This journey will be sooo boring! Come on you guys I thought you would be more f-"
Frostie stopped walking. Gray and Natsu stopped too. The others turned around surprised. Frostie hold her chains tightly so that she could stop Jellal from moving.
" What is it?" Lucy asked confused.
" Natsu what happened?" Erza asked worried. Natsu turned around and looked at Frostie.
" Do you feel it too?" he asked without a single sign of hatred. Frostie turned her head to the left. Towards that direction that she felt all that pain inside her soul. It was like a strong wave had hit her heart and filled her with pain, tears, sadness, suffering. Something terrible must have happened in that village behind this forest.
Natsu and Gray felt exactly the same thing that Frostie did.
" We must move on!" Gray said coldly. Frostie widened her eyes. In seconds she had wrapped her chains all over Gray's neck and turned him around to face her. Everyone got surprised and got allerted.
" Don't you feel it too? Don't you smell it? The pain...The blood.. We must go!" Frostie unleashed a face that no one had seen since the moment she arrived at the Guild. A worried look, a vanurable look.
" Since when do you care?" he answered coldly. Frostie surrendered. Of course...
Since when did she care... That was the picture she wanted them to see. A careless beast. No emotions, no heart. But still...She had to go there. She had to see what had happened.
Gray released his neck from her chains and turned his back at her.
" Let's get going-"
" Oi Gray!"
" Don't give me that crap Natsu. This could be a trap. What... suddenly we trust her?" he yelled furiously.
At that moment everyone thought that Natsu would snap. But Natsu calmed down himself, his heartbeat got slower and steady and the veins disappeared from his arms.
" Gray..." he said with a calm voice. Gray looked at him furiously. " She is in pain!" Natsu said. Gray looked at her.
Her chained up hands were placed upon her head and her eyes were shot closed. She was sqeezing her teeth and her whole body was in tense.
" It could be an act..." Gray couldn't let himself believe that girl.
" We need to go!" Frostie yelled. " I must go there...please!" she said looking at Natsu with eyes ready to water and a pleading surrendered look. Everyone was surprised but no one moved. Until...
Her long strong milky legs guided her in front of Frostie. The wind blew softly and made her golden hair float behind. Her soft small hands took Frostie's chains and with one move she released them. The chains fell on the ground.
" Lucy! What are you doing?" Erza yelled surprised and took out her sword ready to block any attack hat would come from her. Everyone got in a fight position ready to face the attack.
" Aren't we Fairy Tail mages?" she hissed. Lucy turned around facing them. " She is a prisoner with no magic. If we can't deal with her when she tries something unexpected, then we are not worthy of being called Fairy Tail wizards. She won't run. I know she won't!" Everyone lowered their guard and put their weapons back in place.
" Lead the way." Lucy said to Frostie.
Frostie widened her eyes. This golden haired young lady in front of her...trusted her. Or, maybe was her powers and her abilities the ones that believed in? Either way, Frostie was unchained now. But she didn't want to run. She just wanted to pass the thick forest and run towards the location she knew something bad had happened.
INSIDE THE THICK FOREST
They were walking quitely, passing through the enormous trees, the thick bushes and the sun kissed grasss.
No one was talking, they were just following the...the enemy. Frostie's heart started beating faster with each step she made. Closer and closer to that location made her head filled with pain, like thousands of nails were piercing inside her mind. But she showed nothing.. She didn't reveal her suffer.
As for Juvia...
" Gray- sama! Wait a second!" she yelled kindly trying to catch up with the ice mage.
Gray didn't stop walking he just slowed down a bit till Juvia was standing right next to him.
" That...That thing that this girl is feeling...Do you- Do you feel it too? Are you in pain?" she asked. Truth was that Juvia didn't understand what had just happened a few minutes ago. Suddenly they had stopped walking, Frostie started acting weird and she could feel her dear Gray's body tremble with cold sweat running down his naked body. But she couldn't understand the reason.
" Yes! But, not exatly like her. It's been always like that! For me, Natsu and Nor- ...Frostie!" Gray made a pause. Juvia's eyes were studying carefully his beautiful face and his expretionss.
" For me and Natsu it's only just a hunch! It starts with anxiety rising inside us and cold sweat running down our bodies, that's how we know something bad is happening close to us. But for Frostie it's been more awful. I think it came along with her powers. She starts feeling pain inside her head, suddenly the taste and smell of blood is clear to her and her heart starts beating incredibly fast. She is in pain-" he continued but he was cut off by Natsu who was listening to their conversation.
" But we managed to save a lot of lives back at the times thanks to her and that hunch me and Gray had. This thing is a gift and a curse." Natsu finally explained.
" But why do only the three of you feel it?" Lucy asked walking right next to Natsu.
" That...We don't know!" Gray replied speaking of the truth.
Their little chat was continuing till the moment they heard a loud gasp of surprise.
Their feet stopped moving. Behind the sun shines a small village appeared.
" Oh My God!" Erza let the words of surprise escape her mouth. Lucy widened her eyes and placed both of her hands in front of her mouth. Juvia grabbed Gray's arm tightly and tried to look away.
" You were right!" Natsu hissed in anger. That terrible view disturbed him and made him sad just like everyone else.
Frostie for one more time she was right, that was why she was petrified with a blank look on her face.
The little cozy houses were burned to ashes, the rich fields were entirely destroyed and as for the people of the village...Dead!
Each and every one of them. Children, Women, Men...all of them corpses on the ground.
But there was something strange that everyone of the team noticed. There was not even one sign of blood or struggle upon their bodies. The village was brought down to dust but the people's bodies looked unharmed. Though it was clearly that they didn't longer possess a beating heart.
" What happened here?" Lucy asked walking closer to the heart of the village.
" Are they dead?" Erza asked.
" Yes!" Jella stood right next to her replying to her question. Erza didn't blush this time. She couldn't feel embarassed not with that view ahead of her.
" Every one of them!" he sounded so certain.
" Maybe there could be survivors!" Juvia sended a small wave of hope inside their hearts.
" I certainly doubt that." but Frostie was there to ruin it.
" How can you be so sure?" Juvia asked irritaded.
" No, no, she is right! Those people are long gone. They are nothing but empty vessels."
" Vessels?" Lucy asked with sadness in her heart.
" Oi what do you mean by that?" Natsu yelled. He realised that those two, Jellal and Frostie knew something about the incident.
" He means their souls left their bodies." Frostie replied to his question, triggering his curiosity.
" You seem to know quite a few things about that, don't you." Gray said exactly what Natsu was thinking. Frostie looked at him with a serious look that reassured what he already knew. She knew...She knew what happened to those people.
" What are you not telling us Frostie?" Erza asked, understanding those looks between them.
Frostie looked at Jellal. He nodded his head. " There is no point hiding it anymore." he said.
Frostie took a deep breath. She started walking slowly towards the corpse of a young boy at the age of six.
" These people were mortals. Pure hearts and souls with no magic running inside of them." she began to explain. Everyone sarted gathering around her.
Frostie kneeled down and took the young boy inside her arms. Lucy was moved by that. Her eyes were ready to shed a lot of tears but she tried to hold them. The boy was breathless, with no heart pounding inside his chest, no pulse, no blood running through his veins. He was cold under her touch. That boy didn't look dead, but like a...doll! A soulless doll.
" This is the mission that we are asighned to acomplish. We must prevent something like that from happening again." her fingers run through his soft black hair and caressed his forehead.
" The mission?" Erza said. " Yes, but what exactly is the mission? What do we have to prevent? Who killed these people and how?" she asked all the important questions.
" Who did this is unkown yet. But how they did it..." she paused.
" Speak Frostie!" Gray commanded.
" Those kind of people are certainly mages. They dream a world with power and magic everywhere. A world where magic rules! In a world like that there will be no place for mortals, common humans. What we- What Fairy Tail and every Guild in Fiore lives for is exactly the opposite of what that those people want. You live to protect the mortals, they live to wipe them all out...by sucking their souls out of their bodies!"
Everyone was left speachless. For the first time after her arrival, they understood why they needed her. This was indeed a serious mission. Whoever those people were, they wanted to wipe off humanity.
Erza, Gray, Natsu, Lucy, Juvia...all of them were thinking those pure happy faces, those honest smiles upon the people's faces. And then they had that picture in front of them. Corpses. Empty vessels with no souls in it. They must stop this madness.
" Unfortunately we have no names!" Jellal spoke. " We know nothing about the people who attacked. We don't know if this is a kind of magic that they use to suck their souls, we don't know if they use a weapon. We know nothing yet. But what we certainly do know, is that they are looking for powerful mages. Strong enough that they can be members of their Guild."
" That is why you need Frostie to take her powers back." Gray realized.
" As soon as they will feel that power showing up, they will hunt it down. They wll try to find her." Jellal explained looking at her. " And once they will, we will learn with who we are dealing with!"
" Yes but-"
" Enough with talking!" Frostie cutt off Lucy! She placed carefuly the young boy's body and stood up.
" Gray!" she spoke his name. The sound of her voice calling him brought sivers to his body and anger in his heart. But he remained calm.
" Freeze their bodies!" she ordered. Everyone gasped in surprise.
" What are you talking about? We are gonna burry them!" he yelled in anger.
" So you are convinced that we will fail this mission!" she said strictly looking at him with anger in her eyes.
" What? No, I didn't-"
" I'm gonna return that boy's soul in his body! And everyone's in this village! I'm gonna stop this nightmare. But I need my powers. I don't have them at the moment that's why I need yours. Freeze them. Preserve their bodies." she said with eyes burning fire.
And Gray did it! He didn't know why. But those eyes of hers reminded him the old Frostie. The old Nora! The girl he once...cared for. The girl that once was a hero. The girl that once was a family!
Gray used his magic upon the people and with the help of Natsu and Juvia he transfered the bodies somewhere that was safer.
" Done!" he said with his bare sweaty chest showing of the good work he had done. Juvia felt so lucky standing right next to him but she felt burning up with anger when she noticed Frostie's eyes travelling upon Gray's body for a second.
" Good!" she said. Frostie grabbed the chains and placed them upon her hands taking everyone by surprise. " Hey you, princess!" she said mocking Lucy. " Chain me up! There is a sort cut form here to the Winter's Mountain. We need to keep going!"
Lucy chained her up and they started moving ahead.
Along the way Frostie didn't notice the curiosity burning inside Lucy's eyes. She didn't want to admit it to herself, but there was something about Frostie that...realy...realy liked!
But she couldn't tell. Lucy couldn't say that there was a spark inside her that was telling her that Frostie was not the evil girl she pretended to be. She saw how she caressed that boy's forehead, how protectively she hugged his body. She saw how determined she was to save those people. Something was up with that girl...she was certain about it.
" What are you holding?" she took the chance to talk to her the moment she noticed that her palm was closed tightly. Frostie didn't spoke.
" Is it something that belonged to the boy?" Lucy continued. Frostie stopped and looked at her. Then she placed something inside her hand. Lucy looked at it. It was a small velvet pink bow. She looked at Frostie.
" He had a sister!" she said with a sad voice and kept moving on.
Lucy stood there studying the bow for a minute. Then she thought again the tone of her voice when she said that the boy had a sister.
She was one hundred percent sure now. Frostie was not the monster she wanted everyone to think and Lucy was determined to bring that angel that she was hiding back to the surface again.
( Konichiwa Minaaa! Hahah. It didn't took that long to update this time. So anyways. What do you think about the mission? Who are the enemies? And what about Lucy? Do you think that she is right about Frostie? Or is it just an act? Let me know your opinion. Review and let me know what you think, favorite if you like it and follow me and my story for more! See you soon ;) )