Sooo um. Long time no see. I'm just gonna say that this chaoter took a little while. As you can see it's quite a bit longer then usual but there is a reason. There is a lot of information that comes out this chaoter that pertains to the story itself. Originally I wasn't planning on having this much but once the idea bug hit it just ran away from me. Anyway go enjoy and I'll see y'all later.
Chapter 4
Magnolia
Howling precedes whirling leaves. Panting breaths mingling in the mid-autumn breeze.
A blur slings out from between two massive tree trunks, laughter following. Midnight blue hair dips to cover navy blue eyes and Silver grins.
"Come on, Lycan, you're gonna have to do better than that!" Not too far behind he can see the dark silver, almost black fur of the wolf sprinting to keep up.
When the fifteen-year-old looks forward he yelps, leaping to avoid a tall root and takes to the trees. The wolf huffs from the ground. Silver rolls his eyes, leaping from branch to branch with practiced ease.
"Awe, come on, you're just being a sourpuss because I'm winning." Even as he shouts the words at the wolf he feels a twinge of nostalgia, glancing back to see not the wolf he is racing but the black pelt of the wolf he used to race many years before.
He shakes his head, focusing on the next leap. Only… he misjudges the distance. The teen screams uselessly waving his arms at his sides. Near the ground, his mind overrides the panic and he throws his hands in front of him, the index and middle fingers of his left hand spread in a V shape.
"Snow make: Bank!"
Before him, a massive snow bank appears and he crashes into it, an impression cutting deep into the bank. With his fall abruptly stopped he groans, rolling over to stare at the red and yellow leaves of the canopy high above.
Snow crunches from above before several snouts appear over the rim of the hole. When he hears huffing laughter Silver chuckles as well.
"Yeah, yeah, I guess I deserved that." At a small bark, he gets to his feet, his head barely being able to stick out of the hole he made. He looks up, pushing his hair out of his face to see the wolf he's been racing, Lycan, as well as others surrounding the hole.
To the teen, having known this particular pack for so long, he can read the amusement and excitement in their odd silver and blue eyes.
Silver rolls his eyes and turns to the lowest part of the hole. He waves his hands, gesturing to the wolves. "Eric, Trunks, I need to you to move so I can get out."
The taller one turns, kicking snow onto the teen. He sputters, wiping it off his face.
"Seriously Trunks?!"
More huffing laughter has him glaring at Lycan.
"You keep laughing, see if I bring you treats the next time I come out." The wolf's ears perk up at the statement and Silver shakes his head. "And Pops wonders why I come out to see you."
With the snow attack done Silver leaps out of the hole. His bare feet land on it, barely dipping into the drift. He moves over, away from the hole, and sits down with the wolves settling around him.
Lycan settles beside him, the wolf's snout easily finding its way into his lap. His hand comes down to settle between its ears and Silver pauses, glaring at his feet.
"It's not fair ya know? Ever since Mama mated with Dad and Pops they've just become wrapped up in each other. And now with Mama pregnant, it's worse."
He gets up, beginning to pace down the drift onto the forest floor then back up it, his hands flying wildly.
"Silver, you should know better than to use your magic inside." His voice drops, sounding similar to Gray's. "O-Or how about 'Sweetheart, we're not mad at you, now is a trying time.'"
The teen growls. Around him the temperature drops, snowflakes beginning to fall from his hands.
"Like okay, I understand this baby is coming, and yeah I know it'll be awesome to have a little sibling but what about me? I'm supposed to be doing my first solo hunt tonight and no one has even bothered to say anything about it! It's not fair, Lycan. Baby this, baby that! Why can't it be 'oh, Silver, I know you'll do so well on your hunt!'"
With how many times he's vented to the pack leader in the past few summers since the wolf took over he doesn't expect a reply.
"And you will."
Getting one is an entirely different matter.
Though he'd deny it later Silver's scream reaches into the alto range causing some of the surrounding wolves to scratch at their ears. He spins around, the speed causing him to fall back into the snow.
A hand on his heart he pants in shock at the pink-haired vampire sitting on a raised root. Then he scowls, glaring at his father figure.
"What are you doing here, Dad? I thought you and Pops were picking out hunting grounds for tonight?"
Natsu frowns, his crossed legs swinging under the root.
"We were until I heard you leave. You know for our kind; being that loud isn't supposed to be possible."
The teen shrugs. "Well, I was. What about it?"
Natsu sighs, sliding off the root to approach. "Silver, I know it's a lot to handle but you just have to be patient. This'll all blow over and you'll have a little brother or sister."
That has him falling back into the snow with a groan. "And you still don't get it."
Natsu walks over to him, sitting down beside him. He hears humming and Silver feels the older vampire's eyes on him.
"What is it I don't understand? That you're jealous because the baby is taking so much of our time? That you think we've forgotten such an important event as your first solo hunt is coming up tonight?" When the teen remains silent the pinkette sighs, resting a hand on his shoulder. "Little Bit, have either of us told you about your mother?"
He knows Lucy isn't his real mother, he's always known from the different scent that clings to his father just as he's always known the pinkette isn't his real father. Despite his own feelings he glances at Natsu in curiosity.
Natsu smiles sadly, gently squeezing his shoulder. "She was a lot like you, always full of energy and looking to get into trouble."
Silver huffs, looking away. "I don't get into trouble."
His father figure merely chuckles. "You keep telling yourself that. I can count more than twenty times in the last year you've gotten yourself into some kind of trouble." He reaches up to ruffle the teen's hair and Silver whines, ducking away from the hand.
"Tell me more about her." Natsu arches a brow. "My mother, can you tell me more about her?"
The pinkette shrugs. "I don't know. We spent nearly a millennia as a group or in contact. It would take a week to cover it all."
Silver perks up, his eyes holding a hopeful light. "How did she and Pops get together?"
Tilting his head to the side, Natsu looks at the tree trunk behind the teen in thought. While he waits, Silver watches his eyes glaze over as if getting lost in the memory.
His own mind begins to wander, blurry memories that hold no detail coming forward to capture his attention. Distantly he remembers the smell of water lilies and a soft hum but the image that comes with it is distorted, time and age blurring it the more he attempts to focus.
"Gray and I have known each other since we were yearlings." Natsu's voice snaps him out of his thoughts. He looks up to find the pinkette grinning playfully. "We weren't born vampires like you were, we were turned when we were your age and met a year after that. Because our magics were polar opposites we fought all the time. That's calmed down over the centuries but we still get into brawls every now and then."
Silver sweat drops thinking about the fight his fathers had had only a week before. The pinkette pays him no mind though, his focus long in the past.
"About five centuries later we met your mother in a pub. She was surrounded by several drunk men who wanted to 'borrow' her time." His nose wrinkles in disgust. "It was a quick meal and even quicker fight but all three of us swore off attacking drunk men after that. That was a huge mistake I plan on not repeating."
He shudders and Silver sniggers. He'd always wondered why his parents advised against preying on drunk humans but to actually hear the reason is another thing entirely.
If what Mama had told him is true, drinking from a drunk human is similar to consuming the alcohol itself only tenfold. Due to how their own body breaks down their food so they're required to only hunt once a month the effects of the alcohol in the blood can cause a severe hangover that can last for upwards of a week if not longer.
His father chuckles, returning his attention back to the present. "It wasn't fun but anyway after all was said and done we went our separate ways. I, myself, didn't see more of your mother for another fifty years. It was during that time that she started to stalk your father."
He tilts his head, smiling at the memory.
"Because of our enhanced senses we always know what is around us be it by sight, sound, smell, taste, touch. It used to drive your father crazy when your mother stalked him because he knew someone was there he just could never find her."
Silver sniggers at the thought when a question occurs to him. "When did Pops finally figure out it was her?"
The wolves are gone, he only now notices. When they left he doesn't know but it doesn't matter. He knows he'll see them again. Afterall he still has to pay Lycan back for his tricks.
"If I remember correctly the stalking went on for about a century." Natsu hums, one hand coming up to rest on the scarf around his neck. "After that, they got to talking and I wanna say twenty-five years later they finally paired up."
Silver's in awe. Finally hearing the story he hadn't known he wanted to hear is fascinating. He's enchanted, a vision of his father with the outline of a woman that could be his mother forming in his mind's eye.
"What happened then?"
His father's expression changes, taking on a sadden look. "After your father and mother paired up I took off as a loner wandering the world. You have to understand that with our long lives whereas a human is happy with traveling to a different country once or twice we can easily travel every country in the world hundreds of times and still feel the need to travel."
As he absorbs this another thought wriggles into his mind, one he can't quite squash down. Along with it comes an unsettling feeling and he swallows, looking at Natsu with wide earnest eyes.
"Dad," He doesn't know how to ask it, let alone how to even phrase such a question. Still, his father figure smiles in sympathy, out of all three of his parents this one, in particular, can understand the difficulty of asking some questions. So he asks it for him.
"Why haven't we traveled since we had you?" When Silver nods he grins. "There's a little secret about our kind that no human anywhere knows. Do you wanna know what it is?" He leans closer, his voice dropping to a whisper as if passing along an actual secret. "When our kind meets their mate the urge to travel goes away."
Hearing such an anticlimactic answer, Silver groans, flopping onto his back. "Daaaaad."
Natsu laughs at his adopted son's expression, the last of the tension in the air disappearing with the sound.
When his laughing subsides he looks down at the teen with a fond expression. His jade eyes showing such a wealth of love and pride Silver is once more reminded why he gladly calls this man a father.
Silver reaches down to grab some of the melting snow, his cold touch easily refreezing the crystals.
"So why does our kind lose the urge to travel?" He refuses to say the word 'mates'. Something in his gut tells him his head will explode if he even tries. The idea of mates already is incomprehensible. He's only a hundred and fifty springs old!
In answer his father shrugs. "There's not an exact answer for it. When one of our kind marks their mate, the urge to travel begins to die down. It becomes not so much of a bell ringing in our heads as it is a dull echo. And if the pair bears a child then the urge becomes almost completely muted."
Curious he tilts his head, the gesture angling his ear better toward the pinkette. "And why is that?"
"Why do you think they settle down?"
He hates these kinds of questions. Questions about fighting or magic, he can answer easily but when it comes to the subject of behavior and pathology it's like trying to find a corner in a circle. Utterly impossible.
Still, he puts his mind to the question with the same amount of effort he would if his father had asked him about hunting. Oddly, this time it doesn't take breaking a few dozen tree branches to find the answer.
Grimacing he glances up. "Because a babe is too vulnerable to travel long distances?"
Natsu's lips quirk in a half-smile. "Close. Babes age the same way adults do. Every ten human years for one of ours. What that means is that compared to human babes, ours develop much slower." He holds up a hand, stalling Silver's next question. "The slower development is for a reason. The magic we wield?" The teen nods. "Without being able to age more slowly our bodies wouldn't be able to handle the amount of energy it takes to wield the magic. That's why born Vampires are stronger than those who are changed to our kind."
It surprises him to hear his father use the word the humans use for their kind until he remembers that both of his fathers weren't born like he was. That they had to deal with a change he's heard rumors kill most humans is yet another piece of the puzzle he needs to wrap his mind around.
Silver pulls his mind away from his musing. A gut feeling warning him to pay particular attention to this lesson.
"Why is that?"
The pinkette grimaces, looking as if he's swallowed a very bitter berry. "A babe grows so slowly because their bodies need the time to be able to handle the magic. When a human is changed, a feeble body already developed to be able to only survive for a century—if that—is required to be able to take in a massive amount of magical energy all in the span of a few hours. There are downsides to this, many that come from our own kind instead of the humans."
Seeing Silver's questioning expression he sighs. "For those of our kind who are Changed instead of Born they try to hide that fact because there are some raised from birth to believe they are superior to the Changed and that the Changed are only to be enslaved and commanded at will. One of their justifications comes from the difference in the magic in our veins."
Natsu lights a fingertip on fire, turning it down to draw in the snow around them as he continues.
"Changed, like your father and I, struggle to wield our magic for very long. Yes, we can do extremely powerful spells or rather weak ones but we can't do both at the same time. Whereas I'd be able to take down a handful of trees around us in a matter of a minute with one strong spell I'd be able to do the same with many weaker spells that would take much longer."
Silver nods. Mama Lucy had explained something of the like before in her lessons. Just how far that difference goes, though, he's still learning.
"Born, like yourself and Lucy, on the other hand, are able to wield many spells of considerable strength at one time." Natsu glances up, ensuring he's still paying attention. "Really, in the end, a magic fight comes down to a Vampire's stamina. Their stamina depends on if they're Born or Changed and yadda yadda yadda you get the point."
Silver snorts to hide a laugh and Natsu chuckles, shaking his head in amusement. When he falls quiet, he looks down to try and make out what his father had been drawing in the snow. Or rather writing. From he sits he can vaguely make out an old script of language he doesn't recognize. He scoots forward, frowning as he attempts to make it out.
"What does that say?"
"Huh?" He gestures to the writing at Natsu's grunt.
"The writing. What does it say?"
Natsu looks down, only now seeming to realize what he has written. He sighs, looking at the teen. "Duìyú wǒmen suǒyǒu de rén lái shuō dōu shì yīyàng de."
Seeing Silver's confusion he chuckles. "It's an old saying your father and I have kept from the beginning. It means 'To all, we are one. To one, we are all.' Once we understood how hard it would be for a newly Changed in a world of old we made a promise that we would always have each other's backs."
"To all, we are one. To one, we are all." As he repeats the phrase his father's earlier story comes to mind. A nagging thought quickly digging in with it. "Hey Dad, if you and Pops were supposed to look after each other why did you leave after he got together with my mother?"
Natsu grimaces, reaching out to wipe the words away.
"We didn't get into a fight or anything like you're probably thinking. If anything it just kind of happened. I knew Gray was happy and with your mother being a Born I knew they wouldn't have any problems with others of our kind. One day I just told him I was leaving, told him I was happy to see he was happy and the next day I left." He shrugs. "Like I said it just kinda happened. There was no real plan, no real argument. After I left them, I sorta expected that the next time I saw them they'd have a babe and already be settled down in one location while they raised him."
That catches his attention. He perks up, looking at his father in excitement. "The next time you met them was when I was born?"
To his dismay, his father snorts. "No, Little-bit, you weren't even thought of for about another millennium."
"And what's that supposed to mean?" He sweat drops.
Natsu holds his hands in front of him in a placative gesture. "Easy, easy. Remember I told you this story would take awhile and it's not even the full story. I could've also told you about any hundred incidents where your father and I were run out of towns." He pauses, a thoughtful look on his face. "Well, there was that one time…"
"What was it? Tell me! Please, please, please?!" Setting a hand on his shoulder to push him back, his father laughs.
"Alright, I'll tell you. Just calm down for a minute." Eagerly Silver nods, midnight blue hair falling to cover an eye. Natsu looks to the tree canopy, his focus so far inward he doesn't register the colors of the changing leaves. "Let me see…It was," He snaps his fingers grinning. "Oh, yeah, it was about four or five centuries after I left your father and mother. During that time I had traveled Midi for about half a century and met a gorgeous blonde Born. About a century and a half after we decided to start traveling together we ended up out east in Minstrel. The town we walked into was beautiful."
He leans forward, grinning. "Silver, I shit you not. This was one of the most beautiful towns I had ever seen. The rock formations that kept the town safe from attack would be hit by the rays of the setting sun and it looked like the world was just set aflame." He waves his hand in an arc, a wave of flame following it. Silver watches with avid interest, his curiosity and wanderlust thriving on the story. "The way the light danced across the stone, it made it feel like you could taste the magic in the atmosphere. Every light, every splash of color, it looked like one of the phantoms of Howler's Moon had come from the stone to play at sunset."
Dark blue eyes go wide in excitement. He's seen the phantoms of the Howler's Moon or 'Halloween' as the humans call it. A night when all wolves announce their presence by howling to the moon to wake the dead. It's the one night of the year when the souls get to rise and dance the night away. Almost a decade before, he'd even gotten to meet some of the souls up close, a lovely if odd couple who went by Mavis and Zeref. He shakes his head from thinking about trying to find the odd couple when his father's voice drops to a whisper, drawing his attention back to here and now.
"Of course," He looks over his shoulder as if on guard for something. What, Silver doesn't know. "The humans didn't know it but magic was in the air." He smiles. "It was a town of both magic and beauty, a really rare combination for the era. And something even our kind doesn't get to find all too often anymore."
"How did you run into Pops?" While he wants to hear more about the town his curiosity is starting to get the better of him. He wants to know more about his parents.
Natsu playfully glares, reaching out to ruffle his hair. "I'm getting there, Little-bit." Silver whines, dipping away from the calloused hand and his father grins. "See, the town we were at was located on the border with Desierto. It was sometimes a month or more of traveling the deserted lands before we'd come across a town to feed at so when we did, we'd take our fill and leave the next night. That was our plan at least. When we actually got into the town and started hunting it didn't quite turn out that way. At the time we didn't know another pair of our kind had come to the town with the same intent. Not until we ran into them tracking our prey. Thaaaat wasn't exactly our cleanest or easiest hunt. Especially when the women decided to let your father and I go after the same guy because we hadn't realized we knew each other because we were still trying to grab the same prey."
He rubs the back of his head sheepishly while Silver is forced to bite back a laugh. If he's gonna find out the rest of this story before sundown then he'll need to focus. His father frowns.
"We got our prey but with it only being one human and all the time we had spent hunting him we ended up having to stay a few more nights to make sure all four of us ate. On the last night was when things turned south. During the time we'd been in the town your father had gradually started flirting with my blonde. Eventually, it came to a head when he asked her to leave me and travel with him and your mother."
Silver's eyes go wide and his jaw drops in shock. "B-B-But how is that even possible?!" He sputters, outraged even at the thought his father could do something so cruel.
The pinkette shrugs. "It's how our kind was during the era. There was a surge in Hunters during the time and we all felt the pain as our numbers dropped. To fight this, males would sometimes pick up more than one female. If a male had a mate and found another female he could ask her to join their group as long as his mate was willing. Your father was just doing what he felt was right."
"Please tell me you stopped him?" He can't believe this. He'd been thinking his father was an ass as of late but to hear about this, it just adds a new definition to the word.
Natsu rolls his eyes. "Of course I did. Your father and I may be battle brothers but even I have my limits on what he tries to take from me. That, of course, ended up with half the town being burned to the ground, the other half frozen in ice, and nearly three score of angry humans running us, your mother, and my blonde out of town."
Right, they were talking about his fathers being run out of towns. He leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees and his head on his hands.
"So what happened then?"
Natsu hums. "Your father and I held a pretty bad grudge against each other for about another four or five centuries. In that time I hadn't known it but Lucy and your mother kept in touch, often by trading letters. About five and a half centuries after our fight in Minstral, Lucy shows me this letter from your mother that has a specific location written down."
Instead of being happy, his father's expression begins to dip almost too depressed. A bad feeling rumbles in the teen's gut. Suddenly he doesn't want to hear the end of this story.
"Before then their letters had never had any set locations because there was no set location for either of us to stay at. So imagine our surprise when the letter we receive has a coordinate, star course, and town name? Despite the bad blood, I couldn't not be happy to hear he had a little one on the way." He shakes his head, pink locks falling into his eyes. "Lucy and I up and left the next day. We were halfway across the world playing hide and seek with a group of Hunters in Pergrande at the time and it ended up taking us about a year to lose them and make our way to Ca-elum where they were living." His lips lift in a tormented smile. "When we finally found them we got to meet a little three moon old babe that had his mother's eyes and little itty bitty tufts of his father's hair."
He should be embarrassed. He's supposed to be embarrassed. He has to be embarrassed… He's not… Not when it looks like his father is about to cry and the feeling in his gut makes him want to go seek out Mama Lucy to hide behind her skirts like a child.
Clearing his throat, his father looks away but he sees the glassy eyes, the tears welling.
"We decided to stay in Ca-elum after that. There were rumors of Hunters spreading through the harbors and all four of us knew a couple with an infant babe is as vulnerable as they come. Especially with the Hunters grouping into squads ranging from two to five. Even two of our kind without a babe would have trouble fending off that many." The pinkette closes his eyes, and Silver sees a stray tear fall. "A summer after we made our decision it happened."
What 'it' is. He has a pretty good idea and he doesn't like 'it' at all.
"It was a full moon, the best time for hunting, so we left. Your father stayed at the cabin to watch you while your mother and we went hunting. With three of us and rising alarms we decided to split up, each going in opposite directions to avoid notice." Natsu shakes his head. "We didn't know. We were over a hundred miles away and had no clue what was happening. Not until we got back and saw the smoke from the burning cabin. By then they had killed your mother and your father was so grief stricken he didn't have a clear mind to try and get you out of there. Even if he could've, the Hunters he was facing would've killed you both before he had a chance to disappear."
A lump in his throat makes it impossible to speak let alone breathe. To think he would've known his real mother growing up if those Hunters hadn't ripped it all away. Knowing the story now, a well of gratitude and love for his parents blooms in his heart. Still, there's one more thing he needs to know.
"Hey, Dad?" Natsu looks up, grief clear in his jade eyes. While he doesn't want to ask, he knows he has to. "What happened afterward? How did we end up here?"
His father seems to have had enough of sitting done for he gets up, leaping off the melting snow bank to land lightly on the root he had been sitting on earlier. He turns back, tilting his head to the side.
"I'll tell you on the way back. It's almost sundown and you know how your father is if we're late for a hunt."
Remembering what happens tonight Silver gets up as well, jumping to land beside his father. Natsu grins and they take off, leaping through the trees like monkeys. After pulling a particularly tricky move through a smaller double trunked tree he begins to speak again.
"With the three of us there, we had enough hands to protect you as well as fight off the Hunters. Mama Lucy, as you know, has a more defensive type of magic so she hid among the trees while your father and I took out the trash."
He doesn't care what Mama Lucy says, swinging through the trees is just as much fun as running. Even more so when he swings up high enough to front flip before latching onto a tree branch and swinging above his father.
"After the fire was put out we knew we couldn't stay in Ca-elum anymore. Our home had burned down, our settlement had been discovered and it wouldn't be too long before more Hunters came after us. Particularly your father and I."
Silver pauses in a crouch atop a slim branch no thicker than his head and glances down at his father. "Do I wanna even ask?"
Natsu chuckles, swinging past him. "Remember what I said about your father and I fighting? When a fire and ice type get together and begin to travel together it's bound to gain some notice. The Hunters, in particular, don't like it when we manage to get along long enough to Unison Raid. That really throws a wrench in their gears."
Unison Raid? He's heard the term before.
"Ain't a Unison Raid when two of our kind can combine their magic to make a really, really, really strong spell?" His father nods, leaping up onto a branch that runs parallel with his own.
"Aye. It's rarely done though as the magics have to be similar and you have to be able to trust your partner with your very life. To this day I still don't know how your father and I have been able to do it."
Now he's curious.
"What did you and Pops destroy?"
His father pauses mid-sprint, turning to squat on the branch and Silver has to snatch a branch to keep from falling out of the tree. When he comes around to stand on the branch in front of the pinkette, his father grins.
"Even heard of the Great Wall of Sin?" Racking his brain he comes up with nothing and shakes his head. "Of course ya wouldn't. The wall was a massive line of bricks that stretched all the way across the border between Sin and Pergrande. We got in a fight with a giantess a little over a millennium ago who decided we needed to pay a ridiculous amount of gold to get into Pergrande and brought down it down just to spite her."
His jaw drops in amazement and Natsu cackles, leaning forward to fall off the branch. After a minute he shakes his head and falls after him. As he grabs a vine to flip onto a lower branch he looks up, finding his father running almost directly above him.
"Hey, Dad! If Changed are weaker then Born how did you and Pops have the strength to tear something like that down? Wouldn't it have killed you?"
"Not quite, Little Bit." His father is grinning. Even though he can't see it, he can hear it in his voice. "What I said earlier is true, a Born is much stronger than a Changed, but if a Changed trains hard he can make up for his shortcomings. That is what your father and I did. After we partnered up, we would train day in and day out while we traveled. Add our training in with the fact that the Unison Raid takes our power and multiplies it tenfold and it's pretty easy to see how it's possible. As for the exhaustion part, let's just say that after we escaped an angry Giantess we ended up sleeping in an abandoned cave for a solid moon."
They fall quiet after that, though laughter often breaks the silence as they perform tricks leaping through the branches. Most of the tricks Silver does are automatic. He pays no attention to them as his mind is turned inward, carefully sorting through everything he has learned.
Unfortunately so focused is he, he doesn't see the branch that breaks under his father's weight. The branch strikes him, knocking him off his own branch with a yelp. As he falls he looks around, reaching for the nearest branch to at least slow his descent. The branch he grabs hold off isn't very big—no thicker than his arm—only giving him enough time to turn over before it too breaks under his strength.
Seeing the next group of branches fast approaching he groans. "This is gonna hurt!" Several thinner branches whip across his chest and arms causing him on instinct to curl into himself.
What seems an eternity though is really only a few seconds later his hastened descent is brought to a full height by something grabbing his belt. Silver looks over his shoulder expecting to find the leather caught on a branch. A sigh of relief escapes him when he sees his father holding onto him with one hand, the other carving deep furrows into a thicker branch barely outside Silver's own reach.
He grins sheepishly. "Thanks, Dad."
Natsu grunts in response, looking at him then up to the branch. His father must not agree with something for he hears him growl a curse under his breath. After a minute he looks back at the teen. "Alright, Silver. This is gonna be a bit tricky and we're only gonna have one chance at this. Do you remember the Monkey Crawl?"
The teen grimaces. Of course, he remembers it. After they stopped carrying him the move was the only way he was able to keep up with his parents in the trees for the longest time. He absolutely hates it.
His father chuckles. "Well get ready 'cuz you're about to do it again."
No other explanation. No countdown. His father just throws him by his belt into the air. He flips head over heels before straightening out and latching hands and feet to a branch several feet above his father. He growls, his nails digging into the bark as he crawls back on the branch. Back on top, he crouches low to regain his bearings and wait in case his father needs help as well.
Natsu, though, apparently doesn't need help for he lights the tips of the fingers on his free hand on fire, pushing them into the wood like a hot knife through butter. With both hands securely in the wood, he forces his feet under him then pushes off. A strong leap has him flying above Silver's branch before landing lightly beside his son.
They sit there, quietly regaining their balance after the stunt when he glares at the pinkette.
"I hate doing the Monkey Crawl." Natsu chuckles, shaking his head.
"Hate it all you want, Little-Bit, but that move saved your life."
Silver takes on a thoughtful look. "Well, if you wanna get technical, Dad, you saved my life. After all, you're the one who caught me."
The pinkette rises to his feet, looking out over through the orange and yellow leaves. He smiles softly and rests a hand on Silver's hair.
"Silver, that's my job. That's why Lucy, Gray, and I are here—to raise you and protect you until you're old enough to strike out into the world on your own. That's what a parent does for their child." Silver looks up, once more seeing a look of pride and love so wide it feels as if the dark forest could disappear into it multiple times over. "It's what a father does for their son."
Silver shakes his father's hand off his head and rises to his feet. An overwhelming ache takes him and he lurches forward, wrapping his arms around the pinkette. He ducks his head to Natsu's chest, more than grateful for the familiarity.
"Thanks, Dad," Natsu envelopes him in his arms, tightly hugging the teen. "for everything."
The pinkette swallows past the lump in his throat. "Always," He pauses, thinking, then adds barely above a murmur. "son."
Silver's the first to pull away, his pale cheeks a light pink out of embarrassment. He clears his throat, turning away from his father.
"I guess we should be heading back?"
Natsu grins, his arms dropping to his sides. Silver hopes he won't mention the slip-up. It's hard enough to keep an icy mask up when one of his fathers is so warm-hearted and welcoming. That being said, he's also seen his fire-wielding father be as cold as his ice-wielding father when the occasion calls for it. The look being strong and harsh enough to have humans running in terror.
His father nods, already leaping for the next branch and he follows along, his thoughts once more delving into more abstract subjects. This time, while his father plays around he keeps to simple leaps and bounds, his mind turning in too many circles to multitask.
Until his father appears hanging upside down in front of him. He skids to a stop on front of him, only now noticing the pinkette frowning in worry.
"Alright, Little-Bit, what's got you by your teeth this time?" A metaphor for being distracted; his fathers came up with it when he happened to be so distracted running with the wolves one summer he ran into a low hanging tree branch and got his teeth stuck in the sappy wood.
They'll never let me live down the memory, will they? He grimaces, shaking his head. "It's nothing, Dad, I was just thinking about what you told me earlier."
Natsu crosses his arms over his chest, arching an eyebrow. "Go on, we got time before your father starts freezing things."
"I swear, Dad, it's nothing." He rolls his eyes with a groan.
"Uh huh and I'm a flyin' purple people eater."
He sighs, knowing his father won't drop the matter any time soon. Sitting down on the branch he looks up. "Your story. I was thinking about the end of it when you left Ca-Cael—"
"Ca-elum?"
He nods. "That. Why did you travel all the way to Fiore? Wouldn't there have been those groups of our kind you could go too?"
Natsu's expression hardens. The teen doesn't know why, but something about what he said seems to have ticked his father off. When his father slides off the branch to sit in front of him he moves backward, more than weary of how unpredictable his fire magic is when angered.
"What you're talking about," Natsu begins coldly. "is a coven. There were covens in Ca-elum, yes, but a coven is somewhere you do not wanna go. If you had to choose between being killed by Hunters or joining a coven go with the Hunters."
Silver moves further backward. He's seen his fathers mad, he's seen them angry, frustrated, temperamental. He's seen just about every emotion he can think of from his parents but looking at his father now, he can't remember a time where he's ever seen such cold and calculating rage. And though he doesn't want to test his rage, Silver knows that if he wants an answer he needs to ask.
"Why are covens so bad?"
The pinkette growls, red and orange wisps beginning to flicker up and down his arms.
"In a coven, there's one leader, the oldest and wisest in the group that everyone else grants their loyalty and respect. There is a hierarchy in which everyone who follows the leader—the Elder—must follow. The older a Vampire the higher in the ranks they are." Natsu stops, closing his eyes and forcing himself to take a deep breath. When he exhales there's a wisp of flame to it. "Again, the difference of Born to Changed comes in play. Newly Changed are thrown to the bottom of the pecking order—even below babes—and are often spit on and left to fend for themselves. Changed, no matter how old they are, are looked at as second-rate beings."
Natsu looks away, his hands falling to his sides to dig into the bark. "Three years after your father and I Changed we sought out a Coven. We thought we'd be able to find protection there while we trained, a safety measure if you will. We granted our loyalty to the Elder, bent our pride to listen to him, and he turned it against us." He barks out a harsh laugh. "You wonder why your father and I are so strong? I'll tell you why. The first decade of our existence as Vampires was spent fighting for our very survival."
When Natsu turns back to him, Silver's terrified of the crazed gleam in the jade eyes. One scarred over and over again by abuse and torture he himself will never know.
"The Elder felt that in order for a Changed to be in his coven, they needed to be strong, stupidly powerful to even compare to the Born he surrounded himself with. Every night he would command two Changed to fight against each other. Whoever won would live to see another night, the loser was killed while the winner watched as a reminder of the consequences."
He smells wood burning. He's scared, he wants to run before his father burns down the forest. He can't.
"Being so young, your father and I were pitted against countless Vampires. All Changed who some, even after centuries, still clung to their humanity and didn't want to kill someone who had yet to live. Each one, we brought to his knees." The pinkette only now seems to notice the burning wood. Lifting his hands he shakes off the smoke and sets them on his lap. Then he shudders, his eyes falling to his hands.
"'To all, we are one. To one, we are all.' That's where that saying came from. We vowed to always protect each other, to help each other escape that hell hole and live to wander the world. Then came the night there were none younger then Gray and I. The Elder had called us to the ring, we couldn't say no. When we saw we had to fight each other we knew it was time to escape."
He grins darkly, one hand coming up to rub the cross-shaped scar in his abdomen. Silver has always wondered where he got it and when he asked before he always got a simple 'We got in a fight and went too far.' Now he knows, it was more than just a fight gone too far.
"He commanded us to fight and we fought, but not each other. No, the moment we received the order to fight we became battle brothers. We turned on the Elder and his crowd of Born. Together we fought off each of them, inflicting blows we had watched them inflict on other Changed, on us."
He's glad to see his father's rage calming down once more, telling the story opening a way for him to vent. As if coming out from underwater his father shakes his head, looking at him again, his grin falling to a neutral if sad expression.
"After that night, we officially became Rogues to our kind. When we first met your mother and Lucy, they both told us that the scent of killing the Elder clung to us, marking us as Rogues not to be dealt with in anyway." And he shrugs. "To us, it never really mattered. We have our scars from time in a coven, scars that promise we will never go back to one if we can help it. Not if every coven looks down upon Changed like that."
Once again he gets to his feet, leaping to the branch he had originally been running on. Silver copies him, a gut feeling telling to him to stay quiet, that there's more his father has to say.
A moment later his instinct is right on, the older vampire turning back to him. "You asked why we came to Fiore. Why leave your birth land when it has everything we needed. There were three reasons why we did. The leading factor was, of course, the Hunters, the second was we wanted to avoid the covens, and the third was this," He waves to the trees around them. Silver has never really paid attention—not specifically—to the forest he's grown up in. Sure, he's noticed the wolf packs or how the seasons are different within the markers compared to outside them but never has he paid attention to the forest itself.
Not the way the shadows refuse to offer up their secrets, nor how the tree branches seem to reach for them as if either to drop them or support them. Now that he thinks about it, their movements have always been almost completely silent within the trees. Neither the deer or the birds in the trees would know they were there until they showed themselves.
Natsu grins, looking down at the teen. "A hundred years before I traveled east to Midi I stayed in this very forest. I met an elderly Vampire who had been around when the forest was young and he told me its secrets. About how the barrier carved into the trees protects all magical creatures in its depths from being tracked from beyond the border. How the wolf packs, like the pack you're so friendly with, are so large to protect the souls who call this place home. Why their howl calls upon the magic in the moon to wake the spirits."
A memory of a snow and ice covered clearing comes to his mind. A hunter cursed, the other killed to protect the pack and suddenly everything fits. Why he's always been able to understand the pack even after Deliora died, why the souls are so happy during Howler's moon, and why he's always felt a deep respect for the barrier marked into the millennia-old trees.
He looks up, ready to ask his father another question when he realizes the older vampire is gone, racing through the trees once more. Silver openly laughs, launching after him.
A few trees later as he's leaping into a backflip he passes the pinkette by. When he lands on the branch he looks back with a grin.
"Come on, old man! Surely you can beat a young buck like me in a race."
Natsu grins, leaping up to the same branch as his son. "Old man, eh? This old man can still beat you in a race back to town."
They spit in a hand, turn to each other and shake hands. "Deal."
Than Silver is gone, leaping higher into the tree. He breaks through the canopy, his eyes rapidly adjusting to the setting sun. In the distance, he can barely make out the tip of a spire. The spire that marks his target.
Glancing through a gap in the treetops he can just see his father bouncing from trunk to tree trunk, a maneuver he has yet to teach the teen. He smirks.
"You wanna cheat? Two can play that game." He closes his eyes, recalling his magic lessons and balls one hand into a fist. Setting his other hand flat first on the top of the fist then the bottom he chants, "Ice make: Path!"
When he opens his eyes he's surprised to find a somewhat sturdy path of ice three feet wide stretching across several tree tops. However, when he places a foot on the path he grimaces.
When his father had taught him the art of ice magic he hadn't exactly been paying attention, not after he learned his easier ability of snow magic. Now, skating across a wobbly and crumbling path he resolves to ask when they return home about getting an extra lesson in the subject…
Still, the path he creates manages to give him a large enough head start that when it comes to an abrupt edge he's able to dive headfirst back into the canopy. Through the top layer of mid-autumn leaves, he snags a branch and using his velocity swings up, flying over a branch of another tree to land on a sturdy branch two trees from where he fell through the canopy.
He grins, leaping for the next tree when he hears a laugh a few trees back. He laughs as well, looking back to see his father still trunk bouncing from tree to tree. Then he runs along the branch he's on, bouncing on the tip like a diving board and flipping end over end onto a lower branch. His calloused feet, toughened from the repeated experience are the only thing that stops him from sliding into a beehive.
"Show off!"
Running along the branch Silver shoots up the trunk, glancing over his shoulder. "Maybe if you finally showed me how to bounce I wouldn't have to burn you so bad with my mad skills."
His father lands on the branch a little too hard causing a crack to sound from the tearing wood. Both men leap to another branch where Natsu turns to him. A challenging gleam takes to his jade eyes and he smirks.
"I'll teach you if you can keep up. One of these days those fancy tricks are gonna get us all into trouble."
Silver snorts. "No worse than any of your tricks."
Natsu hums, crouching to set his hands on the branch in between his feet. "We'll agree to disagree. If you wanna learn to trunk hop now's a good time to do it since we're so close to town. Copy me."
The teen does as he says, crouching beside him though while Natsu keeps a light grip with just his fingertips Silver grasps the bark with his whole hands.
"Now, once you get going your speed will help you keep a pretty good grip. It's the getting started that'll throw you for a loop. Watch." He leaps, using his arms to push off while his feet give propulsion similar to a frog leaping off of a lily pad.
Slamming into a trunk he's only there for a handful of seconds before he leaps forward again, this time angling his body to be adjacent to the next trunk when he hits it.
He repeats the leap again before landing on another branch four trees away. When he stops moving he rises to his feet and turns around. "Now you try!"
Silver swallows, his eyes darting from tree to tree in nervousness, then he bends down, his eyes falling to his hands and he stops…
There, beside him, where his father had stood are eight tiny holes punctured into the bark. It's a minute detail, one he would've missed any other time, but now he takes a second look at the trees around him—particularly the ones his father had bounced off of. He finds the same thing, eight small holes punctured into the bark exactly where his father's hands had come in contact with the wood.
And he grins.
His grip on the wood loosens, his palms coming off the wood until only his fingertips remain.
"Snow make: claws." Murmuring the spell under his breath, Silver watches the small snowflakes form around his fingers, each digit turning into a miniature white animal claw.
When he grabs the bark the claws dig in, eight tiny holes punching into the wood. Still grinning he launches off the branch, angling toward the first trunk.
The first landing isn't easy; he hits too hard nearly throwing him off the tree to the ground far below. Only his snow claws digging into the wood prevent him from completely going down. The tree apparently doesn't like the hard impact for he hears a deep groan from the wood.
He flinches, pushing off after he picks his next landing point. It takes a couple times before he understands what his father is talking about but eventually he's bouncing from tree to tree in circles around his father.
Natsu laughs, watching his son for a few more minutes before he calls out, "Alright, you got the idea. Now let's go. The sun is setting and your father is gonna blow his lid."
"Okay!" Silver calls out, changing his direction toward the town. So focused is he on bouncing that he doesn't remember a major point until he can see the church spire through the trees. He groans, glancing over his shoulder for his father. "Hey, Dad, how do I stop?"
He has to stop anyway, his claws are almost completely gone. No, wait, they are gone. Crap. Even as the thought crosses his mind he slips off the tree he bounced at and begins falling again.
"Son of a biscuit eating bitttch!"
No time. No time. He's falling fast and no time for his father to catch him. His mind runs through the list of spells he's mastered and comes up with the same he'd used earlier to ease his landing.
"Snow make: Bank!"
Deja vu. Only no wolves this time to laugh at him. Still, as he hits the snow bank an image of Lycan rolling over with his huffing laughter flashes across his mind.
When he finds the wolf again he'll kill him.
Silver squirms, his movements becoming frantic when he realizes his head first approach into the snow bank has pinned his arms to his sides while his feet move free in the air.
A hand grabs his foot and he stills, his ears barely able to pick up the sound of his father's laughter through the snow. Then the snow around him is melting, the warm air around his legs and feet giving him a pretty good idea of what's happening.
Once he has more room to move his arms he squirms backward until he pops out of the snowbank, the snow and water forcing his wild hair to stick up and out at crazier angles.
He's wild-eyed, staring at everything and nothing at once. Only his father's rumbling laughter gets him to focus long enough to shake the water from his hair and look up at the pinkette.
Natsu grins, offering a hand to him. "Well, that explains what happened when I found you earlier."
Accepting the hand he smiles sheepishly. "Yeah, I wasn't watching where I was going and underestimated a leap. The wolves got a kick out me falling out of a tree, myself not so much."
They walk down the rapidly melting snowbank, preferring to walk the rest of the way to town instead of taking to the trees once more. They crest a ridge, coming to a stop in the shadows of the trees to overlook the small town and Natsu shrugs.
"I know you don't like to hear it but being around those wolves teaches you as much as your father and I ever could. We've taught you how to hunt, how to use your magic, and how to blend in with the humans, but those wolves," He turns, setting a hand on Silver's shoulder. "Silver, when you're with those wolves, or hell, even just in the forest, in general, we get to see a side of you we haven't seen for nearly fifty years. You smile, you laugh, that icy mask of yours shatters and we get to see our little bit of trouble again."
Natsu pats his shoulder, walking to the edge of the ridge overlooking the town. "What I'm trying to say is, remember to laugh at yourself once in awhile. You still have another fifty years before you even have to think about being an adult and worrying about the politics of our kind. Be a kid. Laugh, cry, run rampant and play pranks for all I care. Just don't look at the world in such a serious light when you're still a kid."
And he's gone, leaping lightly from rooftop to rooftop in the shadows of the dying sun. Silver's feet feel as if they've been frozen to the ground.
He knows he's become quiet since they announced his mother's pregnancy nearly eight months ago—often only replying to any of his parents with short polite answers but he didn't think it had become so bad. He's just been trying to wrap his mind around everything that has occurred. From moving to this town a decade ago to even the mere idea of having a little sibling.
Even now the idea of the latter has his mind shirking away toward easier—and safer—thoughts.
The former however has his eyes going back to the subject in question. They've lived here for nearly a decade now, their home located ironically in the church whose steeple towers high above the rest of the buildings.
The town of Magnolia as the founders had named it. His father had met them, had known the founders for a short time before he returned to their home much deeper in the forest.
When he had returned Silver had sat for hours listening to stories about the little settlement located directly on the barrier. He'd heard the tales of the town building around the millennial protectors, of integrating them into the town itself without disrupting the border or the magic within.
Three decades later they had moved. His fire loving father having struck a deal with the founders early on that when the town was built they would have a home hidden within.
Looking out over the town sitting tall and proud—an equal mixture of nature and humanity—he wonders why. Why move to a town of humans when their cove was perfect? Why live on the border where it would be easy for Hunters to find them? And finally, buried under everything else, he wonders why the atmosphere so heavy with the taste of magic feels as if it is waiting for a storm to break?
A storm so strong he dreads the thought of the damage it will cause. How many lives will be lost? Homes destroyed? Lives changed for eternity?
The last thought has him looking across the town to the squat building set on the edge of the only lake within fifty miles. The only bar in town, it has always drawn his attention. Something about it has him wanting to keep a careful distance from it. One he knows his parents wouldn't object to him keeping.
He shakes his head. Of course, he wouldn't want to go around it, drunk humans are the worst kind of food after all. With that last thought in his mind, he leaps onto the roof of the closest building. The sun has set, his fathers will be waiting.
Tonight if he succeeds, will prove he can hunt for himself and won't require a chaperone to do so. But only if he succeeds.
As on every moon, he finds his fathers waiting on the roof of the church in the shadow of the steeple. When he lands he pulls on the mask, the one his fire wielding father seems to so dislike and greets them with a nod.
Gray, leaning against the steeple, walks up to him. "How were Lycan and the others?"
He might not show it, but Silver knows his ice father has as soft a spot in his heart for the wolves as he does himself. The teen smirks.
"Still as troublesome and tricky as ever, Pops. Lycan sends his wishes."
His father chuckles. "Glad to hear it." He sets a hand on Silver's shoulder, similar to what his other father had done earlier, and turns him in a specific direction. Gray leans down a gleam of pride in his navy blue eyes. "Are you ready for tonight?"
Silver nods. Of course, he's ready. He's been ready since his parents started throwing around the words solo hunt moons ago. Tonight. Now.
His solo hunt is starting now.
"You'll be taking the northwest quadrant to hunt tonight. Your father and I will be covering the northeast and southeast. Remember, make your kill then—"
"Get rid of the evidence. No human is to know of our presence."
His father pats his shoulder with a nod. "Good. Go. Be back before first beams or we come hunting."
First sunbeam? Ha, he'll be back before Libra has tipped her scales. Oh, this'll be fun. He'll make his parents proud.
Grizz: YAS! Monster chapter is done and posted! *falls back in bed* Now I can finally sleep.
DP: *bangs pot with a spoon* Wakey wakey eggs and bakey!
Grizz: Nooooo! Deadpool leave me be! *groans covering head with blanket*
DP: *grins* No can do, Grizz, you gotta be up and at 'em. *pulls off blanket*
*grabs Grizz by foot and hauls her down hallway*
Grizz: I don't wanna! I want to sleep for the next six months before I have to remind the readers I'm alive.
DP: You can sleep in August. Afterall you're gonna be exhausted after work anyway. *rips open basement door* For now you have to focus on NaLu Week 2018!
*Throws Grizz down steps*
Grizz: Ow! Fuck you! I'm not even doing NaLu Week!
DP: *grins* You lie! Oh how you lie, my dear Grizz. I've already seen the prompts and summaries you've chosen. Gotta admit I can't decide which one I like more. All eight were looking good.
Grizz: I hate you!
DP: I love you too. Now get to work and write the one-shots. I'll let you back out after you've posted the last one. *grins* *slams door shut with multiple locks*
DP: *turns to screen* Now readers, in case you're wondering what that's about. Grizz will be participating in NaLu Week 2018. She and her devil friend have already set up quite a bit and this extra measure is just to make sure she gets it done on time to send to her beta. That said I hope you enjoyed the updated chapter this week because it doesn't look like she'll be updating much else until after NaLu Week is done.
*Basement door thuds*
Grizz: Wade! You better not be talking to my readers!
DP: *cackles* 'til next time Grizz's readers, this is Deadpool signing off!