I almost forgot to post the chapter today, haha! This one is veery feelsy hehe B)) Enjoy!

As usual, consider leaving a review if you enjoy the story! Nothing motivates me more! And I've had kind of a writer's block the last days ugh.


Chapter 8:

if you wish upon a star


The next day, things returned to normal.

They had lazed around most of the day without any major accidents, and after the third card game Lucy had decided that this time around Natsu could well help her prepare dinner, since he ate for most of her money anyways.

To her surprise, Natsu had agreed rather enthusiastically, informing her that Igneel had actually advised him in the art of cooking. This did nothing to convince Lucy, who well knew that Igneel's culinary skills did not go far beyond boiling pasta and ordering pizza.

There was a reason she had been looking after his nutrition for years now.

"Okay, now cut the onions," she instructed her student, carefully observing him as he picked up the long and sharp knife. He held it like a weapon, and Lucy bit her lip. "They don't need to be slain, you know."

"You sure?" Natsu asked with a grin, "Last time you cut them, you cried. Maybe I should punish them for that."

He said it casually, but Lucy couldn't stop the heat that tinted her cheeks a soft pink. She turned her head away, smiling. "Okay then, punish them. By cutting them into tiny pieces."

"Aye, sir!" he called, getting to work. His technique was mediocre at best, but in the end the onion ended up cut no matter how you looked at it.

They were cooking fried potatoes and porkloin, much to Natsu's joy.

(He had opted for steak, but Lucy had almost fainted when she had looked at the price tag, and there had been no more talk about it.)

So he was on his best behaviour, ready to be rewarded by the delicious food Lucy had still spent more money on than she had wanted to. He really was doing his very best to be helpful.

Only, a helpful Natsu was still more extra work than actual help.

"Wait, wait! Peel the potatoes before you cut them!"

"Oh. Like this?" he asked, and proceeded to cut off a large chunk of potato. Lucy resisted to smack her hand against her forehead.

"No, not like this," she told him as calmly as she managed, "When the potato is cooked, you can get it off really easily, look here."

She proceeded to show him how it was done, and Natsu followed her example with surprsing skill. He was a good student, actually, if only you had the patience to teach him properly. It was not his fault that he did not know.

"Okay!" Lucy declared happily after an ungodly amount of cutting and preparation, "We can start frying!"

"Onions first!" Natsu called, and Lucy shot him an amused glance.

"Igneel taught me this!" he declared proudly, face lighting up in almost childlike joy, "Igneel taught me a lot of things!"

"Did he," Lucy smiled, trying to imagine the two of them in the kitchen. It made her heart ache in a good way. Igneel had probably taught him so much more than Natsu was aware of. And most of it had nothing to do with cooking.

They managed to prepare dinner without burning the house down, and that was a success in Lucy's book. Hell, it even tasted amazing.

Not like she would have expected anything less from herself, even with a devil in the kitchen.

With a self-satisfied little smile, Lucy chewed on her food.

Opposite of her, Natsu ate. If eat was still the correct terminology. Devour, gobble, or ravish even, would probably come closer to describe his style of eating. But the way he ate with so much appetite and enthusiasm, completely mesmerized by his food, was a weirdly joyful sight.

It made Lucy eat with much more vigour herself.

The wine they had was cheap but good enough, filling her with just that little amount of intoxication, little enough to not be tipsy just yet.

Natsu, on the other hand, was a different matter.

He had sniffed the red liquid curiously, then downed the whole glass at once, then almost died. The next glass he had treated with much more cautiousness. He did not seem entirely averse to the red liquid, but she wasn't sure if he enjoyed it either. But it sure had an effect on him. The more he drank, the more fond of it he became.

She was surprised when he purposely left her a nice chunk of meat instead of hoarding everything on his plate. She was actually full and satisfied despite eating with Natsu, which came as a small surprise. He seemed a lot more considerate lately, even if he showed it only in unobtrusive ways.

Still, it did not take long for them to finish the whole loin, with Natsu the clear victor of their eating competition (that, of course, existed only in his mind). Fighting for your food made it double as delicious, if you asked him.

He sank back into his chair with a satisfied hum, rubbing his full belly. Lucy eyed it curiously. How was he able to eat so much? She'd had two large pieces and could not have eaten more if you had asked her to, yet the amount had only been a quarter of the meat at best.

Lucy had expected him to become a little quieter after dinner, as he usually did, but instead the wine seemed to turn him into a bubbly fountain of excitement and words.

This guy never ran out of energy.

Giving him alcohol had probably not been one of her wiser choices.

He was laughing about something now, of which she had not heard the cause, fading out of the conversation by accident more than anything else.

Apparently he hadn't been waiting for an answer, because he jumped up and, with the speed of a whirlwind, disappeared into the living room.

"Lucy, look at this!" she heard him call, and with a sigh (and just a bit of relief) she ignored the dishes and went over to where he had called her.

"Natsu! Get off the couch!"

"But look!" he called again, pointing at himself. He jumped so hard that the couch protested loudly, throwing his legs high up into the air before he bounced back down, laughing like a child. He almost lost his balance, but caught himself in the last moment and lifted his leg. "Look, Lucy, I'm a ninja! Nin nin!"

"Oh god," Lucy whispered to herself. "I'm never giving you alcohol again!"

"Come here, Lucy!" Natsu slurred, pointing a finger at her. "Jump with me!"

"No way am I jumping with you," Lucy objected, but walked over to him anyways. She grabbed his wrist, dragging him down into a sitting position. "Stop ruining my couch."

Something in her voice made Natsu oblige, and he blinked up at her almost fearfully. "Lucy, you're so scary sometimes…" he whispered almost reverentially, making her snicker.

She was still holding his wrist, but now he grabbed hers too, pulling at her arm.

"Sit," he demanded. With a roll of her eyes, Lucy obliged.

"I'm not playing another card game, though."

"You're so boooring," he lamented, stretching his arms and making himself comfortable on the couch.

Lucy sighed, pulling her legs up and curling them beneath her, but keeping a safe distance to the guy beside her.

For a moment, they settled into a comfortable silence.

"Hey, Natsu…" Lucy then started almost shyly, unsure of whether to ask what she had been wondering about for quite some time now. Maybe now, with his wine-induced talkativeness, was a good time to finally get some answers. "That exam of yours… You still wanna do that?"

Natsu glanced at her with an unreadable expression.

"Of course," he replied without looking at her.

"Why?" she asked, sounding a little hurt, "I mean, can't you just… not do it? Stay here with us?"

She almost didn't dare look over at him, but when she did, he was staring at the wall with a frown. He didn't answer right away, and she grabbed a pillow, the one with the little hearts, nervously squeezing it with her hands.

"I can't not do it," he finally said, sounding a little confused himself, as if he wasn't sure of his answer, "Everybody does it. I have to do it."

"But why?" she asked again, pushing on, "What would happen if you refused to do it?"

"I don't know," he answered, but his voice was barely a whisper, and he sounded scared, genuinely scared and Lucy turned to look at him in shock.

Natsu blinked, cleared his throat, and shook his head.

"Doesn't matter," he said a lot louder, ignoring her worried stare, "because I'm doing it!"

"Natsu…" Lucy bit her lip, reaching out a hand but letting it sink back into her lap. "It's not nice there, is it. Not even for devils."

It was less a question and more a statement, and she cast her eyes to the ground, blinking away the inklings of tears.

"It's - it's not too bad!" he defended, but it sounded not very convincing. "It's not too bad if you're a proper devil. If you're a proper devil, no one will look down on you, or laugh at you, or treat you like dirt."

He clenched his fists, only slightly, but it did not escape Lucy. There was no use blinking back the tears in her eyes.

"What about family?" she asked almost desperately, trying to find something to stop the dreadful feeling in her chest from spreading, "You said you have a brother didn't you, and that he was… the devil. Wouldn't that make you some kind of - of prince?"

Natsu laughed, but there was little humour in the sound.

"It's not like we are royals or anything. At least not by human definition. That's not how it works. But Zeref is the ruler of hell, yeah. And…" he drifted off, "Well, you'd probably say he's kind of a shit brother. I just… I just need to show him that I'm strong. That I'll make a good devil. Then…" He didn't continue, clenching his jaws.

This time, Lucy did touch his shoulder when she reached out her hand, feeling him jerk slightly. She didn't pull back, and slowly, Natsu turned to look at her. She couldn't quite read his emotions; there were too many. If he saw the tears in her eyes, he didn't show it.

"I have to kill him, you know."

The words sunk in slowly, and after a long moment, Lucy finally managed to speak.

"What?"

"I have to kill him," he repeated, "to become his successor. Because I'm his brother."

"What? But– but that's…" Lucy stuttered, then pressed her lips together.

Natsu inhaled through his nose, looking up at the ceiling before fixing his gaze on her again. Her hand still rested on his arm, but it had slipped a little, hanging limply between them as he turned his body towards hers. Her left hand was digging into the pillow she was clutching to her stomach.

Natsu shrugged. "One day I will have to take Zeref's throne by fighting him to the death. It's tradition."

"That's… horrible," Lucy whispered.

"It's always been that way," Natsu said impassively, "Not like I ever witnessed it. Zeref's been ruling for a long time. If I lose, he'll rule for much longer."

"And…" Lucy swallowed, voice trembling, "If you lose… you'll… he'll…"

"Kill me? Yeah."

Lucy leaned forward, hugging his arm and resting her head on his shoulder. The first tears started falling, but she did no longer care if he saw or not. He swallowed, and it was so loud she could hear it.

"You know," he laughed weakly, "Now that I think about it, I maybe don't even wanna go back."

Lucy sniffed, smiling through her tears. "Then stay," she whispered.

He didn't answer, but she felt him slowly relax beside her. He was warm.

Silence settled.

Lucy turned her head slightly, letting her eyes drift over his skin. He wore the grey sweater she had forced upon him. It fit surprisingly well, considering it belonged to her. But while the sleeves were so long she had to roll them up constantly, for him they barely reached his wrists. Her eyes moved from his hand back up to where one collarbone was showing, so close she could almost touch her nose to it if she leaned forward just a little more. There were little scars on his skin, and she wondered where and why he had sustained them.

Like in a trance, she kept staring at one point, where the tip of a larger scar peeked around his throat, almost reaching his adam's apple.

Her tears had slowly dried on her cheeks, leaving her eyes feeling like sandpaper.

Maybe it was her imagination, but he seemed a lot paler than usual. She wondered if it had to do with his feelings. Now that she thought about it, the colour seemed to fluctuate a little, just gradually. It was a blazing, deep red when he was angry, but on other days one could think he simply was very, very badly sunburned if you glanced at him in passing. Now, his skin was only a few shades deeper than the hair on his head. Like when you held a glass with just a sip of red wine towards the sun.

Lucy took a deep breath, inhaling his smoky scent. It was weirdly comforting, reminding her of campfire nights of summers long gone, when her mother had been alive and she'd had no troubles in the whole wide world. Her eyelids drooped, a soft, sad smile playing around her lips.

She fell asleep before she knew it.

Natsu was startled from his thoughts when a low, soft snore resounded beside him. Lucy's head rested heavy on his shoulder, but it was a comfortable weight.

She made him feel warmer than all the heaters and showers ever had.

Carefully, he reached out his free right arm (the left was still in Lucy's grip, though he could have freed it easily) to pluck the blanket off the backrest of the couch, where it had lain as neatly folded as every other piece of fabric in this flat seemed to be.

A little clumsily, he draped it over her. She had done the same for him once, so it was only fair. He was simply returning the favour. They were even.

His eyes remained on her sleeping face. Her long lashes, her golden hair, her small nose and soft lips. The remnants of a trail of tears on her rosy cheeks.

Natsu smiled down at her. Then he realized what he was doing, and quickly relaxed his face.

He had tried his very best to convince himself that Lucy and Igneel meant nothing to him. Maybe it was time to face the facts.
These people didn't mean nothing to him at all. They meant a whole damn lot, and he'd been a fool to think he could fight it. They had extended warmth and kindness like not many people before them had, and never in such a way that left him craving more.

Hell, Lucy had cried for him. No one had ever cried for him.

He hadn't known it would hurt him to see her tears. He hadn't known he'd feel strangely happy, either. He probably shouldn't feel happy about it. But he did.

Maybe he didn't want to taint them at all, neither her nor Igneel.

Maybe he didn't want to taint anyone, if this was the way humans were.

He wondered what might happen if he really wouldn't complete the exam.

He was strong already! And he could prove it to him. He didn't need the official proof of his strength to know it existed. He was Zeref's strongest, no matter what.

He didn't want to kill his brother, but he knew he could obtain the strength to do so, exam be damned.

What was the worst that could happen? Many things crossed his mind. Many bad things had happened to him before. Worse things to others. You didn't simply disobey the rules.

And you certainly didn't disobey Zeref.

But Zeref wouldn't do anything truly bad to him, to his brother… right?

Of course, he was wrong.

But Natsu did not know that, and so he fell asleep with hope in his heart.


Here we go with some reviews! Thankyou all so much!

R: Animallover: I was just thinking, since Natsu can do some basic transformation, could he also transform himself to look more human if he wanted to?

A: Hehe, this will be brought up very soon.

R: Akela-Nakamura: The holy water bit had be cracking up, and seeing Natsu flounder when he realized he kinda likes Lucy is adorable! And the image of Natsu walking around naked, his tail flicking with arrogance, and a who-gives-a-shit grin on his face just made my day. (You didn't detail the tail or the grin, but I feel that's what happened lol)

A: Thankyouuu hehe. And yes. Yes this is canon. B)))

R: nikkiw67: I love this story! But is it weird all I could think as Natsu ate Lucy's cuccumber was "does it taste kinda like vanilla now?" I must know this answer!

A: Hahaha oh my, this is something I did not consider ;) Maybe a little? :D He has a prone sense of smell after all.

R: laxusdrayer2324: Will Lucy ever find out about Natsu?

A: Find out what, exactly? :O

R: nalubbys: JUST HAVE MY SOUL WILL YOU THAT WAS GREAT *tears* I love your writing so much, thank you for taking time out of your day to give us such great chapters :D

A: *happy dance* ahhh I'm so happy you guys are all loving it! ^o^