A/N: Sorry for the delay in getting this one out, it actually had me stumped for quite a while on how to write it. Nevertheless it is finally done and pretty much presentable. ;)

Thank you to The Jade Empress, shortypink and Crystallight-star13 for their reviews on chapter 9! :) The secrets of Tsuyu and Kasei will be revealed, but its still a couple of chapters off, so I hope that you have the patience to wait that long. :P :)

RxExR!

A Chapter from the Past

Chapter 10 - The Journey to the Island

"Do we have to go by train?" Natsu grimaced as he contemplated boycotting travelling by train. He absolutely hated it and in the last couple of years his tolerance for that kind of travel had gone down nearly exponentially.

"Do you know any other ways of travelling that allow us to travel nearly across the whole of Fiore at the same speed?" Lucy asked him and he sighed heavily. He would have suggested that he flew with Happy but that wouldn't work since Happy wanted to sit with Charle while they travelled on the train.

Happy should better appreciate the fact that he was doing this for him.

"Fine." He muttered in annoyance before stomping off. To some degree he knew that he was being a child but quite frankly he couldn't care less at the moment. He hated travelling by anything that moved due to his motion sickness and everyone knew it. And yet they still made him travel by those means.

Lucy sighed as she saw him storm off towards the train. Yes, she knew that he hated that method of travel, her children hated it as much as he did and she had the same argument with them as she had just had with him each and every single time she had made them board one.

"Don't worry about it Lucy, he'll get over it eventually." Erza said with a smile as she went to stand next to her and Lucy looked over at her in thanks. Erza had always been particularly gifted in sensing how other people felt, and Lucy thought that her friend had become even better at it over the last couple of years.

Her brow rose though at the sight of Erza's large amounts of luggage. Some things really did never change.

"Is he even heading to the right train?" Jellal asked as he watched the pink-haired dragon slayer storm off. Yes, he knew that Natsu had always had a rather fiery temper, but he hadn't known of his intense adversity towards travelling.

"Oh god." Lucy muttered underneath her breath. Seriously, he was even worse than her four year old twins at times. "Natsu! That's the wrong train!" Lucy ran after him and Erza sighed in exasperation. Gray, Juvia and Wendy had gone off to get their tickets while they waited on the platform for everyone to gather their luggage and belongings before setting off.

"So what's the plan of action anyway?" Jellal asked as he turned to Erza. He had honestly expected a bit more planning and thought to be put into the quest but so far he hadn't really seen any traces of it.

"The quest itself is on an island in the Azure region called Rose Island. The trains from Magnolia don't head there directly so we have to travel to Crocus first. We have half an hour there before our next train leaves to the capital of the Azure region, Daffodil City. From there we take a carriage to the port town of Idela and we stay the night there. After that we have a boat waiting for us to take us to Rose Island itself." Erza explained and Jellal nodded.

"It's quite a long trip." He mentioned as he thought about the upcoming journey. Despite having been in the magic council for many years in the form of his doppelganger Siegrain, he had never actually travelled all that much, preferring more to concentrate on matters that were closer to his heart, such as the Tower of Heaven.

"It is indeed." Erza nodded. "None of us have ever been to that area either but we hope that it's similar to here. The Azure region is normally quite detached from the rest of the happenings in Fiore."

"It's also quite different culturally." Erza and Jellal looked to their right as Gray, Juvia, Wendy and Charle joined them.

"We have the tickets." Gray held them up for Erza to see and she nodded at him.

"How so?" She turned back to look at Juvia who had said the previous sentence.

"Juvia's never been there herself either but Master José mentioned one or two things about it when Juvia and Gajeel were still a part of Phantom Lord." Juvia briefly looked over at the commotion that was Natsu and Lucy coming their way. "But he mentioned that the Azure region was not very partial to mages. Juvia will tell you more when we are on the train." Wendy smiled up at Juvia who returned it and they all looked up at the speakers as the departure of their train was being called out.

"Let's go then." Erza led the way with them all trailing behind her as they first packed away their luggage and then went to sit on the train. It was going to be a very long ride anyway and none of them was actually looking forward to it.

~.~.~.~.~

Crocus, the capital of Fiore

"I can't believe it..." Gray said as they got off the train and began walk to their next station.

"I didn't even need to use my magic..." Wendy looked unhappy as she said that.

"Shouldn't you be happy that you didn't have to try and cure his motion sickness?" Charle looked at her protegé with exasperation.

"I am but..." Wendy looked in front of them at Natsu, who was for once not crawling across the floor after a train journey.

"Then just be happy!" Charle's slight annoyance at the whole situation leaked into her voice.

"Did you just call for me Charle?" Happy popped up next to her and Charle jumped in surprise.

"No." She replied with a deadpan face but Happy grinned brilliantly none-the-less. It was like he had become immune against any rejections from her. Everyone pretty much knew that she was in denial anyway.

"He just slept the whole way through..." Gray was still in shock. Not once in the past seven years had Natsu not been sick on a train journey and this time he had just slept through an entire ride.

"It really is remarkable." Erza agreed and Jellal looked at the two of them with raised eyebrows. Okay, so they had told him of Natsu's extensive motion sickness but even he wouldn't have expected them to be this surprised at the lack of it.

"Maybe because he was sleeping on Lucy's lap." Juvia pointed out helpfully and Jellal turned to look at her and nod. The others appeared to be to surprised to react to her comment anyway.

"You think so?" He looked ahead at Lucy who was walking next to Natsu as he carried both her and his own luggage.

"Mm-hmm." Juvia nodded. She didn't know about the others but as a constant fighter for love she could recognise affection from miles away. And it appeared that the pink-haired dragon slayer was unknowingly harbouring quite a lot of it towards their recently returned stellar mage.

But she wasn't about to go and tell the others that, they should try and figure it out for themselves.

~.~.~.~.~

Daffodil City... five hours later

"You know, you really are rather obvious." Lucy jumped as a voice spoke out behind her and she twirled around, only to come face-to-face with Cory.

"Geez Cory, can't you at least say something when you suddenly decide to pop out of nowhere?" Lucy said annoyed, sending a small glare towards the dragon spirit of the zodiac.

"Technically I don't just 'pop' up out of nowhere. I come from the spirit realm." Cory said as she tilted her head to the side. Once again the spirit was hanging from the ceiling, a sight that had become only too familiar to Lucy.

"Yeah yeah." Lucy said as she peered around the lady's toilets that she was currently in to check that no one else was there. "But why are you here?" She knew that her spirits didn't just tend to materialise whenever they felt like it in these cases, despite common belief that they did.

"There are some strange pressures appearing all over the spirit realm. The King sent me to tell you that something may be up and that Tartaros might be making a move soon." Lucy's eyes clouded with worry as she heard that.

"Do you think it's because I came back?" She asked as she bit her bottom lip, a common habit she had when her nerves got to her.

"Nope." Cory said as she popped her 'p' at the end of the word. "From what we can see they've been experimenting with the spirit realm in this region for a number of years now, it was probably one of the reasons that they tried to get rid of you since you would have immediately noticed it."

"How can you be sure that it's Tartaros and not just some people randomly experimenting about?" Lucy knew she was fishing for straws here, but she really didn't want to believe that the dark guild was planning something.

Cory sent her a look that said 'are you serious?'. "Seriously, how many people do you know that just randomly experiment with the barriers of a realm not their own?" Lucy sighed in response. "See, you already know that and yet you still ask stupid questions like that." Cory really did have the patience of a firecracker at times.

"I just don't want to believe that something bad is going to happen." Lucy replied and Cory rolled her eyes.

"Lucy, we're talking about one of the three top guilds from the former Ballam Alliance. And you want to tell me that you 'don't want to believe that something bad is going to happen'?" Cory's look was incredulous now and Lucy went back to sending her a small glare. Yes, she knew that it wasn't so but she could hope, could she not?

"And you're telling me this again because...?" She looked at her spirit, waiting for an answer. She didn't have much more time anyway, their carriage to Idela was leaving in half an hour and Erza wanted them all at the pick-up point within the next ten minutes.

"Because Loke and I are looking into it and because we thought that you should be warned. Keep an eye out where you can, the usual." Cory shrugged. "I'll see you soon then!" And with that her spirit vanished into a puff of smoke and Lucy frowned. Cory was normally never this short with her. Ever since she'd mentioned that she was going to the Azure region actually Cory had been in a worse mood than normal and that was saying something.

Even Loke had commented on it last night when they had talked over the little logistics of the job that they had. He had said something about this region meaning something to the thirteenth spirit but when she had asked about it further, he hadn't been able to give her anymore answers.

"She keeps to herself a lot." He shrugged as he got up to go. "Before you found her key and made a contract with her, none of us had actually ever met her. Well, apart from me, but even I'd only met her once or twice over the past centuries."

There was something about this mission that made her uneasy, as if something big was about to happen.

Lucy didn't like it one bit, not one bit at all.

~.~.~.~.~

Idela, Azure Region... the next day

"We have to go on a boat." Natsu's face was white, it had lost all of its colour.

"Yes, a boat." Lucy said as she looked at him as she crossed over the gang plank.

Natsu paused, looked at the city behind him, then at the ocean stretching out in front of him and then he looked back at the boat.

"Do we really have to take a boat?" His voice sounded small and slightly hopeful at the prospect that they might not have to.

"Yes! We have to take the boat!" Lucy exclaimed in exasperation. "Now get on!" She gave him a glare that could have withered plants and Natsu cowered slightly before carefully making his way across the plank, his face growing greener by the second.

"I completely see where they have it from." Cory said as she watched the dragon slayer get aboard.

Loke chuckled next to her. "I told you so." He shook his head as they both looked down from their position at the bow of the ship.

"It really is remarkable though." Cory said after a couple of minutes in silence.

"What is?" Loke ripped his eyes away from the beautiful sight of the ocean stretched out in front of him to turn his attention to the spirit next to him.

"The fact that no one else here has actually noticed the resemblance between them. It almost hurts to watch them be so ignorant." She said with a huff and Loke burst out laughing. She quirked an eyebrow at him and he just laughed harder, causing the others to look at them in confusion. Lucy only shot them a look of warning, having already guessed what they would be talking about. After all, the whole situation was a mirror image of what had happened over two weeks ago when she, Kasei and Tsuyu had left the island they had been staying on for the past four years of their lives.

Erza looked over at the two spirits with a raised eyebrow before turning back to the captain of the ship that was taking them to Rose Island.

"We're all aboard now." She said to him and he nodded his head in response.

"Best we leave then. The townspeople are getting restless." The old man said and she silently agreed. When they had arrived at Idela the previous night, the people at the inn they had been staying at had been courteous, but that was about it.

They had been polite but not friendly. In fact, it had almost seemed as if they were trying to keep as much as a distance as possible without appearing to be rude. Since the captain of this ship appeared to be different, he had been friendly to them ever since picking them up, she decided that now would be the perfect moment to try and get some answers.

Jellal appeared to be thinking the same as he joined her and the captain. He was quite interested in the history of this part of the country himself.

Slowly the boat began to move away from the harbour and out into the calm of the sea. Erza did a quick headcount as she looked around the ship, just to double check that everyone really was aboard.

Happy and Charle sat contently in the sun, eating some fish that the captain had given them while Wendy and Juvia leaned over the sides, chatting happily as the ship began to pick up speed. Gray was securing the last of their luggage while Lucy was rubbing small circles on Natsu's back as he leaned over the side of the ship for a completely different reason.

"Not to sound rude but why is everyone so antagonistic towards mages in this region?" Jellal asked the captain just as Erza sweeped her eyes over the deck one last time.

The old man chuckled. "So ya noticed that, didn't ya?" He smiled an old smile, one of his golden teeth blinking in the sunlight. "My name's Sam Zeran by the way. People 'ere call me 'Old Sam'. And you young folks are?"

"Erza Scarlet." Erza said briefly, hoping that he wouldn't ignore Jellal's question.

"Jellal Fernandes." Jellal smiled pleasantly.

Erza remembered what Juvia had told them on the train to Magnolia, but it hadn't been much. She'd only said that the people here mistrusted mages and magic deeply, but there hadn't been much more to say really. For her, tt had really brought the secrecy of the whole region to light.

"People 'ere say that magic is the devil's tool." Old Sam's eyes grew sad. "Although many o' us know that that ain't true, lettin' go of old beliefs is 'ard, 'specially for the ones my age." His accent was hard and weathered, just like the ship he steered.

"Why though?" Erza didn't quite understand why people here would still believe that after so much time. Jellal's eyes seemed to echo her question as well.

Old Sam chuckled. "Curious, ain't ya?" He smiled softly. "Jus' like my daughter. She's a mage in Daffodil. Me and my wife are real proud of 'er." His eyes turned sad once more. "Though a lot of folks 'ere don' appreciate it." This time Erza and Jellal waited patiently, they now knew that he would talk with them.

"Legends say that the dragons came from 'ere. Specifically from our island." Erza's and Jellal sat up, they hadn't heard of that before.

"I've never heard of that before." Jellal echoed Erza's thoughts this time around.

"That's 'cause no one likes to talk of it." Old Sam shrugged. "There're more hieroglyphs and books on it on our island though, but they're in the language o' the olden days, apart from the Rowen clan no one can read them no more."

A laugh from the front of the ship distracted them briefly and they looked up to see two of Lucy's spirits appear once more. They had been there at the start, when they had boarded the ship and then they had vanished. It seemed that they were now back.

"People feared the dragons. Some even say they ruled us like slaves." Erza and Jellal stiffened at the mention of slaves, it brought up painful memories for them. "O' course the last time anyone actually saw one is o'er a hundred years ago, though we still tell stories o' them to scare the little ones into not running amok and stayin' in at night."

"But why would that mean that the people here hate magic and mages?" Erza asked, her natural curiousity taking over once more.

"People once believed that the mages were the children o' the dragons." Old Sam said and laughed at their astounded expressions. "Difficult to believe, right?" They both nodded. "They hunted the mages down, sometimes e'en killin' them." His eyes looked out over the sea as he checked their course.

"They killed innocent people?" Erza felt disgusted and from the horror on Jellal's face, it was obvious he felt the same.

"They didn' look innocent to those around them." Old Sam said softly. "To them, they were not natural, they were the devil's work."

"Your daughter too?" Erza asked softly, somehow knowing that this was the case.

"Yeah." He said sadly. "She's safe now in Daffodil, they accept magic more there than they do 'ere. Sophie and me can't not worry though. Our son hasn't spoken with any of us in years. He thinks that we shouldn' be acceptin' 'er for who she is."

"I'm sorry." Jellal said, his eyes a storm of emotions.

"No need ter be sorry lad, every family 'as its problems." He chuckled softly. "Look ahead now, we're 'ere." All of them looked up as they saw a small island rise above the horizon.

It was true, the island was in front of them and the mission was going to begin after the briefing. An increasingly more interesting mission than they had originally thought at that.