Lucy came to Natsu in a white and burgundy dress the next evening. Her hair was loose in curled into ringlets and her lips were slicked with something clear and wet-looking. She looked fuller than usual and when she stepped into the circle of his arms and he felt up her generous waist, he realized she was wearing but simple a tuttenseck. No corset. Just for him? If he considered the other possibility, she was wearing it for whoever she was rushing to meet tonight, he'd go mad.

"You look lovely." She felt better.

She smiled mischievously. "Some men would say indecent."

"Perhaps that's part of it."

"You're a heathen, Crown Prince."

"Then why come to me like this?"

"Perhaps I wanted you that way?" she suggested and between Natsu's legs got tight.

Lucy's smile could cut glass; she felt everything between them and pushed her body harder against his. Her golden tresses tangled in Natsu's fingers and he held her tightly. She tasted like she'd chewed on rosemary. Her chest expanded and contracted beneath his palms and her hands wandered down his chest, lower and lower and lower. Natsu closed his eyes when she got to the waist of his breeches and held his breath, hoping but not really suspecting she'd go any further. But she did. The flat of her palm brushed over his shaft and he let all of his breath go all at once. Lucy purred. She had him hook, line and sinker and she knew it, too.

There was a terribleness to being vulnerable like that, but it was also liberating in a sense, to just stand at the precipice of some dark and lonely tower and close your eyes and let go and see where you land.

Natsu waited for her to undo the lace at the front of his breeches but Lucy just methodically stroked, down his length, a circle around the tip with her short fingernail, up to the base, squeeze. And again. Feeling brave, he grabbed her behind and she hummed into his mouth. That gave him the courage he needed to fill both of his hands with her breasts.

Lucy let him touch her just enough to make him feel crazy, then broke away. She swiped her fingers at the corners of her lips, wicking away his kiss. She fixed her hair in his full-length mirror. Then she straightened her dress so she didn't look so pawed at. "It's almost midnight."

Nearly the shift change. She'd want to be getting out into the city then. He looked morosely down his front. He strained against his pants; it was starting to hurt.

"I'll come back," she promised and kissed him again, long and humid and totally agonizing.

"I look forward to it," he said foolishly.

She brushed her hand over him again, probably on purpose but pretending as though it wasn't. "Call your manservant?"

Natsu pushed his lungs to the very limit, clearing his head with all the sword drills Dimaria insisted he learned. By the time he got to her second favourite evasion tactics, he was mostly okay. He pulled on the string that rang a bell in the room next to his. In a moment, Happy was tapping on his door. Natsu let him in. He looked between Natsu and Lucy and sighed.

"May I advise?"

"You may not," Natsu said briskly.

Happy muttered beneath his breath, too low for anyone to hear.

Natsu threw open the balcony doors and looked out. The moon was a pale wedge in the cloudless sky. Stars shone all around it. Natsu could see forever. The grounds behind the castle wall and beyond were deserted, save for the guards that patrolled this area, men with swords at their sides. Some had flint guns slung across their backs though they'd only be good for a round before they had to pack the gunpowder again.

Lucy stood at the balcony edge and Happy got in beside her. Natsu was wickedly jealous watching Happy take her in his arms, though he told himself not to be.

The clock tower started chiming, the guards came in so the new ones could go out, and Happy's wings burst from his back like two feathery fans. They captured air and then they were flying. Natsu crossed his fingers as they made it over the wall, waiting for something to go wrong but hoping that everything would go just right.

They made it to the other side without raising the alarm and touched down in a copse of trees. Natsu tried to watch them after that, but they disappeared into the thick pine needles and were gone. He closed his door and returned to his room to wait.

It was nearly four before Lucy returned to him. She'd traded her gown for a green robe. Once the door was closed behind her, she removed that and Natsu saw that beneath its plain folds was a golden chemise decorated in silver moons. It must have been expensive. Did Bora buy it for her?

Does it matter? he wondered, and, does it not?

She finally took the tie at the front of his breeches and undid the knot and he thought perhaps it didn't matter at all.

She undid the knot in his shirt, too, and pulled the thread all the way through all of the eyelets, exposing his chest. She trailed her fingers over his abdomen.

"Did your evening go well?" Natsu asked because she hadn't said a thing yet and he was nervous and he wasn't sure if she'd stop again, teasing him until he died frustrated but happily so.

Lucy met his eyes and he couldn't read her expression, it was so complicated. "Sit," she commanded of him and Natsu perched on the corner of his bed, eager and curious and squeezing the life out of his bedsheets.

She undid the tie at the front of her chemise and he could see loads of pale skin. Then she shrugged the shoulders off and the chemise fell all the way to the floor and she was completely bare.

Lucy doused the candle on Natsu's bedside table with a press of her fingers. Natsu vision adjusted to the sudden darkness. Lucy was pulling her golden hair back over her shoulders and stepping into him. He kissed the tips of her breasts and squeezed her bare behind low by her thighs. She sighed and allowed him to pull her on top of him. He settled all the way inside of her and locked his arms around her waist, hands on her hips. She kissed him deeply and moved her body against his and Natsu couldn't remember a time he'd ever fit together with another person quite like this.

His bed was empty in the morning. He called for Happy and got a hot basin of water he used to wash while Happy placed out a pair of pressed breeches and a tunic embroidered with gold. Very Princely. Zeref would be angry if he ruined them.

"Did you follow her through the city last night?"

"For a bit, but then she used one of her golden keys and disappeared into the earth."

Was magic like that possible? She was amazing. "Did she know you were following her?"

"That's difficult to say, but I think she suspected."

"She didn't say anything last night."

"I didn't suspect you were doing much talking," Happy grumbled.

"We weren't." Natsu yanked his tunic over his head, obscuring his stupid grin and ruining the hair he'd so cautiously slicked back. Happy fixed it for him.

"If I may say so, Your Highness, it seems reckless to continue funding her misadventures."

"I need to know what she's doing."

"Treasonous things, likely."

"Why would you assume that?"

"Because," Happy said gently, "There was another explosion last night, by the docks again."

"So? Maybe a captain overfilled his broiler. Or perhaps someone mislabelled dangerous goods and dropped it. Or any other number of things." Reasonable things. Things more common than the woman he'd taken to bed last night was plotting against his country.

"I was following her in that direction before she disappeared. It seems likely she was involved in some way. Or that she saw what happened, at the very least," Happy said cautiously, like he was nudging a badger.

Natsu locked up all his indignation and tried to think logically. "I need to know. For sure."

"I can follow her again the next time she requests it."

"She'll escape again." Natsu tapped his chin thoughtfully.

"No scheming," Happy demanded.

Natsu pretended he didn't hear him. "I need to be out there, too."

"She'll never agree to carry out her business with you hanging over her shoulder."

"Of course not," not secretive Lucy. "That's why she won't know I'm there. I can be discrete." Dimaria had taught him how to mask his movements, how to blend in with the shadows. She'd taught him how to sneak.

"And how do you suppose you'll get out of the castle?"

"You'll fly me out like you do for her, only you'll have to return for me."

"The guards will be out by then. We'll be seen."

"Not if we direct the guards' attention elsewhere."

"I very much dislike this."

"Noted. Can you fly me?"

"I'm not sure."

"We'll practice, now." Natsu tightened his breeches and straightened his tunic and gave Happy his back. "Quickly," he added. "Breakfast is soon."

Happy sighed. "I'm not sure this will work."

"It used to."

"That was before."

"Before what?"

"Before your cooks got better. Before you got fat."

"If I'm heavier, it's with muscle, not lemon cakes. Dimaria would skin me."

"You're awfully defensive for a Prince that doesn't spend his time cramming lemon cakes in his mouth."

"I love you like a brother, Happy, but I swear to god, if you don't be silent, I will tell the cooks to stop making you smoked salmon."

"You're a monster." Happy got in behind Natsu and linked his arms under Natsu's and threaded his fingers together behind Natsu's neck. Happy was sweating and Natsu could feel his muscles bunching.

"This is more intimate than I remember."

"You don't say?"

"Do you want to try a bride carry?"

Happy said, "Just be silent, don't ruin it."

Natsu emptied his mind. "Okay, no ruining. Give it a go."

Happy let go of his breath. The room filled with the scent of magic, and then large feathery wings were taking up most of the space. They curled around Natsu. The bottoms touched the floor, the tops almost the ceiling. This used to work when they were small. He wasn't so sure now.

Happy gave them a beat and Natsu's poetry books knocked down, a family portrait wobbled on the wall, and his bedsheets ruffled, another beat and his dragon statue fell back on his dresser, his colognes toppled over, some spilling, and his swords careened to the ground.

"Keep going," Natsu hissed when he felt Happy waver. "We're almost…"

They raised up off the ground, one inch, two. They were airborne. Natsu cheered.

A solid fist landed on his door, shattering Happy's concentration. His wings wavered and then the magic failed and they both crashed to the floor. Natsu's elbow accidentally sank into Happy's eye and Happy bellowed.

Natsu's door burst open and Zeref looked in. His magic lashed out and pushed Happy aside and back and he probably would have kept going, but Natsu hollered and got in the way.

"Don't! We were just—we were training!"

Zeref's magic retracted completely. He didn't apologize to Happy, who winced as he picked himself up out of the dusty corner and examined the cold welts Zeref's magic left behind. He said, "If you're going to practice magic, do it in the courtyard where you can be seen."

Where you're safe, he meant, where I can keep an eye on you, where I won't wonder if an assassin has snuck into your room to murder you.

Natsu brushed himself off. "What do you want?"

Happy paled at his insolent tone but Natsu didn't care.

Zeref snagged the crown off the stand Natsu perched it on for safekeeping when he didn't feel like being Royal, and placed it on Natsu's head. It was made of heavy gold with a singular blue sapphire in its centre, simple by most standards. "The King's Guard has arrested someone in relation to the minor explosion on the docks early this morning. Our audience is required."

"I'll clean up in here, Your Highness," Happy said.

"Thanks." Natsu rushed to match Zeref's impatient gait. "They were caught setting off the explosion?"

"No, they were caught near the explosion site."

"Like Lucy was?" he heard himself say.

"Yes, but this girl had explosives on her person."

That seemed rather promising.

Zeref opened the Throne Room. There was an audience already. Everyone bowed lowly. There were murmurs of, "Your Majesty," and "Crown Prince."

They only straightened again when both Natsu and Zeref were seated at the front of the room. Natsu picked Lucy out of the crowd. Her hair was in an elaborate weave and she wore her white healer's dress. Natsu tried smiling at her but she looked sombrely at the stained glass above the thrones and would not meet his eye.

The captain of the King's Guard was the newly appointed Silver Fullbuster. He was scarred and craggy, regal-looking in a velvet and rabbit fur-lined cloak. When he bowed, it was so deeply, he was nearly bent double. "Sire."

Zeref waved him on impatiently. "Rise and speak the charges quickly, Commander. It's early and I've yet to have breakfast."

"Bring out the girl," Fullbuster said and two of his cloaked men jumped to do his bidding. They returned from the holding cell on the north side of the room with a woman in tow.

She looked different without the moon and the firelight dancing on her hair, without her brother holding a huge barrel of beer on his shoulder at her side. But Natsu recognized her from Bora's ring. She was Lucy's friend.

"This is the terrorist," Silver said. "We found her with five sticks of dynamite in her pouch and one of my men confirmed they saw her around the Coast Guard's tower moments before it exploded. I think it's an open and shut case. I recommend a trip to Cthulhu's Palace."

Zeref studied the accused. "Do you deny the charges laid against you?"

"No, Your Majesty," she said in a pure and strong voice.

Zeref's knuckles turned white on the arm of his throne. "Why did you do it, girl?"

She drew herself up to her full height. She didn't look like she'd spent the last few hours at the mercy of the King's Guard, dirty and hungry. She looked righteous. "Because men in that building accept bribes so slavers can sneak children out of Alvarez by ship and sell them to wealthy families in Fiore who have a taste for the exotic. And when they're not sneaking children out, they're bringing slaves here and selling them to your citizens who still believe in slavery while their King sits high in his palace ignoring our pleas!"

A murmur went through the throne room.

Zeref said. "Those claims went unsubstantiated."

"Were they lining your pockets, too?" she sneered.

Another murmur followed her accusation.

Zeref looked at her emotionlessly, ignoring everyone else in the room. His eyes were dead; he was in his dangerous place, where he lived when he cut prisoners down in jail cells for speaking too loudly and reaching through the bars.

Natsu was grinding his teeth so badly, he was afraid they would be dust. He prepared for the worst when Zeref stood, but his brother's magic didn't make an appearance. "Bring her to Cthulhu's Palace."

The guards escorted her out. Then Zeref stalked out.

Natsu was left staring at a sea of faces. He thought he was supposed to say something but his mind was blank. He saw a gold sheaf. Lucy. She was rushing out as well, hot on Zeref's heels. Trouble was brewing.

Natsu abandoned his throne, hoping he could douse the fire before it turned into a storm.