"It feels great not to have those annoying stitches anymore," I sighed, rubbing my side. It was still sore, but not like it had been before. Since the stitches had been out, it was much more comfortable.
"The bandages will officially come off tomorrow," Gajeel said, following me into Magnolia. I was meeting up with Deidre again for training, and I was excited to get to actually use some magic in our training for once. I was sick of just watching her get to have all the fun with the spells.
"I can't wait," I grinned. "I'll be all healed up in just a couple more days, and then I can take jobs again! A week without one has been pretty boring." I looked over when Gajeel huffed in agreement. "You and Lily can take one if you want. I'll be alright on my own. I was going to go home tomorrow, anyways, so going home one day early won't make a difference. I'm sure you've been even more bored than I have, since you usually take so many jobs."
"It hasn't been that boring," he mumbled, shoving his hands in his pockets. "It's been kinda nice havin' ya around all the time."
"It has?" I asked, incredulous.
"Don't act so shocked," he frowned. "It's usually only me and Lily, so the change made up for the fact that I couldn't take a job. Hell," he chuckled, "it might even be a little lonely once you're gone."
We both froze, shocked at his confession. Judging by the mortified look on his face I'd say it had slipped out accidentally. He cleared his throat, pointing to the parked train. "You'd better get going or the train will leave without you."
I stepped onto the train, pausing to look back at him. "If it's all the same," I smiled, "I liked staying with you, too." I hurried to my seat after that, wondering why I had just told him that. Hopefully he'll forget about it by the time I get back tonight. I doubted he would though, judging by the startled look he had given me.
The train ride today seemed longer than usual, and I was restless by the time it finally came to a stop. I'd had a strange feeling since I left Magnolia, but I couldn't tell what it was exactly. I'm just still flustered from that conversation we'd had at the train station, I told myself. I had confessed a lot more to him than I probably should have, and I hoped it didn't undo some of the progress we'd made while I'd been living with Gajeel and Lily.
Since my release from the hospital, Gajeel had been so attentive to me. He'd been so kind, and I had gotten to see a new side of him—one that made me like him even more. Like…don't kid yourself, Levy. You know it's been way passed like for a long time now… That it had. I'd been in love with Gajeel since before that mission we'd gone one a month ago, and that feeling had only grown stronger the more I was around him. Although the circumstances were terrible, I couldn't say I wasn't at least a little bit happy about getting to see the kinder, softer sides of Gajeel.
In a better mood as I reached Dee's house, I knocked on the door with a smile on my face. She'd been learning the Solid Script: Hole spell, and had picked it up quickly. If she managed to master it today, I'd begin teaching her a more difficult word like "chains" or "boulder". We had decided to stick with defensive spell for now, and move onto attack spell once she'd gotten the hang of those.
"That's strange," I murmured, knocking again on the door. It usually only took a few moments for either Dee or Eli to open the door for me. After several more minutes of silence from inside the house, I tried the handle. It wasn't locked, so they couldn't have gone out.
"Dee? Eli?" I called as I stepped inside. I gasped when I saw the state of the living room. Pictures hung at odd angles on the walls, stands were turned on their sides, trinkets were knocked off their shelves…the entire room was in disarray. Upon inspecting the rest of the house, I found it in the same condition.
"Dee! Eli!" I called out more urgently now as I searched for them. What could have happened to them? Whatever it was, I couldn't waste any time. I had to return to Magnolia to tell Gajeel and Lily, and get their help finding Dee and Eli.
I had just exited the house when something crashed into me from the side. I rolled across the grass, finally able to catch myself and scramble to my feet as I looked for the source of the attack.
"Solid Script: Blades!" The words shot towards me, and I was barely able to throw myself out of the way when the word pierced the ground where I had been standing.
"It's you!" I gasped. The cloaked figure appeared from the side of the house, their hood still raised to block out their face. "What have you done with Dee and Eli?!"
"They're alive," he said, stopping just across the yard from me. "As long as you cooperate and do as you're told, no harm will come to them."
"And what is it you're telling me to do?" I snapped.
"Come with me quietly. I'd rather not carry you all the way back to my master."
"And what does your master want with me?"
"Gajeel Redfox."
I frowned. "If you have Dee and Eli, Gajeel would have searched for you, anyways. Why do you need me?"
"That isn't any of your concern. Now, come quietly, unless of course you don't care what happens to your dear friends."
"Where are we going?"
He let out a long sigh. "I am tired of your questions. This is your last chance."
"Solid Script: Fire!" I threw the word at him before taking off towards town. If I could reach a populated area, I could shout and have someone call Fairy Tail on a communication lacrima. At least then they'd know about Dee and Eli being in trouble. But I can't stay in the town very long; I can't risk him hurting any innocent people.
"Solid Script: Chains!" I heard from behind me, telling me the spell hadn't given me as much time as I'd hoped.
"Solid Script: Boulder!" I threw the large words into his, smirking when the chains wrapped around the boulder before rolling towards the cloaked man.
"Solid Script: Wall." He put the word up in front of me, cutting off my escape.
"Damn," I breathed, turning to face him. "Solid Script: Bubble!" He looked startled when the words entrapped him, but he didn't seem too concerned. Until I do this. "Solid Script: Water!" I watched in satisfaction as the water filled the bubble trapping him with no air inside the bubble. I had mimicked Juvia's Water Lock, and was pretty impressed with how it had turned out.
Leaving him, I ran around the wall and continued towards town. Hopefully that will hold him a little longer— "Solid Script: Cage!" I was suddenly surrounded, trapped in the iron-like bars of the words. How am I supposed to get out of here?! I had never seen this spell before, so I wasn't sure how to counter it.
"My patience has run out, miss McGarden," he growled, standing just on the other side of the bars. When I struck out at him, he caught my arm. In one swift motion, he pulled out his magic-canceling dagger and sliced the palm of my hand with it. I felt my magic significantly weaken as he did so, and my legs threatened to give out.
"Now, let us return to my master. Solid Script: Sleep." The spell hit me in the face, and as I breathed it in, my head began to spin.
"No, damn it," I groaned, fighting to remain conscious. The cage disappeared, and the cloaked man caught me as my legs finally gave out. Rather unceremoniously, he slung me over his shoulder and started walking back to Eli and Dee's house. Instead of staying on the path, he veered off into the forest beside it, and continued on.
I have to stay awake. I have to memorize the way so I can escape and lead Gajeel back to where they're keeping Dee and Eli. I…have to…stay…
~Gajeel~
"If it's all the same, I liked staying with you, too." Levy's words echoed in my mind for probably the hundredth time since she left. My confession about being lonely when it was time for her to return to her own house had completely slipped out. I have half expected her to tell me not to be foolish or something like that, but she hadn't. Instead, she had told me that. She had complained about me forcing her to stay with me and Lily, but she had actually enjoyed it.
Maybe you should just ask her to make the arrangement permanent, then. The thought crept into my mind without permission, and I quickly scolded myself for even entertaining the idea. Sure, I knew that the Shrimp cared for me, but I wasn't about to scare her off completely by doing something stupid like that. Even if you want to.
I sighed, running my fingers through my hair. "I'm in way too deep."
"In what too deep?" Lily asked, startling me.
"Nothin'," I said, a little too quickly.
"If you're planning on telling Levy how you feel, you should probably tell her about Deidre's mother as well," Lily said.
"W-What? Who the hell said anything about—I'm not going too—" I finally managed to silence my rambling with a quiet curse. "I'm going to tell her about Lorelei tonight. After that, my feelings won't really matter. She's going to want nothing to do with me."
"I think you're underestimating Levy quite severely by assuming that," Lily frowned. "What you did in your past doesn't change who you are right now. And you only did what you thought was right at the time. Levy will understand that. If she cares for you as much as I believe she does, what you tell her won't matter."
"It should," I sighed. "I killed Deidre's mother, Lily."
"And you can't change that," Lily said. "But you have been trying to atone for it, and I believe since you joined Fairy Tail you have."
"I don't think I'll ever be able to truly atone for it," I frowned. "Somehow it seems Eli and Dee have managed to forgive me for it, but I still see Lorelei's face every time I look at either one of them. And I just remember the way Eli had seemed so…broken when I told him what happened. I left before he told Dee, but I know it must have crushed her too. It was her mom, and Eli's wife, and it was my fault she died. They shouldn't have forgiven me."
"If you let hate and resentment rule you're life, you can't ever truly live," Lily told me. "I'm sure they realized that, and they realized it wasn't your fault, so they were able to forgive you. Just like how everyone at Fairy Tail forgave you for what happened while you were in Phantom Lord. They knew most of the hostility was planted in your head by Jose, and you have done nothing but loyally help them since then, so everyone forgave you."
"Yet another person who shouldn't have forgiven me," I grumbled, thinking of Levy and her team mates. While she had forgiven me soon after I joined, it was almost a year before Jet and Droy openly told me they forgave me for what had happened.
"You're right," Lily suddenly said. "You shouldn't tell her how you feel."
"What?" I asked, shocked. A minute ago, he had been telling I should.
"If you can't forgive yourself, you'll never be able to let it go and it will continue simmering. You'll never be able to be happy that way. If you're constantly letting yourself get lost in the past, you will trap her in it as well. Levy deserves someone who is happy to be with her."
"I would be happy to be with her," I snapped, defensively. "Hell, I'd be damned over-joyed if she even considered my feelings."
"Then follow her, Eli, and Dee's lead and forgive yourself," he sighed. "Do that, and then just tell her you love her already."
"W-What?!" I practically fell off the sofa. "I don't—I mean, I care for her, but I never said—that's a pretty big word—I wouldn't say I—"
"Seriously," he sighed again, shaking his head as he left me alone, still trying to find words, "everyone knows how you feel about each other except you two."
I sat there in stunned silence once he was gone. What the hell did he mean, everyone knows how we feel about each other? That suggested Levy felt the same way I did, which couldn't be true. Could it?
I spent the rest of the day thinking about what Lily had said. It had been ten years for Dee and Eli, and that would be a long time to hold hatred. If they really hadn't forgiven me, there was no way they would have welcomed me back into their lives so willingly. But because they had, it made me think that maybe I was being too hard on myself. If they can forgive me, then there's no reason I shouldn't be able to forgive myself, either.
The same went for Levy. If she could forgive me, and even grow feelings for me, then maybe it wasn't so wrong for me to have feelings for her, too. Because it's too late to deny them anymore, anyways, I sighed to myself. After admitting to myself that I loved Levy while she was injured in the hospital, I knew there was no going back.
"Levy hasn't returned yet?" Lily brought me out of my thoughts when he came into the living room, frowning.
"No," I replied, shaking my head.
"She's always home in time to help us with dinner," he said.
"Maybe she got held up at Dee's, or the train is running late," I offered. Even as I said, though, I knew that wasn't it. A feeling in my gut told me something was wrong.
"Where are you going?" Lily asked as I headed for the door.
"I'm going to head over to Dee's. You stay here in case she comes back."
"Alright," he nodded. I rushed to the train station. Although I would have preferred to walk, the train would be faster. And if something is wrong, I have to get there as quickly as possible.
I practically jumped off the train when it finally stopped, and I took off at a sprint to Dee's house. I knew immediately something was wrong when I spotted that the front door was ajar. The inside of the house was a mess, and no one was inside.
"Shit!" I growled, returning to the front yard. I noticed a chunk of the ground had been disturbed, and I recognized the solid script magic instantly. It must have been that cloaked bastard! If he had attacked Dee and Eli, and Levy tried protecting them, then she could have gotten injured.
"This is my fault." He had been after me before, wanting to take me back to his master, so it would make sense for him to go after Levy and the others. He knows I'll come straight to him if he has them.
I stopped in my tracks when I picked up a familiar sent. Like paper and vanilla, and something metallic that caused my nose to wrinkle and my blood to turn to ice. Blood. Levy's blood. The crimson liquid was nearly dry, so it had been there a while. The scent was still strong, however, so I immediately followed it.
I should go back to Fairy Tail for backup, but I don't have time for that! When I don't come back, I'm sure Lily will know something happened and get help. If they've had her for a few hours already, it's hard to tell what they've done to her. A growl rumbled deep in my chest at the thought of her being harmed by that cloaked bastard, and deadly anger boiled my blood.
If he puts even a scratch on her, I'm going to kill him. Ignoring the quickly setting sun, I made my way into the forest by Dee's house, following Levy's scent. Once I find you, Levy, I swear I'm never letting you go again.
WHOO! Only a couple chapters left! We're getting so close to the end! (Whether that's a good or bad thing I'm not really sure...ha!)
Thank you so much for reading this far, and I hope you're enjoying the story! ~~Reviews give me air, and blood, and other essential things to live. ;)~~