Chapter Eleven

Lucy

The strain of my body weight hurt my hands, making them bleed and burn red after the long time of when I tried to slip my wrists out of their chains.

My feet were pushing away from the wall, helping me pull my hands out.

Kage had died a few hours ago, giving me grief but hardly enough to make me cry – I had been disturbed by his story though, true or not. I couldn't help but wonder if his daughter was real but at the moment he was dead, I couldn't ask him anything more.

For some reason I felt as though my hands were fat, despite me being starved for so long, all because I couldn't get rid of these shackles no matter how much I struggled. Exhausted, I rested for a moment and thought of other options – I had tried this method for a while and never succeeded anyways.

I stared at the wall, noticing how the chain attached to the wall was old but taken care of and barely rusted away, almost new. I scowled with frustration but still decided to give the chain a few hard tugs with my remaining strength, just to try.

With no avail, my heart accelerated with the fearful thought of never being able to escape. Claude had done this so I couldn't. He was right, he had done it – I never would leave this place and I wouldn't whether I tried or not.

Stopping and giving in to it now, I let my breath slow down.

Then I saw a familiar mark that stood for so many memories – my pink Fairy Tail stamp.

Immediately feeling stupid and ashamed, I assured myself – calmed myself down – and remembered that I was a member of Fairy Tail. I couldn't afford believe that I'd never get away – especially when what I was paying for this with my life. If I was captured, there had to be a way to escape.

I started to yank at the chain again.

I wasn't going to end up dead like the man next to me.


Natsu

Happy helped me shove a few things inside of my pack before going back to his tiny one. "I can't believe you're going without anybody else Natsu!"

"I'm not going to be alone," I told him, closing the flap of the bag. "I'm going with you aren't I? You're enough to handle anything with me!"

"Aye!" he said chirpily before going back to his cynical thinking, "Everybody'll be mad though don't you think?"

I shrugged despite knowing the answer – of course they would be! If I went without them they would be furious. Knowing Erza, she'd probably kill me before I could see Claude.

There was a knock at the door and the both of us hurriedly pushed our things all over the place, making it seem as normal as it had been before.

Speaking of the devil caused the devil to come, proven by the people who were revealed by the door, after all Erza was the one who had knocked, with Loke and Gray behind her. Juvia and Levy stayed beside each other, knocking at the window glass instead.

"Think about leaving us here Natsu," Erza threatened, "and I'll use your bones to scrape blood off my sword!"

Without me saying anything, they pushed past me into my house with their own packed things. I noticed that they had also dragged along the girl who decided she'd talk. I wasn't comfortable with her but she would probably be here to lead us the way.

Surprisingly though, she said, "You're kidding right? I'm not going with you guys!"

"We aren't kidding," Loke growled, putting her back in her place. "You told us she was in Pergrande Kingdom but you haven't told us where."

"Look for her yourself."

"We'd be doing that if Pergrande Kingdom wasn't that huge," Gray told her with an obvious, annoyed tone.

"She's somewhere in the–"

"South," Loke finished for her, "you've already told us that."

She crossed her arms, deep in thought of what she should say to us. When she opened her mouth as soon as she closed it, we all wondered if she really knew where. To word our mutual thought, Erza said, "You don't know, do you?"

The woman widened her eyes, looking surprisingly scared for a moment, "NO! I swear that I know where she is! It's somewhere in the mountains above Bellum."

"That still isn't specific enough," Happy stated. "Lucy could be somewhere else too right?"

I shook my head, "She should be with Claude."

Verissa narrowed her eyes and furrowed her thin brows in thought, starting to talk before being interrupted as we conferred.

"So we search every mountain in Earth Land's largest country and see if Claude is perched at the top of one of them?" Erza rhetorically asked us, turning back to the silent woman. "Where do you last remember–"

The woman shook her head, "I wasn't ever there where the girl is or where Claude is – I just know one place."

"What do you mean you only know one place?" Loke asked.

"It's where the trade's going to take place – that'll be where Claude will be, won't he?"

"Trade?" we simultaneously asked her but I was the only one who added, with a paling face, "what trade?"

She shrugged, "It's got something to do with your girl."


Master

Few Minutes Earlier

As loud as I could express my frustration, I screamed, "WHAT?"

Shizuka didn't flinch as much as her fellow guild members – but if it was more appropriate, I would have laughed at the way the villagers jumped.

"I can't find any of them."

"They couldn't have…"

"I wouldn't put it past them."

Once I heard those last few words, I made my way to the top of the stairs and started after the three impulsive runaways who had left to have all the heroic fun for themselves.

I had hoped that this wasn't going to happen.

Why it had to – I had no part in it at all, and that was what probably angered me the most.

Had they been that desperate to go before everyone else?

Shizuka had the one to report it to me and I was thankful that she hadn't kept quiet about it. By the way Laxus had his head in his hands, he seemed to be on the side of not telling me.

Just a few of us were waiting at the train station – my grandson, his fiancé, Gajeel, and me of course – for the next available train to Pergrande Kingdom.


Lucy

It had not been surprisingly easy once the skin at my wrists seemed to be rubbed away. My sight was blurry – tears from the painful sting – as I tightly wrapped my wounds with some of the ripped fabric I pulled from some silky piece of clothing. I didn't care if it was expensive, not like I would have before I became a prisoner.

Outside of this caravan lay some foreign land probably, or maybe it would still be Pergrande Kingdom with its long, stretched distance. It felt like it had been hours since I fled from that ghastly tower.

I had everything at my fingertips; at least it felt that way – now that I was freed from Claude. I'd find my way back to Fairy Tail somehow and live the rest of my life the way that I wanted.

Of course I knew that this wasn't going to happen – naïve thinking gets the better of us all, doesn't it?

It was naïve thinking that had destroyed my relationship with Natsu, after all.


After words

Yesh yesh, I know – it's a super short chapter that hardly previews anything that happens next. I'm working on the next chapter now – now that my computer is fine and my internet isn't dying on me ^.^ Sorry for these extra long waits…

*bows bows bows bows bows*

These chapters are going to get shorter and shorter just so you know…until I finally finish it .

Please feel free to leave this story alone until some few years later when I actually finish it ^.^ Oh! And the next chapter is a .5 chapter….just a short story ^.^