If anyone had seen a goat-like celestial spirit carrying a heavily pregnant woman as it raced alongside the train, they would have probably reported their drinks as being spiked. As it was, the train was almost completely empty, so there were no passengers to be startled by the atrange sight; it barely had the minimal of staff, many of them having failed to turn up for their shift. All across Fiore, no doubt there were others doing the same. If war was breaking out, many people would rather be at home with their families, their friends. Getting whatever comfort they could before the storm truly began.

But Lucy had more important things to worry about, certainly more concerning than her own comfort. More important than her painfully swollen feet or the nausea tormenting her, or the faint smell of cooked pasta that hit her sensitive nose as they passed by the dining car, making her upset stomach crave food, even while her unborn child kicked the unholy hell out of it in protest.

Because, she knew the Dragon Slayers were walking into a trap. She knew Natsu was walking into a trap. She was also painfully aware that he probably knew he was walking into one as well. They just couldn't possibly know how bad it truly was. But she did. She'd heard her captors talk about it.

The council had been watching them close enough to know who else to expect. She'd overheard them mention Gajeel, and Gray and Juvia, and Wendy as well. The young Dragon Slayer had managed to find help. Lucy had never been happier to know the girl was alright. There should have been no way for them to know just how many Fairy Tail Mages would be tracking her so they must have been using magic to do it. They would be expected. And if they were to have any chance, she needed to get them help. She needed to be free. Disadvantage or no disadvantage. No magic. No keys. No whip. It didn't change what had to happen. She had nothing.

Just some heavy, heavy chains.

Lucy frequently had her moments of genius; she was certainly no dumb blond, so she absolutely loathed having little choice but to resort to the Natsu way of doing things. The anti-magic cuffs on her wrists were made durable enough to hold up against the strongest of prisoners, so after convincing them to stop so she could get sick, it was a genuine request, she balled her hands into tight fists and swung her arm like a club across the back of the first man's head, and her other over the second ones face. The metal links were hard and heavy enough to drop them immediately. She took back her whip and the keys to the cuffs she wore, and rubbed her now tender arms in irritation. Grateful at least for the training she'd received having to chase a Dragon Slayer around Fiore on jobs. The third guy driving the wagon didn't really stand a chance as Virgo appeared at his side and hit him so hard in the face he exploded out of his seat and into the roadside verge. A broken jaw no less than he deserved.

When they didn't have young girls to threaten her with they were no more powerful than your average thug, and Lucy had been on enough missions with Natsu to know that there was no such thing as an 'powerful' thug. A grunt was a grunt precisely for the opposite.

She left them all at the side of the road and took the carriage. She knew that they'd send others to follow her and she needed to put as much distance between herself and them as possible.

Despite the risks, she figured the best place to hide would be a crowded place, so she made her way in the horse drawn carriage to the bustling shopping town she knew was near by. The plan had been to find somewhere to hide and hope they passed her, or gave up when the realised just how many witnesses would be there to see council men accosting a pregnant woman. What she hadn't expected was for them to seize the town, start blocking the roads, teleport people out. The council could be heavy handed but, it was just not something they'd normally resort to; making such a scene. Even if she'd been a dangerous criminal, they'd have kept a process like that, only as a last resort and nothing else.

It was close, Gemini had been mimicking her at the time and had been teleported out with the market seller they were speaking with at the time, thankfully giving Lucy some warning. Enough time for the celestial mage to quite literally throw herself into the river. Aquarius appearing moments later, shrouded in a terrifyingly a dark aura to bring her safely out of the town with the current, screaming at her about putting her child at risk like that, every single step of the way. At the end of it though, Lucy was safe and still free but she was worried about the others. The group that took her couldn't have been the only one watching the roads out of Magnolia.

Happy hadn't woken up yet, and by the time she'd made it to the tracks, hoping she hadn't missed the train, she was fully prepared for the possibility that the stress would send her into early labour. Seeing Bickslow had been pure coincidence and made her actually tear up with happiness and relief. The night train was the last one going in the direction of Fairy Tail's meeting point that weekend and while she hadn't exactly been thinking further than alerting the guild, her plan had been to get there and get help, she recognized an opportunity when she saw that Seith number one was drinking at the bar; she knew that sorta-Seith number two would be close by. Between the three of them they might be enough to get the others out of this mess.

Maybe just.

"Did you really just offer me hairy trash lasagna?"

"I panicked," Ali muttered. Somewhere in the woman's mind there was an almost ingrained respect, and intrinsic fear of pregnant women.

Bickslow laughed hard.

"What makes you think that..." He paused counting on his fingers. "...four Dragon Slayers, Gray, Juvia and Levy won't just blow their way out of any trap the council have set up anyway? I'm pretty sure that's precisely the boss' whole plan to begin with," He argued. When you worked with Laxus, you learned to trust him. Do your job, because you could be damned sure he'd do his. Second guessing his plan was not something Bickslow was comfortable doing.

"The assholes that took me were talking about taking me to a man that could make me do whatever they wanted. Sound familiar?" Her words carried weight. She saw both of them pause. They understood what that could mean.

If Calus was working with the council in some way then it wouldn't matter how many Dragon Slayers there were. They'd all be in the same situation. They'd all be powerless.

Ali was pulling on Ezra's borrowed leather armour before Lucy had taken a breath after that. Checking her swords and stuffing the remainder back into her bag.

Bickslow sighed dispassionately, giving his bag a little kick and knocking the cork to his soul jar loose with a practiced ease that told Lucy he'd done it before.

"Come on, children, looks like we've got evil plans to foil," He muttered with a tired groan.

"Alma, Alma, Alma, Alma," They all started happily chanting, rising from the bag.

Lucy's eyebrows skyrocketed with the red that suddenly crept up both of their faces.

"Did...did I interrupt something here?" She asked with a knowing smile. Suddenly taking in the fact that they were on a sleeper train with a private cabin. They weren't asleep when she knocked, either. In her arms Happy stirred, slowly coming round after the knock he'd taken to the head.

"No!" Bickslow and Alma both answered in rushed unison, hurrying outside. There was an awkward moment at the door as Bickslow tried to get out ahead of her and they got stuck. The handle of one of her swords catching in the hastily, half tied strap of one of his pauldrons, which subsequently fell off his shoulder, to the floor, wrapped around the blade.

Lucy only grinned wider. She hoped this would all be over soon, if nothing else, she now needed Mira to adjust some wagers. Baby things were expensive, and there was a wager she might just be collecting soon.


Levy knew that Laxus would now only be risking the same fate as them if he came back. The spell she'd placed on her comrades was only a temporary one, and not something designed to last.

Calus had everything he needed to continue and maybe even more at his disposal now. He'd wanted one Dragon Slayer, he got four. He wanted enough power to continue his work with the Well, uninterrupted. He now had the lacrima to store the power, the book, the blood. And an opportunity to test it.

No wonder he looked delighted with himself.

He withdrew, pulling out the book and placing the tip of the dagger against one of the blank pages. The spell flaring to life.

The air crackled with power as a tiny rift opened, no more than a peephole into the Well. Calus held the Lacrima aloft and it began to darken. Blacker than black. Even the light around it dimmed. Levy could barely focus on it at all. It seemed like a hole in the very fabric of existence.

With his other hand, Calus slammed the book closed and the rift closed up. Levy knew from her own research that when it was small enough, and you were quick, it was possible to close like that. Calus clearly knew what he was doing at least.

He stared in wonder at the lacrima in his hands.

"I deeply regret kill Garron. The man that designed this was a genius in his own right. He could have been useful to me," He remarked wistfully. "Very useful. But your sister had a lot of anger for the man. And as a result, so did I," He looked Levy directly in the eye, smiling. "Did you know that her magic was the control of reality itself? " Levy didn't answer him. She remembered Maeve singing to her. Singing to the plants and the animals. She was apprenticing with the local midwife. She had a gift for easing pain.

"Her magic was music," She spat at him. "She was a healer."

"No," He looked affronted by the very idea. "She was a force of nature. Her magic was the evolution of enchanting. With an enchantment, when the caster dies or the spell is undone, the changes revert. Magic is constantly needed to maintain it." He wandered over to a stall in the market and pulled an apple from a cart. "I only experienced a taste of that kind of power. I can make a person do what I say but I can't command the mountains to rise or the tides to turn. Garron was the first time I truly understood what power was. I commanded the very earth to kill him, and it did." He took a bite from the apple and cast the rest away.

"Enchanting can turn an apple into an orange, but its still an apple. And without the magic it'll return to being an apple. What she could do, could make this apple into an orange. No remaining spells to break. No lingering trace of magic. It would be an apple, and afterward, it would be an orange. Each as real as the other. She could twist reality to her will. Bend it. Manipulate it." He reached out and gripped Levy by the throat. "The only reason I even survived against her was her inexperience. Her compassion," He ground out. "Even after her final few months, she was still an innocent when she fell into darkness."

Tears sprung to Levy's eyes and she pulled against her captors again, ripping herself free of Calus' grasp. She didn't want to listen to this.

"I suspect that's what the other one's purpose is. I didn't think I left enough of her to continue but she somehow did. She gave birth to a creature with the experience of a dozen warriors, their cruelty, and their love of death; the knowledge of even more. No where even close to her kind of potential; what walks around in her likeness is a pale imitation at best, but it has the will to destroy me where she didn't," He remarked.

"Alma is her own person. She's not Maeve, and she's not a thing. She's a Human being."

"Alma?" Calus asked. His face split into a smile and he started laughing. "Alma was my daughter-in-Law's name. Your Grandmother," He smirked. "I guess your sister had more of a sense of humour than I thought, to send her bitch creation after me with that name. The McGarden that poisoned my line against me. Whispered in my own wife's ear till even she couldn't bare to look at me."

He held the lacrima out and a bolt of what looked like black lightning shot out and clipped Levy in the shoulder.

The pain was unlike anything she'd ever experienced. It tore through her, burning every nerve in her body till it was all she knew. Darkness was suddenly everything, and it swallowed her. She came back to awareness with the taste of copper in her south and the feeling of lead in her very bones. She couldn't move. The guards holding her lay at her sides, dead, simply from holding her when Calus stuck. She should have been dead too.

"LEVY?" Gajeel was calling her name. Panicked and desperate. "LEVY!"

She groaned, somehow finding the strength to move her arms under herself and push her body up onto shaky knees.

Calus was pulling her to her feet then. She was small enough that even Bloom's body was strong enough to hold her limply off the ground by the collar of her shirt.

"My dear wife's final act before I used her life and her soul to make these books, was to cast a generational spell. To guard her descendants from darkness," He brought his face close enough to hers that she could see the hate swirling in there behind his stolen eyes.

"But that won't be enough to save you from a second hit."

He threw her backwards and brought the lacrima to bear again. Levy didn't have the strength to move or even roll away. She couldn't even bring herself to close her eyes; instead watching in fascinated horror as he prepared to kill her.

A streak of yellow light struck him then. The black lacrima absorbed most of the energy, diverting it away from Calus' chest, where it had been aimed, but enough landed to take him off his feet and send him sailing away from Levy and along the cobbles before coming to a stop about ten feet away, the lacrima rolling out of his grip.

An impossibly large hand pulled her swiftly up to her feet before more familiar arms pulled her from the ground and away from Laxus.

"Gajeel?" She mumbled. She desperately wanted to sleep, and his familiar smell and comforting warmth only made that desire impossible to ignore.

"Where the fuck were you?" Gajeel growled pushing Laxus painfully in the chest.

"Making sure Lucy was safe and finding us some help," He snapped. Laxus trusted them to make it. He'd been too slow to prevent the first hit but saw Levy take the direct blast that killed the men holding her. Saw her get up from that. No one here was weak. In his youth he may have deluded himself into thinking otherwise, but it just wasn't true.

Behind them the ice was breaking around Natsu; cracking as he finally started coming round.

"Do we have any cuffs to put on Calus?" Laxus asked.

"Hold her!"

Then the world stopped and a streak of black shot out faster than even he could react to and hit him, dead on. The Lightning Slayer held the power for a brief moment before he started screaming. Falling to his knees as Calus poured more and more viscus energy into him. Enough that even Garron's lacrima started draining of the precious power it held. Gajeel held Levy tightly in his arms, pressed firm against his chest. And were once it was a comfort, now he was restraining her. Forced to comply with Calus' new commands.

"No..." Levy cried. She was too weak to struggle, she could only watch helplessly as Laxus fell; his body literally smoking. He collapsed to the cobbles, unmoving.

Calus advanced again, moving toward them dagger and book in hand, the lacrima now drained and in need of more power. The book wanting more of her blood to get it.

She pulled against Gajeel's grip, sobbing. Then she felt it, his breath in her ear, whispering to her.

Calus was torn up and bloodied. His clothing black in places from the sheer voltage Laxus had struck him with. On his forehead a gaping wound was bleeding freely.

"As I said, troublesome," He forced out through gritted teeth, his knife raised. He glanced to the lacrima. "When I find out how this was made, I think the next one needs to be much bigger," He smiled.

He jabbed the dagger into her arm like a pin and she shrieked, feeling Gajeel's grip momentarily tighten with the shock of it. There was no little cut this time around. He wanted to inflict pain. He wanted to cause her suffering.

Placing the dagger on the pages of the book another opening formed and the lacrima began charging again.

This was it. The only moment she'd have. Around her Gajeel forced his arms to drop and Levy moved forward with everything she had, yanking the book out of Calus' hands. Gajeel had told her to be ready and she was, with every order Calus gave, the Dragon Slayer was retaining more and more freedoms. He could move if only briefly.

Gajeel trusted that Levy had a plan. Or if she didn't, she would come up with one on the fly.

Calus turned in wide eyed surprise as she fired the book at the rift, watching it sail through, disappearing into darkness like the others. The hole in space closing up afterward. The last key, the last evidence of her family's shame vanishing out of Earthland. She felt a weight lifting from her chest. Like a great wrong had been put right. It wasn't her sin, but she'd still carried it. Like the name that she couldn't legally shake.

He picked up the dagger and turned, arm raised only to freeze in a flash of green that Levy knew was Bickslow's figure eyes magic. There were gasps all round as people came to their senses again. Even the soldiers present returned to their own cognitive thought with pained, sputtered curses. Some of them lay down on the stones and curled into themselves. Most of them ran. Determined to get as far away from Calus as possible before he broke free. It was clear to see they'd been compelled to continue.

Calus couldn't move. He was frozen. But so was Bickslow. It was taking all of his concentration to maintain possession; his babies circling round his head lending him as much power as they could. And even then it was a stalemate.

Calus couldn't speak but the look in his eyes, the smirk on his face was enough, it told them that Bickslow was growing weaker. He wouldn't be able to keep this up for long.

"We should kill him while we have the chance?" Gajeel said out loud.

"He's defenseless right now, you'd be no better than him!" Wendy bit out. No matter how much she wanted to see it, they couldn't just just kill him. There was no justice in a quick death. His victims needed that.

"We aren't going to have a lot of time to debate this," Gajeel argued and Gray nodded in agreement.

"I'm with Gajeel on this. We can't let him live. Sure, rotting behind bars would be better, but can we really risk that. Look at what he's done?"

"He's hurt no family more than he's hurt mine..." Levy hesitated. "But I can't agree with an execution."

While they debated, Bickslow started to shake.

Gajeel looked at Levy understandingly. Despite it all, murder wasn't in her nature.

"Well, whatever we do, we need to do it quick." Gajeel snapped.

And then a set of tanned hands wrapped around Calus' skull from behind, slowly, like a serpent. Ali's splayed fingers crossed over his eyes and temples tightly while Bickslow looked visibly relieved. The strain on him lessoning. Where her skin made contact with Calus, blackness spread like an infection, seeping in behind his eyes. Twisting in there. But they were both tired and the day and night had been unrelenting for all involved. While Bickslow held him still, she got to work. Eyes glazed over in fierce concentration. But he was weakening. Already Calus was starting to move. It only took a moment, just a single instant of distraction for Calus to gain back enough control to raise the now charged Lacrima against them.

Energy crackled outward, one slamming into Bickslow, though his armour deflected a lot of it, the other hitting Alma and sending her sprawling back away from him, where she lay unmoving, the sparse cough the only indication she was even still alive.

Calus rose again. How he kept getting up, they couldn't fathom. His body was broken. He was cut up, beaten up, burned. Laxus was breathing but still unconscious. He turned to the others and issued one last command. The only one he'd the power for at the moment.

"Kill each other!" Suddenly there was chaos as the Fairy Tail mages started attacking their friends. Juvia moved like she were made of Laxus's lightning, attacking Gray. Levy was unaffected. She watched Gajeel catch Wendy out of midair but he simply held her tightly, preventing her from hurting anyone. Levy let out a breath in relief. The command hadn't had any effect on him this time.

Levy looked to Calus and wished she'd have let them kill him when they had a chance. She was tired, and hurt and too weak to do much beyond stare as Calus lumbered over to Bickslow, his hands outstretched.

She realised what was going to happen several long arduous moments before it occurred and she screamed. He pulled off one of Bickslow's gloves and grabbed skin. Ready to change one damaged body in for a better one. A more compatible one. Bickslow was only now coming around and wouldn't be able to defend himself. Tears started freely running down Levy's face at the sight.

No one prepared for Calus' scream of frustration when absolutely nothing happened. He pulled off the man's other glove and tried again and still the same, still nothing. His eyes watering with the knowledge that among all of the loses tonight, none were greater than the loss of his ability to change bodies. Alma had castrated him, stitched his very soul into his current form. He was trapped.

The look of horror on his face was a joy all on its own. For the first time, it looked as though the man was actually terrified. He pressed the palm of his hand against his chest, his breath catching in pain.

"What did you do?" He looked toward Alma's still body. His voice quieting. "What did you put in me?" He snarled before pausing. His eyes glazed over and he started shaking. Energy rippled along his face scoring open, oozing craters in his flesh. Under his skin, something black slithered just out of clear sight. Like a dark snake moving under his shell while he started to scream and roar, tearing at his skin to get it out. So terrible to behold only Levy seemed to notice that Ali was now singing. With words that were pleading for something to wake up. Something to rise and come forth.

That's when they all saw it, felt it. A new rift into the void. Much bigger than before. Her voice growing louder and more frightful sounding as the breach grew. Inhuman notes that seemed to shake the ground like thunder. Her voice answered in the darkness by something beyond comprehension .

There was no spell, no book, but something had torn a hole out of the Well and was reaching for Calus now. Tentacles filled with thorn like blades stretched out for him. When he moved away from one rift, another formed behind him, and another, and another until there was no escaping the creature reaching for him. Now that it was awake, woken by her song, it was trying to take back what was stolen from it. The dark piece of itself she'd carried all these months.

"There...there are far worse things in the darkness than him," Alma whispered, her voice little more than a pained hiss. Levy made her way over to her and cradled her head on her lap as she lost consciousness. Her life starting to fade.

If what Calus had said was true, while she might not have been her sister, she was Maeve's legacy. She was still family.

Already Bickslow was coming round, scrambling over to them and away from the sight that had transfixed the rest. He didn't even watch as the monster cut into Calus' flesh and started pulling him, piece by bloody piece into the darkness. Eyes wide and screaming, pleading for help and mercy, he stretched out a shaking hand toward Levy and she trembled. Not because she pitied him. Or because it effected her to see a human being meet an end like that. And it was, utterly horrifying. She shook with relief. And a horrible realization that while she wouldn't condone murdering him, she also wouldn't mourn his end. Even one as bad as this. Gajeel held a sobbing Wendy against his chest so she couldn't see. For all her fire when Carla had been hurt, it just wasn't in her to inflict pain like that. Natsu was now on his feet, confused as to what was going on but satisfied that whatever it was, getting knocked out was probably the best case scenario. There were things you just couldn't unsee and the sight that greeted him was one he would have preferred not to have witnessed.

It didn't even leave blood behind. That was the only thing to cross Levy's mind as the final traces of him vanished. When the last portal closed every molecule of Calus was gone. The Walled Garden was gone. He was gone. But the suffering remained. So much that she wasn't even sure it could all be made right.

Wendy went to Laxus first and began healing his wounds. Though he'd taken an incredible burst of energy and she didn't hold out hope of him walking this week at least, the Dragon Slayer was at home with lightning. A bolt of pure energy like that did damage him, but no where near as much as it could have. He was already coming round. Hurt but alive. It had hit him hard, but no where near as much as it had done with Alma.

Bickslow was tired and shaken but mostly just bruised. Levy had a painful burn and a number of cuts but was otherwise okay. The rest were shaken and tired.

But Alma, Wendy couldn't be sure of. The bolt had hit precisely over the freshly closed wound on her chest and punched straight through. There was no blood because it had cauterized its way out the other side. There was nothing more Wendy could do but close the wound and hope that she'd eventually wake up. Her life force was so still. There but not the vibrant kind she was used to with the living.

Bickslow took her from Levy and cradled her closely. He could see her soul. See how close she was to passing on. Slipping out of even his reach.

He willed it with everything he had back from the brink. Opened himself up to it in the hopes she would reach out like she had before. But there was nothing. His totems were going ballistic, sailing around shouting and cursing and he couldn't blame them. Suddenly terrified that this would be the last time he'd see her alive.

He couldn't accept it. He pried her eyelids open and summoned every ounce of magic he could and locked on, holding onto her soul. He expected it to fight and thrash like it had all the times previous, but it didn't, it settled against him, allowing him to take control without any fuss. He breathed a sigh of relief as it she started stirring. She'd be okay. There was nothing between them at the moment. No barriers to speak of. She was just there and he could see her clearly. She'd been a good teacher on that front and he knew what to look out for. Eager to point out all the subtleties he'd otherwise been unable to decipher. And that's when he saw them, the tiny veins marbling her being. Brushing them he felt himself, twisting through her core. Felt how important he was to her. She was still so uncertain about who she was to feel something as complex as love, but she held these threads of his with great affection.

It was scary to consider that possible future, but not nearly as terrifying as watching her die. Again. Literally twice in a twenty-four hour period. He had to resign himself to the idea that whatever happened, happened. He'd been hurt in the past, badly, badly hurt, but these types of things you sometimes just couldn't control. Alma was still growing, though. And she was going to need space to do that.

"If you go and die on me, I swear, I'll have you buried in a ball gown," He whispered, smiling when one of her hands came up and with her eyes closed, weakly punched him in the chest.

"I'd come back..just to make you eat it," She muttered lamely.

Levy was laughing alongside Bickslow when a semi-concussed Happy dropped Lucy into Natsu's arms.

Her new family had survived The Walled Garden, and while she hadn't found her sister on her escapade, she'd found her family was only growing bigger.

They were all alive. Somehow, they'd all managed to live though this. Now, she just needed to learn how to actually live without any of this hanging around her neck.

She caught sight of a blood speckled Gajeel smiling at her and she realized just how much she was looking forward to that.


Notes

And we've reached the end. I know some of you guys have been shipping Bickslow and Alma and I wasn't kidding when I said that I would write that up. Lol But I don't believe in making things easy. We're 150k words into how difficult I can make stuff. Sorry for that.

There's still an epilogue coming. I may be responsible for some heartstrings getting tugged. (Rachel3003 is going to kill me.) But I don't do anything without reason. And I am lining up the next story.

Special thanks to everyone on who've been tracking the story there and WheresTheFood, Desna and Rachel3003 for all the support. To my reviewers and guests and any I've missed:

Moonlight Goddesses, piranha pk, Shadow Spears, Krizti, David Saunders, ro-blaze, lilphoenixfeather, Krisa-p15, sassykitten1701, bibliophilia13, EllaEllaAye, FTLevy, Math-Otaku, kmmcm, Satanovna, vixenexiv, Mskumiko24, CanaryOfBlack, spk9293, michellephoenix275, Irukagirl, MissGhoulie, MissOtak1, ladybeth4, suicuneluvr, SailorSilentEarth,

I couldn't have done this without all your continued support! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

Still the epilogue to go, so hope to have that up in the next week.