Disclaimer: I do not own any of the Fairy Tail characters that honor belongs to Hiro Mashima!
I do own the Ocs that appear in this story and the plot~
Chapter 52: The Fox and the Lion
Shizuka was proud of her mask.
Her unmoving, emotionless mask was an excellent skill was serving her well. It had proven to be useful both on and off the battlefield. Her expressionless face made it quite difficult for others to figure out what she felt and that made her unnerving to them. It made it easier for her to throw off opponents and kept them guessing. Her mask was probably the most useful skill she had learned and developed awhile she had been imprisoned. If she was truthful, which she was, it was a very good change in herself. She was no longer easy to read and her eyes never gave her feelings away. Most importantly, she had developed a vast amount of patience. It was harder to make her lose her calm. It was harder for her to get trapped in her emotions, thus she was constantly in a state of tranquility. No, that sounded wrong. She wasn't tranquil or calm. She was simply emotionally silent.
That was much more accurate.
Yes, she was silent. She did not just mean her lack of words. Shizuka was in a constant emotional state of silence. She felt nothing and would continue to feel nothing for quite some time, maybe for the rest of her life. She wasn't too troubled by it. A part of herself knew that it would be for the best. It was best that she did not get close to someone ever again. She didn't want to become close to someone only to lose them in the end. Honestly, she never wanted to feel that sort of pain ever again. She didn't want to be the one to cause that sort of pain again. That was probably why she used her centuries of imprisonment to perfect her mask and kill her feelings. It was so she wouldn't become close to someone again.
Her masked helped with that.
She knew that with her lack of emotions and frozen face that she would unnerve others. There were not many who would want to be near someone like her, someone who was ice cold and lifeless. When she had been set free she noticed that it had worked pretty well. Then there was the addition of being labeled a Lapsis Stella that helped too. That label caused the spirits to be wary of her or they would just avoid her. The small spirit had not too bothered by it. She didn't mind being alone. Since her imprisonment she had been alone, so she was no longer the type the craved too much companionship anymore. Well, maybe just a tiny bit, but that was only a small desire to her. She was just fine being pleasantly alone, though this sentiment didn't include her new blonde master.
Lucy-dono was a whole different topic.
Shizuka just wanted to serve her blonde Celestial Spirit mage. It was her biggest desire to serve Lucy-dono to the best of her ability. That was her only goal she had now in her long life. Her desire to be useful to Lucy-dono is what drove her, what had always driven her forward. She would do whatever she would have to do and learn anything in order to please the blonde woman. That desire of her wanting to be useful had not changed and would probably never change. It was made her a spirit. Her desire wanted her to as useful as possible, which is another reason why she liked her mask. This mask of hers and lack of emotions was very useful. And Shizuka really wanted to be useful. Besides, her current personality was a vast improvement from how she used to be. She would easily admit that there was almost nothing left of old self in her.
Yes, she had perfected her mask.
And yet, it seemed her perfect mask was changing.
She had not noticed it right away, but she eventually did. There were cracks in her mask. Cracks were beginning to form in her mask and there were many. When she noticed it, she swiftly began to reinforce those cracks before they became larger. She didn't want them to become larger though it seemed her efforts were in vain. The cracks always came back and they came back bigger. They were getting larger and growing in amount, but she never stopped patching them up. She kept fixing them, even if it grew tedious. There came the point when her own mind began to turn against her. There came a point when she was not trying as hard to fix those cracks and her mind began to doubt. Her mind pondered why these cracks were so bad.
Maybe her mask wasn't as strong as she thought it was?
Maybe the cracks were there for a reason?
Maybe they were necessary?
She ignored those doubts, until something else had happened.
She had an epiphany.
And with that, the cracks began to make sense to her. The fox spirit may have learned to cage her emotions and bury them in the deepest recess of herself, but that did not mean they were truly gone. She could never really get rid of her feelings completely. They were still inside her. They had just remained dormant waiting for something to trigger them back to life. It didn't take her long to figure out that inside her prison there hadn't been much that could be considered emotionally stimulating. The same could be held true when she had been freed. She had been trapped for so long that nothing really affected her that much. She didn't think anything would, but something had. Something had gotten through her defenses and was breaking away the ice that had frozen her into the person she was today. She had experience something that had caused a major disruption inside her.
And it didn't take her long to figure out what had caused it.
It was because of that damnable intervention!
That was when the first of many cracks had begun to appear. It had been during that intervention when things began to change and she didn't even have a choice in the matter. She had been forced to attend that intervention, just like the spirit that had been with her. She and Leo-sama had no choice but to attend. Actually, they didn't even get a chance to agree or disagree. Then again, calling it an intervention was far from being an accurate way to described what had happened. Truth be told, it was nothing like an intervention. It was more like being forced to be trapped inside the same room by Virgo and the other spirits of the Zodiac.
Still, she had to admit Virgo and the others had a good enough reason for their actions. The fox spirit couldn't deny that she and Leo-sama were at fault for it. She and the lion spirit had forced the others to act against them and caused the force intervention to happen. The experience had happened because of the increasing animosity between her and Leo-sama. They had been at each other throats more and more as the days went by. Their words had grown harsher and more harmful that it even made the others begin to avoid their arguments. It hadn't helped that she and Leo-sama had to be in each other's company twenty-four-seven. The air around them was always tense and could easily be broken into an all out verbal war between them.
She had to admit that they were getting worse and worse. It had gotten to the point where they even couldn't be civil with each other around Lucy-dono. They could no longer hold in their dislike at all anymore. Despite their growing animosity, it had never occurred to Shizuka the others would have acted. She didn't think she and Leo-sama would be forced into an intervention. When it had happened it had been unexpected. It seemed the orange haired spirit thought the same as she did. So they had been caught completely unguarded when other spirits, led by Virgo and Capricorn had arrived in the lion spirit home unannounced one day out of the blue. Since they had been caught by surprise it had been relatively easy for Virgo and the other spirits to gain the advantage over them and lock them inside a room in the lion's home.
They had been sealed inside a room together by the combine magic of the blonde's spirits. The other spirits in a contract with Lucy-dono had heard arguments and behavior were troubling the blonde woman and that was unacceptable to them. That and they too were getting tired of the constant fighting between her and the lion, which could be described as petty squabbles most of the time. The pair had not been listening to Lucy-dono so the other spirits had decided to take matters into their own hands.
That was something that they emphasized when they explained the situation.
"Hime, doesn't like how you two are acting around one another." Virgo enlightened them from the other side of the door. The maid spirit's voice was in its normal quiet voice though Shizuka could pick up the simmer of anger coloring her voice. "She doesn't like it. Frankly, we don't like it any more than she does. And most importantly your hostility is affecting Lucy-hime negatively."
"And honestly, I am getting tired of this childishness too."The voice of Capricorn added. "It needs to stop and we will do what is necessary to stop it."
"I swear by the Celestial Spirit King if you don't let me out of this room you will regret it!"Leo-sama pounded his fists against the door as he shouted angrily. He was making it obvious that he was upset by this. "This is not funny!"
"Just ignore him Virgo. If he needs it then I will douse him with all the water in my urn until he gets the message that his opinion is neither wanted or will be heard or considered."The stern, powerful voice of Aquarius echoed beyond the door that kept them locked in. "Just let Loke whine and whine until his tongue finds other no words to say. He may be a big mouth and he usually doesn't shut up unless we knocked him out, but even he has a limit. Just let him prattle, he'll run out of words and energy soon."
"I agree with Aquarius. If that stubborn lion tires out then maybe those two can have a civil conversation for once. Lucy-sama wants them to get along and if it takes something this extreme then so be it. Perhaps both will learn to hold their tongues and learn how to be friendlier to one another?" Capricorn stated clearly.
"Of course they will learn. We will make them learn! And if they know what is best for them then they will get along one way or another." The mermaid stated in a cold voice and Shizuka could feel the anger she was producing. She did not want to ever get on that spirit's bad side. Aquarius' anger was one of legends and no one wanted it pointed at them ever. "If your method doesn't work Virgo then we will do it my way. And they won't enjoy my method."
"That is what we agreed on." Capricorn replied back.
"Understood." Virgo's neutral voice agreed before she spoke to them again. Her voice had a tone of finality. "This door has been magically sealed and you will not be able to bash it down, even if you two work together, but that won't happen. You two can't even look at each other without fighting so I doubt you will be able to work together to get out. In other words you are at our mercy."
"What!" Leo-sama shouted in rage and disbelief as he continued to pound on the door. "You can't do this!"
"We can and we will."Aquarius stated sternly.
"You two have a week to figure out this hostility and put it behind both of you. If you are still acting like you want to rip out of each other's throats then it is another week. It will continue like this until you two can get along, at least be civil to a level that will please Hime." Virgo added as she finished her explanation. "I hope you two heed my warning and try to speak with one another about this problem."
The fox spirit could hear the murmurs of agreement even with Leo-sama's deafening shouts. The other members of Lucy-dono's spirit team all agreed with Virgo, Aquarius and Capricorn. They were obviously ignoring the Leader of the Zodiac demands and protests. Shizuka decided not to voice her disagreements with this situation. There was no point for her to waste her words when she would only ignore. There was no way out of this. They were at the mercy of the other spirits. Thus she resigned herself to this and decided the best option for the moment was to make herself comfortable. She lifted herself up from the floor, walked over to one of the couch chairs and seated herself in it. As she sat among the pillows Leo-sama was still demanding to be release by the others, but there was no answer now. Shizuka could barely hear the footsteps of the others leaving, but that just made the volume in the lion's voice increase.
She said nothing still. She just waited. She waited patiently for this forced intervention to begin, thinking the sooner they got this done the sooner they would be released. The fox spirit had to admit the yelling was something she could do without. She and Leo-sama talking rationally would be so much better. She snuck a glance at the orange haired spirit, just observing him abusing the door.
It was going to be a long wait indeed.
And Shizuka did wait a long time. Leo-sama had spent most of their trapped time beating on the door and shouting about the injustices his comrades were committing against him. He yelled and complained about being trapped in here with her. He wanted to be let out and wanted the others to stay out of his business. Obviously, his demands were never heard or responded to. The female spirit knew that the others had been long gone from the area and quite possibly the house. She was positive that she and the lion spirit were probably the only ones left inside the house. They were alone. They were alone and they were effectively trapped until the week was done. Nothing about the situation was welcoming or enjoyable to the fox spirit, but her choice had been stripped.
That and she wondered if this would work out.
Her mind pondered it and she had come up with a pretty low percent. She didn't think there was a large chance that she and the lion would be able to stop fighting and actually attempt to talk it out. The hostility between them was genuine and difficult to push aside or ignored. There was that problem and then there was the other problem. They both had to be willing to do that, but that was a problem too. It would be complicated to work out their issues when she knew that the other spirit hated her. Leo-sama had never failed to mention how much he dislike her for what she had done and for what she was. She was a Lapsis Stella that could not be trusted near his Celestial Mage. Even though Shizuka had saved the Lucy-dono's life he still didn't trust her. Leo-sama had wished that she had been left on that prison forever. He had told her he wished she was never found.
All those word he told her were true, but her desire to serve Lucy-dono was pushing for this to work. She had not realize that her open and aggressive attitude towards the lion had been affected the others around her that badly. She probably had not been paying much attention, but that was hard to do when someone was trying to metaphorically rip your throat with their words. Lucy-dono must have been stressing about this so much that she may have sought help from her spirits. If it were up to Shizuka she would just happily stay as far away from the lion spirit as she possibly could, but that wasn't an option. She sighed mentally preparing herself for what was to come. For Lucy-dono she will try to make peace with the other spirit. If it made her blonde master happy then she would endeavor to accomplish it, even if it meant trying to become friends with someone who despised her.
It was for Lucy-dono.
She would endure this for her.
Sadly, she did not have the courage to make the first move
Eventually, the orange haired spirit must have noticed the lack of attention because he stopped and sagged against the door for a few seconds. He had caught on that they were alone. He had clearly given up and had decided to move from the door. With a face set in a glower he quietly shuffled towards one of the other couches and fell into the seat. His fall lacked any of his normal feline grace as he sunk deep into the cushion seat. He had sat so ungracefully onto the couch that he had caused some of the pillows to spill onto the carpeted floor. He took no notice of them. The lion spirit was still grumbling about what had been done, until eventually they had ended up in a heavy silence. They didn't even talk. They just ignored each other.
And still she couldn't work up the nerve because she didn't want to say the wrong thing.
She didn't want to accidently set him off.
So for that entire week the pair of spirits steadily ignored one another. Not a word was uttered between them as they just sat there doing absolutely nothing. There were a couple of times when Shizuka found herself sneaking glances at the lion spirit sitting on the other side of the room and there were times when she caught the lion spirit doing the same. Sometimes their eyes caught each other and they stared at one another before one of them broke contact. It was not until the second week of this that something happened.
It had been quite the happening.
By the end of the second week, the tension between them had immensely increased that it was suffocating. It was so suffocating that one of them just had to do something to relieve it. There had been no shock between her and Leo-sama when it had finally boiled over. It had been Leo-sama who had given into the tension first. He tended to be more volatile than she was. When the lion spirit had exploded into a temper she had prepared for it though no amount of preparation could have helped her if she was honest.
Even now, the white-lavender haired spirit could still easily hear Leo-sama's thunderous yells. It was something rather unforgettable. It had been evident that he had released everything he had pent up inside himself since Lucy-dono had found her. He had expressed every ill-feeling and thought that had crossed his mind since that moment. He had revealed everything to her and left nothing out. She had learned exactly what he thought of her and more. Shizuka had taken it all. She withstood every word that battered her walls harshly, like his words were aiming to break them down. Her lack of reaction must have pissed the leader of the Zodiac off because the expression on his face contorted to something ugly and scary.
She didn't even move an inch when he reacted. He had stood up from his seat snarling as he walked briskly towards her. She could feel his anger because of how close he was standing to her. He was so close that her ice-blue could easily see the beads of sweat dripping down his skin and noticed how sharp his canine-like fangs were. His hands were clenched into tight fists. He look like he wanted to strike at her, but she knew he wouldn't. No matter how much he dislike her he had never physically struck her. That was the one line he never crossed no matter how angry he became. If you were to ask Shizuka she would admit that Leo-sama resembled the animal he represented. The usually gentlemanly man was gone and his place stood an enraged lion.
Still, even as he lashed out at her she did nothing.
She didn't defend herself from him. She just allowed him to verbal abuse her, which he was able to do rather easily, mostly because he had a lot of ammunition to use on her. Since his temper was mostly in charge the male spirit had lost all of his courteous and suave air. It had disappeared and his tongue ran wild. Shizuka had never known how colorful Leo-sama vocabulary was until that moment. If it were any other time she would have been impressed. Besides, what he was saying was all things he had told her before so it was easily to brush it aside. Nothing he said was really bothering her. He also noticed that detail rather quickly and he changed his tactics. He had decided to attack her where it hurt. He knew where exactly to strike.
He brought up her past in the form of shouting more scathing and burning words. As soon as the first sentence left his lips her body seized up. Her instincts went haywire. She had felt that flight or fight instincts were alive and kicking. They were rumbling inside her trying to make her choose one. Flight was currently the choice she wanted to make. She wanted to runaway. She wanted to hide herself somewhere he couldn't reach her, but she couldn't. She was trapped. She was trapped where she was sitting because the lion spirit standing in front of her. His large body was blocking her path to get free. If she moved it would not bode well for either of them. She had decided it was best to wait for an opening and when she saw it she would put some distance between them. So the fox spirit stayed still, reminding herself that her walls could take this verbal beating. She listened to his insults and didn't respond.
There was a large part of her felt that maybe her choice to do nothing was the correct one to make in this situation. She believed unmoving and allowed Leo-sama to get this out of his system would be for the best. Despite being in the Celestial realm, he only had a certain abundance of magic not an abundance of energy. Shizuka had believed that he would eventually tire out and run out of steam to spout his verbal abuse. She waited and waited, but it never came.
Leo-sama's temper never ceased nor did it fizzle out.
It turned out that her decision had been a bad one. Staying silent had only made them worse. The male spirit must have wanted her to react, to do something other than staying quiet and still. It was only making him angrier. His insults only increased in frequency. His words were harsher. The fox spirit was sure that Leo-sama wasn't even aware of the words coming out of his mouth. He was running completely on anger. She still didn't stop him. She knew that if she responded back it could make things worse, but her doing nothing made things bad too. She was trapped between two hard choices. His anger continued.
His stabbing insults continued.
Leo-sama was as much of a predator as the animal he represented. She felt like she would be eaten by the male spirit if she made a misstep. There was that and then there were the other feelings. There were the other feelings that twisted around inside her stomach. In retrospect, she admits that she had learned something new about herself that day too. And she had the force intervention to thank. Shizuka had learned that she had a limit too. She had a limit for the amount of abuse she could take from someone, especially when it involved her past. Her walls began to finally to fall when he mentioned her former master. She had already heard her crimes vocalized to her by others and it was not something she particularly enjoyed. She didn't need anyone else to tell her crimes. She knew better than anyone what she had done.
Normally, she could easily ignore it and not feel anything other than annoyance. That was what she was feeling as the hazel eyed male continued to yell at her. She gritted her teeth and ignored him. She ignored him and his words, but something was different about this time. The white-lavender haired spirit didn't know what it was, but it was there. There was no time for her to analyze it either, not when she had chaos trying to break free from her. Her inner walls were almost completely gone and it was harder to keep herself together. The moment he change subjects of her former master to speaking about him was when she felt it. She had felt something shift inside her when Leo-sama began to insult the one person she had cared for. That was when all her inner walls began to crumble quicker.
Like the predator he was, Leo-sama caught whiff of her weakness and took advantage of the opportunity. He kept attacking the subject of him. The subject of him was a sore spot, a very painful sore spot. He was a subject that still caused her to feel a vast amount of pain whenever he came up or when she thought of him. And the lion spirit had caught on to this. She knew he did because he kept shooting off his own venomous words about him.
Those words were that meant to hurt her.
And hurt he did.
Leo-sama had caused her to feel so much hurt she couldn't defend herself against it. It didn't long for her walls to crumble into dust. She no longer had any sort of defense against the hurtful words and then came the pain. All at once, the pain she had felt those centuries ago and the pain she felt now was tenfold. She couldn't handle it. She attempted to push it back again and again. She tried to make disappear back into the dark recess of her mind, but each time she tried she failed. The pain, the feelings, kept slipping out and attacking her.
There was only so much she could hold in, only so much she could take.
Simply put, Shizuka had snapped.
She had no idea of her actions. She was in no state to be aware of her actions. At least she thought so. It could've been very possible that she was aware, but she had paid no mind to it. She had pushed Leo-sama away from her and her seat. Her unexpected action was something neither of the two spirits had foreseen. The orange-haired spirit, having not been prepared for any sort of reaction, had ended up falling on his butt with a loud thud. He was still coming to terms with what had just happened, thus he had no time to react when Shizuka moved again. She had jumped out of her seat and ended up standing over him. The small ice-blue eyed spirit was snarling at him with all the intensity she could muster and started her own verbal assault on him. Her words were sharp, cold and scornful. They were meant to hurt as much he had hurt her. She had stood over him lashing out at him until she ran out of breath and words to say.
Her magic was humming in her veins asking for some form of release, any form of release. Her small, pale hands were in the shape of claws. She wanted to shred something, specifically Leo-sama. She raised one of her hands, but her claws didn't touch the other spirit. No, even in all her anger she didn't want to cause the other spirit harm. At the last second, she jumped from him and took it out on the room. The pillows seemed to be her preferred victim since they were easy to move around and easy to tear. In the end, the room had ended up being a mess from her actions. Feathers and fabric were littered around the floor resembling some sort of feathery massacre. Not only was the floor cover in it, but in her hair too. She didn't care about it.
Why care when there was a violent storm still brewing inside her?
Why care when she had so much anger dancing in her heart?
There was no point to caring. She had stood there in the room amongst the feathers with her body still trembling from the rage. She had been breathing heavily and her eyes were wide and almost unseeing. It didn't take her anger long to dissipated completely out of her body. It was gone before she knew it, but there was still something left inside her. There was still the self-hatred, guilt and anguish. They were such heavy feelings that she hadn't felt in a long time. They were filling her veins like a virus and she didn't know how to deal with it.
This had led to her breaking down amongst the mess she had created.
"I'm sorry! I'm so sorry! I'm sorry!" Her quiet voice dripped with guilt as she collapsed onto the floor. She brought her hands up to her face as she felt the tears spilling from her eyes. She felt her body shake violently and uncontrollably, like these feelings were attempting to break her from the inside. Her words came out broken. "I'm… so sor..ry! Spirits, I am… so sorry…!"
She hiccuped and attempting to catch her breath as she continued to cry.
"It's my entire fault! I should have stopped him earlier…I should have seen it earlier! I'm such a failure, such a bad spirit. I should've been a better spirit! My master is dead because of me. I did it! I did this to my master and to him! I am the cause of everything that had happened those centuries ago!" She released an agonizing sobbed as her hands left her face and wound themselves in her hair. Her fingers pulled her hair so hard that her scalped throbbed. "Please forgive me, my master…my master, you're dead because of me! And my dear friend suffered because of it too…because of me! They suffered because of me! I only bring suffering!"
She moved her hands and gripped her shoulders as she pulled herself further into her body making herself as small as possible.
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I don't deserve forgiveness…don't deserve anything… not even this useless life I have!"
Her thin fingers had dug deeper into the fabric of her clothes. They had dug in so deep that she caused pain to flare up. She only felt the pain for a second before it was replaced by the ugly feelings making her body feel heavy. She did nothing to stop the feelings and she began to drive herself further into the black hole of self-hatred and guilt. She made herself go into a place that made her feel worse about herself. It made her feel disgusting. No, she was disgusting. She was a revolting existence and she knew it.
She had been so busy repeating apologies and blaming herself that she had forgotten something. She had forgotten that she wasn't alone in this room. She had not heard the movement coming from the other side of the room. Her ears didn't catch the sound of footsteps coming towards her. She didn't notice the feel of a familiar presence next to her, until he had made his presence know. The sudden weight of hands on her shoulders broke her out of her lapse. The mere touch made her sit up straight as she was turned around against her will.
She couldn't move and didn't react when she found herself staring into the hazel eyes of the lion spirit. Her ice-blue eyes were still misted over and the tears were still flowing freely. She suddenly felt like she should look away. That she should be locked back up and pushed back into the dark. She felt like she should be forgotten again. She couldn't understand why someone would want to touch a thing as vile as she was, but she didn't know what to do. She had frozen in place from the shock. She wasn't moving and he wasn't either. He hadn't even spoken to her. He was merely staring at her. He was staring into her eyes with a blank expression and with his eyes dancing with emotions she couldn't quite discern. It felt like forever as his hazel eyes flickered from emotion to the next before it finally stopped. The expression on his face changed too.
And what she saw on his face and in his eyes made her heart catch in her throat and feel weak. He genuinely looked sad and understanding. He was showing her that it was very possible for him to feel something for her other than hate or disgust. He was showing her, the Lapsis Stella, that perhaps he actually cared for her at this moment. She felt like saying something about it, but she couldn't find the right words. Before her mind could ponder further the lion spirit had made his move. He pulled her forward with a swift motion of his hands and her face landed against his chest. The sudden movement made her freeze again. She didn't understand why he had done this action. Then she felt him move again. His hands, which had been resting on her shoulders, left and he embraced her. He held her in his arms in soft, almost comforting embrace for a bit and then he spoke to her.
"Sorry, I'm sorry. I didn't know…shit, I didn't know you were suffering this much." Leo-sama's voice was quiet and soft, like he was talking to someone breakable. She felt his arms tighten around her for a second. His baritone voice still remained gentle and caring as he spoke again. "Just let it out. I won't say anything and I won't judge you. Just, please don't keep it in anymore."
Hearing that come from Leo-sama's mouth was another shocker.
She didn't react right away. What he had said was so surprising that her mind couldn't process it quite as efficiently as it usually did. It was also difficult because she had all this grief, guilt and self-hatred swimming swirling inside her mind too. Still, even though her mind was struggling to comprehend what was happening, but she was still able to focus on one aspect in this whole incident. Shizuka had not expected this. She had never imagined that something like this would happen with anyone, especially the lion spirit. In all technicalities, the relationship between her and Leo-sama was still a hostile one. At this point they were still antagonistic towards one another, but for some reason that was pushed this aside. Leo-sama was doing this for her. He was trying to comfort her and was encourage her to let it all out in the open without fear of his judgment.
"Please, just don't keep it in anymore." He stated with small plead in his voice.
She couldn't take his plea.
When she heard his plea again that was when her mind shut down completely. She allowed her emotions and memories to take over. She allowed herself to let go. It didn't happen immediately, but slowly, like the tears falling down her cheeks. Before she knew it she was crying into his chest with the air in the room filling up with her endless apologies. Leo-sama never said anything. He stayed quiet most of it. Maybe he didn't know what say or maybe it wasn't needed. He let her cry her eyes out and sobbed her apologies and her guilt-ridden words for him to hear. He allowed her tears to soak into his shirt as she released all her pent-up emotions. He let her fingers clutch his clothes like it was like it was her lifeline. The lion spirit offered her wordless gestures of comfort.
During this she felt one of his arms break away from the embrace and soon felt his long nimble fingers treading through her hair in a soothing gesture. Shizuka found herself liking it. She enjoyed it so much that she subconsciously leaned into it. She reveled in the gesture even as another sob escaped her throat. No one had done this sort of thing for her in a long time. Actually, she never had been the one that had to be comforted.
Before her life had become a mess she had been the one to do this for others. She had been the person who would comfort others during their time of need, especially for her dead master and her dear friend. Once upon a time, she would have been the one giving out embraces and whispering the soothing words. She hadn't minded the role. Besides, her dead master and her dear friend had no idea how to comfort someone. They would always fumble with their words and freeze up if she ever needed comforting. She would always had to deal with own problems by herself. It had worked out, but now being on the other side of it made her wish that someone had been there to do this for her. She wouldn't mind it happening again.
Well, if she allowed it to happen again.
Most likely she would.
She decided to enjoy this moment. She enjoyed it as the horrible feelings and guilt she had kept locked up in a cage inside her left her body in the form of tears and words. She continued to cry in Leo-sama's arms and enjoy the comfort he was giving her. She felt the shakes that had wracked her body lessen and her cries were quieting down. The tears that had wetted her cheeks were slowing down to the point they almost dried. She knew her release was coming down to an end. Her sobs were now mere hiccups and a sudden bout of tiredness filled her body. Her eyes felt heavy. She was finding it harder to keep them open. It wasn't long before the tiredness reached the rest of her body. Luckily, she had Leo-sama to support her, so she just let her body slump against his.
Her head rested against his chest as her mind was beginning the process of shutting down into sleep. She found herself only feeling with her senses and the first thing that caught her attention was his scent. His spicy cinnamon scent filled her nose and made her feel somewhat safe. She felt the strong arm that was still around her waist pulling her closer and the hand attached to it began to slowly rub circles on her lower back. The hand in her hair was still there. It was still running through her hair in a repeated gentle rhythm. She was feeling peaceful because of it. She like feeling like this and wanted to keep feeling like this. Before she could further ponder it sleep overcame her.
She ended up falling sleep in his arms with his hand still running though her lavender-white locks.
Her mind ended the flashback and brought her back to the present.
And she allowed herself to smile.
It was a small smile, but a smile none-the-less. And Shizuka couldn't help, but feel a little bout of happiness and fondness every time she thought of that night. It warmed her heart every time too. It may have been a night full of anger and tears, but it was also a night full of comfort and understanding. It was a night filled with things that could only happened with another being. Thinking back, she would admit that she had been swept up by her emotions and her memories. She hadn't even tried to fight against it. Truthfully, maybe keeping everything bottle up had worked against her. She had fallen victim to herself, to her feelings and to her memories. She had been so caught in it that she had let her defenses down.
She had allowed herself to be vulnerable around someone else.
In the end, the force intervention had been a success for both her and Leo-sama. If they had not been forced to confront all the bad blood between them they may have never gotten this breakthrough. And Shizuka may have never allowed her walls to fall enough to have her breakdown. The breakdown was something she had needed. It had thoroughly empty her out though the guilt, self-hatred and memories were still there. They would always be there, but the pain was become a little less and less each passing day. Eventually, it would dull out. The long, very long, talk with Leo-sama seemed to have helped her to. After that talk, where she went into detail about her past, she felt a bit lighter and freer.
And then there was the change between her and Leo-sama.
It was a positive change.
Their relationship that had been filled with dislike and animosity from the start was no longer like that. The intervention had helped the two clear the air between one another. Sure, it had taken them about four and a half weeks for them to talk it out, but it was worth it. After that talk and her crying into his arms something had changed between her and Leo-sama. It was no longer the same. It was something else, something entirely different. It isn't to say that they had become best friends over night. No, that took time, which they had plenty of. Shizuka still had her wariness around him like he did around her. She was still guarded, but not to an extreme point. And there were times when she would let the lion in. And they still had their banter, but it was more teasing than malicious.
Yes, they were now on friendlier terms.
That was a good thing, especially to all those around them. It did take the other spirits some time to believe them and their change. At first, the others thought it was some sort of clever ploy they had come up with so they could be freed. The others had watched them like hawks for days before they became convince that the absence of hostility was genuine. It had become glaringly obvious to the others that they were not lying about the change. The change was sincere.
She and Leo-sama still had their secrets though.
There were some things they didn't tell the others and had decided to keep to themselves. Leo-sama had never uttered a word about what had transpired behind closed doors and she did the same. What exactly had occurred was not fully known by the others and it never will be. Overall, the others were just glad the pair of them weren't fighting anymore that they never pried. They never asked them, which was okay with everyone around. And honestly, Shizuka did not want the others to know. She didn't want them to know the exact change of her relationship with the lion spirit.
In all truth, the lion spirit had become some sort of confidant to her. She never outright told him this, but she felt like she didn't have to state it. She was sure he knew it, especially after she had allowed him to comfort her and to see her in such a vulnerable state. He knew he was her confidant and he encouraged this new change in their relationship. She didn't ask him why he had allowed such a thing, but she accepted it. She accepted him being her confidante and friend just like he had. And the lion spirit did this splendidly. Whenever Shizuka felt like her memories or her guilt were threatening to overwhelm her she went to him. She went to him and let it all out, whether it was by talking or crying or a combination of both. He never denied her. He let himself become her crying shoulder whenever she needed it. He would smile at her and wordlessly embrace her with his hand finding its place in her hair. And she wouldn't leave him until morning came or until she felt like she wouldn't break anymore.
Sometimes she never left the embrace of his arms.
Those sorts of meetings with her crying into him happened more often now, not that the lion minded. When all was said and done they never spoke of it. They didn't speak about it with anyone else. Sometimes they avoided talking about it between themselves. That slowly changed too, at least the subject of talking about it between themselves. It was Leo-sama that had brought it up in small amounts, until he was sure she wasn't going to avoid it anymore. They had begun to speak about it amongst the two of them.
At first, they only spoke about it behind the closed doors of Leo-sama's bedroom. They would sit and just talk with a cup of chocolate in their hands or they would be surrounded by lush pillows as they laid on the bed talking. Then they slowly began to venture outside the bedroom and into other parts of his home. It went from room to room inside his home, until they had no qualms about talking about it anywhere inside his home. Those talks changed too. Their talks evolved into other subjects. It ventured into subjects that friends would speak about and from there they grew closer. Shizuka could easily say the maybe they were actually close friends now, but they kept that in the shadows too.
Why she and Leo-sama decided that she was not certain. They hadn't even discussed it. It had just happened. It wasn't like she was his dirty secret that had to be hidden and vice versa. If anything, their change in relationship would have made Lucy-dono and the other spirits very happy. They just didn't want to share with anyone else. So they kept their lips sealed about it and it didn't matter. In the end, whatever was between her and Leo-sama was just that, between the two of them.
It was no one else's business.
And that brought her back to her original point of this thought process.
It was because of the intervention that her walls and mask were not what they use to be.
They weren't as strong as before because of it. Shizuka had been forced into a tough situation. That tough situation had caused her defensive walls to fall, even though she had built them back up there was still cracks appearing in them. And due to those cracks, memories and feelings that were meant to be locked up were escaping from their prison. This greatly bothered her. She didn't like feeling or thinking about things she would rather have buried deep inside her mind. Her frozen heart had protected her well over the years. It had helped her cope with the atrocity she had committed. It had kept her sane, but now she wasn't sure. She had her doubts and she hated feeling so unsure of herself. She hated it, yet she found herself not caring too much and she had a reason for it.
She was able to feel again.
She was beginning to feel again.
And that was something she had never plan to do ever again. She had worked for centuries shutting her emotions off to the point that they could be considered nonexistence. She had sworn that she would never let them out again. She never wanted to feel emotions again. To Shizuka emotions were too troublesome. She didn't like deal with them. So she had sworn to herself and to the memory of her former master and him that she would dispose herself of emotions. She had sworn to them and to herself she would do that. She had meant it. The fox spirit honestly never wanted to feel again and it was mostly due to how she had felt when she had committed her crime.
Spirits, just remembering how she had felt that day made her want to vomit.
Still, she wouldn't lie.
She had expected feeling like that. She had known that what she had committed would've hurt no matter what. She knew that it would make her feel horrid and guilty. She may have known, but she could never truly imagine the extent of the pain she had felt that day. To this day, she had no words to describe it and she would never find accurate words to do so. The pain had been unbearable. She didn't want to experience that sort of pain again. Her feelings then had not been too enjoyable and were slowly killing her. At that point in her life, her feelings had been her enemy at the time. She still held this opinion, but there was the other side of the argument.
Yes, there was the good side this too.
And that was how good it felt to feel
She had forgotten that.
Since that day of the intervention she was able to feel again and it was anything but gentle. No, her locked up emotions had taken over her hard and fast. Her unprepared body had been overwhelmed by it that it left her in a daze. It had been so fast that she didn't have any time to comprehend it completely. Either way, she wouldn't have been able to stop it. It had been that strong. So strong that it had been so easy for her to get caught up in her emotions. They were like a powerful ocean that could sweep you away with one simple wave and now she could not escape. And she did try to escape, but the cracks were still there and they were growing.
Spirits, it was wondrous, a very wondrous thing to feel again. And yet, she couldn't say that now. She was not feeling wondrous. The emotion that was escaping through her cracked defenses was not a amazing feeling. It was quite the opposite actually. She could only describe it in one word that made sense to her.
That word was edge.
She felt like she was on edge.
She felt like she was teetering on that fine line of stability and instability. It was like there was nothing that could help her keep her feet on balance or soothe the troubles ailing her. She was trying hard to snuff out her turmoil, but that seemed almost impossible. At least she knew the cause of it. The cause of her it was the fact that Lucy-dono was inside this city. Her master was inside this city where danger was lurking. Shizuka knew that the longer her Celestial Spirit mage had to stay in this place the closer she was to falling off the edge. Her instincts didn't like this place. She didn't like the ill-feeling and because of that feeling she didn't like this place.
Ever since Lucy dono had arrived into this city her danger sense had been going haywire. It had been only a few days, but that ugly feeling grew and grew. And it only became worse when Lucy-dono had called her and Leo-sama into the mortal realm. When they had been summoned was when the fox spirit realized how foul the feeling in the air really was. It didn't take her long to come to a conclusion. The air was poisonous. It was a poisonous threat to everyone who came into contact with it. Even being away from the city did not help. When they were inside the Blue Pegasus guild she could still feel it clearly.
She didn't like when she felt.
She didn't like how the air made her feel.
It was a heavy and disgusting feeling that made her body shiver. It made her body feel like it was being violated and contaminated by something nasty. It even felt familiar too. It didn't take her long to compare what she was feeling now to what she had experienced in Sida. Although, she hadn't been inside the town of Sida she had been close enough to properly feel the aura around there. It felt exactly the same. It was that same evil that had surrounded Sida. The only difference between Sida and here was that it was not out in the open. It was hiding in the background, like it was waiting to attack.
It was worse when they had walked back into the city. Her instincts lit up like a fire when they had walked into the city and had settled into the hotel room. Her master didn't seem to have notice. She had been milling around trying to figure some sort of mystery out. The fox spirit believed Lucy-dono hadn't felt it because she was human. Human senses could only pick up so much, but the blonde mage may have felt a little. Lucy-dono had mentioned feeling a little sick and anxious, but she didn't think it was cause by the feeling in the air. The blonde woman had pinned it on being caused by her fight with the Iron Dragon Slayer and nothing else. Lucy-dono had brushed off her worries and focused on her job. When her determination kicked in it was rather hard to change the blonde woman's mind. She was certainly stubborn.
That was concerning though Shizuka learned she wasn't alone in what she feeling. She hadn't been the only one that felt it. Leo-sama had felt it too. He had felt it as much as she had though they didn't speak about around the blonde woman since she had been too caught up in her research to even listen. They had waited until after they had been dismissed by the Fairy Tail mage. They had been sitting inside his home when he had decided to breach the subject to her. Well, she had been sitting and he had been pacing back and forth. It was a habit he did when he was particularly worried about something, which he was.
Leo-sama had gone straight to the point. He had asked her if she had felt anything strange about the area. He asked her what her animal instincts felt about the area. She told him the truth. She told him what her sixth sense had been telling her. She felt like the area was a danger to them and to anyone who was unlucky to be there. He nodded as he listened to her. Once she was done he began to explain what he had felt too. His feelings were similar to hers. He told her that his instincts had been screaming there was danger in the city. They were in danger if they stayed there. He continued on to say that the home of Blue Pegasus had never felt that way before, at least when he had been living there it didn't. He stated that the area felt nothing like the old city he used to live in. The main point of the conversation was that he was also worried about Lucy-dono. They talked about it and about how they would tell their blonde mage about their instincts. They talked about how they would convince her to leave the area. Eventually, the male spirit stopped trying to dig a permanent hole in his carpet and ended up on the long couch. He fell on it, letting his long limbs hanging loosely as he closed his eyes. Nothing else had been said between them and before long the other spirit had fallen asleep. He had tired himself out.
Shizuka had been left with her thoughts and with the dread shifting inside her as company.
After that, it hadn't been long before they had been summoned by Lucy-dono again. The pair of spirits had been worried that they were being summoned to fight or to something equally drastic. They thought this because of what they were feeling from their connection with her. The feeling wasn't pleasant. The blonde was stressed, worried, and afraid. Something was clearly wrong, but they had no clue of knowing what until they arrived. They had prepared themselves to fight, but when they had appeared that nothing was wrong. It had become clear that they hadn't been called in to fight. Lucy-dono was in no danger. She was in her hotel room sitting crossed-legged on the bed. She was surrounded by documents and old newspapers layout around her in no apparent order. The blonde was shifting through them and muttering to herself before she took noticed that they were there. She had greeted them with a strained smile and a voice filled with tiredness.
Once Leo-sama had seen her face he went into what Shizuka called his "mother-hen" mode or in his case "mother-lion" mode. He began to fuss over her and lecturing her about taking care of herself. The female sprit merely watched as the lion moved like the wind as his hands went over the blonde in quick motions. As Leo-sama did this the blonde woman had a face filled with arguments and argue she did. She told him to stop his fussing. She didn't want the lion to worry about her and only wanted to speak about the case about Fear. She wanted to talk about what was happening around them. They argued for a few minutes and the female spirit saw that it was not going to end any time soon.
Shizuka only intervened when she believed that the arguing was pointless.
She had ended up being the voice of reason. That was not something she was use to, but she did it anyways. Surprisingly, her quiet voice caught their attention. When she had spoken they both had turned their heads towards her effectively stopping their chatter. She was even able to stop the lion spirit from fussing over the blonde though that did take some time to accomplish. In the end, they did talk about what the Celestial mage had come up with though it was very little. She hadn't found out much, but she told that it didn't matter. She felt like she was getting close to something. It just needed to click for her. Shizuka and Leo-sama listened to her and provided some input, which wasn't much either. That seemed to have satisfied the blonde woman enough that it left her passive enough to listen to other suggestions. After their small conversation, Leo-sama was able to convince their Master to eat and to get some sleep. They also warned her about their ill-feelings about this place and that maybe she should leave sooner than later. They told her this was not a risk she should be willing to take, especially if it meant getting trapped in the city. The blonde woman listened to their warnings and nodded slowly silently agreeing with their words. It seemed that the blonde woman's instincts had awakened during the few days that she had stayed here. Little by little her instincts stated to warn her that something was not right in this area. She shared the same worry with them.
Eventually she had agreed to leave and to possibly convince an evacuation for the area.
Lucy-dono had promised that after her final check of the area she would tell Blue Pegasus that is was best to leave and escape. Still even with her words of promise the feeling of dread inside Shizuka's body didn't ease at all. She wanted to tell her master to leave now, to get out of the area before it was too late. The fox spirit wanted her master out of here, but she kept her lips sealed. Lucy-dono would not leave until she did her final check. Nothing would change her mind, not even the bad feeling in the air. So they left back to the Celestial Spirit realm, with the dread growing with each passing second. The female sprit could shake that something bad was going to happen to the blonde woman. She felt it in her very being.
She couldn't help but still feel worried and anxious.
Leo-sama had caught on to her anxiousness. Even with her inability to express emotions or facial expressions the male spirit had noticed it. And that only made the lion spirit feel the same as she did and the anxiousness increased between them. The leader of Zodiac had attempted to reassure her and himself by stating that everything would be fine, that their key owner would be fine. Lucy-dono would do her last check and she, along with Blue Pegasus and the residents of that city, would be gone from the danger and would be safe. They would be safe. Their master would be safe.
He had repeated that out loud each passing hour until it had become some sort of mantra. Shizuka wondered if he was trying to convince himself more than he was trying to convince her. It sure felt like it. Either way it was not helping, but she didn't voice it. The fox spirit didn't try to dispute what he was saying. She had just listened to him and to his words because she felt the same too. Well, she had listened to his words until she couldn't stand it anymore. She had to stop him before he stressed himself too much. A stressed Leo-sama was not a good thing for anyone, especially for her. She was the one with him all the time and if he was in a bad mood it usually meant that she would be the one dealing with it. That was why she acted.
"Leo-sama, I don't think your carpet or floor would appreciate a hole in the middle of it." She quipped at him, trying to make the feeling in the room light. She hoped this would give the desired effect or it would backfire on her. She would end up being on the end of his ire. "Perhaps you are planning to make a fire pit there and that it was why you need to hole?"
Her voice and her words had caught his attention. He had stopped mid-step, turning his head and body towards where she had settled and stared. His hazel eyes were still shaded with his worry and fear as he looked at her. He didn't say anything for what felt like a long time, but Shizuka knew it was only a few minutes. Finally, the feelings coloring the other spirit's eyes changed to confusion, utter confusion.
"What? What sort of question is that?"He tilted his head causing some of his orange hair to shift with his movement. His voice echoed off his seriousness as he asked more questions. "Why would I want a hole in the middle of one of my rooms? Actually, why in the Celestial Spirit realm would I want a fire pit inside my house? My house can still burn down from a fire."
"Well, a fire pit is usually used to cook food so I assumed that is why you would want one inside your home. Maybe you are planning a giant barbecue? That is what a fire pit is used for, right?"
Leo-sama stared at her with his mouth wide open, like he couldn't believe what she had just said.
"Right?" Shizuka asked again with a slight tilt of her head.
"Uh, yes… that is what a fire pit is for…" He answered, his utter confusion leaking into his voice. "Wait, why am I telling you this? There is no way I would want a fire pit inside my home. My house can still burn down!"
"That's true. I didn't think about that."
"Then why would think that? Why do you think that I want to make a hole then make said hole into a fire pit? Why would you ask me that if you know there is a risk that my house would catch fire?" He regarded her with disbelief on his face.
"I don't know. It could be a new fashion trend that I don't know about. You know I am centuries out of date about present trends." She responded back honestly. That was something that was true. She hadn't' caught up with all the changes that had happen awhile she had been incarcerated. She probably never would, at least she knew enough to get by somewhat. Well, she had Leo-sama and the others to catch her up on current events, trends and fashion. "I don't know what sort of things you are interested in. You're already a pervert openly, who knows what other…uh… unspeakable things you are into, Leo-sama."
"No, no, I don't want a fire pit inside my home or anywhere on my property!"The male spirit stated with a slight edge in his voice. He almost looked frantic as he stated this to her. "And no I am not into anything unspeakable!"
"Are you sure, Leo-sama?" The fox spirit asked in an uncertain voice.
"No, for the last time no!"He looked ever so desperate now, which she found slightly amusing. Well, at least his attention was on this conversation and not on his worries. "And I swear I am not that big of a pervert, Lapsis Stella."
"I see you're not denying the fact that you are a pervert, Leo-sama."
"That is all you picked up from that. What abou-"
"And it is good that you aren't into anything stomach-turning or questionable. I don't think I would be able to stomach walking into something I shouldn't." She made it a show of sighing in relief. "There are some things I don't want to see."
He opened his mouth like he was ready to say something, probably another denial of some sort, but he stopped himself. He closed his mouth shut and his face morphed from facial expression to facial expression. Shizuka felt like the other spirit was trying to process what was happening and why she was asking such odd questions. His hazel eyes were focused on her and they too were dancing with feelings. This happened all in a span of seconds before he had settled on something. The female spirit was glad she was very observant because she was able to catch the moment when the lion spirit had caught onto her ploy. She saw when he realized that she was not being serious.
"You're just messing with me aren't you?"
Instead of words she replied with a simple nod of her head.
He didn't bother to say anything back to her. She was certain that Leo-sama didn't say anything because he was too shocked to actually say words to her. His face just became slack with shock and a sprinkle of slight irritation in his expression. In the end, he just gave up and collapsed onto the couch. He sat there with his head buried in his hands and not really making any sort of sound. Shizuka just observed him wondering what was going on inside his mind. It was silent for a few minutes before the orange haired spirit lifted his head from his hands and began to laugh. It was a rich, boisterous laugh that always seemed to send warmth into her heart.
"Glad that I could make you feel something other than anger, Leo-sama."
"Shut up." He managed to say through his laughs and his face fell into a glare that had no ill-meaning to it. "Just shut up and let me get myself together."
"When are you ever together?"The little fox spirit retorted back.
"Have I ever told you how much you annoy me Lapsis Stella?"
"At least three times a day, though I don't keep track of it. Actually, you haven't told me much lately." She replied back with a small shrug of her shoulders. "You've been too busy with other things."
"That was a hypothetical question."
"Oh."
He didn't respond back to her instantly. He was still trying to control his breathing as his laughter filtered down to a few chuckles before becoming nothing. He fixed his position on the couch so he was lazily relaxing with his arms resting on a pile of pillows. His hazel eyes were still fixed on her. She didn't flinch or bother to move her own gaze away from him. The fox spirit though that another bout of silence was going to pass between them again, but it didn't. Leo-sama spoke again.
"Thanks."His voice was soft and sincere.
"Hm?" She tilted her head a bit and continued to stare at him.
"You were distracting me with all that nonsense about a fire pit and digging a hole inside my house. And you did a pretty good job of it too." He grinned at her with a wide smile. "I mean I don't think you were being serious about it."
"Like I said, I don't know what you are into Leo-sama. For all I know you could have been planning something like that."
"Uh huh."
"I am being truthful." She stated.
"Whatever." Leo-sama replied with an expression of disbelief on his face. "I know what you were trying to do."
Of course he did.
It was pretty obvious what Shizuka had attempted to do, but she decided to humor him.
"And what did I try to do?" She asked the simple question.
"You were trying to distract me. You noticed how stress I was getting from all the worrying I was doing and that I was doing myself no good." He explained calmly with his voice filled with seriousness. "I am pretty sure that I would have made a hole in my floor if you hadn't stopped me."
"You were pretty frazzled, Leo-sama, more than usual."
"Yeah, I know, but I can't help it. I can't help but be worried. Lucy is risking too much and I understand why she is doing this. I just don't want her to end up losing her life because of this. I don't want her getting caught in the mist and becoming trapped in that city. I don't want Lucy to die, not for a very long time."
"And you don't I think I feel the same way, Leo-sama? Lucy-dono gave me another chance at life. She saved me. I am also worried about her. I don't want her to die as much as you do. I don't want Lucy-dono to die, not since I just met her."
The sudden change in expression told her that the other spirit hadn't thought about how she felt about this. It didn't even cross Leo-sama's mind that she was hurting about this too. A part of Shizuka felt hurt when she realized it. It didn't matter though. Her hurt feeling didn't matter, not when Lucy-dono's life was on the line. She mentally chastised herself for even feeling hurt. She pushed wiped those thoughts away. She should have never had an outburst like that. She decided to focus back onto the conversation at hand since it looked like the other sprit wanted to say something else.
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to." Leo-sama was beginning to apologize, which she decided to stop.
"Leo-sama, I—"Shizuka opened her mouth to tell him that it was unnecessary, but she never finished it.
Something had stopped her.
And it was unpleasant.
Both she and Leo-sama felt it. They had felt it at the same time. Their bodies had stiffened the instant it had appeared. It was like a well aimed punch to the gut that knocked your breath out. Their faces became slacked and their eyes widened with horror. The dread was filling their veins again as they felt the connection they shared with their Celestial Mage being cut off. That connection, that bright warmth, which was Lucy-dono had suddenly disappeared from them in an instant. Shizuka, immediately attempted to feel her mage out, but nothing came of it. She tried again and again, and with no success. From across the room, Leo-sama had tried the same thing and wasn't having any luck either. She could tell from the sudden rigidness and pale face.
They had both came to the same conclusion.
It was gone, completely gone.
"Lucy-dono," Shizuka didn't even realized that she had spoken out loud or how scared she sounded. She didn't even notice that she was gripping one of the pillows in an iron grip. Her eyes flickered over to the other spirit, who had ended up standing up from the shock of the loss of the connection. "What happened to Lucy-dono?"
Oddly enough, he looked more composed than she did.
"I don't know. I don't know what happened." His voice was strained and his hands were drawn into clenching fists. The expression on his face was set into stone and he looked almost ready to bolt. "I can't feel her anymore. No matter how hard I try I can't feel her at all. I can't feel Lucy."
"You can't?"
"No, I can't." He responded back. "Can you?"
"No, I feel nothing, nothing at all." She replied in a quiet, broken whisper. "The connection is gone, Leo-sama."
"Shit."
That one word Leo-sama uttered was easily applicable to their situation. The pair of spirits said nothing else and just stayed there in the silence. They knew there was nothing they could to do. Even if they appeared in the mortal realm where they had last left Lucy-dono nothing could be done. Sure, they could attempt to sniff her out, but from the information they had been given they knew that it would be difficult. The mist messed with their senses, especially their sense of smell. They would not be able to find her. With the connection completely cut off from them they had method of finding Lucy-dono. They could do nothing, absolutely nothing. That didn't stop them from still trying to feel an inkling of their connection.
They needed something to happen, but they had to wait.
So they waited in the thickening silence for something to happen.
It had been an extremely torturous and long wait. It was that, until something had finally happened. They could feel it again. It had only been for a brief minute, but it was enough to feel it. That warm connection that belonged to Lucy-dono came back flaring to life. It filled the fox spirit's veins like it was a spreading fire. She could feel her Celestial mage again and it was wondrous. It was a joyous feeling. Still, the sudden reappearance of the bond had to be pushed aside. There were other things to worry about, like why the connection had been cut off in the first place. Something had happened, but they didn't know what until they actually spoke with their mage. In the end, she had been right. Her earlier premonition that something bad was going to happen had come true.
Something bad had happened to Lucy-dono.
It may have been for a minute, but it was enough to get a fix on Lucy-dono. At least they were able to find her. When she and Leo-sama had shimmered into the mortal realm they were met with an unpleasant sight. Lucy-dono was in a very bad state. It looked like she had been beaten by someone. Her skin was littered with bruises and small bleeding cuts. Her clothes were torn and her ample chest was exposed to the air. Her arms where cuffed behind her back and she looked like she could barely stand, but she still had a look that spelled determination. Leo-sama was the first to move into action. He began to attend to her. As the lion spirit did that the fox spirit's ice blue eyes scanned the area searching for any lingering danger.
She didn't find anything at first, except for dust and other dirty things. Eventually, her eyes found a heap of clothes that could only be in the shape of a human. And it was a human, a human man. She studied him for a bit. She came to the decision that the man was unconscious and quite possibly the person who had attacked Lucy-dono. She switched her attention back to Leo-sama and Lucy-dono, who were still speaking with one another. They have seemed to have forgotten about her during their conversation. Shizuka made her presence known and she was added into the conversation too. It was a short conversation, even when Leo-sama pointed out and named the unconscious man, and it was to the point.
Lucy-dono didn't tell them about how she ended up in this position, but it wasn't necessary. The two spirits could figure out that much on their own. It was quite an easy story to figure out, so they didn't ask her to elaborate, though Leo-sama did complement the beating the blonde woman had give the man on the ground. A few more words were exchanged between them and the cuffs were removed before the blonde woman asked them for a favor. They accepted to check the port area for the Celestial Spirit mage. She believed something could there that could help her with her research. They couldn't argue with that. They understood her reasoning.
That wasn't the only thing she had asked of them.
Lucy-dono, being ever perceptive, had noticed the change of treatment between her and Leo-sama. She had noticed that they were genuinely getting along and even saw how close they stood together. She had asked them about it. The pair of spirits managed to avoid talking about the strange behavior between her and Leo-sama. The two spirits denied anything weird between the two of them by using a simple sentence. The lion spirit had mentioned someone dear to her and that caught the blonde Celestial Mage's attention. Leo-sama told her was here inside this city searching for her. He told her to find the Iron Dragon Slayer that conveniently had their keys, which the blonde woman could follow easily using her magic. Shizuka couldn't deny the bubble of happiness that had bubbled up inside her when she saw Lucy-dono's reaction to the lion spirit words. Her brown eyes had brightened at the mention of the Dragon Slayer. It was no surprise that she had agreed to find the man and with the magic of her keys guiding her it would be an easy feat. With one final affirmation that Lucy-dono would be fine they decide nothing else had to be said.
So they left for the ports even though they rather stay with Lucy-dono. They left to fend for herself and on a mission to find the Dragon Slayer she called her lover. Leaving the room had been easy. There weren't that many Misted around them. The few that were around simply followed them when they had deliberately caught their attention. Shizuka counted them one by one as they continued to walk the streets in silence. More Misted trickling into the crowd that was slowly following behind them. She briefly wondered if the Misted following them would be a problem later when they reached their destination. She didn't know, but a part of her knew that there would problems later. She couldn't imagine the amount of enemies that were hiding in the dense mist.
Maybe she and Leo-sama could lose them along the way.
That sounded like a good plan.
Her mind was already provided her with possible plans and other ideas that could help them. None of the plans were elaborate and most involved being stealthy. As she thought of possible plans the fox spirit didn't miss a step. She did notice that her steps had slowed down. When they had first left the Celestial Mage, an hour ago, Shizuka had been walking side by side with the lion spirit, but now she wasn't. She was now walking a behind the other spirit in a slow and steady pace. The other spirit wasn't too far ahead. She decided that it wasn't too much of a problem and kept walking at her current pace, but she found her mind focusing on something else.
It didn't take the fox spirit long to figure out what had caught her attention. It was easy to find it. It was easy to figure out just what exactly she was feeling. It was a feeling she was quite familiar with. It had been lingering in the back of her mind since they had come to this place, but the worry for her mage had buried it. Now it was back and it was in full force. She knew what she was feeling. The sprit knew what was bothering her.
Shizuka didn't like this city and it was not just because of the feeling of the air or the danger it posed to Lucy-dono.
She had another reason to hate this city.
This place caused a reaction to ensue inside her mind. This place reminded the little spirit of another place. It reminded her of a place that she would rather forget. The area reminded her of her of the forest and of the frozen prison she had called her home for many centuries. Well, minus all the trees that usually surrounded her and her prison. Despite the absent of the tress, this city could have made a very suitable substitute for her ex-prison. It was almost like she was there again, except for the differences. And it was easy for Shizuka to pick out the differences.
Probably the most noticeable two were that she could think freely and feel things rather clearly. When she had been trapped inside her prison she didn't have to feel or think much about anything relevant or frivolous. Inside her frozen cage she was like the ice that surrounded her. She was cold and unmoving. Shizkua merely existed when she had been imprisoned. Now, she was not like the ice. She could feel freely and her mind was rapidly spurning out thoughts upon thoughts with no trouble. She didn't just exist anymore, but she decided not spent too much time analyzing her current life. She knew one thing. Her life was better now, much better. And maybe it would continue to get better, though in a city like this she didn't think that would be happening, not with the bad sensation shifting through the air.
Damn, that sensation.
It felt awful, extremely awful.
Her body could easily sense the misery settling on her exposed skin and seeping into her bones. Actually, that was not the only feeling the little fox spirit was experiencing at the moment. It didn't matter that she only recently began to able to feel again, but she could easily recognize the emotions bubbling beneath her cold exterior. They were the sort of feelings that made her instincts flare up again, just like when they had first arrived here, but they felt worse.
It was her sixth sense and body silently telling her that danger was around.
It made the little hair Shizuka had at the back of her neck to stand on end. Next, she felt the telltale tingles traveling through her body. It began from the bottom of her feet and travelled all the way to the top of her head. Those tingles were the start of the shivers encompassing her petite body. Following those shivers was the troubling and weighty feeling forming somewhere inside her stomach. It was coiling and twisted around like a small monster trying to tear her to shreds with their claws. She knew these feelings well.
They were the feelings she felt when she felt trap. This was exactly what she felt when that incident had occurred. The feelings of oppression, loneliness and guilt slithered into her mind. It didn't help that the farther and deeper they walked into the city the worse the ill-feelings became. Not only did her feelings grow, but so did the eeriness and unpleasantness. And didn't just affect her feelings, but it also affected her body in other ways too. Her limbs felt burdened by some invisible weights that were not coming off her any time soon. Every step she took made her body rigid with tension and her animal instinct screaming at her that this was a perilous place to be. Then there was the constricting of her throat that was making it slightly hard to breathe.
She had to remind herself to breathe.
In the back of her throat she could feel the bile building up and wanting to leave her lips, but it didn't happen. The urge to vomit was strong, but she held it in. She held it in hoping it would go away. It would go away. Shizuka would make it go away. One advantage, besides having a constant neutral face, was that she had developed excellent control of her emotions and bodily functions. So it was not too difficult for the female spirit to push aside the feeling of nausea and to ignore it.
That only left the feelings, which she could deal with too.
At least she thought she could.
It seemed the aura in floating in the air had other ideas. It kept coming back up like an unwanted itch or thought. And her ill feelings was still there just waiting to come back full force. The ominous atmosphere drifting in the city didn't help either. Honestly, Shizuka found this city, utterly repulsive. Well, she wondered if the city had felt this way before this destruction happened. A part of her believed what Leo-sama had told her about this city, about how it was like when he had lived here. He told her it was never like this. It used to be decent area. It used to be a happy place before it had changed for worse. And she was positive she knew the cause of this. Everything, the nightmares, illusions, and the nerve-wracking feelings could be trace back to one thing. Back to one simple object: the mist. All these bad happening had to do with this foul mist.
This may have been only her second encounter she had with this mist, but she already felt like she knew enough about it. The mist wherever it showed up spelled disaster to the area. It only brought about destruction and despair. She could feel the unspeakable malice and evil twisting around in it. Shizuka knew the mist was an unnatural thing. It was an evil, unnatural tool of destruction being used by that villain named Fear. Fear was the one who was causing all this misery. He was using magic for nefarious purposes.
What made the mist worse was how dense it was. Sometimes it was hard to see though it even in areas where there wasn't much of the mist covering it. The mist was a perfect place to hide from prying eyes and was the perfect place to ambush someone. Shizuka hated not being able to see. There had been a couple of times during this walk that she felt like she was being followed. She was certain that she had caught the sounds of steps creeping behind her. The ex-prisoner felt like she was being followed, but she could never see anyone. She knew it wasn't the Misted because none were close enough to her and Leo-sama was in front of her not behind. That meant couldn't be him. There was no one else around that could be the culprit or at least no she can see. A small part of her did feel like it was mist that was following her and her mind had to agree. It definitely felt like it was alive and sentient.
And if this mist was alive then Shizuka could say that it reminded her of a predator. It reminded her of a predator with an enormous appetite. Actually, maybe this particular predator's appetite was insatiable if so many places had been attacked by it. Either way, it was simple for the blue eyed spirit to recognize a predator when was near one. She was familiar with predators. She had been one before herself, but she wasn't a good one. She didn't excel in that sort of role, not like Leo-sama or him. Her ex-partner had been a perfect spirit to be in the role of a predator, much like Leo-sama.
Leo-sama and her ex-partner were both predators, but they were a different too. Leo-sama was the sort that hid his predatory side. He was always a gentleman, who gave off an approachable aura. Even when he fought you would only get a glimpse of his hunter qualities. He didn't like to show it. If you didn't know the leader of the Zodiac you would never suspect that he was a hunter through and through. There was no denying that he was a formidable predator, but it was not important to Leo-sama to portray it on his person.
Her ex-partner was the exact opposite. Everything the man did screamed predator. From the way he moved, spoke and looked at other people was from a hunter's lens. He made an attempt to hide his predatory aspects from her or their master. And if an enemy attacked he had no qualms about showing how much of a hunter he was. Her dear friend loved to have it out in the open because he said it made others aware that he was dangerous. He like others knowing that he was dangerous to them. Oddly, enough it didn't stop her from loving him. She could still remember how he would smirk at her or how he would pinch her cheeks in a mocking gesture. His green eyes would be bright with confidence and he would tell her not worry about anything. He was her protector. She could still hear his voice echoing in her mind as clearly as if it had happened yesterday.
"I'll let nothing touch you. I'll be damn if I would let anyone hurt you." He touched her hand and rubbed circles on her palm. It was his way of silently reassuring her. "You can trust me Shizuka."
Spirits, it may have been centuries ago, but that memory, his words were still enough to make her breathe hitched and a sob threaten to rise up. All these centuries and she still felt like this when ever her mind happened to wander to him. She doubted that her feelings for him would ever change. Still, she shouldn't be doing this now. The female spirit shook her head attempting to clear her thoughts from thoughts she didn't need to think about. This was not the time or place to do so. Additionally, it would do her no good to think about someone from her past, especially him of all people. No good would come from it.
And now she felt worse.
Spirits, she hated this.
She hated feeling like this. The fox spirit attempted to shake it off again and place them in the recesses of her mind, but like the other times it failed. This time they were thwarted by her thoughts. Her thoughts wandered to another important person in her life. She thought of Lucy-dono and that made her nerves to increase. The fact that her current Celestial Spirit Mage was trapped in such a place like this did not quell her nervousness. There were so many threats hidden in the darkness that could harm the blonde woman. Lucy-dono was traversing this dangerous area by herself and injured was nothing to feel calm about it.
Shizuka was worried about Lucy-dono. The white-lavender spirit hoped she was okay. She hoped that she would find the Iron Dragon Slayer as quickly as possible so she could be protected. She knew that the Celestial Mage still hadn't. She could still feel the petal pulling on her magic and thus she could feel the Celestial Mage's magic too. Lucy-dono's magic was still alone and surrounded by all this evil. It was understandable for Shizuka to feel anxious. And she wasn't the only one, though he seemed to have gotten it under control now. Earlier, Leo-sama had been practically dancing with concern and made it blatantly obvious. The lion spirit's ears had been twitching constantly and his head had been slightly flicking from left to right. She had asked him, but he told her he wasn't. He said that he was fine and reminded her that Lucy-dono was strong. That she would be fine. She nodded her head, but she knew the truth. He was just as worried as she was.
After that the pair of spirits hadn't spoken another word with one another word again. They had walked towards their destination in relative silence. Shizuka didn't mind though. She was use to long stretches of silences between the two of them and used to silence in general. She had her imprisonment to thank for that. Those centuries in the ice had been filled long silences since she had no company but her own. She had spent those silences thinking, much like what she was doing now. She decided to spend this particular silence finally making success in forcing her thoughts and ill-feelings cooperating with her. She closed her eyes as she followed the scent of Leo-sama and used her ears to follow his footsteps. She went through her mental exercises slowly and thoroughly. It took her more cycles than usual to get the deed done. Finally, she felt like she had reached a good place that was filled serenity and calm. She opened her eyes and found that the other spirit with her was still walking forward with his eyes focused ahead.
Ah, it seemed that that Leo-sama had not noticed her little hiccup. Good, she didn't want him to think that she couldn't handle it or ask if she needed a break. She didn't want to feel like she was a burden. She watched the well-dressed sprit walk for a bit before she shifted her gaze from him to the mist. Her sixth sense lit up again warning her. She felt like she had to keep her eyes on it or it would pull its claws out and grab her. The fox knew that she had to be careful and as her mind told her this her sixth sense picked something else in her vicinity. It told Shizuka that something or someone had their attention on her. Her eyes intently stared into the surrounding area trying to see if anything was lurking in the darkness.
This she was positive that someone was watching her.
Yet when she searched she found nothing.
Unlike earlier, the feeling did not go away. In fact it had remained on her and since she knew it was not coming out from the mist she knew there was only one other option left. It had to be Leo-sama. Her eyes swiveled to the orange haired male and she had expected to find him watching her, but he wasn't. He was not even facing in her direction. It was his back that was facing her with his eyes set on the course in front of him. She watched him for a few minutes before she looked away. She was about to shrugged it off as nothing or maybe her imagination just running wild, until she felt it again. Someone's stare was on her. She swiveled her head back over towards the other spirit and found him in the same state he was in earlier. She narrowed her eyes at his back. She knew it was him. It had been his eyes on her. He still attempted to hide it and she tried to catch him in the act. These actions repeated itself again and again, even when it became apparent that she had been right. She had caught a glimpse of him turning his head and his eyes focusing on her. He was observing her, but every time he noticed the slight turn of her head he would look away from her.
Why was Leo-sama playing such a game with her?
Why was he staring at her?
Shizuka didn't know how to approach the subject. She wanted to be blunt and asked him why he was acting this way, but she didn't feel the need to do so. She didn't have the energy to ask. She decided that his actions, his staring were nothing too troubling to her or her well-being. It was only just a tad bit annoying. She also doubted that he would listen to her if she asked him to stop. He had a bad habit of not listening. So she decided to ignore it. She refused to acknowledge that she knew he was watching her by keeping her blue eyes firmly away from him. She hoped that her avoidance of eye contact and her sudden closed off aura would discourage Leo-sama's actions.
Sadly, it didn't work out too well.
If anything she felt his eyes on her more now than before.
She still tried it though. She had been steadily avoiding it for the past thirty minutes, until she couldn't stand it anymore. It was beginning to bother her so much that she could not avoid it. It didn't help that her mind was urging her to react. Her mind wanted her to do something. Her mind was urging her to say something to him. She had to say something even if he didn't heed her words.
She spoke to the leader of Zodiac.
"You're staring is becoming rather unsettling, Leo-sama." She stated tersely as her gazed finally shifted from the mist to the taller spirit walking in front of her. Much to her surprise the lion's sprit's back was not facing towards her anymore, instead it was facing away from her. He was walking backwards with an unnatural ease. And this time he made no attempt to hide the fact that he was staring at her. She kept on speaking. "I know I am the only woman around at the moment, but I do not appreciate your eyes constantly on me."
She noticed that some of her words made the male spirit flinch a little, but his eyes were still settled on her. Whatever part of what she said that caused this reaction she wasn't sure, but at least she had some effect on him. That was the only effect she had on him. Her words hadn't caused him to fumble over his feet. He was still walking effortlessly. There was no misstep as he continued to walk backwards with a slight grin on his face.
Actually, it resembled a smirk more than a smile.
That bastard.
Besides his smirk was not the worst of it. The worst of it were his eyes. His hazel eyes were piercing through her and it made her squirm. It was sort of hypnotizing in way, but she briefly forgot about it when a question invaded her mind. She contemplated over how he was able to walk backwards so efficiently. He made something difficult look easy. For some reason, he made everything look easy. Then there was the detail of the fact that his footsteps were barely audible. She could barely hear any of his steps. His steps were so light that they were almost making no sound. She was positive that he was using his feline grace and skill to move as quietly as he was. How this affected his walking backwards she didn't know, but believed it helped him in that aspect too. Even the expression on his face reminded her of a cat, a smirking one. She was sure that he caught on that she was slightly annoyed with him, especially with that glint in his hazel eyes. They maybe on better terms, but that didn't mean he still like to annoy her from time to time.
Annoying her was one of his favorite pastimes.
His response proved her point.
It was just something he would say to further aggravate her.
"Can't blame me for something I can't control. My eyes always naturally focus on a pretty girl before my brain can even give the order." He replied back as he shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly. His hazel eyes were still fixed on her form. "It is a curse I must live with for the rest of my life."
"I never thought I would hear you call me pretty, Leo-sama. I find myself feeling rather ill now, actually." Her eyes left his for a moment and she was sure she felt her mouth twitch. "I'm a Lapsis Stella remember?"
"True, but you can still be pretty for a convicted criminal and a Lapsis Stella."
What?
What!
Her face must have betrayed something because the next thing she knew a chuckled had escaped Leo-sama's throat. He was laughing at her and was not trying to hide it. She felt embarrassed. Nothing she had stated was funny at all. She had the sudden urge to snarl something at him, but she didn't. Words didn't feel like they would be enough to properly describe what she was feeling at the moment. Besides, Shizuka was positive that if she said something that the orange haired spirit would reply back something snarky. He had that habit of doing such things around her. Actually, he never missed a chance to say something to her. Whether it was good or bad, Leo-sama always had something ready on his tongue for her to hear. Not wanting to egg him on further she decided to take a breath and decided not to grace him with any response what so ever. The fox spirit just settled for staring at him and tried to silently express her ire at him at the moment.
All Leo-sama did was to continued to grin at her, showing off his pearly white teeth.
That action was slightly more annoying than him replying.
They continue to stare at one another, but she lost it and ending up speaking.
"Leo-sama, you are still staring and smiling at me. It is still as bothersome and unsettling as it was earlier. Besides, don't your eyes tend to normally avoid staring at me for more than a couple of minutes?" The smaller spirit declared as she stared back at the other with as much intensity as she could muster. "I doubt your so called curse is the reason for your eyes sudden interest in me. So, what is it you need?"
"I knew I couldn't deceive a fox. They are the masters of deception after all."
She raised an eye brow at him, waiting for him to reply. He opened his mouth to speak, but stop himself before a sound could spill out. Instead the man lifted one of his hands out of his pocket towards his face. He placed it under his chin and his expression fell into one full of thoughtfulness. The fox spirit recognized it as one of Leo-sama's thinking gestures. It was one the few expressions she had the privilege of seeing because of their circumstances. It wasn't like they had the choice in the matter. They were require to spend large various amounts together. It was mandatory after all. Due to that, she learned many things about him, more than she wanted.
That was why she knew he was taking too much time thinking about how to reply back. This was not ideal, especially in a place wrought with danger. Shizuka wondered if he was trying to find a proper way to say something without sounding rude. That had to be it. Normally, when he was around her he would've blurted out what was on his mind without second thought. He never hesitated to let her know exactly what he felt or what went on inside his mind. Now he did and she could guess the reason why. She knew why he was being careful with his words. It was because he didn't want to upset Lucy-dono. He had developed this habit because their Master had asked them to be them to be nicer to one another. Lucy-dono had made it quite evident that she didn't like two of them were with one another. So at least around the blonde's presence they tried to remain amicable with each other. Well, it was like that at first, but now maybe that force friendliness was not so force anymore. It was actual real friendliness now. They were now careful around words so they wouldn't inadvertently hurt the other's feelings.
Still that was not something that was of importance at the moment.
That and they were on a time constraint, so she decided to say something before he wasted more of their precious time.
"Leo-sama, don't spend so much time trying to mince words. I am made of stronger wills than most spirits. Spending a centuries in my prison has hardened me. I can handle a few insensitive words." She stated clearly enough for him to hear, although a part of her felt that this was pointless. She didn't have to explain it in details to the other spirit since her had been around her long enough to pick her quirks and what made her who she was now. He should know that she could easily brush aside any ill-meaning comment with a bat of her eyes. In fact, Shizuka had provided a few biting and insulting words to the lion herself. "I have stated as many insults as you have. Besides, I won't be telling anyone, not like anyone actually speaks to me. I am mostly ignored by the others the entire time."
She especially would not be telling Lucy-Dono.
"No surprise there. You are a Lapsis Stella." The male responded back as he still walked backwards. Shizuka had to admit that she was impressed with how long he could walk with his eyes facing her and not the path in front of him. She wondered if he was still walking that way because he was trying to put his admirable skills out there. "Plus, everyone, well mostly everyone, knows exactly what you did."
"That it is true. I'm a persona non grata. Really, it is as simple as that."
"Nothing is simple when it involves you, especially since you are being allowed to serve another Celestial Spirit Mage. It is quite an unprecedented move and ninety-ninety percent of the other spirits are not accepting of it." He left his words to linger in air a bit allowing her time to process. "Some of them still hate you. Some don't think you deserve to free."
Shizuka knew that.
She was a rare case. Even the addition of her prison condition was something odd. No other spirit had committed similar crimes like hers had gotten such a condition before. In fact most Lapsis Stella didn't get any sort of conditions at all. Well, maybe she had been given that condition because of where her prison had been located? Where she had been imprisoned was a rather difficult area to reach. No one, not even the King had expected her or her prison to be found. It was luck that Lucy Heartfilia had found her and actually wanted her to be her spirit. Shizuka had seemed to accumulate a vast amount of luck that saw her free into the world once more.
Despite being found by someone who wanted her, she knew that her life wasn't going to be the same again. Being freed from her prison didn't mean that her life was t going to be easy. She expected to meet troubles because of her release, lots of trouble. She hadn't been surprised by Leo-sama's or the other spirits' reactions to her released. It was what she had expected to happen. She knew that the others would see her in a negative light. She was also aware of what the other spirits said about her and her contract with Lucy-dono. Many were unhappy with the situation and others were just stewing in frustration. She had been on the receiving end of some rather nasty comments and whispers from the other spirits. Some spirits like to display their dislike of her with their actions, though those confrontations were easier to avoid with the Leader of Zodiac around her twenty-four- seven.
And she hoped to continue to avoid confrontations for a long time.
"I know." She whispered quietly as she lowered her eyes away from his face. Her words felt heavy even when they left her lips. She felt something negative stirring inside her body, but she quickly shoved it aside. She lifted her eyes back up towards the orange haired spirit. "I know what they say about me becoming Lucy-dono's spirit and about me being freed."
Something flickered across the other's face, but it was gone in a blink of an eye.
"It doesn't really bother me Leo-sama." She stated confidently, but his next words made her words feel empty, like they were a half lie. "I have learned to accept it and ignore it."
"I know you do. And you may say it dosen't bother you, unless they talked about a certain subject. If they talk about your previous master or him then it bothers you." He replied. He watched her intently and she was sure he caught her body stiffen and the slight flinch when stated what he said. "And they do talk about them a lot, especially when you are around. They talk about it even when I'm around."
"That—" Shizuka stopped talking and felt like her body was made of stone. She didn't know what to say. Whenever the topic of her past, of her former master and of him, she could never manage to form words to speak about them or tell them to hold their tongue about her past. And she always had a hard time hiding her discomfort when the topic was brought up. "I…"
"You know even if you ignore it, people will still talk about it and it will still causes you pain. You can't continue to bottle up. Bottling up all those emotions wouldn't help you in the long run." He responded back in a softer voice only to be colored in playfulness. "I mean you don't have to take my advice and we can just go back to our usual banter, but that won't do us any good. Well, unless you want another forced intervention brought upon us by Virgo and the others. "
"No, but you can't deny it."
"Deny what? That the others were willing to force in a cage just so we could talk about our relationship and learn how to get along."
"It worked didn't it? We settle our differences and are proper friends now." She responded back as she looked past him making sure that he would not trip over something. "We are even each other's confidants, though the others do not know the extent of our new found relationship."
"And they don't have to know. I'm pretty sure the things you've told me in confidence are to remain between us. I don't think you are too keen to the idea of more than one person knowing everything about you like I do. Besides, I like that fact that you trust me so much that you were willing to even talk about that and your old master. I gotta say that it makes me feel special."
"I hope I have not accidently inflated your ego Leo-sama." She shook her head in amusement. "We don't need you fall over because your head weighs too much."
"My ego is fine and so is my head." He chuckled before he continued to speak. This time he asked her a question. "So what were you thinking so hard about that your mind was elsewhere?"
"What? How did you know I was thinking about anything at all?" She asked not able to hide the shock that colored her voice. She didn't think that she gave away any sort of clue that her mind had been occupied and yet had asked that question.
"Your face." His reply was quick and certain.
"My face?"
"Yeah, your face. I was able to tell because of your face. Actually, to be more specific it was your eyes that gave it away. They had that look that you were thinking hard about something that you got lost in it." He explained simply with confidence echoing in his voice. "I have been around you long enough to know when your focus is not all there."
"Oh, I didn't know you could read me like that."
"Please, with the amount of time we spend together both inside and outside my bedroom I would be disappointed if I couldn't read you. That and I would need to improve my observation skills. Thankfully, I am the leader of the Zodiac so of course I picked up some your quirks easily, fox."
He made a valid point since she knew some of his quirks too.
It was still a little aggravating though, but also interesting. She wondered just how well he could read her and her mask. She wondered how much of her behavior he had study and was able to decipher in the time they used to get better acquainted. Did Leo-sama really no longer have that much trouble reading her anymore? Was he actually able to tell her emotional states without her having to use her words? She told herself that this was silly and was not something she should spend any effort on, but the curiosity won out. She decided to find out.
"What do you think I was thinking about, Leo-sama?" She posed a simple question.
Her question must have caught him off guard because he almost stumbled over his own feet. Of course, he didn't fall over because of his feline reactions. He was able to balance himself quickly, but he didn't answer back right away. She watched as he opened his mouth only to pause and bite his lips. He looked like he was afraid to voice his answer to her question, which was odd since the orange haired male tended to be very bold in everything he did. He never held back, so why was he doing that now?
She didn't ask him and just waited for him to answer, which he eventually did.
And she didn't like the answer.
"I thought you were thinking about him, your old partner."
Just hearing that simple sentence was enough to make her freeze up. Her eyes had widened for a second before her body became rigid with tension. Before she knew it, she was closing herself off and shutting down. It was a defensive behavior of hers and Leo-sama knew that too. She always did this. Whenever that subject was brought up she reacted this way without fail. The subject of her old partner was the one subject she wasn't willing to broach with Leo-sama or herself just yet. Spirits, she didn't think she would ever be ready to talk about him. It would be a long time before she had a heart-to-heart about him with Leo-sama.
"No, I wasn't particularly thinking about him, but he did cross my mind for a bit." She whispered quietly to him. "You got it partly right."
"Do you want to talk about it?" He asked tentatively as he watched her face for some sort of clue. "We don't have to talk about it here, but when leave this place it is an option—"
"No, we've talked about this. And you are quite aware about my feelings on the subject. I don't like speaking about the subject and I don't think I will be ready any time soon, Leo-sama." She declared firmly as she could and hoped that he would drop it. "Please, I just don't think I can talk about him without letting out a lot of things I don't want to feel anytime soon."
"I get it. It took me forever to be able to talk about Karen without choking up on my words." The other male spirit admitted sheepishly. "I'm sure that you will be able to speak about him one day soon."
"Maybe…I don't know."
She hadn't meant to respond back with meaningless words, but that was what they were. They were meaningless words that meant nothing to her or to Leo-sama. She knew they had no meaning and would probably have no meaning to them for quite some time. She didn't know when she would ever be able to think, let alone speak, about her former partner. She had only spoken about him for a few seconds and it was causing her so much grief already. Her heart filled up with so much regret and pain that it suffocate her to the point of drowning. The heartbreak she had felt that day centuries ago was still just as strong. Actually, it felt worse than it did then and she knew why.
It was because she had cut herself off from her emotions.
She had refused to acknowledge them.
Since she had cut off her emotions she had never given herself the chance to mourn. She had never properly mourned for her dear friend and maybe she still didn't want to. She didn't want to acknowledge that her dear friend was gone from her life because of her actions. She had taken away his choice and had forced him to run. It was her fault that he was gone from her life. Over the passing years her feelings for him hadn't change. She knew that they would remain the same for years to come. A part of her knew that it would probably be best to let the memories of him go, but she didn't want to. Even with the fact that she would never see him again she still held onto him.
Spirits, she missed him so much.
She felt her self-hatred getting the best of her, but she did nothing to stop it.
The white-lavender haired fox spirit almost lost herself to it, but she was stopped by a simple sound. She had been brought into reality by the sound of snapping fingers. Her ice-blue eyes immediately focused on the hand in front of her face. She knew who the hand belong to. The owner of that hand snapped their fingers again, which accomplished its goal. The sound of the snapping fingers caught her full attention. Her eyes stayed focused on it for a few seconds before they traveled to the face of the lion spirit. She looked questioningly at him and waited.
"Oi, you okay?" He questioned her softly and gently. His eyes were observing her for any sign to confirm his question. He was no longer walking. He was standing a few inches away from her. "Is something wrong?"
Shit, she was worrying him again.
"Nothing is wrong." She replied back quickly without even thinking about it. She saw his concern and instinctively tried to placate it, like she did all the time. She was telling him the truth. She had been feeling bad a few seconds ago, but he had broken her out of it. She was truly feeling okay at the moment, but she didn't know if Leo-sama believed her or not. "Why do you ask, Leo-sama?"
"Why?" His raised an eyebrow and stared at her in disbelief. "Isn't obvious?"
"No, it is not. Why else would I ask, Leo-sama?"
"I'm asking because you zoned out for a bit and stopped walking. You were standing there still as a statue and not responding back to me for awhile."
Oh, Leo-sama had changed the subject on purpose.
He was talking about her wandering mind and not about him anymore. She had to admit she was impressed he had noticed it considering how frozen her facial muscles were. Well, having an unchanging face had its advantages too. Still, the statement he had made was valid. She had been zoning out a lot and she had done this more than once today. Honestly, her zoning out was nothing new to her. She had done this plenty of times before. She had done this when she had first been encased in her prison and after she had been released. It was her go-to-method when she needed it. Apparently she needed more than once today. She wasn't sure what about today was making her mind zone out so much, but it was. It could be because of Lucy-dono, the mist, the danger and a variable of things. Whatever the case, Leo-sama had a point. Shizuka had zoned out so bad that she had stopped walking and she didn't notice it.
Damn it, why couldn't she stay focused.
She needed to focus.
"I didn't notice, sorry. I didn't mean to cause trouble." She apologized honestly to him.
"I never thought you were the type that could be spacey and it seems like you have been doing that a lot today."
"Sorry, I will endeavor to make certain that it does not occur again, Leo-sama." She apologized again.
"Oh, I am sure you will try, but I have a feeling it will happen again." He titled his head as his eyes moved around the area. He was probably making sure that they were alone and that no enemy was sneaking up on them. "Right?"
"I don't know. Maybe it will? Maybe it won't?" She responded back in an uncertain voice. She felt slightly guilty that she was causing him trouble and in a sense causing Lucy-dono trouble too. She was slowing down this progress because she couldn't keep her focus. "I'm not entirely sure, Leo-sama."
"Well, if it happens again at least you can be assured that I am being the watchful one." The orange haired leader of Zodiac stated with a cheeky grin decorating his face. "Don't worry there is a reason I am an alpha."
"You ego is truly appalling and don't think your little distraction worked. You still have not answered my earlier question of why you were staring at me. I am certain it had nothing to do with our current conversation." She stared at him with her eyes unblinking. "So again I ask why were you staring at me, Leo-sama?"
"I knew I couldn't easily trick a fox."
"You know, you use that line many times already. Is it becoming your new catch phrase?"
"You lied to her." The Leader of the Zodiac ignored her other question, not that she was expecting him to answer that. She knew the answer to that one. She did appreciate that he had stopped messing around and went straight to the point. "You actually lied to Lucy directly to her face."
"Yes, I did."She stated in a matter of fact matter. It was not like she was going to deny it to the lion spirit. Lucy-dono may have not caught her little fib earlier, but that didn't mean it would go unnoticed by the other spirit. He knew her too well not to see it. "I lied to her."
"Damn, you don't even try to deny it."
"Why would I? You would catch it if I was telling you the truth or not."
"True, true, I would catch you in a lie and then I would be force to act against you." He shrugged.
Shizuka merely nodded and figured that would be the end of this particular conversation, but to her surprised the lion spirit continued on.
"So why did you lie to Lucy?"
Really, the other spirit was asking her to answer a question with a very obvious answer. And if the expression on his face was anything to go by he knew that it was a pointless question to ask, but he had done so anyways. She knew that Leo-sama would have, has done, the very same as she had before she had even joined Lucy-dono's ranks. She was sure the orange haired male had lied to the blonde woman many times before and he probably did it for the very same reason she had. She didn't understand what went on inside the other spirit's head. Actually, she was pretty certain most of his brain power went into flirting followed by thinking about Lucy-dono and the ladies.
Whatever the case, the lion's flirtatious sides were not important.
What was important was why he even bothered to ask her that question.
"Why must you ask such a question if you already have some idea of my reply, Leo-sama?" She pondered out loud as she quirked up her eyebrows, watching the male spirit for any sign that he was just messing around with her again. He had a tendency of doing that. She had notice that Leo-sama could go from seriousness to silliness in a matter of seconds. "Why should I waste my breath on something you can answer yourself quite easily?"
"To humor me, I just want you to humor this lion's endless curiosity." He replied back in a voice that was too serious that she knew he was joking around. "You know how I get if I don't know something."
"Fine, I will tell you." She released her breath and allowed a sigh escape her lips. She knew what he spoke of. There have many times when the lion had been too curious and when he didn't immediately get the answer he would become somewhat insufferable. She didn't want to deal with that part of him anytime soon. "I told a lie to Lucy-dono for a very good reason. I didn't want her to worry over something that she didn't need too. I knew that she would put my well-being over her own if I had told her the extent of her using that petal."
"Uh huh," He motion her to continue as they began to walk again.
"If I had been truthful she would've deny my protection, especially since that petal will be siphoning my reserves of magic from me. My magic reserves are not high enough yet since the recovery process of my magic is tedious and slow. It will be quite some time before I will be able to be at my full strength. I knew this, so I lied to her. I lied to her so she could be safe. I wanted to protect her even if it meant I will be weakened by it." She explained much more thoroughly than she had meant to. She could have just kept it simple and short, but she had figured that the lion wanted details. And if he didn't get a satisfactory enough answer he would've ask for more. "There I said it. Was that enough to quench your curiosity?"
"It is sated, for now, but I really don't like keeping Lucy in the dark. If she finds out that she is basically sapping your magic until she finds Gajeel she will blow a gasket and blame herself if something happen to you. You are basically putting yourself at great risk. She is too kind hearted to put any of her spirits in danger. I do hope you are ready for the guilt Lucy is going to feel if she learns of this. And the lecture she is going to give you too." The hazel eyed male began to lecture her himself. He didn't sound please with what she had done, probably because he knew the Lucy-dono would feel bad about it. And yet, he also sounded like he was proud of her. Lying to the blonde meant she would be safe and Leo-sama liked to keep her safe. "You will do your best to make certain she never learns of this, right? Would you lie to her if she asks you about it?"
"Of course, I will not burden her with my weakness. That is what I have you for. Besides, I'm leashed to the Leader of the Zodiac and that solves many things, like fighting. If we do have to fight then you have plenty of magic to support us both and get us out of dangerous situations. Unless, you are saying that you aren't strong enough to keep this Lapsis Stella out of trouble, Leo-sama?"
"Don't underestimate me." He growled, his face showing how offended he felt by her words and her questioning of his strength. "I can keep the both of us safe without sweating about it."
She nodded in agreement with his statement, which made him puff out his chest like a peacock that was posturing. She knew that Leo-sama was strong, very strong. Even without the additional boost of the blonde Celestial Mage's magic he was a force to be reckoned with. He may normally be in his flirt mode, but beneath all that was a strength that had him the leader of the Zodiac. There was a reason Leo-sama was the strongest warrior under the Celestial Spirit King. She knew that if it came down to them fighting that Leo-sama would be doing most of the fighting. He had trained her a bit, but with her magic reserves dwindling rapidly her ability to fight was questionable. She was worried that it would get to the point where wouldn't be able to cast a simple illusion. Currently, she could be considered a big liability because of what she had done earlier. And the lion spirit knew that, but he had not stopped her. He was prepared to cover her as much he could and she would do her best not to weigh him down too much.
Truthfully, Leo-sama was a really good person.
"You would have done the same, Leo-sama." The fox spirit didn't say this in order to insult him or to make him feel inadequate. Her words were not meant to be anything. She was merely voicing the truth. "Just like me you would have lied too."
"Yes, I would have." He admitted truthfully. She believed him. He would lie to Lucy-dono too. "If lying to Lucy meant that she would be safe then I wouldn't hesitate to do it."
"Well said Leo-sama." Shizuka agreed quietly. Her eyes swept over their surroundings quickly before her eyes settle back onto the male spirit again. A thought came to her and she voiced it without thinking "Things have not really changed for Celestial Spirits since I have been imprisoned. The world may look different, but it is still much the same for us."
"What do you mean?"
"Celestial Spirits still have their very core. They still love their master more than their own well-being. The need to protect and serve our master to the best of our ability is still strongly present. Even if we change as people the desire to please our master will always be present. It is a rather is a hard thing for a Celestial Spirit to forget."
"Hmm, that is true. It is our duty after all, though I do say it makes a difference when you love them. When you love your master you're cable of doing things that you never thought you would or could do, even if it may not be right. Love can make you do crazy things."
"I know that all too well." She whispered. Her voice was colored with guilt and sadness. The orange haired spirit must have heard and seen it because he apologized quickly.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to bring up bad memories again."
"It's all right. You were speaking the truth about my actions. I will not deny that I loved my previous master because I did. I loved them so much that it drove me to do something atrocious and unforgivable." She attempted to express that she was unaffected, but she knew she wouldn't succeed, not with this mist feed her negativity. "I am trying to not let it bother me anymore. I don't think that is working so well."
"I blame the mist. The mist is some seriously bad magic. It basically attacks all your fears and insecurities and amplifies them to the point you can't stand it. It gets overwhelming that you get dragged in and it's hard to get out." He swept his hand over the floating mist causing it to disperse only to reform again instantly. "Speaking of the mist. have you had any luck on figuring out how the mist works? Or the illusions?"
"No, not really." She responded back in a grateful tone. Leo-sama had changed the subject of the conversation again so she didn't have to speak about painful things again. "And it is very frustrating to say the least."
"I wouldn't know. I have no idea how illusions work or how this mist really work. I mean I can feel the effects of it. I could hear those dreadful little whispers bouncing around inside my mind trying to get me down. I feel like there is something trying to tear into me and bring out anything that will make me miserable, like my worst nightmares." He scrunched his face in distaste as he explained to her. "It's really bothersome, but I can handle it."
"You can handle it? Why?"
"I think it has something to with my light magic. Dark stuff like this usually tends to be weakened by it, but it's strong to still affect me."
"That makes sense. Dark magic is usually weak to light magic so it shouldn't be surprising that your light magic offers you some extra defense against the mist. It is a rather dreadful mist for someone who doesn't use light magic. My magic doesn't seem to be enough against it." She shivered slightly. Yes, the mist was horrible. It had been constantly trying to devour her, but she didn't allow it to because Lucy-dono needed her. "I think my strong hold on my emotions, or lack of emotions, helps me somewhat, but I still feel it too. It is as you describe it, but for me it is a little worse. I have a bounty misery inside of me that can be used against me. I don't want to lose myself in it."
"It won't happen. I'll stop it before you can get dragged in just like you will stop me from being trapped inside an illusion."
"I won't let the illusions get you Leo-sama. Even with Lucy-dono borrowing some of my magic I can still offer you some form of protection from them."
"I know, though it isn't the mist or the illusions I am particularly worried about. Heck, we don't even know if Jose brought any friends with him and I'm not worrying over that too much either. What I am worried about is the Misted. I think the Misted are the biggest threat here, even a bigger threat than the mist." He gestured over to some Msited walking idly by with their blank eyes fixated on nothing specific. "This is a big place and we don't really know how many have fallen victim. We don't know their numbers. We could easily be overrun by them if we are not careful enough."
"You have a good point, but so far they don't seem that interested in us. We've been carefully traveling around this place, but have yet to be attacked by them. I would have expected to be spotted by some of them and then attacked." She added to his thoughts.
"That is true too. We have been rather lucky, too lucky."
"I mean the only time the Misted were interested in us was when we purposely caught the attention of the ones that were where Lucy-dono was. We did that so they wouldn't attack her and they followed us quickly." She looked to where the little group they had made to follow them only to see they had separated and gone in other directions. "See, even the ones that we allowed to purposefully follow us are no longer doing so. They've lost interest in us quickly enough. It's like we are not something to be bother with."
"I see your point, but that doesn't make me feel better about the possibility of being outnumbered."
"We are outnumbered. That is a simple fact and it is something we cannot change. We just have to continued being careful and have some sort of escape plan. I have thought of some already, though I think it would be best if we escape onto higher ground or go to places where it would be too difficult for them to follow." She suggested as she surveyed the area. "From my observations, the Misted seem simple. So it should be easy to trick them away from us or escape from them."
"Yeah, I got that." Leo-sama nodded as he walked ahead of her. It was only a little bit of distance.
"Yes, but I can understand why you are nervous about them. I am too. And I find them rather creepy."
"Are they even alive? The Misted, are they even alive at all?" Leo-sama asked as he shifted closer to the edge of the building trying to stay in the shadows. His eyes momentarily flickering back to the Misted wandering around them before focusing back on her. "They look like they have no life left in them."
"They do look a little dead, but I am certain the Misted are still alive…maybe." Her ice-blue eyes flicker from distance group of Misted back onto the lion. As she mentioned earlier she believed the Misted weren't interested in them, unless they got their attention purposefully. That didn't stop the unease though. They had easily avoided any confrontation with them. Hopefully, it remained that way. It helped that she and Leo-sama knew how to sneak around efficiently. "I honestly can't decide which it is. They look alive, but some of them don't. It is hard to tell, especially with the problem of the illusions. That doesn't help discern their status of alive or dead."
"Their scents don't help much either. Most of them smell like blood and rotting meat. Some smell like they rolling in dirt and mud or possibly sewage. I can smell a hit of death, but I can't quite pinpoint it. I can't tell whether it is coming from them directly or if it is just clinging on their clothes." He took a whiff of the air around them and made an unpleasant face. "It smells awful in this whole city. I can't stand it."
"I agree, the smell here is not something I desire to be around for longer than necessary."
"Hopefully, this adventure helps us in some way, like figuring out the illusions. I think the illusions are what help places like this fall apart so easily and quickly. And I'm sure the spread has something to do with the mist itself."
"That is possible. It is a possibility that has crossed my mind on more than one occasion."
"Well, I'm sure you'll solve this dilemma eventually. You're an expert in everything involving illusions so that ah-ha moment will come to you. Let's hope it happens sooner than later."
"Perhaps, though it is difficult, even for me. I only have bare minimum information that I've received from Lucy-dono. I know that it strong enough to leave residue behind. I do believe the residue is there to cause nightmares on those affected. It feels so malicious that makes everyone around feel ill." Shizuka found herself lifting her hand up toward her lips and unconsciously biting on her finger. "And the fact that this illusion is being widespread to so many people is a big concern of mine. That requires an immense amount of magical energy and it has to remain constant. I doubt even in my prime I would be able to do something that vast. Maybe when I recover enough magical energy I could experiment—"
Her thought process was interrupted when she heard a rich, baritone laughter.
He was laughing at her.
"I didn't realize I had stated something comedic, Leo-sama." Now why was he laughing at her?
"You didn't! It's just that look on your face! I couldn't help it! When I saw that look on your face I just had to luagh!" He managed to say in between his laughing breaths. The lion spirit was holding his sides like she had done the funniest face in the world. "Sorry, sorry."
"Huh?" She cocked her head towards him as she stared in utter confusion.
"Stop it with that face! I can't take it!"
"I have no idea what you are talking about."
"Really?" His laughter slowed down to mere chuckles, until it was completely gone from his system. He was gazing at her with a look of mirth dancing in his hazel eyes and there was a hint of something else. She was sure that whatever else was in his eyes was going to spell trouble for her. "You're serious?"
"Yes!" She hissed at him.
"Let's just say that face you were making was kind of funny. It was funny! Though let me say that if you place your finger in your mouth and begin to nibble at it again I may get the wrong idea. I may think you're inviting me to do something r-rated." He left his words lingering in the air and waggled his eyebrows in a most unflattering motion.
"Leo-sama," Her voice lowered into a threatening tone as he just flirtatiously smiled at her.
"What I am a hot-blooded male and a lion to boot, so I can't help it when I find someone of the opposite gender, you in this case, attractive. It's true I have dirty thoughts. I have lots of dirty thoughts bouncing around inside my head." He explained in a smooth voice that held no shame in it. "Since I can't leave you alone or go out without you tagging along it make things on my end limited. Plus, we live together so I can't bring someone over. Naturally my dirty thoughts have shifted to the only female presence around me, you. So you can't blame me for it."
"Leo-sama!" She growled at him. It wasn't loud enough for her to be heard by the Misted. Only the other spirit heard it and it made him stand straight and grin.
"Have I told you how cute you sound when you growl? No, well you do. You're growl sounds like a little purr compare to mine and you don't look all that threatening. It's just reminds me how tiny you are compare to me. And honestly, a tiny growling fox is rather cute to a big bad lion like me. It is alluring to my predatory side, little fox.
"I despise you." She said in a simple, quiet voice, though it was colored by her displeasure with the man in front of her. "I despise you, Leo-sama."
"No, you don't."
"Yes, I do. Must you hear my reasons of why I detest you, Leo-sama?"
"You're lying. You know, lying to Lucy is one thing, but lying to me is a not a smart move."
"I was not lying." She felt another growl escape her throat.
"Yes, you are. I would say you have grown rather fond of me over these past few months." His ever growing smile was smug and it annoyed her greatly that he sounded so confident in his words.
"You are clearly mistaken." She grounded out as she bared her teeth to him. She hoped her voice was able to display the amount of displeasure he was currently causing her.
From the expression on his face it didn't do the job. He had looked amused with her words and her snarl that he didn't even flinch from her. Instead his amusing expression changed. His lips had morphed into a smirk that could be described as charismatic. Then his hazel eyes darken with seduction as he gazed at her. His eyes silently promised her something pleasurable and were trying to lure her into a state of nervousness. There was also a sudden shift in the air around him. It had changed into something that was inviting her to got to him, like she was a moth and he was the alluring flame.
It was an expression she recognized.
It was on he had used many times.
The fox spirit had seen him use that expression before. It was an expression that always showed up when he was around women. It didn't matter to him where they were from as long as they were female and as long as he found them attractive. He never failed to bring it out into the open. And he was not afraid to use it against anyone, even Lucy-dono or even her. That didn't matter much. What mattered was how this expression of Leo-sama affected others. Shizuka had seen many women melt into some mindless being whenever he pointed that look their way and they would give him whatever he wanted. It basically made others submissive to Leo-sama and they do their best to please the lion spirit. There were a few that could resist the charming lion, but those few did not weigh out his successes. It was no lie that Leo-sama had perfected the art of seducing and the expression he was sporting now was the best weapon in his arsenal.
Recently, since most of their quality time was spent together, the fox spirit had become a frequent target of this face. Sometimes the lion spirit would pull it out of nowhere trying to catch off guard, but she never really gave in. It had become somewhat of challenging game between the two of them and it was one he liked to play a lot. Still, for him to use that expression now was annoying. They were in a serious situation. Their mage was in a serious situation and here he was trying to seduce a response out of her. Surely, he had realized she was immune to it by now. If Shizuka had been able to use her magic fully with no consequence she would have placed the man in the most disturbing illusion she could imagine for him.
Sadly, she couldn't, even if she wanted.
So she talked, but not because of the smoldering stare he was giving her.
No, she was replying back so he would stop.
"Please stop with lady killer stare." She huffed at him, her annoyance easily coloring her voice as she shot the best glare she could manage. "It looks like you're constipated and are ready to vomit your innards out, Leo-sama."
His face didn't falter.
"You don't really mean that. If that were true, you would've looked away and not stared at me. No, I think you actually like my face like this." His smirked held stong, if anything it got bigger and his eyes were darker now. The most notable change was that his suave voice had lower in volume and was husky sounding, almost airy. His voice was dripping with temptation, baiting her to take a bite. "Isn't that right, Shizuka."
Spirits, he had said her name!
He had said her name with that dark, lustful expression on his face. He had uttered her name with that stare that made her feel naked under it. He had said her name with that deep voice filled with unspoken promises and desires. He had said it in that voice that was meant to melt someone's body and heart into trembling goo. And she was feeling like some sort of goo now. She felt like the ice around her heart had heated and was nothing but a warm, bubbling puddle of water. Her blood was flowing so fast that she could hear her thrumming heart in her ears. She felt every bit like a tiny fox under a large lion's gaze. And she did nothing to stop this feeling, but that was not the worst part of this whole thing.
No, the worst part was that she liked it.
She liked it.
The fox spirit liked the way he had spoken her name. She liked how her name sounded in his voice and how it came from his lips. She especially liked it when he called her name with that expression on his face. She wouldn't deny, even to herself, that she would love to hear it again. She wanted to hear again and again. She wanted—
No, she had to stop this.
She couldn't allow herself to fall for his flirtations. She couldn't allow herself to melt because of Leo-sama. She should resist. She could resist him. She had resisted him so many times before with relative ease. And she would continue to resist his flirting words and seducing eyes. She would ignore it no matter how much harder it became. A thought filter through her mind that wished she still had that hostile relationship with Leo-sama. If they were still hostile then she wouldn't be going through this. He wouldn't be trying to flirt with her and use his suave words. That and what he had stated was true too. So she understood his explanation. He was stuck with her.
Being stuck with her meant he had to change his lifestyle in order to accommodate what had been ask of him by the Celestial Spirit King. He couldn't live as he had lived before. He couldn't just go around looking to woo women or bring them home. He couldn't even flirt with them because she was always standing next to him. That made women turn away, though that didn't stop him too much. Leo-sama loved to flirt, loved to love women and lavish them with his attention, but he couldn't anymore. And all added up, thus he needed a release.
It only made logical sense that he would turn his attentions onto her, especially after they had come to an understanding. The fact that they had become friends had gotten rid of that invisible barrier that protected her from the lion spirit's flirty side. He had never crossed that invisible line when she was just a Lapsis Stella to him. Now she wasn't just a Lapsis Stella to him. She was a friend, which meant she was fair game to him now. He had no qualms with flirting with her. And since she was his constant companion she had been the receiving end on a regular basis.
There were those times when he was just flirt just to flirt. That and he thought she made an ideal practice partner. He would try out new moves or lines on her to test their effectiveness. She knew that most of the time it was just Leo-sama using her as practice. That and the lion couldn't help but flirt harmlessly from time to time, but it was becoming harder to tell what was intentional and what wasn't. It didn't help that he liked to tease her.
He often had told that he enjoyed messing with her.
Honestly, she wondered how he had any female friends.
His flirting happened subconsciously to him and he couldn't seem to stop his tongue. Then again Shizuka was sure that he had slept with his female friends on a regular basis before she had come along. She was like the block and that left her all alone to be targeted by him. Sadly, even if she grew tired of his cheesy pick up lines and vast amounts of innuendos she couldn't exactly get away. She had to be near the damn lion spirit inside his home! And there were not that many great hiding spots inside a house, especially when the other could just track you using his nose. She just couldn't get away from the flirt.
Sometimes she wondered if this was just another form of punishment for her crimes.
What made matters worse was that she had seen past all that. She had seen past the flirty man and past his hatred and ager that he carried around for her. She had been privileged to see the real Leo-sama and vice versa for him. And she liked what she had seen. She liked the man that was underneath all that, like him very much. When he had comforted her with soothing words and embraced her when she cried about her past she knew she could trust the man. He had proven to be so nice and gentle. He had shown her how understanding he was. She saw that he was loyal, so loyal that he would never betray her secrets or her feelings. She saw the kind-hearted and protective man he was.
She had seen the man that had become her friend and her confidant
That made all the more harder to ignore him when he was being so inviting.
He affected her and he knew it too. Still she would never voice that to him, never. She would keep it silent and trapped inside her as long as she could. If she ever voiced the words it would become all the more real. She wouldn't be able to handle that yet. She closed her eyes and counted to down from ten to one. She inhale a breath in and then and exhaled it slowly. She opened her eyes and fixed them on him. He was watching her patiently, like he was waiting to see what she would do. She had to show him that this didn't affect her.
That he didn't affect her.
"Don't you ever get tired of flirting?" She told him without a tremble in her voice and with her body standing tall. She held her ground against him, showing that she wouldn't submit to his look or to his tantalizing voice. She saw him sweep her eyes over her in one fluid motion before they moved back to her eyes. He studied her before that damn smirk changed into a pleased smile and responded back to her.
"No, not really. I like seeing someone getting flustered over my presence and my words. I like to see how some submit to me with only a look and a sexy smile coming from me. What can I say? I'm a lion who loves to love women." He shrugged nonchalantly as he slowed his steps.
"I repeat, I despise you."
This time he didn't reply to her. He simply continued to smile at her and not answer her with any words. Instead, he decided to move into her personal space and it only took him a few strides to reach her. Before she knew it he had invaded her bubble and his face was inches from her own. She felt his fingers ghosting over the back of her neck in such a sensual movement that could be considered deadly before his arm settled on her shoulders. If she didn't have the self-control that she had she would've jumped in fright when a puff of warm breath tickled her ear. It still took her mind a few seconds to catch up with what just happened and she expressed this by blinking her eyes rather slowly.
"You don't." He said.
"I do."
No, she really didn't.
He didn't say anything else to her. He just kept on smiling and pulled her closer into his personal space as they walked. Shizuka could hear the distance groans of the Misted around them. Some sounded close, others sound too far to be of any concern. She felt the mist floating around her like a bad omen and heard the echoes of evil voices inside her mind. She felt her magic weakening with each step she took and briefly wondered if she would be able to hold her form. She was still worried about Lucy-dono, but she said nothing.
She kept her lips sealed as she leaned into his touch.
And she enjoyed the amicable silence between them.
Later, when it had felt like they had walked many miles, they had arrived to their destination. The entrance to their target had been closed off by a large gate with a heavy padlock on it. On the outside there were many Misted wandering aimlessly around the area. The pair of spirits immediately noticed that there was a difference between the Misted located here and the Misted in the city. The Misted here resembled walking carcasses. Some were missing limbs, eyes and even half of their skull. Some were just shuffling around with their guts spilling on the ground leaving behind a nauseating mess. The fox and lion spirit were sure that the Misted here had been long dead before they had begun to walk again.
They decided to avoid going through the front gate. They didn't want to risk such a large group following in after them. They carefully walked around searching for another method to get in. It didn't take them long to find a back entrance, though it was one that require them to jump on a roof and slide inside through a window. Luckily, there had been some nice crates for them to land on so they didn't break their legs. Once inside they had quickly determined that there were no Misted around the area. And they also figured out that that this warehouse on the port was nothing special so they went to the next. They search every single one thoroughly and found nothing. It was not until they were searching the outside walls of one that they found a clue.
It was a symbol drawn onto the wall in blood. They both nodded agreeing that there had to be a reason why this one was marked. It was easier to get inside this one than the others because someone had left the door open. They wordlessly separated, both heading towards opposite sides of the building. They left nothing untouched, not even the closed crates. They had gone through the whole building, much like they had the other ones before. It may have been something tedious, but it had to be done. They had to be as thorough as possible. It soon became evident to both spirits that this investigation wouldn't be as fruitful as they wanted it to be.
It was Shizuka who had voice it.
"Leo-sama, I don't feel any other magic except what is left over from the mist. I don't even see any other marks or symbols anywhere here." The smaller spirit stated firmly as she glance towards the other spirit. "I don't think we will find anything. If there was anything here maybe someone has remove and relocated it somewhere else."
"Yeah, maybe..." He was still shifting around somewhere when he had replied back to her. "It's almost like this place has been cleaned out."
"I really do think we should look elsewhere. There is nothing here."
"We'll have one more look around then we can move on, okay."
"Alright." She nodded, her eyes flickering around her side of the port warehouse.
It didn't take her too long to go through the same areas again and with the same result. She had found nothing again. Still, she kept on trying. That was when she noticed that she had missed an area behind a pile of tall crates. Her ice-blue fixed themselves onto what lay behind the crates. It was shrouded in shadows so dark that it looked impenetrable. She moved towards the area only to pause mid-step. Her instincts were warning her. They were warning her that the area beyond the shadows was not a safe place to venture in. The fox spirit stared intently into the shadows trying to pierce through them to see if she could see anything beyond them. She did this for a full two minutes, but was unable to make out anything in the shadows.
That was foreboding.
Shizuka decided that she had to do something about this. She couldn't leave that area unsearched. She glanced over to the lion spirit, who had not noticed her or what she was looking at. She could ask him to come with her, but she decided not to bother him. She would do this herself. She told herself that she could it quickly. She could check out the area behind the shadows, see if anything worthwhile was there and if there wasn't she would just go back. She glanced one more time at the other spirit before she moved forward.
It was rather easy for her to maneuver around the crates. She was small enough to go through it without much effort. She watched the shadows some more before she stepped into them. She could barely see in front of her even with her nocturnal vision. She suspected that perhaps that these shadows were not normal. It had to be some form of magic, but she had no way to prove this theory. Still, at least she was able to walk without crashing into a wall or other things.
And she found nothing, except for a putrid smell. It was the sort of smell she could never forget. She had lived around said smell for years in the past. It was the scent of rotting flesh and blood. It was the smell of death. The scent of death was something she could never forget. Someone or something had died here and it was up to her to find it. With a goal in mind she followed the scent and realized that this place was bigger than she originally thought. It even seemed to be somewhat spacious, which she found odd. She decided not to think too much about it at the moment, especially with the smell growing stronger the farther she walked in.
Eventually, it had gotten so strong that she didn't even want to breathe the air around her.
It had become that bad.
As she walked she squinted her eyes in an attempt to see past the shadows. She hoped to see something that would give her some sort of clue. She didn't find much and felt disappointment filling her heart. That was until she her foot slipped on a slippery substance. She fell down with a soft thud reaching her ears. She didn't hear the lion spirit react so he probably didn't hear her fall or she was too far away to be heard. No matter, she could help herself up, even with the small amount of pain she felt. She used her hands to feel around the floor when she felt her hands touch something sticky. It only took her one whiff to know that it was blood, specifically a bloody piece of human flesh.
That was the source of the smell.
She looked around to find the rest of the body and before long she found it. And it was not the only one there. Stuffed in a corner was a pile of torsos with some inner organs scattered around the floor. They were all missing their heads from what she could see and some had been disemboweled. It was a gruesome sight truly. Despite that, she didn't scream nor did she flinch from the sight.
How could she when she had seen this sort of thing many times before?
Shizuka wasn't proud to admit it, but it was a fact. She had once lived a life where she had been surrounded by corpses in various stages of both decay and death. She had grown use to seeing death when she had serving under her old master. It had gotten to the point that she had desensitize by it. Still, just because she didn't cower away didn't mean she was affected. Bile still rose inside the back of her throat and her breath hitched from the sight. She still got some goose bumps popping up on her skin and a small shiver went through her spine as her eyes observed the pile.
Her eyes moved from body to body in one fluid motion as she counted how many she saw. It was during this motion that she noticed that the bodies were changing. It wasn't something hard to miss, even in the dark. What she saw made her feel like running straight back to orange haired spirit and have him deal with this. She didn't think she could deal with this. She couldn't deal with the rest of the bodies she saw.
There were bodies in that pile that looked out of place. It was like they had been placed there as an afterthought, which made it worse. The bodies that had caught her attention were too small to belong to adults. She shouldn't be surprised by this. Lucy-dono had mention that anyone was fair game to Fear. Anyone could become his victim. Still, she had seen this many times before too. She had seen this too, but she could never get use to it, ever. She still felt ill whenever she encountered this. She shuddered to think what sort of evil someone had to fall in to be able to do this.
How could anyone be so heartless?
Before she could think further about it a chill went up her spine and she felt her hair stand on end. All of a sudden her sixth sense was on alert. Then she felt it. Someone was watching her. Someone was in this area with her and it didn't feel like it was Leo-sama. She quickly stood up and swiveled her head around trying to located whoever it was, but it prove to be futile. She could see nothing. There was no one there or so she thought. She felt her hair lift up and thought it was the wind, until she realized that she was inside a building so there was no possible way for wind to be in here. She turned quickly to look behind her, but nothing was there. Then she felt someone touch her and it was as solid as she was.
The worse was the soft voice that followed.
"There is no need to be afraid, my dear one."
Spirits!
Shizuka didn't even bother to look from where the touch or voice came from. There was no point if she was only going to find nothing. She just quickly began to retreat from this area. She could feel someone intense gaze still on her as she made her way back out. And she swore that she heard the footsteps trailing behind her. The unknown made no effort to hide that they were walking behind her. It was like it was taunting her silently. It was hunting her. She was being hunted by whatever was hiding in the dark.
She had no choice but to retreat. If she had stayed to confront whatever else was in this area with it would have ended badly. She was at a disadvantage. She really couldn't see who was hunting her. The darkness in the area gave the advantage to the enemy. She would be fighting blindly and would not know where the enemy was until she was hit. Then there was the fact that she wasn't a fighter at all. Sure, Leo-sama had begun to teach her some close combat skills because it was necessary for her to learn. He had told her that sometimes she had to fight her own battles so she needed to know this. She had learned some things, but it was not enough for her to actually hold a fight on her own.
Even if she had managed to become a decent fighter in a short time she would still be in trouble. She was running on a low amount of magic and it was getting lower with every minute. The petal was still sucking out her magic and Lucy-dono needed that petal to protect her from the illusions. If she fought she would be taking magic away from the petal that protected her master. She didn't want to weaken the protection she had place on the blonde. The risk was too great to those around her and even to herself. She couldn't risk using up all her magic and being left in her smaller state. She had almost no magic to speak of when she was in her smaller state and was very limited to the number of illusions she could cast.
It would not only endanger Lucy-dono, but would also endanger Leo-sama.
She only knew one thing.
She needed to get back to Leo-sama.
She needed to get back to the safety that the lion provided. She made her way quickly towards it and fought against the urge to just run for it. If she ran she could make things worse for herself. Running was just showing that she was afraid and was asking to be attacked. Predators like the thrill of the chase so she couldn't run. She gulped when she heard a disembodied chuckle that was too close for comfort, but she brushed it aside when she saw the shape of the crates. She was almost out. She was almost back to the lion spirit. She reached the light and hoped that whatever was following her would stay away since it could be seen. She began to maneuver herself past the crates and back out to where the lion could see her. She was almost there, but a part of her was still afraid of whatever was hunting her.
She had to get the Leo-sama's attention.
All she had to was call for him.
"Leo-sama—mmph!" Shizuka wanted to tell him what she had found, but something—someone had stopped her.
Her words had been cut off. They were trapped in her throat by a hand pressing against her mouth and muffing her words. She couldn't even breathe properly because of fingers wrapping around her throat and constricting her wind pipe. It hurt. She was fight for oxygen and she tried to pry the fingers away from her wind pipe, but it was useless. She didn't even have the strength to struggle. Her magic was so low that she couldn't fight. Despite, her losing battle with consciousness she still tried to fight.
In one final desperate move she kicked about widely until she caused a loose pipe to fall onto the floor. The pipe made a loud sound that had the desire effect that she wanted. It had made a loud clanking noise that caught the orange haired spirit attention instantly. She saw his face fall into an expression of shock when his eyes settled on her and on whatever had her in their grasp.
"Shizuka!" He called her name, but didn't dare move towards her.
When he had shouted her name she heard the entity behind her hiss angrily and its grip on her throat tighten. It was so tight that she was being to see bright spots, which wasn't a good sign, but that was not what had her on edge. What had her on edge was that she could the entities' magic bubbling behind her. It was building up and up, like a bomb getting ready to blow up. There was danger behind her. She moved her hand from the arm gripping her throat and tried to move the hand covering her mouth. That didn't work. She decided to take another approach. She bit the offending hand with all her remaining strength and it worked. The hand had pulled back in pain and had given her enough time to warn the other spirit.
"Leo-sama…run!"
"Shizuka!" Leo-sama screamed her name again, but it was too late.
The world had exploded into the shadows.
This chapter was almost 60 pages long, but I stopped at 56 pages. I am deadbeat tired and I sure I didn't catch all of the mistakes, but I am happy with this.
it was worth the extra days.
I hope you enjoy the focus on the relationship between Shizuka and Loke. It did change awhile Lucy was dealing with her own problems.
The next chapter will be in Loke's p.o.v and will be title: The Lion and the Fox.
The due date will be moved into December because November is going to be a busy month so I won't have time to work on it as much as I want. Its going to be another long one.
Anyways, thank you for waiting patiently and I hope you enjoy reading the chapter.
~Frozen~
Next chapter update: Some time in December(will include new update schedule)
*If late due to holidays then it would be posted no later Jan. 7, 2018
