Prologue
She saw the monster before he became one. As Lucy looked over at the crowded market stalls, ignoring her maid's clipped remarks about horrid rats and battered roads, she couldn't help but notice the boy. He was leaning against the back-post of an empty stall, his hands resting in the pockets of his battered cloak.
Lucy could've sworn his disheveled hair was a shade of pink. He was a strange one for sure, what with the hair color and the beige cloak covering his arms despite the sun's relentless heat.
"What are you looking at, Miss Lucy?"
Lucy paused for another moment, her gaze still focused on the boy, before turning back to her maid.
"I was just thinking about this book I finished," she lied, nodding at the silver-covered novel in her hands. Adding extra sugar to the frosting of her deceit, Lucy used the sweetest voice that a little girl could muster: "Is something the matter, Miss Spetto?"
"W-well, I mean, Lucy dear..." The little girl smiled at Spetto's stutters. That voice worked charms on her maid, which was, of course, the intention of "Lucy dear." She didn't need Spetto on her case about rudely-staring-at-poor-boys, which Spetto would lament was beneath a young lady such as Lucy. It was rather unfortunate, then, that Lucy had no intentions of being ladylike.
Spetto's ramblings continued for a little longer, though she cut herself off when silence overcame the bustling market place. When she stood on her tip-toes, Lucy saw the exact cause of the ruckus, though she almost wished she hadn't looked.
The boy from before stood in the center of the gathering crowd, his arm stretched out to a panting woman lying on the ground. The circle of onlookers took a step back as the woman picked herself up from the dirt, hastily moving away from the boy in front of her.
What's with her? Lucy wondered. Why didn't she take his hand? Her questions were answered once Lucy caught a glimpse of the boy's skin. When he reached out a hand to the woman, his cloak came loose and revealed the black marks on his arms.
They reminded Lucy of tribal tattoos, with the way they curved up and around the boy's exposed skin like dark ivy. She would have called them pretty, but the fearful looks etched across the onlookers' faces forced her to keep the thought to herself.
The woman had taken a silken fan from her purse and pointed it at the boy like a weapon. "Step away," she warned. "Don't come any closer."
The boy retracted his hand. "I was just trying to help... You fell and—"
"I don't want to hear it!" She took another step back; several men had already taken fighting stances behind her.
One of them spoke up, his voice rough. "Get outta here. We don't need no monsters here."
Monster? Lucy looked over at Spetto, who for once had forgotten about her darling Lucy. She too was enthralled with the spectacle before her, though her eyes spoke an equal measure of curiosity and fear.
Lucy turned back to the boy whose widened eyes desperately roamed the circled crowd for an exit. When several spectators moved aside to form a path, he ran forwards without hesitation. As he approached, the onlookers quickly scattered, as if his presence itself brought upon a plague.
He never looked back at the crowd as he ran, though Lucy was glad he didn't. He didn't need to see the stones that several of the men had picked up, or the vendor carrying a loaf of bread like a sword.
This close, Lucy could tell that he was around her age, though he was a far better sprinter than she'd ever been. He was fast, she noted. Extremely fast. Part of her theorized, perhaps rather darkly, that his agility came from a desperate necessity.
Without acknowledging Spetto, Lucy acted the opposite of lady-like as she stumbled after the boy. She couldn't catch up to him, but as he sprinted to the edge of the market-place, past the stalls and all of the whispering shoppers, she repeatedly yelled at him to slow down. When the boy finally came to a halt, he turned towards her with raised fists.
He lowered them after locking his coal-colored eyes with hers.
"I didn't mean to scare you," she said softly. "I just wanted to ask you if you were okay-"
"Mistress Lucy!" If Lucy knew how to curse, she would've let out a string of profanity at the approaching Miss Spetto. With the little time she had before Spetto's inevitable lecture, Lucy stepped towards the boy and placed the silver-covered book in his now cloak-covered arms.
He looked at it with wild eyes, seemingly questioning whatever this object was and why the girl had handed it over. He opened his mouth to ask, to say something, but was cut off by the girl.
"I finished reading it," she said, "so I'd rather give it to you." She smiled at the strange boy with the strange marks, and after a moment, the boy weakly smiled back.
It was a beautiful smile, Lucy thought. Too beautiful for a monster.
When Spetto had caught up and grabbed Lucy's hand, huffing on and on about Lucy's indignity as a lady, Lucy called a final message over to the boy:
"All of those stories—they have a happy ending. Just like you will."
The boy watched as the girl with golden hair and chocolate eyes was dragged away by the old woman. He didn't know what to make of her, if there was anything to be said at all. And he didn't know what to make of this strange book—he'd never even held a book before, let alone read one. For Mavis' name, he couldn't even understand the symbols on the cover.
When the boy finally arrived at the entrance of the inn, he saw his traveling companion—a man with red hair and sharp eyes—impatiently tapping his foot.
Before the older man could even speak to express his rage for being left behind, the youth bounced over and held up the book in his hands.
"Look what I got, Igneel!"
Igneel looked down at the smiling boy, his fading anger replaced with subtle curiosity. How had Natsu gotten this? Or better yet, why would Natsu be interested in a book?
As Igneel squinted at the cover, Natsu continued, "I got it from a girl. She didn't look at me all funny, like the other humans do. I don't know what this thing's about, but it looks really neat!"
The man flinched at that. He'd only been with the boy for a short time... teaching Natsu to read hadn't exactly been a priority, though perhaps (in hindsight) it should have been.
"Do you know what this book is about, Natsu?" Igneel asked.
Natsu scrunched his eyebrows. "Something about... food?"
Of course, Natsu. That's most certainly it. Igneel ruffled Natsu's hair, much to the boy's protests. "It's a collection of fairy tales."
At the boy's blank look, Igneel's old heart briefly clenched. He finally pulled himself together, and continued, "Fairy tales are stories filled with all sorts of creatures who go on all kinds of quests. But these types of stories share something in common."
Natsu leaned closer, his attention solely focused on Igneel's words as the man elaborated, "They all have happy endings."
Recognition flickered in Natsu's eyes. "The girl said somethin' about that. Do you think I can have one too? A happy ending?"
He was a young boy. He shouldn't even conceive of anything besides a happy ending, let alone realizing there would be a conclusion. But Igneel reminded himself that this boy—as young as he was, as sweet and innocent as he could be—had already faced too much suffering for a lifetime. And Igneel knew this was only the beginning of the boy's tragic tale.
"Yes, Natsu," Igneel finally said. "You will have a happy ending."