AN: Some big differences between the novels and anime come in play with this chapter, and in some ways doing anime continuity would have been easier, but this is novel's. One big difference is that they never travel to the Outerworld in the novels. As for the others I'll get into them in more detail in the notes at the end because I don't want to give away plot points for this chapter. Read and enjoy!
Lina moaned as she rubbed her back and muttered obscenities under her breathe as she reflected that she hadn't missed this at all. Two weeks into her honeymoon and she had woken to find that her friend had returned, a friend that Lina had never wanted to cross paths with again. She hadn't missed the cramps, or the mess, or the irritation. And, most of all, she hadn't being without her powers.
"What sort of stupid idea what this?" Lina vented, "Of course we wouldn't get pregnant right away!"
"Cheer up." Gourry said as he put a hand on her shoulder as he did his best to mask just how disappointed he was.
"Cheer up?" Lina shot back, "Oh, I'm so irritated right now I could…"
"Eat some chocolate?"
"That…that's actually a smart idea." Lina said as her tirade lost its steam. And then she blushed, "Actually, I need you to go and pick up some rags. It's been so long that I've stopped carrying them with me."
He shrugged as he handed her the box that Luna had given her. "Well, okay. But shouldn't we ask Aliciane to do that?"
"No!" Lina shrieked, "Sis probably has ordered Aliciane to report all of this to her! She's way too interested in seeing me reproduce. I don't want this information traveling across Zeferia!" Gourry looked as her dubiously as Lina glanced at the clock and added, "And you'd better hurry before she comes to get us so we can sit through another long, worn out rendition of our glory days."
He quickly decided that the best course of action would be to just agree with her. "Where do I get them at?"
"The general store should have them." Lina said, and then she looked at him sheepishly. "You don't mind?"
"Well, they're clean, so it shouldn't be a big deal. I'll be back." He said as he moved to kiss her before he left.
When he got out of the inn, he grimaced at the sand and heat. They were in eastern Zeferia, close to the border with the Desert of Destruction. Fortunately this was as far southeast as they were planning to go, and though there was grass, plants and cacti, it still reminded him too much of the Elmekian Empire for his liking. And between that and the fact that, with Hellmaster's destruction the barrier separating them from the rest of the world was gone and who knows what was on the other side, he was already on edge worrying about what dangers lurked in the unknown desert. Meaning that in addition to being disappointing, Lina's time of the month couldn't have picked a worse time to strike.
Still, he reflected as he gazed at the mountains in the distance, there were more landmarks here than in the Elmekian Empire, which was renowned for its boring barrenness. And though it was still early in the day, as far as bad days went, he'd had far worse. If the delay of a dream, so soon after achieving a big one by marrying Lina, and being vulnerable in a dangerous land was what constituted a bad day now, then he was a lucky man!
He encountered no problems at the store, but when he got back to the inn Aliciane was sitting on the porch, regarding him curiously. "Early morning walk?" she asked.
"Yeah." Gourry said.
"Without your wife?"
"She wanted to sleep in," Gourry said, thinking that Lina just might not be paranoid after all. "We'll be down for breakfast in a few minutes."
And then he moved fast to get back to their room and avoid any further interrogation.
Lina moved her arm between her back and the chair as she listened as best she could to the mayor's droll speech. The days they spent walking through the Zeferian countryside were bliss. But the days they spent being paraded through towns like prized horses were becoming torture. The novelty of listening to people wax poetic about her heroic deeds quickly wore thin. Especially now that her back hurt so much. She yearned to get up and walk around a bit to ease the cramping, but that would be frowned upon. She reminded herself that soon she would be back home, teaching and talking rather than sitting and listening, and gritted her teeth and endured the boredom and cramps as best she could.
By now Lina felt that every mayor in Zeferia just passed the same, worn out speech between them. There were odes to her bravery, odes to her smarts, odes to Gourry's loyalty and steadfastness, and odes to their love. Judging by the way they talked one would think that her glory days were behind her and all that was left was for her to park herself on a display shelf and harden into a golden statue. The thought that her greatest achievements may be behind her rather than ahead was a depressing one, especially given that she was eighteen. Still, she reminded herself, the honeymoon would be over soon, and she hopefully would never have to do something like this again.
From beside her she heard Gourry snore slightly, and she jabbed him in the ribs with her elbow. If she had to endure this with her eyes wide open, he would have to endure it right there with her. He sat up straight, but fortunately didn't blurt out anything ridiculous. The audience was another matter as a young man suddenly raised his fist and yelled, "Lina Inverse is an evil witch who destroyed my kingdom!"
Gourry's mouth dropped as people in the audience started murmuring as the mayor stopped and looked out into the crowd, confusion written over his features. Lina straightened to attention as she saw a few guards move towards the man. "Excuse me?"
"Lina Inverse destroyed my kingdom!" he repeated as the guards drew closer.
"Wait!" Aliciane ordered as she stood up, and Lina regarded her and wondered what her game was as she stated, "Let the man talk and air his grievance."
You're really going to take him seriously, Lina thought as a hint of anxiety rose within her. She stood up and decided that acting cute was not going to work in this case, but she really wasn't sure how else to go about this. And either way, she was not in the mood to deal with this. "Um, which kingdom was this?"
"So you admit that you destroyed more than one kingdom!" the man pounced.
"Oh, give me a break!" Lina cried. "I meant which kingdom are you from!?"
"The Kingdom of Ruvinagard! Remember now?"
"That your king was murdering children to create chimeras?" Lina shot back as people gasped in horror, "Yeah, I remember. It deserved to die."
Aliciane smiled smugly as the man yelled, "Lies!"
"Inspector Wizer can vouch the truth for me." Lina replied, but she noted with satisfaction that people were looking at the heckler disapprovingly.
"Inspector Wizer was the one making the chimeras! And he paid you handsomely to pin the blame on our good and noble king!"
Lina folded her arms across her chest, "That's quite some fantasy you've spun. Get back to me when you have some proof."
"I was there when you plowed through a mass of innocent townspeople!" a different man cried.
"What?" Lina exclaimed.
"Mane, remember?"
"Mane, that place that was worshipping Shabranigdu?" Lina snapped, "Tell me, do you worship that Dark Lord?"
"We were harmless villagers with no power! But you tore through us…"
"Xellos tore through you. In case you've forgotten it was my intervention that stopped him from leveling your town to the ground!"
"Of course, it's always someone else's fault, isn't it, Lina?"
Lina's hands bunched into fists as a woman yelled, "You set fire to Galia City! You killed my children!"
Lina paled and started to shake as the woman's punch managed to land below the belt. "No, I didn't. Xellos set fire to your city."
"You helped him!" she screeched, the agony raw, and judging by the looks she was evoking, it seemed that the third heckler was building a sympathetic audience that the first two had missed.
"No, I didn't." Lina said simply, even as the guilt tugged at her for being so stupid to have believed that Gaav's minions were the perpetrators rather than Xellos. "Things get very confusing in a battle. Xellos is a master manipulator. He duped me good. Still, I did not help him set any fire."
"Either you helped him or you're not the heroine they are making you out to be!" the woman continued as Gourry put a hand on Lina's shoulder.
"Has anyone here taken down a Mazoku?" he asked, and the crowd went quiet. "Then until you do that and make every decision perfectly, don't be so quick to criticize."
He moved to grab Lina's hand to get them out of there, but before they moved he addressed the woman, "We are very sorry for your loss. At some point every warrior learns that we can't save everyone. It's never easy, and I'm sorry we couldn't save your children."
Lina couldn't get a good read on the crowd as she followed Gourry off the gazebo, wanting nothing more than to get as far away from this town as possible. They hadn't gotten far when she heard Aliciane say, "Ladies and gentlemen, we in Zeferia take all accusations against our native born heroine very seriously."
Lina's eyebrows hit her hairline as she and Gourry stopped in their tracks to watch as Aliciane continued, "If you have a complaint, please come and see me, and we will hold a public inquiry to investigate it."
"A what!?" Lina exclaimed, but before she could get more information, a loud, screeching noise tore through the air from the east. She turned and saw a horde of demons coming at them from the Desert of Destruction! Gourry stood up before her and drew his sword. She drew hers, thinking that she should have waited until they were home at Maninstit before lifting the sterility spell. But it was too late to bemoan that now. Still, without her powers there was very little she could do against the demons.
"Everyone, take cover!" Lina ordered.
People screamed as they ran in panic, even trampling over each other to find shelter. Lina could do little about the demons, but she could do her part to get people safely to shelter, and she moved quickly to pick up those who had fallen before they were too injured and helped them get to cover. Fortunately the demons weren't anything that Gourry couldn't handle, and soon there was a pile of dead demons at his feet. When he sheathed his sword, people started to clap appreciatively as they emerged from their hiding places, and he shook his head modestly.
"Let's go." He said to Lina.
Lina started walking with him and then bristled as someone said, "She didn't lift a finger to help! She must be taking all of the credit for all of his accomplishments!"
Lina reddened with anger, and Gourry glared at the person who had spoken. "What kind of stupid person would let someone else take the credit for their accomplishments? Lina did all that you heard about today. You just saw her on an off day."
"Then why didn't she use her so called magic?"
Lina and Gourry fumbled awkwardly as, from the podium, Aliciane asked loudly, "Lina, is it that time of the month?"
AN: Lina isn't the wrecking ball in the novels that she is in the anime. She is very cautious about her spell use, and doesn't cast a Dragon Slave until the end of the FOURTH novel (which was loosely adapted to the Saillune family feud with Christopher and Alfred for reference point), and she won't cast it in towns and other crowded places, which limits her severely.
Xellos, on the other hand, is a lot more ruthless in the novels and did set fire to a big city and manipulated Lina into believing that Gaav's minions had done it.
Wizer is also very different in the novels and never tries to throw Lina in jail.
A personal note, I am nervous about posting now. My grandpa went into hospice yesterday and has a week left at most, and for those keeping track, this is the third death in the family in the space of a year. I also had the "luck" to be there when he had his massive stroke, and since it was just me and my grandma with dementia, I suddenly was tasked with coordinating his care and making medical decisions that I did not anticipate having to do and it was incredibly overwhelming, especially on top of already dealing with caregiver fatigue with my job. Writing keeps me from falling into bad thought patterns and from dwelling in a sea of anxiety and usually Slayers fandom has been a reliably positive experience. When my aunt died in January it wasn't. That person has been banished from my realms, so if you're reading it's not you. I just don't want a repeat of the crap that happened when my aunt died now that my grandpa is dying. So basically be kind. Read and enjoy. If you have something nice to say, feel free to share it and as always, you don't have to feel obligated to share it. However, if you presume to know how to write my stories better than me, now is not the right time to tell me and smeg off. Sorry to have to armor up when most of you have been so great because of one person, but I don't feel comfortable posting without this disclaimer. Thank you for your understanding.