[A.N.] Thank you all for continuing to read and for all of your wonderful reviews! I am glad to hear that this story has you intrigued! I hope to continue to keep it so because I hate to disappoint! That being said, P.M. me if you have any suggestions. Also, feel free to tune into my other story I am co-writing with a dear friend. Our pen-name is Shadow Gals and the story is called Gundam Wing Missing Links and its sequel Lethal Beauty! Enjoy!
~Serene
Heero threw down yet another book from the shelves of his castle library. Any and every tome that had to do with swans or magical transformations he and his friends had been working around the clock for days to fully comb through. Duo groaned as he lifted another stack of book up off the floor and carried over to the now empty shelves.
"Heero, buddy, not telling you to stop or anything, but I'm pretty sure you haven't slept in days. Don't you think it's time to maybe rest just a little?" Heero glared at his braided friend.
"I hate to agree with Duo of all people," Wufei added, "but he's right."
"You won't be able to help Relena if you die of exhaustion." Quatre echoed. He glanced at Trowa; the only one who hadn't spoken up, but the look on the man's face showed he agreed with the others.
"You can go if you wish." Heero said. He was tired; extremely, but he couldn't stop yet. He wasn't any closer to answers now than when he started. The look on his friends' faces, however, made him pause. "Forgive me. I do appreciate all of the help you have given, but I can't stop now. The next book may hold the answers."
"Heero…"
"I can't fail her…" Not again… the thought came from nowhere and yet, he felt truth behind it. Fail her again? He shook himself.
"You're not giving up, Heero, you're just taking a break. We can take turns resting and researching so that someone is always looking, but it is our job to protect you, even if it's from yourself." Trowa stated. With the confusion from his sudden thought mixing into his exhaustion, he reluctantly nodded his agreement and made his way to his room hearing the men behind him dictate who would stay and who would go. As his head made contact with the pillow, he felt himself drift off immediately into a restless sleep.
He was in a garden of some sort, looking for something, or someone? The roses and other various forms of flora were fragrant and in full bloom. He could almost feel the ground beneath his feet and hear the sticks and leaves crunch as he walked. Everything was much larger than they should be. No: he was much smaller. He was just a child.
"You can't escape me so just give up already!" A boy called. It took just a moment or two before he realized that it had been him.
"Never!" He heard the reply of a young girl and looked around carefully, his gaze stopping at a tree. The words sounded more like a taunt than a threat and he felt himself filled with boyish joy. Almost immediately he was up there with her, whoever she was.
"Hail Heero Yuy; King of the tree climbers!" He heard her say this with soft sarcasm and her laugh echoed through his mind, seeming to resound throughout the dream world. He had no way of telling how much time passed between sentences. It felt like an eternity and yet he knew it was happening so quickly.
"Whatever changes are coming our way, you won't have to handle them alone. I'll be right here to protect you." He saw her smile: a faceless grin crowned by familiar honey-colored locks.
"Let's make a promise then, to be together, forever, no matter what comes our way."
And I, Heero Yuy, promise to be forever, your Heero."
"Relena…?" He heard himself ask, They were adults now. They were standing in a grassy field. Heero looked at her, smiling, her aqua eyes filled with an innocent joy that the women he knew from the clearing lacked.
"You found me." She said. She leaned over, kissed his cheek. "My Heero…"
He woke up in a cold sweat. It made sense. It all made sense. The details were fuzzy but he now knew why he cared so much. They had been kids together; childhood sweethearts. The exact details of the time and place were still a mystery, but he had a place to start. He now knew the who and the why about her but not about the man that held her prisoner. If he could figure that out then the rest would be easy.
"Hold on, Relena. Hold on just a little longer." He jumped off his bed and headed straight back to the library.
Relena felt the feather fall to the ground as the pain of her transformation racked her bones and tissue worse than ever before. She cried out as she collapsed, falling to her knees. She hissed in shallow breaths through clenched teeth.
"Relena!" the worried voices of her friends greeted her.
"I'm… I'm alright…" She gasped out, her body shivering as sweat dripped down her pallid skin.
"My poor Relena…" Dermail's voice oozed with sickening pity. "I hate to see you this way, but you had to learn." He walked to her, keeping his hands folded behind his back. She didn't dignify his words with a response. She stood on shaky legs, adjusting to her human posture after being a swan for a week; but she stand she did and raise her head with dignity.
"Still so defiant?" He walked to her and she stood her ground, allowing him to tuck his finger under her chin. "Well, that's improvement. Before, you would have shrugged off my touch." He smiled, a glint of victory in his silver eyes. "I'm glad to see you learned something. Unfortunately, my beauty, I cannot stay, but I did want to see how you turned out. I will return before the next full moon." He smiled; an evil grin of triumph. "Until then, my swan." In a puff of dark smoke, he turned into his aviary form and flew off into the distance. Surprisingly, Dorothy followed him, leaving her to the care of her friends.
Dorothy landed at the entrance to her Grandfather's castle; one of many he had acquired through strong-arming its original owners out with his magic. She transformed and smoothed her dress back down and fixed her hair before following him in. The castle was more a giant stone mansion, and one that (without her grandfather's magic) would be long dilapidated. She followed the old man into his stud and watched bemused as he kicked off his boots and leaned back in his favorite chair, propping his feet up with an air of victory.
"Well, that went better than I expected." He grinned and she scoffed at his self-congratulations.
"I'd hardly say you've won, grandfather. After all, she still hasn't agreed." Dorothy sat down on one of the smaller chairs and stroked her eyebrow.
"I agree, it was a small victory, but it was a victory nonetheless. Mark my words, Dorothy, she will give in to me soon." Dorothy watched her grandfather pour himself a large glass of port to toast himself. Her curiosity was bubbling out of control. Why was this girl so special? She knew of the prophesy, but why not just kill her? Why go to all the trouble wasting so much energy and time when simply ending the princess would solve everything.
"Why not just kill her?" She heard herself ask aloud. He froze, tensing and she realized she may have gone too far this time.
"Do you not think I haven't considered that?" He stood suddenly and walked to the fire. "It isn't that simple."
"Alright." Dorothy adjusted her position into a more relaxed pose.
"She is the physical embodiment of light magic."
"I don't understand."
"One of my many victims was a sorceress almost as strong as myself. Upon my defeating her she cursed me with her dying breath saying that one day a young girl would be born that would be light and life itself in human form and that she would destroy me and my magic for all time. As a result, my dark magic cannot harm the girl physically. I wasn't even sure I could cast the spell on her but it worked and so here we are."
"Is there any way she can be freed from the spell? I mean, all this effort would be meaningless if the spell was broken."
"There are two possible ways." He paused and turned to her and the look in his silver eyes, the same eyes she had inherited from her mother and from him shone with an evil that made even her skin crawl. "If she ever finds something strong enough to ignite the fire of her power she could potentially break it herself. Fortunately the girl has no idea she even has magic."
Dorothy watched as Dermail began to pace around on the heart's large rug. She could almost hear his mind thinking like gears and gyros in a clock ticking the time away. She frowned and decided to enjoy a glass of wine she magicked. Finally, he stopped; an evil smile on his face.
"Of course, there is a way she could kill herself."
"What do you mean?"
"Patience, my dear granddaughter. There may not be a need for that if all goes according to plan." He laughed. "And given her current situation, I hardly see how she would be in any sort of situation to cause such extremes. She will have no choice but to surrender." Dorothy took a sip of her wine to try and silence her thoughts. Her grandfather's greed had brought this perilous situation onto himself. Knowing this made her feel a little more sympathy for the princess. Perhaps helping the girl would be the right thing to do? She let that thought linger as she continued to use the wine to drown out her forbearer's boastful prattle.
"And what, prey-tell, is the other way for the spell to be broken?"
"If the princess finds a love strong enough to cement her power into place and he-in fact-loves her just as deeply and is willing to give his life for hers, the spell will be broken and I, as its caster in this instance, will cease to exist entirely." Dorothy winced at that last part. Her grandmother died years ago and her parents joined her not long after Dorothy's birth. Her grandfather was all that she had left. Could she risk helping Relena at his ultimate expense? One might say that after thousands of years of life. Somehow, the idea of him losing didn't bother her as much as it should. Something inside her told her to even the playing field and let the chips fall as they may. Giving her glass of wine one last sip, she placed it down on the table and walked to the grand stairway.
"Turning in already?" Her grandfather asked.
"Yes, grandfather. I found that the late-nights babysitting your menagerie has me quite exhausted." Before he could offer up a retort, she vanished out of his sight into the upper corridors, her mind mulling over her next course of action regarding her current dilemma.
