Disclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail or its characters; that right belongs to Hiro Mashima.

Author's Note: Flathead Lake in Montana inspired this story. I was on vacation, visiting my family, and drove around the Lake and BAM, right out of nowhere this story hits me hard. And please bear with me, it is my first attempt at a mystery story… Not my usual genre of writing. So if you do not like that, I politely ask you to turn around and leave now because I don't see the point in you wasting your time and mine.

Author's Note 2: November is National Novelist Writers Month, aka Nanowrimo! I will again be participating in it. And this year I am going to solely focus on all my Fairy Tail Stories. So, my other stories will not be updated during the month of November. Sorry, not sorry. I am still going to leave this fandom after they are all done. And if, at some point, down the road I find my love for FT again, I will come back with new stories and hopefully a lot less toxic fandom.

Lucy blinked her eye, wincing at how bright the early summer sun was as it streamed through a crack in her curtain. Her body protested via loud popping from her joints as she rolled and sat up. Her head was fuzzy from the dreams she had been having the past few days. It was oddly creepy to feel as much as she did from those dreams. Almost as if she was in a VR game inside her head. And it was also a bit disconcerting. In the two months she'd been in her new home, Lucy had noticed that a lot of things seemed strange.

And it started after receiving all the information about the three-story cabin. Parts of it didn't match up with the architectural plans she'd been given to start with. There were parts of the house that didn't exist anymore that the plans stated should still be there. Of course, being the due diligent person she was, Lucy had asked Silver about it only to get a confused look from him. When she showed him, he seemed off-put and became distant for a while. But she didn't let it bother her at that point; nope, she shrugged it off and went about exploring more of the house.

The root cellar under the house had been a major focal point as she found tons of antique furniture and clothing. It was breathtaking to see Master Craftsmanship. All of it was carved by hand; inlays and small designs were intricate woven pictures that told stories. What stories, she could only fathom. The clothing had oddly been almost perfectly sized to her, except the tops of the dresses and the shirts; her chest was rather... excessive, to say the least. But the condition all of it had been kept in was almost perfect. Almost as if someone had just placed the stuff in the cellar only a few years ago?

Then again, Lucy had not hesitated to bring up some of the pieces and place them at random around the house. It seemed as if each piece had a spot that seemed to be made for it? When she had gotten most of the smaller pieces of furniture in and settled, it had caused both Silver and Gray to pause, looking rather shocked. Gray, of course, still had Lucy confused. She often found him looking at her or asking questions about her life was like before moving to the area. She had been open with him about it, including the divorce. Yet he would be just as cold or dismissive in the next moment. Irritating her to no end with the mood swings.

Standing up and shuffling to the bathroom, Lucy let her mind slide away from the odd man. He was a conundrum to figure out after her fifth cup of coffee. Instead, she thought about how she kept having that nostalgic feeling and that she almost seamlessly integrated into the sleepy, little town. The people acted as if she had always been there. The things they'd say often came off as if they'd known Lucy her whole life? Which was ridiculous. She was born in a major city thousands of miles away. But yet it didn't feel wrong? Giving a small shake of her head as she stepped into the tiny shower stall and hissed as the cold water blasted her skin and woke her the rest of the way up.

Again, Lucy let her mind shift to a different thing. It was the fact that a few times over the past few months, she had woken from a dead sleep to be standing in random places in her house staring at the wall or the doorway to the attic, which she had yet to explore. Why she hadn't Lucy couldn't really explain, except for that it was as if she felt the anxiety about something happening she didn't want to happen? It wasn't her woman's intuition, that was for sure. Then again, she knew from the house plans that the attic hadn't been remodeled, and according to Ul, no one had been up there to clean for a very long time. The woman had stressed the word very to her. Causing Lucy to pause and become leery as it became obvious that Ul didn't want to talk about the attic.

Giving a small snort as she finished with her morning washing ritual, Lucy turned the water off and wrapped the towel around her body. Taking a deep breath, inhaling the steam so it would help keep her lungs clear, Lucy padded out of the bathroom to where she had set her clothes for today. With a quick brisk rubbing to dry her body and hair, she dressed in simple blue jeans, a plain pink t-shirt with a plaid button-up over it. Ready to get some breakfast, Lucy made her way down the hall, pausing at the top of the stairwell as the fine hairs on the back of her neck rose. Glancing back the way she came, Lucy frowned at the feeling of being watched.

She was well aware that there was no one in the house but her. Yet this feeling was starting to happen more and more... along with those strange VR like dreams. The more she stayed in her new home, Lucy felt that there was something she was missing. Two days ago, she had gone to the town hall and looked up the Cabin and property records. There was a fair amount of history and had been permitted by the bubbly rosette secretary to take some of the documents home. Not that she had a chance to read any of it since then, nope, one interruption after another happened yesterday.

Huffing as she stepped into the kitchen, not pausing as she pressed the button on her coffee pot to start it percolating, Lucy used her other hand to snag the loaf of bread. The idea of a simple breakfast of buttered toast and an apple with her coffee sounded perfect. All she wanted to do was go over that information and work on her novel; she soon owed her publisher. Narrowing her eyes as she dropped the bread in the toaster and pushing the tab, so the bread went down, Lucy spun to the floating counter to grab an apple from the bowel and the butter dish.

Her mind instantly went to the dreams she'd had each night. How she would look around and see the cabin behind her lit up from the inside, indicating she was outside. Yet when she wanted to go to it, her body began to move down the semi-darkened trail. Her heart was beating steadily faster as the cool, crisp night air rushed across her face with each step. She had walked this path and knew it by heart where every small dip, turn, and root or rock was at and jumped over them with expert ease. All she wanted was to reach her destination, the shore of the lake, where a part of her property brushed up against. Yet with each step, a sense of foreboding spread through her, making her want to stop and go back to the Cabin's safety. And just before she broke the treeline to reach the lakeshore, Lucy would wake up.

The sound of the toast popping up had Lucy blinking and coming back to herself. It was preposterous; the cabin rested on 2 acres of land, none of which went to the lakeshore. Giving a small growl, Lucy opened the cupboard and pulled out her favorite coffee cup and made her way to the coffee pot, and poured herself a full cup. After a quick debate, she decided she needed the pure caffeine rush waiting in her cup and went to sit at the floating counter to eat her breakfast. It was too early to think of such heavy things and ridiculous dreams.

Lifting her cup to her lips, Lucy felt the fine hairs on her neck rise again as she felt like someone was watching her. Growling loudly, she took a loud, noisy sip of her coffee and set her cup down carefully. She didn't want to spend time cleaning up a damn mess as she forced her body to relax. She had the stuff to do today, and she would be damned if whatever 'she believed' was watching her (because the supernatural didn't exist) was not going to deter her from her plans, dammit.

Sliding her eyes to the side, Lucy frowned openly as she pushed her chair away from her desk, making sure to put the laptop into sleep mode. Her mind had gone back to the documents she had read on the house. It was roughly three hundred years old, been updated, and remodeled thirteen times. There were plans for each remodel that had been done and kept at the town hall. That was good news for her since she wanted to get copies and compare them. It helped that her adoptive brother had a friend who was amazing at building and carving stuff. In fact, Bickslow came from a long line of people who did carpentry and architecture, making her glad she was always curious and asked so many questions. So she should be able to overlay them and spot all the changes from the original plan to now.

Standing up, resting her hands on the small of her back, Lucy bent backward to stretch her muscles. An eyebrow arching as a loud knock came from her front door. It was a good time for her to stop anyways since she wasn't making any headway on the final three chapters and epilogue for her story. A part of her was at a loss for who would be coming up the mountain to visit her? She really hadn't made friends outside of the Ul and the Fullbusters.

Once she reached the living room, she caught sight of the person who seemed to have dark tinted blue hair. When another loud knock came, more insistent, Lucy plastered a polite, professional smile on her face and opened the door upon reaching it. There before her was a petite woman who was a little taller than her. And what she thought was dark blue-tinted hair was actually blue hair, a rare genetic trait and common to this area according to the information she had skimmed about the families and genealogy here. When the woman's blue eyes looked at her widened. This was becoming a very common thing when people saw her for the first time. It did strike her as odd as if they weren't seeing her but someone else that she looked similar to?

"Hello, I am Lucy. How may I help you?" she said.

The woman just stared for a few more seconds before smiling and thrusting out a hand, speaking quickly, "Oh, I am Juvia. I had heard that someone had bought this place. And I just wanted to come and introduce myself. My family has had ties to the family who originally owned it."

At this, Lucy perked up and let her smile become a bit more relaxed. If this woman, Juvia, family had ties to the original family, she might have information that wouldn't potentially be in the town halls documents.

"Would you like to come in for a cup of coffee? I am actually taking a break from my work," Lucy asked, hoping that the woman would accept.

"Oh, Juvia would like that."

The way the woman spoke suddenly in the third person took Lucy back for a moment. But shrugging it off, Lucy stepped back and waved Juvia in. A part of her was hoping this woman could help keep her mind from wandering back to the dreams, waking up at random places in the house, and the fact it did seem something was watching her.

TBC!

NEXT STORY TO UPDATE is Raising Dragon Slayers