Zelgadis's head snapped up when he heard the terrible scream echo though the forest. He knew they were near the keep in which he'd stationed himself to get the Orihalcon statue, he'd simply neglected to inform anyone else of that fact. He didn't want to face the memories of his best friends Zolf and Rodimus.
Lina and Gourry stopped in their struggle for the chicken breast to look at Zelgadis and Amelia. "What was that?" Lina asked around her mouthful of chicken.
"It sounds like a girl in trouble!" Gourry exclaimed. The only thing that could drag him away from food was the prospect of saving a luscious babe from peril. Zelgadis shook his head.
"It came from Mistwatch."
Lina blinked, "Isn't that where you took me when you captured me?" Her answer was a simple nod.
Amelia jumped to her feet, "Why are we just sitting here?! Someone's in trouble!"
"The screaming has stopped, so she might be dead already," Zelgadis pointed out.
Lina rubbed her hands together, "Or they could have just gagged her. But if someone's in trouble, that means its probably bandits! Lets go take care of them!" She got to her feet and with Gourry beside her, they rushed off in the direction of the keep. Amelia called for them to wait up and ran after. With a sigh, Zelgadis got to his feet, dumping dirt over the fire. It just wasn't good to leave a flame unwatched.
* * *
Zelgadis hated being back where it had all began to end for him, at least, for his friends Zolf and Rodimus. He paced through the darkness, a lighting spell resting in his palm. The dust was undisturbed, he had the feeling that whoever had screamed wasn't here.
"I found someone!" Lina yelled from the old dining room. As Zelgadis walked, he noted that the place was in even worse repair then when he was here. He came upon Lina crouching in front of something, he couldn't see beyond her cape and back. She glanced over her shoulder at him, "Zel, you might want to look at this..." Lina said, her eyes were wide and he could tell that it was something highly disturbing because she was being serious.
He stalked up beside her, seeing someone curled on their side, a hood covering their face. Lina reached out and pulled the hood back. Silvery violet hair glittered in the light, almost like metal. Zelgadis crouched, putting one knee on the floor to steady himself as he pushed the person over enough that he could see the face entirely.
Amelia gasped behind them, informing Lina that the princess had come finally. Zelgadis had known she'd been there. "He looks exactly like you, Mr. Zelgadis!" Amelia whispered.
"Oi! He does, Zel! I didn't know you had a twin!" Gourry exclaimed.
"I don't," Zelgadis said firmly. He tossed his light spell into the air and took hold of the mask covering the lower portion of the stranger's face, pulling it down and forcing their mouth open.
"What are you doing, Zel?" Lina asked, frowning slightly at him.
"Checking for something....." Zelgadis froze when he found exactly what he was looking for. The second top front tooth on the right was chipped, making another almost canine like point.
"What's wrong Mr. Zelgadis?" Amelia asked, seeing the look on his face. The Chimera looked at his new friends then pulled back his own lip to show them the same tooth was chipped. "Its....exactly the same!" Amelia exclaimed, looking from the stranger to Zelgadis, "How can that be?!"
"What?" Gourry asked and Lina pounced on him, bashing his head with her fists.
"You stupid Jellyfish! Zelgadis's tooth is chipped and so is that other guy's! The same way!!" Lina shrieked, unaware that the stranger's eyelids were fluttering.
"He's waking up!" Amelia exclaimed.
* * *
Zelda felt sick to her stomach and people were yelling all around her, voices she didn't recognize.
"He's waking up!" a young girl said happily though managing to sound worried at the same time. Zelda's eyes flickered open and she found she was looking up at a young girl with large blue eyes. "Are you okay? Was it you who screamed like that?"
"You sounded like a girl if it really was you who screamed," said a tall blonde man. Zelda slowly sat up, the blue-eyed girl helping her.
Putting a hand to her forehead, she groaned softly. "You're going to be alright! We'll keep you safe!"
"I don't think he needs to be kept safe," another voice said off to her side. Zelda slowly lifted her head to look around. Finding herself sitting in the dining room she'd just been in, but it looked unused, unlike before. There was no magic circle in white powder on the floor and she wasn't in the company of Rezo, Zolf, Rodimus, or Eris. She was, however, in the company of a guy who looked like Glory Gabriev, a girl who looked like Leo Inverse, a girl who looked vaguely familiar, and some other man who had pulled his hood over his face and was currently standing at the edge of the light.
"Something....is not right," Zelda said softly, the only thing she could figure out in all this mess.
"You got that right! Where the hell do you come from?!" the Leo Inverse Look Alike shouted, making Zelda's headache worse. "Why do you look exactly like Zel?"
"Zel? I am Zel," Zelda said, completely confused.
"No you're not!" exclaimed the girl with blue eyes.
Zelda's annoyance flashed, "I am. I'm Zelda Graywords."
"Zelda? That's a female name," said the man in beige off in the shadows.
Zelda blushed, "So my parents couldn't tell the difference."
"Zelda was your mother's name."
Zelda surged to her feet to accost the man who actually knew quite a bit about her but swayed somewhat. "Who the hell are you?!"
"Oi, he really does act like Zel," the Glory Gabriev Look Alike said.
"I AM ZEL!" Zelda shouted, "Tell me what's going on!"
Leo Inverse the female smiled, "We were hoping you could tell us that. Where's the bandits?"
"Bandits?" Zelda asked, having to keep her feet somewhat apart in more of a fighting stance to stay on her feet at all.
"Yeah! We heard you scream. Why'd you scream?" the blue-eyed girl asked, bouncing around from behind Zelda.
"You screamed didn't you?" the man in beige asked softly. There was something familiar about the way he was standing, his voice, his manner. Zelda couldn't put her finger on it. It was starting to drive her crazy.
"C'mon! Just spit it out already! I want the treasure!" Leo-girl bounced from foot to foot.
"There were no bandits." Zelda finally pieced together.
"What were you screaming for?" Glory-man asked, blinking.
Zelda felt as if the floor were spinning under her, "Rezo.. cast a spell on me..."
"Rezo?! I thought we killed him!" Leo-girl exclaimed.
"What kind of spell?" the man in beige asked, holding his hand up to Leo-girl.
Zelda shook her head, "I don't know..." she put a hand to her face again, realizing that her mask and hood were off. "All I know.. is that it required a magic circle..." she shook her head, swaying again, she felt like heaving her guts but didn't want to do it in front of people she didn't know. She realized she was giving information away and clamped her mouth shut, almost on her tongue.
"What was happening when Rezo cast that spell?" the man in beige asked, taking over the interrogation.
"I don't see why I have to answer anything-" Zelda started then watched as the man came forward, pulling his hood down. Another wave of nausea washed over her and the room twisted. She realized too late that it wasn't the room twisting, but her falling.