Lina walked along next to Gourry, enjoying his presence, and trying valiantly to forget their current destination. In order to distract herself, she pondered Zelgadis's problem, wondering what kind of spell would have been used to craft his current body. Chimeras were not her specialty, particularly after her close encounter with a raving lunatic who wanted to put her head on top of one, but considering Zel's situation posed an interesting puzzle that kept her mind occupied while they were walking.
"If you keep chewing on your lip like that, you're going to rip a hole in it, you know." Gourry's voice interrupted her introspection.
Lina was about to come back with a tart rejoinder when suddenly she noticed that a group of bandits was attempting to surround them. She threw a quick glance at Gourry, and realized that he was already well aware of their situation. Lina began to prepare a spell, and the first bandit who jumped in their path was quickly greeted with a Burst Rondo. Gourry drew his sword, and between the two of them, they soon had several bandits groaning in pain on the ground, and the rest beating a hasty retreat. The leader, who had been attempting to direct his group from the relative safety of the trees was gaping like a fish, finding it difficult to believe that his hired thugs had been so completely overcome by two people, one of them a little girl. Something about a small red-head nagged at the edges of his mind, but before he could pin the thought down, the big blond started to advance upon him with a wicked gleam in his eye. The bandit leader started to back away, but he tripped over an exposed tree root and then Gourry was on him. As the leader made a desperate grab to pull out the double-headed axe holstered at his belt, Gourry lifted him up by his shirt front and hurled him into the air. While the bandit gibbered in fear, Lina looked away, knowing that Gourry was going to "practice". Sure enough, tatters of clothing began to flutter to the ground, followed moments later by a buck-naked, but unscathed bandit leader, who quickly jumped up and ran away from this crazy pair as fast as his legs would carry him. The rest of the bandits hobbled off after him.
"Gourry, was that really necessary?" Lina asked sharply as she surveyed the damage, looking for anything that might be valuable.
Gourry grinned. "It's good practice," he shrugged. "Plus, its just as embarrassing as being defeated by a skinny red-haired kid."
Lina was about fire off an indignant rebuttal about not being a skinny kid when something shiny caught her eye. She started to examine it more closely, and realized that it was a belt buckle that had been neatly sliced off of the bandit leader. It was only gilt, she realized and was about to drop it when she suddenly recognized the motif stamped into the metal. She was hardly aware that Gourry had come up behind her and was peering over her shoulder. "I don't get it Lina. It's just a worthless old buckle."
Lina swallowed, barely hearing Gourry's words. She hadn't realized they were so close. Looking around her, she half expected to see Sylphiel waving a white flag. This was one of the bandit groups she had taken on to work out her frustration during the last trip to Sairaag. On her left, she saw a straight line of felled trees, and in her mind's eye, she could see the approach of a swordsman dressed in black armor who expertly wielded Gourry's Sword of Light. She had fought as hard as she could against Phibrizzo's henchman, casting her most powerful spells, the Dragon Slave and even the Ragna Blade. And the swordsman had turned out to be Gourry. This was the place where she had tried to kill Gourry, and where he had tried to kill her. Up ahead, she could see the clearing where his mask had fallen away to reveal Gourry's face, looking curiously blank, but also horrified, as if he knew what he had be forced to do.
Lina stood quietly, holding the bandit's belt buckle in one hand, while the other reached up to clutch the Demon's Blood talisman at her neck. Her painful reverie was broken when Gourry swung her up into his arms and began to carry her, provoking an immediate reaction.
"Hey, what do you think you're doing?!" she demanded with righteous indignation, pounding his chest with her fists. "Gourry, put me down this instant!"
"You were just staring at a worthless belt buckle, so I thought maybe you were injured. Just relax, Lina. I'll carry you until you can finish casting a healing spell."
"Gourry, I'm fine! Now put me down!" Lina continued her frontal assault, ignoring the bruised way her hands were starting to feel from banging into Gourry's breastplate.
"No way, Lina." Gourry stoically endured her pummeling, cradling her against his body. " You'd tell me you were fine if you were on the verge of death."
"I said I was fine and I am. Put me down now," Lina growled.
"No," Gourry returned with a hard edge to his voice. "You may not be injured, but you are most definitely not fine, and you have not been fine since I suggested this trip to Sairaag. I can only pretend that you are fine for so long, Lina. If you really want me to put you down, you'll tell me what is bothering you and why you can't even look me in the eye right now."
Lina looked down and closed her eyes. "I was just remembering," she whispered faintly.
As Gourry gently set her down on her feet, Lina struggled to find her equilibrium. Gourry was right. She was not fine, and she had not been fine, and it was getting harder and harder to pretend that things were normal. She couldn't look at him without remembering the pain and anguish that she had kept hidden on the last trip to Sairaag. Although she had been able to maintain the pretense that last time, Gourry's blue eyes cut right through her forced cheerfulness. All her defenses were crumbling around her, and she hated the weakness she felt.
Gourry stood watching as Lina silently struggled with herself. After a moment, Lina suppressed the urge to heave a shuddering breath, and gave Gourry a weak smile. She could tell that he wasn't fooled for an instant, so she looked away and started searching for anything else the bandits might have dropped during their retreat. After assuring herself that there was nothing of value worth picking up, she called to Gourry. "C'mon, Sairaag is waiting!"
When Gourry didn't immediately reply, she turned around and saw that he had gathered stones for a campfire ring and was busily placing them around an area he had carefully smoothed in the middle of the clearing. He had also accumulated a small stack of kindling.
"Gourry, what are you doing? It's still early afternoon. We can probably make it to Sairaag tomorrow, but not if we stop now. I told you I'm not injured," Lina said with a touch of asperity to cover up the dismay she felt. The place he had picked to camp was the same place where her Ragna Blade had unmasked him.
"Yes, you did tell me that. But I told you that you're not fine. And until you tell me exactly what is bothering you, Lina Inverse, we're not going anywhere." Gourry stood up from his completed fire ring. "Why don't you start the fire, Lina. I'll find something for our dinner." Gourry turned and began to head towards the brook he heard not far in the distance.
As Lina watched Gourry disappear into the surrounding brush, she felt a mixture of trepidation and annoyance. At this point, she just wanted to get this journey over with. Go into Sairaag, get whatever the hell it was that Gourry felt he had "left behind" and go back to their normal routine of punishing bandits, taking their loot, and looking for magical artifacts. She was only on this journey because of Gourry, and if he wasn't going to proceed any farther until she started talking, there were only two options: start talking, or turn around in defeat. Neither was very appealing.
"Now he wants me to start talking, the stupid jellyfish. He's never listened before when I've tried to explain any number of things," Lina muttered under her breath as she methodically built up a pile of kindling to start the fire. A small spell provided the initial spark, then she started to slowly add bigger chunks of wood until she was sure the fire would not go out. Making the fire had provided her with a brief distraction, but now that the task was complete, her memories were demanding attention. In an attempt to stave them off, she started to look for more wood, if only to get out of the clearing where she had battled Gourry. The thought of spending the night there was almost more than she could bear. Lina squared her shoulders and concentrated on exhausting herself through the physical labor of dragging heavy wood around. At the same time, she tried valiantly to solidify the defenses that were letting her weakness through.