It was dark and cold beneath the mountain, and mind numbingly quiet. The uneven underground corridor twisted and turned, but it hadn't forked off into a new path in the past half hour. The Lighting spell in Lina's hand ate away at the darkness of the tunnel, only for it to be swallowed back up as she passed through.
A thin, wispy string of another spell trailed behind her, originating from the enchanted ball of yarn in her bag. It was supposed to ripple like a ribbon, wide, colorful and flowing - that's what it looked like when Amelia had taught her to cast this, at least. Lina herself was no expert when it came to White Magic, and it definitely showed. But it still marked the path she took clearly enough, and so it served its purpose.
Thinking of Amelia made something tighten painfully inside her chest, and Lina forcefully shifted her thoughts back onto her purpose here. The miasma got thicker the deeper down she descended, stifling and oppressive, and she hoped that meant she was getting closer to the source of it.
Listening absently to the sounds of her own light footsteps, Lina tried to imagine what that could be - she was hoping for a Black Magic artifact, of course, but it was just as likely to be a site of an ancient magical battle. Or a curse. Or the last resting place of an unwholesome beast, just like the Miasma Forest left behind after Zanaffar's defeat. Even knowing that her chances of coming back from this empty handed were high, Lina still doggedly pressed on. This was her first real lead in months, and she knew she'd regret a missed opportunity more than the waste of time.
She became a bit lost in her thoughts, and so used to the quiet that she almost stumbled when a new sound reached her. It was a soft, metallic clink - it only rang out for the shortest moment, and then all was quiet again. There was not a single metallic thing on Lina's person; what could be making a sound like that down here?
An excited, nervous flutter went through her, and she slowed her steps, staring intently at the mass of pitch black straight ahead. A shadow shifted at the very margins of her vision, making her heart leap. A human figure came into view, slumped against the cave wall like a weary traveler, and…
"Xelloss?!"
Had she been carrying a light, she might've dropped it in surprise. It was him, without a shadow of a doubt, sitting there by the wall in an ungraceful heap. The cut of his clothes was unfamiliar, grey, loose and nondescript, quite unlike the priest garb Lina remembered him wearing; but his face hadn't changed at all, just as handsome and youthful, framed by the same shoulder length dark hair. In the light of the spell, his eyes seemed a paler violet than she remembered.
Xelloss' head was turned in her direction, but he didn't move nor make a sound. On a second look, she noticed a wide metal band around his neck, connected to a thick chain which seemed to disappear into the sheer wall. It was rather short, permitting him neither to lie down nor rise to his feet - not without bending over uncomfortably, at least.
That detail made her recover from the initial shock, and also realize that she was gaping at him like a fish as she stood there. And he still hadn't answered her. Frowning, Lina took a careful step forward, asking impatiently, "It is you, isn't it? Xelloss?"
At her second prompting, he finally looked up, and the corners of his mouth curled up slowly, eyes crinkling up into happy little crescents, rather like the lights being turned on all at once inside a house. It gave her gooseflesh to see that familiar, unflinching, cheerful smile being leveled at her again - here, deep beneath the earth, and now, who knew how many years away from home.
Lina found his voice also hadn't changed any, as airy and annoyingly chipper as ever, when he answered her in the tones of polite confusion, "I'm terribly sorry, but... have we met before?"
That made her jaw drop again in an undignified gape.
"Are you daft, man?!" she barked, then winced at the volume of her own voice as it was amplified by the winding tunnel. "It's me, Lina. Lina Inverse."
"Well, excuse me." Xelloss didn't seem perturbed at all. If he was pulling her leg, he was doing a pretty convincing job. "There have been many a perky young sorceress who made my acquaintance, and there's only one of me. Can you really take exception to my forgetting?"
"I can, and I will!" Lina heaved a frustrated sigh, but there were better things to do than indulging him in this stupid joke. "Care to explain the… all of this, actually?" she asked, first indicating the chain that kept him attached to the wall, then just gesturing at him as a whole. "What are you doing here? What's going on topside?"
"I wouldn't know. As you can see, I'm a bit tied up at the moment." Saying this, Xelloss cocked his head to the side, still squinting at her good naturedly. The chain made that soft, clinking sound again as he moved.
Lina almost groaned at the corny quip, but it was best not to encourage him in whatever act he was trying to pull. "Yes, but how did that happen?"
Xelloss hmmmed, as if considering her question. A good few moments passed in silence before she tapped her foot on the floor and asked irritably, "Do you feel like answering me any time soon, or?.."
His eyes opened to blink up at her, and he said, looking a bit confused, "Apologies. I was certain I was speaking out loud."
Lina gave him a hard stare, narrowing her eyes in suspicion. Was he punking her again just now? He was certainly committed to the bit, although she couldn't see any rhyme or reason in it. This went a bit further than his usual obnoxiousness.
"Well, if you're a sorceress, and you know who I am," Xelloss continued, once again smiling at her amiably, "then you must also know of the most recent clash between us and the opposition. And, embarrassing as it is to admit, I'm afraid we lost entirely this time."
He kept his carefree grin firmly in place, but Lina could swear she heard a note of melancholy creep into his voice. He didn't add anything more to it, but the admission was enough to make Lina's eyes go wide.
"The mazoku… lost?"
Well, that definitely explained things. Ever since the incident that landed her here, Lina hasn't been able to cast a single Black Magic spell - not her trademark Dragon Slave, not even a measly demon summoning, nothing. It threw her for a serious loop, and she had been convinced she was without her magic for a time, until a Fireball thrown out of habit into an assailant's face proved otherwise. The fiend got burned extra crispy, just the way Lina liked it, and after that, she discovered by trial and error that every spell of White, Elemental or Shamanistic Magic that she knew worked perfectly. But all spells invoking the destructive power of dark lords might as well have been bits of esoteric poetry for all the effect they yielded.
"So that's why my Black Magic has been useless," she said after a moment, concluding her thoughts. "Huh."
"Well, I'm sorry if my entire race's demise inconvenienced you," Xelloss replied in an even voice, making her wince.
As a human, the eradication of the evil race should've been good news for her, actually. It was still awkward, however.
"Sorry." Hoping for a graceful change of subject, Lina added quickly, "That still leaves the question - what are you doing here?"
Without any obvious hint of sarcasm, he answered, "Rather than destroy me, the gods, in their infinite benevolence, have left me tethered here for the past - ah, how long has it been again? I'm afraid I lost track of time entirely!"
"I wish I knew." Lina crossed her arms over her chest, frowning in thought.
According to certain sources, there were four worlds coexisting in the Universe, each with their own set of gods and demons to duke it out between themselves. Mazoku as he was, Xelloss was still undeniably of her own world - so encountering him proved that, as she had been suspecting, she was in the right place, but in a wrong time. How it related to the time she came from, though, she didn't have the faintest clue.
Everything in this world had become unfamiliar to her. Once, Zelgadis had told her that landmasses could change shape, given enough time. (Another painful pang shot through her chest at the thought of Zelgadis, but she stubbornly pushed it down.) Well, getting her hands on a map was one of the first things she did, but then she couldn't understand what she was looking at. The borders made no sense to her; when she tried looking for the familiar Zephilian coastline, it was nowhere to be found on any continent.
It was the first time real despair began encroaching on her heart, and her attempts to find a way back became more frantic since then.
"Lina-san?"
Xelloss' voice made her come back to the present. She met his eyes again, and a possibly insane decision clicked into place inside her head. From her years of dealing with him, Lina knew that for all his tricks and misleading, he was oddly reluctant to tell a direct lie or break a promise. The tricky part was getting the slippery bastard to give his word in the first place.
"Say, Xelloss…" She stepped closer and crouched down next to him, bringing their faces to the same level. "If I set you free, would you help me out?"
"Set me free?" Xelloss echoed. He seemed to find the idea amusing, and his tone was extra glib when he answered, "Why, if you manage that, I would be obligated to repay in kind!"
Well, that was unexpectedly easy, but she wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth.
"I'll take that as a yes."
Lina took hold of the chain and weighed it in her hand, ignoring the startled flinch Xelloss gave when she invaded his space. It was thick and sturdy, despite being covered with rust, and seemed entirely ordinary - but, of course, it wasn't the chain itself that held Xelloss in place. Frowning in concentration, she shifted her focus onto the magic hidden within, and didn't even notice his fingers on her wrist at first. It was hard to tell whether he was trying to hold on or push her away, it was so weak. His skin was the same temperature as the surrounding air, and it felt like being touched by something dead.
With a shudder, Lina jerked her arm back, letting go of the heavy chain. "Turn the body heat up a little, maybe?" she said with an awkward grin, rubbing at her wrist. "This is freaky."
She looked away to regain her composure. Her eyes fell on his hands, lying limp and nerveless in his lap now, and then for the first time she noticed deep gouges in the walls and on the floor around him, as far as the chain would go. Suddenly she could vividly imagine him clawing at the rough stone in the dark, in useless rage or perhaps desperation. How many years did it take before he gave up?
"Well, here goes nothing," Lina muttered, still not looking at him - the stab of pity that she felt probably wasn't going to do a mazoku any good. She got up to her feet to give herself a better angle for the swing, already chanting softly, "Lord of the Dreams that Terrify, Sword of Cold and Darkness…"
The Lighting fizzled out at once when Lina shifted all her concentration onto the new spell, allowing the greedy darkness to swallow up them both. She heard a soft gasp, and in the not-light emanating from the forming blade, she saw that the smile fell away from Xelloss' face, replaced by an expression of awe and surprise both. Just before her chant was finished, he squeezed his eyes shut and lowered his head, going rigidly still.
"Ragna Blade!"
The mass of writhing black lightning in her hands fell down to slice clean through the chain, and a moment later, the ancient metal crumbled into rust. It was a relief to let go of the spell - it was as draining as ever, and Lina let out a shaky exhale, swaying a little where she stood. Before the panic of being left swimming in pitch black without sight could set in, she conjured up another sphere of Light, chanting in a breathless, rushed whisper.
"Well," she said after a moment, placing her hands on her hips. She couldn't help it if she sounded a little smug. "Do you feel stupid yet for doubting me?"
Xelloss hadn't moved, however, still leaning lifelessly against the wall. His head hung low, and his hair obscured his eyes from view. She couldn't even hear him breathe - but then, did he even really need to? Still a bit reluctant to touch him, Lina crouched down again to peek into his face.
"Hey. Are you with me here? Xelloss?"
Overcoming her hesitation, she brushed the hair out of his face, careful not to touch his oddly lukewarm skin. Finally, she caught his gaze again; he looked stunned, staring back at her wordlessly.
"Well?" Lina said again, pointedly quirking one eyebrow. "Cat got your tongue?"
After a moment, he answered slowly, "I've been here for such a long time… And I am so very tired, and so very hungry." His voice was barely above a whisper. "Honestly, I thought the tether was the only thing keeping me attached to this world."
It took a moment for the implication to sink in, but when it did, Lina's mouth twisted into a thunderous scowl.
"So you thought this was going to kill you - and you didn't stop me?!"
Before he could respond, she grabbed two fistfuls of his shirt and shoved him against the wall. The back of his head hit the stone with an alarming crack, but she paid it no mind, instead yelling in his pale, startled face:
"You useless gofer mazoku!"
She hasn't felt this pissed in a while, and this time, she didn't bother holding any of it back. The indignation that Xelloss had the gall to forget her and what she was capable of, and all the things she had kept pent up inside for months - the frustration and loneliness of the world that was foreign to her, the longing for home, the despair and the fear. She might never see her parents again, or her hometown, or her friends. She might never hear Gourry's voice again - the most crushing thought of all.
And just now, she almost killed the only person still connected to the world that might be forever lost to her.
"Didn't you just promise you would help me?!" she snarled, giving Xelloss another hard shove, and watched him wince with terrible satisfaction. "Is your word still worth a damn?! Don't give me that 'I want to die' crap!"
Everything came flooding out, a fevered mix of fear, despair and hot, defiant anger, leaving Lina even more exhausted than the Lord of Nightmare's spell.
Still tense and panting hard after her outburst, she let Xelloss' shirt slip from her fingers, forcing herself to calm down. "Feeling better?"
"A little," Xelloss replied without missing a beat. He was still looking at her with wide-eyed attention, but now a small smile started creeping onto his face. "You're only too kind, Lina-san. I hope you're comfortable where you are?"
With some embarrassment, Lina found that she had somehow almost climbed into his lap in her attempt to give him a thorough thrashing. Jumping to her feet, she staggered back a few steps to establish a respectable distance, then began dusting herself off busily. From the corner of her eye, she watched Xelloss shift on the cave floor, first rising to his knees slowly and then standing up to his full height.
"You better not make me regret this," Lina muttered, looking up again when she couldn't pretend to be fussing over her clothes anymore.
"Time will tell, won't it?" Xelloss gave her that familiar grin in response, full of mischief, even if he still looked a bit shaky on his feet. "I'll be following your lead, then, Lina-san."
Without a word, she turned around and started walking back down the path marked by the White Magic spell. Careful, soft footsteps followed close behind her. Too exhausted to seriously consider what she had just set loose upon the world, Lina only knew that she wasn't facing it alone anymore, and for now, that was enough.
a/n:
a mysterious priest joined your party!
dear reader, thank you for reading through to the end! this has been knocking around my head for almost a year, but xellina week made me finally sit down and write it, even if i ended up a bit late.
in the original idea, lina gave a mercy killing to xelloss who had gone completely insane because of imprisonment, but that would have been too much of a downer, wouldn't it?
concrit is very welcome, but i appreciate any and all feedback! don't be shy to say hello :3