BlackLynx17: I'm watching my little pony right now.
Title: Love At First Sight
Secret Title: Pirate Love
Summary: Wendy is a princess forced to be married at the age of 18. It wouldn't be a problem for her if she had fallen in love with her fiance, but alas fate is not too kind. Determined to runaway to chose her own love, she runs into a nice man who rescues her from her guards. Thinking this man is her one true love, she decides to escape with him. She had no idea that her true love was a no good pirate.
Chapter Fourty
Let's Dig In
"Natsu," Wendy warms.
"Wens, come on. It'll be fun!" Natsu cheers.
"Mest won't like this." She tells him.
"What Mest doesn't know won't hurt him."
"Is that right? Is that how you think of me Natsu?"
Natsu freezes and feels a chill run down his spine. He slowly turns his head around and sees Mest, who appears to have came out of nowhere, frowning and glaring harshly at him as he holds a small box in his hand. Wendy sighs and shakes her head.
"Told you so."
"Where do you think you were going with MY wife?" Mest asks slowly.
"Hehehe," Natsu quickly drops Wendy's hand and scratches the back of his head, "well you see there Mest, there's this competition, and I thought Wendy would be perfect for it-"
"Why were you thinking of MY wife in the first place?" Mest growls out.
He takes a step closer and Natsu takes a step back, the two of them circling until Mest is the one next to Wendy. He hands her the small little box and stands protectively in front of her, glaring Natsu down. Wendy blinks and opens up the box, seeing the cutest little pastry she's ever seen! It was all puffy and covered in frosting, a flower drawn on it. So this is what he went to get her when he told her to stay here for a minute.
"Come on Mest, it's a festival! I just wanted to have fun with her!"
"MY wife is going to have fun with ME! If you're lonely Natsu, go have fun with your significant other." Mest growls.
"There there Mest, I'm all yours now," Wendy says patting his arm as she ate her pastry.
It was soft, and fluffy, and almost bread like, but very sweet. Super, duper sweet. Mest calms down a bit and lowers his shoulders, but the glare still stays strong.
"It was just a food eating contest Mest! I wasn't going to do any romantic crap with her! Gajeel and Laxus and a ton of others are joining it, I just thought Wendy would like it as well."
Wendy's eyes sparkle and she takes a step forward, "food?"
"Wendy, no, we're enjoying the festival together. I'll buy you anything you want to eat-"
"Yup, free food. All you can eat free food, all you have to do is pay a small entrance fee, which Gajeel has already paid for us. And get this, top three contestants get prizes, money prizes," Natsu says, wiggling his eyebrows at her.
Wendy looks up at Mest with her eyes sparkling, "I want to go!"
"But Wendy-"
"Please!" Her eyes sparkle even more.
Mest groans, "I hate you Natsu."
"I know you do Captain, and I'm honestly sorry about that."
"Yes! Come on Natsu! I want to go! Let's do it! Let's win!" Wendy cheers throwing her hands in the air.
"Come and watch if you can Mest, it'll be in the plaza. Let's go Wendy, I'm sure the contestants are lining up now." Natsu says grabbing her arm.
"I'm so happy we stopped off on this island! Hurry up Mest! I want you to see me win!" Wendy calls back after her.
Mest sighs to himself. He thought this was going to be a simple and romantic day. Nothing fancy, nothing stressful, and certainly nothing crowded. Just him, and her, enjoying a festival since Wendy has never been allowed to join one as a guest when she was princess back home. No, she was always the star of the show, everyone in Fiore gathering to her kingdom to see and worship her at every festival and party they threw... at least she's smiling though... food eating contest. Mest rolls his eyes.
He sincerely hopes she won't get sick after this.
Each dish is something different. It's jam packed with different flavors that explode in her mouth and different aromas that fill her nose. All new sensations and they use these weird little sticks to eat instead of forks, chopsticks they're called. It took a while to get used to, but now Wendy was using them like a pro as she slurped up noodle after noodle.
She wasn't the fastest eater, no Natsu and Gajeel were dominating at that part, but she was keeping up with them only being a dish behind. Slowly one by one the contestants dropped out until it was only Fairy Tail Pirates left. Once the spicy dishes came out, forget about it. Wendy was happy Natsu trained her to like spicy dishes or else she would have been down and out like everyone else. She ate through the tears and watched as Laxus's entire face turned red before he slammed his chopsticks on the table and conceded.
Gajeel was stronger. He kept going, and going, and going, until he spat out a certain spicy meat dish and collapsed on the table. Third place wasn't bad, but Natsu was never going to let that go and hang it over his head forever until the next town they stopped at had another contest they could compete against each other.
It was only Wendy and Natsu left, and Natsu had to admit to himself he was impressed. He didn't think the little princess had it in her to survive this long, especially with her tiny little stomach. Wendy had a secret though. Yes she ate a lot, but that was only because she was denied a lot growing up. She remembered every time she was sent to bed without food, every time her servings got less because she gained a little weight and princesses were supposed to look a certain way (whatever that meant), every time she had to go on a diet and eat healthy because one or both of her parents were doing so and didn't want to see temptation in front of them so everyone had to suffer. With those thoughts in her head, she felt hungry. Always hungry, endlessly hungry. She was slow, but she was still going. Natsu on the other hand was eating so fast he chocked once in a while, and his stomach really was started to feel like it had enough.
"Give up now Wendy, you won't win." Natsu grins at her.
"Ha, you looking a little beat there Natsu. Scared?" Wendy smirks back.
Mest watches with a hand pressed against his cheek. He's both impressed and disgusted at the same time. Does she always eat like this? Three times his normal servings, yes, but she was eating like a beast right now. Does he starve her? Is that why she's eating so much right now? Is he not taking good care of his wife? He's going to need to have a talk with her after this.
"Alright everyone, things are really starting to heat up! Now to bring out our next dish! Something to cool down those steaming hot mouths! Next round, seasalt pistachio pudding ice cream!"
Natsu's face drops and he pales, "what?!"
"Oh no," Lucy gasps covering her mouth.
"What?" Mest asks her.
"Natsu hates pistachios."
Mest blinks, "are you kidding me?"
"Nope, he's going to throw up. Oh my God he's going to throw up in front of all these people and it's going to be so embarrassing," Lucy sighs, covering her eyes.
"But that means, but that actually means that Wendy-" Mest says, his eyes going wide.
Wendy smiles and moans as she eats the ice cream, "delicious."
Natsu is pale and sweating as he lifts up his spoon, bring it to his lips. He sticks out his tongue, getting a small taste, and the urge to vomit is immediate. He can't though, he's come so far, he's almost there, he can beat her, he can beat her! Natsu looks over at Wendy, watching her stick her finger in her bowl and lick it clean.
That's too much for him. He drops his spoon and covers his mouth, running out of the eating area and therefore being disqualified. Wendy watches him go and shrugs before pulling his bowl over and eating his as well.
"There we have it ladies and gentleman! Our winner!"
The crowd erupts into cheers and Mest is clapping with a look of disbelief on his face.
"I can't believe that just happened." He says to himself.
"I better go check and see if he's okay," Lucy groans stalking away.
Wendy is smiling brightly and waving her hand around as she's crowned the champion. She skips over to Mest with a huge grin on her face, swinging a bag full of gold coins she's just won. He smiles and claps as she comes over.
"Congratulations Wendy. I... didn't know you had that in you."
"Neither did I, but it feels good to win! I don't think I've ever won anything in my life, or well, there was those sword fights and junk, but they weren't this fun!" She smiles at him.
"Are you happy to no longer be Princess of Fiore? But Princess of Lyneel Town's all you can eat Contest?"
Wendy laughs and shakes her head at him, "you're so silly Mest. Here, look at this! My prize money! It's actually a lot, I couldn't believe how much. This time it's finally my turn to treat you to whatever you want."
Mest smiles at her before deciding to tease her, "hmm, I don't know about that, I've been told I have expensive tastes that could compared to royalty."
"Don't worry baby, I've got you covered," Wendy winks at him.
Mest loses it and laughs hard, shaking his head as he pulls her into his arms.
"God I love you."
"Hehehe, I love you too Mest. Now come on, let's enjoy the rest of the festival."
"Yes Princess."
