Ok, the ideal situation would be to unpetrify the door. Reversal from stone is achieved through the use of an item known as a Soft...
Aaaand I am trying to avoid this conversation even though we are literally locked in here together. A conversation that by my own admission needs to happen.
I finally looked back at Freed, who expression was a cross between awkward discomfort and shame.
"...I really hoped one of us would work up the nerve to start this conversation instead of relying on outside forces." I admitted.
"You mean that I would start it. You made it clear that it was my responsibility." The words had an undercurrent of bitterness to them, though whether they were directed at me or at himself I couldn't tell.
"Which was unfair of me." I tapped on the stone door leading outside to the rest of the guild.
Evergreen seriously used a full blown Cockatrice Stare on the door?
I could undo it, given time, but...this did have to happen. And at least this way, we wouldn't get interrupted. I turned back towards Freed, a sick, swooping sensation in my stomach. Into the emotional storm we go.
"They all forgave you within the same day. I could even forgive Laxus and it was his idea in the first place! But not you." It hurt a little bit that he didn't even flinch at my saying that. I had distanced myself from him, and he had done the same to me it seemed.
"What I did was a far more personal betrayal." Freed said, leaning against one of the barrels. "You asked me why. Why I would even consider going along with this. And it took me some time to even realize what reason I held to." Freed's gaze was dark and regretful as he looked at me and I wanted to look away, or tell him to look away.
"My initial motivation stems from...my devotion to Laxus." He said in a deliberately careful tone. "My family does not look favorably on my magic, less so when my curse came about. Laxus was the first person to look past Dark Ecriture and what it does to me. He was my connection to some place where I belonged, even just a little."
"If Fairy Tail is a place for you to belong, why try and change it?" I couldn't hold back the question. "Were we not good enough?"
"No!" The denial was flat, short and sharp, and Freed's head came up. "Fae, you were more than I could ever have hoped for." His tone went soft and warm. "I was not impressed with master's initial request to teach you. I thought you would...act your age, frankly. I thought you would be naive, and simple minded. You proved that wrong very quickly." Ok, we're talking. That's...that's good.
It spoke a lot for how much I loved Freed that even after some months of being estranged I still felt a surge of pride at his words.
I moved closer, springing onto another barrel across from him and just listening.
"I knew you didn't like me." The admission came candidly, but the afterthought just slipped out between my teeth. "But every time I riled you up was 100% deliberate."
"I knew that, I just didn't mind."
It was something he looked forward to.
The soft nostalgic feelings hung in the air for a moment before Freed kept talking, his face falling from almost happiness back to regret.
"I could barely wait to see you again when I was away. Seeing how far you had progressed in our time apart was the highlight of coming home. You were growing faster than I had ever expected, and I was so proud of you, and everything you managed to accomplish in such a short time." He hesitated for a second... "I still am."
Ok. Ouch.
I definitely felt a deeper than normal stab of guilt for my giving him the cold shoulder now. Freed had been someone who took the door of my magic and helped me open it. Helped me organize my magic into a useable form. He gave me wings... As proud as he was of me, I had been just as fulfilled when I earned his praise.
"I worried about you, whether I was helping you as much as I could. You were already isolated from children your age with you intellect, and your power made the gap grow wider still. That worry eventually grew into a fear that the guild wasn't the best way for you to grow up. And you were in danger so many times. First Phantom Lord, and then with the Tower. Times when you should have been safe but weren't for some reason. Those and Laxus's encouragement were enough to convince me that you deserved a better guild than what we had at present. One where all the members were strong-"
My hand, which had been resting neutrally on the lip the barrel I was sitting on, tightened. Hearing him say that made a sullen ember of anger flare to life in my chest again, something I thought, and hoped, had blown itself out to ashes weeks ago.
Freed had used me essentially as an excuse to try and destroy Fairy Tail. Not in the direct sense. The name wouldn't have changed, but everything else would have. Everything that I had drawn on to make myself into the person I was-!
Whoever you let anger you is able to control you.
The gentle reminder from G2 made the breath leave my lungs in a deep exhale, taking the worst of my bitterness with it. I would still get angry, but I would not hand someone the reins to how I felt.
Feel it, acknowledge it, and then let it go before it burns you even worse.
"Faerun-" I looked at the older Rune Wizard who gave a dry smile. "You were emitting an angry aura. Red light, moving erratically and violently." I let out a huff. Darn magic...
"That only seems to happen around you..." I forced the emotional signal to dissipate as I gathered my thoughts.
"The Tower of Heaven. I was in terrible danger then, even if I wasn't helpless. I only survived because of my friends...Friends who wouldn't have been part of the new Fairy Tail. Even if they did make the power cut, they would never have accepted Laxus as guild master. Not after a coup like what you pulled. You'd have driven them all out...And I would have had to stay." I felt an angry stinging sensation in my eyes. "You'd have made me be alone again...Have made me stay with people I couldn't trust anymore..." My glare felt venomous and I closed my eyes to keep it from stabbing through Freed. All the fury I had bottled up over the last few weeks had been pressurized by Brain and now I was releasing the pressure.
"I'd be lying if I said I didn't expect you to be furious with me." He folded his arms, the sleeves of his coat rustling, his recently cropped hair making him look oddly naked and vulnerable. Actually, everything about him screamed vulnerable. His shoulders were slumped, eyes downcast. He looked like the picture of dejection and hopelessness.
Freed...Sensei...No. No, you never look like that...
"Oh I am. But probably not for the reason you think." I had told Makarov and Erza the bare bones of what Zero had done to me, the technical details of how he had been able to pull it off. But I hadn't told them the full story, or gone into the emotional nuances of the helpless feeling of watching your body move, but feeling someone else drive it.
"I was kidnapped by Grey Chimera for a specific reason Freed...They were working for a dark wizard who had a hand in my early life. The reason why Natsu found me alone and hurt near Bosco. He killed my birth family when I was two, and-" Tears pricked my eyes and I swallowed, taking a steadying breath.
"I was an experiment. For the next five years I didn't have a name. I didn't have a single thought that I wasn't told to have. I could have been starving and had food placed in my mouth. But I wouldn't have been able to even think about swallowing it unless someone gave permission first. My world was doing as I was told. Being obedient was the right thing to do. It wouldn't hurt if I followed orders. There were people who had my command phrase and things that didn't. Nothing else mattered..."
Freed looked like he wanted to say something, but was biting his tongue and letting me talk. I tried not to look at him. He looked like he wanted to cry as much as I did right then. My gaze held his, I couldn't have broken eye contact with him if I had tried. I just...wanted him to understand.
"Something, somehow, woke up in me, and I realized how...wrong everything was. What I had been doing. I had trusted the wrong people, they had used me to hurt others." The uncomfortable parallels hovered before my eyes. Freed and my captors. I had listened to and trusted both blindly. And people had been hurt because of it.
"I ran away...Just turned my back when they were busy and ran as far and fast as I could. They didn't even have anyone watching me in case I bolted. They just assumed I would do what I was told. Like they had trained me to do... Natsu found me out in the woods after I got hurt and had to stop running. He promised to help." Thinking back to that feeling, the terror of being discovered and the blind animal terror of uncertainty that gripped my throat, rendering me mute.
Somedays, I wish I didn't have this clear of a memory. It was like I was living it all again.
"I had never been around anyone who hadn't tried to hurt me in some way, so I couldn't believe him. I was so scared I would just be deceived again..." And when I found you did that to me, I freaked out. I hated you as much as I loved you. Because, even without my memory, I could remember that lies and deception only bring pain.
"That's how I accessed my magic consciously...The first time I used it was to tell whether Natsu was telling the truth. If he would actually help me..." He had smelt like smoke, and his magic had caressed my senses like a campfire's flame. Reassuring, warm and a little ticklish. Home. Safety. Keeping the darkness of my past at bay.
"I didn't want to be a scared girl anymore. I didn't want to be a tool with only a number to define its existence. So I unconsciously hid my own story. Split it off and made a completely new identity so I couldn't trace my own history and remember how much it had hurt." I managed to tear my eyes away now, my hands rubbing unconsciously across the bracers on my arms. One of the first things I had acquired under Freed's tutelage.
"Whatever I have in life that is worth something I have because of Fairy Tail. This Fairy Tail." The tears did fall now, bringing a soothing relief to my eyes over the painful itch that had plagued it before. Suppressing anger now being let out in remembered relief.
"The Fairy Tail you wanted so badly to change for my sake, is the Fairy Tail that gave me an identity as something more than a puppet. That made me want to be alive. That's what it felt like you were attacking, Freed. Not just my friends and my family, you were attacking me! You were saying that it wasn't alright for Fae to be happy and that G2.0 had to keep living when I didn't want to!"
And now Freed was crying too. He was one of the unfair jackasses who looked decent while crying, only getting a faint bit of redness around the eyes instead of me, whose face got blotchy.
"I didn't know..." Three words had never sounded so much like years worth of apologies and pleading for forgiveness.
"Neither did I... Until I was kidnapped, I didn't even know why I was so mad at you specifically." I didn't realize it until Brain made me jog my own memory.
My chest was quivering with the effort of containing sobs. Thinking back to who I had been when I had been G2, and the brief recall of that as my identity, was jarring and terrifying. The sensation of being utterly helpless and despondent. Of watching horror, and being unable to even cry.
It only occured to me that it was stupid for both of us to sit across from each other and cry when Freed managed to choke out some words.
"I cannot...ever ask for your forgiveness..." He would feel like that. Freed would never be able to forgive himself completely. Not after the perspective that his actions wouldn't just have deprived me of my family, but quite possibly of my will to live as well.
I wiped tears off my face, the wet lines tingling in the cool air of the wine cellar. I hopped down from my perch and moved to stand right in front of the crying teenager. And he was still a teenager, though I had previously viewed him as an adult authority figure. Freed pulled away from me, new tears still forcing their way out.
I deliberately reached out and curled my fingers around his hand.
No more running away. I had given him full disclosure. Everything he needed in order to understand me. The emotions running through me were mirrored in Freed.
Guilt. Grief. Loneliness. Pain. Guilt. Desperation. Frustration. Helplessness. Guilt. G2 identified the emotions as she read them. And then she went deeper.
Having the talent that I did in viewing the past so clearly and so personally was a double edged sword. It made acquiring knowledge easy, but also meant bringing on a slew of vicarious emotional baggage. That had been the bane of my learning how to look at something and how to ignore it. I never knew what I would see and it was like I gambled my next night's rest on shaking someone's hand, or on brushing by them trailing after Mira for grocery shopping. With strangers, I could avoid it. But with my friends, there was already enough pain in their pasts to more than make up for my caution with others. Loke's long, long history of being seen as little more than a shiny, decorative tool hanging from someone's belt. How Erza had suffered in physical and emotional slavery, blackmailed into silence as her friends were trapped in hell. The crippling loneliness of Lucy's childhood after her mother had died, taking her father's joy with her. Natsu's feelings of abandonment after Igneel's disappearance. Gray's anger at the world after Deliora attacked...
But Freed, I had never looked at. I'd always been focused entirely on the present with him, so I never saw what he had gone through prior to being found by Laxus and being brought to Fairy Tail.
Not until now.
My first look in Freed's past produced a neutral enough image.
A well-off family with a few children. A younger son, bright and eager but easily overshadowed by the eldest.
The name of Freed's brother was Eion. Eion was several years older than Freed, maybe five or six. Enough that they had never really bonded as children.
I saw the images flash by as I continued to hold his hand.
I had never looked at Freed's past because I liked being the same as him. I wanted to be like him. And if he had a past, then I we wouldn't match anymore. Our coloring was similar, our magics ran in the same vein, we shared so much common ground...
I didn't want to lose that. I didn't want to lose this sense of equality and belonging I had found in Freed, not just in Fairy Tail.
But I looked now. And I shared the story with him, pulling him back through his own memories so he could see what I was looking at.
Struggling to be seen by everyone around him. Competing constantly against older siblings for attention and affection.
It was heartbreakingly similar to Lucy's past, only without as much money. The Justine family did their best to socially climb whenever they got the chance, and the pressure was on to fit into the high class crowd they wanted to live in. Especially on the kids.
Unease prickled the skin on the back of my neck.
"Freed...?" Am I going to need to watch you get hurt?
"Just watch, Fae..." His hand had curled loosely around mine, accepting and resigned at the same time.
Discovering magic thanks to the taunting of older boys, one of which looked a lot like Freed. He had finally seen a measure of approval and genuine affection from his parents. His father took the news with eagerness and great paternal pride, giving Freed access to all the family texts collected from their ancestors who had been wizards. His mother was cooler, more calculating and...hard. There was no other way to describe what I saw in that woman's gaze. It wasn't malice, but it was a certain detached apathy. Freed was an asset, not a son. If he couldn't contribute to the survival and progress of their family, he wasn't worth noticing. But that didn't change the joy he felt at being acknowledged. Of being seen as valuable if only for this one thing.
I didn't realize your life was so much of a battle...
I kept watching.
Jealousy spurred his brother into pushing for something new, something better to regain his status as the favored child. Finding his own talent in runes. He lacked the patience Freed had to flourish in the art, but it didn't seem to matter. He had magic and wanted their relationship to return to the way it had been before. With him as the priority. He tried to push Freed aside again, this time even more harshly. I watched as Eion demanded to be given the family texts that Freed had been gifted.
His father disagreed. Freed was the magical heir, the first born into his power. In this, he was older than his brother and the books would be his.
A rift in the family. The mother and brother turning on Freed as a supplanter. Freed being marked as a promising wizard soon took precedence over Eion, the heir. But the boy didn't seem to notice the attention, immersing himself in his studies with enthusiasm. He was used to being the underdog and unnoticed, so much of the attention from their friends and the inhabitants of their community went over his head.
Several older boys, including Eion, gathering...
I watched as Freed tried to avoid the conflict. He even set up a barrier that kept hostile spells from passing through. Eion charged, slamming into the barrier, halted physically but something still passed through like a ghost. A tiny working of magic, so ameteur and paltry to be practically unnoticeable.
A young curse. Freed's enchantment was proof against spells, hexes and other workings, but he had no idea what a true curse was. And as with most curses, it had a certain awareness of it's caster and it's target. Born of Eion's raging jealousy and desire for power, the curse had the same desires. And it saw Freed, younger, stronger in magic but emotionally vulnerable, as the better host.
They could have found a way to reverse it, if they had known it was there.
The fledgling curse went unnoticed and uncontained for years. The pressure and negative attention from people who should have loved him made it stronger all without Freed noticing the danger. He was strong and bore the hatred from his mother and Eion. And eventually their attention lessened into a reluctant truce. Freed seemed to have won the war by all accounts.
He relaxed his attention. Dropped his guard internally.
Then Dark Ecriture made itself known. The harmless, controlled spells Freed had been able to produce so easily before were now stronger, more violent and less predictable. The first time he used his changed power, he merely intended to light a fire to get warm.
Instead he caused a small scale wildfire.
The increase in strength changed his brother and mother's stance from grudging acceptance to outright fear.
When Freed's father had fallen ill and was declared unfit to lead the family, Freed was banished on account of his magic being too powerful. He was a threat to his father's delicate health.
The weak cannot survive being near the strong. So they will always cast the strong out.
That was the lesson he subconsciously learned.
He fit with Laxus, belonged with him because he was strong. He fit with the Thunder Legion because they were capable in ways he was not. But Laxus's views of the rest of the guild as either weak wizards or weak hearted made him believe that he would not belong among them unless they changed. Unless they became stronger.
And then came you.
He had initially dismissed me. But then I proved him wrong. Proved we were similar in many aspects. I was still struggling to define myself, as he had been. And he was assigned to me as a teacher...So he deliberately molded himself into the kind of guardian and teacher he wished he had had when he was younger. Someone who gave praise, attention and affection. Someone who was there and who always made time for me. My positive response to the affection starved wizard had made him latch onto me in more ways than either of us thought would happen.
Freed saw himself in me. Saw my potential...And thus he decided that to make Fairy Tail someplace I would never be forced out of. That his history would never become my future.
Like I had known weeks ago, holding Freed's hand, reading what he showed me, did let me understand intimately why he had done what he had. I squeezed his hand, drawing myself out of the past for a second...then going back in, but this time...
"Show him how Celeste D Faerun came to be."
An eye for an eye. I get a look into what made him like this, and he gets a look at my history too.
Freed was torn in a strange place of mixed emotions all showing on his face. There was outrage and anger, I expected that, Freed was a decent person and injustice made his blood boil. There was sadness on my behalf. And there was...relief?
That's a little odd.
"You look...weirdly happy?"
"It's foolish and selfish..."
"But still relevant." Freed didn't manage to meet my eyes.
"While...that...isn't something I would wish on even my worst enemy...It did make it so you came to Fairy Tail."
So you came into his life.
"-Without that, you'd never have left that village, and probably would never have discovered your magic." That was true. And while I did feel some regret and curiosity over my birth family, I had to agree with Freed.
I wouldn't change where I was now for the world. I had no desire to go through all of that again, but life was good right now.
"It's ok to be happy for the good parts of life. I'm glad for them too." I then managed to smile up at Freed, pulling out a handkerchief that he always carried in his pocket and wiping away lingering tears on both our faces. We sat in an understanding silence for a moment before I spoke, squeezing his hand.
"I forgive you Freed."
"Fae you don't need-" I put my free hand over his mouth.
"Yes I do. It hasn't done either of us any good. It's only hurt us both. And I can't keep being distant from you and still be honest with myself."
"What do you mean?" I glanced up at him.
"What kind of person would develop a genuine liking to her captors and under what circumstances?"
"That's normally a sign of extreme emotional manipulation, deliberately encouraged over a long period of time."
"It took me less than an hour to consider one of the Oracion Seis enough of a friend to go out of my way to help someone he loved. He was literally my jailer, and I would still call him my friend. After a few hours of amiable talk and despite the attempted mind control by his boss." Freed looked more than a little concerned at this. Papa Wolf Freed makes a comeback...
"All that, and I don't have any ill will towards him whatsoever. Almost a complete stranger." I poked his face, grinning as he gave me a half hearted glare at the annoyance. "Seems kinda dumb of me to hold a grudge against you."
You've done much more for me than you have against me.
I had seen Freed smile before. But it had never felt quite this good to see that look on his face again.
"I'm still gonna be Mystogan's student, officially at least. But...can I come to you if I need help in curse breaking?" Or something that he can't help me with?
I was pulled into the fine long coat that Freed wore in a tight hug.
"You can come to me for anything. Fae...Anything at all."
This...this is nice.
He still smelt like clean laundry and lavender soap. And his hug still made me smile widely as I burrowed into him with a sigh of relief.
I missed this...
"I'll hold you to that."
"You'd better."
-vVv-
We didn't have a lot longer in private in the cellar. The sound of rushing water made us both look around.
Liquid was seeping into the cellar through the cracks around the petrified door.
"What in the world...?"
Juvia is greeting Gray.
I snickered, informing Freed of the water's source.
"That woman...first she flooded the place when he left, and again now that he's back?"
"I guessed she really missed him. It must be hard to turn off the water works when you're a Water Woman."
I hopped down from my seat and approached the door, pressing my hands to the stone door.
Evergreen put up the spell but-
A hand reached over and traced out a line of blocky purple text on the door. I heard Evergreen give a yelp on the other side of the door as her spell dissolved. I looked up at Freed who gave a tiny, dry smile.
"I improved on your method of dealing with them." I tilted my head and listened for what exactly he had done...
"You pre-place rune targets on your friends?"
"They normally are for supportive enchantments in combat, but they work just as well for other things too." He then opened the doors, sending a flood of water inside that drenched me up to the waist. "I think your performance tonight might be a little delayed."
"Maybe. Maybe not." Ok, time to retry the Waterbender attunement with a Magic Circle.
I kept two bracer studs open as anchors for whatever I might need in a given situation. By doubling it up, I thought I might be able to collect all this water...
A fresh wave of water almost knocked me down. Freed steadied me as we slogged up the stairs against the current. Several people were being carried about by the waves of Juvia's ardent love. Gray among them.
"Gray, stop your crazy girlfriend man! We're dying here!"
"She's not my girlfriend!" And this of course made a whole new wave of tears gush out of Juvia's like a fire hose on full blast.
"Uh, Fae?" Wendy was perched on a table that was floating in the turbulent, small ocean that had formed inside the guild hall. Carla was hovering over it all, looked somewhat perturbed at the chaos she saw down below.
"It's ok Wendy! I'll introduce you to Juvia once she stops recreating the Great Flood!" I wanted to get out my syllabary and get started on damage control, but I was worried I'd drop it in the water. Need higher ground.
A wave taller than my head surged towards me.
Freed moved quickly, pulling me up so my head would be above the water level, and turning so the worst of the impact broke on him instead of me.
"Juvia! We understand your enthusiasm at seeing Gray. But for pity's sake, please stop trying to wash us all out to sea!" He barked. I could see Cubellios on the upper story, wound around one of the railings. Mystogan was also there, watching with fond amusement.
It is his home too, for all that he isn't here that often.
"I-I can't help it!" Juvia sobbed.
"Ok, ok!" I finally got my slate out and managed to find my premade rune lays for waterbending. "Juvia! This might feel really weird but please don't resist!" The rising flood suddenly halted. Someone had opened the door.
"What in the world...!?" Erza was standing, the door held open as water rushed out around her. "What is going on here!?"
"Erza! Your Sea Sword would probably help right about now!"
Just having the door open significantly reduced the flood risk. Someone talked Juvia down from her relief and joy, out by the water's edge to minimize water damage, and the rest of us reset the guild hall for the evening's entertainment. Several people made jokes about being grateful to Juvia for her giving them a quick bath. She gave a shaky smile that gradually became more sincere as people showed they didn't hold her emotions taking control of her magic against her.
I introduced Freed to Cubellios, and he only took one look at her before recognizing her as a cursed woman.
"Woman?"
"With this feminine elegance? How could I see her as anything else?"
Well, you've already done better than Eric. He didn't even realize that she was a she. And they were together for ten years.
I continued to step across the still damp floor, moving in a fluid way.
Waterbending is almost like parkour: it never stops moving unless you want ice. And I do not want ice.
By the time I had worked my way across the guild hall and back, Freed had already written a list of potential patterns her curse could be modelled on. One of his eyes was shining dark violet as he examined Cubellios carefully, occasionally asking her to move this way or that.
"This is a true curse, given with malicious intent. And incredibly focused intent as well. Since she indicates that she cannot remember her time as a human, or her name, this could be from the Baleful class."
"Meaning that the original intent was to remove most of her human mind, literally turn her into an animal from the outside in." Cubellios would have felt her mind slipping away day by day. She was treated as a dumb animal day after day, and soon it woud have become easier to believe that she was one rather than deal with the emotional frustration.
"But these make me think it's not so simple." Freed poked at her back and she helpfully produced her wings. "Violet Dracne aren't supposed to have them, and Baleful Curses don't allow for any alterations whatsoever, wanted or not."
"Ok, well, whoever did curse her did a really thorough job. And it happened a long time ago, ten years. Baleful or Shame class curses would be able to last that long, but not allow her control over her body enough to spontaneously produce wings, or alter her size."
"No Baleful curse I've ever heard of would allow for the victim to become something of such size. The largest recorded transformation-"
"Turning someone into a wolverine. Not the brightest idea historically to turn an intelligent enemy into what amounts to a small bear...while they're less than five feet away from you." Cubellios hissed, shifting her coils as she turned towards the door, tongue flickering.
:The dark wyrmling is close, but uneasy about entering:
He is also thinking about retreating before he's noticed.
Oh no you don't!
I ran for the door, leaving a bemused Freed behind me. I whipped around the corner and tackled Rogue to the ground.
"Come on! You made it this far, don't go chickening out now!"
-vVv-
Freed had just mended ties with Fae. And yet it seemed as though nothing had changed in their months apart, except she was far more informed about curses and could apparently speak Snake. He was fascinated with Cubellios and her predicament. And he was also concerned there might be some reflective component in it that could endanger Fae. He hadn't seen anything malicious with Dark Ecriture, and it was uncanny in its abilities to discern threats...
Fae had come back then, and it was like no time had passed at all. They were casually trading ideas and theories, working together towards a mutual goal. It had made something pained and wilted inside him perk up with renewed joy.
Then she had abruptly broken off their conversation and run off, crashing into someone out of sight.
"Fae?" He called, half rising only to realize Cubellios had wound her thick tail around his torso and shoulders and was eyeing him with an amused expression. I had no idea snakes could even make that face. Fascinating...Her curse form may be based off of a dracne, but it's far more expressive and malleable than any curse I've seen before...
A ripple of sound through the crowd of regular patrons and guild members made Freed go motionless. The tone of the sudden whispers, and a few people abruptly turning and heading for the bar after throwing looks at him. He was sitting with his back to the door, and Cubellios was keeping him from turning, but if he just turned his head-
No...
Faerun was standing in the center of attention holding a small green kitten in one hand...And the hand of a dark haired boy near her age in the other.
No...!
"Everyone, these are my friends Rogue and Frosch!"
The boy slightly uncomfortable at the attention and unconsciously shifted closer to the familiar face. Closer to Fae.
Cubellios tightened her coils with what sounded suspiciously like a snicker as Freed tried to rise again and separate the two children.
Why hasn't she let go of his hand yet!? Why is no one reacting to this!
He could hear Bixslow laughing like a maniac, and saw several people snickering at his helplessness.
"It's so good to meet the two of you!" Mirajane swept in, smiling like the angel she most definitely was not. "Welcome to Fairy Tail! As Fae's special guests, you get a front row seat to the show." She gestured them forward, and Fae tugged the boy along to the stage. She gave Freed a wave and a smile as they passed.
"We'll talk more later, Freed! It's time to get started!"
It was actually several minutes past time. But Juvia's little accident had set them back somewhat. Freed was more horrified at the realization that Fae had been waiting specifically for this boy to arrive...
No...no, not yet...!
-vVv-
Cubellios turned her head to look at her hatchling's old tutor curiously. He did not look well, but he had been displaying the signs of sudden, unreasoned action. And her hatchling was so happy the wyrmling had joined them... So she had taken action to prevent him from interfering. The wyrmling needed a den, even just temporarily. And Hatchling certainly seemed to have a talent for bringing new people into her family. Better let their status as allies have time to solidify before her elders tried to frighten him.
Her eyes traced over the not-real images that Hatchling's voice and magic produced as she launched into her story, quickly captivating the minds and imaginations of everyone in the den. She let out a slow breath that would have been a content sigh in a human, and rested her head on the still motionless shoulder of Hatchling's former mentor. A small weight settled on her back and climbed to just behind her head. She smelt that the green kitten. A thin, happy purr started to vibrate through him.
"Frosch thinks it's pretty too." For some reason, although he spoke the human tongue, she had no issue understanding the small cat's speech clearly.
The white maned Demon Master approached, patting the green maned wizards's hand with a smile and began to speak in a soothing tone. While it wasn't making the tension leave his body, she could feel his unconscious efforts to get up were gradually weakening and finally stopping.
-vVv-
"Betcha 10 grand Freed doesn't even make it an hour before he snaps."
"No bet, Mira's defusing him now, look."
"Damn...She must like the kid."
"More like she just wants to make sure no one tries to give him the shovel talk, because that means she would have to give all three kids 'The Talk'."
"..."
"..."
"...Let's try to be on a job when that happens. Say, in Bosco."