Chapter 24

~LoLu~

A small bit of wind stirred small waves from the great river beneath it, and a wisp of consciousness reacted to it, partially waking its sentience from its deep, deep slumber.

Ohhh... I'm so tired. Where am I? A sluggish pause, and then...

Who... am I?

… And why am I so tired?

Something moved against her, then, and a soft, gentle male voice broke over her, tangling itself into her very being. "You are Lucy, my love," it breathed, "the river, Eridanae, and the greatest glory of the heavens. And you're weary because you gave nearly everything you had to save all of those both above - and below - the skies. Again."

"Lucy... that sounds right, but wrong, too. And Eridanae... sounds right and wrong. How am I both, yet neither? How am I two people in one?" she murmured, her voice weak and listless, but sounding better than anything else ever had to Loke in that moment. He had feared so greatly that he would never hear it again, but hear it he did. Barely there, confused and sounding both tired and lost... but beautiful and soft, just like she was.

It was most definitely his Lucy, and once again he could feel that spark of her inside him, the link strong and feeling as though it had even gained in strength through all that had happened.

"You already know the answer to those things, Princess, all you need right now is more rest to recuperate all of your memories and your power. So sleep," he murmured soothingly, "rest as long as you need. I will be here to guard and keep you safe."

But while she was indeed still very tired, she was not able to simply fall back to sleep. Something else was tugging at her consciousness, something important – some unfinished task that needed to be completed. So despite her wish to follow that weariness into some dark hole where she could just sleep and forget everything else for the duration, she instead gathered as much strength as she could, and forced her mind to wake up completely.

It wasn't but two or three seconds after doing so that she gasped in shock, and Loke appeared instantly before her as both took on their physical forms. The blonde gaped at the lion for a moment as every memory of the last several months settled inside.

"I thought I was... dead! How did I survive all that?" she burst out, dazed teddy-bear brown eyes capturing his with a pleading light in them. "Or is this just another dream?"

Loke blinked, then cocked a brow in curiosity at the blonde, with a slightly perverse grin thrown in for good measure. "Ah-ha! So you have dreams of me, do you, my Master? And just what kind of dreams are they, hmm? If I take the strength of that blush for an answer, they must be quite questionable, indeed. My, my, Lucy – I would never have taken you for such a dirty-minded woman."

"I'll give you a black eye if you don't stop being a pervert, Loke!" the youngest of the spirits retorted with a balled-up fist that she shook under the Lion's nose – though there wasn't much force behind it. "What happened with Cepheus? And the other mages? Is everyone okay?! Well?! Don't keep me in suspense!"

With a chuckle, Loke refrained from pointing out that temporary lack of strength, and instead replied, "Everything is fine, Princess. Seirei-o already dealt with Cepheus and his cohorts, and as for the mages left back on Earthland, I'm sure Fairy Tail took care of them already."

"But you don't know, do you?"

"Well, no, but we can find out what happened with the rest after you've slept some more, Lucy," he determined.

The blonde, despite the weary shadows under her eyes, shook her head. "No, no way. We need to go back and make sure everyone's okay and that the danger is over. You don't want to know what being controlled by Marionette is like, and neither does anyone else. I can't rest until I know for sure that it's all taken care of. Besides," she tacked on after a moment, "You know how the time difference works! It could have been weeks already, for them, and they'll be worrying!"

Loke eyed her with minor annoyance softened by rue, and shook his head. "I don't suppose you would just let Virgo or one of the others go to the guild on your behalf, would you? No," he sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose, "I can see by the narrowing eyes that you aren't willing to compromise. So then... how do you intend to get through your gate, hm? I don't think you have the strength right no-"

He was cut off with a glare as Lucy gathered her power, and though it was obvious that she was weakened, she wasn't about to let that stop her... and indeed, within seconds she was no longer there (which was the only reason he was able to escape that glare of hers).

With an utterly forced (and rather manic) smile, Loke opened his gate and stepped through it, disappearing from the spirit world mere seconds behind her.

~~LoLu~~

"Lucy!"

A short, high-pitched shriek was abruptly overpowered as more shouts of the poor girl's name echoed loudly throughout the guildhall, and once again, just like a few weeks before, the girl whose name was being repeated over and over shuddered. Not that she wasn't happy that her friends had missed her so much, but she was still recovering – and probably would be for a while – and the swarm of people heading for her all at once had her shrinking back in fear for the pain she was undoubtedly about to go through when everyone in the guild piled atop her.

She cringed back and closed her eyes, trying to brace herself, but there was a sudden silence and lack of movement, and she cautiously peeked one eye open to see what had saved her.

She was forced to close her eyes again as a bright golden light almost blinded her, and she couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief. Even annoyed, Loke still protected her, and she was terribly thankful for it.

Once everyone had stilled, shielding their own eyes from the intense light of Loke's power, the lion spoke.

"You guys need to chill out and back the fuck off," he growled, giving one last bright flash of light before he let his power fall back to sleep inside himself. "Lucy really shouldn't be up and about yet, let alone coming here to greet you great big group of uncontrolled jerks. But since I couldn't convince her to stay at home and continue to recuperate, you all are going to have to show some restraint. She's in no shape to be pounced on."

At that, most of those that had rushed towards Lucy stepped back, and the few that didn't moved towards her much more cautiously, eyeing Loke all the while.

It was Erza that broke the silence.

"Just how badly were you hurt, Lucy?" she asked gently.

Before the blonde could answer and downplay her condition, Loke spoke, still obviously annoyed. "She nearly died – and since spirits are usually immortal, that should tell you enough without me having to say any more on that topic. What Cepheus released would have destroyed both our worlds if Lucy hadn't stopped him, but the toll it took on her is going to take a while to heal," he answered the red-head shortly.

Before anyone else could speak, the crowd parted and Master Makarov stepped forward, eyeing both Lucy and Loke carefully. He could quite clearly see what Loke meant when he said Lucy was not at full strength or even close; she looked weary, her eyes tired and even a little confused, and her usually healthy complexion pale, almost gray. Whatever she had done had clearly taken almost everything she had to give.

"Everyone go back to what you were doing," Makarov stated with quiet command, and then as soon as there was room to walk, he led Lucy and Loke towards a table and had them both take a seat. He noted Loke taking a spot far closer to the blonde than ever before, and smiled a little inwardly. Perhaps some good would come from all the bad, after all.

Once they were all seated, Makarov met Lucy's eyes gravely. "What exactly did Cepheus do – and how did you stop it? What was he after?"

Loke answered, as he knew more of the story than Lucy, since she'd been under Cepheus' power for most of the time and didn't recal all that was said.

"He wanted to destroy all celestial mages and take back all our keys so that there would be no more spirit-mage bonds." Loke took a long pull of his drink, then set the bottle down gently on the table with a sigh. "He had his reasons, which I won't go into here," he continued, "but what he ended up doing was tearing a rift in space-time, and that rift started pulling all the power from both worlds – your world and ours. Lucy... I don't know how she did it-" he glanced at her with admiration tinged with worry, "-but she somehow channeled the power being drained from both worlds to fuel Cepheus' spell back into the spirit world so that Seirei-o could contain and then calm it all. If it had been any stronger... she wouldn't have survived."

There was a dead, shocked silence, not one person in the building saying a word as they all tried to imagine what Loke was describing.

"Why would he do something like that?" Mira wondered aloud. "I mean, did he want to die and destroy all the other spirits, too?"

Loke took a moment answering as he tried to figure out a way to say it without saying it, so to speak. Rape was not a subject for casual discussion. "As I said earlier," he finally said, rolling his shoulders and not meeting anyone's eyes, "he had his reasons. And they were very understandable reasons, though they pushed him into the insanity of going after all spirit mages instead of just the one that caused the... problem. Everything he'd been doing out there was nothing more than a trap – for Lucy. He specifically wanted her, and again he had his reasons. Not that any reason would be enough for me to ever let anyone harm her in any way whatsoever," he added curtly. "But in the end, even I couldn't deal with what he called down on all our heads. Only Lucy had a chance of that, and she did it. 'Nuff said."

It was clear that Loke didn't want to discuss things any further, and Makarov could understand. But there were still questions to be answered. He looked at the blonde.

"Was he an old enemy of your family, Lucy? Someone with a grudge against you for something they did?"

Tired brown eyes blinked a little dazedly, but she shook her head. "Oh, no, it wasn't anything like that. It was-"

She was cut off by Loke before she could say anything further. "It was just some old prophecy or something," he replied dismissively, though his cheeks pink'd even as he tried very hard to play it off. "He was just mad that a human became a celestial spirit – it was part of that hatred he had for celestial mages, that's all."

Makarov and most of the rest of the guild easily noticed that Loke was leaving something out – something that he was embarrassed about, and they all started wondering. Just what was it about this 'prophecy' he had mentioned that would cause that reaction from the normally imperturbable lion?

"There was a prophecy about me becoming a spirit?"

It was Lucy that broke the silence and asked the question on everyone else's minds, and Loke groaned inwardly. Why couldn't the damn snoops think of anything else to ask about? And in getting Lucy to ask the question, he was trapped into answering no matter his wishes.

"Yes," he replied carefully, trying to think fast to avoid discussing something that should only be between them, and not the entire freakin' guild. "Apparently, everything that's happened was meant to, and I guess things in the spirit world are going to be much better than they ever have been because of it."

He stopped there, hoping to get a reprieve from that particular part of the business, but he had no such luck. Lucy knew him far too well – and right now was one of the only times he wished it was a little less... thoroughly, for lack of a better way to say it.

"That's not all, Loke," she shot back with narrowed eyes, "what aren't you telling us?"

Already frazzled and beyond sure that this whole inquisition had just started, Loke leaned forward and let his head thump onto the tabletop. "Mira, I could use a drink right now," he mumbled into the scarred wood, but the barmaid heard him anyway.

"What would you like?"

"Anything that will make this day vanish into the recesses of my mind and never find its way back."

"Got ya."

Fingertips began a tapping noise against the table, and Lucy nudged the handsome man next to her. "Well?"

He sat up and looked at her with serious eyes. "I'll answer that question later, Lucy, when we're alone. It's not something that has any bearing on the situation with Cepheus or all that, and it's no one else's business, besides, okay? Trust me. You don't want to talk about it here."

Loke almost never looked completely serious – there was nearly always a mischievous gleam deep in his eyes, so the fact that there wasn't right now made her give in immediately. If Loke was saying she didn't want it answered in front of anyone else, then she knew she didn't want it answered in front of anyone else.

"Okay."

Looking quite relieved, Loke breathed a sigh of relief on the back of a smile, glad that she trusted him that much.

Now the blonde pinned the guildmaster with worn but gentle brown eyes. "So what happened after I... disappeared?" she asked. "I've been worried..."

The tiny man waved a casual hand. "Pretty much everyone on the property ran, just like you two thought they would, and Virgo's trench around the ranch fooled every single one of them. Then it was just a matter of rounding them up, and the few that did try Marionette were either knocked unconscious by someone before they could complete it, or Virgo simply did it herself."

A breathtaking smile lifted the tiredness in Lucy's eyes, and she looked immensely relieved. "So no one else was hurt or anything?"

"Nope," Natsu's voice intervened as he sauntered up to them, looking Lucy over with a small concerned frown. "No one but you. The whole thing was boring. While the authorities took care of hauling all the rats in the trench off, we went looking for you and Loke through the wreckage. O'course we didn't find you, and once we figured you guys weren't there, there wasn't much we could do but come back here and hope that you guys would show back up soon."

Lucy looked a bit guilty. "I'm sorry, guys. I didn't mean to make anyone wait. I only just woke up right before we came."

"Naw," the dragon-slayer waved off her explanation, "don't worry about it. We'd rather have waited until you were better than have you showing up here when you weren't up to it."

There were murmurs of agreement from around the room, and Lucy flushed slightly and gave a tiny smile. "Thanks, guys."

Then Natsu grinned evilly as he leaned on the table in front of Loke, Gajeel right behind him as though he knew exactly what the other man was going to say. "The only interestin' part of all of that came from one of those spies gramps had there. What was her name again, bolts-for-brains?"

Gajeel snorted sourly at Natsu. "I think she said it was Shona, ya barbecued runt." Then he grinned smugly at Loke. "She sure seemed interested in where you were and when you'd be returning."

A rather loud growl erupted from a throat, and everyone in the room was quite surprised to see that it came from Lucy, of all people. And so Natsu and Gajeel grinned even more, knowing they were on to something good.

Hands fisted and arms akimbo, the blonde woman glared hard at the tabletop while Loke looked just as annoyed – with a pinch of worry thrown in. "She's one of those women that have to sleep with just about any male that steps in front of her," he muttered sourly. "I went so far as to tell her straight out I wasn't interested, and that only made her more determined. I hope I never see her again."

"She'd better hope she never sees you again," Lucy grumbled, greatly disgruntled at that name. "Or she's going to be wearing my fist."

"You're not mad at me, are you, Lucy?" Loke questioned. "You know I didn't like her."

"I know. You said she reminded you of Karen, and I know how you feel about her."

That part of things was obviously a sore subject, so Erza decided to move the conversation right along.

"So how did you stop all that power and close the rift?"

Lucy shook her head. "I didn't. There was too much. I wasn't even entirely sure that Seirei-o could tame all that, but it was our only hope. So I just opened myself to it all and instead of trying to stop it, I redirected it into the spirit world. Apparently, Seirei-o was able to still the furor, and, well...

"Well, what?"

"Oh, well, it's nothing, really," Lucy replied, blushing.

"Nothing?!" Loke nearly shouted, looking at her as if she were crazy. "You did what you did, thinking it was going to kill you! But you did it anyway! That's not 'nothing, really', Lucy, he mocked, a savage frown making him look angry enough to kill something. "When you woke up, you thought you were dead and just dreaming. You were convinced that what you did was your death sentence, but that didn't stop you or even slow you down." He snorted and looked away, loosening his tightly-fisted hands and trying to tame the fear that even now, with her safe and right beside him, froze his blood in his veins.

The guild all flinched and waited for the celestial mage turned spirit to begin yelling at her partner in the job, but no such thing took place. Instead, she looked at Loke as tears stained her eyes a softer brown, and tentatively reached out to touch his shoulder. When he growled under his breath again, she almost pulled back, but then laid her hand on him anyway.

The guild was absolutely silent as Loke looked up at the blonde woman, but when he saw the tears in her eyes his anger disappeared entirely, and he closed his eyes, looking pained and beginning to shake a little.

"Loke, I'm sorry! I didn't want to upset you, but what else could I do? If I'd done nothing, then we all would have been dead. It was me, or it was everyone. There was just no other way that could have been handled!"

Reaching out and grasping her by the waist so quickly that not only she gasped in surprise, but so did most of the members in the room, Loke dragged her against him and buried his face in her hair, almost too choked up to speak. But after a moment, he managed.

"I'm not mad at you, Lucy. I'm mad at Cepheus. I mean, I know why he did it, and I can even understand it. But he almost cost me you, and that's where I draw the line. I... I just want to go and beat the hell out of him every time I think of what almost happened."

"I'm with Loke on this one," Natsu growled, hugging around the side of the blonde that the lion wasn't taking up before stepping back. "I don't know why he did all that shit, but I don't care. If you hadn't come back... I probably would have killed him."

"You'd have had to get in line," Erza broke in, and Gray nodded gravely in agreement. "I think we all would have liked to kill him."

"Calm down, my children," Makarov finally spoke up. He'd been silent for some time, just listening to what everyone had to say. He was quite sure, however, that no matter how badly the guild would have wanted to get their hands on Cepheus if Lucy had died, Loke'd have had him clawed into tiny little bits before anyone else even had a chance.

It was no surprise, really. After all, Loke was crazy in love with the girl, even if she herself didn't see it. He smiled secretively to himself as he spoke, suspecting that things between the two spirits would be changing greatly in the very near future.

"I would like to know where Cepheus disappeared to. Was he destroyed in the explosion? Should we be looking out for more attempts by him to harm Lucy? And was he the only spirit that was part of this?"

"No, no," Loke denied, exhaling heavily as he let the anger go. "No... something knocked some sense back into Cepheus between the time everything blew up and when he woke up with his cohorts back in the spirit world, facing a very angry Seirei-o. He feels terrible about what he did to Lucy – though that doesn't mean I'm ready to forgive him – and will probably spend the next few thousand years trying to make it up to her. As far as other spirits working with him, there were two, but they were basically the spirit world equivalent of lowlifes, and I think Seirei-o has made them also very sorry for their part in things."

"Then it seems as though everything has ended well," Makarov murmured absently as he went over everything that he'd learned and put it all together so that he could then file it away.

"Yes," Lucy smiled, then flushed as a huge yawn forced itself on her before she could stop it. "I'm still so tired, though," she mumbled, rubbing her eyes and looking like nothing so much as a weary child that needed put to bed, and grinning inwardly, the guildmaster looked at Loke and tilted his head toward the young woman. "I think it's time she went back to bed, now. It's obvious her energy has not yet returned to normal."

The girl slumped against the tawny-eyed man's chest, and Loke wrapped her securely into his embrace as he agreed with Makarov. "Yes, now you know what happened and that everything's okay, so it's time for you to go back to bed, sweetheart. Without arguing," he added.

There was a round of general laughter at that, because Lucy hated being ill or stuck in bed, and detested being told what to do in certain ways, too. But she just wrapped herself around a more-than-willing-to accommodate her Loke, and began dozing off right there.

"Night, guys," she grumbled, voice barely audible.

Loke chuckled as he stood with her in his arms. He opened his gate and stepped through, tossing her message over his shoulder as they disappeared.

We'll have to go hang out with everyone for a few days after Lucy's better, he thought a little absently as he smiled gently down at the sweetly sleeping girl he was holding. Wanting nothing more than to take a nice nap curled up with her, he glanced in the direction of Eridanus and Lucy's house, then glanced around his bedroom, where they'd ended up.

"Screw it," he decided. "She can scream at me about it later. Right now, I just don't care."

And with that, Loke glowed golden for a few seconds as he changed into some sleeping pants and a soft shirt, and then laid Lucy down and promptly crawled into the bed with her. Wrapping himself around her in every possible way he could, the lion sighed and then began purring quietly as he dozed off to sleep.

I could sleep like this every night, was the last thought he had before everything trailed down into a gentle darkness, and he was awake no more.