Chapter 3. Here, the story begins to pick up a little bit of pace.
Lucy was beside herself. She left the cave, not being able to stand it without her parents there. It was cold and empty and just wrong. She ventured into the forest in human form. The trees were so old and large that someone could be standing on the other side of one and you would never know. Branches had interwoven above, blocking out almost all of the natural light from filtering through. There wasn't much of that anyway, though, because the sky, which was technically in the domain of the celestial, was responding to her emotions. It was becoming dark and cloudy and would soon begin to pour.
Within a few minutes, the entire forest was soaked, and Lucy was not exempt. Though sometimes when she made it rain she could deflect it from herself, she was not aware of much at all, hardly able to make her feet move. She definitely did not notice the storm that she was causing.
An indefinite amount of time passed this way, with the storm never letting up and Lucy never stopping to eat or sleep. She was drenched, starving, and about to pass out, but she didn't notice any of this.
She was startled out of her trance by an irritating voice. "Argh, Dragon dammit! Why won't this rain stop?" It seemed to be coming from the other side of a tree to Lucy's left. Going to investigate, she froze when she heard another voice, this one soft and feminine.
"Gajee, there's nothing we can do about it. Calm down," the girl said. And indeed, it did seem to be a girl, for the voice was young. Lucy worried more upon hearing this voice, though, because she felt that often bad things disguised their true forms by pretending to be innocent in the same way a little girl was.
Lucy did not have space to morph into her full dragon form, so she settled for going half-dragon. It was a technique that she had created, allowing her to have wings, a tail, and impenetrable scales, but it kept her at a human size and form. Rising into the air, she rounded the tree fully. "Who would disturb the lands of the Dragon King and Queen?" she asked in a slightly harsher voice than usual.
The little girl who had told the other, 'Gajee' to calm down seemed both afraid of and drawn to Lucy. Her short blue hair was spiky and she had large brown eyes. "Dragons?" she asked, "Gajee, did you hear that? Dragons! Our parents could be here!" Turning back to Lucy from talking excitedly at her companion, she asked, "Have you seen your parents?"
The boy scoffed. "They left us, Wendy. They might not come back. Don't get your hopes so high anytime anyone mentions dragons. This," here he floundered for a word, which Lucy supplied, "girl, she probably hasn't seen Grandine and Metallicana." The names struck a cord with Lucy, and she began to see the influences. Metal piercings in the boy's ears; slit, red eyes; metal-rimmed clothing; and sharp teeth. The girl had little wings on her clothes and also had sharp teeth.
Lucy was just confused. These were seemingly ordinary children, but they seemed to know Grandine and Metallicana, two dragons who were part of the Council that was headed by Celeste and Acnologia. They also both had the customary sharp, animal like teeth that all dragonslayers had. She could only come to one conclusion: These two children were Wendy Marvel, the Sky Maiden, daughter of Grandine and Gajeel Redfox, the son of Metallicana. They didn't seem as powerful as she was, though. Their magic auras seemed weak. She doubted they could become dragons in the way she could. "Metallicana and Grandine, are they your parents?" she asked, not really answering Wendy's question.
"Yes."