Edited by: Trying To Put Pen To Paper
Chapter 4
As she carried her luggage around the streets, Mercedes remembered that she had to meet with Erza so then she headed for the bridge weaving through the cobbled streets and narrow alleyways. While she was quickly ducking around people she knocked into someone, causing her to fall onto the ground. Standing quickly and apologising profusely, Mercedes looked up into the hooded face of the woman she nearly ran over.
"Don't worry about it, Mercedes. It was an accident, you would never mean to hurt me." The hooded stranger said and walked away, leaving Mercedes confused as she caught a slight of blond hair.
Watching the stranger leave, she had a strange sense of Déjà vu. Almost as if she knew the person but couldn't remember how.
Suddenly remembering her meeting that she was going to and continued her run, when she got to the fountain she saw Erza standing at the bridge looking out over the river. Erza turned her head at the sound of her running and blinked as Mercedes went up to her.
"Mercedes, what's with the suitcase?" She frowned at the sight of it.
Mercedes' smile faded and she looked away.
"When I got back to my guild, I found my sister in my room. She told me that since I had the nerve to keep secrets from her and father, I was to be kicked out of the guild and to never be in their sight ever again."
Erza's frown turned into a scowl when she heard this then placed a hand on Mercedes head. "You must have had it rough. You look like you just finished crying."
"Oh yeah, I had to beg my sister to not break my fans." She whispered.
Erza closed her eyes and sighed, trying to bury her anger at Minerva. "Mercedes, let's go to another place and talk more. I want to hear your side of the story on what happened…. actually I want to hear your whole childhood."
Mercedes nodded then they both left to talk in a different place. Erza had taken her suitcase saying that she had enough to carry.
Erza had led them to an all night cake shop where she ordered five cakes (one for Mercedes and four for her) and two cups of tea.
Mercedes began her tail.
"This so-called family for me, started as far back as I can remember. I had never seen either my father or Minerva have a soft side. Even though, in the beginning, I wasn't sure if I was even going to be a wizard, but then one day out of the blue while I was home alone, I noticed that I had a signs of using different magic. I didn't say anything because I knew that if my father had found out about it then he was not only going to scold me for not telling him but have me go through abusive training. Even more so then he already had me through."
Erza frowned then asked. "Did you ever think Minerva would have told you anything, to prepare you?"
Mercedes shook her head. "No, between the ages of 1 and 7, I didn't even know I had a sister or a father. I was being looked after by servants that weren't wizards."
"So you met Minerva when you were just 7?" she asked, surprised that someone could abandon their child for seven years.
"Yes." The young wizard confirmed. "It's something I don't enjoy or particularly want to remember because I would have nightmares about it and everything else that I had to endure whenever I'm around them."
"What happened when you first met your father and Minerva?" Erza reluctantly asked, not wanting to bring up painful memories.
Mercedes lowered her head, closing her eyes as she delved into the past.
"The day I met my father and Sister, would be counted as the same day everything became a living nightmare."
(FLASHBACK)
7 year old Mercedes was in a drawing room, designed to house guests for parties but today the young child was sitting on one of the large chairs with a sketch pad in hand. She was drawing kanji on some paper using black ink, and had been told she was quite the artist for her age. It was getting late and nearing the time for lunch so, putting her paintings down, she left the room to go to her bedroom to put away her inks and brushes and clean up. While she was in her room the door opened behind her then she looked to see one of the servants coming to her.
She smiled up at him. "Hello Ryu-san."
He bowed low in a sign of respect. "Hello Mercedes. I see you're already dressed."
"What is it?" She asked, he wasn't usually this formal and his carefree smile wasn't in place.
He looked away then back at her. "Your father and sister are coming."
She blinked in confusion. "My father and sister?"
"Yes. Come now, they are already here."
They both left the bedroom and traversed the hallways to enter a large room that was seemingly empty. When she gave the room a good look over, she noticed two people sitting at a large table. Mercedes thought that that the man, to her, looked like a giant… who also appeared to be furious. Sitting next to him was a beautiful teenage girl that looked like an older mirrored version of her. The giant man looked at Mercedes.
"Come here." He ordered, scowling.
She slowly walked over to them, slightly intimidated by the man's stare and kneeled before them. Her father looked at her through those angry eyes of his then he turned his head to Ryu who was still standing in the doorway.
"Has she shown any signs of magic?" He barked.
"No sir."
He snorted his glare somehow deepening. "How pathetic. What has she been doing this whole time then?"
Ryu was happy to answer this, "She has been learning what you wanted her to learn, reading, writing, callig-"
Her father cut him off. "All I want for her is to learn is to be strong! She doesn't need anything else!"
Mercedes did a little flinch at her father's outburst. Gemma looked at Mercedes then scowled at her.
"This is our first meeting and you're already showing signs of weakness!" He shouted, clenching his fists and banging them on the table.
At that moment, Gemma stood up and turned his gaze to Ryu.
"I want to see what she has been doing."
Ryu nodded then they all went to the room that had all of the paintings. Just looking at them made Gemma even more outraged than he already was. The next thing Mercedes saw was her paintings being destroyed by her father's magic tearing them all to shreds. After they were all destroyed she went to one of the of the paintings that had remained mostly intact and picked it up.
Gemma glared as he yelled at her. "What are you doing?! It's all trash! In this family we don't need weaklings or trash! All we want in this family is power and that is it, you stupid child!"
Mercedes put the piece down then her father left, storming out of the room.
That evening, since Mercedes was still distraught about all of her paintings that she had days, close to weeks painting, being destroyed in seconds. She had no wish to go to her bed so instead she aimlessly walked through the hallway's but then stopped abruptly when she saw Minerva with her back turned to her. Mercedes wondered if Minerva was just a bit nicer than their father. There had to be a small chance, right?
Mercedes deciding, walked faster and went to her sister. Minerva heard small footsteps behind her and looked over her shoulder to see her little sister coming to her. When Mercedes got to her she reached out to her but Minerva frowned and slapped her little sister's hand away.
Mercedes blinked as she stared up at her older sister, expecting this but still shocked at her reaction. "But Sister, I..."
Minerva looked down at her sister in disappointment.
"Don't call me that. Either address me as Lady or Minerva. Just because we are sisters, does not mean I have to be nice to you. Right now you're weak and that annoys me. In this family you are forbidden to be weak or ask for help. If you want Father or me to notice you, you have to be strong, or you'll end up like the paintings that became trash." She 'huffed' and turned back down the hallway, leaving a stunned, little child behind.
Mercedes was more struck from what she heard then the actual strike to her hand. Minerva made not move to turn back to her little sister as she left. Mercedes on the other hand slowly went to her room and got ready for bed. As she got ready and changed her clothes, she could hear her father yelling down the hallway.
"There is no way that girl will ever be accepted into this family if she is going to be weak and can't use magic!" He shouted as the sound of something breaking could also be heard.
Mercedes crawled into her bed and hugged herself into a tight ball as she silently cried herself to sleep.
(FLASHBACK END)
After hearing that story from Mercedes, Erza shook her head in disgust and closed her eyes. She didn't know how anyone could be that cruel to another human, especially their own child.
"I feel very sorry for you. Families shouldn't treat each other like that." Erza said, opening her eyes and looking at the small, mentally scarred mage. She couldn't help but see a reflection of herself from her time at the Tower of Heaven, before she escaped.
Mercedes looked up at her. "It was when I turned 11… that's when things got worse, because Minerva paid an unexpected visit and caught me doing some magic on the garden…"
Erza sighed as she looked at her, she had an idea of why and how it became worse.
An idea popped into her head "Do you want to join Fairy Tail?"
Her eyes nearly fell out of her head and Erza smiled at the hope there, "Yes, please I would want nothing more!" Mercedes nearly shouted a huge smile on her face, but it quickly fell "…but I do have a question though."
"Sure, what is it?" Erza was curious what kind of question would cause such a huge smile to fall.
Mercedes blushed as she played with the hem of her dress with her fingers and had a shy smile on her face.
"Will you be my big sister?"
Erza blinked and brought her hand to her chin, pretending to contemplate, then smiled after the child's smile slowly faded to a frightened look and brought Mercedes, who squeaked in surprise, into a full hug.
"Aww, you're so cute. Let me handle that big bully. I'll make her feel sorry for what she did to you all your life." Erza promised.
"Thank you, Erza-nee." Mercedes beamed back.
Erza looked at her with mock anger. "What did you call me?"
"Erza-nee. Do you not like it?" Clearly the anger was too convincing as the small girl became timid again.
Erza smiled, she would have to instil some confidence in this child, and rubbed Mercedes head.
"Are you kidding, I love it. Erza-nee…it has a nice ring to it."
Mercedes smiled then hugged Erza back tight tucking her head under the older mages chin.
"Then I'll call you it from now on!"
"Okay then, imouto (little sister). But only you can call me that."
Mercedes was still in Erza's arms as they laughed and she carried the small mage back to meet with the rest of Fairy Tail to tell them the big news of Mercedes joining them.
Hiding from around the corner was Minerva. She had heard everything and smiled in amusement.
"Tisk tisk, Mercedes, do you really think that, Fairy will have a chance against me?" She sneered "Let's not forget that we're sisters by blood, whether you will it to be different, or not. At this point, I might need you for something later, but in the mean time I'll let you have this weak guild comfort you, since you're too weak to handle being on you own. You still cling to people and crave affection."
Minerva turned leaving to go back to her own guild, which she thought superior in every way.