Loke

"You want to join Fairy Tail?" the little man asked. "Well, you come with Master Bob's recommendation, so I see no problem. What magic do you use?"

Leo – no, he had to use his other name now, the name that meant betrayer, trickster, killer of the innocent – Loke hesitated. "Holder-type," he said after an awkward pause. "Ring magic."

The wizened old man nodded, though Loke had the uncomfortable feeling that those blue eyes could see right through him. "We don't have many holder-type wizards here right now, and it must be twenty years since we had a ring-mage. You will be most welcome. Go and talk to Mirajane, over there at the bar. She'll give you your guild-mark."

"Thank you, sir," Loke said quietly.

Still trying to run from me?

He shuddered, only just hiding it. He knew it wasn't her, it was just the crushing guilt that lurked in the corners of his heart, but it sure sounded like her. Always there, just over his shoulder, lurking behind him.

Joining a different guild doesn't make you any less guilty, Leo.

With an effort, he pushed the voice out of his head and went over to where a very pretty white-haired woman stood behind the bar.

"Hi!" she said as he approached. "Welcome to Fairy Tail!"

He was about to turn his head a little, twist his expression into the sultry, seductive one he used on almost every girl he met, when the fragments of his remaining magic warned him that the woman in front of him was not all she seemed. Trying to flirt with her might get him more than he bargained for. Instead, he just said "The Master sent me here for my guild stamp?"

"Of course!" she smiled. "Where would you like it, and what colour?"

He hesitated again. Here was a place he could forget what had happened. Here was a place he could just be himself, whoever that was. But first, he had to deal with the ghost.

"On my back," he said firmly. "Right between my shoulder blades."

He wasn't Karen's any more. He would not serve her, would not be tormented by her. Fairy Tail was his place away from her. They would keep her away from him, would keep the devil off his back, as it were.

"And colour?"

"Green," he said, this time automatically. "Green, like her hair."

It wasn't until the brand pressed into the middle of his back that he realised exactly what he had said – and that he didn't regret it one bit.