Disclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail. Hiro Mashima does. This story was made for fun, and not for cash. (How unfortunate.)

Chapter 22: Confrontations and Revelations

Sting and Lucy were now at a cafe, starting their mornings off with two hot cups of sugary white coffee, and today was the fifth day of the Grand Magic Games. It wasn't exactly the final day that involved a survival tournament with all five members competing, and today was actually a day for all of the teams to take a well-deserved break. Some of them certainly needed it, with their low scores from the previous four days, and they would be able to use this time to prepare for when the final battles would begin.

The tag-team battle involving Sabertooth and Fairy Tail had been the most talked about battle by everyone in Crocus, and people who were viewing the Grand Magic Games on their televisions were also bringing the most views to that battle alone. After it had ended, Sting had been signing many autographs for all of his fan girls. They thought that he still looked hot, even when he was scared of Thorn's power, and they had also been taking pictures with him because he had really redeemed himself from last year.

Lucy had been taking pictures with many kids, who also asked for her autographs while they curiously saw the pink book of spells that she had wielded, and she had also asked Virgo to entertain the kids for her to have some time alone with Sting. Unknown to the blonde girl, those kids were really excited to see one of the Celestial Spirits summoned for them. They had ran out of the cafe with Virgo, wanting to play with her, and the pink-haired spirit thought that this was a good kind of punishment from her princess.

The kids were not exactly really understanding about how magic worked, and Lucy let out a sigh of relief at the fact that none of them had called her by the name of Thorn. Lucy didn't have the slightest idea about who Thorn was, having never even heard her name from her own parents when they were alive, and she still could not understand how Thorn appeared yesterday. As soon as the book turned black, Lucy had lost control of her body while she felt that dark presence within her heart and soul.

She knew that Natsu had knocked the perfume and the book out of her hands, but Lucy could not understand how they had fused together like that. Under normal circumstances, perfume would ruin a book with its liquid if it ever made contact with the pages. However, the perfume seemed to have unlocked that last section of spells. Lucy knew that Parfum Magic was a type of Holder Magic, so why had that bottle of black perfume been so different from any normal perfume bottle? Why was it made to have such dark power?

The brown-eyed girl still looked somewhat scared from the dark power that Thorn had been unleashing yesterday, feeling it to come from things like malice and hatred, and she had even told Sting that those spells were now off-limits to her. She did not want to be known as the mage who could wreak havoc while having a dark side, especially since her own team looked scared from seeing the immense power of Thorn. They had not wanted to say anything to upset her, but something was definitely weird about the book.

"Are you still frightened, Lucy? You'd usually have your hot coffee consumed by now, and it feels cold. I'll get you another one, if you want. Does the darkness in the book still have you freaked out like I was?" Sting asked with a concerned look on his face while having a desire to comfort her in his charming blue eyes, not wanting his girlfriend to become terrified or think that she was some kind of evil monster.

Lucy responded in a soft voice while looking at Sting, not knowing that her cocoa brown eyes were showing him how uneasy she felt about Thorn's vicious level of power, "I'm fine, Sting. Really, I am. You said that I just need to get this new type of magic under control, and you would help me do that. I just have to believe in myself, and I'll be able to make it obey me. This is all that jerk Natsu's fault, anyway. If he hadn't knocked the book and perfume bottle out of my hands, I could've used Fire Magic to nearly burn him to a crisp like I did last time."

Sting could tell that Lucy was really trying her best to stay positive, but it was really no surprise that her eyes revealed to him that the dark power of Thorn had really shook her up on the inside. After all, Lucy was the wielder of the book. She probably did not even know about Thorn being linked to the book in some interesting yet strange way, and Lucy had wondered why Thorn seemed so vicious. Even though she had beaten down Lucy's worst ex-boyfriend ever, didn't Thorn go a little too far without showing any sort of mercy?

Despite the fact that he could understand why Thorn wanted to show Lucy how to really take out her revenge on the guy who she greatly despised, Sting had really been more curious about the person who gave Lucy that book. She might not have had any real thoughts about it, but Sting really had his doubts about them being a random merchant like how Lucy had once told him. She still wore the white heart-shaped pendant around her neck, even though it hadn't really had much of a role lately, too.

Sting had a pretty good idea that whoever gave Lucy that book had clearly known more about it, rather than just giving her a book with weird spells of magic in it, and they had been hiding some important info from her. He had not even seen that bottle of perfume, up until yesterday when Lucy had decided to use it to make herself smell good, and he knew that she usually bought things like clothes and perfume with receipts and shopping bags near it. Since those weren't in the room yesterday, the white dragon slayer wondered where she had found something like that.

He did not want to confront Lucy about it, knowing that she was already shaken up enough by the dark powers of Thorn, and he also did not want to risk anything like that causing their relationship to fall apart if Lucy would fight with him about. He was definitely not going to make her feel uncomfortable, and Sting was starting to have a little plan of his own. He had gotten up from his seat to quickly buy another hot cup of white coffee for Lucy, and he ran back to her while placing the hot cup of sugary coffee on the table. He went around to her side, kissing her lips in a romantic manner to get her feeling good again, and Sting broke the kiss after a few moments to walk away to somewhere.

"Where are you going, Sting?" Lucy asked curiously while smiling, blushing happily from the kiss that really snapped her out of her worries for a little bit.

He replied kindly while turning around to her face her, smirking with his usual high amount of confidence shining brightly like his pearly white teeth, "Oh, I just have to go find Rogue and talk to him about a new move that we came up with."

Lucy told Sting that she was very glad that him and Rogue had found the time to create new moves, and she also smiled happily while waving goodbye to her boyfriend as he exited the cafe while he appeared to be walking off to find Rogue somewhere in Crocus. With Sting supposedly having to do something, Lucy knew that there some business that she had a take care of with a certain new friend of hers. Since Thorn had been released from the perfume bottle, as a result of what Natsu had done, couldn't Karen explain everything to her?

Surely she had to have known about the gifts that she gave to Lucy, especially the spell book, and Lucy took in a deep breath while wondering what she was going to say to the woman with silvery-blue hair. She did want to know about Thorn, but Lucy also wanted to know more about the spell book as well. After all, if a pure and innocent soul was necessary to open the sealed book, why was someone as vicious as Thorn linked to it? Also, Lucy found it to be very strange that Thorn knew exactly how her spells worked like she was an expert with them. Didn't her dark power appear only yesterday?

Lucy left the cafe quickly, looking left and right to make sure that no one from Team Sabertooth or the Fairy Tail teams was around to distract her from what she had to do. She ran all the way to a different street of Crocus, going to one of the intersections from its southern path as a bird's-eye-view would show from above, and Lucy kept going north while she planned to track Karen down with the intent of learning everything that she needed to know. However, unbeknownst to the brown-eyed girl, Sting had been watching her from behind a tree. He lied about the training with Rogue, making an excuse to not seem suspicious, and Sting was secretly going to follow his girlfriend to also see who she would be chatting with.

Meanwhile...

The tag-team battle had left the guild of Fairy Tail pretty shaken up, since both teams had come to the infirmary of the Domus Flau to see how Natsu and Erza were doing, and some people like Levy had their hands over their mouths while looking pretty shocked at what Lucy had done. Gajeel did not even feel like laughing at the fire dragon slayer right now, since the damage that Thorn and Lucy had done on the outside did not seem to really be the worst of it. Even Gray looked pretty freaked out, and he was glad that Natsu had been chosen to fight instead of him.

Natsu had to have his whole body bandaged up while he laid in bed, unable to even move, and the only visible parts of him were his hair, eyes, and mouth. Everything else had to be covered up, most likely to stop all the bleeding and cover up his wounds as well, and Natsu actually had pretty serious injuries from his fight with Thorn. Even though he was smiling confidently, simply trying to give a thumbs-up to everyone in the room to show hem that he was supposedly okay would cause him to feel searing pain in his hands and arms.

Thorn's explosive spells had caused Natsu to have wounds on the outside, but she had damaged his body right when she used her first spell. Getting hit by Shadow Beam had caused some of his bones to be broken, and that Shadow Punch spell had severely broken his arms while twisting them as well. The muscles in his arms and legs were really torn up from the shadows having so much immense pressure in them while they had been breaking his limbs. He had also lost quite a lot of blood, and he needed emergency treatment.

Natsu had really made light of Lucy this time, and he really paid the price for being so rude to her. He had slapped her book and perfume into the air, before he choked her and tried to make her truly feel defenseless like he trash that he thought she was, but he really changed the mood of the fight from proving one worth's to being total all-out homicide when the perfume had spilled on to the book. Natsu's flames had accidentally loosened the cap on the bottle, causing the shadowy liquid that contained Thorn to spill, and he had really screwed up.

The fire dragon slayer did not know what he had unleashed, and he had been too concerned with winning the match to hear Erza weakly tell him to get away when she saw the black aura spiraling around Lucy's body. The scarlet-haired mage's injuries had been fully healed by Wendy and Chelia, but she had been resting all day until she could regain movement in her feet. They were still paralyzed by the fierceness of Thorn, since her level of magical power was off the charts, and Erza had also been low on magical power after enduring Lucy's spells of Heavenly Body Magic and requipping so many armors and weapons.

She had been telling Natsu to not mess with Lucy at any point during the Grand Magic Games, but he just had to let his pride get the better of him. Lucy had definitely shown him up in that fight, whether it was her or Thorn, but both fights left Natsu seeming incapacitated. He wanted to be in the survival tournament on the final day, hoping for Fairy Tail to win while he had some epic fights, but it did not look like that would happen. His reckless attitude led to his own demise, and it looked like his bad karma kept on coming.

"This sucks! Just heal me up, guys! I can totally recover fast with some fire, so just bring me a bunch of lit candles! I could've won that fight, if Lucy hadn't transformed into that gothic demon girl!" Natsu shouted in an impatient manner, looking like he was read to take out his revenge on Lucy and Sting.

"Really, why should we help you? Natsu, it's pretty much all your fault that Fairy Tail lost another battle. You were being such a jerk to Lucy in the fight, and I saw what happened. You did knock the book and perfume out of her hands, but the perfume bottle was opened and it spilled on to the book. Then, all the black smoke appeared and Lucy turned into that gothic girl who almost killed you and Erza. If you hadn't been so dirty to do that to Lucy, as well as trying to choke her, then maybe you wouldn't have lost." Lisanna asked and explained with a straight face, talking in a very convincing and manipulative manner for everyone to agree with her.

Natsu looked angry while reminding her that Team Fairy Tail B lost as well, but Lisanna countered his statement by letting him know that those girls from Team Sweet Melancholy were not in any conflict with them. They had just wanted to end it as fast as possible, which they did. Lisanna was smart enough to hide the fact about Karen's cheating in the card game event, though, since she had actually seen her cards change while the shadows had strangely moved around. Since Karen used shadows, couldn't that connection with a new ally be made?

Plus, Lisanna had remembered how Mabel was glad to work with her during the treasure chest event. They had worked together to eliminate Erza, something that helped a little bit for Natsu's deal with Lisanna, and Team Sweet Melancholy seemed to like playing dirty. Since Lisanna also liked to use pretty devious tactics, in the situation where she was actually pushed to do so, she knew how the old saying went. The enemy of her enemy was her friend, and Natsu was definitely Lisanna's enemy now.

He really wanted to defend himself against her, most likely to save what little ounces of pride and confident he had left, but Natsu looked surprised when Lisanna gave him a harsh look that let him know that their deal was off and that any chances that he had of gaining her trust back were pretty much thrown out the nearest window. She did not want to waste her time on a guy who was so incredibly abusive to Lucy in many ways, and she really did not want any other girl in the Fairy Tail guild to waste her time with him at all. The white-haired mage proceeded to evilly smirk at Natsu, letting him know what would come out of her mouth next.

"Don't even think about it, Lisanna. If you tell them, you'll only be hurting yourself. It must suck to make deals that will backfire on you, you vice-president of the I Want To Be Lucy's Friend Club." Natsu told her while smirking arrogantly, knowing full well that the deal about him being forced to throw challenges would all blow up in Lisanna's face right now because of her careless thinking.

Instead, everyone looked concerned to see tears falling from Lisanna's eyes while her shoulders were shaking like she was saddened about something. She made up a very convincing lie that Natsu wanted her to come back for him, and he had told her to throw challenges while he would do the same. He had supposedly forced her into this deal on the second day of the Grand Magic Games, and Lisanna also told everyone how she initially refused. However, Natsu wouldn't take no for an answer. He told her to keep the deal secret, and he had chained her to it by raping her in the shower when she was all alone.

She even pulled out the Videotape Lacrima Crystal from the left pocket of her pants, and turned it on to show some footage. The footage from the crystal had no date on when it was filmed, but it clearly showed a night of Natsu forcefully trying to dominate over a naked Lisanna in the shower. She was moaning in a scared tone while blushing, actually not enjoying it at all, and guys like Gajeel, Laxus, Gray, Makarov, and Jellal had nosebleeds when they saw Natsu pumping his fingers in and out of Lisanna's womanhood. Quite clever to have footage and acting skills, right? (I apologize for the lemony talk in this part, but many people messaged me about wanting to see the footage that Lisanna had and even gave that specific suggestion.)

After Lisanna turned the Videotape Lacrima Crystal off, as the video ended, she continued to cry while looking distressed. She hugged Mira tightly, looking incredibly afraid, and the older Strauss sister glared at Natsu like he did the worst crime in the whole world. Even Elfman wanted to make the fire dragon slayer be more beaten down worse than he already was for what he did to Lisanna, and it took the power of Makarov's enlarged left hand to hold the white-haired man back. Makarov did not any fighting to happen outside of a battle, since that would get both teams arrested, and he simply left the room with Laxus and the others. Every girl glared at Natsu while they walked out, but Erza asked Lisanna to stay.

"I hope you both know that I'm not stupid. After putting all the pieces together, I realized that Fairy Tail has been cheated out of wins that we could've easily gotten. Natsu, I remember that deal you made with Lisanna. Judging by how you acted on the second day, it seems like you were throwing challenges for her. Lisanna, you sure love to make alliances these days. Making everyone side against Natsu, just because he hates Lucy and broke your deal, is really low. Don't use emotional stuff like that, and both of you better bring your best skills tomorrow. After all, the higher-ranked team is 26 points behind Sabertooth. Stop fighting each other, and step it up a notch. Maybe if you fight Lucy like a friend and ask for forgiveness, Natsu, she might budge a little." Erza explained in a stern manner while glaring at both of her friends, finding this situation to be out of hand.

Elsewhere...

Rufus had called Yukino to a cafe different from the one where Lucy and Sting were located, and it was at an outside black patio table across from the four shadowy members of Team Sweet Melancholy. They were all female, and the fourth person that Karen had created from the shadows to form her full team was a girl known as Haruka Furawa. She wore a simple black T-shirt with a pair of grey jeans, and her dark green hair was tied into two pigtails. She had pale green eyes as well, and all four of the girls seemed to be eating cake from another cafe.

Yukino had been curious as to why the Memory-Make mage had called her here to meet him, and he had been sitting at a table with Rogue and Orga. Whatever was going on, Rufus wanted his friends to know about it. Lucy and Sting were too far away for him to go get them, and it didn't seem like either one of them would be coming his way. The topic that he wanted to discuss with his friends would probably seem almost hard to believe, but it was certainly the weird and hard truth that confirmed his suspicions.

"All right. Now that everyone is here, let m begin this discussion. Keep in mind that we only inform Lucy and Sting about this, and nobody else can hear it on the next day when the survival battles begin. It has come to my memory that a certain opposing guild in the tournament has not exactly been competing fairly. In fact, I remember everything I have seen. They did not do it on the first day, but it appears that we had outside help on the second day." Rufus explained with a calm smile on his face, interestingly not frowning about what he suspected.

Rufus had observed all his opponents, and he had put the pieces together when he saw Karen using shadows to throw Cana out of the arena on the fourth day when Team Sweet Melancholy was matched up against Team Fairy Tail B. She was the same person who used a shadow on the second day to eliminate Mirajane from the event, and she had swapped everyone's cards on the third day's event. She had also eliminated Rocker from the fourth day's event, assisting Mable in her task of picking on people, and Rufus found it weird how they cheated so easily while never targeting Sabertooth.

If they wanted to win this tournament, they wouldn't get fourth and second in two events each while also giving one battle to Team Fairy Tail B before striking back in a rematch for some odd reason. Kira's match against Mirajane would have certainly ended in a draw, but she forfeited before the time ran out. The members of Kira's team acted like they didn't even care for that battle, too, and Rufus really had to question that team's motives for being in this competition. They were after something, but what?

Yukino told Rufus in a soft tone of voice while looking at him, ignoring the fact that the members of Team Sweet Melancholy disappeared into the shadows when they sensed something, "Even when they don't cheat, they are strong people. Let's just steer clear of them, Rufus-san. If we don't attack them, they won't attack us."

In a park...

Lucy had arrived at a grassy park in Crocus, not seeing anyone around while the breeze blew past her, and this was the same park where she had received the black bottle of perfume from Karen. The trees had made shadows, due to the sun shining down on them, and the leaves also had shadows while they fell to the ground. Lucy sat down on the bench, wondering where Karen would be while she looked a bit disappointed and let out a sigh at the thought of her not being here, but she just had to tempt fate.

The woman with long silvery-blue hair came out of the shadow of a nearby tree, and she walked towards Lucy with a calm look in her silvery-blue eyes. She seemed to be eating a cheeseburger while keeping the yellow wrapper on the bottom half of the cheeseburger, and she smiled while seeing that the young blonde maiden had surprisingly called for her. She did not know what Lucy could be wanting at the moment, but Karen gave her a look that let the blonde mage know that Karen would do anything for her.

"Greetings, book master. Is there something that you need help with?" Karen calmly asked with a smile on her face, as she proceeded to sit next to Lucy on the brown park bench.

The blonde mage asked kindly, looking a bit scared, "That dark power... When you first gave me this book, why didn't you tell me that it could turn black with Thorn's power? Also, I know that was no ordinary perfume you gave me. When Natsu made it spill on the book, something happened to make Thorn take over for me in the battle. Will you please tell me how and why the auras, absorbing magic, the perfume, and Thorn are involved in this book that was sealed?"

Upon hearing Lucy's questions, Karen began to smirk a bit. Lucy had not exactly asked about the full history of the book, which was both good for Karen and Thorne, but the woman with silvery-blue hair decided to tell the blonde maiden about what she had asked. Whatever she told Lucy would certainly have a lot of truth behind it, but could Lucy accept that truth? Taking in a deep breath of air, before slowly exhaling and still maintaining her smirk, Karen was now ready to go ahead and tell Lucy a little story about the book.

"The book was actually created by Thorn herself, and she was the daughter of a very elegant woman with a rich father. She had no real talent for learning Caster Magic at all, and even Holder Magic was useless in her hands. Thorn had been the disliked daughter, mainly because she had inherited the lost genetics of a demonic ancestor. Nothing of pure magic would work in her hands, making sense with the fact that she had a very hateful heart, and I was her best friend back in the day. She used to be a weakling like you, Lucy. She knew that it was forbidden to even read any kind of book of the Black Arts, let alone make one with Molding Magic in the mix to be able to be versatile, but Thorn also knew that there was no way that she could be talented without it." Karen explained in a calm manner, smiling a bit.

Lucy was surprised to know that Thorn came from such a harsh past, and she had been a weakling who created a book of spells for her own good gain. She had wanted to become stronger, similar to Lucy's resolve, but Thorn had picked such an illegal way to do it. She had risked so much to become stronger for herself, that was true, but then how did someone with such a good resolve become so bad? Thorn had been rebellious like that, but dark power was not something that came naturally.

"Thorn invited me along on her quest to defeat some demons whose powers she could use for herself, you know. She would write the olden languages in the blood of the demons, and every type of magic has its own color as well. We traveled around so much like a Wizard Saint and assistant, so I always referred to Karen as a master or mistress. She put many curses on her book as well, curses that would prevent almost anyone from reading her book, and one of those curses is adjustment. The spells you use are similar to Thorn's, but they resonate with your heart." The mysterious woman continued, beginning to smirk like the last part would leave Lucy with a blown mind in a state of shock.

"When Thorn eventually died, the shadows of the deceased demon Kurokage were still obedient to Thorn's will. Her soul merged with them, since they were created from the light of what destroyed her. I managed to eat the shadows as well, and preserve Thorn's shadowy blood in her favorite bottle of perfume, but I only have Kurokage's beginner abilities. Thorn's will lives on, and that horrible light had activated the curse of the seven seals. It was bright enough to make eight shadows extend outward from the book, sending the auras in eight different directions across the globe, and that damn guild had taken the book before I could grab it. In this time, I managed to steal it back from them for you to have. You are not just a young blonde maiden, Lucy. You are the outer light and inner darkness of your dark and infamous ancestor, Thorn Heartfilia." Karen finished explaining with a smile on her face, giggling a bit while waving goodbye and disappearing into the shadows.

As Karen left the park, her last revelations could only leave Lucy at a complete loss for words. She was the pure and innocent soul that was needed to unseal the book, which was a good thing. She was accepted by auras and other types of magic, which proved how good she was. She wanted to become powerful and become stronger, which was a good goal. However, she was the descendant of the infamous Thorn Heartfilia? That woman had been known as the Gothic Demon, and now her darkness was linked to Lucy. The blonde mage slowly got up off the bench, falling to her knees, and she couldn't believe it.

Sting had been watching from behind a tree the entire time, and he revealed himself quickly while he had heard everything. He asked Lucy if she was ok, if she was all right, but all she was right now was too shocked to even hear him.

How was the 22nd chapter? Did you like it? Sorry if there wasn't much StiCy, but this was meant to be a semi-filler. Anyway, look at the big whiplash we have here! Lucy is the descendant of Thorn Heartfilia, one of the baddest mages ever! That's really got to be a shocker! Can Sting snap her out of the shock? What happens in the survival tournament? Will Sting do something to the book, causing an interesting effect? Standby for the update!