Natsu gasped for air. His skin, slicked in sweat, felt too tight. His heart, always before resilient, felt like it was going to fail. Lucy's shadows fell away and the dragon slayer was able to collapse. The tree at his back was the only thing that kept him from sliding to the ground like a boneless mess.

Twitching, Lucy slowly propped herself up so she was more on her hands and knees rather than spread out for Natsu to see. Though she was in a slightly more modest position now, she could still feel his eyes upon her and knew that his thoughts, however tainted in hate, were still mostly desire-filled. Easing back so she was on her knees, she faced her camp and waited for the first words he spoke. His anger was like a physical thing. Idly, she wondered if that was the only thing between them anymore, if the only reason he was drawn to her was because he was too angry to stay away. That's alright, she told herself, this is how I like him best. It wasn't even a lie.

Natsu made himself rise and searched for his pants. They were bunched up on the ground several steps away, the legs twisted inside out in his haste to get undressed. He turned them right side in with hands that shook. His head was a riot.

Unable to take the silence any longer, Lucy asked, "Are you just going to run off again?" Her voice trembled in a way she hated. She still faced forward. The fire from her and Gray's camp was dying.

Natsu gave pause and studied her stiff back. Her hair was a wild tangle as it fell between her shoulder blades. Her whole body quaked. He swallowed tightly and finally found the breath and the saliva to croak out, "Zeref?" It wasn't the response she was looking for, but he just couldn't.

"Yes." Lucy forced herself to nod. There was no hiding. And really, why should she?

It took a moment for her confirmation to sink in, but when it did Lucy could feel the heat sloughing off his body as he became more and more irate. "You'll burn the forest down."

He ignored her. "In your apartment? That's who—" Who you replaced me with.

"Yes."

"And after?"

"Yes." The word came out quiet but Natsu's hearing was sharper than ever.

His fingers itched to grab her by the hair and pull her around. He couldn't touch her. "You told me he was no one. You looked me in the eye and said it didn't matter."

"I lied."

"Holy fuck." His fingers drove through his hair again and again. He didn't realize he'd started pacing, that the pine needles under his feet were igniting and burning away to ash.

Lucy wanted to look at him so badly but she knew what she'd find when she saw into his eyes. She didn't need to see Natsu's hate to know exactly what kind of beast she was. "I love it; I can't stop." She twisted her fingers at her throat and couldn't completely swallow the keen that tore its way from her chest.

"You're disgusting."

Lucy flinched. "You liked it, too."

Natsu drew in a sharp breath. Her words stabbed and cut mercilessly. The worst part was that he couldn't totally deny it. The admission, even if it was a silent one, confused him so badly that he was left reeling.

"Please Natsu, I know you enjoyed it almost as much as I did," Lucy said, sensing his confusion. "I felt it. As soon as you realized he was here, that he was touching me—"

"Shut up."

"No. You can't hide that from me. We're all connected now, you, me, Loke, Zeref—"

"And Loke's okay with sharing you?" It was spoken heatedly, challengingly.

"Loke is a good spirit. He loves me. He—"

"Well I can't," Natsu spat. "Not—not with Zeref." He spoke the words because he thought he should, though he wished his voice sounded stronger, more confident.

Lucy finally turned to look at him. His chest was bare and his belt was still unbuckled. Her eyes clung to his stomach where his hips dropped into a V and disappeared into the waistband of his pants. A small thrill rolled through her again and she had to clench her fingers into the needle-choked ground to keep herself from crawling over to him and kissing his skin.

"Natsu—" she hauled herself upright. Her knees quaked, her body still residually high from pleasure.

He swallowed and looked away from her torn clothes. Her breasts were practically spilling out of her shirt, her skirt was still lifted too high on the side, exposing a long line of leg. "This has gone on too long. I don't know why I keep thinking about you, and I don't know why—" I just want to be with Zeref.

"You don't know why what?" Lucy wet her lips nervously.

"I don't know why you can't keep your clothes on." Natsu snapped, annoyed with himself, with her.

Lucy scowled at him. "You're the one that came for me."

"Only for answers!"

"Liar. You kissed me. You touched me. Stop being in denial, things will go better for you."

Natsu's palms were burning. Literally. "What did you let Zeref do to you?"

Lucy twisted her fingers in the bottom of her shirt. "Anything he wanted." She said it to wound and wasn't disappointed.

He shook, disgusted. "And now you're just his? That's it?" She should be mine instead. "What the fuck Lucy? I thought—you and me—" He was so flustered he could barely string a sentence together.

"Natsu—" she didn't know how to finish. She wanted Natsu. Whenever he was around she needed him like she needed air to breathe. She loved him, had loved him for so long she couldn't remember the exact moment in time she realized it. And Zeref… she loved him, too. Going without him was like torture. Couldn't she be both of theirs? She loved the way Zeref touched her and she loved the way he needed her. She remembered how he tasted on her mouth and squeezed her eyes tightly shut. She couldn't lie. "Yes, I'm his. But that doesn't mean that you and I can't—"

The flames that had been restricted to his palms reached to his elbows. Don't lose control again. Don't. Another scene like the one in Magnolia would drive him insane. In the best way. He wanted the world to burn. Lucy with it. It scared him. "That's exactly what that means."

Lucy shook her head furiously. "You haven't tried yet so how could you understand?"

He didn't. He didn't understand why the thought of Lucy with the demon king was as disgusting as it was arousing. He didn't understand why he loved the idea of her being violated and enjoying it. He didn't understand why he wanted to watch it happen. Blindly, he grabbed his shirt off the ground and squeezed it in fingers that felt like brittle matchsticks. "You're a mess." Though whether it was directed at himself or Lucy, he couldn't say.

When he tried to bowl by her, Lucy grabbed his wrist and kept him there, black tendrils rolling over her body on their own accord and wrapping tightly around his chest. "We can do this," she insisted. "Just let me show you."

"Let go of me, Lucy," Natsu said warningly, but his voice lacked conviction. The coolness of her flesh mixed with her new magic felt good on his hot skin. Her presence was slowly clouding his mind.

Lucy ignored him and touched too-cold hands to his neck, squeezing lightly. Then she came up on tiptoes and rolled her tongue over his bottom lip. He was firmly locking her out.

"Let me," she said and nudged his lips apart. He reluctantly opened for her, guiltily enjoying the way she tasted like Zeref. He hated himself for being so weak and he hated her for feeling so good.

She pulled back a touch. "See? Please don't go, Natsu. I want you here. You belong here with me." Her words muffled against his mouth. "We're the same."

No. Natsu stilled and pulled away. Distance didn't help much, she was still gripping his throat and now he was forced to look into her abyss-black eyes. Fuck he loved them. Onyx, like Zeref's. Like mine.

Lucy flexed her fingers. "Kiss me, Natsu."

"You taste like ruin." Bittersweet. The most amazing thing he'd ever had brush over his lips. He pushed past her before he couldn't. When Lucy tried to hold him there with dark tendrils he allowed fire to rise and consume his body. The darkness burned away and Lucy jumped back.

"Natsu—"

But he was already going, his back was to her and he was fading in with the forest. The fire over his skin extinguished and Lucy lost sight of him in the gloom.

That wasn't a very nice thing to do, she thought at Zeref. Shadows at her feet pooled together and the demon king rose, pale skin, dark hair, and flashing, glittering eyes looking like two bottomless pools.

"I'm not very nice." His voice was thick and smoky.

"I want him back," Lucy said morosely.

Zeref gave her half a smile. "You're beautiful when you're miserable." He touched a hand to her cheek and brushed his thumb over her smooth skin, not daring to tell her his brother couldn't help but return.

A thrill moved through Lucy. "You like it when I suffer?"

"It's one of the things I enjoy most," he replied.

While she was angry, Lucy couldn't help but lean into him so her lips were hovering over his. "You really are mean."

"Yes."

Effortlessly she said, "I think I love you, you know? That's horribly wicked, isn't it?"

Her breath mixed with his, sweet and heady. I think I love you. Zeref wished he could have this. He wished it was as natural for him as it was for anyone else. But no, he had blood and demons and death. Soon maybe Lucy would know about all of those things as intimately as he did. Or maybe she'd die. "People like me don't deserve love," he told her after a beat.

"Is that written somewhere?" Lucy asked, snaking her fingers through his.

Zeref squeezed her hand. "You said yourself I wasn't very nice."

She smiled and looked into his inky eyes. "It's a good thing that I'm not either."

He closed the distance between them so their bodies were flush. "It's not real, Lucy, what you're feeling—"

She kissed him to keep him quiet. She had never felt anything more real in her life.

Using enormous effort, Zeref drew away from Lucy's mouth. She wrapped her arms tighter around his neck, sensing his urge to flee. When had all the men in her life started running from her? Was she so hard to be around now?

"Where are you going?"

Zeref ran his fingers through her hair and pushed the blonde locks back from her face. He caught her lips with his. When he came away she was panting. "I have to take care of something," he told her evasively.

"Can't it wait?" She wanted him here beside her.

He pressed his lips into her temple. She felt good, solid and real. "Did you mean what you said?"

She blinked at him.

"When you said you loved me," he offered.

Lucy smiled slowly. "Was I not sincere?"

"Don't play," he said dangerously. "Not about this."

Lucy shivered when darkness swirled around his body. "Do you think I'd lie?"

He studied her. "Yes."

Lucy rose on tiptoe and kissed him. "Not to you."

"You've already lied to me," he reminded her. "You lied to me about Natsu and you lied to me about that spirit. How do I know what you say is true?"

She couldn't rightly deny that. "You want the truth?"

He gazed into her dark eyes and sucked in a breath. You might not like what she says.

"Well?" Lucy prodded.

Zeref suddenly changed his mind. "No." He didn't want to know what she really thought. If she was willing to let him think she loved him, even for a little, then that was good enough for him for now. Soon he'd find out if she burned out and expired or if she stayed strong. Forgive me, he thought, because Lucy didn't know exactly what awaited her in Piper's Hold.

She wrapped her fingers through his. "You look so torn, are you sure you don't want to know?"

If he knew the real answer, he was afraid he wouldn't be able to let her make her own decision when the time came. He kissed her instead of allowing his traitor mouth to ask. Her body revealed more than her words ever could anyway. Skimming his thumbs over her breasts, he had her quivering in a breath. She was so intoxicating. Don't. Don't get carried away, he told himself firmly. If you start now, you'll never leave and this is something that has to be done.

"Lucy—" He choked on her name.

She smiled against his lips. "Yes?"

"I have—" Her fingers tried to slide up into his sleeves. Her flesh was cool and soft and utterly distracting.

"Mmhmm?" She pressed tightly against him.

"I have to go," he spat out and tore himself away.

"Zeref—" She tried to reach for him again. "Don't go, I know you don't want to, so why—"

He thrust her back with a gust of magic that pushed her roughly against a tree.

"Goodbye, Lucy."

And that was it. He melded back in with the shadows and was gone from her sight. Lucy bit her lip until it hurt, angry at him for leaving. She let a pulse of magic bleed from her body and felt the tree at her back wither and die. That release felt so good she wanted to do it again; she wanted to kill the whole forest and watch it desiccate.

Gray is still here, she reminded herself. Good, was her first thought. Then… or not. He's done nothing.

She wondered if he was still paralyzed by their camp even after all the ruckus she, Natsu and Zeref had kicked up. Slowly, apprehensively, she walked back towards the dying flames of their fire and left behind the trees. More had died than she had realized; there was a large circle of aridness where she had stood, as if she had stolen the very breath from that confined radius and wrung all the living things dry of everything that made them vibrant.

In the alley behind a bar who's name he'd forgotten in a dumpy little town that was hardly worth remembering, Natsu pushed a blonde girl he didn't know up against the wall. Her hands were quick-moving and frantic, her limbs uncoordinated and clumsy, but Natsu didn't care. He didn't think about why he chose the blonde when there had been a brunette beside her that would have done just as well. He only kissed her until his head swam.

"Here, kiss me here," she whispered and tilted her head to the side. Natsu obliged and ran his tongue over her neck. She tasted like a stranger, and really, that was perfect; she could taste like anything and he wouldn't have cared, just as long as she didn't taste like Lucy.

She pushed him gently away and lifted her shirt. He barely noticed when she dropped it over his shoulder. He focused on the pale expanse of skin at her chest where her breasts spilled forward and thrust Lucy from his mind. This was a different girl, an innocent girl, a girl with blue eyes and blonde hair, not onyx pits that drew him in and drowned him.

She didn't have near-violent hands that grasped him and pulled at his hair.

She didn't have a husky voice that whispered his name and made it sound like a promise.

He caught his breath. For a second it was Lucy touching him. His hands seared hot with fury-laced desire. The girl hissed and drew back when he singed her.

"Ow," she said accusingly. "You burned me."

"Sorry," Natsu mumbled unapologetically.

Instead of being upset, she grinned. "You didn't say you were a mage."

"Did we say anything to each other?" he wondered casually, depreciatively.

She laughed. "Enough to come out here." She pulled him closer again. "Careful with your hands."

"Mmm," he acknowledged, not really agreeing one way or the other. And then he was kissing her again. He abandoned her lips for her neck, mouth hot over her flesh. He got to a part of her skin that tasted like perfume, chemically and strange. It helped remind him that this wasn't Lucy; she tasted naturally sweet and rich and dark.

"That feels so fucking good," the blonde moaned and grasped him in her hand. A thrill punched through his chest and he clamped his teeth at the junction of her neck. She inhaled and he bit harder, driven on by some insane urge to taste what made her human. "I want to taste you."

She laughed, loose, drunk. "What?"

"I—" Fuck. Really? Yeah. "I want to bite you until you bleed."

"Yes," she said after only a moment's hesitation.

Natsu didn't falter, not until he bit her hard enough that her gasp turned to a cry of pain. You can't do things like this to regular girls. The admonishment was distant and muted. I can do it to Lucy, he thought back. She would let him, he knew she would, and she'd enjoy it, more than this pretender was. But Lucy was different now, not quite so human; that was obvious when he kissed her. She tasted like him, like Zeref.

That thought only drew up the image of Zeref under Lucy while he, Natsu, drove himself into her. The moment their eyes met the dark mage smiled as though there was a secret between them, something shared and familiar.

"Harder," this blonde said. "Bite me harder."

Natsu gripped the girl, utterly frustrated. She squeaked as he dug his teeth further into her skin. When that turned into a whimper he understood she'd asked for it but had no idea what it was she was really asking for. A wave of pleasure rolled through him. Finally, the blood came, coppery and saccharine, pungent. He swallowed her down, enjoying the way she filled him up.

Her pain turned to pleasure. "Yes." Her fingers pressed against his chest. She pulled him closer and he pressed his hips tightly against hers. He was so hard it ached, though that hardness wasn't bred from the blonde mewling in his hands but from a very different kind of girl that he left wallowing in the forest. He swallowed another mouthful of her blood and rubbed his fingers over her hard nipples. She squeaked again. Her hands touched his bare skin. "Please."

"Please?"

"Please fuck me."

That's what he wanted to hear. "Pull your underwear aside."

She reached up her skirt and obeyed.

Taking his cock, he felt her body. She was wet and warm and pulsed wildly when he drew near. He kept thinking about Lucy so he looked into this girl's face. It was impossible to burn the celestial-mage-turned-dark from his mind, but it helped when he thought, she deserves this. He should get to fuck someone else, too. And damn her.

Reinforced, he took the girl by the hips and plunged into her. She gasped and sobbed, half in pleasure, half in pain. Hearing neither, he pushed her hard against the alley wall, kicking his mostly drunk beer bottle out from beneath their feet. It rolled loudly over the uneven pavement, coming to a rest against the far wall.

His mouth found her shoulder again. She tasted even better now, like ecstasy and fear.

Fear?

Yes. Black tendrils that weren't really his came out of his body and held the girl tight.

"Goddd," she sobbed. "Damn. Damn it. That—" She moaned lowly. "That hurts. It hurts. You're—"

Hurting me, Natsu filled in the blanks when she couldn't. Then, hearing her heart, corrected himself. Killing me. If he kept on like he wanted, this girl was going to be dead.

So what?

The thought was so cold it was jarring. The woman he fucked was crying now. Crying.

Crying.

The knowledge was like cold, cold water pouring over his hot skin. He jerked back and came out of her so abruptly it hurt him and probably hurt her, too. He couldn't say sorry for how short on breath he was. The tendrils faded. His mouth was full of coppery sweetness. He thought it should taste gross but when he wiped a hand against his mouth he licked the runner of red from his finger, unable to let it go to waste. It was the most fantastically terrible thing he had ever tasted. He wanted more.

"Gods. You fucking bit me."

He didn't bother telling her that she asked him to.

"I'm—I'm really bleeding."

He just stared at her. Her breasts were still out, the soft tops now painted in scarlet.

"Get—get away from me." Her voice was stronger now that he wasn't pressing against her and kissing her neck. "You're sick. I was just fucking around, but you really bit me. Look at this, I'm bleeding." She clapped a hand to her neck. "You can't just do that stuff you know? That's like assault or something."

Natsu wanted to taste her again. Fire kissed his skin, called unintentionally to the surface. His heart pounded. He took a step closer to her. What are you doing?

The blonde looked at him with bright blue eyes. "Stay away."

He didn't. Flames slithered out from his fingers and gently stroked the girl's cheek. She paled and trembled so violently Natsu wondered if she was going to piss herself or faint. Maybe both. Stop this, he thought.

"Don't hurt me." She turned her cheek into the cool brick beside her face.

Natsu wondered what it was she saw when she looked at him. A monster? Did he look like he was going to kill her? Am I? He didn't have the answers and that frightened him. What the fuck are you doing? The fire smothered; that coiling blackness in his heart retreated so quickly he was left breathless.

"I'm sorry," he told her. She shook and cried harder. "Shhh, I'm sorry. Don't cry, I'm sorry." He came forward and rested his palm against her forehead. She let out a frightened howl and pressed the back of her hand against her mouth.

"Shush," Natsu said. "You're—" fine.

"Hey! What's going on back there?" A body stood in the mouth of the alleyway. Natsu pulled abruptly away from the blonde. Instead of replying he twisted on his heel and disappeared into the night.