After finally getting my lazy bum to the desk and start writing, I saw someone with 'muffin' in their name following another of my stories. So I left again to make muffins...
But I'm back now and happy to present this chapter! The moment you have all so dearly waited for has finally arrived. All our favourite character of all time is finally taking up the stage!
Let's have some Thanksgiving first:
CheesyDelphox, how are you always so quick? Thanks so much for reviewing! For quoting even; I'm happy to know you liked it (smug face but also happy face? maybe two separate ones are less creepy). Yeah, I found it very amusing in the one OVA where the perverted literature was mentioned so that's staying :D Thank you so much again (and I'll try to remember what you guys all call out to give you credit should it happen)!
Somnolent Sushi Roll, how do you always manage to make such long reviews? Makes me feel like I truly create something decent here :) Thank you so much! The ideograph is a new word for me, too (I explained to like three people until being able to research a proper expression... ':D). Haha, no, no explosion, but those hot air balloons are always very loud even if distant. It was just that. Insatiable is a new word for me, though, so thanks! We take and give constantly xD Thaanks!
Mitzy123, thank you so much for your review! Until reading your review, I didn't realise how the dirty talk makes so much less sense in English xD Whoops. But I'm glad it was understandable and amusing. Thanks so much for letting me know about everything you liked!
foxydame, thank you so much! Such a long review and how you pointed out all of those things; makes me really happy! Pigeon may be observant but you've got a keen eye as well and I always appreciate how you mention even the little details! Haha yes, the 'lacking the spirit' always cracks me up :D
jellal san, thanks so much for leaving me a review! I'm honoured to know how you take the time to read the entire story again!
Wendy Marvel (love how Fairy Tail slowly joins in on this), thanks for your review! I'm always happy to read it!
Pilikali, welcome first of all! Thank you so much for leaving me a review! I scanned your profile before finding your review and I already saw the Spanish stories; I'm really impressed! And it touched me how you use a translator to get though the story, reminded me of myself a lot - I used to look up the same word five times a chapter because I couldn't remember it... You're really very kind and I'm so very happy to have received your review! :) Thank you so much!
Isanien, so long, thank youu! There'll be more insight into his work very soon, so thank you for pointing that out; makes me glad to have written the coming chapter! I just realised that you won't see this now anyway since your review was for another chapter but I appreciate that even more - taking the time to review even if there is new material, thank you so much!
Now then, I will not keep you any longer from your most treasured dreams... or are they nightmares...?
Jellal's hand came up to support his head where it fell into his palm. Shoving his fingers up through his hair, he stared at his notes. At the tapping of his quill, tiny specks of ink bounced off and onto the empty half of his sheet. His eyes flashed up for what seemed like the hundredth time, scanning what he could almost recite word by word now, still not granting him any more clues on how to continue.
Putting down the quill, he allowed his back to curve, hunching slightly in his seat as his gaze wandered to the window. It was wide open and still, no attempt to leave.
The chair creaked when he rose, slowly walking over to search for what the pigeon on his windowsill was watching – finding nothing but an empty forecourt where the front gates were to the right beneath his office. He had no idea how it had found him, again turning up without a message but it stayed despite his repeated invitations for it to fly away. It cautiously scooted closer, then sat down where his hand rested on the cold stone, trying to warm up. He had to smile.
Erza had accepted a mission in Era, if a small one, and the hours ticked by much slower in the knowledge of wondering; of worrying for her safety. He was well aware that it was merely a simple chase of vandalisers but there was always a risk involved. He tried to imagine her back home already, having taken but an hour or two, snuggling back in for one of those naps she always took during the day.
With a long sigh, he turned back to his work. It was not long until he became stuck at the same point again, starting to pace his office in the search of a solution. He knew he had read something similar before. Also knowing it not to have been long ago, he trawled through his shelves, causing books to fall and tumble out. It was all so stuffed to the brim, he decided to start organising first.
Only a couple of stacks now piled on the ground when the case came back to him. Endowment, endowment, it circled through his mind. Something had struck him back then about a certain regulation but he could not remember what. The amount? The circumstances? The persons involved?
Finally leaving the shelves for another time, Jellal strode down the long corridors to the archive. That was when he remembered where the file was. To get it, however, he needed a certain someone, currently curring in his office.
Erza let out a long sigh as she closed the door behind her. The morning was still fresh with a chill that had crept into her clothes and through her shawl. The exercise of running after a bunch of schoolboys had done her good, though she felt her legs ache slightly from all the other exercise she was doing. And it was not the battle on Tenrou Island.
Unequipping her outdoor clothing, she stretched her arms above her head, arching her back. There was still so much of the day left and she decided to start on a warm shower to revive her hands and face.
As she shuffled around the bedroom in search of Jellal's comfortable clothes after the shower, she heard a buzzing come from the nightstand. She reached over the mattress she had crawled on, lying on her stomach when retrieving the ringing device from where she had left it.
"Hey Erza," Meredy's voice sang before Erza had the chance to ask anything. She smiled.
"How did you know it would be me?" She asked, shuffling back up to kneel.
"Because Jellal is responsibly sitting at his desk, I'd assume,"
"Quite right,"
"And you picked up without shouting my name in panic or annoyance, so it couldn't be him," Meredy grinned against her own lacrima. She sounded as spunky as ever, blowing of wind and murmuring of voices telling Erza that the Maguilty Sense Mage was outside. It was not long until there was the clinking of a key and familiar creaking of the front door of their home. "I just came back from Wendy's – I really love the rooms at Fairy Hills; she showed me around,"
"How nice," Erza smiled again, remembering not to have offered her rooms yet.
"I can't believe you have a library and, oh, those baths!"
"You'll love them; they've always been my favourite place to go to," Erza said. "Speaking of which, I was going to give you my rooms if you're interested," she moved downwards a little, reaching out a hand to rummage beneath the sheets.
"Jellal told me so – and how high your rent was…" Meredy disclosed with what sounded like a grimace. The fridge's door opened next, followed by rustling.
"You can disconnect the rooms if you'd like." Erza's expression brightened when feeling what had to be Jellal's sleeping pants. She had to lift a leg to free it. "It would be good, actually; no one will rent as many rooms in the future,"
"I had a look at Levy's, too, but I really do like the view out your window," Meredy informed between chewing. "Did you know Evergreen refused to take over your position? Mira of course suspected it having to do with Elfman, but even if that's not true, I'm kind fearing to be the next Head Girl with Juvia's and Gray's ongoing activity…" she rambled on, the stove clicking in the back. Erza's ears perked.
"Ongoing activity?" She felt a light blush crawl to her cheeks, hardly understanding why with her own activities, though the image of it being someone else – and two of her closest teammates on top of that – was giving her a lightly fuzzy feeling.
"Oh, nothing serious, you know him," Meredy said with what sounded like a shrug. Smiling once again, Erza was glad to be hearing the newest member of the guild to be this adapted. She spoke of them as such close friends, treating them like it and not hesitating to show it, even to someone having spent so much more time with them. It was lovely to hear.
"True," Erza could not help another, this time hopeless smile. With Jellal's sweatpants now on her lap – the grey ones with the drawstring and the cuffs at his mid-calves – she groped further for the shirt that he slept in. It still smelled of him, at least she hoped so.
"I think she might sleep over on occasion but I doubt they'll move in together anytime soon,"
"He is not one to make such big steps easily. It's smart, I think," Erza commented, eyes sparking up triumphantly when having dug up the desired shirt. She nuzzled it to her face with a deep inhale before propping the lacrima between her shoulder and ear to start on putting on the lower part of the baggy attire.
"Unlike you guys…" Meredy snickered, something sizzling in the background.
"That's an entirely different issue – hold on, I have to put you down," Erza interrupted their chattering she found to very much enjoy, getting an almost identical reply. After having brushed over the shirt, snuffing again with a dreamy sigh, she picked the lacrima back up. She listened to the crackling and spluttering for another moment before it all died down alongside the hissing of the stovetop.
"Okay," Meredy reported back, cutlery clinking.
"Gray only just discovered to have feelings for Juvia. We've known for years," Erza defended herself while sauntering down the stairs towards the kitchen. Meredy laughed on the other end.
"I know, I know," she paused to chew, "I didn't intend any ill will," she ensured. "But Erza, I actually called for another reason,"
"Oh? What's that?" Erza strolled along the corridor, opening the door to the kitchen.
"I wanted to ask you where you got your pills and what they're called," Meredy asked in a quieter tone now. Erza's brows raised to their maximum but she was not fast enough to form any questions when her ear was practically bombarded with explanations. "It's not what you think, not at all! Only I'm on my period and my stomach's never been this terrible to me – it always was but not like this – and I heard that taking those hormones calms it down…" she faded back out.
Erza gave a soft exhale through her nose, smiling understandingly.
"Could that be why you purposely called during Jellal's work hours?"
"You know he would have never believed me! And he would have made such a scene again – I'd probably be walking around with a chain and lock for a belt only he could ever open when I'm, like, forty!" Meredy groaned, sucking in a breath the next second, something rattling as she had most likely nearly knocked something over in wild gesturing. Her chair scraped over the wooden flooring of the kitchen, telling Erza that something had, in fact, been knocked over.
"You know he's only watching out for you,"
"Can you believe he started that discussion with me in the middle of a fight?" The pink-haired mage went on, still puffing with being upset – glad to be venting to someone who understood her not to be actually hating on her older brother figure in her short fit of exasperation.
Erza frowned when hearing what had first sounded like a knock. She closed the fridge, standing still to hark whether it had come through the speaker. But it came again, despite the brief pause in their conversation. She felt her shoulders sink in delighted giddiness upon spotting Jellal's messenger bird at her window.
"Meredy, I apologise but I have to go," she excused when having unfolded and skimmed the note attached to the foot of the pigeon. It was a blessing to be getting it off without any inconveniences this time.
"Sure, but… the pills?"
"Oh, right. I went to the apothecary shop down the street and asked for what they advise when taking them for the first time. They will ask you about whether you're a Wizard or not and perhaps on your type of magic, but I would guess you to be prescribed the same as me. I'll send you the name,"
"Thanks! You're the best!" Meredy cheered, only hanging up after having enquired again whether it would really solve her problem.
The next thing Erza did was exchange her beloved's clothing for her own, trudging out the house a few minutes later with his left-behind files neatly stuffed into a bag, the pigeon forgotten, trapped inside the house once more.
"Ah, Erza,"
"Warrod," she nodded respectfully.
"What a rare sight to behold indeed,"
"Likewise. You don't come by Magnolia very often. But we have been in Era for almost two weeks now," Erza smiled where she still stood in the entrance hall, greeted by the member of the Magic Council himself.
"No, I mean you," she tilted her head, puzzled. Perhaps he thought it to be unusual of her not to be wearing armour but winter clothes? Then again, he had not seen her very often to begin with so he was hardly one to tell what she wore when it was cold outside. "One rarely gets to see you, or so I hear with that new hobby of yours," Hobby? Erza panicked for a second. Did the Council know of their almost daily – and nightly – engagements? This was the first time she had actually thought about them observing them inside the mansion they had provided. Not that she actually believed it but the possibility was there.
"Hobby?" Erza carefully asked, watching his smile with intent. He might have been a strange old wizard but even he would have had a different look in his eyes if he actually knew. He was just being his friendly quirky self.
"You know," Warrod winked so she awkwardly glanced away.
"Men!" She cringed, finally understanding that he only meant her being in a relationship, however weirdly he expressed it. Sighing in relief under her breath, Erza nodded.
"This joke is getting uncomfortable," she mumbled, making him snicker. "For a second, you sounded almost exactly like-"
"Sniff, sniff," a shiver travelled up her entire body, every hair standing on end and an involuntary yelp escaped her.
"Ichiya!" Erza spun around, shuddering to see his angular face sparkle and his nostrils flare.
"What an utmost pleasure to finally be feasting in your alluring presence again, sniff, sniff," he continued being himself, accompanying his actions by naming them for some reason. It was not like it was a battle move or a spell that needed to be spoken in order to be casted. He was just… Ichiya.
Feeling another shiver, Erza swallowed she momentary horror to keep a straight face, pretending not to feel the sweat that pooled in the back of her neck.
"I'm relieved to see that you've recovered well," she managed with only slowly unclenching jaws.
"Erza," hope fluttered in her stomach upon hearing her beloved's voice.
"Jellal," she turned, almost as desperately as she had spun hectically before. Seeing him come down the winding stairs and into the foyer, she nearly ran up to him, wanting to be saved somehow. She caught herself, however, restraining from throwing herself into his arms. So she stood there, really close, handing him the documents as if her life depended on it.
"Thank you," Jellal smiled gratefully. "What would I do without you?"
"Run up and down the hill?" She threw a grin and he chuckled.
He winced shortly when Ichiya not only came over, but commenced sniffing – vocally commenting himself again. Visibly uncomfortable, Jellal subconsciously put his arm around her waist, tugging her closer with as much politeness as his protectiveness could muster at that moment.
"I see our noble companion from the battle against Acnologia is here, too," Ichiya's hands formed pistols like they always did, something Erza hardly noticed by now. Only the sparkling that seemingly always surrounded him still ticked her off.
"It's good to see you doing well again," Jellal politely greeted the Blue Pegasus Mage. Her edging away did not pass him by, however, and he gently squeezed her side in surreptitious reassurance.
"And what an excellent perfume – the essence of love is strong in this assembly!" Ichiya twirled around himself, spreading more sparkles Jellal became confused at upon noticing.
"The what?"
"Just ignore him…" Erza muttered.
"And so it is your privilege now to indulge yourself in the exquisite perfume of Titania!" The short man continued, oblivious to their quiet exchange.
"Oh, Erza doesn't wear any perfume," Jellal clarified most cutely, she found, his attempts of remaining polite honouring him. Either their last meeting was long forgotten or Ichiya had managed to be serious – at least less awkward – than now. Than usual. She shook her head anyway, knowing how her beloved thought to be understanding the innuendos correctly. Which he was not. Her cheeks tinted with blush at how embarrassed she was on both of their behalves. This must have been one of her worst meetings with the obtrusive womaniser yet.
Warrod snickered again from where he watched the scene unfold.
Ichiya pointed at them anew with his finger guns. Jellal involuntarily winced, blinking in utter confusion.
"It is but the fragrance of youth – of passion and the undying fire that stokes up the odour of lust and devotion," the leader of the Trimens struck different poses to underline his statement. Whatever it had meant.
"He sure knows a lot of words for 'scent'," Jellal said under his breath.
"The scent of adulthood!"
"You lost me there," Jellal interrupted but Erza just sighed.
"Don't pay it too much mind," she waved her hand, trying to shove him back up the stairs and stick to his side at the same time. His escape was desirable before things got even more awkward but the last thing she wanted now was to be left along with that man.
"I apologise, but I still have work to attend to," Jellal got the notion, giving a brief bow towards Ichiya. Finally realising not to be listened to – or rather that someone else was talking, so it seemed – the chubby man whirled around again, pointing his three fingers intently.
"I believe we still have a matter to settle!" He spooked them, mostly Erza in her near flight, and Jellal unsuspiciously scooted in front of her to shield her from any more sniffing. "A race to see who really is the fastest," Jellal frowned, eyes shortly flashing up and down Ichiya with doubt. "Your Meteor against the magnificent Christina!" His fudgy voice exclaimed.
"Who's Christina?"
"The airship," Erza supplied.
"Ah," Jellal nodded.
"After her destruction, Blue Pegasus now proudly presents our newest and most advanced version: The Christina III!" He spun around himself in a whirlwind of sparkles, striking a pose.
"Why did you say it like that? Isn't it supposed to be pronounced 'three'?" Erza gave him a plain look and his jaw dropped overdramatically, appearing very much as if his ego had just cracked. But he caught himself, a smug twinkle in his eyes.
"Your tongue is sharp as always, my honey,"
"My what?" Jellal's brows rose, pupils shrinking. Erza rolled her lips inwards to stop herself from another dismissal towards Ichiya – she wanted to hear this.
"It is simply the banter of a lovestruck-"
"Now just a moment." Jellal's voice was cold as ice, trying to stay collected. "With all due respect, but I remember quite distinctly that you have already pointed out to be informed about our relationship, and yet you have the audacity to call her such a term of endearment in my presence." He all but growled, hardly taking a single breath. She did not even hear him inhale again, only feeling his ribcage expand against her own from the side.
Ichiya began to sweat profusely, for once recognising the situation to be serious.
"I didn't punish myself for over eight years to hear those words from someone else," Jellal remarked sharply, his tone dark, nearing a snarl. Erza tensed when seeing that the matter might be getting out of hand, even though Ichiya was retreating, rather frightened, stuttering excuses and giving insecure laughter.
"Work, Jellal," she carefully reminded her beloved. This time taking a deep inhale, he calmed himself.
"Right," he shook his head, briefly shutting his eyes. "My apologies," he courtly nodded to Ichiya, then bowed to Warrod whom Erza had completely forgotten about by now. "I need to pick up a couple of things in the archive – would you mind helping me carry this?" He addressed her and she accepted without hesitation, following him back up the stairs, always on his heels or by his side.
No way in hell would she risk being forced into another conversation or even worse: lunch with that odd creature of a wizard. That, and she now knew there could be a murder waiting for anyone hitting on her in the future.
"Do you think he heard a single thing of what I said?" Jellal asked in a hushed voice, his frown of bewilderment at the encounter still present. She shrugged.
"The last thing, guaranteed. The rest… not so much."