Chapter Eight

The Tiger snored gently. Her breath rumbling in time to the sound of the engine. Natsu eyed her enviously from his position squashed up against a crate. "I don't see why she gets the entire seat to herself," he grumbled. He tetchily batted a duffel bag by his shoulder and wriggled around to find a more comfortable position.

"Because she needs to rest before her big audition," Erza replied matter-of-factly. She was leaning back against a roll of sleeping bags, her position in the back of the jeep by far the most comfortable.

Lucy looked at her through the pretzel of her legs. As usual, she had the worst position of the three, crammed as she was, into the smallest available corner between teetering mounds of Erza's luggage. "I don't see why I couldn't sit in front. The seat is big enough."

"There are only two airbags in front. Safety is important."

"How is this any safer?"

"Hmm, what was that, Lucy?"

"N-nothing Erza!"

Wendy giggled, her dragon-slayer hearing allowing her to eavesdrop on their bickering. Gray glanced at her curiously, one eye still on the road. "What's so funny?" he asked.

"Nothing really, Gray-san."

"I'm glad to see you're feeling better."

Wendy bit her lip. Avoiding the overcrowded backseat had not been the only reason she had faked motion-sickness that day. There was something she wanted to talk to Gray about. It had surprised her when she realised that she had not mentioned it in the past year, the flurry of battle and the relief of victory having chased it from her mind. This last two weeks, rehashing her Sky Sisters choreography with the Tiger had brought it back. It was hard to think about Cheria without remembering the sacrifice she had made for her, the guilt she would always bear in her heart.

She steeled her nerves. "Gray-san," she said, her voice strong and unwavering. "I need to tell you something."

Gray shifted gears. Wendy sounded serious. He took the speed of the vehicle down from breakneck to brisk and gave her his full attention. The words that came from his lips sent a shiver down his spine.

"It's about Ultear-san."


The hooded figure slinked through the streets stealthily, its brethren right behind it. It stopped at a corner and peered into the street on the other side. Silently, it signalled its companions forward. Their mission was one of stealth, it would not do to be careless.

The group slipped into a store along the main thoroughfare of the town, executing their mission with the expediency that only a well-oiled team possessed. In unison, they nodded to the first figure, who turned to lead the way to their next destination.

And promptly bumped into a similarly hooded figure exiting a jewellery store.

"Hey, watch where you're going!" Natsu yelled, his hood having been pulled off in the collision.

"Huh, Nakku?" the redhead said, pushing her glasses up her nose. Her hood too had fallen over her shoulders. "What are you doing here?"

Erkis glanced up as another one of the hooded individuals stepped forward. "Erkis, how fortunate to run into you. We were just on our way to meet you." Erza's face was barely visible under the cowl.

"Erza!" Erkis said, "How fortunate that you are here! It's a disaster. Everything is a disaster." She sniffed back tears. A few passers-by stopped and stared. Their whispering seemed to shake her from whatever was on her mind. She swiftly pulled up her hood. "We can't talk here. Come, let's go back to the guild."

A few minutes later, Erkis was ushering them into one of the warm greenrooms at Fairy Nail. She set a kettle on the hob before drawing back her hood and sighing gustily.

"So what's the matter?" Erza asked, unbuckling one of the hundred lanyards she had repurposed to strap Gray into his robe.

Erkis raised an eyebrow. "He has a tendency to strip," Lucy explained half-heartedly, helping Erza untie Gray. "We couldn't risk him exposing us by exposing himself."

The actresses nodded absentmindedly, drumming her fingers across the table. She was only half listening. She cast an eye over the group. "You have two new members I see. And where are your cats?"

"We're Exceeds. Not cats," Charle corrected haughtily, throwing off her robe. She was standing on top of Happy's shoulders, the poor blue cat struggling under her weight. Not that he would dare voice such a complaint.

"You can call me Tiger," the Guardian said in a smooth purr, striking a dramatic pose. Erkis would have probably had questions about a talking tiger had her present predicament not been so pressing.

Erza repeated her question. "Erkis. What's the matter?"

Erkis' face crumpled. "Oh Erza-san, it's terrible. Tonight is the opening night of my new play and the diamond necklace that the deuteragonist gives my character is damaged!"

"Oh, is that why you were at the jewellers?" Lucy asked.

"Yes," Erkis nodded, "our stage manager Lizalla took it in for cleaning. Unfortunately, the clasp was damaged in the process. I was trying to see if they could speed up the repair, but alas, there is no hope." She took off her glasses and cleaned them with the edge of her sweater in a nervous gesture. "It's a pivotal scene in the story when the young girl realises she does not want the riches he can offer because she is in love with the hero. If we don't have the necklace, there is no scene!"

"Is that all?" Erza said mildly, a plan forming in her mind as she spoke. "Don't worry, we'll take care of it."


The maiden stepped across the wooden boards, her long skirts rustling through the silent theatre. The audience sat transfixed, waiting for her to speak. And speak she did. Every twitch of her fan, every tremble of her hand, even every flex of her well-turned ankle spoke volumes. By the time she opened her mouth to utter the first words of her soliloquy, the audience already knew who she was, how she felt. Onstage, Erkis was transformed.

The Tiger watched her, the very picture of a girl in love. Her heart clenched. She knew that feeling well. Up, in the heavens, where the entirety of human existence was but a blink of the Heavenly Emperor's eye; someone waited for her as well. She felt the solid magic pulse of the Key in her pocket. Soon.

As the woman on stage grew more anguished, her memories drifted to a young man, weeping over the body of his lover, knowing they were parted forever. That no amount of magic could ever bring them together again. "Why?" he had turned to her back then, his voice cracking. But she had had nothing to say.

She wondered, had she said spoken, if things would not have turned out the way they did. Her grief had blotted the sense from her mind. She had only watched numbly, as her best friend's body had been carried away by his lover.

There were rumours. Of a palace made of bone, where the young man roamed the halls, driven mad by his grief. Of her comrades, chased into hiding, lest they be next.

She remembered her own terror, when death had knocked on her door and how she had escaped it.

The girl in the seat next to her sniffed, pulling her away from her thoughts. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the boy next to her stiffly pass her a handkerchief. The boy who wore dragon skin about his neck so proudly. It had given her pause at first but her doubts had soon been snuffed out. There was something about these wizards that made her trust them.

She could only hope they would survive what was to come.


"The necklace looks beautiful, Gray," Erza said.

"I could have done better if I had had more time," he bragged.

Her smile was invisible in the darkened wings of the stage. The bright stage lights caught the ice in Erkis' hand, scattering the light across the floor like a shower of diamonds. Beyond the proscenium, the audience sat captivated, Erkis' performance bringing to life the love in her character's heart with such finesse. Here, on the inside of the fourth wall, the performance was somehow more intimate; the layers richer and more imbued with meaning. It was a privilege to see it.

"For someone who's never been in love, she's doing a remarkable job, don't you think?" Gray leaned in to whisper.

Erza's reply was cut off by a fierce shushing noise. A girl with short, silver hair scribbled on her clipboard and turned it to them. 'NO TALKING IN THE WINGS!' The word 'no' having been underlined thrice. Erza stifled a laugh. Lizalla was so different from the Lisanna they knew. She tilted her head towards the door that lead backstage and Gray followed her out.

It was dark in the corridor outside, with barely enough space for the two of them to stand without touching. Erza leaned against the wall, her leg propped up against it. She crossed her arms over her chest and eyed the boy across her critically. His hands were in his pockets, his posture relaxed.

"What about you?" she asked.

He looked at her quizzically, his expression was barely discernible in the gloom. Had they been carrying on a conversation that he was unaware of?

"Have you ever been in love?"

The sudden question confused him. He cast about for an answer but he did not know what to say. Was not quite sure why she was asking.

"What about Juvia?"

"What about Juvia?" he replied tersely. His tone bordered on defensive. He knew now, where this was going.

His laconic reply irked her. "You were meant to give her an answer at the Grand Magic Games. That was two years ago. You were meant to give her an answer after our battle with the Alvarez Empire. That was one year ago. From what I can see, you have not given her an answer as yet." The bile rose in her throat and crept into tone. "You're playing with her feelings. Leaving her hanging. It's not fair to her."

Gray blinked slowly. "I can't help but feel this isn't all about Juvia."

Erza flinched. Gray instantly regretted what he said. She was hurt enough as it is. The Erza he had seen in the last few weeks was so different from the Erza he knew. She was coming undone. He saw her posture shift, her shoulders growing hunched and defensive. He knew she was readying herself to apologise when he spoke.

"I don't know." He ran his hands through his hair and sighed. "I don't know! Shouldn't I know by now? It's been over three years. Shouldn't I know by now if I loved her back?"

Erza looked up, surprised. He took a deep breath and continued, "For three years, we've fought together, trained together. Heck, we've even lived together. Shouldn't that be enough? How can I not know after all that?" He stared at the floor, as though committing the lines and grooves in the wood to memory. "Sometimes I think that not knowing is in itself an answer."

"Gray…" she began, but her voice withered in her throat. She was not sure how she would have finished that sentence anyway.

It did not matter. Gray was not really listening. It felt good to finally get this off his chest. "She gave her life for me. And even then, in my anger and grief, all I could think was that her future had been stolen from her. Not our future, but her future. As though they were separate entities.

"I care for her deeply. That much I do know. But love?" he tailed off, at a loss.

Gray's gaze was still intent upon the floor, as though the whorls in the wood held the answers he was looking for. The silence between them was as turbulent as the look on his face.

"Maybe it is hard to recognise what love feels like when you have not been in love before," she offered weakly.

"I was in love with you when we were kids and it wasn't a problem then."

Erza gasped. Gray's jaw hung open, the confession as much a surprise to him as it had been to her. He wondered if he could somehow suck the words back into his mouth, like Natsu eating flames. Why had he said that? The sound of the audience laughing from the auditorium spilled into the ensuing silence.

"You said it yourself, we were kids," she said firmly, her underlying nervousness concealed from her voice, "It was probably puppy love. Things are different as an adult."

The brush-off hurt more than he had expected. "Really? Didn't you and Jellal start as kids too?"

Erza bristled. "That was different. What Jellal and I shared, what we still share, it is-"

"Doesn't change the fact that he's been free for a year and still hasn't come for you, does it?" he said nastily.

Hurt flashed across Erza's face. He had taken her biggest insecurity and twisted it in her side. Gray briefly considered saying something else. To try and negate what he had said. But he found himself unable to. Not with the mood he suddenly found himself in. He left before he could say anything else he'd regret.


Later, he wondered if he had felt bitter about this for a long time. That he had been in love with Erza but she had never given him a second glance, she had always been too busy looking at, looking for Jellal. That maybe she had been so hung up on the romantic notion of them being star-crossed lovers that she had never once considered that someone who loved her so desperately stood waiting, right under nose.

He had moved on, he reminded himself, but he supposed the embers of his resentment still burned under his skin. Her casual dismissal of his revelation irritated him more than it should have. He did not love her anymore, that was true, and he had long since accepted that the only thing he would ever receive from her would be rejection. But he had not expected her to belittle his feelings. To dismiss their intensity. 'Puppy love, my arse,' he thought, 'you don't pine after someone for almost eight years because of puppy love.'

He stopped in the middle of the quiet street and sighed. It turned out old wounds still ached sometimes. He would apologise to her when he got back. She had not deserved his cruelty, not when he knew the full extent of her feelings about Jellal.

He would apologise, not because it was the right thing to do, but because not making things right between them would be unbearable. That was what it meant to be nakama, right?


Memories were trickling into her mind. Seemingly meaningless things that she had long forgotten now took new importance. Gray, age 10, flushing pink when Macao and Wakaba said he had a crush on her. Gray, age 13, stuttering as he handed her a Valentine's card, claiming he found it on the ground; maybe she'd like it because she liked girly things?

The trickle grew to a flood. Flashes of images, whispers of rumours, all rolled together into a whirlwind of chaos. Happy, telling Lucy how Gray had gone berserk against one of the Assassin's Guild in the Tower of Heaven. Gray, on the roof of the automobile as they chased after Lullaby, telling her to slow down or the SE Plug would drain all her magic. Natsu, casually mentioning that Gray had been willing to lay down his life against Racer, so that Erza could be saved. Gray's strong back, so much like Grandpa Rob's, protecting her from Lyon as he tried to chop off her arm. She clenched her fist, there was too much, this was too much. How had she not seen? How had she not realised? Gray, on Galuna Island, looking at her with betrayal in his eyes when she insisted they return to the guild. Gray, finding her the day before her S-Class trial, pretending to pick a fight only to end up wishing her luck. Teenage Mira, whispering about how Gray was going to ask the girl he liked to ride on the Fantasia float with him. He had asked her that year, and she had assumed it was because his crush had turned him down. How could she have been so stupid?

He had loved her. For far longer than he had implied. Like shadows added to a lifeless drawing, her memories were now shaded with new meaning. It made her feel shaky. What else had she missed? Her boots thudded heavily against the cobblestoned streets. She did not know where she was going, only that she had suddenly felt claustrophobic; as though the theatre was too small to contain the cataclysmic shock of Gray's words. She had tried to stop it, to brush his words under the carpet and forget about them, but he had not let her. She felt almost angry with him for it. She could not breathe. She leaned against the low parapet of the bridge she suddenly found herself on, the waters in the river below churning as fast as her thoughts.

He had loved her. For so many years, he had loved her but he had never said. Perhaps it was better that he had not. Her heart could not have loved him back. The guilt would have crushed her. She was grateful for it. But she was angry too. Angry that he did not think he could trust her with his feelings. Angry that he had been right, because what had she done when he had? The thoughts warred in her brain, the paradox of her emotions swirling.

With a frustrated scream she requipped a sword into her hand, slashing at an imagined foe. She stepped into a quinte and thrust, before tossing the sword into her left hand and parrying. The movement was already helping clear her brain. With her usual dangerous grace, she slid into a flèche, disarming her opponent. The familiar movements of the routine calmed her. Like the wind, she whirled around, her sword spinning in a molinet before slicing into an oberhau. The world around her faded away. She poured her feelings into her blade. Shred her turmoil to ribbons. That night, on an empty bridge in southern Tekka, Erza danced with her sword.

At last, she brought the forte of her sword down upon her opponent's skull, banishing them to oblivion along with her conflict. She let the tip of the sword fall, resting it against the ground as she tried to catch her breath. She swept the sweat from her forehead and a determined expression fixed itself onto her face. There was only one thing left to do. With a flick, she stowed her sword and set off towards their hotel.


Natsu grumbled as he stepped out of Fairy Nail, Lucy slung across one shoulder. "Natsu-san, look at me, I can fly." Wendy stumbled in a circle, her arms at her sides like wings.

"That's not how you fly, stupid. This is!" Charle tapped Happy on the head. He unfurled his wings and took off, drunkenly listing to the side.

"Pfft, rubbish. This is the only way to fly." The Tiger raised a fist into the air theatrically and jumped. She fell flat on her face.

The others fell over laughing. Natsu scratched his head in irritation. He was the only remotely sober one in the group. A traitorous hiccup made its way up his throat. OK, maybe he was not as sober as he thought.

The booze had flown a bit too freely at the cast party. Too many people had wanted to toast to Erkis' success. Even Happy had fallen. He muttered a curse. Stupid Gray, they were usually in this together. He had been abandoned. 'Well,' he thought to himself, 'at least Erza is not here.' He shuddered to think of the scolding she would have laid on the unsuspecting members of Fairy Nail. She could not even recognise her own guild members when drunk, he could not imagine the horror she would have unleashed on the lookalikes. He hoisted Lucy higher onto his shoulder. She squirmed in his grip, her bum smooshing into his face.

That had been another problem. Drunk Lucy was horny as all hell. Lucy and her doppelganger, Lucia, had drunk up a storm before turning their sex appeal on Natsu and Nakku. He almost believed it had been accidental on Lucy's part. Almost. After their little verging-on-a-tryst in the swamp the week before, he was not quite sure what to think. He tried not to think about it anyway, his body reacted inappropriately to the memory every time it surfaced.

"Fine, maybe I'm a cat that can't fly. But can you do this?" The Tiger slurred, before growing to twenty times her size. She towered over the buildings, her underbelly catching and destroying the tops of some. She flexed her muscles and struck a pose.

"Waaah, stop damaging the town! We're poor enough as it is!" Lucy complained, drumming her fists on Natsu's leg. He reluctantly set her down, her little fists were getting irritating. Big mistake. Lucy's blouse was gaping open. "Hey Natsu," she said, "I'm a cat too. Meow." She batted his cheeks with her balled up fist. Damn it. She was cute. Suddenly, Lucy disappeared from view. He looked down to see she had lain herself at his feet. She wriggled, her lower body lifting off the ground towards him. "I'm a cat, Natsu. Scratch my belly."

The blood drained from his face. He looked around urgently, hoping no one from Fairy Nail could see this. Nakku and Lucy had been pretty enthusiastic about Lucy and him joining them for their night-time activities. Nakku, in particular, had been eager to make love to himself. Natsu did not want to dwell on the screwed up thinking behind that. When Lucy had inadvertently made a joke that was misinterpreted as an acceptance of the invitation, Natsu had put his foot down. Now he was tasked with shepherding this rowdy bunch back to the hotel. He dragged Lucy up from the floor and looked upwards. "Come on, Furry-chan, time to get yourself small again."

The Tiger barely heard him. It had been a long time since she had been this big. The air smelled cleaner up here. She hummed a tune and looked around the town. It was so peaceful at this time of night. Finally, with a sigh, she realised she should probably not cause more trouble for the dragon slayer. "Alright Natsu, I'm coming down," she said, "Huh? Natsu? Where did they go?"


She was waiting for him on the wide stone steps that lead up from the piazza to the road their hotel was on. "I'm sorry," she said, as he walked up to her.

"What are you sorry for?"

"For not-"

"You didn't owe me anything," he cut her off before she could speak the words. The rejection would sting, even after these years. Besides, he was speaking the truth. "You don't owe me anything."

"Still, I should have at least noticed."

"How? It's not like I proclaimed it from the rooftops."

She winced inwardly. To anyone who had been looking, it had been as if he had done just that. She got to her feet and dusted off her skirt. "Then, at least let me apologise for earlier."

"Only if you'll let me apologise to you. What I said, it was unwarranted."

"It seems that we are at an impasse," she smiled wryly.

He chuckled. The wind picked up, setting the strands of her long red hair dancing to invisible music. "Let's go home, shall we?" he said, walking up the steps.

The words unexpectedly warmed her heart. Yes, home. Not to where the guild was, but to where their nakama were. They would always be their home. He would always be hers.

She reached out and grabbed his arm to stop him. There was so much she wanted to say to him in that moment, but the words choked in her throat. The lump of emotion was too much to swallow. He gently placed his hand upon hers.

"I know," he said simply.

Tears rushed to her eyes and she hurriedly blinked them away. His eyes looked suspiciously moist as well. She nodded at him. "Let's go home."


"Natsu! Wendy! Lucy!" she said, pushing open the door to the room. The beds that lined the walls were unoccupied.

"Hmm, maybe they're still at the party," Gray said.

"Maybe." Her eyes drifted to the clock on the wall. It was getting late. She hoped they'd be back soon. She stepped onto the balcony and a giant form in the distance caught her attention immediately. It looked suspiciously cat-like. "Hey Gray," she called back into the room, "There's something weird going on."

When no response came, she returned indoors. "Gray?" she repeatedly curiously. The room in front of her was empty.

"Erza, watch out!"

She spun towards the sound, her heart thudding loudly in her ears.

Then it all went black.


A/N: Oh dear, everything got serious rather suddenly didn't it? Thanks to everyone who faved and followed! Please review if you have the inclination.

A/N 2: Drop me a message if you want to discuss anything Grayza. I have one friend who has seen Fairy Tail and she is not a Grayza fan. I have so many feelings T_T.

A/N 3: Any fencing enthusiasts out there? I think my little sword dancing bit might have been awkward AF. Let me know.

See you next time!