#its basically just bare salamander skin right there

[rxttenfish]

ah yes my great secret that i never talk about. the fact that anytime miranda gets wet shes also Incredibly Slimy.

[doginshoe]

The Draconian Huntress X

Summary: In a time where there is an impending war to come, Lucy sets forth to find the Draconian people in order to shift the tides against the demon King Zeref that threatens to take over Fiore. read on ff.net here

She hadn’t expected the news that came. Though, she didn’t know what she was expecting - what could the answer be of a country that had locked themselves away from the world?

The Draconians had no part in this war. They wouldn’t be fighting for the greater good - their country was selfish, yet loyal to no fault. The Draco people looked out for their own and that was it. Wars that weren’t their own didn’t concern them. And riches? The city was built upon the most precious ores to be found. Lucy thought it would come to grovelling at their knees for a country that had everything, but...

“They what?”

It seemed that every kingdom had a price.

“This can’t be serious,” Gray stated in disbelief, “They’ll only accept to ally with us if Lucy agrees to marry him?”

“Apparently Lucy has been promised to the chosen prince since before she was born…” Wendy mumbled, flinching from Gray’s rising tone.

He turned around from the window, his dark raven hair a mess from its usual cool style. “These creeps planned to marry off a child?” He was close to popping a vein. “No! There has to be other terms we can agree on. One of them nearly ripped Lucy apart just before!”

“This is an agreement between the Heartfilia bloodline and the Draconians for centuries.” Wendy looked down nervously before her eyes met with Lucy’s. “When your Mother took you away she broke that agreement… Their trust has been wounded and they won’t accept any other way to mend it.”

The archer stared down to the marble beneath her feet as she tried to absorb what Wendy relayed from the diplomatic meeting.

To marry the people her Mother ran from? The very thought made her stomach twist with something she couldn’t quite place.

“This isn’t right. Lucy’s mother took her away for a reason! They’re too unpredictable.”

The blonde continued to brood as Gray raged on. His words held truth. The Draconians were dangerous. That was clear the moment she had been pinned to the floor by the very prince that now asked for her hand. Yet, there was something different about him.

Her gut twisted again as she remembered the gazes burning holes into her back as she left the room. The Lieutenant's look of fury that made a steely shiver wrap down her spine. Almost as if he was imagining himself stabbing her through the back in that moment, her presence extinguished before she could infiltrate their kingdom more than she already had. But, the other eyes she felt staring at her backside…

It was a hunger. Not a hunger for blood or lust - for her. It pierced through her skin, straight to her soul. Similar to when his eyes had flashed gold before he had begun to attack her… the feeling unnerved her as it drove her instincts backwards. They told her to lean into him. To not resist him.

Her body reacted in ways she hadn’t felt before, ways she didn’t know it could. It left her confused and angry. Now, she was being asked to take his hand?

There were too many unanswered questions.

“I’m not letting Lucy marry the prince or any one of them.”

Gray placed a hand on Lucy’s shoulder and she looked up at him with hazy eyes. His eyes were slanted in his anger, mouth set into a frown as he spoke.

“War or not. I won’t pawn you off to help our cause. We will find another way.”

“Gray,” Lucy whispered quietly and he shook his head. The winter sprite had few weaknesses, but his family was one of them. He would lay down his life before he saw someone he cared about get hurt. The blonde had witnessed that when she had first met the stubborn boy when he was sixteen. His normally cool gaze turning deadly when she had been injured, or even before when Erza pushed her too much in training. It was his eyes that lingered on her cuts and bruises so fiercely that she knew he hated seeing her hurt.

He treated her too much like a little sister.

“I agree with Gray, Lucy,” Wendy piqued up, but shrank back when both their gazes turned to her. The young girl grabbed her arm as she looked down before turning her eyes back to them. “In that meeting… The way they talked of your mother.” Her brows narrowed as she became set in her resolve. “They definitely knew why she had ran from the kingdom. I don’t believe it’s safe here for us, especially for you.”

Lucy nodded as she stood, the freshly bandaged wound feeling tight around her thigh. Gray hovered over her to steady her shaky legs but she brushed him off. A sigh left her lips as she began to speak, “I know Erza is counting on us to get back to the battlefield-”

“Lucy!”

“Gray, I know she will be proud to fight beside us whether we convince them to follow us or not,” the blonde cut him off, “but we will fail if we don’t have the Draconians joining our side.” Lucy looked both her comrades in the eye. “This I know.”

“I don’t know why my mother ran or why I was even raised here. My childhood… It’s a mystery to me.” Her eyes softened as she continued. “I know you’re both worried and I don’t trust them either, but this is my only option. For the war and for myself.”

The winter sprite turned his face away, his frown deepening with every passing moment. Lucy knew he could not come around easily - she herself wasn’t even completely convinced with her resolve. However, the war looming over them swayed her greatly. Gray would see her reasoning soon enough when he is not blinded by his protective side.

Another sigh left Lucy’s lips before small hands wrapped around her own. Her eyes flickered to meet Wendy’s, the young girl giving her a soft smile.

“I- no, we understand,” she said gently, “Even if we don’t like it we will still support you, Lucy.”

The blonde smiled. “Thank you, Wendy.”

“I’ve got your back no matter what,” Gray grumbled out and both girls looked towards him. His face was still set in an icy glare and Lucy knew she would get an earful if something were to go wrong, but he would be there at every step of the way.

Wendy grinned as Lucy nodded, the looks they gave each other all confirming their decision.

The Heartfilia’s would be reunited with the Draconian kingdom.

-

As Lucy approached the council room she felt her nerves rise up once again. She had fought beasts and wondered through some of the most feared places in the country, but there was something about being in front of royals that made her stomach churn and her palms sweaty, especially that her audience were Draconians.

“I have considered your terms,” Lucy began the lines that Wendy had instructed her but before she could even get a sentence out the old man’s hands raised to silence her.

“Please wait for the King to allow you to begin,” the advisor interrupted. His eyes turning to Natsu who sat at the centre of the table who sent the man on his right a pointed glare.

The archer could feel her face burn as she tried to hold her tongue.

“Uh,” Natsu coughed as he looked at Lucy, “you may… wait, what do I say again?” He turned to Yajima and a snicker could be heard from his left where the war General and Lieutenant sat.  

“You may approach, Lady Lucy Heartfilia.”

The prince nodded. ”You may approach…” He cleared his throat. “Lady Lucy..”

Her eye twitched as she tightened her jaw. What sort of ruler didn’t even understand his own lines. Even she could remember her basic etiquette despite having dropped her formalities years ago.

“As I was saying, I will accept your terms.” Her cheeks darkened for the second time. “To be your bride that is if my own conditions are met.”

Natsu’s eyes widened along with the other members on the table.

Lucy cleared her throat. “I will not be wed until after the Draconians have marched with us to the field of Mavis and the war is over, but I promise myself to you-”

“Bullshit,” Gajeel’s gruff voice rose up as his hand came down to slam on the table, “You’re the one asking us to fight your war. You can’t make demands!”

“Gajeel!” Yajima interjected but he silenced him with a deadly look as he pointed to Lucy.

“We shoulda just killed her now while she stands within our walls. Then Natsu can find a true mate,” he yelled and the archer took a step back to Wendy and Gray, her brows narrowing. Yet, there was barely time to mull over the words as a crash echoed throughout the large room.

Natsu had stood up, his chair falling to the ground as he gave Gajeel a fierce look with eyes that flashed gold.

“What did you say?” he growled.

“You heard me,” the Lieutenant snarled as he stood up himself, “Those Heartfilia bitches have done us no good since her mother ran outta here. We need a King! Not to be fighting war that aren’t ours.”

Natsu pushed his forehead against Gajeel’s.

“If you lay a single hand on her I’ll-”

“You’ll what, Salamander?”

“I’ll burn you to ash,” he snapped, as red scales began to form along his cheeks.

Gajeel grinned. “You ain’t strong enough to stop me. Not while you aren’t bound to her completely.” He let out a strange laugh before he jabbed a hand to the prince’s chest. “It’d be like fighting a raging squirt before he can fly.”

“Is that a challenge?” Natsu growled

“De provocatione ad throni.”

“Nam throni,” the prince spat as he turned away from the dark haired man.

“Laxus, prepare the Sanguis Pit whilst Yajima rings the bells,” he ordered, “and make sure Lucy has a good view. I want her to watch as I beat this bastard into the dirt.”

“Sire- Natsu, are you sure about this?” his advisor chased after him, but he only slammed the doors as Gajeel cackled.

[the-stick-scribblers]

In the Vague Dark

Prompt: Inside-Out

Christine poured herself another glass of wine, but before she drank any of it, she lay back against the dirt and closed her eyes, blocking out the chattering of her friends and focusing, instead, on the rain pouring down on the glass observatory roof overhead.  She was already three glasses in, but they'd brought an entire case of merlot out here from the fundraising event currently going on inside the mansion to which the observatory was attached.

"We're in a real-life game of Clue," Whitney said, her voice dreamy.

Christine, generally, liked to keep track of how many drinks everyone had -- it made her feel better about herself, for one thing, and it helped her feel more in control of the situation too.  But she wasn't sure she was doing a good job tonight.  Whitney was on glass four -- five?

Opening her eyes, Christine did her best to focus them on the rain against the glass, but between the wine making her vision fuzzy, and the blurred nature of rain on glass in the dark, it had a hypnotic effect.  "No murder," she said.

"What?"

"We can't be in a real-life game of Clue.  Clue is all about murder, and that has nothing to do with anything."

Whitney scoffed, and Christine could picture her shaking her head, brushing off her comment.  Christine shrugged her shoulders even though it meant rubbing dirt into her blouse.

Inside the mansion, the party went on.  Christine could hear it, in the form of a low, constant murmur.  It seemed incongruous with the smell of plant life in her nose, the taste of dirt on her tongue.  Or, no -- that was the wine, but there was something earthy about it in any case.  And wasn't there something about the nose and the tongue being connected, so that to sense with one was essentially to sense with the other?

She stuck her tongue out and, for some reason, was surprised that it felt warm in the night air.  No warmer than the rest of her, but warmer than it seemed like it ought to.  She lifted her hand and clamped her tongue between thumb and forefinger.

"What the fuck are you doing, Chris?" Whitney said from several feet behind Christine's head.  She let go of her tongue and arched her back, stiffening her neck so she could look, upside-down, behind herself and see him.

"You're inside-out," she said and laughed.  "Upside-down."

Now that they had given up on the fundraiser entirely, with no thoughts of returning indoors and trying to maintain any real degree of dignity, Christine felt lighter -- except for the guilt; they were supposed to be supporting Jesse, after all, and it was a good cause, saving an endangered species of salamander or something.  But there wasn't much she could do about that now, so she sat up and left it behind on the dirt.

On her feet, she shifted, unsteady, but she felt a little clearer-headed than she had before taking her brief siesta on the ground.  "I've never been in a real conservatory before," she said and started poking around.

"What is it anyway?  Conservatory," Whitney said, and then she repeated it a few times, like she was tasting the word in her mouth, exercising it.

"It's for -- conserving things?" Christine offered, and then she laughed at herself again.  "What is this place usually?" she said, trailing the tips of her fingers over a deep green plant leaf.  It looked wrong and sort of magical -- like the rain overhead.  Here in the earliest days of spring, the world was all mud and dead leaves leftover from fall, newly visible and slimy as the snow melted.

Christine turned in time to see Whitney shrug.  She shucked her tailored jacket and dropped it onto a small tree as though it were a coat rack.  "Event venue," he said.  She began turning on her toes in slow circles.  "Sometimes-home of some rich guy who's got so many houses he's basically never home, no matter which one he's in."

Christine nodded, more to herself than to Whitney.  She'd always been curious about these big old, Victorian houses on the hill, overlooking the rest of the town.  Now that she was here for the first time, she found it generally disappointing.  But this -- this was nice.

"If I lived in this house," she said, "I would pull my bed and all the couches in here."

She tipped her head back and closed her eyes.  "And this is where all the parties would be."

"With your bed in the middle of the room?" Whitney said -- joking, but not without an edge to her tone, as though she really was bothered by this idea, despite its make-believe quality.

"You're such a prude," Christine said, making her voice sound unconcerned, even though really she wanted a little bit of a fight.

But Whitney didn't bite, either because she was too distracted by her own drunkenness or because she knew Chris too well, even inebriated as they both were.

Despite the itch to argue, the warm comfort of fondness unraveled Christine's resolve, a different sort of emotional pleasure, and one that she decided to accept.

The room, if it could be called a room, was arranged in a maze-like series of plant beds and aisles between them, scattered with the occasional bench or bird bath, though these seemed to be purely for the aesthetic, since this was technically all inside and from what Christine had seen, there were no birds here at all.

Despite the fact that there were, in fact, places to sit that were designed for that purpose, Christine, upon deciding that her legs had grown too syrupy and elastic to hold her up any longer, plopped down into one the plant beds.  She leaned back against the palms of her hands, feeling them sink into the loose earth, just a little.

It took her a moment to realize what seemed off about the way the cool dirt felt beneath her over-warm hands.  it was damp.  Almost wet, as it might have felt in the rain, without the glass roof overhead.

Christine looked up again, squinting through the gray-dark, trying to see if there was a leak in the ceiling.  "Do you feel anything?" she said.  "Like raindrops?"

"Okay," Whitney said and began to make her way over.  "You're cut off."

"No, come here."  Christine held out a muddy hand, rusty in the lack of light, and Whitney took it, allowing Chris to pull her closer.

Christine dragged Whitney forward until she had to bend over, pushing her hand into the dirt where Christine's had been a moment before.

"Jesus," Whitney said as she toppled, catching herself only barely, braced over Christine in the plant bed.  She righted herself immediately, and for a moment, it looked like she was going to wipe her hands clean on her new dress, before she remembered where they were or what it had cost her and thought better of it.  In that moment, she looked down at her hands, and she realized at the same time that Chris did: that the dirt was more red than brown.

Whitney might have been better off than Chris was giving her credit for, because she caught on before Chris did.  She staggered back and away, as though she could escape from her own hands.

Christine heard a goofy laugh spring from her own throat before she came to understand what Whitney understood already.  Still, her body moved faster than her mind.  She turned her head to look, even as she began to wonder if she wouldn't be better off standing, moving away, following Whitney back inside where they could wash their hands and forget all about coming out here in the first place.

But she didn't move away.  She looked down at the dirt beneath her hands, and in the vague light of the dying evening, caught a glimmer that, once seen, couldn't be ignored.

Her horror spread through her like a dawn, slow and unstoppable.  And maybe it was the wine wrapping, rope-like, around her mind, holding her back from reasonable or rational response, but before she knew what she was doing, she held it in her hands, her two hands, cupped in her palms as though it were water, only a pool formed by the rain, rather than what it really was: cold, and solid, and heavy.  The word impossible to hold, unlike the thing itself.  Until suddenly it wasn't, until her mind snapped back into her control.  The thing flew out of her hands and onto the chill tile floor of the path, and the word flew into her head, almost out of her mouth, but she clamped one muddied hand over it just in time.  Heart.

For a moment that seemed to draw itself out, longer and longer, Christine and Whitney remained still and staring, looking down at the dirt-masked thing between them on the ground.  Unmistakable shape, even though everything about it was wrong, wrong --

Neither of them spoke.  Christine didn't even realize she was tipping forward, leaning closer to the earth and tile, until she felt Whitney's hands on her shoulders, keeping her in place.  Dimly, she thought that there would be rust-colored hand prints, two perfect stamps, on her beautiful new blouse.

Whitney pressed her palms to the curves of bone beneath shirt and skin and muscle, dug her fingers in, and lifted, so in a second, Christine was on her feet.  And without a word, Whitney led her back inside, jacket left behind or forgotten entirely.  "We need to wash our hands," Christine heard her say, and she could only nod.