Fairy Tail 1. Chapter 1

The attack on the Mage Guild Fairy Tail had destroyed several buildings in the village along with the main building, but it hadn't disheartened the mages enough to stop fighting against Phantom. In the after math Fairy Tail's guild members stood strong as they went through the wreckage of the fallen dark guild and the ruins of what had once been their own guild. Looking for any signs of survivors, or wounded.

Among the people found in the dark guild's wreckage was Natsu the resident dragon slayer. Bruised and bloody.

And a few feet away was Lucy Heartphilia, the girl that Natsu had tried to save...

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Natsu walked through the front doors of the newly constructed bar with flowers in hand and ignored the sudden silence that filled the room as the other guild members stopped their talking, laughing and arguing to watch him walk towards the back where Lucy was.

"Poor Narsu. Having his partner wounded so badly must really be eating him up inside." Someone said softly.

"Wouldn't it eat _you_ up inside if you had been right there and still failed to reach her?" Another argued in a hushed tone. Not wanting to draw the dragon slayers attention to them. The last time someone had said something like that had been after Natsu's former partner's death and the teen had heard them. There had been blood all over the walls and ceiling from the person that Natsu had almost beaten to death.

But that time was considerably different from this time. Even Natsu's partner was different.

He'd already had one woman die on him. He didn't want another to do the same.

That was why he had worked himself so hard to become the _best_ mage in the guild. And if not for his age, he would have already been named as the next guild master. Natsu had such extraordinary potential. He merely chose to use it differently.

And there was nothing wrong with that since his fellow guild members still needed him available in the field.

Still- everyone was starting to worry about the nineteen year old. It had been almost a month since Phantom had fallen and though Natsu's wound had healed up nicely, he wasn't the only person who had had the damn building fall on his head.

Lucy had been trapped under the rubble too. Wounded badly and just barely alive.

Everyone in the guild could recall the way Natsu had yelled and screamed and tried to reach the young woman when she had been uncovered. He'd thought that she was dead. They all had at first. There had been so much blood, and she had lain so still...

Natsu had been utterly _terrified_ that he had lost another partner.

It had taken a well placed blow to the back of the neck to quiet him and stop him from struggling to reach the girl so that the others could get her out of the ruins and start healing her. She'd suffered severe blood loss, broken bones, and some swelling of the brain and they had almost lost her _twice_.

Yet here it was a month later. Her wounds were completely healed and she had yet to awaken even though the elf woman that treated their master had assured them that Lucy was fine now and would wake up.

Which they had all been relieved to hear yet they couldn't help but still worry. Natsu slipped into the room and quietly closed the door and walked over to Lucy's bed and stared down at her for a moment. God she looked so pale and sickly.

The month straight of non stop sleep hadn't helped her out very much. She'd lost weight, her once golden blond hair had become limp and lifeless. Her complexion was so pale that he could almost see the veins under her skin.

"Luc...are you ever going to open your eyes?" _Will you ever come back to me?_ Natsu wondered as he set the flowers down on the bed next to her head and leaned down so that he was leaning over her and touched his forehead to hers and closed his eyes against the wave of grief he felt building in his chest as he slipped his fingers into her hair, brushing it back from her was so engrossed with playing with the soft strands that he completely missed her fingers twitching on the bed at her side.


	2. Chapter 2

Natsu's visit lasted a majority of the day, like his visits often did. And in that time he told Lucy all the news that was news in the guild. He told her about the new members who had joined. The old ones that had left after the fight with Phantom. He told her about Erza's attempt to go on her first date and how it had ended in disaster, when the mystery guy who had asked her out had been stupid enough to flirt with another woman in front of her.

He brushed her hair and took care of her finger nails. Trimming them and then filing them down so that they were shaped like little ovals, just like she liked then he picked up the little book that he had taken from her home because he knew it was her favorite and flipped it open and started reading aloud to her like he had every day for the past month and silently hoped that some how his voice was reaching her.

Outside the room Mira stood listening to the sound of Natsu's voice along with Erza and Gray as he finished up the chapter he was reading and then stopped. Apparently done reading for the time being.

Next he would hold her hand and beg the girl to wake up until his voice gave out. Just like he did every day. Breaking their hearts just a little more until he finally decided to leave for the night.

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A few hours later Natsu got up off of the floor and leaned over his partner and gently kissed her cheek then straitened his spine and walked away from the bed and slipped out of the room, quietly closing the door behind him.

"Natsu! Are there any changes in Lucy's condition yet?" Elfman called out from across the room, his voice startling Natsu a bit before he shook his head and looked down at the floor trying to hide his pained expression as Mira came up behind him and placed a hand on his shoulder and gave it a small squeeze causing the dragon slayer to lift his head a little bit and glance at her from over his shoulder.

She gave him an encouraging smile. "Don't give up Natsu. Lucy will wake up soon enough."

Natsu stared at her for a second and made an irritated sound and shrugged her hand off of his shoulder and started walking. He wasn't giving up. Regardless of how long it took or how long he had to wait, he'd _never_ give up on Lucy.

He was merely frustrated by the fact that she wasn't showing any signs of life aside from breathing. But tomorrow was a new day, and that knowledge always seemed to bring new hope to the dragon slayer.

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She could hear noise.

For the longest time while her mind wandered back and forth between consciousness and unconsciousness, the noise was the only thing that she was really aware of. After that was the sound of a voice, a man's voice in particular, speaking next to her ear in soft whispered tones. Begging her in an anguished voice, to wake up.

His breath tickling her skin, tickling her and making her twitch.

She'd wake up if her body would stop fighting with her and _let_ her open her eyes. She'd been trying to wake up for who knows how long and the more she tried, the more exhausted she felt. It was so...odd.

She'd never felt so weak before.

She made a weak sound in the back of her throat and tried for what seemed like the millionth time in so long to open her eyes and broke down crying when she managed to open them a little bit and turn her head a little so that she could see a bit of her surroundings. Noting the vivid yellow floral curtain hanging over the window to her left, and the beautiful pink and violet flowers laying on the bed next to her shoulder before her eyes slipped closed again.

The next time she managed to open her eyes was when a man with dark hair was standing over her bed looking at her. Their eyes locked for a second, as his eyes widened, shock and surprise flitting across his features a second before he started shouting something causing a huge commotion in the other room as her eyes drifted closed again.


	3. Chapter 3

The next morning when Natsu stepped through the swinging doors of the bar to go see Lucy he was dumbstruck by the level of hyper activity going on. There was more yelling and laughing and crying than usual, which was odd considering that there weren't any people passed out on the floor among empty beer mugs.

Every guild member in the bar was crowded around the table directly in front of the kitchen where Mira was coming out carrying two trays full of food while everyone at the table tried talking all at once.

Natsu hung around in the door way for a second and tried to see what the fuss was about by listening to the little snippets of conversation that he could catch over the deafening sound of everyone else's voices and getting absolutely _no_ information at all.

_God would it kill them to share some frigging information with me so that I'm not left out of the loop? _He wondered in irritation as he took several steps out of the door way and headed towards the crowd and finally managed to ask, "Did we get a new member or something?"

He wasn't asking because he really cared at the moment, he was asking so that he could figure out why everyone was making so much noise when Lucy was trying to rest. The thought didn't make much sense to him since he wanted his partner to wake up so badly, but at the same time he wanted her to be able to rest undisturbed. Elfman and Gray turned to look at him with huge smiles on their faces as they broke away from the crowd and ran over to him.

"Natsu!"

"It's unbelievable! Lucy woke up!"

Natsu didn't even blink as he walked by them, picking up his pace a little bit and started to rudely shove his way through the rest of the crowd. Not caring if he had to resort to stepping on toes and elbowing some while he grabbed others by the scruff of the neck and tossed them out of his way until he reached the table and stopped cold as he came face to face with his partner and nearly fell to his knees and started to cry himself as he looked her over.

She still looked a little pale, but her color was much better today. Her long hair hung over one slender shoulder in a thick braid. And she had a fork in her hand and was in the middle of taking a bite of food when he grabbed the chair next to her and pulled it out, startling her a little bit if the way she jumped was any indication at all, and then sat down and propped one elbow on the table and settled his chin in his palm and smiled at her as she looked at him.

"Hi." He said, hoping that they could simply strike up a conversation like they usually did. He needed to hear her voice so badly it wasn't even funny. She dropped her fork a little bit and looked around with a slightly uncomfortable look on her pretty face before looking at him again and giving him a nervous smile.

"H-Hi."

"It's been a while hasn't it?" Natsu said gently as Lucy tilted her head to the left slightly and stared at him for a moment a small frown marring her features.

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She didn't know what was going on, or who these strange people were.

All she had woken up knowing was that she was hungry. Which was why the first thing out of her mouth an hour ago had been 'food'. And now that she had eaten some stuff she felt considerably better than she had before when her stomach had been empty. Not only that but with her stomach full now, she was able to better focus her mind and think.

Which had led her to wonder where she was, and who all of these overly familiar, loud, hyper and obnoxious people were. She didn't recognize any of them as people that she knew. The building that they were all in didn't look very familiar.

The people were all dressed strangely and some of them looked like mutants. Not that she had anything against that, it was just a little_ disgruntling_ to wake up too when you were already confused about stuff like; who, what, when, why, and how.

She had been perfectly content to sit there and eat, and then out of no where this guy with sort of spiky pink colored hair and amber eyes appeared and sat down next to her silencing almost_ all_ venues of conversation around her.

She had been about to ask the guy what he wanted when he had smiled at her and said 'hi' and then tried to draw her into conversation with him by saying that 'it's been a while hasn't it?' effectively gaining her undivided attention while she tried to figure out if they had _ever_ met before.

So far she was coming up with a whole lot of blanks. Which was just weird since she was pretty sure that she'd remember meeting a guy secure enough in his masculinity to be seen in public with pink hair.

Which was why she hesitated a second before asking him in a slightly nervous tone, "Do I know you?"

The young man studied her for a second and slowly dropped his arm, a frown working it's way across his face followed by a little bit of a hurt/worried look. "Are you serious Lucy? Do you really not know me?" He asked in a velvety soft, yet oddly calm tone.

She looked around again, noting the troubled looks on everyone else's faces and wondering if she should lie. But knew that lying to them would be pointless since she _really_, honestly didn't know any of them. "N-No..." She stuttered with an anxious look on her face. Almost fearing how the young man and his many, many, _many_ friends would react to her answer.

None of them reacted the way that she had expected. Instead of shocked gasps, or displays of frustration or anger the young man next to her gave her a sad smile and held his hand out to her. "I'm Natsu-" She reached out tentatively and grasped his hand and blinked as he wrapped his fingers around hers and gently shook her hand before saying, "And _you_ are my partner."

She blinked at him again.

Partner? What did he mean by that?


	4. Chapter 4

In the days that followed she started to understand some things.

1) Every one of the strange people surrounding her thought that she was someone else. A girl by the name of Lucy Heartphilia. Which made absolutely no sense to her when she finally managed to recall that her name two days after she finally managed to wake herself up. As it turned out her real name was Rissa Katerina.

She was eighteen. Her birthday was in May. Her blood type was AB positive. Her favorite color was-

Uh... Well she was still a little bit sketchy on some stuff. Like her likes and dislikes and where she was from and such.

But she pretty much knew everything else about herself.

2) Everyone didn't know that she wasn't this Lucy person.

She couldn't exactly say that she blamed them, she _wouldn't_ have believed her either if she hadn't seen the reason for their obvious reason for thinking her the other person, when she had looked at herself in the mirror.

She'd nearly had a frigging panic attack when she had seen her reflection was nothing like she recalled it being. Before she had woken up from her coma, she would have sworn that her hair had been a reddish blond and her eyes had been hazel, and she'd worn an A-cup. And now-

Now she was a blond haired young woman with wide green eyes and _big_ boobs.

She'd freaked after analyzing herself in the mirror a few times and had been found by some of the people claiming that they knew her, huddled under a table with her knees drawn up to her chest crying and rocking back and forth.

3) Everyone, including the guy that had claimed that he was her partner, thought that she had suffered brain damage of some sort. She didn't know what to think about that since thinking anything along those lines gave her a monstrous headache.

4) Everyone was going out of their way to take care of her.

Which made her feel more helpless than she actually was. And to top it all off her partner, that damn devil man- had attached himself to her like a bloody shadow and refused to let her do anything on her own lest she might have a relapse and fall ill again or something.

Or at least that's what he pointed out to her when he started to irritate her with his hovering.

5) Natsu was a very, very, _very_ unusual stalker like guy. Yet he was completely harmless until someone did something that he considered hurtful to her. Then he sort of morphed into a demon and rained down the wrath of _hell_ on the person who had pissed him off.

And frankly speaking, she had became a little terrified of him after a particular incident when they had been out walking around the town and a drunk had knocked her into the side of a brick building and she had hit her head.

Yet that hadn't stopped the pink haired teen from moving in with her and taking care of her. Although things did get a mite awkward from time to time.

Life among the strange people wasn't so bad. It was just a little more stressful than she was used too.

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hello, this is my first Fairy Tail story.

So please Read and Review. And i have a funeral to go too.

later


	5. Chapter 5

A week after waking-

Rissa and Natsu were sitting in the bar waiting for the food that they had ordered when a loud ruckus started behind them and Natsu half turned in his seat and reached out with his hand and put it on top of her head.

"Duck." Natsu said as pushed her head down until her chin was almost touching the bar as a glass came flying towards the back of her head as he glanced over his shoulder at the huge brawl taking place across the room as the glass whizzed over Lucy's head and smashed into the wall behind the bar and shattered.

"If any of you dumbasse's throw another beer mug this way and _hit_ Lucy; I'm going to hurt you!" Natsu called out warningly, his temper spiking somewhat at how close Lucy had come to getting hurt when she was still trying to recover from her month long coma.

It had only been a week since she had woken up and though she generally rebounded from illness and wounds pretty quickly, Natsu and the rest of her friends in the guild weren't taking any chances with her health this time.

They had taken her off of the job rotation, and had more or less confined her to her home, the village, the bar...

Since she was having memory problems, she wasn't allowed to use her magic, or go out by herself. Their reasons for this were sound considering that she'd be easy prey to any enemy that happened to wonder through the village.

Which was part of the reason Natsu had attached himself to her like a shadow. The other part of the reason was that his partner was in a weakened condition and needed to be protected. And as _odd_ as it sounded, he didn't trust anyone to take care of her but him.

"You tell them Natsu-" Elfman said as he came through the swinging door leading to the kitchen, several feet away and walked over to them with two trays of food and drinks perfectly balanced on the tips of his fingers. "It's a man's job to protect his partner. Especially when she's been sick and is helpless." The giant said as Natsu lifted himself from his seat a little bit and took one of the trays from him.

And carefully set it down in front of her, startling her slightly as she lifted her head a little bit and muttered a soft 'thanks' to him and the giant before she started to arrange her food on the tray so that she could eat while she mulled over what the giant had just said, and silently debated with herself on saying something about how she wasn't that helpless and how he had just offended her.

But in the end decided to keep quiet about what she was thinking since she didn't know what the _other_ girl would think or say, and she didn't want to cause any trouble. "Lucy isn't helpless Elfman-" Natsu said as he glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. "Not totally anyways. I just don't want her hurt again."

"Understandable, Natsu." Was all Elfman said with a smile as he set Natsu's tray down and winked at Lucy, and grinned as she blushed a little bit before he walked away.

The second that the giant was gone Rissa glanced at Natsu and asked, "Am I weak?" Natsu paused in mid motion and looked at her, his expression blank. Uh-oh. That sounded like one of those loaded questions that Lucy used to nail him with before she had gotten hurt and lost her memory.

Sort of like the questions, 'Does this shirt make me look fat' or 'Does this outfit make me look slutty'.

If he answered her honestly she was probably going to stab him in the hand with her fork or break a beer mug over his head or something. But if he didn't answer her honestly, she'd probably ban him from her presence until she got sick of being by herself. Which could take months depending on _how pissed_ she was at him. And he couldn't have that with her in her current condition.

So he had no choice but to answer her honestly and hope for the best.

"N-No." He said nervously as he reached out and none too subtly grabbed her beer mug full of juice and her silverware and put them on his other side so that she couldn't reach them without having to go through him first. She frowned at him and craned her neck a little bit as she leaned to the side and stared at the silverware and mug of juice that he had taken from her then looked back at him and thinned her lips.

"You look nervous." She said in an bemused tone.

"I'm not." Natsu said hastily as he propped his elbow on the bar and then settled his chin in his hand and tried to look as if he wasn't as scared and nervous as he felt. It didn't seem to be working since Lucy gave him a knowing look then said coaxingly.

"Then give me my silverware and drink back."

Natsu gave her a mock oblivious look. Apparently thinking that playing dumb would save him if she lost her temper. It wouldn't but she'd give him an** A** for effort. "Silverware and drink? What silverware and drink?"

She sighed and rubbed the tip of her thumb nail along the skin over her right eye brow then dropped her hand. "Natsu, are you worried that I might hurt you or something?" She asked out of curiousity and was a little bit taken aback by the uncomfortable expression that crossed his face as he reached up and rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly.

"Ah. I see." She said as she pushed her food away and turned in her seat and got up, drawing Natsu's gaze to her back.

"What are you doing?"

"Leaving."

"But you haven't eaten anything yet."

"I'm suddenly not hungry. I think I'll just walk around for a little bit."

Natsu was quiet for a second before sighing and saying, "Hold up and I'll come with you." As he started to get up and stopped when she shook her head slowly and said.

"Don't bother Natsu. I won't go far." She started walking past him and he took a second to try and figure out why she was suddenly wanting to go for a walk and nearly swore when he realized that he had just hurt her feelings.

"_Shit_-" He growled as he scrambled out of his seat and ran after her so that he could apologize.

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Rissa was trying hard not to cry. But it was hard. She didn't understand Natsu.

Who in their right mind would willingly hang around someone who hit them and stuff? Did Natsu have such low self esteem that he felt he deserved to be treated like that? And what the hell was she supposed to do in the body of a person who treated others so poorly?

She clapped a hand over her mouth as her stomach lurched dangerously. Oh god, she felt so badly about looking like the person who hurt Natsu that she felt that she was going to throw up.

She heard foot steps behind her and sped up her walk a little bit, already knowing that Natsu had followed her even though she had told him not too, and knew she wasn't sure if she could face him at the moment.

"Lucy." Natsu fell into step right behind her, not even winded by the fact that he'd had to run just to catch up to her.

"Not now Natsu." She said softly, not really wanting to talk anymore. She just wanted to walk around and clear her head.

"Lucy please stop and hear me out. I wasn't trying to hurt your feelings-"

Did he think she was so stupid that she didn't already know that? She was tempted to snap at him but was afraid to take her hand away from her mouth. She could feel bile burning the back of her throat. She felt his hands grasp her shoulders a second before he forced her to stop and spun her around so that she was facing him.

Her stomach lurched again as she blinked back tears as she looked up at Natsu's worried face. "I didn't mean to upset you Lucy but you have a very good track record when it comes to reacting to certain answers. I was just being overly cautious and stupid. I didn't take into consideration that you probably didn't remember how you used to-"

Rissa finally took her hand away from her mouth and grasped his vest in her hands and jerked him down a little bit. Her temper finally getting the best of her. "Stop apologizing to me Natsu, you didn't do anything wrong-"

"But I hurt your feelings-" Natsu said lamely.

"So what." Rissa growled in irritation. He blinked at her angry expression and slipped his hands up from her shoulders to frame her face with his hands and said softly.

"I didn't mean to upset you, Lucy."

"I know that. What I don't know, Natsu, is why you would want to hang around someone who _hurts_ you."

"It's because your my partner Luc-" Natsu said gently, silently willing her to remember everything that she had forgotten. She had no idea how much it hurt him to see her like this. Weakened, ill and unaware of their bond and how strong it actually was. "I'd do anything to be close to you." He admitted after a second or so of silence. Needing her to understand that as a dragon slayer bond that he formed with others were much stronger than normal bonds.

Bonds of friendship if established with the wrong type of person, could lead him to murder and madness. While bonds formed with people who had never tainted their souls with the blood of others strengthened him.

It was the same with affection.

His affection for everyone in the guild was different from the affection that he held for Lucy. Because her soul was brighter, clearer and _purer_ than everyone elses. It was what had drawn him to her in the first place. It was also because of this his affection for her ran so much _deeper _than normal.

She stared at him for a second and sighed. "You shouldn't want to be close to me if I've been hurting you Natsu. You don't deserve to be treated like that." Natsu was quiet for a second before chuckling.

"Silly girl. Is that what's bugging you?"

"Wouldn't it bug you if you found out that you've been hurting someone close to you?" Rissa asked in a peeved tone as Natsu smiled and shook his head at her.

"No. Because it isn't in my nature to hurt the ones close to me. It's not your nature either."

"Then why did you-"

"Self preservation instinct. I wasn't born with it so I had to learn it. And I'm not sure if you've noticed this, but the other women in the guild are more than a little _violent_ natured. Besides, Luc, you've never smacked me without a good reason and that's nothing to feel badly about. Now come on. You still haven't eaten anything and I don't want you fainting from hunger. The others might actually kill me if you do."


	6. Chapter 6

The moment that Natsu dragged her back to the bar, he ushered her through the door and back over to the seat she had been in before and waited until she was sitting back down before taking his seat next to her and picked up her drink and silverware and handing them to her before busying himself with the food that he had ordered.

It had gotten a little cool while they had been gone, but other wise was fine.

The two of them ate their food, occasionally trying to make conversation, but everything they tried talking about came out as more awkward than it should have been. Mainly because neither of them knew what to say to one another.

So Rissa thought to make things easier on Natsu and gather information at the same time by starting small and trying to think of what she didn't know already.

"So Natsu, how long have we known each other?" She finally asked, figuring that this question was as good as any to start things off.

Natsu paused in mid motion, his fork half way to his mouth and glanced at her as he slowly lowered his fork and nervously cleared his throat. He'd known that Lucy would get around to asking him things inevitably, so he wasn't terribly surprised by her question.

He was however surprised by the question that she had thought to ask. Maybe because she sounded so cautious to him. Like she was afraid that she wasn't going to like his answer. Not that he could blame her any. He could understand what she was thinking as a single girl who had a guy sort of attach himself to her.

She was probably wondering if she could really trust him and though it pained him a bit to admit it, it was a damn good question.

It showed that she was being very _cautious_ and _level headed_ about her current condition and was trying to think of ways to keep herself from being taken advantage of.

_Again_, it was a damn good question.

And if their roles were reversed he'd probably ask the same thing to see if he could really trust her. "About a year in a half." He finally said as he pushed his plate away knowing that their conversation, once it was under way, would probably last for a while.

"How did we meet?"

Natsu chewed his bottom lip for a second and debated with himself on lying to her or not. On one hand he didn't want to tell her that she had been caught in a love charm, nor did he want to tell her about how he had saved her from the slavers that had been about to brand her as an object.

It would make her worry unnecissarily. And it would also make her question things in a paranoid fashion that would drive him, and herself up the wall-_ crazy_. In the end after a few seconds of silent debate, he decided to go ahead and tell her the truth.

"I sort of ran into you when you were under the influence of a love charm. You bought me lunch to thank me for snapping you out of it and then later that day you were on a slave ship and I sort of came crashing through the ceiling just in time to spare you from being branded."

He cringed as soon as he was done speaking. Honestly, wouldn't anyone cringe upon hearing that they had been bewitched then captured by slavers? He glanced at her and sucked in a breath when he noticed how _pale_ and _horrified_ she looked.

"L-Love charm? Slavers?" She squeaked, the horrified look on her face never changing though he got the distinct impression that she was on the verge of being sick or something.

Natsu wasn't sure how to react to that look on her face. All he knew was that he didn't like it. She closed her eyes for a second and turned away and took several deep breaths and then finally asked. "You'll fill me in later on the effects of love charms and their many uses, won't you?"

Natsu made a strained sound.

He'd really rather not but he understood her need to be informed about such things. After all if she fell under the influence of a very potent one, she'd be in some serious trouble. Especially since some guys used them to collect young girls and put them to work in brothels and stuff while others used them to divest a girl of her innocence and leave her reputation in ruins.

Causing strain between the victim and her family and friends and sometimes resulting in the suicide of the disgraced woman.

"Yeah. I'll tell you about them later."

"Thank you-" She said very softly before asking. "You weren't hurt when you saved me? Were you?"

"No."

"Well, that's something I suppose." She said with a sigh and Natsu wondered what she meant before she moved things along by asking another question.

"Okay. What sort of relationship do we have?" Natsu made a choking sound as a flush worked it's way across his face. 

_What the hell sort of question was that?_ He wondered as he blurted out. "We're partners. _Just partners_. Nothing more."

She looked at him and then lifted a hand and poked him in the cheek with one finger and asked warily. "Are you sure about that?"

"Very sure."

She made a humming sound and gave him a doubtful look then looked away again. "Alright. So we're just friends."


	7. Chapter 7

They talked for what seemed like hours about everything that they could both think of. Lucy needing information on herself and the people around her had asked all sorts of personal yet oddly enough, non invasive questions.

And when she couldn't think of anything else important to ask him about, she then asked him if he would mind taking her to the market. Natsu regarded her with a curious expression on his face, wondering if she needed to get groceries as he agreed and got up out of his seat and waited on her to do the same before he called out to someone across the bar and said something to them.

Then turned and walked towards the door and followed her out.

"So what is it that you want to get at the market?" Natsu asked as he stuffed his hands into his pants pockets and glanced down at the top of her head.

Lucy tipped her head back a little bit and blinked up at him then flushed a little bit and lifted one hand to tug at her low shirt collar before answering. "I want to see if I can find some less revealing clothes..."

Natsu blinked and wondered for a brief second if she was serious. "What for? You love those outfits. You're always telling me that they make you feel pretty."

"Well they don't make me feel pretty. They make me feel weird. And I've noticed that some people keep looking at me-" Lucy said as she looked around nervously.

"Of course they look at you. You're cute." Natsu said in an amused tone as she scowled at him and snapped in a soft tone.

"I don't_ feel_ cute. I feel like a bunny about to be pounced on by a pack of wolves. It's a very uncomfortable feeling. And I don't _like_ it." Natsu frowned a little bit and looked around the crowded street, trying to see the people who made her feel so uncomfortable. But couldn't really see anyone looking at her.

"Hn... Well, I suppose that if it bothers you so much that some new clothes wouldn't be such a bad idea. Do you have something in mind already?"

"Something with a high collar and sleeves would be nice. Pants. Skirts that reach my ankles, if I can find them-" Natsu made a humming sound as it dawned on him that she _was_ serious. She really didn't feel comfortable in her normal outfits.

How odd.

Was this _another_ personality trait that had developed because of her memory loss? He wondered as they walked in silence the rest of the way. Thirty minutes later Natsu pulled Lucy to a stop outside a clothes shop and opened the door and motioned with his head for her to go in and then followed her through the door.

The shop was nothing special to Natsu. Just a typical run of the mill shop with clothes in it. But to Lucy however, who grabbed his arm and tugged on it to get him to look at her- It must have seemed rather impressive since she started asking questions as she looked over the merchandise.

"What kind of fabric is that shirt made of? It's all shimmery."

"It's shimmery because it's star silk."

"What's this?" Lucy asked as she picked out a weird looking long sleeved ribbon shirt. Natsu blinked at the shirt and then absent mindedly reached out and made her put it down. He understood that she was curious about the clothes and what they were made of and such, but the longer she held that damn ribbon shirt up, the more he couldn't help but see her in his mind; wearing the damndable thing.

It was rather unsettling to him.

"It's called a ribbon shirt-" Natsu explained in a hushed tone as he looked over the skimpy top. True to it's name a ribbon shirt was nothing more than wide ribbon that was used to wrap around the torso in any fashion that the wearer saw fit. They came in many different colors, was made up of silk and satin and cotton, and some had sleeves while others didn't.

They were far too revealing to be worn by a woman who was as well endowed as Lucy was. Besides everyone and their cousin knew that any girl wearing a ribbon shirt was more or less a walking talking soon-to-be-rape-victim.

"And if I ever catch you wearing one, I'm going to be _pissed_. Understand Luc?" Natsu said as she put the shirt back down and then grabbed her wrist and quickly maneuvered her away from the ribbon shirt display.

And dragged her to the other side of the store and absent mindedly snatched some random shirt from it's hanger and thrust it into her hands and then let go of her wrist and walked over to the wall a few feet away and leaned against it and crossed his arms over his chest and decided to wait out of the way and let her look.

Twenty minutes later Natsu stared at new Lucy in wide eyed disbelief and felt the nearly over whelming urge to _gape_ at her in astonishment. How the hell had she- And so quickly-

Was she for real? He wondered as she walked up to him with six pairs of pants draped over her arm, topped by four skirts, five pairs of shorts and nine shirts. "I'm done." She said as he reached out and took the bundle from her and mentally went over things in his mind.

To his knowledge, ever since the day that he had met Lucy. He had gone out shopping with her a grand total of four times. And each of those times had lasted for hours and hours because she had felt the need to look at anything and everything.

Yet here it was just barely twenty minutes from the time they walked through the door, and she already had everything that she wanted. This...was_ baffling_ to him.

"Are you sure that your done?" He found himself asking her curiously as he sort of shuffled the clothing a little bit in his arms and looked the pieces over. All of them were very modest, not in the least bit revealing like the clothes that Lucy was wearing now. None of the shirts had low shirt collars or missing backs, none of them would look very form flattering on her due to the fact that she had picked shirts two sizes up from her normal size.

The pants were modest, the skirts and shorts were of a decent length. He made a humming sound and shook his head as she nodded. "Alright. Let's pay for these and get home."


	8. Chapter 8

An hour or so later Natsu flopped down on Lucy's couch and tried to think of what he was going to fix them for dinner as Lucy put her clothes away in the bedroom. He was tempted to make her favorite food, but with her the way that she was now, he wasn't sure if she would enjoy it.

He sat quietly for a few minutes and perked up a little bit when she came walking out of the bedroom. "Hey Luc, what do you want for dinner tonight?" Natsu asked curiously as she walked over to the book shelf against the far wall and scanned the titles of the books that she had collected and pulled one of the books from it's place before asking in a tentative voice.

"Are you asking me because you really want to know? Or because your secretly trying to scare me?" Natsu snorted in amusement and looked at her. She was staring at him with a wary look on her face. Like she really was sort of _scared_ of the fact that he was planning to cook for them again.

His cooking wasn't that bad. Sure he usually made a huge mess but at least his food was _eatable_. "How about I fix us dinner tonight." She suggested after a second or so of silence. Natsu shook his head no and got up off of the couch.

"No. I'll cook."

"Why? I'm perfectly capable of-"

"You don't remember how to use even the most _basic_ of things Luc-" Natsu pointed out gently. Hoping that having him point out the obvious wouldn't be too painful for her to hear considering the fact that she was trying so hard to regain some small semblance of her former self and independence.

"And don't stand there and say that you'd manage or figure it out on your own. Because that's a lie. I sometimes catch you standing in the kitchen in the morning staring at the stove with a frustrated and lost look on your face."

"You were watching me-" It wasn't a question. Merely a fact that he had finally clued her in on. He made a humming sound and had to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from telling her that he was always watching her.

If he said the words, she'd think he was being creepy or something. And that was the last thing that he needed her to think of him since it would cause problems in the future.

"But Natsu, if you keep doing these things for me then how am I supposed to re learn them?" She asked, surprising him a little bit. He hadn't expected her to question his reasons for doing things for her. It made his motives seem rather suspicious.

Almost as if he wanted her to remain helpless so that he could take care of her. He shook his head as soon as that thought crossed his mind and put one hand on top of her head and ruffled her hair affectionately. "I'll teach you how to use the stove when you've had some time to adjust to being awake and able to move around again. This will also give us time to have you examined by a doctor since we aren't totally sure just how _much_ you've forgotten. So for now, just sit back and try to enjoy having someone wait on you hand and foot."

Lucy got quiet as she gently pushed his hand off of her head and set her book back on the shelf and turned and walked into her bedroom and closed the door. Leaving Natsu standing there with a startled expression on his face.

_Crap._ Looks like he had hurt her feelings again.

He sighed and rubbed the nape of his neck and shook his head as he walked into the kitchen to fix their dinner, hoping that by the time he was done Lucy wouldn't be as upset with him anymore.


	9. Chapter 9

An hour or so later Natsu stood outside of Lucy's bedroom door and hesitantly knocked. "Luc? Foods done. Will you come out and eat with me?" Natsu asked through the door. On the bed, Rissa was curled up on her side, napping. She heard the faint knock on the bedroom door and jerked partially upright on the bed and looked at the door.

"Luc? Come out please. I'm sorry that I upset you earlier." Natsu called out. Rissa sighed and climbed off of the bed and walked over to the door and opened it. Natsu jerked and took a step or so back from the door with a pained look on his face and Rissa said.

"I'm not mad Natsu." It would be difficult for her to be upset with him when he had made a point earlier. It's true she didn't know how to work the stove in the kitchen. And it did frustrate her that the stupid thing never came on or anything when she messed with the dials. Which meant that the stove in her kitchen ran on something other than electricity or gas.

Natsu studied her for a second before nodding his head.

He looked relieved that she wasn't upset with him over their little spat earlier as he reached out and grasped her hand and pulled her out of the bedroom and over to the table set up in the corner of the living room and pulled her chair out for her. Rissa thanked him and sat down and then looked over the food that he had made and smiled a little bit at the spread.

Salad, soup, buttery sour dough rolls, home made honey butter spread, BBQ ribs and cut up fruit.

"Dig in Luc. I want you to eat until you pop." Natsu said as he looked her over. Even after eating three meals a day, and having as many snacks as he could wrangle her into- his Lucy was still so thin that he was starting to worry she would never regain the weight that she had lost during her coma.

He watched her fix her plate and cocked his head as a questioning expression crossed his face. He couldn't quite put his finger on it, but something about the way she fixed her plate bugged him.

Lucy was normally a very regal and graceful woman. It was a part of her upbringing as an heiress. Yet the Lucy sitting across from him kept fumbling with her things, she dropped some food once or twice, and automatically set the ruined food aside on her napkin and used a spare one to clean her mess up before starting to fix her plate again.

Natsu frowned and studied her, wondering if he should say something but was _loath_ to point out the obvious flaws in her actions considering how self conscious she had become about herself since waking up. He didn't want to embarrass her. So instead he pretended not to notice and hoped that she hadn't caught him staring.

"You're wondering why I keep dropping things aren't you?" Lucy's voice cut through his thoughts, drawing his attention to her face as she fumbled with her fork and nearly dropped it when he noticed her hand was shaking slightly.

He started to get up but she lifted a hand and held up one finger, stopping him as she explained in a soft tone. "It's a nervous habit I developed as a kid when people started watching me. I can no more control _it_ than I can control the wheather. I fumble around like a fool then once I feel comfortable enough, I'll stop."

"You didn't do that at the bar." Natsu pointed out, feeling slightly curious about why she was fumbling around _now_ when she should have fumbled around earlier. Lucy gave him an anxious looking smile and gripped her fork tightly in her hand.

"You weren't _watching_ me in the bar. In fact if I recall correctly you were a mite busy trying not to get smacked. So you were probably too distracted to notice that my hand was shaking a bit." Natsu opened his mouth to say something but couldn't think of anything to say. She had a point. He had been distracted earlier.

"I think I would have noticed if you dropped something earlier." He said after a second or so.

Lucy shook her head no. "I'm very good at hiding what I drop. Especially when I'm in public and don't want to look like an idiot." Natsu cringed a little bit and sighed. Shit. What was he supposed to say to that? If he had such an issue he'd probably try to hide it too. So really, who was he to judge?

He started to open his mouth to apologize, again. But Lucy cut him off and said. "Don't feel badly for worrying Natsu. Most people who notice probably think the same things that are running through your mind right now. There are too many phycological diorders and illnesses that can cause such clumsiness. So it's understandable that you would be worried about the _why_ of things."

Natsu shut his mouth for a second and sighed and ran one hand through his hair before saying in a gruff tone. "Just eat your food Lucy. And try not to drop any more okay."


	10. Chapter 10

Natsu was sitting on the couch next to Lucy later that night watching TV when Lucy finally asked, "Natsu, what exactly happened to me to put me in a coma?" Natsu blinked and turned to look at her, unsure if he'd really heard her question or if he had merely imagined it.

"What?"

"What happened to me to put me in a coma?"

"You mean aside from a _whole guild_ falling on your head?" Natsu said without thinking and cringed. Fuck. He hadn't meant to say that aloud. Lucy looked at him and he sighed and ran his fingers through his pink hair.

"Alright, alright. The truth of the matter is that you were kidnapped by people that your father hired to bring you home. However the people who kidnapped you, tortured you, beat you, burned you, drained you of your magic- While all of these things were happening the guild was under attack by the same people. We fought really, really hard to protect the guild- To save you and in the end the result was having an entire building fall on your head and put you in a coma. Is that all you wanted to know?" Natsu asked in a slightly aggravated tone.

Lucy was quiet for a moment. "I'm not sure if that's all I wanted to know. But for now I suppose it is enough." Natsu nodded his head and slowly started to relax again when it occurred to him that Lucy must not remember any of what had happened that day or she wouldn't have asked about it. He frowned and looked over at her as she curled her body in a fetal position on her end of the couch and closed her eyes.

What was going on with Luc? Was it normal to forget so much after suffering a head wound and a coma?

Lucy fell asleep curled up on the couch where Natsu let her remain for another hour or so before turning off the TV and getting to his feet and scooping her up. He was only a little surprised when she shifted in his arms and wrapped her arms around his neck and muttered something inaudable under her breath.

Natsu stood there for a heart beat or so, frozen. His heart thudding in his chest as he carefully cradled his partner in his arms and counted the number of breaths she took as he carried her through the house and into her room where he laid her on the bed and pulled the covers up over her then left the room so that she could sleep.

Natsu slept very little that night. Choosing instead to move about, checking the windows and doors. Then to flop down on the tiny little two seat couch and try to get comfortable.

He probably managed to doze off at least twice but didn't sleep longer than an hour or so before he thought he heard someone messing around outside. Worried that whoever was outside may be after his partner, Natsu rolled off of the couch and slipped outside to take care of things before Lucy's sleep was disturbed.

Natsu was nowhere to be found when Rissa woke up the next morning. Which under normal circumstances might have been okay if Rissa hadn't known how _dedicated_ to protecting her Natsu was.

Which could only mean that something had happened and he had left to take care of it. What worried her though was not knowing what sort of trouble Natsu may have gotten himself into.

She took a moment or so to get dressed and grabbed a ribbon to pull her hair back with then left the house to go see if anyone at the guild had seen him. If not then she would just have to go find him herself.


	11. Chapter 11

"Natsu!" Rissa called out as she ran through the double doors of the Fairy Tail guild and stopped cold as she spotted the pink haired young man slamming down a mug of beer and getting to his feet and pushed his way through the crowd of people that had been around him and grabbed her as soon as he reached her and growled in an dark tone that she'd never heard before.

"Lucy Heartphilia! I'd take you over my knee and _spank_ you for coming here at this ungodly hour if I didn't already know why you came here." His fingers tightened around her shoulders a fraction before loosening again as he leaned in close and hissed, "The next time I disappear- _Don't. Come. Looking. For. Me!_"

Rissa looked at him wide eyed, unsure of what to make of his sudden aggressive behavior as she stammered, "S-S-Sor-ry I-I w-as w-w-wor-ried." Natsu stared at her for a second, his expression furious.

Then slowly, ever so slowly his anger seemed to drain away and he gave her an unreadable look as he slipped his hands up from her shoulders to frame her face and leaned in again to touch his forehead to hers.

"I know you were worried. I'm sorry I didn't have time to leave a note." He said in an soft almost apologetic tone before dropping his hands and stepping away from her. That was when she noticed how dirty and ragged his normally clean clothes looked.

His vest was nearly in shreds and he had banadges around one wrist, one of his biceps, both of his legs had bandaged around his upper legs over his pants, and some bloody bandages around his middle. And he was covered in blue and black and yellow spots from his face down and Rissa wondered what could have happened to hurt him this badly.

Natsu took two steps away from her before turning his head to look at Lucy over his shoulder, gauging her reaction to his wounds while he tried to piece together why another guild like the one before would be after Lucy. The guy that he'd fought with had been super strong, nearly stronger than Natsu himself. But he'd been a loose tongued idiot and Natsu had been able to gather a little bit of imformation from him before he'd put him down.

Apparently Lucy's father had had nothing to do with _this_ attack.

Which in itself was odd considering how much money he'd spent the first time around trying to get Lucy home via kidnapping. Of course her father was probably none too thrilled by the fact that the people he'd hired to bring her home by force, before; had nearly killed her.

Still Natsu didn't understand why another guild would be after her. But as mentioned before, he had some info. So far he'd gotten the name of the guild and figured out that Lucy's father wasn't involved...it wasn't a lot of info but it gave him a little bit to work with.

He'd been here for the past few hours or so asking some of his friends about the strange guild that was apprently new since no oen had ever heard of it before tonight. He'd thought he had come across something when Lucy had shown up, scaring the bejesus out of him. Which was part of the reason he'd reacted so...well, _badly_.

He'd been scared that maybe something had happened while he'd been at the guild trying to get info. It hadn't occurred to him until she'd stopped just inside the door that she was looking for him to make sure that he was okay. "Luc-"

She looked at him and he held his hand out to her hoping that he hadn't upset her to the point where she'd go running blindly out of the guild and into trouble. She looked at his hand for a second then slipped her hand around his. Natsu sighed softly and laced their fingers together and pulled her away from the door.

"How bad are you hurt?" She asked after a moment or so of silence.

Natsu looked down at her with another unreadable look and then said gently, "Don't worry about that none. You and me need to have a little chat about what happened here tonight and why."

"Is it that bad?"

"Dunno Luc, but it could be."


	12. Chapter 12

Rissa sat across from Natsu with a look of utter shock on her pretty face. She couldn't believe what she was hearing. A strange guild that no one had ever heard of before was after her. It just didn't make any sense.

Why would an unknown guild be after her? She couldn't do magic. Couldn't fight (well she could do some hand to hand, but only what she recalled). She didn't even know who she was anymore. She had all these flashes and strange thoughts and feelings and glimpses of memory, but had no clue who those things belonged too. Her. Or Lucy.

And it was because of all of these things that it didn't make sense to her why someone would be after her. She must have show some sign of distress without realizing it because one second her mind was awhirl with all these thoughts of _why_, and _who._ And the next one of Natsu's hands was against her cheek, his thumb lazily stroking her skin. Jolting her from her panicked thoughts.

"Don't be scared Luc, I almost lost you before. I'm not going to stand for losing you again." He said in a slightly growling tone of voice.

"But if someone is after me Natsu, how can you stop them? You're already hurt-" Natsu snorted, a cruel smile curving his lips slightly as he looked at her, the shadows of the dimly lit room giving his normally handsome features a demonic look.

"I know that you don't remember much from before Luc, so I'll only say this once. Only a fool _dares_ to stand between a dragon slayer and it's partner. Because thinking that one can keep a dragon slayer from their partner for any reason will get someone killed with _extreme_ prejudice. So don't you worry none about the bastards after you... I can handle them."

Rissa sat there for a moment utterly speechless. Honestly she wanted to call him an idiot or something, but she couldn't seem to articulate the words enough to do so. Natsu got up from the bed he had been sitting on and moved over to the bed that she was sitting on and dropped down next to her and grasped one of her small delicately boned hands in his and sub consciously laced their fingers together and leaned into her a little bit and lay his head on her shoulder and let his eyes drift closed.

God he was tired. But then staying up all night while wounded tended to have such a tiring effect on him. "Is it okay if I fall asleep like this Luc? I'm very tired." He said after a while. Rissa blinked, his words finally seemed to register with her as she thought about his wounds and how the rest might do him good.

"I'm sorry Natsu I didn't realize how tired you must be. I'll leave and let you sleep for a bit-" She babbled as she started to move to get up when Natsu sighed and wrapped an arm around her middle and toppled them over on the narrow little bed causing her to give a startled yelp.

"Natsu! What are you doing?"

"What does it feel like?" He mumbled as he curled himself around her as she squirmed and tried to get loose. But Natsu refused to let her go. He wasn't letting her out of his sight whether he was conscious or not. It was simply too dangerous.

Besides, he didn't sleep well now a days without his favorite person close by. He tended to have nightmares about the day he'd almost lost her. He held her until she settled down and finally managed to doze off after an hour or so of holding her, a small smile curving his lips.


	13. Chapter 13

A few days later Natsu was fully healed and back on his feet again, shocking the hell out of Rissa since she couldn't exactly recall a time she'd ever see someone mend so quickly. Yet the second Natsu was on his feet again, he handed her off to one of his friends and wrangled a promise from her not to leave said person's side for anything then left.

That was almost a week ago and while she had a fairly good idea of where he'd gone off too, she wasn't all that comfortable with the red headed woman dressed in armor that she'd been handed off too.

It wasn't that the woman was mean or even violent- actually she'd been pretty nice and appeared to be pretty level headed until Rissa had seen her knock a fella through a solid brick wall just because he'd been drunkenly singing off key.

Natrually seeing someone fly through the air after being hit by such a dainty and pretty woman, scared the hell out of her which was why she more or less started tip-toeing around the woman.

She was pretty sure that if Erza had hit one person then she'd hit another and she wasn't looking to be knocked through a wall for any reason. Nu-uh. No way.

She probably wouldn't survive if she was knocked through a wall anyways. And there was the fact that if she did survive Natsu would never trust anyone with her again. He'd hover and worry like he had been since the beginning and keep doing so until he drove her batty.

She was so engrossed with her thoughts that she didn't notice Erza walking up in her nightgown with a bowl of popcorn and a couple of drinks in both hands. The red head sat down next to her, causing her to jump and quickly try to climb over the couch.

"Jeez, Luc. You act like I'm going to eat you alive or something-" Erza said in a teasing tone as she grasped the back of Rissa's borrowed sweat pants and pulled her back down next to her on the couch and pushed one of the drinks into her numb fingers and set the bowl between them. "Calm down and try to relax. Natsu will have a fit if he comes back to find you had a stroke or something."

Rissa blinked and gave the woman a nervous looking smile and quickly uncapped her drink and took a long swig of it as Erza grabbed a hand full of popcorn and popped a few kernels into her mouth and chewed as she studied Rissa for a moment before frowning. "You seem different." She said out of the blue after swallowing what was in her mouth.

Rissa got a slightly panicked feeling and looked away, uncomfortable under the woman's scrutiny. But Erza was having none of that. She reached out and caught Rissa's chin in her fist and made her look at her again and frowned a little more before asking, "How's your memory? Is anything coming back yet?"

"N-No."

Erza hummed and dropped her hand away from Rissa's face and looked sad. "I see. Natsu said that you were having some issues with adapting and such. And then there's the fact that you don't seem to recognise anyone when you look at them. It's been a little over a month...you'd think that _something_ would change."

"I-I'm sorry."

Erza waved her hand at her and shook her head as she grabbed another handful of popcorn. "Don't apologize Lucy. It's pointless to feel bad over something that you can't control. I just wish I could sit and talk to you like I used too without frightening you." Rissa opened her mouth to tell Erza that she wasn't scared of her per say, she was just scared of being knocked through walls for no reason at all. However she never got to say anything.

Erza gave her a knowing look tinged with temper and Rissa abruptly asked if there were any scary movies on Tv that they could watch. She suddenly didn't want to talk anymore.

Erza found them a nice movie, which was just _ghastly_ in Rissa's opinion. Then as soon as the movie ended Erza set the empty bowl and soda bottles aside and stood up and stretched. "Wow that was great." She said as she put her hands high over her head and arched her back a little bit.

Rissa simply nodded her head mutely as the older woman turned the TV off then looked at her. "Do you want me to leave the hall light on for you so you don't freak out later?" Rissa wasn't sure if she was teasing or not, but she decided to treat the question as merely playful picking and shook her head no as she slowly stood up.

Shadows and dark places didn't scare her. She wasn't a small child after all. Later that night, she'd regret that choice when she had a nightmare.

_The world around her was red._

_The deep scarlet dripped from the walls, the ceiling, pooled around her ankels. There were bits and pieces of things that were chalk white. She could tell what they were at first but then they began to take form and she could finally make out the curve of fingers, the pale skin of a forearm._

_Something brushed around her left ankel, sending a shiver racing down her spine as she slowly looked down. Her face draining of color as her eyes widened in horror as she saw a severed head floating next to her ankel a second before she heard a vaguely familiar voice whisper, "What are you doing here?" _

_She looked away from the severed head and looked towards the source of the voice and started hyperventilating when she saw herself as she was now, blond hair, green eyes and all, stained in blood. Clothes torn and a coal black scarf around her neck._

_She stood there for a second just looking at herself when her other self smiled, her lips curving up in a cruel smile as her other self cocked her head. "My, my, the soldier returns. I didn't think I'd be seeing you again for another hundred years or so."_

_"W-Who are you?"_

_The blood stained girl smirked, her lips stretching over sharp jagged teeth as her eyes turned jet black with crimson. "Don't you know who I am?"_

_"No."_

_"Awww, that's just sad. Especially when I know so much about you-" The other girl moved then, so fast that her actions were a blur. One minute she was standing a good twenty or so feet away and the next she had Rissa by the front of her shirt, snarling. "And you shouldn't be here!" _

_She shoved Rissa back, making her fall into the crimson where she disappeared beneath the surface with a terrified scream_.

The next thing Rissa knew she was being shaken and two sets of voices were calling her- no not her name but the other girl's name. Part of her mind recognised them as Erza and Natsu. But part of her mind was still wrapped up in the nightmare she'd just seen and was completely unaware of the fact that she was still screaming.


	14. Chapter 14

Mirajane walked out of the bedroom Lucy was in and looked over at Erza and Natsu both of whom had taken up positions across from the room so that they could wait. Erza had a blank look on her face as she looked at her. But Mirajane could see her worry though she was trying to hide it. Not that she could blame the younger woman any.

It had been an hour since Natsu had come to get Lucy and found her in the hysterical state she'd been in. And while Mirajane wasn't a doctor and couldn't tell them what exactly was wrong with Lucy, she had _some_ experience with patching up wounds and giving people drugs to help them rest. Which is what she'd done for Lucy.

Drugged her before she had the chance to hurt herself.

For that both Erza and Natsu were grateful. Nartu looked at the blond woman, his expression worried. "How is she?"

"She's resting a bit more comfortably now. She finally stopped screaming-" Mirajane said lightly with a shrug of her slender shoulders. Natsu nodded his head quietly and pointed to the door behind her and asked almost anxiously.

"Is it okay if I go in and see her?"

"If that's what you want." Mirajane said and blinked as Natsu slipped by her and entered the room and quietly closed the door. Leaving the two women alone.

"What do you think caused Lucy to freak out like that?" Erza asked curiously. She'd been mentally running through the nights events and couldn't think of one single thing that would cause Lucy to freak out like she had. She just didn't understand how this could have happened when she'd been so careful in her efforts to make Lucy feel safe while Natsu was gone.

Mirajane shrugged again. "It could be any number of things. She could have remembered something from before the coma. Could have had a really, _really_ bad nightmare. It could have been stress related-"

"Could a member of that guild that Natsu's been looking into have gotten to her somehow?" Erza asked seriously. Mirajane considered the implications of such a thing happening and frowned. It was on the tip of her tongue to snap at Erza for saying such a thing, especially when Natsu could probably hear her. The last thing Lucy needed right now was to be seperated from Natsu again because he'd run off and gotten himself hurt or killed trying to avenge her or something.

"Do you have protective seals and barriors around the apartment?"

"No. I never felt that I needed them." Erza said honestly.

"Then, yes. It is a possibility."

"Crap. I was hoping you'd say something else." Erza growled as she ran one hand through her long vivid red hair.

"I was hoping you'd ask something else so I think we're even-" Mirajane said softly before walking by Erza. "I'll go tell everyone at the guild that something has happened to Lucy and see if anyone saw anyone suspicious hanging about and I'll get back to you when I can."

"You might want to tell Grey that Natsu may need him." Mirajane waved at her over her shoulder to indicate that she would and disappeared through the door at the end of the hall.

(********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************)

Natsu moved his ear away from the door and looked back at Lucy, a furious expression on his face as he replayed what he'd just heard. Someone from that damned guild may have gotten to his Luc. Had snuck into a place that by all rights should have been safe, scared her- possibly cast a spell on her.

_Oh those bastards are going to pay._ Natsu thought as he clenched his fists at his sides for a moment before reigning in his temper.

He silently moved away from the spot he'd been standing in for the past ten minutes and made his way over to the bed. His Luc looked as pale as death even in her sleep, the dark cresents of her lashes were still wet from crying and he could still see the tear treks on her pale cheeks. Her blond hair had been pulled back away from her face and now hung over one shoulder in a thick braid.

He sat down on the edge of the bed and leaned over her, slipping his arms under and around her body and lifted her up a little bit so that he could bury his face against her chest. "Luc... My poor Luc. Why was I so stupid as to think that I could leave you alone for even a little while?" Natsu said in a sorrowful tone as he kissed the spot between her breasts.

Then laid her back down on the bed and pulled the covers up to her shoulders then stretched out on the bed next to her and took one of her hands in his and laced their fingers together as he thought, _Don't you worry, Luc. I'll keep you safe even if it kills me._


	15. Chapter 15

When Rissa woke up the next morning she woke up in her-er Lucy's bed. She blinked her eyes tiredly and rubbed one eye with the back of her hand and yawned as she shifted and was about to roll over when she came into contact with something warm and hard.

"Watch your hand Luc-" A familiar voice said in a rough almost growling tone before the bed jiggled.

She jumped, startled as fingers shackled her wrist and moved her arm so that her hand was draped across her belly as she twisted her head around to look at the person in bed next to her. Natsu lay on his side, one eye cracked and the other closed. Looking very much like an overly large lizard sunning itself next to her.

"I don't want you touching me down there-" He muttered as his one partially open eye flickered to his lower body before he finished what he'd been saying. "I'm not sure if I'd be able to keep from taking things too far, ya know."

Rissa gaped at him for a second and he gave her a funny look then lifted one hand and used his fingers to gently close her mouth before shifting a little bit closer to her while using his fingers to tip her head a little bit. Then surprised her when he came up off of the mattress, all pretenses of laziness gone, and licked her cheek before bounding out of bed and across the room as she let out an grossed out/enraged shriek.

He stood at the door with one hand on the knob, his gold eyes studying her as she picked up her pillow and threw it at him.

He hadn't meant to more or less kidnap her from Erza's place last night but after what had happened, he'd felt that the comforts of home would help her if she suffered any ill effects. He'd made sure to leave a note and expected to have his teeth knocked out by the irate red head later today when she came by to check on Lucy.

Lucy's pillow hit him in the chest and fell to the floor yet he couldn't take his eyes off of her. His worry over the previous night's events bleeding over to here and now, making him look for any signs of distress she may be trying to hide from him. But so far he didn't- or rather _couldn't_ see anything.

"What's wrong?" She asked out of the blue, surprising him slightly. He blanked his expression as she threw back the covers and started to climb off of the bed when the sunlight filtering through the window hit her just right. Turning her borrowed nightgown transparent enough to see through.

His eyes widened and he made a strangled sound in the back of his throat as his eyes locked on her breasts for a moment before slipping lower to look at the panties covering her- Good lord they were lace! Snow white lace! How fitting of his Lucy. He mused as his heart pounded in his chest and he flushed and he felt a peculiar fluttering sensation in his stomach that he hadn't felt since his last partner died.

Was this..._desire_? The same desire that he'd held for his former partner?

He knew that dragon slayers like himself often held feelings of _desire_ and _lust_ for their partners. He even knew that some dragon slayers mated with their partners, but he'd never expected to feel like this again.

Not since his last partner had died. And to say that he was a mite disturbed about these feelings would be an understatment. He suddenly felt trapped, his back against the wall, his world narrowed and before he could stop himself; he reached out to grab what he wanted.

His hands grasped the front of Lucy's gown and he jerked her forward so that her body would be closer to his own and wrapped his arms around her. His finger nails lengthened to claws, scales rippled along the skin of his arms, legs, shoulders, and neck. He buried his face against Lucy's shoulder and breathed deep, his gums aching as his teeth slowly started to lengthen into fangs and he found himself saying in a growling tone. _"Say no. Send me away." _

He felt her shiver and tightened his hold on her. Trying hard to resist the urge to throw her onto the bed and fuck her brains out like an animal in the throes of a mating heat. "Listen to me very carefully Lucy-" He said in a breathless tone as he started to back her up towards the bed. "You have until your legs hit the mattress to say no and send me away-" He lifted his head from her shoulder and let her see his face.

He could see the confusion on hers, but there was no time to explain. She needed to send him away before it was too late.

Her eyes widened in shock as she caught sight of his face, the scales along his cheeks, the gold of his eyes had deepened to a molten color. "N-Natsu! Y-Your-"

"Send me away, Lucy. Hurry! We're almost to the bed." She hesitated not knowing what to do and while he wished he could explain things better, he simply couldn't. His dragon side was roaring to be unleashed.

He loosned his grasp on her a little bit and took one more step- The back of her legs hit the mattress and she lost her balance and fell over onto her back. Natsu closed his eyes for a moment a hissing sound escaping him. Too late. It was now too late for him to let her go.

She hadn't rejected him like he'd begged her too. And now...she was his.


	16. Chapter 16

She didn't know what was going on until Natsu crawled onto the bed and sat straddling her legs. Pinning her in place as he leaned over her and grasped her wrists, his grip firm yet gentle as he closed what little distance between their faces and hesitantly put his lips against hers while breathing a small thin trail of blue fire against her lips.

Rissa squirmed, the warmth of his breath was almost painful- it was...well there was no real words to discribe it. It was just uncomfortably warm.

She felt his breathing stop for a moment as something warm and moist ran along her bottom lip, slowly, coaxingly trying to get her to open her mouth. And she made a distressed sound as Natsu let go of one of her wrists and placed his free hand on her stomach and pushed down. She opened her mouth to scream as the air left her lungs in a _whoosh _as Natsu captured her parted lips and snaked his tongue inside of her mouth and started to slowly blow his fire into her.

She panicked.

Who in their right mind wouldn't when they knew that breathing in fire could collapse their lungs and kill them among many other, _horrible_ things.

She tried hitting his shoulder to get him to back off, but all he did was growl and recapture her hand and pin it down again. She tried bucking her hips in an effort to throw him off balance, but Natsu stayed firmly where he was.

His molten gold eyes staring down at her, unblinking, as she tried to hold her breath in an effort to protect her insides, but she could already feel the unnatrual warmth of his flame sliding down her throat, making it's way slowly to her stomach. Her lungs burned from lack of air and her eyes were tearing up despite the fact that the world was spinning and her vision was fading to black.

She started to lose consciousness when he pulled back a bit, lifting his mouth from her own a scant inch to allow her to pull some air into her lungs while continuing to feed her his flame until it turned green and he abruptly stopped and gathered her limp body up in his arms and held her against his chest and stroked her hair and whispered jumbled and broken words to her before kissing her again, this time without the flames. His desire to mate pushed back to the deepest darkest corner of his mind for the moment.

As he tried to get her to respond. To breath before the flame he'd fed to her died.

He kissed her, softly. Using his tongue and used his saliva to sooth and heal the scorched skin of her lips inbetween speaking to her. Trying to calm her because he could smell her fear so strongly in his nose that it worried him. His Lucy should know, even without her memories, that he would never hurt her.

Not purposefully. It simply wasn't his nature.

"Luc. My Luc, breathe. _Please_." He pleaded as he kissed her cheeks, her temple, her eye lids. He waited for what felt like an eternity, hoping, praying that his flame would take root inside of her and infuse her fragile body with some of his magic and power. It took longer than he would have liked but finally she started breathing again, deep shuddering breaths that made him smile faintly as he held her and rubbed her back until he was sure that she was fully conscious and aware again of what was going on.

"I'm sorry Luc, I didn't mean to go overboard." He said as he nuzzled the curve of her jaw.

She smacked him on the shoulder, the blow was pitifully weak even by her standards. But Natsu understood all too well what she was trying to say to him. _No more flames!_ He waited for several minutes, worried and scared that his flame might kill her like it had Lisanna- _No! _His mind cried out in denial. He wouldn't lose another partner to his own flame.

Surely fate wasn't that cruel. But just in case Lucy did burn up- He'd have to be quick about throwing himself into the flames so that he could die with her. He wouldn't lose another woman to his own dragon nature and continue living.

Several minutes passed and nothing happened and Natsu finally breathed a sigh of relief andsmiled as his heart beat, and indraw of breath into his lungs sycronized with hers and kissed her again on the lips. She jerked a little bit in his grasp and whimpered, thinking that he was going to feed her more of his fire but Natsu knew that doing so could kill her.

He wouldn't tempt fate further.

Not when his supressed desire to mate suddenly roared to the forefront of his mind. No, he had better things to do at the moment. Like figuring out a way to get her out of that flimsy night gown and out of those enchanting lace panties she was wearing.

He pulled back a bit, breaking the kiss and said in a rough tone, "No more flames Lucy. Just me-" It felt like he was pledging his life to her in the way human's did and the second the words left his lips more came forth. "Take me. All that I am, all that I will ever be. My heart, my life, my body and soul are yours to comand. I bind myself to you with my dragons flame and take all that you are and ever will be. Your heart, your life, your body and soul as my mate."

He pulled back a bit more to see her face and saw the wide eyed, almost panicked expression on her face and started to lean down to kiss her again, wanting to put her fears to rest when he heard the sound of someone knocking at the front door and completely froze for a moment then leaned back so that he was sitting on Lucy's upper legs and looked towards the door through narrowed eyes.

He wanted to ignore it but knew that if he did then everyone from the guild would be kicking down the door to find him and Lucy. _Damn. Why do I have the worst luck?_ He wondered to himself as he looked down at Lucy and poked her in the chest with the tip of his clawed index finger and growled. "You don't move from this spot. We'll continue once I drop kick whoever is at the door."

She blinked at him and he closed his eyes and let his body return to normal knowing that if he didn't whoever was at the door would go running to the guild then he'd find himself on the receiving end of some seriously _painful_ sealing magicks.

Once he was sure that his eyes, fangs, claws and scales were gone, he got up off of Lucy and quickly made his way to the door and disappeared out of the bedroom to see who was bothering him at such a time.


	17. Chapter 17

This chapter took forever to write due to the fact that I accidentally erased it before posting so I had to re write it from scratch. I just hope that it makes sense.

Happy holidays!

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The second Natsu was out of the room Rissa felt torn between screaming and getting dressed so that she could sneak out the window and run like hell.

It took her less than 0.02 seconds to make up her mind that running would be the best thing to do right now. At least until she figured out what was up with Natsu and how she was going to handle it.

She bounded off of the bed and across the room to her dresser and quickly pulled out a pair of pants and a cream colored shirt with pale green and pink flowers. She dressed quickly, her hands shaking, her breathing erratic, her eyes flickering to the door from time to time as she silently prayed that whoever was at the front door was accurate enough of a distraction to keep Natsu while she escaped.

Once she was done dressing she grabbed a pair of slip on shoes and headed back to the bed so that she could reach the window and cast one last look towards the door, her anxiety spiking to near hysterical levels when she heard the drone of Natsu's voice as he spoke. She slipped out the window and wasted no time in slipping her shoes on before she took off running towards town.

Intending to get lost somewhere in the crowded area so that Natsu wouldn't be able to find her for a while, her mind awhirl with questions. Questions like- What the hell was up with Natsu? He was usually so calm and even tempered. So shy and sweet natured. What had changed? When had something changed?

Then there was the last one. What had Natsu been trying to do by feeding her his flame?

She reached the corner of the house and shook her head as if to clear it as her a thought slithered through her mind. She'd _known_ what Natsu was doing. Or at least she thought she had. Even if she hadn't known consciously, she had still known.

And that was part of the reason she felt so frightened now. That and she didn't understand _why_ he had done it.

Binding a person to a dragon slayer was tricky business. Expecially since most dragon slayers wound up accidentally killing their potential mates with their flame when they preformed the exchange. Then there was the near constant mating because the dragon slayer was being driven to impregnant his mate.

From what little she knew of dragon slayers and their dead and lost magicks it was considered a great honor to both be mated to a dragon slayer and bear their offspring. Because the dragon slayer wound spoil the woman pregnant with his offspring _outrageously_. It was even said that the dragon slayer would take on a partial dragon like appearance so that he could better protect his new family.

These things were terrifying to someone who knew that dragons had a nasty tendency to devour people. Seeing them as prey and little else. She couldn't help but think that in some ways Natsu saw things the same way though he obviously tried hard not to act on it.

Though she got the feeling that he must have slipped a little bit back there after feeding her his flame. And what the hell had he meant by they would continue where they left off once he was done answering the door? She knew he meant something pervy by it but for the life of her, she didn't know what though he had made it sound as if he had more than simple kissing in mind.

She bared her teeth in a silent snarl and growled. _The pervy jerk!_ She thought darkly as she ran through the town, weaving her way in and out of alleys in an effort to leave her scent in various places to distract Natsu just in case he was already after her.

She was so busy laying a false trail for him that she wasn't paying attention to her surroundings and that it never occurred to her that she might fall into the hands of someone worse. She didn't notice that there were three men in scarlet hooded robes closing in on her until it was too late and one of them grabbed her from behind.

Startled and scared that Natsu may have already caught her she let out a blood curtling scream a second before she was slammed against a brick wall hard enough to knock her unconscious before she could manage to scream again.

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Natsu couldn't have been more annoyed with Erza and Grey's timing and didn't bother hiding it despite the fact that they were his friends and were worried about Lucy- no scratch that. _His mate_. Because bedding the girl aside, that was exactly what she was now- And wanted to know if she was okay.

Apparently news about the prior night's events had already reached the ears of everyone in the guild and they were out for blood.

That was all well and good but it wasn't their job to protect Lucy anymore. It was his.

Still that didn't mean that he had to be poilite or even civil with them. His dragon side overriding his common sense. After all if he pissed off Erza, she'd skin him alive. Or at least she would if she wasn't so quick on the draw.

She kept looking at him strangely and asking him peculiar things. He inwardly smirked at her silly efforts to figure out what was wrong with him when Grey happened to look away for a moment and blinked then pointed and asked in a comical tone, "Hey isn't that Lucy heading toward town?"

Natsu turned his head and craned his neck a little bit and caught the smallest glimpse of blond hair and sighed and rolled his eyes a second before excusing himself to go check the bedroom. His mind kicking into overdrive as it hissed furiously-

_She wouldn't dare run away._

He reached the bedroom and pushed the door open and did a quick sweep and wished that he could say he was shocked and surprised to find the bedroom was empty and Lucy was nowhere to be found. But to be honest, he wasn't any of those things. He was pissed that she bothered to _try_ running from him.

Silly girl. Didn't she know by now that he could track her anywhere in the world by her scent alone? _Of course she doesn't know that. She can't remember anything. She suffered severe head trauma and you just terrified her._ _It's only logical that she would run from you. _His rational mind hissed at him.

He made a frustrated sound and then turned and quickly made his way back to where he had left Erza and Grey and stepped out of the house and closed the door behind him, his fingers tightening to the point where he wound up crushing the door knob without realizing it. "I need to go and run someone down. Can we visit later?" His tone was so cold, and aloof.

Nothing like the Natsu they had grown up with. It was startling to them as much as it was uncomfortable. They both nodded their heads and he gave them a quick smile then took off running towards town while thinking about how he was going to drag Lucy back to the house kicking and screaming if he had too.

Why would she run? Didn't his Lucy know by now that he would never hurt her? He wondered as the rational voice in the back of his head responded. _Uh, no. And by exchanging your flame with her earlier you thoroughly scared the wits out of her. Think about it, you should have given her more than a two second warning. Not only that but she probably thinks that you plan to rape her or something. _

Natsu shook his head and made a frustrated sound. He would never, ever force himself on someone in such a way! It was cruel and sadistic and- _You aren't exactly yourself at the moment. _That same pesky voice said and his steps faltered a little bit as it occurred to him that he didn't have to go after Lucy. She may just need time to calm down and sort things out on her own.

_I could give her some time I suppose. I could sit and wait for her to come to me and talk about what happened rationally. Maybe I can put some of her fears to rest before I jump her pretty little bones._ He thought as he stopped completely and was about to turn around and go do exactly that when he heard a familiar blood curtling scream and jerked his head to the right and narrowed his eyes before growling low in his throat. The sound feral even to his own ears.

_Dammit!_ He couldn't leave that girl alone for a frigging second! _I should face facts, she'd be dead in a ditch somewhere without you around to save her. _He thought as he started running again in the direction that Lucy's scream had come from, his pace quickening with his intention to catch her before she could get hurt or escape him again.


	18. Chapter 18

Leo had been walking through the town minding his own business when he saw Lucy- Natsu's partner run inbetween some buildings being discreetly followed by three men in scarlet robes and got a funny feeling that the Stellar mage was in trouble and decided to follow and lend a hand if that was the case.

It wasn't that he liked the young woman. In fact he had a bad tendency to ignore her since Natsu first brought her to the guild over a year in a half ago. Stellar mages bugged him in ways that most mages didn't.

They thought that just because they had contracts with the constellations and could weild their power that they could do whatever they wanted with them. Like they weren't alive or could feel pain and though he got the impression that Lucy was different and genuinely cared for her contracted constellations- he was still wary of her for other reasons. Going out of his way to mask his presence from her everytime she got close.

He worried that if he didn't she would find out the truth about him and try to bind him in a contract through force. But that was neither here nor there as he slipped between the buildings after the men in the hooded robes.

He was careful to stay at a stealthy distance so that he could observe and nearly knocked over a garbage can that he'd ducked down behind when he saw one of the men grab the woman from behind and quickly slam her against one of the brick walls and render her unconscious. _Oh god dammit..._ Natsu was going to murder these guys.

But before that could happen he had to find them which meant that the task of protecting Lucy had just fallen to his shoulders. He peeked out over the top of the garbage can and watched as Lucy was bound with her hands behind her back and none too gently picked up off of the ground and tossed over one guy's shoulder.

"Are you guys sure that this is the woman we were sent after?" The guy with Lucy asked.

"Yes. The tracking spell is never wrong besides everyone in five countries knows this woman's face and her former name." Another said.

"So...what exactly is our boss going to do with her?"

"He's going to make sure that she's Rissa Katerina, then he's going to finish what he started almost ninteen years ago- Once he's made sure that this woman is in fact Rissa, one of the legendary mages, resserected from the dead and given new form. He'll then turn her into a dark mage and use her to usher in a new age of death and destruction!"

Leo blinked and sort of cocked his head to the side wondering what these men were talking about yet finding their conversation more and more fascinating by the moment. This was definately not the usual snatch and grab job. And the information that they had just unwittingly given him was...well, _disturbing_ to say the least. But then it was disturbing to think that the person that had woken up from the coma, wasn't Lucy Heartphilia.

All he could think was, _Who the fuck was Rissa Katerina? And did Natsu know? _And then there was the million dollar question. If that woman isn't Lucy; then where was Natsu's partner?

The three started to move and Leo found himself following, looking for an opening so that he could help the woman, whoever she was, knowing that even if she wasn't Lucy...she wasn't an evil person and he'd be damned before he saw her manipulated into becoming another Jellal.

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Natsu reached the place strongest with Lucy's scent and inhaled deep, detecting the scents of several strangers mixed in with a familiar scent of one of his guildmates, Leo. He cocked his head curious to know what Leo was doing in an alley somewhere but quickly figured that he must have been out for one of his walks and heard Lucy's scream too and had come to investigate.

Natsu touched the side of one of the buildings, detecting Lucy's scent on the stone along with something else. The smallest hint of blood and hair.

His lips curled back from his teeth as smoke wafted out of one of his nostrils as he snarled. Someone had hurt Lucy. Someone had hurt his mate! _Someone is going to die for this._ His dragon side roared as he started running again, following the trail in the air as his fury built to dangerous levels.

Scales rippled along his arms and legs, his eyes changed from a mere gold to molten amber with slitted pupils as he felt the skin of his back shift until large, leathery scaled wings ripped free from under his skin. Reaching up he jerkily pulled his vest off without faltering in his steps and suddenly took to the air with an animalistic roar.

From the air he was able to spot his mate slung over someone's shoulder, eerily still and felt his rage mount a notch higher before spotting Leo trailing after the ones carrying Lucy away from him, looking for an opening to attack. So Natsu decided to give him the opening he was seeking and do something about the men in the hooded cloaks while he was at it.

He'd kill two and keep the third alive for questioning since he had a sneaky suspicion that they were from the guild that had recently surfaced and started coming after her.

He flew a little ahead of the cloaked men and then folded his wings and let himself free fall through the air, flipping and twisting himself this way and that before landing on the ground with a loud crash.

The men in the scarlet cloaks all stopped in their tracks and gaped at him as he unfolded his wings again and let out another roar, this one followed by his fire. His eyes flickered to Leo who paled and looked a little ill and nodded his head at him to silently tell him that it was okay to attack now. He had his back.

Leo nodded back and charged, tackling one guy from behind while Natsu used one of his wings to fling the first guy away, it was like swatting a fly. His body hit the side of a building and Natsu heard the distinct sickening crack of several bones breaking all at once and then looked at the guy holding him mate and bared his teeth at him. Before he closed the distance between them and slashed the pale and frightened man's face with his claws.

All while grabbing Lucy by the back of her shirt and pulling her away from harm and slipping his arms around her limp body and held her against his chest and quickly ran a clawed hand through hair, checking her head for wounds. Finding a knot about the size of an goose egg on the back of her head, under her hair and looked back at the bleeding and blubering man and gave him a feral looking smile.

He eased Lucy down to the ground at his feet, careful of her head wound and stepped over her, and made his way over to the man as he scrambled back away from him and pounced on him and ripped out his throat. He might have taken things a step further and ripped the writhing body open with his claws but he sensed Leo standing behind him and knew that he wouldn't handle seeing such savage ferocity well.

Such a pity too. He would have torn out the dead man's insides and hung bits and pieces around Lucy's home to warn people off.

"Jesus Natsu-" Leo said in a horrified tone as he looked down at the corpse Natsu was crouched over then looked at the younger man-er dragon-er _person_ standing next to him. "I've never seen you kill anyone before."

"So?" Natsu growled before stating in a dark tone, _"He pissed me off." _Leo put a hand over his mouth and looked a little green for a moment before shaking off whatever he was feeling for the moment and asked.

"What do you want to do with that one over there?" He pointed towards the cloaked figure bound on the ground several feet from Lucy. Natsu glanced at the man and growled low in his throat. He'd love nothing more than to rip the bastard limb from limb but for the moment he needed information. So the guy could live.

For now.

"We'll take him to the guild for questioning. I want to know who these assholes are and why they want Lucy." Leo was quiet for a moment, silently debating with himself on mentioning what he'd overheard earlier then sighed and said.

"I think I know why. But we'll need that guy to fill in the blanks because what I heard them talking about didn't make much sense."


	19. Chapter 19

Once at the guild Natsu carried Lucy to the back where the cots were, ignoring the concerned looks that Erza, Grey, and many others gave him as Leo walked in carrying someone in a scarlet cloak over one of his shoulders. "Leo! What happened?" Elfman asked as he came running over and took the person in the cloak from the tall blond.

"This guy and his friends grabbed Lucy and were trying to kidnap her when me and Natsu took them down..." Leo said before pausing and looking towards the back room where Elfmans sister, Mirajane was heading to see if she could help the dragon slayer out. Leo waited until the woman was in the back room before saying, "There is something really funny going on, Elfman and I'm not sure if Natsu can handle it."

The man blinked at Leo, unsure of what he meant or how to respond when Erza and Grey walked over. "Then we'll have to make ourselves available just in case Natsu needs us. Won't we?" Erza said as Mirajane came out of the back troom shaking her head and tsking.

"Mirajane is Lucy alright?" Grey asked. The woman gave him a dirty look and picked up a wet rag and started to rub the paint job off of the bar in irritation.

"I don't know. He won't let me touch her." She bit out from between clenched teeth, worry, fear, concern and anger flitting across her features. Leo sighed and ran a hand through his tousled hair and said.

"Don't let it get to you Mirajane. The last person that touched her got his throat ripped out by Natsu's claws." You could have heard a pin drop from a mile away, everything was suddenly so quiet. And everyone was staring at Leo wide eyed, their expressions ranging from disbelief to horror as Erza said.

"Natsu's not the type to rip out a person's throat deliberately."

Leo snorted at her naive belief that Natsu was harmless. "You didn't _see_ him do it. I did." The two glared at each other for a few seconds, both angry at the other's assumption.

Natsu wasn't a ruthless, cold blooded killer.

Natsu _was_ a killer- Most people were simply too stupid to see that in him until it was too late.

This situation was similar to the old saying; if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it must be a duck. However in Natsu's case it was more like- if it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck but could breathe fire, then you should get the hell away from it before it ripped off a limb or something. Because that was _not_ a normal duck.

Natsu came out of the back and looked at the group around Leo and walked over and grabbed the unconscious man from Elfman and dragged him over to an empty chair and set him in it and then settled one hand on his shoulder then slapped him. The man woke up with a scream and everyone in the guild moved to stand around Natsu and the guy in the chair so that the man couldn't escape if he thought of trying to run.

Not that he would get far in the first place, Natsu looked pretty pissed to them which was part of the reason they were suddenly so quiet. They didn't want to draw his attention.

"Tell me who sent you and why." Natsu said in a rough gravely tone as the man shrank back from him.

"Where are Iseel and Karesu?"

"Dead. Now answer my question or you'll be joining them." Natsu growled in irritation as he shook the guy. The man whimpered and Natsu slapped him again and snarled at him. "Answer me you fucking pussy! Who sent you and why?"

"Donzela! Donzela sent us!" Natsu slipped his hand from the man's shoulder, down his arm to his hand and gripped it and brought it up to his mouth and put his finger in hsi mouth and asked around it.

Erza started to step forward but Grey and Leo pulled her back and both shook their heads no at her.

"Why w-ere youth sent?" The man jerked, trying to get his hand back but Natsu had him it in a bone crushing grip and was biting down on his finger, using his fangs to shred the skin and bite through the bone. The man screamed in pain and horror as Natsu spat his finger out of his mouth and into his lap and licked his lips to catch the blood escaping from his mouth.

"Why you were sent. You'll tell me right? After all if you don't-" Natsu opened his mouth and started to put another finger in when the man screamed.

"I'll talk! I'll talk! Just don't bite off any more of my fingers!" Natsu lowered his hand and waited for all of two seconds for the man to talk before letting go of his hand and gripping his head in his hands and leaned down and bit down on one of the man's ears.

He meant it only as a warning but the flesh tore so easily that before he could ease up on the pressure in his jaws, he tasted blood and the man let out an ear piercing scream as his ear came off in Natsu's mouth.

Natsu pulled back and spat the flesh out at the man's feet and hissed. "Talk now or your nose is next. Then, your eyes, then your tongue-"

"We were sent after the woman!"

Natsu slapped the crying, shaking, terrified man again and growled. "Why?"

"Because something was bound to her ninteen years ago! Something that belongs to us!" Natsu held his hand up and let himself slip just enough to allow his fingernails to morph into claws and then looked at the man expectantly.

Everything came out in a rush of jumbled words at first. But after Natsu warned the stranger to slow down so that he could understand him that jumbled mess became something else. Something much worse than Natsu had ever imagined.

Nineteen years ago Donzela, the mage that had sent the men after Lucy had tried casting a spell to create the perfect dark mage. He'd summoned the soul of one of the ten legendary mages and in an effort to give her a new form, something went wrong. The spirit was no longer able to rest and wound up bound to a child. Lucy Heartphilia.

Said spirit was unnoticed and unknown for nineteen years then when they had heard that the girl had had a whole guild come crashing down on her head they had thought that finally, _finally_ their time to retrieve said soul and put her to work was upon them.

The man confessed that if Lucy's heart stopped even for an instant that her soul would leave her flesh and the other would be forced to take it's place. Ressurecting the dead woman within Lucy's body.

He also explained that as a byproduct of the spell used to summon her- she would have all of her memories of her prior life erased and would become a blank slate. Easy to manipulate and shape as Donzela saw fit.

However Donzela hadn't managed to completely erase her memories before she wound up attached to Lucy. He only managed to erase a fair portion of the woman's memories while scrambling everything else.

He theorized that she may know her own name, perhaps other things too. But she wouldn't understand why she was in a strange body or why she was being called by another name. She would probably be disoriented, frightened, confused-

Natsu stood there and listened for as long as he could stand too before asking what had happened to Lucy. The man looked at him and hesitated for a second then said, "She died. The second that her heart stopped everything that she was or ever would be- Her hopes, dreams and future all became forefit. Rissa is the only one left. And my master wants her _badly_."

Natsu got a peculiar look on his face. A cross between anger, rage and heart breaking sorrow. Still trying to get past what the man said about Lucy being dead as the man laughed at him. Natsu didn't even look at him as he reached out his clawed hand ahd pushed it into his chest, ignoring the gasps and screams of the people around him as he ripped out the man's heart then threw it down and walked off.

He needed time to think.


	20. Chapter 20

Natsu swiped at his eyes with his hands, not caring if there was dried blood on them that mixed with the tears he'd been crying while mourning Lucy. He still couldn't believe that she was gone. It had to be a trick of some kind. I mean, he would have _known_ if she was really dead...wouldn't he? Or at least he kept thinking that he would.

But then it was her non physical body that was dead. Her soul gone forever.

All that was left was her body. A living breathing,_ literally_ empty shell that had been filled by the soul of another being. Another young woman. The same young woman that he'd been bonding with while thinking that she was his partner.

He wasn't sure what upset him more.

The fact that he hadn't known that Lucy was gone. Or the fact that he'd been trying to re-establish a lost bond with a total stranger. He sniffled and wiped his eyes again, smearing some of the blood that had mixed with his tears on his cheeks and looked down at the river that ran just thirty feet or so from Lucy's home.

He'd come here because it was the most comforting place he could think of. The one place where he and Lucy had shared certain experiences. Like watching fireworks on new years. And it was also the place he'd stood with her and exchanged chocolates with her on Valentines day.

This was the place where he felt closer to her even if they were miles apart. So it made a certain sort of sense that he would feel her presence the strongest here. And it was also the place where he felt his failure to protect her the strongest.

He'd spent the past seven hours alternating between crying and telling her that he was sorry that he had gotten her killed. That he hadn't been able to save her. He was sorry that her life, her hopes, her dreams, and her future were _all_ lost to her.

And now that he'd gotten a good portion of that out of the way and was thinking a little more clearly, he was trying to figure out what to do about the woman inhabiting Lucy's body. It wasn't like he could hater her, or knock her around or kill her for decieving him.

That was just stupid and besides that he sort of understood how she must have felt to wake up in a body that wasn't her own, unable to remember even the smallest of things. She didn't know him or his friends, didn't know if they would hurt her once they found out that she wasn't their friend.

So he really did understand where she was coming from.

Now all he needed to figure out was what he was going to do with her. He was bound to her after all, so sending her away would do nothing but drive him crazy. Hell, a majority of the stuff he came up with would do nothing but drive him crazy. Which left him with only one choice left. Though he wasn't sure what to think about it.

He would have to get to know his mate and court her while protecting her from the mage Donzela and his plans for her.

He sniffled and wiped at his eyes one last time and stood up, finally he felt ready to face the person within Lucy's body. He took one last look at the river then turned and stuffed his hands in his pockets and started walking.

(*********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************)

Rissa groaned at the throbbing in her head, the ache in her skull settling somewhere behind her eyes making the pain more unbearable as someone sat down on the bed's edge and leaned over her and said something to her in a familiar voice that it took her a second to recognise as Erza's.

"Rissa? Here, I have something to give you for your head. Can you sit up for a moment?" Rissa's eyes opened at the sound of her name being said by the red headed woman and before she even knew what she was doing or why, she started crying. It had been so long since anyone used her real name that she wasn't sure how to react.

On one hand she was utterly baffled about why the woman was calling her by her real name. Then her bafflement gave way to fear. After all if Erza was calling her by her real name then that meant that she knew that she wasn't the woman, Lucy. Which in turn left her facing an uncertain fate.

Was Erza angry at her for not telling her that she wasn't her friend? Would she physically harm her? Did anyone else know? Did Natsu?

As soon as the thought crossed her mind she went into hysterics. She couldn't help it. She could only imagine what Natsu would do to her if he thought that she had hurt Lucy or stolen her away. Her fear and panic were so great that she couldn't breathe, her chest ached and she fought against the hands that carefully tried to hold her down in an effort to escape as someone, a man with short blond hair and cat like eyes tried to calm her by speaking to her in a very soft, soothing tone.

"Shhh, it's okay Rissa. You're safe. No one's going to hurt you."

She was hyperventilating now, her face completly devoid of color, her expression terrified. The man was wrong. Dead wrong. _Natsu-_ Natsu would kill her! She thrashed around, trying again to get free but there were too many people holding her down.

Then suddenly she heard Natsu's voice and everyone let go of her and backed off as the dragon slayer came walking in and looked at her as everyone moved away. She looked at him, her fear plainly showing on her face and waited for him to kill her as he drew closer.

He sat down on the edge of the bed and she flattened her back against the headboard and drew her knees to her chest and lowered her head. Still waiting when she felt him shift closer and reach out and grasp one of her wrists, and pulled her forward so that she fell against him then wrapped his arms around her and started rubbing her back in an effort to calm her.


	21. Chapter 21

I hope that this made sense.

(**********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************)

Rissa was shaking, her tears dropping onto his bare shoulder. Wetting the skin. Her breathing was erratic, her heart beating too fast- Just what had the others done to her to trigger such a reaction in her? Natsu wondered as he continued to rubb her back when he felt someone start to step forward and pulled one hand from Rissa's back to wave the person off.

He didn't want to hear anything that could possibly upset him further right now. He wasn't sure that he could keep himself under control if he did. He heard everyone file out of the room and waited until it was completely empty before he bothered to speak. "Rissa? Your name is Rissa right?"

She nodded her head and sobbed and asked him if he was going to kill her now inbetween ragged breaths and Natsu felt himself go completely still. His mind blanking for an moment before kicking into overdrive. His temper spiking dangerously. Was that why she was so scared? Because she had somehow gotten it into her head that he was going to kill her?

He bared his teeth in a silent snarl over her shoulder and inwardly, savagely _growled_. Who the fuck had told her that he would kill her? That had to be one of the most ridiculous things he'd ever been asked. And once he found out who had told her this, someone was going to disappear that was for damn sure.

He kissed her shoulder and felt her jerk in his arms as a soft whimper escaped her throat and sighed. "I'm not going to hurt you Rissa." And it was true. He had no intention of destroying someone that hadn't wanted to cause him or his friends so much pain to begin with.

He could forgive the fact that Lucy was gone, he could even accept it despite the fact that Rissa was within her body. He could accept that there was _no way_ to reverse what had been done. And with enough time, patience and understanding he could even be happy again.

All he needed was to get to know his mate and move on. He knew that it would be more difficult than he made it sound- after all no one got over losing someone preciosu to them in just a few hours. It took months, maybe even years of torturing yourself with questions and grieving before you would finally reach the point where you got sick of crying and torturing yourself and decided enough was enough and started living again.

But this situation was a tad bit more complicated. Because on top of losing his partner, he now had a mate to take care of and simply couldn't ignore her until he felt better. It just wasn't possible.

His dragon half wouldn't allow it any more than his human half would. A vow was a vow after all, and he'd promised everything he was and ever would be to the woman in his arms. "I won't hurt you Rissa. If you feel you can't believe anything then at least believe that I'll never raise my hand to harm you." He said softly as he hugged her a little more tightly.

She hiccuped but other wise didn't respond. He doubted that she was feeling very trusting of him at the moment, her fear was making her parinoid about what he might or might not do. It was a knee jerk reaction that was to be expected of someone in her position.

He repeated his words over and over and over again for what felt like forever until her breathing calmed a bit and she lay slumped against him with her cheek resting on his shoulder. Her trembling had almost stopped and from time to time she'd hiccup and whimper until finally she had managed to cry herself to sleep.

Natsu tsked and laid her down and then without thinking about much of anything laid down behind her and wrapped his arms around her. Hunting down the person who had made her think he would kill her could wait until later.

He needed this time to be close to her as much as she needed this time to rest and be close to him.


	22. Chapter 22

Rissa woke up around the time that the sun set to find herself in a strange bedroom adjorned with jewels, cauldron of gold and silver coins with the occasional ivory and diamond studded dagger or sword. The walls of the room were an eggshell white with emerald green and off mint woven together in strange, intricate designs that looked like spells.

The dresser of the room was a stained dark mahogany, then there was two doors- one to a bathroom and another to an open closet with a chest in it. The bed she was laying in was downy soft, the sheets made of a silken material with a thick emerald and off mint coverlet on top.

Her head pounding from the combination of her wound and all the crying she'd done earlier. Making movment of any kind difficult since the pounding morphed into a wicked case of dizziness that left her feeling weak and nauseous.

She groaned and turned over onto her side and lay there trying to let the urge to hurl pass. When the door to the room opened and Natsu filled the doorway wearing nothing but his pants and leaned his shoulder against the door frame and looked her over as he crossed his arms over his chest.

"Ah, you're awake now." He said as she opened her eyes and looked at him. She looked so increadably pale that he wondered if she was going to get sick on him. He hoped not since she was currently laying in his bed. "How are you feeling?"

"I-I think I'm going to be sick."

He made a humming sound and walked into the room, grabbing up a cauldron he dumped the gold, silver and jewels into another pile and moved to put it next to the bed before she could get sick. Once that was done he straightened his spine and looked at her as she muttered a soft thank you and nodded his head and reached out to brush her hair back before he could stop himself.

She visibly tensed as if expecting him to strike her or something and he sighed and dropped his hand back to his side and dug out the tablets that Erza had given to him before he'd scooped up Rissa's unconscious body and started to leave, and laid them down on the small table next to the bed then went to get her a glass of water or something.

He came back with some juice and set the glass down next to the tablets and frowned for a second. He was forgetting something wasn't he? But what? _Idiot. When wooing a woman you bring her gifts to show that she has your favor and affection. _A foriegn voice said in his head. Natsu glanced back at Rissa who had her eyes closed again but wasn't asleep.

_She appears to be a flower sort of_ _girl. _Natsu nodded his head absently and walked over to the window on the other side of the room and opened it intending to pick a few of the wild flowers and roses growing under the window and up the side of the house. And reached out and carefully picked the most flawless blood red roses and a few of the tulips and lilies under the window sill then quietly closed the window and spent a moment or so fashioning the flowers into a nice bouquet.

Then walked back over to the bed and set them down on the table next to the glass of juice and the tablets then looked back at Rissa again. She looked like she had fallen back asleep but he could tell by her breathing that she wasn't. She was merely playing dead for the moment. Perhaps because she was still afraid that he might do something to her.

He didn't know and at the moment he didn't really care. She needed time to let her head wound heal and that meant that he would have some time to get to know the real her and court her a little bit before she tried to escape him again. His lips curved up a little bit in a devious smile as he thought, _It's a good thing I foresaw that inevitable out come and put a tracking bracelet on her wrist and sealed it shut with a spell to keep her from taking it off. _

At least this way if she was grabbed again the matching bracelet on his right wrist would resonate with hers and help him keep track of her. And just to make sure that no one found out about what sort of bracelet he'd put on her, he'd adorned it with diamonds and gold scroll work while she had slept.

The entire point of the bracelet wasn't to keep her from running off if she felt the need to put space between them. She wasn't a prisoner. It was merely a percaution in case she got into more trouble like she had earlier. A way to track her over a distance without feeling the need to be right on her heels.

He figured that she could go anywhere within a hundred miles of where his home was- in any direction, before his bracelet would start to resonate and he'd go to get her. Or at the very least see what she was doing and make sure that she was okay.

He put one hand over the bracelet on his wrist and anxiously ran his thumb along the silver scroll work then shifted a little bit closer to the bed and quickly leaned down over her and brushed his lips across her cheek then bolted for the door.

He had stuff to do and couldn't afford to waste time standing there daydreaming. He needed to clean out his home and make it presentable, needed to get rid of some of his gold and silver and jewels so that he'd have enough money to have a new home built for her once they had a clutch on the way and then there were other less _pleasant_ things that he needed to take care of.

Traps that needed to be set, spells to be etched into his walls to protect his fragile human mate. And a mad man and his guild that needed to learn the true meaning of fear.


	23. Chapter 23

A dragon slayer's wrath was a terrible thing. Especially when said slayer was mated. Their territorial instincts kicked in and any stranger that happened to pass by their home wound up either on fire or dead.

It had been a week since Natsu had brought Rissa to his place to rest and recoup and in that time Natsu had lost count of how many people in scarlet cloaks he'd maimed or murdered outright. His former friends and guildmates were starting to distance themselves from him, worried that they may be next while still trying to figure out what was wrong with him.

Some contributed his odd behavior when it surfaced- to his grief over losing Lucy.

They didn't know shit.

The only people out of the guild that bothered to come around now were Erza, Grey, Elfman, Mirajane and a handfull of others. And they mostly came around to bug him about the bodies that had been piling up. But the one person that happened to drop by that managed to surprise him was Leo.

The blond showed up on the seventh morning at seven a.m. as Natsu was stepping out his front door to go do some grocery shopping while Rissa slept.

The protective spells he'd places on and around his home were neatly in place and activated as he pulled the door closed and paused when he caught sight of the blond man standing a few feet away wearing a pair of old faded and torn jeans and a long sleeved button up black shirt with a jacket.

"Leo. What are you doing here?" Natsu asked as he turned around to face him. Leo stared the dragon slayer down before sighing.

"We need to talk man."

"If it's about the bodies again-"

"Fuck the bodies, Natsu. I don't really care who you kill as long as the guild and I aren't your targets. Actually I came to talk to you about your recent behavior." Leo said as he stuffed his hands in his pockets. Natsu nodded and motioned for him to follow him then started walking. Leo fell into step beside him after a moment or so before Natsu asked.

"You're curious about why I'm nesting aren't you?"

"Sort of and not really. I know enough about dragon slayers to know that they tend to get nasty when they are mated... _Sooo-_ When did you mate?" Leo asked.

Natsu snorted. Nosey lion. "Don't you mean who am I mated too?"

"Nah, I had that figured out when you killed that guy after questioning him. You gave Erza one hell of a shock by doing that by the way."

"I'd imagine so since she tends to think I'm a simpleton." Natsu said as he turned a corner and headed towards the outdoor market. If there was one thing he'd learned in the past week about Rissa it was that she liked the food that he got at the outdoor market. That and the occasional bouquet of flowers that he picked for her. She may not say much about them because she was still wary of him and his intentions towards her, but when she thought he wasn't looking he could see her run her fingers along the petals and smile faintly.

Leo made a noncommittal sound. Natsu was right. Erza among some of the others at the guild tended to treat him like he was a simpleton without a single thought in his head. It was about time they got a great big dose of reality. After all, Natsu wasn't a simpleton. He may sometimes act like it but that was only so that the others wouldn't be afraid to be near him.

It was different now. A week ago he'd dropped his mask and shook up the entire guild by killing the man he had been questioning without a second thought. His dragon side overriding his human half so that he could protect his mate. And while the new Natsu scared some of them, others had already figured out that the resedent dragon slayer wasn't out for their blood and knew that as long as they didn't do anything to cause harm to Rissa then he would have no reason to go after them.

Everyone else was still trying to wrap their heads around what they'd seen him do and were also still trying to figure out _why_. They were such clueless fools. Leo thought as he stopped a few paces behind Natsu and watched him shop. Noting that many of Natsu's former habits had been replaced by soem new and more interesting ones.

The dragon slayer picked only the best vegetables, fruits, nuts, sugar's, creams and meats for his mate. The things that would keep her healthiest and sustain her the longest. It took almost an hour for Natsu to check out everything he was buying to his satisfaction and in that time Leo noted that he was relying heavily on his sense of touch, smell and taste to help him pick out what he wanted.

Then once he had everything he set it all on the counter and waited patiently for it to be rung up by the person selling it all and then helped placed everything in a cloth bag before handing the man running the booth several gold coins then picked up his bag and looked towards Leo and motioned again for the blond to follow him.

Leo smiled a little bit, and fell into step behind the dragon slayer. A mite curious about where the younger man was taking him and stopped outside the village floral shop and cocked his head to the side as Natsu disappeared inside.

_Well, I suppose that even Natsu likes to stop and smell the roses. _Leo mused as he stepped into the shop and paused just in the doorway at the sight before him.

Natsu stood several feet away with one hand completely full of flower seeds, had a white rose bush tucked in the curve of one arm and was reaching for a pink rose bush while the person behind the counter worked on making a bouquet of long stemmed cut flowers.

Oh dear god, what sort of mess had he just stepped into? Leo wondered as Natsu turned and hurried over to him and handed him the seeds and asked him to help him figure out which ones Rissa would like the best.


	24. Chapter 24

Rissa lay curled up on Natsu's bed wearing a long sleeved silken cream colored shirt with one of Natsu's black vests over it, tucked into the waist band of one of her ankle length skirts, her thick hair pulled back into a braid that fell over one of her shoulders.

She'd woken up almost an hour ago after hearing Natsu leave and had gotten up and gone about her morning routines before taking a shower in Natsu's luxurious bathroom then gotten dressed in some of the clothes that the dragon slayer had provided for her while still trying to figure out what he was up too.

To her he wasn't acting quite right.

And then there was her paranoid belief that he was still going to kill her. She simply didn't understand why he was taking so long about it. Was he trying to lull her into a false sense of security? Toy with her a bit maybe?

She'd thought at first that part of the reason she was still alive must have something to do with his binding them with his flame and vows. But she had quickly shrugged that stuff off figuring that since he'd thought he was binding himself to Lucy, that it wouldn't hold.

Which meant that the binding was moot because he couldn't mate himself to a dead girl.

Still his normal, _everything-is-fine_ act was starting to bug her. Honestly she didn't know what to make of it. Sure there was a chance that Natsu knew that she hadn't meant to take Lucy's place or cause anyone trouble or pain, but it seemed unlikely that his dragon half would be so reasonable about his partner's death. Especially if he had harbored romantic feelings for her.

Then again it also seemed likely that part of the reason he kept her alive and brought her flowers and such was because she was in Lucy's body and his mind had yet to accept that she was gone and make a distinction between them as different people. Perhaps he saw her as a convenient replacement for his lost lover.

That was also plausable. Right?

She sighed and rolled over onto her back and stared up at the ceiling. If Natsu was having trouble distinguishing her from Lucy then maybe she should do something about that. Sure it could enrage him and turn him murderous but...well, she felt uncomfortable thinking that he couldn't tell her apart from Lucy because of how she looked.

_Maybe I should dye my hair black or scarlet like Erza's._ She thought as she slowly pushed herself upright and looked at the tip of her braid with a contemplating look on her face. Either color would look nice on her considering her skin tone and eye color. Although she didn't really like the idea of dying her hair so dark that it was black. Maybe an alternative color would work just as well.

Maybe something along the lines of bleaching her hair then using a light pink to give herself highlights. _Nah. _She'd look funny with pinkish blond hair and Natsu would consider the color a form of flattery. She sighed and swung her legs over the edge of the bed and got to her feet and stretched her arms up over her head and arched her back.

She was about to start pacing when she heard the front door open and abruptly dropped her arms and turned around and walked to the door and peeked out. Her heart thudded in her chest, her breathing erratic as she saw Natsu walk across the living room and set his cloth grocery bag down on the kitchen table and dug out some little packets of paper and a bouquet of flowers.

Then seemed to sense her watching him and straightened his spine and slowly turned his head to look at her over one of his shoulders. He turned his head back to his task of digging out the groceries then took a moment or so to put the perishables away before absently picking up an orange that he'd laid aside and then made his way towards the bedroom.

Rissa made a funny little eek sound and scrambled across the room and laid back down on the bed and closed her eyes and pretended to be asleep as he pushed the door open and chuckled at her as he slowly peeled the rind from the fruit as she played dead. "You do realise that I could hear you running across the room right?" He asked in an amused tone as he finished peeling the fruit then pulled it into smaller portions and popped one into his mouth and chewed.

She didn't react. She didn't even twitch. So he decided to play with her a little bit and see how long her act would hold up. Walking over to the bed he set the orange and the rind aside on the small table next to it and then laid down on his side next to her and rested one hand on her hip before slowly slipping it down her thigh and gripped her skirt and started to drag it up a bit.

Biting the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing when she twitched and kept trying to play dead. He got her skirt up almost half way before she finally growled and tried to elbow him in the face as she came up off of the bed. Natsu dodged the blow easily and buried his face against the mattress and laughed harder as she snapped at him in an outraged tone as her face turned a vivid pink.

"Pervert!"

He tilted his head slightly and looked at her from under his bangs and couldn't help the grin curving his lips. So he was a little bit of a pervert when he was with his mate. Big deal. That was normal for a guy his age. Besides, he loved picking on her like this.

It kept her on her toes.

He sat up slowly and turned his body to face her and took up a relaxed posture that he knew would irk her and smiled at her. "Oh you're awake now. Awesome. Come here and let me kiss you."

"Nuh-uh. Your not kissing me after that little stunt."

"Stunt? There was a stunt?" He asked innocently.

She gnashed her teeth and growled at him like an animal before fairly shrieking. "You damn well what I'm talking about!" Natsu picked up another pice of the orange that he'd peeled a few minutes ago and stood up and closed the small distance between them, forcing Rissa to back herself up until her back hit the wall.

Natsu chuckled as he planted one hand next to her shoulder and leaned in close and put the orange slice in his mouth and then grabbed her. She jerked violently in his grasp and hit her head on the wall and he felt a twinge of guilt for making her so scared. "Settle down. I'm not going to hurt you." He said around the orange piece as he caught her chin in his fist and lowered his mouth to hers as she opened her mouth to snap at him again.

Feeding her the piece of fruit before bothering to kiss her for real.

He'd missed her in the short time he'd been out doing his shopping and talking with Leo and was content to show her by giving her a toe curling kiss that left her feeling so dizzy that she had to grab hold of his shoulders just to keep herself from falling.

Natsu made a funny sound as helifted his mouth from hers and licked his lips before noticing a small trail of orange juice from the slice he'd fed to her, running down her face from the corner of her mouth. And leaned back down to lick it away before he reached up and gently pried her hands from his shoulders and kissed her palms as he used his thumb to wipe away the spit he'd left on her face when he'd licked her, then said softly. "Try to eat the orange while I fix you something else to eat."

He stepped back away from her and quickly left the room as she slid down the wall to sit on the floor. Dear god she was really in trouble here, wasn't she?


	25. Chapter 25

At lunch Rissa sat across from Natsu trying to bring up the subject that she'd thought on earlier. About changing her looks. But figured that if the dragon slayer knew what was on her mind, he'd go to great lengths to stop her. So instead she decided to merely 'go for a walk' after lunch and see if she could find anything to use for her plan.

She figured that she could possibly pierce her ears, maybe find a potion at one of the magic shops that could accelerate hair growth and possibly another to change her eye color. That way even if her face looked like Lucy's- Natsu would no longer be able to confuse her for his dead lover.

She figured that she could settle for a nice red hair dye and change her eyes teal or turquoise. Or she could go with her alternative, a nice dark black hair dye with teal or scarlet or violet eye coloring. All would look pretty on her so she wasn't feeling terribly picky.

Natsu finished eating and pushed his plate away and noticed that she had just barely touched her food and frowned. "Something on your mind?" He asked, the sound of his voice causing her to jump a little bit as she jerked her head up to look at him. She had this wide eyed_ I-didn't-do-anything_ look on her face that made him believe that she was planning something.

"N-No. Nothings on my mind." She said hastily as Natsu laced his fingers together behind his head and studied her. She was lying. He could tell, but he wouldn't bother calling her on it as long as she wasn't planning something stupid. Like attacking him, or getting herself hurt, captured, or killed.

He made a low humming sound. "Is the food not to your liking then?"

Rissa blinked at him then looked down at her plate and frowned at the stir fried shrimp and scallops with noodles and garlic sauce with grilled fish and vegetables. It wasn't that the food was bad, to be honest Natsu was a phenomenal cook. Everything always came out perfect.

She just wasn't hungry at the moment.

She still had butterlies from the kiss he'd given her earlier and doubted that she could eat anything. "No. The food is perfect. I'm just not hungry right now." Natsu let his hands drop away from behind his head and leaned forward in his seat a little bit and gently took her chin in his hand and made her look at him. The first thing she noticed was his eyes. They were molten gold again and the pupils were slitted.

_Ah, his dragon side is making a small appearance. _She thought as he ran his now clawed thumb along her lower lip, lovingly, and asked in a guttural voice. _"Are you well?" _

"I-I'm fine." She squeaked as he gave her a narrow eyed look for a moment then drew his hand back and ordered.

_"If you begin to become ill- you will let us know." _She nodded her head slowly, not wanting to snap at Natsu's more primal side since it could easily rip her head off if it wanted and it made a strange sound almost like a shuddering exhale as Natsu's eyes changed back to normal and he blinked before saying in a more normal tone. "If you start to feel unwell you need to let me know."

She nodded again and politely excused herself from the table and muttered something about going for a walk. At this point she would have done almost anything to escape those unnerving, watchful eyes of his. And headed for the door.

She was almost there when she heard Natsu stand up behind her and call out, "Hold it." She froze just three small steps from the door and waited, almost panicking as he walked up behind her and slipped something- a coin pouch from the feel of it- into her hand and closed her fingers around it and said cheerfully, "Just in case you find something you can't live without."

She turned her head and looked at him funny as he put a hand on her shoulder then stepped forward and kissed her on the cheek before saying, "Have fun." And walking away.

_What the hell? _Rissa wondered as she quickly pocketed the coin pouch and exited the house suddenly feeling like she'd set herself up for something that she probably wouldn't like.


	26. Chapter 26

Natsu watched Rissa run away from the house. And him through narrowed gold eyes. _What's she up too?_ He wondered curiously as she disappeared before he stepped away from the window and started chewing on his lower lip as he mentally debated with himself on if he should follow her or not.

He had explained that she wasn't a prisoner and that she could come and go as she pleased as long as it was within reason.

Yet he couldn't help but wonder what she was up too. And worry that whatever it was may be dangerous. He supposed he could follow her descreetly at a distance, if nothing else he could simply make sure that she didn't come to harm while appeasing his curiosity. But the second he thought of doing that, he shook his head and walked over to the couch and sat down and tried to make himself comfortable.

Spying on her meant that he didn't trust her. Which meant that there was little hope for a romantic relationship to form. He had already bound himself to her, he'd simply have to get over his fears and misgivings and trust that she'd come back to him.

And though he logically had made his choice to sit and wait...he couldn't help having his mind work him into a tizzy. God by the time she came back he would be so curious and anxious that he'd develop a nervous tick and wouldn't be able to sit still.

Maybe following her wouldn't be such a bad idea. Especially if she didn't know. _Dumbass. You're going to muck things up before they even get good. _His mind chidded him as he started to get up to do exactly that, then stopped himself and sat back down.

Oh goddamn it. He was going to drive himself nuts while Rissa was gone for her walk, wasn't he? He sighed and ran a hand through his pink hair and made a frustrated sound in the back of his throat as he squirmed around until he had his body wedged at an uncomfortable angle. _Yes that's it. Cripple yourself with back and neck pain to keep from chasing after your mate._ His dragon side chortled in amusement before he mentally added.

_Yeah, yeah. I'm pathetic. Tell me something I don't already know_.

(***************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************)

Rissa ducked into the first magic shop she came across and flattened her back against one of the displays and peeked over the shelf and out of the window to see if Natsu had followed her. Her paranoia showing just for an instant before the shop keeper behind the counter cleared his throat, drawing her attention to him.

"Can I help you with something young lady?"

Rissa was quiet for a moment then nodded and asked for an eye color change potion or spell and nearly died on the spot when the man asked her which color she wanted and almost buried her in several bottles and spell scrolls while explaining to her how they worked.

She made quick work of getting the colors that she wanted and paid the man and quickly ran out with her perchase then found another store and after a little bit of a hassel got several different colored hair dye's one of which was scarlet red, and another was black then walked around for about an hour or two before making her way back to Natsu's house.

And just stood there outside anxiously shifting from foot to foot before slipping around to the back of the house and entering through the bedroom window and quickly (perhaps a little too quickly since she tripped and made a sound) before she managed to pick herself up and locked herself in the bathroom.

A split second later she heard Natsu coming to investigate the sound she'd made in the room. His footsteps paused outside of the bathroom and he made a semi loud humming sound. "Wow, I've had fools slip in seeking to steal treasure before. But I've never had an person lock themselves in my bathroom without touching anything before."

He sounded serious. Yet at the same time oddly cheerful.

His tone was making her envision having the door kicked down and something unspeakable happening to her. Which was why she found herself moving over to the door before Natsu's voice cut through her almost panicked thoughts. "I know it's you Rissa. I can smell your scent all over the room and even through the door. I was just teasing you."

She banged on the door with her hand and he cackled like a mad man. "You jerky dragon! You nearly scared me out of my wits!" Natsu's laughter died down to a chuckle as he rested his back against the door and said under his breath.

"If I had scared you out of your wits then how did you manage to articulate enough words to yell at me?"

She must have heard him because she smacked the door again and growled at him. _"What did you just say?" _

"Nothing." Natsu said innocently before asking. "So why did you come through the window instead of the front door?" Rissa was quiet and he could vaguely make out the sound of a bag rustling and glass clinking together.

"I have something that I need to do."

Natsu was quiet as he cocked his head to the side. _Something to do? What could she have to do-_ He flushed and awkwardly cleared his throat. "Well, don't let me keep you." He said, embarrassed as he walked away from the door and left the room a second before Rissa shrieked in embarrassment/outrage.

**_"It's not like that!"_**


	27. Chapter 27

He'd been sitting down trying to pretend that he wasn't embarrassed by earlier. It had been over an hour since Rissa had returned to his home and locked herself in the bathroom and he couldn't help the wanderings of his mind as he heard the bathroom door finally open and Rissa came out.

He listened to her move around in the bedroom for a moment before the door swung open and he turned his head to see Rissa coming out of the bedroom with a towel around her shoulders, rubbing at her damp hair.

His relief was instant. _Oh thank god. There for a second I thought things were going to be awkward_. He thought as she walked up to him and kicked him in the shin and growled. "You're a moron."

Natsu was about to respond when her towel slipped a little bit and he caught sight of her hair and jumped to his feet and pulled her towel away from her head.

He half expected her to get a panicked look on her face and try to move away from him like she usually did. But she didn't do those things. In fact her reaction surprised him quite a bit. She looked..._defiant_. As if she was daring him to say something about what she'd done to her hair. He reached out and tennatively grasped the formerly mid shoulder length black strands, now mid back length, in his hand and curled them around his fingers almost absently.

With her pale skin, green eyes and newly dyed hair she looked exotically _beautiful_.

She got an anxious look on her face after a moment or so of having him stare at her with those dragon like unblinking eyes and demanded, "Well? Are you going to say anything?" Natsu finally blinked and smiled. Oh no he wasn't going to say anything.

He was going to show her how beautiful he thought she was.

He let go of her hair and before she could so much as scamper away from him like she usually did, he bent down and caught her up in his arms and tossed her over one of his shoulders and headed for the bedroom as she squeaked in alarm and grabbed his vest in her hands and pulled on it as she shrieked. "Natsu! Natsu what are you doing?"

"Going to the bedroom." He said in an innocent tone that belied his intentions.

She squirmed a little bit and sort of kicked her legs, trying to get him to drop her so that she could run, but he tightened his arm around her legs and once in the bedroom kicked the door closed as she started shouting oaths and other things at him.

And he was more than a little amused when she finally shouted. "Bad dragon man! _Bad!_ Let me go!" A second before he unceremoniously dropped her onto the bed. She bounced twice then settled, her dark hair slipping over her shoulders and into her eyes.

Natsu slipped his vest off and laid it aside and climbed onto the bed, his eyes warily watching her legs for any signs of lashing out. The last thing he needed at this point was to be kicked in his nuts. Especially since he wasn't going to do anything terrible to her.

A little light petting and kissing and he'd let her go so that she could run from the room like he knew she was _dying_ to do as he leaned over her and pressed his lips against her collar bone as he pressed her down into the mattress, molding their bodies together as he kissed his way up her baby soft skin until he came to her mouth.

She tried to slap him, but he deftly caught her wrist and made a low growling sound to warn her not to do that again and then tucked her hand under one of his knees to pin it and framed her face in his hands. She jerked a little bit in his grasp and opened her mouth to say something but he silenced her with a hard, hungry kiss on the lips. Stealing her breath and leaving her feeling dizzy and shakey like before.

He pulled his head back a little bit and smoothed her dark hair back away from her face and kissed her a little more gently this time. His mouth slanting over hers as his tongue slid between her parted lips. Rissa made a strained sound and tried to pull back away form him, but Natsu merely followed her movement until he had her completely trapped.

Their mouths never once parting.

He settled his weight on his elbows as he let one hand slip down to her throat to stroke the skin along her jugular vein with his thumb. She trembled slightly under him. And he pulled back a fraction of an inch and skimmed his lips along the curve of her cheek so that he could run his tongue along the shell of her right ear, causing her to whimper and twitch before he shifted his attention lower and sucked on the skin of her throat.

Her breathing hitched and her trembling increased.

Sensing that she was on the verge of giving in to her physical needs, he decided to push her a little more and see what happened. He pulled back again and shifted his body so that he was straddling her hips and pressed his advantage. "Let me make you feel good." He said in a husky tone as he leaned back down to brush his lips against hers.

Her eyes fluttered open then closed again for a second as she frowned then re opened them and looked at him with a confused expression on her pretty face. Natsu's eyes were molten gold again, the pupils slitted as he waited for her to reply. "W-What do you mean by that?"

"Not much. Certainly nothing too risky. Merely that I want to make you feel good."

"My clothes stay on." Rissa said automatically, her tone irked as Natsu chuckled.

"Okay. Not exactly what I was hoping for but it's doable so I won't complain." Natsu said in wry amusement as he lifted himself up a little bit and slipped his hands between her legs.

She jumped and was about to say something scathing about his mother but he stopped her with another toe curling kiss as he carefully pulled her legs apart and then settled his hips in the space between her parted legs and startled her when she felt something hard pressing against her through her skirt. She reached up and pushed against his chest, causing him to pull back as she said in a thoroughly shocked tone. "Natsu!"

He grinned down at her. This was nothing. If she was shocked now he could only imagine her reaction to having actual sex with him.


	28. Chapter 28

Rissa arched her back and moaned as Natsu ground his aching length against her core, the fabric of his pants was starting to grow very uncomfortable against his skin but he was reluctant to do anything that could end this..._love play_ that he had coaxed her into. Especially since he wasn't sure when the next time they'd engage in such activity again would be.

He leaned down and latched onto one of her breasts through her shirt and sucked hard. Rissa gasped and lifted her hips up off of the bed and shuddered as he slipped his hands from her wrists to lace their fingers together. And growled low in his throat as he used the weight of his body to press her back down into the mattress.

"Are you about to cum for me? Hm, love." He asked in a husky tone as he lifted his mouth from her breast to press his lips against her throat.

Rissa whimpered as he gently bit down on the skin of her jugular and sucked as he shifted a little bit and slipped his arms under her and quickly rolled them so that she was on top of him and gasped, shocked by the sensations he had ignited in her body as he grasped her hips and rubbed her against him a little bit harder.

He could feel the juices of her core leaking through her panties and skirt, soaking through the constricting fabric of his pants and knew that he wouldn't last much longer. Niether of them would. He wrapped one arm around her waist and the other around her shoulders and hungrily sought her mouth.

Needing to taste her on his tongue as the tension coiled within both of them finally gave.

He swallowed her scream and made a strained sound in the back of his throat as he came in his pants, his hips still moving against hers until he was totally spent. He stopped moving against her and tore his mouth from hers and just lay there for the longest time with her wrapped in his arms, the sound of their ragged breathing filling his ears as their hearts thudded against their chests.

He ran his fingers through her dark hair, enjoying the feel of the silken strands as they slipped through his fingers. "I like your new look-" He finally said in a slightly hesitant tone. Not wanting to offend after such a wonderfully pleasant and enjoyable activity. "The color suits you." He said softly as he wound a thick strand around his index finger and brought it to his lips.

Rissa didn't respond. He hadn't really expected her too since he got the feeling that he had worn her out. He lifted his head a little bit and glanced at her, her head was resting on his chest right above his heart and her eyes were closed. Though he knew she wasn't asleep. "Ignoring me so soon?" He asked, trying to get a reaction out of her.

He got what he wanted, though it wasn't in the form that he'd expected as she turned her head a little bit and bit him right on top of one of his nipples. He stiffened and let out a long breathy hiss, his arms tightening around her almost to the point of pain as she muttered. "Don't ruin the moment by speaking. I'll kick you out of bed if you do."

Natsu forced himself to relax and chuckled. Even when she had just experienced physical ecstasy she still wanted to fight him. It was as cute as it was bothersome. _Silly girl, can't you drop your guard and let me in just a little? _Natsu wondered as he played with her hair a little while longer, until he noticed that her breathing pattern had changed. Becoming deep and shallow to indicate sleep.

He snorted in amusement and rolled his eyes, Jesus Christ this was just too much. _She_ was just too much. He tightened his arms around her again and subtly shifted so that he was laying on his side and she was laying next to him and closed his eyes as he tucked her head under his chin and said in a hushed tone. "Ah Rissa, I think I'm falling for you."


	29. Chapter 29

Surprisingly enough, Natsu's admission of falling for Rissa hadn't bothered him one little bit. In fact he felt very happy, and dare he say- _content_ with the idea of being in love with her. She was such a sweet girl. Even when she was fighting with him.

Yet after their love play the other day he'd found her so embarrassed about what had transpired that whenever he tried to get close to her, she scampered into the bedroom and closed the door and locked it. Or she suddenly decided to go out and ran out of the house as if the hounds of hell were nipping at her heels.

Which was why he found himself getting more and more_ irked_ by the fact that he hadn't been able to cuddle with her or get within reaching distance of her before she ran away from him. He hadn't been able to touch her. To kiss her.

_If this shit keeps up I may end up raping her just to get some damn attention._ He thought darkly. He missed his luvin's dammit! And his dragon half was all but straining against his mental choke hold- also wanting some attention from their mate.

Honestly he felt like a drug addict that had just been dropped into rehab. And he was _not_ liking how it felt to go through love withdrawl.

However today was different. He would make it so. Today he planned to corner her and kiss her until she was as hot and bothered as he was. Then he'd leave her twisting in the wind to see how she liked it.

He was in the process of trying to figure out how best to approach her while watching her flit from one end of the room to another like a pixie. Looking at various treasures and coins and gems that he had laying around in the corners of the living room where he'd piled them so that they would be out of the way.

She was on her knees in the farthest corner-he suspected it wasn't because of the treasure but because he was present in the room and she wanted to keep a distance between them, just in case- and she had an emerald in the palm of her hand and was running one of her fingers around the smooth surface.

Natsu twitched. He couldn't help it. Everytime he saw her run her fingers along somes surface his cock hardened unbearably and he wished, _oh_ how he wished she'd walk over to him and pay him the same attention and pet him.

She set the gemstone aside and Natsu found himself shifting in his seat, wanting very badly to snatch it up and drop it down his pants or something so that she'd have to touch him just to get it back. But didn't move from his chair. If he did she'd run. So grabbing the gem stone was pointless.

"Hey...what are you doing?" He asked curiously despite the fact that his tone was less than polite as she set another stone, this one a wine colored garnet, aside.

Rissa didn't answer him at first. In fact she didn't really give any indication of hearing him at all as she dug out a few more garnets, then started shifting through his silver. God he hated being ignored. He was about to kick a chair across the room or something to get her attention when she finally said. "I'm seperating it into smaller portions. Do you have a chest or something that I can put these in?"

He blinked and scowled. He did have a chest or something that she could put it in, but he wasn't moving unless he got something out of the deal. His eyes flickered to her butt which was encased in denim skinny jeans that made her ass look just perfect. She stopped shifting through his treasure and turned around a little bit and looked at him expectantly and he growled.

"I'm not moving from this chair unless you let me kiss you or touch you."

"You can just bite me cause I'm not letting you do either of those things." Rissa retorted as her face flushed. Natsu shrugged his shoulders and laid his chin on the table he was sitting at and made himself look pitiful for a moment before brightening. His inner pervert working furiously.

She'd said to bite her, hadn't she? Well that was definately doable.

He could bite the hollow of her shoulder, the side of her neck...or he could strip her out of her pants and bite her lower. Hell the very thought made his mouth water in anticipation as he quietly got up out of his seat and used all his stealthy abilities to get behind her and licked his lips.

Rissa was so engrossed in what she was doing that she didn't notice his shadow looming over her until she felt his fingers tangle in her hair and pull her head back and saw Natsu leaning down as he opened his mouth and felt his breath on her throat a second before his teeth latched onto the soft skin. She yelped despite the fact that he wasn't hurting her and jumped a little bit as he used his free hand to hold her in place by her shoulder.

He sucked then released her for a moment and licked the area that he'd just bitten down on and made a happy little chirping sound before abruptly releasing her and making his way into the bedroom to dig out that chest she'd wanted. Leaving her sitting there wondering what the hell had just happened. And why he suddenly seemed to be so happy.


	30. Chapter 30

Two weeks later-

Natsu was acting weird. Or _weirder_ rather.

Ever since that day she'd told him to bite her...that had been exactly what he had been doing. Every day, at all hours. He'd even started climbing into bed with her and leaving some teeth marks on her...most_ sensitive_ places. And what was worse was she hadn't even known he'd done it until morning came and she found some faded reddish teeth marks on the skin of her inner thighs, her breasts, her neck and shoulders-

She had even found one or two on the soft swells of her bottom!

_Oh you sorry son of a- _She thought as she marched herself out of the bedroom to do something horrible to him.

To say that she was displeased about the markings would be an understatement since she woke him up by punching him in the nuts. Something that had to be one of the worst way to wake up to the girl you loved. Really it was just _aweful_. Especially since it left Natsu curled up on the floor holding his wounded area and trying hard not to cry.

And what was worse was that he couldn't even get mad at her for it because-well, he had technically overstepped his bounds on leaving those marks on her body without permission.

So for a few days there he was on his absolute best behavior. Not that it mattered any since she was still pissed at him and took the time each day to smack him in the back of the head and growl at him for being a perv before stomping off.

That had been almost a week ago and now she was back to scampering away from him at the drop of a hat. It was as_ aggravating_ as it was _vexing_. And he had finally had enough. Now he was all for Rissa running wild and free if she needed the time or space, but the truth of the matter was that she was doing nothing now but running _from_ him in the worst possible way.

And that was something that he just couldn't allow if they were ever going to have a happy home life. He understood her inital confusion, and even her denial but she couldn't hide behind those things anylonger.

So that night after dinner he waited until he knew she was in the bath and then quietly picked the lock on the bathroom door with one of his claws and stepped in and silently pushed the door closed behind him and shrugged off his vest.

Rissa was humming with her back to him, her dark hair was twisted up into a messy bun at the back of her head and she was sitting partially submerged in the water and he smiled and listened to her hum while he stripped.

She must have sensed he was there or something, because one moment he was enchanted by the loveliest sound he'd ever heard before and the next she was looking at him, her jaw slack as he dropped his pants and stepped out of them before bothering to say anything to her. And even then, all he could manage was a strangled and lame sounding, "I thought you could use someone to scrub your back."

She looked him over, her eyes traveling from his face to the width of his shoulders to the lean muscled frame of his body. Pausing briefly on the thick length hanging between his legs before she made a strangled sound and let herself sink under the bath water until she was completely submerged.

Rissa couldn't believe the _gall_ of the man. He accosted her and molested her every god given chance he had after binding her to him. And now he was invading her space yet again. And why?

Well she figured he was fixated on her in some way which in itself wasn't good since dragon slayers were notorious for fixating on random things and-and... Well she didn't know what they did with them biut she could only imagine that his fixation was simular to the type he held for his treasure. Which might explain why he exchanged his flame with her...but that didn't mean that she had to frigging like it!

Her face heated up even more under the water and she felt the hysterical urge to laugh as she thought, _Was he maybe trying to shed his dragonskin or something. _As the mental image of a dry, scaley skinned Natsu rubbing himself against his gold coins, furniture, and even random people; filled her mind.

Making her want to laugh again as Natsu stepped up to the bath tub and looked down at her through the water and scratched his head.

_Well, this was certainly unexpected._ He mused as he wondered when she was going to come up for air. It had already been two minutes and he was sure that she'd need a breath any moment now. Not only that but he wondered about her lack of reaction.

Normally she would have screamed bloody murder, thrown something or called him a bastard and demanded that he put his frigging clothes on and get the hell out. But she hadn't done any of those things yet and he was uncertain on how to continue since the wrong thing could set her off in a rather unpleasant way. He waited a few more seconds and sighed and sat down on the edge of the tub and used his hand to motion for her to come up for air.

It was about time the two of them had a chat about their future. And she wasn't getting out of it by drowning herself.


	31. Small Authors Note

Interesting news kiddies-

After having my story Pet rejected for like the hundredth time I've turned it into an E Book on lulu. It's three dollars. and i think it's okay, i haven't been able to check because my comp is unco operative.

But anyone who wants to check it out, then please do and be sure to get back to me and let me know what you think.

_OH!_

And on a totally seperate note, I've started a DBZ story with a Goku/OC pairing. But I haven't got many readers. If anyone is feeling adventurous then please check it out too.

thank you


	32. Chapter 32

_Un-fucking-believable. _Natsu thought as he partially hauled Rissa out of the soapy water with an annoyed look on his damned woman had actually almost drowned herself!

In the bathtub no less after he'd motioned with his hand for her to come up so that he could talk to her.

Damn her hide. Was he really that hard to talk too? Or did she think he was going to get too close and ravish her or something? The idea certainly had some merit as he pulled her completely out of the water and sat down and settled Rissa in his lap as she coughed up the water she'd swallowed.

Reaching off to the side Natsu fumbled around for something to wrap around her and came into contact with his discarded pants and sighed.

Well hell. It would have to do for the moment. He wrapped the pants around her slender shoulders. Making sure to show extra attention to her chest area to make sure that they got covered up too. Breasts were nice and all, but they were distracting to him when he had something serious on his mind and while his pants covered her upper body, it left her lower body completely uncovered and vulnerable to him...

Which was another distraction since they were skin to skin. Still Natsu had no intention of getting out of hand or doing anything against her wishes.

He just wanted to talk to her. Or at least that's what he kept telling himself when she squirmed in his lap causing a very nice sort of friction against his hardening cock. He gritted his teeth and hissed and tightened his arms around her body and growled. _"Don't do that." _

"Then let go! You're pressing against my butt."

Natsu's eyes nearly crossed and he groaned. Oh dear god the mental images he got! "Then stop moving and it won't go anywhere."

Rissa shrieked and squirmed a little more in alarm. "What do you mean, if I stop it won't go anywhere?" Natsu sighed and prayed for patience. Dear god in heaven, Rissa was going to kill him. He was literally going to be the only dragon slayer in existance to ever have a heart attack and die just because his mate squirmed in his lap.

He would be the laughingstock of his guild and every other dragon slayer in existance. He tightened his arms around her a little more and trapped her against him completely and let out a breathy laugh next to her ear that made her shiver. "What I meant was the more you move around the easier it would be for an accident to happen. And god help me, Rissa I don't think I would mind half as much as you would."

He glanced over at her out of the corner of his eyes and smirked as she went totally still. Her ears a vivid red color. _How cute. I never knew that her ears could blush too. _Natsu thought as his tongue snaked out and ran along the shell of her ear.

She squeaked and tried to lean foward but he stopped her by wrapped one hand loosely around her throat, his thumb stroking over her pulse as he kissed her shoulder then the side of her neck. "N-N-Natsu? I-I thought y-you c-c-came in here t-t-to talk?" Rissa studdered nervously jolting him out of his lustful thoughts. He kissed her shoulder one more time then removed his hand from her neck and sighed.

"Right... Talk-" He got quiet for a moment then asked, "What was I wanting to talk about again?"

"There is no way in hell that you're _that_ forgetful."

"In most cases you would be right. But I think you've distracted me to much from my origional purpose. Ah, I remember now." Natsu said before asking. "Do you know what it means to share a flame with a dragon slayer?" It was a stupid question, Natsu knew. But it seemed like the best place to start their conversation because he had no way of really knowing what she knew about dragon slayers.

"Sharing a flame with a dragon slayer is a way of binding one person to another. But only if the flame doesn't consume the person that it's fed too."

_Ah, so she knows that much-_ Natsu thought as he rested his chin on her shoulder. But just because a person knew something didn't necessarily mean that they understood it. "Do you know what that bond created by flame is supposed to be?" Natsu asked curiously.

Rissa got quiet for a moment and thought before saying in a small voice, "I'm not sure... I have a few theories. But I have so many different ones. So many worries and fears that I-"

Natsu sighed again. "Rissa, I understand that living with me isn't easy. I know that you get anxious, nervous and scared. But it seems to me like everytime I try to help, I only wind up making you more wary. But I would rather _die_ than hurt you. And I'd rather _kill_ than have you taken away from me. What does that tell you about me?"

"I don't know."

He gave a savage sounding growl. _"Don't lie to me. _You can run away from the truth and refuse to admit it all you want but you already know what's going on between us. What I want is for you to admit it so that we can move forward before you drive me crazy_." _Rissa got quiet again and Natsu made a frustrated sound and stood up and forcibly turned her so that they were facing one another.

And leaned in so that their faces were a mere hair apart. "Say it."

Rissa opened her mouth then abruptly closed it and looked mutinous. He grasped her slender shoulders in his hands and shook her a little bit. _"Say it."_ He bit out from between clenched teeth. His temper spiking a little bit.

She shook her head no and he made a soft rumbling sound in the back of his throat and leaned in enough to brush his lips against hers as he spoke. "Say it or I'm going to make you wish you did."

"Y-You wouldn't." Rissa breathed in a frightened tone. Natsu pulled away from her a little bit and smirked evilly.

"Yes. I would." And he'd enjoy every damn minute of it too.


	33. Chapter 33

Natsu had left Rissa after that. Letting her have the bath until it was his turn. And when he came out he had a seduction plan that he felt would work. He was determined that Rissa would admit both to herself and to him that she was mated. _Or else_.

That night he walked out of the bathroom with nothing but a towel wrapped around his hips and padded through his house feeling a little weird. It just wasn't his nature to walk around naked without a reason. Which he had, he simply had to continuously remind himself of. Or he would have run into the bedroom and put some clothes on.

However he kept firmly reminding himself that Rissa_ needed_ to know his body. Every beauty mark, every erogenous zone- Even texture and taste, though those things would come gradually when they finally started sleeping together.

He noted that she tried to ignore him at first. Her eyes fixated on the TV as one of her shows came on, yet from time to time when he walked in front of her he could feel her eyes on him.

On his back, glaring at the towel around his hips. Then just before he went to bed, he made sure that he was in front of her when his towel 'accidentally' slipped from his waist and fell to the floor.

He'd grinned at her as she flushed, her jaw hanging open as she got a full frontal before he turned on his heel and walked to the bedroom and closed himself in it.

A few hours later when she came in to go to bed, he was still wide awake enough to see her balk at seeing him laying on his side on top of the covers- still naked as a flipping jaybird. She tip toed over and hesitantly reached out to put a hand on his shoulder when he grabbed her wrist and pulled her down on the bed and rolled so that he was partially on top of her.

She let out a furious sounding hiss and squirmed a little bit until one of his hands settled over one of her breasts then went eerily still. He could feel her heart thudding against her ribs under his palm. And had to curb the impulse to curl his fingers over the soft flesh of her breast and squeeze. He felt her take a shuddering breath and saw her use the tip of her tongue to wet her lips before stuttering. "N-Na-tsu?"

He didn't respond. If he bothered, she'd just freak out so he stayed quiet and waited for her to settle down and doze off. It took longer than he expected since it seemed that Rissa didn't trust him not to pull something while she had her defenses down.

Which was smart.

But resistance was futile. And in the end she wound up tiring herself out and falling asleep anyways. Which left him free to use some lost dragon slayer magic to weave pleasant dreams for her. After he was satisfied with the dreams he'd created for her, he gave her a small kiss on the cheek then left the room to sleep on the couch.

(*****************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************)

_Rissa knew something was up the second she found herself standing in a field of wild flowers wearing a white sun dress. Oh that sorry son of a- He's woven a dream for her to help his plans further along! "Natsu, you bastard I'm going to-" _

_"Going to what?" Natsu's voice asked curiously from somewhere behind her. She turned around, startled and blinked at him as he leaned against a tree wearing nothing but what looked like black man's bikini style underwear with sheer gold colored material attached to them. There were gold earrings in his ears and and three bangle bracelets around both of his wrists and biceps. _

_And four around his ankles. _

_His pink colored hair hung a little bit past his shoulders and framed his face, partially hiding his molten gold colored eyes from veiw. __Rissa's jaw dropped as she looked at him. In his current state of semi undress, with the jewelry and so on, he looked... He looked... _

_Holy wow- Rissa thought in disbelief. When had Natsu become such a looker? _

_Natsu's lips quirked as if he could read her mind as he pushed away from the tree he'd been leaning against and closed the distance between them. "You look shocked." __Duh, that's because I am. Rissa thought as he grinned at her. _

_"You know, if you had bothered to look closer when your around me you would know that I'm a hottie." He said in a half teasing half chidding tone. _

_"I already knew that!" Rissa snapped. Earning an 'oh' look from him as she said in a more subdued tone. "I...just don't like to think on it." _

_"Thinking on it makes me harder to resist, doesn't it." Rissa blushed then seemed to shake herself and hissed at him like a cat causing him to chuckle. Ah, some things never changed. _

_Even in her sleep she was still hellbent on resisting him. Not that it mattered much since he already planned on seducing her in her sleep and letting her curiosity about the real him get the best of her and lead up to their mating. "You know that you don't have to be so on guard here. After all this is just a dream." _

_"A dream that_ _you tampered with so you could mess with my head." Rissa growled as he gave her a slightly nervous look. How the hell- Whoa... How had she managed to figure that out so soon? Natsu wondered as he rubbed the nape of his neck, the bangles around his wrist clinking together as he moved his hand. _

_"Geez, woman can't you just relax and have some fun for once?" _

_"Sure I can. I merely prefer not to with you around." Rissa said in a sugary sweet tone that made him flinch a little bit._

_"Ow. That hurt." Natsu muttered before reaching out and running his fingers through her long dark hair and finally asked. "What do you think of it so far?" _

_"It?" _

_"The field and such. I created it to look like the area close to where I grew up with my adopted father. My favorite part of that place was always the flowers. I'm not sure how my adopted father managed it, but somehow he kept the flowers vibrant and beautiful all year long." Natsu said in a wistful tone as he looked around._

_"I never knew that you had an adopted father." _

_"You never asked. Not that I can blame you much. It seems like here lately the only thing that passes for descent conversation is you squeaking and fleeing from the room." _

_"Well it's not like you contribute much when all you want to do is corner me and feel me up. If you were in my place Natsu, you'd run too." _

_He snorted. Highly unlikely. He didn't run from anything. Execpt Erza but then she was really the only person alive that he had a healthy fear of. But he supposed that if he and Rissa were to change places she might be right. _

_If nothing else it was definitely food for thought. "Whatever. I didn't weave this dream to sit here and gab at you all night. I want to show you some things." _

_"You're planning to keep your...uh..." She glanced down at his pants with a doubious expression. "Pants on right?" _

_"Nope. I plan to lose them at some point. But for now I just want to show you around. Nothing more." Natsu said as he held his hand out to her. She gave him another dubious look with a hint of wariness and hesitantly took his hand. _

_"Fine. But warn me before you lose your pants okay." Natsu smiled at her. _

_Like hell he'd warn her. He wasn't going to give her a chance to run away from him again._


	34. Chapter 34

_Taking her hand in his, Natsu tugged on it gently to force her to move as he started wading through the flowers in the field around them, taking note of the various details that he had added to his dream weaving without realizing it. There were extinct flowers- like the thunder flower- a blossom that was silvery grey with petals that shimmered like water. Then there was the small formation of trees that he used to use as a tree house when he had been young. _

_He had even created the last minute details of the various things he had stolen from hunters and villagers just to create his tree house. Smiling fondly at the memories of his childhood even as he recalled all the times his adopted father had roared at him for going so close to humans where he couldn't protect him. He pulled Rissa along until finally coming to a stop just outside of a massive cave half hidden by a thicket of trees and tall grass. _

_"Come on. There's something I wanna show you." Natsu said excitedly as he let go of Rissa's hand and took off running, then jumped over a large, thick tree root and landed softly just on the other side of it. And jumped up and down in place a little bit to see if Rissa was following him like he had wanted and saw that she was a slowly (perhaps a little too slowly to suit him) making her way over to him, causing him to sigh in irritation. _

_This woman. Here he was trying to show her what growing up had been like for him and share some of the wonder of being a child being raised by an actual honest to god dragon- and she was dragging her feet! Didn't she realize that sharing this part of himself with her was rare? He never shared such things. In fact getting even the most basic information about his past and childhood was much like pulling teeth. _

_The hand went in the mouth...and then you lost it because the jaws clamped firmly shut and refused to open ever again so that you had no choice but to cut it off. And then what did you have? A hook. And those damn things weren't good for anything unless it was combat, or you were a fisherman... Or in desperate need of a backscratcher. _

_Whatever happened to come first, he supposed as Rissa finally reached the tree root and glared at it before lifting a leg and kicking it hard enough for the thud to reverberate in his ears as she asked in a peeved tone, "And just how the hell am I supposed to get over to you?" _

_"I could climb back over and carry you." He offered helpfully and nearly fell over when she growled, _

_"No thanks. Keep yourself and your hands over there." _

_"But if I do that then how will you get over here?" Natsu asked curious as to how she would respond and started to get angry when she deadpanned, _

_"I won't. I'm leaving now." _

_"Hey! I went to the trouble of weaving this dream so that I could share a part of myself with you-" He all but shouted only to have her shout back, _

_"Well, who asked you too? I've never asked for this information about you're past for a reason, ya know." It was because once she knew it all, every part of what made him tick- there would be no retreating anymore. No escapes or withdrawls. She would be well and truly stuck with him then. In every way that counted. After all, dream weaving was a form of intimacy without the physical sharing of the body. _

_If she continued to see his past, it would only bind her to him even more tightly. _

_Natsu was silent for a few moments, his heart aching in his chest at Rissa's refusal until he decided to change tactics. If he couldn't show her his past- then perhaps he could summon hers forth from the deepest recesses of her mind. _

_Anything was better than being refused by his mate over and over again. He needed to put an end to this senseless fear in her and lay it to rest. And perhaps seeing her past would help him do just that. Plus it might clue him in to what sort of person Rissa had been before her soul had resurrected itself inside of Lucy's body. _

_That alone spurred Natsu to lift a finger to his lips and whisper the incantation to change the dream that he had woven while calling forth forgotten memories from Rissa's mind and thought for a minute that he had her right where he wanted her until she let out a panicked scream and the dream around him shifted and churned then rippled like water until it finally settled and all he could see was a village nestled in a valley, awash in a sea of red orange flames and black smoke. _

_He stood there on the top of a hill watching the village go up, his golden eyes reflecting the flames eating away at the village in horror as Rissa appeared next to him looking equally horrified by what they were seeing and asked in a low, trembling voice, "Natsu, how could you?" _


End file.
