Shattered Dreams ||Nalu||

Chapter Five

She sat slumped in a chair at a table in the dining room of the inn, her eyes half-shut, her blonde hair unbrushed and still a mess from the endless tossing and turning of the night before. She was more than aware of the two pairs of worried eyes on her, watching her every move, but she ignored them in favor of dozing when she should have been eating breakfast or drinking tea. She should have given in to her weakness rather than her stubborn pride during the night. Then she wouldn't have been in this situation.

When they'd spoken with Erza and Gray, the requip mage had requested two rooms rather than one single room. Confused, they'd agreed, leaving it at that. Assuming Erza meant to give the boys their own room, Natsu and Lucy had agreed to stay in different rooms, Happy joining the celestial mage just in case she had another "attack", as they would proceed to call them. Lucy had been reluctant, nearly as much as Natsu had been to leave her alone, but she'd gone to bed, grudgingly allowing Happy to snuggle against her.

Happy hadn't been able to put a halt to the wild dreams. In fact, the Exceed had given up on sleeping with her after the first one and gone to get Natsu, complaining that he'd been kicked. Neither of them had come into the room after that, but with the amount of food Natsu had put away after their train ride, she wasn't surprised.

It didn't make her feel any better though.

Swallowing a giant mouthful of food, Natsu leaned over to lightly poke her arm. "Luce? You okay?"

"Yeah," she grumbled, "I'm just tired. I didn't sleep well last night. I'm hoping it'll be better tonight, when Erza's there." Not that the warrior would see what she was so upset about. "I'll be fine later, when I've had to wake up a bit and the others are here. We have a party to go to after all."

"Huh," Natsu grumbled, shoving another bite of food into his hungry mouth. "There'll be food, right?"

Only he would think of that night's meal while eating breakfast. "Yes, Natsu, I'm assuming there'll be food, but I don't think you'll be allowed to eat it all," Lucy sighed in exasperation. "You're going to have to pretend you're rich and well-known. At least a lot of people know about you...just keep the destructiveness you're known for down, and I think you'll be okay." She finally reached for a piece of food, popping a strawberry into her mouth. "Happy, I'm sorry, but I don't think you'll be able to come inside...would you be able to hang around outside in case we need you?"

"Aye!" Happy agreed. "I'll do it, Lucy."

"Thank you." She took another strawberry, then jumped nearly three feet in the air when a hand landed on her shoulder. Her tea tipped, nearly spilling, but Natsu's hand dove out to keep it from doing so. Her head snapped around to stare nervously up at the owner of the hand. And then she relaxed, smiling faintly in greeting at the equally startled Erza. "Hi, Erza. Glad to see you guys made it this soon...I thought it'd be a few more hours before you got here. Hey, Gray."

Gray nodded his greeting, eyeing the food spread out on their table as he seemed to contemplate how much he could steal before Natsu stopped eating and took notice. "No problems," Erza growled at the ice-make mage warningly. "If you provoke Natsu - this goes in reverse, Natsu, don't you laugh - then I will drag you home by your hair. Is that clear?"

"Aye," Natsu squeaked as Gray reluctantly muttered a "Yes, Erza."

"I need some tips on how to do that," Lucy grumbled as they swept seats over to join their nakama at the table. She propped her chin on her open palm. She hesitated for a second, then asked softly, "Happy said he told you guys what happened...?"

Erza's gaze hardened as Gray muttered quietly, "Yeah. He told us. We'll stop by the graves on our way home. You have to pass the area to get to the guildhall anyways."