yin and yang ― ɴᴀᴛꜱᴜ ᴅʀᴀɢɴᴇᴇʟ

➷ EPISODE NINE.

[ EPISODE NINE ] 

✮

"maya!?" the pink haired boy and his blue haired feline companion were equally shocked by my sudden presence as they stared at me with wide eyes and their mouths hanging open. i sighed, a feeling of regret at the pit of my stomach as i had a bad feeling about letting master talk me into joining the group. 

"what are you doing here!?" happy exclaimed, the first one to snap out of it as he questioned the girl, floating up so he was eye level with the girl. 

"master's orders." i answered, trying to act like being here didn't bother me. although, once natsu pulled himself together, he'd be able to see right through it. "he doesn't trust either of you since you came back after destroying hargeon port." she added, sending them a side-eyed glare to which they both flinched at as happy withered his way back down to the ground. 

"hey, come on now, guys..." lucy was panicking, trying her best to keep us calm, unaware that this was normal for our relationship. another sigh escaped my lips, as i visibly relaxed. natsu grinned, throwing his arm around my shoulder and taking me by surprise as i suddenly faltered under his heavy weight. 

"we're definitely getting macao back with maya on our team." he exclaimed, getting overexcited as usual. although his optimism made my heart race with adrenaline, i knew i would be getting ahead of myself if i fell into that trap. the truth was, i was afraid. afraid of history repeating itself when i was still too weak. 

"let's go." i ordered, brushing off natsu's arm as i walked on ahead and left them behind, the others scrambling to their feet, following after me as i approached the carriage that lucy had flagged down for us. we began our journey to mt hakobe in silence, natsu too motion sick to even contribute to a conversation, and lucy seemingly tense from our earlier conversation as she continued to steal glances of me.

after a short amount of time, the carriage suddenly came to a stop and natsu's motion sickness had come to an end as he jumped up in excitement.

"we've arrived?" lucy questioned in confusion.

"it stopped!" natsu screamed in joy, getting too ahead of himself as he stomped around.

"sorry! this is as far as i can go!" the driver suddenly called out, taking lucy and i by surprise as we glanced at one another. there was no way we were already at our destination, i was sure mt hakobe was still another hour at least. i stood up from the seat and pushed the doors open to see where we were, only to be met with a raging snow storm that immediately blew me back, causing me to stumble and almost trip over my feet. luckily, a hand had placed itself on the small of my back, and put me back on my feet as i caught my balance, mumbling a quiet thank you to natsu.