The Princess and the Commoner

Chapter 6: Lost Memories

Lucy walked up the stairs to the bedroom Natsu was in but stopped at the door. 

"Do I really want to see him...? Does he want to see me?" Lucy stepped backwards and turned but bumped into someone standing behind her. "I'm so sorry! I didn't see you there!" Lucy looked up and saw Gray with Wendy and a blue cat. Gray looked down to Lucy and smiled, 

"Go in there." Lucy nodded slightly and turned back to the door. She took a deep breath and twisted the doorknob. Natsu was laying on the bed with bandages covering his body from where Gray injured him. Lucy walked over to the bed and looked at Natsu's face, he looked like he was in pain. She smiled and sat down on a chair that was in the room. Lucy looked over to Wendy and realized that she had come to see Natsu so she could heal his wounds. But she still didn't know who the blue cat was. 

"Um, Lucy?" Lucy looked up from looking at the cat up to Gray who was not talking to her, 

"Yeah?" Gray sat down on one of the chairs and looked at Lucy, 

"You know...I didn't mean to hurt him, right? I was being controlled by Zeref and didn't have any control over what I did..." Lucy held a hand up and Gray looked at her in surprise, 

"I know Gray. I heard. I was in the room the whole time but I kind of snuck in to see if you were in there and I wanted to figure out why you attacked Natsu." Gray smiled slightly and put his head in his hands, 

"Figures. You're smarter than people give you credit for." Gray looked over to Wendy and sighed, "Happy! Come over here! I want you to meet someone." the blue cat turned and looked at Gray. He smiled and motioned for the cat to come. White wings came out of the cat's back and he flew over to Lucy and Gray. Lucy was staring at him in shock and Gray started laughing. 

"What are you laughing at Gray?!" Gray shook his head and motioned to the cat, 

"Nothing. But, this is Happy. He's an exceed and Natsu's partner." Lucy's eyes widened in shock and she looked at Happy, 

"An exceed?! But I thought that they were all gone!" Gray shook his head, 

"Nope. There are three left. There's Happy which is Natsu's friend, Carla which is Wendy's friend, and Pantherlily which is someone else's..." Lucy looked at Gray and frowned slightly, 

"Who is the third person?" Gray looked at Lucy nervously and chuckled, 

"I'm not sure...but I thi-" suddenly, a large rush of heat filled the room and Lucy couldn't help but cough. She looked over to Wendy who was walking over to them and covered in sweat, 

"Ok, I managed to heal his wounds but I can't help him with the other problem. I don't know why, but when I tried to help him he started putting off a lot of heat." Lucy wiped her hand across her forehead to wipe away the sweat and looked over to Natsu, 

"I hope he's going to be ok..." Wendy smiled and put her hand on Lucy's shoulder, 

"Don't worry. I've known Natsu my whole life and he doesn't ever give up. Trust me, he'll be fine." Lucy nodded and smiled. For some reason, she thought that she knew Natsu her whole life...weird, 

"Gray? Was this the first time i've met Natsu?" Gray looked at Lucy in shock and shook his head, 

"No. He used to live at the castle." Lucy looked at Gray in shock, 

"What?!" Gray's eyes widened in shock and he looked at the table. 

"I see. It happened to the both of you..." Gray looked up and smiled slightly at Lucy, "I'm not sure what happened to the two of you. Your father and some of the maids talked about it but I wasn't there myself so I don't know exactly what happened." Lucy looked down in sadness, 

"Ok then. I feel kind of tired...can I have one of the rooms here so I can take a nap?" Wendy nodded and led Lucy to her room that she was borrowing at the Fairy Tail guild. 

"Are you ok Lucy?" Lucy nodded and smiled at Wendy, 

"Yeah, I'm fine. I'm just a bit tired." Wendy smiled and left Lucy in the room. She looked around and her eyes fell on the bed. She slowly walked over to it and collapsed on top of it. 

"Why am I so tired? Maybe it's because I didn't sleep last night..." Lucy fell asleep almost instantly, and that night, she dreamt...

Lucy was only 2 years old and she was out playing out in the garden. While she was playing, a boy with pink hair and a scaly scarf walked up to her. He was badly injured and bleeding. Lucy asked what happened and he just smiled and shook his head

"What do you mean? I'm fine. Nothing's wrong." Lucy believed him and was going to ask to play with him but before she could say another thing, he collapsed. Lucy ran over to him in panic, 

"Are you ok?!"  the boy coughed and Lucy ran to her mother for help, 

"Mommy! There's a boy in the garden and he's hurt really bad!" Layla ran out to the garden with her daughter and saw the motionless boy lying on the ground in his own blood. Layla quickly bent down and picked up the boy while running back to the castle. Lucy followed her mother into the castle and helped her put bandages on the boy. He had been asleep for a few weeks and when Lucy was going to check on him, she saw that he was sitting up in bed looking at Lucy, 

"Um...Where am I?" Lucy smiled, 

"You're at the castle in Fiore. Can you tell me your name?" the boy shook his head and looked at his hands, 

"I don't know. I never got a name..." Lucy gasped and she ran over to him and grabbed his hands, 

"Can I give you a name then?" the boy smiled and nodded at the little girl. "Ok...then I'll name you Natsu!" Natsu looked Lucy  in shock, 

"Where did you get that from?" Lucy smiled and pointed at her head, 

"I just thought of it." Natsu laughed and ruffled Lucy's hair, 

"I like it. Natsu it is." And from that day on, Natsu and Lucy were best friends. Natsu had stayed in the castle with Lucy because he didn't have a home of his own. It seemed as if nothing could separate the two friends. But one night, someone broke into the castle and found Natsu and Lucy sleeping in the same bedroom. He cast a spell on the two children and gave them false memories to cover the one's he took. He looked down at the two children and smiled evilly. He bent down and picked up the young boy from the bed. He walked away from the girl and prepared to leave how he had come but something grabbed his shirt and prevented him from going any further, 

"Why are you in my room mister?" She looked at the boy in his arms and she frowned in confusion, "Who is that?" The man smiled and knocked the girl out and left her lying on the floor of her bedroom. 

"This is going to be my new slave and brother young princess." 

Lucy shot up and looked around. She was in Wendy's room laying on her bed. 

"Was that a dream? Or a memory?" And somehow, Lucy knew that she had just recovered a memory from her childhood.

"So I knew Natsu when I was a little girl huh...And I gave him his name too. I need him to remember too. He can't live the way he is." Lucy got up from the bed and walked to Natsu's room. When she walked in, the temperature changed from what it was in the hallway.  It was blazing hot, so hot that Lucy was surprised that the room wasn't melting. She looked around and saw Gray, Wendy, and Happy knocked out on the ground from the heat. "What on earth is going on?" Lucy looked over to Natsu's bed and saw someone standing there with Natsu in their arms, 

"Who are you?! What are you doing with him?!" The man smiled and took a few steps back, 

"I'm going to take this boy. You will never be able to return his memories princess. He hasn't forgotten them like you have. They have been extracted from his body completely. There is no way he will ever remember you or his childhood." Lucy looked at the man in shock but before she could say a thing, he disappeared with Natsu. 

"No...Natsu...you can't take him away...please." Lucy dropped to her knees and tears started running down her face, "NO!! Bring him back!"