The Huntress

■Chapter Twenty--Two-The Mark, The Taking■

TWO WEEKS LATER....

"That's it." Lucy smiled with pride at her boyfriend. He had been training with Romeo for the past two weeks and had been progressing rather phenomenally, causing her heart to swell with both delight and worry. The more he grew in power, the faster they'd find him. Hopefully he'd be fully capable of fighting alien forces by the time he was done training with her. 

Natsu walked over to Lucy, giving her his usual bright smile. "I did it!" 

She nodded. "You did it."

He enveloped her with a hug, snuggling his face into the crook in her neck. She kissed his temple. "You're gonna start training with me now." she whispered. 

Romeo quirked his eyebrow at his older sister. "Are you sure he's ready for that? Even I wasn't ready and I had years until I trained with you." his eyes crinkled with worry. 

Natsu jerked in Lucy's arms. "Huh? W-What exactly does she do during the training sessions? I literally just learned how to ignite my powers in different places in my body and use them to boost myself. Please tell me we aren't doing anything too dangerous!" 

Lucy shoved him off her and started walking towards him, a menacing look etched onto her face. Finding himself becoming unreasonably nervous he backed up, his speed increasing the more she approached. 

"Luce, you're making me nervous." he said, holding up his hands peacefully. 

She only growled and kept walking, her legs moving in a march like motion as she traveled the dwindling distance between them. Sooner or later Natsu's back hit the wall and Lucy slammed her hands next to his head, glaring daggers into his eyes. He clenched his eyes shut, his hands making fists. He didn't expect her to be affected so negatively from simply asking about her training methods. He could understand being upset if she had a good enough reason, but this? No. This was totally unreasonable and he didn't understand it. 

"Lucy you're going a little overboard don'cha think?" he asked, his tone indicating his hidden displeasure from her rash actions. 

She suddenly whipped out her bow, aiming an arrow directly against his forehead. 

"Wanna repeat that?" she growled. 

"Yes actually I do! Babe calm down!" he shouted, shooting his arm up to grab hold of the arrow. He gritted his teeth from the amount of force he had to imply into his grip, he hadn't expected Lucy to have so much body strength to counter. Her pupils turned into little black slits and her arm started getting heavier against the tip of the arrow. A thin ribbon of blood formed on his forehead from the arrow head piercing into his skin. He wondered how much longer he could last against her. 

Suddenly the arrow from her fingers fell to the floor, her eyes widened in shock. She backed away, casting her eyes down to her shaking hands. Before he could even blink she took off, wiping her eyes as she went. He looked over at Romeo in utter shock for a few seconds then immediately ran after his damsel in distress. As expected she ran into the forest, which was helpful albeit frustrating because she could've gone anywhere. 

He sighed in relief when he saw her curled up under their tree. He jogged over to her and quickly brought her into his chest. Her shoulders shook against his well built frame and he softly stroked the top of her head. A few minutes later when she calmed down, she must've realized something because almost instantaneously she shoved Natsu away. 

"Stay away!" she whimpered, teary eyes glistening with sadness. Her cries of sorrow echoed in vain across the forest. 

His eyes became cloudy with anxiety and he shook his head at her. "No! Luce whatever's going onーyou need to tell me!"