Tomb Of Time And Destiny: A Fairy Tail Fanfic

Part Eleven

Erza POV

I moved out of the room and out the corridor door to the courtyard. The men swirled, like leaves caught in a whirlwind, still hollering about their victory as if they'd won the World Cup or something. I quickly counted. All eighteen of them were back, plus two captives.

"They put up a small fight, then scattered like dogs," Natsu said proudly to his father as he dismounted. I struggled to hear over the noise, but I didn't want to get too close, to interfere. Also, Carmen and Ava were already on the move, heading to their men. I wasn't going to get in the middle of that.

"We captured these two," I heard Jellal say as he motioned towards two men tied by the hand to a horse.

"Well done, my sons, well done," Makarov said, patting patting them on the back. "Have they revealed who was behind the attack?"

"Nothing, yet."

"We shall get it out of them soon enough. Once we have their master's name, we'll get them into town," he said to his sons, who nodded in return.

"Town?" I said, hope obvious in my tone of voice. "Could Juvia and I go with you? We might find Lucy and Levy!"

Jellal and Gray frowned. "The woods are filled with bands of robbers like these, taking advantage of the conflict between Fairy Tail and Phantom." Jellal said with a shake of his head.

"That unrest could go on for weeks, months!" I said, barely managing to hide the annoyance in my voice.

"Jellal," Carmen said, turning to flutter her eyelashes at him. "I agree with Miss Scarlet. If I were separated from my sisters for so long, not knowing where they were, I'd go crazy. And as I've expressed, I, too, would like to go into to town. Our wedding is not very far away, and there are many plans I must attend to."

"So you want us to escort four women to town now?" he asked in irritation, knowing Ava would want to come too. "In the middle of the worst times we've had in decades?"

We both stared at him, waiting him out. Who'd have guessed I'd ever be on the same side as Carmen?

"Fine," Jellal said, throwing up his hands. "We'll leave tomorrow. But only because my father wants us to take these men into town. And that's if they give us the information we need." He turned on his heel and walked off. And I turned away with a triumphant grin, resisting the urge to see if Carmen shared my feeling of victory.

Juvia POV

"How do you feel?" I asked, pausing in the doorway the next morning with Erza.

Simon looked toward me. He had more color, despite his surly glance. "That was the most uncomfortable night I've ever spent but, I feel better than I have in weeks." He patted his chest. "Today, I can breathe again. Really breathe." He smiled, the spark in his eye made him resemble his cousins even more.

"It's truly a miracle," he said. "I am most grateful for your methods. You've done more for me in one day than all the doctors my uncle has ever brought."

"That is great!" Erza said, unable to suppress a grin. The hope on his face filled us with joy. We'd never done anything that had really helped someone like this before. It made me feel bad about what we had to tell him, so I just plunged forward with, "Juvia and her sister are leaving the castle today-"

"Leave? You cannot leave! I'm just now getting better!" I could see beneath his panic was a slight twing of saddness. "You two are the only ones who keep me company aside from my cousins. Everyone else is too scared to approach me because they think they'll get what I have."

"Don't worry too much yet! We're just going into town to look for our sisters there. It's not certain that we'll leave for sure yet! If we don't find our sister's there then I'm certain you cousins will drag us back here. Even if we didn't want to." Erza muttered that last part in english.