Chapter Text
Dear Mom,
Sorry if it's been a while. I haven’t really had time to sit down and write to you lately, nor have I really had anything to write to you about.
Lucy paused. She placed the tip of her pen to her lips in thought, then continued.
Father is doing well. I heard that his hunters had found a rare item. I’m not sure what it was since they didn’t confirm anything, but dad was happy about it. He wouldn’t tell me anything either. He just asked me what I was doing in his study and told me to go back to my room as always.
Lucy's father was a collector. He hunted down and kept rare items. He called it a hobby, Lucy prefered obsession herself, seeing as he never did anything else. He never told Lucy anything about his collection or where he kept it, but she had heard rumours from her guards that it was the biggest collection in Fiore. Lucy was proud of her father, but she wished that he would pay more attention to his own daughter rather than his illustrious treasures. Lucy had often imagined finding the collection and wandering through it, seeing all the rare items that he kept someplace hidden on the vast Heartfilia grounds.
Sometimes, if Lucy was lucky, she'd sneak out of her room and walk through the gardens. On those nights she would sprawl on the grass and stare up at the stars, dreaming hopelessly of a day when she could reach them. Sometimes she would fall asleep to the sound of crickets and gentle winds that swept the grass, only to be scolded the next morning by her father for sneaking out of her room. On those rare nights Lucy would have the strangest dreams. Dreams of dancing constellations, unknown familiar faces, and voices speaking in ways she could never remember. She loved those nights. Nights that only came once in a blue moon when she was lonely. Though it seemed that she was always lonely.
She sighed and continued her letter.
I wish you could be here. The house is so empty without you. I think dad misses you too; he's too thick to show it, but I know he does. Anyways, I'm doing well. I'm almost seventeen now and I can’t wait for the time when I’ll be able to get out of here and travel. When no one can stop me, not even dad. I’ll make tons of friends and maybe learn some magic. Dad won’t let me touch the stuff, but all that will change when I escape this place. I’ll sleep under the stars every night and not even worry about hiding from my guards. I’ll be free to do whatever I want. It’ll be just like all those fairy tales you used to read me, mom. Happily, ever after.
Pleased with her letter, Lucy let go of her pen, stretching her arms above her head and releasing a sigh as she stared out her window at the falling sun and the brilliant, warm sky as the clouds glowed radiant shades of red, orange, and pink.
"Sunset already?" She mused to herself. Getting up from her desk, she walked towards the windows that stretched to the ceiling and swung open the glass doors to her balcony. As she breathed the cooling summer air, she couldn’t help but think about the rare item her father’s hunters were bringing in. What exactly was it; a rare gemstone that glowed like the moon? Maybe an ancient carving from times long forgotten? Or perhaps something better? Lucy leaned against the railing and let her cheek rest against her arms. She'd never been outside the Heartfilia estate. She had wanted to see the world for the longest time. "Someday," she whispered, "someday soon. Just you wait world; you'll have to deal with Lucy Heartfilia soon."
The sun had dropped behind the mountains that marked the reach of her father’s land; the sky had turned a pale pink before fading to a deep blue. She turned around and walked back into her room, closing the glass doors behind her to get ready for bed. She quickly showered and brushed her teeth, then slipped into her silky, blue pyjamas with cherry blossom patterns and slithered into her queen-sized bed. As soon as her head hit the soft pillows, Lucy fell away to dreamland for adventures with her strange strangers who often accompanied her.
~~~~
Lucy sat bolt upright as her bedroom shook like an earthquake. Dust fell from the ceiling and explosions boomed from below her. Books fell from shelves and her lamp on her bedside crashed to the floor, shattering the light lacrima.
"What the hell?" Lucy bellowed. She flung the covers from her body and jumped from her bed startled as she ran for her door. "What’s going on?" She demanded through the door. When no one answered she pushed the heavy door open and saw that no one was guarding it.
She then realized that the guards were probably off dealing with the cause of the explosions. Without any hesitation she sprinted down the hallway towards the stairs that lead to the lower levels. What was going on? Were they under attack? Who would want to attack them? How did they find the Heartfilia estate in the first place? Were they after her father’s collection? Lucy nearly slipped as she turned a sharp corner but slid to a sudden stop when she saw the chaos.
Furniture and windows were shattered, and unconscious guards lay sprawled in every direction. Chains lay across the ground, it seemed as if they had been melted. Yelling and panic filled the air. Servants ran in every direction to escape the destruction and it seemed as if everything was on fire. The heat of the flames was like nothing Lucy had ever felt; it seemed as if the could melt her skin off if she got within a five-foot radius and standing in the middle of it all was a man unlike Lucy had ever seen before.
He was wearing a black vest rimmed with yellow that showed off his chest and abdomen. Loose white pants covered by black cloth held at his waist by a brown belt stopped at his knees and his sandal clad feet were spread in a wide stance. Small crimson horns grew from dishevelled pink locks on either side of his head, and his ears were pointed like an animals. Bright, scarlet scales covered his shoulders, forearms and knuckles. Flames encased his entire body and the same heat emanated from him that had emanated from the flames. Then she saw his face. His lips were pulled back into a beast like scowl that showed his large sharp canines, and his eyes; one look at his eyes and she felt like he could rip her apart with a look. The look in his eyes was enough to send an army of the best trained soldiers running for shelter. This was no man. This was a rampaging beast that stopped at nothing to tear its enemies the shreds. This was a monster.
The man gave a roar, one that shook the air and the earth. Lucy covered her ears to block out the sound tearing through her head, leaving her ears ringing. Lucy shook in the doorway she stood in, silently wishing that she had stayed in her room. Guards charged at the man, swords drawn and sharp, ready to cut through any threat.
"No!" her head snapped towards the voice that called through the chaos, "do not harm it! It is too valuable!" Lucy stood in shock at her father. Was this being the rare item that her father had found? Was this what her father collected? Was this what her father spent all his time doing? Hunting down magical beasts that she had heard roamed the earth like they were items to be possessed and locked in a cage to be gawked at?
The man, who didn’t seem to appreciate being called an it, leaped at her father inhumanly fast, fist encased in fire, and landed a punch to his stomach ramming him into the wall behind him. The guards cried out in anger, too slow to do anything to stop the man. Lucy unintentionally cried out to her father, drawing the attention of some guards and, unfortunately, the man who was the cause of the damage. His head snapped towards her and their eyes connected.
Lucy cowered under his gaze. His intense dark eyes drilled through her light brown ones. She saw his nose twitch. Suddenly his eyes filled with confusion, and his arms dropped an inch, leaving an opening. A guard tackled him, wrapping his armour-clad arms around the man's waist, and they both clattered to the floor. Lucy snapped out of the trance she was in and, against her better judgement, ran towards her father.
Jude Heartfilia was a horrible father, but Lucy's father, nonetheless.
She ducked and dodged the flames until she reached her father. He looked more angry than alarmed. His eyes were glaring at the guards who were having a hard time calming the place down. His face was covered in soot, and his clothes and facial hair were singed.
"I should fire them," he scowled to himself, "they can’t even handle one damn Dregling."
"One what?" Lucy exclaimed, the room shook again, and she decided she'd ask him later, "dad the building is on fire!" She had been so worried about him she forgot how much he irritated her. Jude stared at her in shock, as if he had just noticed her.
"Lucy what are you doing out of your room! I did not give you permission to leave!" Jeez, he needed to sort out his priorities. Another explosion racked the room. Lucy let out a cry as the wall blew up two feet away from them. Heat exploded beside Lucy as a torrent of fire blasted through the hole in the wall. Lucy did her best to shield herself from the flames as they filled the large room, melting metal and incinerating the destroyed furniture.
"We have to get out of here," Lucy said to no one in particular. She turned and ran, but she only made it halfway across the room before she realized her father was gone. She looked around in panic as she tried to find him. "Dammit." She muttered angrily, "Why do I even try?" Regretting not putting on slippers, she ran back across the flaming, marble floor to the gaping hole in the wall, that was at least ten feet in diameter, to see if her father was stupid enough to jump through it.
He was.
Of course he was.
He was walking right towards the scaled man. Stepping over fallen guards as if they did not exist, their armour melted in areas Lucy assumed the man’s fists had made contact.
"Listen here, beast!" the Dregling, as her father had called him earlier, dropped the guard he was holding by the throat and turned to face the man who had just addressed him, eyes wild. Jude flinched under the glare but did not back down. "You belong to me now!" He received a scoff and a snarl in reply, "Come peacefully and we will not harm you!" Lucy scoffed at that. Harm him? He had done most of the harming. Hell, they had no guards left! How the hell were they supposed to harm him? The Dregling must have thought the same, because fire sprung to life on his hands. Lucy's eyes widened. She could read it in his eyes. He was going to kill him. He was going to kill her father.
Lucy moved without thinking. Her legs broke into a sprint at the same time the man did. Lucy ran through the small fires and past the armoured bodies that littered the ground.
Somehow, she got there first.
Somehow the flaming fist stopped centimetres from her face.
Somehow both Lucy and Jude Heartfilia were not harmed.
Lucy could feel the intense heat radiating from the flames just centimetres from her nose. Making her eyes burn, her skin sweat, and small loose hairs singe. Her determined brown eyes found shocked onyx ones. The man’s nose twitched again.
“Smells funny..." it was barely a whisper, but Lucy somehow heard it. She didn’t have time to speak or think as a small dart sprouted from the man's neck where scales were absent. He recoiled and stumbled back, pulling the small projectile from his skin. Panic set into his features as he looked for an escape route, but too little too late as he was tackled by four guards. One holding him to the ground with one knee pressing to the spot between his shoulders and hand on the back of his head, another holding his legs and the last two shackled his wrists behind his back with strange cuffs Lucy had never seen before. The man tried to struggle but his eyes were unfocused and starting to glaze over. He let out roar of frustration, not nearly as powerful as the first one he had unleashed. Lucy's father pushed her aside to glare at the struggling man in front of him.
"Lock it up in my collection, and make sure it stays there." The guards hoisted the man to his feet, his head fell to his chest and he gazed at Jude with unfocused eyes. Jude grabbed the man's chin with his hand and seemed to examine him, receiving a low growl at the act. "Extraordinary," he mused to himself, "to think it was this powerful." He dropped the man's chin and it fell to his chest as he fell to unconsciousness. "Take it away."
Lucy watched as two guards dragged the man away down the hall. She wanted to follow them, but her father had other plans. Jude addressed the remaining two guards.
"Return Lucy to her room and make sure she stays there."
"But, wait!" Lucy opposed, "What was that all about? What’s a Dregling? Why was that man attacking? Is-"
"Quiet, Lucy! I never gave you permission to leave your room! You are to return there and never speak of this!"
Lucy puffed up her cheeks in anger but had no time to retort as the two guards pushed her towards the stairs. With no other choice, she obeyed; she silently walked behind the two guards. A breeze blew through the shattered windows that rustled Lucy's hair and pyjamas. A white piece of cloth rolled across the marble floors by her feet. Lucy stared at it. It seemed unharmed by the fight that had just occurred. Puzzled, Lucy quickly glanced at the two guards, who didn’t seem to be paying her any real attention, and she grabbed the strange piece of fabric and quickly hid it in her shirt.
It didn’t take long for Lucy's heavy bedroom door to close behind her and the click of the lock to sound. She would be spending quite some time in her room this time. She shuffled over to her bed, just now realizing how tired she was, and flopped down on her back. She took out the fabric from under her shirt; it was a scarf. She rubbed her thumb across the strange item. The fabric had an odd texture, like scales. It was a clean, solid white, like it had just been washed. It was strangely warm and smelled like a fireplace. She pressed her face to it. It was soft too, she realized. She folded the scarf and hid it in one of her desk drawers. She walked to her bathroom door and flicked on the light lacrima.
Lucy stared at herself in the mirror. She was filthy: soot covered her face and some of her hair was dishevelled and singed in a few places. She had just realized that her feet were burning; probably because she had stupidly run through fire. Her pyjamas were black in some places. She released a sigh. She took off her burnt pyjamas and turned on the shower, and after taking her second shower of the night, she changed into a new pair of pyjamas and wrapped up her feet in bandages after applying some cream. She curled up in her bed, but despite how exhausted she felt, sleep would not come. Questions tumbled through her head. Questions about her father, and Dreglings, and whether her mother's fairy tales were true, and by the time the she finally fell into restless sleep, the sun was starting to rise.