After the events of the previous night Lina had expected something bad to happen to them when they awoke the next day. But there was no nasty surprises waiting for them in the morning.
The day was bright and sunny and the birds were singing. It was the type of day that little kids prayed for after a long stretch of rainy days.
Lina groaned at the rays of sunshine poking though the holes in the curtains.
She had been half awake/half asleep for the past hour or so. Really she could have gotten up to meet the others a long time ago but she hadn't slept well the night before. Especially after being woken up in the middle of the night.
Lina fought off the urge just to snuggle deeper into her sheets and got right back to sleep. She couldn't stay in bed all day and she knew it. They were probably waiting for her downstairs.
Lina sluggishly got herself out of her bed groaning all the while. If she had been traveling alone during normal circumstances then she would have just slept the day away. But she couldn't since she was traveling with companions. Not being able to do anything you want whenever you wan is the only real annoying thing about traveling with people. That and if you are traveling with annoying people. Lina thought with a chuckle.
Downstairs Lina wasn't surprised to see Zelgadis sitting at a table drinking his morning coffee. But what she was a little surprised about was that he was alone.
"Good morning Zel! So where's the others?" Lina asked while plopping herself down in the chair next to Zelgadis in a very unladylike manor.
"They haven't come down yet. You're the first one to show up." Zelgadis took another sip of his coffee.
"Not down yet?! You're kidding me! Sylphiel and Amelia are always down before me. And Gourry... well he's probably still sleeping."
"Don't forget about what happened last night. I bet you, Amelia was too freaked out to sleep at all-"
"And Sylphiel probably spent most of the night trying to calm her down." Lina finished off Zelgadis' sentence.
"So don't expect them to be coming down anytime soon. I'm actually a little surprised that you are even up right now. I figured that you wouldn't be coming down for another hour at least." Zelgadis noted finishing off the last bit of his coffee. When he looked over at Lina he saw that she was glaring at him.
"Are you implying that I'm lazy and inconsiderate?!" Lina's voice was deadly. "Choose your words wisely."
"No, no! Not at all! You just need to sleep a lot. I mean more, I mean more then me. Because I'm a chimera and you're... not." Zelgadis laughed nervously.
Lina said nothing and did nothing. All she did was glare at him, and that made Zelgadis really nervous. "Um, Lina?" Zelgadis dared speak.
At this time the waitress decided to show up to take Lina's order. "Good morning Miss! What will you like for breakfast?" The waitresses voice was a cheerful as her smile.
"I'll have four breakfast specials, five pancakes, and a side of hash browns." Lina responded in a monotone voice, not taking her eyes off Zelgadis and still glaring at him all the while.
The waitress sweatdropped. "How will you like the eggs for the breakfast specials?"
"One of them over easy, one scrambled and the other two sunny side up." Lina still glared at Zelgadis.
"And what toppings do you want for the pancakes? Syrup or fruit?"
"Fruit, strawberries and blueberries." Again Lina was still glaring at Zelgadis.
"Would you like anything to drink?"
"Orange juice please."
"And for are you ready to order sir?" The waitress turned to Zelgadis.
"Two pancakes with maple syrup and an order of fruit. And can I also get some more coffee please?"
"Sure! Okay I'll be back with your orders in a few minutes." The waitress walked off in a dazed manor.
Zelgadis was expecting Lina to do something more then just glare at him before their breakfast had arrived. But she didn't. All she did was glare at him. She didn't say a word, didn't move a muscle. This was making Zelgadis very edgy.
"Here you go!" The waitress said coming back with their food.
"Thank you." Lina said to the waitress but didn't look up at her. Yes Lina was still glaring at Zelgadis.
Once the waitress was gone Lina and Zelgadis begun to eat. Only Lina didn't even look at what she was eating. She ate in a slow manor glaring at Zelgadis the whole time.
"WILL YOU STOP THAT?!?!?" Zelgadis finally cracked.
Lina evilly chuckled and rolled her eyes and went back to her food in a normal Lina Inverse style fashion.
"What was the point in that?" Zelgadis finally caved in after about half way into their meal.
"Point in what?" Lina asked. Well not quite, that's what she intended to say only it didn't quite come out that way with all the food in her mouth.
"The glaring. What were you trying to do, drive me nuts?!"
"Yup. And I wanted to see who would crack first. You're lucky that's all I did. Normally I would get violent."
"But normally the person you'd be getting violent with wouldn't have stone skin that would more likely hurt you then the person you are trying to hurt."
"That all depends. If I was planning on using physical violence, magic or just smashing you over the head with some blunt object." Lina shoveled another three mouthfuls of food into her mouth.
"Good point. Do you have to eat like there's no tomorrow?"
Lina stuck her tongue out at him.
Zelgadis shook his head. That's Lina for you, always entertaining. Zelgadis went to take another sip of his coffee when he had the feeling of being watch again. Damn that's the third time today and it's only morning! Zelgadis eyed the room to see who was still in the room from before.
"Something wrong Zel?"
"Don't you feel like -- "
"We're being watched? Yeah have been for some time now." Lina looked around the room herself. There wasn't a whole bunch of people in the inn restaurant and none of them seemed to be watching them. In fact most of the people were either talking with the person they were sitting with or concentrating on their meal. "See anyone suspicious?"
"Well this is the third time I've had the feeling of being watched since I've come down here. Only I don't see anyone that's been here for a long time or at least since I came down here. There isn't any faces I recognize from when I first sat down to have my coffee."
"And no one here seems suspicious..."
"Really? But then whose staring at you two?"
Zelgadis and Lina snapped their heads in the direction of the voice to see Xellos sitting at their table drinking coffee. And not just any coffee, Zelgadis' coffee.
"Give me that!" Zelgadis snapped snatching his coffee from the monster priest's hands. "I can't drink this now, it's probably contaminated."
"You make me sound like I'm some sort of disease." Xellos fake being hurt.
"You are. Now Xellos what the hell are you doing here?!" Lina demanded.
"Having breakfast just like everyone else here."
"Where were you yesterday?"
"Why?"
"Well something happened last night and I want to know if you knew anything about it." Lina glared at Xellos.
"Oh that! How is the little justice paladin?" Xellos asked cheerfully sipping some tea. Where he got the tea was a mystery.
"Just answer my question! What do you know about what happened last night?!" Lina grabbed Xellos by the shirt and pulled him across the table towards her.
"What I know -- "
"Is a secret." Lina and Zelgadis both finished off for him.
"Do you have anything else to say that isn't tired and overused?" Zelgadis asked dryly.
"Nope that's all." And Xellos phased out of the restaurant. A few people in the room gasped at the sight of Xellos suddenly disappearing like that.
"You don't think that Xellos had anything to do with those shadow creatures?"
"No I don't think so. If Xellos did then it would be too easy." Lina resumed her eating.
"What would be too easy?" Amelia asked as her and Sylphiel came towards Lina and Zelgadis' table.
"Nothing just Xellos as usual. Good morning both of you, did you sleep well?" Lina flashed them a large smile.
Both of them gave Lina tired looks before joining her and Zelgadis at the table.
"What do you mean you failed?!" The High Elder yelled at his minion.
"I'm sorry High Elder! I didn't mean to fail! But I couldn't kill her! They showed up too quickly. If I had I tried they would have killed me!" The minion cried out with his head to the ground.
"You should have killed her then maybe your death wouldn't have been so meaningless." The High Elder turned his back on the minion.
"My death? What do you mean High Elder?"
"I mean DIE!!!" The High Elder shot a large beam of energy at the minion incinerating him before he even had the chance to scream. All that was left of the minion was a pile of ashes.
"You go clean that up!" The High Elder order to one of his minions in the room who had just seen the other minion get turned into dust.
"Ah-yes High Elder!" The other minion replied nervously.
"Good help is so hard to find. You think with so many people in this place one of them would be able to kill at least one of that group." The High Elder said sardonically to his companion in the room with the dark hair and the dark eyes.
"Ah yes it would seem so."
"So which way do we go now?" Sylphiel asked once they had finished their breakfast and were out of the restaurant. Breakfast had taken much longer then it should have because they had to wait so long for Gourry to get up.
For some strange reason he slept much longer then he would have normally had. And even though he got all this extra sleep Gourry was still extremely tired.
"We continue going along the western road. There should be another town about a day and a half's walk. So if we go now we should make it there tomorrow night." Lina said looking at the map.
"You mean we have t-to camp out t-tonight?!" Amelia cried out.
"Yes Amelia we'll have to. Is that going to be a problem for you?"
"N-no I'll be fine."
"Amelia don't worry nothing is going to attack you in your sleep. And even if something does we'll all be here to make sure you're fine. That's one of the reasons we take watches so that someone stands guard remember?" Lina reassured the young girl.
Amelia nodded but she was still uneasy.
"So let's going we have a long walk ahead of us."
The rest of the day was pretty much uneventful for the most part. Just your regular traveling mishaps, Gourry pissing Lina off, Lina beating the crap out of Gourry, Gourry stealing some of Lina's food, Lina beating the crap out of Gourry, Gourry pissing Lina off again, Lina beating the crap out of well you get the picture.
With exception of that through most of their trek both Lina and Zelgadis had the feeling that they were being watched. Neither of them saw anything odd so they didn't know what was watching them. Though it might have just been Xellos the whole time since after that stunt at breakfast he hadn't been seen.
"This place looks like just as good as any. Okay guys let's set up camp for the night." Lina declared putting her stuff down.
One of the reasons on why Lina wanted to take this road was that it was one of the quickest ways to get to the ruins. The other reason that it took them alongside a river so they could get fish easily. Not that they were really in need of food anyway, before they left Sailune they had made sure that they had stocked up with lots of supplies.
Lina left Zelgadis in charge of getting the fire started while she went to see if she could catch some fish for dinner.
First she forged around for a good enough stick to use for a pole. Then she pulled out a strand of hair and attached it to the stick. She pulled out something to use for bait and started to fish.
After about ten minutes Lina was starting to get annoyed. By this time she would have gotten a bite by now considering that she added magic properties to the rod to attract the fish.
Hmm... maybe there's no fish in this river? Lina shrugged. No fish for dinner this time.
When she went to pull her fishing rod up something pulled the fishing rod downward. Well looks like there was a fish after all! Lina mused fighting with the fish to pull it on land. But the more she pulled the more resistance it gave back.
Well it's not snagged on anything because it wouldn't pull like this, but the fish wouldn't be that big.
Lina was about to call for someone to help her pull the rod up when she was suddenly pulled forward into the water.
The loud splash alert Zelgadis and the others.
"What's going on?! Where'd Miss Lina go?!" Amelia asked frightfully.
Zelgadis didn't answer but rushed over to the river side. Just as he was about to go in Xellos appeared in the air holding a very wet Lina who was gasping for air.
"XELLOS!" Zelgadis screamed accusingly.
"Zelgadis what out!" Lina yelled just as the creature that had pulled Lina in the water went to lunge at Zelgadis.
Zelgadis recoiled backwards towards the others.
The creature hissed at them as it landed on the grass. It looked like a cross between a water spider and a lizard and it was extremely large.
"Watch out it, may be a lesser monster but it's pretty powerful." Xellos warned.
Sylphiel put up a protective barrier, Amelia and Zelgadis got into battle ready stances and Gourry got out his sword of light.
The light from Gourry's sword agitated the lesser monster. It shrieked as if it was in pain.
"Gourry your sword!" Zelgadis didn't even need to say anything more because Gourry was already lunging at the creature with sword in hand.
The creature back away from Gourry dodging Gourry's strike the light of the sword alone was hurting the creature.
Amelia and Zelgadis' tried using elmekia lances on the lesser monster while Gourry tried to slice it in two with his sword but the spells had no effect and the creature continued to dodge Gourry's attacks.
Lina casted a shadow snap on the lesser monster once she was on the ground.
Gourry took this as a queue to strike. Gourry swung his sword down but the creature just barely dodging it. But Gourry did manage to slice through its' arm. But the light from the sword dispelled the shadow snap and the lesser monster escaped.
"What the hell is going on here?! A lesser monster couldn't take on that much damage and still live! And why did just the light alone from the sword effect it?" Lina wondered out loud. She glared up at Xellos. "What do you know about it?"
Xellos sighed and floated back down to the ground. "Normally in a situation such as this I wouldn't want to say anything, but I have been instructed to against my will. That was just a lesser monster, but it looks like it had also been given extra powers like Gek."
"Well that would explain why the elmekia lances didn't work right. But who is giving these monsters these powers? Is it another monster doing this?"
"No. Not another monster. I regret to say that not even I know of the source of these powers." Xellos sighed again. He really hated revealing so much information.
"So why did you save me Xellos?"
"Ah-ha! That Miss Lina I don't need to tell you! Anyway have a lovely evening!" Xellos pranced off and phased out to someplace else.
"Fruitcake."
"I-I-s it-t-t safe to st-t-tay here?" Amelia shuddered.
"I think so, otherwise Xellos wouldn't have went off. It seems like he's been ordered to watch out for us. Though I don't know why Great Beast Zellas would care about our lives. But anyways just in case Gourry I think you should leave your sword of light out, the light from it seems to have a dispelling effect."
"You aren't thinking of trying to take it when I'm sleeping now are you Lina?" Gourry narrowed his eyes at her in suspicion.
Lina was just about to pound Gourry into a pulp when Zelgadis stopped her. "How about we eat our dinner now."
Lina scowled but went rummaging through their food supplies.
Part 15 | Story Index | Fanfiction