Lina sat at a tiny inn table which was practically groaning with the weight of the food that was piled upon it. She was cheerfully stuffing as much of the food into her mouth as possible, not exactly a new thing for her, but she now had new reason to grab fast. Her new companion was picking up her eating habits since he assumed that was the way things were done here on the mortal plain, and after a few weeks of her company could actually give her a run for her money in the gluttony department. She was kinda getting used to him by now. He was still an idiot, but was rather sweet in his own way. Lina finished her meal with one last swig of ale and pushed herself back from the table with a satisfied sigh.
"Are you finished, Lina?" Gourry asked her around the drumstick that he still held in his hand.
"Yeah, I think I'm full."
"Are we ready to go then?"
"Not yet, I..."
Whatever Lina was about to say was cut off as the room was silenced by a chilling laugh from a figure now standing in the doorway. "Ohohohohohohoho! There you are, Lina! Did you think that you could run off and leave me that easily?"
If Lina had still been eating, she would have choked. As it was, however, her eyes widened and her jaw dropped as the figure stepped farther into the inn. "Naga?!"
Gourry turned his head and blinked at the new arrival. She was taller than Lina by a good bit, and had a much larger chest as well. She also wasn't wearing many clothes. And Lina had complained about his outfit? "Oi, Lina? You know her?"
Naga had fixed her sight on Lina, but turned to regard Gourry at that comment. "Does she know me? Why, she's my sidekick! Isn't that right, Lina?"
"Well, I wouldn't say that exactly..."
Naga laughed again and the inn's patrons began inching towards the door. "You're so naive, Lina! Were you afraid that my power was eclipsing your own by too large a margin? Don't you know that you have to suffer being the lesser sorceress if you ever want to improve?"
"I was more concerned about the possibility of me killing you in the night," Lina muttered under her breath.
"What was that, Lina?" Gourry asked.
"Nothing, Gourry, don't worry about it. Um, Naga, it was really great to see you and all, but we've really got to be going..."
"Where are we going, Lina?"
"Not you, Naga. Gourry and me. See, we're running kind of low on money so we really couldn't take another with us, you know, nothing personal." Lina tapped her fingers on the table and looked longingly at the door.
"So you've come upon hard times since we split up, eh Lina? I'm not surprised! After all, what can you do without me?! Well, if money is the problem..." Naga reached into her cloak and pulled out a large bag of gold. She dropped it on the table in front of Lina's stunned eyes. "There! That should hold us for awhile! I couldn't possibly leave my favorite sidekick destitute! And there's plenty more where that came from..."
"I guess that money isn't a problem anymore, ne, Lina?" Gourry pointed out innocently leaning forward to prop his elbows on the table.
Lina continued to stare at the money, then glanced upwards at the smug sorceress in the leather bikini. She searched her mind frantically for an out, but nothing would come to her. Giving that up, she snatched the bag before Naga could reclaim it and stuffed it into her own cloak. "All right then, I guess you can come," Lina said grudgingly. "Now where did you say you got this money?"
Naga laughed again and the patrons on the inn had enough. In no time Lina, Gourry, and Naga were the only ones in the room. "Some bandits tried to hire me, Naga the White Serpent, to do a job for them. It was so far beneath my dignity to be pathetic, so I blasted them and took the money anyway. They said they had a lot more in their hideout, but I wanted to find you first."
Lina cradled her forehead against the palm of her hand. "Did it ever occur to you, Naga, that they could have been lying?"
Naga laughed. "Don't be naive, Lina! Simple bandits could never lie to me."
"Sure, Naga. Well, I guess that it's worth checking out anyway. Come on, Gourry."
"We're going now?"
"Yes, Gourry, we're going now. Get your sword."
Gourry patted his side and smiled at Lina. "I've already got it."
"Good. Now there's no other reason to waste my time. Let's go, let's go, let's go!"
Naga led the small group away from town and farther back into the wooded hillsides surrounding the area. It was perfect bandit country. Lina watched the sides of the trail suspiciously, expecting ambush at any moment, while Naga strode ahead of her, confident that no one was stupid enough to challenge her. Lina considered fireballing her just to shake her superior attitude. Resisting the temptation by sheer will power, Lina dropped back a little to walk beside her divine 'bodyguard'.
"What do you think, Gourry? Is there more treasure up here?"
Gourry tilted his head to look down at her from where she had disturbed his contemplation of a passing butterfly. "What was that, Lina?"
Lina gritted her teeth. "Do. You. Think. That. There. Is. More. Treasure. Up. Here?"
Gourry blinked at her. "How should I know?"
Lina tried taking deep breaths. It did no good. Now she really wanted to fireball something, preferably her companions. "I thought that you were a god, shouldn't you have some idea?"
"I'm the god of swordsmanship, Lina. I don't know anything about treasure or bandits or anything like that..."
"Talk about your wasted wishes," Lina muttered under her breath.
"What was that, Lina?"
"Nothing, Gourry, nothing at all."
Gourry shrugged and allowed his attention to wander off again. Naga, in the lead, suddenly stopped. Lina managed to halt before plowing into her, but Gourry wasn't so lucky and all three were soon laying in a tangled pile.
Gourry blinked. "What happened?"
Lina growled. "You weren't watching where you were going, you idiot!" she snapped and introduced her fist to the top of his head.
"Ow..." Gourry rubbed the top of his head. "Sorry. What were we stopping for anyway?"
"I..." Lina paused, "Hey, Naga, what did you stop for?"
Naga had regained her feet and flipped her cape back over her shoulders. "Why, Lina, can't you tell? We have arrived!" So saying, Naga laughed lightly behind her hand.
"We've arrived where? I don't see anything."
Naga just sniffed and pointed grandly through the trees at what appeared to be a brush pile in a nearby clearing.
"That? That's what you dragged us all the way out here to look at? Geeze, Naga, where was your head when these losers told you that they could afford to pay you more than they already gave you?"
Naga laughed again. "Don't be naive, Lina. Do you think that I'm stupid?"
"Well, actually..."
"I checked the place out before I took anything from them. There is a lot more to it than there appears at first. Actually, I think that they have guards..."
As if on cue, a group of bandits suddenly appeared out of the underbrush. "You are trespassing on Wood Splinters' territory! Leave now or face the consequences!" one of the bandits announced waving his sword threateningly.
Lina cocked an eyebrow. "Wood Splinters? What kind of lousy name is that for a bandit gang? It doesn't even sound threatening!"
"You'll pay for insulting us like that! Kill them!"
Lina smirked and readied a fireball. "These idiots never learn..."
Later....
Lina blew her bangs out of her eyes as another group of bandits came towards her. "This is taking forever! How many of these guys are there anyway?" She launched another fireball and then parried a sword thrust with her blade. "That's it! No more Miss Nice Sorceress! If you guys want to play rough... Gourry cover me!"
"Right!" The blond swordsmen leapt backwards to take a defensive position in front of her, his sword flashing out at any bandit that dared to get too close.
Lina smirked slightly a began to draw her power around her as she began to chant,
"Darkness from twilight,
Crimson from blood that flows...
Buried in the flow of time...
In thy great name, I pledge myself to darkness!
Those who oppose us shall be destroyed by the
power you and I possess!..."
Lina drew the seething ball of red and black energy closer to herself and prepared to launch it with the familiar trigger phrase when the mass suddenly exploded from her hands and began to swirl in the air before her. "Wha? Wha?" Lina stared in shock as what was going to be her finishing blow on the bandits began to stretch and take the form of a human figure.
Gourry glanced back over his shoulder. "What's the matter, Lina?"
"I'm not sure. I think that the spell backfired or something..."
The spell mass had finally settled into a form, and Lina stared at the stranger that now stood in front of her. He cracked open one eye to look at her for a moment before stretching his empty palm over Gourry's shoulder. A wave of pure black energy flashed out and incinerated any of the bandits that didn't scramble out of the way fast enough. The surviving bandits gave the fight up as a bad deal and crawled and limped their way into the underbrush. Lina was in no mood to give chase as she was still trying to determine exactly what had happened to her Dragon Slave spell, and where exactly the stranger had come from. "Who the heck are you?!" she finally managed to sputter.
The stranger grinned and waved his finger under her nose. "Ah, that, you see, is a..."
"Xelloss!" Gourry had turned to see what was going on since the bandits had all fled. When his eyes settled on the stranger, they had instantly lit up with recognition, and it was from him that the name had come.
The stranger, Xelloss, pouted slightly before his smile returned. "Ah, Gourry, you never let me have any fun."
"Gourry, you know him?"
Gourry nodded happily. "Sure! This is my older brother, Xelloss."
"You...have a brother?"
Gourry nodded again.
"I thought you were supposed to be a god or something."
"Yeah, so? Why can't gods have brothers? Xelloss is a god too, you know."
Lina paused to turn this information over in her head. "God of what?" she questioned suspiciously.
"Black magic!" Xelloss piped in. "I'm disappointed in you, Lina-chan. You'd think after all this time you would know me by now. After all, you do seem to enjoy pledging yourself to my service on an amazingly frequent basis."
"Pledging myself?!"
"Sure! Don't you remember? 'I pledge myself to darkness'? Who did you think you were talking to? The tooth fairy?"
"I, uh..." Lina looked around desperately for help. What was it with her and weirdoes? Seeing only Naga picking through the wreckage they had made of the bandits lair and Gourry still standing before her, Lina nearly cringed as she looked back at the stranger turned god. "I, well, I always thought it was just an expression, you know..."
"Ma ma! Don't worry about it! Saaa... since Gourry-kun is with you, why don't I just hang out with you guys and we'll call it even, ne? Ne?"
Gourry who had been watching the conversation with a rather confused look on his face suddenly brightened and crossed his arms over his chest nodding knowingly. "You got kicked out."
"Now, now! I didn't say anything like that, I just thought that you might have missed me here on the material plane and want my company back, ne?"
"What did you do this time?"
"Why must I have done something? Couldn't I have missed you?"
"Did you dye Sylphiel's spellbooks black again? Or put frogs in Shabranigdo's shower?"
Xelloss' smile was starting to become strained as Gourry continued listing his possible pranks. "All right, so I got kicked out. It wasn't my fault at all! It was just a tiny little misunderstanding that got blown completely out of proportion!"
Lina blinked. Gods could get kicked out? "So, what did you do?"
Xelloss turned back to her grinning widely. "That... is a secret!"
Lina face faulted and then rubbed her forehead. Her gaze went back and forth between the two gods as they returned to discussing whatever Xelloss had or hadn't done. When had her life gotten so complicated? "Guys?"
Both of the gods turned to look at her instantly. "Yes, Lina?" they chorused.
"I think that I'm going to go over there," she pointed towards where Naga was trying to get into what appeared to be a treasure vault, "and help Naga get that cash." Gourry and Xelloss nodded before going back to their 'discussion', which seemed to involve Gourry nodding his head knowingly while Xelloss defended his innocence, sort of. "I think we're going to need it," Lina added under her breath before moving to lend actions to words.