Chapter Text
The town reeked of fish innards and dried kelp.
They had two things to do here, and after that, it would be safe to find any excuse to leave when the sun would be up in the morrow. First, find the city hall. They had to deliver the three rascals who dared conduct a hold-up against two former assassins and a former S-mage, and pocket the money for their capture. Then, find the inn where they would meet the man who sought Crime Sorcière’s help, and discuss the clauses of the contract.
It wasn’t that hard. The city hall was the cleanest place in this town, and the inn the filthiest one. The mayor, a very tall and strong lady with alopecia, didn’t ask anything about their identity. She just surveyed the two bloodied-up scoundrels Sawyer tossed at her feet with a stern eye, then tossed him back a pouch of golden coins before inviting the three of them to fuck off.
Erza frowned at the vulgarity of the exchange and darted an inquisitive look at Sawyer, who only shrugged in answer. She’ll have to get used to it. This is how things were mostly done in the dark parts of the country. Where they roamed all their lives, and where she only went to kick some arses in the name of friendship and honour. No line drawn today, she earned her share of the money and didn’t think twice about refusing it. The past few months had drained both her and her bank account after all.
It’s not like they’d killed the fellas anyway.
Crime Sorcière had a code regarding the infliction of death. By all means, avoid killing the target if the ongoing mission involves one who is very much alive. You already have enough blood on your hands, enough to drown in it, even, so spare yourself the hassle and question yourself accordingly.
Nevertheless, if you happen to unalive the target, there was no such thing as blindness to attenuating circumstances. As long as your mess didn’t involve petty revenge and pure murderous intent, or any kind of dark urge. But you’re above that, aren’t you?
The first thing Sawyer told Erza before they left was that he was mostly tagging along because Macbeth was not allowed to go on a mission alone. The second thing was that every single one of the members of the guild was on meds for mental illness. Jellal included, but that was a subject for another day, he had said.
So, in short, rule 101 was don’t kill and take your meds. Please.
Grand. Erza asked herself if she would end up on meds too if she were to dwell there more than a few months.
There was something about the inn that made the knight mage feel upset, for some obscure reason. Maybe it was the smell of beer on the wet planks and the stench of the sailors who just made it back after a long, long sail. Their entry in the inn didn’t go unnoticed, although the merry songs kept going on and on. But that was just some background noise compared to the buzzing tension building up in Erza’s ears.
Sawyer and Macbeth, despite looking unphased, might have felt it too. She sensed a shift in their stance, like when Natsu and Gray were about to fight, but far, far worse, although much subtler. Natsu and Gray liked to show their aggressiveness, and the whole thing was both mundane and cathartic. The Oracion Seis were assassins and smuggled dark magic spells. In this kind of trade, you make yourself quiet and lethal. And for both her companions, this was their own definition of the mundane.
The innkeeper eyed them wearily, still cleaning whitened glasses behind the wooden counter.
‘What’s your poison? Yous are no sailors.’
‘Thank fuck, we’re not. Three whiskies and an interview with the landlord,' Sawyer said casually. Erza was impressed by how at ease he was in this setting. She wondered how many shady places they all visited when they were in the Oracion Seis. Maybe she didn’t want to know.
‘Here for the contract about the wraiths?’
‘Should’ve guessed so, they reek of corpses. Even the lass,' some old sailor spat, but they all ignored him. Macbeth merely arched a judgmental brow before saying Slainte, keeping it soft and quiet. Trouble was brewing.
‘I’ll fetch the boss for yous.’
Sawyer and Macbeth said cheers, then they all waited there at the counter, sipping on the poor-quality whiskey. It didn’t taste good, but at least it was a decent source of warmth. Ever since they stepped into this cursed place, Erza swore her bones froze, either with the humidity in the wind or the cold stares of the folks.
Of course, the nosy sailors from the next table couldn’t help being busybodies. Of course, they had to go and pester them. It was interesting after all, three mages in a place like this where nothing much happened, really. Erza didn’t infer much; not everyone in the country liked magic.
Some bloke, thin as a rake and wearing a mismatched tartan ensemble, approached her. He grinned widely when she met his stare, unveiling black gaps in his mouth and a few gold teeth.
‘Wait a bloody minute, don’t I know ya, m’lady? Have we met before?’
Ach, she sure was a pretty thing, that was no surprise. Although it didn’t mean they had to let it slide.
‘I assure you, no, we didn’t’, she stated, firm and stern to dissuade him.
Macbeth sighed, loud enough for the unpleasant lot to hear, then addressed Sawyer, who was pretending to be lost in his thoughts. ‘We should’ve rented the whole inn.’
Sawyer sniggered at their obvious but pretended classist arrogance. ‘With what fucking money? The Council got all of our savings, may I remind ye. And they probably already spent all of it to cuff some wankers like us.’
The tartan guy just scoffed, not believing a single word about the threat hidden in this almost mundane conversation and focused back on Erza, who actually hoped her guildmates would retaliate. She was tired, and this place was awful. She was starting to miss the weight of a sword in her hands.
Well, things went south pretty quickly when she punched the fella in the nose as an answer to his attempt to caress her cheek. For her defence, the aggression came with a compliment from the bloke that had Sawyer and Macbeth roaring with laughter.
But they shut their traps straight away as she scolded the entire inn, sailors and merchants, loud and mean enough to have the taproom quiet except for her angry voice. She grabbed the tartan fella by the neck and dragged him in front of his captain, who also got a dressing down. Everyone gawking or showing the slightest opinion on their faces got a rocket too, for the sake of sharing. Then, they all left, tails between their legs, making sure they’d left enough coins on their tables to pay for the drinks and the rooms they had rented.
‘Problem solved,' she merely said to her companions who had admiringly watched the whole scene. Natsu and Lucy, Jellal even, were usually looking like they had pissed themselves with fear. Sawyer and Macbeth looked more thrilled than terrified. She was too tired to decide whether it was a good thing or not.
‘I’ll never try to involve you in one of my shit jokes, I swear it on Macbeth’s life.’
That was the moment their employer chose to enter the inn alongside the bartender. They both looked rather confused before the empty inn, save for the three mages still sipping on their shitty whiskey. No one said anything; there was gold aplenty on the tables to buy the innkeeper’s silence. Erza was certain that deep down, he had wished for a quiet night and finally got it, by the grace of the gods.
A few moments later, the contract was signed and the situation assessed. Their employer’s daughter had tragically died two weeks before. He had buried her and respected the proper burial rites. Still, she had come back home a couple of days ago and not merely to say hello.
‘She swung her axe at me!’, he sobbed before bursting into tears.
To reassure him, Macbeth warded his house, and Erza lent him a dagger loaded with holy magic. After all, it was their job.
And off they went, first to the local cemetery to list the potential undead folks that would probably come at them with ill intent in the future, before retracing the steps of the missing corpses from the empty graves. Oddly enough, they were all leading to the countryside, far enough off to have them take the horses out for a stroll again.
On the way, Macbeth stopped the cart to have Erza and Sawyer look at a strange, emaciated figure standing in the distance. It was almost human, but its skin was an unnatural black, melted by the acidic, spongy ground of the bogs, like that of an overripe fruit. It’s clothing, outdated, melted, and blackened along with it. The corpse’s head was oriented in their direction. It could not look, for its eyelids seemed closed. It could not move either, for its twisted limbs weren’t strong enough to cross the boggy soil.
Sawyer broke their contemplative silence and explained it was a “bog body”. When he was a wean, they discovered one in the bogs near his village. He said they were the preserved bodies of sacrificial offerings for very old gods.
Since it did not pose any threat, Macbeth carried on. Erza wished it would not fuel their inspiration for even more dreadful illusions.
After half an hour, they all made it to what seemed to be an abandoned farmer's hamlet. If the houses looked freshly vacated, it reigned a certain quiet but heavy peace that did not feel natural. Erza had seen places like that. They never told lilting tales with happy endings. A female voice was singing inside the nearest house. The horses had their ears pointing forward, and it was reason enough to stop the cart at a reasonable distance from its front garden.
Magic was at play, and Erza could feel it running in shudders down her spine. Judging by the lack of reaction from her two comrades, she concluded they were dealing with dark magic. She was the only one in Crime Sorcière who still reacted badly to it, and secretly hoped she’d never get used to the feeling.
The door of the house was open. Sawyer entered without knocking, and Erza couldn’t help but snap at him for that, Macbeth backing her with a sharp comment, though in bantering. However, there was nothing funny to witness in the house. A young lady, no older than fifteen, sat in a corner of the pastel-coloured but austere living room. She had her knees close to her chin, trembling all over. Her singing stopped at the sight of the three mages, and her expression shifted to hope and manic glee.
‘Is it over? Are they finally gone?’
There was an uncanny distance in her voice that had them wince.
‘Ye’ll have to be a wee bit more precise, love. We haven’t seen a soul around', Sawyer answered after the three mages exchanged confused looks.
‘Why, Lord Morkan’s men.’
‘I never heard of a Lord Morkan in this country, I fear’, Erza stated, adding to the confusion. The girl’s lower lip trembled as she muttered some prayers to herself.
‘But...,’ her voice quivered. ‘I saw two of them in the front yard last night... I swear! Then it all grew silent and cold. I thought to meself that they would come back on the morrow. So I started singing to bring me hope and chase their evil spirits away, as I felt alone, you see. They- they took my sister and my mother, I-’
Ah, it all made sense now. Come to think of it, her black dress and her laced headdress belonged to another world, to another century. She started sobbing, her face in her hands, revealing the crushed back of her skull. Sawyer startled as Erza stepped back, her breathing ragged.
‘Macbeth.’
Sawyer’s voice was firm, though not authoritarian. An impulse, not a command.
‘I don’t think it’s a good idea to waste a spell on it. It’ll put us in danger. Light magic is too bright and heavy, it leaves too many traces.’
The speed mage snickered. ‘Cut the assassin shit, you dickhead. Here is a wee exercise to work on your lack of empathy: you secure her a ticket to the fucking land of the ever young. Erza and I got you. I’ll even catch you if you faint.’
They seemed to ponder a little, then nodded in agreement. Erza swore they would bite Sawyer’s bait at first and react to the direct attack at their ego, but nothing of it happened. Hell, Macbeth was just nervous, too afraid to mess things up, and it showed.
The crying girl looked up as Macbeth kneeled before her to get to her level.
‘Aye, sorry for the delayed answer, Lord Morkan’s men are gone. There is nothing to worry about now.’ Their quiet voice and the good news seemed to soothe the girl. Her big green eyes softened as Macbeth offered their hand to help her get up. ‘We gotta go now, somewhere safe. First, we’ll patch up this nasty wound, then you’ll rest as much as you want. How about that, eh?’
She seemed to hesitate a second and looked up at Erza, who gave her the warmest smile to encourage her. Having made her decision, she nodded, looked at Macbeth with determination, and finally took their hand.
Soon, the stern living room was flooded with light, and the ghost of the girl was gone.
‘Good job! Now I’m fucking bli-,’ the slash of Erza’s sword interrupted Sawyer’s comment. A female body fell on the floor with a loud thud, echoed by the knight’s mage heavy breathing. In the panic, she dropped her sword, adding to the cacophony, and backed away a few steps, staggering. Sawyer made sure to catch her before she fell as her panic attack seemed to build up.
‘Easy, easy, now. You’re okay, you did an awesome job of kicking the arse of an undead warrior, everything’s fine.’
‘I-I didn’t want to-’
It only took a second. Macbeth was right, light magic was the opposite of discrete, and it attracted the nearest undead warrior. Heavy breathing still, Erza took in the aspect of the corpse. She was just as young as she was, but dead. Tall, probably brave, and dashing in her black leather armour with fancy, floral carved details. But she was dead already, and had been for a while, as decay blackened her bare arms and pulled her lips up her grey teeth. The cross Erza slashed with her iron swords on her chest drew no blood.
‘What, kill her? Nah, don’t sweat it, she was already dead anyway! And, oooh, look at that, that’s the innkeeper’s daughter! Damn, she’s fucking big, Erza, you’re amazing. You took down the undead lass in one shot, fuck’s sake almighty, I’m glad you came with us!’
His overdramatic enthusiasm distracted her from her thoughts. The fog in her brain cleared up, and memories of the past minutes flooded her as her breathing eased. She had felt a malevolent presence behind her back, and it triggered her instinct. Because it brought her back to that damned cube. To that damned cell with Kyouka and Yakdoriga torturing her. She hadn’t wanted to feel powerless any more, so she had struck. Although her reaction filled her with dread, she admitted to herself that she was happy the poor girl had been dead already.
‘All good?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Grand, now you both lock the fuck in. If that was already a very plausible scenario, it’s now obvious. We have a necromancer to deal with. Hey, Macbeth, didn’t we actually have one in our ranks back in the day?’
‘We did.’
‘Under whose command was he again?’
‘Yours.’
‘Well, I hope it’s not him, he was a decent lad from what I remember.’
‘If he matched your expectations back then, I’m not sure he will now.’
‘Ha! That’s the spirit, Erza. Come on now, let’s teach the fucker a lesson and call it a day before all this death drives us insane.’
They took down a few more undead soldiers in the village before heading in the direction from which they all appeared to come. Erza zealously purified the majority of the corpses swarming the village, acquiring the quiet admiration of her two partners in crime, although it was clear enough she mostly did it to distract herself from her thoughts. Nobody judged her for that. It was common knowledge, after all. If there were cracks in your soul, evil spirits would gladly make their comfortable way through them to fill them with their haunting presence, only to metastasise in bad luck and illness. Better chase them away with an iron sword and a holy spell, topped by a little bit of cussing.
The path through the village led them to a field. No crops would grow here; it was obvious enough. The place was overloaded with magic, dark enough to stir the heavy memories buried in the different strata of the soil. If you’d lend an ear, you could almost hear the cries of the fallen warriors on the battlefield and the wails of their widows.
‘Is anyone well-versed in history enough to tell me what the fuck happened here?’
Macbeth answered Sawyer’s inquiry flatly. ‘Some battle, a thousand years ago. Colonisation war. That’s all we need to know.’
‘Ew, explains the bad gut feeling. Wait- a thousand years ago? There are no corpses to revive at this point.’
‘No, but ghosts will do, Racer, sir.’
And here was the source of all this mess, appearing amongst their little group from thin air. Erza didn’t think twice and pointed one of her swords at him. Sawyer turned back, seemingly unphased and with a broad smile on his face, to greet a former grunt:
‘Hiya, there, Drest, long time no see. You look like you’re doing well.’
The necromancer sure looked like a man, but it was quite hard to guess his age. One half of his handsome face showed youth and good health, with his groomed auburn hair and carefully styled beard, whereas the other was showing early stages of decay. His hair was growing white, almost yellowish, and marked with empty spots where cuts that never scarred did their damage. Instead of a bright green eye remained a repulsive empty socket remained, circled by wrinkles and blackened veins. His fine clothing was troubling too, as if he had freshly stepped out of the coffin, then out of the grave with his bare hands.
‘Quite the nice little project, you got here, ’ Macbeth commented, and Erza saw through their manoeuvre as they slowly circled the necromancer. The latter was now in the reach of their deflection zone. A sudden move and the necromancer’s head will roll. Or at least, that was the scenario Macbeth was imposing on them. Sawyer could also get rid of the necromancer in a second. The two metres between him and their target meant nothing. For god’s sake, she was glad they both were on her side this time (the little scars on her ribs tickled her under her armour).
‘Ah... I’m on my last straw.’ Drest chuckled, bitter and softly smiling. ‘Before I go, I wanted to complete my life’s work. I think I grew powerful enough to summon ancient ghosts. But you weren’t the ones destined to hear my swan song. It doesn’t matter, you’ll do, your red-haired friend there will do.’ He looked at Erza, his only green eye filled with sadness. ‘When I’m done with you, I’ll get the recognition I deserve. Please, don’t be mad at me for it.’
He disappeared, exchanging his cold presence for those of fifty ancient warriors rising from the unhallowed soil, ghosts and skeletons both. The three mages swore, forced to engage in combat.
‘Yeah, he sure became the arrogant prick- Ow, fuck off!’, Sawyer shouted before zapping through the rotten skeleton of a horse, making its rider fall. Erza took care of him, thrashing her iron sword through his ribcage, only to throw an enchanted dagger at the grim ghost who was on his merry way to behead Macbeth, too busy disembowelling the zombie of a shield-maiden.
‘You guys cover me for a wee second,’ Macbeth asked them without even checking if they had heard them before kneeling, hands golden with light magic on the burnt grass.
Erza was the fastest to react and rushed to them, carefully avoiding the deflection zone, just in case.‘I’ll guard your back.’
‘Don’t fucking blind us, by the grace of god, I don’t wanna die here, this place sucks!’
‘You got sunshades on, stop whining. Now shush, I need to concentrate so I don’t roast yous like pigs.’
And in a mere second, the undead were all wiped out as Macbeth cleansed the first stratum of the old battlefield. The effort drained them; the whole light magic thing was new, after all.
Too bad they couldn’t reach deeper in the ground. And so, the soldiers swarmed the three mages again, this time older and tougher.
Breathless, Erza feared another wave of ancient warriors after they all cleansed the fourth one. Yet, it seemed the flux had finally stopped. Shit, as the adrenaline cooled down, the throbbing pain in her left thigh made itself known. She wasn’t losing much blood, but was bruised enough for it to ache badly. Leaping on the battlefield, she made to join Sawyer, who stood in a similar state. He didn’t seem to notice her, too focused on the scene laid out a few yards from them. Judging by his concerned expression, Erza couldn’t help but tighten her sweating fist around the hilt of her iron sword.
Of course, the necromancer took it as a cue to finally reappear, teleporting himself back here from wherever he was hiding. There was a scroll in his hand as he faced Macbeth, who was definitely the main cause of his ongoing downfall. If Erza and Sawyer had been efficient in cutting down his army, Macbeth's spells made sure that they wouldn’t come back, despite a few failures. Adrenaline rushed through her veins again. She was too far to prevent the necromancer from wounding, if not killing, her comrade. She heard Sawyer curse; he was out of power and wounded, too.
It didn’t stop Macbeth from being their usual self-important prick and look the calm necromancer down. ‘Come on now, you’ve lost, just admit it.’
‘Oh, that would make everything so much easier for you...’ Drest was knackered too. He used all his magic reserves to restlessly summon dead warrior after dead warrior, taking the damage every time one was sent back. Even from a distance, Erza noticed the burnt mark on his cheek. It didn’t prevent him from answering with equal teasing arrogance.
‘It wasn’t that complicated in the first place, or was I mistaken?’
‘It’s a very old battlefield, I can summon more...’
‘And I believe you. Fancy giving it a try?’
And try he did. From the unhallowed ground raised the dismembered ghost of a child warrior, still bearing the dagger of his misfortune through his rotten heart. The energy of his violent death and his young life, suddenly cut short, even ages ago, still made Erza shiver. Sawyer helped her stand. Perhaps he, too, had needed the comfort of the contact. Today had not been easy at all. Mercifully, light swallowed the child whole in a warm embrace, and they all could breathe properly again.
Drest plainly laughed, taken aback.‘Oh, Macbeth, that’s very much unlike you.’
‘Yeah, I’ve grown expert in purifying ghosts with time.’
‘Oh really? What if I wanted to haunt you for the remainder of your days?’
‘I won’t allow it.’ No playful tone, no bickering.
There was no mercy, nor was there any light for him. Only the sharp sound of the air being thinned then stretched, and the snap of its release. Drest’s head fell on the floor, his half-decayed body collapsing along with it.
On the way back, Macbeth was awfully quieter than usual. Erza didn’t dare ask what the matter was. Deep down, she somewhat understood, and so did Sawyer as he led the horses gentler than before.