"Am I going the entire day going to sleep?" Xina asked as Amethyst healed her. Her eyes were just starting to flutter closed when Amethyst pulled her hand back from the girl's head.
"I think you're fine now," Amethyst said. Xina yawned.
"Really? And I'm not asleep....again?" she asked. They turned silent as Luna passed and set down food before them. Jol and Xina each got large sides of roast beef that would probably not last much longer than a few seconds around them. Val and Amethyst both got coffee. Then the sorceress left to serve other terror-stricken customers. Jol and Xina ignored her, staring starry eyed at the food in front of them.
"What do we do from here?" Val asked, sipping the tea in front of him. Amethyst blinked as Jol and Xina began to tear into their food.
"Uhh...well I suppose we finish our meal here," Amethyst said.
"wmff ood fnd lln fst," Jol added. Xina paused for a brief moment to yawn.
"What did you say?" Val asked
"Where is Xalan anyway?" a yawning Xina asked before digging into the next helping of food that a nameless waitress, with nervous glances at Luna, brought to them.
"He went to look for a weapon of light," Amethyst said. Then she added a little quietly "...with Tinuviel."
"Yfff de," Jol mumbled.
"Mmf bfthr nd," Xina yawned. "tht dff?"
"What did they say?" Amethyst asked.
"I've never bothered to learn how to understand that," Val answered as the swordsman and the kage-kitsune continued to decimate their meal. The only really bizarre thing was the in this place THEY were the normal, most of the other customers were eating the same way.
"You don't eat much for a dragon," Amethyst noted.
"How many dragons do you know?"
"Point taken."
"eh, eena, ou ng eef tht?" Jol asked Xina as he noticed her food starting to pile up.
"Zzzzzzzz," everybody sweatdropped.
"I suppose that we'll waiting here until she wakes up again," Val said. Amethyst giggled nervously.
"Umm," they looked up to see the innkeeper in front of them. "Luna wants you to know that there are two empty rooms upstairs, and the food and rooms are..." he cringed as he continued. "...on the house."
"Uhh...thank you, sir," Amethyst responded after a moment's surprise. "But I'm the Crown Princess of Sailoon, I'm sure my father would send a..."
"Luna told me to make it on the house," he explained.
"Oh," Amethyst said.
"Well I'm finished, should we get Xina upstairs now?"
"I've got her," Val said as she picked up the fox-girl, who unconsciously wrapped her arms around his neck and nuzzled against his shoulder. "Please don't let her wake up like this," the dragon prayed. Amethyst giggled.
"Shall I escort you upstairs, milady," Jol asked bowing before the chimera and extending his hand. She giggled and curtsied, as well as she could in her travelling breeches. It was so hard to use a sword in a dress.
"Certainly, Gabriev-sama," she said formally as she accepted the hand and they walked upstairs in parody of courtiers everywhere.
"Silly children," Luna mumbled as she continued working. Much later she irritably folded up her apron and walked upstairs a moment. She could hear the four adventurers snoring inside. Looking about cautiously the sorceress vanished.
"My lord, there is a woman wishing to speak to you," the guard panted nervously.
"And who is this woman?" Zelgadis asked.
"She...she.." the man collected his breath. "Appears to be a waitress, but she is a powerful sorceress and claims to be the Knight of..."
"Ceipheed?" Zelgadis asked, his heart running cold. He remembered snatches of anecdotes Lina had told about her sister.
"Yes sir, how did you know that?"
"See her in..." a purple haired woman, still in waitress uniform walked into the study.
"I'm here, I apologize for the clothes, but I just got off work," she explained. Zelgadis sweatdropped.
"I suppose you're here about..."
"Where is my sister?"
"Lina's terrified of you," Zelgadis noted. "And she doesn't like company at the best of times. Now probably wouldn't..." Zelgadis barely raised a shield in time to resist the blast of magic. Luna rolled her eyes and the shield cracked and shattered. Zelgadis found himself flattened against the wall.
"I didn't ask if it would be a good time," she said, ignoring the guards behind her. "I asked where she was."
"Why should I tell you?" Zelgadis asked. "I've faced dark lords in my time."
"I have news of my niece," she said simply, after calculating that he wouldn't betray her sister.
"I thought you may have met her children," Zelgadis hmphed. "So why not tell me, and I'll pass the message on to her."
"Because I also would like to speak to my sister," Zelgadis's eyes narrowed. "I swear not to harm her."
"She went home, should be there by now, they call it Kitsune Forest, now," he answered after a long moment's silence. "It's to the East of here, about three days by dragon flight."
"That would put her near where Filia ul Copt resides," Luna mused. "Suddenly that dragon's presence makes sense. My thanks." Then she turned around and left, the guards followed her around a corner and found nothing.
Lina absent mindedly dipped her furred arms into the water to splash it up into her face. In the week she was gone, a small bandit force had tried to set up shop in HER forest. She'd spent the better part of an hour hunting down and tearing the scum to pieces. She whuffed in frustration as she imagined the difficulty of getting all that blood out of her hunting leathers.
As Lina stepped into the water fully she took her human form, skin being much easier to clean than fur.
Lina was coming to the conclusion that she'd have to replace them. This wasn't an unpleasant prospect, the meat from the deer she hunted for leather was quite tasty. She was thinking this while every so often submerging herself in the river, and was just going over the number of places she could find the right kind of deer right now.
"Lina?" the were-fox froze in the middle of scrubbing a stubborn spot on her arm. She stared straight out into space and the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end. There was suddenly a new scent in the air, one that was familiar but which she'd never been around since becoming a were-fox.
"Onesan?" she asked nervously, turning around. Standing before her was her older sister, no older than she had seemed when Lina finally left home all those years ago. "Is that..." Then Luna did something that completely surprised Lina, who was somewhat expecting to be sent into the stratosphere a la raywing. She stepped forward and embraced her sister in a relieved hug.
"Onesan?" Lina repeated, startled. "Are you okay?" Luna released her and then wiped her eyes dry.
"You scared me you little brat!" she shouted. "I thought you were dead!"
"You were sorry about my death?" Her sister gave an exasperated sigh.
"Of course I was!" she calmed herself before continuing. "Please don't do that again."
"I'll try not to," Lina said, still shocked. "Uhhh...onesan?"
"What is it?" her normal facade was starting to reappear. For some reason, Lina wasn't as scared any more.
"How did you learn about me being alive?"