On The Run - Part II
AN: Hey there, guys! I hope you enjoy the chapter!
About the last chapter, the references were: "First rule of going on the run is 'Don't run. Walk'."- Natasha Romanoff on Captain America 2 (OTP forever those two)"; and The Prancing Pony - The Lord of the Rings.
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I Put A Spell On You
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On The Run – Part II
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Feeling much better, Juvia woke up and stretched her body, listening and feeling the 'pops' in all the right placed and she sighed in contentment. Oh, it had been months since she slept so well.
She sat on the bed and noticed it was empty aside from herself, different from the last time she woke up. Juvia got up but sat back down when she felt dizzy and weak. Taking a few deep breaths, she tried it again and felt much better.
Reaching for her wand, Juvia used a spell and changed her sleeping clothes for regular ones and went to the bathroom before she exited the bedroom in search for her friends. Unless... had it been her mind getting delirious while she was sick.
The thought made her stop in the middle of the stairs, fear freezing her for a moment. She had been very sick the past few days and she could've imagined the whole thing. What if her friends weren't there? What if... her Gray-sama weren't there?
Her thoughts were interrupted by a squeaking voice: "Oh, Miss Juvia!" Juvia snapped out of it and looked down to the bottom of the stairs and saw Spetto there and the elf looked surprised. "You shouldn't be out of bed! Miss Lucy told me you needed to sleep."
Hearing Spetto speak about Lucy, Juvia let out a breath she didn't even realize she was holding and was about to answer the elf when she heard someone.
"Juvia?"
She looked to her right and saw that Gray had just walked out of the living room and was standing there and for a second, they just stared at each other before Juvia was going down the stairs as quickly as she could and Gray surely did the same, because the moment the was at the bottom of the stairs, so was he.
The blunette didn't even hesitate to throw herself on him and thankfully, Gray caught her, arms around her waist, holding her tight. Juvia started to cry of relief, face hidden on the crook of his neck – it hadn't been an illusion after all.
"Oh, Gray-sama." Juvia kissed his cheek, his nose, his lips, his other cheek and Gray actually smiled at that. "Oh, I can't believe it."
"Me neither." Gray said and finally kissed her (man, was she happy she had brushed her teeth before she went down the stairs) and Juvia couldn't help it but to keep the tears from falling. "Don't cry."
Juvia laughed. "I'm just so relieved you are okay."
"Me?" Gray asked in disbelief. "You left some crazy message a week ago, then tells me it's a trap and you are leaving, I don't hear from you for four days and when I do find you, you have Dragon Pox and are delirious; and you are relieved if I'm okay?"
"Well, you've been chasing after, longer." She shrugged.
Gray couldn't help it but to agree. "I want to know everything that happened."
Thankfully, Juvia didn't have to answer because Lucy interrupted them. "After she's had something to eat, Gray. It's almost lunch time." Juvia looked to the side and saw the blonde and Natsu looking at them, amused. She finally saw them without blurriness in her eyes and for fugitives, they looked very well. "How are you feeling?"
"Much better, Lucy-san, thank you." Juvia told her friend with a smile and then did the same to the pink haired young man next to Lucy. "Hello, Natsu-san."
"Hey." Natsu nodded her way. "You had us worried for a bit there."
"Let's eat first." Lucy told her friends. "Juvia hadn't eaten anything other than broth for the past few days and all of us need to keep our strength. Come on."
"She's been very bossy." Gray told his girlfriend and Juvia chuckled. He let go of her, but took her hand in his to lead her. Juvia took a few steps and became light headed again, black spots in her vision. Noticing that, Gray's arms were quickly back to her waist. "Whoa, are you okay? Alright, I'm taking you back to bed. You shouldn't be up. I'll bring you something-" Lucy and Natsu looked back, both concerned, but didn't say anything.
"Juvia's fine." She shook her head. "She just needs to eat something and sit down."
"Are you sure?" He asked, concerned, but leading her towards the dining room even so.
"Yes." Juvia kissed his cheek, he was sweet, being so concerned about her. The four of them, followed by Spetto, went to have something to eat.
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"You didn't eat much, Miss Juvia." Spetto asked, worried as she took the blunette's plate off the table. "Wasn't the meat good?"
Everyone's attention went to Juvia's plate, which she managed to eat barely half and then to her. Feeling everyone's eyes on her, Juvia looked at the elf.
"It was very good, Spetto-san, but Juvia's not eating much." She told her but the elf still looked worried. "Don't worry, please. It was lovely, everyone liked it."
"If you say so." Spetto didn't look very please of herself, but started to leave.
"She is right, you barely ate anything." Gray said, worried. "Is your stomach still bothering you? Natsu and Lucy told me you weren't feeling well."
"No, Juvia's fine. She just has been eating less." She reassured her boyfriend with a quick kiss on the lips – he was still shy, but there were only Natsu and Lucy there. "It's alright."
"How are the people in Hogwarts?" Natsu asked, eagerly – Lucy had forbidden any talk about the war during the meal.
"Afraid, confused, not really knowing on what or who to believe." Juvia sighed. "We were hostages, mostly. Whatever Resistance there are, can't just barge in into a school with hundreds of children to have a battle and You-Know-Who followers' inside, know this." The other three looked at each other, all worried. "Wait, how long was since the message Juvia left for you, Gray-sama?"
"A week." Gray told her. "Natsu and Lucy found you here four days after that and I got here two days ago. Getting the cure for the Dragon Pox wasn't easy but I couldn't come here without it. I've read of what does do people and knowing you had it..." Gray gulped and Juvia reached for his hand under the table and squeezed it to reassure him, but she let it go and got up from the chair, in panic, startling everyone.
"Oh, Juvia could still be infectious for all of you." She looked in horror to Lucy and Natsu. "You touched Juvia when she was sick." She looked at Gray, too. "You too! To give me the potion and... and... Juvia kissed you a few minutes ago... what if...?"
Gray got up, looking almost amused. "Juvia, it's fine. I bought two, each of us took a bit of the second one just to be safe." He led her back to the chair. "We're okay."
"For once in his life, Gray rubbed two neurons together." Natsu said with a smirk.
"Oh, sod off." Gray snarled at his friends.
"Order, both of you." Lucy said with an stern voice and then looked at Juvia. "I feel like I'm a mother of two toddlers. Imagine being almost four months sorting their silly fights with n backup and really, no place to run?"
Juvia chuckled. "Poor Lucy-san."
"Now you are with us, so I can look after my guy and you look after yours." Lucy smirked. Her hair was loose and Juvia had forgotten how long it was, the cascade of golden locks. "Deal?"
"Deal."
"We can hear you." Gray rolled his eyes.
"Good." Lucy told her friend. "You answer to Juvia now."
"Bloody ridiculous." Gray muttered under his breath before his attention turned to Juvia. He was serious, then and Juvia lost her smile. "Juvia, I need to ask you about the night you sent me the message you were leaving."
Juvia quickly looked away, the table suddenly fascinating. She knew it was coming, but it didn't mean she would like the conversation. "What about it?"
"First, it said 'Please, help. They are hurting me to get information.' It was your handwrite, I am sure of it. And minutes later, the message saying it was a trap and that you were leaving." Gray probed, being uncharacteristically sweet about it.
"Yes." Juvia still hadn't look up.
"Also, while you were sick and delirious, you kept asking for someone to stop hurting you." Lucy said, gently. "With what you wrote and those words we wondered..."
"Juvia, did someone really hurt you to get information?" Natsu was straight to the point.
Her eyes widened but she kept looking down to the table. The moment they saw her face, they'd known. She kept quiet, trying to find the words to explain what had happened to her during the past couple of months.
"They did." Gray whispered in horror by her side and Juvia finally looked up to him, knowing he saw it in her eyes. "They hurt you."
"Juvia is fine now." It was all she could tell him.
"Tell me what happened that night." Gray's tone was hard. Juvia bit her lower lip, looked to Lucy and Natsu, who were also paying great attention to her. "Juvia."
With a sigh, Juvia started. "We were exchanging messages that night when Dimaria-sama, one of them, came into Juvia's dorm and found the paper. She took Juvia to Professor Yura's office and he used the Imperius Curse on Juvia so she could write that message to you." She looked at Gray. "Juvia couldn't let you go to Hogwarts, not like that, so she hit him with a book, got her wand and summoned your broomstick so she could fly to London." She looked away again.
"He used the Imperius Curse on you?" Lucy's eyes were wide and then she looked at her boyfriend. "See? I told you Juvia would never write that."
Gray narrowed his eyes and his girlfriend. "That's not all, isn't it? You've been under the Imperius Curse before, you told me it was painful to resist it, but nothing unbearable." Juvia closed her eyes – he wouldn't let it go. "Something else happened that night."
"No." Juvia shook her head; she was telling the truth, that night she had been mostly fine.
"Before that." Gray's tone was of realization a couple of seconds later. "Something happened before then, didn't it? That's why you could give us some information. You couldn't have overheard all of it out of coincidence. Tell me."
"Gray-sama..." Juvia tried. "Digging this up won't make any of us feel better. Me, you, Lucy-san, Natsu-san, none of us-"
"Tell me what they did." He asked again, eyes hard and his whole body was tense. Even Natsu and Lucy seemed tense. "Juvia."
The blunette took a few moments to try and formulate the right words. "They knew who your friends were. They knew Juvia is Gray-sama's girlfriend and they knew we had means of communicating." She took a deep breath. "They knew too, Juvia had no valuable information about your whereabouts, none of us are dumb. If Juvia knew nothing, she was safe, right?" Juvia looked away. "So... they wondered... what if Juvia knew nothing but wasn't safe? Would that bring you out of hiding?"
"What?" Lucy whispered to herself in disbelief.
"They thought Juvia would tell you and let's face it, we are all aware you would have find a way back to school if you knew one of your friends were in trouble. It's who you are but in this war, being that way is too dangerous. No one but close friends knew what was happening."
"And what was happening, exactly?" Natsu asked between gritted teeth, but Juvia could feel Gray's eyes on her and it worried her – she could also feel he was getting angrier by the second.
"Juvia is fine now, there's no reason to-"
Gray hit the table, startling everyone and since she was closer, Juvia almost jumped from her seat and looked at him with wide eyes. "What. Happened?"
The Slytherin knew better than to stall even more, it seemed Gray's patience ran out. Juvia averted her eyes from her boyfriend. "Every couple of days, Profesor Yura would summon Juvia to the dungeons, most times, and..." She sighed, fearing speaking the next words. "Some of the Death Eaters stationed there would be waiting and they... well, they would cast the Cruciatus Curse on me." The last words were barely a whisper.
No one spoke for almost a minute, trying to wrap their minds around what they just heard.
Gray was the first to speak. "How long?" When Juvia didn't answer straight away, he asked again. "For how long did this happen?"
Juvia gulped before she answered. "Almost two months."
Absolutely enraged, Gray got up from the chair and started to pace. "Two months? Two fucking months and you didn't tell me?"
"Juvia was trying to-"
"You lied to me for two months!" Gray was so angry, Juvia never saw him like that. "Every time I asked if you were okay-"
The blunette got up from her chair, tried to reach for her boyfriend, who took two steps back from her; his eyes... he looked hurt.
"You lied to me."
Juvia was taken aback with the venom dripping from every word as he looked at her in anger. It broke Juvia's heart, she wanted to go to her knees and ask for his forgiveness, but she couldn't regret her decision, not after everything she went through to keep them safe.
"Yes. Yes, Juvia lied." The Slytherin said. "She lied because she knew you wouldn't bear the thought of someone you care about being hurt!"
"This is about me." It was Natsu who spoke, now on his feet as well. "I had the right to know. We had the right to know."
"No, you didn't." Juvia snapped at him, suddenly angry and tired. "You couldn't know, they are after you. All three of you and Juvia knows you all too well to know most the times you react, and then you think." She looked at her boyfriend, who was still looking at her in anger. "This is war and I was a prisoner of war, it's only natural to suffer. Juvia is glad she is the only one they picked on. So far, at least."
"You should've told me." Gray said.
"No." She kept her ground. "You are not thinking. Neither of you are thinking." Juvia glanced at an equally angry Natsu. "You are reacting and Juvia is right here in front of you, in one piece. Imagine if she had told you about what was happening at the school?"
"We would've gone back." Lucy said, sitting back down and sighed tiredly. "None of us would've want a friend going through that. They could have caught us in our haste."
"Yes." Juvia was glad at least Lucy could see her reasoning, even though the blonde's clear distress. "Someone had to decide and since there was no one else, Juvia did. It was happening to me and it was my decision. This wasn't a haste decision, Juvia thought about it a lot. And Natsu-san, you are wrong about one thing: this isn't just about you. They need you for something and keeping you away from it is of utmost importance to every single witch and wizard. This is You-Know-Who, we're talking about! This goes beyond us."
"You..." Gray was still angry.
"...did what I could to keep everyone safe!" Juvia told him. "Juvia knows her limits and she knew when to get out, just like she did. And don't try to pretend you wouldn't have done the same thing. All of you."
"I-" Gray tried, but Juvia didn't let him.
"No. If something were wrong, you wouldn't tell Juvia." She told her boyfriend. "Don't even try to tell me you would. Juvia knows you, Gray-sama. You wouldn't tell Juvia, you'd keep her in the dark to 'protect her'. So why is it wrong when the tables are turned?" Her eyes watered. "Juvia hates she had to lie to you, but she doesn't regret it if it kept you safe."
Gray groaned in anger, turned around and kicked one of the chairs on his way out the living room. Juvia wanted to follow him, but Lucy was by her side, holding her back while Natsu was the one who followed after Gray.
"Don't." Lucy told her friend. "Both of them need to cool off and it's better if they do it together. I learned that the hard way. Let them figure things out. Besides, you look like you are about to drop." The Gryffindor started to lead the blunette out from the other side of the dining room, towards the stairs. "You might be cured, but now knowing what you went through the past couple of months, you need as much rest as you can get."
Juvia let some tears fall. "He hates me for lying, doesn't he?" She asked in a low voice. "Juvia would do it again if it meant keeping you all safe, but..."
The girls started to walk up the stairs when Lucy spoke: "He doesn't hate you. You were right, he would've done the same thing. All of us would." She sighed as they slowly reached the top of the stairs. "He's just angry because he didn't know and you had to suffer alone. I know it was for the cause, but... he's feeling hopeless. I don't need to tell you that, you know him."
"I do." Juvia whispered in response. "That's why I'm afraid he hates me: he doesn't like liars."
They arrived in front of Juvia's room and stopped for a moment. Lucy sighed. "No, he doesn't. But he also went absolutely crazy when he got that last message. No one could stop him from going out to try and find you, believe me. That's how we got separated. He was frantic, I've never seen him that scared before."
"Really?"
"Really." Lucy said with confidence. "He just needs to cool off, okay?" Juvia nodded. "Now, you need to rest. Come on, I'll stay with you for a while."
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The sound of the door closing woke Juvia from her troubled sleep. She sat on the mattress, heart pounding inside her chest and reaching for her wand, pointing towards the general are of the door when she heard a familiar voice.
"Wow, Juvia, it's me." Gray said and Juvia's vision finally cleared and she finally saw her boyfriend.
She blinked a couple of times before she remembered to lower her wand and she put a hand over her eyes. "Gray-sama. I'm so sorry..."
"Sorry, I thought I had closed the door without making much noise." He replied.
"Nightmare." Juvia told him and she passed a hand through her curls. "It wasn't your fault."
Gray nodded and hesitated to speak or come closer. Juvia looked to the old clock on the wall and saw she had slept most of the afternoon and it was almost time to have dinner.
They stayed in silence for a few moments and when they spoke, it was at the same time. "I'm sorry."
"What?"
"Huh?"
Gray finally stepped closer to the bed. "You... you don't need to apologize. I do." He sat next to her. "I got angry at you and you didn't deserve that. It was an impossible choice."
"Lucy-san talked to you, didn't she?" Juvia was mildly amused.
"Yeah." Gray snorted. "Surprisingly, though, Natsu said something like that too. He was angry too, but not as much as me." He hesitated, but took her hand. "The... the thought of you having to endure the Cruciatus Curse so many times while I had no idea."
"You felt powerless." Juvia squeezed his hand. "Juvia felt like that too, she wished she could've done more."
"I think you've done your part." Gray told her, pointedly. "I will make sure you never have to go through that again. And let me tell you, I will meet this Yura and I will fucking kill him." He was determined and sober for a moment and Juvia believed every word he said. "And I need you to promise me something: no more lying. I hate being lied to, no matter the circumstance." Juvia opened her mouth, but Gray didn't let her speak. "No. I agree, I don't like it, but you had no choice before and you were right, I would've done the same thing, but from now on, we stick together and we tell each other everything." Juvia raised an eyebrow and he rolled his eyes. "Yes, I'm aware I'm not the best at sharing, but I am willing to try."
"Okay." Juvia agreed. "No more secrets."
"Alright." Gray leaned and gave her a peck on the lips. "It's almost time for dinner."
"Lie down with Juvia for a bit, first." She lied back down to the bed and Gray lost no time in joining her, spooning her and Juvia sighed in contentment. "I will want to know about what you went through later."
Juvia nodded. "Alright. Later."
"For now, tell me how you flew from Hogwarts to London."
Juvia chuckled. "How else? Crooked to the left."
Both of them laughed and for a few moments, everything in the world was right.
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A couple of nights later, Juvia was feeling much better, they were talking about leaving the mansion soon – it wasn't safe to stay at the same place too long.
Juvia woke up in the middle of the night with a frown, as if someone as looking at her. She opened her eyes and saw someone at the end of the bed and she knew it wasn't Gray because his arms were around her waist as he slept next to her.
Trembling a little, Juvia reached for her wand next on the bedside table, but stopped when the mysterious man spoke. "If I wanted you dead, you'd be dead already, girl." With the unknown voice, Gray woke up and had the same reaction as Juvia, but the man spoke again. "Stop it, Gray. I'm not your enemy."
Gray stopped in his tracks, eyes wide. Juvia finally got her wand and whispered "Lumos" and when they saw the person inside their room, both of them were speechless.
Juvia knew that face, she had met a portrait of him just that summer. He looked older, but the scar on his eyebrow and forehead and the likeness with Gray were undeniable.
"Dad?" Gray asked, confused and afraid, his voice breaking a little with the shock.
"Hey there, kiddo. Long time no see."
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AN: I'm just gonna leave this here. *runs away*
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