Chapter 24.1- And so the Dragons Danced

The first steps came easily enough. The next few after them, jhowever, were tedious messy, and difficult. It felt like with every step, his ostrich horse would find itself caught in something and then he’d have time to dslwo down to remove whatever reed or vine or greeny obstruction hard hindered his movements before continuing on. If it were just him with the difficulties, then perhaps his displeasure would have taken a while to hit the tipping point. He had patience for days, after all. But it was not just him. He had to deal with muttered complaints from thousands of men at the same time as they all tried to make their way through. In the first few minutes of entering the swamp, whatever they had that seemed to even resemble an organised movement had been washed away, leaving rank chaos in its wake.

The caravans had already broken down in fifteen minutes of entering and then they’d had to slow down to allow some men fix the wheels before they could keep going. Thirty frustrated minutes in and he’d had enough. “Dismount. Dismount, damn you all. We continue on foot. Guide your ostrich-horses by the reins and try to avoid us getting caught up even further in this mess” He said this time, and his orders were heeded quickly. Abashed, he released that he had not said his orders, but screamed them. Not even an hour in, and the swamp was already beginning to get ti me..

“I don’t want to hear it”, I snarled at Toji as he stepped right next to me.

“Yeah, I have the good sense to save ‘I told you sos’ for after we get out of this mess. I just wanted to tell you that two of the caravans have broken down again” Agghhhh. He wanted to scream. Wisely, Toji stepped backwards, but he did not lash out in his anger. He allowed it flow through him and then released it from his nose in the form of steam. He felt calmer. Cooler and calmer. He wiped off a line of sweat from his forehead. The humidity of the damn swamp wasn’t doing them any favours either. In the plains, they had the benefit of a cool land breeze to help them weather the beating of the sun, but here there was nothing. He couldn’t even gain the pleasure of the sun beating down on him because the damned foliage canopy was in the way.

When his fingers left his head, he saw her. Not even her. Just her hair flowing around the tree as she darted behind it and began to move. “Hey you, stop there” he shouted and began to move after her. Lost in his chase, he ignored Toji’s attempts to call out at him. He ran deeper into the swamp, searching her out. She surely had something to do with this, he knew. Perhaps a spirit- maybe the face stealer or something like that. A spirit that had plagued his sleep and was now plaguing his campaign. All he had to do was reach it, he thought. He stared down at his fist and nodded.

He remembered the show. Humans had received bending to allow them fight spirits on an even footing. That meant bending could hurt them, and when it came to making things hurt, there was no element better than fire. And when it came to fire bending, there were few better than he was. It was not a boast.

No longer bogged down by his mount, he practically flew through the swamp’s foliage. He ran across a wide vine that ran through a small pond’s worth of water, and then jumped the rest of the distance to land on the ground before jetting off again. Spotting a loose vine attached to a tree, he ran almost vertically across another tree before jumping and grabbing a hold of the vine before swinging with it across a dozen feet before he landed on the ground. Again, he could just make out the back of the woman he was chasing as she banked left. He followed, turning left on a dime. Only his continued flexibility and dance training prevented him from spraining his ankles with the movement. Finding no easy path after her, he ran along one tree before reaching its first branch and then running along that until he landed on the next branch of the next tree, and so on. Now, he could make her out as she ran across the ground.

He smiled on sighting his prey. This was finally over. He ran the last few feet of the branch he was on before he jumped and boosted his flight with his fire bending. She never even managed to react in time until he had landed right on top of her. And then as he reached down at her, the body beneath him disappeared.

Looking around himself as he stood up, he realised that he’d somehow managed to het himself totally and completely lost chasing this damned thing down. “Fuck!” He screamed to the heavens. This time he did not even bother with resisting the urge or trying to find a more healthy outlet for his frustrations. “Fuck” He screamed again, realising how good it felt. To just let loose with no restraint and caution. He didn’t have men here that he needed to see him as anything more than a kid who’d gotten in over his head. He didn’t need to be anything for anyone for perhaps the first time in his life. “Fuck” He shouted, and this time, he could not help himself, he fell down on his arse and began to laugh at the ridiculousness of it all.

What did it say about him that he felt like he’d found himself the most while being lost from anything and everything that mattered.

“Surely your grandfather raised you with better language than that, Natsu my love” The voice cut through his laughter like a knife through butter, and he whirled around in shock to look at the person who’d addressed him.

“Mum?” He asked instinctively on seeing the face he’d only ever gotten to see in portraits at home. Portraits that he’d lost access to after he moved out.

A/N; Saw it coming