Episode 5

A Chimera’s Karma

It’s Hard Being a Rock

Zelgadis is Put to the Test!

Zelgadis swore. He had stood there in the hall of the Ancient Temple and seen this coming, yet he had done nothing to prevent the group from being split up. It annoyed him, his lack of ability to follow through on anything as of late. He was incredibly pre-occupied, and it grated on him that he was performing to a sub-standard level in the group. Not that Lina would say anything about it to him. She wouldn’t. She was too… nice.

That’s something else that bothered him. Lina. Why was he so worried about what she thought of him lately? He knew that she was to be with Gourry in the end; after all of it was said and done… so why in the name of all that was holy, was he thinking possessively about her? Hell if he was falling in love with her!

But that’s exactly what you are doing, isn’t it, Zelgadis? He asked himself. You’re falling in love with her because you see a side of her that no one else gets to. She treats you with respect, maybe teasing every once in a while… but you’re the one she comes to in a pinch. It’s depressing, really.

He stood up and looked around. Enough self-recrimination, time to discover where he was and what his test was to be.

Nothing too out of the ordinary here, average hotel room… so what was he doing in a hotel room? He walked over and tried the door. Odd. Didn’t the person staying in the hotel room lock the door against the outside, not the outside locked against the person inside? Never mind that… he cast a simple spell, but the magic fizzled as fast as he cast it.

Sighing, he reached into his belt for the kit that he had carried around for many years. It harked back to the days when he had nothing else to do but learn from Rezo, and contained the tools with which to do things the ‘hard’ way instead of with magic.

Unfolding the little kit, he selected a tool, then looked to the doorknob.

There were no little holes for him to use to unlock the door.

He cursed mildly, then put tools back into the kit, rolled it up and stuck it back into his belt. Someone wanted him in this room.

Scowling, Zelgadis sat on the edge of the bed, folding his arms and waiting. The bed wasn’t too terribly uncomfortable, and he was fairly tired…

Slowly his eyes slipped closed, and he slid over sideways into the bed and sleep.

When Zelgadis opened his eyes, he was in a totally different place, a sunlit and cheery room. Frowning, he sat up and looked around him in confusion. Where was he?

The door opened slowly, and Zelgadis almost closed his eyes so that he would look like he was still asleep. A woman came in, and he couldn’t quite make out her face as she stood at the door. She entered the room and walked over to the bed, sitting on it and reaching out a hand to touch his cheek lightly.

He held his breath, unable to move his eyes to see who she was without giving himself away as being awake. Who was she? What was she to him? What was he to her?

She sighed softly, resting her fingers on his cheek. “Oh, Zel… I wish you’d come back to me. I don’t know what happened that day… but I wish you’d wake up and talk to me.”

That did it. He had to see who it was. He opened his eyes and looked to her.

Lina.

“Lina?” He asked incredulously.

Her eyes widened, and she bent over to engulf him into her embrace. “Oh… Zel! I’ve been so worried! You’ve slept for a week!”

“Huh?” He said, muffled by her shoulder. “Lina? What are you doing?”

She sat up, looking at him. “What do you mean? You’ve been out cold for a week. What happened?”

“That’s what I want to know,” he said, sitting up. He wasn’t wearing his clothing… in fact; he wasn’t wearing anything save for a pair of shorts. Immediately embarrassed, he pulled the sheet up around him, to her obvious amusement.

“God, Zel! You don’t need to be embarrassed in front of me! I’m your wife, for crying out loud!” Lina said, reaching out to touch his cheek again.

He caught her hand, looking at the rings on her finger. “Married? You and I?” His eyes shifted to his own left hand, startling himself to see the matching ring on his own finger. Married…

“Yes… married.” Her voice changed, worry seeping into the edges. “Zel… what do you remember…?” Her hands shifted, turned so that she was holding his hand now.

He frowned, struggling to recall anything after the moment etched in his mind of standing in the Ancient Temple hall. “The last thing I remember is standing in the Ancient Temple of Kuroryu. Then I woke up here.”

Lina gasped, pulling her hand away and clapping it to her mouth. “You… you don’t remember anything after? Nothing?”

Zelgadis shook his head, keenly aware of the pain Lina was trying to shield from showing in her eyes. Now that he looked, tiny lines around Lina’s mouth and eyes gave away the clues that time he did not remember had passed.

She sighed, allowing him to pull back his hand, and looked away. “I wonder what happened to you back there?”

“What do you mean?” His voice was guarded.

“A week ago, someone said that they had come to settle an old score with you. You went to talk to them and disappeared for two days. When we found you, you were unconscious with no sign of injury. I even cast a healing spell and it didn’t wake you. And now you’re awake… but you don’t recall… Zel? What happened in the Temple?” She asked.

“Happened? I… I was standing there and suddenly everyone started to vanish. Things went dark… and I woke up in a small room. I think I fell asleep… a tingly sleep, like a sleep spell, and then I woke up here.” He answered, looking at his hands.

“You mean… this entire time… all this time… you’ve been under a spell…?” Lina’s voice was small, curiously strained.

“I…!” Zelgadis looked up to her, seeing the pain etched into the corner of her lips. “I’d like to think that wasn’t the case...”

She put her hands in her lap, the fingers of her right hand touching the slim band of gold around her left ring finger. Her wedding finger. “So would I, Zel. But now, we have to find out not only what happened last week… but what happened three years ago.”

“Three years!?” he spluttered.

She nodded. “We’ve only been married a year and a half of that… and there are no children… so you don’t have to worry about not remembering them…”

“Children.” He said. “How could we possibly have children…?” He looked at her. “I’d like to get dressed.”

“Oh! Um… I’ll… just be… out there…” She said, then stood and walked to the door, closing it quietly behind her.

Zelgadis moved off of the bed and walked over to the closet, peering at the clothing within. Yes, the style and colors were similar to his tastes. Pulling out a shirt and pair of pants, he reflected on how intrinsically wrong this felt. He shouldn’t be married to Lina. Gourry should. Not him.

He dressed quickly, adding socks, and then fumbled around the bottom of the closet for shoes. Once those were found, he tied them and stepped out of the room and into a hallway with pictures on the walls.

There was a wedding photo across from the doorway, and with a strange feeling in his stomach, he realized that Gourry was giving Lina away as the bride. To him, Zelgadis.

Another photo, Lina and himself standing by a tree, his arms wrapped around her waist. They looked so… happy.

So why didn’t he feel happy?

“That was on our honeymoon,” Lina’s voice came from behind him. He turned to see her quickly hide something from her eyes and force a smile. “Are you sure you should be up and dressed?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” He replied. I need to find out what happened. And quickly. This is tearing her apart. And truth to tell, it’s not that enjoyable for me either.

“Lina… I need to find out what happened. What happened in the Temple three years ago?”

Her mouth fell open, then she thought for a moment. “There was a test. We were each tested by ourselves, except Gourry, who had Xellos to help him. Afterwards, we took the princess home and went on our way.”

He looked at her, eyes hard. “We simply took her home? Why had we been tested? What was the point?”

She backed into the wall, bumping the frame of the wedding photo. “There didn’t seem to be any point, Zel… I think they were testing to make sure we were allowed to take the princess back.”

“Who were they?” He pressed.

“Um… I don’t know. They didn’t reveal themselves.” She answered.

“I don’t believe that. There was a female there. She stood in the room and told us about the test. Who was she?” He said, putting his hands on her shoulders.

Lina shook her head. “I… I didn’t see anyone. I heard a voice, but I didn’t see anyone.”

He let go, turning to look down the hall, then looking back to her. Something wasn’t right. The whole of it felt wrong and he was going to get to the bottom of it. Now that he was looking, she wasn’t wearing any of her talismans… in fact, she was wearing a fairly plain off-white dress, a single gold chain around her neck.

“Why… don’t I get you something to eat? You’re probably hungry…” Lina offered, slipping around him and down the hall into the living areas.

He followed, arms folded. “It doesn’t make sense, Lina. How did I act after the test was over? Did we talk about our tests?”

“I…” She leaned heavily against the door to the living room. “You seemed fine, Zel… you were grumpy that we had to be tested just to take the princess home… but we never talked about the tests. Amelia had nightmares for a few weeks afterwards, and she decided to go home to Sailune to rest and recover. After we took her back, I decided that we all ought to take a break and go on vacation.”

“Go on,” Zelgadis said, listening. None of that sounded like anything normal. Amelia never got nightmares to his knowledge, and Lina hardly ever wanted to take a break from blasting bandits for treasure. It went completely against her nature.

“Well… Gourry decided to stay in Sailune and teach swordsmanship, and you went off in search for a cure.” She said, finally moving into the living room.

He followed, looking around at the house and slightly boggling at how… domestic it was. There were books and photos everywhere… and not a sign of Lina’s magical talismans or abilities. “And what did you do?”

“I went home. My sister was there and we spent some time becoming sisters again. She said she was sorry that she beat me up all the time, but that I had to learn to defend myself because she wasn’t going to be around a lot.” She pointed to a small photo on the coffee table. “See? That’s us there.”

Zelgadis looked at the photo and felt something cold settle in his stomach. No, this was seriously wrong. Lina was terrified of even a letter from her sister. There was no way that she’d be happily in a photo with her. But there it was, undeniably. They had their arms across each other’s shoulders, and they were laughing. Their smiles were the same.

He kept his voice carefully neutral. “I thought that you were afraid of her.”

“Well… I was… but things are better now. She’s not half as mean as I remember. She told me that she was proud of me.” Lina said, picking up the photo and looking at it.

Zelgadis shook his head. “This isn’t right, Lina. When Filia came to us with that letter from Luna, you buried yourself in the desert. Any mention of her name and you were terrified that it could bring her to us.”

Lina laughed a little. “It’s not like that anymore. She’s kinda cool.” She touched her sister’s face in the photo lightly.

Zelgadis dropped his arms. That was the last straw. “No, Lina. This is not right. Something is very wrong here and I don’t like it.”

She set the photo down and turned to look at him. “What do you mean, Zelgadis? The only thing wrong is that you don’t remember anything.”

He shook his head. He had to say this kindly, had to make it easy. It wasn’t easy, though. It was perhaps the hardest thing to do. This was his dream that he wouldn’t even allow himself to dream. To be with Lina, in love and married and happy. It would be so easy for him to give into it, to dismiss that tingly thought that this was wrong. To completely… that was it. It suddenly made sense to him, all of it. This was his test. This was the test that the denizens of the Ancient Temple had put him to, and he hadn’t seen it, so was very close to failing. What was truth and what was fiction?

This whole life with Lina was fiction. Just as the fiction was that the black dragons were hoarding power. The Golden Dragons hadn’t seen through the fiction woven by their own minds. But he, Zelgadis, did.

He reached up, cupping her face in his hands. “No, Lina. I know what happened now.” Even in this test, this false reality, he could not bear to hurt her. A sleep spell wove around her by simple act of his will. “You need some rest yourself, you’ve been taking such good care of me.”

Her eyes started to close, and she nodded absently, sitting on the sofa slowly. Her magic didn’t so much as twitch to defend herself.

He helped her onto the sofa, turning her so that she was lying down when the sleep spell took full effect, then pressed his lips to her forehead, speaking quietly. “You belong to Gourry, Lina. No matter how hard I would wish otherwise, the two of you are destined for each other. And while I love you dearly, this life is not for me. I’ll always be there if you need me… that I swear.”

He stood, emotions warring within him, and walked to the door. “Goodbye, Lina.”

Opening the door, he stepped out into the brilliance that swallowed him, knowing that he had passed his test.