"Levy! He's gone again!"

Levy heard the voice call from another part of the house. She rolled in her bed at shook her husband, Gajeel, by the shoulders, "Gale went out again." The circles under her eyes were noticeable. Since her son has been going out and doing questionable things, she's had no sleep worrying about him.

Gajeel mumbled softly, "He'll come back in a couple days or so." His tone was as if he didn't give a care in the world.

Levy rolled her eyes and sighed, "what if he doesn't?"

The careless father faced his wife in bed with as just a careless tone, "what are you talking about? He knows how to take care of himself."

"I know that. But he's been getting in a lot more trouble recently. Remember last year when he was gone for a whole month? And when he did come back he looked as if he was beaten to death," Levy informed with a soft voice.

Gajeel chuckled a bit, "knowing that kid, he probably deserved it." Levy punched him lightly on the shoulder.

"Aren't you worried about him at all?" She asked.

He was hesitant at first, "... Yeah. But it's -"

"Don't you dare say it's just a phase." Levy warned with a harder tone. She's read about teenage hormones, and this was not that.

"Okay fine," he admitted, "but it's Gale for Mavis sakes. The kid has seen some things, give him some credit."

"He's seen things because he does what he does. Do you even know how many wanted posters have his face plastered on it? It's not okay Gajeel." At the moment, she was extremely disappointed in her husband, much less her son.

Gajeel stayed silent. He knew she was right, and he knew Gale was much more rebellious than a regular 16 year old. People have said Nashi was a handful, but they haven't even gotten a taste of troublesome when it comes to Gale. Whoever met him supposed he was obedient, judging by his demeanor. But when he's not formally meeting people, its another story.

"Levy! Gajeel! I'm going to the library right now, I'll be back!" That was one thing Gajeel never got about the three of his family members. They all like to read.

"Okay Nashi," Levy replied as the front door shut. After she had left, Levy got up and started getting dressed in her commoner's clothes.

Gajeel took a deep breath before saying, "So you feel the need to spy on Nashi 24/7 but can't keep your own son in check. Interesting."

"Shut up. It's not like you do anything for the kids." Levy retorted.

•••

Nashi Redfox, adopted daughter of Levy and Gajeel Redfox, as well as older sister to Gale Redfox. She can be quite wild when she wants to. She really has no problem with ticking people off, but her brother is a whole other story.

With Gale, he can never get mad. At least, not around his family. Nashi has never seen it or heard it.

Nashi originally has pink hair, which she doesn't know what or how it happened. But Levy told her as she was growing up that her hair was 'weird' and 'irregular', so, feeling like an outcast, she felt the need to dye it. Dye is hard to come by nowadays, so she started her own flower bed in the back of her house to grow flowers. By that, she can make her own dye. She's had many different hair colors over the years, blonde, brown, blue, white, and even green. Today though, she just had the simple black. And it would probably stay like that for the next week or so.

As she reached the library, one of the two librarians greeted her. "Black hair today huh?" He said.

She smiled and chirped happily, "yup!" Then immediately asked after, "Do you guys have any new shipments?"

The librarian scratched his brown hair in embarrassment, "I'm afraid not, with the war going on it's almost impossible to get new books. Especially when we can't even keep the ones we have."

Nashi became at full attention, "What do you mean by that?"

He sighed deeply, "Zeref's men has been coming in and destroying everything. Says it's the order of the king or whatever." He saw Nashi's face, slowly beginning to fuel with anger, before he said, "Nashi, don't you dare think about it."

"It's not right." She stated, her face was turning red, "He thinks that just because he has power he can hurt us. Because we can't do anything to go against him. It's not right." She repeated.

The boy shook his head, "Listen. I know it's not, but you shouldn't risk your life to-"

"How are you so calm about this? He killed your mother Caleb!" Her voice broke, "Right in front of you."

It didn't matter what she said, he was still calm. It made her think about Gale. The boy who never got angry, no matter what she did to him.

"Gale already gets in trouble for going against the King, your parents can't afford to lose their other child. I know how badly you want to, but I'm telling you it'll be in vain," Caleb explained.

Nashi scoffed, "Gale seems to be doing just fine if you ask me."

"But he's not," he said simply.

Nashi glared at Caleb, "hmm." She folded her arms and rose an eyebrow.

Caleb pursed his lips and began to explain, "He leaves from days to weeks at a time. If he was heartless enough, he probably would've left for good a long time ago. He goes against the rules because he feels like it's right, but that doesn't mean that it doesn't hurt him to leave his family."

The raven haired girl plopped down on a chair next to her, she rested her head on her knuckle. "It doesn't seem like he cares for us at all. He doesn't say goodbye, not even a note. He just leaves."

Caleb rubbed his forehead, "You just need to understand more of why he steals and fights..."

"Do you even know?" She asked.

"No," he answered simply. Then changed the subject, "Are you here for a book then?"

Nashi just went with it. She trusted him enough that she thought he really didn't know, "Yeah, do you have any books about someone who fights against the law?"

Caleb was hesitant but ended up giving her a couple of names for books and authors that she probably hasn't read yet. And haven't been destroyed or stolen.

•••

Walk normally, hum like a passerbyer. You've done this a million times already, you can do it once more. This teenage boy thought as he walked through his home village. He thought it every single time he knew that he'd get in trouble for doing something. Especially when doing something just to tick off the king. He hummed a sweet song, a lullaby his mother sang to his sister and him as children. He had to be careful though, because that song was banned in the country of Fiore.

As he was humming, he came across a cream colored paper with a sketch of a face on it. He took a look at it.

WANTED:
INITIALS. G. R. (NAME UNKNOWN)
AGE. 14-17 (UNKNOWN)
MURDER, THEFT, FRAUD, TREASON
10,000 J REWARD
DEAD OR ALIVE

He smiled to himself when he saw his face on there. Along with the fact that he was wanted for murder, which isn't true. It just proves the fact that the king is stubborn and selfish.

Gale was among the list of most wanted members of the resistance in the country of Fiore. But, he wasn't at the top. There's 80 people on that list and he is near the bottom of it. He also isn't even close to being the most wanted in the continent of Ishgar. Pirates usually took that area.

He crumbled up the paper and carelessly stuffed it in the bag he was carrying around. He then stuffed his rough hands in his pants pockets.

He knew that he would get in trouble and yelled at when he got back home. However that didn't mean he cared about it. He also knew that Nashi would come running up to him and asking what he did this time, stealing or took out a guard or two. It's funny, he's actually just a couple months younger than her, but somehow he acts and seems like a bigger brother to her. 

The castle was far, but not that far from where they lived. You could see where it stood, on top of the dead hills. His parents used to tell him of how they were as green as you could imagine. The trees had leaves and weren't so barren as they are now. That all was before the war, before everything went to complete chaos. The threat of war had always been there, but no one actually thought it would actually happen. No one thought that the King's brother would go against him. No one thought that he was actually that insane. No one thought anything, no one thought a place where the flowers grew and where waters run that something like this could happen. 

They say that King Natsu still lives, but of course, they'd say that after anything. He could be hung before everyone's eyes and they'd still believe it. That's what Gale thought. And he was very much right.

Hope is useless, having faith in something isn't going to make that thing become true.

Gale opened the thick wooden door to inside his home, just to reveal his angry father. Gale sighed and attempted to walk past him, just to get to his and Nashi's room. But Gajeel stepped in front of him before he could do anything, "Where are you going?" 

Gale rolled his eyes, "to my room. There's like two rooms in the whole house dad."

"What did you do this time?" he asked, then added, "this is the shortest trip you've taken so far this month."

"Well I could leave again right now and not return until next week if you want," Gale retorted to his father. 

Gajeel sighed, "Where did we go wrong with you?" 

He shrugged, "Having me in the first place."

"This isn't funny anymore, how many times have you nearly been arrested or killed?" Gajeel asked with complete seriousness. Usually he'd let Gale do whatever he wants, but after what Levy said that morning, he realized the full extent of what Gale was getting into. 

However, his son wasn't as serious. He started counting his fingers as if remembering how many times it had happened, "Uh, more than 30 for sure." 

"Gale!" Gajeel yelled, "you are getting in trouble with the King for Mavis sakes! Do you realize what that could do to you?" Gale didn't answer, he just scoffed. "You could be hung for the King's pleasure. Right in front of us."

"You act as if I don't know that," Gale said, "I knew the risks the first time I went out. What do you want me to do? Stand on the sidelines? Fiore is already up in flames. We don't need it to fall to ashes." He then coolly went off to his bedroom as if nothing happened. His father stood there, dumbfounded. 

The front door opened again, it was Nashi coming back from the library. She was holding a book in her right arm, close to her chest. She saw Gajeel in distraught, then asked, "is something wrong?"

He just replied with, "Gale's in your room if you want to talk with him." then left to his own room. 

Nashi was suddenly full of understanding. 

She quickly went over to her bedroom. It had no door, there was just two creaky beds on each side of the small space and a little bookshelf in the middle. It was only half way with books however, like Caleb said earlier, they're hard to come by nowadays. 

Gale was sprawled across his bed, his eyes closed. Nashi wondered if he already had fallen asleep. But didn't really care because she had gone up to him anyway. 

"Can I just rest for a moment? I've been up for 14 hours already." he said, still with his eyes closed. She sat down on her own bed and set her book on her lap.

Nashi rose her eyebrow, "that's not really my problem is it? I'm not the one telling you to get your butt up and to go commit some crimes." 

"Maybe not, but you do snore." Gale said calmly.

"I do not! Don't lie," she said.

"Do too."

"Do not!"

"Do too."

"I don't!" 

Gale wasn't going to get angry any time soon, "you can deny it all you want Nashi, doesn't change the fact that you still snore."

"ugh, fine." she let her head hang, she gave in. 

His eyes went down to the book she was holding, "what book is that?" 

She took a look at it, "just a book about a boy and a princess. Heard it was pretty good."

He scoffed, "a boy and a princess? That sounds so original."

"It's not just a boy and a princess, Gale. I've already read half of it, the boy is a thief and even has his own street gang. And the princess isn't just any princess, she's also a warrior, she knows how to shoot a bow and some sword fighting. The boy's mother and sister dies in a fire, and most of his gang is killed. Later on, the boy finds out that he's actually the descendant of an extremely powerful wizard. Who was evil, I guess. The princess is also the descendant of his lover, however they had no children together. The wizard went on to have children with someone else, and so did she. The boy then joins the council of the realm, and that's how far I've gotten."

"Well that sounds familiar," he whispered to himself, "What are the two character's names?" 

"Han and Raisa," she answered. Then added, "there's a lot more in between, but that's about the jist of it I guess."

"Can I see the book?" Nashi hands it to him, then he looks through it, "I've read this one. Caused a lot of debate when it came out."

She tilt her head, "what kind of debate?"

"Heard that it related too much about King Natsu and Queen Lucy, people didn't like the fact that a royal married a commoner. When the book came out, it added a couple things but it almost completely depicted their story. The gender roles were switched, and no magic was involved but it did a pretty dang good job of getting every detail right," Gale explained.

He handed the book back and she stared at it for a good two seconds before saying something back to Gale, "take me with you." 

He just looked at her with a confused expression on his face. 

"Take me to do whatever you do for all those days, I want to know how to help."

Gale let out a breath, "Nashi, it's not as easy as just... well taking you. You have to know the risks and what to do and how to do it."

"What, so you had someone train you?" she asked with attitude.

"No," he said with no trace of him being angry in his tone, "that's why I'm saying that. When I left for the first time I knew I would probably be killed and that was about it. I didn't know what I was doing or where I was going or anything."

"I don't care! I'm tired of being here, reading like nothing is happening. It's the people against the King and frankly, we're losing," she said, "I want to leave here and go to the castle, I want to kill the king."

He chuckled, "you think we don't? Nashi listen, killing the king isn't as easy as you make it sound to be. For one, he's in a castle and doesn't go anywhere farther than 5 meters away from it. Secondly, you've seen the soldiers that come down here, could you imagine how many are up there? Third, we found out that he has at least 9 trained bodyguards, or assassins if you will, just protecting his ass. It's impossible to kill him."

"You say it as if he's not even human, if he has a heart-" she shook her head, "wait, no, that's impossible. If he has organs he can die. We just have to be smart."

Gale stared at his sister. Is she serious? He knew how naïve she could be, but she made it sound like murdering the king was no big deal. Like anyone and everyone could do it. As if no one has even tried.

Then he remembered something.

This is perfect.

"Actually..." Gale pondered for a second, then found a solution. "Fine," he said, "you win this one. But if you want to assassinate the heartless ba-" 

Nashi gave him a look saying, 'don't you dare.' He knows that she hates swearing.

"...king then we need help. Luckily I know a couple people I've met on my travels who can definitely help us. We can leave in the morning." 

"Great!" Nashi exclaimed, "so who are we after first?"

"The closest person to us, who happens to be someone I don't along with very well..." his eye twitched just thinking about the person, "a pirate."

"A pirate?!" she yelled in excitement, then quieted her voice, "who is he?"

"It's not just any pirate, and it's not a he," Gale explained, "it's Nova Dreyar, captain of the ship called Fairy Tail."

•••
A/N: The book mentioned is an actual published book called, The Demon King. I highly recommend you check it out (if you read young adult fantasy), it's quite underrated and it shouldn't be. That book actually inspired me to write this in the first place.

In other words, how are you enjoying this book so far? I'd really like your input!