I didn’t ask to be the Demon Queen

She looked like she was saying something, but then she simply went, well, up. And then the ground did too and I realized I was keeling over and barely managed to brace myself with my uninjured arm before blacking out on what remained of the cold marble floor. The last thing I heard was Kazumi calling out my name. I wanted to reassure her that I was fine, but I was already facedown on the floor and words wouldn’t come. Sleep, or the next best thing, finally came over me. 

 

When I woke up, it was in a small-ish room. It actually reminded me of a hotel I’d stayed in once. The most important feature of the place was the bed -- which, in the room’s defense, was a lot bigger than the average -- and the only other pieces of furniture were a large closet and a single, lonely chair. The doors to the balcony outside were closed but with the curtains drawn I could see the sun set over the ocean. That wasn’t right. I blinked and tried to sit up and realized that my everything hurt. Every inch of my body was stiff and sore and I quickly gave up, flopping back onto the pillow with a sigh. I groaned when I heard a soft ripping sound and realized I’d torn a hole through the pillow with one of my horns. 

 

I heard a soft snore next to me. At least from the neck up, I was able to move freely, and turned to the noise. Arms crossed and snoozing in a cocoon of her own tail, Kazumi was propped up in the corner of the room. She snored softly, hissing softly on the exhale. In that moment it was the cutest thing I'd ever seen. On the one hand, she looked too cozy to wake up. On the other, she looked so cozy I wanted some of that.

 

“Hey,” I tried, and found that my voice was more than a little hoarse. Apparently roaring was super stressful on a dragon’s throat. Who would’ve thunk it? Still, my little whisper was enough to have Kazumi lazily open her beautiful eyes, her slitted eyes narrowing as they took in the sunkissed room, her brain probably still booting up. She blinked a few times and then smiled at me in the most wonderful sleep-drunk way and slithered over to me. She sat on the edge of the giant bed and put a hand on my arm. 

 

“Hey, you,” she said softly. She looked like she hadn’t slept properly in a while. I tried to reach up to her with the wrong arm and it briefly felt like being stabbed all over again. If I hadn’t been so exhausted in general, I would’ve probably cried out. As it stood, all that came out was a pained squeak and tears came to my eyes. When I managed to blink the sparks out of my eyes, I saw her worried face and couldn’t help but smile. I didn’t know what to say, but I didn’t think I really had to. She took my hand, the one not at the end of a severely abused arm, and squeezed it softly. “Rest, love.”

I tried sitting up again, but my body politely yet firmly let me know that this wasn’t happening today, thank you very much. No point in asking for management, we’d be open for business when we were. “Wait,” I whispered. She leaned over and kissed me softly on the forehead and looked at me patiently. “I love you,” I said and gave her hand a soft squeeze back. She cried ever so softly and said it back. 

 

“Don’t worry,” she added. “I’m not going anywhere.”

 

I looked to the other side of the bed. “Plenty of room here for two, Kazumi. Just saying.”

 

“I don’t want to hurt you.”

 

“Please?”

 

She playfully rolled her eyes. “Fine. As if I could say no to you.”

 

“Liz no?” I raised my eyebrows.

 

“Liz yes,” she finally grinned. She took her shirt off -- I imagined she’d been staying in it while she stayed by my side, the big sap -- and crawled into bed with me. It was only mildly painful, and once she’d found her spot and did the little shuffle-and-wiggle she did before finding just the right spot, she relaxed with an arm around my neck and our foreheads pressed together. We whispered softly, the same things over and over again, said it for every time we might not have if we hadn’t made it through this. 

 

Sleep came again, heavy and dreamless. 

 

When I woke up, Kazumi sat upright in bed next to me, writing in a giant ledger on her lap. She was dressed in fresh clothes, so I assumed she’d washed at some point. I touched my neck and felt bandages wrap all over my upper body. There was also a lack of something important. I carefully felt around, trying not to panic, but desperation grew when I couldn’t find the necklace that held Sabine’s Sapphire. Fear bubbled up inside me as I considered the possibility that it had slipped off my neck during the fighting, that it had fallen all the way down into the Dergow, when I felt a soft hand on my shoulder. Kazumi closed her book with a smile and took the soul stone off from around her neck and handed it to me. I cried softly as I put her around my neck and ever so gently squeezed Kazumi’s hand. The feeling of relief and gratitude was instantaneous. She leaned over to kiss me. Whenever she did, whenever she ever had, she’d always taken my breath away with her gentleness and softness. 

 

“I’m the luckiest woman in the world,” I said gayly. 

 

“Yeah, you are,” I heard. Sally was sitting cross-legged in the chair on the other side of the room. She was reading an overly large book but seemed to be happy for the distraction. Or, the now-slightly-more-mature part of me said, she was glad I was alive. Oh, to consider the possibility that the people who’d followed me to what had almost been their death actually liked me. What a concept. Sally was covered from the neck down in bandages, and when she moved it was slowly and carefully. For what I assume was the comfort of the staff, she was wearing her magic stone. Having a Demon girl walk around the palace probably wouldn’t help dissuade anyone of the notion that Queen Anastasia had been corrupted. 

 

“How are you feeling?” Sally and I both asked at the same time. We weren’t done with the mimicry yet, as both of us laughed and then coughed at the exertion. 

 

“Dumbass,” she finally managed.

 

“Dork,” I retorted. After a long rest, it was clear my wit knew no bounds. She sat down at the foot of the bed and gently lowered herself to be lying on her back. I could faintly hear her strained breath. 

 

“I’m all right,” she said. “Mostly superficial wounds. But that damned sword of his did a number on me. And you, Liz,” Sally told the ceiling. She wasn’t wrong. I felt the exhaustion in every part of my being. Less each time I woke up, but I would’ve been able to walk if these had been regular wounds. I very carefully tensed up my arm and felt the stiff soreness in my shoulder. The wound on my chest, the cut Otto had made across it, was mostly uncomfortable. It didn’t hurt so much as it made my skin feel tight. But the wound in my shoulder had gone bone-deep. 

 

“How long have I been out?” I said softly, leaning my head carefully against Kazumi’s thigh so as not to stab her with my horns. She played with my hair and I would’ve purred if I could have. 

 

“A little over a week,” Kazumi said. “I was out of bed in half that so I think that means I get to be the queen now.” I heard her dumb grin all the way over and tried to nudge her with my foot. 

 

“I see you’re ready to fight again?” Erza said, leaning against the doorway with a smile. She was wearing her artificer’s clothes, the ones she’d worn what felt like a lifetime ago. 

 

“Don’t just stand there,” Sally said. “You’re not getting away with the aloof T-posing-in-the-doorway you types always do.”

 

“What?” Erza said, genuinely confused but amused. 

 

“Never mind,” Sally said with a chuckle, which she followed up with a groan.

 

Erza capitulated and came in, sitting down against the wall next to the bed. She was tall enough to be able to be eye to eye with me anyway. “How are you, Liz?” she asked. Her voice was soft and gentle and it was strange to hear this kind of concern coming from her. 

 

“I’m all right,” I said and it was true. It didn’t even hurt, so long as I didn’t move too much, laughed, or breathed. “I’m alive,” I wanted to say, in the self-deprecating way that came so easily, but that felt dishonest. “We made it,” I said eventually. 

 

She nodded. “You did.”

 

“Shut up,” I said, and her eyes widened at my unexpected outburst. “We did.”

 

“We did,” she echoed and closed her eyes. I could tell she was still busy relaxing. “You know,” she said, quietly, “I could never be queen.” I couldn’t help but raise my eyebrows at that. She’d always seemed more competent than me in pretty much, well, anything. It was hard to imagine she couldn’t do anything I could do but better. I let her statement hang in the air. I was sure there was more. She smiled. “Too stressful,” she said, and I laughed so hard I tore my sutures.

 

Two days passed. At the end of it, I was expecting Gandalf to show up and chuckle at me from the doorway. But eventually I could sit on the edge of the bed without my shoulder screaming at me to lie down. The others had attempted to do the whole “walking in one at a time to say hi” thing, but Kazumi had told them no. Well, specifically, she’d told them “Liz is okay,” and then she told me “They are okay,” and she wasn’t having any talkback. Possibly this was because she wanted to make sure I had the time to heal more. Alternatively, she just wanted to stay wrapped around me a bit longer. But eventually I had to get up, if not to walk around and stretch my legs, then at least to, y’know, bathe. 

 

The hot water was both the most heavenly thing I’d ever felt -- I couldn’t remember the last time I’d had a warm bath -- while simultaneously being pure pain. When it touched my scars, they burned for a moment, but not for long. And once I was sitting in the tub, I could give them a good look. They had been healing reasonably well, but slower than they should have. With how much they’d been hurting, I’d feared they’d be gnarly and blackened, and I was happy to find that this wasn’t the case. I must’ve been soaking in the bath for at least an hour. When I finally got out, the water was cold and almost brown. I felt clean for the first time in weeks, and finally being dressed in fresh clothing was wonderful. Considering I’d never seen these clothes and how well they fit, I had to wonder if these had been tailored to me while I’d been resting. My arm had to be put in a sling, however. Letting it hang free felt like my nerves were being put to the grindstone, but a mitella kept me from doing stupid things like gesturing. 

 

With Kazumi on my free arm, I finally walked out of the small part of the palace I’d been constrained to for the past two weeks, and all the way to the back, the part of the castle that had been constructed on top of the rock spire jutting out of the Dergow. It was a beautiful afternoon. People were enjoying the last vestiges of the autumn heat, and the sea breeze mixed with the smell of southern flowers. Tilly, Lillian, Sally and Mellie sat by a small garden table having tea and snacks. Erza was reading at a table nearby. I was surprised to see that Elena was sitting under a tree with a book, and a young man I didn’t recognize, his head on her lap, whose curly, red hair she was playing with. Morgana stood by the edge of the garden, hands behind her back, talking to Anastasia, which was unexpected.

 

They looked up as I walked into the garden. I smiled warmly. I looked around the place, and tried to look important, relaxed, even, like the victorious Dragon Queen I was supposed to be. After the events of the past few months, I was surprised to find how easy acting like it came to me. 

 

“Hiya!” I said cheerfully.