**********
"Yare yare! All we need is Gourry and the old gang's all here!" an oh-so-familiar voice said from behind them all.
"Xelloss, what a surprise," Lina said sarcastically. Zel fumed. Leri rubbed his eyes to stop crying, and Daril looked confused.
"Xelloss-san!" Val exclaimed. He winced as the exclamation aggravated his headache.
"You're actually happy to see him?" Zelgadis cocked an eyebrow (ridge, stone, whatever it is.)
"Now, now, Zelgadis." The priest waggled his finger. "Val-chan and I go way back! I visit him all the time."
Valteira nodded. "Although Mom throws pots at you whenever you show up. She really doesn't like you, Xelloss-san."
"Oh, she stopped throwing the merchandise years ago. Now she just hits me with that mace of hers." Xelloss smiled- not hard, seeing as he always smiles.
Lina looked at Zel. He shrugged. Those two would never change…
"Your mother says hello," Xelloss told Val. "And hopes you're eating enough. And washing your clothes regularly. And-"
"I get the point!" Val interrupted. "Sometimes I think you ENJOY embarrassing me."
"Oh, I live for it!"
"What do you want, Xelloss?" Lina cut them off.
"Just visiting. Do I have to have an ulterior motive?" He continued before anyone could answer. "Anyways, when I read Amelia's letter, I figured you'd end up here eventually."
"But I didn't send you a letter," Amelia blurted out. She covered her mouth with her hands as if to keep anything else from slipping out when she realized that she may have insulted the Mazoku.
"I read Filia's," Xelloss smiled. "She kept elbowing me, though."
"You know she hates it when you read over her shoulder!" Val sighed.
"Well," Amelia started, "since we're all here and probably won't be going to sleep anytime soon anyways with all the catching up we have to do… Let's have a party!"
"Great!" Lina exclaimed, stabbing at the sky (ceiling, rather) with one finger. "We can raid the Royal Pantry for snacks!"
Amelia's face fell. "Of… course… Raid the pantry… He he. Ugh."
*****
Later, as they sat around in Val's room, Lina regaled them with the story of how she, Gourry, and Zelgadis (but mostly her) had defeated a piece of Ruby-Eye Shaburanigdo. Zel interrupted a couple of times to correct her more flagrant embellishments, but once she got going, Lina proved to be an adept storyteller. This surprised Zel and Amelia- they'd only seen her lecturing Gourry, who never understood anyway. Now that she had an audience with enough mental capacity to comprehend her, Lina was really shining.
Daril sat next to Amelia on the couch. With Lina and Zel in the chairs, that left everyone else camped out on the floor. Xel sat between Val and Leri, being strangely quiet. Zel kept an eye on him. Quiet Xelloss normally meant something bad was going to happen soon. But it could have been the story. Shabranigdo was his boss's boss, after all.
Xelloss wasn't that particular about his reasons. He was quiet because Lina would boot him from the balcony if he interrupted. Zel was lucky she hadn't rounded on him yet. So he just listened, and occassionally poked Valteira, who kept drifting off to sleep. It was past his normal bedtime.
Leri listened in complete awe, even forgetting to glare at his brother. As a mage, he was enraptured with Lina and her story, although as besotted as he was, Leri would never beat his brother in trance-like admiring. Daril was too busy admiring his fiancee to pay attention to the lady-mage. His face was completely blank, his whole heart and soul being poured into his admiration of Amelia's perfection. Zelgadis had to look away immediately every time he glanced in that direction. The raw emotion was embarrassing to behold, the way his face became devoid of thought was just plain stupid. Valteira had dismissed Daril as a moron long before. Zel was about to agree.
Lina finished her story, absently fingering a lock of flame-colored hair as she remembered how white it'd been. Exhaustion was NOT fun. Although victory was normally very nice.
"I've told my story," she said. "Now it's someone else's turn!" She chewed on her lip as she tried to pick someone. "Daril!" she cried, startling him out of his smitten reverie. "Tell us how you and Amelia met!"
Daril blushed and muttered something.
"Lina!" Amelia snapped. "You're embarrassing him!" She patted his hand, which he clasped gratefully. She spared a glance at Zel, who blushed himself and quickly suppressed it. He had nothing to blush about, he told himself.
"No no," Daril insisted, confidence returning. "It's all right, if YOU don't mind, Amelia." She nodded, her face reddening. His grinned and squeezed her hand.
"It began when I was out riding...."
