Chapter 5: A New Sibling and a New Guild Member
The Fairy Tail guildhall, in the deep quiet of late night, looked like the peaceful aftermath of a battle that had meant every single word of itself.
Bodies were distributed across the floorboards with the artless generosity of people who had simply stopped moving wherever they happened to be when the evening finally caught up with them. Glass bottles stood—or lay—in companionable proximity to their owners. Someone had somehow managed to fall asleep sitting completely upright against a heavy support pillar with their arms firmly crossed over their chest, a feat that was either deeply impressive or scientifically concerning depending on how you looked at it. The wedding decorations still hung from the rafters and windowsills, slightly askew now, while pale flower petals lay scattered across the flagstones like the physical residue of pure joy.
Teilanne stood in the doorway between the main hall and the back corridor, looking out over the chaotic scene, and let out a quiet laugh.
It was the kind of laugh you save for when something is genuinely heartwarming and you happen to be the only one awake to appreciate it, allowing yourself the private, unreserved version. She looked at the sleeping faces of the people who had spent an entire day ensuring her marriage was celebrated properly, and felt the warm, settled weight of the word family in a way that felt more complete than ever before.
Gildarts materialized beside her in the doorway, surveyed the exact same scene, and let out a soft sound of resigned affection that she had catalogued over twelve years as his standard response to Fairy Tail being entirely itself.
"We should probably make sure none of them choke on anything," she murmured.
"Way ahead of you," he replied gently.
They moved quietly through the dim hall together—Gildarts carrying a stack of blankets retrieved from a back storage room, distributing them with the careful efficiency of a man who had spent decades navigating spaces full of people he preferred not to wake; Teilanne quietly setting aside precarious bottles with the practical instincts of a mother who had raised three children and knew a potential hazard when she saw one.
Near the side tables, the three Saiyan children were still wide awake, which surprised exactly no one who knew them. Saiyans slept when they chose to and not a second before, and none of them had decided it was time yet. Kizuna sat at a wooden table, elbows propped on the surface, apparently lost in thought. Uruk leaned against the window frame, watching the quiet night outside. Sala stood nearby, her furry tail wrapped loosely around her wrist, looking over the sleeping guild members with an expression of fond bemusement.
Across the room, Gildarts caught Teilanne's eye.
She met his gaze instantly.
The look that passed between them was one of those silent, effortless communications that build between two people after years of paying close attention to one another—full sentences compressed into a fraction of a second. His look asked: Is it time? Hers replied: Yes. Go bring him out.
"Why don't you go fetch Cumber?" Gildarts said softly, his voice barely carrying over the ambient snoring. "I imagine he's been about as patient as a seven-year-old can reasonably be expected to manage."
"Longer, probably," Teilanne agreed softly. She leaned in—a small, unceremonious gesture of intimacy from two people who were still, in some quiet corner of themselves, slightly astonished to have found each other—and pressed a swift kiss to the line of his jaw before turning toward the stairs.
Behind her, she heard Sala make a tiny, delighted squeak.
Teilanne deliberately chose not to acknowledge it. She knew if she turned around, she would smile, and if she smiled, she would completely ruin the graceful, composed exit she was going for.
Gildarts watched his wife disappear up the wooden staircase, standing in the warm ruins of the celebration with a tender expression he knew was entirely terrible for his reputation as the realm's fiercest mage—not that he particularly cared.
He shook his head once, clearing his throat with the decisive air of a man reestablishing his priorities, and turned around to find three pairs of dark eyes staring directly at him with varying degrees of amusement.
"Not a single word," Gildarts warned, pointing a finger at them.
"I wasn't going to say anything," Kizuna replied smoothly, using the exact tone of someone who was absolutely going to say something and was merely biding his time.
Gildarts gave him a look, then gestured toward the side entrance, indicating that the three of them should follow him. They fell into step without a moment's hesitation—a simple, quiet readiness that continued to mean the world to him. No negotiation, no fuss. Just trust.
They followed him out into the cool night air.
Behind them, peeking out from the frame of a high window, four people who had been very carefully pretending to be asleep shifted position.
Natsu, Gray, Erza, and Mirajane had all, at various points during the evening, independently decided to keep tabs on Gildarts and the kids at a discreet distance. Each would have offered a different reason for sneaking out, but it ultimately came down to the exact same truth: something important was happening, and Fairy Tail wizards simply didn't let major moments occur without being there to see them through.
They followed at a distance they considered stealthy, though "stealthy" by Fairy Tail standards was a fairly generous term.
The night air was cool, and the cobblestone streets of Magnolia were quiet in the particular way a town goes quiet after a grand celebration—not empty or hollow, but filled with the cozy, satisfied stillness of a place resting after a long day of joy.
Kizuna walked beside Gildarts without questioning their destination. The knowing look his mother had passed him back at the guildhall was explanation enough that whatever was coming required arrival, not interrogation. Uruk walked on Gildarts' opposite side with his customary stoic calm. Sala trailed slightly behind them, her tail swishing at a slow, thoughtful pace, her dark eyes darting between Gildarts and the direction of their home.
Of the three children, Sala possessed the instincts most finely tuned to the emotional temperature of a room. She had felt all evening that the wedding, as wonderful as it was, had been building toward a second act—something the adults had been carefully carrying for much longer than a single day could account for.
She kept quiet. She simply walked, observed, and waited.
The Clive residence glowed with warm light from the living room windows.
Gildarts opened the front door and stepped aside to let the three kids through first—an unusual gesture, as he wasn't typically the type to fuss over door etiquette. Kizuna noted the gesture with the portion of his mind he permanently reserved for cataloguing subtle deviations from the norm.
They filed into the main room.
Teilanne was sitting on the sofa, her face wearing a expression of gentle, careful composure. And nestled against her side, fast asleep with the total surrender of a small child who knew he was completely safe, was a tiny boy.
Unmistakable, vibrant red hair—the exact shade of his father's, like a living signature.
And a furry brown tail, curled loosely over the edge of the cushion.
All three siblings stopped dead in their tracks.
Sala's hands flew to her mouth, stifling a sharp gasp.
The sound of the door latch clicked, and the little boy stirred. Children who spend their lives staying out of sight naturally develop light sleeping habits, and he came awake with the instantaneous, full-body alertness unique to Saiyan physiology. His eyes snapped open, his body in motion before his mind even processed his surroundings. He scrambled upright, caught sight of the three unfamiliar figures standing in the doorway, and vanished behind his mother's legs with the practiced speed of a seasoned shadow.
Teilanne placed a gentle hand on the back of his head. "It's alright, Cumber," she said softly. "That's your father coming in behind them. And those three..." She looked up at her older children, taking in their reactions—ranging from Sala's teary-eyed delight to Kizuna's intense, focused stillness and Uruk's carefully neutral face doing tremendous internal heavy lifting—"...are your big brothers and your big sister."
A heavy silence filled the room.
Then, a single dark eye peeked out from behind Teilanne's skirt.
"Siblings?" a small, muffled voice asked.
"Yes," Teilanne murmured, gently smoothing his messy red locks. "Your big brothers and your big sister. I know you've been waiting a very long time to meet them."
A nervous squirm ran through the boy's small frame—the pure, unfiltered body language of a seven-year-old realizing the sheer scale of the moment. He had only ever known two people his entire life. Two people was simple and safe. Three brand-new people all at once—two of them significantly bigger than him and one currently making a squeaking sound that sounded suspiciously like holding back tears—was a lot to take in.
Sala was still holding both hands tightly over her mouth, her eyes brimming with bright, glossy tears, her tail fanning through the air so fast it was practically a blur.
"Oh," she squeaked softly, overwhelmed by the sheer, undeniable sweetness of the sight. "Oh, he's so cute..."
Teilanne smiled warmly. "I'm glad you think so, Sala. Because this is your younger brother."
The three older children processed the sentence in their own distinct ways.
Uruk froze like a statue.
Kizuna blinked once. "Younger?"
Sala lowered her hands slowly. "Brother?"
And then, all three reached the exact same logical conclusion simultaneously.
"EHHHHHHHH?!?!?!"
Cumber flinched hard, retreating another inch behind his mother's dress. Sudden high volume had apparently not been part of his briefing.
"Shh!" Teilanne hissed at all three of them, deploying the sharp, universal authority of a mother who knew half the guild was asleep just down the street.
"But—!" Sala stared, her mouth agape. "You mean... you two were already... before...?"
Teilanne's face instantly shifted into the specific, deeply flushed expression of a mother forced to explain something she had dreaded addressing for seven long years.
"It is... somewhat mortifying to explain," Teilanne admitted, gathering her composure with visible effort. "Yes, Sala. I was already expecting Cumber long before your father and I were married. Before we had even... properly... It was the result of a significant, mutual lapse in good judgment very early on."
The color in her cheeks was brilliant and deep.
Gildarts, standing by the doorway, wisely decided not to let his wife shoulder the embarrassment alone. "I think the lack of good judgment was pretty evenly distributed," he offered with dry self-deprecation. "I take full responsibility for my half of that accounting."
Sala's face flushed a shade of red that nearly matched her pink guild mark. Her mind was attempting to run calculations it clearly wasn't equipped for. "Oh," she stammered, covering her warm cheeks. "Oh my."
"So," Kizuna said, his tone carrying the clinical precision of a scholar verifying a hypothesis, "you two did... and Cumber is the..."
"Yes," Teilanne cut in firmly, shutting down the line of inquiry with both hands.
"I see," Uruk added, his tone entirely flat, choosing to be mercifully concise.
A thick, multi-layered silence settled over the room—a mix of parental embarrassment, Sala's emotional sensory overload, and the stoic internal recalibration that Kizuna and Uruk relied on whenever confronted with wild information.
Then, the quiet was broken by a small, shuffling sound. Cumber, who had been pressed tight against his mother's leg through the whole exchange, had apparently decided the giant strangers across the room were, on balance, harmless.
He peeked out completely.
First one small step forward. Then another. His furry tail uncurled from its anxious coil, swishing with hesitant curiosity.
He looked up at Sala.
Sala looked down at him.
Dropping down from her full twelve-year-old height, Sala sank to her knees right on the floorboards, opening her arms wide with the boundless, unconditional warmth that defined her very soul.
Cumber didn't hesitate. He ran.
He collided with her like a little red-haired cannonball, throwing his arms tightly around her neck. Sala caught him with a sound that was half-laugh, half-sob, wrapping her arms around his small back and holding on for dear life. Her tail swept around him protectively, coiling around his waist just as securely as her arms.
Kizuna crossed the room in three long strides, sinking down to wrap his arms around both of them from above. Uruk joined a second later from the other side, pulling them all close. For a long, quiet moment, the four of them were a tangled knot of brown tails, dark hair, red spikes, and the profound warmth of siblings who had finally found each other.
Gildarts looked over at Teilanne.
Teilanne looked back at Gildarts.
Neither said a word. There was nothing left to say that the scene on the floor wasn't already expressing infinitely better.
Eventually, Sala pulled back slightly, Cumber still clinging to her front like a koala, and held him at arm's length to conduct her very first big-sister assessment.
"Cumber," she said gently.
"Yeah?" he squeaked.
"How old are you?"
He considered the question with profound gravity. "Seven," he answered proudly.
The number hung in the air.
Sala turned to look at Kizuna. Kizuna looked at Uruk. Uruk looked up at the ceiling. All three of them ran the timeline through their heads at the exact same time.
"Seven years," Sala said slowly, her eyes widening. "He's been right here for seven whole years?"
"Right under our noses," Kizuna confirmed, his tone balancing mild accusation with quiet amusement.
"Seven," Uruk repeated, placing heavy emphasis on the digit like a accountant reviewing an improbable tally.
"Mom," Sala asked, turning back toward the couch, "does anyone else know about him?"
"Master Makarov," Teilanne replied softly. "And Porlyusica. Absolutely no one else."
A brief collective pause followed as the three kids envisioned the sheer, apocalyptic level of chaos that would have erupted if the guild had caught wind of this at any point over the past seven years.
"Good," Kizuna declared with practical authority. "Let's keep it that way until we figure out the smartest way to introduce him."
Outside the window of the Clive residence, ducked beneath the shadow of the garden wall, four senior Fairy Tail mages were having a remarkably quiet, intensely mortified reaction to the revelation they had just overheard.
Natsu, to his credit, was visibly straining to grasp the full math of the situation and was sitting at perhaps sixty percent comprehension.
Gray, Erza, and Mirajane, on the other hand, were at a full one hundred percent—and the bright crimson flooding their complexions reflected that fact in exquisite detail.
Under the circumstances, their flaming cheeks were entirely justified.
They beat a swift retreat into the Magnolia night with the coordinated urgency of people who had just stumbled onto a secret they were firmly resolved to pretend they had never heard—at least until an opportunistically hilarious moment presented itself. They scattered back toward the guildhall with a stealth and quiet almost unheard of for a group that normally moved with the subtlety of a avalanche.
Morning arrived with the unique, crisp brightness that follows major life milestones—a clear day that seemed fully aware something momentous had been settled the night before.
The Clive family gathered around the breakfast table together, the comfortable chaos of a household adapting to its newest addition filling the room. Cumber had bounced out of bed in that state of absolute, high-octane certainty exclusive to small children, immediately tracked down Sala, and attached himself to her left side like a burr, clearly intending to stay there indefinitely.
Sala appeared thoroughly delighted with the arrangement, feeding him bites of fruit with effortless big-sister pride.
Gildarts, whose muscle memory for raising tiny humans was being rapidly reactivated, navigated the kitchen with the slightly dazed competence of a man dusting off an old skill set. Before he could fumble, Kizuna materialized at his elbow, handing him a steaming mug of tea with an expression that plainly communicated: I've got this handled, just drink the tea.
Teilanne watched the warm bustle from her chair at the head of the table. For twelve long years, across galaxies and uncertainties, she had held a quiet vision of a moment like this in her heart. Looking at them all now, she knew with absolute certainty that the picture was finally complete.
Once breakfast was cleared and the plates were stacked, she looked across the table at Gildarts.
"Today?" she asked softly.
He met her gaze and gave her a firm, resolute nod. "Today."
Master Makarov summoned the guild to assembly with his customary brief, non-negotiable tone—the kind of summons where everyone understood that showing up was not a suggestion.
Despite the late hours of the previous night's festivities, practically the entire guild was present. Fairy Tail members possessed a legendary capacity for recovery. Even Laxus had shown up, occupying a quiet spot near the back wall with his arms crossed over his chest, projecting the air of a man who was there entirely by choice.
Once the room settled, Makarov gave a brief nod toward the family standing near the front, silently handing them the floor.
Teilanne stepped forward.
She looked out at the assembled faces—people she had lived alongside for twelve years, whose habits, quirks, and unique brands of chaos she had catalogued with the sharp observation of a warrior trained from birth to read a room. She looked at the friends who had filled her wedding with warmth just the day before.
Then she glanced down at Cumber, who was currently stationed behind Sala's leg, one eye peeking out, his brown tail coiled tightly with nervous energy.
"There is someone Gildarts and I would like to introduce to you," Teilanne said, her voice steady and clear. "We only ask that you try not to overwhelm him—he is still getting used to being around new people."
She reached down, extending her hand.
Sala placed a gentle, encouraging palm against Cumber's back—a light touch guiding him forward. "It's alright," she whispered in the soft, soothing voice she had developed over fourteen hours of sisterhood. "Go to Momma. It's okay."
The little boy looked up at her, saw her warm smile, and took a breath.
He stepped out into the open.
He crossed the floorboards with his head down and his tail still tightly coiled, coming to stand in front of his mother. Teilanne placed a hand on his left shoulder; Gildarts rested a large palm on his right. The boy looked up at the gathered crowd with intense concentration, conducting his own thorough assessment.
The guild stared back.
And then, in the way large groups of people suddenly process a shared realization, the pieces began falling into place across the room at record speed.
"Doesn't he look a bit like..."
"The hair is definitely..."
"Look at his eyes..."
"And he's got a tail like the others..."
Wakaba turned to Macao, his pipe hanging from his mouth. "Macao... does that boy look like a mini version of both of them to you?"
"He sure does," Macao confirmed, squinting.
"Which would mean—"
"Which means," Gildarts interrupted, stepping in with the straightforward efficiency of a man who preferred taking difficult conversations head-on, "that you guessed right. He's ours."
A collective pause hung over the hall.
Teilanne provided the formal explanation with measured grace: "This is our youngest son, Cumber. He is seven years old. He is the result of... a rather significant lapse in judgment between Gildarts and myself early on, long before we had come to understand that we wanted to be married." Her voice remained composed, though a deep blush gave her away. "We kept his existence quiet until after the wedding so we could introduce him properly. So, here he is. Properly."
Gildarts added casually, "And Sala here was actually the one who nudged us into finally sorting out the whole marriage side of things. So she gets some credit there."
"—EHHHHHHHH?!?!?!"
The collective shout hit a record volume even for Fairy Tail—a full-register reaction ranging from Elfman's booming shock to Lisanna's musical gasp. People gripped tables, someone sat down hard on a bench, and someone else stood up in pure disbelief.
Startled by the wall of noise, Cumber retreated straight back behind Sala's legs at near-light speed.
Sala, remembering the feeling all too well, laid a hand on his head without missing a beat. "It's okay," she said loudly enough to carry over the din. "They're just surprised. They aren't going to hurt you. Give them about thirty seconds, and they'll think you're wonderful."
Twenty-eight seconds later, the initial wave of shock broke into a warm tide of affection.
The women of the guild discovered Cumber.
For Cumber, this was an intense new experience. He was small, possessed a fluffy tail, had his father's features framed by his mother's eyes, and was—by every objective metric—exceedingly cute. The female membership of Fairy Tail converged on him with a collective cooing enthusiasm he had never encountered before and felt completely unequipped to handle.
He solved the problem by pressing himself firmly against Sala's knee, designating her as his primary defensive barrier.
Sala let out a soft chuckle. "Cumber?"
"There are a lot of them," he squeaked from behind her dress.
"There are quite a few, yes. But they're all sweet," she murmured, crouching down to his level. "I used to do the exact same thing—hide behind Kizuna and Uruk. Do you know how I got past it?"
Cumber shook his head.
"I just decided that the people out there were probably more interesting than staying behind someone's knee. And I was right." She held out her hand. "Come on."
Cumber weighed the offer with intense seven-year-old seriousness, then slipped his small hand into hers and stepped into the light.
"See?" Sala smiled, ruffling his hair. "Was that so terrible?"
He gave a tiny, dignified shake of his head, refusing to grant the admission more weight than necessary.
Lisanna reached him first—a gentle, thoughtful approach. She crouched down low, introduced herself softly, and gave him the space to respond on his own terms.
Elfman followed in his usual way, booming a hearty, manly welcome that caused Cumber's tail to uncurl slightly in sheer surprise at the volume.
Mirajane came next, her genuine, peaceful warmth melting away whatever tension remained in the boy's shoulders.
Erza offered a formal, respectful bow—a gesture she hadn't consciously planned, but felt fitting for the young warrior's son. Cumber stared at her polished armor with keen interest, storing the detail away for later.
Natsu bounded over with full-bore enthusiasm, almost knocking Cumber back on his heels before the boy braced himself and met Natsu's gaze with the calm assessment of someone recognizing a kindred spirit. They regarded each other with a quiet, mutual understanding.
Gray sauntered up completely shirtless, leading Cumber to look at him, look down at his discarded shirt on the floor, and look back up at him with polite, total confusion.
Sala patted her little brother's shoulder softly. I know. You get used to it.
Finally, Cana—who had been lingering near the bar with her barrel—stepped forward. She crouched down, looking at Cumber with a warm, searching expression.
Cumber looked back at her with the same focused intensity he had shown everyone else, then tilted his head slightly. There was something about her—a faint, underlying familiarity that wasn't like his mother or his full siblings, but felt distinctly adjacent.
He resolved to ask his mother about her later. She would know.
Slowly, the guildhall returned to its familiar rhythm. Jobs were claimed from the board, suspended arguments resumed, and the low, comforting hum of Fairy Tail being itself filled the room.
The Clive family occupied a large wooden table near the front windows—all five of them.
Cumber had made it through the barrage of introductions exhausted but far more comfortable, sitting snugly between Sala and Kizuna, with Uruk across the table watching the room with quiet vigilance. Gildarts and Teilanne sat at opposite ends with the relaxed ease of people who had finally set down a heavy load.
"He's going to need to join the guild eventually," Kizuna noted, looking at his new brother with practical foresight.
"When he's old enough," Teilanne said softly.
"He'll be the youngest member in Fairy Tail," Sala added, a bright, proud smile on her face.
Cumber looked between them all. "Will I... will I get the stamp thing?"
"When the time comes," Uruk said.
"Where would you put it?" Sala asked gently.
Cumber considered the question with immense gravity, inspecting his arms, touching his shoulder, tapping his collarbone, and looking at his sister with absolute concentration as he weighed his options.
Gildarts watched the kids from his end of the table. His mind drifted back to a morning twelve years ago when he had walked into a quiet forest expecting a monster, only to find a fierce, resilient woman climbing out of a crater with three infants and the quiet composure of someone who had survived the unthinkable.
He thought about the man he had been that morning—solitary, detached, carrying old grief around the world from job to job.
He looked back at the table.
He looked at Teilanne, who was watching Cumber's deep deliberations with a soft, radiant smile.
Gildarts reached across the wood and covered her hand with his own.
She turned her head to look at him, flipping her hand over to intertwine her fingers with his.
"Good day," he said softly.
"Good day," she agreed.
It was, in the end, an ordinary afternoon in Fairy Tail—loud, warm, chaotic, and filled with people who had chosen to build a life together.
The Saiyan family from another world sat by the window, fully claimed by this land, this guild, and this extraordinary life—and they let themselves be claimed.
The adventures ahead of them were bound to be immense. But that, as always, was a story for another day.
Next Time — Chapter 6: Seven Years Later and a Celestial Wizard