Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The Black Eagles had been routed by the time the rain had started in earnest, but the sloppy, impromptu pincher maneuver that had wiped them out took a toll. Several of the more over eager Blue Lions over extended and got flanked, while the the commoners among the Golden Deer lacked the more formal training of the noble blooded peers and got lost in the fray.

Fódlan’s extended peace had made for sloppier soldiers.

Byleth noticed that one of her students seemingly surrendered when she had the upper hand. Hilda was going to be trouble. She had done this simply because she didn’t want to get wet. No time to reprimand her now. Byleth took this brief reprieve to settle her grip near the midpoint of the practice spear’s shaft. The years of wear had smoothed the the wood until it was a liability and it was made worse with the rain.

She strafed Jeralt’s position, each of her footfalls carrying anticipatory weight. Her flank would be safe. None of the remaining Blue Lions would be stupid enough to rush her. The real danger waited in the center of the field, trying to bait a move out of her. Byleth’s heart thundered as a prickly tension rippled through her body. Even though Jeralt was her father and this wasn’t a real battle, she still wanted to win.

Jeralt shifted his weight into another obvious feint, but one of his gloved hands adjusted further back along his spear. Thus far the old man’s moves were predictable enough and she had studied every parry, every strike, and thrust of his for as long as she could remember. Next he would dance back and wait to feint again. He would continue this pattern until she grew bored and exhausted in the hopes that Byleth came to him on the offensive.

Byleth had youth and speed on him, he had admitted that much to her, the last time they had been drunk together. He probably thought that memory lost in a fog of alcohol. And her entire reason for choosing a spear this day had been to rob him of the advantage of reach. She had always favored swords, taking after her grandmother, but their inherent weakness against pole-arms was something she couldn’t afford in this contest.

Again Jeralt took a heavy step and Byleth knew it was another feint. Early on, they had traded blows with the blunted weapons with him trying to lure her into one of the familiar practice kata it seemed.

“You’ve got this darling!” A familiar, singsong voice called from the side of the field where a few of the members of the Garreg Mach staff watched from an opened flapped wall tent. “Jeralt! Stop teasing the girl—”

Then Jeralt stepped through his feint with a kind of speed that was too much for even Byleth in her distracted state. He cracked the blunted head of her spear through with the pole of his own shattering it, the old Blade Breaker living up to his moniker!

In her shock and anger, Byleth dropped the spear thinking she might be able to tackle him on his attack’s followthrough. But Jeralt jabbed past her face in what Byleth immediately realized was another fake out so that he could push the blunted spear through the neck-hole in Byleth’s armor and catch it to fling her face down to the soaked ground.

Only her pride would sustained serious injury. Even in a real battle this wouldn’t have been a killing blow, but it certainly could be the set up for one.

The old man squatted down next to her, the joints in his knees straining, which only made the whole situation that much more embarrassing. He slapped a gauntleted hand on the armor of his leg and from this distance she could hear the ping of the rain against the metal.

She rolled over onto her side and he tapped at her face lightly with his hand. “Come on, Kid. That’s the end of it.”

Byleth groaned. “Just let me lay here and drown.”

“Get up before your mom and Rhea come out here and kick my ass. I’ll buy you a drink. Come on, you don’t want your precious pupils seeing their Professor being a sore loser.”

Byleth sat up in the grass, running her fingers through her hair to try and clear some of the grass debris and water. Jeralt got to his full height offering out a hand to help her. She took it and allowed him to pull her up. “I’m telling Gran that you broke that spear on purpose if she tries to make me pay for it,” she said.

“Oh, I’m sure Lady Rhea can afford a few practice spears.” He gave Byleth a hearty slap on the back.

“The winner of this year’s mock battle is—the Blue Lions led by our own Captain Jeralt!” It was Alois who made the announcement and cheered in its aftermath as if he had bore witness to the Battle of Gronder of old.

Through the mist and the rain, Byleth took stock of what had become of her students. Claude had faired worse than her seeing as how he was caked in mud and looked to be very sore. Marianne had actually been left untouched, though she also had hardly moved from the position she started in. Lysithea was unconscious and being supported by Leonie and a mud speckled Lorenz.  And off to the side, beneath the cover of one of the spectator tents and working to brush her hair was Hilda.

Jeralt have noticed her gaze. “I’d say you’ve got your work cut out for you this year,” he spoke through a chuckle.

“Last year’s class certainly seemed more eager to prove themselves,” Byleth said.

“Yeah, that was just beginner’s luck. And we’ve got a bumper crop of real hoity-toity ones this go round.” Jeralt raised a hand to wave at the Blue Lions house leader before turning to jog off toward him. “Hey. You did good there son, your spear form is practically immaculate—”

The rest of their conversation was lost under the din of the rain. Or maybe she had hit the ground a little harder than she first thought. Were her ears ringing? It might not hurt to have Manuela give her a once over.

She stared on as her father casually chatted with Dimitri Blaiddyd, the man who would one day rule the Holy Kingdom of Faerghus. Along the sidelines of their battlefield the presumptive Empress of the Adrestian Empire and the head of the Black Eagle House, Edelgard von Hresvelg grimaced with her arms folded as the future heir of the Alliance and head of the Golden Deer, Claude von Riegan, pulled at a twig caught in her hair teasing her.

While it was true that the Officers Academy had been created to build diplomatic relationships between the three nations and train their nobles, Byleth didn’t know if there had ever been a time where all three nations had so many members of their most noble families in attendance at once.

Byleth didn’t think herself to be very politically minded, but as she stood there on a field populated by the future leaders of the continent, she couldn’t help but feel that she was sitting on the precipice of something grand.

History in the making…

The thought had consumed her to the point that her mother was able to make her way across the damp field under the cover of a fine umbrella and bump her hip against Byleth’s playfully.

“Wearing those wet clothes like that could cause a rash or you might catch a cold. You’re going to want to change before dinner.”

“I know.”

“You really want to be sure to leave a good impression as some of these nobles are going to report back to their families and you wouldn’t want them speaking ill of you—”

“I know,” Byleth said cutting her off, but her mother continued.

“—who knows, you might even find a husband out of this group…or a wife.” An elegant, pale slim fingered hand played at the mess of Byleth’s dark green hair. Her mother was a dainty woman, one who she had heard described as frail. Whatever that had been, it must have passed before Byleth was born.

Then her mother added. “If you’ll allow I could cut it for you before supper. Just so you look your best. Like old times.”

She didn’t want to say that she liked the way the barracks cut it, the truth was, she didn’t mind her mother’s haircuts. Byleth just thought that one of the Cardinals of the Church of Seiros had better things to occupy her time with than haircuts.

“It’s alright, Ma. I’ll hurry and wash and get changed.” When she kissed her mother on the cheek, her hair smelled of sweet and smokey incense. “I’ll see you at dinner.”

Her mother paused, as if awkwardly listening for something no one else could hear. Byleth waited, as this was a thing her mother had a tendency to do.  When her mother had said nothing for a while, Byleth continued on back to her quarters. 

“Oh, right, darling. I wanted to say I’m very proud of the fine young woman you’ve become.” Her mother clasped her hands together.

“Thanks, Mom.” The heat was already rushing to her face and she had no cloak to hide it behind. “Tell Gran that Dad broke that spear. I shouldn’t have to pay for it!”

“This banquet’s not some yearly tradition or anything. Really, it just looks like Lady Rhea wanted to start the year off with a big shebang to make it memorable.” Hilda absently flicked her hand through her right twin-tail before continuing. “It’s being held tomorrow—I volunteered to help get a head count. You’ll be there, right Mercedes—oh and you too Marianne.”

The deluge that had been going on during the mock battle had become little more than drizzle, but the gloom blanketing the campus remained. Despite that, the mood inside the dining hall was warm; a scattershot of her classmates were spread across the room wearing a drier change of clothes than she had last seen them in. The cliques at the tables sat in small mixed company clusters. Students, instructors, knights, and clergy all intermingled. In some cases old friends or family might have even been seeing one another for the first time in years. Hilda actually counted herself lucky that no one she really knew was here. 

Marianne and Mercedes were probably the closest thing Hilda had to an audience for her assignment. Most of the others nearby ignored her outright, but those two at least turned toward her even if they didn’t acknowledge each other. In the last several days of being around Marianne, Hilda didn’t think she had heard her speak more than a few times. She didn’t voice opinions or express concerns or even have questions that she asked.

“Oh, a celebratory banquet? I’ll be there; should I bring something baked?” Mercedes asked in her usual, breezy tone. From the odd nature of her answer and the other clipped interactions they had, Hilda wasn’t sure there was all that much going on upstairs with her, but she seemed nice enough.

“There’s no need, Mercedes, but it’s not a potluck. There’ll be food provided,” Hilda said, standing with the clipboard pressed to the pleated front of her skirt.

“Let’s be honest, you’re only doing this so the Professor can’t ask you to do any actual work.” Claude sat a few seats behind where Hilda stood using the crumpled remnants of one of his rolls to mop the gravy up off of his plate. He tossed it into his mouth, but continued to speak despite it. “Plus, you’ll be hard for her to track down if anyone needs you to do anything giving you plausible deniability to laze around.”

Hilda cradled the clipboard against her chest. “Going to go ahead and mark you down as not coming, seeing as how no one wants you there anyway.”

Nothing about Claude’s sudden appearance made a bit of sense. First Godfrey dies in an accident and then a few years later Duke Oswald von Riegan names this mysterious grandson heir to the most powerful family in the alliance? It’s not that Hilda liked the alternative idea of leadership responsibilities shifting to House Gloucester or even her own, but the whole situation rubbed her the wrong way.

“I won’t be attending.”

Hilda almost missed Marianne’s words, but the reactions of Mercedes and Claude confirmed what she thought the other girl had said.

“You really ought to, Marianne,” Mercedes said. “Even if it’s just to have some of the cake I am planning to bring.”

“I was going to ask the prettiest girl there for a dance and I’m disappointed to say that you’re not being there is kind of putting a damper on my plans.” Claude stood up from his seat to slide his bowl and plate closer to where Marianne sat, though he left a chair between them.

Marianne, for her part, did her best to keep staring at her bowl of vegetable pasta salad, but as Claude neared her a slight redness overtook her cheeks. So she did seem to be interested in boys, maybe, Hilda thought.

“You know,” Hilda said sitting down in the seat between Marianne and Claude to block him off. “It’s pretty important to come to social events like this…for the good of your adopted father’s margravate. As one of the Five Great Lords I’m sure he would expect you to at least make an appearance.”

She glared over her shoulder at Claude, thinking that his attempt to lure Marianne in with dancing might have scared her off.

“We could,” Mercedes glanced to Hilda. “Come by and help you get ready. I wouldn’t think you’d have to stay long. How long does it take for one to eat a slice of cake?”

For a moment Marianne seemed to be even more silent than normal. Perhaps she was taking the time to weigh her options, giving her an out to leave the banquet early was actually a pretty intelligent trick on Mercedes’s part.

Truth be told, Hilda could see how the idea of a some massive fancy banquet might bother someone like Marianne. She had heard the girl originally grew up in a more isolated area. Why, there were probably more people in this dining hall all at once than Marianne was used to seeing in a month.

“Okay.” Marianne’s voice was barely audible and as if she realized this, she nodded her head vigorously.

Mercedes lunged forward clasping Marianne’s hands. “Oh, tomorrow before the banquet the three of us should go to the cathedral to pray. Then we can make our way back to the dormitory and get ready together.”

Hilda let out a coy laugh, one that she could tell Claude detected as forced just by the glance he shot her. “I’m going to pass on that. Got so much to do, you know. I’ll meet the two of you at Marianne’s room around, maybe four-ish?”

“That could work too,” Mercedes said.

Marianne nodded, agreeing along with her.

Claude chuckled, but just the same way that he had been on to her laugh; she was onto his. There was something off about him. It was staring Hilda in the face and she just knew whatever it was would be so obvious she’d want to bury an axe in her own head once she finally realized it.

“Well, I would offer to help you ladies get ready just in case there are any hard to reach places you might need a hand getting to?” He asked raising an eyebrow.

“No thanks,” Hilda said. “I’m plenty flexible.”

“Even better,” he said in reply.

Mercedes seemed to actually consider the offer. “That’s awfully kind of you, but I am sure we can manage between the three of us.”

“Alright then,” Claude rose from the table with his plate, the silverware laying across the center of it. “I’ll see you there, oh and Hilda, don’t hesitate to call me if you need any help reaching anything on the top shelves.”

Hilda scowled at him, but said nothing.

“Do you actually know him? I mean, from before you both came here?” Mercedes leaned in close to ask the question, the hair swinging out over her cheek to hide her face from half the room.

The subject seemed to even interest Marianne, because she tilted her body toward the other two women in turn.

“No, never met him before I got here. My brother knew some of Claude’s family, I think. This would have all been before Claude was even born though. Really, no one in the Alliance really knows him from what I gather. It really does seem like Duke Riegan just hid a whole grandson from the world.”

Belial Eisner scampered over the rocks, making sure to stay hidden from sight by the shadows of the mountain. He peered out between two boulders at the stonework complex below. The same reason it had been abandoned for so long was why it had become infested with bandits: years of earthquakes and shifting rock had seen the mountains reclaim parts of the structure, helping to obscure it from easy eye lines. Even the path to reach it required one to shimmy into a narrow space under a collapsed wall.

It was a perfect base for the a troupe of thieves preying on travelers along the Oghma Mountain Pass.

The Ashen Demons Squad to which Belial belonged operated under the banner of the Knights of Seiros as a scouting force, so they tended not to act without a a main contingent nearby. Captain Shamir had never been known to be reckless, but even she wouldn’t have been willing to pass up finding the dastards suspected of plaguing Central Fódlan all this time.

Two weeks ago they had picked up the bandits trail on a scouting mission after one of the other Ashen Demons, Hapi, noticed the three Officer’s Academy students being pursued by a small group of the ruffians. Even more peculiar than that, once they had been saved and the bandits scattered, they introduced themselves as Dimitri of House Blaiddyd, Claude of House of Riegan, and Edelgard von Hresvelg.

Thinking back, they should have been able to deal with a few bandits between their guards and the few other students with them including their retainers. How they got separated from their guard detail and all those other people Belial could only guess.

From where they had hidden, nestled in a divot high up in the rock, there was very little chance of them being spotted by any of the bandits and they had a pretty good view of a courtyard like area at the front of the building complex. Shamir, their commander, sat with her back against the stone. Heat from the day’s sun still radiated out of the rock around them, making the night feel far too hot.

“Is it just me or does this whole set up seem a little too permanent for ordinary bandits?” Shamir asked.

“It looks like they’ve been here a while,” Belial said.

“You see how the lower part of the walls over here are darker—you think this place floods in the rainy season, Shammi?” Hapi asked.

“Either that or they had to dig it out,” Shamir said.

Hapi tried to raise up on her feet enough to see over the top of the pointed rock that Belial was leaning against, but she didn’t dare make herself too obvious. A sudden gust caught her shock of crimson hair for a split second.

“I can’t see over in this direct, but there’s no telling how far back these buildings go. Whole valley could be lousy with bandits.”

Belial nodded. “What do you think? Element of surprise. We have Hapi do a couple sighs to provide some scaly reinforcements and then we get down there and beat it up like egg yolks.”

Shamir slapped a hand to her face. “You did not just say that.”

“Hey,” Hapi said, almost too loud. “I’m not your monster dinner bell, or whatever.”

“There’s only like nine of us out here. You want to just take the lot of them on without something to help?” Belial asked

Captain Shamir narrowed her eyes at him. “If you wanted a suicide there’s gallows back in town, you’re welcome to them. But I’m not marching in there with less than ten lightly armored troops even if Hapi sighs a dozen times.”

“How about I sigh zero times?”

“We know where they are now, but there could be more than a hundred of them dug in down there. We’re going to go back to the Monastery and report to Lady Rhea and Seteth. Then we can come back with a force large enough to rout them.”

He had to admit that Shamir did know what she was doing, when they had first encountered the bandits attacking the Officers Academy students he had wanted to wipe them out then and there. Shamir had asked that they let a few of them escape and trail them around to see where they went, which in turn led them to this place.

“We should at least start back as soon as we can,” Belial suggested. “Something about that place makes it feel like we’re not going to want to leave it to fester for long.”

Chapter Text

“Aye, Jeritza?” Byleth finally knocked on the table in front of him, hoping to get his attention.

He stared up at her with a blank expression. Most of her interactions with the man went exactly like this. It had been fine when he was a dueling instructor, but it was going to be an annoying year now that he had stepped in as Professor for the Black Eagles.

“I swear, it’s like that mask is blocking your hearing. I’ve been hollering and waving my arms like a lunatic trying to get your attention all this time. Are you going to finish the fritters?”

Jeritza wrapped his arm around the plate and pulled it closer to his chest to guard it. “I am.”

“Well, you can’t hog all of them. What am I supposed to eat for my breakfast? You left all the damned cuskynoles* up there—and that flan is hot, for some reason. Give me one of those peach fritters.”

Jeritza narrowed his eyes at her. “No,” he said in that odd, monotone way, like his voice was something unused before and only forced for this particular interaction.

“You owe me. You let your class get trounced in the mock battle, even after I told you we should work together to take my old man down. I got laid out on my ass out in there in the mud. The least you could do is not eat all the fritters for the second day in a row.”

Jeritza rose to his feet causing the legs of the wooden chair to scrape the dining hall floor and made for the door to leave. He had been in such a hurry and so suddenly that he left his food behind. Byleth glanced around before picking up the plate of fritters for herself.

“Can I have one? Thanks.” Her brother Belial snatched one off of the plate without waiting for her to answer. She didn’t know when he had gotten back, but it must have been fairly recently as he still smelled from the hike.

Byleth sighed at her brother before trying to shovel two of the fritters into her mouth before he could get anymore.

“Miss Eisner, may I speak to you?” One of her father’s students, Mercedes, came to a stop in front of her. The girl was wringing her fingers like she was worried about something.

“Whaizid?” Byleth said through a full mouth.

“I am dreadfully sorry for disturbing your breakfast like this, but what do you know about that man who was sitting with you before?” Mercedes asked.

“Jeritza von Hrym? Well, for one thing he’s a goddess-damned pastry thief. He races in here every morning and eats all the best sweets. Guess I’m supposed to just have a banana or something—well not today.”

“You said he’s called Jeritza?” Mercedes asked.

Byleth nodded and took another bite of the fritters.

Belial expanded on the details of what Mercedes was asking. “He’s been the fencing instructor here for a little bit, but this is going to be his first year as teacher—the new instructor for the Black Eagles didn’t make it when those bandits attacked. That’s kind of on me and the Ashen Demons. We didn’t save the poor guy.”

Mercedes studied Belial for a moment like she were just seeing him for the first time. “Oh, are you related to the Professor? You look so similar.”

“This is my kid brother, Belial. And can you please stop calling me Professor.”

“Alright, then am I allowed to call you Byleth?”

“Yeah, that just seems more appropriate. I think we’re the same age.”

“You wouldn’t happen to know where this Jeritza person might have gone, do you?”

Byleth shrugged. “His quarters are in a part of the monastery that are out of bounds to students and he disappears a lot. He’s probably building a nest out of all the sweets he steals.”

Mercedes’s shoulder slumped and though she was trying her best to keep smiling, Byleth could tell that this had disappointed her. “Right.”

“Oh, you should ask Manuela. She spent months trying to get in his pants. If anyone knows where he might have gone it’s her.”

“They should put a bell on that woman,” Belial cut in.

“You’re just mad that she thinks you’re cute.” Byleth pinched her brother on the cheek and he batted her hand away. She chuckled as she offered the plate out to Mercedes. A lone fritter sat in the center of it. “I wouldn’t worry if you need to find him, he’ll be in his classroom at eight when instruction starts. You want the last one?”

Mercedes regarded the fritter, almost seeming to want to say no. In the end she took it anyway. “Thank you, Byleth. For everything.”

When she had walked out of the dining hall Byleth sat the empty plate back on the table. “Glad that she’s not in my House.”

“Why? Too needy?” Asked Belial.

“Too distracting. She’s gorgeous,” Byleth said.

“Haha, don’t think you’d have to worry. You’re a piece of shit, she’d never be into it.”

“And you’re a fritter thief. Shouldn’t you go wash up or something, you smell like the stables,” she said pulling his cheek again.

“I will,” he said rubbing at his reddened face. “I just came to tell you what we discovered further down the mountains.”

“This had better be good. I already had to fight for my breakfast and now I’m having to smell you this entire time.” 

Legends of Jeralt the Blade Breaker seemed to stretch back to the time of Klaus the First, but Dimitri stood before the man himself. The Blue Lions had spent the better part of the morning running drills with a mythic figure. Perhaps some of the feats attributed to him were actually meant to be speaking of Jeralt’s father or his father’s father? Or perhaps his exploits were so epic that they had woven themselves back through the tapestry of history?

At the age he must have been, Dimitri couldn’t believe that he had been able to keep with the class the way he did. Sparring with Jeralt, following the maneuvers that he had he and Sylvain doing with the spears, had been just about all that the could take for the morning.

Annette clutched a book against her chest, swaying slightly as she spoke to Professor Jeralt. Despite the imposing figure he cut, Jeralt was remarkably personable. There was a charm to him where even some of the off color remarks he made, ones that would have caused a stir from anyone else, simply didn’t matter.

Dimitri was too far off to hear, but something Jeralt said caused Annette to burst into laughter. The whole class was pretty taken with him, even after such a short time.

“Looking to spar this afternoon, Boar?” Felix strode toward him from the side of the classroom, arms open as if to invite challenge.

“Some other time. There are some preparations I want to make before the banquet tonight,” said Dimitri raising a gloved hand.

Felix came to a stop as near to Dimitri’s side as he could manage without touching him and though he was shorter, it felt as if they were the same height in that moment. “Just remember not to neglect your training.”

Even without him voicing the rest the last several years had let Dimitri know the exact content of the rest of that statement. Don’t neglect your training because we need you to take back the crown and be a real King, a leader that would do Glenn and all the others proud.

He didn’t need Felix to remind him; the dead would never let him forget it.

“Are you waiting to talk to…Annette?” Felix asked, his voice still low.

“Professor Jeralt, actually. I just wanted to ask his advice in something.”

Felix nodded, though whether he found this answer lacking in some way or not Dimitri couldn’t tell. With that his friend casually walked out of the classroom. Annette passed by a moment later.

“Good morning, Your Highness! Although, I suppose it’s hardly morning anymore.” She bowed, but it was an after thought and she made sure to keep the book pressed to her chest like she didn’t want anyone to see the cover.

Dimitri smiled at her and gave a short nod. “Morning Annette,” he said.

Annette was already on her way out the door. He had become used to her peculiarities, but in just a few moments of interaction she seemed to be trying to outdo herself. And yet some of the quirks in the way she moved and carried herself were so distinctly Gustave that he couldn’t help remembering how his family’s tragedy stole the girl’s father from her.

He felt that it would forever be awkward between them. His inabilities to speak to most women his own age didn’t help matters. Ingrid had been something of an exception as she was more like a sister to him in some ways than just another girl, but given what he had a mind to do later during this banquet…”

“You had something you wanted to ask me about, Son?”

Dimitri lingered so long that Jeralt had walked up behind him, the floorboard creaked as the Blade Breaker shifted his weight and ran a hand back through his ash blond hair. His casual air brought a slight smile to Dimitri’s face. In typical fashion there were no titles with Jeralt; everyone was addressed as “kid” or “son” or some other moniker that only denoted that you were younger than him.

“Yes, sir.” Dimitri fussed with the end of his shirt sleeves. Despite the ease he felt around Jeralt there was also something that made him feel like a kid standing before his father when talking to him. “You were…a knight of the Kingdom, sometime ago, if I’m not mistaken.”

Jeralt seemed caught off guard by the question, though he smiled and pressed a gloved hand to his forehead. “Hells, that feels like another lifetime, but yeah. When I was young I rode under the Griffin Knight banner.”

Griffin Knight banner, that was a name Dimitri had never known their coat of arms to be called, but that was indeed what it depicted. “I suppose it would make sense that you came to be the instructor of our house, then.”

“Lady Rhea needed some extra hands and I’m not one to tell her no.” Lady Rhea. He had used a title with her even though she was his family, if by nothing else but marriage. “And while the Black Eagles specialize in magic and the Golden Deer tend to have a knack for archery, the Kingdom and her soldiers are best known as knights.”

“Well, with all that you say I feel that we are in more than capable hands.”

“Heh, I wouldn’t go that far. I’m just a real old dog that knows more than a few tricks. Least I can do is pass some of that along to future generations.”

The conversation came to a lull between them until the sounds from students on the courtyard outside of the classroom bled through. “Now, what was it you really came here to talk to me about then, Son?” Jeralt raised a knowing eyebrow and again Dimitri felt as if he were a small child standing in front of his father.

What he wouldn’t give for that to be the case.

“I have a favor to ask you or rather, I have a favor that I want you to ask of Lady Rhea.”

Jeralt twisted the hairs of his beard between his fingers as if he were in deep thought. “I do suppose that I have the old Archbishop’s ear, on account of bedding her daughter.”

The line was so crass and disarming that Dimitri burst into laughter. He didn’t have time to compose himself or even stifle it and then he heard the rapid footfalls behind him as someone swept through the doors of the classroom. Jeralt’s lips curled into a slight smile and Dimitri glanced toward the door to see a woman with long, flowing dark green hair. She wore a white gown reminiscent of what Lady Rhea wore, but without the cloak and adornments; it draped off both of her shoulders.

Dimitri had never seen Lady Sitri Eisner up close before, but he could tell immediately why any man would be taken with her.

“You really shouldn’t speak so disrespectfully in front of the boy or anyone else. What if I had been Mother?” She asked.

“You don’t think I knew you were out there snooping around the door?” Jeralt said. “Come on.” He added with a playful shrug. “And I’m sure the boy has heard worse, he for sure will being around the grounds or at some military encampment.”

Jeralt clasped a hand on Dimitri’s back; where most people were afraid to make contact with him, it barely seemed to register as odd to Jeralt. “I apologize for my outburst there, Lady Sitri.”

“There is no need, Your Grace.” Sitri clasped her hands and bowed her head quickly. “It’s Jeralt whose mouth I’m going to wash out with lye!”

The old knight sprung into action at his wife’s threat and scooped her up in one motion, slinging her over his shoulder. Sitri let out a shriek before giggling uncontrollably.  Dimitri reared back, shocked at their playful intimacy.

“Oh right,” Jeralt said as he turned to look at Dimitri again. “If you really wanted to ask some favor of Rhea, she might be the one you want to ask for help.” He rotated to aim Sitri’s face at Dimitri.

“My apologies, Your Grace. I don’t know why he is being like this,” Sitri said out of breath as she hung in the air, draped over Jeralt’s shoulder. “But you can ask me what you want me to pass along to my mother.”

With Sitri face to face like this, Dimitri couldn’t help but feel awkward. “Well, I have heard tell of how things are typically done within the Officer’s Academy, but I was wondering if there might be a way to foster more cooperation between our three houses. Perhaps mock battles with different mixes of students or maybe even joint missions?”

“We’ve never really tried it before, but I could see how that would foster more cooperation after everyone has left the Monastery which was really the goal of the Officer’s Academy,” Sitri said. “I could discuss this with Mother, but honestly I think that you should come by her audience chamber tomorrow and tell her yourself?”

“If you really feel strongly about it,” Dimitri said.

Jeralt nodded thoughtfully. “It would demonstrate a level of willingness to lead that I think Lady Rhea would respect. Now, if you’ll excuse me I have to carry my wife up to my room so she can wash my mouth out with that lye.”

As the old knight struck off with his wife up on his shoulder, she began to laugh again. She protested, half-heartily that someone would see them. There were Officer’s Academy students taking their midday break in the courtyard or walking past along the walkways that lined the perimeters of the buildings. Even as people stared or turned to get a look, neither Sitri nor Jeralt seemed to mind.

They were lost in their own little world.

The hem on the pair of gloves that Hilda had planned to wear to the banquet had a tear. It must have happened in the trek from Goneril territory to here, though it could have occurred before she left. She supposed she could have handed them off to some servant, but she didn’t mind doing this kind of thing herself.

She slipped the thread through the eye at the back of the needle and then held it between her middle and ring fingers as she tried to match the two pieces of fabric up flush together. Then she began stitching at one end of the hole working her way to the other. Hilda really preferred to do this kind of thing outside, so she had gone down to one of the tables gardens. Back home there would have been servants wandering about and guards posted, but she was surprised to see just how some parts of the Monastery could be.

No sooner than when she had finished and held the gloves up to give them a once over, someone called out to her from the entrance to the gardens cut through the hedges. “Hilda, you sew?” Mercedes waved her arm, as if Hilda might not hear her own name being called, and traipsed over with Marianne in tow behind her along with another girl that Hilda didn’t quite recognize.

This new girl was one of the Blue Lions, Hilda thought. It had been hard to take stock of everyone during the mock battle, though. She was petite and despite being only a little shorter than Hilda herself, she felt decidedly younger. The three of them stopped next to the table where Hilda was sitting and the new girl didn’t seem to be able to stop moving, she rocked side to side as if dancing to some unheard song, the bright orange hair at the end of her short braids swayed as she did.

Hilda folded the gloves between her hands and laid them over her thigh. “I do a little bit. Nothing too serious, you know how it is.”

Curiosity about this newcomer must have been written on Hilda's face. “Oh, where are my manners,” Mercedes said. “This is Annette. She’s a friend of mine from the Royal School of Sorcery.”

“Oh yeah?” Hilda pressed a finger to her cheek. “Pretty sure that’s the same place Lorenz is always blabbing on about. Wouldn’t know, I only listen to about half of what comes out of his mouth.” She offered out her hand to Annette. “Anyway, it’s nice to meet you, I’m Hilda Valentine Goneril.”

Annette took her hand. “Nice to meet you too, Hilda. Were you going to be taking any magic certifications anytime soon, maybe we could all study together?”

“I’m actually not very magically inclined, I think in a pinch I know, like, a thunder spell. Figured I would just go about my business uncertified in anything since we’re not really worried a war is going to suddenly break out or something.”

Annette didn’t continue with her line of questions to figure out Hilda’s area of study. Maybe she felt rejected by the reply.

“We were headed over to the church still, since it’s kind of early, are you sure you didn’t want to come with? There were supposed to be some spare clothes stored in one of the storerooms at the cathedral—Marianne didn’t bring anything all that fancy with her, according to her, so we were going to see what we could find there.”

“I might be able to find something to throw over my shoulders with the dress I am planning to wear,” Hilda said. If there was going to be plenty of fabric there maybe she could scoop some of them up and use them for some new designs. Just digging through boxes of fabric like that gave her bolts of inspiration. “I guess I could go for that.”

Back at Galsop Keep, her family’s estate attached to the stronghold of Fódlan’s locket, there had been a small town where merchants would sell swaths of fabric in all manners of sizes. Her brother used to take out to the stores to go through their wares and just see what they were offering. She wondered if she could do the same here at the Monastery, there was a market near the gates.

Mercedes latched onto her upper arm and tugged her upright. “Come then, it’ll be a fun little trip.”

Hilda glanced back. “You okay back there, Marianne?”

Marianne nodded her head.

“Do you know what kind of dress that you’d like to wear?” Hilda asked.

Marianne shook her head.

This was even more interaction from her than Hilda had come to expect. “What about you Annette, any idea what you’re going to wear?”

“I’ve got this white dress that is a little bit off my shoulders. I hope it’s not too revealing though.” Annette seemed to come alive at the prospect of being spoken too again, though Hilda couldn’t tell why. She seemed normal enough. A girl like this had to have friends. She had known Mercedes after all.

“Maybe you could affix some ribbons to it somewhere, like on the bust or sleeves, draw the eyes away from the distraction or something.” Hilda was having to take small hurried steps to keep up with Mercedes, how was this woman so strong.

“Ribbons? Can you show me how to put them on?” Annette asked.

“Yeah,” Hilda glanced to Annette’s eyes. “I’ve got a great color back in my room that would match your eyes perfectly.”

When Hilda finally managed to wrest her arm away from Mercedes she was able to put the gloves into the small satchel she carried. The four of them made their way over the grounds, taking care not to cut across the grass as it was still wet from the previous evening’s rain. There wasn’t much conversation between them and Hilda had a thought that maybe she had been tricked by Mercedes into going to pray.

It wasn’t that Hilda didn’t believe in the Goddess, it was more that she didn’t see any difference in the fortunes of people who were devout from those who weren’t. From what she knew, some of the Houses that held the Church’s teachings in the highest regard had completely crumbled under various circumstances.

Meanwhile, House Goneril had ascended to a level of power within the Alliance that put it either right behind or right ahead of House Gloucester and she had never seen her father or brother pray without being in a social context where it was expected. As they neared the Cathedral the sweet smoky scent of incense grew heavy in the air.

The Cathedral itself towered near the edge of the cliffs of the Oghma Mountains and overlooking the lower peaks, foothills, and valleys out to the west. They crossed the long causeway, but to Hilda’s surprise took one of the side paths around the building and went down some stairs to a set of doors in what looked like a basement.

“The extra clothes are stored in here,” Mercedes said. The double doors opened with a loud creak to reveal racks of clothing and crates stacked against the wall. “Careful now, because they’re all clothes they’re pretty heavy.” Mercedes brushed the hair back over her shoulder.

“Wow, there’s so much,” Annette said.

Marianne shuffled into the storage room wordlessly and started to flip through the racks of clothing, but as Hilda watched her, surprised, she spotted something else that caught her eye. Archbishop Rhea was at the far side of this outer ledge of the Cathedral speaking to a red robbed man with shoulder length hair that Hilda did not recognize.

The two of them looked close, closer than Hilda had seen anyone else get to Lady Rhea. The area on the outside of the Cathedral was massive to the point that even the four of them coming up here and opening a creaky wooden door hadn’t been heard by Rhea.

Just as Hilda thought that this might not be any of her business and she was about to turn her attentions back to the treasure trove of clothing and fabric, the stranger reached out and touched Rhea’s cheek before he leaned in to kiss her.

“What the Hell?” Hilda muttered. Her three companions were deep inside of the storage room and she worried that if they lingered here with the door open too long that man or Rhea might look this direction.

Hilda rushed into the storage room with them and turned to lightly shut the doors, closing all of them inside.

“It’s dark.” Marianne’s soft voice came from somewhere in the darkness.

Annette shrieked, but Hilda shushed her as if she had been waiting for it to happen. Light erupted into existence as Mercedes summoned a ball of fire, letting it dance above her opened palm. “Why did you close the door?”

“Oh, there’s just someone out there walking around that I really, really don’t want to see us,” she said. It wasn’t a lie and even though Hilda didn’t really fret over matters of the Goddess, telling lies beneath the floor of the Cathedral itself might be too far for even her.

“Is it a jilted boy?” Annette asked.

“Mmm, like a jealous ex-lover, how scandalous,” Mercedes said, the glow of the fire making her growing smile seem all the more devious.

Maybe she could just let them believe what they would and take this time to search the storage…to the best of her ability. “Can we just search like this, Mercedes if you keep that fire going I’m sure Annette and I could help you look for anything you wanted. Marianne, how are you doing?”

“I’m fine,” she answered.

Hilda stepped around the crates on the side of the room poking out from under the clothing racks, with it being darker there was some risk of tripping. “Great, I’m going to help you out first, since I only need so much fabric myself.”

For now Hilda was content to just forget what she had seen, but at the next opportunity she was going to learn all she could about Lady Rhea.

Chapter Text

In the few short years since Duscur had been absorbed by the Kingdom, Dedue had grown used to being out of place. His height, his skin, the color of his hair—they marked him as immediately separate from the nobility and from most of the people of Fódlan. The fire at his back warmed the suit jacket of his dress uniform, casting a faded, imposing shadow out across the floor. At the very least the people around Garreg Mach tended to ignore him. He didn’t think that any of the clergy or the knights had addressed him directly in the couple of weeks he had been at the Officer’s Academy, except for Jeralt. Though that man seemed different; he seemed more like His Highness.

Either way he preferred to be a shadow. It made what he was really here to do easier. 

“Shocked to see the lapdog so far from his master.” The voice coming from his right was that of Felix. Dedue had noticed him watching from a small distance away before approaching him, the pair of them were the only two near the hearth because while it provided abundant light and a warm mood, the springtime air filtering through the hall was a bit too temperate for the intense heat radiating out from it.

Heat was something that Dedue craved, though. Back in Duscur there were days when the air chilled you too the bone without ceasing so he would not easily get used to this feeling being so readily available.

“Did you hear me talking to you?” Felix asked.

Dedue turned to look at the other man who held a flute of wine between his pinky and ring finger pressed against the belly of his vest. “I did hear you. I am simply here because it is the best place to observe the majority of the room from.”

“Hmph.” Felix took another swig of his wine. “Does everything here seem to your liking?”

“I am not sure what you mean. With so many people around in such a confined space, even at the monastery there is always the possibility of an attempt on His Highness’s life.”

“Is that all you think about? The boar?” Felix asked.

Dedue glared at him. “You would do well not to insult His Highness.”

“Still the fur on your back, dog. I was just curious about something.”

“And what is that?” Asked Dedue, finally turning his full attention from the rest of the room to look at Felix.

Felix polished off the remainder of his wine and placed the flute on the table near the fire. “If any part of you that’s a real man still exists in there.”

“Dedue? Felix? Have either of you seen Sylvain or Ingrid?”

“Ingrid is stuffing her face. I assume Sylvain is trying to stuff part of himself into some bumpkin—” At almost the exact same moment that Dedue turned fully expecting to see their classmate Annette, the words seemed to catch at the back of Felix’s throat. Whatever else had had planned to say came out as a confused, elongated stare.

The woman speaking had turned out to be Annette, but neither of them had ever seen her like this. Her hair had been pulled into a looser, more pronounced version of the braid that she usually wore and the blueness of her eyes had been extenuated by the dark makeup lining them. And there was makeup tinting her cheeks a rosy hue and it looked to be blended to bring out her features. Her lips were stained a deep red and when she opened them to speak next, her eyes scrunched down in confusion.

“Why are you two just staring at me?” Annette asked.

Did she somehow not notice?

Dedue had obviously seen women in makeup before and he knew that it could change the subtle things about a person, but seeing this Annette after knowing the one he had just been in a practice field with hours ago felt too jarring. How could a change this drastic be possible. “I had actually been watching His Highness so closely that I hadn’t really seen Sylvain or Ingrid,” he said.

Ingrid tended to be standoffish around him, at least as far as Dedue could tell. She had never said anything directly to him about his people, but he could guess that was the issue. She mostly said no more to him than she had to and he saw no reason to push her to connect.

“Aw, I kind of had something I was meaning to ask those two about,” Annette said.

Felix seemed to have shaken off the initial shock. “Well if you go near Sylvain looking like that you’re probably going to have to fight him off.”

“Oh! Did you like my new dress.” Annette grasped the sides of the skirt by her hips and twirled to show it off. The ribbons tied to the little hoops hanging off her shoulders whipped side to side in the air. “Hilda from the Golden Deer let me borrow the ribbons. She said the color would really make it pop.”

Felix eyed Dedue, patting the bigger man on the shoulder. “Apparently I misjudged you, something of the real man is still inside of you. Annette, I’ll go with you to seek out the other two—if we let Ingrid eat her fill, her Pegasus might not take flight next battle from the added weight.”

“Hey, why would you say a thing like that?” Annette chided him.

“Ingrid is not around to hear and I hardly think she would care if she were. Come on.” Felix caught her by the upper arm and led her off into the crowd.

When Dedue raised his gaze and began watching the rest of the room again he quickly realized that he had lost sight of Dimitri. It wasn’t the end of the world, in the last few weeks of being at the monastery it had been safe, probably even more safe than back in the Kingdom, but he didn’t want to let his lord out of his care for too long just in case something happened.

After everyone made their way into the main hall and the band began to play, there was still work to be done for Cyril. He wove his way between the nobles and Officer’s Academy students gathering up the unattended dishes to cart them away. He had made a few trips between the tables running down one wall when a hand grasped his shoulder.

He turned back, expecting that he had done something wrong to see a familiar face in a long maroon dress that caught the nearby candlelight to sparkle. His face twisted in confusion as he spoke. “Miss Hilda?”

“Cyril? It is you. I thought I saw you earlier in the day, but I didn’t really want to rush across the whole school chasing someone only to find out that I was seeing things.”

Cyril turned back to his work. “Did you miss me so much that you thought you’d imagine me being here?”

Hilda bobbed her head side to side, her pink hair swaying down the center of her back as she did. “Well, I had wondered where you got off to. You were always such a good worker. Someone told me that Lady Rhea had asked if she could bring you back here when she last visited. Really, until I saw you the whole thing had kind of slipped my mind.”

“That’s the Hilda I know. I have work to do.”

“Too much work for me to ask for a dance?” Hilda asked.

Whatever words he had planned to next say emptied out of his head. Even as lazy and useless as Hilda tended to be, when Cyril tried to think of a reason to tell her no it took him a moment to come up with anything.

“It’s just one dance. Humor me.” Hilda grabbed him by the hand and led him to the dance floor.

“I don’t really know if Lady Rhea would—”

“—I don’t see Rhea here and everyone else is having way too much fun to worry about telling on you.”

“It’s not like I really know how to dance,” Cyril said.

“I’ll teach you. You can’t spend all your time working, someday you’re going to need to dance. That’s just a fact of life,” she said.

Hilda was much, much stronger than she looked. Which was shocking because he couldn’t remember seeing her ever lift anything heavier than some food or fabric.

The dance floor was spacious enough that when she came to a stop they had a sizable segment to themselves. She took him by wrist and put his hand onto her waist so that one of his fingers was against the curve of her hip. Then she threaded her fingers through his.

Of course Cyril had touched women before, but only in the short bursts where he brushed against them on accident when handing them something. Or the times when Lady Rhea congratulated him with a hug or held his hand. Those things were nice. But then Hilda felt nice too, at least when she wasn’t laying around avoiding chores and being in the way.

“Keep your hand firm on my waist, but relax the other one,” Hilda said. “You’re going to lead me, okay? Like this.” She stepped in a pattern, following the rhythm of the song and counting off as she did. “One, one-two, one-two. Then turn. And one, one-two, one-two.”

Cyril twisted the hand holding hers to the side, trying to steer her away from another pair that was dancing and to his surprise she followed. They moved in that two count pattern for a little while. “This isn’t that hard.”

“See. Now you’re getting the hang of it.”

“I never really had any reason to dance, I just didn’t think it would be one of those things I could do.”

“No one needs a reason to dance,” Hilda said.

He actual was enjoying himself once he melded to the pace of the song and didn’t have to think about it all that much. The only issue was that since Hilda was taller than him he couldn’t very well look directly at her without staring at her chest. No telling how she would react to that, but he didn’t want to find out.

Cyril did the next best thing, he kept his eyes aimed to either side and occupied his time with looking for any other couple who danced to close to them so that he could correct their direction. Sure, Hilda probably wouldn’t let herself just collide with someone at full speed, but she was following his lead.

There was a familiar scent to the air around her. It took him a few seconds of conscious thought to realize where he had smelled it before: on days when the roses were in full bloom and he went to trim them entire sections of the monastery gardens had the same aroma.

“You like it here? More than at Galsop Keep?”

Cyril turned to look up at her, but it took him a few steps of their dance to realize what she had asked. “Yeah. I mean, it’s nicer. Lady Rhea takes good care of me and I keep busy.”

“You’re really close to Rhea, then, huh?” Hilda asked.

“I guess so. Lady Rhea is super busy, but she usually makes time for me. An-and I’m apprenticed to Shamir from the Ashen Demons.”

“Really? I think she and those Demons people helped save Claude and the others from some bandits the other day. I wasn’t really there for all of that on account of them being busy bodies and getting themself into a pinch.”

“Claude is that guy from House Reigan? The new heir?” Even though it wasn’t any of his business what happened back in the Alliance on account of him not even living there anymore, he did hear things. Gossip was a big pass time between the clergy and even when he tried to avoid it something of it slipped through.

Hilda rolled her eyes. “Yes. I’m not really sure what to think about him as a leader, but he is full of himself. And probably some kind of womanizer. I’m shocked I don’t see him anywhere around here scheming on some naïve girl.”

“It sounds like you really don’t like him,” Cyril said. “Is this like a thing about the pecking order in the Alliance?”

She let out a snort. “It’s nothing to do with politics or bloodlines. I just don’t trust any man that beautiful. He’s dangerous.”

Was Hilda blushing? Cyril could have sworn he saw her cheeks turn a shade of red. There was nothing Cyril could really say about the matter between Hilda and Claude without sounding stupid. Even after all of this time, what did he really know about the inner-workings of the nobility?

“You must know Byleth, huh?” Asked Hilda.

“Yeah, Lady Rhea’s granddaughter.”

“So, that’s the thing I am curious about,” the music began to fall to a lull and Hilda leaned in close to speak to him. “Byleth’s parents are Jeralt and Sitri, Sitri’s mother is Rhea, but who is her dad?”

Whoever he was, he must have been gone long before Cyril got there. “I don’t really know.”

“I mean, Lady Rhea has to have someone, right. A man she’s interested in, maybe, because if not I’ve got a very available brother.”

He couldn’t help but think this had been some kind of setup, but at the same time it made just as much sense that Hilda was just being brash and loud. Hilda didn’t have the energy or dedication for scheming.

“Lady Rhea would never—her husband is the Church of Seiros. That and seeing the best done for the people are her main focuses in life.”

“Oh Cyril, you are just adorable,” she said.

“I don’t see why you’re saying something like that…” Cyril trailed off as he spotted a young woman with radiant green hair the same shade as Lady Rhea’s. She wore a dark dress that was held at wide bands just around the shoulders, but left most of the side of her body exposed. She was petite, shorter than him by the look of it and as she turned looking in the direction of Hilda and Cyril he noticed that she wore an ornate, white mask with gold trim that covered the upper half of her head.

If Hilda had been saying something or not, he didn’t know in that moment. Cyril just blurted out the question. “Is that girl one of the students at the Officers Academy?”

They had stopped dancing now and Hilda was adjusting the jewelry she wore around her neck, the beads clacked together as she moved them. She followed his line of sight to see who Cyril was asking about.

“The girl with the green hair?” Hilda asked. “Nope. There’s no one with green hair in the academy, well not a girl anyway. I take it you don’t recognize her?”

“Never seen her before in my life,” Cyril said.

“Oh, you’ve definitely got a type. You should go ask her to dance!”

“What? No!”

“You just danced with me and I’m way scarier than that girl.”

Cyril got into a huff and had to take a moment to calm himself. “I danced with you because you bullied me into it!”

Hilda sighed. “If you’re too much of a coward—”

“I’m not a coward,” Cyril said through clenched teeth.

“Then ask her.”

“No.”

“Ask her or I’ll tell Seteth you were in here lallygagging and flirting with me.”

“I was not fli—”

“Then you’re unattached, she looks like she’s alone. Go ask her. Look the worst she can do is—set you on fire or hit you with a lightning bolt or something, but at most she’ll probably just say no.” As Cyril marched across the floor he could hear Hilda mutter behind him. “This is for your own good.”

The hall where the banquet was being held seemed to grow longer before him and the slurry of conversation and noise sounded like little more than a hollow roar. He made his way over to the girl, glancing back in the hopes that Hilda would lose interest or get distracted by something shiny. But she was still there watching with her hands clasped in anticipation.

All of this was just entertainment for her.

Once he was closer it was easier for him to tell that this girl was actually slightly taller than him, but she had on heels too so it could have just been that. There was a kind of elegance to her, but also a level of endearing approachability. In a way, Hilda had been right, she was way scarier than this girl.

“Hey. I’ve never seen you around here before,” Cyril said from right next to her. “I mean, I hope it’s okay if I get this close. It’s a little loud in here.”

The girl smiled a toothy, earnest grin that made her look both much older and younger all at once. “I can completely understand that. I haven’t been anywhere so loud in quite some time and it is all a bit exhilarating, but also overwhelming.”

“Oh, if it’s too loud or something then we could walk down to the end of the hall there. You’d be shocked how much of a difference a little distance and that wall will make.”

Cyril didn’t so much as ask her to follow him as he gave her the opportunity, but when he started to walk she was close behind and when she reached for his hand to trail behind him he didn’t know what else to say besides to turn back to her and introduce himself.

“I’m Cyril, by the way.”

“Goodness, it is such a pleasure to meet you Cyril. I am Anne,” she replied.

When she was speaking Cyril glanced in the direction where he had left Hilda to see her giving him two, enthusiastic thumbs up.

As it went for most of his time sat the monastery, the vast majority of the people that he passed with Anne paid him no attention. The two of them were able to reach the far end of the room without incident and slip into the wide hall where most of the noise from the band and other guests was dampened.

Anne turned to face him and leaned against one of the walls, her eyes seeming to take on this other wordily glow. Cyril felt trapped in her gaze, but he didn’t want to look away. “You never did tell me where you came from.”

“Well, I would think that is because you never asked.” Anne glanced off to her side out into the chilled night air just beyond the threshold at the end of the hall. “This place used to be my home, sometime ago, at least. I was unwell and had to go somewhere else to rest, but I have returned.”

“Oh, so you’re going to be around more?”

Anne nodded and there was something about the way she sucked at her bottom lip. Cyril found his eyes settling on her mouth. He watched the shapes they made as they curled into a smile and prepared to answer his question.

“I should hope to be around for a lot more.”

She was stunning, Cyril decided and it was in a different fashion than he had ever thought of any other girl as stunning. He did want to dance with her, but he couldn’t bring himself to say the words.

“Are you a student at the Officer’s Academy?”

“No,” he said, his heart sinking. “Lady Rhea took me in. I am a servant, I guess. I’m just here to do whatever is asked of me.”

“Then will you please fulfill one of my requests? May I have this dance?” Anne asked.

Cyril nodded, wondering if he had somehow willed her into saying the words. He carefully wrapped his hand around her hip and laced the fingers of his other hand through hers. The two of them were a much better fit than he and Hilda had been, that’s for sure.

They danced in the darkened hallway with Cyril leading her with the same count that Hilda had only taught him moments before. He prayed to the Goddess that he didn’t let the counting in his head slip out of his lips. The music swelled and despite them having moved to get away from the sound, Cyril could swear he felt the notes coursing through him and guiding him until the dance became second nature.

Lost in the sound from the orchestra, the only thing that dragged him back to reality was Anne pressing herself against him and resting her cheek against his. Somehow, Cyril managed to keep dancing as his entire body became enveloped in an intense warmth. He even began to to feel light headed, but before it got to be too much, Anne stepped back and flattened her hands against his chest.

Her green eyes darted side to side nervously and it is as if something has spooked her. “Thank you for tonight, Cyril. I shall never forget this,” Anne said. And before Cyril could make a reply to brush the favor for her off as nothing, she pressed in close and kissed him on the lips.

As Cyril stood there, paralyzed with shock Anne made for the door into the night. She turned briefly to wave at him before racing outside. Eventually, he reached up and touched his fingers to his lips.

“Cyril?” Seteth swept into the hall with his cloaks billowing out behind him. “Did you come to partake of the festivities?”

“No, sir. I thought there might be work to be done so I—”

“—you would do well to take a break sometime and relax. This banquet has no restrictions on who may attend and this is your home too.” Seteth kept walking to wherever it was he was headed.

The orchestra situated at one end of the hall had been split so that they were on either side of the door leaving the path to the Cathedral open. Edelgard made her way through the large double doors and away from anyone who might hear. As she moved further from the celebration and the banquet the music dulled until only its swells were really audible, the wind dampening the rest of the notes.

Out here there would be no one to hear. Despite the urgency in the need to discuss what she had just been informed of further, she also needed to exercise extreme caution.

Being cautious had carried Hubert and her thus far, true, but they also could not afford to be too married to a course of action. The current opportunity could not wait. There was a time and place for the slow, meticulous longterm plotting that they usually employed; this was not one of them.

This could not even wait until they were safely back in the dormitories that night and it might be too suspicious were she and Hubert to vanish from the banquet so early. Out in the open night air of the causeway they could see anyone approaching long before they got close.

“Well, what do you think?” Edelgard asked as she turned to see him stalking out behind her. 

Hubert opened his hands at his sides, stretching his fingers. “Do you want my honest assessment or baseless encouragement,” he asked.

Edelgard tilted her head to one side and folded her arms over her chest. The gold dress was more revealing than most outfits she would dare wear, but it covered up what it had to. Namely the scar. “Come on, you know which.”

“It’s a fool’s errand. I mean, if it is not some elaborate trap,” he said.

“What reason would they have to trap us?”

“Are we even sure that it is the same camp, Lady Edelgard?” Hubert asked.

“What other large bandit camp this close to the monastery could they mean?” Edelgard said before lowering her voice. “I set up the bandits out of the group that we know to have worked with Kronya. The Knights followed the bandits to the camp. It has to be the same place.” She pounded her fist into her palm to empathize the point.

There was too much that they still didn’t know about their real enemy or exactly what they were capable of. Somehow they had an ability to imitate or even replace people and they seemed to be able to do this indefinitely with the only sure way of knowing who was and was not an imposter being to know the original person well. They also wielded strange magics, including something capable of wiping out a protected stronghold from hundreds of miles away, judging by the historical records it had only been used a few times which led the two of them to think that there must be some strict condition or limitation set on it.

These were just the things that she and Hubert had gleamed and at present they couldn’t be sure who else they could share all of this with because spies could be in their midst. 

Hubert took a deep breath gesturing with his hands parallel to each other. “We have walked the knife’s edge, thus far. What you suggest now is tantamount to declaring open war.”

Edelgard shrugged. “They knew with me at the Officer’s Academy we were likely to cross blades with them. If the Church happens to discover one of their outposts incidentally which is more important? Trying to dissuade Rhea or the Knights from acting and risking exposing myself or sticking to the ultimate plan?”

“If they so much as catch wind of our intentions or involvement in the aftermath, things will go sideways very quickly.”

“Regardless, this is our last opportunity to save her. It’s a miracle that they left us this much of a chance.”

“That is a testament to their assumption no one would dare try,” Hubert muttered. “I thought you once proclaimed not to believe in miracles, Lady Edelgard,” he said shooting her a sideways glance.

“I believe in the sort of miracles I make myself. Every piece is exactly where we need them: Monica, the bandits, them…and now the perfect instructor with the perfect justification for a mission that leaves us with plausible deniability.”

Edelgard gazed off of the bridge out into the darkness of the valley far below them. “One would begin to think that you’ve got a plan to have everything you want. I thought we had left that kind of idealized thinking in the past?” Hubert said.

“I will move to get everything I can, but I won’t compromise success to do it.”

“Remember those words and don’t burn down the whole countryside in the process,” Hubert said.

Edelgard readied herself to turn to leave when Hubert spoke a warning. “Someone approaches.” His lips barely moved and his words seemed to be diluted on the wind.

“Lady Edelgard, may I have a word with you…in private?” Dimitri Blaiddyd paused a short way up the causeway. He was tall, not quite to Hubert’s stature but there was something stately about him. Imposing, but in a different way from Hubert.

She glanced to Hubert. “I shall see you back at the dormitory.”

“Of course.” He gave the kind of obedient bow that people who didn’t really know Hubert would expect of him, but when he glanced up at her before leaving the close lipped grin on his face said: you had better tell me everything.

Edelgard nodded his dismissal, trying as best as she could to signify that she would brief him when they were next together.

Chapter Text

He swept the reception hall up and down to check the tables and even the hallways that held the stairwells at either end only to find no sign of her. Parts of the Monastery were still confusing to Claude and they were sure not in line with the kind of architecture that one would find in his home, Almyra.

The buildings of Garreg Mach were almost too big, too tall. From the outside there seemed to be space no one could access. Walls as thick as whole rooms or floors that just didn’t exist. Everything felt less like it was meticulously designed and planned out. It was more like it had been built on top of another version of these same places or even like the whole mountain was discarded earlier version of the building resting atop it.

Claude his way past the orchestra headed north toward the Cathedral thinking he might find her there. At the beginning of the long bridge that stretched to the next peak where the building rested something gave him pause and he glanced to his left to see Marianne sitting in the shadows.

She sat on the rampart, her legs dangling out over the open air. He wondered if anyone had noticed her. For sure, she hadn’t heard him yet.

“Marianne,” Claude said as he approached her. “I didn’t think you’d be out here.”

When she turned back her pretty face was bathed in a strip of light from the door and he could see the exhaustion under her eyes. In the space of time between when she realized he was able to see her and him actually seeing her, she found a way to force a smile. “Oh, hello, Claude.”

“I’ve been looking all over for you.”

“You have?” she seemed shocked, like she thought he would have forgotten her. Part of Claude wondered if Marianne felt like people only cared about her in the moments they could see her.

“Yeah,” Claude said with a smile. “Did you think I was joking. I made a plan to dance with the prettiest girl here.”

Marianne made a face like she was in pain. “You don’t have to—”

“I know.”

“Claude, I’m just,” Marianne let out a sigh. “I’m too tired to play pretend.”

Claude reached out a hand. “Then don’t. I’m tired of pretending too, Marianne. We’ve all got our roles to play, but I wasn’t pretending with you. I know you’re homesick or worried about something. But we can be sad inside together, you don’t need to be alone.”

Marianne grasped his hand with her smooth, maroon gloved one and he moved to help her climb down. She steadied herself with her other hand on his shoulder and then he led her back inside of the reception hall. They passed back through the doors where the orchestra was and Claude realized he hadn’t thought about all of the people who would be looking in this direction to see them walk in together.

It didn’t seem to matter to Marianne though and he was shocked when he went to direct her into position and she stepped in to let him place a hand at her side. He hadn’t noticed it before, but her cornflower hair was down, running down a silken line down the center of her back. The dress she wore was a deep maroon color to match the gloves, both of which suited her.

They moved together around the floor and he realized she knew what she was doing. As if sensing his amazement she spoke up, her voice small. “My father, he used to dance with me and my mother often.”

“Oh yeah?” Claude said. “My mom taught me to dance, but I think I look positively stupid doing it,” he chuckled.

“You don’t,” she said.

“Well, as long as I have your seal of approval…” Claude trailed off as he directed her into a twirl, his hand holding one of hers high as the dress flared out around her. It felt like the first time he had seen Marianne laugh so he played off that by slinging his half-cape over her head for a moment and pulling it away.

She chuckled harder and backed away. “What was that?”

“I don’t know. I thought it would be funny.”

Someone tapped Claude on the back and he turned around to see all five feet of Hilda standing behind him. “Excuse me, Claude. May I have this dance?”

“There’s plenty of me to go around, you’re just going to have to wait your turn.”

“I was talking to her, numb-nuts,” Hilda said as she pushed him in the chest. “The gloves really do match your dress, Marianne. I told you they’d look great on you.”

Claude raised his hands to let Hilda pass to take hold of Marianne.

Marianne stifled a grin and accepted Hilda’s invitation to dance. “They’re a little small is all, I guess,” she said.

“Well of course they are, I’m a little small. I made them on my hands.”

Sometimes when he was walking the monastery grounds he would see Hilda in the distance tinkering with something. He still found it hard to believe that she spent any of her spare time making things. She seemed bothered by the prospect of putting effort into anything at all.

Hilda cupped Marianne’s waist, taking the other girl back out onto the center of the dance floor. As they whirled away, Marianne did shoot him a glance with a slight smile. He guessed she was trying to say thank you.

Part of him wondered if Hilda could be doing all of this just to annoy him, it really didn’t seem like that was beneath her. Her happiness was far too genuine, she hadn’t even made sure that he was still watching as the two of them danced off. It didn’t matter why Hilda did this or who Marianne danced with as long as she was inside of the reception hall with everyone else. Whatever was eating at her was too much for her to handle alone.

Not that one couldn’t feel alone in a crowd.

“Duke Riegan?” A radiant woman dressed in all white grasped his wrist in a bid to get his attention. “Your Excellency.”

It wasn’t until he gazed into her face for a moment that he recognized her; she had the same features as his Professor but there was a softness behind her eyes. Sitri Eisner, Byleth’s mother. Claude had previously only seen her from a distance.

“Please, the title’s aren’t necessary. Claude is fine.” When she let his wrist go he reached up to scratch at his head absently flashing a disarming smile at her.

“All right then.” She had a smile that could melt chocolate from one hundred paces. Then she tilted her head to the side and paced around him as if trying to see something. “I thought so!” She clasped her hands together.

“Please share,” Claude said through a nervous chuckle.

“You’ve just got Lady Tiana’s eyes. When I heard the rumors and that you would be here I had hoped she might make an appearance.”

His mother had been at the Officer’s Academy once upon a time. It made sense that someone there would make the connection. For sure, by this time his lineage would be a topic on a lot of tongues, albeit behind closed doors.

“Afraid that’s not really in the cards.”

“Oh, Goddess. She is okay, right?”

Claude waved his hands frantically. “She’s perfectly healthy. She would just rather…keep to herself these days.”

“I see.”

“Yeah. Do parents typically come by the Officer’s Academy to visit or—”

“It’s not uncommon for the graduation ceremony, but the nobility tends to be busy with one crisis or the next” Sitri offered out her hand. “If I may ask, are you occupied at the moment?”

“Not at all. If we dance Professor Jeralt’s not going to crash through my dormitory door with a massive lance or something, is he?” He led her out to the dance floor, grasping the tips of her fingers gently.

Sitri laughed. “Of course not.”

“Well that’s good,” he said. “I really don’t want to have to fight the Blade Breaker.”

Claude went to move into the expected dancing position, but Sitri locked her fingers through his on both hands and swung them out to the sides and brought them back toward the center. The song was more upbeat, but he didn’t know she was going to bust into this quick free form thing. She glanced down and he followed her gaze, watching her foot placement as she stepped in and then back with one foot and then the other.

“Okay, I don’t know this one,” he said doing his best to keep up, but only managing to mirror her a moment after whatever she had done.

And then out of nowhere she raised her hands up, still holding his and twirled so that he did the same. He laughed, though he didn’t know where all of this was going. She pushed one of his hands onto her hip and grasped his other tight, moving him into the position of lead that he had originally tried to assume.

With her pressed closer now, he could see that the short burst of energy had the strands of green hair clinging to the sides of her face and forehead. She tilted her head back and laughed. Claude checked their sides to see that a few people had looked their way, but for the most part the room was engrossed in their own little worlds.

“Can’t tire you out, huh?” Sitri asked.

“What was all of that about?” Claude asked, forcing a little laugh.

“Isn’t it obvious?” Then Sitri leaned in close, though she was shorter so her face only came to near his chest. It was still enough for him to hear her whisper. “Do you think those girls noticed?”

“Hilda and Marianne?” Claude guessed out loud.

“Yes. They’re going to see you having all of the fun over here and think, hmm, maybe he’s not so bad.”

“I’m just glad to see Marianne having fun.”

“What about Hilda?”

“Hilda and I are like…oil and water,” Claude replied.

“It’s because she can tell you’re lying too her.” Sitri wrenched her hand out of his and reached up to boop him on the nose.

Claude fought to keep his face neutral. “Huh?” They weren’t dancing anymore as much as they were standing on the floor close together.

She pressed up onto her toes and sniffed the air around him. “You know, the cologne you wear features heavy Bergamot undertones. It’s almost impossible to get them in Fódlan, at least.” There was crooked smile on Sitri’s face as she raised an eyebrow at him.

Okay, so Claude would have to rescind what he had said before. Sitri was much scarier than her husband.

“I’m not going to tell anyone, but you should tell that girl the truth if you’re that worried about her trusting you,” Sitri said.

Claude sighed. “If you know my mom then you know what she would do if  I ran around spreading our family’s business to everyone.”

“Tiana would want you to be yourself.”

“I’d rather fight all Ten Elites and the Blade Breaker than face down Mom.”

“From another mother to you: the only thing every parent wants for their kid is them to have better and do better than they did.” The two of them resumed swaying slowly with the song again. “And on that front, I have to throw this out there—you know my daughter is very single, right?”

“She’s also very my Professor,” he said.

“Only for the year. Just consider it. That’s all I’ll say.” She patted him on the chest as she turned to leave. “Thanks for the dance, Claude.”

“You’re welcome, Lady Sitri.”

Despite being at Garreg Mach for two weeks now, there hadn’t been any real occasions where  Edelgard had been alone with either of her counterparts. The only times that she had spoken to Claude besides the small snide remarks were when they were fending off bandits before arriving at the school. The House Riegan heir seemed content to be alone most of the time, though he was rather chummy with most of his house.

Dimitri had a servant or bodyguard, Edelgard didn’t know which to consider the man, but he was an imposing mountain of a man. This was probably the first time other than the night of the attack she hadn’t seen Dimitri with him. Dedue, she thought he was called. He had to be the tallest person the Garreg Mach. Edelgard had never seen someone from Duscur, though with his skin the color of umber and his silver, straight hair, she could guess that’s where Dedue came from.

The timing of Dimitri finding her here, and without Dedue, it made her suspicious. She and Hubert had been in the middle of quite the conversation. Had he heard something about their plans to rescue Monica? Part of her worried that there could be other plans and plots out there made by Those Who Slither in the Dark, after all if they wanted their goals seen to by any means necessary it would only make sense for them to employ multiple, even competing methods to succeed.

“El, will you walk with me? Please?” Dimitri said.

Him standing there with a hand outstretched to her and using that name reminded her of another time and place where an another blond boy had looked at her in much the same way. The her that had known that person and gone by “El” had died along with the rest of her siblings. All that remained was a pale simulacrum.

“You’re—how?” She narrowed her eyes at him.

“Truth be told, I had hoped to broach the subject while we were traveling. That’s why I followed after you that night. Then Claude was following the both of us and we were set upon by those bandits…” Dimitri trailed off.

Those bandits should have never gotten that close to where they were per her instructions so either they followed after Claude or someone else gave them another set of orders she wasn’t privy to.

Edelgard shook her head. “I think I nearly allowed myself to believe it was all some dream, but you remembered.”

“How could I forget? Your hair is white, but it’s still you,” Dimitri said. 

“A lot more than my hair has changed in these past few years,” she said.

“You still carry the dagger I gave you, at least in most cases.” 

Edelgard laughed. “I usually do. Given the occasion and the dress, it seemed inappropriate.”

“Did you know it was me when we met again or—”

“—I only just realized, but the events that have colored the last several years of my life have distorted things.” Only after Edelgard spoke did the callousness of her words strike her. “I do apologize. With what happened to your parents, I was—”

He touched her on the cheek and brushed the hair away from her face. Instinct told her to smack his hand, but instead she drew in a sharp gasp. “It’s okay. I’m sure it would be safe to say that we both have experiences we’d rather forget about.”

Edelgard could see Dimitri’s thought process. He was wondering what could have been done that turned a woman’s hair stark white to the root? What could she have gone through. In the moment if he had asked her, she might have just told him.

“You did teach me how to dance all those years ago. That much I remember,” he said.

“Really, I remember a clumsy boy stepping all over my feet. You were always watching me instead of what you were doing,” she said through a chuckle.

Dimitri cracked a smile. “It was nerve wrecking being that close to a girl.”

“I was happy to get to dance with a boy—that wasn’t Hubert. He was already much too tall for me.”

Then they laughed together, though it seemed that in this case the humor came from nothing more than the two of them reminiscing about the people they used to be. Or the people they could have been. Back then she wasn’t the heir to the Empire and, to her at least, he was just a noble boy with two left feet.

Who would that version of them have become? Where would they have ended up?

They could have made their way toward the Cathedral, but they were drawn toward the music in the air. The bass and tempo grew so strong that they shook the causeway with the vibrations intensifying was they neared the hall again. Just before the pair of them had reached the reception hall proper, they made a turn in the corridor where the stairs to the second level were and walked out into the courtyard between the main building and the classrooms.

With sun having fully set the only light in the courtyard bled through the slim stained glass windows above the reception hall and from the torches on the walkways around the classrooms and and in-between the buildings.

Out here the music was soft, but still audible and the rhythmic beat of Pegasus wings against the chilly night air melded into the song. During the day the courtyard hosted all manner of students studying and practicing with one another even though they weren’t supposed to do that outside of the training ground area, but now it seemed to be just the pair of them and a distant guard standing under the covered walkway.

A few of the monastery’s infamous stray cats slept in a bush nearby.

“Well, do I have to say it?” Edelgard asked, unable to keep herself from smiling.

“Say what? Dimitri asked turning toward her.

Damn, he was handsome. Not that she cared about propriety, but was she even allowed to think that way anymore with what she was doing, with what she had planned to do? Dimitri had the polished aura of nobility and he had grown up into a fine man, but Edelgard felt there was something more to him. There was something more in him now, a darkness roiling beneath the surface so fierce and agitated that she felt as if she could reach out with one of her hands and touch it.

Though she didn’t need to because it was familiar to her. Dimitri had lost everything, much the same as her, at the hands of a dark conspiracy.

“I think His Highness really ought to ask the lady to dance.” Edelgard smiled and she wondered how many times she had used that real, genuine smile for anyone since he had last seen it.

“Oh.” Dimitri stepped closer to her and she could feel the heat from his person, smell the lavender of laundry soap intermingling with the strong, woody smell of his cologne. “Lady Edelgard, may I have this dance?”

Edelgard giggled. “Only if you can refrain from stepping all over my feet. You’ve gotten a lot bigger.”

“I wouldn’t want to cause you some grave injury so I will do what I can.”

When they were younger, she had spent hours of the day instructing him so that even know the feel of his hand at her waist had become comfortable. Still, there was new strength in his grip, though his touch for her was buffered by a kind of tender carefulness. It had been so long since anyone had regarded her as fragile, dainty, and in a way it felt nice. Odd how easily they slotted back into those old positions, those old roles.

The tension in her muscles faded as they started to twirl through the damp grass of the courtyard with the stars above them. Rhythmic flourishes from the music ebbed through the wall, but the song was so subdued that the beating of the grass against their shoes became part of the music.

They danced for what could have been a hair’s breadth in time or hours before Dimitri pressed two fingers into her palm twice. It was an old tell for a coming change—she hadn’t taught him that. He extended his hand out and with hers still clasped tight, he led her into a twirl until they were the full length of their arms apart.

Dimitri pulled her back to him, but she rotated so that her back was pressed to his chest and crossed her arms so that he could hold both of them while they swayed to the music front to back. Carefully, he moved to dip her over and she felt the white hair fall from around her shoulders to dangle out behind her in the night air.

Electricity thrummed in her stomach, Edelgard had never given much thought to what she wanted in another person for long term romance, but there was surely something of it in Dimitri. The blue and black with the gold accents of his dress uniform suited him, painted him as the living embodiment of the regal heirs of Blaiddyd spoken about in the old tales and depicted in aged paintings.

She rested her head against his chest and the dance became less formal, the techniques turning into a desire to be close. Guilt washed over her, but she fought back having any kind of harsh reaction. These plans that she and Hubert had worked out to betray her handlers could go awry at any moment. Hell, so could even be assassinated by one of the lords of her own Empire looking to get ahead.

Carefulness had guided her this far, but it wasn’t outside of the realm of possibility. So why couldn’t she then entertain this fantasy with Dimitri.

“Did you plan to get me alone to dance tonight?” Edelgard asked, her voice so small that she hardly recognized it.

Dimitri thought for a moment. “I had hoped that it was something that could happen.”

“Did you plan to do anything beyond that?” Absently or perhaps because they both wanted to avoid being spotting, they had danced their way into the shadow of the building right up against the stone barriers of the planters box.

He cleared his throat. “It may sound silly. I feel sillier still for saying it given everything else going on around us at the monastery and with Fódlan, but I would like it if we could enter a courtship of sorts.”

“A courtship?” Edelgard laughed. They were the rulers of two rival countries, even if they were at peace. And given everything they had planned that peace would be tested. “That sounds very structured, even restrictive. I’m not some shrinking flower of a maiden from those legends,” she said.

“No one is saying that you are, El,” Dimitri replied.

Edelgard sighed. “What I mean to say is, that wasn’t meant to be some jab. I’ve just never seen the point of something slow like a courtship,” she said.

“I—well, are you currently with anyone? Are you betrothed or otherwise spoken for?” Dimitri asked.

She hoped that the two of them still being pressed together and their movement with the music, dulled the blow of her words. Her tone certainly felt softer. “I wouldn’t say that I have a desire to be considered spoken for,” she said.

“I do,” Dimitri said. He turned her around in his leaned in, bringing his face close to hers. “Call it whatever you will, I want to devote myself to you—the Empress of my heart.”

Edelgard broke away from him, stumbling off in a fit of laughter. “I’m sorry, did you rehearse this?”

Dimitri’s cheeks burned bright and he scratched at his blond hair. “I may have repeated some things I wanted to say in the mirror and also I ran some by Dedue. I would have asked Sylvain or Claude, but—”

Edelgard stepped onto one of the stone blocks that ran along the perimeter of the hedges and turned, tugging Dimitri forward by the front of his shirt until their lips were pressed flush against one another. He had been drinking before because that was the way his kiss tasted, like dry, bitter wine. Of course he hadn’t planned to kiss her, no matter how far this had gone in his head it hadn’t gone there.

But once the shock of what was happening wore off she could tell that he wanted to.

His hands, which had been frozen at his sides, moved to encompass her waist. That was fine with her as she was balancing on the edge of the building’s gardens for the height boost and still kissing him with this furious anger that seemed to have boiled over inside of her the second he said that corny, practiced line.

Her tongue bargained its way into Dimitri’s mouth and suddenly she wasn’t worried about bandit camps or the coming conflict. In his enthusiasm, Dimitri pulled her forward by the hips until they were forced to break contact due to her almost falling off the planter box. She stumbled out across the grass, smoothing her hands out over the bottom of her dress.

“My apologies,” he said glancing around like he expected someone to have seen them.

“Dimitri.”

He ran his fingers through his blond hair, almost seeming panicked. “Maybe all of this was a foolish fantasy. I don’t really know what I am doing, I’m ashamed to admit.”

“Dimitri,” Edelgard took his, wrapping her fingers through his. “Come, before people start to make their way back to the dormitories.” She tugged his arm and he stayed put.

“What?”

“Have I really got to spell it out for you?” she raised an eyebrow and then jerked her head in the direction of the dorms, bidding him to follow.

In anticipation of all the cinnamon rolls being taken from the desserts table, she had decided to grab two and a slice out of another for good measure. Byleth hunched down over her plate at the edge of the table so as not to drop any (more) crumbs down the front of her dress. When her mother had insisted that this outfit would look amazing on her, she’d apparently forgotten how messy an eater her daughter was.

Manuela, who had been sitting next to her at an otherwise vacant table meant for ten, grasped  the base of her empty wine glass with both hands. “Can I have some that?”

Byleth plucked the last bit of the half cinnamon roll up to push it into her mouth, chewing as she spoke. “No. You better hurry and get your own before that dastard Jeritza sneaks in here and eats them all.”

“Goddess, why are you so stingy with food?”

“Why are you still conscious?” Byleth said through a full mouth. “You’ve done nothing but drink for the entire banquet and I’m pretty sure you walked in here tipsy.”

Manuela ran a finger around the rim of her wine glass. “Because I’m good at what I do. That’s why.” She gave Byleth one of those stern looks that she would have recoiled at when she were younger. “You could at least put a napkin over the top of your dress so you’re not all sticky.”

Byleth shrugged. “I’m going to take a shower after this anyway. Plus, it’s not like anyone ever complained about a girl smelling like cinnamon and icing.”

The songstress struggled to keep her head level as she squinted at Byleth. “You know, maybe this is the bottles of wine talking, but you are a fascinating creature. You might even be wise beyond your years.” 

“That is definitely the wine talking,” Byleth said through a full mouth. “I’m telling Brother Avia to cut you off.”

Manuela gasped. “Traitor!”

“It’s for your own good.”

Manuela folded her arms over her chest and began to pout.

“Would you look at that, someone set a couple of my favorite gals up at a table together.”

“Oh, it’s Jeralt. Maybe you can talk your rotten brat of a spawn out of denying me my wine,” she said turning away from Byleth.

He sighed. “I’m sorry old friend, but she’s her own woman. Also, if she doesn’t stop you what are the rest of us going to drink.”

Manuela flopped down onto the table dramatically and groaned.

Jeralt grasped the back of Byleth’s chair and bent down to kiss her on top of the head. “You clean up well, Kid. What’s got you more gussied up than normal?”

Despite having been there since a little before the banquet began, this was Byleth’s first time seeing her father tonight. She leaned to the side to take all of him in. He stood between her an Manuela holding a half empty mug of dark beer. With him all dressed up in his unfastened burnt orange jerkin with the white dress shirt peeking out from underneath he seemed as awkward as a horse riding a human.

“You’re one to talk old timer. Did Mom dress you like this? Or was it Grandma?” she asked.

“You know how it is, first one then the other. But you should have seen Sitri’s face light up when she saw me in it.” Jeralt chuckled and there was a familiar glint in his eye. There were times when he spoke about her mother and got this joyous air about him. Sure, he was proud of her and Belial, but Sitri was truly his world.

Most of Fódlan may have worshiped Sothis, but her father revered a different Goddess.

Byleth peered toward the other end of the reception hall trying to see if her mother was somewhere nearby, but she didn’t bother to get up as, even on her feet, it was just too crowded. If ever she thought that this building was too large to be filled, she could look back at any White Heron Cup or banquet to put things in perspective. The main reception hall sat beneath the upper floor that included her grandmother’s audience chamber, the library, and some of the offices, including hers. The building could encompass so much, but right now it seemed barely able to contain the Officer’s Academy students, the staff, and the bit of clergy in attendance.

Byleth leaned to one side in her chair, trying to get closer to her father though she had to be conscious of how she moved in this dress. It was sleeveless and opened down the sides with a strip at the center revealing the bare skin almost down to her navel. Worst of all it didn’t feel like it was really fitting her. If she leaned too far anyone looking her way might really get a show.

“Hey, where is Mom?” as Byleth asked the question she felt a soft vibration against the table and looked over to see Manuela snoring.

Jeralt touched a hand to his beard. “I actually don’t know. Last time I saw her she was dancing with your House Leader. They caused a bit of a ruckus.”

She leaned her chair back in a futile attempt to see through the dancers and huddled groups. “Goddess, why’d you let her—you know she’s going to try and convince him to marry me or whatever, right?”

“And it never works.” Jeralt lifted his mug to take a pull from it.

Byleth reached over and swiped the wine glass from in front of Manuela before standing briefly to take the partially drank bottle form the center of the table. “Yeah, but the more practice she gets the better she is going too get at it,” she said as she poured some into the glass for herself. The wine was dark red and so thick it seemed to coat the sides of the glass.

“Your mother just wants to make sure you’re happy.”

“Yeah, well I just don’t think happiness comes from the kind of marriage where I’ve got to spend my time raising an heir or navigating the politics of the nobility.” She took a drink and the wine was warmer than she expected, the taste of it was harsh in the back of her throat. It wasn’t the usual stuff that Manuela drank.

“I know that. I’m sure Sitri knows it too. She’s just trying different things out, I guess. You know, you used to be so small she could hold you in one arm like this,” he cradled his arm up against the side of his body as if he were holding something in the crook of his elbow against his abdomen. “You’re obviously bigger now and older—she just wants to find some way to still be a mother to you.” 

Byleth sighed. “I get that. I just, I don’t know.”

Her father’s hand was still large enough that he could nearly palm the top of her head, he ruffled her forest green hair until she bent forward in the chair. “You just have to talk to her. You always can talk to us, remember that.”

“Dad, cut it out,” Byleth whined.

Jeralt pushed one chair aside to pull out the one next to her as he let out a thick, belly laugh. He dropped into the seat at her side, the wood and leather of the chair creaking from the weight. He leaned forward on the table. “Did you eat already, Kid? I mean, real food.”

She shook her head. “This is my dinner.”

“I swear your diet wouldn’t have changed at all since you were five if it was up to you.”

“You know what you and Mom can start finding for me instead of a noble? Someone nice who bakes and isn’t going to be mad if I don’t really want to put on a bra,” Byleth said.

“Yeah, Kid, this might be one of those times when you’re giving just a bit too much information,” Jeralt said.

Byleth shrugged. “Just pretend you overheard me thinking out loud.”

The two of them sat in silence for a few more minutes while Manuela snored on next to them before Byleth spoke up again. “You know what I want to know about, why does one of my students keeps asking after you.”

“Oh you mean Leonie?” Jeralt asked with a nod.

“You never mentioned her before.”

“Well it was about six years ago. The Knights made the trek out to Gloucester County to dispatch of some poachers. I taught her a few things. Honestly didn’t think I would see her again, especially not all the way over here,” he explained. “Kind of shocked she remembered.”

“Goddess, does she remember. You’re all she talks about.” She took another drink from her wine. “She’s damn good with a spear, though.”

“What can I say. I leave a mark on people.”

“You want to trade,” Byleth said, perhaps too fast as Jeralt didn’t seem to know what she meant at first.

“We can’t just pawn students off. They have to want to move Houses and if my memory serves they usually don’t want to abandon their countrymen.”

“She’s do better in a House with more knights. She’s a cavalier—I don’t even like horses,” Byleth said.

“You don’t even know who you want in exchange, you’re just trying to give me this poor girl,” Jeralt said.

“What about Mercedes?”

“Boy, you really had that name queued up, didn’t you.”

“My House doesn’t have any good dedicated healers, which is going to be very important on any missions if we don’t want to ask Grandma to borrow one from the knights.”

Jeralt laughed. “This sounds like one of your little rehearsed excuses. You like that girl because she’s busty and has those big eyes. You’re not fooling me.”

“I think you’re mistaking me for somebody else.”

“Bullshit. You’re my daughter and we have the exact same tastes. Have you seen your mother?”

“Great talk, Dad. Now who is sharing too much?” She hoisted the wine bottle up to pour herself some more.

“Hey, you just got onto Manuela about drinking all that.”

“What a difference a few minutes makes. I’m going to tell Mom what you said, you know.”

Jeralt put his mug aside. “The busty thing? Come on now, are we back to you tattling on people again?”

“We are.”

“Have you seen your brother?” He asked in an obvious bid to change the subject.

“Nope, he probably made a plate and scampered off to one of his crawl spaces.”

“Did he tell you about this bandit camp he found?”

She took another drink. “Yeah, that was the first thing he did this morning. Usually I would say it’s not our duty to go looking for a fight with the students, but the students were kind of attacked by them first.” She spit the little bit of gnarled cork into her hand and examined it. 

“Ultimately it will be up to Lady Rhea in the end,” Jeralt said.

Byleth nodded. “Even then, I’m sure favorite granddaughter and first grand child gets a little more pull than knight’s captain. I’m going on that mission.”

“By all means, Kid, if you want it then it’s all yours,” Jeralt said spreading his arms wide like he knew that giving it up would make Byleth offer it back to him.

But she just tore off a piece of cinnamon roll, shrugged, and said. “Okay.” She licked her fingers as she finished the small piece. “You know I did want to let you know that come the Battle of the Eagle and the Lion, we’re taking down your House and Jeritza’s.”

“Oh, I welcome another challenge.”

“We only faired so badly this time because you have so many students that started off well trained, plus, as I said before, we didn’t have a dedicated healer.”

He smiled over at her. “Then I guess you have a few months to train someone up in it or scout one out somewhere.”

“Oh, I’m gonna,” she muttered.

“Have you had much interaction with anyone from the other Houses?”

“Here and there, but nothing too significant,” Byleth said. “Kind of how it was last year, they mostly kept to themselves as far as professors were concerned unless they needed some special area of study.”

“What do you think about the idea that Houses trade students from time to time or that they help one another on larger missions throughout the year?”

Byleth shrugged. “Something you wanted to suggest to Grandma?”

“Not exactly, not me,” he said. “Dimitri brought it up to me, asked me and your mom if we thought it could be something that we tried.”

Outside of the things that she knew she needed or how their Houses affected her, Byleth tended not to meddle in the affairs of the other professors. At least that was how it had been last year. It wasn’t that she was against the idea, but over the years of living at the Monastery she had seen more than a few squabbles break about between students of the different Houses over trivial things.

“You seem to be getting along with Dimitri,” Byleth said.

Her father nodded, though she could tell he was glancing around to see who was close. “He’s a good kid, but I get the sense that he’s struggling more than he lets on.”

The Tragedy of Duscur was one of those things that most seemed afraid to talk about, especially this year with the Officer’s Academy hosting students so close to the center of it. It worried Byleth because the whispers that she had heard and the rumors both contradicted and overlapped one another.

Only four years after the fact, the truth already seemed unattainable.

“You don’t really talk about your time in the Kingdom much, but you were born there. Did you know King Lambert? Wait, when was he at the Officer’s Academy?” Byleth asked.

Jeralt thought for a moment. “That would have been back in the late fifties or early sixties. I was here, but you know I had my hands full with something else.” He poked her in the cheek and made a little noise.

Byleth rolled her eyes. “Look, I’m not opposed to the idea of working with the other Houses more closely. If he needs help appealing to Grandma I could act as an adjunct of sorts. Give him that special Grandma’s-Favorite-Boost.”

Jeralt laughed. “We might ask you to be in the room when it comes up, but I think the boy might need to stand on his own two feet. He’s going to be King in a few years.”

“Even the King has advisors,” Manuela said, her words coming out muffled because her cheek was smashed against the surface of the table.

“Did she hear all that?” Byleth asked.

“Kid, she won’t even remember being at this table by tomorrow.”

The orchestral music grew distant until it was lost beneath the wind as they raced across the campus toward the main staircase that led up to the dormitory’s top floor. Here and there light bled out of the windows on the buildings they passed catching Edelgard’s hair or the golden fabric of her dress.

Even at her height and with those high heeled shoes she was outrunning him, the wind in her wake flooding his nose with her smell. They turned the corner onto the cobblestone path that led down the front side of the dormitories. Overhead a Pegasus Knight circled as part of the guard detail and suddenly Dimitri was remember how when he had been young he had wanted to be a Pegasus Knight like Greta of Arianrhold.

His dreams had been crushed when he found out that they were mostly women or petite men, due to the weight limit their mounts could carry.

At times a couple of students would loiter around the stone archway that housed the stairs up to the second floor, though he and Edelgard were doing nothing wrong, Dimitri was glad to see the area vacant tonight. The chandelier halfway up the stairs painted the brick walls with golden light. Edelgard stopped against the bottom riser to rest her bare back against the wall. A light sheen of sweat and mist from the nighttime air made it seem like she glowed standing there.

“Part of me is surprised you followed me,” she said. Of course she wasn’t out of breath, neither of them should be. Even without the well of energy that having a crest provided, he would expect the Adrestian Princess to be in magnificent shape.

“Oh, are you?” He stopped across from her to lean against the opposing wall.

“Mmhmm.” Edelgard reached up and tugged at some ornamental hair decoration that seemed to be a device for making her hair fain out wider at the top of the head. Dimitri hadn’t even noticed it until she was holding it in her hands, regarding it judgmentally.

“I may not know much, but I think that when a woman kisses you and tells you to come, you should.”

“Wise words.” She started up the steps and Dimitri was having a hard time not staring at the way her backside moved beneath that shimmering gold fabric. He had been looking so intently that when she turned to call back to him, she was more than halfway up to the next floor. “Are you coming or not?”

He jogged to catch up to her and followed her into the high second story hallway of the dormitories. Edelgard caught his hand and dragged him into the third room down, the first room lined in red carpet which belonged to her. She put a hand to his chest as if to ask him to stay put and then stepped out into the hall to look next door.

“Hubert’s not back,” she said as she returned. She shut the door behind herself.

“Would that be a problem?” Dimitri hadn’t planned to be in Edelgard’s room like this, he didn’t really know what this was.

“It depends, really,” Edelgard said.

Dimitri glanced at the long table against the one wall covered in small scrolls, books, letters sealed with the Adrestian Imperial mark. Even with the stationary and the like all over, the room was tidy. Each student’s room had started out the same, with the exception of the colors of the carpet to signify their House. While everyone brought personal effects, the school prohibited larger items or furniture unless they were strictly necessary. The dagger he had given her rested on the small table near her beside, beneath the candle. It was a spot that he didn’t think it was meant to sit for long, judging by how neat the rest of it was.

There was something to be said about Edelgard and the almost humble studiousness of her quarters.

Edelgard’s back was to him as she fidgeted with the clasp of the silver necklace she wore behind her neck. She let out a frustrated grunt. “Could you help me with this, Dimitri, please?” He crossed the room and came up behind her as she held her silver hair up out of the way. The mechanism on this clasp is kind of difficult and my hair tries to fall in the way and gets caught.

“I can see how that would be.” He tried pinching the small lever of the clasp between his index fingers and thumb without thinking about how smooth her skin felt or the intoxicating scent of her this close up.

The distractions were not boding well for his getting the necklace off. Every time he thought he had pinched the little liver down, the skin of his massive finger blocked the chain from sliding out. But removing his finger to give the chain more leeway, released the lever trapping it behind the clasp. For a while he worked at it, muttering to himself as Edelgard tried to coach him through it.

“Maybe it’s best to pull the chain to the one side and then open the clasp to give it space to slide out,” she said. Then after a few more tense moments of him barely losing his grip on the clasp she added. “It is rather difficult to get off.”

“Yes, that it is. I’m surprised you still put it on,” he said through gritted teeth.

Edelgard turned, causing Dimitri to stop what he was doing when he almost had it. She could be so frustrating at times, even now, but his annoyance was quelled with her next words and a hand motion. “I only do because it wears so well.” She let her fingers trail down the spindly chain until they came to a rest at the beginning of her cleavage.

“Yes, that is lovely,” Dimitri said because he felt that he had to say something as he stared directly into the event horizon between her breasts.

“Can you just hold my hair up?” Edelgard turned her back to him again. “I can get it, if that’s out of the way.”

Carefully, as if the hair itself might feel pain, Dimitri lifted it. It felt like fine, shimmery silk in his hands. Somehow it weighed nothing. He stared at it so long that he thought he might see his reflection in the surface of the strands.

“Got it,” Edelgard said as she held up the necklace for him to see.

“Good, that seemed like quite the ordeal.”

Edelgard hung the chain of the necklace over a small stand where other jewelry was situated. There were only a few other pieces resting on it, all of them silver or gold and each one seemed distinctly Edelgard by his estimation.

“Yes,” she started. “I’m very lucky you were here to help.”

When she was facing him again, Dimitri had to stifle a gasp as he watched the from of her dress crumple until it was bunched up around her waist. She stepped toward him and pressed a hand to his abdomen.

“Lady Edelgard—”

“If you want to leave that’s your choice.”

“It’s not that, it’s just.” His eyes took her body in now, but an incision scar between her breasts called to his attention. The mark was just below the line of her dress and had been out of sight before, but barely. In what world would that have happened and not been healed with magic?

“Then do you want to sit on my bed with me?”

“Yes.”

Dimitri sat on the bed while his topless childhood friend, the future Empress of Adrestia, folded her legs up underneath herself to sit next to him. The gold dress had fallen most of the way off, but he was staring at the pale blue of her eyes wondering how they had changed so. Sure, they had been a been blue before, but something in them had faded.

Edelgard raised up onto her knees and swarmed him with kisses, holding tight to his suit jacket to steady herself to keep from tumbling off the bed. Her mouth was warm and sweet and somehow these kisses were better than the first one. Each time their lips opened into one another, they delayed longer staying locked together until finally he held her by the chin letting his pinky finger trail along one side of her neck.

His heart thundered in his ears and his muscles went taut. In the thrill his body didn’t know what to do and he felt the Crest of Blaiddyd flair to life within him like a surge of hot energy filling his veins. He didn’t know how long they had been kissing when she finally broke contact.

“El,” he said, trying to coax her lips back to his.

“I know,” she replied, out of breath now.

And he knew it too, though he didn’t know what it was. Something had passed between them, an understanding. It took him a moment to notice her hand on his inner thigh. Dimitri ran his hand along her arm and stopped at the elbow.

“You okay?” she asked.

“Yeah.”

Edelgard fussed with the length of her hair, trying to braid it up out of the way haphazardly, but failed. “Lay back on the bed,” she said. “But let’s slide off your shoes first.”

Dimitri did so, because he had learned when a woman kisses you and tells you to do a thing, you just do.

She actually moved to help him with the shoes. She flung them across into the middle of her bedroom. Through half lidded eyes she kissed him again, slower this time. Her hair hung down around them like curtains, brushed against Dimitri’s cheek lightly.

Edelgard was kneeling next to him on the bed and when he wrapped an arm around the knees and legs he felt felt her shoe. “You’re wearing your shoes in the bed still.” Dimitri’s eyes searched her face, he couldn’t figure out what she really wanted. What did she have in store for him.

“It’s my bed. If we’re in your bed next time you can throw my shoes across the room,” Edelgard said.

They were kissing again and he couldn’t help remember that she used to be funny like this. She used to order him to get closer to and then go all quiet when he did, like she hadn’t expected him to actually do it.

His hand found the small of her back and trailed down a finger across the skin until felt the slight rises and falls of her spine and followed that path down. Edelgard shivered at his touch, arching her back and almost falling fully onto of Dimitri. He caught under the arms, only after the rush of frantic motion to keep her from toppling over did he realize his hand had brushed against the side of her breast.

“Sorry about that,” he said in the newfound stillness of the room.

“It’s okay,” Edelgard said through a laugh that it seemed she was trying to force. “It was just that, well, the way your hand moved it reminded me of a rat.”

“A rat?”

“The way they scamper over you or brush up against your skin. Forget I said anything,” she said.

And he Dimitri did in the next few moments when she slipped his hands off of her sides and wiggled the rest of the way out of the dress and shoes.

Knights in full plate armor lined the cross-shaped halls leading up to the door to the Council Room, crammed together in such close proximity that the strip of blue carpet running the center of the hall was the only place left to walk. Even the personal guard of the Regent hadn’t the faintest clue of what took place between their lord and the others beyond the sturdy oak doors.

Rufus Thierry Blaiddyd had seen to it that only he and a single advisor had been allowed into the room with the prisoner. His only hope in all of this was that the contingent of knights who had escorted her didn’t recognize the woman.

Even if someone recognized her, they might think her some trick of their memory.  She was still just as he remembered her in their few prior meetings, like a ghost or someone frozen in time. Flawless skin so pale that it glowed like the snow on a sunny day. A body on the curvaceous side of thin with hips to make a man give into everything the Goddess abhorred. Hair the color of ravens feathers.

And those deep violet eyes that had always been so curious, though now they avoided meeting his at every turn. Lady Patricia had been just one more thing gifted to his brother. One more thing denied to him.

Cornelia Arnim, the Court Mage of Faerghus stood near the closed door with her arms folded over her chest, projecting the kind of aura that could have shattered mountains. She had been known for her domineering presence, but tonight it was as if a dark cloud shrouded the room.

“Where was she found?” Rufus asked though he was sure he had asked this before.

“As I’ve said before, near Arianrhold, you know.”

Rufus didn’t want to anger the woman, that darkness in the room, the static crackling at the air—it had to be her magic He needed to choose his next words wisely. “And she was recognized by these mercenaries that apprehended her?”

“Rufus—”

“—it’s Regent. Regent Rufus!” Even he had been surprised by the bellow of his voice.

Patricia didn’t bother to try to speak again as she shrunk in on herself, backing up against the long table that filled the center of the room.

“My Lord,” Cornelia spoke as she stepped away from the wall. “I know that we could have had the woman killed for her perceived crime. No one would fault us for doing away with her for the death of the King and the attempted killing of the Prince, but I knew you would want to at least speak with the criminal. She was a very dear friend to me once upon a time.”

Patricia fell to her knees, her skirts bunching up around her. It was impossible for Rufus to tell what was going through her head. But he knew that Cornelia had brought him a loose end that needed to be tied up. They had used her to deliver the King into their hands during the Tragedy of Duscur, but Rufus couldn’t be sure if she knew of his involvement.

He wondered if they should put her to death, pin the crimes on her. Perhaps even use it to quell the unrest in other portions of Faerghus. If he brought the true culprit to justice the people would have to see him as the rightful King and those Royalists in House Fraidarius would look foolish for opposing him.

“You have something to say to me, then, woman?”

“I killed them. I killed them because those fiends had my daughter. They told me that I could see her again if I just went along…” she trailed off.

Cornelia walked over and squatted next to Patricia, taking her face in her hands before looking to Rufus. “You know what I think my Lord, I think we’ve got another victim of the true culprit in this situation. Though Patricia might have blood on her hand it is only because he orchestrated and willed all of this. You had said before you wanted all obstruction removed from your path. This is our chance.”

Rufus nodded. This plan could work in all our favors and it had come at a most opportune time.

The Regent stroked at the ends of his blond hair, not surprised to find them drenched in sweat. It had been quite the night. “I have my course of action. Have a detail of guards deliver Lady Patricia to my chambers and wait with her there. We must keep all of this from getting to the Church or those meddlesome Royalists.”

Cornelia raised an eye brow as Patricia started to cry. “Your chambers, my lord.”

Rufus walked the length of the table, running a gloved hand over its hardwood surface. His hand clenched and he pounded his fist into the wood of the table hard enough that the metal studs marking his knuckles marred the wooden surface and bit into his flesh. Patricia jumped.

This woman was little more than a mewling wretch. Four years on the run had taken the air of nobility out of her, had robbed her of fight. He could do with her as he pleased. He could choke her and watch her eyes bulge and that alabaster skin turn to bright red, purple. Or he could keep her for himself, bend her to a different plan.

“Yes,” Rufus started. “ Maybe out of a need for some mercy I shall take it upon myself to see to it that Patricia says the proper things…if she wishes to keep that beautiful head attached to her shoulders.”

Chapter Text

Dimitri dragged his fingers through tendrils of silver hair lit bright orange in the morning sunlight. The weight of her against him, her fingers resting on his bare chest as she drank in drowsy, shallow breaths stirred a strange beast that had been dormant deep inside of him. It was an entirely different kind from the one featured in Felix’s jabs and slights.

And because he had been unaware of its existence, he was ill equipped to deal with its appetites.  It might have even been altogether more virulent if left unchecked.

His hand moved beneath the sheet when he grasped the smooth skin of her lower back, still slick with sweat. Looking into the soft, peaceful expression on her face he couldn’t help feel a twinge of guilt, though. If not for the absence of the beauty mark slightly below her right eye and the stark white hair, she would have been the image of Lady Patricia brought back from the dead.

This was for Edelgard, too, they killed her mother.

Right then and there Edelgard’s voice join the chorus of the dead as a living victim. Another one of those who would have the wrongs done against them paid in blood.

Edelgard shifted her weight against him, a smile spreading over her face at what must have been the realization of who she was still laying on. She looked even more like Patricia, did she even know what had become of her mother? Killed on foreign soil by conspirators after another nation’s crown

When he had met her only her uncle had been present and though for a few years they had shared a mother, they never shared a home. He couldn’t be sure when she had even last seen Patricia or for how long the two of them had been together, but from what he could tell it had been a long time ago.

“Good morning,” she said, her voice raspy with sleep. Sothis, even her breath in the morning was just fantastic.

As his thumb made lazy circles in one of the divots of her lower back and he looked into her faded blue eyes all doubt melted away. “Hey.”

“I’m kind of surprised you’re still here.”

“I couldn’t very well leave with you sleeping on me. I was supposed to go riding with Sylvain. He might be quite hurt.” The night with her had almost made him forget that and the other obligations he had. This would take some explaining.

“Sylvain? Is he your ginger cavalier with the messy hair?” Edelgard asked.

“Why yes, I suppose that describes him.” Dimitri had never realized it before, but all three of their Houses had a ginger cavalier in them.

“I think he’s the one who keeps asking me if the carpets match the drapes. I can’t for the life of me figure out what he could mean.”

“Knowing Sylvain, it’s nothing decent. I shall have a word with him.”

“I’m sure there’s no need, but thank you,”  her smile deepened. “I  am glad you chose to stay, despite the difficulty we’re going to have explaining this to everyone else.”

“Why? Nothing has to change between the Kingdom of Faerghus and the Adrestian Empire—our nations have been amicable for decades now with no major conflict between any of the three of us since eight-sixty-one.”

“And I would love for that to continue to be the case, but I worry that reality will not be so kind,” Edelgard said.

Dimitri reached up with his other hand and caressed her cheek. “Then it is up to the nobility, to the leaders, to us to force reality to bend to our wills. To shape it.”

The expression on Edelgard’s face stiffened.

Then he added. “What was it I told you all those years ago?”

Despite the vagueness of what he had asked the look of recognition in her eyes was unmistakable. “This is for you. Use it to cut a path to the future you wish for…”

“And I will rise up to meet you there, El.” Over the years he had thought back on those words a multitude of times and the girl he had said them too. He hadn’t thought of her as Patricia’s daughter or the future Empress of the Adrestian Empire for when he knew her she had been neither of those things to him.

He had fallen for her then, as foolish as it may sound.

“I just never thought that the meeting part would happen so early. The world I want is no closer at hand,” Edelgard said, her tone laden with disappointment.

Dimitri liked to think that he knew what she wanted. He had heard stories about her father and the kind of man he had been before upheaval in the Empire. Truth be told, he worried that one of the main reasons that the Kingdom, Alliance, and Empire had abstained from wars with each other for these last several generations was not because of some pact of cooperation, but due to internal strife that they all faced.

Someone knocked at the door to Edelgard’s dormitory room, a light steady hand that paused for a second before the speaker revealed themselves. “Edelgard, there is becoming a problem. Dedue and Hubert are at each other’s necks—he is thinking you child-napped Prince Dimitri.”

“How fast can you put your clothes on?” Edelgard whispered.

“Pretty fast, donning armor at a brash pace is a thing I’ve practiced,” he replied. She rolled off of him so he could scuttle away from the bed and began frantically pulling his articles of clothing on. Edelgard stepped into her own dress and jerked it up over her body, trying to get at the zipper in the back.

“Petra! Let Dedue and Hubert know there is no cause for alarm. If you could send them both here, please?” Edelgard said.

“I am trying, but I may be having a fight on my hand.”

In the hall Dimitri could pick out her footfalls as she charged away and he raced to re-button his shirt at double time.

Claude made his way toward the other end of the upstairs hall of the dormitory, trying his best to ignore the confusing ruckus going on. It wasn’t that he was not interested, the little bits of conversation that he gleamed sounded a little too enticing if he was being honest. He hoped he could get the details when things were sorted out.

“I think you’re all fretting over nothing. Dimitri just probably absconded to somewhere peaceful with a lady or two,” he heard Sylvain say as he passed.

“Don’t speak like that of His Highness,” Ingrid yelled shoving him in the chest.

A little further down the hall, just as he passed the stairs he spotted Caspar, Ferdinand, and Felix in a cluster. Not the oddest group, the three of them did spend a lot of their time in the practice arenas from what he had seen.

“Why is the boar’s lapdog in Edelgard’s room?” He heard Felix mutter.

Okay, so the details were starting to sound somewhat salacious: a missing prince, talk of threesomes, and a future King’s Vassal in a future Empress’s room? Claude really hoped that Hilda had heard something about all of this, but when he arrived at the end of the hallway where her room was, the door was shut tight.

No surprise there, though. Hilda was a heavy sleeper and if others were distracted with their own matters they weren’t trying to put her to work.

He leaned against the doorframe and extracted one of his hands from his pocket to knock. “Hilda, are you awake? I need to talk to you.” Claude waited, expecting to hear something, but when he peered next door he noticed that the room there was empty. Marianne’s room.

Had the two of them not made it back, when the banquet ended he hadn’t taken the time to account for them between helping the Professor carry Manuela back to her room and packing up a cake for Lysithea to take. He knocked again. “Hilda?”

The door opened and Hilda poked her head through framed by the slit of the door, her pink bangs a frayed mess. “What is it Claude, some of us need to get our beauty sleep?”

“I came to talk to you about something, but now I’m worried that Marianne is missing. I didn’t see her return to her room last night and the door is wide open. I think in all the commotion out here, someone may have missed her.”

Hilda sighed. “Maybe you should, oh I don’t know, check the stables. She goes there sometimes to help with the horses.”

Claude paced down the hall. “It seems unlike her to leave the door open like this. Plus, I’m just worried about her, okay? If you’re not dressed can you throw on some clothes and we can go look for her?”

A hand poked out through the crack in the door and flicked at him, trying to shoo him away. “Oh, you worry too much. Marianne’s a big girl.”

How much did Hilda know? He couldn’t very well put Marianne’s business out there, but he really hated to leave her alone like that, even if it turned out to be nothing in the end he wanted to find her.

“Look, I know it might sound strange, but everyone in Golden Deer is my responsibility. I just want to see to it that Marianne is accounted for,” Claude said. “So please, will you help me look?”

Hilda sighed. “There’s no need.” She grabbed Claude at the wrist with surprising speed and jerked him through the door so hard that he wasn’t sure if he could have fought her off if he tried. There was a pop in his shoulder and elbow as he stumbled headlong into her room.

“Gods, Hilda. You’ve got the body of a princess with the strength of a gladiatorial fighter, you could warn me...” the words trailed off as he spotted Marianne laying in the bed sleeping.

“After we were dancing we went outside because they were asking for help cleaning and I just needed some fresh air.”

“You mean you needed to avoid work.”

“I’d just done my nails and Marianne had my gloves, was I just supposed to get callouses or mess up my manicure?” Hilda folded her arms over her chest and for the first time he noticed she was still dressed from the previous night. “Some guy was out in the courtyards near the tables and he kept shouting at us someone named Maury or something. I think he was some pervert. It really upset Marianne and I was going to, you know, punch him, but then I thought about my nails. So I promised her I would let her sleep with me just in case.”

“She almost looks too peaceful like that,” Claude said.

“Yeah, I don’t think the poor thing has slept a full night since we’ve been here. I’ve never seen someone so cute and sweet be so introverted.” Hilda glanced back over her shoulder at Marianne as she spoke.

Claude nodded in agreement. “Yeah. You said that guy was yelling about Maury?”

“Mario. Maurice. Maury,” Hilda said with a dismissive flick of the wrist. “He looked mad as a hatter, that one. Wasn’t about to listen to him and let it make me stupider.”

None of the names sounded familiar to Claude, there wasn’t anyone at the Officer’s Academy or Garreg Mach that he had heard of like that. “Right, well. I’m glad you got her out of there.”

“Of course I did. Oh, you wanted to ask me something?” Hilda said.

“We’re not going to wake her up, are we?”

“Oh no, she’s really drunk. That girl could put away a whole caste of wine, probably not the best way for her to cope though.”

Claude packed that fact away, he’d no need for it. “Well, I just wanted to say that I’m sorry, actually.”

“Sorry for what?” Hilda asked.

He scratched at the side of his head. “I get that the Alliance has operated for a long time without me. And I don’t want to step on anyone’s toes in all of this if I don’t have to. Truth is, I think I can do some good as Duke. At the very least I can assure that all of us make it back to our families in one piece from the Officer’s Academy.”

Hilda’s pink eyes seemed to regard him for a long time. “I tend not to trust any man that’s prettier than me and I just didn’t know a lot about you. But I see the way you are with Marianne and, well, I can at least tell you’re not some sex pest like that guy the other night.”

“High praise coming from the star of the Golden Deer herself, wait, did you call me pretty?”

“Okay, you should go so Marianne can get sleep in peace,” she said trying to herd him out of the room like he was a sheep.

“Wait, there is another thing. Starting right now I promise to be as forthcoming as I can with you. There’s some limits to that,” he said, Hilda paused near the door to let him speak. “Some things that I would like to tell you, but I made a promise to my mother.”

“Goddess, was it like her dying wish or something?”

“No, I just really would hate for her to be mad at me. I’d face down an army to avoid that fate,” he said.

Hilda pushed him toward the door and opened it. “I think I understand now. And it’s not like House Riegan has any reason to betray the Alliance—now you really need to go. Bye,” she said elongating her final word before shutting the door.

Any arguments were quelled when Dedue and Hubert had stepped foot in her dormitory room. They stood just inside of the door, arms nearly touching. These rooms had not been made with having guests in mind.

Even the two of them there, frozen before her door was more interpersonal interaction than she had ever seen between the two of them. It was Hubert who actually spoke first. “Well, this is an unforeseen turn of events.”

Dedue glanced to Edelgard and then averted his eyes.

“Hubert, you remember when my uncle took me to the Kingdom to hide away?” Edelgard asked. “Well, the friend that I made there that gifted me the dagger that I carry—as it would turn out that boy was Prince Dimitri.” She held her hands out as if to acknowledge Dimitri where he sat on the corner of her bed. It was as far as he could be from her seat at the desk. “We actually sat up talking and just lost track of time,” she added.

“Talking? Is that what that smell is?” Hubert said.

Dedue glanced to him, said nothing, and shuffled as far to the side as he could get away from him.

Edelgard narrowed her eyes at her trusted advisor. “Hubert!” When she surveyed the room even Dimitri’s eyes had gone wide with free of what might come of her vassal’s little outburst. Her bedchamber fell into an uneasy silence and the four of them sat together, none of them looking directly at the others until Dedue spoke.

“It isn’t my place to bother myself with matters like this that concern His Highnesses’s personal life. I had worried that something foul had befallen you.”

Dimitri rose from his seat. “If this could remain between the four of us for now, unless there is anyone else trusted that Edelgard would like to include. We just don’t want to cause any undue rumors and discomfort.”

Edelgard rounded on him. “If anyone expressed discomfort at who you or I choose to spend our free time with I could think of a few discomforting places that I could shove the pointed end of my boot.”

“Your boots are far too small to cause anyone real discomfort,” Hubert said.

“Would you like to find out?” Edelgard yelled.

“You couldn’t reach any of the spots of which you speak. Respectfully, Lady Edelgard.”

Dedue held a hand out, catching Hubert at the chest, though he hadn’t taken a step forward. Hubert glanced down at the hand and then at Dedue, but he had removed it before he began to speak. “There seem to have been a great deal of developments that happened last night. I think that after the excitement in the hall, coming in here to see this was a surprise to Lord Vestra and myself. Perhaps we could clear everyone out and then he and I could go take our morning tea. Are you a fan of Cinnamon blend?”

Hubert stared at the man. This was actually one of his favorite teas, Edelgard knew. How did Dedue guess that? “I am not above taking tea, I suppose.” As the two of them made their way to the door, Hubert glanced back. “I still want a full report of what went on.”

Dedue ushered him out and Edelgard and Dimitri couldn’t help but burst into laughter. “I’m sorry, Hubert can seem very cold and calculating, but he is really just protective of me…in all ways it would seem.”

“It’s okay. I understand—”

Before Dimitri could finish his thought, the door to Edelgard’s room flew open and Dorothea swept into the room in a dramatic fashion and flopped onto Edelgard’s bed right next to Dimitri. As if nothing were out of place about the whole situation she began to speak.

“Edie you’ve got to do something. Caspar is out in the hallway with that sour puss from the Blue Lions and Ferdie and he’s toweling off with one of my bras. I heard him call it a sweat rag!” Dorothea hugged one of Edelgard’s pillows to her chest, resting her chin against it. And it was almost like she noticed Dimitri in delayed time, though she didn’t give the proper reaction to it.

“Oh, Dimitri? How long have you two been doing—whatever this is?” She asked, turning to glance over at him.

“Dorothea, there isn’t any—”

Dimitri interrupted Edelgard. “I’m more worried about you now. Did Caspar steal your clothes as part of a prank or some lewd act,” his voice already brimmed with a stoic frustration. Edelgard had to admit the way that he ignored everything else and came to Dorothea’s aid was endearing.

“No, well, it’s a long story, Your Highness. You see, there was this knight and well, things were going well on a walk that he and I took. Better than well, steamy, actually. And you know what you do when things get too hot?”

“Take your shirt off?”

Dorothea nodded. “Exactly. Or rather, something like that. I thought I carried it off but I must have dropped it somewhere between the training grounds and the dormitory and when I heard the noise earlier I came up here and saw Caspar. He must have found it and not known what it was.”

Dimitri covered his mouth and chin with one hand. Edelgard had to cover her own mouth to hide her wide grin. “I see. Well, if you would like I could pretend it was mine and go ask for it back and then return it to you when next we see each other?” Dimitri said.

“You would?” Dorothea asked.

“Of course.”

“Oh, crisis averted. It seems Edelgard won’t have to behead anyone, after all.” Edelgard stood in the center of her room, stunned as Dorothea pushed herself up off of the bed and headed toward the door. Before she left, she turned back to Edelgard, cupped her hand around her mouth so Dimitri couldn’t see and mouthed good job. “Thank you again, Your Highness!” She shouted before shutting the door.

Dimitri pointed toward the room door. “Does that happen often?” he asked.

Edelgard chuckled. “In the last couple of weeks I’ve had to handle several crises similar to that. I’m actually glad you were here to field this one.”

“Me too,” he nodded. “I want to say it would be good practice running a Kingdom.”

“I am kind of jealous of her calling you Your Highness. She never does that for me,” Edelgard said. 

Whatever drama had erupted upstairs in the dormitories coupled with the late start for the whole academy due the banquet made this the perfect time for Leonie go to the arena. It was early enough out that the light still hadn’t reached between the residential building and the back of the Officers Academy proper.

The aromatic oils from the waters in the bathhouse still hadn’t wafted down to be detectable. She had expected an empty arena to be able to practice kata and go over stances and forms, what Leonie didn’t anticipate was finding a man glistening with a sheen of sweat from exertion while practicing a series of strikes on one of the test dummies.

If he heard the door open and close, he didn’t spare a thought for whoever it was that entered the arena. His attacks were precise, deft. Each one hitting a crucial spot with enough force that hay and dust sprayed free from the impact. Leonie jabbed the butt of her spear into the ground, digging it in by rocking it side to side absently, lost in taking in the stranger’s form and technique.

Something of what he used were a little too familiar almost like they were advanced versions of what she had been taught years ago. The man was distractingly handsome; his shirt was off and the power of each careful movement rippled through the muscles of his arms, chest, abdomen. But didn’t he look kind of familiar.

He looked related to Professor Byleth? She did have a brother who was a knight.

The man folded his arms over his chest, letting the length of his weapon rest tucked into the gap between the side of his stomach and elbow. “I got a bit distracted there. Did you need the room?”

Tendrils of hair clung to his forehead, slicked down with sweat and his bright green eyes were focused on her now. Okay, so he was way more handsome than he had seemed from the side. She really needed to stop staring at him and just answer.

“No.” Leonie lifted her spear and walked toward the sandy patch of the floor where there were other practice dummies. “There’s plenty of room out here by my estimate,” she added.

He snapped his finger and pointed at her. “Hey, you’re in my sister’s class aren’t you?”

“Professor Byleth is your sister? I had no idea?” Leonie said, forcing a chuckle.

“Yeah, she looks nothing like me,” he said. She couldn’t tell if that was a joke or not, they looked very much alike. They’d both taken after their mother, Lady Sitri, who Leonie had seen here and there around the campus. He offered out his hand.

“I’m Belial.”

“Leonie Pinelli.”

“Pinelli. Pinelli. Pinelli—ah, a commoner. Well, I won’t feel as weird about asking you to spar.”

Leonie stiffened. “You want to spar?”

“Dummies are fine and all, but I’d rather take a poke at something that can block.” Belial twirled his weapon, bringing it to a stop behind his back. “You interested?

“Hell yeah,” she nodded.

Only moments ago she had her mind set on practicing alone with no distractions, but no way could she pass up the chance to spar with the Captain’s other kid. She hefted a shield from the rack and strapped it onto one arm, taking the spear in her dominant hand.

Belial’s shield lay on the ground just outside of the sand, he flipped it up into the air with the tip of his foot and caught it to slide his arm through the straps and pull them tight with his teeth.

They stepped into the sand patch to circle around its center, Leonie adjusting her feet for the threat of oncoming attacks. She ran through the different openings shown to her by the Captain in her head trying to figure out which one Belial might choose. They moved around each other like two predators competing for a meal when he called to her.

“Don’t watch the ground in front of you; watch my feet. Their positioning will tell you where the attack’s gonna go.” He banged the shield on the armor near one knee as if to drive home the point.

When Leonie opened her mouth to protest the memory of the same thing said to her by the Captain flooded over her. There was barely time for her to guard against his first jab, it wasn’t fast or meant to punch through her defenses. It just made her bring the shield up to catch the blunted cloth tip of the practice spear.

In the moment after his attempt was thrown off, she tried to reply with a prod of her own only for Belial to leap back and dance away leaving sand kicked up in his wake. He approached again and in another exchange he narrowly missed her and when Leonie moved to attack he became so compact, squatting into his shield and scuttling away like a crab.

He popped up into a stance with the shield in front of his body and the spear resting in a notch at the top and ready to extend out. The only bit of him visible over the top of his cover a drenched tuft of green hair and those wary eyes. Despite his labored breathing  and a fatigue that must have seen him here well before dawn, it felt like he was hyper aware. It was as if the whole room were his eyes.

It’s okay, you only need to watch one place.

Leonie focused on his boots, trying to pick out a pattern in the way the leather bent when he stepped back versus when he advanced. She breathed in the sour sweat in the air from the previous night’s duels mixed with the crisp morning air.

“You got dreams of being a knight?” His voice took on an authoritative quality, though it could have just been the way it echoed from behind that shield. 

“Yeah. I want to follow in the footsteps of the best, Captain Jeralt.”

Belial chuckled. “I thought your moves felt familiar. Hey, do you want to see a trick he taught me?”

Without waiting for her to answer he made am ad dash for her, shield up with the spear propped up top. He had moved so fast that she had to wonder if he had a crest fueling him. Leonie did the only thing that she could in that instance and block the attack, but when he made impact he strong-armed the shield to take the blow and let the head of it brush past his flank. Then he twisted shield around so that the back of it was facing the spears shaft and caught it in his hand.

Locked in place with him this close, Leonie had no options for attacking save for her feet. At the same time she was too close to be jabbed at by him, though that was part of his plan. He dropped his weapon from his hand as he spoke.

“This is far too dangerous if there’s a second opponent, but in a single duel you can subdue your opponent like this.” He tackled her to the sand with a hard thud, so that he straddled her. She didn’t even know how he had maneuvered so that the two of them ended up in this position.

Leonie lay beneath him, the warm sand pressed against her back with his weight barring down on her. From this angle he was kind of magnificent to behold, back in her village most boys never gave her as much attention as Belial had in a handful of minutes. A sort of youthful joy over took him and for a long time he perched on her like a statue and examined her, like he were seeing something he hadn’t noticed before, something that only became clear with his hair dangling part of the way into his vision.

She had always wished someone would look at her with this much interest and though she had lost the fight a part of her wanted to burst into a giggling fit. Her face felt warm, far too warm for the short time they’d spent fighting.

“This is the kind of attack you’re going to want to look out for, especially if your opponent is bigger than you,” his voice low and raspy.

Leonie managed to reach up and tap him on the side of the abdomen, only to find his abdomen tight with muscles. She really shouldn’t have dared to touch him because a strange sensation welled up in her stomach. If she weren’t such a coward,  she would have just kissed him right then and there and suffered whatever reaction and consequences there were.

Belial climbed off of her and helped her to her feet. When she hadn’t said anything in so long he must have thought her upset.

“Sorry about that. The sand in here is so thick that I knew you would be fine—the thicker the sand the harder it is to walk in. The heavier you are, the more tiring the fight gets on sandy beaches and in the desert,” he said.

Finally on her feet again Leonie could feel her heart rate returning to normal, she dusted the back of her head off to knock the sand free. “It’s alright, thanks for, uh, showing me that and telling me the thing about the sand. I’ll have to remember that one.”

Then the two of them were just standing there in stark silence. It would have gone on for longer than it did if the door to the arena hadn’t flown open to reveal Felix and Ingrid from the Blue Lions and Ferdinand and Caspar from the Black Eagles classes—the regular crowd. Caspar and Felix spent more time there than anywhere else in the academy, for sure.

Felix’s hair had still been down and he went to tie it back. “Belial’s here. Seems there might actually be a challenge for a change.” Though it was a taunt his expression never changed from the sculpted scowl he normally wore.

Most of them didn’t actually pay nay mind to Leonie unless she initiated a sparring session with them first.

“Not today Felix,” Belial said through a smile. “I’ve got to report to my grandmother about something that’s been going on. It was nice sparring with you Leonie.”

Leonie could feel Felix and the other nobles staring at her. “It was nice sparring with you, too.” Had he done that on purpose to signify to them that she was okay?

Steam raced past Dedue’s arms as he poured the scolding water over the cinnamon sticks. The angle of the tea pot, the thickness and cadence of the water, there were deliberate choices in each movement that Duscuran made. Hubert could hardly believe anyone outside of the Empire cared about tea as much as he did.

Those biases needed to go.

Everything Dedue did looked more than sufficient. In fact, there was nothing that he would have done differently. Still, he liked to concentrate on this because it meant he didn’t have to think about what he had learned about Lady Edelgard and Dimitri. Countless plans drawn up in the archives of his mind would have to be reworked if one ounce of this thing between her and Dimitri went any number of different ways and each path came with its own challenges and revisions and whole avenues that would be lost to them.

Though perhaps there were some to be gained.

“I like to let the cinnamon steep in the water for a few minutes before placing in some bags of yellow tea. I find not having some Camellia Sinensis in the blend hampers my ability to even think of it as a true tea.” The sound of Dedue’s voice called Hubert back to the present.

“Yellow tea?” Hubert’s nose perked up and he leaned out over the table.

Dedue gave his head a slight nod. “The florals and almost fruity flavors give the cinnamon more character, in my opinion.”

This was an interesting development indeed.

Hubert rubbed his chin and cocked his head to one side. “Which type of cinnamon do you use?”

“Dagdan cinnamon, the only true type,” Dedue said.

“Hmm, it must be hard to import it from over the sea. I dare say it’s hard for us to get it to the Empire and we’re quite a bit closer.”

Dedue produced a small wooden box which he plucked the teabags out of and plopped them into the water to finish steeping. The air took on a thick, sweet aroma that seemed to carry a warmth with it, despite the chilled morning air.

When Dedue had sat down across from him the two men stared at each other for some time, they couldn’t very well just keep discussing tea. Could they?

“Edelgard takes her teas as sweet as she can, to the point that the water can’t take the sugars anymore.” Hubert would make conversation this way, using the tea as a leaping off point to steer the man to something else. If he was going to become intertwined in the Kingdom’s affairs perhaps there was something he could gleam from Dedue. 

“I had a younger sister like that, Safya,” Dedue said.

Had a younger sister. The word carried a weighty sorrow with it. Hubert could surmise what had become of the people Dedue had lost, but he wondered how far he could push this to learn something else. Maybe he could even express his true feelings on the matter.

“My sincerest apologies for what became of your people due to an obvious conspiracy by grim opportunists.”

Dedue had been adjusting his cup on the saucer, pushing it by the handle to rotate it to the optimal spot when he glanced up. This man was indeed serious about his teas. “You called it a conspiracy.”

“Of course, I have seen evidence of what happened that day and none of your countrymen appear anywhere among those who could have truly benefited from brash regicide,” Hubert said.

The tea was distributed between them in equal measure with enough for at least one more serving each by the time that Dedue’s shock seemed to have worn off. “Why would you have reason to look into what happened in Duscur.”

“You don’t think someone going around murdering Kings is of importance to me?” Hubert lifted the glass to his face but couldn’t take a sip quite yet due to the heat. “In reality, Lady Edelgard has a vested interest in conspiracies, especially those done by hapless snakes that cloak their goals in the guise of nationalism.”

Dedue drank the tea at the temperature it was, seemingly unaffected. “Even so, the Empire and Kingdom are different places. The things that are present in one are not the same in the other.”

“I wasn’t working from the assumption that the conspiracy started in Fhirdiad or even the Kingdom.”

Hubert had only planned to dangle that out there and try to walk it back or make some weird attempt to cover it up. Dedue was no fool and if he made too bold a statement it might make him suspicious.

As Hubert plotted his next words out, he lifted the cup and took a sip. The warm, aromatic tea washed down the back of his throat in the instant before a shrill scream shattered the peaceful morning air in the Monastery Gardens. The two men shot each other a knowing glance and bolted from their chairs, racing across the gardens and back out toward the direction of the sound, the promenade between the classrooms and the side of the reception hall.

The two of them jogged up to the front of the Golden Deer classroom where a cluster of people had gathered. Professor Byleth staggered through the group, wearing tinted glasses for some reason and stopped to glance down at the ground where a sprawled out, bloody body lay. She pushed the glasses up onto her forehead.

“Oh shit,” Byleth said.

“Professor, what happened here?” Dedue asked before he glanced to Hubert.

Hubert didn’t recognize the man on the ground, though he didn’t look like anyone from the clergy or academy itself.

“I heard a girl scream and came running over,” Byleth said.

Lorenz of House Gloucester raised his hand. “That was me, I was heading into the classroom to pick up a book when I saw this.”

“That is a lot of blood. Anyone want to participate in a hands on lesson in moving a dead guy? There’s some extra credit for you in it.”

Chapter Text

“What do mean you moved the body?” Seteth pushed his thin fingers back through his dark green hair. He paced the tile floor of the Archbishop’s audience chamber, his face growing redder with each step.

Byleth shrugged. “It was blocking my classroom and scaring all of the academy students.” Grandma didn’t seem to be anywhere to be seen, which is why she was dealing with Seteth today. “Besides, I didn’t move it. Hubert claimed that he knew how. Not sure why he volunteered that information, but I’d lock my door tonight if I were you.”

“Enough, Professor!” Seteth shouted. “You should have contacted me or Lady Rhea and had some of the knights block off that area of the grounds until the situation could be dealt with.”

“Uncle Seteth.” Sitri rushed forward pressing a hand to Seteth’s shoulder to try and subdue his outburst, but his expression only looked more annoyed. She had been in one of the side chambers, but must have overheard what was happening. “Please, don’t yell at the girl like that.”

Byleth hadn’t grown up with Seteth, though he was his grandmother’s younger brother and considered her second, he held no official title in the Monastery and had only returned to the a few years ago. Other than Seteth, she really didn’t know what to call him.

“Sitri, she is not a child. She has to learn to responsibility.”

“She made a mistake.”

“Yes, I am pretty sure because she’s suffering from bottle ache!” Seteth said.

Byleth interrupted them. “It’s not bottle ache. I woke up drunk.” Sitri shuffled over to Byleth and placed the back of her hand against her daughter’s forehead to check for a fever.

Seteth rolled his eyes so hard that it looked as if he might do a cartwheel. “We will handle the matter. There is an announcement of some importance I need to make you aware of. My youngest sister arrived yesterday, but with the festivities and her travel, I figured it best to wait until today to tell you.”

“Flayn is here.” Her mother’s big green eyes went wider, if Byleth hadn’t seen it before she wouldn’t think it possible. “I’ve always wanted to meet her.”

“You and Grandma have another sister?” Byleth asked. 

“Yes, she is the youngest of the bunch and has been away for a while due to circumstances beyond all our control. Although I worry this environment might not be in her best interest, what with random corpses popping up,” Seteth said.

“It looks like we’re missing all the excitement.” Jeralt walked into the audience chamber with Dimitri at his side.

Byleth eyed the Prince of Faerghus. He had always been amicable and usually could be found reassuring others, but he seemed almost too happy today. What’s gotten into him.

“Captain Jeralt. It would seem you’re right on time to hear the news: my youngest sister has returned from her time away and your daughter here mishandled a corpse.”

Her father’s brow furrowed and he glared at her.

“Don’t look at me like I killed the guy. If I had I would have done just like you taught me, burn it or, you know, pitch it over the side of the mountain.”

As she expected her father burst into laughter which made Seteth even angrier. Jeralt kissed the top of her mother’s head. “Seems like I missed a lot.”

“Wait, is everything okay? Who passed away?” Dimitri asked.

Byleth shrugged.

“There was a body found in front of the Golden Deer classroom this morning,” Sitri said.

“Oh,” Dimitri wrung his hands as he stood next to her father, his eyes fixed on the floor as if there were something he needed to get out. “I wanted to see if we could try something on our next missions, with the Archbishop’s approval, but it doesn’t seem she is here and there may be more important matters at hand as it stands.”

“Dead body or not, Seteth would be in here bent out of shape one way or another.” Jeralt slapped Dimitri on the back. “Just tell him your plan, Son. He might know if there’s any chance of using it.”

“Right, sir. Well, Seteth—I’ve been thinking that if we’re all to learn cooperation between the nations of Fódlan wouldn’t it do us well to work in mixed groups for some missions? Members of the Lions, Deer, and Eagle could assist each other as needed, especially since there is some skill specialization within each House that the others are lacking.”

Seteth kept his hands locked behind his back, though he lowered his head as if thinking.

“And there is some precedent for us needing to know what each other is capable of, like in the last large attack by Almyra one of the issues was organizing troops between two nations that didn’t trust one another.”

“This might not be something you know, Son, and I probably should have explained it earlier, but there is already a system for asking a willing student to help with missions. It’s something the Professors can do,” Jeralt said.

“Yes. I see no problem with it and I do not think Rhea will object. The details can be fleshed out when we discuss this month’s mission, but right now we have to deal with the dead body that Professor Byleth had moved for some reason.”

“I told you the exact reason.”

“Where did you put the corpse, Byleth?”

“I had him put it near the stables, since no one but the knights really goes over there. Then I threw a frock from the storage over him. Nobody’s going to notice.” Byleth shrugged, still leaning her head against her mother’s shoulder.

“Seems I will need to deal with this myself, but you two are coming with me to clean up this mess.” Seteth started off through the center of the room, his half cape flowing out behind him as he walked. He glanced back. “Did anyone say that they recognized the deceased?”

“It’s him!” Marianne recoiled, hiding behind her hands.

“I’ve never seen that guy before in my life,” said Hilda. “But I know a dead body when I see one. And that guy is super dead.”

Ferdinand stood next to the mangled corpse, the frock clutched in one hand. “Yes, this man is quite dead. Good thing we frightened the pigs away, they were already eating his body.”

It had been the commotion just outside of the pigpen that had caught Hilda and Marianne’s attention. Someone had let the animals out to roam the larger yard only for them to seemingly find a human body to gnaw at. Ferdinand had been working nearby and followed them over, which was good because Hilda wasn’t touching any dead bodies. Though she probably would have never lifted the frock to find out what was going on in the first place.

“That’s the man who pursued us last night after the banquet,” Marianne explained.

Hilda never got a really good look at him on account of it being dark. “Oh yeah, that’s the pervert.”

“Pervert? Did he do anything unbecoming to you?” Asked Ferdinand.

Marianne lowered her head, her cheeks going flush. “No. Not really.”

“He was just yelling something about Martin or Marrison. You can’t have expected us to go up to some skeevy guy in the middle of the night and let him, like, attempt to kidnap us or something. I mean, he’d still be dead, but I’d have been the one to do it.”

One of the pigs wandered up and was attempting to sneak past Ferdinand. “Oh boy, he’s going for it,” Hilda muttered.

It was Marianne who rushed over, waving her hands to get the pig’s attention. “Oh, you mustn’t! Come away from there, Priscilla”

Priscilla? She named them. This was perhaps the most animated Marianne had ever been, even Ferdinand stopped to stare at her as she chased the pig in a tight circle and herded it and a few of the others back into the pen.

Hilda had to admit that was pretty damn adorable.

“You three seem rather comfortable around a corpse and like you may very well know more than you are letting on.”

Marianne was staring past Hilda at the source of the voice and when she turned to see who it was Hubert and Dedue were towering right behind her. Hilda jumped backward, almost losing her footing and falling near all this dirt and pig slop.

“Gah, I’m pretty sure I actually peed myself. Don’t sneak up on someone like that!” Hilda socked him in the arm with the bottom of her fist.

Hubert glared at her, but walked around her toward the body.

“What are you trying to insinuate, Hubert?” Ferdinand said.

The two of them probably should have been more friendly than this, seeing as how they were from the same House and were closely connected to the Imperial Crown, but Ferdinand regarded Hubert with some suspicion and she could see why.

He was a lanky, creepy type. Always sulking in shadows and around corners. Though it was surprising to see him with Dedue from the Blue Lions.

“Oh nothing at all, we merely waited to see who came to collect the fruits of their labor,” Hubert said pointing to the body.

“Waited? Were you two watching us from the bushes?” Hilda asked.

“Then how did you know where the body was?” Asked Hubert.

“Um, we didn’t the pigs found it. Are you two having some kind of treacherous love love affair, what are you even doing in the same place?”

Ferdinand tossed the frock back over the corpse haphazardly. “How did you two even know where the body was to watch it?”

“We put it here,” Dedue explained. “We were asked to move it by Professor Byleth.”

“So you moved it over here where the pigs could eat it?” Ferdinand said.

Hubert sighed. “Of course I didn’t move the body with the pigpen open.” He and Ferdinand were now face to face while Dedue and Marianne watched along with Hilda. “You don’t think that I know that pigs are one of the most efficient ways to get rid of a human corpse?”

“Well, you shouldn’t feed them that,” Marianne said with a surprising amount of confidence. “They should be fed food that’s approved and meant for them by the stable master.”

Hubert rounded on her. “Why are you inserting yourself into this when you were the exact person who mentioned knowing something about this man.” He stalked toward her, a finger aimed at her chest.

“Hey, you ghoul! You don’t talk to her like that!” Hilda stepped in between him and Marianne and despite the considerable size difference between them, when she walked toward him it stopped him in his tracks.

“Children please.” Seteth rounded the corner in the path along the side of the stables, his cape fluttering out behind him in his wake. Byleth and Lady Sitri were close behind him.

“These two were spying, trying to incriminate us,” Hilda whined. “You need to tell Dimitri and Edelgard to leash their mutts.”

“Come on Hilda, I’m in enough trouble.” Byleth hid her face behind her head and tried to slink out of Seteth’s field of vision.

“Seteth, Professor, we found these three snooping around the dead body that Dedue and I were told to move here,” Hubert explained.

Seteth held his hand up. “That’s enough. I think I’ve found the volunteers that are going to be tasked with figuring out who this man is, who killed him, and, if possible, why he was killed.”

Ferdinand ran a hand back through his hair, which was admittedly immaculately kept. “If I may speak out of turn, Seteth—”

“You may not,” Seteth said.

“But this seems like it may be something better left to the Knights of Seiros themselves,” Ferdinand continued despite Seteth’s protests.

Lady Sitri actually spoke up. “His Highness, I mean, Dimitri came to us with a wonderful idea that Seteth is going to be testing out: instead of assigning each house to its own individual mission, a mix of academy students from each house will be tasked with working together on missions.”

“If this course is of His Highness’s wishes, then so be it,” said Dedue.

Hubert raised a hand. “I would like to say that Dedue and I can then investigate this alone.”

“Denied. This task is for you five. You will be reporting directly to myself and Lady Sitri here.”

Sitri waved cheerfully. Hilda figured that with Hubert’s words at she and Marianne would actually be able to get out of this. Investigating dead bodies didn’t exactly seem like the kind of thing that the Officer’s Academy should be doing, but at the very least she wouldn’t need to fight.

There she was. Anne stood at the end of the dock with Lady Rhea.

So the two of them didn’t just have the same color hair. They had some connection. Cyril watched from near the dining hall doors. He had stepped outside to empty out some old grease that had been left over from the previous night’s dinner when he spotted them. Anne was now without her mask, he could tell, and she was close to Rhea. The pair spoke to each other behind bountiful curtains of bright green hair.

He stacked the dishes besides the door and went to the corner of the raised patio area around the dining house door, trying to get at an angle where Anne wouldn’t easily see him if she hadn’t already.

Could he just walk down there and speak to the girl?

In all this, Cyril learned she really loved to fish and she seemed to be good at it. While he stood there the two of them plucked three large fish together.

Anne’s demeanor was not that of the girl who had plied him for a dance the previous night; she wore a belled out black dress with the gold embroidery so common to the Officer’s Academy uniforms and the clothing of the clergy. Her slender arms that seemed too long for her form were almost lost under the puffy sleeves of the dress and the knee high boots stopped just shy of her boots. She wore long stockings beneath the dress—most of her radiant skin was covered and the shape of her body was more hidden.

But when she walked to the end of the dock and turned back to look at Rhea he caught a look at the lips that had kissed him and those gorgeous green eyes. Probably the most distinct difference, the one that could have thrown him off if he hadn’t had the girl on his mind, was how she had her hair styled: split from the the middle starting at the back and pulled down into huge drill like curls that covered the sides of her head hung down over her chest.

And then Anne saw him.

Her eyes met his. Even from a distance, he felt a kind of intense heat in the sides of his neck that radiated up to his face. Then Anne smiled sheepishly at him and turned back to her fishing.

The door to the dining hall sprung open and in flurry of a too large uniform jacket and rapid, stumbling foot steps Lysithea clambered out. “Cyril? Where is the cookware? I need to finish cleaning them.” She reached up and brushed the white hair out of her face.

“Right. Sorry, Miss Lysithea.” He tore his eyes away from Anne and rushed to pick up the stack of dishes where he left them.

“You put them on the ground?” she asked.

Cyril touches his forehead, trying to play off what happened in a bid to keep her from figuring out what he was actually doing. “Yeah, sorry. Hey, I’ll help you finish up.” He hefted everything up, knowing full well that Lysithea would probably be too delicate for this kind of work.

The smart thing would have been for her to leave. All she had to do was make some excuse. The others didn’t want her here and she certainly couldn’t be any kind of help to them. Any assistance she might offer would out the very secret that her adopted father fought so hard to protect.

They made their way back toward the main building with she and Hilda in back and the three men walking up front like they needed to keep an eye on one another.

Honestly she could just slip away and no one would chase after her or care. Or maybe she could tell them that her stomach hurt and try to insinuate that it may have been related to menstruation. Talk like that usually made men want nothing to do with her, usually. Though she worried about Hubert. She didn’t know him well, but given her experiences with him so far he might demand to see proof.

Leaving would be unfair to Hilda though. She had been tasked with pushing the covered cart where they had stored the body for now. Most of the time with Hilda she didn’t feel like she were too much of a burden and Hilda mostly just kind of talked to herself when she was around.

Marianne didn’t mind that either; she didn’t like talking anyway.

“I guess we’re just going to wheel this dead guy back and forth across the monastery until someone notices the smell or something,” Hilda said.

“You know, Marianne, we should have just stayed hidden in the dormitory. Seteth never comes up there and we could have just lounged about in the rooms or something. Goddess, it’s going to start getting hot soon.”

Hubert shot the two of them a dark glance.

“Who did Lady Sitri tell us to even find?”

Dedue answered, though he had to speak slightly louder than normal because they were keeping there distance from each other. The five of them together would draw a lot of attention. “A Cardinal Aelfric Dahlman. He would know of a place we can safely store this while we look into things.”

“Right, not sure how many cardinals there are, but the only one I knew existed was Lady Sitri herself.”

They had taken the path north from the stables after Hubert and Ferdinand loaded the body into the cart and covered it with the frock and stacked lumber along the sides of it to keep it in place. When they reached the covered walkway between Knight’s Hall and the reception hall, Hubert gestured to them.

“That man has the red robes most cardinals wore. It must be him,” Hubert explained in a hushed tone. “Park the cart here against the columns so no one is tempted to fuss with it.”

Hilda’s pink eyes went big. “That’s him? That’s Aelfric?” She didn’t seem to be able to stop staring, Hubert ignored her and turned to walk over to the suspected cardinal with Ferdinand and Dedue.

From this distance his eyes were almost a flat, black color. His hair was dark and thick, just touching his shoulders on the side but longer in the back. He seemed too young for the position of cardinal, though she guessed he didn’t look any younger than Sitri and at the same time there was something stern, almost authoritative about him. The robes that Hubert had described as red were actually black with red leathery embellishments.

“That’s the guy, Marianne.” Hilda had put her face so close to hers that she almost jumped, startled. “I saw that guy kissing Lady Rhea.”

She had whispered, so Marianne must not have heard that right.

“Goodness, what?” Marianne gasped.

Hilda pushed the cart against one of the columns hard enough that it stopped with a thud of rock on wood. She caught Marianne by the wrist and dragged her out into the open of the walkway, checking all around them as she walked. They stopped at the corner of the hedges.

“Remember how we went to that storage room at the Cathedral and I pushed everyone into the room and shut the door?”

Marianne nodded.

“Well, way across on the other side by the back corner of the building I saw him and the Archbishop talking all close and then they kissed—and not like a kiss on the cheek, kiss.” Hilda kissed Marianne’s cheek, causing her to tense up. “This kiss was like a we’re going to do it later type of kiss.”

“Do what?” Marianne questioned. Hilda was saying a lot and Marianne wasn’t sure how the Archbishop kissing on a man could be a thing that she had seen. Maybe Hilda was mistaken?

“Do it, like you know have sex. All I know is that no one has ever kissed me like that. Maybe it’s none of my business, but if it’s not some problem then why are they all the way over there hiding behind the Cathedral? Why have we never seen her anywhere near this—eep!”

“Ladies,” Aelfric had stepped close to them now. Hilda grabbed hold of Marianne when she heard him speak. “My apologies if I frightened the two of you.”

Hilda grasped Marianne’s hand. “It’s perfectly alright,” Hilda said, though the nervousness in her voice was apparent. “I was just talking to my friend Marianne here, she doesn’t like new people so—”

“It’s perfectly fine. Your friends here told me what happened, though I have to say that I don’t like the idea of concealing this kind of thing down there. I do understand Seteth needs for the victim to not be disturbed while things are looked into.”

When Hilda nodded, Marianne followed suit.

“We’ve briefed the good Cardinal here on the gristly details and he has agreed to lead us to this so called Abyss,” Ferdinand said. “Really, if you would prefer, Hilda, I can take the cart from here.”

Of course there was no way that Hilda was going to just volunteer to keep doing work. “Ferdinand, I don’t care what they say about you. You’re such a gentleman.”

He stopped his preparations of the cart to move. “Wait, what do they say about me?”

She never answered and he was forced into double-time to catch up as the others moved through the campus to the north, the cathedral looming in the distance. Right over there was where it had happened, Hilda had seen this guy kissing all over Rhea. Sex kissing.

Her voice could carry so there was too great a risk discussing it with Marianne any further and she wasn’t sure she could trust these other three, Ferdinand seemed harmless enough, but Dedue and especially Hubert looked like they could be up to no good. Who knows if they killed this guy and only pretended to find it when Byleth came up?

The Professor didn’t exactly seem to have the longest wick in the candelabra.

Wherever they were headed, everyone seemed determined to make the trip in silence. They moved north and then west through the front edge of the building where the reception hall was and past the northern side of the classrooms. Seems like the body made a round trip around the monastery if this is near where it was found.

They turned left in front of the arena and came to a stop in a small alley that ran between the side of the dorms and the plateau that the bathhouse sat atop. Hilda was really going to need to seek out hot bath after this one.

Aelfric gestured down the alley with one hand and then proceeded toward the stone wall at the dead end. “Here it is.”

Hilda felt Marianne’s eyes on her as she studied Aelfric. There was more to him. The whole thing with him and Rhea. She hadn’t imagined that.

“We’re just expected to dump the poor soul right here?” Asked Ferdinand.

Aelfric stopped at the wall at the end of the alley. “Of course not, make sure no one else is around.”

Dedue and Hubert checked up and down the path, but there hadn’t been anyone when they turned the corner. The celebration last night had left the whole monastery slow to start the day and even those that had were sticking closer to the dining hall and pond.

“It’s all clear,” Hubert said.

“Same here,” said Dedue.

Aelfric pushed in on one of the stones, then another, then a third. When he pushed in the forth, he reached inside with his other hand and pressed a small switch. A passage opened at the corner of the dorm with a long ramp leading into the ground. The cart would fit, once it was through the door.

So Dedue and Hubert wrapped the body up to keep the blood contained and shuttled it through the passage. “Hilda, help me get this on its side”

“I can’t believe you’re making me do this.”

“It’s better than touching a dead body,” Ferdinand said.

The pair of them turned the cart side ways to get it through the door. On the other side they paid it back on its wheels and followed Hubert and Dedue a short ways down.

“It’s a bit of a ways to the bottom, there are torches kept here by the door,” Aelfric said.

“What is this, some kind of storage?” Asked Hubert.

“It’s much larger than that. People used to live down there some years back. Think of it as a catacomb beneath all of Garreg Mach,” Aelfric said.

“Are you coming with us?” Hilda asked.

“I can’t, I am expected back at the Cathedral to meet Rhea,” he said.

Probably for boring old people sex.

“Listen,” Aelfric continued. “You’re going to want to stay near the entrance. There’s some ruins and a few places you can stow this. Don’t go past the water. The gate should be locked, anyway.”

Dedue laid the body back out in the cart and straightened the frock out over him again, despite there being little need to hide it from anyone in this darkness. Hubert had opted to cast a fire spell above his hand to light the way instead of grabbing one of the torches.

“Hm, yes, I think we have it from here, sir,” Ferdinand said.

“Good, the lever next to the door there is how you get back out. I will send a guard to keep anyone from back here in the meantime.” The rocks slid closed over the opening to conceal it and they were left in the murky darkness.

Chapter Text

Dimitri kissed the nape of her neck, sucking and pulling the skin up between his lips until she can feel the thud of her heart against his mouth. Her legs latch tighter around his waist until she’s practically holding herself off the ground, suspended from him. Where her fingers touch beneath his collar she can feel the risen bumps where she bit into him only hours ago in a fit of ecstasy have began to welt.

He moaned into her, his breath passing down the front of her uniform shirt as he exhales.

In the flashes of clarity Edelgard remembered that they couldn’t be caught like this: pressed against the wall of the greenhouse, but tucked out of sight from the outside world. Anyone could open the door. The greenhouse keeper could return any second. Or a student could come to check on their beloved seedlings.

Still, she is tempted to unfasten a button and let him in knowing that he would have no way to stop himself. He’s a beast, every bit of the unhinged monster that rumors said and she actually loved it.

He squatted down and her butt was resting on between his knees, her thighs against hers. This is how it begins.

Shallow, pain blossomed in the pit of her stomach and if she didn’t stifle it they would give in right here and now. Dimitri raised his head and stared at her, his eyes bloodshot, crazed and his breathing rapid. She touched her lips against his for a second before pulling back.

“We have to stop.”

Dimitri put his thumb to her bottom lip and she tilted forward to suck the tip of it. He nodded, seeming to understand. I am just as out of control as you.

He placed her on the edge of the planter box that ran across the back of the room so she was sitting on the railing and she tugged at the bottom of her shorts pants to unfurl them along her thigh.

“We’re a little exposed here,” he said, though he couldn’t seem to help but run the back of his hand along the seam of her shorts, along her inner thigh.

“You just said we’re a little exposed here. Save some of that energy for tonight.” Edelgard said, her voice a laugh. She hadn’t remembered she could laugh like that.

“If it’s anything like last night we’re not going to get any rest.” He backed across the room to lean against the other planter, running his hand through his blond hair.

Edelgard raised an eyebrow. “We had better. You came to tell me that we’re to go on some mission, remember?”

“Right. We’ll be away from the monastery. Even if we’re going together there’s not a chance we will get this kind of alone time as long as others are around,” he said.

A smile over took her face. “We’ll see.”

The door to the greenhouse rattled and opened, cutting off their conversation. Luckily, it just seemed that they were just in here talking. The greenhouse was usually humid. Anyone looking would attribute the sheen of sweat on their skin from that.

A squat figure with a cane stepped through the doors to survey the room. Tomas the librarian. Dimitri leaned out and turn to see the man. Tomas took a few careful, wobbly steps over the cobblestone floor and let out a chuckle. “Did you two get stuck with greenhouse duty?”

“Yes sir, someone has to see to the herbs in the vulneraries,” Dimitri said. 

“Heh, yes, yes. Don’t let me disturb your work. I was just looking for somebody.” Tomas said.

“If it was the greenhouse keeper she should be up at the dining hall taking her lunch. We passed her on the way in,” Edelgard said.

His hands caught hold of the top of his cane and he rocked forward into a nod. “I shall check there, in that case.”

“We really had best be going too. I forgot that I came to tell you that the Archbishop is going to want to see us,” Dimitri said.

“Right.”

The two of them made their way out of the greenhouse and past a group of students. Edelgard stopped to greet Lady Sitri who had been staring off toward the pond. She needed distance herself from Dimitri to avoid betraying the kind of familiarity they had. In just the last few hours could their whole demeanors toward one another have changed enough for even someone who they barely spoke to like Tomas to notice?

Worse, when they arrived in the audience chamber they would be faced with both of their own professors, plus Professor Byleth, the Archbishop, and probably Seteth too. Would any one of them sense a change in them?

Edelgard shrugged off that kind of thinking. It would only serve to make her look guilty and she wasn’t guilty of anything yet. Except hiring the very bandits that had attacked them and gotten a man killed.

The evidence she and Hubert had gathered told them that the man who would have been their professor was in actuality a spy, someone sent by the very handlers whose plans she sought to thwart on this next mission. Rescuing Monica and dealing a blow to them was what really mattered now.

Though there was a heat at the curve of her neck, swollen skin still wet from Dimitri’s kiss and she couldn’t shake the thought of how badly she wanted him.

Marianne had dressed for spending time with Dorte and perhaps taking a late breakfast in the dining hall. Trudging down a steep ramp into a subterranean cavern had been the furthest thing from her mind when she awoke that morning.

She levitated a glowing ball of fire above the group, centered on herself to provide light while Hubert kept his spell dancing just past his fingertips, ready to fire it off at a moments notice. Though she couldn’t believe anyone was down here or ever had been. Or she wouldn’t have believed it if not for the remnants of a settlement that had been picked clean.

The ramp emptied out into a hallway hewn out of the rock that led to a stonework passages. The edges of their light reached to where rudimentary shopping stalls lay half sunken into the dirt and cracked bricks. There were hand painted signs with prices still hanging from their awnings. The air was damp and smelled of fresh water, off in the distance she could hear waves of it lapping against the rock as it moved past.

Ferdinand rolled the cart to a stop in the center a cobblestone street of the abandoned market just behind where Hubert walked. “What is all of this?” Ferdinand asked.

“That guy said people used to live down here. It sure doesn’t look all that cozy,” Hilda said.

Dedue lifted something from the cavern floor and in the dim light the grains of sand pressed into the hat glistened. “I would guess the kind of people who stayed here couldn’t chose whether they were cozy or not. They probably simply needed shelter.”

“Yes, well if the monastery allowed them to be down here for shelter, it serves to think they could allowed them to stay up there or in the town surrounding Garreg Mach.” Hubert aimed a finger toward the roof, the fire rolling in the air just above its tip.

Marianne was inclined to agree. Why would people be allowed to live down here.

“For once, I’m with Hubert. Why would people be forced to live like this?”

“I’m afraid we do not know the full set of circumstances that led to this place coming to be like this.”

“Correct, Dedue,” Ferdinand said.

“If we’re going to leave that body down here we should have a look around, at the very least,” Hubert said. “All of this is a hole in the monastery’s security. No posted guard and no telling if it empties out anywhere else.”

Hubert’s mind seemed to filter down past any of the concerns Marianne had. He sunk to the dark places and thought of those things first. It must have been what made him desirable for Lady Edelgard to keep around. Someone who wrestled with every woeful contingency would be valuable at predicting what an enemy might do. He was someone who belonged at an Officer’s Academy.

For the love of the Goddess, Marianne couldn’t see what she contributed.

Torches and braziers were still left out in the open and dry enough that they could be lit, they found this out when Hubert tried one and it erupted with bright light. He moved about lighting more of them.

“How we doing, Marianne?” Hilda caught her by the shoulder and leaned in close to ask her.

Any moment she would have broken out into a convulsive shiver, but Marianne held it back. She didn’t want to be a burden. Couldn’t be obviously weak for the sake of the others. She was here and at the very least they had her fire spell for light.

“I’m fine,” she said.

Though the influence of their light spread Marianne felt like the inky darkness down the corridors and around the corners moved. It felt like it might not be the actual absence of light but some vast creature with writhing tentacles waiting for them to slip up. Marianne fired a her spell off down one of the halls where a wall mounted torch burst into flames lighting the corner of the corridor.

She sighted another sconce down the center hall and loosed a fireball at it causing it to burn bright and pushed the darkness further way.

Hilda let out a little cheer. “Way to go Marianne!” Her voice was still low, her enthusiasm seeming snuffed out by the general gloom of the cavern. No matter how many fires they lit or how many torches the would have had with them, the darkness in this place would be oppressive enough to even make Hilda seem dull.

“That’s peculiar.” Hubert had craned his head upward to look toward one of the walls. 

“What?”

“This brick doesn’t seem as much like it was laid down here as it sunk down, some of these buildings are just like what you’d expect on the surface,” Hubert said.

Dedue ran his fingers along the space between the brick. “This brickwork looks hundreds of years old.”

“The people living here before must have built it,” Ferdinand said.

“This place is a corpse.” Marianne didn’t know what compelled her to speak the words, but she could feel it in her veins. These buildings had been homes and businesses, they had once been kissed by the sun. An entire civilization’s rotting remains laid to rest beneath the monastery.

Hubert stared at her, though she couldn’t decide which emotion to attribute to his dark eyes sparkling in the firelight or his parted lips that made the shadows pool beneath the cheekbones.

They left the cart in the market and took down to corridors that passed the water on one side lined with more torches for she and Hubert to light. They wove their way through crosshatched hallways, lighting torches as they went to find the way back. In one room they found what appeared to be a drinking establishment complete with a bar and tables that had rotted through with age. Another reminded Marianne of a place of worship, like the cathedral at Garreg Mach, except the deity housed within was a cloaked statue with massive wings blooming from its back. All around it on the ground were crumpled brick and rock. Dedue had tried to make out the writing, but the best guess anyone could come up with was that it was written in the tongue of Brigid or Dagda.

How it had come across the water from either of those places to find its rest in the center of Fódlan was anyone’s guess.

A subterranean chasm dominated one whole side at the edge of the settlement with a bridge leading across. The gorge was deep enough that the water spilling over into it could barely be seen below where it splashed down into an underground lake. They lit the torches to see a wrought iron gate and Marianne remembered passing bars in one of the corridors when they first arrived, but this gate was knocked free of its hinges and laying on top of some rubble on the bridge

“Okay, let’s not just make out like we’re Sir Bran Bogan or something,” Hilda said through a small, nervous laugh.

“Who?” Dedue asked?

“He was, uh, a famous explorer who mapped whole cave systems in East Fódlan. Though I’m shocked you know of him, Hilda.”

Hilda rolled her eyes. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I meant nothing by it.”

Hubert nearly interrupted Ferdinand. “Lady Hilda is right, we shouldn’t stray much further. There was a door near the entrance that we missed, perhaps it is best to leave the corpse there.”

As they made their way up the passage in the opposite direction of the bridge, Marianne stopped to stare at the wrought iron gate toppled onto the floor across the opposite side of the gorge.

“Do you think that water flowing into that chasm here could be from the fishing pond at the monastery,” Ferdinand started. “I’ve heard of some bodies of water being connected to vast underground reservoirs!”

Dedue scratched at the side of his head as he walked. “The placement might match up…”

“Is something the matter, Marianne?” Hilda had stopped next to her.

“It’s just…the gate. He said it would be sealed,” she said softly.

Hilda laced her fingers through Marianne. “Don’t worry your pretty little head about it, that thing probably fell down years ago. All this old junk is falling to pieces down here. Come on.”

“It might not be the best idea to have the three of us all in one place.” Claude’s arms were crossed behind his head at the wrist, though he held the pose too long for it to be a mere stretch. He needed to give the appearance of someone calm, at ease, even if he was anything but. “When we’re together things tend to go wrong.” He shot Edelgard a wink.

She was to his left with Dimitri on his right so that they flanked him. The Archbishop was dressed in her usual finery with the flowing gold cape with the navy blue lining as she spoke with Seteth. Professors Byleth, Jeritza, and Jeralt were off to one side of the room.

He knew that a dead body had been found outside of the Golden Deer classroom and he figured that this meeting had something to do with that. It was all a little too close to home for his liking. Assassinations and infighting were things back at the palace in Almyra, not constants, they weren’t barbarians. But the old Almyran adage went that if you lord’s eye favors your rival, slit your rivals throat.

Some still held to the old ways at least in spirit.

“One would think that we would be safe from bandits here in the presence of the Archbishop, Claude,” Dimitri chided him, though it didn’t have the severity with which those words often left the young prince’s mouth.

He must have been in a good mood.

“And bandits could find better spoils elsewhere in the monastery for sure,” Edelgard added.

“Indeed,” Dimitri answered her. They held each others gazes and Claude wondered what had gotten into both of them.

“Thank you for coming in such a timely manner. I had expected at least one of you to be a little late, but if we are here we can go over the matters. There is enough of us assembled,” said Lady Rhea.

“Sorry, Gran!” Came a shout from out in the corridor. Belial, the Professor’s brother, ran into the room. “I had a thing in the arena. Wanted to hit the baths before I came.”

“A bath? To what do we owe this honor?” Asked Byleth. “Our noses thank you for this blessing.”

The Archbishop’s usually reverent expression sharpened as she jerked her head to the side to stare daggers at her granddaughter, the movement was rapid like a viper’s strike and it caused the ornate crown she wore to jangle.

“Young lady, do not make me remove this headdress and dismiss these nobles so I can act the role of your grandmother. And Jeralt—this disobedience surely comes from you. You’d best lecture her later so that I do not have to here and now.”

“Hey, Kid,” Jeralt called to Byleth and gestured with one hand’s fingers cutting across his neck for her to cut it out.

They had that one back in Almyra. In fact, Rhea’s tone with Byleth reminded him all too much of his own mother’s voice when he embarrassed her.

“Sorry, Grandma,” Byleth said, her shoulders slumped forward with a kind of humility Claude thought impossible for the woman.

Belial stayed silent as he took his place on the opposite side of the Archbishop.

“Now,” Rhea said switching back into a voice so formal, so quickly that Claude dropped his hands to his sides. “I’m sure you’ve no doubt heard the tragedy that took place this morning when a stranger was found dead outside of the classrooms? We’ve come to the conclusion that they were no one known to anyone here at the monastery, nor were they a student.”

“If I may, Archbishop Rhea,” Dimitri said, it seemed that her words to the Professor had frightened him. “Would it be correct to assume that someone stole into the monastery grounds and was then murdered.”

“Yes and to ascertain why, we’ve actually assigned a special mission to some of your classmates.” Rhea held out her hand, signaling for Seteth to speak.

“Correct. Miss Goneril and Miss Edmund from the Golden Deer, Misters Vestra and Aegir from the Black Eagles, and Mister Molinaro from the Blue Lions have been tasked with discovering the culprit and, if they can, the motive,” Seteth said.

“And you would like us to assist them? Hilda’s not really the most task oriented person and I’m not sure if Marianne is really the best for this kind of thing,” Claude said.

“No, they are going to be answering to Seteth and Lady Sitri, but the three of you are to take part in a joint assignment to root out the remaining bandits from the group who attacked you in route to Garreg Mach,” Rhea said.

The bandits that attacked them are still nearby?

“Belial, if you would,” Rhea added.

“Oh right, Gran, sorry. Um, yeah, so the Ashen Demons tracked the bandits that were chased off and I snuck into a huge camp built into the side of the mountains. It actually looks like it’s an old building of some kind that’s hidden from the main road by the rock formation, but there’s a good number of them left.”

“Would it be right to assume that there might be prisoners or captives among them?” Asked Edelgard.

Belial folded his arms. “You know, I haven’t thought about it. But sometimes bandits have been known to take people to work for them and less savory things. So who can be sure?”

“Well, if it was night when you found the camp they could have been inside,” Claude said, nodding to Edelgard. It was best to back her up on this one, wouldn’t want any civilians to get caught in the melee.

She smiled. “Right.”

Rhea smoothed down the front of her dress with her hands, looking between them as they spoke. “The mere presence of these bandits puts the lives of those within these walls at risk and threatens trade routes that work in service of the monastery and therefore the Goddess. It is of the utmost importance that they be dealt with.”

“I know that I asked this before.” Jeritza stepped forward. The man’s voice caught Claude off guard, the same as it had anytime he spoke out like this. He didn’t as much walk as he did slink, like a cat that somehow had control of a human body. “But I would like the opportunity to lead this mission with Jeralt and the girl to support.”

“The girl…” Byleth tightened her hands at her sides. “I have a name,” she muttered.

“Byleth will work with you as second in command with the students divided amongst you. Captain, you’ll oversee a contingent of Knights—I’m sure that you haven’t forgotten how to preform your old duties.”

“Of course not, Lady Rhea,” Jeralt said with a salute.

“There is one more crucial thing: we would like for this assignment to be handled as soon as possible. You are to leave shortly, you are only traveling down the mountains some,” Seteth said.

“So soon?” Dimitri asked.

“In times of conflict your enemy will not wait for you to be ready. Another factor needs to be considered here as we do not want the bandits regrouping and regaining their strength to be a more formidable force. Vital shipments of supplies are to move through the pass in the coming days and we would like to avoid those being pilfered.”

“That is actually very understandable, sir,” Dimitri said with a nod.

“Alright, you heard the woman. Gather your supplies and the rest of the students. I’ll inform some of the knights.” He tussled Byleth’s hair as he struck off out of the room. “Belial, you’re with me.”

“Right,” his son, the Professor’s younger brother, fell in line to follow him out of the room.

“I thought I had been left in charge…” Jeritza said under his breath.

Professor Byleth reached up and clamped a hand down on his shoulder. “Don’t be so hard on yourself, boy, not all of us are natural born leaders.”

When Dimitri and Edelgard started to leave it took Claude a few moments to decided what to do in the allotted time. Part of him wanted to at least try and find Hilda and Marianne to let them know what was going on and where they were headed, but he didn’t know if there was time or where they were at the moment.

“How long should we take to prepare?” Claude asked.

“Two hours.” Jeritza still watched the doors that Jeralt had left through.

“That seems reasonable,” Rhea said.

It really didn’t to Claude. Two hours to find everyone he needed from his House, try to find Hilda and Marianne, and gather supplies seemed like no time at all. Guess they were supposed to think of it as part of their training.

Two hours might not be enough time for him to even gather all of his classmates, he would hunt around the school for them and hope that he crossed paths with Marianne or Hilda. It wasn’t like they could have left the school.

I think we’re alone now.

The Cathedral was never truly unoccupied for a real stretch of time. Even in the dead of night the faithful would make their way down the causeway to pray. An endless stream of guards walked the grounds around it and stood watch over each entrance, though no one dared ask Sitri Eisner what she was doing or where she planned to go even at the most suspicious hours of the day.

It was still early when she made her way into the alcove that housed the Four Saints statutes. From within here no one would see her acting strange nor would anyone question why she had been secluded away there for so long.

“We could have been along in nearly half a dozen other places around the monastery, including our room,” Sitri said.

The crisp smell of incense and burning candle wax was thick in the air and stung the back of her throat, but after a whole life spent wandering these tile floors and living atop the perch where Garreg Mach, almost no place felt more like home to her than the nearly empty church.

Our husband could show up at a moment’s notice and he would think that he caught you being strange again—though I do think that man likes a bit of our strangeness…

“He does, doesn’t he?” Sitri swayed side to side as she thought of Jeralt. Their dance the previous night still fresh in her mind and some other things that had happened after that. Couldn’t think too hard on that or—

—cut that out. If you get riled up, I’m going to get all riled up too and we need to actually think.

“I think we could do the thinking part separately. Without having to come all the way out here or hiding in some corner to talk.”

If you would learn to talk to me without actually talking out loud, this wouldn’t be such a problem.

Emotion, hints of joy or humor would slip through to her from the soul that dwelled within her, but she could not tell what Sothis was thinking the way that the Goddess could her. Most times, she couldn’t even see her. Flashes of images of a beautiful woman with thick green hair perched atop the throne from the Holy Mausoleum would overtake her in some moments when Sothis really needed to communicate with her.

Other than that she could only visually perceive her while she slept. If there was any conversation that could wait it was better to do it then. While sleep Sothis and she could talk freely as if they were in the same room. When they were up and about, she could only hear Sothis and, if her mind were cooperating, think whatever it was that she wanted Sothis to hear as a reply.

All of this was very difficult to do while going about her average day.

“Yeah, you’ve told me. And we’ve practiced over the years to no avail. Unless that is you have a new method we could try?” Whatever the subject of this emergency might be, Sothis didn’t want to speak the words out loud. This was a thing the Goddess did regularly when she had something too shocking or even just too funny to say. It wasn’t worth the risk that Sitri might scream or burst into a fit of laughter.

Humans still hold an element of mystery. Even you. You’re all silly little illusions of order molded from chaos.

“Not sure why that is after over forty years together. And it was you that molded that chaos.”

I don’t even recall how I did that, but I don’t need to be reminded of how long we’ve been together. The memories of telling you to stop soiling us and not to put random objects down our throat are crystal clear.

“Right. Here we go.”

What I can’t remember is the exact number of times I had to reverse the flow of time to prevent us from choking on rocks.

“I am about ten seconds from eating all the rocks right now.” Sitri threw her hands up and would have walked away from the conversation were it not coming from inside her own mind.

That white haired student from the Adrestian Empire, the one who spoke to you near the pond?

“Lady Edelgard? You know her name, because I know her name.”

Yes, yes. For a split second Sitri could see Sothis sitting upon her throne flicking her hand dismissively. Someone I missed it before, but I sensed my crest in her.

“She is in line for the Adrestian throne , so it wouldn’t be odd for her to have the crest of Seiros. Mother has the same crest.”

No. No. No, you dense girl. She has OUR crest. The Crest of Sothis.

“How? We’re not even sure why we have this crest.”

Maybe it’s just a miracle? I do work in mysterious ways.

“It’s not possible for her father, who has a Crest of Seiros, to pass on a different crest to her, unless her mother had the Crest of Sothis in secret.”

You’re not understanding me. Edelgard has a Crest of Seiros and a Crest of Sothis.

“How can someone have two crests?”

That I do not know, woman. Are you paying attention at all?

Sitri folded her arms and paced along the edge of the room. Out in the Cathedral proper she could hear footsteps now and she drew closer to the door so that they could peek out.

A woman with her a ribbon halfway down her long blonde hair, holding it in a messy, loose ponytail. She was stopping to pray, but paused to to adjust the shawl draped over her shoulders.

Is that Mercedes?

How did Sothis know that name, but forget Edelgard?

She’s quite beautiful. Very peaceful and serene. We really should stop staring before she notices us.

“Byleth seems fond of her,” Sitri whispered. “But she is in Jeralt’s House.”

One can see why. As far as humans go she is quite the specimen, hmmm.

Sitri pulled away from the edge of the door when Mercedes moved to duck back into the Saint Statue Room. “Don’t hmm me like that, we need to think of how to handle this Edelgard situation. What if we were to walk right up to her and ask her outright. Then we reverse time and it’s like the whole thing never happened?”

I don’t remember us being able to reverse time and my powers aren’t yours to play with. There are consequences.

“Pray tell, what are they?”

It may have…slipped my mind.

“Well, we need to do something.” Sitri leaned against the inside of the door.

Do you think we might be able to make skin to skin contact with her? It would need to be for a few seconds at the very least.

“Yeah.” Someone was coming.

Mercedes poked her head around the corner, one hand clutching the shawl in the front. “Oh, Lady Sitri. I thought I heard someone talking in here.”

Sitri smiled. “Excuse me if I disturbed your worship. I come here to think sometimes.”

“It is incredible. Goddess, I just can’t believe I actually get to spend time here. People who spoke about the Cathedral before I came here simply couldn’t do it justice.”

“Perhaps its beauty is lost on me since my whole life has been spent in its shadow.”

My, my aren’t we morose?

That might have been a bit melodramatic, but in response Mercedes’s smile just grew. “I assume that is true. What was it someone said? The grass is always greener in the other field? It must be wonderful to be so near to the Goddess, at least.”

What is she? Or is this another figure of speech?

The girl had no idea how right she was. “I’m not closer to the Goddess than you or anyone else—are you heading back toward the monastery?”

“Did you need something?” Mercedes asked.

“I was going to ask if you’d like to walk with me.”

“I would be honored actually,” Mercedes said.

Chapter Text

The library beneath the monastery had more books than the one overseen by Tomas. From the floor that they had entered on, there were stairs leading up to walkways that jutted out from shelves brimming with ancient books, and there were numerous floors beneath them as well. Ferdinand walked along the shelf, using a lantern he had taken from near the door to read the spines of the books. Many of them were bound in leather and looked vaguely modern, or as modern as something in a crypt below the monastery could be.

Still, others were so ancient that the bindings seem to be made of materials he didn't dare to guess at, hardened and yellowing from age.

He scanned the titles, or the ones that had them, at least, and some of them seemed to be books that he had seen in the other library. Others, however, weren't in a language that he could read.

"Huh, that's random—there's a book about bugs here. Not sure who would go through the trouble to hide that…" Hilda had gone upstairs, and he could see her flipping through the pages of a book, before she spotted something and abruptly shut it. She stuffed it in her purse, though she never noticed him watching.

Hilda made her way to the steep stairs and carefully descended them as she glanced around to see if anyone else had noticed what she had done. He could call out to her and ask about it, but then the others would know. Ferdinand needed to see what was in those pages.

The others were aimlessly surveying the shelves, except for Hubert, who seemed to have found something of interest. Whatever it said, it had so engrossed him that he didn't react when Dedue started to read from another book out loud.

"Listen to this: Why does Seiros despise us so? What did King Nemesis do to incur such unyielding wrath? Perhaps it was a mistake to accept his offer. In any case, this is all in the distant past now." He studied something on the paper before reading further. "And before this body falls to ash, the evil—This is where the pages become illegible, but before then, it actually mentions Itha Plains and Ailell, but as a forest…"

"I think we have a clear reason for why the Church placed these down here," Hubert said, his eyes still locked on the book he read near the lantern that he had hung from a hook on the wall.

"If you mean to say that they are heresy, why would the archbishop of the time or whoever was in charge keep them?" Ferdinand asked.

"The average person in Fódlan can't read, and those of us that can would scarcely be granted access to this place," Hubert said.

"He's setting us up," Hilda blurted out from where she now stood near Marianne. "He knew of this place and what was going on down here, he had to. It's why he sent no knights with us."

Dedue stared at her, the whites of his eyes seeming to glow with the flickering flames. "What do you mean?"

Marianne shook her head, but Hilda spoke anyway. "That Aelfric guy. I saw him smooching Lady Rhea all over the other day, before the banquet."

"Are you sure?" Ferdinand asked.

Hilda let out a sigh. "No, I'm not sure. I'm just saying stuff—of course I'm sure! Who else has hair that color, and what guy have you seen in a cardinal's robes with that travesty of a haircut?"

"That's a big accusation," Dedue said.

"I know, but I figured you all should know in case he's up to something. What if he killed this guy?"

"Look, we were just meant to store the body and return to the surface—it should be safe in here." Ferdinand made like he intended to leave when Hubert pressed a hand to his chest.

"There is still one thing we've yet to do." Hubert uncovered the body, though from this angle Ferdinand could only see one of the parts that had been eaten and a pale hand around the frock that covered him. "The corpse is still rather flexible; I would say that the death happened with in the last eight hours."

Hubert produced a long leather satchel from within one of the coat pockets of the man and unfurled it. The immediate shock on his face was a stark contrast to his usual haunting stoicism. "It's you. They were looking for you."

Ferdinand followed his gaze to Marianne to see her shifting nervously with a hand pressed to her chest. Hilda quickly grabbed hold of Marianne. "What do you think you're doing?" Hilda yelled.

"There is a sketch of her in here with two other people, presumably her parents and notes on a 'Crest of the Beast'. The Crest of Maurice."

Marianne shook her head, jerking away from Hilda. In a rush, Hubert caught her at the shoulder before she could run out of the room properly. "What is the meaning of this?"

Hubert held her as white hot panic seized her body and her crest flared to life; muscles tensed and strained as she fought to suppress it. She could never use it. She could never let that power run rampant due to the danger to others.

"If you value that arm, let her go!" Hilda screamed angrily.

"Listen to me, I want to know exactly what is going on, Marianne!" Hubert let her go and she ran to one of the bookshelves, her back slamming against it hard enough to jostle books free.

Dedue stepped into view at her side. "That's enough, Hubert."

Marianne sunk to the floor of the hidden library, curling up and wrapping an arm around her knees. She didn't want to be here. Didn't want to be anywhere. It was like a fire erupted in her chest and, as the tears rolled down her face, her breathing became uncontrollably rapid.

Hubert held a hand up to silence Hilda, as he stepped toward her holding a piece of parchment spattered with droplets of blood at one corner. "Marianne, look at me."

She looked up and despite the fear, despite every part of her being wanting to run, there was a visceral anger. Hubert must have recognized it, because as his eyes met hers his expression softened. "You're cursed, that's what it says here." He whipped another paper about in the air, this one scrawled with writings. "Is that what you believe? That you're some remorseless beast?"

Marianne managed to nod.

The paper erupted into flames in Hubert's hand, burning to ascend as ash. "If you are to be feared, then embrace it. That darkness in you, that hatred others project onto you, store it up. Use that reputation, their fear, to protect what's dear to you."

The others stood in stunned awe around the two of them.

"Are these your mother and father?" Hubert showed her the drawing.

Her eyes flicked toward the paper and through tear blurred eyes she could see a picture of the three of them sketched out in almost immaculate detail. How had they…

"They look like lovely people, and I am sorry for what I assume to be a great tragedy that occurred. I do not care if you killed this piece of human waste who had come here to do you harm, nor do I intend to speak to others of your crest. It is of little consequence to me or my goals. I am sure that the others will agree to secrecy, or they may find out why I know so much about how to handle a corpse."

"She didn't kill anyone. Marianne was with me all of last night."

"Still, maybe it's best they're gone," Hubert said.

Marianne swallowed nothing. In her heightened state, with her crest's energy surging through her she swore she could hear the air and the blood in her veins. The damp, mineral odor of the water across to the other side of the settlement was as clear as if she stood on the bridge. And there was a noise. Whispered words from unfamiliar mouths and footfalls, along with the footfalls of something large.

"Someone is coming," she warned, her voice cracked as it came out as a rasp.

"Aelfric?" asked Ferdinand.

She shook her head. "Too many people." It became apparent that the gate they'd seen earlier was collapsed because someone knocked it down.

Hubert handed the book he had been reading off to Hilda along with the picture of her parents. "Place these in the bag along with the book you took."

Hilda snatched them from him and slipped them into her purse, muttering to herself as she did. "I swear to the Goddess I am going to slap the shit out of you." She lifted the purse strap over her head to lay it down on one of the library tables.

"It does sound like there is someone coming now," Dedue said.

"We could run for it, maybe?" Hilda said.

"We'd best not put our backs to them," Ferdinand chimed in.

Hubert reached for Marianne's hand, and she grabbed hold of him, letting the much taller man pull her to her feet. Hilda eyed him but stepped over to rub Marianne's back. "Are you okay? You can hide out in here, we can defend from the door."

"I'm going to fight," Marianne said, though she didn't believe it herself.

"Besides, if we try to defend from here, the room is mostly wood—one fire spell, and we would all be burned alive, if the floor didn't collapse first," Hubert said.

Ferdinand was glancing around with an uneasy look in his eyes. "It does sound like there are a great deal of them, and we are without weapons."

Dedue had finished removing his uniform jacket and pounded his hand into his fist. "Then we just make do."

Hilda hefted one of the library chairs and slung it over her shoulder with one hand to let it rest there. "I'm going to grab whatever I can find at the first opportunity. I suggest you do the same."

She needed to say something. It was safer to do this her way.

"If Hubert and I attack them first…from far away…you can just take their weapons." Marianne suggested with a nod, even as a voice in the back of her mind piped up again. Why should they trust you after everything that's happened?

The five of them piled out onto the cracked cobblestone of the abandoned settlement just in time to see men brandishing weapons coming from the side where the long bridge over the water had been, where Marianne had seen the gate.

"This is a good idea. Marianne, you've got this," Hilda said as took a few practice swings with her chair. Hilda had trained with axes and swords; some wondered how she was brandishing furniture like that, one-handed even.

Hubert turned to Marianne, his features looking more snakelike than normal in the low light of the subterranean market, his yellow-green eyes fixed on hers. "Remember, if this doesn't go well—do not hold back. You believe these crests come from the Goddess? Then be her wrath." He stepped forward, plucking a pair of white gloves from his pants pocket and slipping them over his fingers.

He gestured back to the four of them to stay put. He was only a few paces up on Marianne when he stopped again. The crowd of oncoming men were followed closely by some kind of a wolf that appeared multiple times the size it should have been. They had shackled to a collar that seemed to stab its neck.

The men stopped in a bunch, murmuring to one another. Their clothing consisted of scrap cloth stained through from continual wear and the odd pilfered item here or there: a pair of boots, an open vest, and so on.

"They outnumber us, at least four to every one—not counting the creature there," Dedue said.

"It would seem that this place is very much more occupied than we were told." Hubert swept the dark hair out of his face, pushing it back so it lay over the top of his head. Then he tucked his hands behind his back casually and walked up towards the men, greeting them. "We caught you taking your, uh, pet there for a walk? If we may, we'll just be on our way back to the surface. We wouldn't want to cause you trouble." A laugh escaped Hubert, it sounded almost natural.

"If you go back to the surface, then they'll find out we're down here," one of the men replied back. It was impossible at this distance to determine who had said that, and with them standing in a jumble, it wasn't any easier.

"I assure you, if it comes to violence then you shall not be down here any longer to concern the monastery or anyone else," Hubert said with a hint of caution.

Without warning or an order, the men were soon thundering across the cavern floor, the sound of their feet echoing around the chamber. Hubert whipped his hands around in front of him and loosed a series of purple balls that screamed through the air and hit two of the lead men, causing them to grab their ears in horrible agony and come to a stop so rapidly that another man tripped over one of them.

Marianne reached out, palms up and fingers outstretched, to conjure jagged shards of ice. They tore into one of the men that Hubert had stopped, ripping out a chunk of shoulder and neck, with another hitting the man dead in the chest. Another was hit in the face and brought down immediately.

She mouthed a silent prayer for the two men she killed, just as she noticed the movement to her left.

"Shit. Looks like some of them came up the other hallways," Hilda called back to Marianne and everyone else. "I'll cover your flank, Marianne!"

One of the men leapt through the shop stall and made right for Hilda, brandishing an axe that she blocked with her wooden chair, though it lost several spokes from the wood that made up the back. The axe head got slightly turned to the side and ended up stuck between the remaining part of the backrest.

"Huh, that took less time than I figured it would," Hilda noted as she grabbed the axe handle just below the head and yanked it out of her opponent's hands. She righted the axe in her grip and spun in a wide arc to bring the axe around and tear through the side of the man's stomach, just in time to see Dedue flip one man up over his back. When he landed, she buried the axe in his chest with a sickening crunch that she could feel in her own bones. "He-hey, I got a couple!"

Dedue caught another assailant with a thunderous punch from the side that dropped him, his body curling up as it toppled over. "There do not seem to be many taking the other routes, we can move back to help the others with the monster."

Hilda looked back to check on Marianne only to find her housemate now holding a rusty sword in one hand and sticking close to Hubert. Speaking of, Hubert was laughing like a madman as he watched three men writhe and squeal while engulfed in magical fire. Ferdinand had taken a sword and was mopping up anyone who got too close to Marianne and Hubert.

Hilda and Dedue moved to cover any gaps left in their defense as the massive wolf snarled and advanced with its handlers. One of Hubert's fireballs struck the creature, but seemed to extinguish itself almost instantly upon making contact. Another went wild and hit one of the men holding the chain on its collar.

The other man, noticing that their control over the creature was lost, mounted it with a quick leap and clung to its fur. The monster rushed Ferdinand's side, but Hilda and Dedue closed in on it, with him using what remained of her chair to stop it from biting down on anyone. The rider on its back appeared to be of little consequence, as he was unarmed and seemed more worried about avoiding being where the thing could see him than anything else. His companions had all fallen, and the only possible escape for him would be on the back of the wolf.

For some reason, Marianne had stopped attacking with her magic, choosing instead to hold out her sword with both hands locked around the hilt, as if to ward off the creature, because she didn't want to hurt any animals. Hilda rushed to swing at the side of the wolf's head, feeling a surge of heat radiate from her body as her Crest activated. She would bring it down fast, put it out of its misery so it didn't turn on Marianne.

"If I kill this one it's going to count for at least six!" Hilda said.

She swung back in a high arc and down, only for it to catch the axe and part of her arm with its teeth; it was less a sharp pain and more like molten drills had pierced her forearm. Dedue punched the monster in the eye, and she felt it recoil from the hit.

The creature let out a sharp cry when Marianne finally stabbed its leg, but in all the chaos, more of whoever their attackers were had come up the halls and almost surrounded everyone else. Ferdinand turned to deal with them, but the man riding the wolf kicked him with the bottom of his foot, sending him stumbling.

The wolf turned to run, and to keep it from taking the axe and her arm with it, Hilda grabbed hold of the fur around its mouth. Hubert peppered it with the spell he had used on the first of their attackers, though it didn't stop it from moving and it turned to run toward the gate they had come through across the bridge, with Hilda dangling from its snout. If not for her crest, she would have passed out from the pain, but she managed to keep herself conscious.

As the six men closed in to surround them, Dedue pulled Ferdinand to his feet. He needed to find some way to help Hilda. The beast had made for the bridge, but then beelined down one of the hallways, and one of the newcomers barred Dedue from chasing after them.

Of the men that they had seen before, none of them looked like they were more than volunteers looking for an opportunity to cause some violence. Had they thought the knights or some other truly organized forces were around, they would have made a swift retreat or never bothered to come.

But the man who blocked Dedue and Ferdinand was bigger, with an axe that seemed cobbled together from scrap metal. For his armor, he had something like actual armor, stretched out over his body and held in place with a series of straps, because no armor he could have found would have worked. The weapon's reach would prevent them from easily running around him, and already one of the other men had come to assist him. This must have been their escape plan, but there was no one left by the time that they came to execute it.

"We need to get Hilda!" Dedue yelled.

Hubert was fending off another attacker who had actual magic, that though rudimentary, was enough to cover an escape. "My thoughts exactly," he replied.

Ferdinand struck out in trying to prevent one of the other men from getting to Marianne, but she blocked him with her own sword. He pressed his weight against her, being bigger than she was, in the hope that he could knock her down. When Dedue went to move left to help her, the massive axe lashed out and almost caught his chest, and he narrowly escaped by twisting to one side. As the man fell onto Marianne, she grasped him at the throat with one hand. In an instant, ice exploded out of the back of his neck, leaving his head frosted over.

As the man slumped over dead, Marianne rolled him off of her and got to her feet. She retrieved her sword and bolted for the hallway where the wolf had taken Hilda, the tip of the blade dragging through the dirt as she ran. She raced between Dedue and the axe-welding hulk of a man, hoping he would ignore her in favor of Dedue. Instead, he swiped at her and, to keep from being sliced through, she dropped to the ground and rolled, losing her sword again in the process.

Have to get to Hilda. This is my fault. My curse.

She rolled onto her feet to keep running, some of the braid that held her hair coming loose. All the while, she prayed to the Goddess that Dedue, Hubert, or Ferdinand would ensure she didn't catch a spell or the sharp edge of an axe in the back-and that Hilda could hold out until she arrived.

Marianne could have run in a wide curve and then snaked in the other direction to make herself a harder target, but those were vital seconds that could have meant the difference between saving Hilda or not. She raced up the hallway that was just before the bridge but saw no sign of Hilda. There was nowhere for the wolf to go back here except into one of the rooms, but would it have had time to reach one of them yet? Could Hilda have managed to get free?

Her questions were answered when a blur of furry motion whipped out of one of the side corridors. The wolf was just around the corner and not running. She dashed the rest of the way, readying another volley of ice shards. Without her weapon, it was the last attack left to her, but from the way that the fire spell Hubert had cast earlier went, it didn't seem that the creature was very easily fazed by magic. The fire spells she had weren't actual attacks, they were more like parlor tricks or tools to be used for lighting small things on fire. Since they couldn't help her in this instance, it was better to focus on what she did have.

Sharpened ice…

As she reached the corner, she fired spikes of ice into the creature's side, and they struck it true, penetrating it just behind the front leg. Hilda stood, legs braced to push the wolf back as blood leaked down her forehead and out of the wounds on her arm. Somehow, she still had the clarity of mind to fight on. The axe was wedged in the wolf's mouth now, though the handle of it bowed and bent under pressure from its jaws. The wolf's rider was too focused on Hilda, though he wasn't armed and hadn't seen Marianne yet.

"Marianne, get out of here!" Hilda's voice strained and then, as if those words had robbed her of just enough of the vital concentration and strength she needed, her feet gave out and she was thrust backward toward the water. Hilda's back slammed into a metal gate, seemingly designed so that things in the water didn't get swept over the waterfalls that poured out of the area around the great chasm that the bridge stretched over.

The wolf and its rider splashed into the water after Hilda and were struggling to stay afloat as the water around them clouded with blood.

"Hilda!" Marianne's body just moved. She tore off her uniform jacket and dove into the water. The moment that she touched the chilly surface of the water, her teeth chattered. It had been so long since she had really swum; there were days with her mother and father where they had paddled around the little lake together near one of their old homes. Back then, her skin had been so warm in the sun and the air smelt of fresh, musky pine. Her cursed blood had taken all of that from her, she would not let it take Hilda too. She didn't deserve this—Hilda's only crime had been trying to engage with her, trying to make her feel welcome.

Problem was, Marianne was never a strong swimmer, and the water had a violent need to rush toward the iron bars. In the murky darkness under the surface, Marianne rolled and tumbled. She swept her arms, trying to right herself; then her legs hit the metal bars, and she flattened herself out against them, using them to pull her body back above the water.

With one hand she brushed the water away from her eyes as she surveyed the area. The wolf and its rider were at the far end in the corner, pressed against the bars as the creature bit into him and thrashed, spraying the air with blood. Marianne turned away from the horrid sight, trying to ignore the screams and the snapping of bones.

Hilda lay slumped in the water, her body limp with only her back slightly above the surface as it bobbed on the waves created by the wolf tearing into its former rider. Using the bars to pull herself toward Hilda, she managed to get one arm around the other girl. There was a raised edge on either side of the water with decorative columns that jutted out from the wall. It wasn't wide enough to easily walk down, but if she could get Hilda up there, then maybe…Towing Hilda behind her, she got one arm up onto the stonework of the edge. She had to let go of the other girl to pull herself up and there was just enough space for her to draw her legs up under herself and reach out to Hilda. She got her hands under Hilda's arms and pulled her from the water, the extra weight from her soaking clothes adding a degree of difficulty to the endeavor.

The wolf turned to swim their direction, diving under the surface of the water as it kicked its legs. The wound it had sustained in one leg slowed it down enough that she was able to get Hilda out, but it would be upon them at any moment if she did nothing.

"Stay away!" Marianne cradled a lifeless Hilda against her thighs and leaned over to touch the surface of the water. Once again, the crest flared to life inside of her, the beast that she had suppressed so long erupting in a surge of power that froze the water solid at the surface so thick, that she heard the wolf bump against it with a thud.

She held Hilda, afraid to check for signs of the heartbeat and breathing that she knew weren't there. The wolf tried to break through the ice, its head slamming against the thick, frozen water again and again as its eyes went wild with desperation. Its struggle became lethargic and slowed until it went limp against the ice and was dragged into the bars the slow current.

Hilda lay still against her. Marianne put her ear to Hilda's chest but heard nothing. Maybe her heartbeat was lost in the sound of the rushing waves and the distant grunts of battle from the others. Long ago, she remembered her father telling her about a boy he once knew that drowned but was revived through blowing into his mouth and using one's hands to force his heart to move again.

Marianne got the sense that time was of the essence and lay Hilda out flat next to her. She pressed Hilda's chest with her hands and then spread her housemate's mouth open with her fingers. Hilda's lips were cold and slick against hers as she blew into her body, trying to force her to breathe on her own. She pressed Hilda's chest again, harder and more frantically now. The tears warmed her cheeks as they ran down her face.

"No. Not again. Never again." Marianne put her mouth to Hilda's and suddenly Hilda jolted and rolled to the side to cough up the water. Marianne pulled Hilda until she was lying across her legs and held on to her tight.

"Marianne…" Hilda managed to say through the coughs.

"You're alive, Hilda. You're safe now."

Hilda's pink eyes looked over toward the body of the wolf wedged under the ice and against the bars. "You…did…all this?" One of her ponytails had come undone in the struggle and tendrils of wet bright pink hair clung to Marianne and fanned out around the one side of Hilda's head.

"Yes." Marianne couldn't help but laugh.

"That's good. I'm pretty sure I'm not getting that axe back. Got a better one at home anyway—"

Marianne scooped Hilda's face up in her hands and pressed her parted lips up to the other girl's and Hilda responded by parting her own lips, thinking maybe it was her way of saying thanks. It's fine if you kiss your friend out of excitement and, look, she's kissing you back…This lasted for longer than any thank you probably should.

Soon, she learned that tongues, or at least Hilda's tongue, had no taste. Was that normal? Oh well, Marianne supposed, as she had never been normal herself. The tension built beneath Marianne's chest, like a bowstring that threatened to snap. Hilda matched the motion of her tongue. Wet warmth grew between every point where their skin made contact; her stomach contracted and that same warm sensation flooded through her entire body, taking hold of her.

When their lips parted, Hilda brushed a loose strand of hair from Marianne's cheek as she stared up at her. There had to be a thousand questions playing through Hilda's head because she knew there were just as many in hers, but nearby footsteps caused them both to look up, Hilda raising herself up with her good arm to see Ferdinand run into view, carrying a bloodied spear in one hand.

"Thank the Elites," he said with relief. His face was streaked with blood, whether it was his or not she couldn't discern. "They're both all right! Down here!" he called down the hall to the others.

"Is everyone okay?" Marianne said. Had he seen what they were doing? Why did it matter if he did?

"A few scrapes and scratches," he said. "Hilda is really going to need Professor Manuela to look that arm over, though."

"Oh, right…" Marianne took Hilda's arm in her hands, lifting it up with such care that she worried it might rouse Ferdinand's suspicions. "I'll get started healing her as best I can." The soft green glow of healing magic filled the air between Marianne's hands, all while Hilda stared at her.

"You're incredible. Thanks, Marianne."

"Anytime. Now please, hold still."

Though Ferdinand might see the knowing smile pass between them, Marianne wasn't sure that he would see it as anything other than joy at having survived the brutal attack. Maybe that's all it was.

Chapter Text

The sun had dropped behind the Oghma Mountains by the time Byleth finished setting up her own tent. Lightning could be seen flashing in the gaps between the western peaks, so she double checked the stakes, just to be sure they would hold if the winds got high. They had set up the war camps in a small valley that looked more like a hole that had been blasted down through the mountains long ago, though through what manner of power she couldn't be sure.

She braced her legs, her stance wide as she took the mallet to one of the more loose stakes. As she drove it further into the dirt, Byleth could feel a pair of eyes on her; the Professor raised her head and looked to her side to see Mercedes with her hands clasped, standing a short ways off.

"You need anything?" Byleth asked as she drew the mallet up into the air for one last hit.

"Not particularly," the young woman said as she stepped closer, fiddling with the front of her shawl. "You know, I walked with your mother earlier and finally had a chance to speak with her."

Byleth rubbed the back of her hand across her brow to wipe away the sweat as she stood to her full height. "I hope she's not telling embarrassing stories about me again."

"No. Why, are there embarrassing stories I should know?"

Byleth tucked the mallet into her belt as she answered her. "None I'm willing to tell, that's for sure." In the distance she spotted Belial and Leonie laughing together as they tended to a campfire. "She thinks everyone will be as interested as her and Grandma in the adventures of the 'rambunctious Baby Byleth'."

"I'm sure you were nothing short of adorable," Mercedes said through a laugh. "But I suppose stories like that are something all mothers have in common. Kind of like when knights tell tales of their chivalrous deeds."

To Byleth, Mercedes had this shine about her so that, even in the shadow of these mountains, she seemed to be glowing with life. There was a strange ease about her movements, a sort of comfort in every motion she made. Her blonde hair cascaded off one shoulder and down across her breasts like she had planned it, but you couldn't plan to be this beautiful. You just were. "Never thought of it like that, but I have heard my fair share of knights tales."

When she stepped closer, Byleth smelled the saccharine sweet tones of vanilla in whatever scent she wore and noticed that her front teeth were almost too big for the rest in a way that gave her this deceptive youthfulness, despite her being even older than Byleth herself.

"I do wonder…why did you not stay a knight?" Mercedes asked.

Her mother had told her something, Byleth figured. Either that, or someone else around the monastery mentioned it. The question was often asked of her; it had been the route everyone expected Byleth to take from the time that she could swing a sword and fend off fully grown men with the expertise of a seasoned warrior. She didn't have an answer though.

"Last year, Gran just needed another teacher. I stepped in and took the position because, well, it seemed like something I could do," Byleth said with a sigh. "And there was a different kind of challenge to it."

"Might I ask—have you eaten yet, Professor?"

"Not yet," said Byleth.

Mercedes gasped, one hand covering her mouth; she then took Byleth by the wrist to lead her off in the direction of the center of the camp. "I saw you help Edelgard and one of the knights set up the mess tent. Then you were over there digging a latrine too—now you're setting up your own tent by yourself on an empty stomach!"

Her good-natured chiding of her reminded Byleth of a mother's. Mercedes would be a good mother, someday, she thought to herself. "Well, it's not just my tent. My father is probably going to sleep in there with me, since mother's not here." She stumbled along after Mercedes, trying to match the woman's cadence. Belial would take the mid watch and probably stay up drinking with the knights a little before that. He preferred to sleep with his comrades, or alone when he slept at all. That one had way more energy than her.

When he had first been born, her mother used to tell of how she had once been sickly and tired, until they came along; she said that Byleth had taken part of that sickness and turned it into energy, while Belial took all the rest and never looked back. He could stay alert and awake for days, it seemed.

Mercedes insisted on serving Byleth, on account of her making sure that the Professor was eating well. Claude sauntered over from somewhere outside of the camp with both hands in his pockets. He waited for only a moment before commenting on the pair of them together. "I hope you're not planning to betray us, Teach—the Golden Deer need all the help we can get on this one." The words were his, but the usual blasé air that he had about him was missing.

Ever since they had left the monastery that afternoon, he had not entirely been himself, though Byleth wasn't sure of the reason. Claude often played things close to the vest, never truly letting others know what cards he held. Everyone had secrets, but something about his attitude tonight bothered her—it seemed the kind of thing to spell trouble down the road, especially if he got too distracted in battle.

"Afraid not, you're stuck with me for good, Claude," Byleth reassured.

"I'm not going to run off with her, Claude," Mercedes said. "I just want to make sure she's good and fed for tomorrow's battle."

"Ah, you helped cook, didn't you, Mercedes?"

"Mmhmm," Mercedes nodded. "Annette offered, but I thought it best to keep her far away from any fires."

"I heard that Annette is the reason Felix is still growing his eyebrows back in," Byleth muttered. "Claude, did you already eat?"

"Yes, ma'am. Though I might grab a little more before it's time to turn in."

"Don't overdo it." Byleth took the plate and fork from Mercedes and thanked her. "Are you okay? I mean with everything else?"

He chuckled. "You could tell?"

Mercedes smiled at him. "You do seem a little less like yourself. You're not coming down with something, are you?" She stepped closer to examine him, but Claude held his hands up in protest.

"Nah, nothing like that. I'm just worried about Hilda and Marianne."

Byleth shoveled some food into her mouth. "It is a little strange not having her following me around begging to get out of work, but that girl is an artist with an axe."

"Were you okay with her being tasked with solving a murder?” Claude asked.

"Oh, I heard about the body they discovered," Mercedes chimed in. "It must have been dreadful!”

Byleth glanced towards Mercedes and then looked back at Claude. "I mean, you saw Grandma. I'd sooner face down a whole-ass dragon than get on her bad side."

Mercedes blinked, her expression softening in confusion. "Is an ass dragon a type of particularly dangerous dragon?" She clutched at her shawl, touching her hand to Byleth's leg and leaning against her.

Was she playing stupid to flirt? The possibility seemed to be there, though at the moment Byleth didn't feel the part of an attractive young woman. She was drenched with sweat and still streaked with dirt, except for her hands, which Mercedes had seen to her thoroughly washing.

Claude eyed the two of them like he was in on some secret suddenly. "I think she just means a regular dragon. The ass in this case is just an expression, really."

"I suppose that does make more sense," Mercedes replied as she sat upright, pressing a finger to the corner of her mouth.

Petra, one of the Black Eagles, walked up and looked between them. "Claude, Edelgard is wanting to speak with you."

Claude threw up his hands. "They sent a princess to bring me to speak to another princess? How could I refuse that kind of invitation? Lead the way," he said, sweeping his hands out before them before he followed behind the girl with his arms stretched up behind his head.

"Now that we're alone," Mercedes whispered. "How about you finish up your dinner so we can go for a walk?"

Oh Goddess, this little minx is hitting on me. In Byleth's own experience, young maidens with a curiosity for other women weren't out of the ordinary—her own bed could attest to the number of noble girls she'd taken a tumble with. And while there were a fair few noblemen to show interest in her, it was often in an attempt to slip a ring on her finger. The women would return to their House and be married off in many cases, especially those from the Kingdom.

But Mercedes was older than her, and despite appearances, Byleth's gut told her that Mercedes had some experiences all her own. She didn't have a House to return to, if Byleth understood correctly. Mercedes was the increasingly common sort of noble whose House had fallen due to mismanagement or misfortune. The woman was little more than a commoner. She had nowhere to run back to in particular, and no father to marry her off in the hopes he preserved his standing within the nobility.

"Yeah, I need to walk this food off anyway."

For far too long, Edelgard stared at Dorothea expecting some form of answer, but for once the songstress was stunned into actual silence. A loud pop from the logs in the fire coaxed the words out of Dorothea.

"You want me to act as your second?" Dorothea asked as she pressed a hand to her chest. "I've got no idea what you and Hubert get up to. Most of my expertise revolves around singing and, well, you know…" she elaborated with a truncated laugh.

"Manipulation. Coercion. Getting what you want out of whoever you want it from. And you're an extremely talented mage. You'll do perfectly." Edelgard folded her hands across her lap as she stared Dorothea down. This is what she had prepared for. This was exactly the kind of reply she expected.

Despite being well-known for her talents at the opera house, and being the only commoner from the Empire to make it into Garreg Mach, Dorothea doubted herself deep down. She doubted that she belonged, even when she was acting as if she did. Edelgard could use that—perhaps the machinations were a little more dangerous without Hubert here, but she was not without resources. And this would strengthen Dorothea's position, too.

"You think that the others here will actually fall in line if I say something?" Dorothea asked.

"They will if they know it's from me, and also because you're you. Besides, there is no one else here I can trust with this. We'll be lucky to drag Bernadetta out of her tent. Petra doesn't care if you're a noble or not. Caspar will punch whatever you tell him to. And Linhardt is so sleepy most of the time that I am not sure if he could tell you and I apart or what day it is."

Dorothea considered this as she took a seat on a crate across from Edelgard. "But if Ferdinand or Hubert were here—"

"—I have been considering asking you about this for some time. Hubert's duties become complicated some of the time, and if he is needed off the battlefield or in some other capacity, I need someone there I trust. And Ferdinand, well…let's just say that, given recent events in the Empire, I am not sure where his allegiances lie. If it were to come down to his House or the Empire, I do not know where his lot would fall."

"This sounds like it's really going to cut into my leisure time," Dorothea said as she blew out past her lips in a small gesture that Edelgard felt was for show.

"A little, but I think you might have had more work to do back with the Mittelfrank Opera Company than you will for me. I'm horribly self-sufficient," said Edelgard with a closed-eyed smile.

Dorothea folded her arms and leaned back. "Unless there is something on a high shelf. That better not be what this is about."

Claude and Dimitri ambled up through the darkness to step into the light of the fire. "My, how bold you are—you'd make a comment like that to the future Adrestian Empress. First assignment, just sit in on this little talk."

"Oh, wait, what?" Dorothea turned to see the two of them and Claude raised his hand to wave.

"Lady Edelgard," Dimitri said. "To what do we owe this pleasure."

Claude covered his mouth to cut a guffaw short. "Why don't you kiss her feet while you're at it, Your Highness?" He turned to Edelgard. "What's this all about, Princess?"

"Have a seat. First thing's first, I hope you won't mind Dorothea sitting in on this little meeting?" Edelgard said.

"I see no problem with that," Dimitri replied as he gave Dorothea a little nod.

Claude reached out to take Dorothea's hand. "Afraid I've scarcely had time to make your acquaintance, Lady Dorothea."

"It's just Dorothea. Dorothea Arnault."

Claude kissed the back of her hand. "Play your cards right and we might find some way to change that."

"Ooo, a lady could get used to this treatment," Dorothea said with a coy smile.

Good, she's disarming Claude, Edelgard thought. While she was sure that this was part of the game to Claude, he actually did have some kind of need for the attention. To what end, she hadn't figured out.

"I wanted to discuss this with the three of you here, before the professors start handing down orders," Edelgard explained. "These are technically our housemates, and despite everything, we know their state better than anyone else at Garreg Mach."

Claude nodded. "If you're going to say that it's our responsibility to see that everyone make it back alive, I think we can all agree on that."

"That's a given. I am proposing a sort of optimization of our forces," Edelgard said.

"Like we are, to plan things out?"

Dorothea brushed a stray tendril of dark hair away from her shoulder and raised her hand. "If I may, Edie, I think what she is trying to say is, imagine we're all a chorus, our three houses, that is. We wouldn't want to keep the more seasoned singer separate from the weaker ones. We would want to intermingle them, so that neither stands out too much and the stronger singers help keep the others on pitch, and the like."

"I think I get what Dorothea is saying. Maybe?" Claude said, rubbing his chin.

Good job, Dorothea. There is some merit to the idea, but… "Yes, well, almost—instead of spreading ourselves out and trying to normalize what every group has, we double down and play to our strengths. Claude, you're short two people, just like me, so this will be crucial. Bernadetta is not particularly fond of…anyone, but she is a fantastic archer. So, we fill one hole in your ranks with her to bolster your archery's strength. And Dimitri, you're short in the way of Dedue; while Caspar isn't the most intimidating, he makes up for it in raw strength."

Dimitri held up a finger. "And Claude, you have no dedicated healer, and you're going to be fighting mostly at range if you're focused on archery. We could swap Leonie and Mercedes between the two of us. Leonie, Sylvain, and Ingrid could act together as a fast-moving calvary, while Mercedes will still be effective at a distance, both in terms of Reason and Faith magic."

With the conversation taking flight without her, Dorothea shrunk back. She readjusted her hands over her lap, as if she didn't quite know what to do with them. Edelgard shot her a smile, trying to reassure her.

"We do need a healer, and Dimitri, if you want to have a front line that can punch through while the princess and I cover at mid and far range, Raphael should move under your command while I take the archer off your hands," Claude said.

"Ashe?" Dimitri asked as he grasped his chin, his head tucked in thought. "That would be a good trade. A good trade indeed…"

"In a way, Dorothea was right," Edelgard said, rising from her seat to stand next to the songstress. "Because each of the Houses has strengths that the others don't, we can play to them while letting the students who don't usually get to work with others in their same specialty learn from those who are presumably better at it. If working together is to become a normal thing on some missions, we might even have a special roster for it. A strike force of sorts."

"I'll admit, when I presented the idea for working together to Lady Rhea, I didn't expect for you to take to it so readily, El," Dimitri commented.

Dorothea cut in. "Well, when you look at our circumstances, now the Blue Lions are at the greatest advantage. Claude and Edie are down two units while you're short Dedue. Plus, you're bolstered by some of the better trained people in the academy."

Had she been trying to distract from Dimitri's use of my nickname? Edelgard wondered. She did kind of know something had gone on between Dimitri and I, at least to a degree.

If Claude suspected anything, he didn't show it. His eyes turned to Dorothea as she spoke, and he held his gaze on her. Perhaps that was the beauty of having her around—she was too effortlessly gorgeous for the average man to completely ignore.

To Edelgard, this could work. Depending on the way the rest of tonight went and the outcome of the battle tomorrow, Edelgard could be one step up on Those Who Slither in the Dark. If she could snuff out their control over the Empire and weaken their influence elsewhere substantially, she would buy herself more of what she desperately needed:

Time.

She would ask for no help. The small crates Lysithea had opted to carry would have been no work at all for someone like Raphael, and probably little more than a small chore for anyone else, but she wanted to take care of this on her own. She would be of use to the allied forces in some way, no matter how minuscule.

Nearby, some of the knights drank by the firelight while one of them told a boisterous story about one of the last times they had been out of the monastery together. Lysithea only caught that much because of the man's loud voice. She chanced a glance in their direction to see Leonie perched atop a box between Jeralt and that knight, Belial, the Professor's brother. They seemed to welcome her among their ranks, which was exactly the kind of thing Lysithea would never attempt.

Though she would probably never have the chance, probably never get to look as old as Leonie was now.

With the way her fingers ached, and how she had to let her mouth hang open to drink in the cool mountain air, it was best she pause here. She'd made it three-quarters to the makeshift depot, so she could afford to rest. When she went to bend forward her knees seemed to turn into jelly, but she was able to right herself. She glanced around the camp and the air itself was consumed by a white haze. Everything was going murky. Maybe trying to carry three in one trip was a bad idea?

"Let me get those, Lady Lysithea!" Cyril offered as he jogged up, the leather of his too-large armor groaning as it stretched from the movement. He wore only half a set with his legs still covered by loose gray trousers. Was he being fitted for the whole ensemble?

"Oh, that's okay," Lysithea said in mild protest, but he had already hefted the boxes into the air and was turning to carry them to the depot.

"Seriously, it's not a problem," he said in turn. As he walked towards the depot, she chased after him, until he stopped just outside of the open tent flaps, surveying the sectioned off supplies within.

"I said I can do it myself," she insisted. Cyril lowered the boxes and surveyed the contents of the top one. They were mostly dry cooking supplies, the kinds of things that weren't at risk of being set afire. She pointed to the furthest spot to the left. "They go over there."

The spot was clearly labeled with a small, wooden painted sign. Did he not see it?

He laid the boxes out on the ground and then stacked them against the others of their kind. "It's no big deal really," he said. "This isn't exactly the kind of work for you."

"And just what is that supposed to mean?" Lysithea asked, mildly irritated.

"Hold out your hands, please."

Lysithea humored him and held out her trembling hands. There were creases where the lumber of the crates had pressed too long and hard against her skin. At the very least, she had managed to avoid getting any splinters or cuts.

"See? This is what I mean," Cyril pointed out. "These are, like, the hands of a princess or something." Cyril had taken her hands in his; though he wasn't much taller, his hands were bigger, and there was a warm coarseness to them. He massaged her palm as if she were a tomato he was afraid to bruise.

"Stop that," she said, snatching her hands away from him. At the very least, her head was a little clearer from whatever it was he had been doing.

Cyril rubbed at his head. "Sorry, that was odd of me."

"I'm kind of surprised to see you all the way out here, don't you usually stay pretty close to the monastery?" And Lady Rhea, Lysithea added in thought.

"Yeah, but since I'm supposed to be Shamir's squire, I asked Lady Rhea if I could tag along for this mission. I'll be here at the base camp though, just in case I'm needed." He stared at her, his big brown eyes searching her face; what for, she didn't know. "You should see if they need anyone else to guard the camp, just in case something goes wrong while they're out."

Lysithea folded her arms. "Nonsense, I'm needed out there," she said as she pointed in a direction that she guessed could be the direction of the bandit camp.

"I was just saying that since Shamir made me wait here—"

She cut him off, a tight ball of anger thumping in her chest. "You've got your whole life ahead of you. She probably thought it was best that you weren't down there in the chaos of battle. Some of us don't have that luxury!"

Again, her hands began to tremble, and she could feel the sting around her eyes. If she stayed any longer, she might allow tears to fall in front of him. She clenched her hands into fists at her sides to keep them from shaking, and strode out towards the Golden Deer section of the camp.

"Hey, wait, you're almost the same age as me!" Cyril took a few steps to chase after her, but ultimately let her leave. Just before she got out of earshot, she thought she heard him mutter, "What did I say wrong?"

Before every battle, even if it was just a simple one-on-one duel, Glenn Govan Fraldarius would burn prayer herbs and converse with the Goddess. The practice had fallen out of favor centuries ago, but it had been the kind of thing one would find in the old stories of bravery that were told about the knights.

Those books and the tales, as recounted by traveling bards and troupes of troubadours, had become a part of Glenn; they had saturated his very person in much the same way that the smell of those herbs sunk into the clothing of the person praying over them.

Ingrid had grown accustomed to the scent, Glenn's scent. She never quite knew what to say to the same Goddess who let her betrothed die, let the people of Duscur take all those lives, and let them take their King. Thus, she sat in silence thinking of their safety in the battle to come.

Armor jangled with footsteps at her side and there was a slight jolt against the rock where she sat. Ingrid turned to look up at Glenn; she was used to gazing up at him, as he had always been much taller than her, Dimitri and the others. Though he was sixteen, he already had the beginnings of dark stubble beneath his bottom lip that was shading the curve of his chin.

Sixteen. Ingrid was older now than he would ever be.

"You picked up at least one of my habits, Dove," said Glenn.

"It's not a bad habit," Ingrid said as she shut her eyes, trying to concentrate on the task at hand, though she knew it was futile.

Glenn sighed, and she could almost feel his breath on the side of her face. "But you don't believe in the Goddess. You'd never say that to His Highness and the others, but I know it to be true." He stretched his armored legs out in front of him. "That's why you see me whenever you're praying like this."

"And you think others see the Goddess Sothis when they close their eyes and speak their desires and hopes to her?"

"I don't know any others like I know you."

He was dead and buried. He'd never know anyone else again, if at all. And yet, when he reached up and grasped her shoulder, Ingrid could swear she felt him there. His scent was in the air, not just the spent herbs, but the subtle hint of armor oil and the soap he used. The hint of clean sweat.

Ingrid's eyes stung despite being closed, and soon the tears began to leak from the corners to roll down her cheek. Glenn rocked her on the shoulder. "This isn't fair," she said.

"Life isn't, really. I guess I know that better than most."

"And you're not scared for what will become of me, or His Highness, or Felix?" Ingrid asked. When she opened her eyes, Glenn was smiling at her softly. He had taken after his mother, and for that, he was a far more handsome man than his brother or father—deep purple eyes, hair that had an immaculate curl to it. He looked like a painting.

"No," he said. "Well, at least not from some bandits. Your greatness hasn't come yet." Glenn slipped the gauntlet from one hand and brushed a tear away from her cheek before cradling her face.

A morose chuckle slipped out of Ingrid. "What's that thing you used to always tell me?"

"That I'd love you no matter the distance between us?"

"No, you oaf, the other thing."

"Oh—'The true value of a man, a knight, is not in how he dies, for all men die and it is but a moment, but in how he lived?'" He paused a moment, before hazarding another guess. "'Not everyone truly lives, and you've got to live your life.'"

"That's the one," said Ingrid.

"You'll be fine in the battle tomorrow, because you've got something even I didn't have. You've got a legend watching over you, as well as Dimitri and Felix by your side, and even Sylvain; but most importantly, you've got me."

The tears came harder now, until her chest hurt and she was sobbing against his arm.

"Even if you don't believe in the Goddess, even if she's not there, I will make sure no harm comes to you," Glenn reassured her.

The fire she sat by flared up as something was pitched into the flame and Felix spoke to her in a low grumble. "Are you okay, woman?"

Ingrid dried her eyes with the back of her hand. "Yeah, I'll be fine."

"Good. If your…Blood Moon is out, though, that might play to our advantage; you'd be a formidable fighter under it. Just warn me so that I can stay out of the way."

Ingrid shook her head. "You know that's not how that works, right?" Felix always knew just the wrong thing to say in the right way.

"You're right, you're a piece of work anytime. Blood Moon or not, we're practically assured victory tomorrow," he said.

"Yeah, not sure how cramps and headaches are going to make me a better fighter," she said.

"Headaches always make me a better fighter. I strive to vanquish my prey even faster—get it over with."

"Thanks for the tip. So, you're not worried at all about tomorrow?"

Felix walked closer to her and paused, tilting his head back as if he smelled something familiar. "I'm worried I won't be able to find a formidable opponent." He turned to look down at her. "But between me, you, that slut Sylvain, the Boar, the Blade Breaker, and the whole host of other Academy Students, the bastards don't stand an icicle's chance in Ailell."

Ingrid found herself wearing a smirk despite everything. "Thanks, Felix. That was oddly uplifting and even positive."

"Whatever you say," Felix said as he strolled off.

"…And after leaving House Bartels, we made our way over the border into Eastern Faerghus and took refuge in a church. Though that was just Mother and I. She feared that, were she to take Emil with us, things would have ended badly with my father. He wanted an heir beyond all else, and had little in the way of care for my mother or I, you see." Mercedes clutched at her chest, through the shawl, through the button down shirt of her uniform. It was as if retelling the tale had raked at her heart.

Byleth's hand rubbed at her shoulder. She thought to ask her if she wanted to stop, as the last thing she wanted was someone causing themselves discomfort on her behalf. Another question came to mind though. "Why not appeal to the Emperor about the abuses under one of his lords?"

Mercedes stared at her feet as they continued their trek along the mountain path while another flash of distant lighting lit the sky. "House Bartels is a minor lordship at best. I think that is why my father became so obsessed with the idea of an heir. We had little in the way of contact with Emperor Ionius, or even more prestigious houses like Arundel or Aegir. Mother and I fled to the Kingdom, as she said it was the safer option."

"Do you know what really became of your brother…when House Bartels, you know, fell?" The question left Byleth's lips before she could truly weigh the seriousness of the thing she asked.

The Fall of House Bartels had been speculated and gossiped about, and many believed that the heir had been behind the slaughter. It wasn't uncommon as of late for minor Houses to crumble due to mismanagement or losing minor spats with nearby competitors, but it was unheard of that a single man could slay the entirety of his kin and bring about a severe fall of his house from the nobility.

Mercedes shook her head. "I have an idea, but nothing concrete. I've always regretted the way we left him, but…" she said before trailing off.

When the clouds gave way, the moon shone through to light the rock walls that guarded their walking path in pale light. "We don't have to talk about all of this, if you don't want," Byleth offered. "I mean—"

"-no, I tell you this because I think that it is important that you hear it from me. You were so worried before that Lady Sitri had divulged some great secret about your past that I figured it was only fair."

“It's quite alright. I don't think my mother telling stories about baby me shitting myself or me falling asleep drunk in the bushes around the monastery really compares to…this."

Mercedes smiled, her eyes sparkling in the moonlight. "Even then, I wanted you to know me."

"Well, I wish that I had something to tell about my own past," Byleth said.

“Dear, there must be something.” Mercedes paused to think. "It must have been quite an unusual situation, growing up as the daughter of a legendary knight and a cardinal and the granddaughter of the Archbishop."

People would lay her situation out like that at times, and Byleth just never saw it that way, or at least her perspective didn't allow her to think of it like that. "It was normal to me," she said with a shrug. "Grandmother has always been strict, but she was caring too. She would go fishing with me on rare occasions, or read books with me. Did you know she has a talent for hand-to-hand combat and fencing?"

A melodic chime of laughter burst out of Mercedes until the point she was doubled over and holding onto her knees. "Lady Rhea can fight?"

"Oh yeah, she can hold her own against Dad. She used to take me and Belial on at the same time."

Mercedes' bright blue eyes widened and took some time to recover from the shock. "Your father seems so docile and sweet, he loves talking about you and your brother…and Lady Sitri, too."

"Of the two of them, Dad definitely has my more embarrassing stories. One of these days, I'm going to have to corner him and ask him what he's been saying about me."

Mercedes rubbed the tears from beneath her eyes as she giggled. “Goddess, I would hate to have gotten Captain Jeralt in trouble."

Byleth tilted her head towards her with a smirk. "If you think that my dad is out here avoiding trouble, then he truly hasn't been living up to his reputation."

"Oh, really?"

"Yes, really. One time, my mother got hurt in the village a little down the mountain from the monastery. Jeralt mobilized the knights and, because he didn't want to leave me and Belial alone, he sat me on his horse to ride in front of him. But since Belial was too small and he was afraid to let him ride with anyone else or sit in front of me, he crammed him in a saddlebag secured to the side of the horse!"

"Was Lady Sitri hurt badly?" Mercedes asked.

"She'd sprained her ankle. He brought fifteen knights and both of us down the mountain only to find her sitting amongst some of the village children showing them a picture book of flowers she had found."

"So, she was okay?"

"Yeah," Byleth said.

The path carved down around along the edge of the mountain overlooking the area toward the border of the Kingdom and the Empire. A little ways away from the cliff, where you could still see off into the distance, was a rock with a mostly flattened top. Indeed, Byleth had sat here to rest with her father or brother on many occasions. She and Mercedes made their way there to have a seat.

Mercedes spoke as they stared out across the darkened landscape. “Your mother seems nice. In some ways, she reminds me of my mother.”

Byleth turned to her. "That's funny, because I was going to say that, in some ways, you kind of remind me of her—not in any bad kind of way, or like anything physical. It's just that, well…you're so kind." Which seemed to be a feat, considering all that had happened to Mercedes.

Mercedes stifled a laugh behind her hand. "You're adorable, but I think I get what you mean."

Byleth reared back. "I don't think 'adorable' is a word anyone has used to describe me in a long time."

"Then you had better get used to it, because I'm going to be doing it all of the time," Mercedes said with a raised eyebrow.

"Okay, that sounds vaguely like a threat," Byleth said.

"Does it? I'm sorry." She scooted closer to Byleth. "If we're just confessing awkward things, there's something about you that kind of reminds me of Emil—or the kind of person that he could have become, if things had gone better. You're both so serious about your morning sweets, too."

"When I can get them, thanks to that pastry pilfering…philanderer." Byleth tightened her fist in front of herself upon saying that.

"I don't think that word means what you think," Mercedes said.

"Wait, it doesn't? Shit."

"No," Mercedes said with a shake of her head. "But I think what really drew me in to you was the way you're a mix of all these things. You're like a commoner raised among the nobility. You don't seem to care who has a crest, or for who anyone is. You don't seem the type to delegate work that you could do yourself when the need arises, like setting up those tents or patrolling the monastery. And you're extremely brave and selfless, even if you act like you're not concerned with others."

Byleth sighed. "I don't really feel like I'm all of those things."

"At the very least, you're easy to talk to. I mean, you're a little rough around the edges and I do like that. I like rough—in other ways."

The bells of the monastery had to be ringing-either that or an alarm was sounding from within Byleth. This had escalated out of control very fast, in a very specific way. And then there was something else—she could hear that they were being followed. It had started at the camp, and she thought someone was patrolling the road, but their movements had stopped when they did. Perhaps father thought he would spy on them, but Jeralt wasn't dim enough to bring a horse to do the job.

"What kind of women do you like?" Mercedes asked. It wasn't even a question for the woman whether Byleth was interested in women or not. She just came right out with it: what kind.

"Mercedes, you're not my student, and you're not the first from the Officer's Academy to, well, do what I am sure you're trying to do. But it seems wrong to—"

"Does it feel wrong?" Mercedes asked.

"Damn, I…really don't want to answer that truthfully. And I definitely don't want to find out how much fight Gran has left in her."

"You've never exercised any kind of authority over me and, well, I think I may actually be older than you. I'm just saying that, when the term is over, I’ll have a reason to remain at the monastery."

"What of your mother?" Byleth asked.

"She is comfortably married to a merchant, Oscar Duggal. I actually wrote to her a few nights ago," Mercedes answered.

"Oh."

"Yes. I just want you to consider it for when all of this is over. And to consider this."

It came on a rush as Mercedes seized Byleth at the collar, as if she were afraid of the pair of them being swept apart and crawled to sit on Byleth's lap. Her lips brushed Byleth's, asking for permission for more, and the other woman obliged. Mercedes raked her fingers up through her hair as their mouths teased and tested one another.

Mercedes was buttery sweet with a twinge of cinnamon, and just full-on warmth and softness. The sensation of her, the weight of the other woman on her, and the loose wisps of blonde hair caressing her cheeks and the opening below the collar of her shirt. Byleth thanked the Goddess they were in the open, and that she had it in her to refuse this going any further, because the passion behind this kiss surely meant that had she been willing, Mercedes would rip the clothes off of her here and then.

She had experiences with first kisses, but no kiss before had ever felt like this, all heated and drawing the hands of time to a standstill. The air buzzed at her exposed skin, and she felt compelled to run her hand through the other woman's hair.

And something snapped in the distance, but still far too close.

Byleth yanked Mercedes down on top of her and rolled the both of them toward the cliff and off the backside of the rock they had been sitting on for cover. They landed on the rocky ground just as an arrow whizzed by, passing near enough to where they were that the air hissed past their heads.

Mercedes lay beneath her, but Byleth's leg had taken the brunt of the impact to protect her from the fall.

"Professor!"

Byleth touched Mercedes's lips to quiet her as the air erupted with hoofbeats then, but from the other direction. The direction from which they had come.

On each occasion when the conflagration of darkness raged through his veins, he would have given anything to feel nothing at all again. Before he could wrest control away, before the passenger even had fully consumed him and the mask slipped off, his legs moved on their own, and soon he was spurring his steed toward the danger. He knew not whether it was Death or the man who called himself Jeritza or the boy Emil that drove him forward this time.

They rounded the bend at full gallop, a path that all three of them are familiar with as it is one of the few ways down this side of the mountains towards the Empire and the Kingdom. The brisk night air ripped at his skin, and the fullness of the darkness took them in total. Without the ebony armor, he might as well be nude. This exposure would usually be unbearable, letting the filth of his flesh touch the natural, living world?

Unthinkable!

But the need for prey had come too suddenly. He could taste the blood in the air, the blood that would be in the air.

An arrow caught him too high in the shoulder for it to be of consequence at the moment. Even without armor, Death feels no true physical pain, not from mere slings and bolts, at least. He didn't carry the Crescent Sickle on this night, and there were no lances in his repertoire at all, a consequence of the mask he wore preferring other weapons.

It was no matter; the slaughter began just as well with the blade of his sword. The men who had attacked Jeritza's colleague and Mercedes were downhill, around a rocky outcropping. They could not make a retreat before he rode them down and dove upon them, seeking to satiate his bloodlust. There had only been two of them or three, it was hard to tell. Nor did it matter.

Their screams and begging faded soon to reveal the night wind and footsteps at his back. Thick blood cooled on his clothes, spattered across his face and soaking his hands, the vast majority of it theirs. He ceded control to Jeritza, satisfied.

"Jeritza? For fuck's sake, it looks like someone wrung a herd of cows out over here." The annoying woman, the other Professor, Byleth, was speaking when Jertiza came to.

There was someone else with him, someone he had known in another life: Mercedes. A brief expression of recognition flashed across her face, but she quickly stifled it. Good, he thought, she didn't need to think of her brother like this—Emil was dead.

"Goddess! You're hurt!" Mercedes had been holding the reins of his horse, leading it over until she spotted the arrow jutting out of his shoulder. She knelt at his side, despite the slashed and hacked bodies and dismembered limbs, as she began to heal him.

Byleth glanced around at all the carnage before she said, "Thanks, man. I thought you just followed us out here because Mercedes smelled like sweets—but if you hadn't been here that would have been a tough spot to get out of."

"Professor Jeritza, can you speak?" Mercedes asked.

He reached up and ripped the arrow out, which caused Mercedes to scream before she frantically covered the wound with her hands to heal him.

"I just followed the scent of blood," he said, blank-eyed, lit from the soft green light of Mercedes's healing spell.

"Okay, really wish you'd stop saying weird shit like that," Byleth said.

"Oh, he's in shock," Mercedes said as she finished her spell. She quickly removed her shawl and wrapped it over his shoulders. "There." She patted his chest. "You'll be right as rain in no time."

"Who…were they?" Jeritza managed, his body aching with exhaustion. It washed over him in a wave, causing him to tremble.

Byleth rubbed at the mount's snout. "No idea, and good luck finding any clues in all this. The only one of them left mostly intact is the guy you pitched off the cliff so hard that he's probably half-way to Arianrhod by now."

He looked at Mercedes through clouded eyes, the tiredness overtaking him. A different kind of darkness. "As long as you're safe," he said as he slumped over.

"Help me get him onto his horse," Jeritza heard Byleth say, though her voice was distant. "Look, buddy, you can have all the pastries you want as far as I'm concerned."