Chapter Text
We all are caught in the middle of one long treacherous riddle, can I trust you? Should you trust me too? We shamble on through this hell, taking on more secrets to sell, till there comes a day when we sell our souls away…
Chevalier, Cheve, Nohr
Snow drifted down from gray-bellied clouds without hurry, beginning to collect in powdery clumps in the edges and corners of Chevalier’s streets, lest it be trampled under the busy boots that trod along their paths.
On one such street, the second prince of Nohr hunched against the chill, his collar (inside out) pulled up to guard the back of his neck against errant precipitation. Leo was beginning to regret the fact he hadn’t taken Hati, even knowing the walk he took was short enough that between tacking up and having to go the opposite direction of his destination just to get to the stable, riding would have taken the same amount of time as walking.
At least imagining the look of utter disgust and betrayal Hati would have given him at being forced to leave his cozy stall for the dreary day outside was amusing enough to warm Leo’s heart a fraction.
A few minutes later, the prince arrived at his destination, scraping his feet to rid his boots of the mud that hadn’t quite frozen yet before he entered the establishment, a cheery bell above the door announcing his arrival.
Northern Chevalier had an odd little post office; it was tiny compared to how many people it serviced, and Leo had wondered more than once over the nearly two months he’d spent there why it hadn’t taken over a much larger building. It wasn’t even its own building, in fact—merely a counter tucked into the back of the local library-slash-bookstore, run by a steel-haired woman with round glasses and a permanent frown.
As usual, Leo was met with merely a glare from the aged postmaster. She had certainly seen enough of him over his time there—more than enough, he was sure she thought. But for the times he and Camilla ended up further afield in Cheve’s more rural provinces, Leo had made the trek daily.
And for the first time in almost two weeks, his patience had been rewarded.
The postmaster shoved a thick parchment across the counter with her spindly fingers splayed wide. Leo’s heart jumped as he caught a glimpse of the writing under her hand, slightly smudged as if its author hadn’t quite waited long enough for the ink to dry before handling it.
It would be just like Corrin, he thought, resisting the soft grin that was threatening his features as he snatched up the letter.
He dropped the second parchment.
Whatever joy had been thrumming through his veins abruptly vanished at the sight of the fallen letter, its Nohrian crest stamped deeply into amethyst wax. There was no mistaking his father’s seal.
With Corrin’s letter still carefully clutched in one hand, Leo bent down and snatched up Garon’s missive. Might as well get the worst over with, he thought, ducking behind a bookshelf into an aisleway out of sight of the postmaster.
His father’s letter, once he got past the typical trappings of royal correspondence, really only had one sentence with the entire point. I am granting you ten days leave to return to Krakenburg for the new year.
Leo lowered the parchment, already doing the math in his head. It was perhaps three days from Chevalier to Windmire—less if they both took Camilla’s wyvern, but that wouldn’t be happening any time soon. They could leave early the morning of December the twenty-eighth, only the day after tomorrow. If they did, they would arrive on the night of the thirtieth, which meant they wouldn’t miss the annual masquerade ball held on New Year’s Eve—a point which was certainly far more important to Camilla than it was to Leo, but a point nonetheless. (Arriving that late would also neatly absolve them of any responsibility of preparing for that event.) That meant they could stay until the third and be back in Cheve by the night of the sixth.
And that meant he would have time to see Corrin.
Despite himself, another smile came to Leo’s face as he tucked Garon’s orders into the inside breast pocket of his coat. He and Camilla had been sent to Cheve so suddenly that they hadn’t even had time to go to the Northern Fortress and tell Corrin in person—Elise had had to carry the message for them after they had already left. Leo knew that had been yet another part of the discipline even being in Cheve entailed, but it hadn’t stung any less—until he’d arrived in Cheve and had a letter waiting from Corrin less than forty-eight hours later.
She’d written him almost daily since then, but for the past week and a half. (She’d written Camilla as well, of course, but Leo had noted smugly one day that his letters had all been significantly longer.) Now, he held her unopened message with reverent fingers, determined to take it in after the worrying gap.
He might have been imagining it, but he could almost swear he could smell the Northern Fortress as he cracked the seal, that familiar mix of dust and cloves.
Leo,
I’m really sorry I haven’t written you! Father intercepted one of your notes to me last week. It seems silly to me, but Elise says he was ‘super mad’ about it, so I’m not going to be able to send you letters anymore. She promised me that she’d make sure this one got to you (though I’m not sure how. I guess she’ll probably have Arthur send it from somewhere other than Windmire, where Father won’t know about it?) so that you and Camilla won’t worry anymore. (I know you’ve been worrying. Stop frowning, little brother, I can almost see you doing it!)
(Leo had, in fact, frowned at that line, though it was hardly fair for Corrin to have called him out on it.)
I still miss you both lots! I think I’m going to keep writing and just give them all to you whenever you get back. Hopefully it’s soon or you’ll have a lot to go through! Obviously, you don’t have to do the same. It might be a little silly, but I hope nothing TOO exciting happens before you can tell me about it! And don’t worry about me too much. Elise has been visiting almost every day. We’re working on writing ‘The Saga of Lord Bowler’ and it’s coming along really well! You’ll get to read it when you come back!
Lots of love!
Corrin
P.S. Make sure Hati and Marzia get extra pets from me!
Leo read the letter over three times before he folded it back along its creases and tucked it into his pocket alongside its companion. Trust Corrin to cover her own disappointment with extra exclamation points and an utter sense of disregard for her own state. It made his heart ache to think they had gone two months beyond their longest guesses for her captivity—and now he wasn’t even there to weather it with her, all because he’d dared to point it out.
He stared vacantly and unblinking at the shelf across from him for several minutes more than he probably should have. For a moment, he let himself think selfishly. Corrin’s letters had been one of the few things that had made his pseudo-exile remotely bearable, and now his father had taken that away as well.
A sound of utter frustration rose in Leo’s throat, barely muffled at the last moment. Powerless. They were all so utterly powerless against even the most meaningless of Garon’s whims: Corrin in her prison of a fortress, Xander in his prison of loyalty and willful blindness, and Leo simply being too damned outnumbered at every single turn.
Was this how the whole of Cheve felt?
After that sobering question, the quiet background hum of Leo’s thoughts seemed to cut off for a second, then start back off in an entirely different direction. His eyes focused on one of the leather-bound titles in front of him. Thin, scrolling writing down the spine read Artist’s Rendition of a Chevois Winter.
With nimble fingers, Leo slid the book from its place on the shelf, letting it fall open to a page in the middle.
An expertly crafted image stared back at him, rendered in watercolor, bearing the likeness of a frozen lake surrounded by forest. Two tiny, inked figures skated along the icy surface.
He flicked through the book, skimming the rest of it. Most of the art was merely inked, but a few had been fully colored and all were—even by Leo’s exalted standards—quite good.
The entire thing might as well have had “Corrin” written all over it.
“I’m just pointing out that a talented wordsmith ought to be able to create such a powerful mental image one has no need for pictures,” he’d said once—quite naively in hindsight.
That had been a moment before Corrin had replied in a tone that still brought a lump to his throat: “I mean, a picture book is the only way I’m ever going to see Cyrkensia.”
He wondered when he’d ever get to make good on his promise to take her to Cyrkensia and anywhere else she wished to go. Leo and Corrin’s Venture Through Nohr and Surrounding Territories. Or Corrin and Leo’s, as she’d insisted.
Leo supposed he didn’t really care what they called it, as long as the day came that they got to do it.
He wondered if it would be Xander on the throne of Nohr by then.
In the meantime, Leo flipped to the front cover of the book, wincing a little as he caught the price tag. It was more than he usually spent on New Year’s presents, though not as potentially outrageous as it could have been. He did have a rather heavy pouch of gold in his pocket—Garon had sent them with quite a bit more coin than they needed for necessities, probably expecting it to be spent in bribes and the like. Leo thought this was a far better use for it.
He snapped the book closed and headed for the front counter—thankfully in the opposite direction of the postmaster.
As he neared the front counter, the door jingled again, opening to reveal a figure draped in so many layers of furs as to be androgynous. “Bah, if it isn’t cold enough out there to freeze a wyvern’s ass off,” they said, somehow managing to sound grumpy and cheery in equal measure. “Mornin’, Jacques.”
The front counter clerk—a ginger-haired boy of perhaps Camilla’s age, apparently named Jacques—lit up with a cheery wave directed toward the newest customer. “Scarlet! When did you get back?”
The new arrival threw her hood back to reveal choppy blond hair and a fair, freckled complexion flushed from the cold. Having only encountered her in the flesh once, Leo might not have recognized her had Xander not expounded on his own encounter with the governor’s daughter the previous summer in detail.
“Last night,” Scarlet said, leaning over the counter to plant a kiss on Jacques’s cheek. “I’d have stayed in Cyrkensia if I’d known Cheve planned on welcoming me back like this.”
“Who’s to say you didn’t bring the snow with you?” Jacques shot back.
Scarlet rolled her eyes. “Because compared to this, Nestra was downright balmy.”
“Not surprising, really,” Leo heard himself say without making the conscious decision to join the conversation. “There’s a relatively warm ocean current off the Nestran coast that has quite a significant effect on the climate. Nothing like the Mokushujin Current, of course, else Akacester would likely be the only tropical destination on the western half of the continent, but the impact is still noticeable compared to inland Nohr.”
A long moment passed before two very deliberate stares turned in his direction.
Leo paused, his stride coming up short as he cleared his throat. “The more you know,” he added.
Jacques’s expression turned cross and he opened his mouth, then seemed to think better of whatever he’d been about to say when Scarlet reached across the counter to pinch the back of his hand. “Your Highness,” the governor’s daughter said; slowly, like the title burned her throat.
Apparently, the recognition had gone both ways from their singular meeting when Leo had first arrived in Cheve. “Scarlet,” he replied, ducking his head slightly in recognition—not a bow, but a show of respect nonetheless. If Leo was smart and he played his cards right, Scarlet—and her father—could prove valuable allies indeed, and he had no better time to curry that favor than now.
Scarlet, on the other hand, didn’t seem keen on helping Leo further any of those plans. She stared at him for a moment more, then deliberately turned back to the counter in what could only be a pointed show of ignoring him.
Unwilling to be deterred—and still needed to pay for Corrin’s present—Leo continued toward the front counter undaunted. “I trust you found your visit to Cyrkensia quite delightful?” he said. “I’ve heard the showing of The Duchess and the Fox was quite spectacular this year.”
Scarlet shot him a steely look from the corner of her eyes, giving Leo a moment to note they were scarcely a few shades lighter than his own. “I wouldn’t know,” she replied. “Never cared that much for the opera. S’all a bit screamy for my taste.”
Leo shrugged at that, setting his purchase on the counter. Jacques glanced between Leo and Scarlet, then hurriedly pulled out a pad of paper from under the counter.
“I was visiting a friend of my mom’s, anyways,” Scarlet added, then quirked her head to shoot an odd look at Leo’s book. “Huh. Didn’t really peg you for the artsy type.”
Leo blinked, belatedly realizing what she was referring to. “Ah. No. New Year’s present for my sister,” he explained.
“I can have it shipped straight from here if you’d like,” Jacques interjected, then quoted a price that sounded suspiciously high even to ears used to Windmire’s often inflated economy.
“That won’t be necessary,” Leo said, passing the required coin across the counter and tucking the book back under his arm. “I’ll be there to deliver it in person.”
Scarlet shot him another odd look at that, but before she could say anything, a shout from outside rent the air, so loudly it echoed even through the wood and glass of the building.
Another followed it, a bellow of sheer fury eclipsed by a scream of horror. “What the…” Jacques started. Out the window, a pair of pedestrians spun toward the sound, breaking into matching jogs before ducking down another street and out of sight.
“The devil is going on out there?” Scarlet asked, pushing away from the counter as the commotion continued.
Leo didn’t bother to speak, merely tucking Corrin’s book in his satchel beside Brynhildr and striding for the door.
He knew, all too well, the sound of a crowd out for blood.