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It was sunny when they buried Rodrigue in the Garreg Mach graveyard. A few fluffy white clouds floated across the sky, and light poured down all around them. But the sunshine felt weak and wan to Byleth, like golden wine that had lost all its potency.
Felix wasn't there. He'd helped them dig the grave, but as soon as he glimpsed his father's body, small under the plain white sheet, he'd turned on his heel and stalked off. No one tried to stop him, not even Dimitri, who lowered Rodrigue into the earth and stared for what seemed a lifetime. No one moved. No one spoke. Not until Dedue picked up a shovel and handed it to the grieving prince.
"It should've been me," whispered Dimitri.
"Lord Rodrigue would disagree," said Dedue, his face betraying nothing. "And so would I."
They let Dimitri fill the grave, heads bowed in silent prayer or simply out of respect. Most of the soldiers and onlookers trickled away as the oppressive silence became too much to bear. But Byleth and the rest of the Blue Lions remained, waiting until Dimitri threw the shovel aside. He picked up the hastily carved headstone himself, as easily as if it were firewood, laying it over Rodrigue's final resting place.
"Someday—" His voice broke, and a long minute passed before he tried again. "Someday, I will provide you a more fitting tribute for all that you did...my old friend."
In her own mind, Byleth could suddenly hear all the things Felix might have to say to that. All the ways his grief would find its way into cutting words. But she kept them to herself, laying a small bouquet of flowers over the plain grey stone. It seemed so little...so insignificant for the man who had done so very much.
Dimitri looked up in surprise at her, then at everyone still standing there. "You didn't have to stay."
"Oh, don't be silly," said Annette. Her cheerful voice cracked through the gloom, bringing a few hesitant smiles to the faces around her. "Of course we were going to stay. Now come on. We have a lot more ahead of us, and Lord Rodrigue..."
Mercedes put a hand on Annette's arm. "He'd trust us to see it through. He'd trust you, Dimitri."
"My friends." Dimitri's hands, so steady with the shovel, started to shake. "I..."
He looked to Byleth, always and first to her. She took his hands in both of hers and managed the smallest of smiles. "Just say thank you, Dimitri," she said.
"Thank you," he whispered, just to her. Then to everyone else, his voice a bit steadier, "Thank you all, truly."
Byleth watched everyone go their separate ways, back to the frenetic action of the monastery at war. With all the preparations for their next campaign, they'd barely had enough time to properly bury Rodrigue. Dimitri lingered with her, hovering at the very edge of the graveyard.
"Was there something else?" she asked.
He gave her a rueful, fleeting smile. "It has been a lifetime since the academy, and you still read me like an open book. Professor, am I so transparent to you?"
"You always have been," she said. "And I think you always will be."
Dimitri sighed. When he answered, it was as though she'd wrung the word out of his chest with her own hands.
"Felix."
Byleth shook her head. She knew exactly where this was going, and she wanted to stop the cycle of guilt and recrimination before it could start this time. "Let me speak with Felix," she said. "I worry he might run you through."
"I would not blame him if he did."
Self-pity was an improvement over vengeful rage, but Byleth had to bite back the harsh words that first came to mind. She'd spent too many hours sparring with Felix. Instead, she pointed Dimitri back up the stairs to the rest of the monastery.
"The greenhouse needs weeding," she said softly. "And when you're done with that, there's still some rubble near the stairs to the town."
Dimitri scowled at her. "Professor, I'm not a child any more."
"No. But work is still a cure for wallowing in self-pity."
They glared at one another, green eyes fixed on blue. Byleth didn't speak, didn't move, wearing him down with the total stillness that only she could muster...until he finally relented with a low sigh.
"I'm not weeding the greenhouse," he said flatly. "But...I hear you, Professor." He softened a bit, all but pleading with her now. "Please, promise me you'll look after Felix. I'm probably the last person he wishes to see right now, but I know he'll listen to you."
Byleth looked away, feeling her heart break. Felix had said something painfully similar about Dimitri...and Rodrigue had said the same of Felix. She was utterly sick of hearing it, sick of all the unspoken words that had poisoned the three of them over so many years. "I can't save Felix," she said bluntly. "No more than I could save you."
She held up a hand to forestall his inevitable protest. "Dimitri, I didn't save you. Rodrigue didn't save you." At this very moment, she was glad she rarely cried. "All we could do was be there for you, until you decided it was worth saving yourself. That's what I did for you, and it's all I can do for Felix. Do you understand?"
It was an old question from the academy days, but now it had bite to it. Dimitri flinched, shaking his head. "I don't want to forget everything you've done for me. Everything Rodrigue did for me, even when I didn't deserve it."
"That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying it all would've been for nothing, if you hadn't decided that your own life was worth living."
He looked down at his hands. "I... I'm still not sure of that, Professor."
Others saw Dimitri as a brute of a man, tall and imposing with his armor, cloak, and spear ever at his side. But to her in that moment, he looked so small...the young prince with the earnest smile who'd pleaded for her help with bandits. She grasped his shoulders, felt him sigh and shrink just a little more.
"I know," she said softly. "I'm patient."
Byleth found Felix not in the training grounds, but back in his old room from the Academy days. From behind the heavy wooden door, she heard him pacing the tiny space like a caged cat. He didn't answer when she knocked, but the door was unlocked, so she let herself in and waited for him to shoo her away.
He didn't. "Is it over?"
His eyes were dry, but she heard the tears in his voice. Felix, who never cried, whose pain found its home in his relentless drive for mastery. He was so much like her... perhaps that was why he hadn't bothered barring the door. She was the only one who'd come looking for him before he was ready to be found.
"Yes," she said. "It's over."
Felix's hands slowly clenched into fists. "About damn time. I need to train, but I can't do it without everybody trying to offer their worthless condolences." He moved to the window, looking out at the monastery in the setting sun.
"I know a servants' staircase up to the third floor. There's plenty of room to spar on the roof."
He stopped his pacing and stared at her. "You don't have to do this," he said quietly. "I won't be at my best." He watched her like a hawk, daring her to change her mind.
"Neither will I." She drew the training sword from her belt, flipped it around, and offered him the hilt. "We won't always be fighting at our best. We'll both learn something."
Felix's sharp smile broke through his grief, and she saw the light of competition spark in his eyes. Slowly, he took the sword from her, gripping it like a lifeline. In silence, he followed her from the dormitories and up the creaky, abandoned stairs. Not even Cyril went this way often any more, and more than few steps wobbled ominously under their feet.
They emerged at the end of the hall leading to the archbishop's room, then out onto the roof. Felix rolled his shoulders, started to stretch—and then she swung at him.
He leapt back, the tip of her sword missing his navel by inches. "What the hell was that?!"
"Felix, an enemy won't wait for you to be ready." She circled him in a low guard, primed for his counterattack. "No one fights fair any more."
He grimaced and struck back, but she flicked the sword up to deflect his blow. They met with a crack of wood on wood, and she instantly knew he'd struck too hard. He knew it too, withdrawing before she could exploit the mistake.
"Good," she said with a smile. "Now—"
He didn't let her finish, lunging forward with terrifying speed. She barely managed to force his blade high and wide, his face now mere inches from hers. "Very good."
Felix grinned, trying to wind his sword around hers. He lifted the pommel, smacking her hard in the chin. Before she could counter, he had the wooden blade at her throat, amber eyes blazing in the dying sunlight.
"Don't you dare go easy on me," he hissed. "Again."
She felt his pain in each clash of their swords. He swung too hard, parried too wide, his every motion exaggerated and reckless in its ferocity. Byleth deflected the blows with ease, carefully giving ground from a storm of relentless blows.
"What are you doing?" he shouted. "Stop running from me!"
"I've never run from you, Felix."
She parried high, letting his sword slide past hers. Then she stepped behind him, landing a sharp elbow between his ribs. He doubled over with a startled gasp, and she pressed the edge of the training sword over the back of his neck. Felix froze, knuckles white on the hilt of his own sword.
"I told you I would be bad," he said. "Why did you even bother?"
Byleth lifted the blade from his neck and dropped the training sword with a clatter. She reached for his hand, giving him plenty of time to pull away.
He didn't. She began gently working the sword out of his death grip, loosening his fingers one by one. Felix stared at his feet, utterly still but unresisting, letting her ease some life back into his hands.
"You can leave whenever you want," she said. "But I think we both needed this."
He said nothing, and she didn't press him. Each of her former students had been through a lifetime of pain in her absence, and asking too much only reopened old wounds. Instead, she did what she always did with Felix. She waited for him to speak, waited for him to decide he wanted her help. He simply lifted his sword once more, gesturing for her to ready herself.
Three bouts later (two of which went to Byleth, and another to Felix), they were both completely out of breath. Felix sported a fresh bruise along his jaw, which he refused to let her heal. "It was my own damn fault," he insisted. "You don't have to clean up after my mistakes."
He didn't even have to say Dimitri's name. Byleth took a deep breath, trying to choose her words with care. "Felix, fixing a bruise isn't the same as-"
"You're right, it's not." His eyes narrowed dangerously. "You put up with every insult and threat that boar hurled your way. You spent months fighting his damn war. Does all this end with you dying for him too?"
She heard the waver in his voice, the unspoken plea behind the harsh words. Byleth shook her head, hoping against all hope that she was right. "That's not how this ends."
Felix laughed, harsh and brittle as breaking glass. "You can't promise me that."
"No," she agreed. "But I can tell you why I endured for all these months."
She pulled a silver chain out from under her clothes. A ring glittered on the end of it. Battered and scratched though it was, the enamel-blue crest of the Blue Lions still shone brightly on the band. She pulled off the necklace and pushed the ring into Felix's hands.
"Do you really think I'm fighting for the Kingdom of Faerghus or the Church of Seiros?" Now she felt the tears prickling in her eyes, and she made no effort to hide them. "I fight for all of you. All I ever wanted was for my friends to be whole, happy, and at peace."
Felix stared at her as if she'd grown another head. He played with the battered ring, rolling it between his fingertips before he handed it back to her with a frown. "You're too soft to be leading this army. You care more about protecting everyone than you do about victory."
"So do you."
"I—you—" Felix's ears went pink when he found no answer. "Don't you dare say that to anyone else."
She laughed, surprised but pleased that she could still laugh. "If you insist... I'll keep the best of you to myself."
"Shut up." He gave her a grudging but genuine smile, and picked up both practice swords. "Again, tomorrow morning? I'll be a little better."
By "morning," Felix always meant the first moment of dawn, while everyone else still slept. But she was used to it by now, used to waking up to the soft whistle of his sword singing through the air.
"Again, tomorrow," she said.