Chapter Text
It was hard to imagine that the world could ever turn itself upright again after such a devastating war, but sunlight crept into Marianne’s room through the window regardless, the first crack of dawn after what felt like a war that would never end.
The Church of Seiros had fallen, and the Adrestian Empire won the war. They reclaimed the entire continent under its flag, and people in Fodlan were left almost flustered at the unfamiliarity of the peace afterwards. They had all spent the past five years growing used to the sounds of clashing blades and the smell of fire alighting villages.
The violence had ended and the recently crowned emperor of Fodlan promised that a new world will arise from the ashes the war had wrought, one that would value the merit of one’s talents over the blood in their veins.
Marianne threw the back of her palm over her eyes at the sight of such bright morning light. What am I going to tell him?
Her adoptive father had been fumbling around for the past few days, and Marianne couldn’t blame him. The emperor’s first order of business after she ascended the throne of Fodlan was to declare noble bloodlines no longer relevant in her reign. Various noble houses had objected predictably, but they ended up being the first ones to have their wealth and prestige stripped away from them. Marianne predicted that the sight of formerly powerful men and women being forced to kneel before the calm and smooth-faced emperor would be a picture recorded in tapestries and paintings for decades to come.
Would Ignatz have tried to capture that image? No, he always preferred painting landscapes, didn’t he? Like that beautiful view he showed me once . . . . . . a pity I’ll never be able to see it with him again . . . . . .
Frankly, she doesn’t think her adoptive father has anything to worry about. His capability as an orator was renowned throughout the Alliance and although the emperor made clear that her intention was to allow commoners and those without Crests to be able to take political power, she also implied that it was merit that she’ll be judging through as she appointed new figures in her political system. Edelgard would have to be a fool to think that the Margrave Edmund didn’t have the talent and skills to keep his position in the governing body.
Marianne had heard that Ferdinand shall still be ascending as Fodlan’s new Prime Minister, despite being the son of such an infamously corrupt and greedy man. Marianne didn’t talk to him such aside from a few conversations about the responsibilities of nobles that had left a bad taste in her mouth (part of her wondered if he had more to say to her before the monastery was attacked) but she wasn’t opposed to him still taking power in Edelgard’s new world. He had the aura of a kind and honest man, if not a tad overbearing and haughty.
Ferdinand had kept himself in Edelgard’s favor and he was rewarded with the position that had been promised to him since birth. The various nobles throughout Fodlan who were scrambling around in fear should honestly calm down, really. Margrave Edmund will most likely keep his position in the politics of Fodlan, only because of his actual qualifications as a leader and not because of frankly outdated traditions the Church had been preaching was the right way to judge worthiness.
But Marianne was not wringing her hands together because she was trying to find ways to tell her adoptive father that he was pacing back and forth in his office for silly reasons. She placed a hand over her chest and smoothed it down over her torso, letting the heel of her palm skid to a stop right over her womb.
What if he already knows? I tried my best to keep the symptoms as inconspicuous as possible, but what if he’s figured it out already?
She had received a few recipes for elixirs in the mail from Mercedes to brew for the purpose of soothing the nausea that had overcome her recently. Marianne hoped both the staff and her adoptive father would assume she’s obsessed with a new dietary trend after finding strange herb combinations strewn about the kitchen (Hilda always did like to tease how clumsy and scatterbrained she could be at times).
She cannot hide this from him forever, she knew that at least. And she also knew in her heart that she wasn’t going to get rid of it either. Perhaps a scandal would’ve arose before if it got out that Margrave Edmund’s adoptive daughter had become heavy with child without a wedding ring in sight, but Emperor Edelgard had said this would be a new world after all, one without the obsession of birthright and inheritances.
Since the Empire had won the war, Marianne had no obligation to inherit her adoptive father’s position as Margrave or to be married off to some other noble house. Before, having an illegitimate child would’ve ruined any noble-blooded woman forever, lessened their marriage prospects and tainted their reputation amongst the court, but Marianne could breathe easy now that she was sure that this news would no longer give her adoptive father reason to kick her out.
Rather, she feared that he would question who the father was.
Her hand clutched tightly at the fabric of her dress. She couldn’t lie and say she didn’t know who it was, because her adoptive father knew her well, knew she wasn’t that type of person, and even if he believed her, he would jump to the worst conclusion and assume she had been drugged and violated.
He had tried to arrange meetings with noblemen for her before--in preparations for the future, he had told her--and she had been so hopelessly gloomy and clumsy with them that he must’ve written off any ideas that his adoptive daughter had the ability to court anyone of her own free will. Maybe even theorized that she preferred women.
Marianne shifted her hand off of where she knew life was beginning to take shape and clutched at her blankets instead. Her knuckles turned white as she tried to carefully construct a lie in her head.
She knew he wouldn’t believe the truth if she told him.
When the war had started, Margrave Edmund declared his intent to remain neutral in the conflict, deciding to step back and eventually take the side of whoever’s overpowering the other. It was a cold and calculating move, but Marianne expected nothing less from the shrewd politician who took her in. For five years, her adoptive father had kept her sheltered from the violence, probably taking pride in the fact that he was protecting her like a good parent would, but Marianne found only feelings of guilt as she watched the people of Edmund territory ceaselessly fight back against invading armies from the safety of her window.
She had felt like such a useless burden, having so many people suffer and potentially die to keep soldiers out of her adoptive father’s estate. Her darker thoughts had tried to convince her to step outside and let herself be pierced by an arrow, but she was kept back from indulging that thought when she imagined how much of a scramble her adoptive father would be left in if his only heir had died so fruitlessly.
Perhaps the only solace she found during those five years was in reading the letters her old classmates had sent her. She was surprised to learn that Hilda had joined in on the frontlines alongside Claude, remembering how quickly the girl had suggested retreat when the monastery was attacked by the Empire. She felt heartened when Raphael told her that his little sister was safe and that Leonie managed to keep her village from getting invaded. She had smiled so brightly by herself in her room when Ignatz sent her a finished drawing of that gorgeous view he had shown her once, along with a hastily written letter detailing how hard it was salvage during the mad dash to escape the pillaged monastery.
She didn’t know how to feel when Lysithea and Lorenz told her that they will be defecting to the Empire’s army.
Lorenz had just sent her one missive before cutting off communications with her entirely, the handwriting so pristine and small that it looked forced, not scented with any perfumes Marianne knew Lorenz to be so fond of using when writing letters, the message extremely blunt and without any flourish to tell her that his father is making the wise decision to surrender to the Adrestian army before any harm falls to the common folk living in Gloucester territory and that he suggested Margrave Edmund do the same instead of painting a target on his back as he waited to see whose side to take.
Marianne remembered how Lorenz had lavished her with compliments without any prompt, insisting that he was simply pointing out the obvious while she darkly believed he was trying to win favors with her adoptive father. She never got to ask him what exactly he saw in her that was so worthy of praise before the monastery fell. She had tried to write a letter to him back, to beg him to confess what he actually thinks of his father’s decision before realizing that Count Gloucester probably read all of his son’s correspondences before letting it fall into Lorenz’s hands, if not outright stare over Lorenz’s shoulder as the envelope was opened.
Lysithea, on the other hand, had sent streams of messages to Marianne before halting entirely (most likely due to war effort). Her letters, unlike Lorenz’s, were clearly written by her own hand and Marianne could almost hear Lysithea’s voice as she read them, long paragraphs detailing the benefits of surrendering before anyone in her territory got hurt and a few sentences alluding that Adrestia’s ruthless conqueror was not what the Church and the nobility was painting her as.
Lysithea probably wasn’t allowed to go into too much detail, out of fear that the letters could be intercepted or read by Margrave Edmund, but from what Marianne could glean, the world Edelgard was trying to build is a place where the systems that had hurt both of them will no longer exist, will no longer be accepted as just. Lysithea had told Marianne that she would want to join the Adrestian army if only Edelgard were more open about her intentions about the war before her letters trickled to a stop. Her final words to Marianne were that she was excited to see the world Edelgard was building and wanted to Marianne to be there to see it. She told Marianne that she wanted her to be there to help build it, fight for it. She stopped writing to her when Marianne finally responded for the first time during their correspondence to tell her that she was too weak to make that kind of decision, not strong and assured like Lysithea was.
Claude’s letters were perhaps the strangest out of all of her old classmates. Even though Marianne knew that he was engaging in extremely precarious negotiations with the nobles of the Leicester Alliance, Claude’s messages to her spoke of inane things like how beautiful the sea was when he visited it a few months ago before the war broke out or how Hilda managed to find time to thread a few necklaces together and take impromptu naps in between various fights and skirmishes. She wondered idly if there were any secret codes hidden between the lines or a whole other message written in invisible ink that could only be revealed through specific actions.
Needless to say, she felt silly when she held one of Claude’s letters over a flickering candle to find nothing of invisible words and accidentally torched the parchment into ashes when one of the staff walked in on her to deliver her dinner.
She felt ashamed knowing that she deliberately avoided Claude during their academy days after having a conversation that veered too close into her background, her birth parents, her cursed bloodline, and she knew she had to steer clear lest he figure out all of the things she and her adoptive father tried so hard to keep secret. His eyes were too bright, too curious, and she ended up scurrying away every time he approached her like a scared woodland creature. Hilda had teased her about it, told her that there’s nothing to be scared of, that Claude doesn’t bite, not unless you asked him to, and chortled when Marianne turned bright red at the suggestiveness of her tone.
It probably made her look like a bad Alliance noble to be avoiding her house leader and future sovereign so much during the days she was supposed to be securing political connections, but when Marianne looked back on it, it was because she had wanted to spend more time with another house leader, the future ruler of another country that was not her own.
She treasured the letters Dimitri had sent her the most during those dark five years holed up in her room.
Their interactions at the monastery had started with her trying to shoo him off for his own safety and him giving her a gleaming smile in return, telling her that he must politely refuse and endeavored to protect her further, even if it came at the cost of his own well being. She at first thought this only sprang from foolishness and the stubborn martyrdom that seemed to be encouraged amongst the Blue Lions, only to learn that it came from the same desperate need to make up for the misfortune that he must cause from his presence alone that she recognizes so deeply within herself. She realized that much of his behavior mirrored hers, and that seeing him cause harm to himself so others won’t have to bear the burden made her heart hurt, even though she knew she did the exact same.
His presence gave her a new perspective, and it made her want to do better.
They continued to meet with each other after that dining hall conversation where she had let herself laugh in front of him, either doing group tasks with one another or simply eating lunch together in silence. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see the Blue Lions congregate together and it made her want to ask Dimitri why he’s alone with her and not with his future subjects but she couldn’t force the words out of her mouth. Part of her was afraid he would immediately regain common sense and leave her side to join them, and she didn’t know why the thought made her so upset.
She had no ill thoughts of the Golden Deer, and in fact, she thought rather highly of them. They were all so driven and talented in ways she struggled to be, and even though conversations with them often ended abruptly by her own admission, she didn’t think any of them to be bad company. She was the odd one out, like she always was.
The only classmate she had in her own house that she managed to become close to was Hilda, and that was only because the pink-haired girl couldn’t find it in herself to leave Marianne alone and nothing that came out of Marianne’s mouth would’ve dissuaded her. Marianne felt fond of Hilda, and Hilda made it clear that she felt the same, but Dimitri was the only one at Garreg Mach Monastery that Marianne found herself actively trying to meet with more, instead of passively letting herself be talked to.
Sometimes she and Dimitri didn’t even talk. Just silently sat side by side, organizing books in the library together or feeding the horses at the stable. Nothing in Dimitri’s expression suggested he found this to be awkward or stifling, so Marianne let herself relax in these moments, found herself growing more and more comfortable in the presence of a man she would’ve never imagined being comfortable with, until it slowly dawned on her that she had fallen in love with the crown prince of Faerghus.
She had contemplated leaving the Golden Deer to join the Blue Lions house after this revelation. Had a speech prepared to give to Professor Manuela to tell her why she wanted to join the house she was teaching, inspired by how bravely Lysithea went and marched into the Black Eagles’s classroom to ask Professor Byleth to join their house. During a few of their conversations, Dimitri had accidentally let slip that he was told point-blank by Felix that his old childhood friend had no intention to stay in a house run by a beast in human skin and that the encounter left him feeling bereft.
The wound was further salted in when Sylvain told him that he had finally managed to wear Professor Byleth down and he was allowed into their classroom, and when Ingrid had regretfully informed him that she had no plans to be further instructed by Professor Manuela and preferred the teachings of Professor Byleth as well, and with that, all of Dimitri’s friends from childhood had left him in favor of the Black Eagles. He also needed to comfort Annette because Mercedes had decided to transfer classes as well, and the whole ordeal was weighing on him a heavy stone.
Marianne was sure that her presence wouldn’t make up for the empty hole that his three oldest friends and Mercedes had left, but even despite her dismal view of herself, she knew that he felt as much comfort in her presence as she did with his. The Blue Lions needed another healer anyways, so there was no excuse for her to stall on asking both Professor Manuela and Professor Hanneman to transfer into the Blue Lions.
She had stalled, though. Stalled for reasons she could no longer remember.
Maybe she felt guilty for leaving Claude when he really did nothing wrong except ask harmless questions that she felt threatened by. Perhaps she didn’t want to imagine what Hilda’s disappointed face would look like if she told her she didn’t want to stay in the Golden Deer. Maybe logic kicked in at the last minute, reminding her that her adoptive father needed her to stay amidst future Alliance nobles, forge bonds that will be useful in the future for the sake of Edmund territory. If her adoptive father had heard of Lorenz’s attempts to ask her out to tea, he would’ve begged Marianne to stay in Golden Deer and continue this strange dance she didn’t want to participate in.
The ball rolled around. She tried to avoid it as much as she could, had to leave Hilda disappointed and without a partner on the dance floor, and wandered to the Goddess Tower, where fate decided to be cruel to her and place Dimitri there in the room with her, moonlight framing his soft golden hair.
He confessed that he grew tired from the festivities and the constant dancing, and Marianne had shyly laughed and confessed her surprise that the crown prince of Faerghus was an introvert like her.
Dimitri’s mouth opened in shock for a moment before broadening into a wide grin. “Perhaps you’re right, Marianne.”
They hadn’t danced, since neither of them could gain the courage to ask the other, but they had talked, and just the sight of Dimitri’s spirit being uplifted by the presence of someone as dreary and gloomy as her made her heart pound treacherously, made her imagine things she previously thought people like her weren’t allowed to imagine.
Her adoptive father would be excited to see her alone with the heir to the Holy Kingdom of Faerghus. Her classmates would be flabbergasted, and maybe Hilda would be rooting for her to go for it.
She never dared to reach her hand out to Dimitri again during those peaceful days after the ball, and only lamented her decision when she was whisked back to Edmund territory after the monastery fell and never got a chance to see him before she left.
But he had remembered their bond during those peaceful days before Edelgard launched her war against the Church of Seiros and had kept a regular correspondence with her as Marianne watched fire rain down from the safety of the Edmund estate. He told her of gruesome things, of the heartbreak he felt when he learned that Felix had abandoned Fraldarius territory in the middle of the night, the growing numbness inside of him when he learned Ingrid and Sylvain did the same to their families, how the smell of burning bodies and pools of blood drenching the earth was reminding him of his worst memories and that if it wasn’t for the presence of Dedue, Duke Fraldarius, and the rest of the Blue Lions who hadn’t abandoned their country, he might’ve seriously went mad.
Marianne had responded to him by saying he was exaggerating. That he was the kindest, most compassionate soul she ever had the pleasure of knowing, and even though the war was perhaps bringing out the worst in everyone, she certainly knew that the worst version of him would be more likely to hurt himself than hurt others. Dimitri’s next letter had dropped the topic of conversation entirely and moved on to talk about how he was planning to negotiate with the Church in order to stave off the Imperial army.
She couldn’t imagine the things he had been through. Betrayed by his fellow house leader, then betrayed by his three oldest friends, and then being forced to turn his blade against them as he fights to keep his country free from invaders. He spoke constantly of the common folk who were forced to endure the worst of the attacks, how often Dedue got hurt for his sake, and Marianne was forced to marvel all over again how many people Dimitri is willing to put before himself, even those who are complete strangers.
He had no pity for Imperial soldiers, though. He kept mention of them out of his letters to her as much as possible, but sometimes, he moaned about the amount of rats that infest Faerghus and trample over the innocent, and Marianne knew he wasn’t talking about small rodents.
She pored over every letter Dimitri sent her way, despite the guilt that festered in her heart every time she finished them. She’s so useless being sheltered like this, but her adoptive father wasn’t allowing her anywhere near the battlefield before he knew which side to take.
Her adoptive father got his answer when Professor Byleth returned from wherever they had vanished, and declared their intent to side with the Adrestian Empire.
After that, it was like the stalemate between the Kingdom and the Empire crumbled into dust. Suddenly, it was swarms of armies taking over Faerghus and Alliance territory. Count Gloucester must’ve gloated as he and his family remained out of harm’s way as he allowed red-clad soldiers into his former allies’s land. Ordelia remained safe as well, and Marianne wondered if Lysithea allowed Edelgard’s soldiers to take refuge in her own home.
Her adoptive father made his decision. He announced his full support of the Adrestian Empire and suddenly, there were Imperial soldiers dressed in red flooding the Edmund estate, making negotiations with the Margrave and draping their flag against all of their doors.
Marianne thought of Dimitri, back in Faerghus, ceaselessly fighting as much as he could because he would rather die than surrender the land his father had left him to protect.
She thought of Hilda, a girl she spent her school days with, the one classmate she felt comfortable with assigning the name of “friend” within the confines of her mind, who she thought of sweet but incurably lazy and never aspired for anything out loud, risking her life when she said that she swore that she would never, fighting alongside Claude, even though she really had no obligation to.
She thought of what it would mean if the Adrestian Empire won the war, if Edelgard succeeded in her seemingly impossible, lofty ambitions.
And Marianne realized she couldn’t live in a world where the Empire won the war.
It would be a world where Dimitri would either have to be exiled from Fodlan or decapitated in front of all of his subjects. It would be a world where she would have to potentially see her former classmates on the other end of the battlefield. It would be a world where she might have to see Claude, a man she truthfully never got to know very well but still thought of as dedicated and intelligent, on the chopping block if he didn’t say all the right things to the emperor.
She didn’t know anything about what Edelgard fought for, but even if Lysithea appeared before her right now with a list of logical reasons ready to aim like a weapon, Marianne would never want to join the Adrestian army.
Even if Lysithea was right, even if Edelgard was not the mad heretic Church loyalists whispered her to be, Marianne did not want to know what the look on Hilda’s face would be if she had to ready a spell against her. For all the warmth and gentleness her friend had shown her, surely Hilda would have limits, right? It would be ridiculous if Hilda’s fondness for her was so great, she’d even forgive Marianne for ending her life.
The idea of having to look at Dimitri from the other end of a battlefield made Marianne so queasy she couldn’t even conjure the image in her head. If Hilda was the first person Marianne felt brave enough to call a friend, then Dimitri was the first person she felt brave enough to say she was head over heels in love with. The feelings she had developed during her youth had only grown stronger as the years of bloodshed and darkness stretched on. She didn’t know such a warm feeling was possible when all it took was to look out her window to feel soul crushing despair, not that she wasn’t all too familiar with the feeling already.
She thought that her feelings of worthlessness as people continued to die to protect her, as her adoptive father kept her fed while others had to starve, would cause her love to flicker out like a candle. But her love for Dimitri remained, perhaps not extinguishing her feelings of self loathing entirely, but rather existing alongside it, somehow making the weight of her guilt and suffering a little lighter to bear.
And Dimitri was not going to let the Adrestian Empire win the war. He was not going to let Edelgard slaughter his soldiers and his people for her lofty ideals. He would not live in a world where Edelgard won. Neither of the rulers would allow it.
Hilda was willing to die defending the Leicester Alliance, to die for Claude’s ideals. Like Lysithea, the details of what Claude’s ideals actually are were never disclosed in any of her letters to Marianne, but they were just as big and lofty and they somehow inspired someone as spoiled and lazy as Hilda to become a dedicated fighter, unafraid of death if it meant Claude and the rest of their friends could find a way forward.
Dimitri was willing to fight tooth and nail, grovel on the blood soaked ground beneath him, if it meant protecting Faerghus and its people. It was what he was born for, what his father entrusted to him, and he wouldn’t let anyone rip away that life purpose.
They both had such important reasons to live, so many people they were fighting for, but what did Marianne have?
She didn’t know what the Empire was fighting for besides taking land that they had lost the rights to govern countless years ago, and even if she did learn, she couldn’t find it in herself to participate in the violent bloodshed that was tearing parents away from their children. She could not make another child an orphan, knowing the feeling of abandonment herself.
Her adoptive father told her to fight for Edmund territory. He had tried so hard to groom her into a successful heir, make her shrewd and calculating like him, but none of his lessons worked. He had even sent her to Garreg Mach in hopes of her miraculously transforming herself into a woman worthy of what she was destined to inherit. But Marianne did not want any of what Margrave Edmund was willing to leave behind for her. He should’ve adopted any other unfortunate orphan. The only thing that qualified her to be a proper heir was the Crest that she beared, and never in her life had she ever wanted that, either.
She was alive for all the wrong reasons. Not for anything brave or selfless like Dimitri or Hilda or Claude, but because someone else saw worth in her that she did possess at all. Her adoptive father was pinning all of her hopes on her, and she wasn’t even worth any of the effort.
She did not deserve to be alive, not after the countless deaths that must’ve happened because of Margrave Edmund’s choice to remain neutral five years in a continent-wide war against ruthless conquerors.
After her adoptive father donated money and troops to the Adrestian Empire’s army, Edmund territory was deemed a safe zone in the Leicester Alliance. Marianne was sure that as long as the Empire’s flags hang against the doors of the Edmund estate, no one in their territory shall fall to the vicious bloodshed that infected the rest of Fodlan.
As soon as agreements were settled and her adoptive father retired to bed peacefully, Marianne fled Edmund estate in the middle of the night, cloak concealing her hair and face, not even sure that she won’t get pierced by a stray arrow before she even reached her destination.
But even though she craved death, knew it to be her end goal regardless of what happened on this journey, she had to see him first. She had to see Dimitri one last time before praying for the goddess to take her to her once more.
“What is it, Marianne? Why have you called me here?” her adoptive father asked as she sat down before him at the dining table. The Edmund castle truly was too large for a home that only had two residents and various staff members that have went in and out the doors throughout the years. The amount of lavishly decorated empty rooms would’ve made Leonie’s eyes boggle.
The room as it was right now was too large and spacious for Marianne’s tastes. It made her feel anxious, like she was commanding a whole audience instead of just one man she’s known since she was young.
“Father . . . . . . I’ve been hiding something that I should not have been hiding. Sooner or later, you would’ve found out so I believe it is better that I tell you now before it becomes too obvious.”
“Heh . . . . . it’s so strange,” her adoptive father said with an uncharacteristic huff in his voice. He glanced at his folded hands on the varnished mahogany table before looking back up at Marianne. “I thought I was the only person left alive who knew every secret you hide from others, but you’ve changed since you returned home to me. You’re almost unrecognizable, you know.”
“I’m so sorry, you know I never meant to--!” Marianne was about to finish her sentence before her adoptive father held up his hand.
“I know, Marianne, and you do not have to apologize. I’m just so thankful you didn’t return to me in a casket. I had thought that you grew frustrated with me forbidding you to step foot on the battlefield or fled Fodlan entirely once I had opened the doors of the estate. I will not ask what you did during that time, if it’s too hard for you to share.”
“Thank you, Father,” Marianne said softly. It became hard to look him in the face now that her adoptive father had expressed his small kindness. She didn’t know what she was hoping for, but she did not expect such a soft expression from him.
Perhaps now that he knew what it felt like to lose her, the ruthless Margrave Edmund had decided he did not like the feeling of being apart from the orphan girl he had adopted to be his heir. Marianne wasn’t sure what this meant for their relationship, especially with this new revelation she must confess to him.
“I don’t want to go into detail on how it happened, or where you’ll find the father, but all I can tell you is that this was not forced upon me, nor do I intend to get rid of it, either. I want this, Father, more than anything else. This . . . . . this just means a lot to me, and I hope you’ll understand.”
“Wait a moment, did you say father ? Marianne, don’t tell me you’re . . . . . . .”
He can’t finish the sentence, and his face quickly turned pale. His hand stretched toward her across the table, fingers trembling.
She soothed his anxieties with the calmest smile she could muster. It was hard to be a comforting daughter when her life spent with Margrave Edmund felt more like she was a tenant in his house or a student he was trying to coax out of her shell.
“I am pregnant, Father,” Marianne said with her hands in her lap, gaze as firm and forward as she could make it so. “The father is a man I met in the Kingdom after running away from home. I do not wish to share details about our relationship, but it was a brief affair that was left peacefully and without any harm to either of us. I fear I cannot introduce you to him because I do not wish for him to know. But I want the child all the same. Don’t try to convince me otherwise, because I won’t be swayed.”
“Marianne, think about what you’re saying. If you do not intend to marry or even see the father again, then why even keep the child? It is not necessary to produce heirs anymore, not in the world the emperor is building.”
“Is it strange for me to want to be a mother for my own sake and not to tie a man to me or for noble obligations?” Marianne said, perhaps bitterly. If this kind of talk is what Edelgard sought to destroy, treating children as a means to an end to continue a bloodline, then she could find herself sympathizing slightly.
“N-No, but I just . . . . . . well, I didn’t even know that you wanted to be a mother,” her adoptive father fumbled, looking nervous for the very first time Marianne had witnessed. “ . . . . . perhaps I do not know a lot about your dreams and aspirations, in general.”
His words were touched with a tinge of melancholy too shaky to be insincere.
“That is partially my fault, Father, and I apologize for that. Before I ran away, I didn’t really have a dream to fight for, not even when my life was in danger. But I think I have one now, or at least one I can work towards. I want us to be a family, Father, not like how we were before. I want this place to a warm home when my child is born. I won’t be all alone as a parent because you’ll be there, won’t you, Father?”
“Of course, Marianne. How could I ever say no to my daughter like that?”
It felt unfair, strangely, to see the faces of soldiers carved through with scars when Marianne’s face remained just as unblemished as it was during her school days. She possessed not a single scar on her body that she didn’t put there herself.
Meanwhile, the people of Fodlan have either been fighting their countries or tried their best to survive while everything they knew went up in flames and they didn’t know if they would live to see the next day.
All these years, she was kept safe in the Edmund estate, only witnessed violence from within the confines of a gilded cage. Her father had kept her safe, sure, but her despair of being alive when others had to fall had perhaps worsened and drivened her into her lowest point.
If the goddess will not take her away after she prayed to her once more, she will have no choice but to end her life by her own hands.
There won’t be many people who will mourn her. Margrave Edmund adopted her for one purpose and one purpose alone, and she cannot pay him back for all of the food and shelter he had given her. Her death will drive him to find another heir, an orphan much more worthy and not a cursed wretch like her.
Hilda was by all accounts an enemy to her, with her fighting against the Empire while Marianne’s adoptive father has begun to fund Emperor Edelgard’s efforts to conquer all of Fodlan. She cannot see her again because she cannot guarantee Hilda will not strike her down for betraying the Alliance.
Marianne’s end goal was her own death, but she cannot bear to place the burden of taking her life away on Hilda. She will do it by her own hands, if she’s not killed on her spontaneous journey to Faerghus by either a soldier clad in red or blue.
But before she did just that, she must see him one more time. He won’t kill her, or at least, she hoped he wouldn’t. He is too kind for that and while she won’t fool herself into thinking he loved her the same way she loved him, he wouldn’t raise a blade against her.
She wanted to see what the war had done to him in person, maybe talk to him once more so she won’t die with any regrets.
She cannot bring herself to face Hilda or Claude or any of her former Golden Deer classmates, but she wanted to see Dimitri again.
And she did.