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One of the greatest things about the monastery is its self-sufficiency. The communal nature of the chores contributes to this. Even the noble students take turns on weeding duty, stable duty, or sky watch. While its mountainous location isn’t great for farming, through magic the greenhouse is able to produce a significant amount of the fruits and vegetables used in the dining hall. In the event of a siege, Garreg Mach would be able to sustain its inhabitants for a few months so long as the fishing pond and greenhouse remain intact.
Of course, such a macabre situation isn’t likely to happen, Dimitri thinks, even though it’s good to be prepared. Their little community is thriving. The gates are open, and hunting parties are regularly organized to supplement their diets with delicious seasonal game.
It’s still late summer now, and while most big game will be off limits for another month at least, smaller animals like squirrels, birds, and rabbits can make for good eating too. Today Dimitri is to join his first hunting party while at the monastery, and as he approaches the gate, he sees that Petra and Leonie have bows strapped to their backs and their bags packed full of snares. They’re chatting about favorite skinning techniques while Claude gazes at them – and then Dimitri – forlornly.
“Good morning,” Dimitri greets them. “I look forward to helping however I can.”
“You’re a lucky bastard, Dimitri,” Claude says with an exaggerated frown. “Going off into the woods alone with the loveliest huntresses in the academy…”
Leonie pulls a face. “Don’t make it weird, Claude, or we’ll never invite you again.”
Petra nods sagely. “The forest is a place for respect. We are not being responsible for accidents that befall those who have eyes that wander.”
“Betrayed! By my bestest hunting buddies!” Claude laments. And pouts. He’s crouched down in the dirt road, idly tickling the belly of a cat with one hand while nursing the other. There’s a brace on that wrist for a sprain he got while sparring with Dimitri. Healing magic is good for repairing cuts and bruises, but joints are more delicate, and too much brute force healing could limit its function in the future. Professor Manuela had said it wasn’t anything too serious, but he wasn’t allowed to put pressure on it for a while, and definitely NO archery.
Dimitri feels responsible, so he offered to take over Claude’s chores for the week, including the hunting. He has no experience with small game, having only gone after boar and bear and elk in Faerghus. Chasing large animals like that requires hounds and many spears. There’s no way the girls will let him handle any of the shooting for more delicate prey. Really, he’ll only be an extra set of hands to carry things back. There’s nothing to be jealous of. Nevertheless, he gives Claude a weak smile. “Take care of yourself, all right? We’ll be back this evening, and perhaps there will even be roast pheasant for dinner.”
“Ooh, catch me a pheasant and I’ll swoon into your arms, Your Princeliness.”
Leonie shoots him a very unimpressed look. “You already did that last night in the dining hall. I can’t believe you made the Prince of Faerghus feed you.”
“I can’t use my dominant haaaand,” Claude whines. “What was I supposed to do, just rip into a whole steak with my teeth? Besides, none of my traitor classmates volunteered to help. You all just sat there watching me suffer!”
“I am not understanding. Was Raphael not helping you?” Petra asks.
“He tried to make me a sandwich. It was the entire steak inside an entire loaf of bread.”
“You could’ve just gotten something easier to eat. There was no need to call over a prince to cut your food!”
“It’s fine,” Dimitri cuts in. “I really don’t mind helping, especially since I was responsible for the injury. Please, my status means nothing when it comes to assisting a friend in need.”
Claude looks up at him with big, guileless eyes. The little kitten he’s playing with is gnawing on a finger. “I might need help cleaning my room. And Manuela said the sauna might be good for me?”
“C-certainly!” Dimitri nods, feeling his face heat up even though he knows he’s being played. “We’ll do that once I return.”
They set off down the road with Leonie still shaking her head and rolling her eyes at her house leader’s immature remarks.
“Sometimes I think he’s only interested in us for our pheasant catching,” Petra says. “He only jokes about wanting to marry after being witness to great skill.”
Leonie snorts. “At least he appreciates people for their skill. Can’t say that for most of the noble flirts around here.”
Behind them, Dimitri stays silent. He continues to hear Claude softly cooing at the kitten, “Meow meow meow~”
It’s unbearably adorable, that image. It sticks in the back of his mind all the way into the hunting reserve where, as suspected, he’s useless. The girls at least try to teach him how to make snares, but after the second snapped wire, they set him on guard duty instead.
He keeps an eye out on the clearing where they’ve set up their makeshift camp. Most of their extra equipment and emergency supplies have been set down here, and it wouldn’t do for a nosy fox or bear to get into things.
Dimitri thinks he’s imagining it when he first hears the sad little mews. He must still be thinking of Claude and the kitten by the gates. Perhaps he can weave a little cat toy with the sturdy reeds at the edge of the stream nearby.
But then the very sorrowful mews continue even when Dimitri is thinking of happy kittens. Perhaps he is not imagining them at all… No, he is definitely not imagining it! Dimitri follows the cries upstream until he comes to a small cavern in the cliffside.
There are kittens inside! They’re so tiny! And they have tawny fur with black spots and bright blue eyes – such unique coloring! He bites back a gasp. They shrink back at first when they see him, but then slowly crawl out again when he makes no move to hurt them.
Dimitri returns to camp with three sleepy kittens in his arms, their tummies rounded after he gives them all the meaty bits from his packed lunch. That’s how Petra and Leonie find him when they return from their hunting, whole strings of rabbits and colorful pheasants around their necks and dragging a huge stag between them.
“Check out our lucky finds!”
“Yes, there were many pheasants! The chicks are still with their mothers, but now that it is past the season of breeding, we can eat the useless males.”
The girls are glowing in their success and don’t immediately notice the napping kittens, but all the shuffling wakes them and they begin to meow again.
“Uh… are those--?”
“Oh yes, I found them in a cave. They must have been abandoned since they’d been going hungry, and I thought we could care for them at the monastery.”
Leonie looks like she wants to say something, but then doesn’t.
Petra smiles widely. “I did not know this was a Fodlan custom, but I am glad to have seeing it! On Brigid we also raise hunting partners in this way.”
The people of Brigid go hunting with cats? How interesting!
Dimitri bundles the kittens up in his cape and straps them to his chest. Then he hauls the stag over his shoulders and hikes back up the trail to the monastery.
It was easy to divert people’s attention away from the kittens. Naturally the stag was much more eye-catching. Dimitri dropped it off at the kitchens and quickly excused himself with some line about getting in a bath before dinner.
Claude lets him into his room easily enough, though he’s quick to say he doesn’t need any help at the moment. “I was just teasing before. Actually, I kind of like the mess. I don’t know if I’d be able to find anything if it was clean!” Claude chuckles, a light blush gracing his cheeks. “You can go ahead, unless there’s something else you need me for?” He glances at the bundle in Dimitri’s arms.
“Ahem. Um, yes. I found some kittens and thought you might like to see them.”
“Oh? Sure, just set them down… somewhere.”
They clear off some books from Claude’s bed and Dimitri sets the kitten-bundle there. Unwrapping his cape, they’re treated to the sight of the three kittens snuggling together. They mew a little in protest when they’re moved, but easily return to slumber.
“Wow,” Claude says after a while. “Seteth is absolutely going to murder you.”
“How so?”
“Those are not cats. They’re… hmm…” Claude digs through some books on his desk, shoving certain titles to the side until he comes across the one he wants. “Aha!” He brings the tome over. Fauna of the Oghma Mountains, the title says. It looks to be a dry read. Claude flips through the pages of descriptions and illustrations until he comes across a drawing of a large cat-like creature. He points to it triumphantly. “It’s a mountain lion!”
“Mountain lions don’t have spots.”
“According to this, the young cubs do.”
Dimitri pauses. He blinks. “Is a mountain lion not a cat?”
“Is a dire wolf a dog? You know these little guys will grow to be the size of a large man? What are we going to do with them then?”
“Petra wants to adopt one when it’s big enough to go hunting with her. I’m, ah, not sure how big that would be. I thought she was joking.”
They’re both silent for a moment, lost deep in thought. Dimitri runs various scenarios through his head. He could send the kittens up to Fhirdiad with instructions for the castle’s servants to care for them alongside the Blaiddyd hunting dogs. He could… send them to Rodrigue?
Then Claude comes up with a genius scheme.
“You know, they could be a sign from the Goddess. Three houses, three kittens… Three of her fiercest creatures found right outside the Church grounds… Surely they’re meant to be our class pets, to facilitate inter-house bonding!”
“I thought you weren’t religious.”
“I’m not. But do you want these poor babies to starve out in the wild all on their lonesome? They’ll be crying in their den, ‘Dimitri, where are you? Meow, meow, come save us!’”
The kittens – er, mountain lion cubs – spend a few weeks in a box under Claude’s bed. Dimitri spends a lot more time in Claude’s room. There are rumors.
The rest of the Golden Deer find out about the plan because Leonie thought she was defending someone’s honor (whether it was Claude’s or Dimitri’s is unclear) by dispelling said rumors. Hilda laughs herself sick and then gets to work making cute accessories for their soon-to-be class pets.
The Blue Lions find out because once the rumors suddenly die down, Sylvain loudly confronts Dimitri with, “Are you banging Claude or not? I keep hearing weird meows coming from his room, and I don’t know if you guys are roleplaying or keeping a zoo in there.”
Petra is super excited to train her mountain lion to bite out the throats of her enemies. She tells Dorothea, who tells Ferdinand, who tells Caspar, who tells Linhardt, who says the information absolutely must not go any further lest Edelgard’s sense of propriety ruins all their plans. But then he sticks his head through Bernie’s door and says, “Did you get all that?”
(Later, though, he’ll slip up and mumble, “Hubert probably already found out and told her though… But I suppose they like their plausible deniability.”)
Once the kittens are big enough to be adopted, which according to Petra-who-totally-has-dibs-on-the-meanest-one is when they’re big enough to scratch the hell out of Claude’s door, they make their debut.
They’re wearing little headbands handcrafted by Hilda: a feathered one for the Black Eagles, a fluffy lion’s mane for the Blue Lions, and mini-antlers for the Golden Deer. Before the professors arrive, the students set their cats on the podiums and ready their arguments. They’ve all written essays about auspicious signs from the Goddess and the benefits of keeping class pets that promote inter-house unity while being able to bite out the throats of their enemies. Also, it’s totally traditional in Brigid and multiculturalism is a virtue.
The professors don’t know what hit them. Neither does Seteth when he’s called in to all three classes at once.
Autumn comes and goes, and then winter, too. It’s almost graduation. The kittens are only half grown and just starting to follow behind the hunting parties. Soon they’ll all be separated.
Dimitri’s thoughts turn halfway melancholy even as he’s watching Claude tickle a mountain lion’s belly.
“Meow meow meow~” he says softly.
An unfinished thread from a conversation long ago worms its way into Dimitri’s mind at the sight, and suddenly he’s blurting out, “A dire wolf is a dog.”
“…What?”
“The Blaiddyd hounds have all traditionally been dire wolves. Would you like to come see them?”
For a while, Dimitri is afraid Claude will say no. He looks concerned, for lack of a better word. He’s still smiling, but his brows are furrowed.
Then he sighs and the tension leaves his face. He’s radiant as he says, “You know what? Sure, I’ll come visit you and your pack of murder dogs.”
Dimitri smiles back too, so widely it feels like his lips will split. It’s the start of something beautiful.