Archive of Our Own

Not for the first time that day, Hilda wished that Holst was there with her. She couldn't run this damned dukedom without him. Why did he have to go and get himself killed? Absently, she stroked Freikugel’s handle from where it was leaned against the desk; she could nearly feel the grooves where his fingers would have squeezed and shaped the leather.

“Hilda.”

She blinked, refocusing on the pale-haired woman standing before her. “Edelgard.”

The woman in question glared icily at her before continuing her previous spiel. “I need the Goneril forces concentrated at Fódlan’s Locket. Protect our flanks from an incoming Almyran invasion.”

Hilda heaved a sigh—more fighting, more murdering, more of her soldiers looking to her expecting to see Holst. “And who will do all this paperwork while I’m gone?” She gestured at the piles of bills and forms and tax records strewn all over Holst’s desk—her desk, she corrected herself. And her work. She resisted the urge to sigh again.

“One of the neighbouring lords will handle it. I want you ready to move out by tonight, and marching at dawn.”

Hilda still wasn't sure if she completely trusted the woman. It had been a long five years of service, and Edelgard hadn't tried to get rid of her yet. She hadn't exactly been welcoming either, though, not like she was with Dorothea or Hubert or even Ferdinand. But even if Hilda had wanted to say no, she would not have been able to do anything. Without this title, she would have nowhere to go—not when Edelgard’s grip on Fódlan was one of the strongest steel.

Edelgard waited, unblinking, for Hilda to eventually nod, like they both knew she would. With this confirmation, the emerging Emperor of Fódlan left with a sweep of her red cape, boots clicking neatly against the tiles.

If Edelgard had anything going for her, Hilda admitted bitterly, it was style.

*

Hilda fanned herself with a gloved hand, grimacing. The air weighed down on her, its muggy warmth typical of the Garland Moon weather—a month which she despised for exactly this. Even in the dimness of the office she was occupying, the heat found its way in.

From her vantage point from their hasty command centre, she could see heavy clouds blotting the horizon. Hilda squinted through the window, trying to discern when the storm would hit.

“A storm approaches, little duchess.”

She jumped, nearly kicking Freikugel from its position across her lap. With a glare, she snapped, “What is it,” without even looking at Hubert. “And don't call me that, you slimy good-for-nothing.”

He tsked. “I'd be careful of the tone. One word from me and the Goneril family line disappears.”

“One swing from me and your head says bye-bye to your neck. Von Vestra goes poof.” Hilda stood and hefted the large, glowing axe in her hands, just to prove her point.

He laughed without humour, striding to stand right in front of her with a smirk. “We both know you would never do that, little duchess.”

Hilda’s jaw clenched along with her grip on the axe, but all she did was say, “Tell me what you want and begone.”

“I was just letting you know of some intel we discovered. Her majesty thought it would be pertinent to you.” He stopped, looking to her for a reaction. If he was going to be manipulative about it, he could at least hide it better.

Hilda rolled her eyes. “Get on with it. I don't have time for your games.”

“The Almyrans have a new commander, believe it or not. And that commander is Prince Khalid VIII…” He trailed off, a glint in his eye. “Who is also known as Claude von Riegan.”

Hilda blinked. Blinked again. Finally, she uttered a single word: “What?”

Hubert chuckled—the bastard clearly took joy in her confusion. “You really didn't know? His closest confidant and you weren't even aware of his heritage?”

“I—I didn't…” She wasn’t sure what she could say. Claude, a prince? It was nearly unbelievable.

He laughed again at her expression. She couldn’t even muster a glare in his direction.

She'd known he was Almyran; that didn't take a lot of thinking to work out. But royalty? King-in-waiting of the Almyran Empire, a Khalid rather than a Claude? It made sense from all that he had told her: a duchess mother who had eloped with her husband, abandoning her land and title; an ‘undefeated’ warrior as an instructor; that strange white camel story. She was an idiot. A fool of epic proportions.

Hilda looked around wildly for Hubert, but he had already slipped off into whatever shadows somewhere.

“Her majesty didn't want you to have a nasty shock on the battlefield.” His voice came from behind her again, and she was jittery enough to nearly swing at him. “Goodbye, little duchess. I would hope you're aware that she wants you to eliminate him at all costs.”

She turned to see the faint purple wisps disappearing as he warped away, back to Edelgard’s side like the glorified hound that he was. Outside, thunder rolled down from the mountains.

Hilda sat heavily in her chair once again. She wasn't sure if she wanted the invasion to come sooner, or later. Sooner, and she could see Claude again. Later, and she could postpone murdering him.

Freikugel clattered as it hit the ground, the blade hissing against the wood. She put her head in her hands. Oh, Claude. What have you done?

The memory of his smile, his real smile, slipped unbidden into her head. She couldn’t stop the memories being dredged up, all of those complicated feelings that she had shoved down and away.

A bit over five years ago, when Edelgard invaded Garreg Mach with an army, Hilda remembered waking up to guards barricading her inside her dorm room. When they'd finally let her out and gathered her with the other students, Claude had been nowhere to be seen. A wyvern was later discovered to be missing from their roost.

The Empire soldiers had asked her where he went, interrogated her when they found nothing. They made a common assumption: Hilda must have known where Claude was, because she was his most trusted confidant. She was his friend.

It had hurt her five years ago, at the young age of eighteen. He had left her behind, and worse yet, he hadn't told her a single thing.

Now twenty-three, Hilda still sometimes sniffled while falling asleep, wondering how different things could have been. If maybe Claude had decided that he did need her wherever he was going, which apparently was Almyra, and they could have flown off into the sunset together, or something. He’d said he wanted her to meet his parents, didn’t he? Was that a lie? Had he changed his mind about it—about her?

It was foolish of her, she knew. Hoping like a little girl for a big strong man to save her. She wished Holst was still alive, and she wished Claude would come back for her. She wished a lot of things, but still did everything that Edelgard told her to do. It was just…easier that way.

Hilda shook herself. No, it wasn't because of her. Her soldiers were relying on her to lead them now. She was the last Goneril, and she couldn't just leave them; Holst would be so disappointed in her.

And even if she did defect, she would be hunted, found guilty, executed. Try as she might, Hilda couldn't find her way out of this duty. There was no one here to do it for her. No one to persuade, no one to charm. It was simple: Hilda would kill Claude.

Lightning threw the room into sparse light. Hilda’s head thudded against the back of her chair. She watched the rain begin to pour down.

*

“…I'd let you grasp me any day. My hand, my heart, even my neck. But if you want to know all my secrets, you'll have to bare yours as well.”

Claude grinned at Hilda from across the table, the picture of carefree with his hands clasped behind his head. He was as handsome as the day she’d first met him, shiny like counterfeit gold—even if it was fake, it was still something to behold.

She tilted forward on her elbows, chin resting on her palms. “Oh really? Was that a promise?”

He unclasped his hands and leaned forward, voice quiet and conspiratorial. “Why don't we play a game, you and I. You have to answer a question I ask truthfully, and then you get one out of me.”

Hilda was careful not to look away from his eyes. He was prone to reading her, and she didn’t want him to glimpse her curiosity. “Alright. What d’you want to know?”

He smiled at that, and returned to his earlier lounge. Hilda wasn't sure how he even managed to look comfortable on these rickety wooden things.

“Does it bother you when you're compared to your brother?”

He was still smiling, but it was different. His eyes had become colder, somehow. Hilda tried not to stare, sitting back and crossing her arms. “No, it doesn't.”

“Hilda, I’ve known you for about two months and even I can tell you’re lying.”

She frowned at him. “Expert on me, huh? Well, sure. Fine. It does bother me.”

He smiled, but his eyes were still drenched in that calculating cold. After a long moment, she said, “Anyway, it's my turn to ask.”

“Ask away,” Claude said, returning her smirk. The entire scene was taking on a warped, blurry look. There was no warmth in his face now.

“Did you mean it, when you said we’d visit your home together?”

For a moment, he didn’t react. Then his grin widened, and kept widening. But his eyes stayed the same: cool, glassy, soulless. Hilda stumbled back as he stood, towering over her. His voice had become something inhuman, layers of it reverberating over each other as he asked, “What do you think?”

Then, he leapt onto a white wyvern that had appeared behind him. Hilda was frozen. Had that wyvern been there the entire time?

The wyvern, and Claude, burst through the ceiling of the dining hall with a horrible crash. The last thing Hilda saw were his eyes, impossibly far away in the blue, but still fixed on her.

An echoing, bone-deep thud. Phantom pain shooting through her body. She was falling into the earth, or maybe the earth was falling onto her.

Hilda woke with a jolt, sweat making her tunic cling to her back. Her cheek was plastered to the desk before she sat up. She blinked blearily, rubbing her eyes only to find her fingers came away wet.

Tears slipped free from the corners of her eyes. She roughly swiped them away. There was no time for crying here; she was no longer a teenager. She had work to do.

Hilda was wandering the small village that had sprung up at the base of the mountains of Fódlan’s Throat. Why here, she couldn't understand. Nothing like the imminent threat of foreign invasion to keep the crops growing merrily and the livestock grazing peacefully.

The heavy cloud cover was the blood-red of sunset after a storm, and the air was too still. Hilda felt rather uneasy, but continued along.

The few townspeople who still remained during the Empire’s military occupation looked at her with open distrust. If she was eighteen again, she might have spoken to them, charmed them into liking her. Or, if Holst were here, he may have impressed them with his strength of character and kindness.

But Hilda just adjusted the harness of her axe and walked on. Why should these people like her? She wouldn’t be their duchess for long, not if Edelgard had her way. Hilda was an uncontrollable variable. She disliked Edelgard, and openly despised her chief advisor. She was a worm lodged deep in the core of Edelgard’s perfect red empire.

As she walked on, she found she couldn’t forget the memory of Claude in her dream: his lifeless grin, and those empty eyes. Maybe he hadn’t cared about her at all. Those years could have been a ploy, another of his infamous schemes. Gather intel on the Goneril family, the only people in Almyra’s way.

The more she considered it, the more it made sense. Hilda tried to harden her heart. She was the last Goneril, the last of a long, proud line. Claude was an Almyran spy. Once, she would have died for him. Now, well, now she would kill him. They weren’t children anymore. This battle was hers, and she would win it.

“General!” She whirled, a hand on the handle of Freikugel. “The Almyrans are here!” He turned without another word and sprinted down the road.

Hilda uttered a prayer to the goddess, despite being as irreligious as they came. Then, she followed the soldier towards the sounds of fighting.

The sharp scrape of metal on metal clamoured in Hilda’s ears as she came upon the fort. Built at the opening of Fódlan’s Throat, it was a fearsome stone structure. Archers manned its towers at all hours. Any movement on the other side of the wall was skewered by a flurry of arrows; no one made it to or from Almyra.

Now, though, dead soldiers dangled from battlements. Wyverns roared with their riders, sunlight on shining metal scimitars and lances. Fire licked at the base of the north tower. Smoke blotted out the setting sun. The pungent, metallic scent of blood coated the entire scene, undercut by the stench of burning flesh. Hilda had seen her fair share of battles, but this? This was massacre.

One of her sergeants—Teodric, was it?—skidded to stop before her, covered in scarlet. “General. The battle is going badly, with many of the men initially injured by a surprise assault. All of the archers on the battlements are out of action, ma’am. The Almyrans seem to have mustered their entire army.”

Hilda took a deep breath, staring at the destruction around her. “Send a battalion to Count Gloucester immediately, asking for reinforcements from the Empire. Muster as many foot-soldiers as you can to put out the fires in the north tower, and send the rest of the archers to the south tower. Save as many survivors as possible. Allocate anyone who can heal to that copse of trees over there.”

Her stomach twisted into knots, she nodded to Sergeant Teodric, keeping her voice steady. “Go. May the Goddess have mercy.” He saluted, then ran off, shouting instructions.

Hilda was drowning. This wasn't how it was meant to go; what sort of maniacs attacked at dusk? But, if Hubert was right, then the surprise factor was typical of Claude.

Her chest clenched at the idea of him being here somewhere. She would find him. She would find him, and kill him. She wasn't a little girl, she was Hilda Valentine Goneril, head of the Goneril dukedom. Her soldiers would not die in vain today.

The air tasted of the chalk of ash and the tang of blood. Hilda’s heart thudded heavily against her ribcage, a beat to the sigh of her axe as it sailed through the air. She dodged a lance, using her momentum to bury her axe in the Almyran’s shoulder. They fell off the wyvern with a scream, the wound already cauterised by the searing heat of the blade. The Almyran scrambled clumsily away, shouting in their language. Hilda silenced them with a quick swing, averting her eyes. It smelled of burnt flesh.

She whirled just in time for the black wyvern’s charge. Her head thudded against the ground, Freikugel spinning out of her grip. Its claws dug into her shoulders. She hissed at the searing pain, reaching for the handle of her axe. The wyvern hissed and spat above her, pressing harder. Hilda’s vision was going black; she couldn’t breathe.

With a final burst of strength, she clawed at the ground to grasp the tip of Freikugel. The wyvern’s talons scored deeper into her flesh, blinding her with painful spots. With the axe’s heat burning through her gloves, she wrenched the blade upwards, into the soft spot on its neck. Its death scream was piercing, the spray of blood hot on her skin. She scrambled away as its body collapsed to the ground.

Staggering to her feet, Hilda lifted Freikugel and strode on, trying not to think of all the wyverns she had ridden in her school years.

The next hour was a blur of charred skin and war cries and Almyran and Fódlan screams alike. Hilda was covered up to her elbows with blackened flesh and blood. Freikugel glowed as if new, its blade sharpened to terrible points. Her wyvern-inflicted wounds had become a dull background pulse. She hoped she wasn’t losing too much blood as she hacked her way up the south tower. Her arms were beginning to sing with pain with each swing. It hurt to even consider climbing more stairs.

Passing a window, she glanced outside to see a fresh battalion of wyverns descend on the soldiers holding ground outside the fort. Their screams echoed in her ears. Those screams would reverberate inside her skull for months, she knew. Goddess, how would they survive this?

The number of Almyrans pouring down the stairs was lessening. She slowed the spinning swing of her axe and peered cautiously ahead. A Goneril soldier was barring her way. “General, don't go up there!” Her voice was shaking. She had an empty quiver slung on her back. “The Almyran commander! He's slaughtering all our archers!”

Hilda’s breath caught in her throat. “I—No, I have to. Gather as many soldiers as you can and get to the healers.”

She was ending this. Either she or Claude would be leaving this place alive. Hefting Freikugel in her hands, she barged up the last few steps, dodging the bodies of her soldiers and trying not to look at their faces. Her eyes roved the battlements. She was holding her breath, wondering whether he would recognise her. She was here to kill him, she reminded herself. She was here to—

There he was. Astride the largest wyvern Hilda had ever seen in her life. His hair was longer, with new sideburns along his jaw. His shoulders were broader under that armour. That boyish charm had developed into something different, something older.

Hilda couldn't help the tide of affection that rose up in her, threatening to wash her under. There he was. Her Claude—no, a different Claude. Khalid.

As if he had sensed her thoughts, Claude looked up. Made eye contact. His eyes widened, Failnaught stilling in his hands. She saw him say her name, quietly to himself, like it was a question.

She wished she could answer. Shout his name above the din of battle, sweep him into a hug like they were old friends reuniting.

But her gaze swept over her soldiers, skewered with Claude’s green-fletched arrows. She glanced at the turmoil below her, Goneril people fighting for their lives against these invaders. Looking at Claude again, she saw him as he really was. Her enemy.

“Go!” she shouted to the archers. “The fight continues below!”

They nodded, and ran. A pair shuffled past carrying an injured friend between them. Hilda hoped that they would make it.

“Hilda!”

His voice had deepened. It was richer, brassier, striking a chord deep within her. She shook herself, mustered a glare as she stalked closer. “Claude. Or should I say Khalid?”

He had the nerve to look sheepish. “I'm sorry. I didn't want to lie to—”

“I don't care.” She was circling his wyvern as it watched her with red eyes.

“But you do! Hilda, I know you do. And I’ll be sorry for the rest of my life, I swear.” He was standing in the wyvern’s stirrups, and jumped to the ground before her. Hilda’s axe was between them in an instant.

“Don't!” She swallowed back a sob. “Don't come any closer. Don't pretend to know me. You lied to me, Claude.”

He put a gloved hand on Freikugel’s blade. Gently pushed it to the side. “Hilda, please. Listen. I can explain all this later. Surrender, and no one else has to die.”

She leapt back as he attempted to place a hand on hers. “You're manipulating me, again! Always with the acting, with the lies, the false promises!”

Claude swallowed, his throat bobbing. “You're right to be angry, you are”—she looked behind her again, saw her people’s blood painting the field red—“but I swear I can explain. I don't want to kill you.”

His eyes were sad as he advanced towards her, bow hanging loose in his grip. Behind him, his wyvern paced to and fro, its tail whipping the ground.

Hilda raised Freikugel again, gently pinning him with its furthest point. “Not. A. Step.”

She could kill him right now. He was defenceless, guard down. Gut him right then and there, then take out the wyvern before it made a fuss. He would be dead. Gone. Her duty would be fulfilled.

He must have read her intentions from her, because in the next moment he had tackled her. Freikugel skidded away, landing directly beneath the wings of Claude’s wyvern. He squeezed her wrists, bodyweight pinning her to the stones.

She brought her knee into his stomach. He groaned, but maintained a grip on her wrists. She kneed him again, further up in the chest. “Hilda—” he wheezed.

With a final twist, she tossed him over her head. He landed in a tangle of limbs, without enough time to even catch his breath before she had a hand grasped around his throat and a knee to his chest.

“It's over, Claude.” His eyes were pleading. He scrabbled weakly at her arm. Behind her, the wyvern roared.

“Please…” He was gasping against her grip. “Hilda…I think I love you.”

She lost control of herself for a second, but had him back against the floor once again, giving his head a good crack against the stones. “You're lying. Stop it.” Maybe her heart would beat itself out of her chest. It couldn't be true, it couldn't. How could she kill him knowing that?

“No—Wouldn't—Swear—”

“Why now? It's five years too late, I don't—” She stilled as he reached out towards her. She wasn't sure why she let him rest a hand against her cheek. It was warm and calloused. “What are you…” she breathed, grip loosening.

Then he seized her by the collar and wrenched her away with a burst of strength. His wyvern reared as she slipped and rolled along the stones. She landed in a heap, right as it brought the weight of its taloned foot onto her.

Hilda swore, fastening her hands around its claw. When she couldn't make it budge, she glared up at Claude. He was wheezing and coughing, a hand pressed to his windpipe. “You dirty liar!” she spat.

“I wasn't lying,” Claude hissed. And she knew he was right. She had known his tells for years. “I do, I swear I do.” He smiled bitterly. “But I guess it's too late for that, isn't it?”

He sidled up to her, snatched Freikugel as she scrambled to reach for it. She let out a howl of frustration and attempted to claw his eyes out. “Just kill me now!” she snarled. “One of us is dying here today. End their suffering, and kill me now.”

“We both know I can't. Just like we know you can't kill me, either.”

Hilda glared at him. “Speak for yourself.”

“Who’s the liar here again? You had every opportunity just then to snap my neck and get it over with.”

She felt like crying. Nothing was going to plan at all. Her people were being slaughtered below. She was trapped under the claws of a wyvern, her enemy just out of reach. Staring at him, closer than he'd been in five years but feeling just as far away, the question slipped from her lips: “Why did you leave me?”

He didn't look remotely surprised by it, but she saw a flicker of guilt in his eyes. “I—Well, to be honest, I was afraid. I left as soon as I could to save my own skin. I didn't stop to think about yours until I was too far gone.”

Hilda’s chest shook as she suppressed a sob. He wouldn't look at her. “It's your turn to ask,” she said softly, trying to hide the tremble in her voice.

He looked up sharply. “You remember?”

“Of course.” She managed a small, sad smile. “It was the only way I could get anything truthful out of you. Or so I thought.”

He looked at her, looking as if he wanted to respond. Instead, he just asked, “Why didn't you kill me? Is it wrong of me to hope that it's because some part of you still cares for me?”

Hilda felt a tear leak from the corner of her eye. Claude gently wiped it away, though not fast enough to stop the rest following the first. “You're wrong,” she said, staring past his head into the purpling sky.

Claude laughed bitterly. “You're lying, Hilda.”

“And if I did—if I did love you, Claude? What would that achieve? I have to kill you. I have to, or I die. Edelgard will hunt me down for the rest of my life.”

“It's easier, isn't it? To just follow her orders.” He had a twisted, resentful tilt to his lips as he stared down at her. “You were never one for taking the hard path.”

“You—You don't get to lecture me on the easy way out! You left me, Claude! You left all of us!” He flinched as if she had hit him. “You don't understand what it was like! Holst was murdered before my eyes! She told me that the same would happen to me. I can’t—I can’t die! I'm the last one. If I die, my entire family has died for nothing. They have protected these lands for centuries. I can't disappoint them today.”

He stared at her for a long moment. Then, he whistled. The wyvern lifted its leg, and Hilda jumped to her feet. Her hands found Freikugel. Its blade was poised over Claude’s throat as he kneeled before her.

“So, I hope you understand why—why you have to die today.” She couldn't stop the tears dripping off her nose and chin. They landed on hands that couldn't stop shaking. Her entire body was shaking, preemptively trembling with the guilt of what she would do next.

In a flash, he had an arrow nocked in Failnaught, its point directed straight at her heart. Her arms locked as he began to speak. “We have the same goal, Hilda! Don't you see? We’re coming to stop her! Once she conquers Fodlan, what's next? She isn't going to just stop at these borders. I can't let her take Almyra too.

“So, how about one last scheme? You and me, like old times.” His voice was uneven, tremoring. “We can both survive this. No tricks this time, I swear.”

She considered his words for a moment. He wasn’t lying—Claude was almost a perfect liar, but his one tell was the nearly unnoticeable change in his voice. But if she defected, what would happen to her? What would happen to her family’s land?

Edelgard would have gotten her hands on it one way or another. She was just biding her time, waiting for Hilda to die. Maybe she knew that this would happen. At least if she went with Claude, there was a chance she could get it back. There was a chance that Holst hadn’t died for nothing.

Hilda would have been lying if she wasn’t also allured by the idea of being with Claude once again. She wanted, so very badly, to stand beside him as they had five years ago. She wanted to smile and laugh and play his stupid games again. Taking a deep breath, she said, “Put down the bow.”

“Put down the axe first.” Hilda swallowed, staring at him. Would he kill her if she did? No, he wouldn’t. He wasn’t lying. She let Freikugel fall from his throat. To her relief, Claude withdrew the arrow and redeposited it in his quiver with a twirl.

They stared at one another. Hilda couldn't help the tug of her heart towards him, or the way her breath hitched in her throat as she took him in. Five years lay between them—the worst five years of her life.

Finally, Claude cleared his throat with a quick grin.

“The only way this ends is if one of us dies, right?” he asked, eyes gleaming. It was like they were seventeen again, messing with Lorenz’s perfumes. Hilda managed a smile at the memory.

“Right. So one of us will appear to die.” She shared a brief smile with him. Despite the five year rift between them, she had desperately missed their scheming.

They hurriedly discussed their plan as Hilda glanced at the clamour below. Claude was saying something to her just as she caught an Almyran get impaled by a lance. She winced, and turned back to him. “Oma won’t hurt you. Not seriously, I don’t think.”

Hilda managed a nervous, stumbling laugh. “That’s comforting.”

“I’m making up for those five years, starting now.” He was looking at her with such open sorrow, eyebrows knitted and green eyes sad. Stepping closer, he drew her hand to rest on his chest, over his heart. “I meant what I said before.”

This close, Hilda could see the shadows under his eyes and a new spattering of freckles over his nose. “I know,” she breathed, leaning closer. One hand snaked around the back of his neck, the other wound itself into his hair. He sighed softly in the space between their lips, his hands splayed against her back, drawing her ever closer. Then she was pressing her mouth against his; he smiled against her lips. The contact was brief, a second at most. She drew away to catch him still grinning. It was his real smile.

After smiling at each other like lovesick teenagers for a moment, Hilda punched him in the shoulder. “Get on with it, your highness.”

“M’lady.” He bowed to her. In the next second, he bellowed, “Die!” and brandished a scimitar in her direction. Hilda pressed a hand to her mouth to stop a laugh escaping.

“Almyran scum!” She charged at him, axe held above her head. He dodged backwards, running along the tops of the battlements. She noticed a few soldiers below glancing up at them. A sergeant shouted something to her. “Stay back,” she yelled. “He’s mine!”

Claude bit back a wide smile, and let loose an arrow. It sailed past her ear, catching a few hairs on its way past.

“You will die!” she shouted, swinging wildly in his direction. It went wide, of course, but it looked like an impressive effort to those below. With another spin, she brought the axe back around. Claude’s eyes went wide as he threw himself backward to just barely avoid it. Still, the blade seared a scratch along the front of his tunic.

He raised his arms above his head as she pressed a boot to his chest. “Any last words?” she snarled. Her arms were shaking with the weight of Freikugel above her head.

Claude winked, and blew her a kiss. “Look behind you.”

Hilda whirled, a very real fear sweeping through her as she beheld the albino wyvern rearing behind her. It batted her away with its wing. Her axe hit the stones with a crack, as the floor beneath the weapon split. She landed sprawled on her back, with barely enough time to suck a hiss of pain through her teeth before Oma kicked her again.

Blood dripped down her chin from her nose. Blinking away stars, Hilda stared up into the wyvern’s red eyes. It tilted its head at her. Claude whistled, and its foot slammed into the cobblestones beside her head, cracking them on impact. She let out a sharp cry of pain and squeezed her eyes shut.

Peeking through her eyelids, Hilda watched Claude bend to retrieve Freikugel and stagger to the edge of the battlements. “Almyrans, to me!” He waved the axe above his head, its glow bright against the blue twilight.

The triumphant roar was deafening. A hundred wyverns ascended to the battlements, the flapping of wings cacophonous. Wind whipped at Hilda’s hair as she lay as still as she could. Hopefully none would look too closely to notice the lack of any real injuries. “People of Goneril, return to your Emperor and tell her the general is dead!”

Claude raised a hand, and the remaining Almyran warriors drew their bows as one. “Go, or die where you stand.”

Hilda hoped to a Goddess she didn't believe in, praying that they wouldn't be stubborn, that they would just go. After a few seconds of fraught quiet, the Almyrans broke into cheers all around her. She strained to hear the horses of her soldiers galloping off.

Claude didn't waste any time with celebrations, already allocating orders in quick Almyran. Finally, as the last soldier left to take news back to Almyra, she felt Claude kneel beside her. Oma shifted, bringing up her wings to shield them. It was growing darker now, but Hilda could still see the dying light reflected in Claude’s eyes. He produced a handkerchief and dabbed at the congealed blood coating her lips and chin.

“I guess Oma doesn’t know her own strength,” he said with a quiet chuckle. “Sorry about that.”

Hilda snorted. “You don’t say. I hit my head hard enough to have a minor concussion, and I’m going to be bruised and sore for days.” She sat up with a groan and snatched the handkerchief out of his hands.

“But you’re now dead in everyone’s eyes! Free to go wherever you please.” He stepped closer, adding, “Though, I would hope that you’re staying with me.”

“No, why would I?”

Hilda was pleased to see that he at least pretended to be shocked and hurt. He placed a hand on his chest and drooped like a flower with no water. “Please, Hilda, my most dearest darling, how can I persuade you to stay?”

She shoved his shoulder hard enough for him to nearly lose his balance. “You are awful. Shut up, and I might just.”

He laughed and launched himself towards her, wrapping her in a hug. She stiffened for a moment, before melting into his arms. Claude was so warm, and sturdier than Hilda remembered. “I missed you,” he murmured against her ear.

She pushed him away and buried her face in her hands. The tears were coming too fast for her to stop. Sucking in ragged breaths, she peered through her fingers to see him smirking. “Those are the real tears, I see. What an effect I must have on you, m’lady Hilda.”

“You’re horrible! It was all romantic, and then you had to go and say that.” Despite her indignant tone, she couldn’t help the giggling that overtook her.

“Come on. We have five years to catch up on.” He got to his feet, wrenching her up with him. He also bent to retrieve Freikugel and attached it to Oma’s saddle.

She clambered up onto the wyvern with his help, felt him climb on behind her. “And also some work to do, if you’re up for it.” She didn’t need to see him to know he was smiling.

“Any work with you, my ever-precious Claude, is not real work at all.”

He scoffed. “Alright, enough with the act.”

She laughed, told him it wasn't an act at all. He laughed at that too.

With a mighty leap, Oma threw herself into the night. The stars emerged around them as they ascended above the clouds, twinkling silver against the velveteen black. Hilda shivered in the brisk air, and nestled closer to Claude. He settled his chin on her head, squeezing her waist with his arms. For the first time in five years, she felt like herself. She didn’t need to lie to herself any longer.

On a white wyvern skirting the nighttime clouds, Hilda stared into the stars and knew that Holst would have been smiling down at her. She was doing what she thought was right. Sometimes, that took a little work.