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bite down, bite down
(you better sink your teeth, before i disappear.)
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They’re just really, really, good friends who come out of rooms with disheveled hair and painted lips, and neither of them are quick to answer when prompted. Robin always has something to say, smooth as glass, clear as crystal. Sumia’s always a little more fidgety, stumbling over words and excuses.
Chrom chalks it up to Sumia being Sumia.
But even he starts to notice when Sumia’s Captain!'s aren’t as vibrant or when her presence starts to shift towards the other side of his quarters where the cartography table is, with a stack of lightning tomes in various sizes on the chipped furnish.
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He starts to knock on Robin's door. He’s never done that before, but the last time he barged in there was a scuffle, Robin opened the door with silver hair at her waist and a sloppy attempt at a dress made out of bedsheets, she hissed at him to knock, that a lady needed her privacy and barraged him with a set of insults that left him reeling and stepping back, almost hurt.
He heard someone else in that room, but he knows now better to give his tactician her privacy.
So he knocks anyway.
"We’re best friends, right?"
"Of course." Robin thumbs through a page of her book.
"We promised to be honest with each other, right?"
She doesn’t like where this is going.
Chrom clears his throat, he must be delicate about this. How should he phrase this. He’s fiddling with his sleeve and Robin’s crossing and uncrossing her ankles, one and two and three.
"Are you seeing anyone?"
A little blunt.
Robin’s lips curl into a wry grin. An almost smirk.
"Did the prince of Ylisse fall in love with me?"
Chrom reacts in an exaggerated manner fit for children and Robin laughs, No! Of course not! That would be a catastrophe.
"You’re a very important friend to me, more like a brother than anything." Chrom says.
Robin rolls her eyes, Okaaaay.
"But, if you are seeing someone, you can always bring them over, I'd like to meet the person who captured your almost nonexistent heart."
Robin pouts.
"You wouldn’t like them much, I think."
"Is it Henry?"
A pause.
"Oh gods, is it Tharja? Robin are you feeling all right? If it’s a hex, we could get someone—”
Robin puts an index finger on his lips.
"Stop while you’re ahead, Lordling."
When Chrom finally leaves, Robin laughs a little. It’s not particularly joyous, but it seems like the only appropriate reaction, she brushes her thumb over a small pendant, a little tiny flower.
No, he wouldn’t like Sumia that much, not when they were engaged to marry as soon as the war was over.
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Sumia thinks she’s made a mistake somewhere along the line, maybe she shouldn’t have fallen over that particular pebble, a stupid, little thing, and let Robin catch her arm before her face hit the ground.
Robin asked her if she was all right, helped her dust off the dirt and grime, and she helped her get back on her feet. Robin, she was gentle and a little condescending at first, Sumia knew the tell and the tone well, she’s heard it throughout her short existence, but instead of leaving her with her own devices, Robin, she asked and poked her head into Sumia’s library and Sumia's fantasy world. She would ask about the family tree in the Holy War series, and prompt Sumia with questions about her favorite characters and countries, which family was she rooting for. And Sumia, well.
She let her in.
They spent hours on end side to side in Miriel’s study, if they were quiet, they were allowed to read, that was the rule. But on that fated day, Miriel was not there, out on some errands and was not due for a couple of days.
They were pouring over the Ribald Tales when Sumia accidentally tipped over an ink well, and it fell on Robin’s hands. The tactician, she said it was fine while Sumia apologized, and picked up the object and put it away, her hands onyx and stained black.
"Sumia, you look loveliest with a smile," and Robin poked her cheek with her dark finger, and traced runes on her fair skin.
And Sumia didn’t know what to do, because Robin’s hand became a caress and she leaned into her touch. Robin, she leaned in and got close, close enough to touch, to burn, and Sumia’s breath hitched, got stuck in her throat. Like in one of her favorite novellas.
"Is it okay?" Robin asked.
"Yes." Sumia responded, and Robin took the confirmation out of her lips.
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At one point, their meetings moved from Miriel’s study to Sumia’s private quarters, where she had floor to ceiling windows and a small, but extensive library. Robin would flit like a fairy from shelf to shelf until she found a volume that was particularly satisfying.
Sumia would read out loud sometimes, because Robin said that she liked her voice.
Sometimes Sumia would bake a rhubarb pie and she wouldn’t need to honey her words, Robin would take it and thank her eagerly, rave about how wonderful it was. Not a single word of complaint.
And Sumia thinks, yes. She likes this a lot.
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She deserves this feeling. This feeling, it bubbles in her chest and spills out of her lips when she says, I love you, because you make me feel like I’m worth it, and Robin tells her, that she’s just a woman with a sketchy past, there wasn’t anything she could offer to someone like her—-and to never dictate her self worth based on the feelings of others, because that would never be enough. Sumia, Robin says, you’re strong and brave and beautiful, and that’s a fact tested by time and by trial.
There is no person who can take that or tack that on to you, not even me.
And Sumia blinks back tears she wasn’t aware she was shedding.
Robin fumbles with her cloak until she retrieves a small pouch, and shakes out its contents.
A silver ring and a silver chain.
"You don’t have to wear it on your hand." She says simply.
(Sumia wears the ring on her hand up until she’s proposed to with the crest of House Ylisse. She moves it somewhere safe, somewhere close. The chain leaves the ring pressed against her chest.)
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The proposal is awkward and rushed, Chrom declares his undying adoration on a battlefield and twenty sets of eyes bore into her back when she’s forced to return his sincerities with as much enthusiasm and passion as is expected from a woman to become queen.
"Of course, my love." She lets Chrom kiss her knuckles and she stands as tall as she can, emulates Cordelia in that regard until their audience finally disappears and the ring is on her hand, and it feels like lead and it only weighs her down.
She’s never been this miserable. She’s never fathomed that a childhood dream would end up like a clandestine nightmare.
Robin can’t even look at her anymore. Sumia blinks again, and oh, no, Robin was always looking, always stealing glances, it was Sumia who couldn’t bring herself to lock gazes.
Because she felt she would break the moment she stared into those dark brown eyes.
She would fall forward into her arms and Robin would still catch her. She was sure of it. This was her fear.
Robin deserved better. Robin deserves better. Yet, she lets Robin kiss her cheek, once, twice, after announcing her pregnancy.
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"I’m still yours." Robin whispers into her lips, back pressed into a marble column.
And Sumia, she knows this to be true.
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Two years pass by and Chrom tells himself, assures himself that he made the right choice. He has to be more convincing, if he’s to make the reflection in the mirror understand why he did it. There is no love between the sheets, they sleep with their backs to each other, each wide awake and staring in opposite directions.
Whatever adoration and whatever love, Chrom clung to it like the holy ghost and he prayed their daughter would be more receptive of Sumia’s kindness.
She still kisses him goodnight and murmurs good morning—and that’s what leaves him cold.
Chrom loves her. He does. He needs to be more convincing, more fervent. More passionate.
He’s scared he can’t muster up the strength to keep this marriage together, when he’s the one who dragged her along with him.
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Chrom is not stupid, maybe a little far sighted and too trusting, these were all reasonable criticisms.
But he’s learned from the best about being observant.
When he takes his bride to bed, she fumbles with a chain around her neck and he doesn’t think much of it. Jewelry was common with the women of the court, even Sumia who wasn’t all that interested in fineries, she could pick up a silver chain. It wasn’t out of the ordinary.
It’s been two years and they’re on the road to battle, and that silver chain is all he can really see. When he sees Sumia, he sees a ring.
Chrom asks Robin to see him after the battle on Port Valm. After they have picked up his daughter from the future, after they pick up his daughter who would want nothing more than to slit his other half’s throat.
Robin is dressed in sorcerer layers and she sits with a practiced poise.
Chrom looks at her and sets his jaw. Patience. Delicacy. He has done this once and he can do it again no matter what, she is still Robin.
And that’s the problem, he knows. The miracle maker. The ties that bind.
"Robin."
"Chrom."
"Are you going to stare for another ten minutes, I know the outfit is a little gaudy, but Tharja said this was customary."
Chrom pinches the bridge of his nose, he knows her tells. She’s trying to shift the conversation away from her, and gods, she’s gotten better.
But he has too.
"Are you seeing anyone?"
"No."
"We promised each other honesty."
"Yes, and it wounds me that you think so lightly of my word."
"I do not mean to offend."
"None taken."
Chrom doesn’t like this. He really, really doesn’t, and would prefer the name come out of her lips instead.
"How’s Sumia?"
"You’re her husband."
She doesn’t miss a beat.
"You spend a lot more time with her than I do."
He wills himself make it sound less terrible. Robin shrugs a little, twirls a piece of silver hair with a dark hand.
"Mmm, I suppose."
Robin gets up and walks around the room, measured steps and footfalls before she stops abruptly, puts her hands on her hips.
"I’m getting married."
This is a slap in the face. An absolute suckerpunch. He flinches, leans back, marks the space between them. She looks at him with that wry expression--she's keeping a secret.
Chrom can’t even formulate a response to that.
"It’s an agreement formed out of shared interests, if anything." Robin says quietly after Chrom congratulates her.
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(Henry doesn’t care about marriage or the life that comes after, but Robin needs someone who she can use. She kisses his cheek and his forehead but never his lips, and he is fine with the distance between. He is fine, he holds her hand close, and tags along on her adventures and her quests, and thinks, this is fine--just fine.)
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Robin and Sumia are paired together after the pegasus knight trades in her white steed for a black one and receives a set of tomes. Becoming a dark flier was never on the agenda but she’s good at her job and Robin is a particularly good tutor.
The fight against the rebel forces is waning thin and emotions are overwhelming for all parties involved.
When Robin kisses Sumia again it’s with the intention of leaving a mark.
Valm is cruel, but the humans marching through are worse.
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Chrom falls asleep in an individual bedroll and lies awake at night knowing that his wife had a lady consort that also happened to be his tactician.
The betrayal numbs him and he knows now, he is incapable of doing anything. What is there to do after this.
The third time he knocks on Robin’s door she opens it and she looks tired. They were to march against Castle Valm tomorrow.
"Is Sumia there?"
Robin doesn’t lie anymore.
"Yes."
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Sumia can pinpoint exactly where her story went wrong.
She’s put together the chapters and tied the pages together with silver twine and gold thread. Accepting Chrom’s marriage proposal was the first, and then allowing him to take her to bed, that was two, watching Lucina grow up with an ache in her chest because this was her daughter and she was the spitting image of a man she did not love. Third, was allowing Robin to kiss her neck and stay by her side until the sun rose again. Fourth, was congratulating Robin on her marriage and grasping her callused hands with her own set, brushing her thumbs over the other woman’s until it was too long of a touch to be considered friendly. Fifth, begging to accompany the main party on the campaign against Valm, not because of the husband who loved her but because of the tactician who stood next to him.
A complete divergence from the fairytale ending she wrote when she was twelve—when she was young, and naive, and impressionable.
She does not wait for people to make decisions for her anymore. That was for Sumia the Knight, Sumia the Squire. Not for Sumia, the Queen.
"Chrom."
And he comes to her.
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For the sake of the halidom, they do not have their marriage nullified and their second daughter, the one not yet born, she will grow up with Sumia and Robin and Chrom will watch them come and go.
Robin apologizes profusely for her betrayal and Chrom puts a gloved hand on her shoulder—It’s fine now, that’s the end of it.
Even when it was tearing him apart. Because they’re two halves of a greater whole, and it shouldn’t have been that much of a surprise when they both fell in love with the same woman.
It is a separation that they can all agree on, for the sake of each other’s happiness. They’re all the self sacrificing, martyr sort.
But Robin, she can’t help but feel like she’s cheated in a game of strategy and logic, because she’s to give birth to a child in six months time.
There is no happy ending to this act. Not when all the players in the play were desperately trying to make things worse.
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But,
There is a yearning for the company of each other in a setting where they could put down all walls, and weapons, and sink into each other’s bones and lie there until the apocalypse takes them both.
(When Cynthia comes from the future, she sees Sumia and shouts, Mother!!
And when her dark gaze settles on Robin, she shrieks, Mom! and tumbles face forward into her arms.)
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Maybe, that constant upheaval against the current with the miracle maker by her side, maybe this was it. Sumia thinks, biting the end of a pen. That’s the only way for things to be. That's the only way she would want it to be. Morgan puts a blanket over her shoulders, and Sumia, she scratches the back of her head and smiles.
"Thank you."