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Chapter Text

“That was...unpleasant,” Zelgius says, after both children, Gawain, and Elena’s lifeless body are tucked away into the little house.

He surveys the remains of the town with disgust. Corpses strewn about, torn asunder. The stink of cooking, rotting flesh, like the battlefield, except it had never been a battle, but a slaughter. The whole place was unnaturally silent.

“Indeed,” Sephiran sighs. “I had hoped...alas.” He shakes his head, weary beyond his visual years, unhappy creases set around his eyes and mouth. “Needless deaths, all around. At least this was an accident. I have seen enough death, I think.”

The town stays eerily quiet, all its inhabitants dead or sleeping. Not even the birds were singing. Likely the stench had warned them off.

But—

There. Out of the corner of his eye, something shifts.

Zelgius turns sharply, instinctively shielding his companion.

“Who’s there?” There’s no response. And then— “Are you looting the bodies?” He stares in disbelief at the scrap of a child, half hidden behind a pile of carcasses. He strides over, half a mind to chastise them about stealing from the dead, and drags them upward by the arm.

The child flinches, and scrabbles away at the air, kicking fruitlessly at Zelgius’ armour. They’re easier to lift than expected, and Zelgius frowns at the signs of obvious neglect — nothing but shapeless rags that hide the too thin, malnourished stick of a body. Something’s off here. He looks him over again. Pale, almost translucent skin, and a dark rat’s nest of hair that almost covers the bright, blood red mark on his forehead.

Oh. You are of my kind, he wants to say, a shiver running down his spine, and aborts the unconscious movement of his other hand, half raised, in motion to touch the sudden ache in the shameful mark on his back. He understands now, how this child could be left to the mercy of the wilderness, abandoned to die.

“Hello,” he says instead. “You’re like me, are you not?”

The child scowls at him, still dangling from his hand, but no longer kicking. Red eyes meet his, and he blinks at the uncommon colour. Perhaps it was part of his heritage, but it would have been a dead giveaway to the beorc of his unnaturalness, along with the unfortunately placed mark on his forehead. Zelgius, at least, could hide his mark under clothing. This child? They would need a headband, or a hood, and judging by the state of their clothes, there was no extra fabric to spare.

“Zelgius, what— ah,” Sephiran appears in the corner of his vision, watching. “Does he know?” he murmurs into his ear. “About how the bodies came to be?”

The child apparently has sensitive hearing, because they shake their head no. Zelgius wants to know how Sephiran is so sure that this is a boy, because children tend to be rather androgenous, but this is not the time to ask.

“Are you alright?” Sephiran addresses the — boy, apparently. “Where are your caretakers?”

He shrugs. Zelgius puts him back down on the ground, now that he seems less likely to run.

“He’s Branded,” Zelgius says, turning to Sephiran. “And alone.”

“Yes,” Sephiran says. “I know.”

“Would you consider— would it be possible—”

Sephiran frowns, considering. “I cannot. My duty is to my current charge. But perhaps you would like an heir? I know you have been discomforted by the amount of ladies the senators have been throwing at you.”

“And the Senate would agree if I just turn up with a boy under my cape?”

“Zelgius,” Sephiran says. “It is quite simple. If you would like to take him, then do so. I will handle the Senate. Otherwise, we can drop him off at the nearest temple.”

Upon hearing this, the boy shrinks, quiet, a shadow retreating under midday sun. Zelgius cannot help but feel a shred of pity, remembering another dark haired boy who had starved for kitchen scraps and shrank from those who would cause him harm, until one stranger had lifted him up into the light, and taught him to fight.

“Yes,” Zelgius says, quite determined. “If you would like to come with me, I can promise food, and shelter. We will not be so lonely together, I hope.” He offers a gauntleted hand, palm up.

The boy looks up at him, red eyes narrowed and wary. There’s the hint of a bruise on his left cheek, but the boy otherwise has all the dignity of a noble, drawing himself up to judge his trustworthiness. He stiffens under his scrutiny, as the boy peers into his soul, and then finally, an eternity later, gives a small solemn nod, a half bow of gratitude, and shakes his hand.

Sephiran, too, nods beside him.

“Do you have a name?” Sephiran asks the boy.

The boy shrugs, glances at the ground, and scuffles his feet. He holds himself stiffly, as if ready to flee at a moment's notice. He doesn’t meet either of their eyes.

Sephiran frowns, countenance growing stormy. “Did no one teach you how to speak?”

The boy flinches, backing away, and Zelgius reaches for him, and grips one slender, bony wrist.

He opens his mouth, and out comes a garbled chant of something. It sounds vaguely familiar, but Zelgius can’t place the rhythm, much less the words. Sephiran only frowns further.

“That makes no—” and then Zelgius catches the narrowing of the eyes, the thinned lips, and knows Sephiran is well and truly incensed. “Ah. I see.” Sephiran says, with icy calmness. “It’s not your fault,” he says, more kindly to the boy. “I hope whoever taught you that taught you to read, at least?”

The boy nods.

“Wonderful,” he says. “That will make things much easier.”

“Make what much easier?” Zelgius asks. He lets the boy go.

“Teaching him to speak, of course,” Sephiran says, and then places a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “I think it’s time we take our leave. We’re done here, and I would like to go before they wake.” He nods at the house.

Zelgius agrees.

They go.

It turns out that while the boy cannot speak, he can write. Sephiran gives him parchment and charcoal, and he scrawls his name on it in the careful precision of a child who has only just progressed past copying out letters.

“Soren,” Zelgius reads out. “Your name?”

The boy— Soren — nods.

“It’s a good name,” he says, gruff. “I’m Zelgius. I’m a knight of Begnion.”

He nods again, and then points the stick at Sephiran in obvious question.

“He’s Sephiran. He’s the Chancellor of Begnion.”

“That means that I make sure that the people in my care are safe and well,” Sephiran explains, and then indicates to Zelgius that he’s going to go have a chat with the priests. Zelgius gives him a brisk nod, and returns to his new charge.

Soren nods in understanding. Then he hesitates, frowns, and writes something else on to the paper.

Ike?

“The General’s son?” Zelgius asks, leaning forward to peer at the name. “He’s alive, if that’s what you’re asking.”

Good, Soren writes. Ike is kind. He gives me food.

“I’m glad to hear that,” Zelgius says, in the absence of not knowing what else to say.

He promised food today. I did not see him, so I was looking. None of the bodies was his.

Ah, and that’s why you were rifling through corpses, Zelgius thinks. Out loud, he says: “I see. Ike is safe, Soren. He was sleeping.” He picks his words carefully, not quite ready to lie to the child just yet. After all, it was hard to determine how long the boy had been picking through the village, or how much he had seen. “Perhaps you’ll see him again, one day.”

Soren circles the word Good, and puts the charcoal and parchment aside when Zelgius pulls out some rations. Eyeing the sudden jump to attention, Zelgius hands him a biscuit. The boy wolfs it down pitifully quickly.

“You’re going to choke if you eat it like that,” Zelgius says, but does nothing to stop him. Instead, he hands him his open water flask, eating his own biscuit with quick, efficient bites.

Sephiran appears in the doorway and sighs at them.

“You could at least wash your hands,” he says, exasperated, and places the closed wicker basket onto the table. “We have dinner, courtesy of the temple. Go wash up, please.”

Zelgius shrugs, sheepish. It was a habit from his time in the army, to take advantage of whatever minimal time there was to eat. Sometimes, there was no time to wash in war, but food had to be eaten anyway. He glances at the boy next to him.

Soren’s eyes are the size of dinner plates, fixed on the basket.

“Of course,” he says, and chivies Soren to his feet. “We’ll go do that now.” He puts a hand on one bony shoulder, and steers him out the doorway.

“Second door on the right,” Sephiran calls after them.

Zelgius waves a hand behind him in acknowledgement, and turns the corner.

It is, in fact, as easy as Sephiran says. Zelgius doesn’t know what price he paid for it, but suddenly, he has a long lost nephew for his ward and heir.

The senators are displeased, but hide their anger under slick, simpering smiles that make him grit his teeth, while Sephiran is serene as ever, hand tucked neatly into sleeves. The political stage is not, has never been his battlefield. He prefers a blade in hand, blood singing as he tests his skills against worthy opponents. Nothing about this is worthy, and he feels a mongoose in the snakes’ pit.

One morning, Sephiran quietly pulls him aside to tell him that Gawain has taken his children to Crimea, to start up a band of mercenaries. Zelgius nods. It’s not a bad plan, for a man who is so insistent on never rejoining any sort of military. You can take the man from the army, but not the knight out of a man. Gawain has always been a warrior. He’s not surprised.

“We will meet again,” he promises to an empty room, and then goes to see about securing basic lessons for his new charge.

It turns out that the garbled nonsense that Soren had spouted was in fact, the beginnings of a Wind spell. Zelgius has to go resist the temptation to facepalm when Sephiran points out the hole in the education plan he’s somehow managed to cobble together in the span of a week.

“An anima spell,” Zelgius says, gripping the bridge of his nose. “How in the goddess’ name does a scrap of a boy know wind magic before he even knows how to speak?”

“Not all magic users are kind or benevolent,” Sephiran says. “Likely someone mistook his brand to be that of a Spirit Charmer, and sought to exploit his natural talent.”

“Is there anyone you’d suggest for a tutor?”

“Give me a couple afternoons with him for the basics, and I’ll let you know,” Sephiran says. “I wonder if the fool that taught him went over the theory, or just shoved a tome in his face.”

“Done,” Zelgius says, noting it down in the book. “I’ll send him to your office?”

“Goddess, no. The western sitting room on the second floor will do fine.”

Zelgius nods. “Childrearing is a tiresome affair,” he grumbles.

Sephiran, who’s been raising Sanaki for the past handful of years, laughs at him. “But it is rewarding,” he says, eyes twinkling. “If you think it’s tiring now, just wait until he grows confident enough to talk back.”

He groans, and mock-falls back in his chair. “Actually, that would be rather reassuring, now that you bring it up,” he says. “He still tenses like a rabbit every time I enter the room.”

Sephiran hums. “It takes time to adjust,” he says neutrally.

“I know,” Zelgius says. “It hasn’t even been a week. I’m just impatient.”

“The heart is not always a logical thing,” Sephiran says, smiling. Then he sobers. “I have a serious matter to discuss, if you have the time. It’s about General Nell’s upcoming retirement.”

“So it’s not a rumour, after all.” Zelgius tucks his notebook away into a pocket. “By all means. I’ve been hearing it for years, but I suppose nearly losing a leg is enough to make a man weary. Who’s up for a promotion?”

“You are,” Sephiran tells him, solemn. “I intend to back your name. You’re popular enough with the people and are known in the Senate for your efficiency and skill. Your subordinates follow you like ducks and your commanding officers have nothing but praise. Nell’s put your name forward himself.”

Zelgius blinks. “It’s not a little too fast?” he asks, trying to add up the years since joining Begnion’s army. “Surely there are other officers in the running.”

Sephiran waves a hand. “Of course there are other officers in the running. But you are the most competent neutral candidate.”

“I see,” Zelgius says. That meant some senators would pick him, if only to avoid petty ire from their fellow senators for not opting for their pick. He was the safest choice.

“If you win the ballot, you’re likely to be granted land and an dukedom,” Sephiran says. “You’ve busy days ahead, friend.”

Zelgius smiles thinly. “It is my duty to serve my lord Chancellor to the best of my ability,” he says, and pauses. “I will not waver.”

“Good,” Sephiran says, and favours him with a nod and a clap on the shoulder. “I have great faith in you.” He smiles. “We should let Soren meet Sanaki, one of these days,” he says, and walks out the door.

Zelgius can’t help it. He laughs.

Chapter Text

Despite Sephiran’s insistence on their first meeting that his duty was to the Apostle, he still manages to whisk Soren off for hours of private lessons every week. In the western sitting room, they talk about everything from magic theory to politics to philosophy over a steaming tea and an intricately carved wooden chess set. It’s been years now, since Zelgius handed him a biscuit and welcomed him into his home. Time flies, and his views on the situation in Begnion are ever-changing.

“You don’t like me much, do you,” Sephiran says, a slight smile on his face.

My personal misgivings hardly matter in this scenario, Soren would like to say. But instead he picks out his words carefully as he sips his tea, fingers cradling the delicate porcelain. “You are my uncle’s esteemed patron.”

It’s not that Soren doesn’t have fond memories of Sephiran teaching him how to manipulate politicians, make inane small talk, and handle his hair with the proper care it deserved. Even now, Soren wears his gift: the silver hair ornaments that tied his hair back and out of his face. It’s ironic, how some senators whisper about their similar appearances — the long, dark hair, the slender willowy figure — and wonder whether he’s his bastard child. Because they are similar, not in a familial way, but in the way that makes them wary of each other, repelling charges not quite on a collision course.

It’s not that he doesn’t know that Sephiran is incredibly important to Zelgius, and that it is through his interference that he is here today, but whenever he interacts with him, he feels like a chess piece a master is considering, thinking about in which ways to nudge or push, the calculating stare that would have no trouble sacrificing him for the greater good.

Soren is a tactician himself. He has no interest in becoming the pawn of another.

“That’s not what I meant,” Sephiran says. He slips long, elegant fingers around his teacup and peers into it as though he’s looking for answers to the universe. “Good. Trust your instincts,” he finally says. “They will serve you well one day.”

He does not share this conversation with Sanaki when he visits her. She loves Sephiran with a child’s love for a parent, with reckless abandon and blind faith. It would only be a waste of breath.

Soren slips a bookmark into the heavy tome he’s been reading and lets it fall to the table with a thump when Zelgius appears in the room, jet black armour suddenly reflecting firelight.

“Soren— what?” Zelgius asks, dripping wet, Alondite still held in his grasp.

“Did you accomplish whatever it was that you set out to do?” Soren asks, fixing him with a disapproving stare.

Zelgius takes off his helmet, and tosses it on the table with a clatter.

“Of a sort,” Zelgius says, grimacing. “Didn’t I tell you not to wait up?”

“You tell me constantly,” Soren says. “However, I have decided that— ah, what does Deputy Commander Tanith call it— sticking it to the man and teenage rebellion is clearly the only way to go when one’s guardian is being a complete idiot, raring off in the middle of the night to get himself killed.”

Zelgius rolls his eyes. “I’m hardly going to get myself killed,” he says, shucking off his armour. “Not only am I a skilled swordsman, but this armour is blessed with near-invulnerability.”

“That sounds dangerously like overconfidence,” Soren says. “At least tell me what you’re doing and where you’re going so that I can do something about it.”

“There’s nothing for you to do except your studies,” Zelgius says. “Sephiran has it handled. Don’t worry about it.”

“Oh, good,” Soren says. “So, why do you have an alter ego that’s terrorizing the countryside as one of the Four Riders of Daein? It’s not as if Begnion skimps on their pay for General Zelgius of the Begnion Imperial Central Army. Not to mention I can’t imagine the madman pays well enough for you to take on the second job.”

“It’s for other reasons,” Zelgius says, gritting his teeth. “Reasons that are beyond your understanding. It’s part of the plan, Soren. May I go wash up now?”

Soren scowls at him. “You’re not injured, are you? I did bring up a heal staff, if you need it.” He nods at the propped up staff in the corner.

“No, I’m not injured,” he says. “I’m going to go to sleep. Remember to put out the fire.”

Soren glares at his back as he retreats. It’s completely nonsensical. He doesn’t understand this foolishness. Daein’s the enemy, and while Begnion is stewing over the fact that Daein thinks that it can waltz in and conquer Crimea, Begnion is also too disjointed and lazy to do anything proper about it. And yet here’s Zelgius, playing at being a general for both countries? Absolute madness. Unless he’s spying for Begnion, which is the most likely option. But why couldn’t Zelgius just come out and say it? Soren, with his tactical mind, would understand, of course. Spies and intel were his bread and butter. Which means, of course, that there’s something else going on here.

He mutters something unpleasant about Sephiran under his breath, and goes to put out the fire.

Of course, Soren is in Kadohl when the Crimeans arrive in Melior. He sighs when he reads the letter that Zelgius has sent home by express mail, detailing the arrival of one Ike, son of Gawain, his mercenary group, and the Princess Crimea. It’s not quite a formal summons, but it’s a heavy suggestion of ‘you should be here.’ Soren wonders if Ike will remember him. It’s been over a decade, at least. He lets the steward know, packs, and saddles up. It’s not his favourite way to travel — horses don’t like him or Zelgius, due to their Branded nature, but these ones that they raise on the dukedom at least tolerate them.

He opens the one from Sanaki next, detailing her adventures at sea. He snorts as she complains about being treated like a child. However, the notes about the pirates and the Kilvas ravens are rather alarming. How did they know where she would be? Who is the traitor? Sanaki has no shortage of enemies, especially among her so-called allies, but most are not cold-hearted or idiotic enough to straight up assassinate her. It’s much more strategic to assassinate Sephiran instead, and position Sanaki into a figurehead position. At least, that would be what he would do, if he wanted control over Begnion. Sanaki’s death would only cause unrest.

He frowns, uneasy. The unease follows him all the way to Melior.

“It’s done,” Zelgius says when he enters the room for lunch. “I march in two weeks time, after the newly dubbed General Ike.” He shucks off pieces of his armour, shedding skin before sitting down across from Soren. “He’s capable, I’ll give him that. And handy with a sword, too. He has potential. I can see it.”

“That’s good news, if he’s to go haring after the Mad King,” Soren says noncommittally as he tears his bun apart.

Zelgius eyes the brutal massacre of the bun. “General Ike is lacking a tactician,” he says carefully. “You should offer your services.”

Soren glares at him. “Like he would trust me,” he grumbles. Ike, much to his dismay, but not entirely unexpected, did not recognize him. Soren had awkwardly apologized for bumping into him, and they had shared an intensely uncomfortable ten minutes picking up the books that he had dropped. It was nice to see that the recent tragedies that had befallen Ike had not dulled his generous spirit. He had taken half of Soren’s stack of books and insisted on carrying them to his work space. Soren’s cheeks had burned red whenever he’d thought about it that afternoon, and had gotten nothing done at all.

“He’ll trust you more than you think,” Zelgius opines. “I think Sanaki’s half inclined to order you with them.”

Soren resists the urge to make a face. “Really?” he asks. It’s a rhetorical question, but he can see the sense in that. It’s a clever move, too. He’s someone she trusts, and out of that number, he’s the one that can be moved. He sighs. “It makes sense,” he admits. “I’d be fine with that.”

“If it helps, I’m only two weeks away,” Zelgius says. “Try not to lose your head in combat.”

“You found me in a village of corpses,” Soren says. “I think I’ll be fine.”

“Corpses is different than turning people into corpses,” Zelgius says. “And battle’s different from sparring. Try not to be in the thick of it, especially since you’ll be the tactician. I’ll be greatly displeased if anything major happens to you.”

“Alright,” Soren says. “I’ll try.”

Sanaki does, in fact, order him with them. She sends him with Tanith, which suits him just fine. Him and Tanith understand each other.

It’s odd, meeting such a large amount of people in such a short time. The core of Ike’s group is clearly close, all family, united in purpose. In a way, Soren feels like a voyeur, looking in on an already well-oiled machine, an additional part that hasn’t quite figured out where he fits.

Titania, Ike’s deputy, looks a little relieved when he admits that he’s quite proficient at numbers as well as tactics.

“I used to be part of the Crimean Knights, before I joined Greil’s Mercenaries,” Titania explains. “Greil used to do the accounting. Now, well. Neither of us have the head for numbers. Rhys does arithmetic alright, but he’d faint if we ever made him do the casualty counts.”

A healer that faints at the sight of blood, Soren thinks. Charming. He just nods. “Do you have a ledger book? Or any records, so that I can familiarize myself with how you operate?”

“Of course,” Titania says. “Right this way.”

He gets a couple of account books to stick his nose in for the rest of the journey northward. Tanith checks on him a couple times throughout the day, and then proceeds to invade his privacy in the evening.

Soren looks up, and glares at her.

“The Apostle charged me with your health and safety,” Tanith informs him. “If that means sitting on you so that you’ll sleep at an appropriate time, so be it.”

He makes a face, then blows out the candlelight he’s been reading by. Satisfied, she exits the tent. He rolls over, and curls up into his bedroll. The nights are cold this time of year, and it’ll be colder still the further north they get. He might as well enjoy what little warmth he can glean now.

They run a couple of drills as they move northward, to get Soren acquainted with how they move and operate. They’re quite good— not bad at all for a bunch of mercenaries without a formal tactician. The main group at least is fairly cohesive and understanding of each other’s strengths and weaknesses — the main problem is that they sometimes fail to mesh with the newer recruits. Different lifestyles, different ways of operating, Soren reminds himself as he watches them.

“Can we try something new?” Soren asks Ike. “Who’s the most tactically minded member of your group?”

“Titania,” Ike says, and she joins them, swinging down from her horse.

“Split the group in two,” Soren says. “Half under your command, half under mine.”

“Capture the flag?” Titania says, smiling. “That will be fun. We’ll make it an even split, one main healer, one main flier for each side.”

“Five minutes to deliberate. It’ll let them get used to trusting me as well, hopefully.”

“Sounds good to me,” Ike says. “Would you mind if I stick with your team, Soren? I’d like to get used to working with you.”

His cheeks heat up, and he hopes they’re not red. “Of course, General.”

“Call me Ike, please,” he says. “None of this General nonsense.”

“Of course, Ike,” Soren says.

It’s nice, working with a ragtag group of colourful personalities that at least trust each other to watch their backs. None of that staid rote drilling that the army likes so much. They’re willing to try new things, give new strategies a shot. When Ike calls a stop for lunch, the more expressive ones, at least, are beaming ear to ear.

“That was fun,” Mist says, grinning. “We should do that again sometime!”

“You just liked riding on Jill’s wyvern,” Boyd says, crossing his arms as Mist used a heal staff on a rather spectacular bruise.

It fades into indeterminate chatter as they all sit down for lunch.

“That was a good idea,” Ike says. They sit down with Titania and Elincia, at the corner of one of the tables.

“If you don’t mind me asking, Soren,” Titania says, “why did the Apostle send you as tactical support? I know that the Apostle was aware that we were lacking in a tactician, but…you’re not exactly what I would consider a normal military tactician.”

Ah, down to business then.

Soren looks flatly at her. “This advance guard is hardly a standard army division, either,” he points out, and then hesitates. “I’m sure the Apostle mentioned it, but she is not exactly limitless in her resources,” he admits. “The army tacticians tend to be higher ranking, which comes with the risk of political games in the Senate. Besides, your group shows a decided…disregard for the regular chain of command. I believe the Apostle took that into account when deciding to send me.”

“And you have experience with such military matters?”

“I’ve followed General Zelgius on campaign,” Soren says. “I drew up his tactics, but he had the liberty of changing them while on the battlefield. Sometimes, the field changes. I understand that.”

“I see.”

“What’s your opinion of General Zelgius?” Ike asks, curious. “I know he’s heading Begnion’s army behind us.”

“Any soldier under General Zelgius’ command would tell you that he is the best of men,” Soren says, and drops the snark. “An excellent swordsman, with skill bar none. A level head on his shoulders, cares for his men. Tactically cunning, as well, with quick reflexes to adapt on the battlefield. Of course, as his ward, I am somewhat biased.”

“Ah,” Titania says, rubbing her chin.

“However, I have no other ties, save that of heirship to his property.” Soren shrugs. “Empress Sanaki is a childhood friend. I am here, in some respect, because I am one of the few people that she trusts, as is Deputy Commander Tanith. I hold no love for the Senate.”

“She trusts us to keep you safe, and trusts you to keep us safe,” Princess Elincia says. “A gesture of mutual trust.”

“That’s a naive way of putting it, but yes,” Soren says. “Not an inaccurate summation.”

“Well, that’s good enough for me,” Ike says. “Happy to have you on, Soren.”

“Thank you,” Soren says. “I’m happy to be here.” And to his own surprise, he means it.

Chapter Text

There’s a knock on the canvas of his tent that evening.

Soren grimaces. “Come in,” he calls. It’s one of Ike’s swordsmen. One of the newer recruits, Stefan. Soren knows exactly why he’s here. His head throbs, and he scowls with irritation.

“Close the flap behind you,” he grumbles. No sense in leaving it open for people to eavesdrop, after all, and the wind is quite biting tonight.

Stefan regards him coolly. Soren waves at him to sit down, because craning his neck upwards all the time is draining. He’s already short by beorc standards, but he spends all his time around people that are taller than he is. It’s awful. The man sits down across from him, the candle between them flickering as it throws light and shadow across the tent walls.

“I’m the same as you,” he says, voice flowing like desert wind across the sand dunes, softly melodious.

“Hardly,” Soren scoffs. “But yes, I’m of the Branded.”

“And yet you’re employed by Begnion’s Apostle,” Stefan says. “She doesn’t know, does she.”

Soren resists the urge to snort. Sanaki doesn’t know this, but she is surrounded by the oddest of people. Him, Zelgius...whatever Sephiran is, who always pings as non-human, but not Branded, either. Instead, he is sometimes an unnerving, placid void. This, too, puts him on edge around him.

“Of course she doesn’t,” he says.

“Then why play at something you aren’t?” Stefan asks. “There is a village of folk like us, out in the Grann Desert,” he says, voice coaxing. “The Branded. When this is over, you should come seek us out. There’s no need to hide your true nature.”

“I am not hiding,” Soren says, bristling. “Do not presume to understand my circumstance.”

“No? Then you do not fear the reactions of those around you when they discover your status?”

“As I said,” he says, gritting his teeth, “do not be so foolish to assume about my background.”

Stefan gives him a curious look. “Then you are a brave man, to venture into the lion’s den,” he says, and sobers. “But there are some things about us that cannot be hidden forever. Eventually, the beorc will grow suspicious.”

“I know,” Soren says, resisting the urge to rub at his forehead.

“We age much slower,” he says. “It depends on the subspecies of laguz, but it’s a universal thing.”

“I know,” Soren says. “It’s not of concern.” He has looked into the mirror. Three years ago, when he had taken the matter to him, Zelgius had squinted at him and said that everyone would just assume that the baby fat was taking a little longer to disappear, that’s all.

“Puberty happens at different ages, even for beorc,” Zelgius had said with a shrug. “And you’re short for your age. They’ll just assume you’re a late bloomer. We’ll crack a couple of jokes about being too pale and not enough sunlight and exercise and everyone will laugh it off. You’re not often in the public eye, anyway.”

Zelgius, for his part, had looked eternally the same for as long as Soren knew him. Perhaps a little tightening around the eyes, but still the man he remembered. He, at least, had the excuse of wearing a helmet when he wanted.

He was alright, for now. He was under Zelgius’ protection, which meant that as a whole, he was under Sephiran’s protection. When the time came, and Zelgius needed to vanish, Soren would go with him.

“Well, if you’re sure,” Stefan says, shrugging. “But when the time comes, and you need a place to disappear… come visit us in the Grann Desert.”

“I will keep it in mind,” Soren says, a brisk nod of acknowledgement and dismissal all in one.

Stefan, similarly sensing this conversation to be over, prepares to stand.

“Ah,” Stefan says. “One last thing.”

Soren raises an eyebrow. “Yes?”

“Some advice.” He straightens his clothing. “About the laguz in Ike’s party. You shouldn’t have any problems with Mordecai or Muarim,” he says. “Lethe can be prickly, but that’s because of beorc and this entire situation in general, and not because of our Branded status. She’s mellowed out. Or the mercenaries have grown on her. Either way, if you don’t go out of your way to pick a fight, you’ll be fine.”

“Thank you,” Soren says, because intel, however unnecessary, is always appreciated.

“Nasir though… I don’t trust him,” Stefan says darkly.

“The ship captain?” Soren asks, and thinks back on his brief introduction. “He’s slippery, isn’t he.”

“I can’t get a read on him,” Stefan says, grim. “He’s laguz, but I can’t figure out what type he is. You’re difficult to make out as well, but that’s how it is with us Branded. It’s different.”

“I see,” Soren says. “Thank you for your insights. I’ll look into it.”

He nods. “Have a good night.”

“You as well.”

Stefan leaves, a burst of cold air and swirling snow coming in through the tent door.

Soren sighs, and contemplates what little of the story he knows. Nasir’s likely a Gallian spy, which makes sense in some respects. Hired by the Gallians to ferry the Princess Crimea and her envoy to Begnion, ergo likely feeding information back to them in some fashion. But was it necessary to have an additional spy in their midst while they had two Gallian warriors that were similarly able to transmit information back to their homeland? Or was he here for other, more sinister reasons?

He growls in frustration, pounds a fist into the blankets, and blows out the candle. A matter for another day.

Their next battle, the first that Soren directs, goes remarkably well, for all that it is a shitshow. For one, the Daeinites seem to know they’re coming. For two — well. There are the ravens. Fortunately, they get reinforcements by way of Phoenicis, who know Kilvas best. Soren’s not lost on the fact that the Hawk King has sent both his eyes and ears to keep an eye on one Prince Reyson of Serenes. The Prince, for all his fragility, is an astounding boon to the army — ancient heron galdr is nothing to sneeze at. Soren can feel the energy swirling around him every time he opens his mouth to sing, and it’s distinctly unnerving. However unsettling, Soren would take ten of him for the way he allows them to move with extra verve and gusto, fighting on when their reserves are low.

By the end of the fight, they gain another ally— apparently an old friend of the original mercenary troupe. Well, only after everyone watches Ike pound him into the ground first.

“So, not only is the brat Commander, but we’re to take orders from this kid?” Shinon asks, his face a colourful assortment of bruises, scoffing. “What, are we a child army now?” He scowls, but is much less intimidating after watching Ike thrash him. When he doesn’t get a reaction from Soren other than a raised, unimpressed eyebrow, he walks off, grumbling. Soren watches as Rolf runs up to him, tugging at an arm. To his surprise, Shinon doesn’t throw him off.

“He’s foul mouthed and bad tempered, but he’s a brilliant shot,” Titania admits as they watch them walk away to the medic tent. “And for all he grouses, if he’s deigned to come back, then he’ll stay.”

“Good,” Soren says. “More long ranged support will be useful, especially if we’re to face fliers in the future.”

Ike walks up to them, fiddling with his new armour. “Is Shinon getting settled in?” he asks, sheepish.

“Yes,” Titania says. “Rolf’s handling it.”

There’s a brief look of amused understanding on both their faces. Soren doesn’t understand, and tries not to feel left out.

“Ike,” Soren says instead, standing to attention. “No casualties to report. Tor Garen is fully under our control. Four new additions to your command: two hawks, one heron, one sniper. I’ll go through the inventory later and give you a full report, if you require.”

Ike blinks at him. “Okay,” he says. “No casualties… that’s good. I don’t think I’ll be needing the full report. Thank you for letting me know.”

“You should at least know how much gold we have in our reserves,” Soren chides. “I’ll give you that number in the morning, after we’ve had the chance to go through the storehouses.”

“Alright,” Ike says. “Thank you. Is there anything else?”

“There is the issue that the enemy knew we were coming,” Soren continues, frowning as he taps his fingers against the account book in his hand. “Either they’ve been employing the ravens as scouts, or we have a spy.”

Titania sighs. “I guess we have to start remembering to look up, or discover more wooded areas to travel in.”

“Wooded areas are far and few between in the mountains,” Soren says. “I may suggest that our fliers do regular patrols. But it’s unlikely we would miss an entity passing above us in the sky. Unless the ravens have individuals that possess Janaff’s eyesight, the latter is more probable.”

Ike makes a face. “I trust all my men,” he says, grimly.

Soren narrows his eyes at him. “It’s not a matter of trust,” he says. “It’s a matter of lives. If someone here is feeding Daein intel, then that puts our lives in danger. I may be able to overlook a miscreant skimming a couple of coins off our gold, but this is different.”

“You think someone may be selling us out for money?” Titania asks.

Soren shakes his head. “I think it’s unlikely to be money related,” he says, unhappy. “I know some of your men have money problems, but there’s money problems and then there’s common sense, when you know who you’re going to be fighting in the morning.” Makalov, for all his greed, is too cowardly to sell them out to the enemy, and too dense to figure out how to do so unobtrusively. Soren had clocked that about five minutes into confronting the man after catching him red-handed in the supply tent.

“Which makes things more complicated and difficult,” Ike says.

“Exactly,” Soren says. They all stew in that for a bit. And then someone walks across the field towards them.

“Ah, Commander Ike,” Nasir says. “I have some news I’d like to share with you.”

“Alright,” Ike says. “Let’s hear it then.”

Soren and Titania exchange glances. Nasir looks at them as well.

“In a more private setting, perhaps?”

Ike shrugs. “Anything you want to say can be said in front of Soren and Titania,” he says. “I’d be filling them in on your news later anyways.”

Soren can’t help but feel rather smug at that. Nasir, however, looks a bit discomforted. Titania pokes Ike with a foot. Ike sighs, nods, and starts moving towards the gates. Nasir follows.

“Titania,” Soren says quietly. “Is Nasir a Gallian informant?”

Titania raises her eyebrows. “Seeing spies everywhere, are you?”

“Just a hunch,” Soren says, shrugging.

“Not sure,” Titania says. “Not that he’d admit it, anyway. Whatever he is, he wouldn’t be following us if he wasn’t on our side.” She looks uncomfortable. “Unless you think he has more sinister reasons for following us.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of,” Soren mutters under his breath. “Alright,” he says, a little more loudly. “I’ll take your word for it.

It’s clear that Daein pumps gold into its military, the way that they find so much of it at every major outpost they claim. Soren can only shake his head and add numbers to their ledger, equip their troops with whatever better equipment they can find out here. Ike has been distant these past few days, as they fight through heavy winds, ice, and whatever men Daein sees fit to send their way. Or throw their way, perhaps, given how pitiful they are.

Soren shakes his head. It’s clear these are meant to slow them down. Someone is still relaying their position to Daein’s command. At least Titania and Ike have conceded that no wyvern knight could spot them from above through this nasty winter weather, and given that Prince Reyson informed them that Kilvas was withdrawing from the war after his long and heated conversation with him, they have no choice but to conclude that someone in the company is leaking secrets like a sieve.

“So, we should narrow our investigation to the newer members, or perhaps those that have ties to Daein,” Soren concludes, crossing his arms. Across from him, Titania frowns. Ike appears deep in thought. “Is there anyone you think has been acting particularly suspiciously?”

Silence. Soren sighs. “This individual would have the ability to sneak off and relay information by some means,” he says.

“Not Jill,” Ike says. “Mist’s cleared her. Her wyvern’s too young to fly so far and fast without being detected.”

“She’s come a long way from when we first met her,” Titania muses. “Still, I suppose it’s no harm to be wary when we start to approach the area she hails from.”

“I’ll ask Mist to keep an eye on her,” Ike says, grimacing. “Lethe might be willing to help out too. It’ll be bad if we run into anyone she knows on the other side of the battlefield.”

“Or, perhaps,” Soren says, looking to get this conversation back on track, “the enemy’s sending in someone to rendezvous with the spy. May I ask about Volke?”

“Volke?” Titania asks. “He disappears all the time, but that’s more of a habit of his profession, not of anything sinister. I hope, at least.”

“Didn’t you say that this man does anything for the right price?” Soren asks, frowning. “Ah, but I suppose he’s in our employ at the moment, correct?”

“It’s not Volke,” Ike says firmly. “He does disappear often and refuses to join us for meals, but it’s not Volke. Volke — he was hired by my father. And now me, I guess. It’s not him.”

“Oh.” Titania blinks, digests this information. “I see. Interesting. I hadn’t known the Commander knew him.”

“Well, in that case, assassins of his reputation are likely to be rather tight-lipped and loyal,” Soren says. “They wouldn’t last, otherwise.”

They sit in silence for a bit, considering.

“What about Nasir?” Soren asks.

“Soren has a theory about Nasir,” Titania explains to Ike.

“What about him?” Ike says.

“I think he’s a Gallian informant,” Soren says.

Ike shrugs. “Would make sense,” he says. “That conversation the other day — he told me that Gallia’s seriously considering joining the war, if we keep winning.”

“And have you ever considered how he gets his information from Gallia, despite it being so far away?” Soren asks, mind churning. He knows Begnion has warp staves and warp powder, but that doesn’t seem fitting for the laguz, who tend not to use beorc magics.

“Never asked,” Ike says, looking discomforted.

“You see my issue?” Soren says, putting his hands out on the table. “There are other ways of communication that we don’t know about. In that case, everyone is suspect.”

“You can’t go around accusing everyone of being a spy, Soren,” Titania says wryly.

Soren huffs. “No,” he agrees, “I can’t. That would be awful for morale.”

In due time, he realizes that for all of everyone’s — and his own — conjectures about Nasir, he’s yet to have a lengthy conversation with the man. Of course, he comes to this realization when the man himself decides to have a chat with him.

He’s rummaging in the back of the storage room, recording the number of staves they have on hand, when there’s a cold prickling at the back of his neck that makes him look up.

Nasir, in the doorway, regards him coolly.

Soren is struck with the same discomfort as when Sephiran peers at him from over teacups. This man knows much more than he’s letting on. He grits his teeth.

“Yes? Can I help you?” he asks.

“Forgive me. I find myself curious about our new tactician,” Nasir says. “Someone highly regarded by the Apostle herself, but barely looks out of his teen years. Tell me, does the Apostle surround herself with children as brilliant as she is?”

Soren tries not to bristle as he does every time someone brings up his age. “The Apostle merely makes it her duty to ensure that those with the talent are given the space to pursue it,” he says. Sanaki, in truth, is often surrounded by those almost five times her age. Soren is the person closest in age she interacts with on a regular basis due to the closeness of their guardians.

“How fascinating,” Nasir says, teal eyes glinting in a distinctly non-human fashion in the dim light. “I wonder why your Apostle has sent you to serve here, of all places.”

He bites back the first retort that springs to mind. It’s far too revealing. Instead, he replies: “Much like how I wonder why you’re still here.”

“Oh?” Nasir asks, amused. “I’m simply here to lend my support, same as you.”

“Are you?” Soren says. “I fight on the battlefield, with everyone else. What do you bring to the table?”

He smiles, close-lipped. “Intelligence,” he says. “I’m sure that you of all people understand the need to keep my own secrets.”

“I’ve not heard anything close to intel from you,” Soren says, and leans in close, glaring up at him. Nasir’s at least a head taller than he is, but that doesn’t matter. “And for all that you may pass on information to the Gallians, I doubt that to be your true purpose here. You’ve achieved Gallia’s main objectives: to deliver Princess Crimea to Begnion, and determine whether this — our — cause was worthy of more of their aid. That begs the question: what are you still doing here?”

“Certain individuals are curious as to the progress of our continued travels through Daein,” Nasir says smoothly. “I’m sure you would agree that obtaining more support in Gallia would be a substantial boon to our forces here.”

Soren steps away. It sounds reasonable enough, but there’s something about it — about him — that makes him on edge. He’s not lying, but he’s skirting the truth, playing the tightrope. Sephiran does much the same when giving mild suggestions that are really more like commands. He’s not going to get anything more out of this man, not tonight.

“Of course,” he replies, equally as smooth.

Nasir smiles. It curls around his mouth, satisfied. The dim candlelight catches the red mark on his forehead, like a third eye. Unbidden, a chill runs down his spine. He resists the urge to shiver.

“I think I’ve satisfied my curiosity for the night,” Nasir says. “Do get some rest soon, Soren. We march so early these days, after all.” He turns, and leaves with a sweep of his cloak, effortlessly elegant for a simple traveller.

Soren returns to his staves.

“I don’t like him,” he says to the empty storage room. “I don’t trust him at all.”

He finishes up his inventory, retires to his tent, and lies awake in the dark, turning the conversation over and over in his mind.

Chapter Text

“Any luck?” Ike asks the next time the three of them meet, huddled in his tent.

Soren shakes his head. He’ll need more evidence to prove Nasir’s duplicity, if it exists. A gut feeling is hardly enough to condemn a man, especially when Nasir’s known them for longer. Soren, for all that he has been welcomed with open arms, is still a stranger.

“We’ll have to plan with the expectation that they’ll know we’re coming,” he says, staring down at the table. Someone’s driven a groove into the wood, an unexpected indentation.

Titania grimaces. “That’ll be more difficult, won’t it?”

“Better to be prepared than to be caught unaware,” he says. “I’d rather do the work beforehand than scramble when it comes to actual battle. Plans rarely survive first contact with the enemy, anyway. It might come down to improvisation, in the end.”

Ike makes a face, and yawns. There are dark circles under his eyes, and Soren doubts he looks much better.

“My my, you two,” Titania says, sighing. “You both need to get better rest.”

“Couldn’t fall asleep,” Ike says. “I was thinking, and then it was morning.”

“There’s so much to do,” Soren agrees. “So much to consider.”

Titania shakes her head at them.

There’s a commotion outside. Soren’s head snaps up, staring at the tent flap.

“Something wrong?” Ike asks, noticing his sudden awareness.

The flap bursts open to reveal Mist, hair in disarray, eyes wide with panic.

“Ike!” The flap swings shut behind her. “It’s Mother’s medallion! It’s gone!”

Ike stands up. “What?”

“What am I going to do?” Mist asks, wringing her hands together. “It’s the only keepsake I have of Mother. I’ve looked everywhere.” She’s almost in tears now, wiping discreetly at the corners of her eyes. Titania attempts to comfort her, to pull her down into a seat, but she refuses.

“Shall we go look for it then?” Titania asks Mist, raising an eyebrow at Ike, who seems frozen in place. “Perhaps another set of eyes will be helpful?”

Ike’s jaw sets, stubborn. “Yes,” he says. “Thank you, Titania.” He seems distant, not looking at anyone in particular. Titania puts an arm around Mist, guiding her out of the tent, when: “Titania.”

She looks back at Ike.

“If you find it.” He looks back at her. “Don’t touch it with your bare hands. Wrap something around it, or tell Mist. She’s the only one who can pick it up. Be careful. Please.”

“I — of course,” Titania says. The tent flap swings shut with a loud thwap, echoing loudly in the sudden silence.

“Ike.” Soren touches his shoulder, as he stares into the distance. “Is it — it is important?”

Ike looks at him, solemn and grim. “Yes,” he says. “I’ll tell you about it eventually,” he promises. “I should. I know it’s odd, but,” he frowns, “I think I can trust you.”

Soren swallows. “I’m honoured by your trust,” he says softly. “I suppose we should go look for it, then. Is this something that everyone should be on the lookout for, or should we keep it between us, for now?”

“Might as well let everyone know we’re looking for it,” Ike says. “No one’s to touch it.”

“I assume there’s a valid reason for this,” Soren murmurs.

Ike breathes out, carefully controlled, measured, calm. “The last time someone touched it, my father went mad,” he says. “My mother sacrificed her life to stop him.”

“Ah,” Soren says. Suddenly, the reasons for not touching the thing make much more sense. “I see. In that case, we should emphasize that no one’s to touch it if they come across it, and ask that they simply report to Mist instead.”

Ike nods, and slips out of the tent, eyebrows furrowed.

Left alone, Soren thinks about something he hasn’t for a long time: the village, and the corpses. So is that what happened there? he wonders. Indiscriminate slaughter? He shivers. What a man could do with that sort of power… He hopes it’s merely lost somewhere in the camp, and not been taken for other, more nefarious purposes.

Soren surveys the land beneath them. It’s ruined, flooded and matted with rushing water, the shambles of broken wood and stone shattered across what was once fertile land. He grimaces at the smell. He’s a war strategist, taught to wage battle and wreak havoc, to strangle towns to supply an army, not to hold, tend, and nourish lands. That had always been Sanaki’s lessons. He’s grateful he sat in on them now, hours of tedious relief planning, of distribution and food. For all he thinks that this is useless, the people he travels with think otherwise, and he is only in their employ. It doesn’t matter what he thinks.

Behind him, footsteps. He turns to see Jill, armour slick with blood, axe by her side.

“It’s not supposed to be like this,” she says, staring out at Talrega beneath them. Tears stream down her face, as she dashes them angrily out of the way. “We’re supposed to care for the people, not destroy them.”

“I suppose,” he says carefully, “that this is what happens when a king decides he has more use for conquest than for his own people.”

“My father would never — he should have never —” Jill cuts herself off, biting her bottom lip. “How could he?” she asks, quietly. “These were our lands, these were our people. In our care! To throw away their lives… it’s cruel. But he’s still — he’s still my father. And the worst part is, I understand why he did it.”

Soren closes his eyes. “Yes,” he agrees quietly. “I understand why he did it.” Liege lords required obedience, and Ashnard had been the general’s. He doesn’t know why Jill doesn’t go looking for Mist, or for Lethe. He’s hardly the most comforting individual in the group.

“Ike told me,” she swallows, “I have the right. To want revenge for my father.”

Soren hesitates. “Did he,” he says, as neutral as possible.

“He did,” she says, voice hitching. “But it’s not his fault, really,” she says, voice stronger now, “is it.”

Soren remains silent.

“It’s his,” Jill says. “Ashnard’s. He made him fight like this.”

“General Shiharam was beholden to his commands,” he agrees.

“So, I just wanted to let you know — and you can let Ike know too,” she says, determined, “that I’m staying. I’m fighting until the end. We’re going to fight Ashnard, and then I’m going to tear out his guts.”

Soren blinks, taken aback but the sudden bloodthirst. “Ah… that’s good to know,” he says. “I’ll let Ike know then.”

Jill gives him a small attempt at a smile. “Thank you,” she says, and walks away.

There is a dragon waiting for them in Nevassa, not a mad king. Soren watches as she falls, her form shifting into that of a young woman, distinctive red markings on her face and forehead, pink hair tied back into a ponytail. Ike stands above her, sword raised.

“Surrender,” Ike says.

Out of the corner of his eye, a cloak. Nasir appears, untouched by battle.

Soren gasps out a warning from his winded crouch on the floor, and then Ike is thrown back, stunned.

“Ike,” he croaks out. His head is spinning.

“Nasir,” Titania says, spitting his name out like a curse. “What are you doing?”

“Go, Ena,” Nasir says, helping her up. He doesn’t look any of them in the eye. “Go now. Hurry!”

She slips into the hallway. Gone.

Old castles have plenty of secret passageways. They’ll never catch her now.

“So you’re the traitor,” Ike says, getting up slowly, sword up, the tip pointed at Nasir’s throat. “You’ve been giving information to the enemy. And you stole Mist’s medallion too, I expect?”

Nasir doesn’t reply, just looks placidly back at them.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” Ike says in disgust, and calls for Nasir to be taken prisoner.

“Palmeni Temple,” Nasir says, quietly. “You need to go to Palmeni Temple.” And then he’s gone, taken away by soldiers.

“Sounds like another trap,” Soren grumbles, but accepts Titania’s hand up, leaning against her horse. “What business does Goldoa have in this mess?”

Titania shakes her head. “I don’t know,” she says. “I never thought I’d meet a Goldoan dragon, much less on the fields of war.”

Soren agrees, and then thinks about Stefan’s warning. He’s laguz, but I can’t figure out what type he is. He had assumed at the time that Nasir had learned some technique to obscure his laguz presence and identity, but it seemed more like they had failed to identify him because they hadn’t know what they were looking at. “Dragon,” he breathes out, and thinks about the blood-red mark on his forehead. “Dragons.”

Zelgius arrives in a week, to help them hold Nevassa as they lick their wounds and count inventory. Ena was right: the majority of their military weapons and supplies aren’t here. Soren can only assume they’re in Melior, with Ashnard and the rest of the troops.

“I’m glad to see you’re unharmed,” Zelgius says, as he knocks on Soren’s open door. It’s a small room he’s claimed for himself, among the rest of the mercenaries. The main draw had been the handsome dark wood desk that sat below a window with a view to one of the castle’s many courtyards.

“Hm,” Soren says, and starts putting away his work.

“And how have you enjoyed working for General Ike these past months,” Zelgius asks, teasing.

Soren glances up. “Fine,” he says. “It’s work. You know that.”

Zelgius presses his lips together in the way that lets Soren know that he’s amused and trying not to laugh or smile at him. Soren huffs.

“I would enjoy it much more if we didn’t have traitorous backstabbing dragons in our party,” Soren grumbles.

“Ah,” Zelgius says. “I heard.”

Soren sighs. “Come in, and close the door. Did anyone see you come up?”

Zelgius shakes his head, and does so.

Soren kicks out his chair for him, and goes to sit on the bed.

Zelgius sits down.

Behind him, the sun is setting, rays of violet and orange light playing across the evening sky.

“Do you know what laguz blood you carry?” Soren asks at last.

Zelgius frowns. “One of the bird tribes, judging by the shape,” he says, and then his mouth twists, wry. “I’ve met both Kilvas and Phoenicis in battle. I’d say I look much more a raven than a hawk.”

“I think I might be part dragon,” he confesses.

“Hm,” Zelgius says, and leans back in the chair, eyes narrowing as he looks Soren over. “It’s not an inaccurate assumption to make, I think. But I would like to hear your reasoning.”

“It’s —” Soren reaches up, and presses a finger to the blood-red mark. “Nasir has one. Ena does as well. I know I don’t look like either of them, but same colour, same location. It can’t be a coincidence.”

“I doubt it’s one as well,” he says, and hesitates. “There are multiple types of dragons,” he says slowly. “You may look like one of the others, or you may look more like the beorc side of your blood. Does it… bother you?”

Soren frowns, thinking. “No,” he says. “I don’t think so. I’m curious because I’d like to know, not because it’s particularly important to me. It doesn’t really matter, because they’d shun me either way.” He thinks about the particularly grating way Nasir spoke to him, toying. No, there’s nothing lost that way at all.

Zelgius sighs. “My laguz ancestor’s far back enough that they’re likely dead,” he says. “Goldoa though… they’ve been strictly neutral and isolationist for as far as I can remember. I really can’t tell you anything about them.”

“And I wouldn’t expect you to,” Soren says. “You picked me up out of a village full of corpses. I’m hardly expecting you to pull out my genealogical records.”

“Good,” he says. “I don’t have it.” He holds out his empty hands in gesture.

Soren rolls his eyes. “Actually, I have another question,” he says.

“Go ahead,” Zelgius says.

“About the village,” Soren says. “Ike said there was a medallion his father touched. Did he kill them?”

Zelgius stiffens. “Yes,” he says, voice low. “It was the medallion’s influence.”

“The medallion is missing,” Soren says quietly. “I know I walk through battlefields every day, but I don’t wish to see that sort of mindless slaughter again. Will you let Sephiran know to keep an eye out for it?”

“Of course,” Zelgius says, almost too easily.

Soren swallows. Sephiran already knows about it. Of course. Why else would he check up on a random village in Gallia, with Zelgius by his side? Something doesn’t add up here.

“And will you —” Soren hesitates. “Will you be careful?” he asks, puts a hand on Zelgius’ armoured knee. “If that’s what it did when it possessed him, then I don’t want you anywhere near that thing either.”

Zelgius looks him dead in the eye. “I won’t touch it,” he promises, voice low, reassuring. It rings of truth, and Soren lets him go. It’s not lost on him that he doesn’t say anything about being near it, either.

“Right, well,” Soren says, looking away. “It’s almost dinner.”

“I hope they won’t mind if I join you tonight,” Zelgius says, amused.

“Why wait for an invitation if you’ll just invite yourself,” Soren sulks, and opens the door. “After you.”

“Ah, but how could I not take an interest in my nephew’s friends?” Zelgius says as they head out into the corridor. “Especially those who have been instrumental in saving his life — oof!” Soren reaches out and pounds a fist into his chestplate. It hits and bounces off, to absolutely no effect other than Zelgius shutting up in mock surprise, as he usually does, but this time both of them freeze to find Titania at the end of the hall, watching them in amusement.

Soren flushes.

“Deputy Commander Titania,” Zelgius says, recovering much more gracefully. “I must thank you for watching over my nephew these past few months.”

“No need,” Titania says. “He’s gotten us out of a fair few scrapes himself. We’re very grateful to have him.”

“I’m glad to hear that,” Zelgius says.

“He’s invited himself to dinner,” Soren tells Titania, trying not to scowl.

“Well, the more the merrier,” Titania says, taking the usual way out of familial disputes in the Greil Mercenaries: don’t get involved. Soren’s been using the technique himself whenever Boyd and Rolf or Marcia and Makalov get into scrapes. He doesn’t know what else he expected, and resigns himself to embarrassment.

Ike takes this all in stride, and takes Zelgius’ questions in stride as well. Soren attempts to intervene, only to be thwarted by a pointed look from Zelgius.

Titania just looks more and more bemused as time goes on.

“Stop this,” Soren mumbles to her.

“So you do have someone in your corner after all,” Titania says instead. “I’m glad. You seemed so… solitary when we first met.”

“Titania.” He makes a face.

“Oh, he’s only looking out for you,” she says, clearly trying not to laugh. “Although this is a bit extreme.”

“You’re being embarrassing,” Soren informs Zelgius. The whole table ignores him.

He ropes Zelgius into helping tidy up afterwards.

“Did you have to do that?” he asks him.

“I wanted to know his intentions towards you,” Zelgius says, poker-faced.

“You wanted to know his— you wanted to know his—'' Soren sputters and breaks off, shaking his head. “What in the goddess’ name are you talking about — there’s nothing going on.”

Zelgius shrugs. “You’re sure about that?”

“You’re awful,” Soren says. “I’m not talking to you."

The corner of Zelgius’ mouth twitches in amusement. He’s clearly laughing at him inside his head, so Soren huffs before pointedly turning his back to sweep the floor.

“But that being said,” Zelgius says quietly. “I’m glad that you’re experiencing the world and making new friends.”

There’s a pleased heat that rises in his cheeks.

“So am I,” he admits.

Zelgius pats him on the back. “Good,” he says. “There’s a lot of world outside of Begnion, despite what the Senate thinks.”

“I’m aware of that,” Soren says.

“I meant, there’s a lot of world outside of Begnion that is not necessarily at first glance as cruel as your first few years were,” Zelgius says. “Expand your horizons.”

“I don’t know about that, seeing as we’re fighting a war that’s been started by cruelty,” Soren says bitterly. “Lands destroyed, people torn apart, mistrust and greed at every corner.”

“Ah, but as you know, even in a world full of suffering, there is hope,” Zelgius says softly. “Someone who will stretch out a hand and offer kindness out of the goodness of his heart.”

Soren goes bright red and clams up. They’re burning, like he’s cast Elfire on them.

At this, Zelgius chuckles. “Nothing going on, is there?”

“Fine.” Soren glowers at him, crossing his arms. “Maybe a slight infatuation on my part, which is attributed to merely transference from him being the first person to rescue me from starvation. It leaves an impression. I’m sure it’ll fade in time, given further exposure. He doesn’t even remember the event, so clearly it’s unimportant.”

“Of course,” Zelgius says, amused and unimpressed, but concedes.

Afterwards, Stefan comes up to them.

Zelgius raises an eyebrow, clearly noting the Branded status they shared.

Stefan nods at Soren. “It seems I’ve assumed incorrectly,” Stefan says. “You are among our own kind after all. Hello, General Zelgius. It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance. I’m Stefan.” He holds out a hand to shake. Zelgius takes it, eyes narrowed.

Soren scans the area. No one in sight. “Stefan’s a swordmaster,” he tells Zelgius. “He’s…well. He has a group of friends out in the Grann Desert.”

“I see,” Zelgius says.

“Of course, you’re welcome anytime,” Stefan says. “Both of you.”

Zelgius gives him a nod. “Thank you for the invitation,” he says. “I trust you will be discreet?”

Stefan inclines his head. “Of course,” he says. “We’re all just trying to get by. I understand that.”

“Thank you for your understanding,” Zelgius says. “When we get an opportunity, I’d like to challenge you to a spar.”

Stefan grins. “I’ve heard of your legendary skill with the blade,” he says. “I’d be honoured to test mine against yours.”

“Excellent,” Zelgius says. “Until next time, then.” It’s clearly a dismissal, and they exchange polite farewells before parting ways.

“Not tomorrow?” Soren asks in an undertone.

“You’re scouting Palmeni Temple tomorrow,” Zelgius murmurs. “General Ike is of the opinion that there’s something of importance there, and there’s no need to bring such a large force to such a small temple. I’ll be here until you get back.”

“Ah,” Soren says, swallowing as he remembers the name, and tries not to be visibly apprehensive. “I see.”

Soren is lost in his thoughts about Nasir and the possibility of a trap the whole way to his room. Zelgius is similarly distant as they exchange good nights and head their separate ways.

Chapter Text

These rooms — there’s arcane script all over the walls, scrawled by a steady and sure hand, slowly turning shaky. Spells may be written and invoked in this ancient language, but they’re merely cobbled together bits of phrase with expected outcomes. This is not that. This is a language, a story to be told. This was not written to be cast.

Soren, by virtue of his time with the old sage, can make out bits and pieces of it, like a puzzle not yet put together, holes missing in the picture. When this is the way one’s taught to speak and read from books of arcane spells, a child’s mind makes quick inferences to the construction of the language. Soren, in this way, has an advantage: so often do mages learn the ancient script later in their lives, not as a language, but as a tool to be picked up and put down.

I am alone, trapped in this room…they command that […] by galdrar, […] cannot see the skies, feel the wind on my feathers… […] caged in eternity.

Soren shivers, and tries not to recall the dark cellar that had been his room, once. What is the ideal hiding place, to not be seen? he asks himself. Beneath the cot. He crouches, and peers into the darkness. There. A feather.

“I believe someone was locked in this room in the past,” Soren says quietly, and traces the word wind with a finger. He says it often enough these days, screamed on a battlefield, whispered softly to blow out a candle, or fix his hair.

He puts the feather in Ike’s hand. It’s a white, wispy, delicate thing, with barely any weight. “Give this to Reyson,” he says.

Ike looks at the feather, with a dawning look of horrified understanding. He nods, claps a hand on Soren’s shoulder, and approaches Reyson, who’s transfixed on the writing on the walls with cold fury.

The story unspools from there.

“The man who killed my father was the king’s henchman,” Ike says with bitter venom, and something in the pit of Soren’s stomach turns to ice.

Titania jumps in, demanding to know the man’s identity.

Soren does not. Soren has his own sinking suspicions that he already knows exactly who it is.

Of a sort, Zelgius had said that one night. Failed to obtain the medallion, but succeeded in eliminating one of its guardians. Had that been the original goal, to keep the medallion from Ashnard’s hands? Why ever would Zelgius want to put the medallion into the hands of an already mad king anyway? Sephiran couldn’t want that.

“Despite this new information, I believe our main objectives are unchanged,” Soren interjects, to stop his own rapidly derailing train of thought. “We still need to defeat King Daein, and his underlings, and retake Crimea. Perhaps with a greater sense of urgency, now that we suspect the medallion may be in his hands.”

“It’s so odd…” Princess Elincia muses. “Everything seems to lead back to Daein, somehow.”

But does it, Soren wonders. Does it really?

Soren hates this bridge. Soren is going to set this entire bridge on fire, if he can get away with it. The bridge, being their only route into Crimea through the mountains, was an obvious spot for the Daeinites to fortify and hold position. Nothing else was feasible. And so, they were on an obvious back foot, to try and rush a heavily fortified base where the enemy had already laid traps in wait.

“Listen up, dogs,” A woman with long dark green hair sitting astride a horse, fiery red lance in hand, tall and proud, roars across the field. “There will be no retreating today! We stop Crimea's advance here! We will not allow them to gain the comforts of their homeland! Any who do not fight to the death will face my lance!”

“That’s General Petrine of the Four Riders,” Soren tells Ike, Ranulf, and Titania. “They’re intending to stop us here, I expect. It’s a good choice of choke point. Easily defensible, from their point of view. If you want to find another route over the mountains, now would be the time to speak up.”

“Well, we’ve come this far,” Ike says, grim. “We’ve got our marching orders. Titania?”

“Everyone’s in position,” Titania confirms. “We’re ready to march.”

“Here goes,” Soren mutters under his breath.

“Move out!” Ike looks out over their gathered cluster of people. “I really hope I’m not sending them to their deaths,” he mumbles.

Soren grimaces. “They’re my tactics,” he tells Ike in an undertone.

“They’re following me,” Ike replies, and they share a look of frustrated understanding. “Let’s go,” he says, in a louder voice, and they rush forth, into battle.

It’s a dizzying, heartstopping fight, once they start falling into traps on the bridge. More than once, Soren has to order their fliers to help the others across, and then quickly yell at them to get back out of range of the archers. It’s harrowing, and so when they finally reach the other end, Soren is more than ready to light Petrine on fire for all the trouble she’s given them, including this awful headache this entire fight has been.

Except Ike gets to her first, and then her lance lights on fire.

“You’re the knight my father battled,” Ike says, and Soren has one brief moment of relief before he realizes Ike didn’t say you’re the knight that killed my father. So, it’s not her then.

“You,” she hisses, and attempts to skewer him.

Soren takes the opportunity to cast Elfire, which spooks the horse. Distracted, she looks down at him instead, eyes narrowed in fury. A chill runs down his spine. A frisson of understanding. There’s the hint of a green mark, just above her cleavage in the gap of her armour. Oh. You, too?

“Now you…that mark on your brow…” She brings her horse to heel, and thrusts the lance in his direction, which he dodges. She smiles, a thing with no humour and too much teeth. “We’re the same, aren’t we?”

Ike takes the opportunity to plunge his sword down her side. She yells out in pain, and circles again, the lance searing dangerously close to Ike’s head. The horse rears, and they drop back to dodge the steel-reinforced hooves. Ike looks at Soren and tilts his head at her, in a clear finish it motion. Soren nods, grim.

What was it with other Branded assuming that they were all the same?

“Don’t be foolish,” he sneers at her, and casts Elfire again, feeling the surge of energy rush along his arms. Fire explodes outwards, blazing hot, and he incinerates her. “We’re nothing alike.”

He picks up the lance, and gives it to Ike, who puts a hand on his shoulder.

“Good one,” Ike tells him. He’s looking at Soren consideringly, and Soren remembers — he was there for that entire exchange.

Soren forces himself to relax. “Thank you,” he says. “Go ahead and —” He gestures vaguely at the keep. Ike nods in understanding — not here, not now — and raises his voice to offer terms of surrender.

Afterwards, Ike finds him in his room.

“Soren,” he says.

“Ike.”

They sit there, in silence.

“Why…” Ike hesitates. “It’s none of my business, and I’ll respect your decision if you want to keep silent on this, but why did Petrine think you were the same?”

Soren stares down at his clenched fingers in his lap. It’s a secret to be kept, Zelgius murmurs, from a memory long ago. They’ll shun us if they knew. But Soren isn’t in Begnion, is in Crimea with Ike and the most diverse band of people he’s ever worked with. Laguz, beorc… Ranulf knows what he is too, given the all too knowing once over that the cat had given him upon their first meeting, but he hadn’t said anything, had just treated him like he had anyone else.

“I’m of the Branded,” he tells Ike, heart in throat. Please prove me wrong, he thinks. I do not think I can stand it if you, of all people, turn your back on me.

“What’s that?” Ike asks.

Soren bites back the impulse to laugh hysterically. “A cross between the beorc and the laguz,” he says instead. “Said to be abominations. Violations of every teaching of the goddess and every rule of society.”

“So you — and her — you’re part laguz?” Ike says, surprised.

Soren nods, and brushes away some hair on his forehead, turning to show Ike the brand. “It always shows up somewhere on our bodies at birth,” he says. “A mark, to show our tainted blood.”

“That’s silly,” Ike says. “You’re not tainted. You’re a person, like everyone else is. So what if you have a mark. You're still my tactician. You’re still my friend.”

“That’s not what everyone else says,” he says. “The laguz shun us, and the beorc, driven by a lack of understanding, attack and mock us. I find your worldview remarkably refreshing.” He hesitates. “I’m sorry to bring it up, but I was wondering — how much of your upbringing in Gallia do you remember?”

Ike frowns. “Not much,” he admits quietly. “I remember my mother, and her lullaby, and Mist, and the flowers. I remember…a quiet village, warm and filled with the smells of baking.”

“What would you say,” Soren asks, equally as quiet, “if I told you that we’d met before, in Gallia.”

They sit there for a moment, in silence.

“If we did, then I’m happy to have met you again,” Ike says, pensive. “I’m sorry I don’t remember it. Perhaps our lives were always meant to cross.”

Soren smiles. “That’s a nice thought,” he says. “I don’t put much stock in destiny, or luck.”

“No?” Ike asks, teasing.

“No.” He shakes his head. “We make our own luck. I’m happy to be your friend, Ike.”

“And I’m happy to be yours,” Ike says. “I’ve got your back, Soren.”

“And I yours,” Soren says.

Chapter Text

Soren swallows. King Gallia and King Phoenicis take up a large amount of space in the tent, not just in size but in presence.

“What about those two children? Surely they’re not involved.”

Soren pinches his nose, and tries not to feel too offended. “Children?” He’s at least three years older than Mist. At least King Tibarn’s objection is due to his visual age, and not his Branded status.

Titania’s mouth twitches in amusement.

“This is Soren,” Ike says. “He’s my tactician. And this is Mist, my sister.” He hesitates, and then forges on. “There’s a story I would like to tell everyone concerning my parents.”

Partway through the story, Soren knows he’s in trouble. Zelgius, he thinks. You idiot. You knew. How could you do this to me?

So this is how it’s going to go. Soren’s going to have to pick between his friend and his guardian, or even worse, he’s going to have to watch as they tear each other apart.

Fort after fort falls to their advance. Soren is well-practiced, now, at commanding an army and a strike force on the field. They are well-armoured, well-informed, and well prepared, especially now that they’ve gained forces from Gallia and Phoenicis.

Fort Pinell is different. Fort Pinell is where Daein has decided things must come to a head. For one, there are more soldiers, and secondly, these soldiers are better trained, better equipped, and have better tactics than before. Soren suspects Zelgius’ influence.

Therefore, Soren is unsurprised when Ike claims the Black Knight as his personal target of vengeance. He can only hope that Zelgius does not intend to fight them now.

No such luck.

“Don’t follow me,” Ike says, gaze searing and grave. “I’m going in alone.”

He turns, and goes through the large, heavy wooden doors.

“Ike, wait!” Soren runs after him, but Titania snags an arm around his waist.

“Let me go,” he hisses at her, struggling in her grasp.

“No,” Titania says. “He has to do this alone.”

Mist takes their quarrel as the opportunity to slip past the doors, and they close with a resounding finality.

“You let Mist go,” Soren accuses.

“I had my hands full with you,” Titania says, and puts him down now that the doors are sealed. “Besides, she’s Greil’s daughter too.”

“How could you let him do this?” Soren asks. “He could die. They could both die. Why challenge him in fair combat when we have the upper hand in numbers?”

“Do you think Ike would accept that?” Titania asks.

It’s a rhetorical question; they both know the answer to that. He wouldn’t, of course. Soren should be able to understand. There are no rules in war, save those that you do not cross unless you wish the same atrocities upon yourself, but there are unspoken rules in vengeance: a child has the right to avenge their parents’ deaths. But here, Titania does not know: he does not want either of them dead at the other’s hand.

If Zelgius kills Ike, could I ever forgive him? Soren considers this scenario, and decides: no, he couldn’t. Because while Ike does not know the true identity of the Black Knight, Zelgius knows who Ike is, will have weighed the obvious and chosen his — or Sephiran’s — interests over Soren’s own.

But if Ike kills Zelgius, could I still look him in the eye after? Soren does not know the answer, and fears he must soon find out.

And then something else occurs to him. I have been keeping the secret of his father’s killer. This is the stone that lies in his mind’s eye. Something Ike will not forgive. He shudders.

And then the castle falls apart around them, and Ike rushes through the doors, Mist right behind, and Nasir carrying Ena, and Ike is yelling at them to run.

Soren runs, and does not think about what Ike’s survival means.

It’s night by the time Soren makes it back to his tent. He rubs his eyes, mind swimming with maps and troop placements. It’s a more palatable alternative to thinking about other things.

“Missing something?” Zelgius asks from his seat on the floor.

Soren closes the tent flap behind him.

“You ass,” he says with feeling, and sits down with a thump.

“It was an expeditious retreat,” Zelgius says. “Ike’s not nearly as good as his father was yet. He’s got potential. Perhaps in a few more years.”

“Kindly stop discussing your plans to murder my commanding officer in my tent,” Soren says.

Zelgius shrugs. “The boy will murder me otherwise.”

“That’s because you killed his father first,” Soren says. “I think he’s rather justified. Do I want to know how you ended up in my tent and not under the ruins of a castle?”

Zelgius pulls out a pouch of something from his armour.

“Ah, warp powder,” Soren says, recognizing the design. “From Sephiran, I take it?”

“Of course,” Zelgius says.

“Why my tent?” Soren asks.

“Because you would be furious with me if I told you later,” Zelgius says. “I have a message from Lord Sephiran for Tanith anyways, so I thought I’d stop by.”

“Hmph.” Soren doesn’t dignify that with a response.

“Something you ought to know,” Zelgius says, watching his face very carefully. “You should prepare for having to face the medallion on the battlefield. It is in Ashnard’s possession.”

“With Nasir’s disappearance, I assumed,” Soren tells him bitterly.

“The sword Ike now carries will allow him to deal substantial amounts of damage to King Ashnard,” Zelgius continues. “Soren.”

“Yes?”

“Don’t face King Ashnard yourself.”

Soren frowns at him. “Why not? It’s tactically sound to outnumber and overwhelm enemies.”

Zelgius shakes his head. “Your magic will not damage him,” he says. “He is too strong to be distracted that way. Stay out of range.”

“I won’t stay out of battle,” Soren says, narrowing his eyes.

“I did not expect you to,” Zelgius says. “Cut down all the Daein troops you wish. Avoid Ashnard, if only to spite the goddess with the knowledge that you live still.”

Soren’s mouth twists. “Very well,” he says. “Is that all?”

Zelgius stands. “If you run into trouble,” he says, and hands him the nearly empty bag of warp powder. “Two more uses. I am only a few hours behind you.”

“I understand,” he says, and takes the bag, tucks it into his robes. “Tanith is with Marcia and Princess Crimea. They’re running pegasi drills on the east side of camp.”

Zelgius nods. “Stay safe,” he says, and leaves.

Soren resists the urge to scream into his bedroll.

They’ve won.

Soren sits, and catches his breath with everyone as they listen to the song of Reyson’s galdr, and watches Ena with the dragon’s head in her lap.

“That is her mate,” Nasir explains.

Family, loyalty, and love is such an odd thing, Soren thinks. It drew Ena here, to a madman’s command, and it drew Nasir here, to betray them and follow her. And how is he any different? He, who follows Ike out of debt to a deed Ike doesn’t even remember, and by Sanaki’s entreaty, but keeps vital secrets from him because Zelgius is the man who raised him. Zelgius, who in turn lets Sephiran hold his strings, for some unfathomable strength of loyalty and love that Soren thinks he might understand now that he has stood by Ike’s side. What tangled webs we weave.

The song finishes, and the dragon turns into a man. Long, dark green hair, blood red mark on his forehead. There are multiple types of dragons, Zelgius had said. So he does take after the laguz side of the bloodline after all. Ena whispers things to him, and the man reaches out to touch her face, gentle, intimate. Soren turns away, uncomfortable with an expression of affection that seems wholly private.

Nasir is regarding him with quiet consideration.

“Yes?” Soren asks.

“It’s nothing,” Nasir says, and gives him the barest of nods. “I should apologize for my betrayal.”

“Save it for Mist and Ike,” Soren says. They had been the ones to truly trust him, and the medallion had been Mist’s keepsake.

“Indeed,” Nasir says, and gives him one last lookover, before looking away and grimacing to himself. “Excuse me.” He walks away, presumably to find Mist and Ike.

Soren finds Tanith, who’s running a hand down the nose of her pegasus.

“Soren,” Tanith says. “Our job is done here. A job well done, according to Duke Persis. I’m to fly back with a report on our victory, but Duke Persis says you’re to remain. You’ll depart with the Begnion contingent that’ll be here for the coronation.”

“I see,” Soren says. “Thank you, Tanith.”

She nods. “I’ll be off after I convey my farewells to General Ike,” she says. “Take care of yourself.”

“Of course,” he says. “Safe travels, Deputy Commander.”

It’s a raucous, roof-raising night after their victory. Soren can’t blame them for their determination to celebrate their living another day, but the noise is truly something, for someone who prefers to spend his days in near-solitude.

Despite the noise, something makes him want to stick close, so instead of retiring to one of the rooms in the wing of the castle Elincia had given to the mercenaries, he sits outside, on the stoop of the bar, just close enough for the warmth and cheer of his allies.

“Hey,” Ike says. “It’s really loud inside, huh?”

Soren looks up, and scoots over to the side. Ike takes this as an invitation to sit next to him, legs brushing.

“Yes,” he says.

“Can’t believe we did it,” Ike says, a half-filled pitcher in one hand. “Thank you for everything, Soren.”

“What is there to thank me for?” Soren scoffs. “I only joined halfway through. You brought Princess Crimea to Begnion, and then led the army to overwhelming victory through the strength of your leadership. I should be thanking you, for ridding the world of Ashnard.”

“Yes, but your tactics,” Ike tells him. “It’s by your skill that everyone is still alive.”

Soren shrugs, uncomfortable with praise. He thinks of telling Ike that he was doing just fine before coming to Begnion, and then thinks better of it when he realizes Ike might be thinking about the death of his father. Instead, they sit in silence for a while.

“I’ll be here for a week, at least,” Soren says. “I’m to depart with the Begnion contingent that’s arriving in a couple days for Elincia’s coronation.”

Ike nods. “We’ll be sticking around for a while too. There’s plenty to clean up and help with around here, and we don’t want anyone getting ideas before Elincia can claim her throne.”

“Likely wise,” he says. “Some people will take any opportunity in turmoil to seize power.”

“There’s the matter of our payment to settle, too,” Ike muses. “No chance for me to show you around our keep, is there.”

“Unfortunately, I don’t think so,” Soren says. “We’ll be busy in the next few days, I expect. Enjoy your night off while you have it.”

Ike salutes him with his pitcher, and drinks. “Would you like one?” Ike asks, foam forming a bit of a moustache above his lips.

Soren’s mouth twitches at the sight. “No thank you,” he says. “But you’ve got a bit of —” he gestures at his face.

“I’ve been doing that all night,” Ike admits, scrubbing with the back of his hand. “Dad would never let me have more than a couple of mouthfuls.”

“Don’t get drunk,” Soren advises. “I’ve heard the hangover is killer, and heal staves don’t work on them.”

“Anyway, when this is all done with,” Ike waves at the destruction of the city they’re in, “I’d like to keep in touch.” He traces a finger along the precipitation of his pitcher.

Soren blinks, suddenly feeling warm. “Oh,” he says. “Of course, yes, I’d be happy to.”

“Jill and Haar are thinking of starting a courier business,” Ike says. “I was thinking of writing letters.”

“I’d write back,” Soren says.

Ike grins, a bright, boyish thing. Soren’s not seen this type of smile from Ike before.

“It’s a deal,” he says.

And so it is.

Chapter Text

Soren spends the next three years helping Sanaki, and exchanges frequent letters with Ike. Jill and Haar’s delivery service is booming.

He tells Ike about the news in Tellius, about the tactics he’s considering, about how to navigate the royal court. In return, Ike tells him about his day, how the rest of the mercenaries are doing, and his uncomfortable time in the royal court of Crimea.

It’s pleasant, having a pen pal. And he can trust Ike’s good natured heart, so he has no worries about telling him about the more questionable things going on in the world that should probably stay privy to the various leaders of the world.

Such as, of course, the unrest in Daein.

A young, sheltered, secret-kept heir to a dead king, and a charismatic commander with the force of the people behind them. Soren thinks this is all very coincidental.

This may be cynical of me, but it feels manufactured, he writes. Their situations are different, of course, but similar enough that it brings pause. I hope it’s not a sign of more unrest to come.

He taps his pen against the table, grimacing. Young and charismatic leaders, rising up in turbulent times, winning against all odds…who would push for such a thing? Why would someone push for such a thing? For a moment, he toys with the idea that Sephiran was trying to level out the playing ground for Sanaki, and then dismisses it as foolery.

Unrest, he thinks. Who benefits from unrest?

The medallion comes to mind. No, that’s too niche. There are only a handful of those who understand its significance, and none of them are particularly in the business of wanting the dark god to be released. So, who else?

The rich, he thinks, cynically. And who is richer than the senators of Begnion?

But that didn’t make particular sense either, given Crimea. Unless they had intended for Crimea to return under Begnion rule, after liberating them from the Mad King. It’s possible. Instead, they had seized Daein, and had made enough of a hash about it that Sanaki was having to come down hard on them.

There’s distinctive footsteps in the hallway. At this time of night, really?

“Where are you going?” Soren puts down the pen, and wrenches the door open. Zelgius stands there, in familiar pitch black armour, deeply exasperated at being caught. “What are you doing? No, never mind that. I think I can figure that out on my own.” He scowls, glaring at him. “You’re causing problems in Daein.”

“The Begnion occupancy is a terrible misuse of power by the Senate,” Zelgius informs him, as if they both already didn’t know, having sat through meetings with Sanaki. “I’m simply doing my part.”

“Sanaki’s already dealt with the management and legislational side of things,” Soren says. “I suppose you’re showing up to scare them into running for the hills?”

“Hm. No,” Zelgius says. “It’s something time sensitive. I have an assassination attempt to stop.”

Soren makes a disgusted noise. “If the Daein Liberation Army isn’t enough to stop assassination attempts without you, I don’t know how they’re going to hold Daein,” he grumbles. “What, the Silver-Haired Miracle of Daein isn’t aware that people might make attempts on — what was his name — Prince Pelleas’ life?”

“Wrong target,” Zelgius says. “The girl’s decided to take a stroll around camp. The Prince is quite well protected, from what I hear.”

Soren glares at him. “Go on then,” he says. “Don’t make it too easy. You don’t want the girl thinking that you’ll jump in to save her whenever she makes a silly mistake like that.”

“Thank you for your consideration,” Zelgius says dryly. “This might run late. Don’t wait up.”

Soren absentmindedly gestures him onwards.

Sephiran’s still involved, Soren realizes. If Zelgius is still running around as the Black Knight… His heart sinks into his stomach. Sephiran’s running some part of the show. Well, this terrible occupation needs to be stopped anyway, it’s bad for Sanaki’s image…? He makes a face. That does not seem quite right. The damage had already been done. If Sephiran had really wanted, he could have stopped the Begnion occupation of Daein outright. It would have made him massively unpopular with the Senate, but it was doable. Perhaps they had been too naive in assuming that the senators assigned to the task would do a decent job. Clearly, they had assumed wrong. He chews on that for a bit, and can’t puzzle it out.

Instead, Soren goes back to his letter to Ike, and does not mention the Black Knight at all.

I don’t like the sound of that, Ike writes back. I’ve had news of things happening in Crimea’s court. I’m sorry, but I can’t share any more details with you. The Greil Mercenaries have a new job in a couple of days, and I have to go silent.

Perfectly understandable, Soren writes. Stay safe.

The letters stop coming.

The situation in Daein resolves itself.

Then, unrest in Crimea.

Soren waits with baited breath.

The Laguz Alliance declares war on Begnion.

Soren stops waiting for the letter that will never come.

Zelgius takes one look at Soren, packed up and ready to go, and stops dead in his tracks.

“You’re coming with me?” Zelgius asks, surprise in his voice. “I’d much rather you stayed in Sienne.”

“Sanaki has Sephiran and the Holy Guard,” Soren says. “I don’t trust the Senate. It’s much safer with you.”

“You’re sure about this,” Zelgius says, forehead creased in concern. Soren doesn’t meet his eyes.

“Yes,” he says. It comes out petulant and defiant, and he wishes he could take it back. He takes a deep breath. “I can do this. I have to do this. It’s just a job.”

Zelgius frowns, but doesn’t say anything as Soren falls into step with him.

The Laguz Alliance attacks fast and hard. Flaguerre and Mugill fall swiftly to their teeth and claws. And then they’re staring at each other across the Ribahn, neither quite willing to be pinned between their enemy and the rushing river.

“It’s a waiting game,” Soren murmurs over the map in Zelgius’ tent. “They’ll be looking for ways to attack first, because that has been the extent of their tactics so far. But now that we’ve aggravated Phoenicis, the remainder of their army will join with the laguz. They’ll have air support.”

“The senators are uneasy about the presence of laguz so far within Begnion’s borders,” Zelgius says. “It’ll only be a matter of time before one of them orders us to eliminate the threat. The only question is which will happen first.”

“I would much prefer the former option,” Soren says. “If we cross the Ribahn, it leaves us vulnerable should we need to take up a more defensive position. Not to mention we’ll be easy prey as we cross the river.”

He looks up to see Zelgius’ raised eyebrow.

“I know,” Soren says. “The Senate wouldn’t care about our casualty count just as long as we fulfilled the mission objectives. But I find the idea of it…wasteful.”

“It’s unpleasant,” Zelgius agrees.

Of course, that’s when the messenger comes screaming into camp about the Laguz Alliance on the move.

Soren waits in silence, poker-faced and arms crossed, watching as another foolish Senator berates Zelgius for failing to eliminate the Laguz Alliance. There’s nothing that can be done other than to listen to the abuse, and attempt to rectify any failings the Senate perceives after the fact, while trying to save as many lives as possible.

Levail is clearly new to this sort of situation, and being the sensible, pleasant sort of man, protests the ridiculous course of action.

Zelgius shuts him down, and the senator leaves, satisfied.

“There’s no use in objecting,” Soren tells Levail, after his attempts to get an answer out of Zelgius have failed. “The Senate commands the army, including Zelgius. You’re under their thumb as well.”

“But he’s —”

“He’s a soldier,” Soren says. “The chain of command is how things work in the army, which you should already know, being a general. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have some plans to go over with Zelgius before our next offensive on the Laguz Alliance.”

“He’s right though,” Soren tells Zelgius later, privately. “It is madness.”

Zelgius’ lips twitch. “I’m well aware,” he says.

“You should just challenge Skrimir to single combat,” Soren grumbles. “Take a page out of Gallia’s book.”

“I’ll keep that in mind, should I get the opportunity,” Zelgius says dryly as he tends to his armour.

Soren makes a note on a scrap of parchment, unable to pin down the reason he’s feeling so…discombobulated.

Zelgius waits, patient.

“I don’t understand what they’re doing,” Soren finally hisses, hands slamming down on the table. “Why continue to press? They have us on the back foot, and they know it! They should be asking for talks, now that they’ve finally gotten the Senate’s attention!”

“Do they even know it’s an option?” Zelgius asks calmly. “None of them are particularly well-versed in tactics.”

“Ranulf should know it’s an option,” Soren says. “He’s clever enough to know when to attack, and when to retreat. Ike should know it’s an option, given how many letters we exchanged about tactics—” Soren cuts himself off.

Zelgius eyes him, but gives no other reaction.

“They should know,” Soren says. “But why aren’t they?”

Zelgius shrugs. “We have no current insight into the Laguz Alliance,” he says. “The ravens are obviously no longer trusted in their circle. All we have is your time with the Greil Mercenaries and your previous experience with key members of Gallian society. If anyone could answer that question in the army, it would be you.”

Soren glares at him. “That’s not helping.”

“I’m not trying to help, I’m only pointing things out,” Zelgius says, unhelpfully.

Soren makes a noise of disgust.

Zelgius snorts, and goes back to his armour.

Zelgius ends up challenging Skrimir to single combat.

“I wasn’t actually serious,” Soren tells Zelgius.

Zelgius shrugs. “I saw an opportunity, and I took it.”

“The Senate won’t be happy about the way you ended the war,” Soren says, frowning. “But they’ll have no place to criticize you, given how it ended.”

“They’ll have to make do,” Zelgius says. “Sanaki and Sephiran will be glad to know it ended in minor bloodshed. Perhaps we’ll finally be able to sit down at a table for peace talks and reparations.”

There’s a knock on the door.

“General Zelgius, General Sigrun is here to see you,” a soldier says.

“That doesn’t sound good,” Soren murmurs, and exchanges a glance with Zelgius, who looks grim. Zelgius nods at the soldier, and exits the room.

Ten minutes later he’s back, even grimmer than before, Sigrun pale and trembling.

“What’s happened?” Soren sits up straight, gaze flicking between the two of them.

Zelgius closes and locks the door, and ushers Sigrun into a chair.

“Sanaki and Sephiran have been captured,” he informs him.

“Ah.” So, things in Sienne have come to a head. He frowns. “It’s gotten that bad with the Senate then?”

“Apparently so,” Zelgius says, scrubbing a hand into his hair. “I’ve been ordered to repeal the cease-fire on the Laguz Alliance and destroy them and their allies.”

Ike. “And now we have no choice but to obey, or Sanaki and Sephiran will pay for it,” Soren concludes.

Zelgius nods, grave.

“Weren’t you supposed to be protecting Sanaki?” Soren asks Sigrun.

“You know Sanaki hates being followed around,” she says. “Besides, we couldn’t bar the senators from seeing her. You know how it is.” Sigrun sighs. “I have certain members of the Holy Guard out looking for her now,” she says. “Those I trust, personally. No luck yet.”

Soren grimaces at the emphasis in her words, which suggest traitors, Senate sympathizers, or members of the Senate’s prominent senatorial families in Sigrun’s Holy Guard. “I see,” he says. “Our hands are tied. Can we press the offensive without the slaughter they want?”

“If you have appropriate suggestions tactics-wise, I’ll consider them,” Zelgius says, sighing.

They discuss their situation for a while, and Sigrun fills them in on what she knows from the situation in Sienne, before she stands up.

“I’ve got to go,” she says. “I’ve to deliver a message back to the Senate, and then I must get back to looking for Sanaki.”

“Stay safe,” Zelgius says, and they send her on her way.

“They’ll be fine,” Zelgius tells Soren. “They won’t hurt Sanaki, and Sephiran is fine.”

Soren privately thinks he’s trying to persuade himself more than him, but he nods. Zelgius worries. This, he understands.

Chapter Text

They make plans.

Of course, what happens is that the Begnion Senate gets in the way of those plans. Daein, by some baffling turn of events, allies itself with Begnion. Or, rather, Soren privately thinks, puts itself back under the thumb of Begnion. Soren suspects foul play and blackmail. Nevertheless, it puts the Laguz Alliance in an extremely tenuous position.

I hope someone’s using their heads over there, Soren thinks, and hopes Ike and the rest will be fine.

Curiously, it does give the Begnion Army a period of rest.

“Really?” Soren asks Zelgius when he emerges with the set of black armour. “Now?”

Zelgius shrugs. “They need the help,” he says. “I’ve never approved of the idea of making soldiers ballista fodder.”

“And you’ll get to see Ike,” Soren says bitterly.

Zelgius eyes him. “Relax,” he says. “It’s not time for us to spar one on one yet.”

“Yet,” Soren says, and tries not to sulk.

“Chances are I won’t get to fight him at all,” Zelgius says. “I’ll be in a swamp. It’s bad for the armour.”

“Still,” Soren says.

“I’ll let you know if he’s relatively unharmed,” Zelgius says. “Although I think you should be able to figure that out for yourself.”

“We’re not writing letters anymore,” Soren says, sitting up. “What do you mean by that?”

“Did we never touch on this?” Zelgius asks, somewhat rhetorically. “Sometimes, if I close my eyes and concentrate…” He touches the centre of his chest with his fingers. “Sephiran’s alive, and still in Begnion.”

“Yes?” Soren squints at him, confused by the subject change. “Of course?”

Zelgius sighs and raps his knuckles on the table. “It’s Branded senses. I think you should be able to do the same for Ike.”

Soren makes a face, but humours him, closing his eyes. He slips into standard meditation breathing, the basic exercises for beginner mages to read energy and flow. Sephiran had taught him and Sanaki this too, knees on silk cushions on weekend mornings, golden sunlight streaming in through the windows. Center, and focus.

“Ike’s fine,” Soren says, opening his eyes. “And I won’t tell you where he is.”

“But you’re able to ascertain the general location,” Zelgius points out. “I’ve always assumed it’s a Branded thing. We pick one person, and gravitate towards them, like a pole star.”

Soren swallows. “Sephiran for you,” he says. And Ike for me.

Zelgius nods. They both understand. Zelgius looks grave, as he slides the helmet on his head.

“Keep yourself safe,” he tells Soren. “Keep yourself busy.” He points at the maps. “You have the run of my quarters while I’m gone. Feel free to throw out anyone who comes sniffing around. Give my excuses to Levail. You know how to reach me if you need anything.”

“Of course,” Soren says. “I’ll hold down the fort, General.”

“You’d better, Tactician.” Zelgius pulls out a pouch of warp powder, and measures out a pinch with one gauntleted hand. One last nod, and he’s gone, the distinctive smell of saltpeter and ozone filling the air.

Soren picks up the map on the top of the pile, his finger landing unerringly on the Ribahn River. Something inside him twists uncomfortably. I’ll be in a swamp, Zelgius had said.

So Branded senses are good for something after all.

Soren wrinkles his nose, and goes to open a window.

“The Kauku Caves?” Soren stares at Zelgius like he’s grown a second head.

“Yes,” Zelgius says.

“We’re not going in there,” Soren informs Zelgius.

“No,” Zelgius agrees. “We’re not going in there.”

“But you’re sending a force in there,” Soren says.

“Unfortunately,” Zelgius says. “I have a new chain of command. Valtome is my newly appointed commander-in-chief.”

“Ah,” Soren says, wincing. Valtome had always been rather unpleasant to interact with. “Are we going through Crimea then?”

“Looks that way,” Zelgius says.

“They made it out, in case you’re wondering,” Soren tells him, later.

Zelgius shrugs. “I’m not surprised,” he says.

Soren opts out of meeting Queen Elincia with Zelgius and Valtome, and instead takes the opportunity to wander Melior’s streets. It’s rebuilding, more vibrant and healthy than it was at the end of Ashnard’s defeat three years ago. He passes the bar where they had celebrated their victory, and brushes a hand along the wooden railing of the stairs, hesitant.

“Soren?” It’s Lucia. Soren almost doesn’t recognize her at first, because her hair is cropped decisively shorter than before.

“Lucia,” he says, giving her a nod of acknowledgement.

“Would you like to take a walk?”

Soren grimaces. It’s less of a question, and more of a polite suggestion. “Of course,” he says, and falls into step by her side. “It’s nice to see that Melior is healing,” he comments.

Lucia smiles. “It is, isn’t it.”

He waits for her questions.

“What does Begnion want with Crimea?” she asks.

Soren’s mouth twists. “That depends on your definition of Begnion,” he replies, carefully neutral. “The Senate is not interested in you, but in the eradication of the Laguz,” he continues in a low tone, “it is not anything in particular to do with Crimea, save that you are a convenient and easy path to Gallia. That, and Valtome will likely seize whatever supplies you have for the army.” This, he does not worry about giving away. It’s common sense, and he doesn’t like Valtome, anyway. Elincia, for all of her naivety, is much more pleasant than dealing with Begnion senators. He’d much rather help Crimea get one over them.

“And the Apostle and Prime Minister Sephiran?”

Soren remains studiously and pointedly silent.

“Ah,” Lucia says, reading his expression correctly. She’s Elincia’s right hand these days. She understands the dirty games of court and politics. With any luck, she’ll convey Sanaki’s… unavailability to Elincia, who will understand her plight, and therefore graciously forgive Sanaki when they manage to rescue her. Sanaki will not suffer diplomatically for all of the Senate’s idiocy.

“Do you know of a good merchant in the city who’s willing to bargain for high-quality wares?” Soren asks, forcing himself to return to pleasantly conversational.

“Of course,” Lucia says without blinking. “Right this way.”

They’re due to meet the Laguz Alliance in battle on Crimea’s border.

On the eve of battle, Zelgius pulls Soren into his tent.

“You’re not coming,” he tells him.

“What.” Soren stares at Zelgius, wondering if he’s misheard.

“You’re not coming,” Zelgius repeats.

“And why not?”

“Because the Greil Mercenaries are on this front, and I’m not to be worrying about you while I command the army,” Zelgius says, matter-of-fact.

“I can handle myself just fine,” Soren growls.

“Let me rephrase,” Zelgius says. “I don’t want to worry about you turning fire on Begnion while positioned within our ranks.”

“Excuse me?” Soren thinks he has every right to be offended.

Zelgius raises an eyebrow at him. “You think you can hold your magic if you see Ike get cut down in front of you?”

Soren opens his mouth, closes it, and tries not to call Zelgius a number of very rude names he learned from Zelgius himself.

“Exactly,” Zelgius says, and points at the chair in his tent. “That’s got your name on it. Now, don’t come out unless the camp is on fire. Do I make myself clear?”

“Crystal,” Soren says through gritted teeth.

The morning of the battle comes, and Soren sits, sulking, in Zelgius’ chair, watching him get ready for battle.

“Stay safe,” Soren tells him.

“Of course,” Zelgius says, and leaves with a swish of his cape. “Be good.”

It’s a morning of unbearable waiting. Then, all of a sudden, the noise of the army returning. Soren frowns. It’s too early for them to have fought and finished a battle.

Zelgius strides into the tent, hair mussed and wild-eyed.

“Pack,” Zelgius says, voice harsh. “They’re going to arrest me for treason, and you’d best not be here when they do.” He takes Soren by the shoulders. “Do you understand?”

“I — yes, but treason? You, a traitor?” Soren sputters at him, poleaxed. He starts packing in quick, efficient movements. Zelgius takes his own ration packet, and shoves it into Soren’s bag.

“I publicly disobeyed orders,” Zelgius says. “Valtome will be here any minute now. There’s no time.” He slices a hole through the back of the tent.

“What about you?” Soren asks, heart in throat.

“Oh, they’ll make a public show of it, I presume,” Zelgius says with a humourless smile.

“You’re not coming?” You’re not fighting?

“No,” Zelgius says shortly. “They’re here for me, not you.” Almost absentmindedly, he reaches out and tightens the straps of Soren’s pack, like he’s still the child he sent off to lessons. He hasn’t had lessons in a long, long time.

“Zelgius—”

There’s noise outside, and the front of the tent bursts open.

Both of their heads snap up, to see the pointed tips of lances, and helmet upon helmet of shining red armour.

Zelgius shoves Soren behind him.

“Zelgius—”

"Run, fool boy,” the man who raised him snarls, and steps forward to face the troops, hands out in surrender.

Soren turns, and runs.

He doesn’t look back.

Chapter Text

Soren heads blindly for the warm feeling in his chest, wherever Ike is. There’s nothing he can do for Zelgius now, if he refuses to save himself. The low lying branches whip in his face as he stumbles over roots and the hard packed ground, gasping for breath.

“Trespasser,” a voice hisses, filled with loathing and hate. “You dare!”

Something heavy and sharp lands on his chest. He gasps, the breath knocked out of him.

Claws. Whiskers. His stomach sinks. They were on the Crimean-Gallian border, after all. Shit.

“Lyre!” Lethe’s voice snaps out.

“What?” the voice snaps back.

Lethe ignores her. “State your business,” she says, and looms over him, pushing the cat on his chest backwards.

“I’ve got a message for Commander Ike,” he says, panting around the weight on his chest and the stitch in his side. “Urgent.”

“Alright,” Lethe says, eyeing him. “Let him up.”

“But he’s a—”

“Quiet, Lyre. I smell no dishonesty from him. This way.” Lethe helps him up and leads him forward, into the camp. Laguz mill around them, some giving Soren odd looks before turning away, turning their backs. Soren ignores this, swallowing around the lump in his throat.

“Commander Ike,” Lethe says, knocking on one of the tent flaps before entering. “Soren’s here to see you.”

“Soren!” Ike looks up from the table, eyes wide. Beside him, Ranulf folds up the map they’ve been looking at.

“Hello, Ike,” Soren croaks out. Ike stands up, face creased in concern.

“You don’t look well,” he says. “Are you — is everything alright?” He puts a hand around his elbow, and guides him into the tent. “Do you need Rhys?”

Soren shakes his head. “They’re going to execute him,” he says, dazed.

“Who?” Ranulf narrows his eyes at him.

“Zelgius,” he rasps out. “I told him — he told me to run.”

“Well, now we know for certain that the Begion army has major leadership problems,” Ranulf mutters. “What a mess. At least General Zelgius is honourable. These senators?” he shakes his head.

“Sit down,” Ike says, and Soren finds himself sitting on a pillow.

“Valtome,” Soren says. “He’s the new commander-in-chief of the Begnion army.”

Elincia grimaces. “That awful man? Oh no.”

“That asshole senator?” Tibarn crosses his arms. “I don’t like him one bit.”

“I’m going to tear him to pieces,” Soren says, and stares at his hands, twisting over and over in his lap.

“Get in line,” Tibarn informs him, and then looks at Caineghis. “Well, I think this meeting was just about over anyways.”

Caineghis nods, and everyone clears out.

“He said he was going to be charged for treason,” Soren says. “The punishment for treason is execution.”

Ike puts a hand on his shoulder. “Maybe we shouldn’t use the main tent for this,” he says awkwardly. “Soren, do you need a heal staff? You’ve got some pretty bad scratches on your face.”

“Maybe a vulnerary instead,” Titania says, and hands Ike a familiar looking bottle.

Somehow, Soren ends up in Ike’s tent, sitting on his bedroll.

“You can take off the pack,” Ike says, and Soren shrugs it off, and tries to breathe. Zelgius dead, Sephiran and Sanaki captured. What were they going to do? What could he do?

“Hey, it’s going to be alright, okay?” Ike dabs vulnerary onto his face, and Soren hisses at the sting of pain.

“It’s not,” Soren says. “Sanaki and Sephiran have been captured. No one knows where they are. Sigrun and the Holy Guard are looking, but—” he hisses again in discomfort when Ike brushes a particularly deep cut “—Sigrun’s worried about traitors in her ranks, and the Senate’s hellbent on eradicating Laguz. They won’t stop. Levail doesn’t have Zelgius’ clout, either. He’s not going to be able to do anything with Valtome breathing down his neck.”

Ike grimaces. “That’s a problem for later. You need to pick yourself back up right now. Do you want us to go rescue Zelgius?”

“What?” Soren looks up at him, baffled. “He’s your enemy.”

“He wasn’t three years ago,” Ike says. “I’d rather face him than this Valtome.”

Soren shakes his head. “Zelgius doesn’t want to be rescued,” he says bitterly. “He didn’t even fight.”

Ike sighs. “Okay then. What are you going to do after this?”

“I’ll join you,” Soren says. The words are out of his mouth before he can think them over. We pick one person, and gravitate towards them, like a pole star. Zelgius’ words echo in his mind. This made sense. He would stick with Ike.

“Uh, okay then,” Ike says. “We could use someone with real tactical training. We’ve been doing a lot of improvising. Could use someone who knows what they’re doing.”

“You’ve been doing well so far,” Soren says.

Ike looks away, pinking. “Yeah,” he says. “The books you suggested were helpful.”

“Good,” Soren says firmly. “That’s good.” He tugs his knees up, and rests his forehead against them.

Ike sits down next to him, a solid line of warmth down his side. He puts a tentative hand on Soren’s back.

Soren breathes.

“We’re probably going to head further back into Gallia,” Ike tells Soren the next morning. “We need to figure out our next steps. If the Begnion Senate is determined to eradicate the laguz, then we’re going to have to stop them. Maybe Elincia will join, now that they’ve done…all this.” Ike gestures, all-encompassing.

Soren nods. He’d slept in Ike’s tent, having no tent of his own. He hadn’t had the time to grab one before he ran.

“That makes sense,” Soren says.

“If you’d like to let everyone know the current situation in Begnion,” Ike says, trailing off uncertainly.

“I’m fine with that,” Soren says, cutting Ike off. “My loyalty was never to Begnion anyway. My loyalty was to Zelgius. And to Sanaki.”

“Great,” Ike says. “And now, breakfast.”

They head to the food tent. Soren ignores the whispers and the pointed silence that follows. Ike lifts his head and glares at the laguz. Soren ignores that, too.

“Hello, Soren,” Mist says as she ladles something warm and steaming into a bowl. “Titania said you were joining us.”

“For the near future, yes,” Soren tells her, and accepts the bowl. “Thank you, Mist. I’m glad to see you’re well.”

Mist smiles at him, bright and sunny. “Ah, everyone’s coming back,” she says. “Soon, it’ll be just like old times.”

“Mm,” Soren says, and waits for Ike. Titania waves them over.

“I’m glad to see you’re looking better than yesterday,” Titania says. “You were as white as a ghost.”

“Hm,” Soren says, and declines to comment.

“A good night’s sleep helped,” Ike says, nudging Soren.

Soren shrugs and digs into his stew.

“Meeting’s after breakfast,” Ike tells Soren.

Soren nods, and focuses on the stew. It’s quite good, which suggests Oscar is on cooking duty. One by one, old friends stop by to say hello. Soren’s pleasantly surprised by some of the familiar faces. There are more of them than he expected.

“We’ve got to get going,” Ike says apologetically, and they stand, make their excuses, and clean up.

They’ve just cleared the mess tent when —

“Incoming messenger!” Janaff’s voice calls out. “Pegasus, looks like Deputy Commander Tanith!”

Soren looks up, and cups his hands around his mouth. “Tanith!”

Tanith touches down in front of them.

“We got there just in time,” she tells Soren, and then turns to Ike. “I’ve a message for the leaders of the Laguz Alliance and Queen Elincia from the Apostle, if they’d deign to hear it.”

Her pegasus dances on his hooves, uneasy, but Tanith keeps a firm hold on the reins.

“I’ll let them know,” Ike says, claps a hand on Soren’s shoulder, gives him a nod, and leaves him there with Tanith.

“The Apostle’s alright?” Soren asks Tanith.

Tanith nods. “Safe,” she says. “Sigrun’s not letting her out of her sight.”

“And Zelgius?”

“Zelgius is fine,” Tanith says. “Like I said, we got there just in time.” She grimaces. “It was an ugly, almost thing. Sanaki had to intervene. I assume he told you to run?”

Soren nods. “Yes,” he says. “Shoved me out the back of the tent.”

“Good,” Tanith says grimly. “Zelgius is made of sterner stuff than you are. Besides, as far as the Senate is concerned, you’re expendable.”

“The Senate clearly thinks Zelgius is expendable as well,” Soren says bitterly.

“He’s well-known enough for them to make a spectacle out of it,” Tanith says bluntly. “You, they would have just killed on the spot.”

Soren swallows, suddenly queasy. “Thank you, Tanith,” he says.

“Sephiran’s still missing,” Tanith says, more quietly. “Zelgius has plans to rescue him, I think.”

“Of course,” Soren says, equally as quiet.

Ike comes back, nodding at Tanith. Tanith swings off her pegasus and hands the reins to Marcia, who cheerfully informs her that she’ll “take good care of him, promise!”

They enter the tent. Soren sits next to Ike.

“I have a message from Empress Sanaki Kirsch Altina, 37th Apostle of Begnion,” Tanith says, in polite formality. “She would like to meet the Laguz Alliance at a neutral location, and would ask if Queen Elincia would be gracious enough to lend Castle Crimea for the talks.”

“Of course,” Elincia says, clasping her hands together. “I’m glad to hear that the Apostle is safe.”

“Gallia is willing to attend these talks as well,” Caineghis says, dipping his head.

“Phoenicis is in,” Tibarn says.

“So it’s decided then,” Tanith says. “I’ll let the Apostle know.”

Soren watches her go on her pegasus, becoming a speck in the sky.

“You could have gone with her,” Ike suggests, tilting his head.

“No,” Soren says. “I’m quite fine where I am.”

Chapter Text

The familiar visage of Crimea Castle is a relief.

They arrive first, the Greil Mercenaries scattering to their previously assigned rooms. It’s been three years, but Soren can still remember the hallways, even if they’re significantly less damaged than before.

“The Apostle’s due to arrive in the main courtyard with her Holy Guards,” Elincia tells him, and then she hurries off to make last minute preparations.

“What portion of the Begnion Army that remains loyal to the Apostle will arrive shortly afterward,” Lucia murmurs.

Soren grimaces. He had expected the fracture, but hearing it was another matter. He wonders how small the portion is. “Thank you,” he tells Lucia. “Are you waiting as well?”

“As a representative of Her Majesty, yes,” Lucia says. “She intends to be here when they arrive, but I’d better stay if they’re early.”

Soren nods. Understandable.

Elincia joins them in the courtyard soon after, having cleaned up a bit. They watch the skies together. Eventually, a speck appears on the horizon, growing larger.

Sigrun smiles at Soren, tired and wan, but jubilant at the same. “The 37th Apostle of Begnion, Empress Sanaki Kirsch Altina,” she says, announcing Sanaki’s arrival. Sanaki herself is behind Sigrun on the pegasus, in her familiar red elaborate robes, head held high and dignified.

“I’m glad to see you safe and well, Apostle,” Elincia says, greeting Sanaki as she slides from the pegasus’ back.

“And you as well. Thank you for your well wishes, Queen Elincia,” Sanaki says. “And thank you, for agreeing to host these talks.”

“Lucia can show you to your rooms,” Elinica says, nodding at Lucia. “You’ll all be hosted in the same wing. I hope this arrangement is satisfactory?”

“Yes,” Sanaki says. “It is.” She catches sight of him, lurking in the shadow of the doorway.

Soren nods, once. Yes, he’ll follow them. He has questions he wants to ask, anyway.

“Wonderful,” Lucia says. “This way then.”

Soren falls into step with the procession, beside Tanith.

“Zelgius and Levail are coming with what remains of the army,” Tanith says, voice low.

“Good,” Soren says.

They don’t speak any further until Lucia has shown them to Sanaki’s suite, large enough for her and her rotation of bodyguards.

The moment Lucia leaves, Sanaki dismisses the majority of the Holy Guard from the room. It’s just her, Soren, Sigrun, and Tanith. Everyone she trusts, then.

“Empress,” Soren says quietly. “I’m glad to see you safe.”

Sanaki runs her hands through her hair, and takes a seat on the edge of the bed. “I’m really glad you decided it was safer to go with Zelgius, Soren.”

“It was that bad, then?” Soren asks.

“It was fine for me,” she says. Which, of course, implied that it had not been fine for everyone else in her immediate circle.

“I see,” Soren says, and exchanges glances with Sigrun and Tanith, who are studiously unpacking. He sits down gingerly on the bed beside her.

“Any news on Sephiran?” he asks.

Sanaki shakes her head. “Jailed somewhere, likely,” she says, voice bitter. “Zelgius said he had some plans. But he wanted to secure our land route first, just in case anything happened.”

“He’s planning on sneaking back in,” Soren fills in. “That’ll leave Levail in command.”

“No,” Sanaki says, dismissing the thought with a flick of her hand. “Levail can remain in command of Begnion’s division of troops, but I have someone else in mind for the head of my army.”

Soren’s mouth twitches. “Oh,” he says. “He won’t like that.”

“We did bring this,” Sigrun says, gesturing to the familiarly shaped package wrapped in brown paper that Tanith places gently on the vanity. “We had to smuggle it out.”

Soren resists the urge to laugh.

“He doesn’t get a choice in the matter,” Sanaki tells him imperiously. “And I know you’re close, so you’re not to ruin my surprise.”

“Of course not, Empress,” Soren says, bemused. And turn down the opportunity to see the utterly baffled and exasperated look on Ike’s face? Never.

“You’re to be my tactician, of course,” Sanaki continues. “And then we’re going to show those senators that I’m not to be crossed.”

“Of course,” Soren says. He had assumed he would be her tactician anyway, in Zelgius and Sephiran’s absence. “Do we know who in the Senate is blackmailing Daein?”

Sigrun stiffens. “Daein?” she asks.

“They declared an alliance with Begnion against the Laguz,” Soren explains. “It seems wholly unlikely to be genuine, given the circumstances.”

“No, I agree,” Sanaki says, and makes a face. “I’ll have to apologize to Elincia, if this gives her trouble on the Daein border.”

“Crimea’s got no lost love for Daein, either,” Soren reminds her. “The people are still smarting from three years ago.”

Sanaki sighs. “What’s your opinion on Levail?” she asks.

“A sensible man with a head on his shoulders and a good dose of respect and reverence for Zelgius,” Soren says. “Naturally, this means he had some disagreements with the senators.”

“And tactically?” Sanaki asks.

Soren frowns. “No head for the Senate’s political games,” he says. “I’ve been running most of the tactics for the army through Zelgius, so they’ve been mostly mine lately. Why do you ask?”

“If I’m leaving him in charge of Begnion’s ground division of troops, then I want to make sure he’s not going to cause problems for my choice of commander-in-chief,” Sanaki says.

“He’ll be fine,” Soren says, considering. “Are you planning on following the army?”

“For now, yes,” Sanaki says. “It would be poor form and bad morale if I left.”

“We’re aware,” Sigrun says, answering Soren’s unspoken question. “And we agree. We’ll be with her, anyway, so it’ll be fine.”

“I’m hardly defenceless,” Sanaki says, hand slipping to rest over one of the pockets in her robes. Soren knows that’s where she keeps her tome.

“Of course.” He doesn’t argue.

Someone knocks on the door.

“Come in,” Sanaki says.

“Apostle, the army has arrived,” one of Sigrun’s Holy Guards says, poking her head into the doorway.”

Sanaki nods, and turns to Soren. “Bring them up,” she says. He goes.

“Generals,” Soren says, meeting them at the main gate. “The Apostle requests your presence.”

Zelgius sweeps his gaze over Soren, checking for injuries, and then turns to bark out a set of orders at one of his subordinates. “Lead on,” he says, turning back to Soren.

Levail falls a couple steps behind, letting Soren walk in step with Zelgius.

“You’re fine?” Zelgius asks, a gauntleted hand falling on his shoulder.

“Fine,” Soren says shortly. “You?”

Zelgius looks fine, like this was a normal occurrence, like he hadn’t been about to be executed for treason only a week ago.

“The Apostle arrived in the nick of time,” Zelgius says. Soren doesn’t understand it. How could he be so calm?

He knocks on the door, hearing Sanaki’s muffled “Enter,” and ushers them inside.

They walk through the halls of the castle. Sanaki is doing what she does best now, talking to the other leaders of Tellius.

“You’re really alright?” Soren asks.

Zelgius nods. “They only got close enough to hold a blade to my throat,” he says. “The Apostle flew in to decry the Senate and expose their plot, and that was enough to stop the proceedings.”

“I don’t like that they got close enough to hold a blade to your throat in the first place,” Soren grumbles.

“The soldiers were just following orders,” Zelgius says. “And by a certain point of view, I did betray my commanding officer’s orders.”

Soren shakes his head, scowling.

“Enough about me,” Zelgius says. “Tell me about you. Did they come after you?”

Soren shrugs. “If they did, I didn’t notice,” he says, staring out the window.

There’s a pointed silence. Zelgius expects him to elaborate.

“I found Ike,” Soren says. That should be self-explanatory enough.

“You ran for the one man you knew was living in an enemy camp filled with laguz,” Zelgius says dryly.

Soren shrugs, embarrassed. “Not my best idea,” he agrees.

Zelgius huffs.

They continue walking, down into the main courtyard. Soren makes a beeline for a secluded spot that will allow them to watch the conversation unfolding in the east corner. Zelgius follows.

“…Especially since I’ve decided to make you the commander of our combined forces,” Sanaki is saying to Ike.

Ike sputters. “Apostle Sanaki, I’m very flattered,” he says. “But surely General Zelgius is much more qualified—” He breaks off, meeting Zelgius’s eyes. Ah. Busted.

Sanaki turns and rolls her eyes at them. “Soren, really?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Soren says. “We’re simply looking for a secluded spot for a private conversation.”

Zelgius’ mouth twitches in amusement. “What he said,” he says, tilting his head at Soren. Then he clears his throat. “General Ike. I am not able to lead Her Majesty’s army, because I am returning to Begnion to rescue Prime Minister Sephiran.”

“Our army consists of the remaining Begnion troops, as well as the armies of Crimea, Gallia, and Phoenicis,” Sanaki says. “Ike, you're probably the only person on the face of Tellius who commands respect from all four countries represented here.”

“Ah,” Ike says, in helpless understanding.

Ranulf takes this time to appear. “Besides, Ike, you’re the only person who can bridge the rift between laguz and beorc.”

“That’s very true,” Titania says, Mist right next to her. “We’ll be by your side no matter what you choose, Ike.”

Ike makes a face. “Have you all been listening in? Where have you all been hiding?” he asks, indignant. Then, he sighs. “If you think I'm the only person who can pull this off, then I'll do my best not to let you all down.”

Mist lets out a little cheer.

“Thank you, Ike.” Sanaki smiles, one of the first true smiles Soren’s seen from her since this whole thing started. “We’ll have to go meet with the commanders and the armies you’ll be commanding.”

“In terms of tactics,” Ike says, and turns to him. “Soren. Will you be my tactician?”

“Of course,” Soren says. “The empress would have assigned me anyway, but yes, I’ll be your tactician, Ike.”

“Soren is well informed on the Begnion Army’s capabilities,” Zelgius says. “I’ve left Levail with instructions as well. The Begnion troops shouldn’t give you any trouble.”

“Good,” Ike says. “Thank you.”

“I leave him in your care.” Zelgius catches Ike’s elbow, gaze intent.

Ike meets it, equally as solemn. “I understand.”

Soren sighs, deeply annoyed and exasperated. There’s no point in arguing the matter, since they’ll just ignore him anyway.

“It’s time for me to go,” Zelgius says, breaking from the staring contest. “Empress. Good luck.”

“May the goddess light your path,” Sanaki says, equally as solemn.

“I shall do my best,” Zelgius tells Sanaki.

Sanaki gives him a nod, and dismisses them from her presence.

“Let’s do this in your rooms,” Zelgius tells him.

“You’re packed?” Soren asks him.

“I have everything I need,” Zelgius says. They’re silent until Soren closes the door of his room behind them. Zelgius sits on the chair.

“Soren,” Zelgius says, quiet, thoughtful, watching. “You understand that I cannot always act as you’d like me to.”

“I noticed that,” Soren says, crossing his arms. “You’re your own person. It’d be impolite and immature to expect otherwise. I find that people are often...unpredictable. I simply dislike watching you give up your life to die at the hand of incompetents.”

Zelgius’ mouth twitches. “Valtome is hardly incompetent if he and the Senate have managed to twist our arms this thoroughly,” he comments. “But I see your point. Was it the lack of fight that disturbed you?”

“I’ve never known you to not fight for anything,” Soren informs him dryly. “You threatened my etiquette tutor with a blade when he insinuated I was a bastard. Which, as you know, I probably am. Both ways.”

Zelgius shakes his head, amused. “For an etiquette tutor, you would think that he’d have the common sense not to insult my charge,” he says. They pause. It’s the remnants of an old joke echoing between them, reminiscence of the past. Sometimes, Soren wishes he could return there, to cold, empty wooden tables, books towering higher than his head. “You’re right,” Zelgius says finally, serious. “I can see why that might have been unsettling.”

“You’re not supposed to give up and die,” Soren says.

“No,” Zelgius agrees. “I suppose not.”

“You’re going back to rescue Sephiran.”

“I am,” Zelgius says. He hesitates, fingers tapping idly at the wooden table. “Soren.”

“Yes?”

“Do you remember our conversation before the battle?”

“Yes.”

Zelgius looks at him, even, calm. “If the day comes that we stand across battlefields, then I ask that you trust and stand by your own judgement and convictions.”

Soren stares at him. “I beg your pardon?” There’s an awful, sinking feeling in his stomach. The Black Knight is on the move once more, he thinks. Ike. Zelgius. “This is hardly the time to go challenging him,” he bites out. “Breaking Sephiran out is your priority at the moment.”

Zelgius shrugs. “So it is,” he says. “We’ll see.”

“No,” Soren hisses, and stabs an accusing finger at him. “There is no seeing. We’re going to thrash these senators through the mud, rescue Sephiran, and put Sanaki back on the throne where she belongs, or so help me if you use this time to mop up your rivalry with Ike.”

“Very well,” Zelgius says, approving. “Just like that. You’re not beholden to the Senate or to Sephiran like I am. You are your own person.”

Soren draws himself up. “And you? Aren’t I beholden to you?”

“No,” Zelgius says. “You’re past the age of majority. You may choose to follow where I go, or you may forge your own path.”

“I owe you,” Soren points out.

“Whatever debts you think you owe were paid years in advance,” Zelgius says softly. “I am simply...paying it forward, as the saying goes.”

“Oh,” Soren says. He doesn’t know what else to say to that. There’s a sinking feeling in his stomach about who, exactly, paid those years in advance, raising Zelgius up as he did Soren.

“It’s your choice,” Zelgius says. “I only wish that you make the right choice for you. Leave me to reap what I sow. Children should not have to pay for their elders’ folly.”

“The world does not work that way,” Soren says. The Branded did not ask for their blood, and yet — and yet!

“Would you begrudge me my choice?”

Soren swallows. “No,” he says quietly. “No, I would not.”

“Then you see,” Zelgius says. “I will do what I must. You must do what you think is right.”

Soren’s mouth twists. He doesn’t like where this conversation is going anymore. “You let him think you beat him three years ago,” he says. “Do it again.”

Zelgius scoffs. “He’s had three years to hone his skill as a swordsman,” he says. “He is almost there. I intend to face him full on. It will be a challenge.” His eyes gleam, and Soren looks away, discomforted. “There is only so far I can fake when he matches my skill.”

“Then fight till surrender,” Soren says. “Or first blood. Is this melodramatic duel to the death really necessary?”

“If I have the opportunity, I will strike him down, but endeavor to leave him alive,” Zelgius says, shrugging. “He likely will not. That makes it all the more dangerous.”

“You wouldn’t be in this situation if you hadn’t killed his father in the first place,” Soren growls at him.

“As I said,” Zelgius says, full of dark humour, “allow me to reap the consequences of my own mistakes.”

Soren swallows. Something’s not right here, but he can’t quite figure out what. “You’re not wishing to die, are you?”

Zelgius raises his eyebrows. “Why would I be rushing off to die when I have things to do?” he asks, unimpressed.

“But afterwards?” Soren presses him, trying to think through the jumbled mess that was his mind.

Zelgius looks away.

“Zelgius,” Soren says, and resists the urge to drag his hands down his face. Instead, he decides emotional blackmail is his best option here. “You said, when we first met, that we would be less lonely together. You can’t possibly tell me you’re planning on leaving me alone.”

“You’re hardly alone,” Zelgius says, shifting uncomfortably. “You have your commander now.”

“Yes, my commander who you are intending on having to kill you,” Soren says sarcastically. “Could you perhaps understand why that is not exactly ideal?” His voice, which has been steadily increasing in volume into yelling, cracks on the last question.

“Ideal or not, they’re the cards we’ve been given,” Zelgius says, eyes blazing, mouth pressed into a thin line. “Figure out how to play them.”

“Then shuffle the deck!”

Zelgius sighs, and the fight goes out of his shoulders. “It’s too late to shuffle the deck, Soren.”

“I can’t believe you,” Soren says, mutinous.

“I’d like to not part on bad terms before I go to rescue Sephiran,” Zelgius says, closing his eyes and tipping his head back.

Soren huffs and looks away. “Fine. I think you’re making an awful, idiotic decision based off of some misplaced sense of guilt and honour mixed with your abominable habit of needing to be the best swordsman in the room. I don’t approve of your decision, but I understand that you’re going to make it anyway no matter what I tell you, so I’d rather not waste my breath.”

They’re quiet for a bit after that. Soren tries to get his breathing back under control.

“Alright,” Zelgius says. “I suppose that’s as best as I’m going to get. Thank you for acknowledging that I make my own decisions.” He stands up.

In uncharacteristic, jerky movements, Soren crosses the room to stand before him, and attempts a hug through the armour. He feels Zelgius sigh, breath puffing across the top of his hair, and he hugs back. It’s odd. They’ve never been tactile people. But it’s nice, Soren supposes. Perhaps Titania and Mist had the right idea after all.

“Try,” he says, voice soft. “Please, Zelgius.” The for me goes unspoken, but they both know it’s there.

“I will,” Zelgius says. “Thank you, Soren.”

They break apart, avoiding each other’s gaze.

“The warp staff?” Zelgius asks.

Soren nods, and takes the warp staff out of his carefully packed supplies. “Stay safe,” he tells him. “Rescue Sephiran, and come back alive.”

“Of course,” he says, and waits, expectant.

Soren breathes, focuses, concentrates — and he’s gone.

He spends a while controlling his breathing in the empty room. When he comes out of it —

Ranulf is waiting for him next to the door, calm and expectant.

“You know,” he says quietly, “cats have really good hearing.”

Soren clenches his hands into fists, to stop the shaking. He’s not sure it works.

“That sounded pretty nasty to me. Not my business, of course. Though, you may want to tell Ike sooner rather than later.”

“I beg your pardon?”

Ranulf sighs. “I was going to tell him,” he says, tail twisting around his leg, “since I fought him in both sets of armour. I figured it out. Pretty distinctive fighting style, and he smells the same. But I think it’s your secret to divulge. I’ll give you some time. If you don’t tell him though, I will.”

Soren leans against the wall, and tries to maintain composure.

“Hey,” Ranulf says, sounding more concerned now. “You alright?”

“Yes, I’m fine. Shove off,” Soren tells him.

Ranulf gives him a measured look. “Alright then, if you say so. Don’t collapse in the hallway, it’s bad for morale. Do you think you’ll be able to make it to dinner, or shall I tell Ike that you’ve decided to squirrel yourself away to start making plans? Regardless of what I tell him, he’ll worry, of course.”

Soren takes a shuddering breath, and evens out his breathing. “Don’t tell him anything,” he says through gritted teeth. “I’ll make it to dinner just fine.”

Chapter Text

Daein decides they are in cahoots with the Senate after all. It’s the goddamned bridge, because of course it is.

“I was over this bridge when we crossed it three years ago,” Soren grumbles. It’ll be his first battle against the Maiden of Dawn. To be honest, Soren is a little intrigued to see how they’ll match up.

Perhaps he’s been ruminating over it too much, in fact. He rubs his temples, the beginnings of a headache coming on. He’ll have to sleep it off later.

“Didn’t they repair the bridge afterwards?” he asks Titania, scowling.

Titania shrugs. “I heard they did. Are the holes in the same places? Old stonework isn’t exactly cheap or easy to repair, you know.”

Soren makes a face at her. “Clearly the Maiden of Dawn has been busy,” he grumbles. “We’ll have to prioritize the fliers.”

“So, she’s clever enough to retreat when the situation turns against her,” Soren says, casting a dismal look down past Daein’s side of the bridge. The well-worn mountain path, lined with well-packed snow trod by hundreds of soldiers suggests she’s cut her losses and retreated to a more defensible position. “That doesn’t bode well for us.”

“You think the fighting will drag on,” Ike says, frowning.

“A clever strategist on the other side means our choice to cut across Daein will not be as quick as we like,” Soren says grimly. “Granted, this was our only choice. Gallia’s previous invasion would have left Flaguerre and Mugill on high alert, and it would be politically inadvisable if we wanted the Apostle to maintain her support.”

Silence.

Soren looks up at Ike. “What’s worrying you?”

Ike looks out over the valley, deep in thought. “Soren, do you remember the medallion?”

“You’re worried about the fighting,” Soren concludes. “The herons are looking after it, no?”

“Daein, Begnion, Gallia, Phoenicis, Kilvas, and Crimea,” Ike says, ticking the names off on his hands. “That’s almost everyone involved except for Goldoa.”

“And as long as Goldoa stays out of it, the herons think they’ll be able to keep it under control. Are you… do you want to stop this?”

Ike shakes his head, forehead creased. “No,” he says. “This shouldn’t be stopped. What the senators are doing is wrong. I don’t like that I’m the figurehead for the army, but I’m not going to back out now.”

Their path through Daein is just as slow as Soren predicts. The Maiden of Dawn is a formidable opponent, and Soren spends his nights pouring over maps, sometimes with Ike, sometimes with Ranulf, sometimes both.

Soren, to some disappointment, does not get to fight the Silver-Haired Maiden. It’s probably for the best, given his mixed feelings regarding her skills as a tactician and her ability to be a complete thorn in his side. The Holy Guard incident was a sore spot in particular, due to Sanaki’s close shave with death, the temporary disablement of the Holy Guard as an aerial force, and the deaths of the majority of more than a handful of platoons. He’d swallowed his pride and thanked Tibarn for that one, since his quick thinking had saved the day.

Tibarn, for his part, merely levelled Soren with a deeply piercing stare before laughing and clapping Soren on the shoulder.

“We’re allies,” the Hawk King said. “I like the little empress, and she’s promised to be fair right back. As for you, you’re doing good work. Keep it up.”

Between this meager praise and Skrimir’s open adoration, Soren’s mildly discomforted by his wholesale acceptance by Laguz royalty, but supposes he’s already fought alongside them three years ago and proved himself decently acceptable, if not vital to military success. Besides, Ike would never stand for any hint of unfairness in his army.

He also finds himself gaining an appreciation for war tactics compared to the complex politics of the Begnion court, which is an uncomfortable realization. Sephiran and Zelgius’ backroom games had been his introduction to tactical manipulation and thought, and everything had been twisted and hidden in half shadow, but battles at least took place for all to see. Or not see, depending on what he wants. He’s not sure it makes sense, but it does, somewhere in his mind.

“We’re the diversion,” he says, turning his attention to the present, tapping a castle fortification on the map. “We’ve spent long enough throwing the Greil Mercenaries at our main targets that they won’t hesitate to assume that we’re going for the prize. Not to mention, intelligence suggests the Silver-Haired Maiden and her advance guard are here. They’ll be distracted, and the Maiden unable to give orders to this side of her army. Therefore, this will be where Skrimir and King Tibarn lead the charge. General Levail will flank here to support the army.”

Skrimir and Tibarn exchange smiles full of teeth. Levail nods in understanding.

“Sounds good to me,” Ike says. “We’re all in agreement?” Nods and approving noises around the table. “Then let’s move out,” he says, and they disperse.

His plan goes well, until it doesn’t. That is to say, it goes well until the laguz start losing it, and then it goes straight downhill when a certain Goldoan Prince smashes a tower into it. Soren doesn’t know why he’s surprised anymore, except the thought of Goldoa now interfering in the war sends chills down the back of his neck.

At least he knows this now: the Maiden of Dawn is a fellow Branded. The odd twinges he gets and the headaches make much more sense.

Elincia and Ena descend to explain their side of things, a hurried, nervous desire for a ceasefire —

“We’ve attempted to hold peace talks with Daein on multiple occasions,” Sanaki snaps. “They refuse to listen to reason, and instead choose to fight. We have no more time to waste on people who choose war over peace at every turn!”

“The strife and chaos is affecting the medallion,” Ike says, passing a hand over his eyes, quiet, grim. “It glows brighter every day.”

Ena and Elincia pale, faces going equally grim as Leanne produces the medallion for their eyes. It flickers, an ominous blue glow reminiscent of fire, waiting to be unleashed.

“The blue flame burns once more,” Ena murmurs softly, and then addresses the room. “We must halt the fighting as soon as possible. Prince Kurth is speaking with the leaders of Daein.”

“If there is a way to stop the fighting, we will pursue it,” Sanaki agrees. “Peace has been our goal since this began. But I cannot abandon my people in Begnion.”

Elincia nods, in tacit agreement.

On that bright note, they dissolve to discuss things in twos and threes. Ike makes a beeline for Elincia and Lucia, no doubt to ask their reasons for coming. Instead of following him, Soren lingers at the table.

“Soren,” Sanaki says quietly. “Do you think I’m doing the right thing?”

“Is there ever such a thing as the right thing?” Soren asks.

Sanaki glares at him. Soren reconsiders his statement.

“The decision makes sense for you,” he says instead.

“This could doom us all,” she murmurs, “but my people have placed their trust and faith in me. How could I abandon them to the likes of the Senate? And Sephiran and Zelgius, too? They’re all counting on us to succeed.”

“Exactly,” Soren says. “You would not be able to make any other decision, because you have a duty to your people. Therefore, for you, there is no such thing as a perfect choice. You are doomed for certain if you choose to give up here, but if you choose the other path, there may still be a way to untangle the knot if this all fails and we press forward. Our glimmer of hope is in persuading Daein to stand down and let us pass.”

“You don’t think they will though,” Sanaki says, peering up at him.

He shakes his head. “The Senate must have some significant amount of leverage. Otherwise, Daein should have simply left themselves out of it. They have a long history of loathing towards the laguz, but I cannot imagine they hold much lost love for Begnion, either. The occupation shattered most of their resources, which would have served them much better if they put whatever was left towards rebuilding rather than waging a hopeless war with us.”

Sanaki breathes out, her breath fanning into a white cloud. “That is unfortunate,” she says, and then hesitates. “I think I may know what they’re holding over their heads.”

“Care to share?” Soren asks, surprised.

Sanaki shakes her head. “It’s only a guess, and based on some… evidence I’ve recently come into. I’ve promised not to share with anyone, and I won’t betray that confidence. But suffice to say that it’s very good leverage. What ruler does not care for their people?”

That’s…cryptic. Exactly the sort of evasive turn of phrase Sanaki would have learned from Sephiran.

She continues: “But we must push onwards, regardless. I hope — I hope this all ends soon, though. Insurrection and a country divided is no good for Begnion. But neither can I stand idly by when the Senate commits such acts of treachery.”

“You have a long path ahead, Empress,” Soren says, dipping his head in agreement. “Even if we succeed tomorrow, mending a divided people is no easy task. They won’t forget that division, even if they’re still under one country.”

“I know,” Sanaki says, looking much older than her thirteen years. She flaps a hand at him. “Go make your contingency plans. I know you’ve been dying to run off and start working on them.”

Soren nods, and goes.

Chapter Text

Of course, because that’s the way Soren’s life goes, things get worse. He’s going through the supplies with Ike in the main tent when Ena rushes in, cold air in her wake. The look on her face makes Ike stand up straight, face grim in the candlelight.

“Sir Ike,” Ena says, giving them a nod. “I’ve just received a troubling message from Prince Kurthnaga.”

“Don’t tell me,” Ike mutters, and then clears his throat. “Let me guess…no luck?”

“Far worse,” Ena says. “Prince Kurthnaga has decided to fight for Daein.”

Soren gives up the pretence of examining their supply records, puts down his papers, and stares at her, eyes narrowed, turning things over in his mind. She’s clearly unhappy about this decision. For all that she was engaged to Rajaion, Kurthnaga is still Prince — Dheginsea’s only heir, now. He outranks her, and she has no ability to order him to stand down, not that it seems her style.

Ike scowls, eyebrows furrowing into a dark frown. “What? He was supposed to stop them from fighting! He’s going to fight us instead?”

Ena shakes her head. “He has… a good reason to side with them,” she says slowly. “Unfortunately…I cannot tell you why.”

“Wonderful,” Ike says, sarcasm dripping from his words as he glowers. “So instead of standing down, Daein has just added one supposedly neutral Goldoan dragon Prince to their army. And we’ll still have to fight them, probably tomorrow, because they refuse to give up. Just wonderful.”

“I’m sorry, Ike,” Ena says, sighing. “I will try to reason with him again. Prince Kurth wished to come here so badly…King Dheginsea knows nothing of our visit. It is an unwise idea — no, it is unacceptable for the Prince of Goldoa to stand on a battlefield. I will continue to talk him out of it. I must talk him out of it.” She fiddles with something in her hands.

Clearly, the medallion weighs heavily on her — on all of their minds. Soren grimaces. The loss of life due to the prolonging of this idiotic war is already a waste without the threat of a dark god hanging over them like a stormcloud.

“I’m sorry, Ena,” Ike says, apologetic. “I know you’re doing your best to persuade him. I’m just upset.” One hand rubs ruefully at the back of his neck, the other bracing against the table.

Ena smiles tiredly at him, a small despondent thing that doesn’t reach her eyes. “I know, Ike. I will keep trying. You have my word. But,” she frowns at the stone in her hands, “I thought you should know. It is important information.”

“Yes,” Ike says. “Thank you for letting us know, Ena. We appreciate it.”

Ena nods at him, pulls out one of the stools, and perches on the edge of it, cupping the stone in her hands as she murmurs something in quiet concentration.

Soren takes a closer look at the supplies, and starts planning their distribution to withstand — or launch — another attack. They’ll be fine, really. They have the supplies they need at the moment. It’s just regrettable, that’s all.

“Er,” Ike says. “Are you talking to him with that stone?”

Ena looks up, and gives a more genuine smile. “Yes. We dragons have the power to sense the presence of our allies. If that ally is someone we care for very much, we might even be able to talk to them telepathically. But with the sending stone,” Ena lifts the stone in her hand, “we can communicate over long distances.” She sighs. “I just hope he listens to me. The current state of the Fire Emblem…no, we cannot delay. We can’t afford for the dark god to awaken.”

Soren frowns at her description of dragon laguz powers. That explains a great deal about his flight from the Begnion army to Ike’s camp. He can’t help but feel as though he’s been cheated out of telepathy somehow though, despite it clearly sounding something rare in condition. He shakes his head, clearing it of thoughts.

Ike walks to the tent, and peers outside. “It’s almost dawn,” he says quietly. “Do what you can to keep the prince out of this.”

“I will do my best, Sir Ike,” Ena agrees.

“I would have preferred that we avoided this fight, but clearly Micaiah isn’t giving us a choice. Soren?”

“If it comes down to a fight, we’ll be ready,” Soren murmurs, shuffling his notes. “By your leave, I’ll let everyone know.”

Ike nods, a sharp and brittle thing. Soren doesn’t like the look in his eyes, and touches his hand briefly as he passes him, trying to send him thoughts of calm reassurance. Ike tries to smile. It doesn’t reach his eyes, but Soren appreciates the attempt.

It will be alright, Soren wants to say. But Soren does not lie, and he suspects that would be a rather big one. So instead, he stays his tongue, and goes off to relay Ena’s message.

Soren takes back everything he’s ever thought about preferring the battlefield to politics. This is awful. There’s something absurdly wrong with today’s battlefield, the way that everyone seems to be just on the verge of absolutely losing it. Soren himself has a blistering migraine that he’s trying to ignore as he blasts soldiers to pieces with sheets of magical wind.

“Ugh,” Ranulf mutters beside him at some point. “All this chaos…I can barely see straight.”

Soren nods in part acknowledgement and part understanding, his stomach twisting uncomfortably as he turns to heal him with his staff. They exchange identical grimaces, and push on by tacit agreement.

Haar swoops down. “Micaiah and Sothe just left the battlefield,” he reports, his wyvern beating its wings steadily in place.

Soren frowns, thinking of the possibilities. “Do you have room for an extra passenger?” he asks. In response, Haar tugs on the reins, dipping lower, and extends an arm. Soren grasps it and swings on behind him, holding on for dear life as the wyvern lifts them into the air.

“Do you know where?” Soren asks.

“Back there,” Haar says, gesturing with an arm. “By the way, Jill’s flying with us now.”

Jill pulls up and gives Soren a sharp nod, which Soren returns.

“Do you know where they’ve gone?” Soren asks again. Perhaps Jill will know.

To his disappointment, Jill shakes her head. “But Micaiah’s been… off before this,” she says. “Perhaps she wasn’t feeling well, and Sothe took her off the field. It’s happened before.”

Perhaps the headaches are getting to her as well.

“Where were they positioned?” he asks. Jill’s lips tighten. It’s clear that she’s not exactly thrilled with the idea of immediately giving away all of their secrets, despite switching sides. Soren waits for her to make up her mind.

“This way,” she says finally. “I’ll lead you. Commander Haar?”

“Right on your tail,” Haar says, and swoops after her as they wing across the field. Soren takes the opportunity to cast a couple of spells into the fray, but movement on the wyvern’s back is making him nauseous and visibility is getting bad enough that he’s not confident he won’t accidentally hit any allies with it, so he desists and resorts to healing Haar and Jill whenever they get hit. Regardless, he’s able to see their branch of the army making their way forwards, especially once Jill and Haar make short work of the other dracoknights.

“Behind that copse of trees,” Jill says over the din of battle. “Not sure if you want us to charge right in.”

Soren checks the speed of their army. Steady progress, getting closer and closer.

“We’ll try to be unobtrusive,” Soren says. “But don’t worry if we’re spotted. We’re close enough to our people that we’ll have backup soon enough if we’re caught.”

Jill looks rather nervous, but Haar just nods, steady on, cool and collected as always, and nudges his wyvern into a silent dive. Jill follows.

There’s no sign of Micaiah or Sothe. Whatever footprints that they may have left behind have been covered by the snow that’s been rapidly falling. Instead, this is clearly on-site command centre of the Daein army, because there’s a large black dragon hovering anxiously at the side of a wolf and a heron — Queen Nailah and Prince Rafiel, likely — and there’s a shivering little king in mage’s robes. There’s also a handful of clearly trained generals in full plate armour, cavalry, and a collection of priests or bishops. This would probably go very poorly.

“Turn back,” Soren says to Haar. “I’ve got to let Ike know.” Haar signals to Jill, and they start their retreat, but not before they’re spotted. Shouts call up from the kernel of determined troops.

“Hang on,” Haar says, and pulls his wyvern into a series of heart-stopping manoeuvres that are supposed to make them harder to hit, but also causes Soren a great deal of vertigo. Nevertheless, said manoeuvres were not meant for this scenario, because apparently no one thought to factor dragon laguz into Begnian dracoknight — or Daein dracoknight — drills. Soren curses their lack of foresight, and hangs on for dear life.

Haar also curses, but he does so out loud as his wyvern yelps in pain, singed by Kurthnaga’s dragon breath.

“Too much weight,” Haar grunts.

Soren grimaces, and makes a large sweeping gesture at Jill, who takes it for the signal it is, and darts off to hopefully inform Ike of the lay of the land. “Let me off then,” Soren says.

Haar gives him a look.

“Thereabouts should be alright for me,” Soren says, pointing out a spot that’s closer to the priests.

“For fuck’s sake,” Haar says, and does a barrel roll as another ray of breath comes streaking dangerously close.

“He has really bad aim,” Soren notes through the pain in his head.

“I really don’t think this is the time,” Haar mutters under his breath, but jerks the reins for his wyvern to swing around in a wide arc. Soren takes the opportunity to heal the long scrape on the wyvern’s side, and slips from his back, tome in hand. He scrambles backwards, flipping it open.

Just in time, as dark magic explodes in front of him, right where he had landed. King Pelleas stands there, staring at him, his own tome open, outstretched hand wreathed in dark purple. Damn. Dark magic. Sephiran had managed to teach him some, but dark tomes were so rare and their users usually ostracized from society that they had only gone over the basics before returning to pursue anima more thoroughly.

“Ah,” Soren says, and gleefully ignores both his splintering headache and the fact that he’s smack dab in enemy territory. “The new king of Daein, Pelleas. Wonderful. How convenient. I can end this farce right here and now. Surrender or die.” He brushes his windswept hair out of his eyes, which apparently draws the king’s attention.

“Who are you? What is that mark on your forehead?” Pelleas asks, eyes wide, the purple glow dissipating from his hand. “Is it a mark of Spirit Protection?”

Soren bristles, and tamps down the urge to scoff. Who in the goddess’ name let their unblooded king on the battlefield without an adequate amount of briefing and appropriate battlefield manner?

“No,” he sneers instead. “It’s something rather… different.”

“But it looks so much like mine!” Pelleas pushes his bangs aside, exposing the blood red mark on his forehead. Soren squints, but honestly, the visibility is so bad, and he’s not getting any closer to check if their marks are identical — that’s the very definition of a foolish, gullible idiot. Besides, Ashnard had been such a madman, Soren wouldn’t be surprised if he’d slept with laguz. He had been blasé about using them as disposable soldiers and laboratory specimens, so it wouldn’t be a stretch for the man to use one as a bedwarmer.

“Is that so,” he drawls instead, unimpressed. “Then you may be more interesting than you let on. Even so, that changes nothing. Stand down or perish.” He raises his hand and begins casting.

“Wait!” Pelleas extends a hand outward, rushing forward as if to stop him — “I have so much I want to ask you!”

Soren blasts him with wind magic, making sure to angle it so that it’d pick up the ice on the ground. The king gives a satisfying yelp, and Soren does it again, pushing him back and away from him.

At least the king manages to recover some of his wits, because he gets pelted by a large swirling mass of dark magic, which stings, but is easy to withstand. Instead, he hitches a ride off of the residual dark energy, coaxing it into familiar magical patterns as he surges upwards, words of shearing winds and icy gales falling from his lips as he does his best to blast the idiot who’s caused them so much trouble from his sight.

“Ah,” Pelleas says, hands clasped to his chest, and one of the generals in familiar looking silver armour pulls him aside, to retreat. “I must…live on…”

Soren rolls his eyes, but doesn’t pursue because his head is truly throbbing in protest now. Instead, he keeps an eye on the other soldiers, who have finally decided that the intruder in their midst is a bad idea. Soren ducks a poorly thrown javelin and returns the favour with a well-placed blast of wind.

He dodges the myrmidon’s first slash but not his second, and sends up more wind magic, forcing them away from him. The narrow slash in his side burns, but he does his best to ignore it, twisting to avoid another blow.

A dracoknight bears down on him, axe glinting. Soren winces, and jumps back, trying to cut at the vulnerable belly as he sends magic outwards, switching to lightning as he goes. It’s deflected easily by armour, and the soldier wheels back for another go —

Haar swoops down, his own axe slashing across the rider’s neck, his wyvern forcing the enemy’s to the ground.

“Nicely done,” Soren rasps out.

There’s a roar on the other side of the clearing, and the cavalry has arrived. Figuratively, of course, since only some of them are on horseback. Ike strides in, Ragnell swinging from his hands, an avatar of war on the battlefield, soldiers cut down left and right. The enemy is suitably distracted, which gives them some breathing room. Soren takes the opportunity to turn the ground beneath them to slush by setting them on fire, then attempts to freeze them in it with particularly freezing blasts of wind. He’s only partially successful, because it turns out being set on fire makes people rather jumpy.

“Time to go,” Haar says, and yanks Soren upwards by the collar of his robes, which is highly uncomfortable but much preferred to getting run through with a lance. Where’s his battlefield awareness? Zelgius would be so disappointed. Actually, Zelgius would probably be horrified by this whole sequence of events. He has this thing about tacticians staying safe in the backlines, which Soren wonders whether is due to Soren’s chosen profession, or just tactically sound. Knowing Zelgius, it’s probably both.

Soren squints at the field, gleaning what he can from his brief flight.

“Nailah and Rafiel have vanished,” he says to Ike when he rejoins him at his side.

Ike frowns. “With Micaiah and Sothe?” he asks.

“Unclear,” Soren says. “Micaiah left first. Nailah was still there.”

“Hm,” Ike says.

“Also, Pelleas has retreated.”

“Well done,” Ike says.

There’s a rhythm here: Ike cuts into their enemies, Soren blasts them away with wind and ice. He’s hoping they’ll find it too cold and freeze. This goes on for a bit, before Boyd comes running with a truly abysmal piece of bad news.

“Ike, get over here quick!” Boyd’s strident call echoes over the battlefield, over the loud din of metal clashing and people dying. “Mist’s collapsed!”

They exchange glances. Soren gestures at Mia, who gives him a brillant grin like a madwoman, Ilyana right on her heels, charging in to take their place, and they’re off to follow Boyd’s voice, Soren pulling the healing staff from his belt.

“Mist! Mist, what’s wrong?” Ike barrels ahead of Soren, clearing the way.

Boyd has his arms around Mist, supporting her. There’s no blood, at least.

Soren kneels down next to them and concentrates on the healing staff.

“It’s not an affliction that can be healed,” he says, frowning as the glow fades from the staff.

“Ike…my head… hurts so much,” Mist mumbles as her brother looms over her in obvious worry. Then, she says three words that cause all of their hearts to sink with despair. “It’s the medallion.”

“What do you mean?” Ike asks.

“She’s calling out to me,” Mist murmurs. “The medallion…Ike, will you take me to her?”

Ike nods, eyes creased with worry. Soren thinks it’s probably not a good idea to take an obviously weakened Mist to a medallion possessed by a dark goddess, but it seems a spectacularly bad idea to voice that thought, so he keeps it tucked to his chest.

“I’ll clear a path,” Boyd says. “Take Mist with you, quick!”

Ike nods and gathers his sister up into his arms. She’s remarkably small and fragile looking compared to him, and Soren dearly hopes they’re not walking into a trap as he covers their escape.

He returns to the fringes of the battlefield with Boyd, who’s clearly upset, but determined to protect the path from detection. Soren agrees, and they stand there chucking axes and wind magic at anyone who’s foolish enough to head in their direction for a while, before there’s a flash — a glow of magic of some kind —

and everything

goes

silent.

Chapter Text

The first thing Soren notices is that his headache is gone. Instead, his head is pleasantly clear of the thoughts that have been plaguing him for… a long time.

“What in the name of Gatrie’s moldy socks,” Boyd says flatly.

Soren gives him a side-eye. That’s…certainly a creative way to curse. He thinks he can see Titania’s hand in that.

Instead of denigrating his cursing skills, Soren turns to look at whatever has caught Boyd’s attention.

“Ah.” Soren frowns, and moves up to tap gingerly at a soldier’s stone chestplate. “Hm. Well, this is certainly interesting.”

“Interesting?” Boyd asks. “It’s weird, is what it is.”

“We should find the others,” Soren says urgently. “I hope they’re not turned to stone.”

Boyd nods, grim-faced, and they break into a run when they hear Ike yelling.

Luckily, most of their usual party is unaffected. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the majority of the army — on both sides. The battlefield is a silent statuary that Soren hopes will withstand the wear and tear of nature until they can figure out a way to return them to their original state.

This, however, means that they have more pressing business than the war.

At least this means he’ll finally get to meet the Silver-Haired Maiden in person.

“I’m not Micaiah! How many times do I have to tell you that?” It’s a shrill, annoyed voice of a woman. Soren blinks, and amends his earlier thought. Apparently not, it seemed.

“Right then,” Ike says, frowning in doubt. “In that case, who are you?”

“I’m Yune,” she chirps. “Nice to meet you!”

Soren frowns. Ah. Sounds like a case of possession, or perhaps insanity.

Sothe, who is much taller than when Soren last saw him, glares at her. “What have you done to Micaiah?”

Soren resists the urge to scowl. Is everyone destined to tower over him? Knowing his luck, one of these days Sanaki will grow taller than him, and then he’ll never hear the end of it.

“Nothing!” Yune says defensively, like a child caught with their hand in the cookie jar. “She’s still here with me now. She knows you’ll never be able to fix this without my help. So, she’s letting me use her body to talk to you now.”

“Uh huh,” Tibarn interjects, skeptical. He crosses his arms. “So you don’t have a body of your own. What does that make you?”

The being hums, chewing on her fingernails. “Well, I’ve been asleep for a very long time. Longer than any of you could imagine.” Her voice trails off, dreamlike. “But the galdr woke me up.”

“Lehran’s Medallion,” Ike says, in a tone of dark realization. “You’re the dark god that was sealed inside it?”

Soren tries to ignore the spreading warmth of pride as he listens to Ike question Yune. It’s illogical for him to feel like this for a realization that isn’t even his.

“Um…no? I’m not a dark god, silly. I’m not dark or light. Hm, how to put this in a way for you mortal beings to understand…I am freedom. Chaos. Transformation. Future. Mystery.” Yune spins around on the spot, the borrowed robes flaring out around her as she claps her hands. “I am what I am. I am Yune.”

“I don’t care what you are, or what you’re called,” Ike snaps. “Are you the one who turned everyone to stone?”

At that, the goddess droops with upset disappointment. “No, that wasn’t me,” she says. “I haven’t done much of anything. I just woke up.” She pauses. “No, that was Ashera’s doing. It was her judgement upon the world.”

Sanaki’s eyes and mouth go wide. “Nonsense!” She bats a hand out, as if to physically swat the statement from her presence. “Ashera would never harm us!”

Soren…begs to differ. But it’s different for Sanaki, who has to uphold a country and all its values at age thirteen. Begnion is a theocracy, and Sanaki up on a pedestal as her voice and will. Sephiran, too, is strangely deferent to Ashera, which Soren supposes makes sense for Sanaki’s upbringing, and Sephiran’s masquerade as a common priest. Zelgius has never revealed his thoughts on the subject, but both of them know, even unspoken, about the Branded’s role in Begnion’s religious dogma. But Zelgius follows Sephiran’s lead, so Soren keeps his head down and his thoughts to himself. There’s nothing to think about a goddess who believes he ought not to exist, so he doesn’t. If it weren’t for the evidence of a goddess in front of him, he’d ignore their existence the way the laguz did his.

Yune levels her with a surprisingly measured look. It’s curious: Micaiah’s eyes are a blood red, like his. Sothe flinches every time he meets her eyes, so perhaps the red is a sign of possession. He’ll have to look for that.

“You’ve got it all wrong, little meatling,” Yune says, tone amused but devoid of humour. “Ashera is not kind or loving to the beings of this world. She, too, is neither light nor dark, good nor evil. She is…restriction. Order. Stability. Past. Certainty. Restraint. She is what she is. She is Ashera.”

These descriptions are rather unhelpful. Soren regrets not delving more into religious studies when he still had access to the royal libraries of Sienne, but he was rather determined about the ‘ignoring beings that would rather he not have existed’ at the time, which made total sense when he hadn’t anticipated coming face to face with the perplexing goddesses themselves.

“I don’t understand,” Ike says. “That doesn’t make sense. Why would the Goddess Ashera try to destroy us? If anyone’s going to do that at all, wouldn’t it be you, the dark god who was sealed inside the medallion for trying to drown us all in the first place?”

At this, Yune lets out a squawk of indignation. “Dark god? You called me a dark god again! How would you like it if I called you a dark bag of organs? I don’t want to talk to you anymore!” She huffs and crosses her arms before turning around in a slow circle. “Instead, I’ll talk to…mm… you!” She perks up again, beaming as she points at Mist.

Mist blinks, taken aback. “Me?” she asks.

Yune nods. “Ashera’s always hated me, but I’ve always liked her! You’ve got some of her in you. So, I’ll talk to you!”

“Uh, okay,” Mist says. “So… you’re Yune?”

Soren resists the urge to sigh.

“That's right. I'm Yune. Ashera is order. I am chaos. We’re sisters, but opposite in all things. We're linked to one another, though. When I sleep, Ashera sleeps. When I wake, Ashera wakes.”

That…explains quite a lot, actually.

“...And the goddess Ashera was the one who turned all the beorc and laguz into stone…” Mist trails off, thinking. “Are you here to tell us how to fix everything?” A pause, and then Mist claps her hands together and exclaims: “Oh! You’re the one who spoke to me! You said, "Wake me with the galdr of release, not with the spirit of war."

“Yes, I did! I'm so glad you understood! You're so very clever.” Yune beams at her, then continues: “Of course, I was hoping that by sending you that message, we’d be able to stop all of this from happening.” She looks a little more somber at that, gesturing to the battlefield around them.

“What do you mean?” Mist asks.

“Hm…how to explain…” Yune trails off, tapping a finger against her lips. “Long ago, your ancestors made a promise to Ashera. They promised they would start no wars among all the nations for at least one thousand years. If this promise was broken, then we would be woken by war, and Ashera would destroy the world and try again with a new one. Despite this promise, you dummies kept fighting each other. So war and conflict spread throughout the world, and when Ashera woke up…she cast her judgement upon the world.”

“So what does it matter?” Ike asks. “You were woken by the galdr, not the spirit of war, and this happened anyway. How were you going to stop Ashera from doing all this?”

Yune makes a noise of offence. “I’m not talking to you!”

Ike scowls. “Would you stop acting like a child?”

Mist, ever the peacemaker, interjects. “Please, Yune,” she says. “Forgive my brother. We want to save the people who were turned to stone. We need you to tell us how. It did matter that we woke you with the galdr of release, right?”

“It does,” Yune agrees, smiling at Mist. “You understand that because of our link, waking me is the same as waking Ashera. Now, if Ashera had been awakened by the spirit of chaos, none of us would be standing here right now. She would have done what she was supposed to do, which was to destroy the world, like that.” She snaps her fingers. “No hesitation, no discussion. Just boom! Gone.

“But, if she was awakened by the galdr of release, she was supposed to consult with me first. She wasn't supposed to pass down her judgement until she heard from me. Ashera went ahead and turned everyone into stone without asking me.” She pouts, crossing her arms. “That's so unfair! I'll show her, though. I'll turn them all back somehow! The problem is that I can't do this by myself. I need your help. Will you help me?” She turns earnest eyes onto the rest of their party.

“Of course we'll help,” Mist says, glancing at her brother. “It's strange, but I trust you, Yune. And we all want to save the people who got turned to stone.”

Ike nods. “Yes,” he says. “We’ll do whatever it takes.”

After that, everyone quickly pitches in with their agreement. Soren keeps an eye on Sanaki, who seems rather subdued: not unlikely, given the revealing contents of Yune’s explanation. He waits for her to come to a decision — but it’s obvious what she’ll choose in the end. Regardless of her belief in the goddess, Sanaki has come this far for her people; she won’t hesitate to go even further.

“To be honest, I've spent my life learning and teaching that the goddess Ashera watches over and protects us,” Sanaki says. “This is all a little hard to accept.”

“You don’t have to believe me,” Yune says, cocking her head to the side. It’s oddly sympathetic, the way she watches her, but the next words that come out of her mouth are anything but. “You could just let her destroy the world.”

“No,” Sanaki says firmly. “I will do whatever it takes to save the people who were turned to stone. I will join the others in helping you.”

Soren smiles, and hides it behind his hair. Sigrun, too, is smiling, a small, proud thing. Tanith nods in brisk approval.

Sothe, on the other hand, is much less pleased.

“So what you’re saying is that we all have to play nice and work together? Just forget about all that’s happened?”

“Sothe, look around,” Ike says, voice low and firm, and takes Sothe aside. A murmured conversation later, and they break apart in agreement.

Yune claps her hands in delight. “Great! I’m glad that’s all settled then. Now…how should we begin?” She frowns. “I know! Let's divide the army into three teams. I'm pretty sure that Ashera is going to notice what we're up to, so we’re going to have to move quickly…”

“That’s a good idea,” Ike says thoughtfully. “It reduces the risk of everyone being killed at once.”

It also reduces the risk of detection, given their numbers. Soren frowns, and casts a speculative glance at the Dawn Brigade, who he’s largely unfamiliar with. Perhaps he’ll ask Jill or Sothe for their opinions if Yune doesn’t deign to release Micaiah.

“We have to hurry,” Yune says, closing her eyes. “I can feel Ashera’s power building.”

That’s an ominous statement if he’s ever heard one. If they want to make it to the tower, they’re going to have to put aside their differences. To that end, they’re going to want to put together parties that are unfamiliar to each other but need time to work together to be decently cordial. Each party is going to want some sort of tactician on the team as well — that means he’ll split himself and Micaiah into different parties. The last group can have Ranulf and Tibarn, who have enough experience with the battlefield to make up for the lack of formal tactician. Where Tibarn goes, there’ll be Reyson. Nailah will stick with Rafiel, and Leanne with Nealuchi.

Ah. He’d forgotten. Ena would make sense for the third group. She’s a formidable tactician in her own right, given his suspicions that she’d ran the tactical side of Ashnard’s war. The question is whether she’s available in that capacity, given Prince Kurthnaga’s current state of mind. He hasn’t seen the prince — as far as any of them know, he’s huddled in his tent at the moment.

He’s distracted from his thoughts by a bright light. Ike is glowing, a flickering blue like the medallion. He glances at Yune, who’s smiling, which suggests everything is under control. Somehow, this is not a comforting thought. Soren sucks in a breath, staring at the luminescent figure until the light fades.

“How do you feel?” Yune asks.

Ike frowns. There’s something new to the way he’s carrying himself now, even though Soren knows he’s tired of the weight on his shoulders.

“…Strong,” Ike says, solemn. “Like I could take on anyone.”

“You’re very confident for a being who can die,” Yune chirps cheerfully. “I’m glad that worked. Now…each team should take a different route, but your destination will be the same: the Tower of Guidance that stands in the middle of the land you named Begnion. I hope to see you all there. I'll be waiting. Don’t take too long, okay?”

Yune collapses into Sothe’s arms. Then there’s the delicate sound of chirping birdsong, and they all stop to watch as a small, orange bird flies off into the sunlight.

“A bird?” Ike asks, surprised. They’ve not heard birdsong since Ashera cast her judgement. Ulki had pronounced the world silent.

“That’s Yune,” Sothe says. “Then that means—” He looks down at the girl in his lap. “Micaiah?”

“Oh, Sothe…” the girl murmurs, then her eyes flutter open to amber gold, not the blood red that had been there previously.

“You’re back! I was so worried!” Sothe looks down at her, eyes alight with some unnamable emotion.

“Hey, if that bird was Yune, where’d she go?” Ike asks, still staring off in the distance after her.

“I don't know where exactly,” Micaiah says in a much calmer and softer lilt than Yune. “But she said she must go look for...something.”

“Leaving us by ourselves, huh,” Ike says.

“It doesn’t matter,” Tibarn says quietly. “We need to split ourselves into three groups and move out for the tower.”

“The supplies as well,” Soren says, and turns to the merchants, who have already obligingly split themselves into three groups.

“I’m going with Ike’s group,” Aimee says immediately.

Soren rolls his eyes, and they move into the command tent.

“Yune had some suggestions for paths each group can take,” Micaiah says, pulling out a map. Soren takes the opportunity to approach and peer over her shoulder as she traces them out with a finger.

“The first one goes through the desert,” Soren says, frowning. “Mages and fliers. No cavalry, the horses will slow them down.”

“I’ll take that one,” Micaiah says softly.

“I’m coming with you,” Sothe says, firm.

Soren shrugs. He’s got no real opinion about that. Across the way, he meets Sigrun’s eyes. Grim-faced, she gives him the barest hint of a nod.

“Take Apostle Sanaki and the Holy Guards with you,” Soren says. “The empress is an accomplished mage, and as you well know, her guards are fliers.” Micaiah gives an absentminded nod of agreement.

Sanaki grits her teeth, but doesn’t say anything. Sigrun leans down and murmurs something that Soren doesn’t catch. Sanaki won’t be happy with him for this, and the oil incident still shines apparent in their minds. But if they’re to work together, they’ll have to confront them face on and put their quarrels aside. Besides, Sanaki will be able to interrogate Micaiah to her heart’s content, and with Sigrun and Tanith watching over her, she’ll be fine.

“Skrimir, Lethe, Mordecai,” Soren says, frowning. Micaiah will need to have experience with laguz and their fighting style. “Take Princess Leanne and Nealuchi as well.” He wants to split up Nailah and Rafiel from Micaiah. He doesn’t know what made them fight for her in the end, but he doesn’t intend to leave them all together. “You know your people best,” he prompts.

“Jill, if we’re looking for fliers,” Micaiah says. “You’ll have to tell me your plans for the rest of the groups for me to decide how to split my people.”

“Take Marcia and Haar if you want the rest of the fliers,” Soren says instead. Haar, in case Jill needs someone to keep her head straight. “Ulki and Janaff will stay with King Tibarn.”

“Ike and Queen Nailah, for the second route,” Soren says. “Mist and Prince Rafiel to go with. I’ll stay with Ike. We’ve been in this area before, so the majority of the Greil Mercenaries will do well here. Titania, Boyd, Rolf. Gatrie and Shinon. Mia. Heather, in case we need someone with light fingers.”

“Volug, to go with Queen Nailah and Prince Rafiel,” Micaiah says. Soren nods, flicking eyes over the half naked wolf man.

Soren points out the third route, which goes through forests and a patch of what might be swamp. “King Tibarn, Prince Reyson, and Ranulf for the third route. Queen Elincia and Lucia as well, if that suits. Tibarn’s retainers will go with, and they can have the Crimean Knights and militia as well — Kieran, Astrid, Makalov, Brom, Callil, Nephenee — take Oscar as well, since he’s familiar with how they operate. And Rhys, in case you need a primary healer. There’s more ground to cover, so the horses will come in handy.”

“Fiona is our only cavalier,” Micaiah says. “Meg to go with her father. Tauroneo can go along as well.”

“Ranulf, would you prefer Lyre and Kyza to follow you, or with Skrimir?” Soren asks.

“Skrimir,” Ranulf answers thoughtfully. “With Lethe, to watch her sister’s back. I’ll be fine with the hawks, and Queen Elincia and I get along rather well.”

“Ena, are you able to advise on tactics?” Soren asks, moving on.

Ena shakes her head. “Regrettably, no,” she says quietly. “I am not available for that at the moment.”

“Understandable,” Soren says politely. The hawks will be fine with Ranulf and Elincia, and Lucia can chip in if necessary. If only Elincia had brought Bastian! “In that case, have you given any thought to who you’ll be travelling with?”

“With Ike’s group, if he is amenable,” Ena says, glancing between him and Ike.

Ike shrugs. “Fine with me,” he says.

Soren nods and makes a note on his papers. “You’ll want an extra healer for your group,” he tells Micaiah.

“Laura and Aran,” Micaiah says, indicating her priest. “Edward, Nolan, Leonardo. Zihark. Ilyana, if she’s agreeable.”

“Wonderful. Sounds like a plan, unless anyone has objections?”

And with that, the groups are divided. Soren notes down the appropriate supplies, and everyone gets started on the process of getting packed for travel.

Soren swallows, and tries not to think about how failure at this stage may mean the end of the world. If it does end, it’s not like he’ll be around to agonize over it anyway.

Ena steps forward. “If I may have a moment?” she asks. “Prince Kurth has requested that I hand these out to each of the herons.”

“Those are sending stones,” Ike says, recognizing them from — was it only yesterday? It feels like ages ago.

“Yes, that’s correct,” Ena says. “King Tibarn, would you give this one to Prince Reyson?”

“That’s clever,” Tibarn says, as he takes a stone. “We’ll be able to communicate with the other teams using these.”

Ena smiles, and holds out another. “Queen Nailah, please give this one to Prince Rafiel.”

Nailah nods and turns the stone over in her hands. “I will,” she says.

“And this one is for Princess Leanne.”

“She’s with our group,” Sothe says. “I’ll give it to her.” He takes the stone in his hands, and Ena steps back.

“Be ready to move out in an hour,” Soren says. “Spread the word about the groups, especially if they’re in yours.”

Ranulf catches him by the elbow as he leaves the tent.

“It’s about time, don’t you think?” he asks, faux casual. Both of them know that this is anything but.

Soren breaths out, letting it crystallize in the cold winter air. “As you wish,” he says bitterly.

“He may not take it as badly as you think,” Ranulf says. “After all, he has more pressing matters on his mind.”

“If you say so,” Soren says, shrugging. He takes a step back, breaking his hold on his arm. “Now, if there’s anything else?”

“No, nothing else,” Ranulf says, and gives Soren a searching look. “Take care, Soren.”

“You as well,” Soren says, resists the urge to scowl, dips his head, and does his best to leave before he gets further waylaid.

Instead, Sanaki makes straight for him, and drags him into a nearby tent.

“May I ask why?” she asks, blunt and to the point.

“You need to be able to work together in the future,” Soren says. “She’ll be influential in Daein, whatever happens. They look to her, not King Pelleas. You’ll want to get a measure of her sooner rather than later, and you’ll be able to ask the questions you want without worrying about how it looks to anyone else.”

Sanaki looks away, a dark look on her face. “Fine,” she says. “I don’t have to like it, but I can see your point.”

“Who knows,” Sigrun comments lightly, “you may even find things in common with her. After all, she’s a young leader as well, Empress Sanaki. You get along well with Queen Elincia, after all.”

Soren resists the urge to point out that Elincia had been in a completely different situation and hadn’t been trying to kill her, which would defeat the point Sigrun was trying to make.

A muffled ‘ow!’ from Tanith suggests Sigrun had foreseen a similar statement coming out of Tanith’s mouth and had elbowed her rather sharply to shut her up.

Sanaki scowls at the ground. Soren think’s there’s probably something else bothering her, given the religious aspect of their current problems, but she sighs instead. “We won’t be able to go looking for Sephiran and Zelgius, will we.”

“No,” Soren says, regretful. “They should be fine on their own, nonetheless. Sephiran’s a skilled magic practitioner and Zelgius is one of Tellius’ best swordsmen. Unless they get taken by surprise, they should be alright.”

“Unless they’re stone,” Sanaki mutters darkly.

“In that case, it’ll be up to us to save them,” Sigrun says. “We should get ready, Empress.”

“Yes,” Sanaki says, taking a deep breath to steel herself. She holds her head high. “Let’s go. Good luck, Soren. Stay safe.”

“Of course, Empress,” Soren says. “You as well.”

Sigrun gives him a hasty hug and a smile, and follows Sanaki out the tent. Tanith lingers a little longer.

“May this not get us all killed,” she grumbles. “I hope you know what you’re doing, putting them together on a team.”

“They have a greater cause to work towards,” Soren points out. “If they’re unable to do that now, they’ll be unable to do it when it really matters. Better to find out earlier rather than later. Besides, if it gets really nasty, you’ll be there to have her back.” He pauses. “I find that life or death scenarios also give a sense of camaraderie, which may go a long way in the future.”

Tanith nods. “You take care as well, you hear?”

“Pleased to know you care, Deputy Commander,” Soren drawls.

“Otherwise, I’ll have no one to roll eyes with and make fun of the senators behind their backs,” Tanith says. “Of course, that’s provided we leave any of them alive after this mess.”

Soren gives a snort in answer, and Tanith departs.

He takes a deep breath, and goes searching for Ike.

Chapter Text

Soren finds him at the top of a ridge, surveying the silent battlefield of statues.

“Ike,” Soren says quietly, in the emptiness of the winter air. “I have something to tell you.”

“Yes?” Ike asks, his hair dotted with melting snowflakes. He smiles softly at Soren, open and trusting. Soren swallows, hard. He’s about to tear it all down.

“It’s about the Black Knight.” He turns away, unable to watch Ike’s face change.

“I see,” Ike says, voice carefully emotionless. “What about him?”

“The Black Knight,” Soren says, fighting to keep his breathing steady. “Zelgius is the Black Knight, Ike.”

He waits for Ike’s judgement, staring out into the cold landscape.

There’s a long period of silence.

“I see,” Ike says again, and then on a shakier, indrawn breath of air: “General Zelgius killed my father?”

“I think so,” Soren says, eyes burning as the wind blows frost into them.

“Are you certain?” Ike asks, voice soft.

Soren closes his eyes, turns towards Ike, and nods.

A warm arm drapes around his shoulders, pulls him in.

“Soren,” Ike says. “Father sometimes used to say…children are not their parents.”

Soren twists out of his grip to glare up at him. “My guardian killed your father in front of you, and you — you — attempt to comfort me about it?”

“What?” Ike asks, confused. “It’s not like you were there. I’d know.”

“It’s your father who died, Ike,” Soren says, scowling. “You shouldn’t be comforting me. I’m pretty sure you should be furious with me.”

“Well, being furious with you isn’t going to bring him back,” Ike says. “Besides, it’s not you who killed him.”

“No,” Soren says. “But I’ve been keeping it from you. You should be mad about that.”

Ike is quiet for a while. “How long have you been sitting on it?” he asks, finally.

“I had my suspicions, three years ago,” Soren says. “I put the pieces together then too. He admitted it.”

“I can’t say that I’m not hurt that you knew and you kept it from me,” Ike says slowly. “But I also can’t fault you for it, I suppose. You were walking a pretty thin line there, being my friend and his ward and also having to keep the army together. I think I might be more upset about it later, when I’ve had the time to think about it.”

“Why are you being so understanding about all this?” Soren asks, ire rising. Zelgius had killed his father, and Soren had kept it from Ike for three long years.

“Do you want me to be angry about it?” Ike asks. “It’s not the time. We have a goddess to confront. If Zelgius shows up, I’m not going to say no to more hands on deck.”

“And if he shows up to cross swords with you?”

Ike gives him a measuring look. “Do you think he will, at the world’s time of need?”

“I didn’t think him capable of committing atrocities in Ashnard’s name, either,” Soren snaps, crossing his arms over his chest. “It discomforts me. I don’t know what he has planned. I don’t know what’s going on, and it irks me.”

“Has he ever spoken to you about it?” Ike asks, pensive.

“He’s just the sword arm, Ike,” Soren says. “It’s Sephiran who’s running the show, most of the time. They’re very — they’re very loyal to each other, you know.”

“And you?” Ike asks.

Soren looks away. “I told him to leave it,” he says. “To fake it again, like Fort Pinell.”

“And he said?”

“You’re too skilled for that now,” Soren says. Bitterness seeps into his tone. “He thinks it all a good lark, testing his strength in battle.”

Ike hums. “I’ve had enough of bloodshed for a lifetime, Soren,” Ike says, equally quiet. “I’m tired of kill or be killed. If he comes at me with a sword, I’ll match him. I’ll kill him if I have to. But if he leaves alone — I’ll leave it. Until all this is done and over with, at least. We’ll see after that.”

“I won’t ask you to spare him,” Soren says. “I don’t have the right. I won’t hold it against you either, whatever you choose.”

Ike gives him a long, searching look, and nods. “Thank you,” he says. “For letting me know. It can’t have been an easy decision.”

Soren doesn’t reply, and stares, mulish, out at empty fields of snow. Ike puts a hand on his shoulder, squeezes once, and leaves, snowflakes in his wake.

“No,” Soren agrees quietly, after Ike has left. “It wasn’t.”

The journey to the tower is uncomfortably quiet, save for the sounds of Volug playing in the snow, and the quiet short conversations people are having. Mist has thankfully recovered from her previous illness on the battlefield, while Prince Kurthnaga remains clearly unwell, Ena staying at his side.

Soren doesn’t walk alongside Ike, but falls in with Titania just behind, keeping an eye on the head and shoulders held high in front of all of them. He doesn’t know if Ike has told Mist yet. He definitely hasn’t told Titania.

“He’s awfully quiet, isn’t he,” Titania murmurs softly. “Can’t be helped, given the situation we’re in. The world’s lives are a heavy burden to bear.”

Soren makes a noise of acknowledgement. He’s not particularly inclined to chat.

Titania nudges his shoulder. “You should go talk to him.”

“It’s not a wise idea to distract him at the moment,” Soren says.

“You’re not the distraction you think you are,” Titania says. “I think he’d welcome the distraction, to be honest.”

“I don’t think so.” Soren resists the urge to cross his arms and look away, instead staring straight at the back of Ike’s head.

Titania sighs. “Well, I can’t say I didn’t try. What’s bothering you, Soren?”

“It’s none of your business, Titania,” Soren returns.

“Hm. Well. Keep in mind that a group needs its leader and tactician to be on good terms in order to function,” she says. “Communication is key.”

“There won’t be an issue about that,” he says. “I guarantee it.”

“So it’s a personal matter then,” Titania says, and sighs. “I do wish the two of you had picked a better time to have this spat. Although I suppose with the end of the world approaching, there is no better time.”

Soren frowns, twisting his face into baffled confusion. “What do you mean?” What spat had Titania been expecting?

“Ah.” Titania, seeing the expression on Soren’s face, looks caught off guard and immensely awkward, flushing red under the red of already wind blasted skin. “You’re very quiet when it comes to your emotions, but with Ike, you wear your heart on your sleeve,” Titania says, in clear diversion.

Soren narrows his eyes.

Titania’s expression softens. “You don’t have anything to worry about, you know,” she continues. “The commander is clearly fond of you as well.”

Soren tilts his head, turning her words over in his mind. “I don’t understand your meaning,” he says at last. “That has nothing to do with anything.”

“No?” Titania’s mouth tenses, trying — and failing — to restrain a smile. She pats him gently on the shoulder, oddly maternal. She reminds him of Sigrun. Soren thinks they would get along very well, if not for the fact that every time they saw each other, it usually meant they were trying to hold off certain disaster. “Think about it,” Titania encourages, and mercifully, leaves him alone to think in silence.

A brisk lunch, and then the day turns to afternoon, and then to purple twilight.

Nailah suddenly bounds up to Ike, Rafiel following close behind. Ike looks over his shoulder, straight at Soren. Soren nods, understanding as he struggles through the snow to get to his side.

“My sister just sent a message about some ‘Disciples of Order,’” Rafiel says, hands clasped tightly around the crystal in his hands. “Ashera freed them from stone to fight for her. She blessed their weapons and armour, and sent them to fight. They fought them off, but it was an unnerving experience. Micaiah speculates they’ll only get stronger as we approach the tower.”

“We’ll have to move quickly then,” Ike says, grimly focused on the direction of the tower. “We don’t want to get worn down by constant ambushes.”

“Worse, that means they could attack at any moment and we’d have no idea who or where they are,” Soren says, frowning. They had come across too many grey statues in their journey. If any of them started moving — “I’ll start working on contingency plans. We’ll have to remain alert.”

“Agreed,” Ike says.

“I’ll keep my ears open,” Nailah says with a toss of her head. “I may not have the hearing of that retainer of Tibarn’s, but I should be able to hear if anything’s coming.”

“Thank you,” Ike says, and exchanges a brief look with Soren. Soren meets his gaze, and then swings his head around to stare at their group as Ike relays the news of the attack on Micaiah’s party, encouraging everyone to keep a hand on their weapons as they travel.

“We won’t be able to keep up a state of indefinite alert for very long,” Soren says quietly. “It’ll tire us out quickly.”

“We just have to hold until the tower,” Ike says, face determined.

They make camp earlier than usual, scavenging for sandbags in a long abandoned ruin. In fact, it’s more clearing in the woods than ruin at this point, but a wall is still a wall, no matter how close it looks to crumbling into sand.

Everyone’s gone to sleep, in full armour. It’s not comfortable in the least, but they all know the dangers of being caught unawares in their sleepwear. Soren has first watch, which he appreciates. He needs the quiet time to think.

“Er, Soren?” Someone sits down on the log next to him. Well, not someone. It’s Ike, of course.

“Yes, Ike?” Soren asks.

Ike fidgets. “Uh, Aimee said to give this to you,” he says, and deposits a tome in his lap.

Soren looks up at him through his hair, and then back down at the tome, which looks positively ancient. The green cover denotes it as part of the wind family, the golden embossing a clear sign of its superior value. This is not a cheap tome. In fact, this looks extremely rare and expensive.

“Did she?” Soren asks, bemused. Aimee doesn’t seem the type to be gifting him expensive tomes, but he supposes the end of the world might be enough to make even the most greedy merchant part with their wares.

Ike nods, an odd look on his face.

Soren, despite himself, smiles. “Thank you, Ike,” he says simply, and cracks open the tome, running fingers over carefully inked words of power. “It’s very thoughtful of her.”

“Mhm.” Ike makes a noise of agreement. “Hey, Soren?”

“Yes, Ike?”

“We’re okay, aren’t we?” he asks, quiet. “I mean, things are kind of awkward right now, because of what we talked about earlier today, but — we’re alright, aren’t we? We’re not the men who raised us.”

Soren swallows. It was all theoretical. Zelgius was either stone or wandering aimlessly in Begnion, and wasn’t about to jump out of the shadows to challenge Ike to a fight. “No,” he agrees. “We’re not the men who raised us. If he comes at you, Ike, I expect you to fight and not lie there to be gutted like a fish.”

“I won’t blame you for his actions,” Ike says. “He answers for what he does, not you. And I have no intention of giving up. As for your keeping this secret from me…” Soren waits with baited breath. “I think you’ve tortured yourself enough over it. Yes, I’m upset about it, but I don’t want this between us. Not here, not now. Can we put this behind us?”

“If that’s what you want,” Soren says.

“That is what I want,” Ike says firmly.

Soren dips his head. “Then I’ll do my best to do so.”

Ike’s mouth does a funny twitch, like an almost smile, then claps him on the back. “Good,” he says.

“You should go to sleep,” Soren tells him. “I can take first watch by myself.”

“I don’t mind,” Ike says, mulish. Then he sighs and runs a hand through his hair. “I can’t sleep anyway, so I may as well be doing something helpful. Do you want to talk to me about your plans?”

“I don’t think there’s much I can plan for,” Soren admits. “It’s hard to plan for the unknown. The most I can do is make sure we’re well equipped and prepared to fight. We’ll have to react quickly, because we won’t know what we’re facing until we’re looking at it.”

“Oh,” Ike says, and they both fall silent for a spell, staring out into the pitch black of night. A wind blows, and their firelight flickers.

Soren glances across at him, and Ike’s face is so tense, fists clenched in the robe hastily thrown over his armour. His shoulders are up, held tight and impassive against the winter chill, knees locked together in hopes of preserving warmth.

“I hate this,” Ike admits.

Soren glances at him, concerned.

“I’m tired of leading armies,” Ike continues, voice barely a whisper above the wind. “I never set out for any of this. My father taught me how to lead the mercenaries, not armies. Daein and the rest of the world might still remember him as the legendary General Gawain, but to me he was just my father and commander, Greil. I never met General Gawain.”

“Are you sure they’re so different?” Soren asks, equally quiet. “General Gawain did leave to raise you and Mist, after all.”

Ike shrugs.

“The point is that I don’t want to do this again,” he says. “I thought I was done with armies three years ago. I don’t resent Gallia for pulling me back into this, but I’m tired. I don’t want to do this anymore. I don’t want to be remembered for this, either.”

“Then don’t do it again,” Soren says. “Say no the next time someone comes to your doorstep.”

“But I can’t stand idly by when injustice is being done either,” Ike says.

Soren contemplates this for a moment. The sentiment does ring true for Ike, who is honest and straightforward in the morally upright kind of way.

“You’ll never be left alone here, you know,” Soren tells him. “If we succeed, I mean. Then you’ll be the hero of Tellius, and they’ll never leave you alone. Even those you consider friends and allies — it’ll be one thing, and then another.”

“I know,” Ike says, closing his eyes. “I know.”

Chapter Text

A detour through the gaudiest mansion of a spineless worm of a certain senator and a quick skirmish later, they arrive in Sienne.

The Tower is aglow with golden light, the streets silent and empty with its statues, both stone and marble alike. The silence is almost unbearable. These were Sanaki’s people. How many times had he watched her be received by cheers and adoration? Once, he had been irritated by the crowds and what he perceived to be the mindless fawning of the masses. Now, he thinks he may never take the noises of people going about their business for granted again.

Not even the reunion with the other two groups can dull the silence. It’s a muted affair, everyone solemn at the sight of the Tower looming ominously above them and the all too many statues they’d passed on their journeys.

There’s nothing else to do, except to rest and push on. They make camp.

“Soren,” Sanaki says, and pulls at his sleeve until she’s pulled him into a relatively quiet, out of the way corner.

“Is it important?” Soren asks.

“It’s about the Black Knight,” she says.

His blood turns to ice.

Sanaki looks up at him. “You knew,” she says. “Of course you’d have figured it out. You were his ward.”

“Can it wait for later?” Soren asks, and brushes her off. “We have more pressing matters.”

Something flicks over Sanaki’s face, too fast for him to determine. “Of course,” she says, graceful, and the courtly mask slips back over her features, carefully emotionless. “He showed up in the desert.”

It’s a knife to the chest. “And why isn’t he with us now?”

Sanaki turns to look at him, quietly ponderous. “He didn’t talk to me, you know,” she says. “He only talked to Micaiah. And then he left, using that warp powder of his.”

“Did he say where?” Soren asks.

Sanaki shakes her head no.

“I guess neither of us knows what’s going on,” Soren says bitterly. “Thank you for telling me, Apostle.” He walks away before Sanaki can ask him any more questions. He doesn’t want to talk about this.

He’s being stupid, he decides. He’s an adult, and he has to make plans for entering the tower tomorrow morning. He doesn’t have time to worry about Zelgius anymore. Zelgius can go ruin himself if he’s so intent on it.

Of course, that’s what he tells himself. He’s not so sure he believes it.

Someone pulls open the flap to his tent.

“Soren,” Stefan says.

“It’s the end of the world. Of course you show up,” Soren says, scowling, rubbing his eyes.

Then, he looks up. The man looks awful, a sort of shell-shocked glaze in the eyes, trembling shoulders, mouth twitching like it didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

“Pull yourself together,” he snaps from his writing desk. He doesn’t have time for this. Yes, it isn’t everyday that they go walking into a fight with a homicidal goddess, but every battle carries with it the chance of life or death. Stefan, being a seasoned swordsman, should know this much better than him. Also, he’s not an agony aunt. He has a tower assault to plan, and hypothetical battles to walk himself through.

“Did you know?” Stefan asks instead, somewhat nonsensically.

“If you’re going to have a breakdown, come in and close the tent flap,” Soren says, and waits for him to do just that as he packs up his parchment. “What’s the matter?”

“It’s all been a lie,” Stefan says, in a hiccupping sway. “The hatred that’s dogged our steps from the moment we were born…all of it, lies.”

Soren narrows his eyes at him, and sniffs. “You sound like you’ve been imbibing, but I don’t smell any liquor on you,” he says.

“I’m not drunk,” Stefan says, finally seeming to pull himself together. “I’ve just had a rather enlightening conversation with our local embodiment of chaos.”

“I see,” Soren says, not really seeing at all. If Yune’s presence causes discombobulation and an abandonment of mental faculties, he’s going to have to stay away and make battle plans accordingly. “Please, do continue.”

“She approached me, actually. Wanted to know what I was.” Stefan laughs again, but there’s no humour in it. “She didn’t know, Soren. I had to explain to her what a Branded was. Years of this crime against the goddess, and the real thing is so perplexed by my presence that she has to ask me what I am.”

“Well, she’s considered the lesser half of the two,” Soren says, tapping his pen against the writing desk. “Begnion prefers Ashera to Yune. Even if Yune doesn’t know, that’s hardly indicative of Ashera not knowing. Although intel does point to Ashera being asleep for the last hundred or so years, so that point may be moot.” He frowns, musing on the matter. Then he sighs. “I can see why it’s startling news for you, but it doesn’t make a difference. People are petty and cruel and unaccepting of things that don’t fit into their narrow worldview. If it wasn’t a ‘crime against the goddess’, we’d be just as reviled for some other thing, like being the representation that a beorc was willing to debase themselves to be with a laguz, or vice versa.”

“You’re very accepting of all this,” Stefan says. “Is it so hard to believe that we could have been accepted in society, had someone kept their mouths shut?”

“The world doesn’t work that way,” Soren says, crossing his arms. “Now that you’ve cried on my shoulder, are you ready to go out and face the world without causing the demoralization of my army?”

Stefan sighs. “You give horrible pep talks,” he says, scrubbing a hand over his face.

“I don’t give pep talks, so consider yourself lucky that I was willing to humour a conversation. If you want pep talks, go talk to Sanaki,” Soren says. “I would have directed you to Micaiah for fellow feeling, but since the goddess currently possessing her sent you into hysterics the last time you talked to her, I’m feeling charitable. Now, I really must get working on this for tomorrow.”

Stefan lets out a soft ‘ha’ of laughter. “Always busy,” he says. “Say, where’s your guardian? Even the Apostle’s here. Shouldn’t he be as well?”

Soren stiffens. “I don’t know,” he says. “It’s none of my business what he does with his time.”

“You’d think a man like him would be here, helping us,” Stefan says. “At the very least, I’d expect him to be hovering over you.”

“He has other responsibilities to ‘hover over’, as you so put it,” Soren says, jabbing his pen a little too harshly into the paper. “I could ask the same of your village mates.”

Stefan shrugs and lounges back, like he’s settling in for a while. “Touché.”

Soren glares at him. “Get out,” he says. “It’s late, and I have work to do.”

After he tosses Stefan out of his tent, he finishes his work. Then he sits back, gets over himself, and reconsiders Sephiran and Zelgius, contemplating the matter by removing himself from it entirely and examining it like a particularly multifaceted glass bauble. It was true; it isn't like Sephiran and Zelgius to sit back and let the world burn, so where are they, and what are they doing?

Soren doesn’t like any of the answers to the possibilities he comes up with.

“This is illogical,” he mutters to himself, and with that cheerful thought, blows out the candle and goes to bed.

The morning dawns bright and early, and then everything goes downhill from there. There is only so much one can take when a so-called goddess reanimates corpses to prove a point to her endless power.

Now, they step into the Tower of Guidance — one group of friends left behind, to guard their backs against the endless horde.

Of course, what greets them is the piece of scum that tops Soren’s most hated list. Oh, Soren respects Senator Lekain’s ability to manipulate everything he can get his grimly little hands on and ooze his way out of trouble, but this man has been Sanaki’s biggest roadblock in the Senate for the past handful of years.

He spares a glance for Sanaki’s reaction, and it’s a quietly intense anger. Fists balled, shoulders stiff and unhappy, but she doesn’t lose composure.

Micaiah, on the other hand, starts spitting words in venomous fury at Lekain, which is not surprising except for the contents of those words, which are particularly interesting. Blood pacts? Soren will have to look into that later. Pelleas, too, looks mildly green at this confrontation. He hopes it’s not battle nerves. They have quite enough to deal with instead of babying a princeling.

Soren’s been keeping a quiet tally of the senators they’ve been facing lately, and he suspects that if they make it out of here and win, Sanaki will have a much easier time with the Senate.

At least it looks like they’ll be able to take their frustration out on him with tomes. Perhaps he’ll be able to get a shot on Lekain with Rexcalibur.

The enemy approaches.

It’s time.

Soren doesn’t get a chance to revel in their victory.

Instead, he overhears Yune’s words to Ike.

“The next one who stands in our way is someone deeply tied to you.”

Ike glances at him, and their eyes meet in understanding. Ike clenches his jaw, and turns back around, facing forward.

“Let’s go,” he says.

Soren swallows, but moves forward. There is no going back now. Upwards and out. Fight or die. That is their only option, so it is no choice at all.

Imposing black armour stands at the end of the room.

Blood roars in his ears, and he comes to stand by Ike’s side.

“Don’t hold back,” he tells Ike, and Ike reaches for his hand, squeezes once, and lets go, his fingers slipping through his. Then Ike marches forward, alone, resolute.

“General Zelgius.” His greeting echoes in the room, the architecture suited to ring endlessly with the peal of bells. This pronouncement is met with surprised murmurs behind him. Soren ignores all of it, his focus solely on Ike and Zelgius.

“You’ve come,” Zelgius says, voice deep from within the helmet. “Welcome, son of Gawain. Welcome, courageous warriors.”

The door closes behind them with a resounding thud. Then, the rushing of armour, heavy metal boots strangely muffled on the tiled floor. Blue light sweeps between Soren and Ike, a barrier that Soren is too late to pass.

“Ike!” He bangs, ineffectual, on the clear wall. “Zelgius!”

“I won’t let anyone interfere with our fight,” Zelgius says. The words are directed at Ike, but they’re meaningful enough that Soren assumes they were spoken for his ears.

“You’re determined to block our way forward, then.” Ike’s hand rests on Ragnell’s hilt, steady, waiting.

Zelgius points Alondite at him. “Draw your sword, and let us begin.”

“Fine,” Ike says. “Let’s finish this.”

Soren turns away.

Facing them are the remnants of the Begnion Central Army, a familiar face in command. Soren’s not sure what it’ll do for them. There’s nowhere to go, and there’s no place to retreat. They’re trapped.

“I know you,” Sanaki says suddenly. “You’re a general in Duke Gaddos’ army.”

“General Levail,” Soren says, striding his way to Sanaki’s side, ignoring the sounds of swords clashing behind him. “What’s going on?”

“Why is Zelgius here? Did he betray Sephiran to the Senate?” Sanaki asks.

“No! No, he wouldn’t do such a thing,” Levail says, voice growing shrill. “No, I was the one who betrayed the Duke of Gaddos to follow him. We are not your enemy, Empress Sanaki.”

“Then tell your men to stand down,” Sanaki says, fists balled up. “I must speak to Zelgius. Remove the barrier.”

“I — I’m afraid I can’t do that, Empress,” Levail says, soft but firm. “General Zelgius’ orders were to let him fight that man alone. I am to eliminate any intruders within the Tower in the meantime. My deepest apologies, Empress.”

So Zelgius had ordered their elimination, but he hadn’t betrayed Sephiran. Sephiran had to still be around, which meant —

No.

“Levail,” Soren says. “Let me past the barrier. He won’t mind if it’s me.”

Levail hesitates, but doesn’t lower the lethal spear at his side. “No, Tactician Soren,” he says, just as firm. “I cannot. You understand loyalty. I am loyal to him, as you are loyal to the Apostle.”

Which implied there was a difference, whereas before there had been none.

I cannot be loyal to both? he wants to ask, but resists the urge. That would be a useless question.

“I cannot harm you, Empress, nor can I harm you, Soren, and I am under orders not to harm the Silver-Haired Maiden, but the rest I must eliminate,” Levail says, jaw set. “Kindly lay down your weapons and remove yourselves to the sidelines.”

“I will not!” Sanaki pulls out Cymbeline, head held high in righteous anger. “I fight with my friends, and I won’t idly stand by while you attack them.”

Soren dips his head. “Well said,” he murmurs, for Sanaki’s ears.

Levail sighs, shoulders drooping with disappointment. “I tried,” he says, then raises his voice so the whole room can hear him. “Face me in an honourable duel, and know that I shall be the one to take your life!” He lifts his spear, and the room dissolves into chaos.

They’ve mopped up Levail’s forces. The man himself is dead, lying in an undignified pool of blood. Sanaki gingerly steps over a limb to slide his eyes shut.

“Soren,” Sanaki says quietly.

“Empress.”

“They were loyal men,” Sanaki says. “Loyal to Begnion.”

“But not to you,” he says.

“No,” she agrees. “But he was loyal enough not to kill me.”

“He was loyal to Zelgius. He trusted his general.”

“Not Lekain.” Sanaki gives a bit of a grin at that, and sobers. “I can’t demand loyalty from my troops, Soren. Not when I’m — me. I’m not the apostle, Soren. I don’t hear the goddess’ voice in my head.”

“You’re the empress,” Soren says. “They make their military oaths to you. And not hearing voices in your head is a very good sign of sanity.”

Sanaki snorts. “I know you’ve never taken any stock in the goddess, but Begnion’s…Begnion,” she says. “The goddess is the cornerstone of Begnion’s way of life. Wouldn’t it be a betrayal of my people?”

“Wouldn’t it be a betrayal of your people if you abandoned them to some foreigner with the right blood?” he asks in return. “If you can keep the faith of your people even with Lekain breathing down your neck, then I fail to see how any of it matters.”

“Hmph,” Sanaki says, but looks thoughtful.

“Besides, I wouldn’t put much stock into worshipping the goddess at the moment,” he continues, and gestures at the ceiling above them. “It’s hardly helpful at this point.”

“No,” Sanaki agrees. “I suppose not.”

Their attention is drawn to the shimmering blue barrier, and the clashing figures behind it.

They’re trading blows, golden blade against silver, and there’s no clear winner, no one who has the apparent upper hand.

Ike deals a wicked backhand blow, sending Zelgius to his knees a good three feet away. It’s an all too perfect opening, and Ike points Ragnell at his head.

The barrier flickers and fails. By unspoken agreement, no one interferes.

“Surrender,” Ike says, voice grave.

“I am a soldier, and I obey my orders to my last breath,” Zelgius says instead, head raised in defiance. “Otherwise, I would be nothing more than a common sell-sword. End me or die, son of Gawain.”

“Zelgius,” Soren steps forward, hand outstretched.

“Soren,” Zelgius says, blood bubbling at the corner of his mouth. “Don’t interfere.”

He leaps, Alondite surging forward, light glinting off deadly steel—

Ike whirls low, Ragnell firm in his grasp, and strikes true.

Zelgius falls, toppling to the ground in a clatter of pitch black armour.

“Well done, Ike,” he rasps out, smiling despite the blood dripping out of his mouth. “Well fought.”

“I would have preferred it if you yielded,” he informs him, voice carefully blank, and strides off, shoulders squared and arms crossed.

Soren picks his way over and presses a hand to the bloody wound. He’s seen enough battlefield injuries to know this one’s past saving. Still, he pulls out his heal staff with his other hand.

“I hope you’re happy with yourself,” he says, tart, and begins muttering the arcane phrases that speak of numbing pain and healing flesh.

“Soren,” Zelgius says, and coughs wetly. “Soren, stop.” Gauntleted fingers pluck at his sleeve. “There’s no use.”

“I’m well aware of that,” Soren says. He feels nothing, just numbness. “However angry I am with you, I can’t stand here and watch you bleed out.” He’s mechanically going through battlefield triage.

“Stop,” Zelgius says again. “No, listen.”

The light at the top of the heal staff sputters, and goes out. Soren dips his head, letting it rest on his blood-slicked breastplate.

“I spent so much of my life shrouded in darkness,” he says, his breath stirring the air just above his head. “But my life had meaning. I’m sure of it. I made my choices, some of which I’m prouder of than others. But they were mine to make. Do you understand?”

“Yes.” He lifts his head, and meets Zelgius’ eyes. He wants to say no, he doesn’t, to yell, to scream, to cry out in angry disbelief.

“Good.” Zelgius smiles even as his eyes begin to drift shut. His breathing grows laboured, rattling in his chest.

“Sephiran…” His words are barely a whisper, and Soren strains to hear them. “I will wait for you in the afterlife…”

His fingers slacken with the release of death. They slip from Soren’s sleeve to clatter with finality on the stone floor.

Soren stumbles back, reeling.

“Soren…” Sanaki trails off, coming to stand just behind him. “Soren—”

“Why?” Soren asks the pile of black armour, his fingers leaving bloody streaks along the polished surface. “Why, Zelgius?” He kicks the armour, ignoring the pain in his foot, resentment and fury and loneliness battering like winds in his heart. It’s a question that needs no answer, because he already knows.

There’s only one person Zelgius would follow into death.

Sanaki plucks at his sleeve, tugging him away from the body.

Does she know? Has she guessed? Surely, she has all the pieces. But to put them together, and then to accept the only truth that remains…

“Sanaki…”

“I know,” Sanaki says, voice soft. “I know.”

She takes his hand and squeezes it, once, and leaves.

Soren shoves his emotions away, and locks them into a box, to open never. He has no time for this, so he hardens his heart to ice.

Alondite glows dimly from its place on the floor, where it had slipped from Zelgius’ nerveless fingers. The handle is slick with rapidly congealing blood, but he picks it up anyway, and walks after Ike in a haze.

Chapter Text

Soren has to sit down on the stairs, because the world is starting to blur around him, and buries his face in his hands. He’s shaking. He doesn’t know when he started shaking. His breaths are coming in as sharp, harsh gasps and exhales, and he just needs a moment—

It’s Jill, of all people, who sits down next to him.

“We should start a club,” she says nonsensically.

He recalls, vaguely, that they had killed her father in that first war, all those years ago, and resists the urge to laugh.

It comes out as a strangled, choked out thing. Jill eyes him sympathetically.

“I used to think it was trite, when people told me it would get easier,” she says. “It doesn’t, really. On some days it is. Further away, that is. But some days, everything’s a slap in the face. A reminder that we’re all pieces in somebody else’s game, and someone rolled the dice and said this is how he should die.”

“And the further up we go, the closer we get to the grandmaster,” Soren murmurs, thinking of long hair and elegant fingers.

“Yeah,” Jill says. “Haar would tell me that revenge is unhealthy, but—” She shrugs.

Soren takes a deep breath in. Holds it. Lets it out.

“Thank you,” he tells her quietly.

“There’s someone who wants to talk to you,” she says.

“Alright,” he says. “I’m fine. What is it?”

He looks up, and Jill takes the opportunity to slip out of sight, giving them the illusion of privacy. There’s only so much camping room on a staircase.

It’s Ike.

“I don’t know if you want to talk to me right now,” Ike says, painfully awkward.

“What is it, Ike?”

“I understand,” Ike says, solemn. “Say the word and I’ll go.”

Soren suddenly feels immensely weary. “I don’t hate you,” he says quietly. “Quite the opposite, in fact.” He looks at the empty space next to him, pointed.

“I’m not sorry I had to do it,” Ike says, and sits down next to him with a thump.

“He’s an adult,” Soren says. “He made his own idiotic choice a long time ago. Why should I blame you?”

“You’re being surprisingly logical about this,” Ike says, and hesitates. “I got you something.”

Soren tears his gaze away from his hands in his lap. Ike holds out red fabric, neatly folded into a square.

He takes it. It’s obvious what it is.

In return, he picks up the still gently glowing blade at his side, and presents it to Ike, laying it across his lap. He’d spent what felt like an eternity cleaning the blood off of it. It had been a source of time spent together, once. When they’d first met, and Soren was still uncertain about the stranger who had taken him in, he’d creep through the empty halls in the middle of the night, watching him care for the blade. Eventually, Zelgius noticed the shadow following him around at night, and showed him the best ways to sharpen, clean, and polish a blade.

It seemed only right that Soren did the one duty Zelgius would never have neglected if he was still alive.

“Soren,” Ike says. “This is—”

“Alondite,” Soren says, watching the light play over the blade.

“You…don’t want to hang on to it?” Ike asks.

“We’re facing off against a goddess,” Soren says. “We need the best weapons we can get.”

“No, I mean — this is kind of silly, but I’ve always thought you must know how to use a sword.”

“Ike,” Soren says. “In all our years of battling together, have I ever brought a sword onto the battlefield?”

“No, but Zelgius must have taught you how to fight with one.”

“He tried,” Soren says, and the memory brings a dull pang. “I know the basics, but I’ve always preferred magic. It’ll be better off in someone else’s hands. You’ve sparred with everyone here. You choose.”

“Soren…” Ike trails off.

“I trust you,” Soren says, unwavering, “to make the right decisions. Always.”

Ike’s mouth twists. “Why do you?” he asks. “I’m just another person, going through the world. I’ve always wondered. You reserve your trust with others, but you were so willing to help me.”

“Do you remember our first meeting, when we were children?” Soren asks.

Ike frowns, forehead creasing. “You’ve mentioned it before,” he says. “But I don’t remember it.”

“Yes,” Soren says. “ I…there’s no point in me explaining if you don’t remember.”

“Then I’ll think on it,” Ike says, determined.

“Do,” Soren says, mouth tilting up into a not quite smile.

The next floor answers the question of Goldoa’s missing dragons. This isn’t a question he wanted answers to, but it’s a particularly convenient one, since he has no emotional attachment to them whatsoever, and blasting things to shreds has always been a good outlet for strong emotions he wants to purge himself of.

If he has to be honest, if he was in his right mind, Soren would have preferred they not have to fight them at all, seeing as they towered over him and could probably tear him from limb to limb, but as it is, Soren’s glad it’s someone else’s family drama taking centre stage for once.

“We have betrayed our vow to our goddess. We should have learned, but the fighting never stopped. Now we must pay for our crimes. We must take responsibility, and accept Ashera’s judgement. We will wait here patiently for the punishment we deserve. If you are unwilling to await judgement…”

The figure at the top of the dais steps forward, proud and obstinate, and transforms. Scales. Wings. Claws. Dheginsea, King of Goldoa, is a towering monster of a dragon, his shadow falling over the battlefield as he roars, the air trembling before him.

Of course this man’s country could be neutral all he liked. Goldoa, warm and rich with forests and natural resources, protected by mountains, armed to the teeth with dragons that dwarfed wyverns and their riders.

Prince Kurthnaga squares his shoulders, and marches on. He may be the image of a baby-faced teen, but Soren has seen babier faces making difficult decisions. Regardless, for an individual that’s spent the last couple of days face first in a bucket, it’s a striking change. Brother dead, sister anathema, Kurthnaga is the only heir Goldoa has left, and yet he fights tooth and nail against them, for the rest of the world. Perhaps the next iteration of Goldoa will not be so isolationist.

Dheginsea roars, and Kurthnaga, dwarfed in his shadow, roars back.

The King of Goldoa is dying.

The dragons crowd around him, Kurthnaga kneeling at his father’s side.

“We will be back, Father,” Kurthnaga is saying. “We will defeat Ashera. Wait here for our return.”

“…I’ll be waiting,” Dheginsea says, after a pause.

Soren brushes past, filing out with the rest of their group, determined to give them some semblance of privacy. They head up the stairs.

Behind him, a sudden sense of loss. Emptiness. Grief.

“Father…” Kurthnaga says, into the silence. Soren glances over his shoulder. Ena’s head is bowed, a hand on his shoulder.

“Kurth,” Ena says. “He’s gone.”

“I know,” he says. “This is simply…another reason to move on.”

Soren turns away. He’s heard enough.

They make their way across the antechamber to the set of tall double doors engraved with flowers and feathers and oddly enough, the spray of seafoam and waves.

“They won’t budge,” Ike says.

“What’s wrong with them?” Yune, wearing Micaiah’s guise, joins him, running curious fingers over the etchings and the edges of the doors.

“Those doors can’t be opened,” a familiar voice answers from behind them, back the way they came. “They've been sealed with powerful magic.”

Elegant robes, long dark green hair, golden staff in delicate fingers.

Sephiran of Persis stands alone.

There’s a rushing in Soren’s ears, and the world fades away, only to be anchored by Ike’s grip around his wrist.

“Sephiran!” Sanaki says. “I’m relieved to see you’re alright!” She rushes forward, clasps his hand in both of hers.

“I’m sorry to have been a cause for concern, Apostle,” Sephiran says, serene as always. Soren wants to shatter that calm facade. How dare he stand there like nothing had happened when Zelgius had died for him?

“Sephiran... There's something I need to tell you. I'm not a true apostle. I didn't mean to abuse your trust,” Sanaki says, barely a whisper.

“I’ve known that for quite some time, Sanaki,” Sephiran says gravely, the light cresting off the bridge of his nose, the edges of his cheekbones. “I was the one who raised you. It doesn’t matter to me whether or not you can hear her voice.”

She sniffs, choked up with some unnamed emotion. Soren hates it. This has gone on for too long already.

“I’m glad,” she says. “Thank you, Sephiran…for always having been there for me.”

Ike makes a wordless noise, in between a sigh and a throat clearing. “You should tell him about Zelgius,” he says, voice begrudging. He nudges Soren forward.

“Hm,” Sephiran hums, face carefully setting back into its neutral state.

“Sephiran,” Soren says finally, voice harsh and cracking.

The man inclines his head with the same unnatural grace he’s always had. “Soren.”

What he intends to do is rake him over the coals. Instead what comes out is an indignant: “Was this your plan all along? To send us like pigs to the slaughter?”

“What— Soren!” Sanaki makes a noise of protest. “What kind of question is that? This is Sephiran!”

Soren ignores her.

Sephiran smiles, although it doesn’t reach his eyes. “Ah, so you’ve figured it out. How long did it take you?”

“I’ve had my suspicions for a while,” Soren says, gritting his teeth. “The senators threw me off. But I didn’t know for certain until Zelgius.”

“Zelgius is dead, Sephiran,” Sanaki says, voice soft. “I know you put a lot of trust in him, but he was also Daein’s Black Knight.”

“Which he knows,” Ike interrupts. “Zelgius…a man like that could never serve two masters. Everything he did, he did for one person, and one person only.”

Sanaki grows very quiet. “I can excuse you for sending him to serve Ashnard on the pretext of spying on Daein,” she says, desperation in her tone.

“Which I did,” he agrees.

“But the medallion?” Ike asks, stepping forward almost involuntarily. Soren takes his wrist, a silent support. “The Black Knight killed my father for that medallion. Was that your plan?”

“Naturally,” Sephiran says, smiling. “Ashnard believed it was his as well, which is why he asked Zelgius to retrieve it. I simply…whispered in his ear, you might say. I told Zelgius to follow through on his order and deliver the medallion into his hands, by whatever means he deemed necessary. Your father’s death was an unfortunate incident that could have been part of Zelgius’ own private agenda, or simply something he perceived as a…roadblock to his mission.”

“Both,” Soren mutters, for Ike’s ears only. “Probably both.”

“And your plans for the medallion?” Ike asks, gritting his teeth.

“The goddess was to be woken,” Sephiran says, the smile still stuck on his face, “and all living beings destroyed.”

Soren feels a surge of dark vindication, then nothing but a bone deep weariness.

Sanaki stares at him, flabbergasted. “Come again?”

The group behind them breaks into outraged disbelief and exclamations. Micaiah—or perhaps Yune, Soren couldn’t make out the colour of her eyes—’s face is tilted to one side, contemplative, watching Sephiran, as though there’s something she can’t quite put her finger on.

“My goal has always been to wake Ashera, so that she may pass judgement on the world,” he says. “The people of this world deserve only destruction. The selfishness, the brutality... The disregard for others, the endlessly quarrelling laguz and beorc. We have been given many chances to correct our behaviour and ourselves, and have squandered them all. The only hope for a peaceful, orderly world is for Ashera to wipe us all out and begin again. And to do that…I had to use you…betray you.”

“I can’t believe this,” Sanaki says. Soren’s close enough to see her fingers shaking, hidden by her long sleeves. Soren’s rather numb himself.

“It’s the truth,” Sephiran only says.

“So many people trusted you,” Ike says. “And you betrayed all of them? For this? I don’t understand. Why would you do such a thing?”

“Yes. It was all for this. As for why…I’ve just told you. It won’t make a difference however much I explain. It’s something that can only be understood once you’ve lived as long as I have.”

“So it’s like that, is it?” Ike asks, scowl prominent on his face. “I suppose we’ll just have to make you talk.”

“I can’t believe this!” Sanaki says again, and throws up her hands. “I don’t want to fight you, Sephiran! I can’t!”

“You have no choice, Sanaki,” Sephiran says. “The doors are sealed with my magic. The only way through to Ashera is through me. You must kill me if you want to go past these doors.”

A long moment of silence.

“Oh! Of course it’s you,” Yune says suddenly, shoving her way through to face Sephiran, hands on hips. “It’s been your memories I’ve been seeing this whole time.”

“Mine?” Sephiran asks, tilting his head to the side in much the same way she had.

“Give it up, Lehran,” Yune says, oddly coaxing. “Death is all you’ve wanted since this started. Everything else has been little more than a terrible side effect.”

“Lehran is a being of the past,” Sephiran says, his calm facade breaking, gaze flicking frantically from Yune’s, unwilling to meet her gaze. “I discarded it a long time ago, Yune. He no longer exists. I simply wish for…an end to things. Please, don’t stand in my way.”

“Lehran? So now he’s some kind of hero-saint.” Ike crosses his arms, a mullish expression on his face. “Saint or not, he doesn’t get to decide whether or not the whole world dies so he gets his wish.”

“...you’re running out of time,” Sephiran says, voice soft but no less audible.

“And you’re stalling,” Ike says. “Not as ready to die as you thought you might be?”

“No. I simply think it would be a shame if you were too late to face the goddess after coming all this way.”

Ike makes a noise at the back of his throat, between a scoff and a huff of disbelief.

“Well, I suppose that just leaves our fight to the death to take care of,” Sephiran muses, fingers twisting around the staff in his left hand.

“No, wait!” Sanaki calls after him, reaching out—

The ancient language rolls off of Sephiran’s tongue in the habit of a native speaker long used to speaking his own language, voice ringing throughout the tower, clear and bright, asking the spirits for aid. He does not stop for Sanaki. He does not stop for anyone.

Luminous spirits form in midair around them, leaping in translucent wisps of barely contained consciousness. A thunder spirit reaches out, intent on causing hurt—

Soren spits out the phrases for Rexcalibur, summoning shearing winds, and batters it backwards, away from him.

It is to his surprise that he reaches Sephiran first.

“Soren,” Sephiran says, a smile on his face. “To be honest, I’m glad you figured it out so late. You were the person I thought most likely to discover my plans. Your tendency to hold your cards too close to your chest was most helpful.”

Well, that’s not a stab to the chest at all.

“I had a good teacher,” Soren says bitterly. “But even if I knew your plans, I don’t think I could have stopped them.”

“No,” Sephiran says, calm. “You couldn’t have. Come, Soren, strike me down. Let the student surpass the master.”

“Following Zelgius into death? How trite and melodramatic,” he says, smoothing his hands over the pages of his tome. “For a man who pities orphans, you’re oddly desperate to make more of them. I suppose it can’t be helped.”

“Ah, the sharp tongue as always,” Sephiran says, humourless laughter bubbling through. “You see right through me. You remind me much of your grandfather,” he continues, suddenly melancholic. “You have the same sharp wit and intellect. Perhaps I should have given you to him instead.”

“My — grandfather?” Soren reels back, hand suspended over the tome, classic starting position. He had no kin, no nothing. Just him and Zelgius, then Sephiran and Sanaki and the Holy Guard. He had no other blood. The implication that Sephiran had known all along and had kept it secret… “What are you talking about?”

“Your grandfather,” Sephiran says, watching his reaction. His eyes crinkle in that way that scream pleased whenever he thwarts a senator, and Soren has the distinct feeling of being outmanoeuvred. “The late King Dheginsea, of Goldoa. We were old friends, once.”

He casts his mind back to the imposing black dragon that had towered over them, and the weak stumble of the bald man who he had passed, thinking to give Kurthnaga and the rest of the dragons their space.

“Dead because of your schemes,” Soren says, numb.

Sephiran shrugs, neither denying nor agreeing with the statement. “He died doing what he believed was right,” he says, almost trancelike as he readjusts his robes. It’s the rehearsed speech of a madman that sits in front of his mirror, persuading himself to folly.

Soren is unprepared for the sudden rush of unnameable emotion that rushes through him. Illogical, he thinks. All this for a man you never met.

Rexcalibur glows, and his opens his mouth to chant—

Sanaki brushes past him. He breaks off, the icy green glow of magic sputtering out as the tome falls shut in his arms. Suddenly, it is all too heavy, and he sags, drained of strength.

Instead, he watches Sanaki. Soren sees her hands tremble even as they hold Rexflame, but her voice is ringingly clear, the empress of her court, wherever she may go.

“Sephiran,” she says. “Everything you’ve ever told me, every time you gave your hand to me, every time you smiled… They were all lies?” Her voice quavers. “You’re the most appalling fraud I’ve ever known!”

Sephiran looks at her, at them, quiet and emotionless. “No, Lady Sanaki,” he says. I’ve actually lied to you very little. What I have done is hold things back. I’ve also twisted the truth from time to time.” His mouth twists upwards, into a bitter smile. “But I have only told you one blatant falsehood. That one lie has weighed heavily on me. It makes me hate myself, sometimes.”

Good, Soren wants to say. Good, because you ought to, given what you’ve put us through. His hands clench in the fabric of his robes. But this is Sanaki’s conversation, and her right to tear him a new one, should she see fit. He won’t take that away from her.

“Sephiran…” she says, voice trailing off, uncertain. Soren closes his eyes.

“I’ll always care deeply for you, my little Lady Sanaki,” Sephiran says, soft, gentle, like they’re still in that sunlit sitting room, sprawled across decadently embroidered cushions, learning magical basics. “You are my sun and my moon. I never wished to harm you..” His voice turns pleading, the desperation of a drowning man. “Please…you must understand—”

Sanaki stomps her foot, near tears. “No! Sephiran, no! What are you doing?” She runs her fingers through her hair, and tells Soren: “I can’t do it.”

Soren opens his tome again, and Sanaki takes a step back, eyes shadowed, watching. Sephiran spreads his arms wide, in open welcome.

His heart is in his throat, but he casts Rexcalibur anyway, blasting him with ice and howling wind. In the maelstrom, Sephiran staggers. Soren’s will gives out, and he ends the spell, breathing heavily.

Sephiran straightens. His robes are out of place, his hair a windswept mess, but otherwise, there is not a scratch on his pristine skin.

“I’m afraid that won’t work,” Sephiran tells them, a touch amused.

“Magic might not work,” Ike says, emerging from the fray, a glower on his face, Ragnell at his side. “But a blade will. Tell me, Sephiran: if you truly think we’re all irredeemable, then why did you save me that day?”

“Ah, yes…” Sephiran peers closely at him. “Do me a favour, Ike, and tell me how you feel about it now. Can you bear recalling those horrific memories?”

“Yes,” Ike says. “I’m fine now. But I suppose at the time I wouldn’t be able to handle it.”

“All beings endure tragedies for as long as they continue to live. It has always been the case that suffering is unavoidable. And this grim reality plays out over and over, in every country, under every ruler…As long as there are beings who feel, they will feel pain.”

The worst thing about this is that it is not untrue. Soren can — however unwillingly — see his point. For a boy who spent his earliest years the way he did, he has long thought suffering and pain things of life, unavoidable in every way. Things the beings of the world inevitably inflicted upon each other. If they could be eliminated…

“So what? We should all just give in and die? Put it behind you. Deal with it.” Ike stares him down, impassive.

“Do not make light of this,” Sephiran says, expression twisted with some amalgamation of fury and pain.

“I’m not,” Ike says. “Sephiran, I’m extremely grateful that you once helped me through a terrible time. But we have to accept that occasionally we all have to deal with hard times. I’ve had pain, I’ve had suffering, and I have gotten up and moved on. I don’t try to forget what happened that day. I just accept it, and keep going forward. Neither that, nor anything else will stop me.”

Sephiran smiles at him, a thing that holds no humour or happiness. “You are a strong man, Ike. But not everyone is as strong as you.”

He opens the magical tome in his hand, a thick, heavy, old looking thing embossed with far too many designs and gold leaf. Soren has never seen this book in Sephiran’s collection. He does not want to find out what it does.

“Watch out—” Soren reaches for him, as Sephiran begins to cast, but Ike is already on the move, a blur of movement, red blossoming on Sephiran’s white robes. His spell goes wide, dazzlingly bright orbs crashing together, a blinding explosion of sound and light. Soren feels the heat left behind, and skitters to the side as Ike goes in again, Ragnell flashing gold and blue. He would cast his own spell, but he doesn’t want to hit Ike, so he stays his hand, looking, waiting for an opportunity to strike.

The chance never comes, because Sephiran falls.

Sanaki claps both hands over her mouth, a soundless scream.

“At last…I’m dying,” he whispers.

Sanaki runs, stumbling to a crouch beside him, hands scrabbling to staunch bleeding with torn robes.

“Sephiran, hold on! Open your eyes!” She looks behind him, at Soren, eyes wide. “Soren, could you— your heal staff—” Soren just stares back at her, frozen. She casts around, wildly, and her gaze lights upon Micaiah. “Micaiah,” she says, voice shaking. “Your healing powers—”

In the end, it is Micaiah who kneels with Sanaki over Sephiran’s bleeding body. Soren stands with Ike instead, numb and useless. Ike’s hand slips into his.

“I’m sorry, Sanaki,” Micaiah says softly. “The doors leading to Ashera won't open while he's alive. I can't save him.”

They exchange words of murmured conversation, and Sephiran gives Sanaki something round and gleaming, clasping her hands with his own even as his eyes drift shut. Soren looks down and away, to find that his grasp on Ike’s hand has turned his knuckles a painful white. His grip must be painful, but Ike doesn’t pull away, gaze still fixed on the scene in front of them.

“Sephiran!” Sanaki cries out.

The doors open, covering them in bright, blinding light.

“Now! Micaiah!” Yune’s order rings out across the room, and Micaiah leans down, silver hair aglow as her magic surges into the body on the ground.

“He’s — alive?” Sanaki says suddenly, in the silence. “He’s breathing! Sephiran is breathing!”

Micaiah sags back, exhaustion evident in every line of her posture.

“Just in time,” she says.

“You saved him!” Sanaki throws arms around Micaiah’s shoulders. “Thank you, Micaiah! Thank you!”

“Micaiah’s completely spent,” Micaiah — or rather, Yune — says. “She needs to take a rest, so I’ll be around for a while. But there’s no time. Hurry!”

The rest of their group begins filing through the doors. Soren thinks about leaving with them, but Ike’s hand in his keeps him there, rooted to the spot.

“Why did you save him?” Ike asks — demands of Yune.

“Should I not have?” Yune returns as she gracefully gets to her feet, head tilted to the side in question.

“I can think of a few reasons why you shouldn’t have, yes,” Ike says, bristling, and strides towards Sephiran. Soren follows him, because Ike has forgotten that his hand is in his.

“Hey,” Ike says, unfriendly as he leans over Sephiran’s face, casting a long shadow over him. “Get up. Now.”

“Take it easy on him!” Yune says, indignant. “He’s had a hard day!”

“Ah…” Sephiran’s eyes flutter open, a vibrant green. “I’m alive? Goddess Yune, why…?” His voice trails off, weak and confused.

“Because I want you to live, Lehran,” Yune says. “Because you’ve always taken care of me. Because I couldn’t bear it if it ended like this.”

“But…I’ve lost all my hope,” Sephiran murmurs. “All my hope in the world and the beings living in it…Please, Yune…let me die.”

“Well, if death is what you really want, then I'm not going to let it happen on my watch.” Ike looms, determination set into the lines of his face. “I don't care what you've gone through. I don't care how much you've suffered. What you've done is unforgivable.”

Sephiran closes his eyes.

“Ashera is waiting,” Ike continues, voice flat. “It’s time for the final confrontation with her. You can join us… if you want to.”

Sephiran’s eyes open, wide and startled. “You’re asking me to turn my back on goddess Ashera?”

“If you really want the final extinction of beorc and laguz alike, then you can just lie here like a lump,” Ike says. “If not, then this is your last chance to start rectifying your mistakes. Think hard on that.”

Sephiran’s mouth opens, and he makes to get up, but no sound comes out. Ike turns his back on Sephiran, faces the double doors, pulling Soren with him. Soren takes one last look at his childhood mentor. Their eyes meet. Soren would like to think there’s something apologetic there.

“Soren—”

“I have nothing to say to you,” Soren says with finality, and turns to follow Ike into the light.

Chapter Text

“Soren,” Ike says, as they walk onwards, hand in hand. “I’ve been thinking about our first meeting, and — I finally remember it. Our first meeting, in Gallia.”

Soren frowns. It’s odd phrasing — how does he finally remember? Why didn't he remember in the first place?

“How could you forget?” he asks, hurt.

“It’s a long story,” Ike says hastily, catching the look on his face. “Sephiran — my mother died at my father’s hand because of the medallion, and he wiped my memories of that day to protect me. I guess it wasn’t very precise magic, because I also forgot about meeting you.”

“Oh. But you…remember now?”

“Yes,” Ike says. “I don’t know if it’s because of this place, or because of the people we’ve been defeating, but I’ve been regaining memories as we’ve gone up the tower. I remember…looking for a stick to play with. There was that huge oak tree by the clearing, and at the bottom of it—”

“Me,” Soren says, voice barely above a whisper.

“You,” Ike agrees. “A boy my age, skinny as a twig, wearing rags and covered in dirt, looking near death. I gave you my lunch, didn’t I?”

“You tried,” he murmurs. “I didn’t take it at first.”

“No, that’s right,” Ike says. “You shied away, didn’t you? You were scared of me.”

“I was afraid it was a trick,” Soren says. “I thought you’d taunt me with food and chase me away.”

“But I did get you to take the sandwich eventually,” Ike says. “It was like you’d never eaten before in your life. So I thought — ‘gee, he must be really hungry,’ and invited you home.”

“Which I also refused,” Soren says, voice dry, but Ike continues as if he never spoke.

“My parents would have never turned you away. They’d probably have taken one look at you and taken you in.”

Soren looks away, heat rising in his eyes.

“Instead, I promised to come back the next day with more food, and you finally nodded and agreed. It made me happy,” Ike says. “I felt like I was doing something right, helping you. Like I was the only person who’d do that.”

“I was happy, too,” Soren says. “Not just because I had something to eat, but because someone would finally talk to me. So I went back the next day, even though I was scared of the other villagers and their rocks and their sticks, but I still went back. I went back because that was the first time someone looked at me and thought I was someone worth saving.” He blinks away the blurriness as Ike’s thumb draws comforting circles over the back of his hand. “You wanted to know why I trust you the way I do. That’s why. I’ve never forgotten it, the way you looked at me and stretched out a hand like I was someone, like I deserved to be seen.”

“You are someone worth saving,” Ike says, low and fierce and certain.

“But the next day…” Soren trails off at the memory. Bodies lining the streets, men, women, children with looks of terror and surprise and agony. “I went back…and the village was littered with corpses.”

“It was my father,” Ike murmurs. “He went crazy when the spirit of chaos in the medallion touched him.”

“I thought — I’d thought — I went through them, looking for you. And that was when I met them. Zelgius and Sephiran. They caught me going through the bodies.”

Ike’s head jerks up. “We missed each other by moments,” he says.

Soren shrugs. “Zelgius…he’s Branded,” he says, voice very, very soft. He’s dead anyway, so this is Soren’s secret to tell. He doesn’t think Zelgius would mind. “We can sense others of our own kind. So he took me in. I think him and Sephiran had to forge some documents to fake a connection; I’m not really clear on the details. Regardless…I grew up with them. Zelgius was my guardian, and Sephiran was my teacher. I…thought about looking for you several times, but Zelgius told me from the start that you were alive and safe, so I thought — well. It doesn’t matter now. I was going to go find you, once I was old enough and could slip away.”

“Except I showed up in Melior,” Ike says. “And I didn’t recognize you. I didn’t remember.”

“Yes, but that didn’t matter,” Soren says. “I only wanted to see the boy who held out a hand when I had nothing.”

Ike stops, and turns to face him. His hand comes up, towards Soren’s face. He pauses, and Soren is about to ask if there’s anything wrong, when his thumb brushes delicately under one eye.

“Soren…don’t cry,” he says, voice impossibly soft.

Soren looks up at the concerned expression on Ike’s face. “I’m not crying,” he says, voice thick with tears.

“We found our way back to each other in the end, didn’t we?” Ike asks.

Soren nods. “We did,” he agrees.

Ike smiles, and draws him into a warm embrace.

The moment doesn’t last forever, because both of them know what’s waiting for them up ahead. Soren scrubs his face clean, and they part to find the rest of the group having their own final moments of conversation. The light glows ever brighter behind the next set of double doors, and it’s clear to all of them what they might fight beyond them. They’ll save the world or die trying.

Ike nods at Yune, and together, they push open the final set of doors.

Ashera awaits.

Tall, stately, long hair scraping the ground, black gown flaring out around her into white feathers, she would be the image of a normal beorc woman, perhaps slightly taller than average, if not for the light that shines and glitters around her, refracting strangely across the tower’s tiled floor. Her hair too is an unnatural colour, shimmering from red to pink to orange, reminiscent of a sunset, or perhaps a particularly bloody dawn.

They file in after Ike and Micaiah, fanning out to fill the room. The doors close behind them, a particularly final sound echoing in the small space.

Unnervingly, Ashera does nothing to hinder their steps and waits for them to finish moving, eyes closed.

“It’s her…” Ike says, trailing off into the hushed silence.

“Ashera,” Yune agrees, voice firm with a degree of seriousness that Soren hadn’t thought possible from the goddess before.

Her eyelids flicker, but no other movement.

“Ashera! It’s me, Yune! Can you hear me?”

No response.

“Please! Please listen to me! You don’t need to pass any more judgement! You can return the people to normal!”

At those words, Ashera opens her eyes. Her silent stare is an unnatural piercing thing that glides over each person as if she’s seen right through them and decided they don’t exist. Soren finds this unsettlingly familiar, and a long remembered hatred burns in his chest. Ashera, it seems, only has eyes for Yune.

“I cannot,” the goddess says at last, voice stilted and echoing off the walls. “There are still those in my world who are made of fallible flesh. It has fallen beyond control. I must pass my final judgement.”

“But a thousand years haven't passed,” Yune says, pleading. “We were woken by galdr, not by mankind’s war!”

“It no longer matters.” Ashera makes a dismissive little scoff, fingers twitching as if to brush them all away. “During my long sleep, beorc and laguz have continued to fight. The children of flesh will never learn, nor grow. Time may continue to pass, but nothing can change the flaws of mankind. Its destiny is fixed and unchangeable.”

“But you’re wrong!” Yune steps forward, arms outstretched in outraged protest. “People are the only living things in this world that we didn’t create. The Zunanma evolved to become the laguz and beorc. But that doesn’t mean they’ve stopped evolving! They’re still changing and adapting to the world around them.

“They may look separate now, but did you know that children can be born of both a laguz and a beorc parent?”

A murmur runs through the group. Soren inhales sharply through his nose and tries not to tense up. If it turns out that Stefan’s little conversation with the goddess has some use after all…

Out of the corner of his eye, Nasir grimaces.

“They’re still small in number,” Yune continues, impassioned, “but if we allowed them to flourish, then they could become anything! If we let mankind continue to evolve, then something wonderful will emerge, I’m sure of it! You can’t just bring that to a halt!”

Soren’s not sure what’s so wonderful about being reviled until Branded start making up the majority of the population instead of skulking about in the shadows or on the fringes of society.

“Do not claim certainty of anything,” Ashera says, staring down at Yune. “The children of this world are born of chaos, and nothing could be more unpredictable. This world does not require the uncertainty of man. My responsibility is to the balance of the world, above all else.” Her lip curls, a cold, unfeeling disdain. “Evolution without my guidance will only destabilize and threaten the order of this world. Because of that—”

“You have to wipe out everything that we didn’t create?” Yune interrupts, staring up at her with frightening intensity, fists balled. “Is that what you’re trying to say?” She takes a deep breath. “...Very well then,” she says. “You and I have nothing more to talk about. My only choice is to defeat you.”

Ashera tilts her head to the side. “Yune, do not be absurd. You cannot defeat me, just as I cannot defeat you.”

“Of course not,” Yune says, and throws out her arms to gesture at all of them. “But they can.”

Rexcalibur falls open in his hands, perhaps for one last time. In front of him, Ike unsheathes Ragnell, a beacon of gold. To one side, Mist lifts Alondite into the air, waiting. To the other, Sanaki holds Rexflame, a scarlet glow already gathering at one palm. Around him, everyone readies their weapons.

“Ah…these people…they carry your blessing, Yune. You mean… to fight me?”

“Yes. Everyone…the time has come.” Yune steps back into the group, head held high.

There’s more conversation after that, but what captures Soren’s attention is the single door on the left side of the chamber as it swings open.

A hush falls on the room.

Elegant, long dark green hair. Sweeping robes of ivory and violet, golden embellishments glittering in the light. A staff clasped in pale, narrow fingers.

“Forgive me, goddess,” he says, voice soft but no less firm. “I must end my service to you now.”

“Lehran…” Ashera turns. Sephiran takes the weight of her full regard with almost no reaction at all. Sanaki claps her hands over her mouth.

“Forgive me,” he repeats. “Everything I’ve done was a mistake. This is all a result of my weakness. The changes I endured…the things I saw… It was too painful to watch, too terrible to live through. My heart grew heavy with cowardice. I was overwhelmed, and could think of nothing but soothing the pain.

“As long as I suffered, I was blind to everything else. The beautiful things of the world…the suffering I’d caused…I couldn’t see any of it. I can see now…the people deserve compassion. They deserve another chance. They deserve to have their lives back.”

Ashera stares at him for a long moment. Soren wonders whether his words will have any impact. At the very least, it seems that she will at least hear his words out.

“No.” She straightens her already perfect dress. “You were always too flexible, too inconstant. Too easily swayed. You cannot sway me further.”

“Ashera…my goddess…please.”

“No, Lehran. Be silent now, as I remove such things from your confused heart.”

Power surges through the room, a rush of cold energy surging from her body. Fog hangs in the air, a visible aura of light surrounding her.

“Attack the aura first,” Yune counsels, Rexaura already high in her grasp. “The aura, then Ashera herself!”

“You would face me in battle?” Ashera asks, voice echoing off the walls of the room, reverberating to a level that’s almost painful. “I need no further evidence of your kind’s imperfections. This will hardly be a battle at all. Simply an end. Perish, flawed ones.”

They charge. It’s reckless and foolhardy, but they have no element of surprise here. Better to be on the move than to stand around being a target.

Even then, the ground beneath them shatters like an earthquake, agony twisting into flesh and bone. Soren lets out a soundless gasp, even as he stumbles into the stomach of a dragon, dark scales giving way to the lighter coloured underbelly.

“Onwards,” Kurthnaga tells him.

Soren grits his teeth and obeys, sheets of wind and ice emanating from his hand. Sanaki’s Rexflame nearly singes the top of his head a moment later, and he ducks, hissing in discomforted surprise. One intense blast of dragon breath later, and the fog has thinned, ever so slightly.

Waves of light radiate outwards, another staggering blast of energy rippling through the air. Soren takes this one with more grace.

It goes on like this for a while.

Then —

An exhale, and the mist clears. Ike stands, sword held high, blue flames rippling down from tip to hilt —

He strikes true.

The goddess falls.

Chapter Text

In the end, Sanaki opens the palace for everyone to settle for a short while, to sleep off the injuries and bone-deep exhaustion. Everyone accepts, even though they know it’s only temporary. The royalty among them have responsibilities to return to, people to soothe and appease. The rest have homes to return to, uneasy among the empty opulence of the palace.

But first, there is a conversation. Micaiah pulls him and Stefan aside, and unravels before them the history of the Branded. It would be a bitterly unsatisfying tale, if Soren didn’t already know that the Branded would have been doomed either way, because people are closed minded and disliked things they didn’t understand.

It’s a darkly hollow vindication to realize Dheginsea paid just as dearly for his choices as Lehran did. The man probably wouldn’t have even recognized him, for fear of sparking outrage in his own people. Both elder son and daughter lost in vain for the cause of a Branded abomination, the very thing he had sought to keep buried and hidden.

And Sephiran — Lehran returned to his wife’s country at last, spurred on to seek out the children of his child out of longing and sentiment, encountered some small glimmer of hope, then stumbled upon innumerable grief and devastation as both his descendents and his people were killed. But in the end he stayed, for the one child who lived: Sanaki. And, of course, to put into place his master plan for wiping them all out, including himself. Which he failed, thanks to timely intervention from a chaos goddess. Soren plans on making him clean up the mess he’s made.

As for the rest, they negotiate temporary ceasefires between Begnion, Daein, Gallia, and Phoenicis. Reparations, trade, various prisoner exchanges. Elincia serves as mediator, Crimea a relatively neutral party in this tangled sprawl of a mess.

Then after those are hammered out, and questions answered for certain betrayals and slights of hand during the war, they begin to depart.

The dragons go first, seeing as they have Dheginsea’s funeral to attend. The Dowager Queen of Daein goes with them, and Soren only gets a glimpse of her, a ghost in the halls of his childhood. He doesn’t think he’s seen the last of them, anyway.

Daein leaves soon after, Pelleas intent on ceding the crown to Micaiah. He’s very firm that it won’t cause trouble or unrest, since the people of Daein like her better anyway. Soren doesn’t find it hard to agree. It turns out Micaiah is Sanaki’s older sister, and Soren supposes they’re all finding out things about their families these days. The two smile at each other. Sanaki hopes that their ties will strengthen the bonds between their countries. At the very least, there will not be any more war between them, and that is a relief to everyone’s ears.

Sanaki cedes Serenes Forest back to the herons in a grand ceremony. Prince Reyson smiles, brighter than he has during these last long years, and Princess Leanne is radiant, beaming with joy. They sing, too, a song that fills all those attending with hope and warmth. Tibarn admits that with the hawks shattered from their losses during the war, they’re thinking of moving and settling down in Serenes with the herons. Naesala, when asked about Kilvas, shrugs and says a lot of things that ultimately mean nothing. Sanaki tells Soren that he’s abdicating, and Kilvas is also moving in with the herons. Apparently Sanaki and Naesala have struck up some sort of understanding. She’s hoping he’ll consider becoming an ambassador of sorts.

Elincia gets promises out of all of them to attend the official peace talks in Melior in half a year’s time, then she and her contingent bid them farewell, all smiles. The Gallians depart with them, laguz mingling joyfully with beorc. Ike and Mist and Titania and the rest of the Greil Mercenaries are going home too, all of them travelling together on the road.

“I’ll see you again soon,” Ike tells him. “Take care, Soren.”

“You too, Ike.”

“I’ll write,” Ike promises. “Jill and Haar are thinking of starting up their courier services again.”

“I heard,” Soren says. “I’ll reply, if I’m not too busy.”

And he might be, because Sanaki looks to him for advice these days. Lekain’s faction is no longer a thorn in her side, given that all of them have died during their rush to save the people. It makes her job much easier, but she takes too much on herself now, unwilling to rely too much on Sephiran and all too aware of the blindspots that had allowed Lekain and his ilk to flourish in the Senate in the first place.

Ike clasps his forearm, pulls him in for a hug, which Soren returns. Then, he lets him go. They’ll find their way back to each other, like always.

Meanwhile, there’s plenty of work to do.

Sanaki wrangles her Senate back into shape. She gives Muarim a position, a title, and land, encompassing the desert. Tormod is his heir, of course, and they’re to continue the work they’ve been doing, freeing laguz slaves.

Sephiran is still Chancellor, maintaining his gracious public appearances, soothing the hurts of the people. Internally, his role is greatly diminished, and for those that are in the know, there is something off between the Chancellor and the Empress every time they talk. He wanted to leave immediately, to lay it all bare and resign, but Soren tipped off Sanaki, and they cornered him in the western sitting room, railing at him about personal responsibility until he’d tripped over a cushion and acquiesced to their demands. He’s smaller too, unsure of himself and his decisions. It’s a far cry from the man who he met all those years ago, but he brought this on himself with his idiocy. The least he can do is smooth things over for Sanaki as he prepares to leave office. There are still too many that seek to curry his favour, not Sanaki’s.

Soren, for his part, has found himself dealing with Zelgius’ affairs. The Duchy of Kadohl was never meant to be hereditary, but Begnion’s military is a wreck and Soren’s the most familiar with the area, so he steps in. It gives him more credibility as Sanaki’s advisor in the eyes of the Senate, he supposes, but it’s only a temporary thing. Soren has no intentions of staying. He is not interested in land, or glory, or people. The day to day operations are run by the steward, a man handpicked by Zelgius. The connection here is that the man has a Branded daughter.

For a man who insisted on clinging to Sephiran like a lifeline, he had a remarkable ability to inspire similar loyalty. When the time comes, Soren’ll hand over the title and the land and all the duties associated with it. Put in a recommendation for it to go to Cador, the steward. He’s already doing the work anyway, he may as well have the rank and privileges along with it.

He’s also writing Ike, and their letters fly to and from so often that he thinks they must be funding most of Haar and Jill’s courier service. Hopes, dreams, wishes, they spill everything onto those pieces of paper. Ike wants to travel, writing of what he’d learned from Rafiel and Nailah about the desert and Hatari, a land where Branded and laguz and beorc all live together in harmony, and the possibilities of lands beyond that. Soren replies with the research he’s found in the Begnion library, and before they know it, they’ve made plans. Extensive ones. Ike writes about his worries of leaving Mist behind, of leaving his father’s mercenary company, and Soren returns with his own complicated feelings of abandoning Sanaki to her eternal toil of running Begnion. But neither of them write about considering giving up the idea, so it’s something that must be done. They’ll understand.

“So the dragons,” Sanaki says to him one day.

“So the Silver-Haired Maiden,” Soren replies.

“You realize you’re royalty twice over,” Sanaki says, unimpressed by his attempts at redirection.

“I don’t have any ties with either of them,” he says. “I don’t even remember her face, or his.”

“You’re happy here?” she asks.

Soren hesitates. “For now,” he says.

Sanaki contemplates him, frowning. “I could make the current arrangements permanent, if you wanted.”

“I don’t want Zelgius’ lands,” Soren says. “Give them to someone else. Cador, perhaps. He’s doing an excellent job of managing the lands.”

She gives him a searching look, too old for her years.

“You’re not staying, are you,” she says.

He shakes his head, unable to voice his agreement. “It’s too much,” he says instead, knowing she’ll understand.

“You know, you’ll always have a place with me,” she says. “I could use your advice.”

“I think you know the time is fast approaching where you’ll need to stand on your own,” Soren says, quiet. “The amount of secrets I have, that I know now…” He shakes his head again. “I can’t. I won’t jeopardize your reign by staying.”

“That’s a sorry excuse,” Sanaki tells him. “You can just tell me you can’t stay, because you can’t stand it here anymore. And I get that. Sephiran—” Her voice drops to a hushed whisper, even though they’re the only people in the room. “Sephiran’s planning on leaving for Serenes when his term’s done.”

“Good for him,” he says, voice dull and flat.

Sanaki slaps him on the arm, then sighs. “At least he’s trying to find some inner peace,” she says diplomatically.

“He’s leaving you to clean up the mess he started,” Soren says.

“After he’s so helpfully cleared out the Senate of the old geezers,” Sanaki retorts. Her gaze softens. “Anyway, what I was trying to say, is that I don’t blame you for wanting to leave.”

Soren swallows and looks away. “There are too many ghosts here,” he says.

She goes quiet. She — and he — know that he’s not just talking about Sienne, or Begnion.

“You’ll come back to visit?” she asks.

Soren doesn’t answer.

She straightens in her chair. “I do hope you’re not planning on going alone,” she says. The unspoken it’s dangerous hangs in the air between them.

Something on his face must give it away, because she says: “You’re going with him then.”

“I’m considering it, yes,” he says.

“Go then, with my blessing,” she says. “Go with him. Keep each other safe.”

“Of course, Empress,” Soren says.

“When are you planning on leaving?” she asks.

“After the peace talks.”

She nods, and then someone comes in with documents for her attention. Soren takes the opportunity to take his leave, and she dismisses him with a distracted wave of her hand.

The Senate makes Zelgius’ funeral a huge occasion. Officially, it’s a funeral for all of the Begnion people who died during the period where the world turned to stone, but Zelgius — and Levail, by extension — are the only high-ranking people who are spared from the damning revelations of Lekain and his followers. After their betrayal, the people are in need of dead Begnion heroes to immortalize, so Sanaki provides. Soren does not attend. Soren slips out the back door as Sanaki is preparing to give her speech, slinks out to an old, out-of-the-way courtyard, where Zelgius had once attempted to teach his young ward to hold a wooden blade, and sets a folded red cape down in front of him.

Then, he sets it on fire.

“I hope you’re happy, Zelgius,” Soren says. “I hope it was worth it, whatever it was you wanted.” His eyes burn, stinging in the smoke that wafts upwards, but he stands anyway, fists clenched at his sides.

“He’d have hated the pomp and circumstance the Senate made of this event,” a mellifluous voice says from across the yard. “I find this much more fitting.”

Soren half turns, but he already knows who this is.

“Sephiran,” he says. Go away, he wants to say, but he can’t get the words out, stuck in his throat. Zelgius wouldn’t have wanted him to say those words.

Sephiran puts a hand on his shoulder, Soren allows it, and they watch the cape burn.

After the ashes have all drifted away, Soren asks the question that’s been lingering in his mind, like a bad cold.

“Why didn’t you use me instead?”

Sephiran, to his surprise, smiles, a wry and bitter thing.

“Soren,” he says. “If I had told you a year ago that you were the son of Ashnard and the heir of Daein, what would you have done?”

“I would have laughed in your face, and told you to pull the other leg,” Soren says. “And then I would have torn the archives apart looking for evidence.”

“And why,” Sephiran asks, still smiling, “do you think I didn’t tell you?”

“Because you were worried I’d see through your plan,” he says, then pauses. “I wouldn’t have needed Micaiah, either.”

“No, you wouldn't,” Sephiran agrees. “You would not have been as malleable. You would have seen through Izuka. And Lekain. No blood pacts. Just swift, decisive victory.”

“That’s very flattering,” Soren says. He doesn’t like the idea. With Zelgius’ death and his current place at Sanaki’s side, he’s found more and more nobles who previously wouldn’t give him the time of day are now asking for favours and advice. He imagines this would be the same in Daein, and it discomforts him. But this sort of praise from Sephiran is different.

“Of course, I also expect you would have snubbed the Begnion Senate at the first opportunity,” he says.

Soren scoffs. “They would have deserved it, too.”

Sephiran tilts his head in agreement.

They stand there, in the quiet, for quite some time.

“I don’t know if you’ve heard from Sanaki, but I’m planning to settle in Serenes after I resign,” Sephiran says, voice soft among the gentle breeze. “Princess Leanne wishes to sing for me. And it is my home, and I long to see it again, no matter in what state.”

“And?” Soren asks, knowing that there is some second part to all of this.

“I am wondering, Soren,” Sephiran says, old and weary and tired, “what your plans are. Sanaki refuses to speak on the matter, and says I ought to ask you directly.”

“And why are you asking?” he replies.

A deep sigh. “Is it so hard to believe that I have some measure of attachment towards you?” Sephiran asks. “I watched you grow up alongside Sanaki, if you’ll recall.” He pauses at Soren’s scoff. “If you doubt my care for you, then perhaps you’ll accept that I did care very much for Zelgius, who would have liked to know what his ward was up to, and I am asking in his stead.”

“Shouldn’t have let him die then,” Soren says, bitter beyond all else.

Sephiran’s expression closes off, but he folds his hands and waits.

I made my choices. They were mine to make. Zelgius’ words rattle in his ears.

Fine, Soren concedes to Zelgius’ voice in his head. Fine.

“I’m leaving,” he tells Sephiran. “I’m not staying here. I’m travelling — elsewhere.”

Something like regret passes across Sephiran’s face. “Ah,” he says. “Alone?”

“No,” he says. “With Ike.”

Sephiran nods, thoughtful. “Of course,” he says. “I wish you both safe travels. And after I’ve been the reason for so much of your unhappiness, I hope — and this is presumptuous of me, but I hope you find your happiness, Soren.”

“Thank you,” he replies stiffly. “I hope you find yours.”

“Zelgius, wherever he is, would be proud of you.”

Soren nods. It’s a nice sentiment, but he’s dead, so it’s irrelevant.

That’s where Sanaki finds them, later, full of indignant exasperation, but no real surprise that they skipped the whole thing.

“You couldn’t have let me in on it too?” she asks, hands on hips.

“They would have found it terribly suspicious if all three of us were mysteriously missing from the funeral,” Sephiran tells her. “You’d be the one most sorely missed.”

She scowls, but concedes. She’s not truly upset, but it’s something to quibble over, and they’re in sore need of childish distractions.

Life goes on.

Spring dawns cold and wet in Melior as they arrive for peace talks. It’s amazing what wonders shared near-death experiences will do for camaraderie. Soren ends up near Ranulf, who gives him a grin and a wink.

“The Greil Mercenaries are in town,” he says to Soren. “It’s not formal or anything, according to Her Majesty, though I hear she offered. Might be one of those closure things.”

Soren makes a non-committal noise, but he understands the sentiment. Which is why he slips out of the palace, feet leading him unerringly towards that bar where he’d sat on the stairs, Ike a solid line of warmth beside him. He can see from here that the windows are lit, glowing warm and welcome, the noise of happy patrons echoing from inside. He pauses at the door.

“Soren!” Someone throws arms around his neck, and he stumbles back, catching himself with the railing.

“Mist?” He pulls away. He doesn’t know why he’s so surprised. He’d been told they were in the city, after all.

“I’m so glad you’re here!” She beams at him, then takes him by the wrist, drawing him inside. “We have a table. Ike’ll be so happy to see you!”

He follows her in, protests about not drinking and not being one for noisy spaces dying on his lips. They do, in fact, have a table. They have several tables, which suggests they actually occupy a not-insubstantial corner of the bar, crowded full of familiar faces. Mist jostles him into what must have been her previously vacated place, and parks herself very deliberately on his left. There’s a chorus of greetings, Jill raises her pitcher at him, Shinon scowls, Soren turns to his right—

“Soren,” Ike says, smiling at him. “Glad to see you made it.”

“Hello Ike.” Soren says, and glances around the bar. “Is there an occasion?”

Ike shrugs. “We’re alive. What better reason to celebrate?” Then he adds, in a much lower voice: “Unofficially, it’s because Mist is taking over my father’s mercenaries. Officially?” There’s an amused glint in his eyes. “Mist and Boyd are getting married.”

“Oh?”

Mist jams an elbow into his chest, smiling, radiant like the sun. Boyd, Soren notes, is on her other side, grinning like an idiot.

“Congratulations,” he says, and is only mildly surprised to find he means it.

“We’re going to get married in town, while everyone’s here,” she says. “You’ll be there, of course?”

Soren nods. “Of course.”

His agreement secured, Mist beams at him and very pointedly leaves him alone with Ike, taking Boyd with her.

Soren glances around. No one seems to be paying particular attention to them, and they’ve always been a noisy bunch, which is why he leans in close.

“Our plans are in place,” he tells Ike. “I already broke the news to Sanaki. She might want to talk to you before we go.”

“Talk to me, huh.”

“Not to persuade you otherwise,” Soren says. “She’d have started with me, if that were the case. She took the news rather well, all things considered.”

“That’s alright. I can think of a couple of other things she might want to talk about. Just tell her to name the time and place.”

“And Sephiran knows.”

A shadow passes over Ike’s face, but it’s gone in an instant. “And how did he take the news?”

“Does it matter?” Soren asks, fighting to keep the levity of his tone.

Ike considers this, then says: “To be honest, I don’t care much for his opinion. I suppose I care more about what he said to you. You’re the one who’s known him longer.”

“I burned Zelgius’ cape.” Soren says instead. It doesn’t answer Ike’s question, not really, but he doesn’t push. Ike just nods, solemn, his hand a comforting warmth on Soren’s arm.

The first thing that catches his eye is the sword that Ike carries. It’s not the Ettard he’s slung on his back, tucked away in its sheath. No, this one he carries with familiarity, long and gold and still shimmering faintly blue with Yune’s blessing. Ragnell is in his hands again.

“Ike—”

“Yes, I know,” Ike says. “The Empress insisted.”

Sanaki huffs. “You didn’t need much persuading,” she says.

“You had a good point,” Ike replies. “Several good points.”

Soren glances from person to person. Ike doesn’t seem upset, or particularly irritated. Just a bit tired, which is par for the course after a long day of listening to people talking at each other. Sanaki, on the other hand, seems a bit smug.

“That’s a priceless national artifact,” Soren says, but there’s no bite in his words. It’s a paltry argument, and they all know it. Weapons are meant to be used, which is why Zelgius had Alondite, and Ike Ragnell. He hopes Ike hasn’t been strong-armed into taking it up again.

“It’s not a gift, it’s a loan,” Sanaki says, sticking her nose in the air. “I’ll expect it returned at some point.”

“Of course,” Ike says. He even seems faintly amused.

“Then it’s settled. Ragnell is yours to wield, until you decide otherwise, in which case it’s to be returned to the Empress of Begnion.” Sanaki nods to herself.

“No objections here.” Ike stands, at ease, relaxed.

“The Empress doesn’t lend out swords without strings attached,” Soren snaps at Ike later, in the privacy of his room. The last time someone else was in here with him, it was Zelgius he'd been talking to.

“There were strings attached,” Ike says, calm and placid. “I decided I could live with them.”

Soren eyes him — and the sword in question — rather dubiously. “Not to say it’s not an excellent sword, but I thought the reason we were going away was to stop all this,” he says, gesturing at it. “The obligations.”

“Didn’t you hear Sanaki?” Ike asks him, all wide-eyed indignation. It’s a look that’s out of place on him ever since he’s shot up in height and put on several pounds of muscle, and Soren knows he’s not telling him everything. “It’s a loan. It was loaned to me on the condition that it would be returned to her.”

Soren shoots him a look.

Ike huffs. “I told her I wouldn’t be able to keep it from you, but she wanted me to try,” he says. “She wants me to look out for you, which I told her I’d do anyways, sword or not. She didn’t have to ask me that.”

“And?” he asks, expectant.

Ike tilts his head. “I’m sure you caught that she expects it back,” he says. “We’re hardly going to deliver it by Jill and Haar’s delivery service.”

“I thought you were planning on never coming back,” Soren says.

Ike shrugs. “Maybe, maybe not,” he says, and Soren can almost hear the second half of his thoughts. He doesn’t want to hear them. They’re alive and well and this isn’t something he intends on thinking about until decades later. The matter of his lifespan — and Ike’s — can wait.

“Alright,” he says, and lets the matter go.

The morning after Mist and Boyd’s wedding, Soren meets Ike so early in the morning that dawn is barely peeking through the clouds of the gray sky. Mist hangs in the air still, dew forming on every blade of grass and leaf. Waking early is no trouble; they’ve had their fair share of early mornings, and will continue to for the years to come.

No words need to be spoken. Soren takes Ike’s hand, and they step forward, onwards, together.