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She should have tied her hair up.
Lysithea shook her head vigorously, spluttering on the long strands that had worked their way between her lips. She squinted and blinked, her eyelashes battling against the storm, and fought to see the enemies that charged towards her.
Naturally, the day of their battle on the Great Bridge of Myrddin would grace them with gale-force winds. It felt as if they were in Faerghus — facing terrible weather and frigid temperatures. Overnight, the canvas of Lysithea’s tent had whipped wildly, with noises so loud they had dragged her from her fitful slumber. A tempest was brewing, and would see fit to make the battle ahead as difficult as possible.
Now, she glanced nervously to the deep black clouds hanging low in the sky, looking full to the bursting of cold, heavy rain. Soon, the Golden Deer would face a downpour as well as a gale: still more treacherous conditions to be fighting in.
Next to her, Claude raised Failnaught and loosed an arrow into the heart of an enemy soldier, grunting as he threw his arm back to grasp at the fletching of another. Yet just as he was unguarded, another soldier — garbed in the signature blood-red of the Empire — leapt to the defence of his fallen ally. He raised his axe, its hue the same baleful colour as the clouds above, and grinned as he brought it down through the air, aiming for Claude’s head.
Lysithea grit her teeth, raised her hands, and acted on instinct. A deep purple glaze shrouded her eyes as she willed the magic through her blood, sending the fizzling, buzzing sensation down towards her fingertips. Once, such a feat had been difficult for Lysithea to achieve; as a child, she had sometimes struggled to make the magic manifest in the ways she wanted it to. Now, it was second nature. The cloud of poison gathered around her fingers, and Lysithea shot it forwards, watching it hit the Imperial Soldier square in the chest.
He doubled over at once, injured from her spell, but just as he raised his axe once more — a look of rage crossing his face as he fixed eyes on Lysithea — an arrow found his throat. It didn’t come from Claude, whose arrow remained between his fingers and whose eyes had widened; instead, it had come from behind Lysithea. She whirled around to see the familiar silhouette of Cyril, shielding his eyes from the wind.
“I’ve found the generals!” he called as he approached.
A chill bit through Lysithea’s skin at his words, though not from the gale. The prospect of facing the Imperial Army’s generals, people she might know from the Academy, made her muscles stiffen.
“Did you see who they were?” she asked.
His face darkened — her suspicions confirmed. Bonds wound their way around her heart as she imagined facing her schoolmates. “I did,” he replied grimly. “I recognised one of them, at least…”
Lysithea didn’t even dare ask.
“Lead us to them,” said Claude, brushing himself off and coming to stand beside them both.
Cyril looked between him and Lysithea, his expression tight, and nodded.
Together, the three of them fought their way through the troops, concerned not with the soldiers, but with the people commanding them. Claude and Cyril’s arrows buried deep into the bodies of the enemy, whose blood was indistinguishable from their garments’ hue. Lysithea’s magic flanked them, conjuring black bursts of energy from her fingertips, shooting them out to buckle the knees of all those who stood in their way.
All this magic use was draining her. Her vigour would only last so long; soon enough, she would crash, massaging her hands where the dark streaks of black magic mottled her veins, staining her skin. But that moment would not be now. For Claude, for the Golden Deer, and for herself — her own honour — that moment would not come until the battle was won.
They reached a clearing not long after, where two people stood alone watching the fights ensue around them. A woman sat upon a wyvern that hovered mere feet from the ground, a silver-tipped axe in her grip. She screamed orders at the troops around her, sending fleets of heavily-armoured foes into Claude’s battalions. Yet sitting beside her on a chestnut horse, his hair whirling behind him in the wind created by the wyvern’s powerful wings, was somebody who was all too familiar. Flowing amber hair that did not lose its shine beneath the quilt of black clouds. A face that was not lined even beneath the scowling frown he wore.
Ferdinand von Aegir commanded this battle.
Lysithea gritted her teeth hard, a pain spreading in her chest. It was bad enough having to face countless other humans for this battle — striking down people who had families of their own, loved ones and children. Now, however, she was facing somebody she knew.
Images came back to her of Ferdinand from their time in the Officer’s Academy. A joyful spirit, vibrant and warm, his laughter livening up the dining hall. It occurred to Lysithea that she would never hear those sounds again. She would never be allied with him again; in the present, their livelihoods were opposed. He sided with a leader who could not co-exist in the world Claude intended to create. And vice versa.
Claude began to voice his commands to her and Cyril, the latter standing to attention, nodding at his every word. Yet Lysithea could not focus. Her eyes glazed over, her muscles froze, and she clenched her fist.
There was so much death. All around her — the lifeless bodies on the floor, the bloodthirst of every fighting soldier. Unless Ferdinand surrendered, which she doubted entirely, there would be more.
It dawned upon her suddenly that these were lives she was taking. During a war, it became so easy to see soldiers as nothing more than numbers — tally marks upon the death toll. But staring into the eyes of Ferdinand von Aegir, watching him turn and focus those glowing golden eyes upon her, Claude, and Cyril, Lysithea became crushingly aware of the consequences of this war.
Before even Claude could speak, Lysithea found herself calling out a command. “Ferdinand!” The voice was a bellow, coming from a place inside her she’d never been made aware of before. Desperation reached a peak in her chest, making her hands begin to shake. “Stand down, please!”
His eyes locked onto hers from where he sat atop his horse, and he slowly shook the reins to walk the steed towards them. He did not drop his weapon, but he did not angle it to attack either.
“Lysithea von Ordelia?” he asked, disbelieving. “Do you command this army now?”
Heat flushed her cheeks. “No,” she replied, trying to fight the embarrassment and shame rising inside her. No, she didn’t have any reason to be barking orders at him. “But I implore you. Look at what we’re doing!”
She felt Claude and Cyril glancing at her, saying nothing.
Ferdinand looked around him with that same frown etched into his features. “I see war. I see your forces slaughtering mine.”
“And I see your forces slaughtering ours !” she snapped back. “That’s precisely the point! We are killing one another! Once, we were friends. All of us, back at the monastery. Yet now, at the end of today, chances are at least one of us will be dead! But why?” She shook her head. “For what? Is this truly the answer?”
A thought occurred to her. Was she really trying to end this all-out war — suture the chasm that had torn the country to pieces — with words?
How childish.
Yet a warm hand holding her shoulder brought her back to reality, and she turned to see Cyril standing steadfast by her side.
To her surprise, Claude spoke up next. “Do as she says, Ferdinand.” The words came from deep within his chest and he stepped forwards, raising his chin. “We don’t want to do this.”
Yes… No matter how small she felt, she knew she would have the support of her fellow Deer. That was why she did this — why she fought. For them.
Claude and Ferdinand exchanged words, their voices rising with each sentence until eventually they shouted at one another. Their ideals clashed; Edelgard had made her stance clear, and Ferdinand would not waver. The Empire’s other commander drew closer, landing her wyvern at Ferdinand’s side and demanding to know what was happening.
It would not work. Despite everything — Lysithea’s pleas and Claude’s appeals — they would not yield.
As their argument grew, the soldiers of both sides began to gather around them, the golden capes standing behind the Deer commanders, and the crimson capes behind Ferdinand and Ladislava. Weapons were drawn, the debate grew heated, and soon, two armies stood almost face to face, prepared to fight once more.
She had tried. She did not want all this death, but if it meant saving the lives of those she loved, she supposed she had no other choice. Lysithea glanced at Cyril, who had raised and knocked an arrow, and watched his scarlet eyes focus only upon Ferdinand von Aegir’s face.
The bowstring creaked, and on instinct, Lysithea closed her eyes tightly. She heard a whistle cut through the air, felt innumerable tiny pinpricks of heat splatter against her face, and opened them again. Both armies charged forwards, but the figure of one man slumped from the top of his horse. With horror, Lysithea looked down to find flecks of crimson — of blood — beading in her hair as dewdrops would upon blades of grass.
Oh, she should have tied her hair up.