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“That’s going to scar.” Felix said.
“Yeah.” Sylvain breathed. “I think it will.”
They watched the blood seep through Sylvain’s fingers. Felix couldn’t feel it, not really. He didn’t know if that was worse, seeing the deep wound without actually feeling any pain to go along with it. He was in shock, Felix dully realised. Not that he could do much about it now, the damage was already done. A dagger was sticking out of his thigh and his blood was staining Sylvain’s hands wether or not he could feel it.
Felix was leaning against a pillar, Sylvain crouched beside him. Three thieves lay dead near by but Sylvain didn’t bother to take back their plunder, his focus solely on Felix.
Felix closed his eyes, resting his head on the pillar.
“Keep talking.” Sylvain said.
“I’m awake.” Felix grumbled.
“I know, I know, just… Keep talking, okay?”
Felix’s eyes slitted open for for a long moment he just watched Sylvain carefully.
“Syl,” He said. “I’m fine.”
But even as he spoke Felix knew it was a lie. He wasn’t just feeling fuzzy and distant; he felt sick. His hands were shaking, nails digging into the palms of his hands even though he could barely feel that either. He had been hit by an arrow before, even in the same leg, but it hadn’t felt like this. It had been burning then, annoying but not life altering.
Something was wrong.
“Just think how badass the scar will be.” Felix said, his voice hollow.
He tried again, if only to not worry Sylvain but all that came out was a mumble.
“Felix.”
Waving away Sylvain’s worry, Felix wondered why his hand hadn’t actually moved to his command. He was tilting forward now, not that he could stop himself. All at once he was falling forward and Sylvain’s hands caught on his shoulders, holding him upright. Felix latched onto Sylvain’s arm in a desperate bid to keep himself from throwing up. He realised the mistake at the same time that Sylvain did.
Without pressure, Felix’s wound bled freely.
Everything went black.
Sylvain cursed, scrambling to hold Felix’s leg again but it Felix was already unconscious, his body fully slumped forward. Sylvain’s hand slipped in the blood and he cursed again, pressing as hard as he could. No matter he held it did nothing, red pooling around them. The arrow hadn’t just hit Felix’s leg; it had hit an artery. It was luck alone that Sylvain had kept him conscious this long but now he simply couldn’t find the artery again.
Felix was still breathing, surely he was still breathing. Everything was going to be okay, Felix couldn’t die like this, not to a stupid arrow and certainly not because Sylvain had tried to help him staying sitting upright.
He couldn’t die like this.
Sylvain blinked back the stinging in his eyes. People had died from less. He had killed from less. As amazing and as incredible as Felix was, there was only so much the boy could do to survive a severed artery without a healer.
Healer. Sylvain had never tried, had never let himself try. But he had been in the classes, pretending to sleep, but he had been there. All he had to do was remember, remember Byleth’s lesson, remember how Annette and Mercedes described what it felt to heal.
Remember.
He didn’t know the words, didn’t have a tome with hundreds of spell, but Felix was dying goddammit and Sylvain couldn’t let that happen. Sylvain pressed his fingers into Felix’s wound, hating that Felix didn’t so much as flinch.
“Heal.” Sylvain said.
Nothing happened. No warmth spread through his body, no mixed feeling of euphoria and exhaustion. Nothing happened because Sylvain was stupid and Felix was going to die for it all because he had pretended to be sleeping in that class. He willed his hands to still but they wouldn’t and with a heaving sob Sylvain closed his eyes.
“Heal. Please… He can’t die… He can’t…”
He was probably already dead, joining his brother after all these years because Sylvain had failed him.
Felix sucked in a deep breath, his head snapping up.
“Felix!”
“Syl-Sylvain? What… I…”
“Just relax, you’re okay.”
The swordsman looked down, down at all the red that surrounded him. He tilted again and for one horrible moment Sylvain was certain that he was going to lose consciousness again. Felix swallowed roughly, meeting Sylvain’s gaze with glassy grey eyes.
“That’s going to scar.” Felix whispered.
Despite himself Sylvain laughed.
“Yeah, you already said that Bud. Just stay awake, okay? You’re gonna give me a heart attack if you do that again.”
Felix hummed but his eyes stayed open. A hand slowly raised, setting itself onto Sylvain’s arm.
“Thanks.” Felix said.
Sylvain hadn’t done anything. He hadn’t used magic, there had been no blinding light, no invocations. Surely it had been chance alone that he found the artery and regained pressure. Except Felix wasn’t just awake, he was aware. Sylvain felt warm, not from stress and concern like he had assumed but he simply felt warm. Felix was still bleeding but it had become more sluggish, red seeping through Sylvain’s hands.
“Who knew you had magic.” Felix continued tiredly. “But…”
Felix readjusted, wincing.
“It’s starting to really hurt.”
Sylvain hadn’t realised just how good it would be to hear those words. Felix wasn’t in pain earlier as if he had been in shock, a moment away from dying outright. But then Felix shuddered and Sylvain felt guilty that he had been happy for his friend to be in pain.
“Just hold on,” Sylvain said. “Mercedes is coming.”
He hadn’t seen her since the start of the battle, hadn’t seen anyone but Felix. Surely if the battle was over Mercedes and the others would go find them and she could heal Felix in a way Sylvain never could, fluke or not.
Felix chewed his lip, holding back a whimper.
“Are you okay?”
Felix glanced at him and Sylvain was surprised that he hadn’t glared instead.
“It just… Stings, a little.”
“Stings?”
“Okay, it fucking hurts.” Felix snapped.
“An arrow will do that Bud.” Sylvain laughed.
“Well arrows are stupid.” Felix said. “Swords are so much-“
Felix hissed, jolting a little.
“So much better.”
“I don’t know,” Sylvain said teasingly. “I think spears beat swords.”
This time Felix did glare at him and Sylvain laughed again, glad to see that his friend was starting to act like himself again. A tremor washed though Felix and reality set back in.
Where the hell was Mercedes? Even the Professor knew more healing spells than Sylvain did and by this point Sylvain would take anyone.
“Sylvain,” Felix said. “Thanks.”
“Can I get that in writing?”
“Oh fuck off.” Felix huffed. “I’m trying to be serious. I’m glad that out of everyone, you’re the one with me.”
Sylvain didn’t know what to say. Anyone else would have been better in this situation. Ingrid would have pushed Felix out of the way before he had been shot. Mercedes would have already had him walking again and Annette would have never let him lose so much blood. Dedue would have carried him a thousand miles to get help and Ashe knew enough about arrows that he would have realised sooner that an artery had been pierced.
Even Dimitri would have been better. But it was Sylvain and only Sylvain here and he had nearly let his friend die.
“Syl,” Felix whispered.
“Yeah?” Sylvain croaked, eyes stinging.
“Sorry.”
“First thanks and now an apology? What has gotten into you Fe- Felix!”
The shudders in Felix’s body continued even as he leaned back into the pillar, his eyes closed. He was breathing, thank the Goddess he was breathing, but who knew how much longer his lungs could hold out. Felix had lost so much blood all because of Sylvain’s stupid mistake that even though he was fairly certain he had somehow sealed the artery with magic, he had still lost too much.
“Sylvain!” A voice shouted.
Sylvain twisted, keeping pressure on his leg.
“Annette! Please! I-I can’t fix this… I can’t fix this!”
Annette rushed towards them, already flicking through her tome.
“It’s okay.” She said quickly.
If she was shocked by the amount of blood, she didn’t mention it. Annette crouched on the other side of Felix.
“He’s-“ Sylvain choked. “He’s going to die. He’s going to die and it’s all my fault.”
“Syl,” She said. “I need you to breathe, okay? Felix is going to be alright but he needs you to focus. When I say, you need to move you hands. Can you do that for me?”
Sylvain distantly knew that Annette was treating him like a child in shock but he was so scared and confused that he found that he didn’t care.
“I can’t move.” Sylvain said. “He’ll bleed again.”
“I know,” Annette said. “But I need you to trust me. I’ll stop the bleeding but I’ll need you to let go. Ready?”
“I can’t, he’ll die, I can’t let him die.”
Sylvain knew that he was becoming hysterical but this was Felix dammit. His best friend. His… His best friend.
“Three. Two. One.”
Sylvain threw himself backwards, not letting himself second guess Annette. Light beamed from Annette’s hands, focusing mainly on the wound on his leg but the rest encompassed his whole body.
Annette continued her incantation as Sylvain forced back the rising nausea. Felix was dead. He wasn’t breathing and he was dead and it was all Sylvain’s fault.
Hands grabbed at Sylvain but he shoved them away, gasping for air.
“Sylvain,” A voice said.
Sylvain knew that voice. Dimitri. He friend. His ally. His brother. Sylvain threw himself at Dimitri and Dimitri grunted, falling to the ground but as soon as Dimitri recovered he was holding tightly onto Sylvain’s shaking form, keeping him grounded. Dedue was standing beside them, keeping watch in case there were more enemies.
“I’m sorry.” Sylvain choked.
“It’s okay,” Dimitri said. “You’re safe now, I promise.”
Sylvain’s head spun and he forced himself to suck in a deep breath. He was acting like a child, clutching onto Dimitri like this, and he knew it. But everything felt wrong and Felix was dying so maybe he deserved to feel like a child for a little bit.
A second voice joined in with the chanting and Sylvain dully wondered when Mercedes had arrived. But then the chanting stopped and Sylvain’s heart stopped alongside it. He pulled away from Dimitri, stumbling towards the pillar.
Towards Felix.
He wasn’t moving.
They had stopped healing and he wasn’t moving. Felix was dead. Felix was dead and it was all Sylvain’s fault.
“Syl.” Felix mumbled, blinking slowly.
All at once Sylvain was throwing himself towards him, not caring when his knees slammed into the hard concrete ground.
Felix looked exhausted, drying blood staining the ground and his clothes. Where the wound had been there was now a thin line. It was barely noticeable, even with all the blood, but it was a line all the same.
It was going to scar after all, just not as badly as either of them assumed. But if it scarred then that meant Felix survived his wound and Sylvain wouldn’t mind that one bit.
“Felix.” Sylvain said lowly. “If you do that again, I swear to the Goddess I’ll kill you myself.”
Felix glared at him but his lips quirked up in a smile.
“You,” Felix said. “Can get fucked.”