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No one dared venture towards the minister the past four days, a wave of tension and unease washing over anyone in eyesight of him, practically suffocating anyone in his vicinity. It has been four days since the end of their last battle. They had won, so one would think it would be a call for celebration. Indeed, for most of the army it was, but in everyone’s merriment, there was a particular redhead noticeably missing from it all.
During the aforementioned confrontation, the Aegir Astral Knights were fighting a battalion from the Kingdom’s army, when a wild demonic beast clashed into them. In the ensuing chaos, it was impossible to discern anything, only screams from the mutilated entangled with the monstrous roar of the creature. Before Hubert could attempt to aid them, the monster tore through the soldiers and broke away as the knights retaliated. The damnable virtuous lot gave chase, Hubert unable to see if Ferdinand was leading that charge.
It was now day four since then, and the evening sun was upon them already. Hubert wasn’t able to follow the battalion since they were all on horseback, and it wasn’t like he didn’t have his hands full in those manic few minutes. There had been no word from the battalion. No soldier has returned, or at least, none that weren’t in the back of a cart with a tarp covering them. It was far from customary for a top general like himself to inspect all the dead, but no one dared question it. Every time he went to pull back the covering over the corpse, he steeled himself for what he felt was inevitable at this point. Due to the corrosive poison the beast spewed out, many of the bodies were beyond any recognition. Aside from the ones he saw die, it would appear several died in the pursuit as well. He liked to think that he’d be able to pick out Ferdinand no matter his state of his body, yet it didn’t silence the paranoia eating away inside him that he already found him and he was in the ground at this very moment while he continued this foolhardy search.
Despite this constant state of paranoia, if you were just another soldier, other than his terrible mood, he presented as he normally did. Yet, anyone who knew him could see he looked like utter hell. The dark circles under his eyes somehow were more prominent, his boots clearly haven’t been cleaned or polished, and you could see the rare stubble on his face from lack of shaving. He tried to distract himself by overlooking paperwork, but the words on the page seemed entirely illegible, merely staring at the paper. He has barely gotten any sleep the past few days, even less than he normally got somehow, so his mind was at a mere crawl. He flinched when he heard the sound of a mug set on his small desk in his cramped tent. He didn’t even hear anyone coming inside, turning to see Edelgard.
“I hope it is brewed to your liking, I asked Shamir to help me make it,” she said. She knew better than to try and tell Hubert to rest.
The smell of coffee filled his nostrils, something that’s normally comforting replaced with the anxiety of not even noticing coming inside his tent. “I… thank you, Your Majesty,” he managed to say, “you didn’t need to take it upon yourself to do such a thing, I am perfectly capable of doing so myself,” he said, taking a drink. Weaker than how he normally prepared it, but he could hardly complain.
A small sigh escaped her nose, “I didn’t need to, I wanted to,” she corrected. A silence lulled between the two of them, Edelgard mulling over her words carefully and Hubert just too exhausted to attempt to argue with her. Finally, she spoke up, “I don’t wish to condescend you with faux sympathies, but… I want you to know, should you need anything - absolutely anything , please, let me be the first to know,” she said. She knew exactly what it was like to have people give her false hope towards the livelihood of the missing.
His grip on the handle of the mug tightened, closing his eyes for a long moment to keep his outward stoicism in check. “...Thank you, Your Majesty, it is truly appreciated,” The uncertainty of everything was going to be the end of him. Could someone just show up with his damned corpse already so he can be done with this agonizing?
It was then Hubert heard someone shout from a distance, “ Your Majesty, Minister Vestra! ”
-
Riding on the back of his trusty warhorse Ginseng, Ferdinand couldn’t help but to laugh to himself at how odd the past few days have been. When he woke up that morning for the battle, during his clash with the Kingdom’s knights, the last thing he expected was a rogue demonic beast to crash into the middle of both sides of the fight. There were immediate casualties on both sides, the two parties being completely blindsided to the beasts rampaging from the wooded area close by them. He was barely a hair’s width away from the impact of the fowl creature’s initial lunge. His priorities immediately switched gears to focus on the beast, as did everyone else’s. Being pierced and slashed at by spears, axes, and swords, the monster took off, but they all took chase after it.
It seemed all the soldiers had forgotten they were in a battle against one another a moment ago, everyone shouting at each other in which direction they saw the creature run off too. Their horses were pushed to their very limits trying to keep up with the giant reptilian monstrosity’s breakneck speed, bounding across the land for miles.
Once it gained some ground, it spun around and spewed forth a terrifying miasma of poison, many of the men who were in front of Ferdinand shrieking in agony as they were directly hit with the caustic substance. He nearly fell off his horse from the frantic jerk he made to force it to leap out of the way. Some of the substance splashed onto his leg and the steed’s side, not enough to lethally poison them, but burned through the fabric under his armor, letting out a pained cry feeling the searing pain of the toxic substance. As his horse thrashed back and forth from pain, Ferdinand grabbed his javelin and threw it as hard as he could, piercing one of the gray beast’s eyes. The shrieking, ear shattering roar that it let out hurt almost as much as the burn on his leg, the monster taking off once more with reckless abandon. As horrible as it was, there was no point in stopping to aid the injured, anyone who was in front of the remaining soldiers were already dead. It sickened him to just leave them there, but he quickly gave chase once more.
Before the adrenaline could wear off long enough for any thought on what in the hell Ferdinand was doing, terror pierced through his entire being as the silhouette of a small village came into view, with the injured monster heading straight for it. Any inkling of doubt on this course of action was quickly thrown out, pushing his poor injured steed even more in a desperate attempt to reach the creature before it destroyed the entire village. His men and Faerghus soldiers alike all had the same thought, a battle cry ripping from the ranks of each soldier as an enraged cacophony of noise.
This no doubt frightened the battered monster, blindly ramming straight through a building. It tore through it, instantly decimating the old church. It slowed it down just enough. “Unleash your fury, men!” he bellowed, the knights all swarming the beast. The villagers could only scream and try to escape from the sudden attack, the beast’s thrashing damaging everything near it. Walls of homes caving inward, entire roofs smashed and torn off, yet the men gave it no quarter. For the anger on behalf the frightened common folk this wrecked thing has wrought and the burning rage in them all for their fallen comrades, cut down so brutally in torturous pain.
Ferdinand charged forward in the moment it was distracted by a throwing axe lodging itself into its side, “With all my might!” he roared as he thrust his spear upward with all the strength he had left in his body, striking the scaled beast at the soft part of the underside of its throat. He held it there as it screamed in its death throes, barely having enough time for the horse to leap out of the way to keep them both from being crushed as it collapsed.
His chest heaved, the exertion he had put on his body hitting him all at once for what must have been hours since the monster first appeared in the battlefield given the sun was now setting. Despite this, victorious shouting soon surrounded the depleted general, soldiers from both nations and villagers alike rallying around him and the corpse the creature. All he could do was smile and laugh, almost faint from exhaustion and his injuries setting deep in his bones.
The village was so kind and forthright with their gratitude towards the soldiers, offering them lodging in a local inn and surrounding homes for all the men. He was amazed to learn that they managed to stray 40 miles away from the battlefield. The chase felt like mere minutes yet it must have been at least two hours of nonstop breakneck speed for them to cross that distance. There was no way either army would think they were this far away, especially in such a small town that crossed into Alliance territory.
It was for the best this way, he thought, seeing soldiers in enemy uniforms sitting side by side and merrily banging their large steins of beer together as if earlier that day they weren’t trying to kill one another. He graciously allowed the priests in town to heal him of his wounds, particularly his leg which looked much more grotesque than he thought, “normally for something like this, I’d say a week or two of bed rest, but I have a feeling that’d be falling on deaf ears with you,” an older woman sternly yet warmly tutted.
Of course that was obviously true given this was Ferdinand von Aegir she was speaking to, but even a man of seemingly boundless energy needed three days to rest, practically sleeping the entirety of the following day. He was grateful for this exhaustion though, it gave him a chance to speak with the Faerghan knights. The Kingdom’s soldiers were surprised speaking with the Adrestians, the church spoke of them in such twisted ways, to see they were indeed normal men who didn’t try to slit their throats in their sleep was shocking to say the least. It was then they learned the shocking truth that the hero who landed the final blow on the monster was a top general within the army. They had the image painted of how things used to be with top generals in the Empire being nobles merely appointed to the position due to buying their way into prestige. Something Count Bergliez was more than happy to get rid of once he swore allegiance to Edelgard’s cause.
It was here he was able to untangle the truth from propaganda for the soldiers, Ferdinand offering any soldier who wanted to defect to the empire for their cause to be welcomed with open arms and for those who didn’t, that he bore no ill will and would make no mention of them in his official report on what all transpired. To turn your back on your home country is something he couldn’t bear the thought of, so to readily demand it of others was too cruel to him. His sincerity seemed to have swayed them, as most of the men decided to swear allegiance to the empire, though many of the rough countryside men of the north made it a point they were swearing loyalty to him more than the emperor. He couldn’t lie, he did feel a small sense of giddy arrogance hearing that at first, but promised the men that Edelgard was a more than reasonable woman to follow.
As Ferdinand and his soldiers, both new and old, set out to leave the village, he swore on his life to the village elder that once he got back to Adrestia, he’d work tirelessly to repay his debt to them and rebuild the damaged town all anew. They left early in the morning, knowing it would take all day to get back to camp at a comfortable speed for horses so the poor things didn’t keel over sprinting again. He could hardly contain his excitement at getting back and telling Hubert of his heroic exploits. Although man was far too rigid to be truly starstruck by it, no doubt chastising him for running away from battle, he couldn’t help but fantasize dazzling him nonetheless.
As him and his men came within eyesight of their encampment, Ferdinand could already hear faint shouting in the distance. He made sure to ride in the front, with the Faerghan soldiers in the middle of their group so nearby snipers on guard duty didn't accidentally murder one of the army’s new troops. He could feel the unease from his new conscripts, “There is nothing to worry about, my friends. I will vouch for your place here,” he assured once more.
As they crossed into the camp past the guard post with some very confused soldiers seeing their supposed enemy mixed in with Ferdinand’s lot, many of the soldiers who saw their return let out a victorious shout. After all, it had been bottled up for days as they awaited to hear the fate of Aegir. He noticed a lieutenant step forward, Ferdinand going up to him and explaining the situation with the foreign soldiers, to ensure their place here and to find them somewhere to rest for the evening while they sort out everything properly in the morning.
The crowds around them grew, as many of the Aegir Astral Knights received their much deserved praise for their battle against such a foe, hearing several different men begin to recount their fight to comrades and friends as they swarmed around them. Sitting up high on the warhorse, Ferdinand was able to easily spot the man all in black. He beamed with excitement seeing Hubert, carefully steering the steed through the winding crowds. He swung off of his horse, expecting to do so with his typical ease, but stumbled instead when he landed on the previous injured leg. While the old woman healed the wound, he could tell it’d take a while to get back to his peak form. Still, he didn’t let it bother him, smiling ear to ear, giddy to not only see Hubert again, but to tell him what all had happened to him in the past few days.
What he didn’t expect was Hubert walking over to him, placing both hands on his shoulders and pressing his forehead to the top of Ferdinand’s head. The nobleman couldn’t help but feel scandalized by the sudden close contact with Hubert, in public no less! Something Hubert had made explicitly clear that they should not do, especially during the war! “Hu-Hubert, are you-”
“You’re alive…” he said, almost more of a sigh than words, as if all of his strength suddenly left him.
Ferdinand froze up hearing those words. He wasn’t some arrogant fool who thought he was immune to death - well, not any more , but it wasn’t something he put much thought on. He was so focused on the victory by slaying the monster and saving a village from it, that he didn’t take a moment to dwell on what could have happened to him instead. And judging by how Hubert is acting, it seems that’s all he could think of.
The thought of Hubert’s own mortality hardly crossed his mind. Hubert could do anything, he always thought, there’s no way he would let anyone kill him. He was… incredible, and the pessimism of that potential outcome made his skin crawl.
He carefully reached up and gently held each side of the other man’s head, stepping back just enough to get a look at his face. He’s never seen Hubert look so haggard before. A sting of guilt pierced his heart realizing the torment he incidentally put his paramour through. He still mustered a smile, knowing that was what Hubert needed to see in that moment more than the millions of apologies that were screaming in unison in his mind, “That I am,” he responded just as softly as the mage spoke. They stood there for a long moment, as if time had frozen with their eyes locked towards one another.
Maybe it was the lack of sleep on Hubert’s part, but Ferdinand made zero effort to stop him as he leaned down and gave him a kiss on the forehead. Something so small and brief yet said so much to him that he had to actively stop himself from starting to cry as he so often does in these tender moments with him. Instead a small giggle bubbled up from his chest, looking down, “here you are, acting like the man of my dreams, yet I was running up to tell you about my past few days like a child looking for praise,” he sheepishly commented.
“It is quite alright, I’m not sure if I could stomach dealing with another me,” Hubert said, only now taking a step back when their friends ran over to them, all buzzing with excitement and relief to see the redhead alive and well.
“Oh, Ferdie, you’re okay!” Dorothea exclaimed as she eagerly grabbed his hand with both of her own, trying her best to hide the tears that pinpricked the edges of her eyes.
“Dude, I heard you killed a monster!” Caspar loudly exclaimed, throwing an arm around his neck, grinning ear to ear.
“Yes, I have much interest in learning on how you bested the creature in battle!” Petra said, having much the same fervor as Caspar and himself.
“And actually put that overly familiar friendliness and energy you have to good use sparing those Faerghan soldiers,” Linhardt commented, still so backhanded yet Ferdinand has had to learn that was him being nice.
Bernadetta just hovered in the back behind Edelgard, smiling and happy to see him okay, but far too anxious to speak up with everyone else all vying for his attention.
Edelgard gave him an exasperated smile, “I’m just glad you made it back in one piece. Welcome back,” she sincerely said.
Ferdinand returned that smile, “thank you, Edelgard,” he said.
“Come on, I bet they’re throwing together something good to eat now that you’re all back! I want to hear anything!” Caspar excitedly exclaimed.
Ferdinand was about to agree, the smaller man’s energy contagious, but as he noticed Hubert retreating back towards his tent, he shook his head, “I’ll do my best to get there later, but Hubert requested an extensive field report, I have to go with him first,” he politely declined, giving a small wave to everyone as he turned to follow.
Even if he was still sore and tired, he knew Hubert needed him now. The man’s ceaseless pessimism had taken a clear toll on him, so Ferdinand knew he had to dash away those inner demons and prove to him he was alive and well. He knows he can’t rid Hubert of that mentality entirely, but it was a good thing Ferdinand was an expert in arguing with him. When he reached the beleaguered man, he took his hand in his own, lacing their fingers together and gave a small squeeze with a smile. He will gladly shoo away all of that doubt and anxiety with his own boundless optimism, and he wouldn’t have it any other way.