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He should have been the one to kill her.
That is his only coherent thought as he finally stands, knees creaking from the endless hours of kneeling, the rest of his mind the rancorous sea of white noise made up of prayers melding together into pleas and pleas melting into something that can only be described as gibberish. His eyes are unfocused as if he’s gazing at something far into the distance, beyond the walls of the crypt. Perhaps it is better this way. At least now he isn’t looking directly at her when he lifts her body and places it in her coffin once more.
He should have been the one to kill her. That is the only thing he thinks as he crawls into the coffin with her, fitting easily, though she is much smaller than him. He should have been the one to kill her, and now he will atone every day for the rest of his life for being too weak to.
If only they hadn’t called him Caesar.
Caesar is his father, but as crown prince of Nohr, the title would one day be his, and so he learns to wear it with pride. He knows they do not call him that because of his birthright, but because they think him a better ruler than his father. The thought makes him grit his teeth so hard he feels his throat hitch into an almost dry-heave, and he wants it to be because of their infidelity, their disloyalty to their own country, but he knows himself better than that. Feels the way his hand automatically moves to his sword every time the man growls out, “Marx,” drawing out the hard x in his own name, splitting it in half as if he knows that’s what his son expects - fears - his orders will force him to do too.
He remembers his father pointing to the map with his own axe, dragging it across the kingdom of Hoshido until the ancient fabric frayed, and the relief that bloomed unjustly within his naive heart. That he would be the commander of the battles to come, not his warmongering father. That he could bring Kamui back home, that she even wanted to come back home. He had known, had always known, that Nohr was not her home. Still, he crushes the part of himself that tells him such things, the logical part, believing it to be only irrational feeling. Hoshido is not her home. Not anymore. She belongs with them, her Nohrian siblings, the red strings of fate binding them closer together than blood ever could.
And so he had to bring her back.
For his sister, Camilla, who dotes on Kamui, believing them connected, not by royal lineage, but lack thereof; loneliness running in her bastard blood the way it hadn’t with their other two siblings, her only comfort the only child with less Nohrian blood than her. For his brother, Leon, who would never admit his attachment to the girl, but who he sees gazing into the ever-dark horizon as if waiting for the warmth of a sun that would never penetrate the layers of gloom, that surely Kamui was under in Hoshido. For their littlest sister, Elise, so light despite the darkness of their kingdom, whose smile had worn away more and more each day Kamui was gone, like the dimming of a dying star. He will bring her home so his mind can stop wandering, so he will stop finding himself in the crypts, gazing idly at the tall epitaphs that supposedly enshrined his ancestors, before turning his back on them, refusing to bend his knee, his only trust in the living.
For his family, so that they may be whole again. So that the light could return to his dark country.
He had to bring her back because he was Marx, the greatest, the Conqueror, and if his people believe in anything it is that. Because she believed him unstoppable, because he believed she was still the girl with flowers in her hair, forever reaching for him, for something he couldn’t allow himself to give her. He had to bring her back because she had called him “brother.”
She still calls him Brother when they stand on the battlefield, under the hot Hoshidan sun. She still wears a flower in her hair, the same kind he’d try to bring back for her from the battlefield, the only life he was okay with taking, it’s sacrifice for the happiness of his beloved Kamui. She still wears her tiered silver armor, and her blue sash billows behind her in the wind, and she’s exactly the same as he remembers. But the sun glints off the silver, distinctly different than his and his siblings’ onyx armor and that voice in his head bites back again, telling him what he already knows. Even if she is unchanged - Father made sure she would never truly be a part of them. The flower in her hair is wilted. She reaches her hands out to him, palms upturned, as if offering him something, and he wants to believe her outstretched hands are for him to grab, to pull her back to their side. Even as the words spill from her lips, calling his father a tyrant, a monster, even as she says she is going back to Hoshido, he wants to believe. But he can’t will those words away forever, and they cut his certainty down better than any blade could. He hisses out, “Traitor,” and her hands close. If she knew him, she would have known those hands had nothing he was worthy of.
With her betrayal, he is lesser somehow, not incomplete but - intangible, like the wind. No. He is scattered, split and far off, like something tossed into the breeze, like the way dandelion seeds scatter in the wind, spinning round and round in circles, over and over, unable break out of such a light breeze; he wonders if they would stop even if they could. He is petals shredded in a gloved hand (hydrangeas, he notes offhandedly), sweet perfume sticking to the leather - black dye tainting the blue ever so slightly, carried away by a merciful breeze as they slip from that ever tacit hand. He tries to imagine those petals whole again and it isn’t true but he wants it to be just for the moment, just in his mind’s eye, where no one else can see; and there they are gripped tightly, safely within gloved fingers, wilting, blue turning blacker and blacker like a spreading bruise and-
Freeze this frame.
Lance it through the heart and let the blood flow. Smother it until it stills. Soak these hands with blood until there is no trace of blue. Until those perfumed gloves smell of only iron and steel. Mind over matter. Mind over mind.
He can feel the muscles in his shoulders twitch, wanting to tremble, but he will not let them. This is right. Recreate the image. Make it right, too. He is scattered, like troops spread too thin. Troops marching aimlessly, pursuing the enemy like the obstinate beating of the tide on the rocks. Over and over. Seeping across the land. Smothering it. Drowning it. Indiscriminately marching forward, crushing all underfoot. People. Insects. Flowers. Bushes of hydrangeas.
Yes, this is better. This is right. His body steels itself once again, his breath is even. This isn’t right, but it has to be.
He finally exhales. In the crypts, he stands, wavering, incense smoke thick in his lungs. He prays, though he doesn’t know how, properly, and fears it is too late to learn. His prayers are wordless, little more than fleeting thoughts, and an everlasting gaze directed at where he’s placed Kamui’s piece from his strategy set.
It reminds him of days long past, on the battlefield, where he’d spend months away from Kamui. It reminds him of cold nights he’d spend under faded gloom at the border, stars only barely visible, glowing like faint promises. And while the rest of his soldiers slept, he would sit next to the dying embers of the campfire, limestone in hand, dulling his gardening knife by carving little sculptures. For his strategy set, he tells himself, and he isn’t wrong, but he knows he’s lying to himself. The rough stone in his hand becomes the beginnings of simple doll - Elise would probably call it “cute” - with long hair and a meticulously carved flower. He whittles it down until the edge is gone from the knife, and he sighs, wondering if he should even show Kamui when he gets back. If such a silly thing is appropriate - or even worthy of her, or if it will be placed inside his strategy box like the carvings of his other siblings; like the flowers he gathers for her, wilted and browning by the time he returns, are more often than not thrown out, with trembling hands, before he opens the door to greet her.
But there, even on the battlefield, it felt like blades could create. Like there would be an end someday, and he would not have to carry flowers under armor, and those carvings would be nothing but decorative baubles in a warm home with her, and the rest of their siblings.
That fantasy, of being able to come home to her, of being able to hold her, finally, finally is what gets him through those long months away. But it is a fleeting thing, never more than a dream faint as the stars, or the dead cinders, never to be elaborated on. He stills the image before it can go too far, before she can open her mouth and call out for him. He will not let his dream be tainted by her calling for him. He does not think of how she calls him “brother.” He does not think of the single time her mask slipped, and called him her “love.” He does not acknowledge that he remembers her trembling lips and hands, and how she had cried because he had known better, and being unable to wipe her tears as either a brother or lover. He had wanted to be everything for her, and in doing so, could not be anything to her. The two words ring in his dreams, brother and lover, the only place he can find her still, and he accepts it. As long as she was there, he would accept anything.
Yet in camp, he cannot sleep, cannot find her anywhere but as a potential enemy on the strategy maps. He knows how he must look to his siblings, little more than a walking corpse, eyes red and hollow, cheeks sunken in. Leon is the only one who can bear to be in his presence, but he does not look at him and speaks only of maps and war and bloodshed. Camilla brings him food and water as one would take care of a prisoner, but never stays long. Once, while leaving, she hesitated, looking back at him as if wondering if he was really there after all. And then she was gone with a shake of her head. He sees Elise through the slight gap in his tent flaps sometimes, halting just outside, like a child peering into their closet, unsure if monsters really exist. They do, child, they do. He wants to tell her that, but holds his tongue. Let the child believe what she wants. That her brother is somewhere in that dark. That when the tent flaps are pulled back and the light returns at last, he will still be there.
They call him Hades when he is on the battlefield. With his dark blade in hand, clad in onyx armor, he cuts down any who should stand in his way - and perhaps the underworld is where he belongs. The only thing that escapes his wrath is Kamui herself, seen on the outskirts of the battlefield as he loops around for a hammer-and-anvil strike, armor shining between the trees. He sees her, and knows it is a mistake. And she - she takes a careful step toward him, hands outstretched as if to call him back. His hand is still on his sword, heavy and still as a statue. Instead of drawing it, he turns his back on her. Knows he should not look back, but does anyway, and knows he is forsaken. In that moment, he wishes he could be made of sterner stuff, that he really could be Hades.
But he hates the name. If he were Hades, this would be a happy day. If he were Hades, then Kamui would be coming home at last, at long last. As soon as the news reaches him, he works his horse into a gallop, not caring what soldiers he runs down.
He finds her on the ground, smeared with dirt, silver armor reddened whether by her own blood or the reflection of her real elder brother’s crimson armor as he kneels beside her, he does not know. The man looks up, prince-something-or-other - he doesn’t care - and his grief mutates into rage and he draws his sword at Marx. Marx can feel his face contort too, but it isn’t anger or even grief - but something animal. Like a slinking fox after a hare in the dead of winter. Like a mouse caught between the paws of a cat. This is the true form of a conqueror. Not regal or kingly, no. Desperate, wanting, after what is not theirs to have, after something more than they are.
He duels that prince to a standstill, and he’s burning, asking him why, why, over and over. “Why would you take her body if you wanted to kill her?” He does not answer, but strikes him with the flat of his zweihander, and can feel the other man’s ribs crunch. That prince can only wheeze as him as he still struggles forward to lunge at him, but Marx pays him no mind, threat nullified. The wheezing grows fainter as his retainers drag their defeated prince into the distance, looking at Marx sideways, as if seeing something they weren’t supposed to.
Perhaps, if fate had been kinder, that prince would have been more than a bug to crush under his heel. Perhaps, if this story was different, they could have truly been enemies, two princes destined to do battle over Kamui and perhaps a happy ending would await the victor of their legendary squabble. But this is a tragedy. A good end awaits neither of them, their fight in vain, and that prince is nothing more than a typo, a waste of breath, a nuisance.
And with that nuisance gone, he kneels as if at an altar. Touches Kamui’s face, wiping the dirt away, feeling the curve of her cheekbones and the slope of her jaw. He can feel the softness, almost, seeing the way his fingers press into her flesh, but refuses to take his gloves off, even now. He wonders what her dying thoughts were. Were they of Nohr? Of Camilla, cradling her in her arms, talking of lands far beyond the bleak mountains, of a land of light and laughter? Or Leon reading to her as she trained, telling her stories of fantastical beasts and heroes and princes that were supposed to save princesses? Or of their littlest sister tugging at her arm to show her the beginnings of flowers, talking of how she was excited for blooms that would never come. Were her last thoughts - dare he even think them - of him? Of his back, always turned away, cold, stiff, and all the hard lessons he’d taught her?
Was Nohr her dying dream, still beloved, just out of reach? Or was is Hoshido?
He should have been a better brother.
Freeze this frame.
Let it seep into your heart, your mind, your very existence. Let this failure burn into your very soul. Searing, red-hot. Let it mark you. Like a criminal. Like a slave. Like a traitor. Let it brand you so you will remember it until the end of your days.
And with that image of her firmly locked within his heart, he unclasps his cape, draping it over her body. He cannot look at her again.
He is sick to think that history will call him the victor. They greet him with laurels and fanfare, and his Father is indifferent. He is a hero for winning the battle, yet a failure for leaving Hoshido standing, and choosing instead to bring her back. He is the one who must arrange her funeral, for no one else will give her the justice she so deserves. He strips her body of the royal Nohrn sash she still, for some reason, wore - blue, to signify she was not truly a royal, unlike his and Camilla’s violet. He can do no more than that. Depriving her of such a thing, he is shamed - but still, he is selfish, and cannot give it back or bear eyes upon her without it. He leaves the oversight to Camilla, and finds himself going to the crypts, that dying wisteria over and over again, fond company only to the dead.
The funeral passes in a blur he chooses not to remember. There is nothing to remember - he does not speak during the service, nor does he look at Kamui again. But that night, as she is laid out in the crypts, so that the ancestors may guide her into glory, he sneaks in to see her. Gives her his own sash, so that she may be buried with honor, even if Father would never allow it. Almost kisses her - gives her the one thing he never could - but decides against it. He cannot take back the past. He cannot make this right.
Instead, he kneels and prays. He prays for the ancestors to accept her as one of them. Prays and prays, until his thoughts run into one another, becoming gibberish in his mind, and there is only desperation left. Crawls inside her coffin with her to try and atone.
He should have been the one to kill her. At least then she wouldn’t have been alone.
When he wakes, his hand is in hers, skin against skin as if they were children again. It feels like the gods are laughing at him, mocking him. It feels like a misericorde, slipped under the tiers of his armor, burrowing into his heart. It feels like warmth blooming, gushing from such a wound. He places her sash against his rambunctious heart, as if to stop it, as if to beg her to stop it for him.
In the passing days he does not leave his chambers, and no one calls for him, and he in turn calls on neither men nor gods any longer. Kneeling there, he is nobody at last. Stripped of his titles, he thinks of himself as only memory - of a better time. He remembers how she had called him Love, only once. He thought she had understood. But it was only her own feelings refracted onto him that she saw. Because he did not reach for her. Because a love that yearned, that desired, that wanted compensation was not the love he could harbor, existing as both her prince and her brother. Because he did not love her in a way a human being could understand. Wanting neither touch, nor loving words, it would be enough just to exist, unchanging, as they always had.
Remember the days of your youth, when the gardens still bloomed, and Kamui was here, and the family was whole. Remember the crown she made of hydrangeas and ivy, that day under the dying wisteria tree, and how it felt like peace on her upturned palms. And immortalize that moment, that in between worlds, that endless possibility the rare spring brought, blooming like flowers that should not exist in their homeland. Before love was neither a word, nor sin, nor even a feeling, but simply was - the hope buried at the bottom of Pandora’s Box those two lonesome souls created, before skin touched skin and the world burst into color, and the heart could know happiness only from despair.
Freeze this frame.
Eyes shut, her scent clinging to his armor, his breath echoing higher against the desolate stone walls, her sash is warm, gently laced through his fingers.
It feels like a hand to hold.