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The night is deep and cold, the moon long set and the dawn yet distant. The camp is nearly empty- only the two of them, three sentries, and those too injured to take the field, who tonight number only Sumia. Libra had gone with the remaining Shepherds; Lissa and Maribelle were left in reserve. They are all too wary now to have all three of them in danger at once. Two, perhaps, might be permissible, but Lissa’s barely seen the front lines since her brother’s death and Maribelle has barely left her side, so they've fallen into this pattern instead: Libra goes with their slow-dwindling friends and does his best to keep them on their feet. When they stumble back to camp, Lissa and Maribelle do what they can.
It isn’t the finest arrangement, Maribelle admits, but they can only do their best with what they have. No Ylissean is eager to see their exalt-regent so near the danger of the same creatures they say slew her brother, but they cannot argue there is no heir and Lissa refuses to remain behind. Privately, Maribelle is glad she at least does not try to lead from the front as Chrom would. It’s better this way, and marginally safer, and it doesn’t force Lissa to do anything she finds distasteful- and the Risen are, truly, distasteful. It seems trite, amidst encroaching ruin, to complain of their smell of all things, but Maribelle will never grow accustomed to it.
No one wants to think this is a losing battle, but every year they lose more ground and the doubts that the Fell Dragon flies again grow smaller. Their options are limited, to say the least- but the Shepherds never were given to giving up, not even when it seemed wise, and they are all of them too mad to do so now. If not for their dead then for the living, and if not for the living then at least for their pride. If the Fell Dragon means to have the lands of Naga’s faithful, then he will be obliged to take it inch by inch.
Spite is a poor motivator, but it must do when hope is slim.
Maribelle says little of this to Lissa. Her wife is hard-pressed enough to keep up her smile, and whatever she uses to fuel it, Maribelle will not see it go out for want of a bit of optimism on her part. The Shepherds still look to her, ever their princess, and so does Ylisse, and so does Maribelle. They will not let her falter nor fall if it is in their power to protect her.
Maribelle shakes herself from such dark thought, too familiar a companion during these long nights, and crosses the tent with swift strides. She adds another log to the sturdy iron stove, whose door still creaks when she swings it shut, and sets their beaten kettle over the heat, and waves to Lissa, hunched beneath her cloak beside Sumia’s cot.
“I will be gone only a moment,” she says, the words like ritual or a ward they hope will hold. “And when I return, the water should be warm enough for tea.” Lissa smiles, wan and worn like only Maribelle- and perhaps Frederick- ever get to see, and returns the wave.
“Hurry back,” she says, the same as ever. As if that’s all it takes to make it so. Well, perhaps it is. They’ve been playing these parts for years now, and they haven’t failed yet.
Maribelle huffs warm breath into her cupped hands, regretting most immediately leaving the shelter of the infirmary tent. Grass and gravel crunch underfoot, brittle with cold and loud in the quiet, and she hurries on.
She can circle the whole camp twice in the time it would have taken her to make one circuit during the war in Valm. Even with the few recruits they’ve been able to accept, they are much diminished. Maribelle sighs heavily, and stops at their picket line, and picks her way carefully to Ember. The fierce mare shudders awake at her touch but barely lifts her head, just as weary as the rest of them.
“I am sorry, dear girl,” Maribelle murmurs. “It will be warmer soon, I promise.” Ember huffs, and butts Maribelle’s chest with her head, and stamps. Maribelle leaves her in peace, assured that, should it come to it, one rider at least might escape. The Risen have so far only seemed to find their reserve camp by accident and not in force, but such grace cannot last forever. She marches back to the infirmary tent, waving to the sentries that all is well, and slips back into the only warm place in camp.
“I can still hardly believe those young men wished to follow me out here,” she declares, setting tin camp cups down with more force than is strictly necessary. Lissa startles, just a little, but Sumia doesn’t stir, so Maribelle doesn’t set out a third.
“Who?” Lissa says around a wide yawn. “The boys from Themis?”
“Yes, them. I’m not sure what possessed them to come stand around in the cold for hours on end rather than remaining in- in a place with actual walls.” Not their homes, not Themis. Gods, that still stings, doesn’t it. She shakes herself. “If they find it a worthy task, then that’s a fine thing, I suppose, but I can’t claim to understand it.”
Lissa laughs, breathy and thin. “Who wouldn’t want to follow you, Maribelle?”
“Oh, don’t tease about that-”
“I’m not.” Lissa’s voice is suddenly sharp and deadly serious, her gaze heavy on Maribelle’s shoulders. “The people of Themis know you care for them; why shouldn’t they follow you?”
Maribelle sighs heavily through her nose. How many times has she seen her lands burned in the last ten years? It must be a shock any of her people still call her duchess at all. “I suppose we all need something to give us purpose these days,” she says. A handful of hunters and loggers turned soldiers? Even Donnel had not become one overnight, and he had been given far more training than these can be spared.
At least in their temperaments they are suited to the company. The Shepherds are a couple dozen madmen with more loyalty than sense and they always have been- they were even worse when Chrom still led them. They made a fitting honor guard for the prince and princess.
They thought themselves invincible, once. Especially after Robin joined them.
The kettle whistles on the stove and they both flinch. Maribelle does not curse about it, but she does most precisely pour the water and scoop out measures of tea. The spoon scrapes wood harshly; there isn’t much of this one left.
“Here, darling,” she says. Lissa cups the warm drink gratefully, holding it close to her chest. When she sits again, she does so between Sumia and the tent flap. It’s no tea party; their tutors would be ashamed to see the state of it. Maribelle hasn’t brought out even her faded finery in what feels like years. What she wears now is all thick wool and well-stocked pockets and faded bloodstains, practicality through and through.
“Lissa, dear, you’ll burn your tongue,” Maribelle chides, but Lissa only tosses her head, unabashed.
“It’s fine!” she insists. “This one just smells too good to resist.”
“You won’t be able to taste it at all if you scald your taste buds off!”
“You worry too much about silly things. Besides,” Lissa adds with a sly smile Maribelle swears she must have learned from the likes of Virion- or perhaps that Gaius. “I know just the woman to ask for assistance should I wound my tongue.”
Maribelle blinks, and tries not to flush, and fails rather spectacularly at it, and hides her face in her teacup instead. Gods! Did she plan that? Perhaps Lissa has indeed spent too much time with Virion, to score such well-aimed shots. Her laughter is bright and bubbling, though, and Maribelle has sorely missed that sound, even at such a cost to her dignity.
“Oh, Maribelle, you’re so red,” Lissa crows. “Oh I can’t believe that worked. I could barely get the words out without turning the same color. Maybe there’s something to this after all…”
“I am certain Sir Frederick would be most curious to discover where you are learning such things,” Maribelle says primly and Lissa gasps.
“You wouldn’t!”
“I-” Maribelle pauses, taking in Lissa’s wide-eyed glare. “Darling, he does know we are wed.”
“Yes?”
“And that we have children.”
“Yes…”
“He can’t truly fear for your modesty still after all these years.”
“You have met the man, Maribelle.”
“I suppose I have,” she concedes. If there was anyone more protective than her of the last of Exalt Garen’s children, it surely must be him. “Still, I thought it only jest. Surely he would not cause such trouble now.”
“He wouldn’t think it was causing trouble,” Lissa mutters, but there’s a touch of fondness there, too. Maribelle blows delicately on her tea and tests a sip. The night is cold, but at least it renders her tea drinkable quickly.
The tea is lemon and ginger and just a bit sweeter than she likes- but they can’t be so picky anymore, and more importantly Lissa really does like it, and perhaps most importantly it’s potent enough to keep them both awake through the night. These vigils are no unfamiliar thing to them, not anymore, and long as the winter nights are there's routine to them, too, to the pacing and waiting and their inelegant, camp-worthy tea. They keep watch, and they wait for trouble.
Distant horn calls shatter the night. One sounds like the Shepherds’ horns; the other is unfamiliar. Lissa and Maribelle rise as one, staves in hand. Even Sumia stirs from her deep slumber at the sound.
There’s nothing that isn’t stained with blood anymore, but at least there’s still this, pulling Lissa close as the sentries call warning of someone’s approach, kissing her quickly if not decorously. She tastes like citrus and the sting of magic they’ll both work to save everything they can, for as long as they can keep it. This wasn’t what either of them thought their lives would be like- how they thought they’d use their talents. Healing was always a useful thing, and a fulfilling one, but they never meant to be so practiced at it as their world came down in ashes.
This is the world fate has decreed for them, however, and they can do no more than their best with what they have.