-1-
The temperate spring breeze glided over the coast of Lycia as if on gulls' wings, soaring over the mainland and bringing a sigh of relief to those who long awaited the end of cold weather.
Rebecca stumbled over her feet, nearly falling in the tall grass.
"Is that it, clumsy? I knew a girl would only slow me down," Wil said, staring down his nose at his neighbor.
"It's not that I'm a girl, idiot! You're older than me!" she protested.
"Nuh-uh! I'm just better than you, Freckle Face!" he insisted, sticking his tongue out at her. He blissfully ignored the light dusting of freckles across his own nose and cheeks, but his comment stung Rebecca too much for her to even mention it.
"Who needs you?" she demanded, trying valiantly to bite back the tears that were quick to come at five years old. "Daddy's got enough roosters strutting around! Bawk bawk bawk!"
Wil made a face, but couldn't think of anything to say to that until she had already stomped off, nursing her bruised pride. He was a mean boy, and she didn't want to see his stupid face any more!
"Better a rooster than a fat ol' cow!" he yelled, but Rebecca was far enough away that she could pretend she hadn't heard him.
-2-
Summer came to Lycia, as hot and stifling as a heavy wool blanket thrown over the world.
Rebecca stared with open admiration at the little paint pony that trundled through the well-grazed grass.
"Pretty neat, isn't she? Think your folks'll let you have one?" Wil asked, as excited and proud as any nine-year-old would be.
She knew full well that if she wanted a horse, she would have to earn it on her own. The knowledge that Wil's parents had just given him one sat heavily on her mind. Still, she wouldn't let him know how bitingly jealous she was.
"Mine'll be better!" she argued with the pugnacious tomboyishness she'd learned from too many years without female company her age; the nearest farmstead was Wil's, and in the nobles' manor on the hill, their only daughter, Isadora, was ten years her elder. Even without all that, her gung-ho older brother had instilled too much of his brusque, argumentative nature in her for her to have turned out any other way.
"I'll let them race anytime! Bet'cha no pony of yours can outrun Vivi, Freckle Face!" he returned.
"With your fat head on her, I'd be surprised if she ran at all," Rebecca countered.
"At least I have a pony," he huffed, yanking on one of her braids as a substitute for a solid insult.
"Idiot!" she yelled, punching him in the shoulder before storming off, leaving Wil rubbing a bruising forearm.
"You're the idiot!" he shouted after her, but she didn't reply to his pathetic comeback. He wasn't worth it, and besides, she wasn't sure she could speak without her voice wavering. Having her hair pulled hurt.
-3-
Fall crept slowly over Lycia, whirling the world as if through a kaleidoscope of myriad colors.
Rebecca's feet dragged as she made her way through the low-cut grass of the fodder field, the tools she carried feeling as if they weighed more than she did.
"Having some trouble with that?" Wil asked, looking sideways at her over his own load.
Although farming was tough work, she refused to let him know how tired she was, and Rebecca shook her head. She had to look undaunted, no matter what, or he would just taunt her mercilessly. He was two years her senior (and he never let her forget it), so she had to be strong to match him step for step.
"You wish," she returned with a confident grin that was belied by the sweat dripping down her face. "I can shoot a bow better'n you now, right? So there's no way you're gonna do anything I can't!"
"Too bad I already do everything better than you!"
"Yeah?"
"Yeah!"
"What about riding horseback, huh? You can't stay on faster than a trot without help!" Rebecca reminded him triumphantly. It was true—for all that he had his own pony and for all the time he'd spent trying to ride it, Wil was the most hopeless horseman she'd ever seen. If he wasn't more stubborn than a chestnut mare, she would think him hopeless, and even then! She prided herself on how well she handled his pony on the occasions he let her ride, and found his skills laughable.
"What would you know? Lady Isadora says I'm good for my age," he protested.
"Lady Isadora doesn't know anything about country riding," Rebecca snapped. "But if you're gonna listen to a metal-bound knight instead of someone who knows what she's doing, then you can go off and learn how to ride from her, idiot! Good day!"
"What do you know of it, Freckle Face?" he called after her as she stalked off, but Rebecca was too indignant to even reply.
-4-
Winter sighed softly over Lycia like a robin fluffing her feathers before settling down over unruly chicks.
Rebecca's feet crunched on the frosted and browned grass, her expression stormy.
"You're gonna miss me, right?" Wil questioned, smiling sheepishly at his ten-year-old neighbor.
"No."
"What about Dan? He's your brother, so you're gonna miss him...right?" he asked, hesitantly trailing off at the end.
"No."
"C-C'mon, Rebecca! Why are you mad at me? We'll be back soon with a mountain of gold and you can come on an adventure with us!"
"Go off on your adventure, idiot! Take Dan and don't come back! See what I care!" Rebecca snapped, hands clenched into fists. "See what I care..."
Wil didn't seem to notice the tears in her eyes, and Rebecca was glad for it. He was just so, so stupid, and right then he could drop off the face of the planet for all she cared. He was just going to go off without her, take her brother, and not even bother to think that maybe she did care. Maybe she would miss the friend she'd had for as long as she could remember. Maybe she would miss the ridiculous moxie that caused Dan to foolishly attempt to fight anyone he met. Maybe she would hate to be so cursedly alone once the only two people she knew heart-to-heart left.
For all the "maybes", Wil's cluelessness was a definite, and he didn't react beyond a pathetic look reminiscent of a kicked dog.
"Are you at least going to say goodbye?" he asked quietly.
"Goodbye! Now…Now get out of here! Go on!"
"Well...Fine, maybe I will! And you can just stay here and never be anything more than a farm girl!" Wil threw back, his temper finally flaring. Good. If he yelled at her, she could be mad at him. Then she wouldn't miss him.
She didn't want to miss him.
"Father is the head of the village! You're just going to go...wander around like some worthless vagabond! So go on. Git outta here!" she snarled, before turning on her heel and stalking off.
"Will not...Freckle Face," he muttered discontentedly, kicking the ground. She didn't say a word to him, tears rolling down her face.
It didn't change the fact that he was leaving on the morrow.
-5-
Spring stole up behind winter, gone one minute and there the next with the precision of an assassin.
Rebecca sighed and lay on her back in the grass, a butterfly lazily fluttering through the air above her.
Time seemed to have passed as slowly as that butterfly flew. The planting and tending and harvesting had all run together, and she couldn't tell one day from another. She'd grown by a handspan and put extensive practice into hunting and riding, but it was empty to have such bragging rights and no one around to brag to.
Wil should have been back. Dan should have been back. Mountain of gold or not, she wanted them both back. She missed the way Dan would eat all of his food in a minute and snatch hers up if she wasn't quick. Dinnertime seemed so quiet without his boisterous attitude.
But the daytime bothered her even more. She could forget sometimes that she used to eat dinner while her brother sung bawdy tavern songs, as he had before he left three years ago. She couldn't forget how she used to run through the woods with Wil ducking low to keep from hitting his head on the branches, or how they'd walk back from working and he'd whistle, high and off-key, or even the way he'd stick out his tongue and call her Freckle Face.
"Idiot," she sighed, heart heavy, before she slowly pulled herself to her feet and headed home.
She especially missed pretending she didn't hear him yell some last-minute, slipshod insult after her.
-6-
Summer barreled into spring like an overeager puppy, knocking it to the ground and prancing off to take its place.
Rebecca slogged through marshy grass, conscious of the raw blister on her heel from where a hole had been worn through her socks.
"Here, lemme help with that," Wil offered, taking the pack off of her back before Rebecca could protest.
"You can't just show up and try to be all nice in a week to make up for five years without a word," Rebecca muttered, not even looking at him.
"Worth trying, though, right? I mean, you never used to let me carry things for you, and you will now, so that's good?" he laughed, smiling his old eyes-half-closed smile. There was a fluttering feeling in her chest, and Rebecca reasoned that maybe, maybe, she could be persuaded to talk civilly with him, if only he'd keep smiling.
"Well, I knew what a big idiot you were," she replied, before her mind had time to process that it was supposed to be focusing on the conversation and not his dazzling grin.
That's not what I meant, she sighed to herself. But calling him stupid sounds better than "Well, you didn't have such mighty fine muscles then, nor did I notice how much you made me smile or how cute the way your hair stuck up in the back was or what a nice person you were—are!"
He sheepishly scratched the back of his head.
"Yeah, I know I keep messing up…But even a blind squirrel finds an acorn sometimes, right?"
"Blind? I think not. I've seen you with a bow," Rebecca complimented, but her mouth was too quick for her mind, which was currently more interested in his delicate cheekbones, and she added "And so I know that if you were blind, I probably wouldn't have to duck for cover so often."
Wil's grin and stride faltered.
"Are you still that mad at me?" he asked. "For leaving or being a big jerk or calling you Freckle Face?"
"...yes," she stubbornly muttered, before racing to catch up with the vanguard and leaving Wil behind.
For once, he didn't say anything at all.
-7-
In name, it was still summer, but in the Bern Mountains the only season that held sway was winter, the usurping tyrant that the others grudgingly tolerated.
Rebecca plowed through knee-deep snow, thinking wistful thoughts of temperate Pherae.
"Look, I know you've been kinda avoiding me lately, and I really don't want us to leave off on such a bad note in case—"
"In case anything happens?" she asked bluntly. That morbid thought had been on all their minds, what with the increasing number and skill of enemy soldiers. Sheer dumb luck with a dose of tactical brilliance had held them through that far, but not without losses—Erk, stabbed in the back by one of Euban's mercenaries, was a shock to those who previously thought they were sheltered by fate. That didn't dampen the hurt when the lethal White Wolf proved that his status as one of the Four Fangs was not just for show—Rath, who had only just joined them, left just as quickly. Guy had made it away from that encounter with his life and precious little else. The healers had barely been able to keep him from bleeding out, a small consolation in the face of Rath's death. It was understandable that Wil be worried about their lives.
"Well, er, yeah...because we've been hurt pretty badly, and any day…"
"Don't worry about me," Rebecca insisted. "I can take care of myself, and in any case Sir Lowen is there to fight off the ones I can't get to. He hasn't failed me yet."
Wil's ears burned red, which seemed quite a feat in the frigid air. Rebecca wondered what she'd said wrong.
"...yeah, well, I guess he's better'n me, then. I missed a wyvern and its rider stuck a lance through Senior Raven's shoulder. Bloody mess, it was, then he passed out, and we were short on healing staves, and it wasn't like the healers' tent wasn't full enough already..."
"Who else is in there?" Rebecca asked, quick to use any topic that would pull him away from his self-degrading rambling.
"Remember that whole problem with our shortage of archers and the drastic increase in magic enemies? Sir Wallace was nearly cooked by a fireball, and although he insists he's fine, Priscilla's trying her best to convince him to lie down and get some rest. Guy's still in there from…you know…and Lucius had another one of those 'fits' of his. As soon as he's coherent again from the dark magic that hit him while he was out of it, he'll probably want to thank Sir Heath…and, well, near a dozen others are in there too," he sighed. "Matter of fact, Serra patched me up from all those snapped ribs back in the Badon ambush…"
"Snapped ribs?" Rebecca echoed, horrified. She'd been lucky enough to get away with little more than scratches and the general discomfort of bedbugs and sore feet, and she'd assumed that Wil had escaped with similar. The notion that he'd suffered further hadn't crossed her mind.
"I tumbled down a hill after another of those blasted flying lizards took it into its head that I made a good snack. Don't worry—I'm fine. That healing magic works wonders," he said with an embarrassed chuckle.
"Then I'm glad you're fine, at least," she admitted nervously. The way his face lit up at her compliment caused her lungs to malfunction, and she averted her eyes for a moment to compose herself.
"Idiot that I am, right?" he asked, amusement still obvious.
"What else, stupid?" she said playfully, glad to be back on familiar ground. All the seriousness and worrying was getting to her head, and she would much rather go back to the same childish insults they'd tossed back and forth for as long as she could remember.
Her heart sunk at her own words, though, and Rebecca was struck with the confused feeling of something normal going horribly awry.
Wil shrugged and didn't even bother to call her Freckle Face as she ran away from the source of her sudden problem.
-8-
Time seemed to turn backwards as they returned to Ostia, fall setting the leaves ablaze with fiery reds and oranges, a breath of frost touching the earth.
Rebecca sat in the clean-cut grass of the parade grounds and leaned against the stone wall, eyes fixed on the puffy clouds that passed the world by.
"What're you doing out here all alone?" Wil asked from his spot next to her, not even paying attention to the sky.
"I can't stand being inside. Everyone's more tense than a bowstring! No one's taking this well," Rebecca complained.
They were leaving for the Dread Isle as soon as the lords finished buying any last-minute supplies they might need. She wondered if they would have the strength to go back to the Dragon's Gate. Rebecca remembered well how her legs had turned to jelly at the sight of the fire dragon, how her knees had knocked and her heart fluttered in her chest. Rebecca knew she hadn't been the only one to lose herself at the sight of it. Florina had sobbed hysterically, Canas had been reduced to little more than a terrified mess (despite his mumblings about "magiphysics of transdimensional recall"), and even grief-numbed Matthew had found something that could move him, or at least make him stumble backwards until he tripped over his own heels and hit the ground.
She didn't blame them. Rebecca remembered vividly the creature, power and fear incarnate. The monster's scaled bulk had been made of muscle atop muscle, its every inch covered with natural armor that even the strongest fighter would have trouble cracking. Its whiplash tail had shattered a column that was as wide around as a watch tower, its fangs longer than a man's arm, wings of flame blazing at its shoulders.
From the ashen look on Wil's face, the memory was every bit as real in his mind as it was in hers, and the idea that either one of them could be pitted against such a creature tore their courage to bits. She didn't blame any of the army for their nervousness in the face of such a beast. The only people she openly begrudged were those foolish go-getters like Farina who hadn't been with them the first time around, or those who spread their depression to others with their morale-killing fatalism, such as Harken.
Wil forced a grin, trying feebly to lighten the mood.
"I know what you mean," Wil agreed, making a face. "I left 'cause hearing Raven's boots click on the hall floor as he paced back and forth and back and forth was enough to drive me crazy."
"Or drive you sane, idiot," Rebecca playfully replied, more than willing to follow his lead. He nodded enthusiastically with that grin that did funny things to her insides and probably was not good for her health.
"He's intolerable now anyway, ill humor that he's in, and I've gotta wonder how Lucius puts up with him. I tell you, I'd take the dragon over an angry Senior Rave any day! Matthew is bad enough—knowing that we're going back to that blasted island has him moping and drinking again. Yours any better?"
"Who, Nino? Yeah, but I can't stand that creepy Jaffar staring at me like he knows every sinful thing I've ever done and plans to judge me for them. Dunno if anyone would approve of him and her being alone in there together, but I wasn't staying," Rebecca groaned.
"Hey, speaking of couples, Sain says he saw Kent and Lyn in the kitchen. Kissing. 'Course, he said Lyn looked a little more like she was actively venting frustration on his lips, but kissing's still kissing to me," he said with a grin and a wink.
"They're fine and all, but I don't think someone should court like that so far outside their status," Rebecca mused.
"What, like you and Lowen?" Wil blurted out, the slightest edge of a demand in his words. It was obvious he'd had this question on his mind for a while.
"No!" she snapped, quicker to anger than a bull seeing red. "He's only a friend, idiot!"
"Idiot? C'mon, I was just wondering! No need to go all Vaida on me over one thing!" Wil attempted to joke, hastily jumping to his feet as she stood up.
"Since when was my love life any of your business anyway?" Rebecca shouted, put on the defensive by the knowledge that he might realize that the one she couldn't keep her eyes off was him, and that maybe he wouldn't think the same. After all, she was just "that stupid farmgirl" with the freckles he so hated.
"I was just wondering!"
"Okay, then, how about you and Lady Lyndis?" she accused
"What?" he yelped, completely taken aback. "Didn't I just tell you she's fallen for Kent? And didn't you just say you had a problem with courting outside your status?"
"Well, I'm more than willing to marry within my status if—"
"If you weren't such a, a freckle-faced jerk!" Wil cried, taking off at a dead run.
"If you'd only understand what I've been trying to say," Rebecca sighed, head drooping. She wondered just when their positions had been reversed.
-9-
The chilling, ghastly mist of Valor almost masked the sweltering residual heat of dragonfire, where time seemed to stand still.
Rebecca sat numbly a dozen feet above the dead grass, the papery bark of a birch tree providing a rough texture for her backrest.
"It's over," Wil shakily declared from the branch opposite hers. There was, thankfully, a whole tree between them to keep him from seeing just how jarred she still was from that horrible battle.
Her memories of the first dragon were nothing, nothing compared to the size and power of the second. Breathing huge gouts of flame over their heads and using every one of the natural weapons so gratuitously lumped onto its already fearsome body, it had her and Wil clinging to each other and silently thanking the gods that they were not in possession of the legendary weapons necessary to fight it. It awed them all to see Eliwood dance in and out of its reach on his half-mad horse, Lyn rushing in close enough to be burnt by the fiery aura around it, Hector charging with all the strength and recklessness of a bear, and Athos calmly intoning the words to the same spells he had cast a thousand years ago. Those were the heroes, the ones not wholly of her world. They were the brave ones, unlike Rebecca, who wanted—no, needed!—Wil to protect her.
"I guess things will return to normal now. That is what we fought for," Wil remarked.
"As normal as it can be after that," Rebecca darkly agreed. "We fought a dragon. Dan…isn't really himself anymore."
"Yeah…He doesn't remember. Not you, not me, not home. So things can't be like before…"
"Rubbish. Things are...things will be like before, right?"
"We've seen things we had no damn right seeing," he swore, for one of the first times in Rebecca's memory. "The dragon was horrible enough without those soulless morphs! We already lost Rath"—Wil's voice broke at the mention of his old friend—"to Lloyd, but to lose Isadora to him as well…."
"I know," she breathed. "But we could have lost more people…"
"What, like Legault? I know he's still alive, but there isn't much a blind man can do…"
"You're okay," Rebecca sighed. "And I'm okay. At least we can continue on with our lives."
"Pherae's old marquess is dead! The country's torn up! Ostia's marquess—and the head of the Lycian League—is dead too! Everything's all wrong!" Wil exploded. His voice carried a near-crying note, and he anxiously fidgeted. The sharp twang of an over-tightened bowstring echoed through the still night, as did the smack it made upon striking Wil's skin.
"Idiot," she huffed at his foolhardy reaction, overtly tense from his outburst and the nerve-wracking atmosphere. None of her usual joking lilt touched the comment.
"Stop it!" he cried, voice cracking. "Stop calling me an idiot! I'm sick and tired of everyone thinking I'm stupid! I don't care what Sain or Kent or you say! I'm not an idiot!"
Rebecca paused, taken aback by his suddenly violent reaction to the name she'd teasingly called him since childhood. But then again...he was right. Wil wasn't an idiot, in the slightest, and she'd only called him that because she'd done it so long it just...seemed like the right thing to say.
But Rebecca's temper caught up to her and dragged her to her feet, demanding a cynical retort to his outburst. She dropped from the branch to the ground, circling around to face him.
"Well, I'm sick and tired of you calling me 'Freckle Face' like it's such an ugly thing! You've got freckles yourself, id—" Rebecca paused, thinking it cruel after what he said, and changed midword—"jerk! Right there, across your nose!" she yelled, finding her eyes tearing up a little as they always did when she was angry
"I never said they were ugly! They're adorable, so there you go just saying I'm being stupid again!"
Rebecca froze, temper dissipating like smoke on the wind.
"...what did you say?"
"I'm not stupid and you're beautiful! And I was gonna say that maybe the only place for me now was somewhere with you, and would you marry me?" he yelled, face flushed with anger and embarrassment.
"I would in a second," she whispered.
Wil was left grinning like a madman as Rebecca raced off to tell Lady Louise the good news before her heart burst with excitement.
-10-
Spring crept up slowly on them, before falling flat on its face and waking the whole world to warmer weather and new life.
Rebecca meandered back towards the little farmhouse that Wil had built, fresh grass vibrant and green.
"I'm back from the market," Wil announced from right behind her. "Did you miss me?"
"I'm not so lovestruck that I'm distraught at a day apart," she replied. "But yes, I did."
He slipped his calloused hand into hers, positively beaming as he always was. She gave his hand a squeeze, still as in love with him as she had been when he had blurted out his proposal in the middle of the argument. Their arguing still hadn't ceased, either. He was still as oblivious as he had always been, and she was not so proud that she would deny her own stubbornness. Still, it added spice to their marriage, and was preferable to the boring monotony they'd seen with others.
"Rumor has it that we're not the only ones of the old group who prefer married life," Wil said, nonchalant statement belied by his wide grin.
"Are you talking about Eliwood and Ninian? Because everyone knew that was going to happen."
"Nope! Lady Lyn and Kent took off for Sacae, and I'll bet the house it's not to look at horses. Nino and Jaffar apparently eloped, or so says Legault—would you believe he was the number one crime problem in Etruria for awhile?"
"I guess he's 'robbing people blind' literally," she dryly said.
"You bet! Oh, and get this—Farina ran off with your brother!"
"Hope he doesn't tire himself out trying to keep up with her," Rebecca laughed.
"Yeah, good luck with that," Wil muttered with a grimace. "She'll be the one worn out, same as I was."
"What, not as young as we used to be?"
"No, it's just that he was too much for me even then! Besides, I'm plenty young! Nineteen's hardly old!" he spluttered.
"Race you to the front door," she challenged.
"You're on!"
Rebecca was left behind as Wil tore off like an arrow out of a bowstring. She attempted to keep up for a short distance, before slowing her pace, hand resting on her pregnant belly. She smiled as Wil tripped over his feet, landing in the tall grass.
"Idiot," she chuckled to herself, but she helped him to his feet anyway.
"Thanks…Freckle Face," he teasingly replied, and they walked up to the house together, hand in hand.
No one would be left behind again.