Title: "Shield and Lance"
Author: Joanne Blessing
Series: Fire Emblem (aka Fire Emblem: The Blazing Sword)
Setting: Post-tutorial. Somewhere in between the end of Lyn's story and the start of Eliwood or Hector's story.
Note: This is mostly a crackish idea.
Disclaimer: It goes without saying, but I will state it nonetheless: I own nothing of this franchise, it belongs to Nintendo/Intelligent Systems. I took some license with the characters' backgrounds, building off what was revealed in the tutorial.
Summary: Kent is trying to spar with Sain, while Lyndis watches. Knowing Sain's penchant for drama, hilarity is bound to ensue.

"Shield and Lance"

"What do you think you are doing, Sain?"

"What? OW! Kent, that wasn't called for! Milady Lyndis was speaking to me! You shouldn't hit me when she's talking to me!"

Kent, the commander of the Caelin knights, sighed as he faced his long-time partner, friend, and now sub-Commander; "Sain, you utter lout. Pay attention to me when I've got a lance pointed at you! Honestly, I don't understand how you've survived all we've been through!"

"I have to agree," Lyndis, generally referred to by her friends as Lyn, the heiress of Caelin's noble house and granddaughter of Marquess Caelin, Lord Hausen, chuckled from where she sat on a porch, watching the two knights sparring. "Sain, you worry too much about what I'm doing. Worry less about me and more about yourself."

"Yes, but you were talking to me, my lady!"

"I was asking you what you thought you were doing! You were spacing out!"

"Yeah, but..." Thwack! "Ow!"

"I'll keep smacking you until you start dodging," Kent said calmly.

The next swing met air as Sain ducked, and then spun around and swung his own lance lower to try and knock Kent's feet out from under him. The red-haired knight, sometimes called the Crimson Shield by his fellow knights, didn't let his friend, sometimes called the Green Lance, get away with it though. He spun around and got his feet out of the way, bringing his lance around to block the strike.

"Finally getting serious?" A gravelly voice said from behind Lyn. "About time, hmm?"

"Good morning, Grandfather!" Lyn said happily, standing up to embrace her grandfather.

"Mm! You know that I was up before you, Lyndis!" Lord Hausen said with a smile as he embraced his only living family member left.

Lyn was just about to sit back down when she spied a regal-looking gentleman with scarlet hair stepping out of the doorway, dressed in very smart-looking blue clothes. He had a very noble air about him, middle-aged as he was. His gentle blue eyes and striking red hair reminded her rather abruptly of a young lord she owed a great debt to.

"Take care, my friend," Hausen said to the gentleman. "T'would be a great tragedy if something befell you."

The man laughed merrily; "Hardly, my friend. I have left my two best paladins at home with my dear wife, and my son is old enough that should something happen to me, he can succeed me. He will be a good ruler. But, I have no intentions of handing it over to him yet anyway. I am just investigating some oddities. Thank you, though, for your cooperation. The fewer provinces of Lycia that get involved in Lord Darin's mad plan, the better. I believe I can count on Ostia to take care of itself, as Lord Darin wouldn't dream of taking on Lord Uther, but I feared you, as a neighbor, might get caught up in the fringes of this."

"I want nothing to do with whatever Marquess Laus is planning," Hausen said firmly. "My only wish is to remain peaceful, to regain my strength so that my dear granddaughter can fulfill her promise to me, to take me to see the lands she lived on before, that my daughter so loved enough to forsake Caelin to live in." There was no bitterness in Marquess Caelin's voice, only affection. He had long since gotten over his anger that his daughter had run away from him to live on the Sacae plains with a tribal lord. "I wish to see the lands Madelyn loved so much before I depart this mortal coil."

"Grandfather," Lyn said firmly, "please do not speak so morbidly. You are in fine health. The physician is impressed with your recovery. We have much to do yet to catch up still, after all!"

The red-haired man laughed, clapping a hand on Hausen's shoulder; "Your granddaughter is a joy to you, my friend. Not unlike my son is to me. Well met, Lady Lyndis. Well met."

Lyn gave the gentleman a polite bow; "How do you do, sir?"

The gentleman smiled at her; "The pleasure is mine. I believe you know my son?"

"Are you Marquess Pherae?"

"I am indeed. Elbert of Pherae, at your service." Lord Elbert executed a chivalrous and respectful bow. "Eliwood is my son."

"I do indeed know your son, Lord Elbert," she said with an awkward attempt at a respectful bow - bows like this didn't exist on the Sacae grassland plains, after all, so she was still learning how to be a proper lady - and gave him as radiant a smile as she could to make up for her blunder. "In fact, I owe him a huge debt of thanks. Without his help, I might not have made it to Caelin to meet my beloved grandfather. Please tell him when you return home that I thank him for his help."

"I'm sure he knows already, milady," Lord Elbert said with an easy smile that reminded her of his son's open and honest charisma. "I would like to stay here and hear your story of what my son did to aid you, but I have a long ride ahead of me. I regret to take leave of you, Lady Lyndis. Friend Hausen," he turned to Marquess Caelin and saluted, "I may be a while, but I hope to visit you in a few months' time on my way home."

"I look forward to seeing you again, my friend. Go with my good will."

Lord Elbert gave Lyn a salute as well, before striding out into the yard where his knights waited with his big white stallion. He mounted up, made a gesture to his knights, and they galloped out of the courtyard and out onto the road without another word.

"Ah," Hausen said, stretching his arms over his head, "what glorious weather. What did you have in mind to do today, Lyndis?"

"Well, I was hoping to spar with one of those morons," she grinned, pointing at the two sparring knights. "Whoever wins, in fact. But I'm starting to think that Kent is doing everything he can to not win!"

"Ahaha!" Sain erupted into laughter. "Did you hear that, Kent? Milady thinks you fail at sparring!"

"Actually," Lyn retorted, "I think he's being too generous, giving you all kinds of opportunities, which you aren't even taking advantage of!"

"AAAIIIEEEEEEE!" A voice screeched from overhead.

On instinct, Lyn pushed her grandfather back close to the wall, her sword arm poised to draw the Mani Katti if necessary.

Then a flash of white as Florina, a longtime friend of Lyn's and an Ilian pegasus knight in service of House Caelin right now, came careening into the courtyard aboard her new pegasus partner, Makar, whom she'd nicknamed Huey. The young stallion was a clumsy replacement for her previous partner, an older mare that had been badly injured by an arrow and had to be retired from service. Apparently Makar was even more afraid of arrows than the mare had been, and Lyn knew that Florina was trying to train the pegasus to not be quite so skittish around allied archers. It appeared that this was the result of one such training, and it was about as effective as all the previous ones before: not very effective at all.

Makar's wings flapped wildly as he skidded across the grass, and he whinnied in a combination of terror and frustration. The two of them plowed right into Kent and Sain, sending them flying apart like bowling pins.

"Florina! Florina! Dammit, Florina, tell me you're okay! Lyn'll skin me alive if I've hurt you!" Wil, the castle's most elite archer, came pounding into the courtyard. "This is madness, this training! I really wish you'd stop insisting I shoot at you when you're flying just so you can learn to dodge!"

Kent scrambled to his feet, looking around. "Is anyone hurt?"

"M-medic?" Sain raised an arm up feebly from where he was laying face-down in the dust. "I... ouch."

"Oh no!" Florina leaped off her pegasus and ran to his side. "I've hurt you, haven't I, Sir Sain?"

"Oh the pain!" The knight wailed melodramatically. "I need a cleric! A beautiful cleric!"

Wil put his hands on his hips and sighed; "Sain, dude, that's enough. You're going to upset her if you keep up this farce."

"Wil," Kent said in a warning tone. "Your manners."

"Come on, Kent, we just had Florina crash into you guys, and you're worried about my manner of speech?"

"We are in Lord Hausen's presence, Wil. You should behave yourself."

"M-medic!" Sain sounded petulant, and Florina looked like she was going to start crying.

"I'm so sorry, Sir Sain!" The pegasus knight was trembling with frustration and fear.

"Get up, Sain," Kent said firmly. "You're not hurt."

"I took a wing to the face!" Sain complained. "Of course I'm hurt!"

"You couldn't have taken a wing to the face, because the wings were up in the air when Makar collided with us - his shoulder hit you, and the force knocked you back. Get up, you lazy lout!"

Sain let out a long sigh and pushed himself up out of the dirt. There was a mark on his jaw where something had collided with him and had left a mark that looked like it would develop into bruise.

"Now that we've ascertained that it was an accident," Lord Hausen said mildly, "Lyndis, I must insist that you stop trying to force me inside the house."

"Eh? Oh!" She stepped away. "Sorry, Grandfather. I just..."

"I know, my dear," he said kindly, patting her head. "And I appreciate your concern. I really do." He knew how much she'd lost when the Taliver bandits had attacked her village. Lyn had been the only survivor in the end, having been out on hunting duty all day and thus not around to ingest the poisoned water, so when the bandits attacked, she had been the only one capable of moving much. Hassar had made sure that his daughter escaped the carnage to go get help, but in the end, help had come far too late, and she'd been the one with the worst burden of all, survivor's guilt. She'd lost everything dear to her, and had nearly lost herself on a dark path of revenge, until she'd chanced upon a tactician named Mark on the plains, who had transformed her fighting skills and had helped guide her and her new friends to victory time and again.

It was a pity that Mark had disappeared like he had after securing Castle Caelin from Lundgren's ambitions.

"Grandfather?" Lyn looked at Hausen expectantly. "Are you not feeling well?"

"Sorry, my dear, just a little nostalgia."

"Jeez, Sain," Wil was saying, his arms folded across his chest; "You know what? I think I know why your momma named you that."

"What?" The green-armored knight blinked in confusion as he dusted off.

"Cuz otherwise, you wouldn't be at all!" The archer was trying to not laugh, and failing miserably.

"Wouldn't be what?"

"Sane! Get it?"

Kent and Sain exchanged glances.

"It's a pun! Sain... sane, as in, his sanity... come on, laugh about it for once, Kent! You have to have a sense of humor in there somewhere!"

"Trust me," Sain said with a grin, appreciating the joke even if it was at his own expense, "Kent doesn't know how to laugh. I've been hunting for his sense of humor for years."

Kent harrumphed and grasped his lance, spinning it in his hands. "Laughter is moot anyway. Sain, if you don't want to actually get hurt and need a priest of Elimine, then I suggest you get serious."

"Priest?" Sain feigned horror.

"You know that Caelin staffs no clerics, only monks and priests," Wil grinned

"My thoughts exactly," Kent growled, going into a stance. "You have three seconds to get your lance ready and block me! Hyah!"

Lyn grinned and laughed, looking at her grandfather; "They're certainly energetic."

"They are two of my most loyal knights," Lord Hausen said wistfully. "I do have hope that they will remain loyal to you even after I've left this mortal coil. And don't look at me like that, Lyndis. I'm very old. You've given me a new lease on life, but I won't be around forever. I'm not being morbid, I'm being realistic. And you, my dearest child, must learn to accept that loved ones don't live forever, and learn to accept their joys and sorrows while they live with you. But I won't leave you alone just yet, so don't look so sad!"

She looked sheepish as she hugged him. "I know. I'm sorry."

"Let's go for a walk in the garden while those two knights sort themselves out."

"Good idea."

The two of them departed the porch and headed for a small garden nearby while Kent ran Sain ragged around the main courtyard. They could see Florina and Makar in flight again, and Florina was begging Wil to shoot at her so that she and her pegasus could learn to dodge arrows.

Mother Earth and Father Sky, Lyn thought as she walked beside her beloved grandfather and watched the bustling of the castle around her, I am so blessed with these people. Thank you for sending me the Crimson Shield and the Green Lance to fetch me home.

THE END