A/N: Because Fire Emblem is love. That's all.

This is set at the very end of Lyn's quest, to make the chronology of the matter explicit.

I don't own Fire Emblem. I doubt anyone could. There is only one bond that can hold the folk of the Legion, the Elite and the Horde. And that is the net that can catch the wind.

peerless warrior

We know one another's faults, virtues, catastrophes, mortifications, triumphs, rivalries, desires, and how long we can each hang by our hands to a bar. We have been banded together under pack codes and tribal laws.

~Rose Macaulay

Eros will have naked bodies; Friendship naked personalities.

~C. S. Lewis

You were the one that found me.

There are books about being a tactician, and they say, often and often, don't get attached. People are units, and units are expendable. Any worth they have is linked to their speed and strength, their choice of weapons or magic, their occasional special tricks of the trade, the rarity of their skills, and it can be calculated in precise numbers to twenty decimal places. They are no more than this. They cannot be any more than this, or you have lost already, because you cannot think clearly.

I have read those books. But it is too late; they will not stay in my head. A fire has risen, burning all the carefully written statistics, because you were the one that found me.

How do you describe falling in love? It is hard enough if the love is the commonplace sexual sort. That is talked about all the time, but this, never…I was tired, and hungry, and alone, for a very long time, on the plains of Sacae. And then I was injured, and it became too much, and the darkness descended, and when it lifted again you were there, looking at me. Caring for me.

That was when the fire was lit. It was when you let me in. Let me into your home, your heart, your story. You gave me a place and a purpose. You gave me yourself-not just your quick feet and your sword arm, not the statistics of a unit, but yourself. You offered me friendship.

The speed at which a small flame can breed a roaring conflagration shocks all who have witnessed such a thing. It opened in me like wings. Wings to shelter and protect this changeling brood, this legion too small for that name, this guerrilla army. My fighting children. My family. Loved and precious, precious beyond reckoning, no mere units but people of incalculable value.

Sain and Kent, green and red, sweet and sour, two sides of a coin, sword and shield, linked in opposition, rivals in cooperation.

Mouse-shy Florina, wide-eyed innocent, a maiden fit to tame unicorns, purity masking the strength she does not know she has.

Wil with the mouth that runs on fiddlesticks, a mile a minute and a smile wide enough for the world, a smile that you simply cannot help but smile back at, a smile that breeds exponentially.

Dorcas loyal and steady and true, unyielding and faithful; Natalie is a lucky woman.

Impudent Serra, full of sass and backtalk, delightful in the saucy boldness that sits strangely with her white habit.

Erk the sharp-witted scholar child, sharp-tongued sometimes too, older than he should be yet still very much a teenager.

Rath quiet and guarded, full of a hard-won peace, who kills in honour and never in anger, so that his name is a misnomer, Rath the unwrathful.

Matthew quick and darting, laughing and mischievous, a little brown squirrel of a boy, or a puckish sprite in red and green.

Nils who plays music for his sister; every night at the campfire he played music for us, and the flames were dancing to his tunes.

Lucius, Light even in name, kindness and faith and vulnerability and a surprising core of stubbornness.

Wallace gruff and laughing, hearty old soldier.

And Lyn. My Lyndis. You.

My Lyndis, my rescuer, my graceful dancer, my swordswoman, tribal princess, noble lady, my blue-eyed girl, fledgling chieftainess, survivor born, grieving at loss, rejoicing at the unexpected. My defender, with blade in hand. My lover, my sister, my child, my friend. All these words are too small to describe you. My miracle, my Lordling, my own. You were the one that found me. Our fates were linked from that day.

I vowed that I would let none of you die.

I could not accept it if you died, pure and simple. How would I live with your blood on my hands? How could I live, knowing that I had led even one of my dear hearts into a death-trap? Better for me to die myself-and so I resolved to do the impossible, and made it possible. It is as if probability itself was incinerated in the blaze of my hundred books of statistics, as if twenty decimal places were miraculously replaced with a storybook law of love. I guided you through each battle, and you suffered no fatalities, and now all the battles are done.

I kept my promise, dear Lyn of the Lorca; surely you can trust, then, my words, when I say we'll meet again? Know that I will miss you, think of you each day. But when we are reunited, it will not seem so long. It will be as if only days or hours had passed since we stood here at the gates, saying our goodbyes.

I wrap my arms around you, kiss your cheek. It is the first time, since you found me, that we have touched. We haven't needed to. We demonstrated our love for each other with words and actions, every day. We knew.

Then I pull my cloak about me, turn and walk away, though with many a backward glance. I walk down the long North road, and around me the red and gold drain out of the landscape, and the stars prickle through.

My peerless warrior…stay well, and good luck.

Dedicated to the people of Fire Emblem, sword, stone, and path. Without you there'd be no fandom, but how often are you thanked? Merry Christmas from the tacticians. We love you.