It may not be completely obvious due to my large amount of laziness when it comes to writing, but the Fire Emblem series is one of my absolute favorites, and while I actually enjoy all the games equally, I have a special part in my heart for Jugdral and the sheer amount of mythology that's been thrown into it. Thus I've started writing fanfic for my favorite characters while trying to pick out every piece of mythology so that I can post my findings on the internet and stop seeing weird names being tossed around, because while Nintendo's translators may have not caught up on it, whoever chose all the names for Jugdral especially had to have about ten thousand mythology books around, and they knew what they were doing. After all, when your main couple is named after the tragic hero born of incest, Sigurd, and a woman who was called Deirdre of the Sorrows before she was even born, you've got an excellent doomed couple. And with Deirdre's minor Loptyr blood and Sigurd's major Baldr blood, well it's no wonder she partly led him to his downfall even if it was unintentionally, after all, no one hated Baldr as much as Loki did. And Arvis and Deirdre's mother is Sigyn, Loki's wife. They were all doomed from the start just by their names alone.

Fine, I'll stop rambling about mythology. For now. But undoubtedly every single Judgral fanfic will have at least one author's note going "oh my god mythology look at who's named after whom!"

"She realized that it was still midafternoon, still an ordinary day in the existence of the people, and that no one's life had changed but her own."

Kira, Gathering Blue

She couldn't get him out of her mind, not after the way he frightened away the man with only a look and a stern word. Deirdre sat in the little house that had once been her mothers and tried to push the young lord out of her mind.

Sigurd...she thought before chastising herself for being so moonstruck over a man she knew nothing about other than that he was a noble and the lady Jamke had called Etaín had spoke very highly of him in the conversation she had overheard while trying to leave the market before anyone tried to detain her. And that he was handsome.

Grandmother had said that she could never meet a man outside the village, that their blood made it not safe. That it was why her mother had died in misery. Someday, she might have one child to pass down the bloodline that they kept so that the dark god would not try to revive himself through choosing another family to bear his powers.

When she was younger, she thought that she would be happy with that life, living in a village that time seemed to pass by. And yet now that she had met Lord Sigurd, she could understand why her mother had left the village so long ago.

But wasn't her return proof that it hadn't been worth it? She looked out the small window at the sunlight filtering through the sacred trees, and two birds fluttered past in animal courtship. Grandmother had always been so adamant that it wasn't safe, that the world would use and break her till she returned like her mother to die without even naming her daughter. She had been named for the sorrow that had possessed her mother.

And yet...and yet a part of her wanted to take the chance that maybe there were good people in the world who wouldn't break her, who would let her into their lives and she could live in peace. Grandmother would have said that it was Sigyn's foolishness running through her veins and that no good could come of it. But she couldn't go and ask her anymore about what to do.

Sighing, she stood up and walked to the lone window. Outside, Ciabhan and Cliodhna were tending to their garden, the look of rapturous happiness on their faces the same as when they had wed a year ago. Iseult stood with her bow looking into the woods along the only path leading to the village. Her husband Llyr was undoubtedly out hunting. There was no one else there anymore. Everyone who had come before her had passed away.

She didn't want to do the same, living day after endless day in the woods that only changed for the seasons, where no one dared enter for fear of what might lurk in the spirit woods but for those who came to escape the world with them. A thousand years since Loptyr had perished, and still they hid from those who wanted his return, who believed his silken lies that they would be the only ones left after he rose.

She shouldn't leave these woods. She shouldn't go and seek that which could destroy her like her mother.

And yet none of the justifications she used to use to tell herself why she always returned at the end of the day to this sleepy village seemed to matter anymore. In essence, nothing at all had changed in her but for her desires. Which had always existed, but could be turned away.

She knew that leaving the safety of the forest for a man who she knew nothing about was as foolish as foolish could be. And yet she did not want to live her life in sorrow.

Turning away from the window, she knew that there was not much time before Sigurd would undoubtedly move on in the tides of war, that if the rumors she had heard were true, he would be going into battle against the sorcerer Sandima. And she did not know if anyone fought with him who could withstand Sandima's dark magic.

The deceptively innocent looking staff leaned against her fireplace with the dark purple stone drawing in all light to it without reflecting it back. She left it leaning there as she picked up the little bag she used to carry edible plants from the forest and started to put the things she would need to bring with her on her journey. If she was swift enough, they would not know she'd left till she was long gone.

Settling the odd silver circlet that her mother had left to her over her hair, she hung the still light bag over one shoulder, picked up her staff and walked out of the little house, perhaps for the last time.

Thoughts?