She put down the book and sighed deeply. Suddenly dark magic no longer held any of her interest anymore. Maybe it was because she read it so many times already, maybe because she felt a little sick in the stomach for what those knowledge of hers could cause to people, she doesn't really know or care. She felt… wrong. Not because she mostly living with reanimated corpses, no. It was because of that man.
She could hear those steps for five rooms away. Those heavy greaves against the black stones of this castle were as stealthy as trying to hide a red ball between whites. One of the corpses, a dismounted Paladin, gave her a slight bow to her before speaking in a distorted drone that all the corpses seemed to share.
"Milady Marcia, Lord Gimle is calling for your audience."
She waved the Paladin off. She doesn't really in mood to meet that man right now.
But still, he was the man that she called 'Father'. The man who took her under his wings after she had been abandoned by the other children. Running her fingers in her hair, she got up from her chair with an annoyed groan.
She remembered when the last time her father left his family behind. People, especially those of the Royal Family, said he was captured the Cult. The army was devastated, Lord Chrom walked in circle until his throne room's floor had a permanent mark on it, and not to say anything about what happen to her mother. Drank herself to sleep and whispered curses at random passersby, everything was even darker than the usual in their little barrack of a home.
She would often sit beside her mother, watching her slowly set those dark eyes on her and stared. Sometimes, she just stared at her for a really long time without moving. Her mother then rose her hand to caress her cheek, nuzzling her nose to her hair and kissing her forehead, all while whispering her father's name non-stop. Sometimes, she could see her sister peeked out from behind a door frame from the corner of her eyes. More seldom than not, she sat beside her to watch over this heartbroken woman and had her face caressed too, enjoying attention of hers other than being a guinea pig.
It broke her heart to see something like this. She didn't want to stay and watch her mother's flesh metaphorically rotted away while still pretty much alive; but she was her daughter, one of the last things remained of the great strategist Rufure. People had commented that she looks a lot like her father, and God be damned if she takes away that image from her mother's sight. She thought that if they stay together, they could take on everything and they would be okay and her father could be theirs again.
And then, Lord Chrom was killed.
Everything just spiraled out of control. His wife and daughters were understandably distressed, the world was plugged to Chaos. The rumor said the Cult succeed in resurrecting the Evil Dragon. The world suddenly flooded by living deads, people were killed left and right in utter madness.
She was 6 year old at that time.
The time when Azur cried his eyes out when he heard his father fall. At that time, she always thought that Mr. Henri was the second strongest dark magic user she knew. He just seemed so invisible, no blade or spell could touch him under the watch of his pagan Gods. That Mr. Henri, who always had smile on his face and stories to tell to the children, who could fry a man with a simple wave of hand, died. At this time, the Vigilante Force realized that they were screwed.
Mothers hid their children while fathers went to war. But all for nothing; those things were too much, they're almost endless. One by one, the fathers died out and their family spent the last 2 years living in hiding and fear. Either surrender into the embrace of Gimle or be massacred. But the children were completely have the army's creed close to their heart, that they are the children of the men and women who always stood in Gimle's way from swallowing the world into his eternal darkness.
But those corpses know no rest; they are relentless and merciless. They hunted the army down to the last man. Nn separated from the bunch when Mr. Grego took her to his own mercenary troupe after Ms. Nono stayed behind fending off those things in Sonshin. When the troupe came back, Nn led the army with no Mr. Grego in sight.
She walked in the stony castle corridor, dinky and dark with strange purple flames as the only source of light in the entire place. It was damp, and maybe a little corny, as it almost like a textbook example for an evil overlord to have his roosting place an ominous black castle and strange colored illumination. For someone who succeeded in spreading the eternal darkness into the continent, Gimle is surprisingly predictable in decoration department.
She announced her presence by slamming the door open with an unnecessary grandeur, before prostrating for approximately 5 seconds in front of the man that she used to call 'Father'. Head leaned on his right fist, dressed in Sorcerer garb, Gimle smiled down at her before walking down the steps of his throne. Her face was set in a stony expression even when the Evil Dragon God embraced her shoulder and guided her to one of the windows. Horrible darkness as far as she could see.
"My dear little Marc, you don't know how proud I am of you."
"… Maybe I'm not, maybe I am…" Gimle let out a low throaty laugh.
"I can't do it without you, my dear… You know we had been hunting down the children since they were wee younglings. They're very persistent, just like their parents." The man leaned on the window's stone frame as she cringed, "And yet, you could capture those four in your first mission. I know you're special, young lady. You completed your training in such a short time, became a master of dragons with just a couple of months. But capturing the children in your first try?"
"I have my own way."
"You want to share some pointers to your old man?"
Marc gave him a glance that says 'Try me'. Gimle again laughed that throaty laugh.
"Since you're so good at it, I'm going to send you into another mission…"
"Capture another batch of the children?"
"Not quite…" Marc turned to the man, who only grinned back at her.
"I want you to annihilate them."
Shiver run down her spine. She gulped down bile that rose up in her throat at the order. She made sure that her friends would still be alive even though they have to live in Gimle's mercy. She thought that when he let her keep those four as her hostages, she at least could be relieved knowing that her remaining family and friends are fine. But she shouldn't show it in front of the Evil Dragon.
"Then why would you let me keep the captured alive?" The question was a deliberate baiting; he must not know that she still has a soft underbelly after his maddening torture of a mind. He made her watch slaughters, rapes, and people got eaten alive since he got the possession of her; he would definite do horrible things should she couldn't provide her service.
"That, my dear girl…" still is grinning, "Because they still have uses…"
She couldn't hold a twitch of the corner of her eye.
"You know I killed your mother, no?"
"Yes."
"You know that, as the daughter of the Great Dragon God Gimle, you could die anytime at hands of my enemies, no?"
"Yes…" she then quickly added, "But one of them is technically your daughter too… Don't you have enough of that already?"
"What do you think I would do?"
"… With you, I guess not."
"Good girl."
Before going to her mission, she visited the cells. Cynthia, Degel, Noir, and Nn curled up in the corner of their respective cells that were closest to each other. Dressed in rags, skinnier then the last time she saw them, and yet… their eyes are more alive than hers. Clanks of her armors alerted the prisoners and they stood in deviant, gripping their bars tight.
"Good afternoon, ladies. Glad to see that you're still good and dandy."
"Cut the crap!" Degel shouted from the far right corner, "What do you want?"
"Just want to informed you, that Milord Gimle is going to pay you a visit. If you're lucky, Lucina and Serena will soon join you."
Degel's eyes dawned at the implication of the Dragon Master not telling about the boys and she kicked her bars.
"Damnation!"
Marc turned to her guards and waved them away. The corpses left them alone, completely alone. Perfect.
She waved her pointer finger. Noir, who immediately recognized the pattern made by the finger, wanted to say something when Marc held up that finger to silence her.
"At least… this is what I could do to you."
"What?" Cynthia yelled from her cell, "What did she do?"
"S-She… she let us go." Noir said almost inaudibly.
"But why…?" Nn said in disbelieve. It was the first time she says anything; not even when she was captured she said anything.
"Because I don't want you to get killed or violated or whatever that bastard can do that has an everlasting mental trauma to you. If you can't tell, I'm a girl too, you know? I can understand that feeling. In the end, we have to stick to each other." She quickly changed to her business mode.
"Now listen up. Those corpses don't need sleep or anything like that. But they still need to have their connection to the bastard reestablished. Once in three days, you should notice that, right? They're leaving their posts at those times."
"And that day is today. I can already see it." Degel nodded to herself.
"Right. Now look, the spell won't open the door immediately and to open it, you have to say 'O Fomortiis' Gate, brittle like a rusty iron you are'. By saying that, you could unlock any door in this dungeon. Go left and before the guard post, there's a secret stair to the surface under giant Gimle statue. You won't miss it."
"Thanks…" her sister said that so softly, so gratefully. Her eyes got misty, but her helmet's overly small eyeholes prevented any from dripping. She nodded for the last time and turned away. Noir's hand shot out from behind the bar to grip hers.
"Y-You… stay save, okay?" Marc sighed at this.
"I fully expect that your friends would kill me in the mission, actually." She averted her eyes, unable to see those sad eyes that are so characteristic of Noir, "My life has no meaning anymore after I became Gimle's daughter… Farewell, ladies. I hope you could end this shitty situation that we all stuck in."
She walked away until…
"Marc!" her sister cried, sobs distorting her voice.
"I was told by Mother to take care of you. I promised you to protect you. I-I… failed you the last time. Please… I don't know what to do if you die too…"
She peered the crying girl from behind her shoulder, trying to even her voice.
"I'm sorry. I don't know this 'Marc'…"
She never enjoyed flying. Just like everything else in Gimle's army, her dragon is a corpse too. The last living dragon would be Jerome's Minerva; even then, she's a quite old dragon and has no mate to preserve the kind anyway. She binds her dragon to her will when Gimle offered her the class. It's foolish to miss the opportunity to be in one of the strongest class, so she accepted for sake of pursuing knowledge of her native.
The thing was strong, but she's stronger. Now the dragon receive no order but from her; not even Gimle's.
She had been chasing after some faint tracks for three days without resting much. But in the fourth day, it was raining and the track became even clearer. Footprints that weren't sinking too deep into the mud signed that people that she chased weren't of a heavily armored or mounted classes. Not to mention, one of the footprints were bare-feet.
'That pathetic wuss Chambray, huh?'
On the fifth day, it was raining again. This time she had them cornered in some chasms and fragile bridges. The place was cramped with almost nothing to gain footing on and they most likely to destroy the bridges to stop the pursuers, but her preys were also wide open for attack from the flier units.
'If I surround them with the Pegasi, they won't have anywhere to or even the chance to destroy the bridges.'
She gave the sign, and the Dark Pegasi took a round on the mountain range along with several Tricksters with them. Her army pushed the small group into defensive; they seemed to know that they all won't make it and Azur and Eudes used themselves as decoy so the other two could escape. She watched the fight, the two men are keeping up a good work defending the north side of the bridge, before deciding that it was enough and swoop down to her prey, yelling on all her way down.
"If you want to defeat me, you'd better doing it right!"
Eudes, Azur, Bredy, and Chambray turned their eyes to the black dragon rider, widening their eyes when the rider swung down the legendary axe wielded once by the Crimson Princess of Macedon. Her axe fell, slicing open Bredy's shoulder to the bone. He screamed out in pain, alerting Eudes when the dragon rider tried to take another shot. He blocked with his Mysteltinn, had it crossed against Hauteclere's shaft. The shaft was stronger than most axes, not to mention Hauteclere was in higher rank. Weapon triangle was useless against her.
Marc's dragon roared and bit his thigh. Bredy recovered enough to focus himself on her friend's wound, but he was stopped.
"No! You get away from here!"
"But Eudes-"
"We're surrounded already! You run before they get us all!"
Chambray, who since the first blow had been traded always tried to find an escape route, suddenly stood his ground and went into all-four.
"Chambray!" Azur yelled from his own place as the bridge's barricade.
"Naga be damned if I have to leave you guys here!"
He transformed and immediately leaped on her. That heavy frame of the Taguel slammed against her dragon, sending the dragon and its rider spiraled down the chasm. Marc regained her momentum after a slight dizzy spell and flew out of the ravine, cutting the children's celebration short. Seeing their commander got ganged up, the Dark Pegasi came out of their hiding and shooting spells to the bridge. The ropes burned and snapped, it was the children's turn to fell to the river below.
Someone snatched them out of the jaw of death, though. Dragon riders just like her. She frowned at this.
"Nosferatu…"
Her strength was drained and she felt even more disoriented. She felt it, the familiar pull of Nosferatu as her own life force sucked out of her body. Her mouth exploded in blood.
'Strong… they have a Dark Mage in their rank?'
Her eyesight was spotty, but she could make out that silhouette of the Dark Mage preparing to blast her once again with Goetia. A white haired man chanted the all too familiar spell and Goetia's characteristic evil laugh sound ripped from the black lightning that strike her down with vicious vengeance.
'Mr. Henri?' she chuckled bitterly, 'Azur's father came out of his grave to protect his son, huh? I guess it's a fitting end of me…'
Lying face down on the muddy road, but still perfectly conscious. She stood up, and satisfied with the startled gasps from the children's reinforcement.
"I'm still not dead yet…"
One of those reinforcements walked until he was right in front of her. Long black robe and long black hair, he was quite tall as she couldn't see his face from her nodding off head other than his chin and side tails.
She had the feeling that this guy is important to the army. But she doesn't really have any strength to swing her axe again with her shoulder joint roasted by the earlier unholy lightning.
"Why do you do that? You already mortally wounded, enough already."
"You think it's that simple." She raised her head and found out that her vision was absolutely filled with black spots, "If Gimle is oh so merciful that he will let me scot free after a failure, then why do you think that there's not that many people serving him, huh? I'm expecting that last Goetia really destroy me enough that I don't have to go back to that mockery of a man with my senses intact, only to be put in some unsavory- urk…"
She swayed back, only to be caught by the man.
She was close enough to see who the man was.
"You are…"
He was there, younger and without that goatee, the man that she used to call 'Father'.
"That sounds…" He hesitated, "…horrible. You should come with us then."
"…Thank you for the offer, but no thank you." She smiled to herself as Rufure took a step back. Her Gimle's Scale mutation worked wonder, her wounds already mostly healed. She stood straighter, now facing him with their eyes meeting, "I can take care of myself if it's just about surviving my wounds."
"How…?"
"Gimle implanted some of his essences into people that he thinks could take the strain of his will." She pulled off her gauntlet, showing the black leathery skin splotched on the otherwise healthy soft tan, "Those who survive will be stronger, faster, and heal their injuries as easy as you make them..."
"Just like Fauder…"
"Yes, him too. But his corruption was really bad, covering almost all of his body. Some says that is the reason why he so devoted on bringing back Gimle, he became nothing but his pseudo-vessel of Gimle's will in his journey for knowledge that ended with him as a mad man. No one really sure, though. You should take that statement with a pinch of salt." She leaned back and continued in a slightly mocking tone.
"But it's most likely; after the Iris Royal Family's orgy of destruction decades ago, it's perfectly understandable to seek some kind of retribution, even though Gimle's rule makes everyone suffer including the Perezians."
She could made out from the corner of her eyes Lucina's indignant stride toward her, but she immediately intercepted by her father, who only shook his head. She grinned at this; it was his father who killed the proud nation of Perezia and forced to them the life of barbarians, after all. The thing that made Emerina burdened by the responsibility of a queen at age 10, the thing that made Gangrel feared Warm's advance of unification like his ancestor, King Alm the First, before the Cult corrupted his motive, the thing that made Felia withdrew their alliance to Iris at the most important time.
The man in front of her, on the other hand, seemed to distract himself in something else.
"If you don't really want to serve Gimle… then you're the one who blew those lock picking spells on the underground dungeon in Warm? You're the one who help them escape? I heard the girls say something about a Dragon Master that did just that."
"…wait… you saved the girls?"
"We heard something about the remaining Vigilante Force had been captured, so we decided to take a look. Maybe it's weird to say it to a supposed enemy, but I thank you for your help." Marc raised a fine eyebrow under the helmet.
"It's indeed weird." She pointed the rest of the army who now stared at both of them with their eyebrows disappearing in their hairline, "But a simple courtesy is not discouraged. You are welcome."
Rufure sighed in relief.
"I don't think we have to fight anymore, right? Why don't you come with us? We can defeat Gimle, all of us, and end this horrible nightmare."
Marc froze, before reawakened her dragon and jumped on its back. She gave the man that she called 'Father' a cheeky smile and urged the dragon to fly toward south.
"Thank you, but no thank you."
She could not believe this; the past version of their parents came to this timeline with mission of defeating Gimle. She might jump up and down in joy from the sheer thought, but she still got something to do. The last band of this timeline's children seemed to march toward the Other World Gate for their journey to the past; if she could convince them to stay, they could teamed up with their parents to fight Gimle in a decisive battle. No need to abandon this timeline and such.
She flew to the lonely island with renewed vigor. Finally a chance to set things right.
Until a roar and as stream of black dragon's breath annihilated her dragon and sent her soaring to a stone mountain. Her back let out a terrible crack that made her cringed for the pain that she should feel if not for her being numb all over. There's no way she could mistaken those red eyes and loud roar.
"Well, well, my dear girl. You've been a really bad girl, have you not?" Marc spat her blood to Gimle's general direction. Curse whatever Lady Luck that governs this realm for not being a slightly more merciful to someone in the face of victory.
"Give it up. Lord Chrom is here, so does Lucina. They will destroy you and save us all."
He only let out that characteristic throaty laugh of his.
"It doesn't mean anything if they 'kill' me here. Behold the Other World Gate, my dear Marcia. As long as I can go possess the other past version of my vessel, I'm invincible. You think that only you could abuse such method?"
"Of course not…"
"Even though Chrom's army sped their way to this island, they are still miles away from here. They won't make it to reach the last of the children when they arrive to this gate, and I would be there instead to finish what you did not want to do."
The Evil Dragon God help up his hand, dark power crackled on his fingertips.
"Good bye, my dear Marcia. You're no longer needed."
An explosion, crushing strength grinded her ribs into dust, and then black.
.
.
.
She woke inside some kind of a tent, morning sun softly illuminated the interior through the flaps.
"Oh, you're awake!"
She turned to face her savior, only to see a familiar face. She had saw several times the illustration of the Spirit Talismans, but to see the real person of said talismans?
She looks just like in that piece of paper; long green hair and gentle curves that she could not believe are in possession of someone of her age. Those beautiful eyes, that are bright and honest but also hiding an unexpected anger even to their owner herself. There's no mistake; this is the Noblewoman of Sacae, Lyndis of Lorca tribe, the ancestor of Perezians.
She must be blown away to the Gate when Gimle 'killed' her and stranded in a past era.
"Hey," Lyn shook her shoulder, snapped her out of her musing, "Are you alright? When I found you, you got really large wounds on you. They healed quickly, but still…"
"I think so…"
She runs her fingers through her hair when she realized something. She inspected her arms and everywhere that she knew she had them. The Gimle's Scale on her is gone. This only means that Gimle is dead. He's dead… she thought in disbelieve. She was… happy, to say the least.
But now she's lost in past without knowing how to get back. Somehow, all the struggle and victory means nothing because she basically went back to square one. Lyn smiled at her answer nevertheless.
"I don't think I get your name."
Then she realized that she couldn't just explain she came from future. On the other hand, she knew that the Nomad of Sacae hated bandits and never lie, which is really ironic given that the Perezian had actually made a living through those methods; if she wants to keep the circumstance a secret, then she had to lie. The stigma of Dark Magic from where she was born into also adds up the odd that Lyndis might kill her right here and now.
"I… uh… I don't think I can remember anything…" she said while holding her head. At least she doesn't lie about the headache.
"Eh? And amnesia, perhaps? Do you really not know anything about yourself?"
"Uh… my name… it's Marc, I think?"
"Mark?" Lyn pondered a little at this, "That's a strange name for a girl…" but she then clapped her hands in delight, "Well, it's nice meeting you, Mark!"
"Uh… yeah, me either."
She could help but to smile back at the young woman. Perhaps she could follow Lyndis to her journey to find the Other World Gate; knowing that her meeting with Eliwood and Hector leads up to many places, maybe those places have clue to help her get back home.
But right now, she might just enjoy the hospitality.