"And you're sure that will be ready in time for the Lady's birthday?" Seth asked again, as though he'd forgotten the answer the other two times the baker had replied. The planner sighed impatiently, rubbing his chin with the back of his hand before discarding the glove he wore to the table casually, then turning again to the Silver Knight. Seth's gaze turned somewhat apologetic, as though he'd realized what he'd been doing, but his longing to see Eirika's birthday turn out perfectly trumped his sympathy for the man.

"Sir Seth," the planner started slowly, as though thinking that saying his response slowly and clearly would help the retainer to the realm understand him any better, "I can guarantee you, on the vows you, yourself, took to the throne, we will have everything— cake, decoration, entertainment, even guests from the other countries— ready in time for Lady Eirika's birthday. Heck, you've given us two month's warning, I could have it all ready early, if you'd like."

Seth flushed a little; not nearly enough to make the crimson on his face match his natural hair colour, but enough to show his embarrassment. Had he given too much notice? Was this being… over-anxious? He wasn't sure.


Six weeks later, strolling the grounds of Castle Renais, and he still wasn't sure at all. Weren't these sorts of matters supposed to get easier, the older one got?

Shaking the confusion from his head (or, at least, trying in vain to), Seth passed Franz sparring with Forde on the lawn, and gave a pleasant wave, declining their invitation to join them. This, naturally, was a telltale sign to the paladin and cavalier that something was most definitely the matter with the Silver Knight: Seth refusing training was not something that happened ever. However, as Seth made no attempt to move away from the two, and instead settled beneath one of the larger trees on the grounds to watch the two duel, neither of the two made a move to confront him, and settled into a comfortable exchange of steel, each wanting to put on the best show for his commanding officer.

Franz and Forde circled each other, their equine steeds lowering soft neighs in anticipation for the pressure on their sides which would mark the beginning of the action. Franz led the assault first, leading in with a sword of iron which rattled noisily off of Forde's shield. Not one to be outdone by his little brother, Forde retaliated with a vertical chop with his steel sword, hoping to knock Franz off with the flat of his blade. Seth saw the swing coming, and, in his own mind, thought of about three different parries and two effective dodges within the time it took Forde to raise his arm, and wondered what Franz would do.

What Franz had chosen, however, Seth didn't see, as his Lady Eirika appeared beside him almost instantly (he wondered just how intently he'd been watching the duel so as to not notice her approach) bending over him from around the tree in an attempt to startle him from his reverie. Soft blue hair drifted lazily over his field of vision, and the two combatants faded from view, as did, quite frankly, Seth's interest in the match. He began to turn upwards to look at her, just the slightest head movement, just to see her

I swear to you that I will never again forget my duty in that way.

The head movement quickly corrected itself. Seth turned his gaze in its previous direction, trying to ignore the curtain of blue hair that blocked his view.

"Good afternoon, Lady Eirika," he said as levelly as he could manage.

"Seth," Eirika said, trying to hide the tone of annoyance in her voice. "It's not like you to sit so still when there's training going on." She moved out of the way of the duel, but took a kneeling position next to him.

The paladin smiled slightly. "I can hardly be expected to be able to participate in every training match that occurs on these grounds, milady." He still avoided her gaze. She furrowed her brow just slightly.

"Seth," she said, her bottom lip raised just a tad, "how many times have I told you? When in no other company, you may address me as Eirika only. You are a servant to the throne, yes… but a good personal friend, as well." Seth held his breath for a moment, then released it slowly. He was on thin ice, and he knew it.

"Ei"

When I see you next, it will be as a Knight of Renais…

"…milady," he corrected himself, speaking a little louder to be heard over her minute sigh of frustration, "it would not do. You cannot"

"Treat one subject over another, Seth, yes, I am aware," she cut him off, a little more suddenly than she'd intended, but sudden all the same. "But that doesn't mean I have to act the princess' role in private."

"Forgive me, milady; but you should not be acting the princess, at all. You are royalty," Seth pointed out. Eirika didn't seem to have an answer to this (though her brother had ascended to kingship, she was, of course, still princess and next in line to the throne), and so Seth found himself managing to focus on the duel again; despite looking forward through his exchange with Eirika, he found that he wasn't actually watching anything. Now that his attention was refocused, he found Forde on his horse, grinning down at his little brother, who looked back up at him sheepishly from an uncomfortable position on the ground. Seth wondered how the offending blow had been struck, then noticed a little ways further down the lawn that Amelia was approaching the knights, waving and smiling warmly.

Seth chuckled softly, and Eirika couldn't help but do likewise at his side.

You should marry! It will do you good to have a family to go home to.

Seth's smile turned a little sad at Sir Garcia's words as they were turned over and over in his mind, not just for the former warrior's sentiments, but for the inopportune timing they had employed. Ah, Garcia, he had replied that day. You may be right, but I'm afraid it will take me some time to get there…

Especially, he added now in his own mind, with my own vows standing before me. If Eirika saw the wistful look in his eyes as he watched Franz and Amelia walk off, she didn't let on. She was too busy hiding the same look in her own eyes.

I will lay down my life to protect my queen.


Joshua smiled. It was a good day to be king. His desert kingdom couldn't have been better. The vultures were crowing, the wind was blowing, the sand dunes were flowing, and these suckers couldn't figure out any of his tricks.

"Ah, what a shame," Joshua said, the fake smile of a charlatan lighting up his face. "That loss brings your record on the day to three wins, thirteen losses. Are you sure you want to keep going? Maybe it's just not your lucky day." He looked over the crowd he'd assembled to his recreational (i.e., gambling) hall for the night, and was, in a sense, disappointed. It had taken him approximately twenty minutes to nearly wipe clean the wallets of several Carcino nobles. He had hoped he could do it in less then fifteen, but he was more disappointed that the lack of liquid assets around the table meant that he wouldn't be able to win any more money on the night.

Then again, he assumed it was just as well. Natasha might get angry at him if she found out the extent to which he'd been gambling with the royal treasury, and Joshua didn't like it when she was angry: the fact that he loved her notwithstanding, those heal staves hurt when she swung them!

The nobles collectively looked into their money purses and decided it was time to retire for the night before Joshua won the purses, as well. Joshua, ever the gracious king, made sure the help saw them out.

Joshua, then alone, wandered the halls of Castle Jehanna slowly, the moonlight flittering in through the windows, leaving shadows long and tendril-like along the walls and carpets. Tapestries in the darkness turned from a proud history of the people of the sand to a darkened epitaph of battles gone past, of blood spilled and forever mingled with the white dunes below.

Joshua shivered slightly. Though he had no reason to be even slightly scared (the castle guard was large and well-trained, and it's not as though he couldn't hold his own in a fight), the swordmaster could not shake an ill feeling of foreboding that permeated his castle. Something, he felt, was going to happen soon. Something that would affect scores of people, and yet he hadn't the simplest idea what it would be.

It's not as though Joshua had any substantial proof that something bad would be happening, but a collection of myriad subtleties kept poking away at his mind.

For starters, there was the peculiar fact that his queen, Natasha, cleric of two countries, insisted that at all times, a chariot must be readied for her, that at the slightest notice or provocation, she might be immediately taken to southern Grado. Whoever accompanied her, she said, must be willing to "brave a long and perilous journey, traveling over the earth even in places where Magvel has been torn asunder."

So, Joshua had thought, she has a flair for the dramatic.

But all kidding aside, he focused his mind on the strangest details he'd lately been mulling over. Ever since the Demon King of legend was defeated again some three years, however-many-months ago, Natasha hadn't been acting the same as she had been before his defeat. Granted, Joshua based that observation on what he saw of her during their battles, as he hadn't known her before that fateful day in Serafew, but he thought it reasonable to assume that whatever was causing this stress in her, it wasn't likely to be something she'd been tolerating her whole life.

Joshua moved quickly and silently through the halls to find his wife, rounding two more corners and leaping up a flight of stairs before settling on the balcony of the third floor dining hall. All that searching, and still no sign of her. If they weren't so secure in the castle, he admitted to himself, he would have been nervous.

He turned away from the rail, and made to move toward the hall to continue his search, when something, suddenly, didn't feel right. He dove for the centre of the floor, clutching onto a support pillar out of pure instinct, when everything stopped being still. The shaking was soft at first, but slowly grew both in frequency and in strength.

Jehanna Hall was beset by an earthquake.

As the magnitude grew, Joshua found his own sense of panic increasing; so, too, was the list of questions in his head growing, as though each question was capable of spawning itself multiple times. Thankfully, it did not seem like Castle Jehanna would fall. Although he made a mental note of minute cracks forming in the thick walls of the building, it appeared the regal palace would stand for the time being. After what must have been a minute (stretched into an eternity), the shaking ceased, the cacophony of shifting earth lowering into a dim rumble which faded against the ringing of Joshua's ears.

"Natasha!" Joshua cried out, worried he would stumble upon his queen, mortally wounded. As he rounded the corner to look for her, however, she bounded into him, nearly knocking the both of them over out of the sheer unexpectedness of the collision. "Natasha! …Natasha?" he asked softly, brow lowered, a look of confusion spreading across his face. "What's wrong?" For, indeed, something was troubling the beautiful cleric; she was now fighting back tears which threatened to spill down her cheeks, and Joshua wondered what could have happened to his homeland or his castle to make his queen so distressed.

"Joshua…" She sniffled slightly, but refused to lose her composure. She was a queen, now, after all. "The chariot to Grado. I need it right away."

Joshua stared at her incredulously. "Right now? That's gotta be the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard." Her gaze hardened, but he either didn't notice or paid it no heed. "That quake put cracks into our solid stone walls, Natasha… it's not that I want to keep you here, but that quake was so damaging, can you imagine what our country looks like, right now?" Her gaze was unrelentless, however, and not even Joshua could ignore it forever. "Don't look at me like that! I just don't understand why you want to leave. We get hit with some deadly quake, and all of a sudden you want to choose the most dangerous time to use the chariot—"

"To go 'traveling over the earth even in places where Magvel has been torn asunder,' remember?"

There was a brief silence. Joshua's eyes narrowed, not in malice, but in wounded pride. "You knew."

She replied in barely a whisper. "I did."

"And you didn't trust me enough to tell me?"

"…I didn't want you to worry about it like I was…"

And with that she was gone, turned right on her heel and running for the chariot, praying she might arrive in time to make some little difference.


There was a tiny tremor in Renais. Not very much, but enough to knock a few things over: bottles, upright books, lavishly expensive decorations for parties-to-be. Little things.

Seth, awoken from his slumber by the rocking of the earth, decided to take the opportunity to walk once around the grounds, taking in some fresh air and clearing his head of the day's events.

The problem with clearing his head, though, is that it seemed to result in a less muddled picture of Eirika. …Lady Eirika.

Surprisingly, there was some commotion in the kitchens. Some of the younger squires and a few of the young knights seemed to be in some sort of annoyed uproar, and the racket they were making might have been enough to rouse the royal twins. Seth decided to step in before that happened.

"Is there—" He stopped to clear his throat and start over, much louder, as his first words were absorbed easily by the din. "Is there a problem?"

The knights and squires immediately settled down. No one dared to make a scene before the Silver Knight. The head chef, relieved at the extra help in keeping order, moved to Seth and whispered lowly in his ear.

"It's the alcohol," he murmured sadly. "The tremor knocked the bottles off their shelves."

Seth cocked an eyebrow in surprise. "Every bottle of alcohol in the kitchens is gone?" His subordinates gave a loud, if slightly embellished, groan.

"Every last one," the cook confirmed. "Shattered on the floor, and since the floor leans a slight bit, by the time we got to it, all the liquid had run out the door and mixed in the dirt. It's all soaked into the ground, by now."

"…even the whiskey?"

"Especially the whiskey."