Dawn of Balance
Life is a matter of balance. Order and chaos are both necessary, like the two halves of a whole. Without the chaos and darkness of the night that is finished and the order and light of the day that is to come a dawn cannot exist.
Disclaimer: I am not Intelligent Systems. I do not own Fire Emblem. End of story.
Chance Meetings
Feeling with his new name he had truly left his old life as a heron behind, and no longer sure what exactly he still was, Sephiran continued to travel through Begnion. His command of the style of magic practiced by the beorc continued to improve, aided by the fact that he spoke the ancient language with as much facility as the spirits themselves.
To fund his journeys he took to tomebinding. At first, he bought blank books, covering their empty pages with his neat, precise script and finding himself incapable of suppressing the urge to add tiny, jewel-like illustrations in the margins. As he practiced and his skill increased, he progressed to painting the covers in appropriate and brightly-colored designs, illuminating the edges of the spells with pictures of various spirits invoked therein.
Most customers merely exclaimed, "How pretty!" and thought no more of it, but one or two bishops to whom he had sold his light tomes had tapped the pictures with a finger and confidently identified the spirit represented, saying, "Camiah," or, "Helios." No doubt they were helped by the fact that many monasteries had at least one mural or mosaic of a seraph spirit- a very powerful, orderly light/fire spirit- on their walls somewhere, usually Camiah or Mikhaiel. Still, the fact that some beorc were evidently doing it right enough to have experience with a seraph spirit's magic gave Sephiran hope that the cause of Tellius was not wholly lost.
Not all light-magic users he encountered were a delight to meet, of course. Sephiran ran into his fair share of corrupt bishops who charged the poor exorbitantly when they came to the monastery doors, begging a use of a Heal staff for their child's broken leg or for the finger the father nearly lost in a farming accident. Sephiran had met priests and clerics who flagrantly were not living by their vows.
It only became worse as time passed, too. Having lived for so long in a timeless land like Goldoa, whose people aged almost imperceptibly, and having existed for so long himself, Sephiran found himself perpetually surprised by how quickly time flew by among the beorc. Sunrise, sunset- he had seen so many of them they had become mere ripples in the long, long stream of his experience. Seasons came and went, and he found himself astonished at the years. Children he had known had become parents or even grandparents when he returned to a town again, and he had to hope no one recognized him.
With each passing generation, however, the parents passed on their disordered thoughts to their children, who soaked it up. Begnion parents who hated laguz nurtured that sentiment in their own offspring, and laguz who had once been enslaved by beorc and managed to escape the country instilled in their own young a healthy distrust of the featherless, furless children of iron and stone. One man alone could not reverse the tide, and Sephiran found himself weeping at times, struggling to hold on to the hope that had led him out of Goldoa.
Idly, he considered working towards political power in Goldoa, perhaps even working his way up towards the position of a senator. The Begnion aristocracy was largely inherited and titled, but nothing in Begnion could not ultimately be bought, won, or traded, for, he had learned. It was doable. Was it worth it?
Any sacrifice is worth it, if it frees Ashunera's laguz children, Sephiran told himself.
So he looked into the matter.
His resolve crumbled after he actually encountered senators. The first meeting was in a monastery library in Sienne. Lehran had heard that that particular monastery, Vitus Cathedral, had a selection of rare ancient texts that he wished to examine. What he learned later was that most of the aristocracy of Begnion sent their boys there to be educated.
This education did not merely pertain to the usual subjects taught at the various institutions of higher learning found in all of Begnion's largest cities, but also included instruction in light-magic. By the time they had graduated, the sons of Begnion's nobility would walk out as bishops, high-level light magic tomes clutched firmly under their arms. Most, indeed, would continue to practice light magic alongside their political careers. Apparently, they liked the option of being able to blast political opponents with the righteous wrath of the gods if their own bill was defeated in the senate.
At any rate, Vitus Cathedral was hosting that day a reunion of sorts for the members of a class that had graduated ten years ago. The first Sephiran learned of it was when the bored-looked librarian told him, gesturing with a thumb towards the door to the corridor leading to the main hall. A distant rumble of many voices emanated from that direction.
"You need not worry, my lord," he said. "They'll be there quite some time. A most excellent feast has been prepared- pheasant, turkey, pork, with the finest of cranberry puddings and an enormous cake in the shape of Mainal Cathedral." The librarian had a secret girlfriend in one of the cooks, which explained his knowledge of the feast's entrees. The fact that Sephiran listened politely and seemed completely ignorant about the big to-do encouraged him to talk more.
"The head bishops and saints were most hopeful that they would be able to persuade her holiness, the blessed Empress Misaha, to attend. After all, three of her senators are attending this reunion. Unfortunately, she had pressing matters of state to attend to and most regretfully had to decline her invitation."
Sephiran made an idle comment about the duties of high officials, purely in order to keep the librarian talking. Servants often proved to be invaluable fonts of information. The man, however, needed little encouragement. The higher-ups usually sent their own lackeys to fetch books for them, and said lackeys were rude and authoritarian with him, relying on the status of their masters to protect them. The librarian enjoyed a sense of superiority over this wandering bishop or sage- he wasn't sure which Sephiran was.
"Yes, but the good senators could not miss a reunion at their alma mater. These three all still practice their light magic, too… I hear there's to be a demonstration later, at three o'clock out in the courtyard. His lordship, Duke Oliver of Tanas, has indicated that he has managed to resurrect an old form of light magic capable of healing the wielder. The good bishops and saints are all most eager to see this."
Heal the wielder? Sephiran was intrigued. "You would not happen to know the name of this tome, would you?" he asked.
The librarian smirked. "I may be only a humble librarian, but I do know the contents of my domain. The functional magic texts are not kept in here, of course, but I have access to a great many depleted tomes. In my spare time, I flip through them to try to improve my grasp of the ancient tongue. Old Master Sabend, who restores the crumbling texts, doesn't particularly like it when I go through books he hasn't yet restored, but…" The librarian shrugged. "It's not my fault if he's too slow. And we have some old tomes, too. Here, let me show you."
Arising from the stool behind his counter, the librarian forged ahead through impressive rows of towering bookshelves, not even glancing at the placards at the ends of the rows to find his way. Curious, Sephiran followed. They arrived at a dim corner of the library, the arched, stained-glass windows above the bookshelves seeming very tiny and high-up. Before them, a cabinet with doors of tinted glass loomed, its handles and hinges written with magic sigils.
"We have to ward it, to protect the scrolls and books inside," the librarian explained, a bit pompously. "I am one of the few to know the secret of unlocking these doors." Reaching forward, he precisely tapped out a sequence on the various sigils, which glowed briefly and faded. The latch clicked free, and the librarian gently swung the glass doors open. Carefully he removed a crumbled book, bound by the tattered remains of red leather, and gingerly flipped to the table of contents.
"See this?" he said. "This was not a typical tome. Instead of containing simply one spell, it is a catalogue of many different light spells. One page is allotted per spell. It starts out with the easiest, and progresses from there. See? The first page is an ordinary Light spell. I find it fascinating that that spell has been around, in its basic form, for centuries now." The librarian slowly turned a few more pages. "And here we have Ellight, and Purge, nothing new. Here's where it becomes interesting." He paused to give Sephiran another significant smirk and turned a few more crinkly, yellowed pages. "See the title? Nosferatu. That's not a very nice name, now, is it? It certainly isn't the name of a light magic spell. I was very surprised to find it in here, and so I've studied it for a long time. It is my belief that this was originally a dark spell some daring sage managed to convert into a light format." He shuddered theatrically. "I would never dare use it myself, of course. By the language of the spell, the traces of dark magic within it are still too strong. It's tainted, if you catch my drift."
Sephiran nodded. His eyes had flown over the faded text, memorizing the script- he honestly doubted the self-important librarian would let him study it for himself, so he had to be quick. He agreed with his assessment, however. Something seemed off about the spell, and the vocabulary did indeed smack of dark magic.
"Now, what is really interesting is the tiny footnote at the bottom," continued the librarian, pointing to the relevant line. "The author says he plans to revise this spell himself, cleaning it up and making it more orderly and light-magic-friendly, and perhaps call it Resire. I applaud his bravery, but since we have never found a later tome written by him I fear he died in the attempt." The librarian sighed dramatically. "Such is the fate of intrepid researchers sometimes. We must sacrifice so much for the sake of knowledge."
Sephiran made sympathetic noises. Pleased, the librarian carefully replaced the book. His fingers ghosted across a nearby scroll, the man still plainly anxious to show off his learning. However, at that moment they heard heavy wooden doors opening, the babble of several male voices, and an impatient tinkling of a small bell.
The librarian hurriedly closed the glass doors of the cabinet and reset the lock, cursing under his breath. "That will be the lord saints and the senators," he whispered. "They must be going on a tour and have decided to drop by the library. They do that occasionally, purely to annoy me, I think. I must hurry back. Come along. Do not say a word of what I have shown you to anyone, especially not his grace, the Duke of Lard- oh, pardon me, the Duke of Tanas."
When they returned to the counter near the library entrance, Sephiran could appreciate the librarian's sarcasm. Six men in official robes stood next to the counter, one of them- probably the head of the monastery, if his elaborately embroidered garments and impressive hat were anything to go by, Sephiran thought- still ringing the little bell that sat upon it. Behind him stood two acolytes in plain, crisp white robes, escorting their lordships through the monastery and carrying various articles for them.
The other three personages were, if possibly, even more richly dressed, their very posture speaking of arrogance and wealth. One was tallish and slim, his longish hair as carefully styled as the coiffure of any high-class woman. He was whispering to one of his compatriots behind his hand as Sephiran and the librarian walked up and let out an annoyingly high-pitched laugh.
The senator he had been speaking to- Sephiran could only assume these three were the alumni senators the librarian had spoken of- was shorter than the other and much rounder; Sephiran momentarily wondered if he ever became stuck in doorways. He was balding, but appeared manically cheerful despite that. Whatever the tall fop had said to him, he plainly also found it amusing, for he chuckled uproariously with an equally annoying, "Oho ho ho ho."
The third senator stood a few feet apart from them, closer to the head of the monastery, as if to distance himself from their impropriety. He was a thickset man with a leonine face, his well-kept yellow hair and beard contributing to the appearance. He was glancing about the library as if comparing it to his memories of the place from ten years ago.
The librarian hurried towards the elderly saint who was his head and bowed nervously. Sephiran lingered to one side, at the end of a row of bookshelves, assessing the situation. He would not have needed to be told that these three senators had continued their magic practice; he could sense strong magic in all of them. He knew the names of the current Begnion senators, and was trying to fit names to the faces before him. Based on the librarian's comments, he could only assume the portly one was Oliver, Duke of Tanas.
The head of the monastery and the librarian had a brief, whispered conversation. Turning to the senators, the elderly saint gestured expansively to the library and started talking about "a most generous grant" and "recent renovations" that had been done to their alma mater in their name. The senators nodded graciously and looked approving. Meanwhile, the librarian had ducked again behind his counter, looking very much inclined to stay there.
The short conversation was long enough for Sephiran to decide that he did not trust any of the three senators. He could not explain it; it was just a feeling that had come to him. Without his heron gift of reading hearts, he could not understand people and their motives as he once had, but he still possessed a sort of intuition about things. At the moment, that intuition did not like the look in these men's eyes at all. He could not define it any better than that, except to say that they seemed cold, cold in a way that light magic should not be.
The elderly saint gestured to his two acolytes, who opened the doors. The little procession was on the verge of leaving the library- the librarian had already let out a tiny sigh of relief- when the portly senator paused, his round face lighting up with astonishing glee. To Sephiran's horror, Oliver waddled straight towards him, hands held out.
"Oh, what a glorious sight is this!" he exclaimed. "Truly, my friends, have you ever seen such beauty as this? This is magic, this is poetry condensed into living flesh. A miracle of the spirits, indeed!"
The leonine-faced senator rolled his eyes, exasperated. The three monks- four monks, if the librarian was included- all seemed a bit troubled, as if they sensed a disaster in the works.
The tall fop of a senator, however, examined his nails. "You said that about the last one, Oliver, dear," he drawled, "and he was frankly ugly…"
"No, no, no!" cried Oliver. He was by now standing far too close to Sephiran for comfort, gazing up at him greedily. Keeping a tight hold on his bookbag, thinking he might need to grab his Ellight at any moment, Sephiran slowly inched back.
"No, you do him an injustice, Valtome!" Oliver continued. "Look at him! Such lovely pale skin, and such long, gorgeous black hair! So sleek and shiny… I can hardly believe he's human. I thought such beauty belonged only to the feathered angels of Serenes, but here stands living proof of my error! Oh, just let me touch him…"
Oliver stretched out greedy hands. Quite alarmed, Sephiran sidestepped him, whipping an Ellight out of his bookbag and holding it, unopened, in front of him. He glanced at the other senators, to see what they thought of this.
The leonine-faced senator seemed bored, if a bit amused, and did not seem as if he would intervene anytime soon. The monastery head and his acolytes had worried expressions, as if they knew and pitied some terrible fate that lay before Sephiran. Valtome had finally glanced up from his immaculate nails, and gazed at the ex-heron, mildly interested.
"Well, he's better than the last one," Valtome admitted.
"Noooo, you mustn't use magic!" cried Oliver, offended. "You mustn't bestir yourself. You're much too pretty to soil your hands with work."
"I… I beg your pardon?" stammered Sephiran, utterly bewildered. His fingers inched across the cover of his Ellight tome, ready to flip it open and start casting at a second's notice.
"Even his voice is gorgeous!" Oliver was nearly drooling. "I must confess, I am quite overcome. I must not let such beauty as this go to waste, obscured among the squalor of the public world. I must keep it and guard it most carefully, as it deserves… Come to papa. You will never want for another thing again, I promise. I will take the greatest care of you, in return for… special favors… Come to me!"
Oliver lunged. His meaty hands closed on Sephiran's right arm with a vise-like grip. Panicked, Sephiran did the first thing that came to mind, whirling on his heel and smacking Oliver on the temple with his hardbound copy of Ellight.
Crack!
Valtome cringed. Even the leonine-faced senator winced. Oliver let out a dazed croak and slumped to the floor.
Backing up, still clutching his Ellight, Sephiran surveyed the results of his deed. He was vaguely surprised he hadn't broken all the bones in the back of his left hand, and surmised that Ashunera's Blessing had, once again, come through. For once, he had absolutely no regrets about performing an act of violence.
"Oh, bravo. No one has rejected Oliver like that in a long time," said the leonine-faced senator, slow-clapping ironically. "You must be either very brave or very foolish, master sage. You are aware you just decked a holy senator of Begnion?"
Sephiran was aware, but the ex-heron who had defied Dheginsea to his face was not very bothered by the fact. "What was he doing?" he asked,
Valtome merely gave his high-pitched laugh again, while the leonine-faced senator smiled in a humorless way. "…Recruiting for his personal art collection," he said at length.
Oliver stirred. Slowly heaving his bulk into a sitting position, he glared blearily at his two compatriots. "What are you just standing there for? You let him do that, Lekain! He may injure himself or mar his exquisite beauty! Quick, fetch guards and secure him. I cannot let such beauty pass me by. I must have it…"
The monastery head, his acolytes, and the librarian made no move. They feared the senators, but did not want to be part of Oliver's scheme. The leonine-faced senator shrugged in a bored way, as if to say, Suit yourself, but I am not helping.
Finally, Valtome said, "Only if you share, Oliver."
Staggering to his feet, Oliver considered this for a few seconds. "Very well, then," he muttered.
Yawning languidly, Valtome took a tome from one of the acolytes and lazily flicked it open. "I know I promised to show you boys my new Valaura at the demonstration at three o'clock, but you shall have to settle for a preview now. I find the poisonous factor to be invaluable, as it weakens opponents delightfully."
Fight or flight. Fight or flight. That instinct was still strong in the laguz, and herons had always taken the latter option. Now, however, Sephiran would have to fight to flee. His knuckles turned white on the cover of his Ellight.
He would get no help from the monks. However, as his gaze flicked across them, the librarian gave him a small nod. It seemed to say, Blast your way out if you have to; I'll make your excuses. Just get out of here.
Valtome opened his mouth to begin his spell. In that instant, Sephiran flung his Ellight wide, his lips already shaping the words of the ancient language. This copy of Ellight was an invocation to the light spirit Sol, and golden sunlight welled up from the pages, flowing through Sephiran's fingers and condensing in the air. It split into half a dozen spirals, twisting through the air to strike the foppish senator.
Before Valtome could do more than gasp, dropping his own tome- of course, he would have high magical resistance-, Sephiran had duplicated the attack, smacking him again with as much power as he could throw into the Ellight. Thank goodness for the speed of the bird tribes.
At the second blow, Valtome staggered back, slumping against the librarian's counter. Sephiran bolted forward, racing past the startled Lekain and slipping between the two acolytes to squeeze through the half-opened doors. Once in the passageway, he did not stop but bolted for the outer door of the monastery and the sweet freedom of the streets.
Sephiran was mildly surprised the senators did not hunt him down and arrest him for assaulting one of their number. Later, he reflected that they might have tried, but without being officially registered as a light sage or bishop of Begnion they could not look up his records in their databases. He had not even told the librarian his name, let alone a class, and he felt quite certain that none of them would be able to recognize or locate his magical signature, so thorough were his otherworldly disguises. They would have to hunt through every school of magic in Begnion to find him, a wandering sage whose appearance no one could remember precisely and who never told anyone anything about himself.
Perhaps, Lekain might have thought Oliver merely got what was coming to him for his perversity, and was willing to hush up the matter of the insult to one of his political brethren rather than institute a nationwide manhunt.
At any rate, Sephiran was wise enough not to linger to find out. He had left Sienne by nightfall, vowing that as long as Lekain, Valtome, and Oliver were members of the Begnion senate that route was closed to him. Sephiran did not have the raw courage of the beast tribe; he could not face them again. He would have to find another way to free the laguz slaves in Begnion.
His wanderings took him to the edges of the Grann Desert. Rumors in local towns informed him that escaped laguz slaves liked to hide in the desert from their angry masters, counting on the harsh terrain and fierce sandstorms to deter any beorc pursuit. Lehran wondered if he could confirm these rumors for himself and offer any assistance to the escaped slaves. At the very least, vanishing into the vast wastes of the Grann Desert would help to cover his trail, if the senators were searching for him.
He laid his hand on his medallion. "You have never been here before, either, have you, Yune?" he said idly. "The Grann emerged in the aftermath of the… well, of the Great Flood. The waters carved out the canyons and salt plains, leaving behind these walls of rock and sand. It is the same for the Desert of Death on the northeastern edge of Daein, I believe."
Yune gave no sign that she had heard him and slept on.
With his lessened need for food and increased tolerance to the elements, Sephiran wandered through the sand dunes and pebble-strewn wadis, searching for any sign of laguz life. Occasionally, he employed friendly wind-spirits to clear a path for him across the dunes. They obliged happily enough, glad to find someone new to talk to in the wilderness. Most of the time, when they were bored, they were forced to create some excitement for themselves by stirring up a sandstorm.
Are there any laguz here, in your domain? Sephiran asked them.
Yes, yes, they chirruped, pointing him towards a seemingly empty section of sand and heat-blasted rock. They would not say any more, but only danced all around him, elemental tails creating green, silvery, and gray patterns in the air of the spirit dimension as they followed him.
Sephiran was pondering how strange it would seem to someone other than him to realize that he saw in two dimensions- that of the physical world and that of the spirits. He walked and lived and both equally, and sometimes it seemed to him that the spirit world had become more real to him than the physical world during his millennia of existence, particularly after his separation from Altina and Sephora. Without his heron children, without his short-lived beorc family, he no longer had any tie to the physical world to ground him other than his heart-felt duty to Ashunera's children. Sometimes he feared that his magic would dissolve his frail physical shell and he would dwindle to no more than a wraith, a disembodied mind on the breeze.
Suddenly, the ex-heron paused, glancing around. He had felt something, like a flicker of a life signature, beneath the sand. Beneath the sand? What on Tellius could possibly be living under the sand? No small nocturnal animal or colony of termites would amass that strong a life presence. This seemed more like a beorc or a laguz… Surely the beorc legend of giant worms living under the sand was just that, no more than a legend…
"…Hello?" he said tentatively.
"Hello to you, too," said a cheerful voice from behind him.
Sephiran whirled around. As if he had materialized out of thin air, a swordsman dressed in purple and black stood there, his outer coat tugged only halfway on, with one sleeve left to dangle behind him. A shaggy mess of green hair hung about his face, covering his forehead and one eye. Though one could hardly expect visitors out in the desert, he was smiling as if he had been expecting Sephiran to drop by for a cup of tea or something.
Sephiran felt his jaw drop. "…Soan?" he murmured, shocked to his very roots by the sudden apparition of the green lion laguz he had last seen seven hundred and forty-nine years ago.
If the man had laughed heartily, thrown an arm around his shoulders, and told him that he did not look a day over a thousand years, Sephiran would have at once firmly believed that it was indeed Soan, either returned from the dead or miraculously preserved for over seven centuries.
Instead, the green-haired man raised his eyebrows. "Now, that's a new one," he said to no one in particular. "I have never had anyone mistake me for an acquaintance of theirs before."
"I beg your pardon," said Sephiran, recovering himself, "but you do resemble someone I once knew very well. He must have died a long time ago, however."
"A very long time ago?" the swordsman guessed.
Sephiran gave him a curious look.
"Unless I am very much mistaken, neither of us is exactly young," said the green-haired man. "Come now. Our kind can recognize each other… neither laguz nor beorc. We do not belong with anyone, do we? For that is why you have come to the unforgiving Grann, is it not?"
"I came because I want to assist the cause of the laguz slaves treated so unjustly in Begnion," said Sephiran. "Neither laguz nor beorc… I do not understand what you mean."
The swordsman shook his head impatiently. Sephiran was reminded of Soan tossing his mane and sitting down to groom his paws during a particularly boring council meeting. "You do not? Surely you know that the beorc call us the Branded and the laguz call us the Parentless. We're a curse upon the world, outcasts who should never have been born. We are crimes against the goddess."
"What…? Crimes against the… I have no idea what you are talking about," Sephiran confessed, bewildered. "There are more of you? I only knew of one child of a laguz and a beorc…"
"Oh, yes, there are more of us," said the green-haired man grimly. "Beorc treat us just as badly as they do the laguz, or worse, if at all possible. Laguz like to pretend we do not exist. But we do. There are more of us than either the beorc or the laguz would like to admit."
Sephiran was speechless. All this time he had believed that Sephora had been completely and utterly unique. Instead, had she merely been the first?
"Other laguz and beorc… have had children?" he repeated, almost numbly.
"Yes. It's still a rare occurrence, though," said the swordsman. "Most beorc-laguz unions are infertile. Still, now and then a child will be born. Sometimes the child appears as no more than a beorc, and may live his entire life as one of them, and the curse will strike one of his descendants instead. Most of the time, however, before the child is grown a mark will appear upon his body, branding him as the product of an impure union. And then… he becomes an outcast from society. He lives longer than other beorc, and he may have powers beyond their lot. In return, though, the laguz parent always seems to lose his own heritage."
Sephiran set down his bookbag upon the sand, staring blankly at the horizon. "…This explains so much," he murmured.
"I am sorry to have been the bearer of bad news," said the green-haired man kindly. "I had assumed you knew all this. Magic usage can extend one's life only so far, 'tis said."
"Oh, it was magic, in my case," said Sephiran, his mind lost somewhere in the past, "magic out of my control. However, this explains so much… about what happened later…"
He remained silent for a few minutes, trying to wrap his head around the news. So that was nature's price for a laguz-beorc child, the laguz's birthright? Ashunera never decreed such a thing; she had no hand in the evolution of the Zunanma and their descendants. And why did this man believe that such children were cursed? Sephiran could not believe that. No one had believed such a thing over seven centuries ago…
The green-haired swordsman waited patiently, but with curiosity now behind his kindness.
"I am sorry," said Sephiran finally. "Please forgive my ignorance. I… it was a surprise, but it makes so much sense to me. My name is Sephiran… or, at least, that is the name I go by now."
"I am Stefan," said the green-haired man, smiling. "Pleased to meet you, Sephiran."
"I have no wish to be offensive, but…" Sephiran hesitated, unsure of how to continue. "You are one of these… so-called Branded, then?"
For answer, Stefan reached up and brushed away the green bangs covering his forehead. A green mark seemed to have been tattooed there. Sephiran let out a slow breath.
"I do not know whose fault this was," said Stefan. "My parents were ordinary beorc; I bear no resemblance to them. Whoever committed the crime lived long ago, so long ago that no one now remembers. You must imagine my surprise when you mistook me for someone else."
Sephiran smiled sadly. "I may be able to surprise you some more. Your mark… it looks like the writing we magic users use to record magic. I cannot read it all… but it speaks of the beast tribe. Given that, and your appearance…" Sephiran tilted his head. If he but imagined green facial markings on the man standing before him now, and perhaps leonine ears half hidden among the green hair, he could have convinced himself that Soan stood before him again.
I miss you, old friend, more than ever. Faithful and hard-working to the end, and you stood by Altina and helped her rule her kingdom when I could not. Have you returned to me now, in this hour when I feel that I am alone against the world?
"I am not afraid of your speculation," Stefan told him steadily.
"Well," said Sephiran, with a bit of a laugh, "you mightn't believe me, if I told you. Do you know of the story of Ashera's Three Heroes? People in Begnion still seem to know of it, though much of the truth has been obscured by time."
Stefan frowned thoughtfully. "Hmm. It's been a long time since I heard that one. Something about the grand story of creation, the Zunanma who evolved into beorc…"
"They were the ancestors of both the beorc and the laguz," Sephiran corrected him, confused.
Stefan raised his eyebrows. "Is that so? Well, of course the beorc wouldn't like to tell it that way, I guess," he said. "Ashera's Three Heroes? Well, there was something about a dark god who had to be defeated and sealed away, and they were blessed by Ashera to do just that. One was the Dragon-King of Goldoa, and one was Altina, the first ruler of Begnion. I remember that much. Whoever the other Hero was, he was never mentioned much."
"No, with the prejudice Begnion has embraced, I would imagine he has been ignored through the years," said Sephiran sadly. "It's such a shame. He did so much for Begnion in its early years. Be that as it may, his name was Soan. He was a green lion."
"A lion," repeated Stefan, deadpan.
"Yes. I have met blue, silver, and green tigers, and white, black, and reddish-orange lions, but he was the first and only green lion I ever met," said Sephiran. "He was a good friend of mine, and he was Altina's staunchest ally in running her new kingdom. After she died, he ruled it until her child was old enough to assume the responsibility."
Sephiran had wanted to go to Altina's funeral, wanted it so desperately, even if he could not greet Soan or Sephora. Dheginsea had forbidden it. Sephiran recalled holing up in a corner of the library, looking out the window at the skies now inaccessible to him, clutching his silent medallion and weeping for what was no longer his.
"I miss him," Sephiran added, barely audible.
Watching him, Stefan appeared to come to some sort of decision. "It was certainly no accident I found you today," he finally said. "Under this hot sun is no place for a proper conversation. Come with me."
It turned out that Stefan and other Branded who had formed a tiny community in the midst of the unforgiving Grann had excavated tunnels and lodgings for themselves out of the rock and earth beneath the sand. Down there, out of the glare of the sun, it was cool during the day and warm during the night, and they could keep out the poisonous asps and other unsavory creatures. It also helped them avoid detection from occasional patrols of the Begnion army, which swept the area sometimes in search of escaped laguz slaves on behalf of the nation and populace.
"I am by myself at present," said Stefan, almost apologetically. "Some of us leave at whiles, to wander Tellius or just to go get fresh supplies, or other matters. I've wandered Tellius myself in the past, but for now I'm content with Grann. In a weird sort of way, it has become my home in a way that no other place has. You could almost say I am the desert."
"So am I intruding upon your territory?" asked Sephiran.
"No, no, of course not!" Stefan laughed. "Not you. I cannot quite understand it, but there is something about you… something about that makes me want to trust you, to confide in you. It was not merely the fact that I believed you one of my kind…"
"You said it was no accident you found me," observed Sephiran.
"It wasn't," said Stefan, slowly, as if turning over some strange occurrence in his mind. "I do walk the desert at times, but I would not have found you today, had I not been led there. This… bird appeared to me. It was not any sort of bird I have seen before in the Grann, but a small, chubby, orange-feathered thing. It seemed to appear out of the sunrise, and flew straight for me. It landed on my shoulder, twittering at me as if it had things to tell me. Now, I am no stranger to odd events, but this took the cake. I wondered if it were a sign, so when the bird flew off and seemed to want me to follow, I followed. And I found you."
"A little orange bird…" Sephiran repeated, "…coming out of the sunrise…"
Stefan shrugged. "Likely a trick of the eyes. The desert sun can do strange things to a man's mind, even if he has lived there all his life."
"No, I believe it was a sign," said Sephiran. "I cannot understand it fully, but… I think it was a sign, and it gives me hope. …It has been a long time since I had any hope."
"Hope cannot live in Begnion," said Stefan, not harshly, but as if reluctantly stating a painful truth. "That country grows worse with each year, and not all of it can be laid at the feet of the follies and vices of people, laguz and beorc alike. I smelled a foulness on the air, the last time I was abroad." Stefan wrinkled his nose, as if that unpleasant odor lingered with him still and he wished to be rid of it. "It was then I decided the Grann, as unforgiving as it may be, was a healthier environment for me and my own kind than the rest of Tellius."
Sephiran leaned forward, hands clasped together. Stefan had led him to a small underground room, lit by small oil lamps, the walls hung with mats patterned with the reds, browns, and blacks of the Grann sands. It was amazing how at home Stefan seemed to be in that crude setting, as if he truly were a lion born to the wastelands, ruler of the domain he had selected for himself.
"So you, too, believe there is some evil at work beyond the darkness of men?" asked Sephiran.
Stefan considered this. "I would not say I believe it to be so," he said. "I do not know much about magic and the ways of the spirits. I trust my nose, however, and something didn't seem quite right. That is all I can say."
Sephiran let out a breath. "For many years now the pattern of events in Tellius has seemed odd to me," he confessed. "I am groping in the dark, I have no idea for what I am searching or even what I suspect… but I must, because I would still like to save the people."
"The people who hate our kind?" asked Stefan, not rudely, just curiously.
"…They are still all just children," said Sephiran sadly, "spiteful, mean children sometimes, throwing sticks at the others… but I remember when they were young and kinder, and I wish to have those days again."
Stefan laced his fingers together, lips pursed as he thought. "I have no wish to be offensive, but… you are far, far older than me, are you not? Are you the oldest of our kind?"
"Ah, no, no, I am not," said Sephiran. He smiled sadly, absent-mindedly running his left hand over the back of his right, where the mark had appeared on Sephora's skin. "I was the father of the oldest of your kind."
Stefan blinked. "So you mean…"
"I do not know why you believe you are cursed," said Sephiran. "I had never heard of such a thing, when my child was born. In fact, there was rejoicing, for never before had laguz and beorc had a child together. It was seen as great progress: perhaps, one day, the races would be united once more, as they had been in the Zunanma. No divine proclamation had been issued regarding such unions; Ashera was already asleep in the Tower of Guidance by then."
Stefan sat up straight. "You are telling me that the belief that that my kind is cursed, product of tainted blood, is a lie?"
Sephiran spread his hands. "You have been honest with me, Stefan, so I feel that I must repay you by being completely honest. My original name was Lehran, and I have lived in Tellius longer than any other being alive. I was the forefather of the heron race. In the war of the Three Heroes, I was the one who sang the goddesses to sleep. And…" Sephiran paused, before forcing himself to continue. "And I was the husband of Altina, and the father of her child. We believed our daughter… Sephora… we believed she would be no more than a beorc. Then one day… I lost my power- my galdrar, everything- and the mark appeared here, on the back of her hand."
Sephiran held up his own hand, tracing with his fingers the rough outline of the mark seared upon his memory. "We believed my power had left me and entered her. But never, ever did we once believe that what Altina and I had done was wrong or condemned in some way. I cannot explain where that belief has come from. The goddess never mandated it."
Stefan took several moments to absorb this. Then he leaned back against the earthen wall and laughed hysterically, as if the revelation had been too much for him. Sephiran watched him, troubled, until he finally managed to compose himself.
"It's just… it's… it's such a magnificent lie!" Stefan finally gasped out. "I think you are telling the truth. Your words… they just ring true, somehow, I can feel it. But that all these years of pain and suffering, not just for me, but for all my kind, that they should have been for nothing…"
"…I cannot think who would start such a rumor…" murmured Sephiran, horrified himself as he imagined what could have befallen his daughter. Did any such trace as this of his powers linger in the bloodlines of the Empresses of Begnion? Did the people know? Surely they did not, since all their history books would have told them that Sephora was the daughter of two beorc.
"I can," said Stefan. "The wealthy beorc of Begnion, and the general populace of Daein. Daein was colonized by the most radical laguz haters from Begnion, of course. That's not to say that all Daeins are insane bigots, however. I passed through there on my last travel through Tellius. I met quite a bright, reasonable lad, named Gwain… taught him quite a few things about how to use a sword, too," he added, thoughtfully. "However, the majority have no love for laguz. They will believe almost anything vile about them, since it is what they want to belief. Persuading themselves that any union between laguz and beorc is intrinsically tainted and forbidden by the goddess would not be hard for them."
"I am so sorry…" Sephiran said quietly.
"The whole mess is not exactly your fault," said Stefan. "How could I blame you? You loved your daughter very much. I could hear it in your voice."
Sephiran nodded numbly, forcing himself not to give in to the tears he could feel pricking his eyes. "I wish I could have seen her grow up… But I have spent most of the past seven hundred and a half years in Goldoa."
"Why?"
"It was for my own good, I will admit," Sephiran said, running a hand through his hair. "When I lost my birth right, I… it messed me up badly. I tried killing myself several times. Eventually, the Dragon-King made excuses for me and took me back to Goldoa. Sometimes I have wondered if it all would have turned out better if he had simply killed me."
"Maybe there was still a purpose to your life," Stefan said quietly.
"I thought I had found a purpose again. I thought I could work to free the laguz slaves in Begnion," said Sephiran. "But what can one man do alone? Year after year I watch the hatred only increase…"
"No, you will never be able to do it alone," said Stefan. "You need allies. I do not know how much I can help you in this. I have no influence, save in Grann. Yet I do not think you should expect too much of the Begnion legislature. The senators are the largest slave-owners in Begnion."
Sephiran winced. "Hardly surprising."
Stefan looked interested. "Have you had your own run-in with those charming men?"
"Part of the reason I came to the Grann is because I am hiding from them," Sephiran admitted sheepishly.
"Oh, really?" Stefan grinned. "What did you do?"
"I sort of hit one with a book," said Sephiran. "An Ellight tome, to be precise."
Something akin to hero-worship flickered in Stefan's eyes. "You hit a senator… with a book."
"In my defense, I was minding my own business in a monastery library, when they barged in. One of them began acting very creepily towards me," Sephiran explained. "No one else moved to intervene, so… I hit him. Knocked him out, too."
Stefan laughed. "Hahahahaha… I wish I could have seen that. I'll bet he never saw it coming… Hahahaha…" Composing himself, he added, "If I may ask, which senator was it?"
"The Duke of Tanas."
Stefan paused, then burst out laughing again. "You knocked out… Oliver?" he asked, chuckling helplessly. "I've heard of him… helped a few of his slaves escape to Gallia… By all accounts, he is not a pretty sight. Hahahaha… How I wish I could have seen that!"
"It may also interest you to learn that I had to hit Senator Valtome with Ellight twice to get out of there," Sephiran continued.
Still chuckling, Stefan reached over and patted Sephiran on the shoulder. "You, my friend, are officially amazing," he said. "Don't feel too bad. You cannot have burned any bridges that were not worth burning. Your best bet, I think, is to go to your great-times-a-hundred-granddaughter, Empress Misaha. She may be able to get things done the senate would never be moved to do otherwise."
Sephiran shook his head. "They will have forgotten me long ago," he said. "Officially, Sephora was the daughter of a beorc man. The records were written down that way."
Stefan frowned. "Surely they recall something. After all, they live longer than most beorc- not too much, but I've been around long enough to notice. Herons are one of the longest-lived races, am I correct?"
Author's Notes:
And so Sephiran's encounters with people you might recognize begin. I had fun with this chapter. I tried hard to make everyone sound in character, and if I have failed just flame me or something.
A note on the Nosferatu/Resire mix-up might be helpful. Riddle me this: Resire was the name of the tome when it was considered dark magic in Sword of Seals. When it became light magic in later games, it was renamed Nosferatu. This just makes no sense to me. Therefore, for the purposes of my little headcanon world, I have decided that Nosferatu was the original dark magic spell, which some crazy magician shoddily converted into a light magic format but never renamed. Later, someone else tried to 'clean it up' and make it less sinister, and then they renamed it Resire, having produced something a bishop or a light sage could feel comfortable wielding. However, this is just me making up stuff in order to make a series of video games make some sort of sense to me, so feel free to ignore me!
A note on the senators might also help. I honestly have no idea how Sephiran tolerated years of them canonically. I just don't think if he had known he would get stalked by Oliver the whole time (tell me Oliver didn't do it – just look at their battle convo!) he would have done it. Or perhaps he would have, anyway.
In this fic, though, he encounters the senators before the Serenes Massacre and decides, Nope, can't do it. A perfectly reasonable reaction, I think.
I also find it hard to believe that Sephiran would tolerate years of those senators without personally killing them for their dealings in the laguz slave trade. I believe that, if he had known about the Oliver-Reyson fiasco, he would have strangled the fat man himself. After all, he swore to wipe out the entirety of existence after the Serenes Massacre. Then again, in this fic Sephiran is portrayed as more determined and decisive than he is at times in the game, so it could all just be perception on my part.
YMMV on everything, my lovelies!
Also, tell me Valtome is not either gay or bi. Take his creepy fascination with Zelgius, for starters. Or his blatant disapproval of Elincia. And his obsession with clothes. (Note his remarks about the armor of the Crimea Royal Knights if you have Kieran fight him.)
As for the names of the light and seraph spirits, I made them up, drawing primarily on various mythologies. Other spirits will be named in the future. Also, I have totally made up the distinction between the various types of spirits. You'd think that, for referencing them from time to time, FE would explain something about them. Apparently not.
Stefan? Yes, I like Stefan. He's an awesome character. I didn't have room to bring him with me into the Tower though, unfortunately. I brought his Vague Katti, though, and had it blessed (and forgot to get Alondite blessed, stupid me). Yes, I subscribe to the theory that he is a descendant of Soan. It doesn't hurt that his Japanese name is Soanvalcke.
Gawain? Yes, I mentioned Gawain. Another headcanon of mine is that Stefan taught him. After all, when you recruit Stefan in PoR, he offers to help Ike refine his swordsmanship. (The convo actually gives you a Mastery Scroll, I think, which allows Ike to learn Aether. Correct me if I'm wrong.) But how can he teach Ike if he doesn't know Ike's style of fighting? That question led to my headcanon. I think being taught by a Branded would have also opened Gawain's eyes to the prejudices against laguz and the Branded; after all, he taught Zelgius, who is Branded, and he raised Ike and Mist to be as totally unbiased against the laguz and Branded as you could wish. Since he hails from Daein, I figure his lack of prejudice has to have had a cause.
Of course, this theory of mine means that Stefan = Qui-Gon Jinn, Gawain = Obi-Wan Kenobi, Zelgius = Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader, Ike = Luke Skywalker. You cannot unsee it now.
- No, I don't actually think that Ike is Zelgius's son. Don't take me that literally!
However, I do have a theory about Ike's family which shall be (hopefully) mentioned in later chapters. For now, however, we follow Sephiran through Begnion.
Spinner here, signing out.