Dark Sun of Desire
I do not own Fire Emblem or any of its characters.
Back into the land of T-ratings. For now, anyway.
Part Four: Sing, Little Birdie
The rippling sands of the Valencian desert ended as abruptly as though some giant had thrown down a verdant carpet on the earth. Timur helped Nyna down from her camel, and it seemed she felt the life of the ground echo with each step upon the vegetation.
"The earth is good," she said, not knowing entirely why she said those words. The brilliant greens of beryl and jade, broken by small explosions of scarlet, deep pink, and flaming orange, were a pleasure to the eyes. The air, so silent in the desert, was filled now with bird-song and the chirruping of frogs. Two butterflies landed on Timur's shoulder, and the boy walked on for some time unaware that he carried them as passengers.
Shortly after their exit from the desert, they came across a small shrine, half-hidden by the vines that twined around it. The pale stone figure had been much weathered, but it seemed to be of a female saint or goddess, robed and crowned. Something about the statue struck Nyna as familiar, though she could not place it.
-x-
In Nyna's fantasies, she would leave Archanea the morning after her marriage. Her business as she saw it was done, and the kingdom had no further need of her. The Council of bishops sought to differ with her; with the marriage consummated, Nyna was obliged to wait until it was certain she had not conceived a possible heir before she was allowed to depart. Such was the tradition with newly-widowed queens and other irregular persons, and Nyna was nothing if not an irregularity at her own court.
The first day, the second, she chafed at the restrictions. Every courtesy shown to her heightened the irritation- she was, she felt, a most honored prisoner of state, a thoroughly tiresome place to find herself in again. On the third day, as Nyna's attendants dressed her and set her hair, she felt a strange calm settle over not only her heart but her limbs. She looked back at herself, at the familiar shell of gilding and powder she inhabited, and decided she could live with that facade a while longer.
I thought you looked like the blessed messengers of the dead...
She was not of this place. Her destiny had already broken open; the bishops could delay her, but they could not stop her.
-x-
"The right fork of this road will take us to the capital, Mistress. If we keep straight, we will be instead at a port city. It will be two days from here, but many days more to the capital."
"Let us continue on this path, Timur. A port city sounds... charming."
She had no great wish to see the capital of this kingdom at the present time. Besides... a port city would be a good place for news and rumors. Perhaps this Port of Sofia would have tidings of a masked knight by the name of Sirius.
-x-
Linde visited daily; the knowledge that the young sage loved her- as a sister and a confidante as well as a sovereign- should perhaps have bent Nyna's will. It did not. She looked into Linde's shining brown eyes and felt as though a polished stone lay in her breast in place of a heart.
As for the state of her marriage... she and Marth took their meals together, and she entertained herself with books while he dealt with guests and councilors, and it was all rather pleasant in its own way. At the stroke of ten, they would bid one another good-night with a kiss upon the cheek, and would see no more of one another until breakfast. Nyna did not ever wonder what her nominal husband did during their nights apart; what he did with himself was none of her concern and was very likely dull in any event. As for what did concern her, the delay made for an extended farewell to Millennium Court and all of its ghosts- her father, her mother, her teachers... and the restless shade of Artemis.
"I wonder if she can see me now," Nyna said to Linde, as they stood beneath a portrait of the princess whose broken heart had placed a curse upon Nyna's bloodline.
"I don't think so," Linde replied. "When Lord Marth restored the Fire Emblem to its true state, I think he lifted the curse on it... and with that, Artemis should be able to find some peace among the spirits."
Nyna stared at the texture of the paint that formed the image of her ancestress. She heard the words that Linde spoke, but they no longer made sense in her heart. Tokens that carried a dire curse and enchanted shields that placed a holy seal upon evil sounded like things from children's tales, and Nyna had lived with those tales and the spell they wove entirely too long. Soon, soon, she would be in a place that had never heard of the Fire Emblem, or the Curse of Princess Artemis, or the rest of the threads that formed the shroud of her living death as the Queen of Archanea.
-x-
Color. So much color.
Houses with walls of bright blue and orange under roofs of red tile. Inns three stories high, built of rose or salmon stucco, with banners at every corner. City walls painted with brilliant murals, art whose style screamed to Nyna of its foreign nature... or, rather, her foreign nature.
She paused in the middle of the stone-paved street just to let the hundreds of colors, the sound of a dozen dialects, wash over her.
"Careful, Mistress!"
Timur took her by the arm and pulled her from the path of a four-wheeled cart laden with yellow fruit.
"Thank you, Timur. I was... overcome... by this place."
It would not do, after all, to meet her end beneath a fruit cart. Though if she had been crushed beneath its wheels now, here in this beautiful riot of a city, Nyna might have died laughing.
-x-
"This marriage is good for Queen Nyna," she heard them whisper.
It was, in a sense. Her mind was able now to focus on a single goal. She drew Linde into her plans for escape, made the girl her conspirator. Desire to see her queen happy overcame Linde's wish to see Nyna on the throne of her forebears; the girl had a romantic streak that now proved useful. Linde would be there to speak for Nyna when Nyna herself was gone.
Nyna paced through the halls of Millennium Court, her steps slowed by heavy embroidered robes. She did not take her shoes off and run, now. She did not drink herself dizzy, nor did she laugh at the wrong moments, cry at the wrong moments. Yes, this marriage was good for her. Queen Nyna was a new woman. Again.
She counted the days.
To be continued...