Chapter 7) Assassins
"No, no, like this!" Chrom laughed as he tried to 'teach' me the clapping game he played with Emm. I already knew it, of course, since I'd been the one to teach Emm, but he had so much fun trying to show me that I pretended I didn't know, just to see him smile more. "This!"
"Oh, I get it now," I replied, biting back a laugh. We went a couple of rounds before I purposely messed up the rhyme and the clapping. "Oops…"
"You silly!" Chrom giggled, though, and took my hands again. I marveled at how small his were and yet, how large. In my head, I still imagined him with pudgy little hands that more smeared food on his face when he tried to feed himself, or that turned pages three-at-a-time because he couldn't get them to just grab one. Now, he was doing clapping games and turning the pages one at a time. I remembered how he couldn't walk down the steps without someone holding his hand, and yet, he could now take the steps, slowly and clumsily, without any support. "This way!"
With Emm, I'd gotten most of her baby and child moments. I'd had free time to babysit, and so, I got to see the amazing first times alongside Candace and Adair. With Chrom, I missed out on so much, as did Adair. All of Chrom's firsts were just Candace's, and while I loved that she at least got to see them, it made me feel a little lonely that I couldn't share them as I did Emm's. I hoped I'd be able to be able to see the new baby's firsts. I knew Adair did too. The whole reason I got Chrom to myself right now was because Adair had been playing with Chrom, but then the council had dragged him back to work, because our economy was starting to wither. There really was too much going wrong.
Gods, why did the Plegians want to bring Grima back? Why worship something that only brought destruction? I didn't get it at all.
"Clar?" Chrom tugged my sleeve, and I nearly yelped when I realized he'd actually crawled into my lap. I hadn't even noticed. "Clar, you k?" he asked, peering up at me worriedly. I automatically wrapped him up in a hug. "Crying but not crying?"
"You think I'm crying in my heart?" I asked. He screwed up his face in thought before nodding. "Well, I suppose that does sound a bit accurate. War is a horrible thing."
"Then why?"
"Why fight?" I hesitated before answering. "Sometimes, Chrom, you have to fight in order to keep the people you love safe." I smiled slightly, amused I was having so serious a conversation with a four year old. "Peaceful options are better, but some people just don't want peace. They just want to hurt people. So, you have to lead the way to peace with a blade in hand."
"Oh." He frowned, not quite understanding, and then his eyes caught on something behind me. "Shiny."
"...Shiny?" I twisted, wondering what the hell he meant. And then I had to yelp and roll out of the way as I realized the 'shiny' was actually a magic spell, a dark magic tome I'd seen so many times on the field. I clung to Chrom tightly as the spell hit the far wall with a deafening crack, the glass from a nearby window shattering from the impact.
Dark magic was only used by the Grimleal. What the hell was one of them doing here? I wondered, but I had no time, so I tucked Chrom into a closet, kissed his forehead, and shut it on him, wincing as I heard him whimper and yelp. But I had no time to try and explain or comfort. The… the assassin was preparing another spell, and I had to deal with them, immediately.
So, I bent my knees slightly and lunged. Ducking under the next spell, I tackled them, knocking them off balanced. They were taller than me, which wasn't uncommon since I was small, but that didn't matter. Since they were startled, I used their elbow as a ledge and swung myself up and around, twisting their arm with me as I settled briefly on their shoulders and wrapped my legs around their neck. Then I went with the momentum and twisted again, using my thighs to put pressure on their neck as we hit the ground and I held them in a choke hold. I waited a few seconds before they went limp and untangled myself from their unconscious body. I poked them one, just to make sure, and then kicked their tome away and snatched a sword from an ornamental statue not far away. Then I brought the blade on their head, shattering the skull and spilling blood all over the pretty marble floor.
"That was for almost killing Chrom," I hissed to the corpse. I jerked the sword out and returned to the room, heading for the closet where a crying Chrom still hid. He flinched away from me, and for a second, I wondered why. But then I realized this was the first time he'd ever seen me covered in blood. This was the first time he'd ever seen me as 'Lady Clara, the Holy Swordsman of Ylisse', not as 'Auntie Clara who cannot do clapping games right'. But, after a moment, still crying and shaking, he reached out and clung to my shirt. I hugged him back with my free hand and kissed the top of his head. For a moment, everything just stilled, like it was just us in the whole world, like my only job was providing comfort to my precious 'nephew'.
But then someone shrieked, and I realized that if there was one assassin, there had to be more, and if they were criminal enough to attack while Chrom was near, then Candace and Emm weren't safe either.
I snatched Chrom up, tucking him against my chest, and rushed down the hall. A couple of other dark magic users appeared from alcoves, trying to ambush, but I cut them down without a thought, doing my best to try and keep the blood from hitting Chrom. Sadly, I wasn't very successful, but he clung to me tightly, whimpering but refusing to let go.
An arrow flew past my face, and I whirled, ready to cut the archer down. Then I paused as I realized it was David, and he stared at me in blank astonishment. Then he smiled sheepishly. "Sorry, I got used to just shooting everyone who passed," he explained. "But good, you have Prince Chrom…" He carefully put his arrow in his quiver and knocked on the door behind him. I took a quick glance around to see that there were no assassins near and… that I had to be at the door to Candace's salon… parlor… place. "My Queen, Lady Clara has your son."
"Oh, thank the gods!" Candace's wavering, thick voice filtered through the door. I relaxed at hearing it. "Please, let her in. It'll do Emm some good to see him."
Panic flooded me at the words, and I didn't even bother waiting for David to 'let me in'. I pushed past him and opened the door myself, terrified I'd see Emm laid out from an injury or something. I wasn't sure if the sight I saw was better. Candace was the one injured, blood staining her dress. The way the blood was splattered told me she'd been struck across the back.
Still, she smiled when she saw me. Thinly, and it looked horribly wan in her pale, pained face, but it was a smile nonetheless. "I got hurt protecting Emm," she explained, stroking Emm's hair. Emm was curled up in her mother's lap, silently sobbing. "How is Chrom?"
"MAMA!" Chrom answered for himself, squirming out of my arms and stumbling over to her and Emm. "Scared…!" he half-sobbed, curling up in her lap too. Emm wriggled out an arm and threw it around Chrom to try and give him a hug. "Scared…!"
"I know. I'm sorry." She looked up at me tiredly. "David bandaged my injury. Do you know about Adair?"
"...I don't, sadly," I answered. I made to walk over, but then I remembered how bloody I was. I couldn't hug them like this. I couldn't comfort them with these blood covered hands. I would just scare them more. "I'd been playing with Chrom."
"I see." She closed her eyes, and a tear slipped down her face. But when she opened them again, there was resolution in her eyes. "Clara?"
"David and I will protect you. Just focus on yourself and your children." I made myself smile, and she managed to return the smile with one of her own. "It'll be okay." I stepped out then, and closed the door. Just in time, as some more assassins had arrived. "Cover me, David."
"Always, my lady," he replied without hesitation. He glanced at me. "The Exalt?"
"No clue, but if anything happened to his wife or children, we'd lose him anyway," I retorted. I steeled my resolved and calmed my heart. I wanted to find Adair. I wanted the reassurance that my brother was fine, both for myself and for Candace. But I was a Knight of Ylisse, and I had my duty. I would be damned before I let these bastards harm Candace, Emm, or Chrom. "Keep focused. We'll drive these pests out, or slaughter them like the rats they are."
I had to keep them safe, and I just had to hope Adair was alright. Gods, what the hell was going on?
I wondered how the hell so many damn assassins had snuck in. Did we have traitors? Logically, that had to be the case, but I wondered who, and why, someone would sell themselves out to Plegia of all places. But there were others who were better suited to burning those sorts of people out. I was a knight, and that meant I was best for killing and leading, not subterfuge. And I had my hands full with these too damn many assassins!
"My lady, have you noticed?" David asked me at one point. We had cut down so many assassins that we'd actually left some up as a 'barricade' to the door and moved to have a little more room to maneuver. And for David to retrieve his arrows. "They wear the emblem of the Grimleal, I think."
"Do they?" I asked, wiping some sweat off my face. I growled as I noticed more coming our way, and then frowned as I noticed something else. "Do they look… what's up with their eyes? They looked… I don't know…"
"They look dead." David summed it up neatly and we both shifted to put our backs to the wall. We no longer fought those with spells, just simple swords and other weapons. "...Their clothes are Ylissean."
"Did the Grimleal fucking take over some of our own?" Not only did they attack civilians and children, but they used our own? The cowards! If this is what they fell to in order to win a war, I had no qualms cutting them all down! "Gods, I could kill their king. Authorizing something like this… he is clearly as demented as the Grimleal." I surged forward as one came close and cut them down before kicking the body towards a second, giving David another opening. "Well, Grima fell to the First Exalt centuries ago, so the Grimleal will meet a similar end to the Knights of Ylisse!"
"On our honor!" David set his jaw and shot two more in quick succession. I whirled and jumped into the middle of a group, taking a blow to the back in exchange for killing three in two swings. Then I jumped back and cut down a fourth. A fifth caught me on the arm, and I decapitated them.
When a sixth tried to attack me, I noticed how flaily and stiffly they moved, like they were a puppet being controlled by a child. Unnerved, I looked at the others, and froze, noticing the same. Each of them moved like puppets. Killer puppets being manipulated by some psychopathic child, trying to kill David and me. Killer 'puppets', really peasants broken into nothing more than dolls. This was madness. This was absolute madness.
"Clara, what the hell are you doing?" The shout was accompanied by the sound of two strikes accompanied by green sparkles dancing in the dim light. A body fell and I turned, seeing Adair standing near me, blood splattered and annoyed, Falchion gleaming in his hands. "I can't believe you gave me an opening to save you," he grumbled. But there was a teasing note to the words. "Wow, you must be exhausted to do that."
"What, and deny you a chance to dramatically use Aether?" I asked. Now that I knew he was here, I knew what the green sparkles had been. Aether, once a legendary skill of the Hero of Blue Flames, was the signature skill of the Exalt, taught only to the Exalt-to-be and their children, and combined the Luna and Sol skills. Luna had blue sparkles, while Sol had yellow. Blue and yellow made green. "Good to see you. I was almost worried."
"Only almost?"
"Be glad I had any worry at all. David's skill bought me enough breather for that."
"David, I owe you a hell of a raise!" Adair shifted so that he and I were standing back to back. "Remind me of that later!"
"I'll take the raise, and a drink as well, if you don't mind my being cheeky, Exalt Adair," David instantly retorted. I glanced over and saw him even grinning. "It doesn't look like we have much more to deal with."
"Oh, thank everything, there's an end!" I groaned. I felt in better spirits, except… I still was fighting puppets. I still was killing peasants who were being controlled. But I had no other choice. It was kill or be killed, and if I died, then they'd go after Candace, Emm, and Chrom. I couldn't… I couldn't…
I wasn't sure if it was a relief or not that David was right and we finally did kill all of them. I no longer had to kill, but I also no longer had the battle to numb me.
"Freaking hell," Adair groaned, rolling his shoulders. He turned to David and me, and bowed. "Thank you graciously for your fighting efforts. There was a fire in town shortly before the attack, which is where most of the guards went. Clearly, setting things up for here, damn them."
"Damn them indeed, Your Grace," David agreed tiredly. He managed a smile. "Would you like to see your family?"
"Yes, actually." Adair's eyes lit up. "How are they?"
"Scared, frightened. Queen Candace took an injury to her back, but it was very shallow." David turned and led the way back to the room. I had to drag Adair with me to follow as he'd frozen from shock. "Lady Clara? Your orders?"
"Oh, me?" I asked, smiling slightly. I wasn't even sure why. It felt stiff. "Just… make sure there aren't more, and that the fire is under control."
"Of course," David murmured. He bowed and darted off. Belatedly, I realized he was making sure to remove the 'non-family' member from the group, so that Adair would not feel obligated to hold onto his 'Exalt mask'. That was another drink I owed him. Damn it, and I couldn't even be mad about it.
Especially since, after I cleared the door and opened it, Adair bolted inside, tripping and stumbling, all pretenses of Exalt Dignity discarded. Guilt flooded me as I watched Adair gather his family in his arms, openly crying at how close he'd been to losing them. Genuine pain clawed my heart at how Candace sobbed into his shoulder, how Chrom and Emm bawled as they clung to their parents. So frightened, so terrified… so close to death when they shouldn't have been...
I should've been more careful. I should've investigated closely. I should've...
A sound made me freeze, and I whirled, blade out, ready to strike. But I paused, waiting, as I noticed the source was a small distance away, a young man half hiding in the shadows of a pillar. The first thing I noticed was the strange headdress-crown the man wore, a gold thing that hooked behind the head and underneath the chin. The second thing I noticed was the sharp red eyes that glittered with keen intelligence. A lean face, a lean body in general, with sharp features emphasized by the beard he wore. Black hair, dark enough to blend into the shadows. Clothing that marked a high ranked Sorcerer of the Grimleal. A cocky little smirk that said 'well, well, I know everything, but you are still so amusing'. He knew I saw him. He knew I studied him.
He seemed to study me took, and his smirk simply widened after a moment. He stepped back, slowly bringing up his hand, and snapped his fingers. Instantly, some sort of magic wrapped around him, and in a blink, he was gone, as if he'd melded into the shadows itself. As if he had never been there at all.
Gods, if I needed any more proof that the Grimleal were evil, that man checked off all the stereotypical villain traits from a story book. Freaking hell. What was wrong with Plegia?
Seventy dead. There were seventy dead. Sixty of them had been Yllisean peasants, based on their clothes. Sixty of them had been normal people snatched during the night and brainwashed into madness. Gods, I hated Grima.
"And that is David's initial results," I explained to Adair, too tired to even sit down as I usually did. No, not too tired. Too drained. So many were dead, and there was one piece that made no sense to me. For some reason, they had focused on two targets: Candace-Emm-Chrom and the Vault. I could understand the former, but hell if I knew why there were so many in front of the latter. Not only was it impossible to open if you weren't of the Royal Family, but it only held one thing, the Fire Emblem. That thing was useless, just a relic of old times. "He's double checking the town."
"Is he officially your second?" Adair asked. He leaned against his desk, looking up at the ceiling. I half-thought he'd almost fallen and just happened to land on his desk. "I think I did that."
"Yes, that's how you got me on the picnic."
"That's right." He shrugged and smiled thinly at me. "Good man."
"Yes, yes, and we're overworking him horrendously."
"Right, pay raise. Hell of a pay raise." Adair groped for a pen and jotted a quick note. "And alcohol. Lots of alcohol. A cask for you, dear sister?"
"Considering tonight? I want three." I smiled slightly as he managed a laugh. "I mean it. Three. Delivered promptly tomorrow afternoon."
"Three. Got it." He wrote that down too. "So, I've a theory for who did this."
"Oh?" I paused, remembering something. "Do you know what sort of title in Plegia wears an odd headdress that goes like…" Words decided to fail me then, so I just gestured around my face, miming out the headdress I'd seen. "I saw someone like that. Disappeared quickly."
"Well, that turns my theory to fact. That headdress is the symbol of the Hierophant, Validar." Adair glowered up at the ceiling. "He's supposed to be very skilled at the dark arts and curses, which according to the stories, was capable of breaking a person's mind and will and controlling them. He's also supposed to have an old magic called 'Rewarp'. Probably showed up, brainwashed them all, and then got out of here." Adair drummed his fingers on the desk. "Somehow learned it from the Witches of Valentia, gods damn him."
"Valentia… that's the old name for Valm, yes?" I couldn't believe this… Hierophant had studied, and learned, magic from a place across the sea. "You don't think they're stirring up trouble there too, do you?"
"Who knows? We're clearly dealing with mad people." He sighed, running a hand through his hair. "Regardless, though, it seems the Grimleal are operating more directly if we've got their Hierophant moving."
"We just have to hope they don't stop our advance force." I shrugged, but a quick glance down showed the blood still crusted under my nails. I'd have to take another bath. "What… are we going to tell the people? About the ones we killed?"
"Plegia. We say Plegia killed them. It's the truth."
"The people won't believe that." I shook my head, drooping. I'd screamed at Plegians for harming 'civilians', yet that was what I did. True, they had attacked us, but the fact remained that it wasn't willingly… "If there had been rumors of kidnappings before, then maybe, but there's been nothing. So…"
"It's. The. Truth." Adair said the words firmly, and I closed my eyes, recognizing the tone. It was his 'I am not budging' tone, and I knew better than to argue. "Go rest, Clara. You'll need it."
"Only if you promise to do the same. I know you. You need to reassure yourself that your family is safe." I made sure to smile, and he softened enough to smile back. "So, that's the deal. I'll rest if you do."
"...Fine." His smile became wry. "Blackmailer."
"Yes, yes, I'm horrible." I rolled my eyes and turned away. "But I'm going to take another bath."
"Don't stay in long. I need my sister to not turn into a fish."
"Yeah, yeah." I waved the words away and walked out of the room, heading towards mine. But I only made it a couple of steps before I had to stumble into a nearby alcove and slide down the wall, shaking as I tried to bite back sobs.
Candace almost died. Emm almost died. Chrom almost died. Adair almost died. And, because I'd stupidly thought everything was safe here in Ylisstol, there were going to be bunches of families who'd have to deal with their family members suddenly being dead, and they were going to be fed a half-truth that it was Plegia's fault. Plegia's Hierophant, if he was really involved, might've controlled them, but I was the one… I was the one who…
I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry.
Author's note: Well, since Aether is Chrom's signature, and it's something Lucina (and any of Chrom's daughters) inherits, I figured his father might know it too. So, have Adair using it. There's no mention of Plegia (or at least the Grimleal) sending assassins in-game during the war; I added it in as a mirror to what does happen in game. The game implies (and outright shows in a certain chapter) that the Grimleal are capable of hypnosis or mind control, which I brought in for here too.
Next Chapter - Strangeness
