Disclaimer: I don't own Fire Emblem.

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Chapter 11

Marisa was in an unfamiliar setting. Her body ached from lying on the cold hard ground. Her right arm was sore from lying on top of it. Her head hurted the most, she used her left arm to reach up to feel her head for the damage. She winced as her fingers made contact to the side of her head. She looked at her fingers, there was a smidge of blood on it. She looked down to see if her sword was with her, but it was gone.

"Marisa!" Shouted a voice.

Marisa groaned as she sat herself up. She looked around the place. She was in a small empty room, with stoned walls, except one wall was barred. She knew she was in some cell. Across from her cell, was Cormag, in another cell. He stood up, clutching the bars as he looked at Marisa with concern.

"What happened?" Marisa asked as she held her head where the pain was.

"We were surrounded. The bastard Duncan smacked you in the head with the hilt of his sword. And I was taken by force."

Right, she forgot what had happened.

"We're lucky we're still alive. I don't know what he has planned for us…" Cormag said, his voice trailing off at the last few words.

"Where are we?" Marisa asked. She had a lot of questions.

"Apparently, the prison of the castle."

Marisa didn't know the castle even had a prison. She went up to the bars to look around. From what she could see, to Cormag's left were 2 more cells. And on his right was nothing, but a torch that hung on the wall.

"How long were we in here?" She asked.

"Not too long. I'm not sure if night time. There's no windows." Cormag sighed as he sat down.

"You okay?"

"Me? I'm fine, but are you okay? He hit you pretty hard."

She was slightly okay, her head pounded every time she moved, but she nodded at Cormag. Bad idea, the shaking of her head worsened the pain. She sat down slowly, hoping that maybe a little rest will subdue the pain.

She leaned against the wall, with her legs outstretched in front of her.

A million questions were going through her head. What was going on? Who truly was Duncan? What was going to happen to Joshua? Was Lady Marisol in on the plan? She probably was, she remembered them leaving to have their private talk. She wasn't sure if Cormag had an answer to her questions.

"Do you…. Have any idea what's going on?" Marisa asked.

"No… I've been on border patrol duty the last few days… Damn it, I should've stayed. I probably would've prevented this from happening." Marisa heard him punch the ground. He was frustrated. But Marisa was even more frustrated. She was in the castle when Duncan and Marisol arrived. She saw Joshua act weird in front of her, why didn't she do anything?

"Marisa." Cormag's tone was serious. She looked at him.

"I saw Joshua as we were being dragged away."

Marisa stayed silent so he could continue talking.

"He looks eerily similar to Prince Lyon before he got possessed by the Demon King."

Marisa's eyes widened. She was speechless. Could the Demon King be back? No, she helped seal the beast's soul alongside with many the many strong people of Magvel.

"But he's dead." Marisa managed to say.

"Yeah, I know." Cormag slid over to lean against the wall.

Marisa sighed heavily. What could she do? She was stuck in a cell. She reached up to touch her wound on her head, but her fingers found something else. It was a bobby pin that she wore to keep stray hair out of her face. She quickly took it out. She rolled it in between her fingers as she thought back to the Sacred Stones war.

(Flashback:)

"What are you doing?" Marisa asked as she crept up behind Colm. He was bent over to a treasure chest.

"Oh! Marisa, don't scare me like that. Come." He ushered her to come beside him. She looked around to see if any enemy was near, but saw none so she crouched beside him.

"I'm trying to open this chest. There could some valuables useful to the army." He said as he fumbled with a long piece of wire. He bent it into a loop and stuck it into the keyhole. He wiggeld it in his fingers, but the chest wouldn't open up.

"Damn it." Colm hissed as he took the wire out. "Hey, you got any hair pins or anything like that?"

She stared at him then remembered that she did have several in her hair. She reached up and took one out of her hair. "Like this?"

"Yes!" Colm said happily as he took it out and opened them up so they were about an inch apart.

She watched as he stuck it in and furiously wiggled it about in the keyhole. After some time, there was a click.

"Voila!" Colm exclaimed as he kicked the chest open, revealing plenty of gold coins.

If she remembered correctly, she could mimic Colm's lock picking. She opened the pin apart, about an inch apart.

She stood up and used her hand to feel for where the keyhole to her cell was. She found it.

But how was she going to lock pick it if she couldn't see it?

"What are you doing?" Cormag asked as he stood up. "Lock picking it? I didn't know you were a thief." Cormag joked. She ignored him as she stuck the pin in the hole.

What did he do?

She wiggled the two sticks in the hole, hoping she would hear a click. No click. She continued to wiggle the pin about, pushing the pin deeper and deeper until it couldn't anymore.

"That's it… I think you got it…" Cormag said as he watched her.

Then… Success! There was a click, and Marisa took out the pin and pushed the cell door outward.

She was proud of herself. She could now successfully pick a lock. She walked out and looked around the cell. There wasn't too much cells, there were 5 more on Cormag's side and 5 more on her side. To her left was the stairs to upstairs.

"Okay, my turn!" Cormag exclaimed. Marisa rushed over to his cell door and mimicked the same action as she did with her cell. There was a click and Cormag was free.

"Yes! Great job, Marisa! Now, let's go get that bastard." Marisa nodded in agreement and they ran up the stairs.

When they got to the top, there was a door. Cormag opened it slowly to look out.

"C'mon." Cormag whispered as he walked out. Marisa followed after him. She looked to see where the room was hidden and why she didn't notice it before. She saw that it was at the bottom of the west stairwell. That explained it, she never used the west stairway down before, for that her bedroom was nearest the the east stairwell.

"It's quiet." Cormag whispered. The two tiptoed their way through the hallway. They looked into the throne room, no one was there. They looked into the ball room, no was there. The castle seemed empty.

"Where are they?" Cormag asked.

Marisa did some calculations in her head. If she was correct, today was the day Joshua was too give a speech in town.

"The speech." Marisa said.

Cormag stared at her. "You're right. You don't think they'll do anything to the townspeople…?" Cormag asked.

She didn't want to think about it, a town filled with paled face walking corpses. She hoped not. But then again, what was really Duncan's plan?

"Let's hope not." She said. "Let's go."

"Right. We'll take my wyvern. The two ran down the hall to the corridor where the wyverns were kept. As they ran, she saw a familiar object on the floor of the ball room.

"Wait." Marisa called out. She walked over to it and immediately recognized it as her sword in its sheath. She picked it up and tied it around her waist. She was glad to have her sword back again.

The two made it to the wyverns. There wasn't very much wyvern riders, just Cormag and 6 more. How Cormag could distinguish which wyvern was his, she didn't know. They all looked the same.

"Good thing they're not under whatever spell the others are under." He climbed onto the creature, and then Marisa climbed on and sat down behind him. She wrapped her arms around his waist tightly. This felt much safer than having Joshua's arms be her "barrier".

The sun was still out, and as they flew, Marisa looked down at the empty desert to see if the Joshua and the others were making their way to town. Then she saw a large group different color moving. From how high she and Cormag was, they looked like ants. And they were heading back to the castle. Had Joshua already gave his speech? What happened to the townspeople? The two would have to check on them later, right now, their priority was Joshua and the other men.

"I think I see them." Marisa said as she pointed towards the large blotch.

Cormag gazed down. "It is them. So what's the plan?" He asked.

Marisa wasn't sure. She thought that if she killed Duncan, the guards and Joshua would go back to normal. But what if they didn't?

That was a risk she would have to take.

"We go kill Duncan. And possibly Lady Marisol." Marisa said.

"What about the others? And Joshua?" Cormag asked.

"Don't kill 'em."

"…Sounds like a plan." Cormag shouted for the wyvern to descend down.

They landed in front of the large group. From what Marisa saw, all 400 and plus men were gathered there. In the front was Marisol, Duncan, and a pale looking Joshua. He and the rest of the men wore an expressionless, almost dead expression on their face.

"You two!" Duncan said.

"I thought you said you took care of them." Marisol said sternly.

"Yeah, but with their power under our control, we would be invincible. Especially the girl." Duncan shot another one of his menacing grin at Marisa. Cormag and Marisa quickly climbed down and held out their weapons.

"What's going on here? What have you done with Joshua?" Cormag asked curtly.

"Meh, we might as well just tell you, since you're going to die." Duncan shrugged. "We have these idiots under our spell so that we can take over the castle of Jehanna. I mean what better castle to take over than this one? With a weak King in its ruling… It's perfect."

Marisa gritted her teeth together. Joshua was anything from weak. He was a splendid King… But at the same time, she was relieved that Joshua wasn't possessed by the Demon King.

"Someone from town probably saw something was wrong with Joshua and the men." Cormag said.

"Maybe." Marisol talked. "But it doesn't matter. I prepared a speech for Joshua to give. Everyone cheered for him despite his appearance." Smirked Marisol.

"But… If you're going to rule Jehanna, they're going to suspect what happened to Joshua." Cormag said.

"We'll just say that the King of Jehanna was foolish enough to go on a mission with a couple of guards to eliminate a group of Cyclops out in the desert. He was pretty hard headed. Took almost a week to get him completely under the spell." Marisol said.

The two didn't say anything.

"What I'd like to know is how did they not fall under the spell? It was your responsibility to take care of the guards." Marisol had a hard expression on her face.

"I guess I didn't spend enough time with the girl. And the boy, I've never seen him around." Duncan said. "If you hadn't barged in on our conversation that night, I would've had her in my grip. Literally."

Marisa shuddered at the thought. No way would she have climbed into bed with a man she just met.

"Shut up." Marisa said. "I don't care if you're the greatest general in Magvel. You're evil. And you're going to die." She was about to run towards him, but Duncan gave out a loud laugh. Marisa froze as she watched him guff. What was he laughing?

"Damn right I'm the greatest general around here! It's about time I get rewarded properly. What's a better reward than the King of Jehanna?"

"But what about you…?" Cormag asked.

"Hm." Scoffed Marisol, her arms were crossed. "I'm the same with Duncan, years and years of working with stuck up nobles, princes and princesses. I think I deserve to be Queen of Jehanna. Even though it is the scummiest country in Magvel."

"Well. We're gonna stop you." Cormag said.

"Hah! You and what army?" Marisol sneered. "In case you haven't got it through your dull heads, we have the army of Jehanna with us."

"We don't care." Marisa said as she charged toward the two.

"Men! Get the two! Cut them up!" Marisa heard Marisol shout. The 400+ men charged towards her, Joshua stayed limply by Marisol's side. She wasn't going to back down; she was just as willing to risk her life to save Joshua's.