Robin

"Chrom."

With as brave as he'd been a week ago in Tinsdale, I found it pretty hilarious that my voice had the Shepherds' captain jumping into the air like a naughty child. He whirled around to face me. "R-Robin? Don't sneak up on me like that!"

"I wouldn't have to if you hadn't been avoiding me." I crossed my arms. "I told you already that I forgave you for the bathing tent incident, and that I wanted to put it behind us. So, why are we still having issues over it every time you accidentally touch me?"

His face reddened slightly, and he looked down sheepishly. "I just still feel so bad about walking in on you like that," he replied, voice quiet.

"I appreciate the fact that you recognize that you made a mistake." I sighed. "That doesn't mean I want our friendship to suffer."

"I know, I know." Chrom put his hands up to his hair. Whether the gesture was from frustration or anxiety, I didn't know. "That is the ultimate invasion of privacy, though. I can't help but feel that I need to make reparations, even if you've already forgiven me. Is there anything that I could do for you?"

"We've already had this conversation, Chrom," I replied, shaking my head. "You've saved my life twice over now and given me a place to-"

"I would do that for anyone. Something else, Robin."

I frowned at him, and he looked back at me, something pleading in his blue gaze. He was being utterly ridiculous about all of this, but I supposed that I could humor him since he was insisting that he was still in the wrong. I did have something in mind, what with Donnel and thinking back to a conversation I'd had with Stahl about the last war. "Well," I began. "There is something I wanted to know about-"

"Risen!" Vaike's yell interrupted my question about Chrom's parents, and we quickly turned to see the fighter sprinting toward us.

"You're certain?" Chrom asked in alarm.

"Both smelt and heard 'em!" Vaike called as he ran past us toward the camp. "And boy, they sounded angry!"

Chrom and I began running after him. "They sound angry already?" Chrom looked toward me. "The usually don't start snarling unless..." his eyes widened in sudden realization.

"They're after someone," I finished grimly, and we burst into the camp to find it in a flurry of activity. "Sully, Sumia! I need you to get to the bridge as fast as possible! Sumia, take Lissa with you, the Risen have their sights on someone!"

"Dagblammit!" Sully flew onto her stallion, Major. She spurred him into full speed, and they thundered past me and Chrom. Lissa hopped up onto Snow, Sumia's pegasus, and they zoomed after Sully, worry evident on Sumia's pretty face.

"Donny, you're with Stahl," Chrom told the boy, and he saluted before hopping up onto Del, Stahl's mare. "Kellam, tend to the camp. Vaike, Robin, let's go!"

"Way ahead of ya!" Vaike rushed past us again, this time with his axe, and we were quick to follow. I could hear faint snarling as we kept moving through the trees.

"I do not have my tome," I realized. I'd left it with the rest of my things when I'd very quickly packed up my tent before going out to talk to Chrom. Chrom sent me a concerned look, and I waved a hand. "I have my sword, though, I don't go anywhere without at least one of my weapons. I can use it almost just as well as a tome."

"How about against pegasi?" Vaike called from past the treeline, and Chrom and I entered the area to see a small flock of Risen pegasus knights in the sky. A screaming whinny akin to what I'd heard the mounts of the dead calvary make pierced the air over the sound of their wings flapping. There appeared to be one lone ground unit, a myrmidon who was on the other side of the river. Sully and Sumia were also on the other side of the river, Sumia already stabbing a gray pegasi and rider with her lance. Sully hit an incoming javelin away with her lance, scowling at the Risen that had thrown it.

"When you really wish that you hadn't left the archer in Ferox," I muttered, noting that Lissa was talking to a woman with a red ponytail and bronze lance near a fort on our side of the river. She looked nearly identical to the merchant I'd gotten supplies from in Ferox, and seemed to be clothed in a similar garb with a similar bag. So that's who the Risen had been chasing. I looked to Stahl and Donnel, who were looking up at the flock with trepidation. "Stahl, you and Donnel help the girls out on the other side, and the three of us will protect Lissa and the merchant."

"You got it," Stahl replied while Vaike began hurrying toward the fort.

"Oh boy," Donnel muttered, then they galloped over the bridge.

"Heyyyy, is this a tome?"

"What?" My gaze snapped toward Vaike, who was holding a rather tattered book with a golden cover in his hand that wasn't holding his axe. "Yes," I replied, hurrying over and taking it before seeing the title and grimacing. I couldn't read the first line of it, but Bolt was the second word. Making it therefore useless to me since I couldn't decipher the text properly enough to be able to make use of the magic sealed inside. "This will be useful in future battles, not so much here."

"You rude!" Lissa yelled behind us, and we all turned to see her diving into the fort, a javelin-sized dent in her skirt. She lifted her rescue staff, and the merchant disappeared in a flash of green light, reappearing in the fort just before Lissa slammed the trapdoor closed, the next javelin hitting the wood.

We started running toward the fort, and the pegasus knight turned its attention to the girls, chucking a javelin at Sully. Sully turned, caught the javelin, and chucked it right back, hitting the pegasus in the leg. "Chrom, you take the north side of the fort, Vaike the west, and I'll be on the east," I told them.

"Got it," Chrom told me, and we quickly took position.

"Pardon me." Sumia flapped over as I drew my sword. She stabbed through the pegasus knight while it was turning toward her, turning both pegasus and rider to smoke.

"Great!" Sully called, and Sumia zoomed back to her side.

"It's all right," I heard Chrom say, then heard an angry snarl.

"An' don't you forget how that felt!" Vaike snapped. I turned my head to see him swing his axe down and through pegasus and rider. The trapdoor opened behind him slightly, and he turned to grin at Lissa, who was peeking out at us. "You stay in there, squirt, we'll knock if we need ya."

"Agreed." Chrom nodded. "The protection you have is already damaged, and no one is in serious need of help out here. Stay in there with the merchant."

"You'd better knock if you need healing," Lissa muttered, but closed the trapdoor.

"Hiiii-yah!" Sumia yelled from across the river.

"Save some for me!" Sully roared, and I turned to see her stabbing the lone myrmidon down to size.

"I'll get the next one!" Sumia told her.

"Then you'd better go!" Sully replied as another pegasus knight zoomed toward them. "GO!" Sumia nearly dodged the attack due to Sully trying to stab the Risen, looking like she only got a glancing blow to the back before hitting the dead knight in the shoulder.

"Whoa!" Something hard hit the fort, and I turned to see a javelin falling off of it. Vaike brandished his axe at a nearby pegasus knight, and the creatures lunged forward, the rider's lance grazing the blond fighter's arm before he slammed his axe into the pegasus.

"My turn." Chrom darted around the fort and Vaike to slice down the rider with Falchion. The flier dissolved into smoke.

"I coulda done that," Vaike complained while Chrom hurried back to his side of the fort.

"Vaike!" I yelled, seeing the javelin being hurled his way. He blanched and dodged right, but still caught the thing dead in his left shoulder.

"Ogre's teeth!" he snarled while Chrom slashed at the Risen who'd thrown the weapon, making it retreat. The trapdoor to the fort opened slightly once again while Vaike yanked the javelin out of his shoulder and threw it down. "Uh-uh, squirt, got another one comin' and I can't hold still," he warned when Lissa's heal staff emerged.

"You're bleeding something fierce there, my friend," a cool voice remarked from inside the fort, and I frowned. The woman we were rescuing sounded a good deal like the merchant I'd done business with in Ferox, too, her voice low and amused.

"Yeah, so hurry and take care of those Risen so I can heal it," Lissa added sharply.

"On your left, Vaike," I called, and he quickly whirled his axe that direction, slicing through pegasus and rider alike.

He grinned at the resulting smoke. "Yeah. I rule." He looked up, then pointed to my left. "Looks like Javelins wants a piece of you, Robin."

I looked to see the pegasus knight that had wounded Vaike readying a javelin to hurl my way. "Oh no, you don't," I muttered, then moved left before sprinting forward. My movement got the hesitation from the creature that I'd wanted, and I slashed down with my sword on the pegasus's neck. It screamed, reeling back, and I quickly slashed upward. The hard flesh gave way to smoke, and the javelin in the rider's hand crumbled with it.

Gods, but I preferred tomes to physical combat. "Anyone else?" I heard Vaike call behind me.

"Don't challenge them, you doofus!" Lissa scolded, and I grinned, turning to see blue light swirling around the fighter while he shook his head at our scowling cleric.

Chrom was cutting down the last pegasus knight on our side of the river, and I hurried to his side, reaching him just as the last of the smoke faded from view. Chrom gestured toward where Stahl was blocking a spear thrust from yet another pegasus knight. "Only two left," he told me. "The girls are tackling the other one. Did you have a particular reason for pairing them up?"

"They're our fastest units, and I didn't see a reason to separate them once we got out here." I watched Sumia stab the felled pegasus knight and yank the iron lance out of its smoky grip while Sully cheered her on. "Sumia seems to do well with the more ruthless fighters anyways." I'd noticed as much in the two battles she'd been in. She'd done really well by Frederick's side, not so well by Donnel's.

"Stinkin' dead thing!" I heard Donnel yell, and turned to see the final Risen high above him and Stahl, practically raining javelins down on the poor boy that he was running to dodge through. "You ain't s'posed to be smart!" Donnel snatched the pot off of his head and chucked it at the Risen.

It was a direct hit to below the pegasus's wing, and it screeched, wing folding so that it plummeted from the sky. The Risen aimed another javelin at Donny, but Stahl was galloping forward now. "Need a hand?" he called, and then Del leapt into the air. Stahl swept his sword cleanly through the pegasus and rider, arm fully extended.

"Amazin'!" Donnel gasped as Stahl landed, and I couldn't help but silently agree, watching the last wisps of Risen smoke disappear against the blue sky.

"Good riddance." Sully and Sumia crossed the bridge, and Donnel and Stahl hurried to catch up. "That the last of them?" Sully asked.

"Looks like it," Chrom replied. "That ended more quickly than I thought it would, thank the gods."

"Aw, Donny, you're bleeding!" Lissa hurried over, lifting her staff to Donnel, and his leg began patching itself.

"And I have money!" Sumia called, holding up a small, tattered brown sack and an extra iron lance up excitedly. "The Risen actually had things that didn't crumble to dust after they dissolved."

"That's great!" I grinned at her as she handed the sack to me. "I'm glad we have at least some funding for equipment now."

"So you're the one in charge of that sort of thing." I turned to see the merchant giving me a smile, her red eyes glimmering with something that I couldn't quite read. "Thank you for taking the time out of your busy marching schedule for me."

"No trouble," Chrom answered for me. "Though we must be going. Donnel and Robin are the only ones among us that are already packed, and we need to get marching quickly."

"How opportunistic." The merchant's smile grew. "They happen to be the ones I want to speak to before you Shepherds leave me. Would that be all right?"

Chrom studied her for a moment, then nodded. "That's fine. The rest of you, let's move," he called.

"Lissa, Sumia's injured," I told her. "Heal her on the way, would you?"

"You got it!" Lissa lifted her staff to Sumia as they began walking off.

"You wouldn't happen to be a twin, would you?" I asked the merchant as she stuck the point of her lance in the ground and began rummaging through her bag.

"People ask that more than you might think. No, friend, but I have a few sisters that I am very similar to... in more ways than one. Call me Anna." She pulled out a sapphire that was encircled by three rings of silver, and then grinned at me. Probably at my expression, because I knew I was staring. A second seal. "Yes, I think that this will do nicely."

I raised both hands in a stop gesture when she held it out to me. "I can't accept that," I protested.

"I insist," she replied, firmly taking my hand and plunking the second seal into it. "Nothing in life is free, my friend, survival least of all. I'm just paying my dues. Besides, these beauties aren't as rare as you might think, so you can sell it if you want. I'm certain that you'll come across another."

She winked at Donnel, and I frowned at her. She just smiled back, and I sighed, cupping the seal in both hands. "Fine. You be more careful again, all right?"

"Of course. I may never see you, but I've no doubts you'll see my face again. Heh." Anna picked up her lance and walked over the bridge, back the way she'd come.

"Why'd she wink at me, Robin?" Donnel asked, eyeing the second seal in my hands with obvious awe.

"Because you'll be seeing this again," I replied, drawing my thoughts away from Anna's riddles for now. "I told you that you're a villager, right?" He nodded. "Villagers and soldiers are ordinary folk that wield lances, so they can't progress without switching weapons at one point."

"Yeah, you told me alla this." Donnel stuck his lance in the ground. "We went over my options, which don' include no cavalier, knight, or mage. The first two because they take trainin' from a younger age than I am right now, and the latter because I have no magic signature thing. We agreed that I'd one day be a mercenary, but ya told me that there was no need for me to be practicin' with a sword just yet."

"This is why." I lifted my hands. "It's called a second seal, and having you use it will give you basic knowledge of how to use your new weapon. None of this learning by example business that you've been doing with that lance."

"Oh, wow!" Donnel's eyes grew round as saucers. "But... you said I gotta get real good with the lance and used to this fightin' before that day comes, right?" I nodded. Him becoming somewhat close to what a mercenary resembled was unfortunately necessary for this seal to work. "Is that what you'll be usin' on Lady Lissa when she'll be a sage?"

"You better not let her catch you calling her that," I told him dryly, and his expression turned sheepish. "No, that's a different seal, since she's keeping her staff. Those are master seals, and they look a bit different." I tucked the second seal into the pocket that also held my new tome that I needed to start figuring out so I could use it in the upcoming tournament. "We'd best get back to camp. It wouldn't do to have the others waiting on us."

"Nope, not at all," Donnel agreed, and we left the bridge and river behind.