Warning: Discussion of pregnancy and abortion.

Chapter 25: Kinship

CORRIN

Her mouth was sour and dry, the spot covered by her eyepatch was itching while her left eye was flowing with water, the misery oppressed her chest so hard that it was difficult to breathe. She felt so unsightly before Azura, as the evidence of her biggest mistake was unveiled helplessly with each aching word.

Corrin didn't know to whom else resort to first. Azura was a person who knew how to keep secrets, but was it the right thing to confide her on such an overwhelming problem?

It was easy to imagine Azura's disgust, the fact that she was extremely good at concealing her emotions wasn't helping her assumptions. At least Azura listened to her story in spite of the silent whimpers and troubled words, simultaneously too afraid of getting judged too hard—or just about right. Azura listened to everything and didn't even blink at the end of the story.

"—It wasn't Ryoma's fault. Nothing of what they say about him is truth. You know him well enough", Corrin said, her hands were twisting the fabric of her sleeves, the chills wouldn't leave her body alone, her distress fed that painful heaviness in her stomach.

Azura gave a long sigh, her eyes were strangely cold. "No matter whose fault it was, you should think about what to do for the better of all, Corrin."

"… What do you suggest?"

"I'm going to say something really harsh, so please listen carefully: In the heat of the battle, you cannot afford to care about an unborn child. You might as well lose it anyway if you get injured or for even less. I know, you wouldn't be asking me for help if you weren't looking for reassurance to keep that child, but I cannot lie to you about this." Indeed, her words were severe, but there was a great anguish living in her voice, as if this wasn't the first time she witnessed such a thing. And Corrin couldn't say that Azura was entirely wrong, but still…

"Is it really that bad?"

Azura nodded. "… I could get you an abortifacient from the apothecary in case that you make up your mind, but in the end, it's up to you to carry on. Whatever you choose, I'll do my best to support you."

…

TAKUMI

It wasn't like he was enforced to spend all the time inside that lonely room, but he was simply mentally adjusted to the idea that he was a prisoner and needed to act as such, just as long as he was needed to play this role. Azura was the only constant visitor he'd get, and they still didn't speak much, and they deliberately kept their conversations short, as to not arise any more suspicions that she was conspiring with him. She must already deal with a fair amount of mistrust from the nohrians.

The emptiness that followed after being left alone wasn't anything he wasn't accustomed to, but he slowly started to realize how much space was gaping around him when he didn't have Sakura or his retainers around. He missed talking to Sakura, he missed hanging out with Oboro and Hinata… he missed being around his own people. He always thought that he was comfortable in his loneliness— and he was—, but he also craved for the company of people who would look up to him instead of feeling sorry for his every single melancholic breath. He loathed it when people pitied him.

He had another night of dreaming about dragon claws, dreamed about how they'd gently pierce into his still-open wounds. More than fearsome, it was a disquietingly thrilling dream and it'd leave him feeling sultry by the morning, having all his emotions in disarray, for there was no clear meaning that connected one image to another sensation. More than a couple of times he was forced to request that he'd like to personally wash his own clothes and sheets.

This offended Felicia, the maid who sometimes tended him and today was on laundry duty, accidentally making her feel like she was being incompetent at her job, which he truly didn't mean. Of course, after trying to clear this misunderstanding, he was eventually allowed to go to the laundry room with Felicia. Needless to say, Felicia turned out to be a very clumsy, if not deficient maid, tripping everywhere and soiling the clothes right after scrubbing them with water and soap.

Where did Corrin get such an ill-fitted servant…? Then again, Hinoka herself had a pair of very underqualified retainers, so who was he to judge?

After he was done, he casually left the laundry and helped to hang up the sheets to dry out, then he sat down to wait in the courtyard, watching as the multi-colored clothes were caressed by the weak breeze of the wind.

Takumi started to grow uneasy with being out of his room in plain gray daylight. Of course, nobody was allowed to touch him as long as he remained in the fortress, he knew that he was being watched from afar by Leo's closest subordinates. The possibility of encountering the older siblings of Corrin wasn't appealing in the slightest, but he doubted that they'd attempt to harm him. Besides, his own appearance was wrecked badly enough to not be immediately identified as the Hoshidan Prince he was supposed to be, which was a terrible shame: he actually liked his hair long.

"Would you like to spar with me? You look so bored."

Corrin walked into his view, he was taken aback by the proposal but even more so by her attire. The sharp neckline of her black tunic went way down exposing a generous amount of skin, but he wasn't staring at her cleavage particularly… his eyes caught sight of that scar burnt on her chest, expanding across her skin like branches of a tree. He tried to not stare for long enough to make it obvious.

"Are we allowed to do that?", Takumi asked, looking up at Corrin's strangely passive expression. Her paleness and subtle mannerism gave him the impression of sickness.

"Not really, but we could both use some exercise, don't you think?" Her voice was also strange. In her hands she held a pair of blunt-edged practice swords.

"I still don't think it's a good idea."

"Humor me, then."

Hesitatingly, he grabbed the sword that she offered him and his hand welcomed the weight of the wooden weapon—far heavier than a shinai but manageable—, but he couldn't understand what was going on inside Corrin's head to make her act this way; he couldn't fully figure out his feelings when he looked at her scarred chest either.

That large mark was nothing but a reminder of what Ryoma have done to her, just like her eyepatch was a reminder of what he did to her. Takumi couldn't bear to look at his own naked body and its small markings without feeling sick, so how come she was so shamelessly showing off that wound in front of him? Was it a misguided sense of pride… or something else entirely?

When he stood right in front of her, sword in hand, he felt like he was still inside a weird dream. There was something frightening and alluring about the way she looked and acted right now, and it was indeed going to test him.

"Alright, let's go."

He nodded as he positioned himself with the sword on defense, Corrin immediately leapt the distance between them and with full-force swung that sword towards him, taking Takumi by surprise by that sudden burst of strength. He managed to block that strike with the sword, but lost his balance quickly, his weight falling on one knee.

Corrin took stepped back and her body spun, aiming for a consecutive attack. She roared as her sword hit him again. Takumi moved, received the blow with the blade and his arms quivered by the brute force she used to swing, which was a little too harsh for just a sparring session. Or maybe it was only because he's grown physically weak? It was hard to tell.

Takumi grabbed the sword's hilt with both hands as he withdrew from her reach. She roared again and went to clash against his shoulder, but he reacted just in time to block her, and in return pushed her back with a little more effort than what he expected to use.

He yelped as he struck back at her, knowing full well how quickly she'd block that slash directed for her chest, but he sharply withdrew and struck for a second time, nearly catching her off guard; still not good enough.

Takumi begun recalling those distant sparring sessions he had with Ryoma a little before the breaching of the war. He remembered his careful deliberate movements and also his slow descent to desperation that would result in the same defeat over and over again in hands of Ryoma. Corrin's sword technique was entirely different from what he was used to; even when he watched her train with that old knight Gunter days ago, Takumi didn't have a good grasp on how she fought.

Brusquely she swung her sword again, each thunderous strike more powerful than the last. His arms started to hurt, the effort demanded for sword fighting was making his weakened body work out more than anything that he's done for the past few weeks. Takumi regretfully thought that he should've at least asked her to let him warm up a little, but his own lack of self-care was partly up to blame.

"Harder! I need you to come at me with killing intent!" she bellowed at him as her chest heaved, the tree-scar looked like it was alive. The wretched taunt sent chills down his spine.

There was a sort of cold wildness in her only eye, brimming with fury and abandon, yet at the same time… helplessness, frailty, like a wounded animal lunging for a final stand. It was clear that she didn't intend to hold back, but he wasn't sure if he could reciprocate her demands.

They continued like this for a while longer, Takumi eventually resorted to dodging and deflecting the thrusts of Corrin's sword, but he realized that every time he'd try to strike her, she'd lower her guard, not enough to make it seem extremely apparent, but he had a keen eye and was able to detect this anyway. He'd then deviate his blade to clash against hers, avoiding to touch her.

Every time he did this, she'd groan and attack him again with the same intensity. Takumi was very confused about her intentions at this point… She was so ill-fitted for a fight in her current state, yet she kept on provoking him like a child…

The moment which he pushed her away, he was already exhausted and bathed in sweat, just like her. He's never had a sparring session so long and so pointless like this one. And yet, she ran towards him, charging at full-speed with that frightening battle roar. Takumi sighed, tired already of this. He reacted quickly enough to step aside and lessen the impact of her sword, simultaneously lifted his right knee as she ran into it, making her trip violently on her face as she yelped in shock.

A dirty trick, he wouldn't call it other way, but that was the only thing he was able to think to halt Corrin's frenzy.

"Pent-up anger is not a good component for a practice fight… let's just call it a draw", Takumi breathed as his hands discarded the sword, feeling his fingers burn with blisters from the friction against the sword's hilt.

Corrin slowly picked herself from the dirt, slowly turning her messed-up face towards him. She had the expression of a sore loser, but there was a disquieting frustration arising from her left eye. Slowly, she found a sitting position, her hand abandoning the sword as well. Her nose bled from the impact of hitting the ground, but she simply wiped off the blood and dirt from her mouth and continued to look at him with disbelief.

"Why were you holding back?"

He shrugged. "You looked sickly… and there's no way I'd feel good beating you up when you're clearly in disadvantage. I just don't know why would you ask me to spar when it'd be better for you to take a rest?"

Corrin twisted her mouth as she looked at her bare feet—he noted how dirty and rough her foot soles were—; she looked so sourly defeated right now even when he didn't try to hurt her (and that was probably the point). She inspired him pity.

"Resting up doesn't always help me cope with the pain… I'm sorry for dragging you into doing this. It wasn't right of me", her voice was back to a passive tune and she couldn't even look at him in the eye. Takumi knew that there was more to it than she let on, but he refused to add anything more.

"… Let's try again another day, when you're not sick. I'd like to defeat you when you're in top form, alright?" Takumi sighed, his body was exhausted and he wanted to leave. Takumi leaned down and stretched his hand towards her, more subconscious than intentional; Corrin stared at him with a questioning look before accepting his hand, her fingers were also rough to the touch.

He knew that sometimes he came off as aloof and brash towards her, which was mostly involuntary, so he could understand why was she so unused to his rare display of politeness. They walked together among the sheets hung on the lines, as if their gentle swaying shielded them from prying eyes.

"I really don't like sword fighting", he said suddenly. "I have never defeated Ryoma in a sparring match. Not even once. There were days in which I couldn't land a single blow on him. And this might sound childish, but I decided to pick up the yumi because I figured that if I couldn't best him on the sword, I'd do it with the bow." Unconsciously, he grinned, as a pleasant memory ghosted over him. "Mother was so eager to teach me how to wield the yumi properly, even when she was a very busy woman. She was beaming the day that Fujin Yumi chose me as its owner. Back then, I thought that was the happiest that I've never seen her."

"I knew that Mother used the yumi… but I've never seen her."

"She was amazing. I'm not nearly as graceful as she was."

"You're already an impressive archer on your own, I can't imagine how she was." From the corner of his eye he watched Corrin smile half-heartedly. For some reason, that sight gave him chills. "… If you want, we could practice with range targets instead."

"You don't have to be so pleasing."

"I could arrange it so it we wouldn't run into trouble."

Takumi shook his head, averting his gaze from her before he could panic. "That's not what I'm talking about."

"Oh… I get it. It'd be awkward to allow you walk around with a bow in your hands, it'd put everyone on edge."

She was right, but he also meant something else too regarding Corrin's personality, the way she acted, the way she moved… so effortlessly kind and painfully artificial at the same time, it was bafflingly hard to tell those two sides apart. He recalled worrying about someone like this before. Takumi didn't completely realize this uncanny likeness until now, for he filled so many of his days hating and misunderstanding Corrin that he never stopped to see those similarities, both qualities and flaws…

"… You are so much like her" he murmured when he stopped and rested his back against one of the stone pillars surrounding the courtyard. Corrin's left eye examined him with familiar intrigue, it made his skin crawl as if he just faced a ghost. "You really are my Mother's daughter."

She went quiet for a while, her only eye wandered to all places before returning to him. "I never thought about it."

There was an odd taste in his tongue when he called her that. Despite everything, Corrin was still Queen Mikoto's only child. Thinking about it made his body feel brittle with the load of all those conflicting memories, which is why he always tried to avoid them.

"… I was always jealous of that, you know? Despite being apart for nearly all your life, she really loved you. She wouldn't let it show because she was the Queen, but I knew that she cried alone whenever she missed you… I wanted to be good enough to stop her from being sad, stop her from thinking of you", his voice faltered a little, Corrin's heartbroken look wasn't helping either. Why was his chest feeling so heavy all of sudden? "But she loved us too. She loved me, even if I wasn't her true son, even if… e-even if she wasn't bound by anyone to do it. I knew she always did her best to raise me and Sakura, even though she wasn't perfect and had better things to worry about."

Takumi raised his hand towards his face, pressed his eyelids with his thumb and index before the tears could come out. His whole body was trembling and he couldn't stop it. He didn't want to cry in front of her again, but this has been weighing him down for such a long time, it bent him broken.

Corrin wasn't alien to the feeling of loss, but her emotions were so distant from his own and yet she was the only one around who could empathize with him in a moment like this. She was probably aware of this.

"How long has it been? About half a year, right? Although it feels like it's been so long…" Corrin said, her wistful humming hovered with the soft breeze of the wind, it was so pitiful, just like him. "We haven't had the time to mourn for her, have we?"

He let out a shaky breath, his chest overflowing. He could feel that her pained words were at least in the same place as he was. And that was good enough.

"Takumi?"

"… I'm fine." He managed to hold back the tears, the most he could do.

She walked him back to his room, they exchanged a bit more of words about when would Leo hold another secret meeting, but the details easily escaped him, his mind wound up by their conversation. Corrin left him alone after she ran out of conversation topics. Even then, he could tell from the way her mouth moved reluctantly, she still had more things left to tell him.

But she didn't.

It was fine, he didn't have the energy for more anyway.

Today he managed to understand Corrin a little better, but didn't change his troubled feelings towards her, didn't help subside this sickly curiosity that was yet to haunt even more of his dreams at night.

…

CORRIN

She ended up running into the infirmary again to check on in the nearest mirror her bloody nose and if she damaged her right eye during that fall at the end of her match with Takumi. She had to remove the white-leather eyepatch; luckily, she didn't sustain any damage. But it was a challenge to adjust to that sight, the way in which her pale eyelids sunk down lazily, the absence of an eye made the pink veiny flesh inside all the less pleasant to watch. She was never one to feel insecure about her own looks, but she couldn't grow used to seeing her own face with only one eye.

Takumi's words about Mother nearly made her cry today too, and she vaguely wondered if her right side would still be able to produce tears.

Bringing up Mother right after what she tried to do was a little too much for her. Azura would later reprimand her severely for this, but she didn't have a good explanation for acting so rashly; there were surely a lot more ways to solve her problem without coming into harm's way and leave Takumi out of it for good.

She nearly made Takumi do something cruel beyond words, as a twisted maneuvering of what she considered justice, while freeing her of something she dearly feared.

Corrin went to sleep early that day, as if trying to shut down her mind spiraling into hopelessness, edging towards madness. It crawled beneath her skin as a destructive force that wanted nothing but to punish her for every single sin. Even in dreams, the monster inhabiting her would grow restless, a violence-starved dragon threatening to claw its way out of her. But she was herself the dragon, no matter how she wished to interpret these self-destructive urges.

It was suffocating. She was left alone to her anguish until her muddled senses started to detect voices outside of the realm of dreams.

"—no… ! You've got a fever…!"

It was a voice like a ray of sun, sounded a lot like Elise, and in that moment Corrin felt small hands feeling her up carefully, cold enough to make her gently squirm out of that nightmare almost completely. A faint sense of alertness made her feel uneasy about those tiny hands checking on her.

"… What?" There was a confused shiver in that voice, the little fingers abruptly shied away from her. "This can't be right…"

Corrin was slow to react, her head was heavy and her limbs wouldn't respond until after Elise was already out of reach. Not long after, when she finally opened her eyes, she saw at the room's door Xander's tall grim frame in contrast with Elise, so small that she barely made it up to his chest. Xander looked down at his little sister and nodded at her. Corrin's mind was racing into understanding what was happening.

"Thank you, Elise. You may leave us both alone", his regal voice wasn't half as strong as usual. Elise was upset.

"Don't you shoo me away all of sudden! Whatever you're going to talk about, I'm old enough to listen!"

"That's not the issue and you know it."

"But…!"

"—I promise that we won't fight. We're just going to talk. Please, just let us be alone."

"I didn't tell you so you'd punish her, Xander. You're the only one who can protect her now."

Corrin was shifting from the bedsheets, still struggling to get her body up, her heart shivered with the obvious context of her siblings' words, her mind panicking when Elise begrudgingly had to leave them alone and Xander closed the door behind him as he walked inwards this room.

There was a severe frown on Xander's face, each little fold added some age to his yet-young face, but it wasn't anger what he wielded with such scowl, and Corrin didn't know why it made her gut feel so much worse.

Xander lifted his face as his dark purple eyes pinned her down. "Honestly, I didn't want to believe all the rumors that Iago left in his wake, for I always thought that I knew better… But this demands an explanation, Corrin."

"… What are you talking about?" She looked away, anything was better than to face him.

"Don't play fool with me." His voice got louder for one second, demanding her full attention; he was not going to beat around the bush. "Has someone, anyone, done something heinous to you during your captivity? Has anyone abused of you?"

"No", she breathed sharply. Xander kept coming closer, his imposing height looming on to her. Her breath hitched, feeling that pain on her sides again. Tears were threatening to slip out, but she found herself unable to.

"Are you sure, little princess? Aren't you trying to protect someone?"

She opened her mouth, it was shivering uncontrollably. "Xander, I know exactly what you're thinking, but it's not what it seems. Whatever Iago said about me, it's not true—"

But before finishing, his hands grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her, not violently, but with enough force to startle her. His was a desperate-looking face, fearful above anything. "I cannot take this lightly and neither can you. You need to tell me what happened!"

Her whole body was tense under his grasp, and for long seconds she didn't know what to say to him. She knew what people said of Ryoma particularly, Iago had made sure to twist the truth however he pleased, and Xander's certainty of that was probably her only leeway to save part of Ryoma's reputation. But she could only do so much when all those lies were founded on one terrible truth.

"It was a guard", she spoke, suddenly bit ill by the unconvincing words. "He was very kind to me and we fell in love. I know it was improper, immoral to an extent… but it simply happened because I was the one who wanted it to happen." Her voice took newly-found strength within that last sentence. "I know that you must feel so disappointed on me, Xander, but what are you going to do about it? …My honor is not yours to defend, so stop acting like it is."

"You understand whose reputation is being soiled because of this, don't you? A guard, you say, but a nameless cur is not enough evidence to clear what they're saying about Prince Ryoma", Xander let go of her but didn't get his eyes off her. "I have no idea what are your feelings towards Prince Ryoma after all your time as their prisoner but you ought to clear things out, even if only for YOUR sake and the child you're carrying."

"… If I say a name, what will happen then? Are you going out to protect the father or are you going to kill him? You're still going to wage war against Hoshido and you're still going to fight against him. Why in the world do you care?"

Xander gritted his teeth, disgusted with her crudeness. "Because it's your own brother they're talking about!"

She lowered her face, feeling an involuntary pang trickle across her scarred chest. Until now, Xander and everyone else referred to her hoshidan siblings with animosity and denial because in their eyes they would never be Corrin's true family… but now Xander's fears and morals have forced him to accept this reality.

"… So you finally acknowledge that Ryoma is my brother?"

"Help me, Corrin", he uttered beneath his teeth. "Help me, so I don't have to believe that he's the one who touched you."

"Of course he didn't. He is my brother." The lie slipped coldly between her lips. In a moment like this Corrin understood the importance of Ryoma's secretiveness towards their blood relation, because if Xander were to ever find out, all of this would be for naught, nothing would change. "Or you could just believe in whatever you want, Xander, if it helps you justify the hoshidan lives you'll have to take."

"Stop that."

"Stop what? Does the truth cripple you from obeying Father's demands?"

"Do you honestly think that the truth never weighed on me? No matter how I wish otherwise, I know the truth has brought nothing but pain and self-doubt to you, and naturally it leaves us questioning whether the love you harbored for us is even healthy. There's no point in gliding over the facts: we raised you as our own only because you were victim of circumstances beyond anyone's control." His gloved fingers tensed tightly under that black leather, now he couldn't look at her in the eye. "I don't know what Father was thinking that night when he brought you in to us… I still can't figure if making you one of us was even worth the consequences that followed. I cannot explain why he is like that; some days I cannot help but to wonder if he's still my Father… I don't know." His breathing wavered for a moment, his scowl deepened, Corrin's chest clenched. "But know this: I will not ignore you anymore. If anything, I'll keep on doing what I can to protect you, whether you can still see us as your family or not, little princess. Being your big brother is the only thing I've ever been able to offer you."

Corrin went quiet after Xander was done, the anxiety was still stirring inside, keeping her from fully embracing this genuine show of empathy. She knew Xander was kind and capable of tenderness, she knew that he meant well, but he was completely helpless to the forces controlling his and his siblings' lives, therefore, he couldn't promise to do all of that.

Xander too was a victim of circumstances beyond their control. Corrin wanted to finally tell him to truth, free him at last from that controlling monster's claws… but the time would come very soon. They needed to wait for the Impostor's arrival to Mokushu, which would happen in a matter of a few more days, according to Leo.

Until then, she needed to stop capturing Xander's attention like this. She also needed to figure out that other pressing problem, her fingers were twitching over her stomach, her heart pulsing in her throat.

"What do you want to do?" he inquired calmly, but with a demanding undertone. "Are you going to keep that child?"

It was worth pondering about, because from one moment to the other, she thought about getting rid of it and regretted it instantly. She'd still try to talk to Azura more about her second-guessing, but until then, Corrin was completely uncertain of what she truly wanted.

With rigid hands, she looked back to Xander with a frozen expression.

"I need to think about it."

…

Later that night, Corrin left her room instead of turning to Azura for counseling, she went to Takumi's room just below hers, for she was painfully aware that he must've heard her conversation with Xander, just like it happened last time.

And she found him there, sitting in that same spot in the dark, beneath the weak light of the moon outside the small window, the stillness in which his body rested against the wall was like that of a statue. He didn't move until Corrin sat right beside him, letting out a long sigh. The room's floor was very cold.

"… Sorry for calling you 'fat' the other day. I feel stupid for not realizing it before."

"I didn't realize it either, so maybe the stupid one is me." Corrin grimaced, his despondency palpable through his silence. "What are we going to do about this?"

"We? You realize that it's not me who is carrying a child?" She couldn't see Takumi's face when he turned his head to her, but in the dull light lining his small shape she could see how tense his shoulders were. "I'm at loss for words. I should have known that something like this would happen. What's done it's done, but what do you want to do?"

That question again; it only managed to make her mouth go dry and her thoughts tumble against each other. She was too tired to put up a façade in front of him, when they were both sheltered by darkness and dim moonlight.

"… I thought about keeping it at first, but I don't know if it'd do right by me, or the child in question. There's too much to take in consideration. What if I lost it during the next battle? What if it comes out malformed or sick? What if I cannot love it or make it happy?"

She sensed how Takumi shifted lightly when she mentioned that last part, she realized that she hit a nerve with bringing that up. Not over a day ago they were talking about their Mother.

"I can't deny that it'd be a better choice to simply not have the child at all, but you know that I don't have a say in what you want to do in the end. It's your choice. Think hard, because it's not going to wait for you forever!"

"… Azura told me something similar."

"Did she? I guess she'd be far more helpful than me in that regard."

"But you know exactly why I've come for you too."

"… Yeah."

This was going to be the bastard child from the illicit union between brother and sister, and that was a burden too great to place on a baby that wasn't even born yet. Even worse than that, Corrin knew that she would be projecting her still-latent feelings for Ryoma through this baby… It didn't feel right to keep a child just for the sake of the one who fathered them.

"Even if you're not my kin, the child you're carrying is my blood. I suppose that I should be feeling something about them, but… I'm sorry if that's not the case." Takumi didn't even try to sound scornful, he was just tired.

There was something else to this unborn infant though, something that caught Corrin unprompted while Takumi brought up the words 'kin' and 'blood', which made her heart tingle.

The world was too lonely for a creature like herself, and this child was something that she could call her own, her blood, her home. The mere existence of this child breathed into Corrin a new sense of belonging, something she thought she lost when Ryoma told her she had no blood relation to anyone except Queen Mikoto.

In that moment, for the first time in such a long while, Corrin felt hope.