Series introduction:

The Fire Emblem: Lion & Stag series is centered around two romances: Felix & Byleth and Claude & Sylvain. Part 1 (completed) focuses on Felix, and Part 2 is all about Sylvain and is through his point of view. It takes post-timeskip in the Golden Deer route.

Content warnings: explicit sex, violence, panic attacks, trauma.
The first-person narrator of each chapter is denoted by the chapter name.

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1 - The Past Drowns the Present

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Sylvain

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"Why did you even offer to come along? All you're doing is distracting me," Claude says.

He has been trying to keep his attention focused on the valley below for signs of prey, his hunting bow in one hand and an arrow in the other, ready at any moment to fire. We are getting low on food and figured a good solid meal would boost morale. But crouching here in the bushes for hours is a cold and boring business and I lost my will to persevere through it long ago.

Now I've got my arms around his waist and am nuzzling his neck affectionately, pressing my lips here and there across his skin, nipping at his earlobe every once in a while, playing with the gold earring with my tongue.

"You came to hunt elk; I came to hunt a deer," I murmur. "So far only one of us has caught our quarry."

"You think I'm going to miss my shot and go home empty handed because I let myself get distracted by you?" he asks, but I can hear the playful edge creeping into his tone and can feel the little shivers of anticipation and excitement in his body.

I smile and grow bolder, moving my hand to his leg and sliding it slowly up his thigh.

His breath catches slightly and he swears quietly in Almyran.

"I'm never bringing you along again," he whispers.

"Really? Never? You don't want to bring me to these woods which are so beautiful and so very secluded and let me do this to you?" I reply. I tip up his chin with one hand and kiss his neck more intently. The other hand I slip deftly under the waistband of his pants so I can get him as aroused as I am.

He gasps and twists around to kiss me hungrily, his composure finally breaking. The feeling sends a thrill of pleasure through me and a quiet hum of desire escapes my lips. Even though it has been nearly a month, I still haven't gotten used to this.

People come to me for a satisfying, no-strings-attached orgasm. That usually doesn't include much kissing, or at least not like this. Claude doesn't seem to understand the idea of a quick, down-to-business fuck. Even though I know I am just a toy for him, whenever he kisses me like this it is easy to forget. I bet this is how it would feel to kiss someone who loved me.

Claude is so good at faking emotions that his sincerity and enthusiasm are easy to get caught up in and believe. It takes a lot of self-admonition to remind myself of my trifling, unimportant place in his life.

Nonetheless, I get carried away enough that I decide to get on my knees and go down on him so passionately he sees through time and space. But just as I start to, he abruptly pulls back and freezes. He stares past me into the forest, holding his breath, a look of fierce concentration taking over his expression.

I give him a questioning look and he puts a finger to his lips, nodding towards a thicket of pine trees to our left. When I look carefully over my shoulder at them, I can detect the glimpses of movement that must have caught his attention. Silently, he nocks an arrow to his bow and raises it.

Then a skin-prickling screech comes from the thicket and the foliage sways and crashes as a demonic beast bursts through it and out into the open. It's a huge dragon-like abomination of a creature, its jaws coated with blood and the mangled limbs of a freshly-slaughtered deer.

Although rooted to the spot for a moment in terror, the irony of the sight does not escape me.

Grateful I was cautious enough to bring it with me, I grab the Lance of Ruin and leap to my feet. But Claude grabs my arm and hisses, "What are you doing?"

"You need space to fire at him and find his weak spot. I'll distract him," I answer. Yanking my wrist free, I dart into the open, brandishing my lance and yell at the beast. "Hey you big ugly motherfucker! Look over here!"

It loses all interest in Claude and charges at me, its great scaly paws sending tremors through the ground. I grit my teeth and steel my nerves, already slightly regretting the noble but possibly suicidal instinct that caused me to bolt out here to protect Claude.

I dive out of the way of its snapping teeth, blood from its dripping maw flicking across me, then I swing my lance at it. The glowing spikes of the spearhead startle it and it staggers back a couple steps and rears up onto its back legs, roaring.

The déjà vu of the moment triggers something deep within me and I freeze, heartbeat spiking with a whole new kind of terror, far more deep-set than the fear of a fight. But when the beast crashes back down to its front paws and lunges at me, I stir back into action.

As it snarls at me and opens its jaws, I leap forward and stab the lance into the roof of its mouth, throwing all my strength into wrenching the spearhead in as deeply as possible. The beast cranes its neck up, struggling to break free of it, and the movement exposes the fleshy gap in its scales on the underside of its neck.

Immediately, an arrow strikes the spot dead-center, followed by another. The beast flails with a screech and I rip the lance free. I stagger away from its thrashing limbs and another arrow zips past me, embedding itself into the beast's eye.

But the wounds are not enough to kill the creature and it hauls itself back to its feet, blinded but enraged. The fell scream that tears from its throat pierces into my mind, dragging repressed fears back into reality from the buried recesses of my memory. A visceral panic grips my body and I drop my lance and fall down to my knees, staring up at the monster helplessly.

"Sylvain!" Claude cries. He snatches the Lance of Ruin and grabs my arm, hauling me to my feet and dragging me away from the beast.

Hardly aware of what I am doing, I run beside him, his hand clutching mine tightly as we flee. The blinded beast chases after us, but its pain and confusion disorient it enough that we manage to keep a few paces ahead of it without it catching up.

Then Claude catches sight of a narrow ravine in the hill. He races towards it and jumps down, pulling me with him. It is little more than a cracked scar in the earth between two ridges of rock, sheltered mostly from the ground above by scrub brush and fallen pine needles. He crouches down and watches the sliver of sky and trees visible above us warily.

But I can barely focus on my surroundings. The panic is sucking me into a whirlpool and my thoughts grow distorted and muddled, the rush of imaginary water filling my ears and an icy chill seeping deep into my skin.

My back pressed against the wall of rock, I slide down to the ground and clutch my hair in my hands, closing my eyes. My breath is racing but I can't get it to stop. I can't convince my senses that what I am feeling is an illusion, which is even more frightening than the illusion itself.

Over the phantom noise of the water, I hear crashing steps and the roar of the beast. I gasp and right as a cry escapes my lips, Claude clamps his hand over my mouth.

He puts his other hand on the side of my face and whispers, "Sshh."

I open my eyes and struggle to focus on his face, on the feeling of his steadying hands. The footsteps of the beast pass by us and fade into the distance. Once the danger has passed, Claude relaxes and breathes a sigh of relief. But my panic does not recede. Even if the beast is gone, the cold water is still swirling around me, chilling me to the bone, threatening to drown me if I give up fighting and slip beneath its surface.

No, no. It's not real! This is just a hole in the ground. It's not a well.

Claude moves his hand away from my mouth and I gasp for breath, coughing the phantom water from my lungs, shivering violently.

"What's going on? Are you hurt? Sylvain, talk to me. I'm right here."

His voice tugs at me through the chaos in my thoughts and I focus on it like a lifeline, lifting my eyes to meet his.

The drowning pressure eases from my lungs and I begin to breathe more freely. The noise slips away, leaving behind the normal rustling of the forest and the sound of Claude murmuring my name.

He takes my face in his hands and looks at me in confusion. "What's going on?"

I try to respond, but no words come. I am still struggling to stay in reality. The splash of water is there in the back of my mind, mixed with the echo of the demonic beast's scream. Clenching my jaw, I focus on muscling the illusive memories back into the far corner of my mind where I have locked them away for years.

"I'm sorry," I finally manage to whisper.

Claude's brow furrows in worry and he says, "What just happened?"

"Nothing. I'm sorry. It's just…" I pull myself together enough to force a faint, hollow laugh. "What a very inconvenient moment to get spooked." I shake my head. "I'm usually pretty calm in a fight. What nonsense. I must be short on sleep or something. Maybe Lysithea cast some kind of latent hex on me to get back at me for some stupid thing I said."

"That wasn't magic," Claude says.

Desperate to look anywhere but his searching gaze, I glance up at the top of the ridge and ask, "Can we get out of here?"

"We should wait a bit longer to make sure that thing isn't coming back."

Oh Seiros. He's right. We need to stay here. In this hole. Trapped.

Fuck. I can't do this. I can't! Fuck, fuck, fuck. Get out of here, Sylvain. Go. Now!

The panic claws at me desperately until I jump to my feet and scramble out of the ravine.

"Come back!" Claude says. "Sylvain!"

But I ignore him. I drop to my hands and knees in a tangle of brush and force my senses to stop reeling and my breathing to slow back to normal.

Claude climbs out and crouches down next to me, scanning our surroundings warily. "We need to lay low."

"I need to get out of here," I say. "You can stay if you want. But I-"

I can't think of a rational explanation for my need to be out in the open air not trapped in the cramped space of the ravine. Grabbing the Lance of Ruin from him, I return it to its strap on my back and set off back towards the monastery, careful to walk quietly and keep an eye out for any signs of the demonic beast.

Claude catches up to me after a moment, guarding my back with his bow raised and an arrow nocked. After a minute, I break into a run, heart pounding painfully in my chest, and I don't stop until we are free of the woods and the walls of the monastery are in sight.

Slinging his bow across his back, Claude's vigilance eases a bit and he falls into step beside me, staring at me worriedly. "Sylvain."

"What?"

"Are you going to explain why you went out of your mind back there? I can't be sending you into battle if that could happen again."

I laugh uncomfortably. "It doesn't happen in battles. Don't worry about me. Killing people isn't a problem."

"It's the demonic beasts?"

"Just ones like that."

Claude is silent for a moment and I steal a glance at his expression, afraid that he is clever enough he will be able to put the pieces together easily. And sure enough - Seiros damn me - he does.

"It looked like Miklan, didn't it? I wasn't there that day at Conand Tower but I heard the stories," he says.

When I refuse to respond, he adds, "I can't believe Rhea sent the Blue Lions to fight that battle. It was needlessly cruel. We could have handled it just fine. That she would pit you against someone from the Kingdom, let alone your own family, is insane. I'm-"

"Stop."

"I'm not judging you, Sylvain. We've all seen things that-"

"Will you drop it?" I ask, turning to face him with a sudden anger I am unable to control even though I know it should not be directed at him. "Stop sticking your nose in my business, okay?"

"Your business was my business back there. We both could have died because you bolted out of our hiding place too soon," he says.

"You could have stayed. Just because I'm a fool doesn't mean you had to be one too. So leave me alone."

Anger of his own rises up in his eyes, even though his expression remains calm. "You think I'd just abandon you to run out into danger alone?"

"I don't know. Maybe. You're supposed to be the smart one. Goddess knows one of us has to be at least," I answer.

Claude falls silent and I turn my attention back to the road, quickening my pace so we can reach the monastery sooner and I can retreat to somewhere where no one can see me like this. I can't believe Claude of all people saw me break down like that. What is the point of this stupid mask I have crafted if it slips off when I need it most?

I thought maybe I'd started to earn a bit of respect from him. If not as a man, at least as a warrior. Now he can't trust me on the battlefield anymore than he can in our personal lives.

My anger turns inward on its only valid target and I berate myself viciously for ruining everything I have been working so hard for in one stupid moment of weakness.

But who am I kidding? It's not like him messing around with me was going anywhere anyways. Claude is the kind of man too set on his purpose and plans to have time for anything real. He likes me because I am amusing company and an easy fuck. I don't take time or effort or investment of emotion. So, honestly, what did I even have to ruin? I've known my place from the beginning.

Time to move on and find someone else. With our reinforcements growing, there are plenty of people around Garreg Mach these days. And a time of war is the best playing field. With the future so uncertain and perilous, everyone wants to make love like there's no tomorrow. All it takes is a…

My mind won't even finish the thought. My brain is as tired of my bullshit as I am.

I don't want anyone else. I want him. It's irrational and almost funny in how pathetic it is, and yet it is inescapable and I can't keep denying it to myself. I want him more than I have ever wanted someone before. And far more than I crave his body, I crave his respect.

What a joke.