Chapter 11: One Forward, One Back

About half the conversations he had with Ignatz for the next week involved Ignatz apologizing for his rudeness that night. Nice as it was to hear the first few times, it was off putting when the guilt seemed to jump from nowhere and grab Ignatz's ability to hold a conversation by the throat. Thankfully, Raphael would always pop up whenever the conversation became too awkward.

Raphael proved to be as friendly as his muscles were large. Although Cyril hoped to never be on the receiving end of one of his back claps, it was hard to complain too much when the time Cyril spent chopping wood was chopped in a quarter with Raphael's insistent assistance. Cyril had whined that it was his job and that he could finish it alone but Raphael had just laughed it off and said, "Claude told me you'd say that!"

"And what else did Claude say?" Cyril had asked suspiciously.

"That I should ignore what you say and do it anyway."

If Claude planned to force him to interact with the Golden Deer...he was succeeding.

He found Leonie joining him at the bow range, often asking about Shamir and how he had convinced her to train him. Lysithea had begun to take on her role as a "senior student" with great verve and insisted on running through the confusing parts of Byleth's lecture with him after every class.

Lorenz, on the other hand, pretended he didn't exist. Most of the time. At other times, Cyril still caught an indignant stare from the corner of his eye, making it plenty clear that Cyril was an unwanted presence yet, but Lorenz held his tongue. If Claude had something to do with that too, Cyril was grateful that he had opted to tell Lorenz to leave Cyril alone. Lorenz was nice enough to Marianne and Ignatz, but he knew Lorenz hadn't the foggiest idea how to be kind to him.

Cyril was still uncertain what the point of it all was. The students would all be gone come this time next year, and there would be a new crop of eyes that would linger upon him with a mixture of loathing and exoticism. If Claude thought Cyril would exhaust himself every year trying to prove himself, he would be sorely disappointed. He had Lady Rhea. He had Shamir. That was plenty.

But, if Claude was insisting for this year, it wasn't too bad. Work went faster, and the conversation, stilted as it often was, sometimes was also a little interesting. Just a little.

The day before, he had even decided to accept the offer for help given by the silver haired boy from the Blue Lions. It was one he had rejected for the past month, and Ashe had nearly fallen over in shock.

Cyril stretched as he straightened from the folded position he had been holding to scrub a wyvern's legs. The wyvern gave a low growl, deep within her throat, and gently bumped her head against Cyril's lifted arm. With a soft laugh, he scratched at the wyvern's chin, taking a moment to indulge in the wyvern's reverberating purr before turning to leave the stable.

His good mood was immediately twisted out of shape when he spotted Hilda standing just outside the stable.

Hilda neither avoided nor sought him out. At times she would make a passing comment before fluttering away to the next thing that drew her attention, seemingly oblivious to the way his shoulders would square and his hands would close into a tight fist.

He had her full attention now. "Hey, Cyril!" she said, voice trilling on the last syllable of his name. "Are you working again?"

A sweet smile was on her face, but it was as pleasant to Cyril as fumes from a sugar rotted tooth. He could feel his stomach churning at the sight of her candy pink hair that marked her as a Goneril.

"Move," he managed to say. "You're in my way."

She let out a scandalized gasp. "Rude! I am not in your way!"

"You dodging work again?" It wouldn't surprise him. He had thought the Gonerils lazy, but Hilda had crafted her laziness into an artform that could be hung on the walls like the paintings the Gonerils used to make him dust.

"I'm here to work actually," Hilda huffed. "I just wanted to ask if you knew where the horse feed was."

Cyril felt a stab of panic. He was cleaning out the horse stables next. "I'll take care of it," he said quickly, praying that Hilda would not suddenly decide to be industrious.

"Wow! Really?" Hilda clapped her hands together happily. "Oh, Cyril, I knew I could count on you!"

"Sure," Cyril mumbled. Hilda continued to stand in front of him, blocking his exit from the stable. The pleased smile was still gracing her features, but one of her fingers had drifted over to her lips as if she was considering something. "...can you move?"

"Hmm? Oh well, you know you're really something Cyril," Hilda giggled. "You're always so hardworking, I almost forget that you're Almyran."

Don't think we'll let you laze about like a little beast.

"My family guards the border, so they see lots of Almyrans. My father and brother won't tell me much about the battles themselves, but I do know that Almyrans will attack for no reason, break treaties, and lie…"

We lost three good platoons to those countrymen of yours this week. You ought to be grateful we didn't take your head for your mistake.

"Just a bunch of shifty brutes, really."

I know you're lying you little—

"...uhhh, Cyril? Am I boring you?"

A hand waved before his eyes. The light wind from the movement stung his eyes, and Cyril suddenly became aware of how long he had failed to blink and of the stinging in his palms where his fingernails had pressed into his skin. Cyril blinked rapidly, forcing the daze to leave him.

He was at Garegg Mach. There was only Hilda here, no other Goneril.

"I was talking about your people, you know," Hilda said.

"They're not my people!" Cyril shouted, outburst causing Hilda to jump.

Hilda gave a nervous laugh. "I guess that's true. You're pretty normal. The archbishop was so angry when she saw that my uncle had Almyrans on the goddess' land, my uncle had to give them all up. But you're not like them at all, so it's no wonder she made an exception for you—"

Nothing cut through a haze like anger. "Lady Rhea didn't get mad on behalf of the goddess," Cyril said through gritted teeth.

Hilda's brows furrowed, and her mouth opened to ask—

"Hey, Hilda! Teach is asking for you!"

"Oh no, I forgot I had extra axe training. Ugh, I'm still going to be working," Hilda whined, whatever query she had already forgotten in the face of this personal tragedy.

"Don't tell me you already pawned your work off on some poor sap," he could hear Claude say.

"Hey, Cyril likes working!"

"...Cyril?"

Claude's face darted into view, poking out from just beyond the door frame of the stable. A flash of panic passed through his eyes before he smoothed his features into a smile for Hilda. "Don't keep Teach waiting then. Let's talk more later."

"I do not want to do this," Hilda said, complaining to her last even as she walked away.

Claude watched until Hilda had rounded the corner before rounding the corner himself into the stable. His face was drawn into a frown as he lifted one of Cyril's hands and unfurled the fingers. The frown deepened when he saw that Cyril's open palm was cut with bloody crescent moons.

"You should go see Manuela. I can finish up for you," Claude said. His gaze returned to Cyril's face. "...are you alright?"

It wasn't a question, not really. Cyril glared, and Claude's unchanging expression meant that he already knew the answer.

"No." Cyril snatched his hand from Claude's. "Did you tell her to talk to me?"

"Of course not—"

"Then tell her to stay away from me!"

He didn't want to be stuck in that classroom with her. He didn't want to see her during training. He didn't, he didn't…

Just until the end of the month. He would only need to hold out until the assassination business was over, then he could go back to avoiding them like he had planned from the beginning.