Clash
"Are you certain he is there?" Nephenee asked. Rather than the icy winds, distress shook her voice.
"I'm certain he's only waiting for us," Ike said. His horse threw its head back. Nervous. "He allowed you and Soren to return to Lycia. So he knows we are coming for him."
"Then Thria is a trap?"
Ike let his eyes travel across the snow-covered roofs several hundred yards ahead. Smoke curled from the chimneys, but all sparks froze long before a gust could pick them up. Nothing breathed on Thria's streets. Only the river on the town's far side rushed with meltwater.
"We'll know soon enough," Ike said.
A splash of red flashed in a thicket to the right of Thria. Ike squinted, but by then, the snow-coated hazel bushes and wild broom had swallowed the apparition. No way anyone from Thria had noticed. The apparition came and went, and with the soundless steps befitting for a hunter, it circled the hill where Ike and Nephenee waited. A moment later, Jeorge stepped next to Ike's horse. His feet left next to no indentation on the snow. Quite the feat considering snow blessed the grasslands of Jeorge's home only once in a triple moon.
"And?" Ike asked.
Jeorge lowered his red scarf, patterned in Lorca fashion, from his face. Around the rock formations of southern Sacae, the color of his tunic provided decent camouflage, but against the snow of Pherae, he might as well wave a flag above his head. Ike didn't doubt Jeorge's ability to sneak, he had barely noticed Jeorge himself, but he half expected alarmed shouts to ring from Thria all the same.
Ike grimaced. With the overly prestigious general cape around his shoulders, he wasn't going to win in the stealth department either. Thanks be to the queen.
"No movements from predator or prey," Jeorge said. "Silence hangs above the streets."
"Do you think the civilians fled from Roy?" Nephenee asked.
Jeorge jutted his chin; maybe a Lorca mannerism equal to a shake of the head. "No. They are hiding like the mouse from the desert falcon."
"Except that this particular mouse has a flaming sword on its side," Ike said.
"Loud stranger," Jeorge said, "you let your face be prey to your worry. Worry taints the hunt and upsets your aim."
"Then you haven't seen any signs of a trap?" Nephenee asked.
"None." Jeorge took an arrow from his quiver and slit it into his boot. "But a trap would not deserve its name if easily spotted. I expect the mouse to kick and to bite deep. It will be no easy hunt. All the more reason to abandon worry and ensure a steady aim."
"That's conformation enough for me," Ike said. "Roy had a good week to prepare his trap. It would be a shame to let all that hard work go to waste."
"We ride right into it?" Nephenee fidgeted with the strap of her helmet. Her ears peeking through the long fern-colored hair were red with cold.
"Turn around if you're not up to it," Ike said. He had no nerves for sympathetic chit-chat. That was Lucina's specialty.
Nephenee shook her head. "No, I… I swore to seize the opportunity next time. If this brings a real end to the war, I will do my part."
"Fingers crossed. But if you run into Roy, leave him to me. You're no match for him."
"Are you?"
The cold silver of Tiki's pendant pressed against Ike's chest. He fastened his collar, but the priceless chain around his neck caught Nephenee's eye regardless. She believed in dualism and a balance between Naga and Grima. A rarity these days, but for what it was worth, she did have faith in Naga, and in the right moment, she might even pray to the goddess. For her, the stupid charm inside the pendant might actually work. But Lucina hadn't talked Tiki into shedding a few more of her tears for the rest of the squad. No, the only mystical item with the supposed power to save a life hung around Ike's neck.
A strategic decision, nothing more. Lucina needed her best executioner for a while longer. Nothing more.
"All the training I've done has to pay off at some point," Ike said. "Roy will get what's coming for him soon enough."
"So it will happen," Jeorge said.
Nephenee nodded and tightened her helmet's strap, a little more steeled than before. "I have never seen you lose a fight. Apart from the one training duel you had with the queen in Sacae. Remember? But the exception proves the rule, right?"
Ike had also lost his last training duel against Cordelia. The scent of caramel in her breath lingered in his mind. The snow-laden taste of defeat. But he had no intention to inform Nephenee about this particular encounter.
Titania directed her horse towards them. "Ike, the others are ready. They are waiting for your orders."
Ike threw a look over his shoulder. A total of twenty riders huddled in the relative security of the birch forest outside Thria, him included. Dry leaves crunched under hooves. An observant patrol could have spotted the movement of Altean blue between the undergrowth. But still the rooftops showed no footprints from archer activity, no trickle of snow from the thatch overhangs. And no signs of a trap.
Ike had fought alongside these nineteen people in his party before, he knew all their faces and the stories that had led them to despise Roy's empire, one more bloodstained than the last. They all had played their part in the rebellion, in one way or another.
Today, they would finish what they had started all these years ago, when a single Altean flag, stolen from the fires of some city, had been their only symbol. They would finish with Roy's blood in the dirt.
Ike put up one hand, listening. Silence captured the birch forest, barely broken by the puffs of nervous breaths. The river sloshed around Thria's bridge. A sparrow fled the undergrowth and bobbed towards where the Black Wall blocked the horizon.
But before Ike could squeeze his hand into a fist, and before the order to ride out passed his lips, boots stirred the snow on Thria's main street. The figure stepped into the open. A red cape billowed around them; a pristine sword flashed in the cold winter sun.
Roy looked directly at where Ike's party hid itself. He smiled.
And Ike forgot everything and charged.
Three days after the battle of Lycia, the dead are burnt and buried. The survivors use the time to celebrate the end of the imperial tyranny, a toast here, a senseless dance there, and they all look to the Altean flag above the palace with something like optimism. Lucina's name accompanies their carousals like a prayer more and more often. Especially among those who know nothing of her but her name.
Ike doesn't participate in their merriments. The dead may be burnt and buried, but there is one person in the capital who still breathes when they shouldn't. As long as they do, the rebellion isn't over, not for him. And Ike, his pauldron still strapped to his shoulder, his sword still sharp, heads away from the noise of tinkling wine glasses to visit this exact person.
The dungeons beneath Lycia are quite charming – if one fancies darkness and the smell of ancient stone mixed with undeniable decay. Luckily, Ike won't need long for his visit. His torchlight flickers on the walls and illuminates empty cells every few paces, an emptiness all too eager to swallow the sound of Ike's steps. The same old cloak conceals his figure, and the thought of dissolving into a shadow as nameless as the ones around him almost brings a grin to his lips.
A single guest occupies this lovely establishment. He looks up when light meets his prison bars. Even in these miserable surroundings, in a room where he can barely stand and with straw for a bed, Roy, former king of the Pheraen Empire, maintains his regal posture. Only his eyes betray the strain of imprisonment.
Ike imagined him to look older.
"Have you come to finish what she started?" Roy asks and gestures at Ragnell. The hilt peeks out from behind Ike's shoulder.
"If it were up to me, your head would decorate the battlements by now," Ike says. "Lucina is too soft in that regard."
Roy rises to his feet, but instead of facing Ike, he studies the water drops sneaking down his cell wall, as though they contain the key to a plan that will let him escape. "Then we agree on one thing," he says. "You know that she will bring this nation to ruin, don't you? Stronger leaders as well as her own followers will abuse her trusting nature, and if the burden doesn't crush her, the next war will."
Ike grits his teeth. "We'll see. Either way, Archanea will be a lot better off once you're out of the picture."
"Then you should kill me. That sword you have isn't for show, I reckon. Use it. At this point, what does it matter?"
Ike steps up to the metal bars separating them and frees a set of rusty keys from his belt. The door springs open. Roy looks at Ike. But in the dimness of the dungeon, his expression remains hidden in shadows.
"I'd be more than happy to oblige you. If it weren't for her, I would have cut off those hands that killed so many people from Tellius and Altea back during the battle. And your split tongue too, while we're at it." Ike presents Roy with handcuffs. "But I have to disappoint you. You're being transferred. I heard Johtran is refreshing at this time of the year."
Roy frowns. "So, you have fallen for her tricks as well…"
Ike fastens the handcuffs around Roy's wrists. "Do me a favor and shut up. Or I will regret not silencing you for good myself."
"Yes, you will regret… son of Gawain."
Ike stumbles. All air has fled the dungeon, and his fingers cramp around the torch until splinters pierce his skin. Roy looks at him, looks through him, into his deepest, naked core. All the measures he took to conceal his identity from the enemy, all the lengths he went to so that he will never hear that name used against him – for nothing.
The torchlight twists Roy's smile into an ugly grimace. "Yes, I know the story of that sword. A golden beacon amidst the black shadows of Tellius. Some say blue flames danced around the blade when Gawain wielded it. A story of course, nothing more than a myth for the people of Tellius to cling to while the Black Knight slaughters their families. Or so I had thought. Until eight years ago, when a golden sword revealed itself at the first battle of Persis."
Roy offers Ike the chance to respond, deny these claims or deliver on his promise of cutting Roy's hands off. But Ike lacks all words and any willingness to move.
"Did you think I had forgotten?" Roy asks. "Countless of my soldiers reported of a young man, little more than a boy, who would cut through their ranks with a golden sword. Some of the guards you passed on your way here might still wear scars from that encounter. But, most interestingly, none of them saw you fall on the steps before Persis that day. Unlike most of your rebel friends. And thus, the myth survived a little longer. I must say, your rebellious activities caused me quite a bit of trouble. Although I cannot help but notice that you are fighting on the wrong side of the Black Wall."
"Your wall locked the people of Tellius out with the Black Knight." The words sound hollow even in Ike's ears.
"Ah, so you considered me the greater of two evils. Or perhaps I should say, the more immediate of two evils. Then nothing stands between you and the people of Tellius now. And yet, here you are to carry out Lucina's orders. Perhaps you feel drawn to her because she completed her father's mission – the very thing you were never able to accomplish."
"Unlike you."
"Yes, the great Eliwood, beloved by all. A legend among legends." The irony drips from Roy's lips. "We are all slaves to our parents' stories, aren't we? Running away from Tellius was perhaps the best choice you could have made."
"I didn't run away."
"If you say so." Roy steps past Ike out of the cell, and neither the dimness nor the shackles around his wrists taint his smile. "For your sake, I hope your path won't lead you back. Although, Lucina's new empire of ruins makes for a poor alternative. Shall we?"
Ike says nothing. How can he when his thoughts are screaming at the top of their lungs? With mechanical movements he locks the empty cell. As though he can confine the demons through metal and stone after they have sprung up and clung to him. The dead may be burnt and buried – but one of them has slipped back to once more wrap their hands around Ike's wrists like shackles. Their blood still drips from his child face.
Ike and Roy ascend the many slippery steps of the dungeon, two named shadows of legends. The shackles of one rattle in the dark. The shackles of the other still control his hands when he charges into Thria.
When Ike charged into Thria, the wind bit into his wrists like iron shackles. He was a prisoner to his sword training, a prisoner to his name, and the only light in this dark hell waited for him in the middle of Thria's street. Prison bars separated him from that light. Prison bars in the shape of Roy's neck. This time, Ike would cut through.
Hooves thundered as the horses dashed towards the town entrance, but the clatter of Ragnell was louder in Ike's ears, reverberated in his gut and his head. So long, he had waited so long. Last time, Lucina had denied him the chance to slay the king. But this time, nothing stood between Ragnell and Roy's neck.
Snow and dirt sprayed high, the ground shook, and still Roy stood alone on the street. If he was disappointed by Lucina's absence, he didn't show it. In the personification of calm, he drew his sword.
Ike shifted his weight in the saddle, freed one foot from the stirrups. He would jump at Roy and wipe that rich bastard smile from his face. Ten more strides. Hopefully the king savored his breaths.
They would be his last.
Then, when Ike had passed the first handful of houses, the world flipped. A black chain rose from the snow, made taut across the street between two opposite house entrances. Ike yanked at the reins but too late. His horse broke its shins at the chain, an agonized squeal, and he flew out the saddle. His shoulder collided with the street, hard, Ragnell skidded out of reach. The air fled from his lungs for one heartbeat, two heartbeats.
By the time he pushed himself to his feet, the first arrows zoomed into the ground.
"AMBUSH!" Ike shouted, but his comrades had already galloped into the trap.
Roy's men raised a second chain at the town entrance. A black liquid dropped from the metal links on both sides. Oil.
Horses wailed in agony, their legs twisted, and riders dropped to the ground. No escape.
The entirety of Thria had gathered on the rooftops, bows drawn, ready to carry out their king's orders. Some of them wore headbands in Tellius style, and an all too familiar perma-frown led them.
Ike cursed.
Arrows rained into the street, and pained screams bounced between the house fronts, piercing, familiar, each voice a face and a story in Ike's head. He dove for cover behind the twitching remains of his horse. Ragnell glistered in the snow mud a handful of feet away, but the distance might as well measure all of Archanea, spiked with arrows, devoid of cover.
This time he had really messed up.
An arrow grazed his arm, and he cursed Soren for bailing out when he had known so damn well Ike would need his strategic input. Then again…
Titania scrambled for a house entrance, the blood of her horse all across the white of her breastplate. Jeorge tried to cover her, but his arrows stood against fifty, and for the two archers he sent tumbling from the rooftops, three more readied their bowstrings. High above, Shinon took aim with a grin. Steel buried itself into red-patterned Lorca fabric.
The next volley hailed down.
Nephenee hung onto her saddle for dear life. Other horses were dying, they tried to flee but couldn't, and under their hooves crushed snow and wood and the bodies of their riders. A man stumbled past Ike, screaming. He clutched the stump of his right arm. "Fire!" a voice ordered from above, and the man screamed no more.
Nephenee flinched each time an arrow lodged into her shield, and someone else's blood stained her face, but by some miracle she kept her horse and herself out of harm's way. Her eyes remained fixed on the target.
Roy had planted himself on the other side of the chain and relished the death screams. His eyes found Ike amidst the chaos. Again, that disgusting smile, the smile of the victorious tyrant. The oil dripped from the chains. It mingled with snow and blood. Then Roy turned towards the only rider left on horseback and adjusted his stance.
Nephenee's horse pranced backwards for the run-up. Amidst the hailstorm of arrows, she seized the opportunity.
"DON'T!"
Ike's warning went under in a storm of death cries.
Nephenee vaulted the chain just as Roy spun his sword in a circle. Then the world exploded in flames as the oil on the chains caught fire.
Ike stumbled backwards and had to shield his eyes from the brightness. This wasn't the work of some measly fire arrow, this was worse. Far worse.
Magic had born these flames. Not the type of magic Soren had practiced once or twice to make a fireball hover above his palm but something far more ancient and far more powerful. Roy had called forth these flames with a single wave of his sword.
Ike felt the sudden urge to thank Naga for making Lucina stay behind in the capital.
He couldn't see Nephenee behind the fire wall; the clangs of sword and shield clashing almost went under in the roars of the fire. Volley after volley of arrows shot from the rooftops, piercing hauberks, shields, and flesh.
Ike dragged Jeorge into the relative safety of a doorway, even though he wouldn't live long with the arrow buried in his stomach. His quiver lay out in the open, the bow useless at his side. A red bubble popped in the corner of his mouth.
Titania kneeled between a house corner and the corpse of her horse. Ike found her gaze, and fear mixed with the relief over seeing him alive. Alive for the moment at least.
But the moment wouldn't last long if the chain kept them trapped. Jeorge for sure would run out of breath long before the marksmen would run out of arrows. And Ike wouldn't bet on his own luck in the matter either. Not without Ragnell.
"Don't move and don't die," he said as he shoved Jeorge deeper into the doorway. Then he raised his voice to Titania. "I'll draw fire, you get rid of the chain!"
"That is madness! They will kill you in a second!"
"You got any better ideas? Because I don't. We won't be holding out for much longer if we don't act."
A death scream rung through the alley. The next wave of arrows silenced it.
Titania struggled with herself for a moment longer before she nodded. "I will follow your lead."
Ike locked his eyes onto the shimmer of gold that revealed Ragnell's position. He tensed for the sprint, but a vice-grip around his wrist stopped him. Blood dripped from the corner of Jeorge's mouth, but the intensity of his look didn't waver. With his free hand, he slid the hidden arrow out of his boot.
"I can buy you three seconds." Each word came out alongside a blood-filled gargle.
"Don't be stupid," Ike said. "They'll send a hundred arrows your way before you can even breathe out."
"And where will these arrows fly during your plan? I am already dead."
Soren's voice echoed in Ike's head. I'm already burning.
"I'm the one who led you right into the trap," Ike growled to silence Jeorge and the memory. "This is my business."
"What is it the loud stranger likes to say? No sacrifice…"
"…cripples the determined man," Ike finished on reflex.
Jeorge let go of Ike's wrist and fastened his arrow. "Three seconds."
Ike clawed one hand into the wooden doorframe and forced himself to nod. He waited for the next break in between volleys. Feet shuffled and snow flacked from the roofs as the townspeople drew another set of arrows from their quivers.
Now or never.
Ike darted into the open street. The movement drew the attention of every last archer on the roofs. Shinon left the few surviving riders where they huddled and pointed his arrow at Ike. The others followed his example. Several dozen deadly steelheads reflected the fire, the first fingers twitched. One second.
Until Jeorge's arrow hit the opposite rooftop, and an avalanche broke lose. Archers stumbled, some of them fell, a snapping neck rung through the street like thunder. Two seconds. Those left standing aimed for the hidden marksman.
Ike didn't look back to confirm whether they hit their target. The orchestra of arrow strings was deafening, he dashed forward, managed the last steps, and closed his hand around Ragnell.
Three seconds.
The leather-wrapped hilt hugged his palm, the blade a perfect extension of his arm. Ike soaked in the air tasting of metal, blood, and burning oil.
He raised Ragnell. The blue light of the myths didn't spring forth, but the golden steel alone shone like a beacon, and something like hope rippled the skin of his arms upwards until it captured his chest, and he found the strength to run on.
The archers paused or backed away, startled by the sudden flash of golden light amidst the slaughter. One short moment, but that was all the time Ike needed to reach the opposite house front. Ragnell sliced through the support beam like a candle through the dark.
Another avalanche tumbled down, screams erupted, a panicked shuffling of boots, and the chaos was complete. Snow dripped down Ike's neck and melted with his sweat. A bloody hand stuck out of the mud in front of him, reaching for some unknown sky. But it had all been worth it because Titania had pushed towards the chain. Her halberd hacked into the metal once, twice, sparks burnt down the tips of her hair, but she didn't relent.
Shinon shouted for more arrows, a quiver passed through the archers, but too late.
With a yell and a final swing, Titania cut through the trap. As soon as she did and the chain dropped into the snow, the magic trickery with the fire died down.
The path stood open.
Ike allowed himself to breathe.
The marksmen up ahead took too long to react; Ike deflected Shinon's arrow with Ragnell's side and broke into a sprint. The other projectiles all missed.
"Ike, wait!" Titania shouted, but he ignored her.
Behind him, the poor remains of his party regrouped, but Ike couldn't bother with them. They had only one chance to win this: cut off the eagle's head.
Roy had fallen back into the town square. But one glance confirmed that Nephenee had the worse. She had abandoned her horse, or maybe it had thrown her. Her shield hung in broken shambles from her arm, and she swayed, more dead than alive. Roy parried her thrust with terrifying ease.
Soldiers streamed into the square from side alleys; the Pheraen eagle gleamed on their equipment. Ike only needed a heartbeat to recognize them as the soldiers he had fought alongside with at the Black Wall. And from the eyes within the open helmets, he knew they recognized him too. Fear carved itself into their features. Sometimes reluctance.
Ike didn't slow down.
Ragnell cut the first man in half before he even raised his spear. The man simply died; no last words or curses, only a red puddle in the dirt.
Ike spun, and he sliced, and he killed. Left and right the soldiers dropped. He hardly noticed. Ragnell's golden hunger had infected his arm, burned in his veins. But he hardly noticed that either.
In his ears thundered the sound of sword and spear connecting. The noise drove him farther, through the enemy lines, until he devolved into pure destruction.
In the moment Ike cut through the last opponent, a spear dropped onto the cobble with a clang. Too loud. Too final.
Ike slid to a halt and choked on his breath.
Roy had buried his sword into Nephenee's chest. She slumped beside her spear, dead before her head touched the ground.
Roy shook her blood from his sword and faced Ike. "Thus we meet again, son of Gawain."
Ike didn't bother with a reply and charged.
Ragnell's blade shone as he hacked for the king, brutal hits, no technique. Roy answered with flames. Ike squinted, blinded for a moment. He slipped on snow or Nephenee's blood, he couldn't tell. Out of the red stone in Roy's sword sprouted a figure, a spirit dressed in pure fire. And with her, tongues of flames flickered over Roy's sword as it sliced the winter air.
The Binding Blade. Without a doubt.
Ike took a step back. If Roy had managed to pull some goddess-given magic on his side, Ike would need a miracle to prevail. The cold air burned in his lungs, the taste of ash and meltwater wouldn't vanish.
For the moment, adrenalin kept him going. Ike needed to act now.
In the moment he pounced at Roy, the square erupted in rattling and clattering; Ike's remaining forces engaged Roy's soldiers. Feet pounded on the earth, and steel flashed, but Ike couldn't risk a glance at the other fighters.
Ragnell and the Binding Blade collided. Red flames twined around the two swords, hungry for flesh, hungry for victory. And no miracle flared up to stop them.
"I see you still don't wield the blue fire your father was said to possess," Roy said. "I suppose it was foolish to expect otherwise."
Ike gritted his teeth, and the heat etched into his hand as he pushed against Roy's defense. He gained an inch. Then two. But before Ragnell found the soft flesh of Roy's shoulder, the fire spirit jumped in.
Less than a touch, only a breath of hers sufficed to set Ike's sleeve on fire. The myth of a sword enveloped by blue light died in an instance as the flames ate into fabric and then Ike's skin.
The pain was unbearable.
His eyesight quit on Ike; the stench of burned flesh nauseated him, clogged his senses until every breath became hellfire, became the burning steps of Persis, and he breathed the ashes of his comrades.
With tremendous effort, he fought for consciousness long enough to rip the burning sleeve from him. One moment of relative painlessness followed.
Just as Ike regained his sense of up and down, Roy tackled him. Steel met steel, loud enough to thunder all the way back in Lycia. And Ike, for perhaps the first time in his life, retreated.
Roy pushed him back into the mess of fighters, where blood and bodies obscured the ground. Ike fumbled with his balance too often. And every time Ragnell and the Binding Blade crashed into each other, the hit reverberated through his burnt arm to make him retch.
Ike bit into his tongue to silence the reflex. He hadn't come this far to die here. He hadn't sacrificed so much to stand down while Roy made a cripple out of him.
But the king was relentless.
"You should have freed yourself from her traitorous grip," Roy said as he pursued Ike. "Then maybe you would have lived long enough to see her pay the price for her madness. Such a waste."
One last, desperate advance from Ike. Roy evaded, Ragnell met air, and Ike staggered.
The pendant slipped out of his collar, and the green stone pulsated as it counted down the seconds he had left to live. All other sounds had died down except for the panicked beats of his heart. Was the silence so loud because the battle had ended? Had everyone else died? Not that it mattered. Ike would join them soon enough.
The fire spirit called forth her flames. Biting and fatal. The heat crept into Ike's skin and bone and heart already.
Roy raised the Binding Blade for the death blow.
The pendant pulsated. And the moment before the blade stuck down, it cracked.
A wall of fire erupted between Ike and Roy, as blinding as it was beautiful. Not the work of Roy's partner. But not born from Ragnell either. The explosion of divine magic plucked Ike from the ground and whirled him around like the leaves of a withered spruce tree.
Tellius.
If he focused, he would make out the scent of the spruce forests beyond the brew of iron and blood. So close, just above the Black Wall.
But Ike couldn't focus. Heat crept through his skin and bone and heart until it became cold instead.
Then he drowned within.
Notes: I think it's fair to call this the midpoint-turn of Book II. And it ends on a cliffhanger, I haven't done those in a while. This battle is crucial (and also quite long), so hopefully I did it justice with my writing - pacing, descriptions, and all. Let me know what you think.
