Fire Emblem Three Houses: Five Years War

by Thuglas-El-Bosso

A series of one-shots concerning the timeskip that occurs in Byleth's coma. The Black Eagles defected from their own house, rejecting Edelgard's views of a better future. Although she may be alone, she has allies around all Fodlàn, while Dimitri wanders around aimlessly, and Claude struggles with his new position as the leader of the Leicester Alliance.

12. Chapter 12: Felix

Fire Emblem Three Houses: Five Years War

I don't own Fire Emblem Three Houses, or any of its characters. This will be a series of one-shots concerning the five years timeskip that occurs right as the war starts. It will contain spoilers for the Azure Moon storyline, and the supports of some characters.

I will treat everyone from the Black Eagles as being recruited by either the Golden Deer or the Blue Lion house, except Hubert who's impossible to recruit. I will attempt to put the shipping to the side as much as possible, but here's what you can expect: Dimitri/F!Byleth, Claude/Hilda, Ferdinand/Dorothea, Petra/Linhardt, Caspar/Bernadetta, Felix/Annette, Dedue/Flayn, Lorenz/Leonie, Sylvain/Ingrid, Lysithea/Cyril, Catherine/Seteth. It will also contain the Ashen Wolves, who will get a dedicated chapter.

I might operate some minor design changes for some of the characters who don't have any post timeskip designs (Catherine, Shamir, Seteth and Flayn for example).

That said, I hope you enjoy your read.

Chapter 12: Felix "Pragmatism and Nobility" Around the Guardian Moon (January) of year 1183

The war between the dukedom of Faerghus and the last remnants of the kingdom was at a steady status-quo, with the two sworn enemies starting small skirmishes after small skirmishes, both unwilling to lose more troops due to the larger scaled war going on around the continent of Fodlàn. The last breakthrough either side had done was thirteen moons ago when the dukedom nearly took the Fraldarius estate. Since then, the attackers had been pushed out of the Fraldarius lands, only to continue the status-quo.

Both sides had problems inland, the dukedom forced to use its best army, from house Kleiman, to calm the duscurians who had decided to reclaim their homeland, while the Gautier household had to station the majority of their troops along the Sreng border in case of an invasion. The majority of the clashing forces were Galatea and Fraldarius on the remnants' side, while the Fhirdiad army along with the house Rowe army constituted the majority of the forces of the dukedom.

It had been nearly four years since this conflict began, and yet, there was no end in sight.

…

Felix was sitting on a chair in his tent, the chilly wind coming through the doorway, impatiently waiting for his two guests to finish sipping their tea. They both had their signature satisfied looks, despite the biting cold of the faerghusian winter, as the orange-haired man put his cup down on the table, at the centre of the tent. He was wearing his usually nobly red outfit, with a tad more armour than before, having now shielded his arms with armour. Still, he wore a blue cape that showed his new allegiance.

Meanwhile, the dark browned-haired woman covered her crimson dress with a blue cloak, protecting her from the snowy weather and the temperature it brought. She was smirking smugly while drinking her tea, seeing through Felix' seeming patience. Indeed, if Felix had asked the two in his tent, it wasn't for having a cup of tea, but to discuss their next moves. However, Ferdinand had decided it was the right time for tea, and brought his service. Between Ferdinand entirely ignoring his host, and Dorothea silently revelling in his impatience, Felix cursed his father for forcing those two into his strike force. He'd rather have Sylvain and Ingrid, who were supposed to support Felix' force if something went wrong.

Felix cleared his throat, to which the two put down their cups on the small round table. "First, we'll take the small village of Fremart, it should draw us a little closer to Fhirdiad, but before that, we need to cross the Lillested forest. There may be new fortifications there, such as small outposts. We will need to move swiftly, otherwise, we might be overwhelmed by reinforcements." The two adrestrians nodded to that. "If you don't have anything to say, we will depart at dusk."

The two left his tent, Ferdinand taking his tea service back to his tent, discussing with Dorothea about their next move, which annoyed Felix. Why was it only when they left that they started getting serious?

…

The full moon lit the forest the small troop was going through. Its light was reflected by the snow, that was lightly falling. Ferdinand led a small troop of cavaliers from the Aegir territory, while Dorothea led a group of magic scholars that had left Fhirdiad after Cornelia had made it the capital of the dukedom. As for Felix, he was leading a group of Fraldarius soldiers his father had assigned him. It was a small force compared to what the dukedom could throw at them, but most of the soldiers going through the forest veterans even when the war started.

So it had been easy to capture the small outposts Cornelia had scattered in Lillested forest, even before they could sound the alarm. Felix slit the throat of a guard on his way in an outpost, followed by a few of his men. They were covered by the night, and were going pretty fast. At this rate, they would attain Fremart before sunrise, though Felix expected a little more resistance there.

They held the rest of the garrison stationed in the small outpost captured, which further diluted their forces. It was the third outpost his group was coming across, and he doubted he could take the small city if they encountered another outpost. Luckily, Ferdinand came back from his scouting ahead "We are closing in on the town, it seems less defended than we predicted it would. However, I would recommend caution."

Felix nodded to that, and ordered his men to advance towards the village, after leaving a few to guard the prisoners they had made in the outpost. The forest stopped before the small town of Fremart, leaving enough space for Felix to observe it from afar. It had some small fortifications, along with barracks housing the small garrison. Strangely, it seemed that there were very few soldiers guarding the town. Even with their current forces, Felix thought that the losses would be low due to the small resistance offered.

Felix ordered Ferdinand to get around Fremart, to attack it from behind, and prevent anyone from, while the main forces would enter from the main gates and capture the city. "Things are going a little too smoothly for my taste." Felix heard Dorothea say by his side. She was frowning "If the last two months taught me anything, it's that these sort of checkpoints should be full of soldiers, so why have they almost all disappeared?"

Felix nodded "Something's fishy, stay on your guard." With that said, they all entered the city at once. All seemed too calm, Felix thought, he was turning around a house leading to the small barracks. Him and his group entered the barracks only to find them empty. Where had all the soldiers gone to? Even Cordelia wouldn't be so careless to put no guards in a city close to Fhirdiad.

"Search the area for any sign of ambush or bandits..." The soldiers obeyed and went out of the barracks. It looked like the dukedom soldiers had left in a hurry. Felix went out from the other side of the tent only to see a long trail of blood… and a disembowelled dukedom soldier. The blood on the snow still seemed fresh. Felix unsheathed one of his two swords, cracks in the blade already present from all the combat they went through over the last 4 months.

He walked carefully to meet up with Ferdinand, when one of the houses' walls beside him was run through by a rat-like demonic beast. Despite being on his guards, the creature managed to push him over to the main street. Felix grunted, feeling some of his ribs broken from the impact with the creature. When he lifted his sword arm, he saw that his ribs weren't the only things that had been broken. The shards of his blade had exploded everywhere, with one piercing his left shoulder.

Felix pulled out his armour-slayer from its sheath and swung at the beast, to avoid getting skewered by its gigantic claws. The beast simply pushed the sword out of Felix' hand. It was preparing its claws to finish him. Felix held up the Aegis shield, in vain, but Ferdinand intervened just in time to save him from this fate, by cutting the creature's arm off. Dorothea blasted its side with dark energy, distracting the creature enough for Felix to pierce its neck with the armour-slayer. The creature morphed back into a young man, bleeding to death, naked on the snowy ground.

Felix sheathed back his sword "This solves the mystery of the disappearing garrison. But shouldn't there be more of them-" He was cut off by a roar, echoing from the back of the village. Ferdinand talked before Felix could "My group encountered a demonic beast, and as soon as we dealt with it, I went to look for you. Dorothea scattered her mages to take them down." The brunette nodded. Ferdinand held out for Felix to stand up, but he refused as he rose from the ground by himself. "What about the rest of the garrison?"

Ferdinand shook his head "They didn't expect us to surround the village before they did. Some of them ran away. I'd expect a counter-attack just after sunrise." He nodded towards Dorothea who concentrated, red energy channelling through her hands, until she held her hands up in the air to let go of the red glow. The energy flew up the skies only to explode into a red flash. She turned to face both Felix and Ferdinand "Let's hope ours will arrive soon enough. Let's move, there are still beasts inside the town."

Felix picked up a sword from a corpse on the marketplace, and used it as a crutch, following the two adrestrians on their hunt for beasts. Dorothea walked at Felix' pace to heal his broken ribs and shoulder. They followed the screams of mages, caught by surprise from the beasts' sudden appearance. They found a beast with wings, made of flesh instead of feathers. Ferdinand grabbed a javelin and threw it with all his force against the monster's left wing. The javelin took the beast by surprise and pinned it to the wall.

Dorothea, holding a Thoron tome close to her chest, quickly followed up on the immobilized monster, by piercing its chest with a beam of concentrated energy. The creature's wings morphed back into hands, to show a young woman, naked and pinned to the wall. Screams could still be heard from the other side of the town, as a part of the fortifications were suddenly ablaze, and it guided the trio towards their next target. Ferdinand offered a hand to Dorothea, who climbed on his horse, and he did the same towards Felix, who refused and ran by their sides. He saw both of them going on ahead, towards the blazing wall, while he ran, his side hurting much less thanks to Dorothea's help.

Up ahead, he could see a trail of light going through the night sky, as it hit a flying demonic beast. But he was distracted from that view when a beast of the same size of a hound tried to munch the arm where the Aegis shield rested away. Felix swiftly cut its jaw, leaving it hanging, before finishing it by cutting through its torso. It morphed back into the form of a child, which disgusted Felix. They had been killing villagers all this time? The last time he had seen the enemy use such underhanded tactics was when the Flame Emperor lured captain Jeralt out of the monastery's walls to kill him right in front of his own daughter.

But he wasn't let enough time to think about it as another hound tried to gnaw his sword arm off. Felix pulled out his knife and cut its throat, leaving it to bleed to death on the street's pavement. He turned his head to face a pack of these small hound-like demonic beasts, and Felix decided to run for it, towards the main cluster of the strike force. He could see one of the wall's section tumbling down in flames.

Felix entered a house, closed the door shut behind him and moved a cupboard in front of it to delay the hounds from breaking in. He saw an old man, dead on the table, his lower half missing, while Felix heard some ruffling in the next room. He would have preferred not to check what was going on in there, but there might still be people to save here.

He opened the door, weirded out by the sound of chewing, only to find two children gnawing at legs. When the two little girls noticed Felix, they jumped at him, with a gleeful smile, and white eyes, which reminded Felix of the state the villagers were in, when he had seen the boar's true face for the second time back at Remire village. He hit them both with the flat side of his blade, knocking both of them out, before closing the kitchen door, locking it, just before the hounds busted in. Felix jumped up the stairs, immediately followed by the hounds herd, entered a room and jumped out of a glassed window while protecting his face.

Felix rolled on the ground just as he landed on the thick snow, took no time in checking if the hounds were still following him, and ran towards the main group of the assault force. There, he found out the corpses of multiple villagers, along with those they attacked, as Ferdinand, Dorothea and the rest of the strike force desperately tried to hold off the beasts. Felix could see from where he was that Ferdinand was seething, surely at the idea of killing civilians, while a streak of blood fell from Dorothea's forehead, which made her close her left eye, now blood-stained.

Some Fraldarius soldiers went to meet him, and started hacking towards the hound-like demonic beasts, cutting them down to the last. And finally, as the last of the demonic beasts morphed back to their human form, silence settled in, only the blazing building around the armed group breaking it. Felix went to meet with Ferdinand, who was applying some vulnerary on Dorothea's forehead, who was sitting on a bench.

After getting healed, Dorothea spoke "The city is indefensible in the state it is in, right now. We have a huge hole in our defences that I'm sure the enemy will exploit. We don't have enough soldiers to hold its defences, I say we should retreat for now."

Ferdinand shook his head "If we pull out now, Sylvain and Ingrid will head right towards a trap. I say we should wait for them before retreating." Dorothea huffed "We'll just send another signal, then." Felix shook his head "No, they would be suspicious of any other signals fired. We have to defend the place, but we need our enemies to think that we are more numerous than we really are. What do we have at our disposal?"

Ferdinand pointed towards a ballista in the centre of the place "We have two of these with a trebuchet at the centre of the town." Felix sighed "I don't like those odds, but we have no choice. We have to prepare for a retaliation." Ferdinand looked down "Maybe we should check the houses before fortifying..."

Felix raised an eyebrow "What for?" Ferdinand shook his head "We should look for survivors, and as for those who were turned into beasts, I think we owe them at least to be killed swiftly." Felix huffed "About that, the villagers seem to have been turned berserk" Dorothea raised an eyebrow "What do you mean?"

"It looks too similar to what we saw at Remire village four years ago, the Blue Lions and I." Ferdinand and Dorothea hadn't joined the boar's house just yet, when they were tasked for this mission. A shiver running down Felix' spine reminded him of the deranged glare that was inhabiting Dimitri's eyes. It didn't seem odd that he had snapped shortly afterwards. "I guess we can knock out the kids, but I'm afraid we'll have to kill the adults..."

Ferdinand clenched his spear "Is there truly no other way?" Felix grumbled "You two will go organize the defences. I'll take care of the rest." The two adrestrians nodded and left. It was going to be a long night.

…

The sun usually rose late during the winter. It was around ten in the morning when the first rays of light were reflected by the falling snow. The small town of Fremart was once again covered by snow, its destroyed buildings covered with a thick layer of white, over all the red that had flowed in its streets. Felix was checking for the last time on the horses they had managed to gather from the hostilities, and all the maddened children they had managed to recover from the houses, tied up and muzzled, to avoid from having them bite the horses they were forced to ride. A few Aegir cavaliers were guarding them, awaiting for their signal to take off. The rest were along the walls, waiting for the attack.

The Fraldarius soldiers his father has assigned him counted a few archers, who wielded the ballistas and trebuchet, the rest behind the sword, axe and spear wielders. The Institute mages were waiting alongside Dorothea for the enemy to arrive while Ferdinand cavaliers were waiting for a breach in their defences to adapt and go where they were the most needed. Felix joined his soldiers and observed the enemy's forces.

They were… a lot. Either Cornelia had severely overestimated them, or she just wanted them dead as soon as possible. Felix even wondered if they'd manage to push back their first assault. Over his head flew a boulder, along with arrows and dark energy, contrasting with the white clouds over the town of Fremart. Felix had ordered to target the enemy's archer battalions first, to make Ingrid's job that much easier. And from the lack of arrows coming towards them, it seemed that this first barrage had succeeded. Now were just the rest of the army, who were charging directly towards them. Felix had predicted they would go for the breach first, as it was not easily defensible.

The front units raised their shields, as the dukedom's forces crashed on the wall. Felix could see some hammer-wielding dukedom soldiers making their way to the enemy line, ready to smash both the shields and the soldiers behind them. Fortunately, a few of the Institute's mages had made the same observation, and cast deadly spells towards them. Once that was taken care of, Felix could see some of the enemy trying to sneak around the fortifications, towards the back gates. But he knew that Ferdinand was already heading towards them to intercept.

Suddenly, another section of the wall fell off, behind it was revealed some soldiers, wielding hammers, who had made in their best efforts to break the wall section down as quickly as possible. The enemy invaded inside the town, killing a few of the Institute's mages by smashing through their ribcages, throwing guts all around the immaculate snow. Some of Felix' swordsmen went to confront them, skilfully parrying and dodging their blows, before cutting through their chests. The enemy continued to swarm through the breach, the Fraldarius soldiers desperately trying to contain the flow.

The dukedom's forces continued to slash through their defences, cavaliers showing up to kill the swordsmen, up until pikemen managed to stop them. The remaining mages blasted away the most enemies they could up until the enemy stopped coming at them. From where he was, Felix could see that the enemy officer was eyeing them, gauging the defences, before sending a second wave, to finally break the last remaining Fraldarius forces.

Ferdinand came back to meet with Felix "What do we have left?" Felix sighed "We won't be able to hold against another assault." Ferdinand nodded "It is clear what we must do, then…" He climbed down from his horse. "Take everyone you can with you, my riders and I will try to hold them off as long as possible, so you can escape." He was holding out his head for Felix to climb on Ferdinand's horse, when Dorothea came "You won't hold them off for too long alone, Ferdie, I will stay as well."

Ferdinand was going to object when Felix raised his hand "Neither of you will cover my escape, I will cover yours. We have plenty of men on the Fraldarius county willing to die to defeat the dukedom. The same cannot be said about Aegir cavaliers or Institute mages." Ferdinand was going to object again, but Felix cut him off. "Now go."

Ferdinand helped Dorothea climb his horse, as did most of the Aegir cavaliers with the Institute mages. The Fraldarius foot soldiers, however, prepared themselves for the last fight of their lives, checking on their weapons and shields. Ferdinand took a last look at Felix "Farewell, Felix, may the Goddess guide you." Felix smirked "I don't think the Goddess exists or cares, but thanks all the same."

The cavaliers left, taking with them the last of the mages. Felix looked outside of the walls, only to see the officer raise up his sword up in the air, and then pointed at the remnants of Fremart. It was then that the enemy charged again. It had been how he imagined Dimitri would die. Not back-stabbed by politicians, but a maddening rage overtaking him, as he charge towards an enemy he had no chance of defeating. The irony of Felix taking Dimitri's place was not lost on him. But for the sake of Sylvain and Ingrid, he would hold the enemy off as long as possible. He could not let his friends head right into the trap they fell into.

Felix was so focused on the enemy's charge that he barely noticed white feather falling from the sky, mistaking it for a snowflake at first, until a pegasus knight directly entered his sight. He could see a red glow on the knight's spear. Felix sighed in relief when he recognized Lùin and the one wielding it. Ingrid and her pegasus knights started cutting through the enemy's charge, while some of the dukedom's soldiers managed to slip past them. Felix took a defensive stance, which was visibly unneeded, as cavaliers galloped past them, to stop the wave for a moment, as Felix felt himself being picked up.

Sylvain put Felix on his saddle, smirking "It seems we've made it just in time. Now, time to go." Sylvain's cavaliers and Ingrid's pegasus knights picked up the rest of the Fraldarius foot soldiers, and rushed towards the back gates, the dukedom's army stopping their pursuit once they all entered the Lillested forest.

…

It was the afternoon once they had settled a new camp, near the Fraldarius county. It was still snowing lightly, as Felix walked through the camp with Sylvain, Ingrid and Ferdinand with him. The camp was centered around a giant tent, where Dorothea and the mages Sylvain and Ingrid had brought with them were trying to calm the curse that had been afflicting the children.

Felix felt his eyelids falling on their own, Ferdinand bearing the same signs of fatigue, with dark bags under his eyes. Sylvain smirked "The busy night you seemed to have." Ingrid punched him in the shoulder "That's no matter to joke about, Sylvain! They almost died!" Sylvain rubbed his shoulder "Aw, come on! Am I wrong for cheering them up a bit after what happened last night?" Felix sighed "Never thought the dukedom would stoop that low..." Sylvain shook his head "As soon as they allied themselves with Edelgard, I expected something like that… no offence." Ferdinand raised his hand "None taken."

They continued walking through the tents, and then got to the medical office. The result wasn't good to see, most of those who had survived resting on the ground, waiting for someone to take care of their wounds. Dorothea was leaning towards one of the Institute's mage, healing a bite mark left from a hound. Ingrid rested a hand on her shoulder "You should go to sleep, we will handle the rest." The brunette nodded and stood up, while Sylvain was indicating to Felix and the two adrestrians the sleeping tents.

The next logical step would be once again to move forward to Fhirdiad, get pushed back to the status quo, and then try again. Felix suddenly wondered if he would see the end of this war, then laughed to himself. There wasn't any god-like being still breathing on this land, or any of the likes of Dimitri, who could win against a whole army alone. But, if he had to die during this war, at least he hoped it would be before his friends.

Sorry for the late upload (again). I know it must get annoying after the third time, so I'd like to announce a pause for two weeks. There are still exams I must work, so I will not be able to release a chapter before the 6th of July.

No with the official stuff out of the way, I'd like to expand on the ideas I used in this chapter. First, I decided to reuse the berserk plague we could see at Remire village, because it seems the writers totally forgot about that plot point that could have rendered some situation interesting (for example, Cornelia emits from herself some magic energy that turns every inhabitants of Fhirdiad completely bananas, and you have to be careful with your barely sane Dimitri to not kill too much of them, and killing Cordelia resolves in everyone getting their minds back).

One thing I didn't mention in this chapter is the very bad image the resistance has, for the common dukedom inhabitant, since it seems they pillage and murder everyone. Though, I still think they would wait for Dimitri to make his return and solve the problems plaguing Faerghus, since Cornelia still is a b*tch.

Fhaerghus seems to have a French/Slavic inspiration, so I made sure to respect it when naming some places.

It's also been nearly three months since I started posting these chapters. I hope you've enjoyed your experience so far, I would love to hear what you thought of the last chapters.

Next Chapter: The Hunt (spoil: it's an Ashe chapter)