At some indeterminate point after my head hit the hardwood floor of Duke Varley's barroom – I began to dream. But because this fight-induced-fugue state started on the seventh and appeared to only end when I woke up in Edelgard's hotel-room on the eighth, I've decided to devote a separate entry in order to record it. I'd label it an interlude or something to that effect, but titling it with a word so highfalutin-sounding seems pretentious given the circumstances.
Thankfully, the abrupt, head-first journey inside my mind was not unfamiliar in its core features – beginning like many of my dreams often do – with the sound of kindling crackling as it is consumed in flames, swords clanging in sheaths, and the incoherent shouts of two forces engaged in what must be a battle. Like many of those previous dreams, the scrap has already long since begun, with the initial disposition of forces or movements of the troops before my arrival well outside my knowledge or control.
I find that frustrating as of late – finding myself wishing I had arrived earlier to advise this or that faction on deployment, maneuvers, formations – that sort of thing. It's something I never felt before when dreaming – being content to simply watch both sides maul each other. This is to say that the battles that appear in my dream often appear to be the work of amateurs. Massed levies dueling each other in total ignorance of terrain, force displacement, and the like. Light missile cavalry operating in the midst of allied massed infantry – that sort of thing.
While battles often devolve into chaos shortly after plans are executed – they tend to be even more chaotic when the forces march straight into one another without regard for friend, foe, and basic principles of strategy. I get the impression, although I have no data to support it – that most of the visions I get involve armies clashing in that sort of confusion that often evidences poor leadership. The combatants always appear to be the same as well, at least in previous dreams – the banners typically featuring an Eagle and a kind of rune.
This dream that I'm having right now is different, however.
In this scenario, the engagement of arms – or more precisely, its participants, are more of a known quantity to me. They are not the faceless, helmeted and utterly anonymous combatants led by the mysterious, shapely green-haired woman who vaguely resembles the Archbishop, or the yoked greybeard with the magical whip-sword. This was not some nondescript clash of forces from what some unmarked era, lost to time…
This was the battle last week in Remire.
Even though I never saw the combat there play out before my eyes – I recall the after-action report that was penned by my father and forwarded to me. I remember the descriptions of the bumbling, uncoordinated movements of the levy archers, the burning blockhouse that was pelted with flaming arrows, and – as I take my first few furtive steps into the foggy vision – I can see Felix Hugo Fraldarius rescuing a small child from a collapsing rampart.
Inexplicably, I am at the village gate, and here more specifically at five in the afternoon, mere moments after Edelgard and I set out for Remire from the Red Canyon. Mere moments before the battle for the Lions went terribly, terribly awry.
Still – the battle here was seven days ago. I wasn't even aware of its results and Raphael's subsequent death until the wee hours of the 3rd, after the Eagles sojourn to the caravanserai.
So, that begs the question: is this a dream or some sort of memory?
I would be asking the other resident inside my mind for an explanation, but Sothis is nowhere to be found. That's because I killed her, of course. Strangled her to death on my apartment's floor, to be more precise.
And – in light of that, without a proper guide, I begin to step forward into the fog of war. My hand immediately takes to hovering over the sword safely sheathed on my belt. Even though I must be dreaming – a battle is still a battle.
Thinking first of approaching Felix who I can see in my confused periphery, I notice that he's shooed off the child he saved with a pithy insult – and is now cursing bitterly at Mercedes and Anette who have arrived to cast a healing spell on his broken collarbone. The thought occurs to me to give the fellow some space – which I resolve immediately thereafter to do – particularly once Mercedes sets about setting his fractured clavicle.
With a nod that's noticed wordlessly by the otherwise mewling myrmidon, I press on.
After each footfall into the seething fog, the background battle becomes even visually incoherent. A mass of archers whose individual hoods and bows I could previously recognize just outside the village palisade now fade into a blob that looks like a hulking demonic beast. Flaming arrows erupt from its hide and rain down on the village – but none make contact with me. For a moment, I consider charging the beast and tearing it limb from limb. This would be a way to protect the people here – and perhaps, if I could find its neck – or necks – I could start extracting some information out of it that way.
But before I set upon that course – my attention is drawn instead to a burning building that seems to call out to me in a sort of accusatory anguish – a blockhouse. The east-gate blockhouse – the one, which at five-o-clock in real life was billowing black plumes of smoke from its front door and second-story windows.
The blockhouse that I suggested Dimitri build to defend Remire Village.
The blockhouse whose collapse killed Raphael Kirsten.
In acknowledgement of that fact, I go to confront my own creation.
"Urk...Professor…?!"
Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd – having just noticed my approach – is kneeling nearby, bent over the dead body of a minor – a girl who I vaguely remember from my own childhood here. The girl is lifeless, and the burns that cover her body indicate that she must have just emerged from the building with Dimitri's assistance. The Prince, meanwhile, is hacking his lungs out in an attempt to get my attention. The look in his eyes – cerulean reddened with blood and dirtied by soot – is that stormy, pained one that I recalled from his spat with Edelgard on the mock battlefield.
I knew innately that he had seen a massacre before – the true mania of an unrestrained bloodbath in a way that Felix, Edelgard, or Hubert hadn't. While I'd be willing to grant that Felix and Edelgard had at least fought before – and Hubert had certainly killed – none of those three had seen an equivalent to what I saw on the shores of Kupala. But the Heir to the Kingdom had, I suspect.
The look on the Lion's face is not unique to any soldier or civilian who had confronted mass death in such a proximal way – but this commonality of expression was itself a rare quality. What I'm getting at, I guess, is that Dimitri had the same look Holst had on when we first surveyed the gassed and liquidated village on the northern shores of Leicester. And that look, at least according to Holst, was missing from me when I took stock of the same scene.
But that expression of Holst's was present on the Leader of the Lions.
Squatting down and bridging the distance so that I might catch Dimitri's expression – his face being blackened and obscured by soot, I acknowledge him – and our situation – with:
"Dimitri, I'm here."
And that about sums up my knowledge about the situation before me.
"Professor – damn my weakness… I…" he begins, but is overtaken by another coughing fit.
Shaking my head, I ask:
"You were inside there?"
A strange series of questions to ask, given my history. On my last campaign with Holst – if I had encountered a wounded princeling like Dimitri, my questions would've been about the enemy force, the tactical situation, or the condition of our forces. Now, all I can think about is his safety, and the safety of the Blue Lions – who aren't even my students, are they?
"There are…" another choking session claims his throat.
"Take a breath." I command, realizing that he won't be able to communicate a thing unless he settles down a bit. After a few anxious, painful inhales punctuated by stuttered exhales, the Lion King recovers.
"Raphael… is still inside, Professor. It is my responsibility to–"
This prompts a great degree of surprise from me – even though the extent of my ability to express it is to only drag up my left eyebrow a bit.
"Alive?" I inquire.
The Prince's head falls in resignation.
"Not for long if I cannot–"
At the very least, I can save Raphael here, can't I? Do I not owe him that effort, at least?
"I'll go. Alert me if enemies approach."
"Hold, Professor – the fire in the atrium will consume you!" I'm warned by the Prince.
At this point, a certain whimsy takes over – a feeling that I would've never had before the 20th of Great Tree Moon – before meeting His Deceitfulness, Edelgard, and Dimitri. Bringing my right hand to Dimitri's face, I snap my fingers and produce a flame. I then snuff it out with the palm of my left, prompting a rather surprised look from the Prince.
"I don't mind being burned." I inform him.
Without fishing for a reaction, I rise to my feet and cross through the burning entryway and into the blockhouse. If I can, I will rescue Raphael. I certainly owe him that much, don't I? He brought the espresso machine and Hubert's coffee beans that assisted Edelgard in realizing her dream on St. Macuil's Day. Without even knowing it, Maya's brother had done a great service to one of my Eagles. And that's certainly a measure of kindness, is it not? Not that I would know such a thing intimately… but as I choke smoke down my throat, it seems like a fine idea.
What I mean to say is that I'd want to have the Leciestrian as a student of mine, if I could. Unfortunately, it is probably far too late for that now, though – unless this dream is actually real and I can actually save him.
"Raphael."
Raphael Kirsten is dying – there's no doubt about that. Clutching the central beampost that supports the floorboards of the second-story infirmary inside the blockhouse, it's quite easy to notice that his hands and lower arms are riddled with second-and-third-degree burns. Unless he gets proper healing magic fast – he's likely to die standing up… long before this blockhouse collapses.
"Hey, Prof…! Kind of a sticky situation here, amirite…?"
The only thing that's really sticking at this point is Raphael's skin and tissue to the timber – and even that's beginning to melt off his bones and drip onto the ground below.
"That's a word." I note – sticky being almost too on-the-nose for the situation.
"...Forget it, Prof… just – can you lend a hand?"
He'll need more than a new hand to survive this, I suspect. Still – he is a student, and I am a teacher – so I must protect him. Even though he's not my student– I don't see Hanneman anywhere, and that makes me the responsible adult.
"I'll cover your escape." comes my command, and I that command is issued distractedly as I figure out how the hell to dislodge the Elder Kirsten from his nearly fused position on the white-hot beampost.
"...Can't do that, Prof… there are kids… still inside there, hurt… Dimitri's gonna be back in a… sec…!"
Considering I just gave express orders to Dimitri directing him to not haul himself back through the burning entryway – I doubt he will… and have to consider a way to explain that circumstance in a manner where I won't be exerting too much sorely-needed energy.
"Both of you are dying from smoke inhalation." I note matter-of-factly. I'd prefer they not die of smoke inhalation – or at all, in fact.
"Yeah, but...the whole tower'll come down…" Coughs begin to overtake the Deer's ability to string together sensible statements in much the same way as Dimitri. I suspect my body will start aching for oxygen soon if I don't get Raphael out of here in another minute or two.
Thankfully, I'm not particularly chatty. Still – I make one last go at appealing to Raphael's rationality.
"Your hands are burning. You need to leave."
A pained smirk creeps up the Deer's face.
"Burned through the… nerves… a long time ago, no worries…"
The issue is, of course, that Raphael has nerves that can be burned… probably because he's a normal human being who just happens to have an impressive physique and extraordinary work ethic. I have the former – but certainly not the latter – one of the last long conversations I had with the Diety inside my head was one where she accused me of being fat and lazy. That said, I do possess an innate resoluteness and resistance to burning that I've never seen anyone else possess in my entire life. Other people tended to die when molten silver was poured on them. For me, it hurt roughly as much as a bee sting and provoked similarly mild swelling.
This beampost certainly couldn't do worse than that.
In a way, I'm much better suited to what Raphael is so intent on doing here. Especially dying – which I suppose will happen to me as well – given how I'm not as impervious to being crushed as I am to fire.
"Let me do it. I don't burn."
To hammer this point home, I stick my hand on the beam and start gripping the post just above the remains of the Elder Kirsten's hand.
"Woah – hey…!" he shouts, as if he's somehow not guilty of doing the same.
The difference is – naturally – that his flesh reddens, burns, peels, and then melts – while my milky white skin is totally unblemished.
"Told you."
"Hey– you don't, do you, Prof…!" the Deer quips through a few wheezing breaths.
With some effort, I attempt to give Raphael's massive frame a shove. He does not move, but I'm left to question whether that's because he's built like a boulder or the fact that his hands have more or less fused with the burning-hot-wood of the beam.
"You should go." I advise, although I'm still rather unclear regarding how he could actually do that.
"...Still, Prof – I don't think… ya've got the strength…" the Brother of Maya chokes out – and I realize that this fellow can even mog me while dying. In spite of rushing in here to rescue him – he's rendered me more than a bit emasculated. Maybe he's just doing that to get his mind off what must be some very painful wounds – but still.
So I'll need to lend him my strength in a roundabout manner, and show him that I can in fact hold up a beampost. Maybe.
"Allow me to demonstrate." comes my reply – although my monotone doesn't indicate how unsure I actually am about this proposition.
In spite of that lack of surety, I lift my leg up and prepare to deliver a sharp kick to the Sir Kirsten in order to force him off the beampost one way or the other. Although Raphael might leave this building short his hands – he'll still have the rest of his life ahead of him, and get to be a big damn hero throughout the remainder of it – which I hope is a very long one indeed.
Just as I drive my leg forward, however, time stops – familiarly – and then the burning building around me disappears in a black morass. After a few minutes of wandering around in this new abyss, however – I eventually find myself before the stone throne of a certain green-haired gremlin.
"We are doing the same thing over again, tonight…!"
"Sothis." comes my reply. I'm not sure what else to say, honestly.
For her part, The Beginning looks awfully mad. But I guess she's entitled to be mad, given the fact that I killed her not long ago. I think.
"You're really quite foolish…!" I'm told. I know this, and will likely know all of the insults she levies at me – given how she's apparently been freeloading in my head after death itself tried to claim her. I certainly thought I managed to do after observing the state of my dorm room.
Still– given the fact that she's here and vocal, I might as well try to work towards an answer about what in the eternal flames is going on here. At the very least, I might be able get a question answered if I try to cut through all of her insults.
"...Aren't you dead?" I ask – foolishly.
Needless to say, that didn't come out quite right, and probably sounded cavalier, in fact. Impish emerald eyes respond to that query with an accusatory squint. Sothis's elfen ears also begin to twitch in what must be extreme annoyance. When she finally opens her mouth, she snaps:
"Obviously not…! I'm the beginning!"
I know this, obviously.
"I was saving Raphael. Can I go back now?" comes my very natural follow-up.
A certain someone isn't done giving me shit yet, though:
"You should be thanking me, you know! If you insist on trying to save him, you'll die – again…!"
This fresh invective from the omnipotent one is delivered while she gesticulates wildly with her left foot, crossed over her right, which is bare. This begs a question: why doesn't Sothis wear shoes? Or socks?
What's more, the little gremlin keeps uttering again as if I've attempted to rescue Raphael once already – but that idea is preposterous, isn't it? I was six-hours' ride away from Remire when the tower fell and crushed him to death. Now, on my sole opportunity to save him, Sothis decided to intervene and stop time.
So… what's the big idea here, exactly? Is she just going to drag me for choosing Edelgard again?
"...Like with the bandit?" I lead – waiting for her to blame my House Leader.
"No…! I mean the last three nights! Your very stupid conscience asked me over and over to try your hand at saving that child for the past three nights in your dreams, and each time I have brought you here… you've failed!" She notes with a rather intense tone.
I should've figured that I'd get a dressing down for this. Sothis gives me shit about everything else that she's awake to witness, after all.
All I can offer the Beginning is a blank stare to express my confusion. Picking up on my consternation telepathically, she continues:
"It is exhausting to have to repeat myself! Listen carefully: each time we meet in your dream, your conscience asks me to go back in time… and each time, we find ourselves further and further afield from being able to save that boy!"
Having a conscience is news to me, but not altogether unpleasant news, honestly. I'm not entirely sure what a conscience really is - but damn if I haven't been accused of not having that thing by damn near every comrade I've ever fought with.
In light of that, it bears repeating that:
"...I'm helping now."
Which earns a dismissive exhale from the tiny lungs of this tiny, Verdean Provocateur.
"Phooey! You're hardly strong enough! Even someone like you has their limits."
Stating the obvious, I remind her:
"Raphael will live. It's good."
"...Not unless you want other children – your children – to die!" comes the rejoinder.
The only other children in imminent danger are the ones that are supposedly in the floor above – which should be noted is currently consumed in flames. Even providing that they're still alive, however… I really can't be bothered to save them.
"The children up there aren't my students." I say, finishing the logical wagon-train of thought.
Two emerald irises get quite wide at this admission.
"There were no children up there anyway…!"
Tilting my head a bit – I find her reading of the situation rather curious, particularly why her information doesn't line up with the impression I was given by the Lion and the Deer.
"That's not what they said."
Sothis toes dance in the light that seems to radiate from her throne, and then direct my attention back to the Elder Kirsten – a vision of whom has manifested beside Sothis's throne.
"You would trust the affable man-child and the prickly princeling over me?"
At this, I'm compelled to defend the Deer. Raphael seemed to do a fine job of looking after Maya, and apparently used physical intimidation tactics in order to protect her and Marianne from Sylvain Jose Gautier. Perhaps Sothis forgot that development, or was too busy sleeping through it.
"Raph is quite responsible." I remind her. She was, I presume, present for my brief chats with the fellow.
Unfortunately, my comment just elicits a very smug expression from the all-knowing one.
"Hmph! It is very amusing to hear someone like you speak of responsibility. Even more amusing when you're quite incorrect about circumstances, as well!"
"You're aware of this how, exactly?" I ask, now a bit perturbed myself.
"Because we did this song and dance last night, and the night before… and you ignored my advice each time!"
Sothis's exclamation forces me to retreat inward a bit and try to remember if I've had this dream before... but to the best of my ability - I can't recall.
That said, I'm not given much time, as I'm immediately dragged out by another invective:
"And that doesn't justify what you just said either, you… Demon! If there were children upstairs, you should be volunteering to save them!"
"Then what children will die?"
"YOUR children, child!"
"The Eagles, you mean?"
The little imp reaches peak intensity and shouts:
"Yes– those children! Who else would I speaking of?! There is no one else of significance in your life, is there?"
Realizing that I have to grant her statement as true, I confirm:
"I'm pretty apathetic about my father."
"See? Again, I have proven myself omnipotent and all-knowing."
"Then you know that the Eagles are not up there."
"Obviously…! They are in danger, but elsewhere!"
"I doubt that."
"Fine – I suppose I must show you – again…!"
With this, the Beginning starts to rise, and the two of us are taken to a nondescript point in the Arundel Road – a featureless stretch somewhere between Remire and the Arundel Caravanserai. A familiar feeling took hold and told me that I probably encountered this area with Edelgard on horseback… but apart from that – this was a place that passed by us in total anonymity.
This stretch of road, however, was not anonymous at the moment. Instead, it was filled with dead Eagles and Deer. As I paced around – I first noticed Marianne and Ferdinand splayed out across the corpse of a pack horse. Not long after, Bernadetta, impaled by a great-knight's lance. Linhardt was run through in his sleep, portending this as an ambush… perhaps at nightfall – and the heads of Lysithea, Leonie, and Hilda sticking out at the ends of spokes from what must have been a shattered wagon-wheel. A curious feature, as I had ordered the wagons burned.
In fact… I burned the wagons myself after Caspar performed the task of dismantling the axles too slowly. Caspar's body is rent in half beside the remains of one of those unburned wagons, as it happens…
Notably missing were Petra, Hubert, Ignatz and Lorenz… although there were several corpses that were burned beyond recognition. They might be those.
Dorothea's body was stark naked, bent over a tree stump and impaled by a longspear. She showed signs of being handled roughly as well.
Claude von Riegan's body was the most prominent of the bunch, though – having been tied to a tree and shot full of arrows from head to toe after being beaten and tortured.
What I viewed here wasn't so much a battle as a massacre. And even though I felt nothing when I viewed that gas attack in Kupala a few years back… this display hurt quite a bit to see. In fact, I don't think I could ever unsee it.
"...What happened?" I asked, tripping over both words with a suddenly dry mouth.
"In this future, you traded your life in exchange for the flaxen-haired boy's. That troublesome girl made no effort to hold off that army alone."
Troublesome Girl must mean someone who wasn't with the column, and that can only mean:
"Edelgard?" I inquire.
"Yes… it seems like she withdrew from the field – strange, given her personality…"
No one could justifiably expect a single student – noble or otherwise – to hold off an entire battalion of troops even in the most favorable terrain. She did the justifiable thing and retreated, I'm sure. Maybe I even told her to retreat in this particular, nightmarish future.
"I would have instructed her to do that." I offer – turning away from the bodies of the students in what must be my first true fit of revulsion.
It's a feeling that I don't envy not experiencing before, either.
"That girl is smart enough to not accept your terrible advice so blindly…!"
Retreating from a larger enemy force with an initiative advantage is actually good advice. Clearly, Sothis subscribes to the same tactical school as the Archbishop's doppleganger… who also kind of looks like a moderately older Sothis.
Curious, that.
I don't dwell on that thought, however, as I need to defend Edelgard:
"Actually, My Student is brilliant." I tell her – and that's the truth. ¬‿¬
I'm sure if Edelgard were on that throne of Sothis's, she'd shine a million times brighter than this little shit-stirrer. And I would tell My House Leader that, if it didn't sound as crazy as it does to write it down now. Also… the idea of letting Edelgard have a constant window into my thoughts now seems a bit intimidating. I wouldn't want her to lower her estimation of me by getting a window into this confusing mix of feelings that I have for her.
Why do I even have those, I wonder?
Unfortunately, I don't have the time to consider it further because my moment of contemplation is cut through with a:
"Phooey…!"
This utterance of Sothis's is returned with a shrug from yours truly. Undeterred, the deity presses on:
"So, what will it be…? Do we try again like the past three evenings? If you fail again, will you bash your head against the wall like a… CHILD… and then try to attack me, your only aid!"
I guess that was the sequence of events on the 3rd.
"I've failed previously, you mean." I say – fishing for a confirmation.
"Of course you have…!" Sothis confirms.
Turning back to the vision of my abused and murdered wards, I find that I would've performed a feat of calculus that rendered Raphael's life more valuable than theirs.
"Did you show me the Eagles before?"
Sothis huffs and puffs at this.
"No! It took me all day slaving away at the hands of time to find that window into that future. It certainly wasn't made easier by all that banging about this evening!"
"The fight, you mean."
I don't intend to apologize for killing the Brigidian if it allows Bernadetta to ease the confinement of her mother. That Brigidian, like Raphael, like Dimitri, and like the rest of the damn world... isn't my student. In a sort of heavy acknowledgement of that fact, I reply with:
"There's no future where I can save Raphael and the Eagles, then."
"Hmm… if there was, you destroyed that future by doting on that girl." comes a strangely thoughtful and unsure reply from the Deity in my mind.
Shaking my head at the vagueness of such a scenario, I ask the obvious:
"Raphael would've survived if I chose the Deer?"
"Perhaps! But even if that were so, my power is too weak to see such things, and I cannot turn back the hands of time that far." I'm informed by Sothis. In effect, the omnipotent one isn't all that omnipotent.
So the Eagles would've been sent to handle the rebuilding of Remire, then?
Wouldn't Raphael have been recruited for such an affair anyway... or would it have been another brawny student like Duedue? I can scarcely wrap my head around it... and find myself recoiling from such an excercise of my mind, anway.
"I wouldn't want that." I confirm, mostly to myself.
"Then why are you wavering now, foolish child?" she asks in annoyance.
I don't bother looking at her when I answer her noting:
"You're correct. I must protect the Eagles."
Causing another silence to pervade the space between us. I cannot let this future before the two of us come to pass under any circumstances.
"Well… I wish to aid you in that effort. It is one of the few redeeming parts about sharing this body with you!"
A rare vote of confidence from the gremlin? Still, I feel the necessity to explain:
"I never asked you to be there."
"Hmph. You would be dead without me, you know..."
In spite of her moving the goalposts there, I still find myself speechless at that moment... mostly because Sothis's observation forces me to make an observation of my own: if I die… so do the Eagles.
And so… I can't die just yet, because my existence is tied to theirs. While I like Raphael as a person, I cannot trade his life for theirs.
I never made a resolution to Raphael, or rather – to Claude, his house leader – to protect his classmates. His Deceitfulness and I made a promise to the effect trying to make peace during a future continental war... one which I doubt I have the capability to achieve anyway. I did make that first resolution to Edelgard, though. If that means leaving Raphael Kirsten to die, I suppose I must. And while I will carry that sin with me, it is certainly not the first decision like that I've made.
...I'm a mercenary, after all.
This dream has just been the first chance I've had to think about things like that.
And… I'm glad I did, even if it gives me the unshakeable impression that I'm, in fact, a very evil person.
One final thought follows this one:
For my students, I would leave a thousand Raphaels to die.
But maybe… to avoid this situation again:
I should make others I care about into my students.
Author's Note:
Winter: I think what we have here is a medieval, feudal Calvin Candie who has been rendered weak and a manlet by Habsburgian inbreeding among Fodlan's nobility. At least that was my inspiration.
Dandaman: This is a lesson, particularly - don't dip on your 19 year old pregnant gf unless you want her to leave nauseating notes in your personal belongings. More to the point: what nineteen year olds don't have nauseating relationships, really?
My favorite part about Edeleth as a ship is how fucking nauseating it would be, and how nauseated everyone would be - particularly Hubert.
