Hello and welcome back to 2021's Marileth week. And, on a side note, I went to my college campus for the first time. Yeah… that was concerning to say the least, but I survived the day and had some time to clock in progress on this story. Not too much, but some progress.

So, today's theme is tender moments. And, fun fact, I was the one who submitted this idea. I'm not trying to brag or anything, but I had pitched the idea when the Twitter account was asking for ideas and it ended up being an option. Nice.

And a quick other side note, congrats to the Ashen Wolves for getting into FEH and a happy fifth birthday to Persona 5. Just wanted to mention those things really quickly. Alright, let's get this one rolling.

Disclaimers: Fire Emblem belongs to Nintendo, Intelligent Systems, Koei Techmo, etc.

The passing of Jeralt hit the whole of the officer's academy as a whole. The past few days had been surprisingly quiet for the hustle and bustle of the academy and monastery. However, nobody was hit harder by this than Byleth had been. The professor ended up isolating himself away from just about everybody apart from the occasions where he walked out to briefly talk or eat something.

The class that Byleth had taught, the Golden Deer, were all simply watching their professor go through his grieving process without much of an interaction. The most recent person he had spoken to was Leonie, but that had… ended in a disaster to put it mildly. Leonie ended up isolating herself not too long later, while the remaining Deer tried to focus on other things and helping their professor.

With the professor still not being around, the students took to their own time to try and study. Lorenz was off doing some axe training with Lysethia simply observing him, Leonie was nowhere to be found, Raphael was working on something the others weren't sure of, nobody was quite sure where Ignatz even was, Hilda ended up going to spend time with Felix, and the transfer students were trying to do their best to stay on task.

Marianne, meanwhile, was finishing up some of her homework that had been assigned before the events that lead to Jeralt's death had occurred. Once she had finished, she saw Claude walking over to her.

"Oh… hello…"

"Hey. Listen… can you do me a favor?"

"...depends."

"Marianne… can you go see how Teach is going?" Claude asked.

"M-me?" she blinked in confusion.

"Out of everyone here, you're the person who Teach is closest to. I've tried to talk to him, but I've never gotten a response. I'm starting to worry about him."

Marianne was about to say something, but realized Claude did have a point about them being close. She gave off a small sigh before nodding a little.

"Alright. Thanks. We're counting on you."

Marianne looked at the front door to Byleth's room for a bit in silence. After a few minutes, she gently knocked on the door to try to get his attention.

"Professor? Are you in there?" she asked. There wasn't a response, which made her knock a little more, "Professor? Please… say something…"

More silence came in response. Marianne let out a small sigh before she saw the door was somewhat open. She gently pushed at the door to see that it wasn't actually locked. She looked a bit surprised that the door wasn't locked, but then she steeled herself.

"I'm coming in…" she called out.

With that, Marianne walked into the room to see that Byleth was curled up in his bed without even looking at anything. Marianne walked over to his side, quietly closing the door, and then she took a seat at the edge of the bed. Byleth looked towards her, making her see that his eyes were bloodshot and his expression was just unreadable.

"...I'm stupid…"

"Huh?"

"I'm a stupid idiot…" Byleth said to himself, "I couldn't do anything!"

He then just gripped his chest before tears started to form in his eyes. He then felt Marianne pull him into a hug. Byleth looked surprised by this and turned towards her.

"It's ok… it's okay to be upset…" she told him, not letting go from the hug, "Cry as much as you feel you need to. I'm here for you."

Byleth looked surprised at her as she just remained hugging him. He just continued to cry a little bit before he returned the hug to the young bluenette. The two simply continued to hug each-other as time continued to tick away, with Byleth finally starting to calm down after a while. Marianne simply gave him a gentle smile as the two remained side-by-side for a bit longer.

"...thank you…" he whispered to her.

"No problem."

A couple of hours had passed and the two had separated from the hug, then Byleth ended up falling asleep not too long later. Marianne simply gave him a gentle smile before heading away from his room. Byleth had a bit of a relaxed expression as he slept, finally seeming to be at ease from the recent loss.

The next morning, Byleth was finally back in class and starting to teach them a little bit. Once the day had ended, he walked over to Marianne's side and simply smiled at her.

"Thank you. Just… thank you."

"No need to thank me, professor," Marianne assured him before she walked off.

So, silly little story about me writing this… as I was doing this, I honestly completely blanked on Leonie's name. No, seriously. I was writing out a part of it and then I was like "Oh… uh… what was her name again?". That was just a funny little thing that happened.

This chapter went pretty well. May be a little on the short side, but I think it turned out well. I think my favorite part was just the hug and how it flowed to me. Good stuff that just sort of flowed well, even though I was typing on my phone.

Hope you all enjoyed this one. We're only a few days away from the prompt I'm the most excited for. Can't wait to see how you guys react to it.

Just Live More.