Notes
I'm glad I have the energy to post this, lmao. Happy Yurileth week! I only managed to finish two fics, but two is better than none so I'll take it. I've actually been really sick - not with covid I think but with the normal flu, which still sucks - but I'm excited to go through all the stuff people have made for the week.
This is my least favorite of the two fics but oh well. Sometimes it be like that. Anyways, I hope y'all enjoy, and see you in a few days for more Yurileth goodness!
Oh, and before you start: This takes place after the Cindered Shadows DLC.
It barely took two weeks for Byleth to find her way back down into the Abyss. The students that had accompanied her and the house leaders down there hadn't so much as even mentioned wanting to go back down, but through every class she taught, through every night she slept in her own quarters once again, the basement of Garreg Mach stayed on her mind. There was nothing special about the Abyss - in all honesty, it was fairly run down. While the people who had made it their home thrived there, and while it wasn't dissimilar from the mercenary outposts she'd frequented with her father, the air was… thick. Heavy.
Byleth found she missed it, anyways, after returning to the surface. She missed the tension that laid itself down over the whole of the Abyss. She'd adapted alright to the cushiony life of a teacher, all things considered. That didn't stop her from wanting.
And more so than that, she sought a desperate reprieve.
Her mother had been stashed away there. Her father had lied to her, for years, about her birth, about her heritage, and about himself. About her own blood.
She'd been born dead. No heart, no heartbeat. Even with her mother's heart in her chest, she still had no pulse, where her mother's should be. Her mother's, who she had watched turn into that wretched thing with a man who was too attached to give her up.
At least her father had that going for him. He'd loved her mother, truly, and had known when to say goodbye. Had known not to fight death, and to take the child she had loved so much who she would never have to know and flee.
Growing up in Fodland, it was difficult to avoid the Church. The followers of Seiros were plentiful, and nearly all three countries had avid followers. Byleth understood, now, why her father had tried so hard to keep her from it. Had tried so hard to keep her away from the monastery.
She'd liked it, at first. It had been a gentle place; one that she'd never had the joys of knowing. The students there - both her own and otherwise - were all wonderful, and wanted nothing more than to learn and prosper. Dimitri, the head of the house she taught, was an especially bright star in the sea of students Byleth had encountered.
After learning at least some bits of the truth, it had soured considerably. The calmness she once allowed herself to bask in had become unsettling. The students she once looked forward to teaching and getting to know had become hard to look at.
But the Ashen Wolves, in her mind, had remained… pure, so to speak. The leader, Yuri, had understood her better than she or he had let on. It was hard not to, when both were so well known in the underground, and had lived that hard and cruel life. Besides that, the point also remained that they had been kept in the dark by members of the Church, too.
All four of them bore ancient crests that were said to have died off long ago. All four of them had been forced into a plan of someone else's creation, for a purpose they did not agree with.
If anyone in the monastery could understand her misgivings, it was certainly them.
And so, on one quiet night in Garreg Mach, long after everyone had settled and the rest of the students and faculty had gone to sleep, Byleth put her armor back on and found her way back to the passageway that led down to the underground.
As soon as she gazed upon the warm light of magicked candles, Byleth took a breath. For the first time since she'd fought that beast, she felt as though she filled her lungs.
"Hey, friend." If Yuri was surprised to see her, he didn't say it or show it. "What brings you back down to my world?"
That was the question, indeed. Byleth shifted on her feet. It was still not easy for her to speak about these things, blunt as she may be. Talking about feelings was still much of a foreign concept to her.
So instead, she shrugged, and opted for a half truth. "Hard to think up there," she told him, surveying him quietly. "What are you still doing up?" If she had seen one of her students up at this time of night, she would've escorted them to their dorms herself.
Yuri wasn't one of her students, however. Part of her was honestly surprised to see that he'd hung around these parts. Now that Aelfric was gone, the Ashen Wolves could explore the world as they pleased. For the most part, anyways. He hopped up on one of the worn desks, a smile playing on his lips.
"No rest for the wicked, as they say." At her own small smile, Yuri's posture seemed to relax. "If it's easier to think down here, be my guest," he said, waving a hand lightly.
Byleth leaned against a different desk, facing Yuri. She had come down here on a whim, but now that she was actually here, she wasn't sure what to say to him. What to think about. There were so many unanswered questions she had, about why all of that had been hidden from her, why Rhea had put her mother's heart in her chest in the first place…
Why Sothis spoke to her. Why Rhea was pulling out all the stops to keep her and her father placated.
She sighed. "Sometimes, I miss being a mercenary," Byleth confessed, voice smaller than she was used to. Probably because she wasn't sure why she was telling him anything at all.
Yuri hummed in response. "Can't say I blame you," he said honestly. "The Underground becomes a part of your bones once you've learned to thrive in it." His eyes swept around the torn down classroom before finally landing back on Byleth's own. "That fight never quite leaves you."
Byleth knew exactly what he meant. For so many years, she had lived in a kill or be killed world. In order to survive, she'd fight. In order to eat, she'd fight. In order to move up in the world, she'd fight. Even before everything with the Ashen Wolves had happened, Byleth still found herself constantly reaching for her daggers when she was alone, or having to force herself to relax when settling down for the night. Those kind of habits weren't just worn down through routine and having things handed to you. There was likely never going to be a day where her mercenary habits were purged from her bloodstream.
But next to Yuri, she felt the closest she'd ever felt to at ease. Maybe it was because of what they'd went through together. Maybe it was because she knew that he was just as capable as she was. She didn't know, and she supposed it didn't really matter.
What did matter was that she felt her lungs take in air. What did matter was the way her shoulders relaxed after months - years - of being tense. What did matter was that she felt like she could speak. She felt like she could feel, something that she'd still been getting used to up on the surface.
"Why didn't you leave?" Byleth asked him, curiosity getting the better of her.
"For the same reason you came back down." Yuri shifted on the desk, moving one of his legs up so he could lean on it. "There are always things for me to do, people for me to see," he paused, eyes twinkling, "but even I can admit it's nice to have a place to come home to, after everything. Besides, the people here need me. Despite Aelfric's betrayal, many of them still don't have a place to go if the Abyss were to collapse."
Byleth blinked. For whatever reason, she hadn't been expecting such a… detailed response. It was funny, in some way, that she felt it was easier to converse with Yuri then her own students. Her own father.
After a moment, she broke away from his gaze, eyes going to the floor. "I'm not sure if I have a place to go back to, now," she finally said, feeling like a dam was about to break inside of her. "I didn't even know how old I was until…"
Until Aelfric had used her mother's corpse and mangled it into something unrecognizable. Until Rhea had confessed that she was stillborn, and her mother's dying wish was to put her own heart within her tiny body.
All her life, she had never thought about why she was so different compared to others. Other children would smile, laugh, play. Up until coming to Garreg Mach, she never had; an Ashen Demon through and through. Now, she wondered.
Though she wasn't looking at him, Byleth could feel Yuri's eyes still on her. "I meant it when I told you that you were one of us, now," he said, voice heavy. "After everything, friend, you are most certainly an honorary Ashen Wolf."
There were many different smiles Byleth had seen on Yuri since she had met him. Flirty, relaxed, teasing - he was a man of many masks, using whichever to get what he needed out of an interaction. As she looked back at him, never had she seen the smile that was currently on his lips.
It was small, a delicate thing, but Byleth was positive nobody had ever looked at her like that before. Even her own students, who she had thought she had bonded with fairly well had never looked at her with the amount of trust and affection Yuri was giving her in that simple expression.
She felt an overwhelming urge to move herself closer to him, to be in his space.
"Besides," Yuri continued when she didn't respond, "if you're looking for work, there's always something that needs to get done around here. Teaching brats certainly isn't going to scratch that itch, you know."
Pushing herself off the desk, she moved herself closer to him. Once she was in front of him, however, she wasn't exactly sure what to do from there. Sothis, who had been shockingly quiet during all of this, scoffed in the back of her head.
From up close, Byleth could truly appreciate how beautiful Yuri was. The way his lips shone with the gloss he used and his hair was kept to perfection certainly would throw someone off if he was trying to keep his identity a secret. She wasn't sure she had ever met someone as beautiful as he was, underground or otherwise.
Yuri, however, seemed to know exactly what to do. He lowered his leg, bringing a hand up to cup her cheek. "Still as adorable as ever," he commented, almost as if it were an after thought. "What brought you over here, friend?"
Her cheeks felt warm at his touch. "I'm not sure," she answered honestly. "I just…" Feel comfortable in your presence. Feel like I can finally let my guard down when I'm with you. There were so many different ways she could end that sentence. "Feel like things make sense from here," Byleth finally settled on.
"How about this," Yuri said, his thumb brushing against her cheek in slow motions. "A truth for a truth? To make it easier on both of us."
Trust wasn't transactional. Friendship certainly wasn't, either. But they were not normal people. They didn't grow up in a way where these things came naturally to them, and Byleth was thankful for the out. Trying to talk about herself, her emotions in the capacity that Annette and Mercedes always encouraged her to do was a daunting, impossible task.
She nodded, and Yuri slowly took his hand back. "You first," Byleth said, trying to gather her thoughts enough that they would make sense once spoken aloud.
He laughed softly. "That wasn't the deal," he told her, humor in his tone, and Byleth frowned.
She'd only wanted him to go first so she could do what he asked of her. Of course, this was Yuri. Even when he was being nice, he didn't like to make things easy for anybody. Really, she liked that about him, even if it annoyed her greatly sometimes.
It took a few minutes, but once Byleth started speaking, it was like everything was bursting at the seams to finally be let out into the world. "I'm aggravated with my father for keeping me in the dark. With Rhea, too. I had never cared about much, but now that I'm able to, I find it difficult," she said, staring at her open palms. "I just want answers, but nobody is willing to give them. Years ago, I would have found this to be of no consequence, but suddenly it's all I can focus on. I miss being a mercenary for many reasons, but most of all because none of this would have ever mattered to me during it. Now that it does, I'm at a loss."
It was probably more than she'd ever spoken about herself in one sitting in her entire life. It wasn't that she didn't care about her students, about Yuri and the Ashen Wolves, or hated the fact that she did care about them all. Of course she cared. Even when she'd been on the road and didn't have much, she still genuinely loved and cared about her father.
Just from a distance. Byleth was used to being detached from these feelings. Having them suddenly at the forefront of her mind took a toll on her, along with all the questions that now plagued her in her every move.
Yuri regarded her carefully, taking in everything she'd said. "My turn, then," he said instead of giving her any kind of response. For a split second, Byleth was agitated, but the feeling faded as soon as it'd come. In fact, relief slowly overtook her when Yuri began to speak. It wasn't as though he was ignoring everything she'd just said - in fact, he had never said that they would have to speak about the truths they were sharing. Just that they would feel more comfortable getting them off their chests.
And really, Yuri couldn't answer any of her questions. He had no solutions, and he wasn't about to pretend he did. She was sure he could offer her sympathy, but sympathy did not solve a thing. The fact that he knew that was comforting, in an odd way.
"I haven't been able to get you out of my mind," he told her, speaking slowly. "Which is ridiculous, considering the amount of shit I do every day. But in everything I do, I wonder how you are. I wonder how the surface is treating you, and it's bothersome. I feel like if I had you here, my dreams would come to fruition, but even besides that, I have never met someone like you." He scrunched his nose, eyebrows furrowed. "I'm not normally the one in this position. I'm normally the one putting others in this position. I don't quite like it. It's very anxiety inducing, you know," he said casually, as if he were talking about the weather and not about something that obviously mattered to him.
"Huh," Byleth said smartly, unsure of how to answer all that. Yuri smiled thinly.
"Tell me, friend," he continued, bringing a hand up to touch the ends of her hair. "Why did you come to speak to me?" Why did you really move so close to me, was the question hidden in his words. When Byleth still didn't answer, his smile dropped, and his own cheeks seemed to color. "You know, this is very difficult for me. An answer of any form would be nice."
She blinked, feeling very stupid. What he was insinuating from his words, what he was trying to tell her… it was hard for her to wrap her head around it. Of course, she'd seen plenty of people in relationships, plenty of people craving after them. Among her own students, Sylvain seemed to toy with the idea often, and Annette and Mercedes generally had ideas of what they wanted from their futures in that respect that they'd shared with her on occasion.
And of course, there were the stories about her father and mother, that she'd only heard just recently. Stories of how much they cared for one another, of how they grew together, finally resulting in marriage and, well, herself.
But those stories had not ended happily. The idea of caring that much about another person terrified Byleth, to some extent. All the same, she wasn't one to deny herself, even if she didn't quite understand it.
In truth, Byleth had sort of known why she felt so comfortable with Yuri. Why her face would warm and why she continued to seek him out. It was just a matter of letting him know, now.
She took a deep breath, looking him dead in the eye. "I feel safe with you," she told him honestly. "And if it's alright, I…" Byleth trailed off again, inhaling sharply through her nose. She had no idea what she was going to say to him.
Without waiting for her to finish, Yuri pressed his lips to her own. Softly, at first, but when her eyes fluttered closed, he leaned into the kiss more, pulling her closer to him. Byleth had never been kissed before, but it felt… nice. Without realizing it, her arms moved around Yuri's neck.
His mouth moved against hers for a moment more before he backed off, breaths a bit shallow. "You will be the death of me, I think," he said, eyes moving back and forth between her eyes and her lips. "I'm in love with you, is what I'm saying. Goddess, this is mortifying." Yuri untangled himself from her, giving her a bit of space so she could think.
I'm in love with you. The words rung out like a bell in Byleth's hair as she struggled to process them. Love. Love. The feelings that had led to her birth. The feelings that had convinced her father to take his corpse-like child away and pretend that she'd died in a fire he'd set. The feelings that had gotten so skewed, so disastrous that it caused Aelfric to mangle her mother's corpse. The feeling that had made Rhea keep her mother's corpse in pristine condition for over two decades.
Her fingers brushed over her lips lightly, where Yuri had kissed her. "I don't understand," she confessed. "Why me?"
It was likely a stupid question in retrospect, but Byleth wanted to know. The more she spoke to him the more she recognized that there was a reason she had sought him out in the first place. Still, though, she wanted to hear what he had to say about - about this. About her.
Luckily, Yuri at least maintained his sense of humor. He cracked a smile at her, shaking his head. "I just told you I'm in love with you, and you ask me why?" He sighed, letting himself down from the desk with ease, silent as a cat. "I don't know, Byleth. You're special. When I'm with you, I feel like I can accomplish anything, because I'm with you. I'm not sure what you want from me, here."
She wasn't sure what she wanted, either. "Is that what this feeling is, then?" She mused, surprising herself by reaching for his hand. Yuri let her take it, lacing their fingers together. "I've never been in love before." Understatement of the century.
Yuri gave her hand a light squeeze. "I can't answer that for you," he told her simply, "but I'm here if you'll have me. In fact, I insist."
"I trust you, though," Byleth said. "I don't want to lie to you, or be wrong about something like this. But," she paused, trying to organize everything going through her head. Sothis normally would be interjecting in these kinds of situations, but she seemed quite content to sit this one out, unfortunately for her. She was at a bit of a loss without her normal comments. "I think I love you, too. The feelings I have for you are completely new to me."
The normal discomfort she felt trying to talk about these kinds of things was vanishing more and more with every word. Her initial reasoning for coming down here was nearly forgotten, and for that, she was grateful.
For the first time since she'd met - and subsequently lost again - her mother, Byleth felt normal. Like she could breathe, think, and feel without worry. Without questions. And it wasn't just the Abyss that was helping with that, like she initially thought. She doubted she would feel this relaxed and comfortable with only Constance, Hapi, or Balthus.
Yuri was, as usual, the exception.
Certainly, the Abyss was a factor; it was nice to not have to act with the airs she put on in the halls of Garreg Mach. But that wasn't all it was. When she was with Yuri, she didn't feel like she had to look over her shoulder with every movement. And if she did, she knew he would be doing the same.
She felt that he was on her wavelength. Even though she experienced things vastly differently then him, he never questioned her viewpoints, only added to her understanding. Even now, when she had told him that she didn't understand those feelings, he had not tried to force his own understanding onto him - at the potential cost of his own happiness.
That was rare to find in anyone, and Byleth wasn't stupid. She didn't want to lose that. Love was quite a daunting thing, but for Yuri, she thought she would be able to manage.
Though she had no idea what she was doing, Byleth leaned in again, and her lips found Yuri's with a bit of difficulty. He smiled into the kiss - surprising her, since she didn't know she'd be able to feel that - and his hands found her waist.
Byleth found she quite liked it.
Later on, after they realized how late it was growing and she started to make her way back up to the surface, Yuri's hand caught her wrist. "Before you go, I wanted to talk to you about one more thing."
Curiously, Byleth spun around to face him. "What's up?"
His hand didn't leave her wrist. "What you were talking about before," Yuri explained vaguely, expression growing serious. "I didn't want you to dwell on it much for a bit, but now that you've had a reprieve and are heading back up, I wanted to offer a piece of advice." At her nod, he continued. "It's okay to be unsure and even angry at being kept in the dark. I'm still struggling with my own place in all of that," he said, eyes narrowing. "But I will do all I can to find the answers we both seek. I promise you."
There was no room for doubt in his words. "I believe you," she said slowly. "But I won't stop looking, either. It was nice to feel real again, but I don't think I'll ever be ready to just… forget." That much was obvious at least, she thought.
"Then we'll figure it out together, yes?" Yuri let go of her wrist, his smile returning. "Between the two of us, I don't think there's anything that can stop us."
Between the two of them - and their friends and students, of course - they had managed to beat whatever Aelfric had become, defying fate in one fell swoop. Byleth returned his smile with an ease she never would've expected from herself.
"I trust you," she repeated her earlier sentiment. "Until next time, Yuri."
He let her leave then, with a wave and a smile. She made her way back up to the surface, the exhaustion of the last few weeks slowly catching up to her. By the time she was almost back in her own dorm, the sunrise was already beginning.
For the first time in weeks, Byleth thought it looked hopeful.
Notes
Dimileth may still have my heart, but Yurileth is certainly a close second. Yuri hits so many of my buttons, lmao. Hope y'all enjoyed and are staying safe!