A/N: Here's the next chapter. Just a quick heads-up, this one is a lot more combat-focused than the previous ones.
Disclaimer: I don't own Fire Emblem: Awakening.
Survivors
Chapter Four: Knights and Dragons
"Perhaps she doesn't need our help so much as we could use hers…"
"Any questions about your mission?"
Cordelia shook her head, adjusting the straps of her armor and securing her utility pouch to the back of her waist. Her pegasus, already saddled and equipped for the task ahead, nibbled curiously at what appeared to be a tuft of dried grass. The animal had adapted fairly well to the new environment, the arid Plegian desert a far cry from the chilly lands of Ferox. The same could not be said for its rider, however.
"Okay. One more time - the objective here is reconnaissance. Keep an eye for enemy troops or emplacements. Note their types, strengths, any special features or particular behaviors. Even if you see targets of opportunity, do not engage. Avoid combat unless absolutely necessary. The rest of the Shepherds will be too far away to come to your aid in time."
Robin's briefing might've been dull to some, but the pegasus knight welcomed it with open arms. It gave her something else to focus on besides the sweltering heat, and how she felt as if she were being spit-roasted in her armor. She'd have to acclimatize, and quickly.
"According to the maps, there should be a few villages up ahead as well. See if you can observe anything from the air about them. Hopefully, they aren't aligned with these... Grimleal folk."
"Understood." Satisfied with her preparations, Cordelia retrieved a small water canteen, twisted off the cap and drank. Only half, as her instructors used to say. Hydration. Wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, the pegasus knight replaced the half-empty canteen in its strap on the side of the saddle, then mounted her steed in one practiced motion.
"If that is all, I shall be off now."
"No recklessness, Cordelia. Return safely."
The pegasus was already in the air.
It felt good to be out flying once again.
Cordelia let out a small contented sigh, basking in the familiar feeling of the wind in her face. Flying - an experience that was either terrifying or thrilling to most - was simply another part of her, as natural as breathing or sleeping. She was a pegasus knight; they were expected to be just as home in the air as they were on the ground. They were the eyes in the sky, the ever-vigilant watchers, the fearsome warriors that brought death from above. A lone pegasus knight was not much of a raider, but could still be an effective scout.
And Cordelia was one of the best.
The miles swept by beneath the pegasus, its rider setting a brisk pace. It almost felt as if she was flying over an endless ocean, albeit one made of sand. Cordelia scanned the desert as she flew, directing her pegasus with light taps of her knees and minute shifts of her weight. A few trees here, an odd-looking sand dune there; the sands were devoid of any signs of life. Little wonder why Plegia was hell-bent on conquering Ylisse, aside from the usual cries of 'death to the Exalt'.
A dark blotch in the distance caught her attention. Pulling on the reins, the red-haired woman brought her pegasus to a halt, the rhythmic beats of its wings as it hovered in the air filling her ears. She extracted a small cylindrical device from her pouch, carefully examining it before bringing it to her right eye - just like how Robin demonstrated when he'd handed it to her prior to the briefing. There appeared to be some sort of special glass inside the object, as ordinary glass panes did not amplify distant sights like it. Regardless of how it worked, she was grateful it did; she would not need to fly as close as she would have without the aid of the 'spyglass'.
Cordelia frowned. There was no mistaking the tents on the edge of that distant oasis. About a score of them, maybe more. The sight that truly disturbed her, however, was the emblem of Plegia emblazoned on each - if the purple and gold wasn't an obvious giveaway. She'd found the enemy.
Her usually-disciplined pegasus snorted, loudly. The pegasus knight glared down at her mount, words of reprimand already forming on her lips, when the winged horse shifted. She bit back a curse, fumbling for the reins to prevent herself from falling. It was then that an arrow whizzed by her face, missing her head by a few inches. Inches that her mount had just moved.
Now the pegasus knight cursed. Her training taking over, she pulled sharply on the reins, directing her pegasus toward the source of the arrow. Attempting to flee would only expose her back to her enemy, and that had been the downfall of several members of her squad. Cordelia readied her lance, quickly locating her foe - a lone archer, the purple Plegian garb sticking out like a sore thumb amongst the desert sands. A second arrow went wide, the panic creeping into the archer. She grinned.
"Out of my sight!"
The light leather armor beneath the archer's robes might as well not have existed, for all the protection it provided against Cordelia's attack. There was no resistance as the lance sunk into her target's chest, the point emerging from the other side in a spray of red. She tore the lance free and the archer fell with a bloodcurdling scream that echoed across the plains. Cordelia winced at the sound - that would certainly attract a lot of attention.
So much for avoiding combat... Can't I do anything right?
Hastily flicking the blood off her lance, the red-haired woman wheeled her pegasus around and began heading back the way she came. Staying to fight against the Plegians alone would be nothing short of suicide, and the Shepherds needed to know about the information she'd gathered - even if it wasn't as much as she'd liked.
Most importantly, they needed to know that a fight was inevitable.
Ten minutes.
That was all the time Robin said he could spare her before she would be sent back out again. He looked almost apologetic as he began to explain the importance of aerial support to his tactics, but she waved his words away. She would not be a burden to the Shepherds.
No rest for the weary.
Cordelia downed the remaining water in her canteen, the lukewarm liquid soothing her parched throat ever so slightly. Placing the empty vessel aside, she moved to check the equipment strapped to her pegasus, ensuring that everything she needed was present and secured properly in their appropriate places. Javelins, vulneraries, a spare weapon for emergencies; good, everything was in place. To the untrained eye, the pegasus knight was treating her mount more like a pack mule rather than a steed of war, loading everything imaginable onto it. In reality, she was struggling to find the perfect balance between 'too much equipment' and 'not enough'. Out on the battlefield, unnecessary equipment meant unnecessary weight, which would slow her down and tire her mount faster. On the contrary, not having a certain piece of equipment out in the field could be the difference between life and death. It was a puzzle whose equation and variables changed with every battle, and one she had to pray she got right every time.
Someone called her name. Glancing up, she spotted a familiar brown-haired figure atop another pegasus. "Robin wants you down the middle!" Sumia gestured with her lance. "Be careful!"
"On my way!" Cordelia's mount took to the air as soon as its rider leapt atop it, swiftly heading towards the fray. The sandy plains beneath her were now swarming with Plegian forces - warriors, mages, archers, even the occasional wyvern rider. A battlegroup no doubt, but not an entire horde, gods be praised. Still, there was enough of them to be trouble.
A glint of dark blue in the midst of a circle of purple caught her attention. She descended, eyes wary for any spells or arrows, and the colors soon coalesced into shapes. Frederick, a grim expression on his face, hurled a throwing axe at a charging foe whilst drawing a sword with his free hand. To say that he was in a tight spot would have been a gross understatement of the situation; outnumbered nine to one, surely even the great knight would fall beneath the sheer force of numbers.
A trio of Plegians moved to engage the lone Shepherd, fencing him in and keeping him pinned down with their lances. The remaining soldiers split into pairs, clearly intending to strike from the flanks. Their admittedly-sound strategy came undone when the pegasus knight fell upon the group attacking from the rear, impaling one soldier with her lance and crushing the other beneath the hooves of her pegasus. Distracted by the sudden loss of two of their comrades, the group on the left became easy marks for Frederick's blade. The survivors wisely retreated and regrouped.
More Plegians soldiers came into view, closing in on the two knights. Arrows flew overhead, forcing her to direct her pegasus closer to the ground. The beast's hooves scrambled to find purchase on the uneven sands even as the Plegians unleashed another barrage of projectiles. Frederick leapt to her defence, his plate armor an impervious wall of steel, brushing the arrows off like droplets of rain.
The same could not be said of the wind and thunder spells that slammed into his chest.
The great knight reeled back, gasping. Cordelia gritted her teeth and reached for the stack of javelins she'd brought with her. This is bad.
"Enter the Vaike!"
Vaike - the blonde, muscular man she'd seen several times around camp - barreled into the Plegians, his axe swinging wildly. Behind him, a bespectacled woman in the robes of a mage shook her head in disapproval, then flipped open the tome in her hand. An explosion rocked the far side of the Plegian line, throwing bodies into the air with a violent burst of wind energy. The woman glanced to her side, nodding approval at a male mage young enough to be her son, before casting her own spell; a second explosion decimated the line in a great plume of flame.
It was as if a switch had been triggered; the area was now teeming with Shepherds, all engaging - or moving to engage - the Plegians in combat. Weapons clashed and spells flew as warcries filled the air, the chaos of battle quickly spreading through the area. Cordelia eventually found herself dragging Vaike back from the thickest part of the fighting - no mere feat, considering that the man was struggling mightily against her.
"It's nothing ol' Teach can't handle!" He protested. "Just a scratch!"
"If I can see bone, that is most definitely not a scratch!" The pegasus knight snarled, dumping the overzealous fighter next to the nearest healer, who turned out to be Lady Maribelle. Cordelia prayed she had a stronger stomach than Lady Lissa. "Take care of him!"
"I can still -"
"Be selfish for once and look after yourself!" She screamed. Before either Shepherd could question her further, the red-haired woman spun her pegasus around and dove back into the fray, forcing her mind away from thoughts of her fallen squadmates.
Vaike was not the only Shepherd that needed saving.
Cordelia wiped the sweat away with a hand, guiding her pegasus down towards the next group of Shepherds. She immediately recognized Lon'qu standing guard; a small part of her cursed her luck. Behind him, an older swordsman lay on the ground, bloodstained hands pressed to his lower left leg. The crude bandages tied there were already soaked in blood.
"What happened here?" She called, attracting the attention of the duo.
"Sneak attack. He came to my aid," the myrmidon explained, gesturing to the wounded man. "Get him to the healers."
"Gregor is fine..." The man spoke through gritted teeth as her pegasus landed. "No worry about Gregor." His eyes widened and he raised a hand, pointing to something over her shoulder. Cordelia turned to look, just in time to see a small girl with light green hair running after something.
"...help girl!" Gregor rapsed.
Against her better judgment, Cordelia dismounted and ran after the girl. She was just about to call out to her when the girl abruptly stopped, falling to her knees and digging frantically in the sand with her bare hands, as if she were looking for something. The pegasus knight could only stare. Did this girl have no common sense, running about a battlefield as if it were a playground?
"...aha!"
"You there!" Cordelia shouted. The girl jumped and spun around. "Are you crazy?! Do you know where you are?!"
"I-"
A monstrous shadow fell over the girl; she glanced up at the source and screamed. The wyvern lunged towards her just as Cordelia's lance embedded itself in the beast's neck, the tip piercing the soft, unprotected tissue. Its roar morphed into a shriek of pain, and the pegasus knight took the chance to seize the girl by her arm.
"Wha-"
"Just run!"
Behind them, the wyvern roared again. Apparently, the blow wasn't as severe as she'd hoped it would be, for the unmistakable sound of flapping wings soon filled her ears. Cordelia gritted her teeth, her lungs already starting to ache. On foot, facing a wyvern and its rider (for finding a wild wyvern on the battlefield was next to impossible) would be an uphill battle, but facing one on foot and unarmed was nothing short of suicide. She'd take the advice her instructors once gave a recruit who asked how dismounted pegasus knights were supposed to battle other aerial targets.
Don't.
If she could get back to the others; if she could get back to her pegasus - and her weapons - there was a chance. A small one, but there would be a chance...
A group of Plegian foot soldiers appeared seemingly out of thin air, barring the path ahead. The pegasus knight swore, barely managing to stop in her tracks lest she impale herself upon one of their blades. Spinning to her left (the girl squeaked with the movement), she was about to resume running when a second group of Plegians came into sight, cutting off that route as well. Cordelia glanced over her shoulder; the wyvern and its rider hovered menacingly just out of reach, effectively blocking off her remaining escape routes with its maneuverability and bulk. In the distance, Lon'qu drew his sword, but in between protecting Gregor and dealing with the Plegian rearguard, he would not reach them in time. He seemed to realize that fact, his bladework becoming more and more frenetic, but it made little difference in the long run.
They were trapped.
"Get behind me, quick," the pegasus knight whispered to the girl, eyes darting left and right. Perhaps she could seize a weapon from a Plegian?
"Uh, how about no?"
Cordelia whipped her head around to face the girl. "What are you-"
With a toothy smile, the girl stepped in front of the pegasus knight. She shook the sand from her hands, revealing what appeared to be a perfectly-rounded, multicolored pebble clutched tightly in her grasp.
"Don't worry. I got this."
A brilliant flash of light, brighter than the sun itself, filled the area. Cordelia winced and shielded her eyes with her hands, wondering if now was the time when an arrow or spell would end her life. There was an earth-shattering roar and a sudden blast of wind; the pegasus knight risked opening her eyes a crack - and gaped at the sight before her.
"You like dragons?!" The green-haired girl had vanished, and in her place was a draconic creature she had only seen in tomes prior. Golden scales glittering in the late afternoon sunlight, the creature unleashed what appeared to be a blue ball of fire from its mouth, scattering the Plegians in its path. The remainders quickly fled when a second fireball slammed into the wyvern, ripping off its entire right wing and throwing the rider from his seat. Neither rose again.
"Oh yeah!" The manakete girl, for there was no doubt what she was now, cheered. In a flash, she had reverted back to her human-like form, and turned to give the pegasus knight a pair of thumbs-ups. Her smile widened. "Nowi rules!"
Cordelia sighed, glancing past her and out over the battlefield. The last of the Plegians were fleeing for their lives, no doubt frightened spitless by the sight of a manakete amongst the Shepherds. Satisfied that there were no immediate threats, she began trudging back towards her pegasus, the manakete by her side. Chrom's militia had begun securing the area - there was still the matter of the neighbouring villages, and she had a feeling that the lord would want to check in on them soon. Meanwhile, all she wanted to do was drop Gregor and Nowi off at the healer's tent, and collapse back into her bedroll.
Fighting alongside the Shepherds was both physically demanding and emotionally draining.