There was a certain energy buzzing about the Officer's Academy that morning that Eve couldn't place. She felt as if there were more eyes on her than usual, voices lowering to whispers whenever she came near. At breakfast, she had eaten with Ashe and Annette and they had all chatted as normal. But when Eve passed Ashe on their way to morning lecture not even an hour later, he blushed and avoided her eyes.
And now at their morning training, Eve felt as if she were about to burst if she didn't figure out what was going on. She was fine with people avoiding her and they could whisper all they wanted, but now Felix wouldn't even look at her and he was training with a viciousness that could only mean he was angry about something.
"So, I guess you changed your mind about wanting to break Dimitri's heart." Sylvain sidled up to Eve's side as she stood in front of the rack of training lances.
"What are you talking about?" She asked, more focused on figuring out which length of lance would better suit her. Byleth had asked that today everyone train in a weapon they weren't familiar with in order to improve on their skillsets.
"I mean I was wondering why you stopped coming by." Sylvain continued with a cheeky grin, ignoring her question. "Must say I miss our little get-togethers."
"Sylvain," Eve turned to him, crossing her arms, "what in the hell are you talking about?"
"Come on." He chuckled. "You're not getting coy on me now, are you?"
"If you're not going to answer my question, can you at least make yourself useful and help me pick the right lance?" Eve turned back to gesture at the rack of weapons.
"Wait, do you seriously not know what I'm talking about?" Sylvain's grin dropped as he reached out to grab one of the lighter lances that had a longer blade to hand to Eve. "This one'll probably suit you best."
"Thank you." Eve nodded, taking the weapon from him. "And yes, seriously."
"Uh, well." Sylvain scratched the back of his neck, glancing over to where Dimitri was attempting to train with a bow. "Yeesh, I thought he was handling it surprisingly well."
"Sylvain." Eve raised an eyebrow, hoping her threatening tone was enough to indicate that if Sylvain didn't tell her what was going on, he was going to get a face full of training lance.
"Linhardt saw His Highness leaving your quarters early this morning with his hair all messy and his uniform wrinkled." Sylvain offered a somewhat sympathetic frown. "He didn't think anything of it, but I guess he mentioned it to Dorothea off hand and from there it got spread around pretty quick."
"Goddess." Eve sighed, throwing her head back in exasperation. "I almost forgot this is a school and people have nothing better to do than gossip."
"Hey, I mean, it's pretty annoying but at least it's a rumour about you and your future husband." Sylvain shrugged. "Some might say it's unconventional, but it's not like you weren't ever gonna get busy with His Highness."
"We didn't!" Eve hissed, perhaps a bit louder than she had intended, as she snapped her head back up to look at Sylvain. "I didn't mean for it to happen. I just wanted him to take a little rest, but I ended up falling asleep too."
"So…" Sylvain drew out the word, again looking back at where Dimitri was. "Nothing happened?"
"The only thing that happened was I got a major crick in my neck from sleeping sitting up." Eve grimaced.
"Good luck explaining that to Felix." Sylvain let out a low whistle as he looked over to where the aforementioned boy was tearing a training dummy to shreds with an axe. "I thought the training weapons were too dull to actually cut anything."
"I'm guessing he's already caught wind of this rumour?" Eve asked, gently knocking her training lance against Sylvain's wooden sword in an invitation to spar.
"Yeah, and I might have accidentally fed the flames on that one." Sylvain sucked in air through his teeth as he half-heartedly swung at Eve.
"Goddess, Sylvain, what did you do?" Eve blocked his attack and smacked him on the arm lightly with her own weapon.
"Well I kind of forgot about the whole love triangle situation you've got going on and when he brought it up, I said something along the lines of you getting a head start on the baby-making part of your job as Queen." Sylvain laughed sheepishly.
"You what?" Eve didn't hold back on her hit this time, hitting Sylvain's arm with all the force of her anger.
"It was a joke!" Sylvain defended, wincing at the contact. "A bad one, but I didn't mean anything bad by it. I knew His Highness wouldn't lay a finger on you."
"But did you consider that not long ago Felix was convinced I was just throwing myself at any able-bodied male?" Eve hissed as she jabbed at him, though there was considerably less fury behind her attacks now.
"I'm sorry, kitten." Sylvain said and Eve could tell he was genuinely remorseful. "I wasn't thinking about it when I said it. And once he got all upset there was no convincing him otherwise."
"I know, I know." Eve sighed with a shake of her head. "I just have to think about how I'm going to convince him I didn't sleep with Dimitri."
"I mean, technically you did." Sylvain smirked.
"Sylvain." Eve jabbed him in the stomach with the butt end of her lance.
"I know, I know." He smiled when he straightened up from the blow. "Not helping."
"You're his best friend." Eve said as she blocked another swipe from Sylvain. "Tell me how to make this right."
"You think I know?" Sylvain laughed.
"I have this innate ability at making Felix furious with me whenever I try to talk to him." Eve grimaced, thinking back to all the other times she had tried to confront Felix.
"I think that's just what talking to people does to Felix." Sylvain shrugged noncommittally. "Besides, is this really a bad thing if he thinks you slept with His Highness?"
"What do you mean?" Eve asked, stealing a glance over at the prince and then his childhood friend.
"Well, sooner or later you're going to have to break things off with Felix, right?" Sylvain cocked his head to the side. "Why not do it now while he's mad at you anyways than prolong either of your pain?"
"I…" Eve trailed off.
He was right. This could be the perfect time to put a stop to her foolishness. She could lie, tell Felix it wasn't just a rumour and that she and Dimitri had been intimate. She could say she was accepting her role as Dimitri's wife. But she didn't want to lie; not to Felix, not anymore.
"But that's not what you want, is it?" Sylvain asked when Eve paused.
"Does it matter what I want?" Eve laughed bitterly.
"I'm not the person to ask." Sylvain shrugged rather unhelpfully, earning himself a glare from Eve. "Listen, you loved Glenn enough to go against everything you had lived by. You would have even defied Rodrigue for him. So maybe now is the time to consider if you'd do the same for Felix. If you're not ready to shirk your duty for him, is it really fair to keep leading him on?"
Eve was stunned motionless by Sylvain's words, only reanimating when the flat side of his blade whacked into her ribcage. It was true, she had chalked up her selfish behaviour when it came to Felix to her being bound by her duty to Dimitri. She convinced herself she had always been dutiful, but that wasn't true. For Glenn, she had thrown caution to the wind. She had told him who—what—she was and had been prepared to go against Rodrigue's wishes had he not supported their relationship.
"So?" Sylvain raised an eyebrow. He was sneaky, Eve decided, hiding behind a façade of laziness and immaturity when truly he was wiser than he ever let on.
"So, what?" Eve blinked away her thoughts.
"Do you choose Felix or your duty?" Sylvain clarified.
"I don't…" Eve frowned. "I don't know."
"Yeah, sounds about right." Sylvain laughed, his serious expression quickly gone.
"Sylvain!" Eve couldn't help the smile that teased the corners of her mouth. She was grateful for him. He was facetious and childish at times, but beneath that he was truly a caring and attentive person. And the best thing about him was that he didn't want anything from her.
"Come on, kitten, don't make that face." Sylvain winked. "You'll get wrinkles in that pretty little face of yours."
"You're a menace." Eve shook her head lightly. But he was right. She was going to have to decide very soon if she would choose Felix over her duty. And even sooner she was going to have to face Felix and his wrath.
She hadn't intentionally left it until this late. In fact, Eve had wanted to talk to Felix as soon as she had heard about the rumour from Sylvain. But she knew she was still under the watchful eye of Rhea and Seteth; she still had to be careful about being seen alone with anyone other than Dimitri.
And to add onto that, the news about Flayn disappearing was shared with everyone at the beginning of their afternoon lectures. The whole of the Academy was sent into disarray, looking for any clues as to where Flayn could have gone. There wasn't time for Eve to approach Felix when she had been sent to town with Annette and Mercedes to ask if anyone had seen Seteth's little sister.
Come suppertime, Seteth had asked to see her in his office and she hadn't had the chance to eat with everyone else. So it wasn't until now, very late into the night with everyone else long gone to bed, that Eve had the chance to talk to Felix. Luckily, she knew him enough to know that if he was upset, he would still be awake and training.
And sure enough when she pushed open the heavy doors to the training grounds she could see his silhouette training in the moonlight. He moved so gracefully, spinning about as he swung his sword. It was so much like watching a dancer upon the stage, and Eve found herself captivated by him.
"Felix." She called out to him quietly, almost afraid to be heard.
His movements stopped abruptly, and he turned to face her. Even though he was backlit by the moon and his face was nearly impossible to see, Eve could tell he was grimacing. And suddenly, Eve realised she didn't know what to say. She had had all day to figure it out, and yet still she had no clue what to say to him.
"Felix." She repeated his name lamely, clearing her throat and walking towards him.
"What?" He crossed his arms as he watched her approach.
"Can we talk?" Eve asked before casting a glance at the weapon still in his hand. "Without the sword?"
She followed him silently as he walked to return his training sword to its rightful place on the wall. He was quiet, as if he were contemplating something. Eve noted that he didn't necessarily seem as angry as she had expected. He was certainly mad, she could tell that much, but it wasn't the type of fury that she had seen this morning. It was as if he had decided something. And as he turned to her with an unknown determination in his eyes, she found herself somewhat frightened.
His eyes swept up and down her body as if assessing her in the dim light. Suddenly, he stalked towards her. And even though he was shorter than her, however marginally, Eve felt intimidated. She took a small step back, unsure of what exactly Felix was planning to do.
"I'll show you." Felix's voice was nearly a growl.
"Show me what?" Eve asked quietly, noticing that now she was backed up against a pillar. He was being rather unlike himself. She had been prepared for him to yell, argue, be angry with her. She was better equipped for his usual biting commentary than whatever this was.
"That I'm better than the boar."
With that, his lips were on hers. Once again, Eve found herself on the receiving end of a sudden kiss from Felix. And once again, she found herself unable, or unwilling, to push him away.
Just as ever, he was overeager and inexperienced, however Eve found it somewhat endearing. He had one hand on Eve's waist, the other tangled in her hair, as he used his entire body to push her into the pillar behind her. Meanwhile, her own hands found their way up to his face, pulling him closer to her.
"Felix." His name came out as half a sigh when he stopped his onslaught on her lips to trail kisses down her throat.
Her voice wasn't nearly as commanding as she wanted it to be and Eve chastised herself.
"Felix." She tried again more forcefully as he nipped at her collarbone a little too hard. His hand on her waist had been steadily travelling north and was dangerously close to cupping the underside of her breast. "You have to stop."
"I'll make you forget the boar." He growled lowly into her ear.
"Stop this." Finally, Eve grabbed him by the shoulders, pushing him away to hold him at arm's length. "There's nothing to forget, Dimitri and I didn't do anything."
"You expect me to believe that?" He scoffed.
"You really think Dimitri would have had the gall to touch me?" Eve asked back.
"I think that you're very good at getting what you want from people." Felix narrowed his eyes at her.
"Do you think this is what I want?" Eve asked gently.
It was an unfair question to ask, given she herself didn't know what she wanted. But she knew for a fact that she didn't want whatever this was between her and Felix. She didn't want him to be angry, didn't want him to feel like he needed to be forceful to get her attention.
Slowly, Eve cupped Felix's cheek in one hand. She caressed his skin gently as she leaned forward to place a delicate kiss on his nose, his cheekbone, the corner of his mouth. And as she did so she realised this is what she wanted. She wanted peace, just a moment of quiet to be tender with a person she held dear.
"Not everything is a battle, Felix." Eve sighed. "I'm sorry I didn't talk to you sooner. The truth is, I tried to get Dimitri to take a nap and I ended up falling asleep too. That's all that happened. He left once he woke up."
"But it's going to happen eventually." Felix said bitterly, avoiding her eyes.
"What is?" Eve frowned, still caressing Felix's cheek with her thumb.
"Sooner or later the boar will know you carnally." Felix's cheeks flushed crimson. He seemed almost ashamed to Eve, fists balled at his sides. "I don't know what's wrong with me. When I think about it, all I want is for you to think of me whenever he touches you."
"It won't happen for quite some time." Eve said softly. "And I'm sorry, but I can't allow myself to know you in that way either."
"Can't or won't?" Felix sneered.
"Both." Eve sighed. "You're young, Felix. You forget that there are years that separate us."
It was something Eve had considered way back when Rodrigue introduced her to Dimitri. Even only taking her physical age into account, Eve's body was still five years older than Dimitri was when they had met. And though she knew it to be rather arbitrary given her true age, she had vowed to herself not to touch him until he had turned eighteen at least.
"I've forgotten nothing." Felix interjected.
"By the time you're of age, I'll have already married Dimitri." Eve continued. "It's bad enough I allow myself to be like this with you now because I know I'm simply leading you on. Come the Ethereal Moon, I know I will put an end to all this."
"I don't get you." Felix shook his head with a bitter laugh. "You defied orders to tell me the truth about your connection to my family. Then you defied orders again to save me by using your Crest. But you act like your hands are tied when it comes to your wedding."
"I…" Eve bit her lip as she thought of what to say. "There's a lot I can't…won't say. I have my reasons for keeping the truth to myself. I told you the truth and used my Crest to save you not because you're Felix, but because you're Fraldarius."
"What does that mean?" Felix narrowed his eyes, scrutinising her face as if looking for any trace of her lying.
"I did those things because of my duty to House Fraldarius, not because of any feelings I have for you." Eve elaborated. "That is why I can justify those actions to myself. But betraying Dimitri for you would be entirely selfish and completely because I have feelings for you. There'd be no excuse."
Felix seemed to contemplate this for a moment. Eve could tell he was holding back his anger, trying to stay rational rather than lashing out at her. He was clenching and unclenching his fists at his sides as he thought, clearly battling with something internally.
And as he did this, Eve wondered how she had managed to mess everything up so spectacularly. All she had had to do was marry Dimitri and be a good little wife. But that taste of freedom leaving Fraldarius territory had given her was so tantalising. Suddenly, she had started living as a young woman again rather than a servant hidden away from prying eyes. It wasn't that she had been unhappy serving the Fraldarius family, after all it had been her idea. But she had longed for more and coming to Garreg Mach with Dimitri had been that something more for her. She got greedy, though, and now her hubris was hurting those around her.
"Three months." Felix muttered finally.
"What?" Eve snapped out of her thoughts to look at him.
"We have three months until you marry the boar, right?" Felix looked at her with determination.
"That's correct." She nodded, unsure of where he was going with this.
"Then…" He blushed, averting his eyes, as if he had suddenly lost all of the confidence he had started this conversation with. "Let me have you for three months."
"What do you mean?" Eve's brow furrowed in confusion.
"I want… to…" Felix still couldn't meet her eyes, turning redder by the moment. "Are you really going to make me say all this?"
"I at least need you to say enough for me to understand what you're talking about." Eve smiled softly with an exhale.
"You came in here like you wanted to tell me you couldn't talk to me anymore. I really hate having you avoid me." Felix looked at her with herculean effort as if trying to convey his intentions to her solely through his gaze. "You said come the Ethereal Moon you'll have to put an end to whatever is going on between us."
"Yes." Eve nodded in confirmation, still completely confused as to what Felix was saying.
"So, wait until the Ethereal Moon." He said. "Don't… don't cut me off until then."
"Felix, are you sure?" Eve asked, finally understanding. "Even knowing I'll marry Dimitri in the end?"
"Don't get me wrong." Felix shook his head. "I still fully intend to convince you not to marry the boar. But I can't do that if I let you forget what you feel for me."
"You're rather confident." Eve couldn't help but laugh. In the back of her head, though, all her reason was screaming at her not to do this. She was only going to feed her selfish desires even more. And on top of that if they were caught there was no telling the retribution that would come from Rhea.
"I never lose." He replied with determination.
Except to me, Eve couldn't help but think.
"So give me until the Ethereal Moon." Felix reiterated when Eve didn't reply, leaning forward to place a kiss on Eve's lips as if to seal the deal.
She was surprised at how gentle it was given the other kisses they had shared. But the other times he had kissed her had been to plead for her attention. They had all been outbursts, rash action taken in the heat of the moment. But this kiss didn't beg for anything. It was more a promise, a vow not to let her go until the very end. And despite all reason Eve allowed herself to be persuaded.