Lucina found herself increasingly nervous as the day of her husband's expected return approached, and as usual she found herself in the training grounds more and more. At first most people paid it no mind, but as the weeks went on her family began to grow concerned.
Morgan had finally had an opportunity to sit down and have lunch with her mother. It had taken some convincing, but Lucina was able to pry herself from her routine to spend an hour or so with her daughter. Morgan was really excited to get the older blunette's opinion of her cooking, which she had started with her grandma. The aspiring tactician thought that she really was getting the hang of the basics and wanted to show off, in addition to spending time with her mom of course.
"Dig in Mom! You're gonna love it."
Lucina looked down at the food her daughter had prepared, it was a humble meal of baked chicken and broccoli. Nice and healthy for keeping in shape. Lucina noticed that Morgan was waiting in anticipation and took a bite, her expression lighting up as she tasted her food.
"This is great Morgan, what did you do to make it taste like this?"
"The chicken was Grandma's recipe, and Mr. Gregor showed me that just a little bit of seasoning for the broccoli can go a long way during mess hall duty. I'm glad you like it." Morgan said with a smile.
The expression warmed Lucina's heart, that her daughter could be so happy over such a simple thing made all the fighting worth it. This mood continued for most of lunch until Morgan suddenly asked
"So what do you want to do after? Is there anything neat you've been doing that you'd like to show me?"
Lucina coughed on her drink as she heard Morgan question, she hadn't thought that far yet. They could spar, but surely her daughter wanted to do something more relaxing than that. She had to think of something else.
"We could… practice some swordplay if you'd like?" The princess sheepishly asked "I know you use lances as a dark flier, but you started out with swords. Maybe you'd like to brush up on your skills?"
"Oh. Yeah we could do that, Maybe we could finally see if I can use Parallel Falchion."
Lucina was glad to see that she hadn't ruined the mood, even managing to look past Morgan's silly name for her family heirloom.
The two time travelers made their way down to the training hall after finishing their lunch. During the walk Morgan had been uncharacteristically silent, but otherwise she seemed fine. As they entered the room, Lucina grabbed a pair of wooden swords and handed one to Morgan.
"Mooooom, do we have to use these?" Morgan sighed "I know my way around a sword already, I wanna see if I can use your Falchion."
"You need to brush up on your basics first Morgan." her mother countered. "Remember, Falchion is not a toy, or even just another weapon. This is that all remains of our heritage from my world. From the Hero-King Marth all the way up until my father" she continued. "It commands respect, no matter the circumstance it is used. You do want it to choose you as one of its wielders, right?"
Morgan had no wise retort to this, she knew that her mother never mentioned her original father lightly. Lucina watched her daughter take her practice sword and assume her stance in front of a training dummy.
'Its sloppy' Lucina thought as Morgan began to swing her blade. The arc of her swing was wide and she wasn't performing any finishing moves. She continued for about thirty seconds before her mother stepped in.
"You're giving your opponent too much time to react, and even if you fix that you won't be able to disarm or defeat them with those attacks." the older blunette lectured.
"I'm sorry," her daughter replied. "It's been so long since I fought without a mount or using a sword, but my style is different from most. I usually chain attacks from my tomes the way father would."
"Your father always drilled the basics before working on his own style, if you don't know the fundamentals any technique you use won't last long in actual combat." Lucina replied in a harsher tone than she meant.
Morgan flinched at the remark, she looked down with a sad look and Lucina knew she had made a mistake. Of course she would ruin an otherwise pleasant afternoon with her miracle of a daughter. She had to try and salvage this. Lucina put her hand on Morgan's shoulder and waited for her daughter to look up at her.
"I'm sorry I raised my voice Morgan, I just worry about you. If anything happened to you before your father returns I don't know how I would be able to face him."
Morgan raised her head and gave a weak smile.
"I know, let's just forget this stuff and carry on with our day. I can show you some of the books Grandma's been showing me." she suggested. At this point Lucina would have done anything to make Morgan smile again.
"Sounds good to me. I'll put these swords away and we'll head to the library." Lucina replied. As she laid the swords back where she found them she couldn't help but feel that she had botched a perfectly fine day with her daughter.
"How have you been, Lucina? I haven't seen you too much outside when we eat together."
Lucina had just left her room and was on her way to meet up with Cynthia and Severa when she ran into her mother.
"I wanted to see how Severa's training has been so far, do you need me elsewhere Mother?" the princess replied.
"I wanted to see if you'd like to give baking another try, I had a section of the kitchen cleared for just the two of us so we could have some one on one time together."
Lucina couldn't help but flinch at the suggestion. She still remembered what happened the last time she tried baking, the last thing the blunette wanted to do was waste even more of her mother's time and the castle's resources. Yet at the same time, her mother took the time out of not only her day, but the castle staff's as well. Lucina couldn't let that be for nothing, so she tried to meet the queen halfway.
"I'm not sure if I should try baking again so soon, but I'd love to see you give a demonstration. I'll just need to let Cynthia know we'll have to reschedule first." said Lucina, as she began to take her leave.
"I already sent a message to your sister, so we can go right away." her mother was quick to respond.
'She must really want to bake today.' Lucina thought to herself. "Glad to hear, let's go mother."
When the two of them arrived Lucina found that the room was completely devoid of everyone else but her and her mother. It was strange seeing the usually bustling atmosphere of the castle's kitchen replaced with dead air. It wasn't even like this when they were with Morgan. Lucina began to speak as Sumia began putting her apron on.
"Where is everyone mother? I've never seen the kitchen this empty. Is there a holiday I forgot about?"
"Don't worry sweetie, it's nothing like that. I just wanted to have a talk, just you and me." her mother calmly replied.
Lucina wasn't sure why her mother wanted to talk, but went along with it. Maybe this could be a nice chance to have some time alone with her.
"How have things been, Mother? Morgan tells me she's been learning to cook as well as bake from you. The lunch she made the other day was amazing." the princess began.
As Sumia finished tying her hair back she replied "Yes, your daughter has been quite the fast learner. She has her father's wit and her mother's determination." Lucina couldn't help but feel a pang of sadness at the mention of her husband. "That girl will be able to do anything she puts her mind to. We were both hoping you'd be willing to join us again sometime. Does that sound like something you would be interested in, sweetie?"
"I'm not sure if I have the culinary skills necessary to cook or bake, and besides. I'm happy sticking with what I know. Even if there's peace we'll always need to be ready for lesser threats like bandits." the slightly younger woman said. Sumia paused as she began rolling a wad of dough.
"Lucina, you need to have some interest outside of swordplay. Just look at your father, even though he's the Exalt he manages to find time for his… fantasy arena league." Sumia sighed, shaking her head as she finished talking.
As much as Lucina wanted to inquire about whatever that thing her mother mentioned was, she knew that would be missing the point. The young princess was a bit oblivious in picking things up, but even she could see that her mother was concerned with her. It made everything she did today make much more sense. Lucina was happy to see her mother care so much about her, but everything was fine.
"I know, and I'll get there soon. I'm just still adjusting to this new life, I'm sure in a month or two I'll have things figured out by then." Lucina replied.
"In a month or two when Robin is back?" her mother bluntly countered, completely abandoning her dough as she gave her daughter her full attention. "Lucina, we all miss him, but it's not healthy to be so dependent on your partner. We don't even know if he'll have returned by then. In the meantime you need too-"
"But he will come back! Robin's bonds with us all are strong enough to keep him in this world!" Lucina yelled, interrupting her mother.
The two just stood in silence for a moment after that. Lucina had never raised her voice at either of her parents before. This was uncharted territory for the princess. Lucina couldn't bear to look her mother in the eye. The queen on the other hand had dealt with this world's Lucina in her terrible twos already, she knew a thing or two about an angry daughter. Sumia slowly approached her daughter and began to speak.
"Lucina, this is a very hard thing for anyone to have to deal with. It's hard enough losing a partner, it must be even worse not knowing if they're really gone or not. I'm not saying that you have to give up hope of ever seeing Robin again, but you need to accept that he might not be coming back and live the best life you can regardless."
Lucina was beginning to tear up. She couldn't imagine her life without Robin, even now. She just felt like she was waiting for him to come back like he promised all those months ago in the bathrealm. This didn't change things with her mother though, she yelled at her when all she was doing was trying to help her. Lucina felt awful and didn't know what to do next.
Lucina started to get up, but her mother pulled her in for a tight hug. Lucina just hugged back even though she didn't think she deserved it. By the time she was able to make eye contact with her mother she was crying.
"I'm not mad at you sweetie, I just want you to be happy. I can't think of anyone who deserves that more than my two girls or my granddaughter." Sumia reassured her daughter. "Just promise me you'll be happy."
Lucina wasn't sure how she could do that without Robin, but she figured if it came to that she would try.
"I'll try mother." Lucina sniffled.
"Ok, do you want to stay and watch me finish this recipe or do you want some time alone?"
"I think I'll head back to my room for now, thank you for being yourself Mother."
And with that Lucina left the kitchen. As she made her way down the castle halls she was thinking about what her mother said. How was she supposed to be happy without her husband? While on the topic of Robin she remembered that it was almost a week until the anniversary of the day he joined the Shepherds.
'He'll be back soon, and then I won't have to worry about being happy without him.' She thought to herself 'Everything will be fine.'
It was late, but all Lucina could do was lie in bed. Tomorrow was the day Robin was expected to return, everything pointed towards it. He first appeared to the Shepherds there three years ago tomorrow, it made sense he would reappear in the same fashion he started his journey with Chrom and the others. She had no clue how long she had been laying there trying to sleep, an hour, more?
The alternate princess' thoughts raced with her husband and everything leading up to their battle against Grima. The way she recklessly jumped to conclusions about what needed to be done, and how that must have affected him after learning about his role in Validar's twisted destiny. Robin was never the same after that day. He acted like his normal self around the others, but Lucina saw through his facade. When they were alone she did all she could to reassure him that he was his own man, his supposed fate be damned. Robin was always too hard on himself however, and she knew once he heard Naga say laying down his life was the only way to end Grima's he'd gladly pay that price.
Was it her mission that gave him the final push to make that decision? Telling him that she would put it before her feelings was the worst mistake she could ever have made. In the end it wasn't even true, she couldn't go through her plan to kill him. The way he offered his life for her duty was too much for her heart to bear. Robin was perfect, and she threw him away. Lucina hadn't thought of it that way yet, but maybe she did kill him that day. No, she couldn't afford to think of it like that. Robin WAS coming back, and tomorrow would be the day he did.
The blunette kept running through a mixture of these thoughts over and over again, until a voice from outside told her to get up and join them for the search.
Everyone was getting ready. That morning had been a blur to Lucina, she had barely registered anyone else as she got herself together. A mixture of voices blended together in the background as she made her way to her father. Chrom had found him lying in that field the first time, so she was staying right by his side until he led her there. She was so focused in fact, that she failed to notice a voice calling out to her.
"You excited Mom? We're gonna see Dad again!"
Lucina kept walking, unaware of her daughter calling out to her. Last night's thoughts still weighed heavy on her conscience, what if he didn't come back today? What would she do? The princess never really thought about that before, and now that the day was finally here she was starting to panic. She was so wrapped up in her worries she almost bumped right into her father.
"Lucina! You nearly knocked me over. Is everything alright?" asked Chrom.
"I'm fine, just tired Father. I had a hard time sleeping last night." his daughter replied.
Chrom just looked at her for a moment before getting distracted by the other blue haired descendant of his, the one that still makes him feel much older than he is.
"Mom, Grandpa, you guys ready?" Morgan asked, practically bouncing up and down where she stood.
"Morgan, please try not to call me that. It's getting hard for me to believe that I'm still only twenty-three." Chrom said to her.
"But Grandma Sumia loves it when I call her grandma, why can't I call you grandpa, Grandpa?" his wisecracking granddaughter replied.
"Morgan, Father will get enough of a hard time from your father when returns, try not to wear him out before then." Lucina said, trying to defuse the situation.
"We might not find him this time you two, just want to make sure you're prepared for that outcome." Chrom said, seriously.
Lucina and Morgan nodded quietly, Lucina in particular tensed at that thought. They would find him today. They WOULD find him today.
It had been a few hours out on the road, Lucina stayed close to her father's horse while Morgan flew above them on her pegasus. None of them had said a word for the duration of the journey so far. The other Shepherds with them were Lissa, Frederick, and Owain, the others had gone off in other groups. Frederick already had his hands full when it was just Lissa he had to keep in check, but adding Owain to the mix was giving the poor knight a run for his money. Ordinarily Lucina would try to keep her cousin from causing too much trouble, but she was busy trying her best to stay awake.
'We're almost there, can't fall asleep now.' She thought to herself.
The princess could barely keep her thoughts together, so many different emotions for each scenario. She tried to keep the negative thoughts out but they always crept back in. She just had to settle for telling herself over and over that Robin would be there, but each time she felt less sure that he would. What was she even basing this on anymore? An arbitrary date and a sliver of hope, nothing more.
"Lucina…"
A voice roused her from her thoughts. Her father was giving her a pained look, glancing around she saw Frederick and Lissa wearing a similar expression.
"What is it? What's wrong!?" Lucina yelled.
"I'm sorry Lucina, Robin's not here." was all Chrom could say.
"Are you sure this is the right spot? How is it any different from the rest of these fields?" Morgan interjected.
"The engraving on that stone we just passed, we placed it there at his majesty's request on our first expedition looking for Robin. It was meant to serve as both a marker and a memorial for Robin." Frederick explained.
Lucina fell to her knees, this was happening. Robin wasn't here. Lissa and Owain rushed to her while Morgan began to tear up. As Owain grabbed her hand and Lissa pulled a healing staff into view, Lucina came to her senses.
"Dearest cousin, now is not the time to fall into-"
"Let me go Owain! And I don't need a healer!" Lucina yelled.
The future princess staggered to her feet as her aunt and cousin recoiled from her shout. Ordinarily she would be embarrassed over making a scene like that, but she couldn't be bothered to think and act rationally now. Robin wasn't here, and he probably wasn't ever coming back. Somewhere in the midst of her raw emotion, Lucina knew she needed to be there for her daughter. The poor girl was probably just as devastated as she was. As she turned to face her daughter, Lucina noticed smoke coming from the horizon.
"Aunt Lissa! Stay with Morgan, she's in no condition to fight!" Lucina ordered.
"Fight? Lucina what are you…" Chrom trailed off as he noticed what his daughter was talking about. "Frederick, Owain, get ready to move! Southtown needs our help!"
As the others got ready to move, Lucina was already on her way. She didn't know what she was going to do about Robin, but she would always know her way around a battlefield.