Author's Notes: At long last, the second part of 'Grima Wins!' This took me a lot more time to write than I had anticipated, largely because of not knowing how to begin and insecurity because I know I suck at battles, but in the end I really wanted to finish this. It's a bit longer than the first part, but knowing you guys I'm sure that's alright!

The Exalt of Destruction- Part 2

Her eyes jolted open and she found herself sitting upright, her consort still firmly asleep next to her. Her breath came slowly and in deep, exaggerated puffs. Assuring herself that at least she was still breathing, she realized that she had woken up from the premonition. Hmm. If that was what fate had in store for her, she wasn't sure she liked it. Despite knowing there was no wound there, she ran her long, slender fingers over her chest as if she expected Naga's damned tooth, Falchion, to stick out of it.

The blasted thing wasn't in the palace, of course. Unlike the Fire Emblem, which was harmless while dormant, Falchion would always be an eyesore and a threat to her. When she had restored her consort –she turned her head sideways to look at his sleeping form lovingly- she had made sure to remove the blade from his grasp and sling it as far across the Table as her weak, human body had allowed her to. For the first time in a while, she wondered what had become of it.

By all means, the Table being reduced to rubble should have left it lost to the world. Her minions guarded the remains, so retrieving the thing would be all but impossible. Not to mention, there were only two people in this era who had ever been able to wield it. One had been Chrom, an adult male descendant of the first human wielder of the blade, and the other had been Morgan, the last remaining male descendant of said human. Both were in her palace, under her control.

So then why did she consistently predict her own downfall as a blue-haired warrior drove the blasted thing through her blackened heart?

Groaning in frustration, she decided that fate would not have its way with her. All-powerful or not, she needed a contingency plan just in case her premonition held a grain of truth. She left her bed, instead heading to what remained of Ylisstol's royal library.

She had packed the bookcases full with books on ancient and dark magic. Tomes that even her mortal father, Validar, would not have dared touch. Some recently written by her worshipers –blessed be their tasty, nutritious souls!-, others older than the continent itself. What she sought was somewhere in between the two extremes, however, and she murmured the title to herself as she ran her fingernail across the spines of the tomes.

Finally, she found it, having to bend over to pull it from its spot on the bottom shelf. The book was dusty and brittle, with very little power remaining within its pages. And yet, what little power it had left was tremendous, and would be even more so in her beautiful hands. Besides, she did not need to cast the spell contained within and use up all remaining power at once. No, once battle erupted she would simply draw out the power in one continuous stream to shield herself.

Falchion could not break a shield crafted by the Dark Pontifex's masterpiece. Chuckling to herself, she raised the tome above her head in a salute to her long-dead, unwitting ally. Still, she would have to study the brittle pages of the tome. It was entirely possible that time was of the essence, after all.

She soon learnt that it was. As she buried herself in the tome once more, weeks later, she found her thoughts interrupted by the infernal creaking of the door to the library. "This had better be urgent, darling," she said, turning in her chair to see her consort standing in the doorway. "Has the girl arrived?" He only nodded. At once, Grima's heart started beating a little faster, and she stood up from her reading table, shutting the ancient tome on it and tucking it under her arm. In passing, she took her consort's with the other. "Well, then… It would be positively rude to not welcome her home."

Darling Lucina was such a dead ringer for her father- although she clearly took her beauty from her mother, she thought as she looked upon the blue-haired girl. She had smiled as she and Chrom had entered the entrance hall, but her smile faded when she saw what Lucina was holding. "That," she said, recollecting herself with a gasp. "Where and when did you get that?!" The girl didn't answer, and her eyes narrowed as she mentally re-experienced the events of her return. "Frederick," she finally said. "I thought I'd killed that miserable sod."

"He always said he would oppose you to his last breath," Lucina said, the tip of Naga's reforged fang firmly pointed at her heart.

A low growl left Grima's throat. "Then he got what he wanted."

Lucina's jaw only clenched in that characteristic way she had inherited from her father, but very little to Grima's surprise, one of her companions jolted into action. "You monster!" he shouted, throwing open a spellbook and gathering power in his free hand. She recognized the boy; the son Frederick had conceived with that bookish wizardess. What was his name, again? Lucina called out that he had to wait, but it was too late- a large plume of fire left his hand as he thrust his palm towards his empress, outright screaming the name of the spell he hurled at her.

Her consort took a few steps back, removing himself from the literal line of fire, and she raised one arm, a thin barrier of black magic growing into life and harmlessly dispersing the fire, splitting the plume off to arc around her on either side. When it died down, she lowered her arm, enjoying the gasps of terror her unblemished form provoked from Lucina's little band of warriors. "That's adorable," she said, baring her fangs in a grin. "My turn." She strode forwards, closing the distance between herself and the boy in a few steps, and reached out with her free hand, much faster than the human eye could follow.

Before any of the children realized what was happening, the boy was dead on the ground, his heart clenched in Grima's outstretched claw as she held her tome against her side. "Is there anyone else who would like to try?" They just looked in horror, even Lucina needing a moment to swallow and clutch her sword. "No? Very well, then. Sweetie, please show them out."

"Yes, Mother." Morgan's voice echoed from behind the band, which turned around in shock at Grima's little tactician and his squad of Risen cutting off their escape. They gathered their wits eventually, but far too late, as she felt Morgan's magic surging through their ranks and heard the satisfying sounds of arrows, axes, and blades biting into flesh. They would not last long.

Grima watched for a moment, but soon turned to her consort. "Darling, would you-" as she turned, she was faced not with her consort but with her daughter, who had launched herself at her. "Oh dear." The brightly gleaming blade of Falchion came towards her quickly enough that a Risen would have to be concerned, but she was much, much faster than her servants, both in body and in mind. She called the shield to life once more, using her hand to catch the blade before it would land on her.

"Now, Lucina," she said, her voice starting to lower to a rumble once more, "I know we've raised you better than to take a sword to your own mother."

"You are not my mother," the girl said, her voice rife with fire and rage. "You killed my mother and twisted her body!" She grabbed the hilt of the sword with two hands, futilely trying to push it through the shield with brute force.

"Lucina… Urgh." Frustrated, she flicked the sword away from her, the sudden lack of resistance causing Lucina to fall towards the floor. "Must you be so stubborn? Your father was like that, too. Speaking of, darling, if you're done watching our daughter's tantrum, I would appreciate a little help." Lucina whirled around in surprise, having been so utterly focused on Grima that she hadn't noticed her father's presence.

"Fa… Father..?" she asked, taken aback. For the first time, Grima saw the sword shake in her hand. Hmmm. Interesting. Clearly, she had known that Morgan was with Grima, but no one had bothered to tell her Chrom had been, too. Although to be fair, she thought to herself and she chuckled, unlike Morgan, Chrom left no survivors when he was sent out. Her musings were interrupted when the girl turned to her again, this time hysterical. "What have you done to my father?!"

"Oh, sweetie, didn't you know?" she placed her hand on her face as if shocked. "I needed his life force to become whole! And I couldn't very well just leave him there, could I?" She smiled. "So I brought him home with me and restored him. And if you don't see reason, I'll have to do the same with you."

That set Lucina off, and she charged at her mother again with the sword raised high, light radiating off it. Grima would deny it later, but that light scared her- it was antithesis to everything she was, understood, and dominated, and quite possibly the only reason that Falchion was such a threat to her. Fortunately, when she took a step back, her consort placed himself between mother and daughter, catching Falchion's blade on his own and pushing it off to his side, before turning his sword around in his hands and ramming the hilt into Lucina's ribs with all the force he could muster.

Considering he was no longer human, and judging from the cracking sound that followed the impact, that was enough force to break at least a few of them and knock all the air out of her lungs. Oh, well. There was no damage he could do to the girl's body that she couldn't repair, given enough time. She collapsed to the ground, dropping her sword and clutching her chest. "Fa… ther…" she gasped, only able to look on in defeat as his foot nudged her sword far out of her reach.

With Lucina now harmless, Grima put her tome away and walked over, just as Chrom stroked the girls face. He wasn't happy about having had to hurt her. "It's alright, darling," she told him. "She'll be fine soon. Would you be a dear and help her up?" He did as she asked, putting one arm under Lucina's armpits and effortlessly lifting her from the ground. His grip was firm, so even if she had wanted to struggle and break from his embrace, she wouldn't have been able to. Grima had the sneaking suspicion she knew she'd lost; judging from the fact Morgan had stopped casting spells and bellowing orders behind them, her companions were dead, and the sight of her father seemed to have destroyed her will to fight.

"Poor dear," the empress cooed, gently putting a hand on her shoulder and patting her. "It'll all be over soon, I promise." With that, she placed her hand over where she knew Lucina's heart to be located, casting a single powerful spell to put a stop to it over the span of less than a second. As she went limp in her father's arms, Grima sighed. Such a shame the poor thing wouldn't see reason, she thought, as she turned around to compliment Morgan on a job well done.

At least she had been much stronger this time, and hadn't needed to ravage Lucina's body nearly as much as she'd had her father. Restoring her was a simple task and required little effort; removing Naga's brand in the girl's eye was by far the most taxing aspect of the whole process, especially without ruining the rest of the eye or robbing her of her sight. She'd learnt from the process with Chrom.

Still, it was testament to the girl's own strength that Grima looked up from her tome a mere week after beginning to restore her, to see her in the doorway to the throne room. Body once more intact, her beauty almost otherworldly, and her eyes glowing with the same power she had given Chrom. "Sweetheart!" she said, shutting her tome but not getting up, instead letting Lucina walk to her. Her gait was normal, she didn't limp like Grima had initially suspected she might. "I didn't think you'd be up yet! How are you feeling?"

"I'm alright," she said, her voice stable. Good, that meant it hadn't been damaged like Chrom's. She really was learning. "Mother, I wanted to apologise… For the way I've behaved."

"Oh, sweetheart…" She stood up from her throne, walking over to Lucina and capturing her in an embrace. "Don't you worry about that. We all have lapses in our judgment. What matters is that you're with us NOW."

With Lucina now by their side, they had completely squashed all traces of resistance and completely conquered Ylisse. Together, they could conquer the world… and if Grima had a say in it, they would. There would be no trace of the foolish, judgmental insects that were humans.

No one would break her beloved family up again.

Additional Author's Notes: I know I'm not supposed to say this about my own writing, but I love this Grima. She was really fun to write because she's so -different- from any other character I've tackled, even from the plans I have with Nergal. Kind of a shame I won't be able to use her again in other fics.