Fire Emblem is the property of Intelligent Systems and Nintendo. I merely borrow what others have labored to create.
Please, for the love of all that is good in fanfiction, WRITE A REVIEW!!! Even better, make it thoughtful and specific as to why you think as you do. I solemnly swear by Athos' beard that I will reply to any signed reviews given. Claus: I reserve the right to base the thoughtfulness of my response on that of the review.
Have you ever asked yourself the question of what might have been? This is a game I play with myself sometimes. It is good a way to occupy your mind when you're too sick to get out of bed or wandering in Sacae's endless plains. And yet, the more I try to imagine, "What if…" the more I realize that there are some things which are too important to us to imagine them happening any differently. Sometimes it's very possible that they could have happened different, perhaps they really should have happened differently. But they do not; they remain the same.
I'm having trouble sleeping tonight. While I lie next to my husband, making small talk, he tells me that he loves me. Or, he meant to say that he loved me, but instead it came out, "I…luff'…'ou, Iyn, aaaaahhmm." Poor man. He's so tired he can hardly think without yawning. I have no sympathy for him.
"Oh, well, I'm glad to hear it," I reply, smiling at him, my beloved husband of so many years. I sometimes have wistful moods and this is one of those times. "I can't believe our daughter is almost seventeen. Father Sky, she's already being courted!"
He smiles at me without even opening his eyes and says, "She's just like you Lyn. I swear, half the men in Elibe must be pursuing her hand," his smile suddenly changes to a wicked grin, "And the other half must have died from sheer terror when they realized that they had to go through you first." This remark only earns him a small bruise on his shoulder.
"It's not my fault that I must act the father in your place with these boys! If I weren't here, she would've been married off at least a half dozen times."
This seems to amuse him since he gives a dramatic sigh, "Ah my dear wife, you're even more man than I am!" That almost earned him another bruise, but he preempts me by rolling over to give me a lingering kiss. I graciously decide to spare him and allow him to continue to kiss me. I even help a little.
He doesn't finish until many long moments later. Finally, we release one another and he returns to his spot. It wasn't long before he was almost asleep.
Hoping to continue our conversation a little longer I ask, "Hmm, what would I do without you?"
Rather than the sarcastic reply I expect, he surprises me with an unexpectedly thoughtful answer, "I really don't know Lyn. I'm sure you would've gotten along just fine, but I honestly can't imagine how I ever lived without you." Another long yawn, "Why just think: you're the one who really started it all. If you hadn't saved a certain, poor tactician then none of this would ever have happened."
After giving his final remark, he was soon fast asleep, leaving me alone with my thoughts. For what seems like an eternity, I lie awake with my eyes closed, trying to go to sleep, but to no use. Eventually I give up and went outside for a walk.
As I walk through the summer night, awash in the light of the full moon, my mind wanders through all the years of my life: my childhood, being the Lady of Caelin, the war against Nergal and the long years afterwards. There's much I think about, but I keep returning to my husband's reply and the question it causes: how would my world be different if I had made only a single different decision?
I found that I simply couldn't answer it. I knew only what I was now and to be anything else would be idle speculation. I could only remember…
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He was cold. We were in Sacae, in the middle of a blazing summer. There's no way he should've been chill to the touch.
I worriedly pulled my hand from the unknown man's ashen forehead. It had nearly been two days since I had found his unconscious body. He had been lying near a massive outcropping of rock that served as rendezvous and waypoint for plainsmen and traders alike. I had been camping a few minutes away when I had seen the smoke and rode to investigate. All the area around him had been scorched, forming a black scar on the infinite sea of green.
Lying next to him had been his only possession: a large cane of black wood, unadorned save for two diagonal slashes on opposing sides, forming what I assumed was a grip.
The strange man had had no obvious wounds, yet it in the passing days he barely breathed and never responded to either voice or touch. He consumed no water except what I had been able to force down him and I was worried about dehydration.
I wore circles in the small dirt floor of the hut, thinking aloud as I ran through my limited options, "If only I was nearer to Bulgar I could ride and retrieve a healer…but we're too far for me to simply leave him. If he doesn't improve I'll have to put him on my horse and walk beside him." The idea didn't appeal to me. Bandits were known to roam the area around Bulgar, preying on merchants and other travelers. I could avoid them easily enough on my own, but not with him slowing me down.
Thoroughly frustrated, I resigned myself to staying by his side for at least another day. I was in no danger of going hungry because of the plentiful game and the hut served as an adequate shelter for the winds. The thing was, I had no medicine with which to treat the stranger besides a few vulenaries and these did not seem to help. I could only pace or if I became tired of pacing, sit and stare at my unconscious companion.
He certainly was a strange one. When I first found him, I'd been too concerned with looking for outward injuries notice anything peculiar about him and then I was distracted by transporting him back to my hut, not very easy when he weighed about as much as I did and he was as limp as a boned fish. But when I finally found some time to sit down, I couldn't help but stare at him. Lying almost naked on my small cot with nothing, but a small undergarment to cover him, he was undoubtedly striking, perhaps even attractive in an exotic way.
His skin was darker than anyone's I had ever seen. The people of Sacae are well known for their bronzed skin, a result of lives spent in the open sun, but this man was different. His skin seemed to be naturally darker than anyone I've heard of in Elibe. It was not black, rather it was closer to a tone you might see in the sand and soil of the earth. His features were extremely lean, all sharpness and angles, as if the rock and sand he seemed to have sprang from had stripped all that was soft from him. Every muscle, every bone stood out in sharp relief.
His hands especially showed his starvation. His fingers were longer than normal and almost skeletally thin, like the claws on some strange bird. Blue veins crisscrossed like faint rivers under their tops. I probably had been watching him for too long, but I could not keep my eyes off his hands. They were disturbing for some reason I couldn't put my finger on.
What intrigued me most, however, was his face. His cheekbones were high and prominent. A broad face, quickly narrowing into an unusually sharp chin and nose completed the stranger's foreign look. He had a patrician look about him, an appearance that was only complimented by the soft, raven hair that hung to his neck.
Striking yes, but the more I looked at him the more something seemed…off. It was hard to tell his age: he looked early to mid-thirties, but the man's thin lips were framed on all sides by a wildly uneven moustache and beard, giving him an older, feral look. Hollow cheeks testified to many long days spent on miserly rations and belied his other, more cultured features.
That's how I passed the days. I woke up early to eat a light breakfast and check on my mysterious guest. If it was necessary, I hunted. Otherwise, I continued my watch over him with only the occasional interruption to eat or sleep. I couldn't keep it up it up forever though.
When the sky reddened in the third morning since our meeting and no perceptible change had come over the man, I grew even more concerned over his condition. I decided to risk the trip for Bulgar and resolved to set off the next day at first light. That gave him one more day to wake up before I had attempt hauling his unconscious self around like corpse and it would keep me from having to rush preparations. Besides, I was too used to being on the move and I was almost ready to go insane from being confined inside for so long. I suddenly had an inexplicable feeling of resentment against the man, as if he were purposefully keeping me here against my will.
"Looks like we're going to be footing it," I quipped to the still sleeping man, trying to allay my frayed nerves with sarcasm, "well, I'm going to be anyway. You're just going to be riding on my horse." I got up from where I had been sitting and went outside, intending to bring some fire wood with us for the journey. Fuel of any size is quite rare on the plains. Long grass and shrubs or the waste of man and beast are the most common means of fire. Wood is only for dire emergencies. However, it is custom in Sacaen dwellings to always have enough wood and kindling for one fire, even in the summer, since you never know when you will need to quickly get a blaze. It wasn't long before I was walking back in, my arms full of long sticks well suited to burning.
"I hope you don't plan on sleeping much longer because," I never got to finish. As pushed through the twin fur pelts covering the doorway, I looked up to see a pair of pale blue eyes staring dispassionately at me.
I stopped dead in my tracks. Whatever I had been planning on saying escaped me entirely. All I could do was stare back helplessly at the horrible eyes that held me captive. It was as if a man who had lost both of his eyes was staring directly at you, a man who had had both of his replaced by replicas; perfect in every detail, but never alive.
"Where am I girl?" Dead, his voice was as dead as his eyes.
"My…my hunting hut," I replied automatically. I felt like a doll that a small child plays with, limp and easily forced into whatever poses were desired.
"And how long have I been unconscious?" Completely monotone, no inflection.
"Nearly three days. I was almost ready to leave and take you to Bulgar."
"Bulgar…that is a city?"
"Yes." In my mind I felt as if those long, skeletal fingers were being raked through thoughts.
"You've been caring for me then?"
"Yes," I replied.
"I see." He seemed to lose interest in me, his eyes lost in introspection up near some distant point on the ceiling. His weariness seemed to retake him then. Those terrible eyes closed again and then, drawing a ragged breath, he seemed to deflate in front of me. As soon as his gaze left me I felt as if an immense weight had been lifted. I suddenly realized that I was no longer holding any of the wood. It was scattered about my feet. For a long moment I stood there without knowing what to do, the kindling still strewn about my feet.
After several moments I worked up enough courage to walk over to the cot. I was about to ask him if he was feeling any better when his eyes unexpectedly snapped back open. The seeming transformation is cause was frightening. With his eyes closed, I had allowed myself to think of him as almost normal. Now, he was disturbingly frightening again, perhaps even more so because his voice had unexpectedly changed.
"I am still alive…so she must not have been bluffing when she withdrew from my defense." No longer cold and emotionless, it had become a sibilant whisper, almost mocking in tone and laced with menace. I could only be thankful it didn't seem directed at me.
"Then the next move is mine…and yet…what to do? If I truly injured her as much as much as I believe, the Hag will have withdrawn to her lair. It could be years…" His thoughts seemed to trail off. For a moment, he simply stared off into oblivion and then the murderous spirit that he seemed possessed of left as suddenly as it had arrived. He now seemed simply weary, the old weakness and frailty returning.
I suddenly found myself at the end of his gaze again, except it was no longer threatening. He simply looked utterly tired.
"I owe you my life…what is your name?"
I was so startled by his question that I could only stare stupidly at him for several seconds. However, he simply remained silent. A small ghost of a smile somehow crept onto his face.
"I…my name is Lyn…of…of the Lorca tribe." I suddenly felt some of my courage return to me. Who was this man, this stranger who was interrogating me within my own shelter? Had I not taken care of him for two whole days?
"So, what is your name?" My tone sounded insolent, even to my ears, and I was sorry as soon as I said it. I could only set my mouth in a firm line and wait for the sudden change. The changeover came, but it was not the murderer who came to his face. Instead I was given a leering smile that did not quite reach those puppet eyes.
He surprised me again by laughing: a quiet, halting chuckle that came only from his upper throat and not from his chest; not true laughter. After he trailed off, he once again gave me that chilling stare before giving his reply,
"I think…that it is entirely too early for me to be giving you my true name." His lips curled into another smile that didn't reach beyond his mouth.
He gazed at me for a long moment and then, with no apparent reason, his face melted back into its original deadpan. The changes that came over him were almost too swift to follow. "It's like watching a signal mirror," I thought, "Flashes 'on' one second and 'off' the next." Then he spoke again in a clear voice, though he still sounded quite weak, "For the time being, you may simply call me Mark."
"Mark?" The name seemed so out of place with him that I simply stared dumbly at him again. My feelings must have been obvious as he allowed himself another "almost" smile. It seemed to be more genuine then before, but that might have also been wishful thinking on my part. "Mother Earth," I thought, by now completely bewildered, "what kind of man is this?"
"It is a common enough name, yes?"
"Yes…" I didn't want to say more than necessary and risk offending him.
"What is wrong?"
"Uhmm, nothing. Nothing's wrong." That was a blatant lie
He seemed not to notice or perhaps he simply didn't care.
"Then Lyn of Lorca, I suggest we wait at least one more day before leaving. I am quite weak and I do not think I will be able to make it tomorrow."
It was my turn to give a penetrating stare. Waiting another day certainly made sense, but I was reluctant to delay, not to mention I was suspicious of him. But, when I couldn't think of any sinister motives beyond simple weakness, I agreed. Besides, more arguments would only put both of us in a bad mood.
"Sounds good, but I still say we should leave tomorrow if possible. If you're too tired, fine, but if not, we'll have a decent start before nightfall." I waited to see if he would argue, but he surprisingly, he did not.
"That is a fine plan. Now, if you will excuse me, I will be going back to sleep. This conversation has severely taxed my strength." He began to settle down, but paused to add one final thought. "I will still be a burden, but if we at least wait until late noon, I will be able to provide some small help."
Having said his piece, he laid his head back down and was out faster than a snuffed candle.
"Uh..." For the fourth time in as many minutes, I was left staring stupidly at him, completely at a loss as to what had just taken place and to what I should do. I didn't have anything better to do so I simply continued preparing for our trip in case "Mark" was ready to leave the next day.
My hands did their work on the numerous water proof wrappings necessary to pack the food needed for our journey. As a nomad, especially as an orphaned nomad, I know the routine so well that I could do it in my sleep. As I rolled extra blankets and padding for sleeping, I tried to mentally sort out what had just happened.
Although the man appeared helpless, I didn't feel secure. The horror of talking directly to him faded quickly to a simple wariness, but that fact that I had been horrified confused me as much as anything else. After all, I was a healthy, trained warrior of Sacae and he was frail and bed ridden. What did I have to be afraid of?
I thought of the fear I had felt. It all came from him looking at me. Remembering him staring at me brought no notable reactions, in fact, I couldn't figure out what had been so scary. I simply knew that I had been scared, but as to why, or even what it had really felt like was already lost to me. I almost would have sworn it off to daydreaming.
"Why am I afraid?" I wondered. "I've seen my home destroyed, my parents massacred, and I'm no stranger to fighting. I'm no soft city-dweller. I'm a tribeswoman of Sacae!"
By the time I had finished preparations, the sun had set and I had decided that I would stick to the original plan. I would not flee my own home and leave the weakened stranger at the mercy of the elements. It would be dishonorable and I valued my pride and honor as a nomad of the plains more than any possession I had.
"It's settled then," I thought, "I head for Bulgar tomorrow morning and I won't be going alone." I allowed myself to look back at my sleeping guest. "I'll just be sure to keep my sword close by."
Red Notes
1) I had a lot of fun writing this chapter. It was tough at times…my "backspace" certainly saw a lot of use, but overall, it was definitely worth it. If I had to judge, I would say this is the best chapter out of the whole work, at least from a technical stand-point. Everything just sort of meshed…the daily life of a nomad, Mark's unusual physicality and personality, the underlying tension of the unknown., etc.
2) Lyn was actually the more difficult of the two to portray in this chapter. I knew I wanted Mark to be cold and menacing, but Lyn had to appear vulnerable, while still containing the spirit of the Lyn shown in the game.