198DISCLAIMER: I do not own any of the characters, places or anything else; they remain property of Nintendo and Intelligent Systems. This is a work of fanfiction and love: please don't sue me. Wait, I think I own the OCs… nah, screw it; Nintendo can have 'em if they really want.
Okay, let's try this again…
Welcome, one and all to the sequel to Invisible Ties! Yes, this is a continuation of the story I started with Invisible Ties. Go read that first.
This story, Fire Emblem Awakening: Future's End is a sequel to my earlier work Invisible Ties and the canon I established within that story's continuity. So this story, too, can be considered AU. Like any good author I've striven to make this a stand-alone story; you don't have to have read Invisible Ties to understand this story, but it will definitely help. I urge you to go read Invisible Ties regardless, though. Read it. If you've already read it, read it again.
Now that I've added OCs to the mix, I also feel it necessary to point out that any and all resemblance that the OC characters or locations bear to any people, alive or dead, is strictly coincidental. I've used a random name generator for the ones I've come up with, so it's entirely out of my hands.
Updates to this story when they happen. I genuinely don't intend for this story to run as long as IT did; for Naga's sake, that story is worth three or four novels and took more than a year to write! Any thoughts, queries, concerns, don't hesitate to PM me. Any kind words or constructive criticism, go right on ahead and post a review.
And most importantly, enjoy the ride. Again. Nagaspeed, good readers!
metallover – 2014/15
Prologue
The city of Chon'sin on the Western continent of Valm was a strange place to the residents of the Eastern Kingdoms. Many differing customs and a totally different and alien language made for difficulties in travel and trade between the two nations of Chon'sin and Ylisse. Even little things such as the buildings and vegetation were almost totally different, further cementing the feeling of homesickness that the travellers from Ylisse would feel. Buildings of timber and tiled roofs, with thin walls of light plaster and paper within the buildings made for a startling lack of privacy, the Ylisseans complained, and the trees gave little shade. Many small differences made the western nation almost unbearable for long periods of time.
However, the long voyage home across the central sea made many consider simply staying there anyway.
That is what people said, anyway. People always talked, too much in most cases, and all it took as a little attention to pick up on important facts and news.
A young girl wearing a flowing, pale pink robe-like kimono walked along the street overlooking the docks, watching with bored disinterest at the workers below her. Strong men moved cargo while fishermen watched from their places on the wharfs, talking and laughing merrily. The girl found this scene of daily monotony was repeated again and again in her travels. It was loud, it was chaotic, but it was calming and beautiful in a sense.
Mari'ko nodded silently to herself as she turned, scanning the crowd of people on the street going about their daily lives.
She had been told that she had a rather severe bearing, and her mother often parroted that she would be prettier if she smiled more often, but such things were unnecessary. Even the beautiful silken kimono was an extra burden, the carefully woven brocade simply weighing her down.
With a sigh the girl looked down disdainfully at her clothing. One day soon she would trade the ridiculous clothes for the battle-garb of a swordsman; just like the Queen had worn during the war with Valm. Her father had always complimented her on how she looked in a gi before he had died, even if her mother had hated that she had chosen to become a warrior instead of a bride.
She glanced back up as shouts came from the crowd; but rather than the fearful, angered shouts that had been so common in Chon'sin until recently they were cries of adoration and love.
Queen Say'ri strode through the crowd slowly and purposefully, smiling and waving as she led a small procession through the city. Mari'ko felt her pulse quicken slightly; among the usual train of attendants and guards for the Queen, or rather Empress now that many of the smaller nations had pledged their allegiance to her, there was the object of Mari'ko's search.
A man in a long black duster walked behind her, chatting amicably with a blue-haired woman at his side as another, younger woman with brown hair and a matching duster laughed at his other.
Mari'ko nodded to herself, taking a deep breath as she started to follow them from a distance. She had missed her chance when the previous King, Yen'fay had died, and she'd missed her second chance when the Empress and the man in black had left for the Eastern Kingdoms after the war with Valm…
She would not miss this chance, too.
A cart pulled in front of her, blocking her progress as the Empress and the man in black led the procession around a corner and further back to the Imperial Palace, and Mari'ko hissed a little in frustration. She pushed through the thickening crowd of others trying to get around the cart and jogged a little to catch up. If they made it back to the Palace she would lose her chance, and have to wait for them to emerge again. Mari'ko didn't want to wait any longer. She had waited for more than two years, and now…
Mari'ko rushed around the corner, hoping to close some of the distance and find an opening. She spotted the procession a little way up the road, not so far that she couldn't catch up, and-
Strong, callused hands grabbed her by the arm, one shooting up to cover her mouth as she was dragged into the shadows behind a shack selling fresh fish from the market. Her eyes widened as she looked up into the hooded and scarred face of a foreign stranger, framed with scruffy white hair and grinning down at her.
"Hold on a second, kid," he whispered in perfect, if accented, Chon'sinian. "Show's about to start."
Mari'ko looked back to the crowd, eyes widening as a large number of men erupted from the buildings bearing crude weapons and armour as they raced towards the Empress' procession. The stranger released her, stepping calmly into the street as the pedestrians began to scream and scatter. The men, obviously bandits that had once supported the Imperial Valmese rule judging from their hastily-painted red armour, tore through the Empress' guard and circled her and the other three.
"For our lives and our Lord Yen'fay, today we take vengeance on his murderer!" one of the bandits shouted to the approval of the other men.
From where Mari'ko was crouched she could see at least thirty men surrounding the Empress and the strangers with her. The white haired man had stopped on the street, calmly watching and waiting for something to happen. The Empress herself stepped forward, and Mari'ko nervously swallowed, loosening her kimono and reaching for the short sword hidden within. The Empress may have been a warrior unmatched, but against numbers like these even she could be undone. Mari'ko would help her, and…
"Fie, foolish man," the Empress laughed. "I cannot believe you fell so readily for our trap! Now!"
Mari'ko looked up, eyes widening as the form of a large wyvern descended on the bandits, a beautiful woman atop the creature swinging a heavy long-handled axe like it was made of bamboo. Across the street a man appeared atop the inn, taking aim with his bow and firing arrows so fast his hands were a blur. Another blue-haired woman charged from an alleyway opposite the girl's position, wearing clothes exactly the same as the woman standing next to the Empress. Only this woman had a warrior's intensity about her, striking with the strength and skill of a veteran as she crashed into the bandits' rear. Inside the circle of bandits the Empress and the girl in a black coat had begun to fight, the girl swinging around a long, thin nodachi while Empress Say'ri struck with her twin swords.
The white-haired man, though, remained stationary in front of Mari'ko, lazily looking through a thick, handwritten book.
"Argh, where was that spell again?" she heard him mutter in the Eastern tongue. "I miss my sword… Ah! Here it is!"
Mari'ko edged into the street closer to the man as he began to mutter to himself in a strange language, gesturing with one hand in the air towards the bandits. There was a great gale of wind as a green-tinged tornado began to spin around the bandits, throwing most of them off their feet or into the air, only to come crashing back down to the ground. Many of the bandits surrendered after the show of magical superiority, the rest of the Empress' retinue making quick work of the remaining men that refused to succumb. The white-haired man grinned as he approached the Empress and the crowd of warriors around her, and Mari'ko hesitantly followed him.
"Ah, what nostalgia!" the teal-haired bowman declared as he leapt down from the roof of the inn he was perched on. "Truly, we are still the most magnificent of warriors!"
"Dad!" the brown-haired girl in black cried indignantly as she sheathed the nodachi over her shoulder. "I wanted to get more practice with this stupid sword in!"
"It is not a stupid sword, it is a historical heirloom and a treasure of our family," the Empress scolded the other girl.
"Yes mo- er, Sis," the girl sighed, correcting herself.
"Fight faster next time, then," the white-haired man shrugged, turning to the other two that had fought next to the Empress. "You still alive, 'Robin' and 'Lucina'?"
The woman in blue chuckled a little, pulling her blue hair off and shaking out long, straight black hair. She grinned as she dropped the blue wig, shrugging as she tucked the throwing knives in her hands back into her clothes.
"I'm fine," she said, before turning to the other man in black. "Are you fine, 'dear'?"
"Sei'ko, this day has been humiliating enough for me, please stop," he growled, tearing his own white wig off and throwing it at the ground. "I am the General of this Empire's armed forces and right-hand of the Empress herself, not some skulking ninja!"
Mari'ko couldn't stifle a gasp as the full enormity of what she had witnessed sunk in. She forced herself to calm down as she reviewed the facts the way her father had taught her to, the white-haired man turning back to face her as the others noticed her presence.
Firstly, the Empress had clearly set this trap herself, knowing that she would fight. Meaning that the brown haired girl in black was Princess Morgan, and the other man in black was General Kei'ji. She had no idea who either woman in blue was, but both were incredible fighters. They had obviously been bait to lure out the bandits and end a possible rebellion before it started.
But if that was the General, then the man with his hood still drawn must have been…
"Oh, right, hood…" he said, pulling the hood off his face and grinning to her.
"Now," the famous Grandmaster and tactician Robin said. "What was it you wanted with us?"
The deserts of Plegia on the Easter Continent were a harsh place; water was scarce and oasis' were carefully monitored and controlled by the merchant groups that had risen to power after the demise of the country's monarchy. What few areas of useable soil for farming there was were controlled even more closely, and coveted above all else. These areas were centred mostly towards the south-western corner, close to the coast and the port-city of Misayl, one of the largest trading cities in Plegia after Saiqat to the east and Hutun in the far north, near the Longfort.
Misayl had been one of the first cities to open trade negotiations with Valm and Chon'sin, and many merchants had made themselves incredibly wealthy in the ensuing rush of commerce, the city growing exponentially with their wealth.
A young man, covered in a tan travelling cloak and festooned with bags and pouches for a long journey, sighed as he watched the barely-contained chaos that was the port as a new ship docked, workers already clambering over themselves to unload it. The Ama al-Tha trading company was the first to truly capitalize on the new market, building a colossal trading post at the docks in Misayl, despite being based so far away in Saiqat. The young man frowned as he watched the workers literally carrying heavy crates, rather than take the time to load them on carts. His interest was piqued when he spotted a girl hefting a crate herself, struggling under the weight as she tried to keep pace with the other workers, but lost her quickly in the press of bodies.
"Idiots," he sighed to himself.
Galle had often been told that he had a bad attitude; he had been called rude, arrogant, and even selfish by the people around him. Yet for all that, he was still one of the more successful members of the Ama al-Tha trading company's Misayl branch, despite his young age. Mostly because of those qualities.
He was ruthless in making deals, and so often insulted the other parties that work was beginning to become scarce for him.
Being a merchant wasn't what he wanted to do, anyway. He'd just sort of fallen into this life by chance, and now that he was older he was beginning to get the urge to move on. He wouldn't be missed by his colleagues; the only other merchants that he even remotely enjoyed being around was the wandering Anna that came and went like a dust-devil on the wind, and only because she had a similar mentality to him, and the Chon'sinian ones that bartered their foreign knowledge for his time. Like their peculiar penchant for fighting unarmed…
He glanced up when he heard footsteps behind him, an older man in long black clerk's robes smiling down at him from beneath thick, bushy white eyebrows. The Branch Manager, Ibran, was far too soft to hold his position, but Galle had simply held his tongue over the last year. Now that he was leaving he could potentially tell the man exactly what he thought of him; that he was a snivelling coward who was afraid to get his own hands dirty with anything but ink. But why burn bridges?
"Are you sure about leaving?" Ibran asked, his reedy voice like two sheets of paper rubbing together. "You could do much as a member of this company, you know."
Galle scoffed at that.
"I'm not a merchant," he said, biting his tongue. "Have you got what I asked for?"
Ibran nodded, producing a rolled up sheet of thicker parchment from his robe and passing it to the boy.
"This was delivered by one of the Annas' contacts. It is their planned travel route through the desert. It appears they're heading north."
Galle nodded, not even looking at the parchment before sliding it into his bag. He trusted the Annas implicitly; after all, he'd paid for a service, and they never disappointed.
"I will ask one last time," Ibram rasped. "Are you-"
"Don't bother, my mind is set. But you know, I'll really miss this place," Galle deadpanned sarcastically. "I'll send you a letter or something when I get to Saiqat. Have a good life, Ibran."
I always hated you, Galle added in his head.
A little under two weeks later and Galle could honestly say that he'd gotten lost in the desert. Not really something that he wanted to admit, but there came a time, when a man was running out of food and had run out of water the previous day, when he had to admit defeat.
He let out a sigh as he sat in the shade of a small rock formation, squinting at the sky as he waited for the sun to set. Travelling during the day was too taxing on his dwindling supplies, and the moon was full enough to illuminate the night.
Resting his head against the warm rock behind him Galle began to let his mind wander as he waited for the evening.
First and foremost in his mind was the thought that entering the desert at all was a bad idea. Especially to look for such a small group. He'd come across tracks a few times, but getting lost and turned around in the desert was so easy that he really should have known better. He could almost see his father, grinning and shaking his head as he scolded Galle for his impulsiveness.
"If I've told you once I've told you a thousand times; don't go into the desert unless you are one-hundred percent on where you're going. The desert, especially the dunes, do not forgive unprepared travellers, boy."
Galle's Father had been a total survivalist, though; being an officer in Gangrel's army had meant he was responsible for the lives of his men, after all. He'd served against the Ylisseans during the war and then against the Grimleal with the Ylisseans and… never come home. His mother had disappeared, too, along with more than half of the country's population. One day she'd been at home with him, caring for the local villagers as their healer and medicine-woman, and the next she'd been gone, leaving Galle to travel north with the survivors to one of the many refugee camps in Regna Ferox, through the desert during the hottest time of the year.
Unlike most of the foreigners seemed to think, tough, the Plegian deserts weren't an endless sea of sand dunes. It was only really the central area, close to the now-abandoned former capital, that there was really any dunes. Most of the country was arid badlands, full of hardy desert plants and animals that could both survive on little to no water.
Unlike Galle, who was currently dying of thirst.
He chuckled weakly to himself, thinking defeatedly that he would see his parents again soon after all, and closed his eyes.
When he finally opened them again the sun had set, and the desert landscape had come alive in the cooler night time.
Galle let out a low groan as he climbed to his feet, dusting his pants and cloak off as he marvelled at the fact that the vultures and coyotes hadn't found him. He gave the positions of the stars a brief glance to see just how much time he'd lost from passing out, feeling a small sense of relief when he realised that it wasn't too late after sunset. With another deep sigh he began to walk back in the direction he'd last found an oasis, deciding to simply call his search a wash.
He'd been hoping to find the group before they'd reached Saiqat, if only because he hadn't wanted to deal with the Company in the Oasis City, but he would simply look for them there while keeping a low profile.
For now, he simply prioritized putting one foot in front of the other. Once he had water he could focus on finding food. Once he had food, he could begin to travel again.
He trudged through the desert for what felt like an eternity, his mouth feeling parched and ashen as he tried and failed to work some spit up to coat his dry throat. As the first rays of the sun began to crest the horizon Galle let out a final groan, collapsing to his knees before onto his face.
He began to laugh a little, weakly and brokenly.
"Never thought… I'd die… like this…" he managed to whisper to the dirt.
Oh man, Ibran would never live this down, he thought bleakly, continuing to chuckle.
Footsteps approached, but Galle was too exhausted to even roll over to greet whatever reaper had come to collect him. Old, dirty boots stopped in front of his face, the hem of a black robe or coat hanging around them.
Guess… this is it, he thought, closing his eyes again and waiting-
Cool, fresh water began to fall on his head, and Galle let out a cough as he pushed himself onto his back. He blinked, the sun now in his eyes as he tried to look up at the stranger wasting precious water on him. When his vision finally cleared Galle couldn't help but laugh again.
"I've been… looking… for you…" he managed to rasp.
"Yeah, I've been getting that a lot lately," Robin chuckled, squatting down next to the boy. "There are better places to take a nap than in a field, you know. Well, okay, so this is more of a savannah, but…"
In Ylisstol, the capital city of the Haildom of Ylisse, life went on as usual. Grocers and other merchants made sales to their customers under the watchful eyes of the City Guard, some coming as far as Valm across the sea to buy Ylissean goods; tradesmen shouted orders to their apprentices, some of the slower ones receiving swift kicks to the rear as they contemplated getting out of another day of work; Guards smiled and laughed with the citizens as they went about their daily patrols in the bright morning sunshine.
It was the pinnacle of idyllic life; the people were happy, the kingdom was stable, and the weather was brilliant.
All of this went completely ignored, though, by the two youths racing through the streets of the city's outer slums.
"Argh, I hate you, Isaac!" one boy shouted desperately, tugging the long yellow scarf he wore down from where it was riding up his neck. "We're late! We're so dead!"
"It's not my fault we're late!" the other, larger boy panted. "I was up late last night polishing your stupid sword, Van!"
"You're a blacksmith's apprentice! It's what you do!" Van cried.
"Shut up and run!" Isaac groaned.
They raced down the central street, all the way to the military ward by the Ylisstol Palace, and stopped just short of bursting into the sombre parade ground. The Exalt himself was addressing the cadets today, and from the sounds of things he'd already started.
"Oh crap, oh crap," Isaac muttered, hastily adjusting his ill-fitting uniform.
"Relax, we'll be fine," Van mumbled back, carefully positioning his scarf beneath his jacket.
"Yeah, I don't think Chrom'll care," a voice said from behind them. "Better not let Frederick see you, though. You'll wind up doing star-jumps until the sun sets."
Both boys jumped, spinning around to face the source of their advice. An average-seeming man stood behind them, smiling from beneath a dark hood. White hair framed his face beneath the hood of his black coat, and Isaac let out a gasp when recognition set in.
"Oh no, we're so dead," he moaned. "The Grandmaster himself…"
"What!? Oh no… S-sir, we're so sorry, mister Grandmaster, sir…" Van stammered.
"Former Grandmaster," Robin said, leaning closer with a grin. "Now, stand at attention and follow me, boys."
Van and Isaac exchanged glances as they snapped to attention, the still-grinning hero brushing past them and walking along the periphery of the parade ground.
"… and I have great expectations of all of you, for the future safety and sovereignty of our nation…" Exalt Chrom went on, clearly reciting the speech from memory given his bored monotone.
Van and Isaac both faced directly forward, doing their best to tune out the curious stares from their fellow students and the withering glares from their instructors. Robin led them directly up to Knight-Commander Frederick and his retinue, and Van felt his stomach sink into his boots. He and Isaac would be cleaning latrines for a month this time…
"Frederick, how are you," Robin nodded, drawing his hood back. "You're doing a great job with these kids. They took the time to show me the way here, even though it made them late! Guess it's been too long since I've been back to Ylisstol, huh? I gotta say, that's some seriously knightly behaviour, though. I commend them. Hell, I'd give em a promotion!"
Frederick narrowed his eyes slightly before grunting and nodding. He looked around Robin at the two boys and twitched his head to the side, signalling that they join their unit on the parade ground. Robin turned for a moment, too, to give them both a wink and a grin before turning back to Frederick and the other Knights.
"Have either of you seen Lucina…?" the boys heard the tactician ask before they were out of earshot.
Van and Isaac both let out relieved sighs under their breath as they reached their unit, both exchanging glances and grins before finally paying attention to the rest of Exalt Chrom's speech.
"One day, we'll be like them," Van muttered under his breath so only Isaac could hear. "One day, we'll be the heroes giving the speeches."
"And busting the students for being late," Isaac groaned, eying where the Knight-Commander was still watching them.
In the Ylissean city-state of Themis it was said that there were districts that never slept. The sprawling limestone metropolis, famed for its stout cavalrymen that had turned the tide in not one but two wars, always had some form of movement, some form of work happening. Things had quietened down recently, since the rebuilding of the city was almost complete, but commerce was forever marching on.
Or so they said, anyway. Arya wasn't convinced as she rode the Plegian wagon into the city, looking around with wide eyes at the bright, solid limestone buildings. Even at night the city was still bright, so different to the desert cities of Plegia. She had come a long way from Misayl, crossing deserts and mountains to finally be here.
The whole city, and even the country around it, were alien to her. Gently rolling fields, full of lush green grass surrounded the tall, impregnable-seeming walls of the city. The city itself was a shimmering white, and statues of fallen heroes were everywhere along the main colonnade. Arya couldn't help but think that it would be a grand city in the daylight.
She craned her neck, looking at the quiet streets and catching the eye of a passing City Guard in white mail armour. She glanced down quickly, hiding her face beneath her hood.
"The Ylisseans are cruel to Plegians," she had been told. "They will look for any reason to hurt you, to humiliate you. Just for being Plegian. Don't even make eye-contact."
Arya was nervous about being so far away from her homeland, but excited all the same. She'd decided that she needed to know the truth about Grima and the Grimleal, the whole truth from both sides. And to do that she needed to go to Ylisse.
The wagon lurched to a stop and Arya glanced back up, blinking in surprise as a horde of Ylissean men rushed out of the closest building and began to unload the wagon in practiced, smooth motions. She glanced at the wagon's driver next to her, currently speaking in hushed tones with the old one-eyed man that had come out of the building. The man nodded and looked to Arya, offering her a brief grunt.
"You gonna help the boys or not, kid?" he grumbled. "Get yer arse in gear."
"Y-yes!" Arya squeaked, jumping off the wagon.
This was clearly the Rommel Trade Centre, the girl realized as she started hefting crates. This was where it had been organized she would work so that she could cross the border as a labourer, rather than a refugee. How long that would last, Arya didn't know. Hopefully long enough to get the answers she needed.
It didn't seem to matter to the men working alongside her that she was little more than a child, either. In fact a few of the labourers looked hardly older than she was themselves. The group made short work of the crates, and before long the wagon was off trundling back towards Plegia, leaving Arya alone in Ylisse.
She glanced up at the night sky, wiping sweat from her brow and nodding in satisfaction.
She wouldn't stop until she understood why so many Plegians, including her family, had died. If that meant she had to labour as an Ylissean worker for a little while, she could handle that.
AN2015: I think I left this for too long; I had a lot of trouble writing this prologue, and I'm far from satisfied with it. But I needed to get the ball rolling on this story and get it back up, at least in part. Hope you enjoy the new prologue, guys. It's a little short, but I realized that most prologues kinda are. Not much else has changed in the chapters following this one, the changes come in what I'm working on afterwards. An updated chapter seven with new content should be up not long from now, probably tomorrow.
Oh, and if I get any more spoilers for Fates in the reviews I will be very unhappy. Like, seriously. Not cool. I'm pissed. I think at this point I've had the entire game's plot twists spoiled for me, but I don't want to take the risk. No. F*cking. Spoilers. Please.
