[Fire Emblem 6] Glory For a Fallen King

[runiclore]

Glory For a Fallen King
By: Amber Michelle
Gauntlet theme: 22 - You said "it's just like a full moon"
Fandom: Fire Emblem 6: Sword of Seals
Characters: Percival, Elphin
Words: 4829
Warnings: n/a

Notes: for this challenge with measuringlife.

Haha, totally didn't edit! I will. It's just, I feel so lazy after having done nothing for the last few days. Indulge my need for instant gratification.



..........................................................


The Alliance Army was up at dawn, stretching from the edge of the foothills to the river up from the western sea, a forest of canvas tents and fires, lines of horses, and Percival watched it awaken while he waited by the picket line with a sack of carrot pieces he fed to his mount, Tancred, one by one; they were purchased at a dear price, and almost gone. The sky lightened in the east, gray instead of navy. His own men were bringing their tents down already, and he smelled porridge cooking, crisping salt pork, and heard a low murmur of voices below the ambient sound of so many moving, breathing, and a brush of air at the back of his neck.

Aquleia was over the next plain, perhaps two dozen leagues away. He watched a carrot disappear past the horse's blunt teeth, felt the velvety brush of his lips. Months ago, weeks ago, he wouldn't have thought himself unlucky enough to look forward to a clash with Douglas on the battlefield. The Great General had spoken of retirement and his old age, but the force of his blows still had the power to knock Percival back in a friendly spar - and he knew their power when driven by deadly intent. If he fell, Prince Mildain would be left short one vassal; if Douglas fell, his heart not behind his axe-- it would be the same. A fragile prince left behind, and a slip of a daughter with no guardian.

That was the trouble with marriage and its resulting obligations: women left widowed, children left fatherless. Percival had just passed his twenty-second summer, and he knew his father by reputation, by legend - and by memory, only as a faded image in his favorite storybook. He couldn't remember if he'd ever noticed the absence.

The sun was two lengths above the eastern mountains when the day's march began. A small band of twenty followed Percival, a length of ten or twelve horses between their line and the Lycian troops, and he spotted the green glint of Cecilia's hair farther up near the head of the column, perhaps talking with Roy, or her female pupil, whose name escaped him. Her forces merged seamlessly with the Lycians, with Klein's, and Percival watched the column in his peripheral vision. Stubborn, she said of him when he'd joined.

He was not a mercenary - nor were his men traitors. She couldn't expect him to ignore their discomfort. Etrurian discipline did not lend itself well to a casual merging of armed forces.

It was much later, once they'd forded the at the bend of the river and waited in the shade of a copse of pines for the rest of the army to follow, that Percival saw the wavy golden hair of his prince walking among the Western Isle force with his dun horse in tow. He left the men to his second-in-command and led Tancred through tall, sunlit grass, watched the prince speak with Lalum and her escort, whose hair looked nothing if not silver-plated and slightly tarnished, though her axe was sharp enough. Yellow flowers waved their heads in the breeze, bees hummed away from his approach, shaken from the stalks; the rebels clustered on a large gray rocks, some with flat tops and others slanted, the inclines shallow enough to be used for sitting. Beyond them the river shore was crowded with horses and fogged with spray. The din of their crossing drowned all but the prince's laugh. Percival's toe caught on a rock hidden in the grass, kicked it up, and announced his approach with a storm of white butterflies and the rattling harness of his horse when he jerked back and shook his head.

Enter the knight, he heard his prince's voice say, shaking and dissolving into laughter, and while Percival steadied his horse, someone clapped - the girl, who followed the prince as he led his mount over. "Just like a fairytale," Mildain said, his lips pursing to hide a smile when Percival lifted an eyebrow and snapped his own reins around his wrist.

Lalum skipped to a stop between them. "An unhappy fairytale, though." She put her hands on her hips. "Does he always look so angry?"

"It is said General Percival was born frowning instead of crying." Mildain switched his lead to the other hand behind his back when Tancred snapped at his horse and led her out of range with a tug. "The legend seems to be true."

If it were anyone else teasing him, Percival would have responded in kind. "You know the stories better than I, Master Bard. Where did this one come from?"

The prince smiled, a more subdued curve of his lips. "No need for such formality," Mildain said, tilting his head from the nuzzling nose of his horse. "Call me Elphin."

"Of course." It wasn't that Percival had forgotten, only that the alias did not leap from the tongue as Mildain did, or my prince. It did not have the ring of master, nor did it inspire the same expression, a lidding of the eyes and a not-quite smile.

"I'll ride with the general a while," the prince told his companion, turning his head to address her, and the sheen of his hair was pale sunlit silk. "Tell Echidna I'll join you later."

The din of their river-crossing faded past the copse of trees. His men didn't react to Elphin's presence aside from his second, who knew to keep his mouth shut, though his eyes widened and he dropped his canteen. In the shade the prince's hair dulled to mere gold, and the wear on his clothing was more obvious - threadbare elbows, a mended sleeve. His harp was in a case slung over one shoulder to thump against his back beneath the blue cloak, and when the wind tossed his braid it slapped against the hard leather like a drumstick. Percival wanted to untie the end, let the curls flow and drift on the current of the air.

At first they spoke of nothing - the distance to Aquleia, the speed at which the army marched and how much more might be expected of them in an emergency; the unseasonal warmth that beaded Percival's brow with sweat and made his prince hunch under the hand of the sun, though he should not be required to bend to anything, be it a worldly monarch or the myth of god beyond the blue sky. He climbed into his saddle and sat with his back straight, his shoulders squared, looked upon the remains of his kingdom.

Percival swung into his saddle, nudged Tancred forward. He raised his arm, motioned with his hand to his second - move up. "How many others know?"

"I could not hide it from Klein." Elphin rolled his neck, cracked it, lips hinting at another smile when Percival told him he shouldn't do something so inelegant in public. "Cecilia guessed, and aside from your second, I don't think anyone here came close enough to recognize my face. What is his name?"

"Robert." Lycian mercenaries walked in a loose formation to their left; Percival watched the group from the Western Isles to their right, and he was paid no notice, though Elphin smiled at the commander. "He would have met you at the gala last year," Percival said. He was close enough to reach over and touch the prince - his arm, his knee, his pale hand. "You didn't finish telling me of your own circumstances. I won't be distracted with politics this time - out with it."

"Is that an order?" Elphin chuckled when Percival's face flushed. "Why don't I tell you a story instead."

Percival glanced over, lowered his voice. "Unless this story involves your mysterious disappearance--"

"It's a plainsman tale," Elphin said, blue eyes sliding to watch him. "The Benevolent Ghost, as I believe it is known in Sacae." Percival snorted, and the prince raised his eyebrows. "Have you heard it before, General?"

"I cannot say I have."

Elphin's cloak fluttered in the breeze, and the hair framing his face drifted back, caught the sun. "I trust you will withhold judgment until I've finished."

Percival bowed his head. "Of course."


*


Two years ago to the very day Percival stood where he did come nightfall, after the Alliance stopped to make camp. An imperial villa lay to the west some thirty minutes' walk down a meandering dirt path through the pines, at the edge of a town and within sight of the blue and gray horizon of the ocean. He'd followed the prince past its white walls as squire, as knight, as general, sat with him beneath the low-slanting eaves to watch the night-blooming flowers at dusk and discuss matters not revolving around court. They'd read old scrolls by candlelight in the small library, bare feet on the cold terracotta tiles. They toasted to his knighthood in the garden, seated beneath an arch overrun with jasmine, and he remembered Mildain lamenting his own inability to wield a sword. He remembered telling the prince that was nonsense. His knights existed to hold those weapons for him, to spill blood so he would not have to - to obey his every command, no matter how unreasonable, wrong or right.

They'd waited at the crossroads for a scout to return and report the road ahead safe. Dusk had fallen then, too, leaving their small party in shadow, and Percival remembered nudging their mounts so close together their thighs brushed, ready to grab the prince and run if a threat presented itself. He even reached for his hand, rested his fingers over a slim white wrist, and felt the brush of his pulse beneath the skin - cold skin.

Stop fidgeting, Mildain said - though he didn't pull his hand away when Percival took it and rubbed warmth back into the skin. Who knows we're here?

No one. No one knew; they made the trip because the prince was tired of the birthday celebrations, the parties in his honor and the near-constant flow of gifts, notes, visitors to his rooms, the library, and wanted a few days of peace. Just the two of us. He was staring out at the full moon when he said it, seated at the table in a small drawing room he used for private dining, leaning his elbows on the table. Indulge me, won't you, Percival?

Always.

Another day passed before they ran into each other again. Aquleia was in sight once they stopped for the evening, though several leagues away across a deforested plain; the city lights glittered to the north like a sea of yellow stars scattered on the plain and hovering above the ocean, where ships sat in harbor. Percival remembered the uneven ends of Elphin's nails and found an apothecary among the services pulled along by the supply line to purchase a small pot of scented paste. It was the sort of luxury they had in the capitol, along with lotions, oils, perfumes - but if the prince insisted on working with his hands, they would stay healthy.

The perimeter guard was doubled at Cecilia's suggestion, and the troops were encouraged to retire early. The campfires were small, but there was no use in hiding them; the city must know of their approach by now. Douglas would be in charge of defenses if not Bern, and neither were slack in the execution of their duty. The outer city would be left undefended if Bern were in charge, and the walls to the inner city would be manned by archers and infantry with javelins. Percival had seen to the defenses weeks ago, maybe as long as a month.

He'd not seen the garden for much longer - a year, perhaps.

Elphin sat alone on a crate by a small fire. The tents nearby were lit; voices drifted on the night air, muffled by the canvas, and the fire snapped, sparked, played orange and red on the prince's hair and the strings of his harp. He lifted his head slightly when he heard footsteps, though he did not look up.

"Master Bard," Percival said, and the prince straightened at the greeting.

"Still so formal, General," Elphin said, and his fingers tightened on his harp. "I have not yet mastered the art. You pay me undue honor."

Percival side-stepped between crates and entered the circle around the fire, thinking to make the prince meet his eyes. Elphin's gaze remained fixed on the flames, a mirror for their shifting light. "I have a gift - for your service earlier, that is," Percival said, and approached to speak more softly. The murmur of conversation behind him didn't pause. "You must be working harder. I saw the condition of your hands."

Elphin rubbed his fingertips with his thumb, cradled his instrument to his chest. "Yes. The resistance was never what one would call a robust force. I am unused to playing for so many people, so often."

"Ask the dancer for help - it's why she followed you, is it not?"

"She knows who we march to fight on the morrow." The prince leaned to the side, reached down, and Percival heard the harp case scrape the crate when Elphin lifted it and felt for the clasp. "I sent her to bed, and Echidna accompanied her, or I would not sit here alone."

Percival's fingers twitched to open it for him; the prince felt for the inside of the case before he placed his harp inside, slowly, groping like a blind man seeing with his fingers. A chill pricked his arms. "Pr-- Elphin, is something--"

"Nothing." Elphin's blue eyes turned down, but they were not fixed on what his hands were doing; he appeared to stare at the ground, where broken grooves in the dirt bore testament to the drawing of a map, now swept away by a boot. "You have a personal tent, correct?"

Percival watched the light flick in his eyes, on his thick fringe of golden lashes. "Yes..." His hand trembled when he reached out, spread it before the prince's eyes. They blinked, did not shift. He sucked in a deep breath, and it became a hiss through his teeth. "Nothing?" Percival leaned down, took hold of Elphin's shoulders. "What is the meaning--"

"Quiet." The prince covered Percival's mouth with his hand, and finally turned his face up, a dull glint to his eyes. They looked at his chin, and yet at something far off, unseeable. "Take me there. Lead me, and I will tell you. I can't, not here--"

The old protest was on his tongue - rumors will fly, we should wait - but a shadow creased the smooth skin between Elphin's brows, and Percival straightened, pulled the prince to his feet, took the harp case and held it under one arm. "It will be a long walk." They would be seen many times over. Rumors would fly. Bards of the prince's caliber were valued in Etruria, and not always for their stories; he had never tried to attract one by offering patronage, but he knew of others who spent more than money on their favorite artists.

Elphin's arm curled around Percival's elbow, his hand grasping the shoulder of his tunic, and he turned ghostly in the moonlight when they left the entertainers' fire, maneuvering between the crates, then along a meandering pathway between tents. He adjusted his step to match, and the prince shuffled over the trampled grass, kicked up puffs of gray dust. He clenched his fist in Percival's sleeve, a tremor in his arm. It seemed every step was a heartbeat, or two, and the camp was deathly silent aside from their breathing, though some canvas walls were lit, and there were shadows crowded around the bigger fires, and meat still sizzled and cooked. The way the prince hugged his arm and stumbled, one might think him drunk.

He wanted to ask what possessed Elphin to stay outside when his companions left, what good they were if they did not check on him-- but Percival could hardly draw a deep enough breath to satisfy his lungs. If he spoke it would be in a breathless whisper, as if he'd run all the way from the capitol with Bern at his back.

He felt light-headed when they reached the dome of his tent and he lifted the flap, led the prince inside, and guided him to sit on the cot. It was unmade. Percival yanked the blankets in place and helped Elphin sit, left the harp case on the pillow. "What is this?" Percival whispered, the sound harsh, sibilant, another chill along his spine.

Elphin led his hands slide over Percival's sleeve, but gripped his hand tightly instead of letting go. "I'm sorry, Percival." His other hand reached, brushed the pommel of his sword. "I could not speak of it at the fire, you understand." He knelt at Elphin's feet because he didn't think his legs would hold him upright the way they shook. He'd neglected to light the lamp, and the moonlight filtered through the canvas only faintly, enough the prince was a shadow against the gray backdrop - and thin, cold hands that released him and rested against his cheeks. He tilted Percival's face up. "I am still recovering." He smelled like honey and ambergris, and sweet rose. "The healer tending to me said the poison may always linger - I suppose it might have damaged something."

He spoke of it with so little tone Percival choked on his own protests and had to swallow hard several times, holding the prince's hands to his face, feeling wisps of hair tickle his knuckles. "Never. When you return to Etruria we will have another care for you. Or, one of the divine weapons--"

"Rubbish." A jagged fingernail pressed the skin near Percival's ear. He thought Elphin leaned forward. "They must not be used for such a selfish purpose. You know that."

"Selfish?" Percival tensed at the volume of his voice, swallowed against a dry throat. "You didn't ask to be the victim of an attack--"

"I will be fine with rest." It was the movement of the air that told him Elphin drew away again, the sudden coolness against Percival's forehead, against his cheeks when the prince pulled his hands away. "I was fine earlier. I will be well in the morning, and you will forget about this. We can't have you trailing after a simple bard all hours of the day - consider this an order."

Rank be damned - Percival would do it anyway. He had followed his prince to dozens of parties and private meetings and managed to remain unseen - whether by his own skill or the willful ignorance of their hosts, he could not know, though he hadn't met many nobles one could call observant of anything but jewelry and the cut of one's clothing. "I do not say it often," he said, lowering his gaze to nothing - to the shadow that might have been his companion's lap, or folded hands. "But there are times you can be a cruel master, Prince Mildain."

A short, sharp sigh was his answer.

How often did this happen? Had the blindness struck before on this trip - before Percival joined, or after? Who protected Mildain while he walked in darkness? Who led him to his tent, hid him from the public eye - surely they must have. Blindness was sometimes the touch of the gods, and sometimes a curse, and the backwater towns clustered on the Western Isles could not make up their collective mind on which it should be. How trustworthy was their healer? The prince was alive, but--

Percival stared into the darkness for a count of ten. Maybe it was twenty. He managed to stand by bracing his weight on the frame of the cot, felt the tangle of Elphin's hair before he straightened and felt his way across the tend to the table with his maps, a book, matches, and the oil lamp. Its flame was a tiny sun that made the tent walls opaque, a dull brass color that made Elphin's braid look a pale brown over his shoulder, and his hand a shadow dancing along the weaving, down, down, playing the highlights like harp strings until he found the cord tying the end and yanked it loose.

Percival retrieved the harp case and left it on the table, removed his sword, his dagger, the pouch hanging from his belt, and heard the pot of salve clatter against the silver. The astringent scent lanced his nose when he pulled it out and worked the stopper loose. The ceramic jar was small enough to fit the center of his palm, packed to the neck with waxy, brown butter.

"The sun had just set when my vision faded," Elphin said, half whisper. His hair spread over his back in thick waves, spread on the blanket behind him, and the circlet and cord dangled from his fingers. "It looked like a beautiful night was approaching."

"Give me your hands," Percival said, crossing the tent floor and kneeling again beside the cot. He dug a nail-full of butter out, left it on the floor. Elphin's hands were warmer than when they'd touched last, still soft but for the tips of the fingers, where he'd had calluses as long as Percival could remember. The prince began his education before they met; even as a child the skin was hard there, accustomed to the plucking of silk strings.

"Tell me what it was like," Elphin said, eyelashes lowering as if to watch. He rested one hand on his knee. "The moon hadn't risen yet. The sky was still gold."

Percival rubbed the salve into Elphin's finger around the nail, rubbed it in until the skin was smooth and the nail shined. "I am not very good with words," he said.

Elphin found his cheek again, the touch of his hand feather-light until it drifted downward, rested against the side of Percival's neck. "Tell me anyway." His lips curved up, fuller in the dim light. "I want to hear your voice."

Heat spread from his hand like magic, and Percival found it difficult to breathe once again. He let the silence linger while he applied the salve, tried not to wrinkle his nose at the smell, though his prince could not see the expression. "The moon waxed full tonight," he said, holding Elphin's fingers spread, tracing the bones across the back of his hand. It couldn't have been more than a day since Percival last touched him, but it felt like the first time again - the first time after that long, dark year during which he sought death for himself rather than glory for a fallen king. "It rose against a magenta sky, and the stars seemed to come out in its wake..."


*


Percival woke to a hand shaking his shoulder and someone's voice outside calling his name. The air was hazy, warm, smelled of straw and dust. A thin slash of sunlight entered between the tent flaps, the angle just right to shine into his eyes when he opened them, blinked. Dust motes swirled when he expelled a breath. Metal clattered beyond the walls, voices shouted, and then once again, just outside, he heard, General Percival, I really need to talk to you, come on please--

He jolted awake. The muscles in his back pulled when he sat up too quickly, sore behind a shoulder blade where a rock had poked through the burlap floor, and he groaned. "Just a minute," he called, and the voice fell silent.

"Lalum," Elphin said, his voice still deep and lazy with sleep. He squinted against the sunlight when Percival turned, rising on one elbow. "She will have missed me."

Percival watched his blond hair slither over a shoulder, pool on the cot, slide over the edge. "Of course." He squeezed his eyes shut to rub them. "I'll--" He'd get up, talk to her, reassure her - quietly, though there was no use in trying to hide her now. His men knew better than to talk.

The prince shoved his shoulder, and Percival's joints cracked when he climbed to his feet, aching, stiff from sleeping on the ground. He ran a hand through his hair and pushed outside. Lalum was a washed out figure in the glare of the morning, against the east sky, the top of her head glowing gold and red. He hadn't realized how small she was; had she even come of age yet? "He's here," he said, and resisted the urge to rub grit from his eyes. "Please don't make a fuss."

Her hands went to her hips again, and he wondered if she met everyone with the same pose. "Would you want me to say nothing at all?" Lalum's eyes flicked up, down. Her gossamer scarves looped around her elbows, and the outline of her legs showed against the thin silk of her ballooned pants. "Didn't get much sleep, huh. You're even more sour than before."

Percival stared at her, then looked down at himself. Bare feet, creased trousers, no shirt-- "Just--" He cleared his throat, heat creeping to his face, said, "Just get him a change of clothes, girl," and bent to re-enter his tent.

He heard her giggle and clenched his teeth. Elphin's laughter joined hers to greet him, and glittering blue eyes a poet might have likened to jewels, but Percival could only stare at them a moment, note how the prince met his gaze, and feel his chest tighten.

"I am an amusing man," Percival said, leaving the entrance, approaching the cot. "So you told me a long time ago." He rolled his neck, rubbed the muscles at his back. "How amusing?"

Elphin covered his mouth with a hand and cleared his throat, seemed to swallow his laughter, though the set of his mouth was too firm, the corners still slightly turned up behind the fingers. "I couldn't have said anything of the sort," he said, slanting his eyes away. "Nor can I have poor Lalum running at your beck and call. I am only a bard, sir knight - not royalty."

Percival gathered the tangle of Elphin's hair with one hand and sat behind him, shoved the pillow over the edge when it got in the way. "This bard will be treated like a prince." It streaked over his lap when he let it go, brushstrokes of sunlight. Percival separated a section and combed his fingers into the waves, starting at the ends and loosening the knots. "No argument."

"Hmm. Stubborn." Elphin inclined his head slightly, perhaps looking at his hands. Maybe he smiled again - Percival's fingers were clumsy, snapped a hair, and his heart beat harder again as if he could see it. He would have given anything to see those lips again, hear this hum of a laugh. "If that is your wish--"

"It is."

A pause, a sigh. "You've developed an irritating habit, Percival."

"My apologies." The silk of Elphin's hair slid between his fingers, scented with roses. "Name my penance, and I will see to it."

Percival heard his second call out camp assignments - three to take the tents down, two to pack them into the supply wagon, two for cooking duty, and they were to be quick about it. The chorus of responses was loud - too loud. It echoed, carried on the cool air, and he stared at the golden curls in his hands. They marched on the capitol today. The battle would begin when they were tired, end with exhaustion, but they were too close to wait another night.

"I will tell you later - after the battle," Elphin said, and he reached back to find Percival's hand and grasp it. "You must return in one piece, unless you intend to compound your wrongs."

Always. He would never neglect to return to his prince. "As you wish."


................................................................

I hope this inspires someone in spite of the potential lameness. >_>

Anyway, part of the reason I didn't edit is because this is my first fic for the game and these characters, so I'm bound to hate everything about it later. May as well just bite the bullet and put it up.


ETA: edits have been made over at the FF.Net version.

Anyway. There are some aspects I think are too close to measuringlife's fic - Percival's second-in-command, and also the thing with the hands. I really love the idea of Percival preening his prince. :P I think this comes from comparisons to Sephiran...


DVD Commentary notes here.

Comments

[measuringlife.livejournal.com]

So, only ages too laaaate. This is really lovely and atmospheric. I love the hints of humor and Percival's like, desperation and Elphin's sort of dry amusement throughout it all.

I don't think it's too close. I mean, the tone for the scenes were entirely different, and taking care of someone is a common inspiration. Obviously you just really liked the hand-caring scene and subconsciously did your own take on it. I'm flattered :D

[runiclore.livejournal.com]

Well, I'm glad you don't think so. It seemed like it was too close to me after I'd finished, at least to that one part. So I guess you did create fanon. Thank you.