l'espoir ‧₊˚

There’s a cruel irony to being so similar, yet so different. If he removes his heart from the situation, he gets that her lack of eye contact and the wringing hands are products of anxiety. Inigo knows there are things Lucina has to face on her own. He’s never let himself fully accept that fact, and now, he’s left with no choice. 

It still hurts. 

Something cracks deep inside his chest. The tears gathering along his lash line finally spill over, sliding down reddened cheeks and gathering at the point of his chin. He can’t hear the teakettle over the roaring in his ears. 

“Can I…please, Lucina,” he begins, voice breaking on her name, “did I do something wrong?” How selfish, to think only of himself. (One day, when he’s older and mature and wise, he’ll understand all that went into Lucina’s choice.) 

Her last words aren't meant to be cruel, yet Inigo feels the sting all the same. He knows talking about her feelings doesn't come easily to her; some distant corner of his heart appreciates that even now, she’s making some effort. 

But anger doesn’t listen to logic. Inigo takes a step back, as if struck, disbelief and unadulterated hurt contorting his tear-streaked face. “That’s all? I haven’t seen you in weeks, and this…” He swipes a hand across his chin. He wants to beg her to stay, to promise he’ll stop acting like such a lovesick idiot. 

The words won’t matter. One she’s made up her mind, it’s near impossible to change it. Inigo sniffs. “Do the others know?” Naga, how can he explain this all to them without breaking down? He shakes his head; a bridge to cross once he gets there. For now, it’s just him and Lucina. 

Lucina doesn't answer, because she doesn't know how to. If she tells the truth ( no, he didn't do anything, yes, that's all ) it won't make much for a difference. It's impossible to explain the truth past her shame, and even if she could, he wouldn't understand.

That is, perhaps, the most miserable things of having people who love her. They want the best for her-- he wants the best for her. It's a pure intention, a sweet notion, but it bears fangs and claws that cannot be seen by those who wish to enforce it. She doesn't want to leave this ghost of her home, but she has to.

"No," she says, finally, because this at least is simple enough. It hadn't felt right to make a list of goodbyes. No, Inigo was the only one she knew she could not forgive herself were she to deny him one.

And that, those words, are exactly why.

Lips press thin and still she does not look at him. It's not that she doesn't reciprocate, it's that she doesn't know. In the heat of war, with the end of the world a mere night's sleep away, things are so easily turned hazy. Love for desperation, for the chance to feel something you may never get the chance to. If they had died trying, they would have died knowing the warmth of another.

But they had lived long enough that the warmth had, to her, grown suffocating.

She speaks into existence a somber consequence of the harsh lives led by many, a reality of the most sorrowful kind, and his face softens. Though they are strangers he cannot help but to feel attuned in the manner of kindred souls with kindred pains. Even, perhaps, for reasons of the subconscious far lesser known to him. They are similar not only in the way of sundered homes, after all. If one should compare the two in this room who stand side-by-side, they might reckon there to be a certain resemblance looming above the skin. And lurking beneath it.

"I see," he says sincerely, captured by a look of sympathy for her troubles. "I am truly sorry to hear that. My home too was lost to me some years ago. Both your story and the one told here are ones I deeply understand."

In the wake of their unifying moment, companionable silence takes roost as Marth allows his attention to shortly roam, taking renewed interest in the unsightly scorch marks and holey walls of the deserted shell of a home. There is no beauty in it, hardly material to extol or craft odes about, but still it is worth seeing and remembering. Telltale to indiscriminate destruction, there are no shortages of similar adversities out in the world as can both this family and that of their own can attest.

He returns to the stranger, or rather to the weight of her stare, and his encouraging smile for her does not relent. It drops only for the proposal that they part ways here.

For all her efforts to evade this situation, he makes an equal effort to trap her within it. What's worse, perhaps, is that he's not even trying to. He's just being kind, one of the very things she has always heralded his image for.

"If you would like," she relents, "I imagine it will be easier done with the two of us."

Eyes flit to meet his finally, intended to be for only a moment, but it's difficult when she finally sees him properly to look away. Were there any denying it, there certainly isn't now. She wonders what it might be like to see him as anybody else-- to look at this man and see just that, a man-- because to her he is something pried straight from a dream.

She has to tear her gaze away (and hope, distantly, that he hadn't bothered to pay too much attention to her iris.) It'll be a challenge enough to act normal without him asking questions that have uncomfortable answers.

If she can avoid the shame of telling her idol she masqueraded as him to try and save the world, well, she certainly will.

Carefully, she begins the process of picking her way back through the rubble. His invitation to follow goes unspoken, emphasized by the way she pauses in the husk of what was once a doorframe, holding the charred remnants open for him to step through.

Listen! He doesn't want to be overbearing! There are a lot of things he wants to say but now that they're safe they'll have nothing but time!

He doesn't know where to start. How to talk to the daughter that another version of him once failed so completely. How to say I missed you and are you enjoying your travels and is this place worth staying in and I hope you're happy, are you happy, please tell me you're happy.

Lucina is his entire world. It doesn't get any simpler nor more complex than that.

"Hey! Lucina!" he finally calls. Nothing lost from really showing how he feels. One never knows how much time one has left after all. "Over here!"

Not that it softens the blow-- or shock, rather, which jolts up her spine and sends her bad rod-straight-- that comes at the sound of his voice on the familiar syllables of her name. It's the same moment that always happens when they talk, when, for just a single second, she hears her father's voice and thinks perhaps it was all truly a dream.

Eyes fall on the man himself, bringing that moment to the same end it always finds. He's too young, too real. Her father, yes, by a technicality, but still someone else's. The corners of Lucina's lips are reminded to curl into a smile.

And she's glad to see him, really. Kind of. At least a little bit. It's good to see that he is well, that the world has not yet fall apart in the time since she has let its weight fall from her shoulders, but it's hard in equal measure. Something that, she reminds herself, is too selfish a notion to play into.

Still the way she spoke of him and the hope he carried, it caused a smile to bloom.

"I'd say the same about you," The prince spoke, focus falling back on the sword and the act of polishing it. "Wanting a happy future for the people around you, that's also hope."

When Elyos had been at war and even during the moments of peace before and after it, Alfred always wanted happiness for those around him. Whether one day he's far away from them or their ties were cut due time's flow, the hope that their path ahead was a peaceful and beautiful one where their smiles shine brighter than the sun itself.

"Love's important too don't you think? It's always nice to look at your side or something you carry and see someone who cares about you the same way you care about them. Family, friends or what follows." A soft laugh as he placed the sword down, head tilting as it eyed ever corned of the weapon. "All we can do for now is what we are doing now and train hard. Our muscles have to be ready for anything if they want to protect peace!"

The blade seemed to be in better quality than when he had begun but there was still a bit to do before its true brilliance reflected him. Now that he thought of it, it had been some time since the last time he wielded a sword on the battlefield, lances had always been his weapon of choice after all.

Whenever he wielded his, he felt closer to the day spent with his father as a child learning and training together. The prince had improved greatly from the days he wasn't even a decade old, if past and present self duele, would he become a teacher to himself?

Love. She nods her head again. Love is invaluable in all of its thousand shapes. It is a sister to hope-- a thing strong enough to destroy cities, to build them anew. Her own hope is wrought in it, love for a world and its people. For her father.

It had carried her through time and back again. It had carried her through war's end. It had carried her here, and it had made her strong. Enough to learn grief at an age far too young, enough to know what to sacrifice.

Her expression has turned solemn, watching her own reflection in the newly shined steel of some soldier-to-be's blade.

"Peace, love, hope," she turns the sword over, sets it in its rightful place, "they are noble causes, worth defending. For where there is not one, the others often follow."

A world without love is a hopeless one, without peace is loveless.

"But they are also impossible to kill. They get quiet and tired, they are sometimes forgotten, but they are never lost." Not even in one's enemy.

She looks to him again, head canting curiously at the question. "Well enough," her answer comes with a humble shrug. "I am versed in most weapons, though none as well as the sword."

A person has to be, when sometimes any weapon is the only weapon. Lucina blinks to the one in the boy's hand.

Perhaps there was always a light and darkness in all humans. Perhaps they couldn't forget that, but...

“ If conflicts are a part of being human, then that means it is in our power to end them, isn't it? It's our fault if we allow it to rule us. ”  It is an oversimplification, but Leif holds steadfast, seemingly as true as his aim with his axe.  “ People suffer because of the greed of others. So we must put aside that greed. We have to convince everyone that remains that a peaceful future is worth more... ”

"My father taught me many things when I was still set to inherit his title." A swing of her axe like the weight of her grief might be easier to bear for the wood it splinters. "One of them was that, no matter how true you believe something to be, no matter how simple, it will always be different for another."

Father would have known, carrying his father's fractured Halidom on his and his sister's shoulders. Aunt Emmeryn was a wise and caring woman in the shadow of a crueler Exalt, but not even that would be enough for peace. There is no world where everyone will agree, only hope for one where they might.

And that hope drives the effort for alternatives to war, ways to appease conflict, but never to end conflict altogether.

"The world will never be without hardship, and people will never be without plight. For some who suffer, they become generous. They wish to see the world absolved of that which they endured. For others, they become cruel. They feel that they are owed something, a kindness that the world has given another. Are they wrong for being angry?"

Lucina wipes the sweat at her brow.

That, unfortunately, is the problem with being dead. Have been for some thousands of years, in fact. The time when he could throw himself headlong into battle is a thing of the very, very distant past now.

“You may call me █████.”

...But he can certainly still judge the pale imitation wearing his name like an ill-fitting suit of armor. Leaving the prince and princess behind — they will return to the capital in one piece even if he does not watch them every step of the way, between their knights and new companions — instead he follows after the masked swordsman before he can fully vanish into the night, like a moth to light. To the dangling thread the other has made of himself through his cryptic warning and given identity.

For even now, frigid hands cupped protectively around the still-warm embers of his memory, he knows he does not take as kindly to pretenders.

“Quite the name you’ve chosen for yourself,” he calls out once thoroughly removed from the vicinity of any prying ears. It takes a moment to remember how to assume visible form again, appearing scarcely much older than the young man he’s come to haunt; not because he had died at that age by any stretch of the imagination but because...he doesn’t know, actually. Because it was when he’d gone to war, he supposes, ever at his side along the way. Where he could have left a mark in the pages of history but chose not to.

The way his story is told now though, it might not have mattered either way. He scoffs at the thought, of only a select handful spared from slipping between the cracks altogether while the rest are lost to time — perhaps forever at that — then continues, “Do you really think you have what it takes to bear the weight of that mantle? Or will you be crushed by it instead? Tell me honestly.”

And she does not deign to respond, at least not to the first remark. Some fan of old legend, then. Such recognition was inevitable, after all, but to follow a stranger over nothing more than a name...

Lucina bristles.

"Who are you?"

Soldier pivots finally, turns to face the man who speaks so coldly to her back, only to freeze once more. Beneath Gerome's mask she has paled, no great hero's name enough to stop the chill that creeps up along the back of her neck. Perhaps the question should not merely be who, but also what.

He appears to her a man, but in the same way that his voice sounds too-distant, his visage is somewhere else as well. Lips twitch into a frown, determined to remain stoic where her nerves wish to be otherwise.

"And what does my answer matter to you? I cannot imagine much."

She does not dodge his question only to be coy. It is a question she has asked herself, a question to which she does not know the answer. How could she? The end of the world had come, is coming, and she is just one body in the face of it.

If the weight of the Hero-King's name does not crush her, the inevitability of the end certainly will.

finally kissing the person you’ve been pining for .

a kiss shared during a game  ( truth or dare ,  spin the bottle ,  etc ) .

kissing your lover to show you forgive them .

neck kisses that turn into love bites .

wiping away your lover’s tears as you kiss them .

a kiss to prove you don’t have feelings for them .

a last kiss before one goes away .

biting your lover’s lip amidst a kiss .

an emotional kiss bringing one party to tears .

a kiss while being reunited after a long time .

kissing your lover in a moment of sheer joy .

a kiss while slow dancing .

sharing a spontaneous kiss with a stranger .

an abrupt ,  heated kiss during the middle of a fight .

kissing them to shut them up .

a kiss to wake your lover up in the morning .

sharing a kiss in a heavy downpour of rain .

kissing your partner to seal a marriage .

a possessive kiss that is meant to stake a claim .

a kiss to resolve suppressed romantic/sexual tension .

a kiss attempting to convince the other party to stay .

kissing the top of their head as you hold them .

a risky kiss between forbidden lovers .

stolen kisses while hiding away from a crowd .

a kiss that leaves lipstick stains .

a kiss shared on a rooftop while the sun sets .

a flirtatious kiss on the back of the hand .

sneaking off to a public bathroom to make out .

a kiss on the forehead as the other sleeps .

an  ( accidental / mutually )  drunken kiss .

caging your lover against a wall with your arms to kiss them .

a kiss after joining your lover in the shower .

a kiss after receiving good news .

a tentative ,  exploratory kiss between friends .

a kiss shared between enemies during combat .

kissing your lover after believing you’d lost them .

a kiss after a devastating event ,  meant to comfort .

a possessive kiss in front of a jealous third party .

kissing your lover under the night sky while stargazing .

a kiss between two people in a fake relationship .

a kiss that seals a promise .

kissing your lover lazily first thing in the morning .

holding your lover by the jaw to kiss them .

kissing the tears from their cheeks .

a kiss to your lover’s stomach as you travel down their body .

an abrupt kiss that you melt into after a moment of hesitation .

sleepy ,  domestic morning kisses in the kitchen while making breakfast .

a rushed kiss before one party leaves for work .

Indeed, it seemed whatever fascination women seemed to hold for him had no waned in his months away. In fact, he had forgotten how forceful they could be, and was now seeking refuge while his mask was still in place. He was sure he had lost the group of the girls but it was hard to tell over the cacophony of magical explosions.

It was no surprise he ran right into someone, but all Gerome saw was a flash of long hair and panic seized him.

"Get back! Not one ste—" His voice fell, breath momentarily catching in his throat. "—Lucina!?"

Here she was, their fearless leader standing before them in the flesh, alive and well. His mask could not hide the way his mouth hung open nor the rigid set in his stance. He should not be surprised that she was here, he had already met many of their friends, yet somehow seeing her made him waver.

He would've stood by her through the end of the world, but she had disappeared at the campaign's end just as everyone else had. Lucina had surely been better off without his presence, though. No doubt she had not rested on her laurels in some dark room like a craven.

Lucina spins on her heel and darts after him, watching the crowd for the back of his head with no less effort than one might exert to track a wild animal. She had certainly anticipated a happier reunion, perhaps one with less chasing, but this is Gerome.

And it's not that she minds much, really.

When they do finally stop it is in the narrow passage between two canvas tents, precariously disguised by some empty crates and a few bleating goats. Lucina gives the things as wide a berth as she can, side eyeing them until she has reached a distance further than their tethers allow.

A deep breath, a hasty dusting of her tunic. She looks around and then at Gerome, and then around again, and then back to Gerome. A few blinks.

"Some things never change," she offers weakly, unsure of what else to say. Hello, probably, or It's good to see you again. Neither feels right. There's an apology owed somewhere for her absence, an explanation for its cause that she finds difficult to word despite the number of times it has been managed before.

Her weight shifts, right foot to left, and she tries her hand at an empathetic smile. One that likely looks as awkward as it feels.

Her heart skips faster. Survival situation or not, the fact of the matter remained that they were prey to a predator. Without the comfort of potential retaliation, what could Selena do but bow her head forward and continue onward? 

Her boots squelched through the mud. The tension of the situation seeped in as the pair trekked on. One foot after the other, breathe not too loudly, mind your sword hand, and always keep your partner visible. She exhaled. In the moonbeams coming through the foliage, Selena refocused her eyes, hoping for a glint of her companion.

“Hey, Lucina.”

She paused. The woodland ambience was now only complemented by the rustling of ferns far behind her back. Though squinting in the low light, Selena’s chocolate eyes bore no holes into the mesh of darkness.

Shit.

Head swivels now, frantic, lips pressed into a hard line. She waits for a sign, a rustling bush or the snapping of a twig; any indication at all of where her partner may have gotten off to. Something-- anything.

A flurry of birds. cawing in alarm as they are disrupted. Lucina bites her cheek. That's something, alright.

She takes off in their direction, ducking beneath low branches. It's too dark now to make out much more than shadows and silhouettes, but that's enough. Something crunches near her flank, and in her relief Lucina whirls to face it.

So he believes, until their hands clasp, and her fingers twitch much like they had the first few times he'd casually shown her such affection. Here, at last, is physical proof something has broken. His stomach suddenly feels hollow. A battle waits for him; this time, he knows he won't be able to charm his way to victory.

And there's the first cry.

Talk. She makes it sound like such a taboo thing; especially when it comes to more emotional matters. He well knows how securely she guards her heart, has always considered it the highest honor to cradle some small piece in his hands. Never all--and he contented himself with that.

Inigo stops in the hallway leading to the kitchen. Faces her fully, refusing to release her hand. "Always, Luci." Weight shifts, free hand absent-mindedly finding his earring, fingertips tracing the curved edge. "Need me to duel someone for your honor?"

Another smile flickers, there and gone in a blink. He prays she doesn't catch the note of desperation dulling his usual cheer. The joke falls flat between them and he imagines he's standing on the knife's edge of a chasm.

"For a diplomatic trip?" He replies, stupidly, body going still. One push and he'll fall. Her evident discomfort collides with his own mounting anxiety in the form of rapidly welling tears along his lash line. It's the finality of her tone, the grim countenance he'd once said will permanently mar her lovely face that sends him tumbling down.

He knows he's lost her forever. The last frayed edges of his hope snap completely. "Why?"

"For... something like that."

Nothing like that. He should know, he does deep down, that there is no place for her on any sort of official Ylisstol business. She is no Exalt, not here. That belongs to another girl's father, will be passed on to her in due time. Not to Lucina.

And that is why she has to go. For the weight of her own selfishness, for the limb that she has lost without a world to save. She was never good at sitting still, and war has done nothing to better that. If anything it has made her worse, digging at her own skin in the absence of a purpose.

All of which she can only feel more guilty for, when her friends have settled in to the lives they have won. They want her to join them, want her to relish in the safety that they all fought so hard for. She does not know how to, and knows even less how to deal with their disappointment. How to deal with her own.

Her hands wring, idle, searching for words that he might understand. She finds none. What good would explaining herself do? Or apologizing? Neither will change the outcome, neither will make her stay.

"It's complicated, I-" She tries to look at him, she finds that she cannot. "I won't be back for a long time."

She may not be back ever, something she again finds impossible to speak aloud. Enough damage is being done here, in the living room of a house Inigo has already seen once destroyed.