#still exist

Oddly, the sun had barely descended past its watchful position straight above. It seemed impossible that hours hadn’t passed since you set out upon the canyon considering all that had happened. Then again, your mind recalled the entire battle as nothing more than a blur, a flurry of sword strikes and shouted commands slipping by in a matter of minutes.

There had been the cold and prickling anticipation as Professor Byleth performed his final inspection and gave orders, a shuddering dread as you lined up against the bandits with weapons that had never tasted blood, the fluttering anticipation when the charge was called, and then a surge of energy, strength filling your body as all you had learned in training took over and you fought your first battle with everything you could.

And now, victory.

You didn’t think about what to do next, sheathing your sword and beginning to move contrary to the tide of men. Towards the front line, searching the dissipating crowd for familiar faces. Or, really, just the one familiar face. Your expression split into a bright smile when you saw him, heedless of the exhaustion. Dimitri’s blond hair was messier than you’d ever seen it, even while training. It caught every drop of sunlight, shining gold even when sticking to his head with sweat, several bits swept away at chaotic angles. There was blood on his armor, his cheeks were spotted with a red flush from exertion, and his expression was a bit worn. But, most importantly, he was unharmed.

Right then, in your half mad mindstate, you felt a blind rush of affection. Excitement. Victory. Skipping on feet that felt lighter than air, you rushed past the few scattering ranks of your small force. Dimitri saw you, opening his mouth to say something, but you cut him off by throwing your arms around his shoulders, tilting onto the tips of your toes. Luckily, he was used to moving with a spearman’s firm stance, which was the only thing that stopped both of you from toppling to the ground. The recklessness of the action hardly registered. Impulsive and excited and bubbly with the vigor of life itself, you pressed a kiss to his cheek. It happened so quickly that the sensations barely registered; a whiff of the musky masculine scent of his sweat, the smooth warmth of his cheek against your lips, your hand brushing the back of his hair when your arms met around his neck; and then you were dancing away, smiling with a mouth on the cusp of releasing a bout of delighted laughter.

“We did it!” you said, uncaring of the childish sound of your victorious words. The fact that you had fought and won was more than the victory of battle, serving as solid proof that you were meant to be among the knights and students, that you were right in choosing your own fate. It meant that your father had been wrong. It meant you were supposed to be here. At Dimitri’s side, maybe. “I can hardly believe it. I was so nervous at first, but we did it! I did it!”

“That you did,” Dimitri said in a slightly stiff voice, a measured contradiction to your manic excitement. He had pressed his hand to his cheek, right over where you had kissed him. Was that displeasure you read in his widened eyes, or disgust? Maybe surprise, being attacked was an awfully good reason to lose composure. And more, was his face that red before, or had the color darkened his fair complection further? His hand dropped, being used in a casual gesture towards you. “And with energy to spare, I see,” Dimitri teased. Although he still seemed a little flustered, his blue eyes twinkled with laughter.

You giggled in response, a giddy and nervous sound. The situation was beginning to sink in. Firstly, it probably broke a dozen different rules of etiquette to have thrown yourself at him, and that was before you factored in the unspoken rules of friendship and boundaries his status afforded him. Not to mention the battlefield you stood upon, or the uncomfortable weight of the gazes of the remaining soldiers who lingered, or the fact that Professor Byleth stood nearby speaking to a knight, or that not even a dozen feet away laid the unceremoniously fallen corpses of the bandit chief and his main guard in puddles of drying blood-

No. You forced yourself not to look at them, unwilling to consider the dead in conjunction with the way you felt now. Instead you focused on Dimitri and the thread of enthusiasm that had brought you to him, refusing to allow embarrassment or doubt to make you fold now that you had already committed.

“I’m just so happy that we won!” you said as way of justification. “I never thought that I’d be able to do something like this… And I wouldn’t have been able to do it without your help so I wanted to thank you because if it hadn’t been for all that training I think I totally would have choked, but because of you I didn’t, so...” You let the thought drop there, your disorganized words rushed together just as badly as your thoughts. And then, what else was there to say? The jittery excitement was still thudding in your heart and making your hands shake. You wanted to apologize, but you also didn’t feel sorry, so you chose instead to settle for the middle ground. “Anyway, I… I should probably go back and help.” You gestured vaguely behind yourself, smiling like a fool for all that you should have at least tried to feel shame. “Um, see you, Dimitri! And you, Professor!” you called with a jaunty wave before turning on your heel. If eyes followed you, or if either responded, you didn’t know, and you were far too shy to check as you hurried up the steps to the top of the canyon where  the horses and knights were all congregated.

Embarrassment was easy in coming, but found little traction in the thrill that filled you as well. Victory was exciting in a way no song had ever properly described. Maybe more than any song could. And then there was the way your body buzzed, the warmth tickling your lips, and the way your heart pounded when you thought of how bold you’d been.

Victory truly was sweet.

Symphony Vittoria Opus 3, No. 2 II. Adagio

Victory, as it turned out, could hurt.

When Lord Lonato fell, it was with an awful, hollow stillness that came in the stead of fanfare or glory. This did not feel like victory, or at least any sort of victory you could be pleased with. Ashe waved away any of your attempts to console or help him, returning to the town alone to find his brother and sister. Even though you desperately yearned to, you didn’t dare follow him alone, knowing that you would be rejected as the enemy.

In the eyes of the townspeople, you were the enemy.

So you watched Ashe go, heart heavy and aching. It wasn’t Ashe’s rejection that stung, not exactly. What hurt the most was the knowledge that you, right then, were useless to him. Nothing you did or said would be able to help him, your words would fall on ears made deaf as they strained to hear the voices of the dead. Nothing you could do would ease his pain or set his world back to rights.

Just like your mother. You could picture her clearly right then, standing in a beautiful black dress above your father’s grave. Weeping because of her true, singular love for the man and the gaping emptiness in her heart that would never be filled without him. Like Ashe, your mother hadn’t wanted your help. To her, you had been nothing more than a reminder of what she could have had, what she was going to have before he died. That day, you lost your mother, too.

Would Ashe be the same as she had been? Would you be a symbol forever reminding him of the death of the man who raised and cared for him? Would he stay in a state of frigid misery, bound by the lingering hold of the dead and unable to move forward? You had only known him for a few months, yet the idea made your eyes hot and teary, a terrible feeling clenching in your chest.

No. You would figure out a way to prevent that from happening, you would not fail again.

Or so you swore to yourself, right then.

Turning away from the empty forrest road and that tremulous silent promise, you set out to find Dimitri. You didn’t know why. Certainly not to ambush him with a hug and kiss on the cheek as you had at the end of the last battle, or anything resembling any sort of excitement. For comfort, maybe. Maybe to ask for advice about Ashe. Then again, you weren’t sure you really wanted to supply a reason for desiring his company. More and more you’d begun seeking it out unprompted. You were friends, and that was definitely sacred and worth pursing. He shouldn’t have been special beyond that, but he was. And you didn’t like to think of exactly why that was, so you didn’t.

The knights were all packing up to make the return trip to the monastery, not losing a second of daylight in their meticulous routine. It struck you as horrifically callous. The church with all their men and might will come to kill your fathers and brothers and then leave within the hour, leaving naught a trace behind. But that was foolish, a childish fancy given teeth as you tried to reconcile what had happened with what you wished would have happened. It was kinder and more pragmatic to leave as quickly as possible and allow the people to grieve in private.

That was the reality.

You were better off with the indignant stance that Lord Lanato was the one at fault for the deaths. His own foolishness was at the cost of the men you had killed. But in the same breath of that scorn could you smell the blood, feel it flaking off of your hands like flakes of rust.

No.

You didn’t want to think about that, you couldn’t let yourself. A knight didn’t weep for those they killed if it was necessary. Those words were a lesson from your sword teacher in Fhirdiad, a knight who had retired after partaking in one too many of the ugly skirmishes that had popped up in the wake of King Lambert’s death. His eyes were haunted when he told you that it was important to know when to care, and when not to.

Another thought that was best left alone.

So you focused on your search efforts. Unfortunately, while dodging through the collected chaos you realized that Magdred Way’s tree lined paths weren’t great for visibility, even without that supernatural fog. Not only was your heart heavy with thoughts you cared little to entertain and you couldn’t find Dimitri, but everybody looked so sad as well. Your friends who should have been proud of themselves for achieving victory without any casualties were wearing grave masks and curled postures with slumped shoulders, the knights grim faced and terse. Professor Byleth was the only one seemingly unaffected by it all, pointing you in the right direction to find Dimitri without expression or comment, trailed by an especially and uncharacteristically severe-looking Catherine.  

Probably, you should have been concerned by that sight alone. But you weren’t, not really, because once you knew where to look Dimitri was easy to spot. He was tucked in the shadow at the edge of the trees, sitting on the convenient seat of a rock with his head bowed and hands folded in something like reverence. The cheerless image brought you up short, the words you had intended to use to call to him dying on your lips.

Pain clung to him, weighed him down with something more than than the cheap sorrow you’d been fighting off. You could easily recognize the way it crowned his head in invisible lead and sank deep and heavy into his bones. It was, after all, a familiar sight.

Holding completely motionless a yard or so away from him, you briefly considered turning around and leaving Dimitri be. People who looked like that had never fared well with your intervention. But you couldn’t. He just looked too sad and lonely. So you approached him with soft steps, feeling the hesitancy of regret before you even spoke.

“Dimitri?” you asked softly, uncertain. “Are you all right?”

He tensed up at hearing your voice, his posture straightening out with a snap as if to cover for the momentary weakness. Red rimmed his eyes, although you thought it was more of an effect of fatigue than tears. It complimented the bluish shadows beneath.

“Yes, of course. I was just resting a moment,” he told you, his expression and voice carefully controlled. “Did you need something?”

Any person in the world would be able to tell that he was feigning indifference. Pain was stretched thin in the forcibly casual tone of his voice like pottery held too tightly, seconds away from cracking. It hurt, strangely, that he would put on an act around you, but you didn’t dare think too hard about that sharp stab of pain or why you’d feel it. More than anything, you were worried, your heart set aching anew as you realized that his sorrow far overcame your own.

“No, I don’t. You looked...” Despairing. Agonizing. Like the weight of the world was crushing you and I don’t understand why. “Upset,” you said lamely. An underlying awkwardness edged your voice, created by your influx of emotions you suddenly had no idea what to do with. “I can… I can go if you want to be alone.”

“It’s not that-” Dimitri began with more false pretense, only to cut off whatever else he was going to add and let out a heavy breath, rubbing a hand over his face and allowing his posture to relax. “I’m sorry. I’m fine. I wanted a moment to collect my thoughts.”

“Is there anything I can do to help?” you asked.

“No,” he said firmly. Then, a moment later in a softer tone, “I don’t know.”

“This battle was… It was hard,” you said, an understatement if there ever was one, but Dimitri seemed to understand all the same.

“It was, and I know that what we did was necessary, but... I can’t help but wish that we could have handled that differently, that there was a different way to settle things without such violent measures.” His voice lowered even further, head bowing. “But if it wasn’t necessary, then what we did...”

Dimitri allowed the silence to speak for him.

“I think I understand,” you said, although you weren’t quite sure if you did. A part of your mind rebelled at the idea that violence wasn’t a way resolve conflict, although another wondered what such peace would look like. “But… We just have to keep going, don’t we? Maybe there’s another way, but this… We can’t let it define us, we just have to keep going forward and try to do better in the future, right?”

“Don’t you find it wrong?” Dimitri asked, his question given passion and intensity as he suddenly stood. The louder voice as well as the dramatic physical shift pulled you up entirely short, sending you a step back. “Does it not bother you to indiscriminately take the lives of those opposing us without even questioning if we could achieve the same goals without death?” All of the dispassionate pain you had seen before was gone, lit to a blaze in the soft blue of his eyes.

“I… I hadn’t thought very much about it,” you answered. The words came honestly in the face of being so startled, along with the pang of guilt that hit you from the accusatory nature of the question. “If it’s asked of me and my loyalty… No-” You hesitated, trying to think of a better way to phrase your thoughts, a prettier way. “If something I’m doing is protecting the lives of those I care for, I… I believe that it’s right,” you told him carefully. But, beneath the searching weight of his gaze, you wondered if that was only something to say. Like a poem or song. In truth, you hadn’t given the nature of battle or what you did to your enemies any sort of deeper thought. You didn’t want to. A hero couldn’t be a killer, even if they killed. And wasn’t it the same for you? For him? You had to believe that.

“What if the enemy believes the same?” Dimitri pushed urgently. “If all they’re doing is defending the people they care for in a conflict they have no say in?”

That gave you further pause, your eyebrows furrowing and chapped bottom lip retreating between your teeth as you tried to find an answer. You saw his argument, felt it just as clearly in the conflicted pain in his eyes. Doubt was poisoning him. Comprehension was sharp in that moment, an understanding of something you had been missing in the months you had known him. Dimitri’s capacity to care, something you admired so much, was a double edged sword. Great strength and great vulnerability. Of course it was. You’d seen it before, the agony of caring just a bit too much.

“I’d be glad,” you finally responded, slightly indignant in your desire to stand against his questioning. “If I died because of something I believed in, I would not regret it. I hope that anyone I fight feels the same.”

“And the ones they leave behind?” Dimitri asked, his voice softer, the rigidity of anger gone from this question. You met his eyes. Pure, perfectly pigmented powder blue. The color of reliability and honor, but also the color of melancholy and cold. Now they were needful. Looking for an answer you didn’t have, that probably didn’t exist. “What of them?”

You had heard that question before.

Any and all desire to argue against him bled out of you, leaving the overwhelming swell of post-battle exhaustion and anguish to hit you in full force, so stark it was nearly physical. “I don’t know,” you answered, your voice even softer than his own.

Dimitri’s eyes closed as he turned away, dissatisfied with your answer. “There really is no answer, is there?”

“Maybe there is,” you said, a weak attempt at hopeful optimism against his stormy despair. Dimitri didn’t disagree, but he didn’t have to do anything other than allow the words to deflate and disintegrate in the relative silence of your little bubble on the edge of the trees. And with them, an argument you couldn’t help but feel you had lost terribly.  

“We should return to the others. Professor Byleth will want to speak to us all when we return, disturbing news had been discovered.” Dimitri said, his eyes opening and posture straightening out. The voice he used now was firm, but empty. Closed off once more. He did not wait for an answer before brushing past you, or look to ensure you were following.