Chapter Five: A Shadow and a Doubt
Another day, still travelling through this desert. Destination? The next place with water. The sun cast into Ike’s eyes, leaving dancing spots of light in his sight. Past the bright globes, he could see Soren fighting to get the sand out of his hair and clothes. Really, everyone was trying to get the sand out of places it shouldn't be (Ike pointedly averted his eyes from Titania as she fidgeted irritably with her shirt).
Like his companions, he was uncomfortable and had grit in his hair, eyes, ears, and in other places, but he could ignore slight discomfort. He was a soldier. He knew what it felt like to go through harsh conditions. For the benefit of those around him, he cursed the sun and sand, but inside...
Ike liked the feeling of the warmth lingering on his skin, left there by the radiant summer dawn. The light of the day painted the landscape with soft browns, fiery reds, and vibrant oranges. It was similar to the Grann desert, but this one was much more expansive, more majestic in scope. The beloved goddess herself had to have shaped the graceful lines like a royal tapestry. With each breeze, the initial lines changed, and would continue to remake themselves over the days and ages, but it was blessed with an eternal beauty.
"Soren, what name do they call this desert?" he asked, feigning polite interest.
He should have known better, though, to pretend. The moment Soren's scarlet eyes focused on him, Ike knew that he could see right through the nonchalant charade. "The natives call it the D'Hari Desert. In their tongue, it would mean 'Lady of Beauty'," the sage replied, brushing his hair out of his face.
"Lady of Beauty," Ike repeated absently, mulling that over. He had noticed that the closer they came to the heart of this strange and foreign place, the names took on a more feminine sound, and meaning.
"There can't be an Emperor."
Why was that? Crimea had crowned its queen years ago, Daein had its own to boast of, and Begnion was commanded by an Empress. None of them forbade men from rule. "Why do they only have Empresses, not Emperors?"
"The one who unified all the peoples under one emblem was a woman," Soren said, now fighting with his robes. "They believe women, with their more emotional and nurturing nature along with their inherent need to care for others makes them more suitable rulers."
Boyd grinned at that. "And how has that worked out for them?"
Soren, in comparison, did not look as amused, but the times the sage smiled in public were very rare. "They've had a few bad apples, but in general, it is the men who have made the most mistakes in their history. Only a female may hold the highest seat of power, but there can be a king, a steward that is the caretaker of the throne until the next Empress is ready to assume her position. That is how it is now."
"Now?" Ike asked.
Soren heaved a bit of a sigh. "The current ruler is King Valcox e Telemari IV. He does have children, but when his sister, the last Empress died, she left no Heirs, thus...the passing of power. He has five children, but only two of them could become the next true ruler."
"How do you know all of this anyway?" Boyd wanted to know.
"Read, Boyd. It might do you some good," the sage said scathingly as he moved ahead.
Though he could not see his face, Ike could tell Soren was rolling his eyes. He thought of reprimanding them, but decided against it. It would do very little good, he knew from past experience: the two engaged in these sorts of spats on a daily basis, and though it could be considered a disturbance in the group, it happened with such regularity that the others would only notice it in passing or it would become a subject of amusement for the next hour. Simply because no sane person would want to infuriate Soren, the group tended to target Boyd. The green-haired reaver often made himself a target for ridicule just by opening his mouth, and he was much more terrifying in battle than he was on the road. A mere glance from Soren would frighten someone more, even though Boyd was physically built larger than Ike himself.
Bored with the conversation already, Mist looked up at Ike, a mischievous smile on her face. "Hey Ike....I spy--"
Ike had to fight the strong urge to roll his own eyes. "Mist, we are not playing that game," he groaned. She had tried this before, and as her older brother, he had decided to humor her...and regretted it.
"But why not?" she argued with a pout. "I'm bored."
As much as he loved his little sister, on long treks such as these, she could be a little annoying--no, downright impossible. "Because we are in a desert! Other than sand and the sky, there is nothing out here! And as much as I'd love to see your variations on describing a sand dune, I think I'll pass," he snapped irritably.
Boyd was immediately by her side when her bottom lip pushed out and she looked upset at her brother. Ike had noticed the bulky fighter's increased sensitivity to his sister's moods, which was better than when he used to moon about Titania. However, whenever Boyd approached Mist, Ike could feel himself tense up, and he knew that he didn't like whatever it was developing under his own nose.
"Are we anywhere near civilization yet?" Shinon was dumping sand out of his quiver, holding the arrows in his other hand. For a brief moment, Ike felt like a father would when dealing with an obnoxious son who wouldn't stop his badgering. The older man's tone was slightly reminiscent of a petulant child, but Ike valued his opinions, excluding the attitude that came with the delivery free of charge, and his sharper eye as a marksman.
Ike decided to let Soren answer, since he was the tactician, and the one with the map. "The next oasis is about half a day away, and the nearest settlement is farther still." The sage rolled up the map, his expression touched with annoyance. "In other words, the same answer I gave you last time."
Before the archer could retaliate by saying something nasty, Titania intervened. "We know that it looks like this desert has no end, Shinon. We don't need you to remind us of that," she said reproachfully, then went back to her conversation with Rhys. Ike suppressed a smile. There was no doubt that even though Ike was technically the leader of the group, Titania was the one who no one could argue with, if they wished to keep their insides where they were. Granted, Shinon had never disobeyed a direct order, but he would give the younger commander enough lip about it to make Ike want to strangle him. He was the only one who still questioned Ike's abilities and intelligence.
On his first day, Boyd had treated him like a friendly rival would, each of them pushing the other through taunts and challenges to be even better. Rhys was more understanding if anything, given his natural disposition, and Titania was sympathetic without coddling him or being overbearing. Shinon regarded him with outright scorn and didn't even bother to hide it.
That was then. Then, he hadn't lost his father, nor had he been a war veteran who had seen people die in front of him, their blood staining the ground. Then, he hadn't had his heart broken.
There were days when Commander Ike wanted to go back to the times of being a rookie. Before Greil had died, before the Mad King's War, before he'd even heard of a Princess Elincia Ridell, the heiress of Crimea.
This was one of those days.
***
The sun began to set over the dunes when the company closed in on the oasis. Water spots like this were a blessing from the goddess after traveling for hours in the heat of the afternoon. It was almost worth the sweat and grit to know that they had come this far.
As much as Ike and the others wanted just to rush towards the water, caution stopped them. Experience taught them that they weren't the only ones who could be here. Oases such as this one were the favorite haunts of desert bandits who would stake out and wait to ambush an unsuspecting traveling party. Fortunately, the mercenaries were not the ideal prey. After several years of hunting those kind of vandals, they had strategy and experience they could rely on.
Ike nodded to Titania and Boyd, two of his strongest fighters. Titania was nigh indestructible, this too was something learned during Ike's tenure as part of the group and later as a commander. Boyd was a bit of a moron, it was true, but what he lacked in some departments he made up for in brawn. If Ike had to fight him, he wasn’t sure he would win. The two circled to the left and right of the foliage, scouting out the area for unwanted vandals. Finally, both fighters strode back to the group confidently. "Nothing suspicious, just a family of four here for water and shelter, same as us, Commander," Titania reported calmly. A sigh of relief could be heard, from Rhys or Oscar, Ike couldn't quite tell.
He nodded. "Everyone, get water and wash up. We'll set up camp after," he ordered.
The others went ahead, but Soren noticed that their leader was not following. Instead, he had his eyes trained on the horizon, brows knitted in thought. The sage approached him, and tried to see what it was that fascinated the commander so. "Ike, what is it?" he asked after a long stretch of silence.
"I don't know what it is, Soren. Just a feeling about this place, something about it..." Ike muttered under his breath, searching for the right words. "I've seen deserts and sunsets before, why should these be any different?" The young man's brow wrinkled slightly in frustration, his blue eyes reflecting the light of the dying sun.
"Why indeed," Soren mused, watching the sand by his feet stir in the breeze, but stop short of the plants. It was as if the oasis was protected from the harsh elements of hot wind and ravaging sand. "Perhaps it is unsettling because it is both the same and different. This place raises questions by nature – mystery and intrigue permeate the very air. We can't help but be strangers here, even if we've seen a thousand sunsets and crossed a hundred deserts." Soren paused, studying Ike's face before choosing his next words carefully.
"History doesn't always repeat itself."
***
Everything was silent as the group washed up quietly and set up camp. Twilight fell over Ike's hands as he struck sparks with flint onto the kindling Mist had gathered. After a few failed attempts, he crouched before the tinder, his arms propped up on his legs with his wrists dangling, fingers loosely holding the rock. His eyes gazed up at the sky, now painted over with pinks and purples as the sunset drew its shroud of twilight close.
With that shaded dusk, he thought he heard a faint voice, singing on the wind. A male tone that vaguely reminded him of an old enemy he'd once fought. A person who didn't belong to either world, a creature exiled from both the Beorc and Laguz, the parent of the Parentless. Hair the color of true darkness, his heart had been lead astray when he had lost the only thing he'd cared about, deeply and with no reservation.
Ike found himself listening as the voice carried over the desert dunes. The soft tones made him wonder if he was really hearing it, or if the day’s heat had affected his mind.
"...Dusk falls on the east
In the dark I find
I miss you all the more
But never do I doubt
You are with me now
At the end of days."
The hauntingly beautiful sound, full of grief and heartbreak, was so familiar, and it struck a chord deep in Ike's heart. Even when the voice on the desert breeze faded, the song stayed with him – at least, the part he could remember. If it was even real.
He gently fanned the spark that had finally caught on the tinder, and as it grew to a small flame, he repeated the snippet he could recall under his breath. You are with me now..."At the end of days," he murmured, trying to make sense of it. Where had he heard that before? It was like a distant memory he could not quite grasp.
"I was not aware the end of the world was upon us," Soren said dryly, coming up behind him. He took a place beside Ike, sitting on a rock, and watched the sun's rays disappear from view.
"It was something I heard," Ike admitted, and he repeated what the voice had sung over the wind. A faint frown traced over Soren's face as he regarded Ike, and the shadows of twilight fell over his forehead, covering the elegant red lines there.
"How did you know about that? Those poems aren't very well known where we come from, Ike. They're from the Idyll's End songs, written by the founder of the Drazi Empire, Evalia the Great. They're very controversial here," Soren said, frown deepening. "It would be better that you didn't say those words here at all."
"They're just..." Ike stopped before he finished. "Why are they so controversial?"
Soren shook his head. "They say some things....similar to predictions, depending on the interpretation. Evalia the Great was not very optimistic about future generations, particularly with the royals."
Ike's eyebrows went up. It was always about the noblility, when it came down to it. People's lives were at stake with their every decision, and he'd seen some who had complete disregard for them and no compassion whatsoever. But then there were those who did everything in their power, and worked tirelessly for the benefit of their people. "Not all of them can be that bad."
"No, but most of the ones who matter are," Soren replied mercilessly. "The only one I can safely say has a shred of humanity left in him is probably the Grand Archduke, the eldest son of the king. His Grace Liyal e Telemari, he is the Speaker of the Senate, and has...very strong ideals, for being the son of one of the king's mistresses."
"He's not even a legitamate child?" This was news to Ike. A highly ranked noble who had that sort of history was not usually held in the highest of esteem.
"He was officially adopted into the family at the request of the king's second wife, Rimeria fa Nolindori, his stepmother and the mother of the current Heir. It was probably the only thing the king ever did for either one of them. She's dead, and everything the duke has done he's done on his own." Soren sighed heavily. "This place is far more different than we are used to. The Mad King's War and the conflicts after were some of the worst we've seen, but the atrocities committed here...It is a miracle they're still moving after Ashera's judgement."
Maybe that's just it...Maybe it's a miracle, but miracles happen for a reason. "Maybe they were awakened from the Judgement..." Ike fought to find the words, and he paused for a moment. "Maybe it was for a reason. That they still have a purpose, or something."
At that, they both fell silent as the family Boyd and Titania had mentioned came into view, or at least, some of them did. The eldest child, a girl with her hair covered, held back with her mother, both staying hidden in the shadows warily. The father, a big man with arms that were hardened by labor and weathering tough times, filled water skins with his younger son. The boy fiddled with a bandage on his arm, and Ike noticed a raised scar on the father's upper left arm, near the shoulder, in exactly the same place. When he turned, both mercenaries could see it in better detail. A circle with a star in the middle, a burn mark that had turned a dark reddish color.
"Is that..." Ike couldn't find anything to say, a lump had formed in his throat.
Soren was thoroughly disgusted, and didn't seem to have a problem expressing it. "It seems like a family crest, the others have it, too. It's burned into their skin, like the mark of slaves or cattle." Marks or brands were a sensitive subject for the sage, as he himself had been shunned from society for being one of the Parentless, a Branded. The proof of his heritage was a simple red mark on his forehead, the elegant lines shaped as though the brand on his skin had been painted with a calligrapher's simple hand.
"Burned?" Ike whispered hoarsely, his brain still failing to wrap around this new, very alienpractice. He couldn't believe that someone had taken a hot iron to that boy's arm, and pressed it to his flesh.
A set of feet stopped behind them. "It's a practice here. It's a special ceremony that's performed when a child turns five years old. They receive their name and the crest of their family," Rhys said very quietly, a touch of nausea in his voice. "The mortality rate for that tradition is there, but they've taken steps to bring it down..."
"If they stopped the practice altogether, there would be no concern for the child's life at all, now would there?" Soren said, quiet enough so that the family would not hear, but the others could clearly hear just how upset he was. "Burning the mark of a family into a child's skin, that's just..."
"It's foreign to us, as we are to them," Titania murmured behind Rhys. "Of course we find it abominable, but for them, it's a way of life."
"A way of life that should be changed," Soren argued back.
Ike put a hand on the mage's shoulder, and felt it trembling so slightly. "Soren, it's touchy for you, I know that. And it's just as bad for me, and for the others, too. We don't like it anymore than you do. But we're the strangers here, they wouldn't listen to us."
Rhys sighed. "It would depend on the stranger. They've listened to foreigners in the past. The current leader of the Northern Territories married a foreigner. The Lady of the Princess's household is from Begnion, and the Commander of the Imperial Guard is from Daein. They'd listen to those from other lands...but..."
Titania shook her head. "Not a troupe of mercenaries just passing through. From what you've told me, Rhys, these people like their secrets, and they don't appreciate having their affairs meddled with."
"Things here have all but been set in stone," Rhys replied softly. "The practice of Imahai, the Naming, has been done for centuries, before the Restoration and the Golden Age."
"Samtai and In'nae," Soren muttered. "Dawn, and High Noon. The first two books of Idyll's End." When the others looked at him with puzzled expressions, he sighed irritably, a sign to Ike that he was gradually settling back into his prickly, normal self. "Rhys mentioned the Restoration. The first book of Idyll's End is called Samtai, or 'Dawn', and it tells of the Restoration, which was after the War of Tears. Their Founder was 'restored' to the throne. In'nae is 'High Noon', the Golden Age of the Empire, when they had prospered, and there were no poor. Sickness had left them, famine had fled, and war was all but extinct. They were happy."
"'Were'?" Ike prodded.
"The...third book is Tanpali...Twilight in our tongue. The Empire in decline. They've been fighting for years now...the nobles squander their wealth while the common folk starve. They're on the cusp of the fourth book from coming to pass. Owanbate."
"Darkness..." Rhys said under his breath. "The fall of the Empire, and its total annihilation." Titania sucked in her breath at that, but Rhys shook his head. "The Founder predicted many things... The extermination of the Imperial nobility by one of their own, high-profile deaths, a war to end all wars, and a rain of fire from the sky."
"So a grim end? Prophecies aren't set in stone, they can be changed," Ike scoffed sceptically.
Soren stood up abruptly. "Everything she's predicted thus far has come to pass, why would the rest be any different?" He strode back to the camp, the heavy crunches in the sand from Titania and nearly noiseless steps of Rhys following him, leaving Ike alone.
Ike rose slower than his friend, and listened to their footsteps retreat as he looked back up to the sky, and the stars winked back at him, twinkling with a cold fire that was so far away. Beorc have wronged you, Soren, but I'd like to think we're not all bad. Prophesies are subject to interpretation. History can change, or at least...
I'd like to think so.
***
The fire snapped and crackled, throwing up sparks into the air, the bright orange flaring briefly in the dark before dying out. Ike threw more wood onto the fire as the others bade him good night and turned in for the evening.
"The nobles squander their wealth while the common folk starve."
That wasn't an unusual story in the records of history. Nobles got selfish, and when push came to shove, their world fell apart around them. They always got knocked off their high horses, be it a revolution or an outright slaughter. Ike didn't know this place well enough to know which was brewing, but something was off here. It made the back of his neck prickle with nervousness and anxiety.
They didn't belong here.
He stared into the fire, blue eyebrows knitted together. Suddenly, the fire flared, and a tongue of flame kicked up. It wasn't high enough to become a column of light, but for a moment a vague shape appeared...
That's a bird.
The next moment was definitely a dream. There could be no other explanation for it.
He was standing before a fire among a group of hooded people with their heads bowed, his head also covered. A simple pyre was in front of them, and the flames were licking the base of it, growing ever higher to devour the body of the woman that was laid there. Her skin was a pale white in death, lacking any blush or tint it may have had in life. Her hair was an almost silver shade of blonde, flickering in and out of view as the fire roared ever higher. The features of her face were peaceful, still unlined in youth and beauty, shimmering with the heat waves. A boy, not even five years old with large, pale green eyes, began to sob into the robe of what appeared to be his nursemaid. Another boy, this one older, held a baby with the beginnings of red locks on its head, big reddish-brown eyes staring at and reflecting the flame.
When he blinked again, it was gone. He shook his head as if he was shaking water from his hair, trying to loosen the memory. It couldn’t have been real. It just goes to show that I'm tired, I need sleep.
There'd be no sleep for him, though. There hadn't been for over three years, since he'd fought through his first war. The scars on his body had long healed, but in his heart he could still hear the screams of dying men and women, the roars of wyverns as their riders battled each other for the chance to have just one more breath, for the chance to see their loved ones again. When those went silent, and they fell from the sky, the sickening thud as they struck the ground still rang in Ike's ears. The clash of metal on metal, or worse, the sickening sound of when it sank into flesh, to find something vital to crush...The shrieks of the grieving as they found their loved ones dead, gone forever.
Fighting against Rajaion, even when he wasn't in his right mind, when the former prince's fiance was one of Ike's friends, was one of the worst things he'd ever had to do. A terrible choice that was no option at all. He'd had to kill Rajaion to get to Ashnard. Killing Ashnard was a non-negotiable in the war. He'd known it in his heart that Ena would have to weep over her beloved's cold, dead body.
Elincia, then just a princess, had waltzed into his life, asked everything, promised everything, even love...and nothing in the end. It couldn't work, because he'd deluded himself into thinking that it was love when it was merely infatuation, and she'd already known it wasn't meant to be. Once he'd served his purpose, she wanted nothing more of him, no more professions of love from him, no more pretending on her part.
It had left him bitter, that blatant disregard, though he'd fought not to show it. He'd long let her go, knowing that he could not give her the same happiness another could. It had hurt at first, but so had a wound. In time, it would leave behind nothing but a scar, one that would be a reminder, but without the pain.
He'd left Melior and Elincia behind, rejoining the Mercenaries, until his assistance was requested again. For another war. More screaming, more bloodshed, more death.
More nightmares that left him in a cold sweat.
I hate war.
It seemed to follow him wherever he went. In Daein, to Melior, to Gallia, then the gates of Sienne, and now...to this place. The Draza Empire, a land he knew very little about, and didn't wish to know more about. The earth under his feet seemed to scream in pain, and the sky pressed down on him, suffocating him. I don't want to see any more pain. No more grief. No more blood.
As a Mercenary, those things followed him no matter where he traveled. He'd always had to take Ettard in his hand and fight someone, something, it didn't matter. He was always fighting, it seemed. "Will I ever find peace?" he muttered to himself.
Will I ever be able to atone for the lives I've taken in battle? Then I could justify it, that I was doing for the good of peace, but now? Why else would those dreams haunt me the way they do? Death is death, killing someone can't be justified. In the end, the families of those I've killed hate me for what I've done, that I couldn't stay my hand and show mercy, even if mercy meant that my life would be forfeit. I guess I'm selfish that way.
"I don't know anything else. This is my life, but what reason is that? I could have turned my back on it long ago, laid my sword down and never touched it again."
So why didn't I?
"I wish I did, in some ways. Then it wouldn't be hanging over my head."
Do I mean that? If not me, then someone else would have had to live with it. The guilt of ending so many lives...I couldn't condemn someone else to that.
"So I've condemned myself – that's it."
A cool breeze rustled through the plants and ruffled his blue locks. Once again he found a sound carrying on the wind. A voice.
"You've protected more than you've ended. You will see. We have waited for you, Hero of the Mad King's War."
A beautiful voice, cool as water on feverish skin, old as ages yet still with the ringing tones of youth. A grown woman long gone from the living, her life cut short before it's time. Full, both of sorrow, and of hope at the same time.
"Hero of the Mad King's War, huh? I haven't been called that in a while. How do you know me?" he asked that voice.
There was no answer.
Voices singing earlier, and more voices that came when they weren't asked and left with no further explanation. His favorite kind. He was going mad from sleep deprivation. That had to be the only answer. He wasn't like Micaiah, who could hear the voice of the Goddess. He didn't hear voices, no one he knew that wasn't the current Queen of Daein heard them. It wasn't a laughing matter anymore. He'd heard voices twice, seen something in a fire.
Either there was something very wrong with him, or it was this place. It was beautiful, he couldn't deny that, but...in that beauty, he'd found something terrifying. It shook him down to the core.
I didn't question why I am what I am before. I was sure of who I was, that what I was doing was right, but was I fooling myself all along?
There were those questions again. He really needed to put a lid on it already. Commanders don't question themselves. There's no room for doubt on a battlefield.
Of course, now with his nerves rattled, he was wide awake. With a growl of annoyance, he rummaged through the packs for something to read. This ability was a new-found joy of his, contrary to popular belief. His writing was a bit lackluster, it was true, and Soren griped about the messy scrawl, but when he had trouble falling asleep reading usually set him straight. The more boring, the better the cure for his insomnia.
He found a leather-bound book of Soren's, and the title read "Twilight" on the cover. It was one of those books Soren talked about. A translated copy of one of the three books, those Idyll's End books. He opened it to the first page, and began to read.
"Even now, when the sun's still high
Day always fades to night
It is the twilight, the time between
That draws me in the most
Not quite dark, yet with little light
I fear it will come in time
Sooner than believed
Our Golden Time will soon die
And yield to neverending night."
"Soren was right, she was pessimistic," he murmured to himself, turning the page. He settled into a comfortable position, the fire warming the bottoms of his feet, and continued to read.
"The Blessed will come to us
They will not know her
She will always have doubt
But in Defiance of the night--"
"Why's that? 'Defiance', not 'defiance'? Why's that letter capitalized? Why's that important?" he mused.
"This little flower of water
Bred in fire, nurtured by earth
She will not long live
With the poisoned shadow
We have left behind."
"Well, that's nice and confusing," he growled. Turning another page, he read it by the light of moon and the dying fire. The strokes slowly but surely blurred together, and Ike's eyes drooped closed, the book falling to his chest.
A poisoned shadow? Doubt? Defiance? What kind of place is this?
