SOL REGIS.

one could imagine the sun as a kind of metamorphosis.

[soliegis]

𝐀𝐍 𝐀𝐁𝐔𝐍𝐃𝐀𝐍𝐂𝐄 𝐎𝐅 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐒𝐔𝐍.

skinfcxi​:

[ ... ]         Dagr blinks once, twice, thrice. She is almost impressed that he had managed to hold off against Vestri for so long, but the larger part of her is enraged.

         “Hey! What in the nine worlds do you think you’re doing?” Dagr shouts, storming right in between the combatants. “What’s wrong with you, man? Do you usually go around and beat the hell out of people’s pets? Are you some crazy animal hater or something?”

          Jötunar jabs a finger at her fellow knight.

         “I’ve been looking for my damn bird for the last hour and a half! We have places to be, y’know. I hope you didn’t bang him up too bad — he’s got a beauty pageant to get to.”

         Vestri caws in agreement, taking his usual place upon Dagr’s shoulders. 

         “I have half a mind to sic Vestri on you again! What do you have to say for yourself?”

          fixed on the adversary before him, ephraim doesn’t at first catch the sounds of approach from behind — only picking up on the crunch of heavy boots through underbrush at the same instant a startlingly human light of recognition dawns in the giant bird’s eyes, fixed on some point past him. it’d be an opening! if not for the voice that rings out — no, booms out — practically shaking the leaves from their branches. and rather than someone concerned for his facing the eagle alone ( he has something about how he was handling it fine readied on the tongue; call it a learned defense ), the woman storms between them and fixes him with a glare.

          the storm of words that comes out of her next is nothing short of baffling.

          pets? animal hater? what kind of accusations— a beauty pageant?

          his expression must be utterly dumbfounded if he looks as blank as he feels. but the proof is there in the way the bird settles, completely docile, on the giant woman’s shoulder, and he has to face what his eyes are telling him. ❝ er— i... that bird is yours? ❞ as ridiculous as it sounds.

          but he’s seen half-man-half-stallions, the walking dead, three-headed dogs and petrifying snake-women; fairytales most, including himself, would have dismissed as ravings. so maybe it’s not as ridiculous as it seems. ❝ i was defending myself, ❞ he finally explains, straightening up, ❝ it attacked first. ❞ or at least he’s pretty certain it had. reginleif tips spearpoint towards the ground, though he still keeps an eye on the creature just in case the threat to “sic” it on him again hadn’t been an empty one. ❝ i thought it might endanger the town, so i wanted to prevent it from getting close. i didn’t realize it was tame; i apologize. ❞

          now that the apparent danger has passed, though, he can admire the beast for what it is, with that jagged beak and talons no longer directed at him, he hopes. its trainer, too, is familiar; one of his fellows among the knights, though he recalls neither name nor station; he would remember if they’d spoken before. but a bird like that looks more fit for hunting, or even war, not... he clears his throat, ignoring a growing knot of uncertainty as to whether he truly wants to know. ❝ and, what is this about a... ‘ beauty pageant ’? ❞

[soliegis]

𝐒𝐄𝐋𝐄𝐍𝐄𝐋𝐈𝐎𝐍.

freliaes​:

[ ... ]       To stem the fear and terror in his voice. He couldn’t bear to hear it again. Not from Ephraim. Not from that man. Not again.

      With the sudden righting of the ship comes the threat of Innes losing his own balance, stumbling in his mad scramble to reach the railing in time. The shouts of the sailors and the roar of the waves are lost to rush of blood in his ears—everything fades as his focus hones in on the hand desperately clinging for purchase, slipping by the finger with every second that passes. He reaches out, growing closer and closer, almost close enough when a sudden tremor wracks the ship. The force throws the Frelian prince forward, the air knocked from his lungs when his chest crashes into the railing, arm thrust over the edge before he has time to think.

     His hand clasps around a wrist, heart fluttering with both adrenaline and relief as he holds out his other for Ephraim to take. “I’ve got you! Grab on—” Another harpoon then pierces the beast’s side, and the monster screeches in pain, recoiling from the blow. Now linked to the creature by several ropes, the ship is pulled along with it, and Ephraim’s wrist slips in his grip. “NOW! Hurry!”

          blotting out the sun, a stern face wreathed in iron-green appears above like a shadow backed by the sky. ( hah, he would think, were this the kind of situation for humor, has he ever seen the prince of frelia look so stricken? there’s no time to reflect on it. ) he sways like flotsam cast at the mercy of the ocean, and for the first time he understands what it’s like to feel adrift and weightless, with no holds or purchase — it may not be completely so, but the impression is a deep one as the vessel jerks again, with each almost living motion threatening to unseat his last tether to firm ground — and life.

          over the crash and roil of waves and beast, the roar in his ears, it’s almost impossible to hear the man’s voice, but he doesn’t need to. he gathers what momentum he can—

          and the ship seems to dip into the waters as the monster below pulls back into the depths; ephraim swears he feels the grasp of cold seawater at his very ankles. when the buoyancy of the wood lifts, straining against the ropes, he seizes upon the instant of latent velocity and uses it to throw his flailing arm up as high as it goes,

          even as his wrist in innes’ clawlike grip slips precariously for it.

          ❝ pull! ❞ is all he can manage, hoarsely, and he surmises the prince can hear him about as well as the reverse. and with that, his other wrist finally gives — and not a moment too soon for him to latch onto the iron rail with it instead, slick metal cold and stinging at his palm, and with the combined efforts of two-pronged desperation, he’s weightless again, but this time in relief as he’s dragged up.

          weak legs stagger upon the deck — solid and safe — but he gathers himself again quickly, adrenaline and muscle memory overtaking what fleeting knowledge of fear his body still recollects from humanity before the calling of a warrior. ( this is much better than fear. why worry about what can be lost — again? — when he can defend it, instead. ) ❝ are there any harpoons still left? ❞ already his head is whipping around, searching for remaining artillery. the shipmen are rushing about, shouting, billowing sails snapping open overhead with deep cracks like thunder magic to offer more resistance against the beast’s deep-sea pull. ❝ we can’t let it pull us under. we have to kill it before then, or bring it back to the surface. ❞

          there. one last harpoon. he dashes for it.

          ❝ i’ll load the canon! can you hit the beast with your arrows! ❞ there’s no point in both of them manning one harpoon; he can figure it out on his own with some minimal direction when it’s needed. they need to focus on firepower — as much and anything as possible, to put the monstrosity down before it drowns them all.

[soliegis]

what goes screech in the night

petrykos​:

𝐈 𝐚𝐦 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐧𝐞𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐭𝐨, 𝐬𝐡𝐞 𝐚𝐥𝐦𝐨𝐬𝐭 𝐛𝐢𝐭𝐞𝐬 𝐛𝐚𝐜𝐤, 𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐛𝐢𝐭𝐞𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐢𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐝𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐞𝐤 𝐢𝐧𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐚𝐝, turning away from him once again. It was part of his job as a knight at the academy, to ensure students’ safety, and for that she couldn’t find fault in him. Silence is hung heavy between them. It couldn’t have been a long walk back to camp, if they left now, they would have a decent amount of sleep for the journey come dawn. Then what would she have come all the way out here for then? To let the beast slip away into the night and vanish indefinitely. The more she attempts to recall what it looked like, the hazier the image becomes.

          The frown etched on her features dissolves into something less severe. If there was a fort up top, then they may rest if need be, even if only for a fraction of what moonlight they had left to guide them. Petra looks between the trees, the cliff, and the knight. Though she looked ready ( and for a moment was ) to turn back, her eyes searched not for the path back to the camp, but the best way up that cliff.

          Should she cut down the tree to use as a ladder? Did her partner have any rope she could use? Possibilities run through her, but no matter the method she decided to go with, she would reach the top.

          “Let us go, then. There is little time to be wasting.” She has climbed trees before, so this should hardly be a feat.

          …

          She thought this much before actual execution. In combination with already exhausted limbs, the climb proved much steeper and more difficult than initial impressions. She hoists herself up onto the ledge just enough to not fall right back down. The patch of grass she finds herself in is soft enough to call a bed, but despite her heavy eyelids and sweat covered forehead, there is enough strength and resolve in her to continue. ( Though, a quick moment to recharge wouldn’t be an awful idea. )

          Her eyelids briefly close as she continues to lie down, waiting for her partner to meet her.

          for several beats, he stays where he stands to watch her begin the ascent, half expecting enthusiasm to get the better of her ability and for her to come tumbling back down. when she doesn’t, last glimpse of her foot vanishing beyond the dark canopy of the treetops, he lets out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. a competent tracker, even in the dead of night, and now capable of scaling a sheer cliff face without even rope? what do they make the students of here in fódlan?

          a hand runs back through dark teal, and he shakes the thoughts away for now. he’d better not let her get too far out of sight in this darkness.

          the divide between nature and the sky has always been a harrowing one. though seldom one prone to fearfulness, ephraim still knows caution when he feels it, and the rush of the open air at his back, the cold bite of yet-unfrosted rock digging against his palms, reminds him of the peril of this venture. he’s always preferred having both feet on the ground, but a pegasus wouldn’t be bad right now, he thinks with a flicker of a grin as sweat trickles into his eyes. one hand reaches high to grasp onto the final hold, with the top of the ledge in sight.

          a grunt, the skitter of loose rock, leather scraping soil — and he hauls himself onto earth again, with an exhale letting the tension in his muscles, particularly his protesting arms, release. a cold breeze passes its hand over him as though to soothe, but its frigid touch near freezes beads of sweat uncomfortably on the skin. he doesn’t loiter long to rest, pushing to his feet and dusting debris from his tunic; the fort ruins, an angry, looming outline of thick stone and half-crumbled facades, are within sight, and if his guess is right, then they’ll be sitting targets the longer they’re still.

          ❝ are you all right? ❞ he looks to her, a motionless outline of mauve and ivory without even her eyes open to watch for threats. don’t tell him she’d worn herself out on the climb. ❝ we shouldn’t linger here. the monster might be close. ❞ the night is no longer a haven. human-like, she’d implied of the beast earlier. the image of its spindly limbs, oblong face, the wicked scythe flashes behind his eyes, and he frowns. monica, little more than an animated corpse. no, he’s letting his imagination get ahead of him.

[soliegis]

𝐀𝐍 𝐀𝐁𝐔𝐍𝐃𝐀𝐍𝐂𝐄 𝐎𝐅 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐒𝐔𝐍.

          when the eagle brings its talons forward again, he dives. this time, rolling through bracken and the sharp pinch of twigs and stones against his shoulder as massive claws carve the air not inches above his head. jaw clenched, he’s back on his feet, drawing back the spear in his hands, and pitches it forward, certain that it would—

          with a twist, the bird deflects the weapon aside midair with a kick and a shriek that sounds almost offended, sending the spear shattering against a nearby tree to join the woodland debris hidden among the shrubs. gaze hardening, ephraim takes a step back and reaches for reginleif, searching for a weak point beneath the blade-like metal plumage, an opening. this isn’t an ordinary monster, not by fódlan’s standards as far as he’s seen them, and not by magvel’s. it’s too intelligent, almost...

          it throws its wings wide again and challenges him with a look in its eye to confirm that acuity, and he brings his trusted battle spear forward, steadies his stance. ❝ is it me you want? ❞ he calls back. ❝ come on then! ❞

          intelligence, its origin, its strength; those aren’t important. whatever the case of its being here in these woods, he can’t let it get close to the monastery town. a steel-bodied monster like this, even if not as large as the crest beasts he’s seen, would still cause panic and endanger anyone it came across. the students. eirika.

          it’s too high up in the air, and has the advantage of that mobility in these restricted trees, of the upper hand of momentum for its offensive and determining the reach of his own. he can’t risk throwing reginleif, so if it decides to make a run for it, then that’s that. he has to bait it — maybe into a more open space. if he remembers, the treeline thins to a field up ahead. the bird shrieks again, feathers flashing in the dappled sunlight. he lunges with intent to feint. draw it out, keep its attention. ❝ is that the best you have? ❞

     ☀   //    @skinfcxi

[soliegis]

what goes screech in the night

petrykos​:

𝐓𝐡𝐞𝐲 𝐡𝐚𝐝𝐧’𝐭 𝐛𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐚𝐰𝐚𝐲 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐭𝐨𝐨 𝐥𝐨𝐧𝐠, 𝐲𝐞𝐭 𝐧𝐨 𝐬𝐢𝐠𝐧 𝐨𝐟 𝐚 𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐜𝐮𝐞 𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐲 𝐧𝐨𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐛𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐭 𝐬𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡𝐭. Her eyes had adjusted to the dark enough to discern bluebells from phlox, but that only proved useful for the uncertain missing scraps of bark on trees.

          Had she been going about this the wrong way? Think, think, think. What did it eat? Berries, rodents, snakes? Surely, it needs water; had there been a bank they stumbled upon before? Frustrations pound in her head like cymbals, crashing and disharmonious. She couldn’t. Her eyes close as if dulling one sense would sharpen the others. She thinks, maybe her ears were missing some scratching or gargling, but they are only filled with the unsatisfactory sound of his voice. 

          “When you find it.” If she finds it, or anything more than the bushy caterpillars or hungry squirrels that have been scattered through the woods.

          “To not be killed,” she answers without much hesitation and rather flatly, that if she were anyone else, it could have been passed as a joke. It was an obvious answer to her, but it was also safe to say that she had no concrete plan. ( She could only run so far until she reached the edge of the cliff. ) Petra’s head turns toward him now and she tilts it slightly. “…Are you having an idea?”

          While there was no intended vitriol in her tone, it may have come across as vexation presents itself in the form of a huff and sigh. She’d take any suggestions ( any that didn’t involve turning back ) at this point, she was grasping at straws, twigs and berries even. 

          one brow cocks at the deadpan response from over her still-turned back, unappreciative of the sarcasm to what had been a genuine question, as though he was the one causing trouble by being here when she had decided to walk off on her own without so much as leaving word. she’s competent in the wilderness — that much is clear from watching her navigate the last several minutes — but that doesn’t mean she could just —

          when she does turn, it’s to parry the question back instead, and he can’t help but frown. why would he have an idea of what to do with the monster on the unlikely chance they managed to find it? going after it wasn’t my idea, he almost replies, but manages to school himself out of the riposte.

          ❝ keep you safe, ❞ he answers instead, and it’s only in hearing the words come in a firm but true breath from his mouth that he realizes how the timbre matches his late father’s. a strange sensation, but not an unwelcome one. ( and for an instant he understands now those occasions he’d spoken similarly in the past, occasions the young ephraim had shirked in favor of everything else. ) he’s no stranger to headstrong girls, he thinks, and even if she insists on being difficult, it’s his responsibility to make sure they both make it back to camp in one piece.

          —and, if he knows anything about headstrong girls, it’s that there’s no point in telling her ( again ) that this was a wild goose chase.

          resisting the urge to fold his arms, he scans the mass of the nearby cliffhills, breath leaving him in a cloudy puff. ❝ the monster looks similar to one i know. it probably lives in the highest place it can find, around rocks or ruins where it can camouflage easily. ❞ it’s a reach to assume that the fiends here would be cousins to ones worlds away leagues across the sea, and he doubts the girl is very interested in what he has to suggest, but the night is creeping into the small hours and he imagines she had planned to get back and sleep at some point.

          at least, he assumes.

          ❝ i didn’t bring a map of the area, but i recall that there’s an abandoned fort at the top of these cliffs. ❞ he jerks his chin towards the sheer-faced walls looming before them, cloaked in darkness and the forested canopy and recognizable only as a void where the treeline suddenly stops. nearly a ninety-degree climb, it’ll be a task to either scale or find a path to the top, but part of him hopes that she won’t find the effort worth the possibility and will decide to turn back.

[soliegis]

@ulirblood:​

[ prev. ]

she'd had patients like him before. men who thought they could take whatever was thrown at them and keep going. lord sigurd had been one of those kinds of people. she'd learned very early on that she had to be rather forceful with these types. "absolutely not, young man." she huffs, pushing him back down on the infirmary bed. "just because you're a knight of seiros doesn't mean you can just walk it off. no one can walk off a wound just like that." she frowns, frustration gnawing at her. why did they always think they were invincible?

"you can leave when i say you can, not when you think you can. do i make myself clear?" her voice raises at the end. there was no doubt that the few other knights in the infirmary she was taking care of heard the entirety of her chastising, even with the curtain shut around the two for some semblance of privacy.

          the flaring indignation of her response is less jarring than the push of hands on his shoulders, landing him on the bed again with a creak of its frame, and he can’t completely hide the wince as the wound twinges in protest. had he crossed some line he hadn’t realized? all he thought he’d done was say he was clear to walk and take his leave — he’d meant it to free her time and energies to tend to the others, some of whom were in worse condition than himself. so where was this coming from?

          ❝ no, listen, i’m fine— i— ❞

          she’s not listening. and he knows that look; he’s not going to win. chivalry is dead, he’s overheard women complain before; and what about bedside manner?

          ❝ do i make myself clear? ❞

          what else can he say. swallowing a sigh, he forces muscles tensed in preparation to rise into relaxation again. ❝ yes... i understand. ❞ and if it comes out a little too acquiescent, if he could hear forde back home laughing him out of the stables if he ever heard the king of renais had submitted so easily to a cleric’s demands, then, well—

          he thinks he knows better than to argue with the ones who determined his wellbeing.

          ... looks like he’ll have to get used to the infirmary ceiling for a while longer.

[soliegis]

𝐃𝐈𝐒𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐎𝐌𝐁.

leicestersbeast​:

[ ... ] As is… “I kinda figured that something’d’ve have to happen by now, but it’s real still out there. Might be a long night’a vigil, sir.”

Cords in his neck, muscle down to his shoulder blades, tense. He could blame it on the air, which still feels cooler than he might like. Not so bad, having just emerged out of winter—anything warmer than the mountains chill can almost be balmy, now. Likely more to do with wandering thoughts, and—

“—Hey, did’ja mean that? Earlier, I mean. What you said about havin’ dealt with zombies before.” That’s something Raphael doesn’t really know what to make of. An unshakeable sort of thing to just say, and Ephraim hadn’t lingered on it, and with other things to see to, Raphael had put it out of mind until he was left staring at a humble collection of headstones. 

Weirder things have happened, maybe, but even if that constant refrain there’s not any weirder thing that’s happened Raphael can really point to, right now. He glances sidelong at the other, squints through the dark. “Just… Can’t imagine what’d bring that about, is all.” He hopes they don’t find out.

          he hadn’t expected much. if there had been something to wake up to, he wouldn’t have been peacefully roused from sleep for the midwatch. still, a kind of restlessness settles in with the vacant stillness of the landscape, deep beneath his bones and difficult to shake, that grows and gnaws incessantly with every moment he doesn’t move. familiar, because he recognizes it from his childhood. frustrating, because he thought he’d been rid of it after getting older and picking up better techniques to ease his mind. it’d started up again after they’d returned from sreng, and got particularly bad in the dark.

          ❝ i hope you don’t mind if i stand, ❞ he comments. if he sat down to join the other man, he’d be up again in less than a minute. as it is, he’s doing his best to go through some basic stretches slowly, not just to warm up in case anything calls for action, but in part to stave off the mounting intolerance under his skin. if not that, he’ll start pacing soon, or doing spear tricks, just to move. which, aside from likely drawing more attention than needed their way if any graverobbers did happen to show, would probably eventually invite questions, if not irritation, if past experience was anything to go by.

          then, welcome conversation breaks the silence, and, at first, the question seems to come out of nowhere, before he remembers what raphael is referring to. ❝ oh, that. ❞ in hindsight, it hadn’t been the best thing to let slip out of his mouth, especially when they still weren’t sure what they were dealing with.

          how to explain to someone what that had been all about?

          ❝ i come from a continent a long way from here, called magvel. back home... ❞ how to say it? the walking dead isn’t uncommon is too minimizing, isn’t it? ❝ we have legends of monsters and fiends, including the undead. it turns out they weren’t just legends. ❞

          prior to a couple of years ago, he would have thought it sounded unbelievable too. and he almost says that, but — the story isn’t a pleasant one by far, and he doubts the man had asked looking for a history lesson. the wasted, decaying shell of orson’s wife, insensate and echoing, frozen with that ghoulish smile... ephraim had never considered himself faint of heart, but there had been something so profoundly wrong about what they had seen there that day that it raises the hair on the back of his neck still to think of it. monica — and her husband, too. alive only in the barest sense of the word. they should have been grieving orson’s death long before he’d met his physical end.

          ❝ i take it fódlan doesn’t have any similar stories, does it? ❞

[serenes-forest]

[soliegis]

𝐃𝐈𝐒𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐎𝐌𝐁.

leicestersbeast​:

GHOSTS AND GHOULS DON’T BOTHER Raphael all that much. In theory. He’s never had to test the theory, but figures if he has to here, now—over this—that’s not such a bad reason to confront the is or is nots of the ether.

The story’s real unnerving, to be sure. Graves turning up empty when they’re not supposed to be’s never gonna bode well for anyone, most of all the families and villagers that preside over those resting places. Raphael never minds gathering information. Talking to folks is easy, setting them to ease is part of the task, nestled in. This time, it feels him with a creeping discomfort. Wordless understanding is shared between villager and student is a startling familiarity with how important these sites are, how much of an ache it sets forth in those who have lost loved ones to see them disturbed. 

(—In the countryside of Leicester, there’s two humbly marked places that Raphael knows well from tending, visiting. Needless to say, it strikes a chord to listen to the villagers while gathering information to get their wits about them on what’s to be done.

The walk back up doesn’t do much in terms of helping Raphael sort through the information, sifting for the most important.)

“Said it mostly seems like the trouble’s coming from the northwest’a here,” Raphael supplies, a start. “Honestly, no one seemed like they had much more to say about anything other than what we know already—graves being bothered.”

A beat, gloved hand rubbing slow at the back of Raphael’s neck, nodding to himself. Any other time he might be inclined to enjoy the scenery. The plateau’s nice, far as places they get sent to goes. Task at hand sours it, though. Boots scuff against the ground as Raphael stands just downhill from Ephraim—why’d anyone go digging through the earth looking for trouble?

He continues, “Lady I was talking to figures it’s some kinda—zombies?—undead-was-dead folks risen again, or something like that. I’m not really sure why zombies’d be bothering other graves though. Getting outta one seems like a hard enough time, let alone turnin’ around and digging up another…”

            northwest on their map points them deeper into the plateau, where the cluster of homes and meager farmland disperses into flat, rocky uplands that seem fitting for the simple burial grounds of a village — he’d estimated that the area might be their site earlier, surveying the surrounding landscape for signs of disturbance, human or otherworldly. ( which he’d found — tracks and evidence that the land had been passed through, but several days old and not telling enough of anything more than that, which matched with local claims that the last sighting dated not yet a week ago. )

            turquoise lifts at the mention of zombies — what would have been a bedtime tale to frighten children not two years ago. the dessicated ashes of their reality still trail in the motes of his memory between disbelieving truth and fiction. and their origins... no, he wants nothing else to do with the shells of the living; nothing good ever came of them. ❝ if the dead are walking, then this village has more on its hands than some empty graves. things like that don’t happen without reason. ❞ the trusted spear strapped across his back is both a reminder and an assuring brace. ❝ but if it comes to it, i have some experience with them. ❞

            he doesn’t let that sit for long. ❝ if there are no other leads, then we’ll have to resort to vigils. let’s gather the others and make preparations near the gravesites. ❞ they had bothered the people here long enough.

                                                        ——   ☀   ——

            altitude and the sparsity of alpine air robs spring of its enlivening warmth, and he’s grateful that they hadn’t come earlier in the year, though even this is a temperate balm compared to the glacial cold of the sojourn into faerghus two months ago.

            the moon has risen high, an off-white, elegant sliver of a thing, by the midwatch hours when he stirs easily to the footfalls of the one who’d come to wake him. all around, nature has long since withdrawn into that dreamlike stretch of night, and it’s into its deep and apparitional hush that he rises, suppressing a yawn and rousing himself to vigilance. upon the small hill’s crest that overlooks their rustic cemetery sits that student’s burly outline once more, at the latter half of his watch that ephraim would now share.

            recollection takes a moment. he’s never been good with names. ❝ raphael, right? ❞ steps come to slow beside the other, eyes sweeping out and below across the pale-phantomed expanse of dark as though in bated breath for a glimpse of shambling corpses, flickering shapes disturbing the gloom. ( silhouette of a body, suspended on a hook— )

            he shakes his head. ❝ any movement? ❞

[soliegis]

oak :   who would your muse consider the strongest person they know

  ☀   //    botanical headcanons.  /  @sennokao

prior to the latter half of fe8, the answer would’ve been instantaneous: his father, or — runner-up barring that — general duessel of grado. both people whose strength he looked up to and whose reputation as authoritative and peerless warriors he wanted to emulate.

after that, the answer becomes much more muddied, and today’s ephraim would think a good several seconds before probably asking back what manner of strength you’re asking about.

physically, his answer probably wouldn’t have changed much, though his perspective on his father has now shifted fairly substantially to include respect for much more than his legacy as king and warrior. he’s started to think a lot more deeply about other kinds of strength, though, after his version of it cost him just about everything he claimed to want to be stronger for. like the kind it takes to understand and touch the hearts of others, the kind it takes to heal, and the kind it takes to know what matters, and who, and when.

in c17, fomortiis!lyon accuses ephraim of having always thought of lyon as kind, gentle, and weak, which ephraim denies ( sort of; he doesn’t really, directly ), but which is probably true and just something he doesn’t want to admit, especially in front of eirika *. the kind of strength lyon had, which ephraim had always had a subconscious appreciation for — that much is not a lie when he says it — but which had also always been overshadowed in his estimation by his own visions of what it meant to be strong, is something he’s tried hard to understand in the time since, too.

i think a large part of his reason for wanting to personally be the one to go to grado and help in the aftermath of the grado quake — alongside wanting to do so to honor lyon’s wishes — was to search for and understand that kind of strength lyon had: the kind that would push a prince out of such love for country and people to be willing to sacrifice anything for them, which is something ephraim isn’t sure he can even imagine himself doing **. not that he wants to do what lyon did, but there’s something profound in the spirit of it, even if he didn’t necessarily agree with the execution.

this is getting long-winded and it’s because strength for ephraim is inextricably tied into his understanding of leadership and kingship, which is Only His Entire Character Arc ( imo ). and in broadening his horizons of what that looks like during the war of stones through witnessing lyon, eirika, innes, l’arachel, seth, duessel, gerik, syrene, so many others, he no longer has as clear-cut an answer for this question as he did when he was younger.

so... his answer now would probably be that he thinks each person has their own kind of strength, some that are more obvious than others, but all that can be learned from. and he’d probably add that he hopes one day he can come into the kind of strength he hopes for himself too, something that embodies all of those qualities in equal measure.

-----

* though ephraim denies it in this moment, i think this is a big underlying factor in his subconscious that leads up to the final confrontation where he asks lyon if it’s his fault that lyon has changed so much, and the continuation of that guilt post-fe8 even after lyon reassures him that’s not the case. i don’t usually pull from feh lines all that much because, since i don’t play, i miss out on a lot there LOL but ephraim there pointing to his lack of empathy as the key factor for what cost him his friend in the end is i think an indication that the demon king’s words got to him more than he’d like to admit.

**  i know this is a generous interpretation of lyon’s motivations, but it’s how i characterize ephraim as interpreting them, or wanting to interpret them. ( also bren slap me if i’ve got my head real far up my own ass here )

[soliegis]

𝐒𝐄𝐋𝐄𝐍𝐄𝐋𝐈𝐎𝐍.

freliaes​:

[ ... ]    “The harpoon.”

     He can feel his heart jump into his throat at the word, and a sudden burning in his chest as he remembers the hooks, the talons, the spearpoint, plunging into his middle—and he looks back over his shoulder. Ephraim’s there, and further behind him, seamen are rushing about on the deck below. There’s screaming (the same as when those claws tore into him), and panic (they all fought for him once; Ewan, and faces he can now hardly remember—), and Ephraim’s there a g a i n, his voice cutting through the haze, forcing Innes back to reality.

     ( This reality, anyway. )

    “—har… poon.” His hand slams against the contraption once more, and he looks back. The barrel, unloaded. “The cannon. Right. Right. Let’s—” His eyes dart across the ground, from the rope attached to the weapon, half-submerged in seawater, leading to the harpoon lying on the far side of the bow. “Grab that! We need to—” There’s another impact against the ship, another groan. The beast must have been hit by at least one other. “—we need to load the cannon first!”

          if innes, too, is disoriented, then the situation is bleak. but urgency doesn’t allow for hesitation or dismay — only the initiative the renaissian king knows best. he follows the search of frelia’s gaze before the other man speaks, and is lunging at a run for the steel-bodied spear even as he directs. it can’t be dissimilar from loading a ballistae, he reasons as both hands take hold, grip and hoist and palms bitter and wet of seawater clutching purchase on the narrow metal neck. 

          the vessel lurches again dizzyingly under his feet from another impact as though the ground were no more stable than clouds, but there’s a shout that sounds like triumph from somewhere on the deck below, and it’s everything he has just to keep his footing as he lurches his way back across the bow, warm brine washing at his boots, where innes stands ready at the barrel. ( if innes, too, is— what had he felt, in those final— what did it mean for a man— to die and live again? )

          rusted and dark, the cannon’s eye stares him at an angle for the harpoon to slide and sit into, but just as he opens his mouth to shout if this is how he should be fitting it, an unearthly scream rends, sonorous and watery, from the depths below, and suddenly the woodboard has vanished from under him, and the harpoon from his hands. the ground slams back into his arms and he’s sliding, rolling, scrabbling vainly for purchase on a diagonal floor, swallowing saltwater and sputtering. legs, back collide with bars behind him to halt his descent — the railing — and something hard follows bruisingly against his stomach. saline coughs out from his lungs ( not blood ), dry and stinging. the harpoon, blessedly seated lengthwise across his torso lest it have run him through as it slid across the deck after him.

          he’s struggling to his feet again in this slanted world. he’s picking up the weapon. seawater draining out under his feet.

          until he’s not. until the edge bangs his knees and hip and he’s slipping past it— weightless— the beast in the fathoms—

          ❝ innes! ❞ the billowing masts above, monstrous in their vision of hope. the frothing torrent below, monstrous in its promise of death. when had he grabbed onto the rail? the harpoon is gone, whirling dizzyingly into the sea, and the higher rungs taunt him charybdically with life when he can’t right his momentum to swing his other arm high enough. once more, the ship rejects gravity and pulls itself back onto its keel as though to mock him, nearly wrenching his shoulder from its socket; or worse, his grip from the slick iron.

          the truth is cold. the scyllan deep leaps for his ankles. his purchase slides.

                                                                                ❝ innes!! ❞

[soliegis]

what goes screech in the night

petrykos​:

𝐈𝐧 𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐬, 𝐬𝐡𝐞 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐚𝐠𝐫𝐞𝐞 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐬𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭—𝐡𝐞 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞𝐥𝐲 𝐦𝐞𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐰𝐞𝐥𝐥 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞 imminent threat could be lurking above their heads readying to end them in one fell swoop. She imagines her grandfather, features pressed into a stern frown not unlike the one the knight gives her now. He would likely agree with him—*do not loose your arrow into thick brush* he might say—but she wasn’t out of lust for blood, victory, or whatever superficial reason may exist. Petra only held the facts close to her and used those to guide her actions, it was weakened enough to run away, it was unlike the others, and it could come back at any time and strike the others down in their sleep. It was less of a martyr case and more of a… learning opportunity, she might call it. If they tackled it while it was weak, they could know in advance for future encounters what it was weak to, where it liked to tread, how to take it down.

          “Do you not have curiosity?” she begins. Baseless and reckless, yes, but she presses on. “Right now, we are equals, by being here, you are also reckless. The beast could come and be killing us both, yet you are staying, following even.”

          She stops by a tree that was nearly identical to the others, placing her hand on the trunk. Small tracks large enough for a fruit tree seed are fresh in the ground, but it wasn’t the creature she, no, they were after. Calloused fingers run over the bark before she notes a few scrapes where tiny ants had already began crawling and claiming its estate. Quickly, she searches for marks identical to the tree branded on another. Only another two trees bore some fraction of resemblance, but it was as good of a lead as any.

          She looks over her shoulder at him and gestures in a come here motion with her fingers. “This way, the trees are telling us.”

          curiosity? he opens his mouth to challenge. this wasn’t a game of pursuit, some fanciful woodland chase after harmless shapes by the certain magic forested daylight possessed. they were soldiers here, and disobeying both the command and safety of their camp without reasonable grounds. something within him balks instinctively at the assertion that his move to follow and protect her should be held up to the same light as hers to bound alone into the darkness without even a word left behind. ❝ i can’t let you go alone, ❞ is all he can answer, as she’s already moving again. ( —and yet, isn’t it an impulse, a drive, he understands? had not the same bold search for answers and thrill been a source of the castigation that’d dogged him from the tongues of all around him since childhood?

          do you not have curiosity, she’d asked. and the beating of demonic wings; and the screech and clamor of the skirmish; and the arterial thrum of satisfaction in the creature’s wounded retreat.

                                                            he does. he does. )

          the deep plum of her hair melds into the shadows of the undergrowth, leaving him to trail by the powder white of her blouse and the outlines of movement. her palms press to the bark, eyes searching with a shrewdness he recognizes from lessons in game tracking and the sport hunt. did they teach these skills at the academy? wordlessly, he follows, keeping a periodic watch to the umbral sky. the trees are telling us. not untrue, he thinks, if an odd way to put it. in passing her steps, he notes briefly the marks she had — nearly invisible on the trunk in the night, but she’d picked them out as though she’d already know what to look for and where.

          seconds fill into minutes underscored by the crunch of footsteps across the permafrosted floor of the boreal north. in this season, the wilderness hovers with a crystalline silence, colored only by the promise of their unseen threat. ❝ tell me, ❞ he eventually asks, the puff of his breath warm and cumulus, ❝ what do you plan to do when you find it? ❞ their ascent has taken them now far afield towards the seat of rocky cliff-like foothills; having come all this way, they’ll have no one to rely on but themselves, where there has been no sound or sign of a party sent to retrieve them. ( simple neglect, he wonders, or cowardice? )

[soliegis]

goldenrod :   does your muse believe in luck or fortune ?  why or why not ?   where do they believe these things come from ?  

   ☀   //    botanical headcanons.  /  @alfvangr

in a general sense, yes, ephraim believes in luck and fortune as concepts. i don’t want to derail and get into too much detail on my headcanons about renaissian spiritual beliefs, but tl;dr it’s posited similarly to zoroastrianism in that there’s a pantheon of gods and spirits and creatures, over which a cosmological duo — a supreme deity of good and a supreme deity of evil ( fomortiis ) — dominate. and at the end of fate, good is always predestined to triumph over evil. something something it grew out of humanity’s way of coping and survival during the age when darkness ruled over magvel, and is a big contributor to the overarching atmosphere of relative optimism in magvel as a whole.

anyway, the forces of luck and fortune stem from this same pantheon, so with the general belief that there are divine or at the least unseen forces that are on humanity’s side comes a healthy acknowledgement that these things play a part in day to day life.

with ephraim himself, aside from that acknowledgement that they’re real, he just doesn’t like to rely on them too much himself. as someone who likes to be self-sufficient and who takes pride in his own strength and capabilities, he’d rather bank on his own read and understanding of circumstances rather than trust in unseen forces, which he feels to be unreliable as a foundation. luck and fortune are nice, and he won’t deny they play some part at times, but they’re ultimately cherries on top and shouldn’t form the basis of one’s actions.

[soliegis]

a case of mistaken identity

resurrectionpact​:

*sneaks up behind @soliegis* BOO! [ Faith +1 ]

Lyon could imagine the three of them in front of this tree. Eirika with innocent eyes and a bright smile earnestly making a wish, Ephraim with his arms crossed like one of the older men insisting that “this is something for girls, not something that a man would do”, and he would be right, but Lyon would privately think of how beautiful the gesture was, dreams adorning a tree in color and beauty during a time when they have precious little of it.

The tree before him blooms with dozens of delicate, petal-pink ribbons tied around its budding branches. On the lowest ones, there isn’t even enough room for a sparrow to perch on, never mind a ribbon, and never mind the three ribbons getting permanent wrinkles with every second they are trapped in Lyon’s anxious, clammy hands.

Beyond the thick layer of pink fabric, Lyon can see bare branches with only a handful of ribbons. Certainly enough room for three. But they sit so high, high enough that one would have to climb just to reach it. Defeat, strong and familiar, weighs heavily on Lyon’s heart…. 

No, no, not anymore. The old Lyon would have accepted defeat and walks away, just like he accepted everything in the past. But the new Lyon fights because there are things worth fighting for, like the right to be strong and the right to tie ribbons to trees.

His hands grip the rough bark of the oak tree, and it’s then when he remembers that, actually, maybe he hasn’t climbed a tree before. Still, memories of Ephraim doing the same thing guide him on this unprecedented journey. One foot fits itself into a groove in the tree’s trunk, while his hands grab at a large branch above him. 

          in ancient tales like the ones he would often hear as a child, gathered about a hearth with others as a groaning squall raged beyond the windows, it was always a foreboding eve when the spirits appeared, the world plunged into black and cold, often storming too. and as he’d grown older, there’d come a point that he’d realized such stories were told on nights that mirrored those within them for a reason. logic followed, then, that if the details were exaggerated, then the stories themselves were only fabrications designed to frighten; he’d been all too proud to let those around him know of this revelation — that, rationally, ghosts didn’t exist, and those ghoulish things that lurked under beds in tales were nothing scarier than moving shadows and human imagination. as though, like the rays of the sun that banished all nightmares with its coming in the morning, he could content in how he had brushed the pall of anxiety from eirika’s face, or chased the tremor from lyon’s gentle voice.

          ghosts, of course, did exist. he had learned this since. and they were all that the stories told of them and far more. but one thing about his childhood discovery had remained true.

          it is no dark and stormy gloom when this one appears; it is a quiet, balmy spring night, where the people have all retired but the world is still awake and vibrant with the calls of midnight birds and vernal wildlife that navigate the monastery’s pathways undisturbed. it’s a movement in his periphery at first, just like it had been a movement in his periphery last time.

          a whisper of his name last time. a press to the back of his hand last time.           ( the spot is still cold. )

          it’s not doing what would be expected of a ghost — the dead, as he understood it, didn’t know of physical barriers, and would hardly be found climbing trees — but this isn’t what he thinks of first. instinct is first; grabbing reginleif is first; and though this image of lyon is a little ways up the tree already, he won’t hesitate to launch the spear if it proved malicious, even if it would do nothing more than pass through a body. he’s already seen how it looks crumbling to dust, once.

          ❝ why are you here, ❞ he calls; a demand, not a question, though it rings less of hostility than distress. this is no magvel, no grado that its prince — his friend — had so loved. he is a stranger here. there is nothing for his soul.

          ❝ what unfinished business would bring your spirit here to fodlan? ❞

          ( he can’t help but wonder when it would finally come to rest — lyon, the war, his mistakes, his guilt. has his work since not been enough? would they follow him still, rejecting burial and the toil of the living? he can accept regret, responsibility, but this burden of a strange era when those who should be dead still walk feels as though it may overpower even him. it is unfair, he thinks. he is not asleep this time, and so this memory has no right to haunt him. )

[soliegis]

           ☀   //    HEADCANONS.  /  some renais worldbuilding

COUNTRY. the kingdom of renais

COLORS. dark — nearly black — indigo and that fiery sunset-orange are its two signature colors: the two you see on ephraim's cloak in his sachiko wada cipher illustrations. incredibly bold hues. renaissian decor is well-known for its vibrant and intricate use of color in general ( think persian rugs ).

SYMBOL. the rearing mounted cavalry knight. on their flag, it's emblazoned with a lance and sword crossed behind the figure: siegmund and sieglinde.

GOVERNMENT. absolute monarchy. though the king has a handful of advisors, there are few to no checks in place to monitor his power: no cabinet, no court. hinges very heavily on having good leadership, as seen when everything went to shit under orson.

CAPITAL CITY. a bit of a trick question with renais. the capital city is knaan ( pron. kay-nen ), situated in the valley of hamon-duin ( the bottom-most of the three valleys that renais' territory stretches across, the one the castle is seen located in in the game map — lit. 'valley of multitudes of [mael]duin'. there's war history here. for another time ). but some ways east of knaan is castle renais itself, a separate structure nested right at the base of the mountain range that separates renais from jehanna and carcino.

originally, boas of the five heroes, the kingdom's founder, had the castle built during the war against the demon king as a refuge for the disparate people of the area suffering from being terrorized by monsters. its first, short-lived name was lost to history, but it was renamed castle renais at the christening of the kingdom itself after the defeat of fomortiis to symbolize the new age of freedom for humanity in magvel.

as time went on, of course, castle renais and its surrounding castle town wasn't big enough to hold the ballooning population, and so the capital city of knaan was constructed further in the valley at a natural chokepoint. the much smaller castle town of renais then became a place only for the royal family and its immediate retainers and guards, which it remains to this day. the kingdom of renais is thus a curious case where the royal castle isn't located in a city, but stands separately in a remote location. this physical rift compounds upon the mindset passed down in its monarchic family that royalty governs the people from a distance to maintain unquestioned authority.

at some point about 200 years after the sealing of fomortiis, the king of renais at the time declared that, as the capital of renais, knaan should look the part, and redesigned it as a fortified city despite the time of peace throughout magvel. and he didn't just want a nice wall and some decorative fixtures — he wanted the city to be able to withstand an onslaught from all the armies of magvel combined. the result is an impressive military citadel of 12-meter high walls fully enclosing the city, several dozen watch towers spaced along its perimeter armed with countersiege fittings, and a heavily-fortified bridge across the river to one of its entrances, which is protected by another chatalet. someone had too much money and nowhere to spend it.

during the grado attack, though the kingdom itself fell with the taking of castle renais, knaan actually was never captured by the grado army. unable to get past its defenses, they instead held knaan under siege while their elite forces painstakingly bypassed it to get to castle renais directly. as the route through the valley had been designed so that castle renais would be near inaccessible if knaan didn't fall first, this feat would have been much more difficult, maybe even impossible, if renais' forces hadn't already been all but overrun by this time, aka. if ephraim had been there to defend it. the siege then lifted some weeks later to answer ephraim's offensive into grado, leaving knaan one of the only places that technically remained in renaissian hands the whole time.

[soliegis]

𝐃𝐈𝐒𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐎𝐌𝐁.

          evening climbs slowly in the thin heights of the rugged west, where sleepy mists and the last of winter cling to distant rounded highland peaks brushed dark with swaths of spine-like conifers. after the day’s long march from their settlement further down the valley, weariness has begun to seep among their number, hindered further by the arrival of spring’s soporific warmth. yet night was precisely when they couldn’t afford to rest.

          brionac plateau marked their position upon the map unrolled between his hands, and within it the pinpoint of a nondescript upland village some distance from the nearest major territory. it’s no wonder it’d taken so long for their distress calls to be answered; apparently, they’d been sending missives to their region’s governor for many weeks since the first of the disturbed gravesites had been discovered. he knows well the hierarchy of a regent’s task list, and mere rumors of troubling shapes and spirits in the night are difficult to muster the manpower to attend. but perpetrators, whether human or otherwise, would be put to rest soon now, with any luck. selfishly, he hopes it turns up more interesting than a petty crime, or a protracted prank. it seems like a waste to have come all the way out here for little more than exercise.

          among those he’d been sent with stood one tall, brawny young man more than twice some of the others’ size, who’d seemed to outgrow the academy’s student uniform and for whom he’d developed a liking despite never speaking. not once since their departure has he heard a complaint out of him, nor seen him rest before everyone else. it’s he who approaches now up the crest of the incline, descent of sunset casting his broad shadow across the tawny grasses, to which ephraim greets with a nod. ❝ what did the villagers have to say? ❞

          the pattern of incidences had been scattered and by appearances random, with the locals further scrambling their stories out of human fear for the murky figures they had claimed to see. he had hoped that careful subsequent questioning would unearth more information around which they could plan their approach, or at least build some expectation of what they might encounter. it was all well and good to wait until nightfall and stride up to the gravesites to keep vigil over the interred, but given the morale and momentum of their group, he’d thought it best to attempt a more strategic plan before resorting to their most straightforward option, yes, if not their most unenviable.

        ☀   //    @leicestersbeast​

[soliegis]

𝐒𝐄𝐋𝐄𝐍𝐄𝐋𝐈𝐎𝐍.

          circling clouds of overhead sea vultures had been the first ill omen, they said. ephraim’s brow had darkened with a frown, but as the sailors took action to investigate, he remained without any clue of what should be done. only twice in his life had he stood upon an open sea vessel, and of those only once had proven dangerous.

          fortunately, there isn’t much time to wonder.

          an eruption of sea spray and thick foam too close off to the right is the waking call, throwing the rocking deck into sudden chaos. ❝ crest beast! ❞ someone shouts as balance tips and tilts. ❝ off the starboard side! four o’clock! ❞ it’s echoed quickly by others amid the stampede of boots — ❝ pull the lines! ❞ — the g r o a n of the straining vessel. ephraim takes one step,

          and is sent nearly sprawling as the world is bucked viciously to the side. more shouts; the earth spins s l o w, then a massive splash somewhere as the ship rights itself again and brine rolls across the wood boards under his hands and knees. now he scrambles upright again at an unsteady run, cursing leaving his weapon in the cabins — but would spears even be useful against a submerged enemy?

          ❝ innes! ❞ he calls out before he can wonder why, searching eyes pinpointing the much more seaworthy figure near the bow. how does one watch the fall of a man who’d already fallen? tumbling headfirst over the railing, aegean green disappearing beyond reach, swallowed by a colossal beast — gone again? he blinks hard.

          ... an illusion. he’s still there.

          a bellow from far below is nothing like an eagle’s screams, and he can see the rays of the clouded sun, and another sobering spray of ocean salt is the o n l y reason he comprehends the bedlam of voices echoing out to load up the harpoons! the harpoons! ( to return a life is a gossamer thread, the thinnest blade’s edge. it’s not difficult to understand. but how is it thus — to live again? )

          ❝ the harpoon. ❞ his voice doesn’t feel like his own upon finally reaching the other man; his legs burn from climbing steps two at a time they shouldn’t burn from. and his lungs, and the fire of lasers, hooks, talons on his chest— another fountain of water shatters the roiling waves, and he can make out the fractured outline of the dark shape beneath. it’s like something from a distant dream. he forces himself to focus. ❝ innes, do you know how to arm a harpoon cannon? i need you to show me. ❞

      ☀   //    @freliaes