Fire Emblem Fates: The Reimagining (Chapter 22: C)

About an hour after bidding Kaden goodbye, Corrin was almost at the border.  She had been doing some thinking about where she would try and go once she was out of Hoshido, and she decided that she would find some small town that needed protection and offer to work there.  After all, with the faceless around, most places weren’t protected at all.  This would also give her soul the opportunity to heal, something that she desperately needed.

Suddenly, the sound of horse’s hooves started echoing through the area.  She didn’t even need to look behind her.  She knew who it was.  Even so, she kept walking.  A minute later, a hand grabbed her arm.

“CORRIN, WHAT WERE YOU THINKING.  LEAVING CAMP IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT?  WE ALL THOUGHT THAT YOU WERE CAPTURED!”

Taking a look at Xander’s face, she could see that he was livid, maybe because he had been so worried about her.  She didn’t care, however.

“It wouldn’t matter.  There was no reason left for me to stay there, so why would I wait for you all to force me to stay?”

She tried to pull her arm out of his grip, but Xander was holding firm.

“You’re one of us!  You’re our family!  You’re our sister!  You can’t just abandon us!”

At the word ‘family’, Corrin started getting mad.  How dare he still indicate that the lie was always true!

“WE’RE NOT FAMILY!  WE NEVER WERE!  YOU ALL WERE ESSENCIALLY MY PRISON GUARDS!”

Xander was starting to get mad as well.  He was barely keeping it together.

“Corrin, listen to yourself!”

“I HEARD MYSELF LOUD AND CLEAR, PRINCE XANDER!

Corrin finally decided to call him by his title instead of just his name.  That choice had a bigger impact on Xander than she anticipated.  His face contorted in shock, then it hardened again.  His grip tightened around her arm and he started pulling her towards his horse.

“You’re troubled, Corrin.  I’ll take you back to camp and help you figure this out.”

Corrin quickly ripped her arm out of his hand and backed away.

“I’VE ALREADY FIGURED OUT WHAT I NEED TO DO, AND GOING BACK TO THE LIFE THAT I HAD ISN’T IT!”

The fact that she was not coming back to them as their sister finally got to Xander, but he wasn’t ready to accept it.  The state she was in was preventing her from thinking rationally.  At least, that’s how it seemed to him.

“Corrin, all the others will be heartbroken if you go!”

“IF YOU ALL HAD IT YOUR WAY, I WOULD NEVER LEAVE, EVEN WITH ALL THAT I KNOW!”

Corrin started panting as the energy from the moment wore off.  She just stood a bit away from Xander, staring at him, daring him to tell her how wrong she was.  Instead, Xander looked down after seeing the anger and pain in her eyes.  His face was full of guilt.

“I know you’re having a hard time…  I know you’re confused…  I know what you’re going through.  I know… because you are very similar to Erline.”

The name was unfamiliar to Corrin.

“Erline?”

Xander looked at her again, eyes holding a pain that he had tried to keep inside for so long.

“…She was my full-blooded little sister.  You don’t remember her because she was killed at the beginning of the Concubine Wars, before you came into our lives, but, she was just like you back then.  She was always curious and eager to please.  She was also a bit naïve.  She didn’t want to realize what was going on in our home, and when she did realize it, it devastated her.  She… was killed… to get to me.  That’s why I tried to be there for you.  It’s why I’ve tried to be the older brother that you needed.  You remind me of her that much.”

He reached for her hand again, but Corrin stepped back.  The anger that she held was finally starting to turn into tears.

“She isn’t me.  SHE wasn’t kidnapped as a CHILD!  SHE wasn’t LIED to for most of her life!  SHE wasn’t FORCED to choose between her real family and her essential KIDNAPERS!”

Corrin started to leave, but Xander grabbed her hand again to stop her.  Even so, she still didn’t change her mind on what needed to be done.  Turning back towards the man she used to love as a brother, she caught a sad look in his eyes, but she was too emotionally distraught to care.

“I wish I could have taken a different path!  I was never meant to be in Nohr!  I was supposed to be with my real family in Hoshido!”

A few minutes went by in silence and contemplation before Xander decided to pull Corrin into a firm embrace.  Corrin was caught off guard and she tried to break out, but Xander would have none of that.  It was as if, by showing Corrin this rare physical emotion, he was doing it for Erline as well.

“We all wish to turn back the clock sometimes.  I’ve wished something similar.  I’ve wanted to go back and save Erline, but no matter what happens, we all have to live on with the choices that we make and the things that happen, whether for better or worse.  If you run away, you are abandoning everything that you’ve fought for.”

His grip got tighter around her, but not so tight she couldn’t breathe.

“Please, Corrin.  Come back.  For Elise and the others, if not for yourself.”

At the thought of Elise, the only one of the Nohrian siblings who she was sure wasn’t aware from the beginning, Corrin began to reconsider.  She must have been so frightened.  Pausing in her struggling for a moment, she thought of what her options were.  If she went back, they would definitely try to keep her with them, but even so, her emotions were telling her to go back and give Elise a chance to say goodbye after the war.  After some deliberation, she came to a conclusion.

“…I’ll only come back until this is all over.”

Xander smiled and loosened his grip, but when he looked down, Corrin’s face was still and downcast.  She looked as if she was completely apathetic to what happened to her.  With concern in his eyes, he led her back to his horse and lifted her up.  Seating himself behind her, he gripped the reins and started heading back to the camp.

It took about two hours to ride back there, since they were moving much faster on horse than she had on foot, but Corrin refused to look around.  Was this the right choice?  If it wasn’t, what would happen to her?  She couldn’t find any answers to the questions before the encampment came back into view.  Corrin saw that some of the tents were damaged, as if there was a battle since she had been gone.  Camilla was on the edge of the camp, so she was the first to see them.  She ran out to them excitedly.

“CORRIN!  XANDER, YOU FOUND HER!”

Corrin slipped off the horse without even visibly reacting to her.  Camilla didn’t notice, however.  She was so relieved to see her.  She just grabbed her and held her close, tears slipping down her face.

“I’m so glad that you’re alright.  When we were attacked early this morning, we went to your tent, but we couldn’t find you, and we saw your necklace on the ground.”

She reached towards a pouch and pulled out Corrin’s abandoned necklace.  The chain was still broken, but the pendant was cleaned up a little.

“We can fix the chain when we get back to Nohr.”

She held it out to Corrin, waiting for her to take it.  Corrin just looked at it without expression, and pushed it away.  Camilla looked at her with shock, but Corrin didn’t notice.  She just started walking back to her tent, which was, surprisingly, undamaged.  She did hear Xander telling Camilla what happened when he found her, but she didn’t care anymore.  Before she slipped into her tent, however, she took a glance to the side at the rest of the camp.  What she noticed surprised her.  It was Hinoka's pegasus, tethered and panicking.




Takumi was still at the bottomless canyon with Azura.  They had just gotten word of how close the smaller force was to the capital and were ordered back.  He hadn’t spoken to Azura for a while, as he was still angry at what was done to his family.  He was about to leave, but an attack prevented him from withdrawing.  All of a sudden, a cackle sounded behind him.  As he turned around, a blast of magic knocked him back towards the canyon and over the edge.  The last thing he heard before he blacked out was the voice of the woman that he hated.

“TAKUMI!!!”