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1: wyvern moon.
Then it was over: that which you fear, being
a soul and unable
to speak, ending abruptly, the stiff earth
bending a little. And what I took to be
birds darting in low shrubs.
Much, much later, when Byleth finally found reason to recount the story—to Seteth’s quiet amusement and her embarrassment—she would begin with Flayn’s safe return all those years ago. With her eyes half-open and tasting the sting of daylight for the first time in a week:
“…Mother?” said Flayn. Her voice, thin from disuse, was little more than an exhausted whisper. She then promptly fell back unconscious, head cradled in Byleth’s left hand.
It was just as well, because Byleth had no idea what to say to that.
Taking great care, she walked up the stairs to the monastery’s upper quarters. She wasted no time in finding Seteth pacing back and forth in his office. “Is she well? Professor, say she is well!”
“Yes, just tired out. Not a scratch or a bruise.”
She placed her charge in Seteth's arms, but her grimace and labored breath did not escape his notice. “But the same cannot be said for you! I will put Flayn to bed and accompany you to—no, I’ll not let her alone tonight for a second—but I will send word for a medic. Please, rest here!”
“It is a shallow wound, and I would rather not see my blood on your office chair,” said Byleth, following him into his room. “And I’d like to watch over her a while before I visit the infirmary myself.”
Her curls were dispirited, her face pale. Seteth fussed over her, constructing around her a cocoon of bedding; she looked so diminutive, drowning in the mess of blankets and pillows. They watched her sleep in silence, both struggling to grasp the enormity of it. How unthinkable the tragedy was that had been averted. Emotion grasped Byleth’s throat, like the summer-grown ivy that snaked around the pillars in the hall below. All the panic and fear of the last week arriving belatedly, and all at once. She’d had no time to worry, with duty unfulfilled… Now she knelt by the bed and touched the back of her hand to Flayn’s forehead. Perhaps it had been improper for her to enter Seteth’s private room without asking first. At present she thought she would get away with it.
“Thank you, Professor. Thank you. I… I am forever in your debt,” said Seteth. His voice was relieved but the lines of worry on his face remained, as if his body had yet to accept that she was safe.
“Seteth,” she began.
“Yes?”
“She… did she ever… well… nevermind.” Whatever Byleth wanted to know, she had not yet the question to ask.
· · ·
The sun grew shy as the days shortened; thankfully, the day they went to the pond was cloudless and amiable, and the fish eager to bite.
“Thank you for today, Professor. It means more than you know. I used to watch my mother fish when I was young! It is no small wonder I have not yet learned myself. I had always thought there would be time…” Her gaze was fixed across the pond. The air had turned to a grayish chill, and the low daylight was painted on the rippling water. They had stayed nearly until the threatening of dusk.
Byleth gave her a gentle squeeze on the shoulder and began to pack up. She was slow and deliberate in this so Flayn could see where everything belonged. The live bait went in a pouch half-full with cool dirt from the greenhouse, and the rest neatly in the trusted tackle box. It was an old thing from Jeralt that had kept her company since her childish hands had first learned to drop a line. The wooden poles, horsehair lines tied straight, were returned to the stall by the dock. They were usually lent only in exchange for a portion of the catch, but she was in such good standing with the fishmonger that the day’s fish could be delivered in entirety to the monastery kitchens for tonight’s dinner. Most of them—rather, all of them credited to Byleth! But she was confident that Flayn would be a sure angler by the end of next moon.
Together, they trudged up to the dining hall. Flayn had not been her usual chatty self today, perhaps focused on the fishing, or perhaps on something else. As always, Byleth was happy to keep company in silence, and wordlessly handed her the bucket to hold after the covetous glance she sent its way. She perked up when the kitchens cooed over the quality and quantity of the supply. “How wonderful! You caught all of this?” they asked her, upon Flayn’s proud presentation.
Byleth piped up. “Nope. All me.”
“Professor!” Flayn’s expression was one of utter betrayal.
“Imagine how exciting your first real catch will be. Don’t you want everyone to share in that excitement when it happens?”
She mulled over this, and reluctantly said, “Very well. I shall forgive you this once.”
At her pouting, Byleth felt an inexplicable urge to lay a hand on her head, and ruffle her hair with fondness. She refrained from doing so because she knew she would only further incur Flayn’s wrath. Professor! I must remind you that I am not a child! She could imagine her admonishment quite easily…
They shared a table that night as well, tacitly understanding that they ought to celebrate the day’s partnership by enjoying the fruits of their labor together. Flayn finished her trout with enthusiasm but pushed around the boiled cabbage and carrots with her fork. She felt compelled by an odd sense of obligation to say something. “Flayn…”
“Professor?”
“Ah. It’s just, your vegetables. Shouldn’t you…” As soon as she said it, she began to despair. I’ve surely overstepped. Why did I say anything at all?
“Well, I am grateful for the meal, of course. Dare I say the fish was perfect! But, could they not have chosen a more palatable manner for which to prepare these vegetables?”
Privately she agreed but nonetheless soldiered on. “They’ll help you regain your strength sooner…”
Flayn looked down at her plate. Eventually, she sighed. “Yes, mother…”
Byleth inhaled her water. “Ah—wh—pardon?”
Flayn seemed to take pleasure in her suffering, and between giggles, she explained. “Oh, it’s only that—Sylvain says that to fluster Ingrid when he thinks she’s nitpicking! Not that I thought you were. Oh, and not that she does either! It merely seemed the perfect opportunity. Yes, I do believe I’m beginning to understand our classmates’ senses of humor,” and she punctuated this declaration with a proud smile.
“That is nice to hear, but your brother will have words with me if he finds out you’ve been taking pointers from Sylvain of all people,” Byleth said, coughing into her napkin.
A new trend took root: while she continued to spend meals with her students and colleagues in turn, dinner was often reserved for the company of her new fishing partner. On the rare occasions he could be coaxed out of his office, Seteth would be spotted joining the two of them.
· · ·
Then, when assignments were handed out in class:
“So you’ve read the first chapters on basic positional theory… then, could you please write a paper with some ideas on how you might apply them to your own formations for next week?”
Annette raised her hand primly. “Professor, how long—”
“Not too long. Please. Not too long.”
Felix crossed his arms. “The notion that something this basic could still improve my technique…” And he made sure the room knew how he felt with a pointed harrumph.
Byleth sank her fingers into her temples. “Would you like to read a later chapter and write on that, instead.”
Felix thought on this for a long moment. “No,” he said, at last.
“Then we seem to have come to an agreement.”
He slouched back in his chair, looking supremely dissatisfied.
“Mother—” said Flayn, and then she froze, instantly realizing her mistake. Her ears burned. She stared straight ahead, pretending not to notice Mercedes sitting beside her, looking like she had just seen a basket of puppies. Why in the world had she said that?
To her credit, Byleth seemed unperturbed. “Flayn?”
“I—apologies! Professor, I mean to say. I do not have much… recent battle experience. Aside from our recent journey to the coast, that is. I wished to ask if I may draw on certain… records of historical battles to complete my paper?”
“Of course.”
Later that night, Byleth pondered, as she often did, the endless ways that students continued to thwart the most meticulous of preparations. It was not so in battle, that much she was sure of. At least battle was predictable. “I’d rather face a whole army of bandits than one classroom of children,” Byleth declared to herself, tossing and turning in her bed. At this, Sothis chuckled merrily. You truly are an odd one!
“Seteth said I was getting better at this teaching thing… but I’m already so bad at talking with others… I always feel like I’m doing poorly by them…”
Do not fret, they love you! Aaand, one of them already thinks of you as her mother. If that is not progress, then what is?
Yes, that... she had almost dropped her papers when Flayn had said it. “You’re being ridiculous,” Byleth mumbled. But she fell asleep soon after, the slightest of smiles on her face.
· · ·
2: red wolf moon.
You who do not remember
passage from the other world
I tell you I could speak again: whatever
returns from oblivion returns
to find a voice:
“You’re acting pretty distracted, kid.”
Byleth wiped the sweat from her face with a cloth. “I am?”
Jeralt hung his lance on the rack with the other training weapons. Byleth felt inspired to follow suit by tossing her sword to the corner, where it kicked up a puff of sand before flopping over dramatically. He scowled at her. “If there’s anything you need to tell your old man,” he began.
On instinct, she shrugged dismissively. He waited.
“Well, there is one thing.”
“Hm. Well, come for a walk with me. It’ll do the muscles good. And pick that sword up.”
Byleth made a face at her father but addressed her earlier fit of pique, and hurried to follow him through the door.
“So, you know Seteth’s, ah, younger sister? Flayn? I’ve been taking her fishing on free afternoons, the way you used to. I think we’ve gotten closer since that whole thing with the Death Knight and all. She called me her mother when she was in my arms… and that’s happened a couple times since… I guess I’m worried that she thinks of me that way, and I’m worried I can’t be that person for her, and I don’t want to let her down, and—”
“Whoa, whoa. Slow down, kiddo.” He rubbed his chin. “I think I understand. So you’re not ready to be a mom. Ow! Just kidding around. You can’t go hitting my shoulder like that anymore. Too strong for your own good, I swear.”
She raised an eyebrow, unimpressed.
“The way I see it, it just means that she looks to you as someone who brings comfort. She feels safe with you. Because of what you’re already doing to help her out, right? So, all you have to do is keep doing that.” He shrugged, like it was a very simple matter.
When he received no response, Jeralt continued, “Look, I get it. I never felt ready to be a dad either. Cool it with the fist, let me finish! I mean, just being responsible for someone’s growth into an adult. You’re a real mentor to these kids, huh? That’s no small burden to bear. When you were small, you know we were in danger, you know how we went into hiding. Every new moon we’d go to another village. I’d lie awake at night, wondering if I was robbing you of that childhood you deserved. If I was spending too much time teaching you the ways of the life I knew, how to hold a sword, and not enough to play and paint and dance. All that stuff kids do. It just felt like I was never doing the right thing for you.”
Byleth was shaking her head emphatically.
“Yeah. You turned out all right. See? Your students will too. They’re great kids, and on top of that, they’ve got a great teacher.” He clapped Byleth on the back and she yelped and stumbled, glaring at him.
“Whoops. Goes both ways, huh?”
· · ·
“Don’t fidget too much. If they know you’re here, they’ll scare. And a scared fish won’t bite for the rest of the day.”
She spoke in murmurs, sitting cross-legged on the dock behind Flayn, who was on the edge, legs dangling over the water. Cold blanketed the morning. Byleth wondered if the fish would not be stirred into activity because of it, but Flayn had been determined to try. She was fishing with a float in hopes of hooking a smaller and less belligerent fish than the ones that swam at the bottom of the pond.
The float was tugged down. Flayn looked back in panic, eyes wide. Byleth gestured urgently with her hand. There was no time to look at her! Now!
Flayn struck, and the fish was hooked firmly; it came up without incident. Soon enough, she held the wriggling creature in both hands, strung to the pole laying at her side. Byleth couldn’t hold herself back and leapt to her feet, letting out a joyous whoop. The fish in the pond would surely frighten, but more important was to mark the occasion with the ceremony it well deserved. Flayn smiled wide. “How wonderful!” she proclaimed.
It was a common herring, mouth agape. On the smaller side. And yet, Byleth’s heart was full to bursting with happiness—greater than what she would have felt if she herself had caught the largest and most handsome fish in all the world! The revelation was unexpected, but quickly the truth of it washed over her. How odd, she thought to herself. How wonderfully odd.
“We might bring it into the kitchen and have it between ourselves with rice, for lunch,” Byleth suggested, dazed by the unfamiliar depth of her emotion.
Flayn considered this, running a finger along the scales. “I think I would like to let this one go back into the pond,” she said. Then she blinked and tilted her head, in the surprised way that one does when they speak their intention without first consciously realizing it.
Byleth nodded, and showed her how to remove the hook, gentle so the fish wouldn’t sustain too great an injury. She inspected the hook—it hadn’t bent too much, and was still sharp. “We’ll rinse this in clean water, and use it again for next time,” she said. Flayn helped her pack up, then they stood up and stretched, thoroughly satisfied. Byleth cracked her back, neck, and knuckles, and Flayn made a noise of mock disgust. Moved by the morning’s success and a new understanding of the things that brought her joy, Byleth was struck by an impulse. “Here,” and she pushed the tackle box that had once been her father’s into Flayn’s hands. “You’ll need this now, I imagine.”
“Oh…!” Flayn looked down. “It is too great a gift, I couldn’t possibly take this…”
But her eyes were watery, and shimmered like the pond at noontime, and regarded the rusty scales of the old tackle box in much the same way as she had the herring. As an unexpected and miraculous thing. Byleth knew at once that it had been the right thing to do, no matter how much teasing she would sustain once Jeralt caught wind of it.
“I’ve got another in my room, don’t worry.” A lie, of course. She would purchase one from the fishmonger tomorrow morning.
Lunch, while lacking in seafood, was delicious all the same. Contented and drowsy, they strolled down to the greenhouse to enjoy the plants’ idle company. Byleth squatted down by the flower beds, taking in sprouting stems between index and middle finger. “Forget-me-nots,” she said. “They’re your favorites, aren’t they?” Flayn nodded. “Seeded off-season. Things grow slow now because there isn’t as much sun, but we should still see them bloom soon. Next month, maybe. I’m glad that it's nice and warm, so that students may see their favorites at any time of year. Especially those who celebrate birthdays in the winter.”
It was not the first time that Flayn had been struck by awe at her professor’s easy selflessness—how a stoic demeanor and stilled pulse concealed, like the warmth of a greenhouse cloaked by winter’s spirit, a heart of loving character.
Having had the same idea for the afternoon, Dedue and Dimitri soon joined them. “Hello, you two,” said Byleth. She stood up to greet them.
“Professor,” said Dedue, with a bow of his head. He frowned and looked around, as if tracking a bug flying amidst the plants. “There is getting to be quite a chill here. Will the Madam Keeper be lighting the fires tonight?”
“It’s no problem. I can do it myself.” Byleth spread her palms.
He smiled. “The flowers shall be grateful. And I.”
As she descended with Flayn down the ladder, Byleth explained that the greenhouse was kept warm during winter nights by the furnaces in the underground storeroom, the heat from which would rise lazily through the corner vents. Flayn watched her eyes close. With fire in her hand she lit the furnace and just as soon withdrew it, like a bee dipping into a flower. “Just one will be enough for now. Let’s go back,” said Byleth. The light flickered against the metal of tools hanging against the wall. A bundle of wooden posts rested in the corner. Earthenware pots stood halfway to Flayn’s height, a solemn row of soldiers. Following Byleth back to the ladder, she curiously lifted the lid of one and found it full of dirt.
After she had walked Flayn back to her quarters, Byleth realized she had left her shoulder bag in the basement and hurried back to retrieve it. She quietly reentered the greenhouse. Her two students had stayed, obscured by a row of tall bushes. Dimitri was saying something that made her give pause.
“...at the pond last week as well. It is nice that the two of them seem to have found a manner of family in each other, is it not?”
Dedue murmured assent. Embarrassed, Byleth closed the greenhouse door behind her, awhirl with thoughts. She waited a minute, and then two, and then entered with a decidedly noticeable noise. She nodded in passing. “I’ve just come to get my bag,” she said.
· · ·
It was the last week of the moon. Byleth was drifting off when she was interrupted by a soft knocking at the door. “Come in,” she croaked.
Flayn’s face poked through the crack. “Professor,” she said, summoning her sternest voice, “You must not forget to lock your doors at night.”
Her reply was muffled by the pillow and by drowsiness. “Sorry, not used to it,” she said.
It had seemed to everyone that Byleth’s adjusting to this new, relatively cloistered life had been seamless. But Flayn realized that habits such as this just went unnoticed. It was no surprise that the professor did not belong in a cramped and shuttered room, from what she knew of the ways of her youth. Not that she knew much. Like her, Byleth kept her childhood tucked away in the chambers of her heart. She thought Byleth ought to be sleeping by starlight, defying a closed door’s containment—like the water that splashed over the edge of the pond, the smoke that spilled forth from the kitchen chimney. But there was the issue of safety… “Professor, the monastery is not safe at night, I know firsthand.”
A long pause. At last, a sarcastic grumble that sounded like yes, mother, came from the bed. Flayn laughed and took care to lock the door behind her.
“That is why I came, to tell the truth. I apologize for intruding upon your sleep, but my father is working late tonight. I do not wish to keep him. These days, I find myself having trouble alone in bed… scared that I might—” Her voice cracked. She carried on, feeling small, “If I might sit by your side and wait until my father is finished, it would be a great comfort…”
Byleth mumbled unintelligibly and lifted the blanket’s corner.
“Oh! No, I wish not to bother you further, it isn't necessary. Just to sit beside you is enough.”
The blanket stared back without a word.
“Well, if it is alright… I suppose…”
She soon became drowsy in the shared warmth of the bed. In the haze of approaching sleep, a memory of last week’s class came to mind. Byleth was teaching Ashe to better defend in close quarters. Flayn, a fellow beginner in matters of the sword, was running basic drills with him. Byleth had danced through sparring pairs, a different weapon in hand every time Flayn could spare a glance. She would come to deliver judgment and just as soon move on to the next, like a sudden storm in summer. She had corrected Ashe’s stance, shifting his balance by pressing her wooden sword against his back leg, light as a bird landing on a branch. And Flayn had felt how it had all come together for him, after that—felt it in the weight of his weapon.
She remembered that day in part because of how equally inelegant Byleth was now, in sleep. Her arm fell heavily over Flayn as she curled against Byleth’s side. Her mouth hung open and her face was not so much resting on the pillow as it was smashed into it. Actually, her snoring reminded Flayn of her own far-removed childhood days. Of the in-out-in-out breathing of the sea, and of the trumpeting foghorns that docks’ keepers would play by the coast. To lead ships through the mist to shore. Somehow it was far more comforting than distracting—the unmistakable sound which accompanied the breath and seemed to say, you are safe, you are home.
The next morning, Flayn woke alone. Her day’s uniform had been retrieved from her room and lay folded at the foot of the bed, her boots unlaced just enough to slip her feet into. A cup of milk and a pastry, still warm, greeted her on the bedside table. Her first thought was to seek the professor and scold her. She did not need to be fussed over! She was perfectly capable of taking care of herself! But then a tear came to her eye, and as soon as she swiped it away it was replaced by another, and then another, and then she found herself weeping into the blankets. She had long since grown accustomed to a world in which Seteth was her only caretaker; even then, she often denied him that privilege for the sake of guarding a hard-won sense of independence. As she laced her boots, she felt the laws of nature rewriting themselves. It was like she had awoken in a different world, in which the days were long all year, and the flowers bloomed in wintertime.
· · ·
3: ethereal moon.
from the center of my life came
a great fountain, deep blue
shadows on azure seawater.
Flayn found her at the grassy outcropping that overlooked the chasm, the place that served as a small graveyard for the campus. Byleth spotted her peering from the top of the stairs. She patted the spot next to her in invitation, and Flayn hesitated before descending and sitting next to her, smoothing out her skirt.
Byleth sat facing the headstone. The lettering had already faded past recognition. Perhaps it was the constant wind that came from the canyon that had weathered it away. Her finger traced the words over again, as if to reinstate meaning into the stone.
“I learned that she died for me,” said Byleth. Her words were barely a whisper, but clear in the absence of birdsong. “I don’t know about her. I don’t know what she liked. I don’t know if I would have made her proud.”
“You would have, I am sure of it.” And she believed that. But the words felt a little hollow nonetheless.
“Flayn—" she cleared her throat, unaccustomed to giving long speeches outside of the classroom, "the wind has come such a long way to reach us, hasn’t it? It comes in all the way from the sea, past plains and valleys, and now it's here. Where we are, nestled up by the mountains. It’s such a long journey. But I can still imagine the taste of the sea in it. Don’t you think me ridiculous?” Flayn shook her head, and Byleth continued. “I haven’t shared this with anyone, but… I feel like the winds have carried with them a feeling of dread. As of late. The feeling that something so terrible is going to happen. But maybe I just don’t like the feel of the winter here, all the way in Garreg Mach, and would rather be where it is warmer. Like the coast. Where the wind begins.”
They sat there for a long while. There was a tall tree that grew on the terrace by the bridge. The growth of its gnarls had seen generations—Sitri would have seen it nearly the exact same as it was now. Its branches stretched high over the lawn, and a hearty gust of wind divested it of its few leaves, the last stragglers stuck in denial of the season. Some fell in spirals and landed among the cowslips around them.
At last Flayn broke the silence. “One time, my father was upset with me. Now I don’t remember why. Perhaps I was distracted from my studies? Anyway, he said,” and her voice grew stern to imitate Seteth, “you are to stay in your room and read until dinnertime…”
Flayn was sulking in her room. A book lay open on her pillow. She did not want to afford it the dignity of being read at the desk, or, for that matter, being read at all. The pages remained unturned as she stared out the window. When her father had built the house, he had ensured that his daughter’s room would face the ocean, so that she might be greeted by it in the morning, and soothed by it at night. Now it taunted her while she served her (in hindsight, rather short and reasonable) punishment. In a pet, she tugged the curtains closed with uncharacteristic roughness.
A knock came at the door. Flayn did not respond. The indignity of her confinement deserved only silence in return. But then a hushed voice came from the other side. “Open the door!” It was her mother.
She did, and a hand darted through the crack to grasp her wrist. “Your father is in his study, so stay quiet, and let us go!”
Her mother led her out the front door, swinging a pail in hand with the excited, playful air of one who is conspiring. This mood spread quickly! In spite of herself Flayn felt her aggrieved pouting melt into a smile as they absconded down the rocky path to the beach, hand-in-hand.
“He’ll be upset when he sees us gone, but we’ll come back with clams to have with dinner, and then he’ll have no choice to forgive you—for if he doesn’t then he shan’t have any!”
“Oh, Mother, and what if Father sends you to your room as well, so that you may think on the mischief you have made?” And the thought of it had them laughing all the way down to the muddy surf line. There, they got on their hands and knees. Wet sand clung to the hem and skirt of Flayn’s dress. This was not unusual. When one lives up against the shore, all clothing must have its turn. For sometimes the call of the sea is too strong and too insistent, and there is no time for basic preparation, such as putting on appropriate swimming wear.
Together, they searched for dimples in the sand, pressing on the ground so that light patches spread outwards. Her mother shoveled, and then Flayn raked with a stick. They came upon what looked like a seashell, but their experienced eyes knew it was not so. With a gentle but triumphant tug, her mother pulled the clam out and handed it to her, and Flayn ran joyfully into the water to rinse it of sand.
When they entered the house, cheeks flushed and eyes bright, her father was sitting at the kitchen table, arms crossed.
Her mother kicked off her boots and went to him, wrapping her arms around his neck. “Cichol,” she said (as Flayn told the story, she replaced the name with a term of endearment), “I needed her help. You couldn’t possibly expect me to dig up all those clams myself, did you?”
He gave her a look, as if to say: you know as well as I do that you dug up the clams while she splashed around the shore. But then her mother waved Flayn over. On cue, she presented the wet pail. An offering in exchange for forgiveness, along with the roundest and most beseeching of eyes, and finally he relented with a theatrical sigh.
“Very well,” he said. “But you two will be helping with dinner.”
Her mother cheered and took Flayn in her arms. “Don’t we always?” she said. And they danced around the kitchen, celebrating the victory. It was one of the last memories Flayn had of her.
As she told her story, they had sidled close together. Now she rested against Byleth’s shoulder. A leaf had settled on the top of her head. Gingerly, Byleth reached around with her hand, and at long last, delighted in giving Flayn's hair the slightest ruffle. At her immediate glare, Byleth presented her excuse by plucking the leaf off and innocently laying it in Flayn’s lap. There were a few moments more of silence—only the faint voices of students in passing, for there were no more leaves for the wind to rustle—and Flayn suddenly felt self-conscious for having spoken at such length. “I think your mother is simply proud to see that you are alive and happy,” she concluded, looking at the gravestone.
Byleth looked sideways at Flayn, and at her eyes. She saw how it had hurt her to share this memory. Hurt in the way an old wound did, well-known to the point that its greeting was like a familiar neighbor’s. A pain that no longer needed to trouble itself with regular, acute visits: only with the stars at certain alignments, or when the weather was just so.
“I think you’re right,” Byleth said, holding the girl tight.
· · ·
Then, a short time later:
The door creaked open; the lock hadn’t been bothered with. This time, Flayn paid it no mind.
“Do not worry, it is only me,” she whispered. She shuffled towards the lump on the bed. It was night, and the drawn curtains blocked out the moon, leaving the room in total darkness.
She did not speak further.
Neither did the lump.
Slowly, carefully, Flayn stepped out of her nighttime slippers and crawled into the bed, trying not to disturb the exceptional, encompassing quiet that such complete darkness seems always to create. She felt Byleth freeze and her breathing pause. Flayn tucked her legs up closer to her chest, facing away, and the walls of the room swam into shape before her. As her vision adjusted to the heavy darkness, she felt Byleth hesitantly pull her close and she let herself relax into the embrace. She lay there, breathing deep and tumbling into the warmth of the blankets as Byleth trembled against her in small, dry sobs. She closed her eyes, imagining herself bringing in the professor’s grief bit by bit from where it was stuck out at sea. Willing into existence some magic through which the wound could be taken into her palms and healed. There was no such thing, she knew this well. By its very meaning, absence was not something that could be taken away.
· · ·
It was nearly the end of the year. Soon, the days would once again grow longer. Soon, the fish would return home to familiar waters. Soon, the hoarfrost would release its grip on the greenhouse exterior and retreat back into the ground.
Again, it was at the graveyard that Flayn found her. She had since returned to her teaching. Flayn recalled the students’ steadfast devotion to her in the weeks prior, taking meals to her door and attending to the work that the other professors assigned in her stead, with the grave dignity of a company keeping vigil.
Flayn watched her, as she had before, from the top of the stairs. And as she had before, Byleth turned and beckoned her down.
She had placed two bunches of flowers on the ground. Before Sitri’s grave were sprigs of lavender, and before Jeralt’s, forget-me-nots. The soil on the right was fresher than the other, and the patch of lawn there had stayed short and pallid, for these new sprouts would not grow well in the cold, despite the best efforts of the groundsmen. But soon the flowers would rejoin fully with the earth, as they all would someday, and the grass would grow back stronger for it, after the first spring rains.
“I stopped by the greenhouse this morning. I was so happy to breathe in the garden air,” Byleth said. She smiled. Her crow’s feet reappeared from hibernation, making their timid presence known. “They’ve bloomed beautifully, haven’t they?”
It was true. Flayn had seen it herself earlier that day. Even when outside the snow dotted the paths in the morning, and the dew froze on the grass, and the clouds melted into night without a hint of blue. Even when the cold wind stung the cheeks of students hurrying to their classes, and howled portentously at night, heralding the darkest years to come. In the greenhouse there was only the riot of blues and purples bursting past the fences and over the paths, and still others: the vivacious carnations that puffed out haughtily, the choir of white hanging-bells that swayed in chorus, and countless more, streaks of oranges and reds and every season's colors in-between.
“Flayn,” said Byleth.
“Yes, Professor?”
“Do—do you remember when you called me Mother, in class, by mistake?”
She coughed, face growing hot. “Well, I was rather hoping you would forget. About that. Yes. I am truly sorry for that.”
“I—I—well, it’s not that I minded—oh, what am I saying, that’s not it—I only mean to say! I mean to say that I care for you a great deal, and it doesn’t matter how you think of me. I wish to be there for you in whatever manner you need. And that you have brought me much happiness in the months that I have known you. And taught me much about myself and of life that I did not know before! I think it is because of you that I can be at peace at this moment. So, that is to say… oh, I am being awfully presumptuous, aren’t I?” Byleth stammered her way through her speech, and finally buried her head in her hands. “Just that… that you may call me in any way you wish, and I will happily accept, and be there for you all the same!”
Flayn blinked, taken aback. “Oh! Well! That is… I, well… I care for you too! And I give you my thanks!”
The awkward atmosphere was infectious, growing like the echo that returned when one hollered from the edge of the chasm. Together they sat, becoming steadily more and more embarrassed, before they broke down, giggling in disbelief at their mutual gracelessness.
“Professor, if you so dearly wish for me to call you Mother, you need only ask!” she teased, patting her on the back.
“No, no, that’s not it, really!” Byleth struggled to say, breathless from laughter.
“Perhaps if you and my father stop dancing around each other, and get together, I shall find reason to!” And Byleth gasped, at this boldest of proclamations.
“Oh Flayn... you are trouble! Not a word from you, or you’ll get what’s coming!” And under this magical spell of camaraderie they collapsed, backs to the ground. The cold was all around them, but Byleth took Flayn’s hand in hers, warm from merriment. They lay there together, chatting in the cemetery as if it were the bustling courtyard, basking under the pale gray of the sky as if it were the liveliest sun. The ancient tree swayed with amusement on its high perch, and the simply-etched names of Byleth’s parents kept watch over them in quiet satisfaction.