#every time i explore the monastery i find hubert and just. stand beside him for a bit | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

kumeko · 4 years

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Title: for the dances that never were

Prompt: Exploration, Secret, Ambition, Devotion, Bonus: Gossip

A/N: For the Fódlan Bakeoff challenge! I couldn’t post it on time due to internet issues (sadness). I had a hard time picking what characters to write before realizing, I haven’t posted anything with my OTP of the series!

…

There was, Claude had to reluctantly admit, a sort of grace to Fódlan dancing. Standing in the Great Hall, he watched as his peers swirled on the dance floor. Above them, enormous chandeliers gave enough light to chase the shadows out of every corner. Dresses swished as women twirled, the silken fabrics resembling a fully-bloomed rose. Pairs of dancers glided past one another, just narrowly avoiding collision.

This dance was nowhere near as loud or energetic as an Almyran dance. There was a vibrancy, a feeling of life in their movements that just couldn’t be matched with a simple twirl and side-step. Still, the dances here were nonetheless pleasing to watch. Standing in a corner, he swirled his wine and watched as the lion prince and eagle emperor dominated the dance floor, elegance and poise radiating off every step.

Claude wasn’t the only one watching. Across the dance floor, he spotted Byleth and Jeralt chatting amicably, their eyes firmly on the students. Well, he guessed they were having fun. It was hard to tell with his professor sometimes, her expression was often blanker than a slate.

“Whatcha looking at?” A familiar voice asked beside him and he didn’t have to turn his head to know it was Hilda. Slightly breathless, she leaned back and fanned herself. “Or should I say who?”

“You can say whatever you like,” he replied smoothly, smiling as he turned to his exhausted friend. Her neatly coifed hair was starting to unravel, stray hairs falling out of her bun. “Someone’s popular.”

“Please, I’m not that popular.” Despite her words, she looked utterly pleased. Winking at him, she gestured at the professor. “She’s everyone’s first choice.”

That didn’t surprise him in the least. It explained why Byleth’s expression looked slightly worn, the way it did when she’d entertained too many of his questions or cleaned up after his pranks. “I wonder who her’s is.”

“No idea.” Sighing, Hilda shrugged. “She accepted everyone who asked, which is really stupid. You have to be picky or you’ll wear yourself out.”

“Like you have?” he teased, smirking.

“I am just taking a short break. I can still dance.” Hilda glanced at Byleth, than at him. “You going to ask her too?”

“Maybe.” It wasn’t a bad idea. She was Jeralt’s daughter, a teacher at the academy, the wielder of the Creator’s Sword, and seemingly Rhea’s favourite. There were only bonuses to getting closer to her. One way or another, she’d be useful to his ambitions. He wasn’t sure why he was hesitating, standing on this side of the room and as far from her as possible.

“Ohh, too late.” Hilda giggled as Sylvain approached Byleth, looking as charming as ever. “You have to be fast to catch her.”

“There’s always the dance after.” Claude shrugged. Holding out a hand, he winked. “Care for one more?”

Hilda frowned. She still took his hand. “I thought I told you I didn’t like too much work.”

ii.

Claude stared at the ceiling. It was funny how, five years later, this sight remained the same. The dorms hadn’t been as badly damaged as the rest of the academy in the attack, but his room had remained utterly unscratched. The structural damage remained unseen.

Closing his eyes, he listened to the leaves as they gently rustled. An owl hooted nearby, crickets chirped. Five years ago, there would have been students chattering as they snuck off for a nightly escapade. Now there was just the clink of chain mail, the guards patrolling the area in case of attack.

After tomorrow, they wouldn’t need to. A final clash between Empire and Alliance, one that would hopefully go as the battle of Eagle and Lion had gone years ago. Claude sat up at the thought. Who was he kidding? That had been a friendly bout between houses. Now almost everyone he’d defeated from that time was dead. Running a hand through his hair, he sighed. There would be no sleep tonight, which was a pity. A tactician needed his rest. Edelgard and Hubert wouldn’t make tomorrow’s battle easy.

Slipping out of his bed, he crept out of his room. The sensation as he stalked the school at night was both familiar and strange. Even now, he remembered the secret passages, which stairs creaked, the best shadows to slip in. Yet the stairs were different, the walls lined with scorch mark, and he felt like he was exploring an entirely new place, an explorer finding ruins where a city should have stood.

He was not sure what led him to the great hall, to the half-collapsed ballroom. He wasn’t sure, but when he spied Byleth inside, sitting on a jagged piece of rubble, he couldn’t stop his smile. Somehow, his path led to her, and he shouldn’t have expected this to be any different. They were connected, fates intertwined, and he was certain that if she died, their journey would end right there.

Despite his quiet entrance, Byleth noticed him right away and watched as he slowly approached him. Bathed in moonlight through the broken roof, there was something ethereal about his former teacher. She had always been a mystery, even before all of this. With her blank expression and gaps of knowledge, there had been something interesting about her. The secrets she held now only made her even more intriguing.

He always liked puzzles. Sauntering over, he asked, “Couldn’t sleep, Teach?”

Byleth shook her head. Her eyes looked even darker in the gloom. It was strange to think that he’d seen this place entirely lit up once. Now all it held were shadows.

“Me neither.” He leaned against the rubble, looking around him. “One way or another, it will end tomorrow.”

“Can we…” Byleth trailed off, her voice so low he could barely hear it. She wrapped an arm around herself, her fingers digging into her arm. “Do you think we can…”

“Win?” Claude guessed, giving her a confident smirk. “Of course.”

She shook her head. “Save them.”

“Oh.” That was a harder question. Almost impossible to answer. Edelgard and Hubert would fight to the death; he had never seen either of them back down. Dedue seemed to be on a suicide mission. How many others were left alive? Petra, Dorothea—but who else? Maybe some of the Blue Lions had survived that last skirmish and were just hiding. “I don’t know.”

Her shoulders slumped at the answer. It was strange to think that at one point he thought her emotionless. Her tells were more subtle than others, for sure, but he could read her now. It was hard to mistake the sorrow washing over her for anything else.

Maybe she wouldn’t smile, but he wanted her to be at least a little happy before it went down. One way or another, it would end tomorrow. Maybe he’d die. Maybe she would. Maybe neither of them would and he’d remember this night as the time he had been a little dramatic. Claude gestured around them. “Remember the last time we were here?”

Byleth glanced at him curiously before nodding. “The dance.”

“Yep. I remember someone being very popular that night.” He winked at her. “I think you danced with everyone that night.”

Still not following him, she nodded. “There were a lot of hands. I didn’t want to refuse anyone.”

“Even Marianne asked you to dance.” Claude sighed. “And yet, I think I’m the only one who didn’t get a dance.”

“You didn’t?” Byleth frowned, ticking off her fingers as she remembered that night. It might have been five years for him, but for her it must have felt like months.

“Every time you took a break, someone else approached. What’s a poor guy to do?” Claude tapped his chin for a long minute before pretending to come up with an idea. “Oh, but you’re free now.”

“There’s no music,” she pointed out, catching on.

“That’s fine.” Claude held out a hand. “I still want my turn.”

She looked at him for a long second, and he wondered what was going on behind her green eyes. There had always been a practical air about her, no doubt from her lifetime of mercenary work. He wasn’t even sure if she liked dancing, let alone wanted to do it. Before he could retract the offer though, she slipped her hand in his. “Alright.”

“Great.” He pulled her down from the rubble and wrapped an arm around her waist, pulling her closer. Winking, he started waltzing through the debris. “I hope you haven’t forgotten how to dance.”

“I never learned in the first place,” Byleth answered, her tone lighter. It was a start.

“Then I’ll just have to take lead.” Claude twirled her. He wasn’t sure when it happened, when he’d stopped thinking of Byleth as a friend and instead as something more. Maybe that was what had stilled his hand all those years ago, an emotion that had slowly taken root and refused to go.

He had always known he was a bit of a coward, but hadn’t realized that it even extended to his feelings.

iii.

It wasn’t a surprise to find Byleth alone, after all was said and done. They had defeated the Empire and yet somehow, it didn’t feel like a win at all. They had lost almost all their classmates, either at their hands or at the hands of the Empire. Even Dedue, who had reappeared out of nowhere, had fallen in his last-ditch attempt to avenge his king. And even then, after killing Edelgard, they had discovered that they had an older enemy to face.

It was no surprise that victory rang hollow. His peers were scattered about the monastery, trying to make sense of it all, and so it wasn’t a surprise that Byleth had isolated herself as well. What was surprising, though, was that he’d found her here in the ballroom once more. The repairs were almost done now, the rubble from before cleaned up. There were cracks along the walls, signs of the war that wouldn’t fade, but with a little paint this would be a ballroom once more.

The late evening light bathed the room a dark red. It wasn’t the same colour as Edelgard’s cloak, as her blood, but he couldn’t look at it all the same. Byleth stood in the center of the room, back toward him. He wondered what expression she had.

“You okay?” he asked, leaving off her nickname as he broke the silence. It was too quiet in here. It reminded him of the throne room and he didn’t want to think of that.

Byleth didn’t reply. She turned toward him, looking utterly heartbroken.

Stopping next to her, he lifted his hand before dropping it back to his side. He didn’t know where to touch her, what to say that wouldn’t hurt her. She had looked like this as she’d lifted her sword, as Edelgard had closed her eyes. He should have stepped up then, taken her sword so she didn’t have to carry that burden too.

He could still hear the sound as Edelgard’s head hit the ground. Maybe she was still listening to it too.

Finally, she uttered, “Did it have to be like this?” Byleth gestured around, her voice cracking slightly. “We danced here. Edelgard, Dimitri—I danced with all of them. Couldn’t we have done something?”

It was a question he had asked himself many times. There had to be a path, somewhere, somehow, that had all of their houses surviving, all of the people coexisting. But there had been too many secrets, too many untold ambitions and hopes. “I don’t know,” he answered honestly.

He hoped there had been but it was too late now.

“I should have been here,” she murmured, her shoulders sagging from the weight of it all. He had never thought of Byleth as a small woman, but she looked tiny now. A single touch could shatter her. Somehow, despite it all, she didn’t cry. Her expression looked like she wanted to, needed to, but her tears remained unshed.

“There’s nothing you could have done.” Gingerly, he wrapped an arm around her, pulling her in for a hug. He hadn’t understood the word devotion before, what had made his mother leave her homeland and everything she’d ever known, but he could feel it now pulsating through his veins. Claude would give anything to make Byleth whole again but after this, he wasn’t sure anything could.

“There had to be something.” She rested her head against his shoulder.

“Even if there was, we can’t change the past.” Claude slowly walked her around the room, a slower version of the waltz they’d done just a month ago. He hadn’t imagined that the next time they’d be in this room, they’d feel even worse than they had then. “There’s only the future.”

“The future.” She followed his steps automatically. “Another fight.”

“Beyond that.” He shook his head, pulling back so she had to look at him. Smiling gently, he added, “After the war, after it all—that future.”

She still looked lost. “What happens then?”

“Many things. My dreams. Yours.” He rested a hand on the small of her back, guiding her through the dance. Half of him wanted to confess, to kiss. To show her there was some light in the darkness. But the future was still too uncertain and he didn’t want his love to be another stone she had to carry. “We’re bringing peace to everyone. We’re going to change Fódlan, for the better.”

“So no one has to go through this again.” Byleth nodded, her lips pulling up slightly.

“So no one has to feel like this again,” he echoed, resisting the urge to push back her hair. “We can do this.”

“Yes.” While her expression still looked bittersweet, he thought it was more sweet than bitter this time. “Thanks, Claude.”

“Anytime. We’re in this together.” Claude winked. “We’re partners, right?”

“What about you?” Byleth asked, looking at her hand. She turned her attention to him, her green eyes bright. “How are you feeling?”

“Better now.” It was a truth, in a sense. He felt much better now that she did. After all this was over, maybe he’d tell her what was really in his heart. When she still looked doubtful, he playfully added, “Teach, I didn’t know you cared so much.”

She didn’t refute him, like he’d expected. Instead she gave him a flat look. “Of course I do.”

Claude wasn’t sure how to respond to that. He wasn’t even sure what she meant, or if he wanted her to clarify. There was no way to tell without asking. Faking a laugh, he replied, “Aww, Lorenz will be jealous.”

“How are the others?” she asked, looking past him at the ballroom entrance. “I should check on them.”

“They’re coping, but I think they’d like a little comforting from you.” Claude sighed. “I guess I can’t hog you all to myself.”

“No, you can’t,” she agreed, letting go. Byleth had always been all work and no play, and he had expected this reaction.

That didn’t make his hand feel any less empty. “I’ll head to the war room, then. Maybe Judith has some information on those slithering guys.”

Byleth nodded before heading to the doors. At the threshold, she paused and looked at him over her shoulder. “After this is over, let’s have another dance here.”

“A dance?” Claude smiled as he looked around the room. More than a paint of coat, what this room needed was laughter, was the smell of sweets and the bright lights of a thousand candles. It was what they’d all need, after it was all over. “Yeah, that’s a good idea. A party would lift everyone’s spirits.”

“And this time, you’ll ask me to dance.”

He whipped his head to the entrance, but she was already gone.

Maybe, just maybe, he wasn’t the only one who had some feelings left unsaid.

#claude von riegan #byleth #claudeth #fe3h #claudeleth #claude x byleth #fire emblem three houses #fanfic #it's been ages since I've written a non-zine piece #huzzah

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