Chapter 1: Waking Up in a Foreign Land
---
The wind stirred first.
It moved through the grass in long, lazy waves, carrying with it the faint scent of wildflowers and something altogether unfamiliar — a warmth that belonged to a land that was not his own. It brushed against his face, gentle and indifferent, as though the world had not yet noticed him lying there.
Then, slowly, Odyn Albanar opened his eyes.
A groan escaped him before conscious thought could stop it. Pain lanced through the back of his skull — dull and throbbing, like the aftermath of a blow he couldn't quite remember receiving. He blinked against the pale light of the sky above, pale blue and cloudless, unmarked by any landmark he recognized.
*Where... am I?*
The thought arrived sluggishly, wading through the fog that still clung to the edges of his mind. He tried to sit up. His body refused. Not out of injury, he realized after a moment — the pain wasn't sharp enough for that — but from sheer, stubborn exhaustion, as though every reserve of energy he possessed had been spent getting him here, wherever *here* was.
With a long, controlled exhale, Odyn let himself sink back against the grass.
*All right. Fair enough. I'll lie here a while longer, then.*
He stared up at the unfamiliar sky and tried to think. The effort was frustrating. No matter how carefully he reached back through his own memory, the details dissolved the moment he touched them — like trying to hold smoke in a closed fist. He remembered faces. He remembered motion, urgency, the sensation of something vast and uncontrollable pulling at the world around him. And then nothing. A blank.
He turned his head slightly, wincing at even that small movement, and catalogued what he could. He was in a field of some kind, the grass soft beneath him, the nearest trees standing at a comfortable distance. The air smelled clean. Peaceful, even.
His coat was intact — the deep black of it was familiar at least, layered over his blue undershirt. The brown belt still crossed his chest, the sheath on his back still secured. His army-green trousers were muddied at the knee. His silver fingerless gloves remained on both hands. The dark green cloth of his headband was still tied firmly at his brow, though slightly askew.
*That's something, at least.*
His pointed ears caught the sound of footsteps before his eyes did.
Slow, deliberate, approaching from the direction of a road he hadn't noticed yet. His instincts sharpened at once. Whoever was coming, they hadn't announced themselves. That could mean anything. His hand shifted fractionally toward the hilt at his back, then stilled.
*No. Don't be rash. Not yet.*
He stayed still and listened. The footsteps were unhurried. Three sets, if he was counting correctly. No weight of urgency in them. Conversation, too — low voices, too distant to make out the words, but relaxed in tone.
*Hopefully they're friendly.*
He let his gaze drift to the side and noticed them then — the shapes of his companions scattered across the grass nearby, as still and crumpled as he was. His jaw tightened.
*So we all went down, then.*
Whatever had brought them here, it had not been kind about it.
---
The road that wound along the edge of the field was quiet in the midday sun, cutting a gentle path through the rolling countryside of Ylisse. It was a beautiful kingdom when the weather cooperated — and today it was cooperating splendidly. The sky was wide and clear, the fields green and unhurried, and the distant mountains capped with the last of winter's silver.
Three figures traveled the road.
The first walked with the loose, easy gait of someone who had spent much of his life in motion. He was tall, blue-haired, with the kind of earnest, open face that invited trust — though there was something behind his blue eyes that spoke of quiet determination. His dark blue shirt bore a crossing of belts, functional and well-worn. Silver pauldrons sat at his shoulders. A white cape swept behind him with each stride, and at his left hip rested a distinctive sword — its circular hilt shining with a silver sheen, the handle wrapped in dark tape for grip, the pommel a dull copper. His right arm, bare from shoulder to wrist, bore a singular mark upon the shoulder blade: a teardrop-shaped emblem unlike any common crest. This was Chrom, heir apparent to the Halidom of Ylisse — though you would not know it from the way he walked.
Beside him, half a step ahead and already sulking about something, was a girl with blonde hair caught in two pigtails that bounced as she moved. She had the same cream complexion and blue eyes as her brother, but where Chrom's gaze was steady, hers was expressive and impossible to miss. She wore a cheerful yellow dress over a white undershirt, brown boots, and dark gloves, and carried a healing staff that caught the light when she swung it — which was often, and usually to punctuate a complaint. This was Lissa, youngest royal of the Ylissean line, and she had opinions.
Behind them both walked Frederick. He was the kind of man buildings were designed to frame — broad-shouldered, composed, and armored in sky blue plate that he wore as naturally as a second skin. His brown hair was slightly unkempt in the way of a man who prioritized discipline over vanity. His dark eyes missed very little. He walked with his hands clasped behind his back, his expression the practiced neutrality of a man who had been serving the royal family long enough to have seen everything twice — and was still quietly worried about all of it.
"Auggh!" Lissa stopped walking abruptly, which caused both men behind her to adjust their stride. "Why are we *out here* anyway?!"
Chrom glanced back at her, amusement crinkling the corners of his eyes. "Come now, Lissa. Exercise is good for you. Besides," he added, with the careful precision of someone deploying a known argument, "you were the one who wanted to leave the castle."
Lissa opened her mouth, closed it, then settled for an exasperated sound somewhere between a sigh and a groan. She couldn't exactly argue with that.
They continued on, the road curving gently toward a stretch of open field. The three fell into a comfortable silence — the kind that only comes easily between people who know each other very well.
It was Lissa who broke it.
She stopped again, but this time it wasn't with complaint. She had gone still in the way of someone who has seen something unexpected, her hand raised slowly to cover her mouth. Her wide eyes were fixed on the field ahead.
"Chrom," she said softly, with an urgency that hadn't been there before. "Look."
Chrom looked.
There were four of them, scattered across the grass with the particular stillness of the unconscious. A young man with dark blue hair leaning against the base of a tree. A boy with deep crimson hair sprawled face-down on the ground, one arm outstretched. A girl with black hair curled on her side, her weapon resting in the grass a few feet from her reach. And further off, a second girl — crimson-haired as well, though longer — lying still at the field's edge.
Frederick's eyes swept the scene once, methodically. "They appear to have been in some manner of altercation," he said, "though I note no visible wounds."
"Their clothing," Chrom said slowly, more to himself than the others. He was already walking toward them. "It isn't from anywhere near Ylisse."
That much was immediately apparent. The fabrics, the cuts, the styling — none of it matched anything in the Halidom, nor in any neighboring nation Chrom could call to mind. And then there were the symbols — identical on each of them, marked upon their backs and worked into the designs of their armor. Two crossed swords behind a shield, all framed within a tongue of fire.
"Milord?" Frederick's voice came from behind him. "You seem troubled."
"Just... thinking." Chrom shook his head and offered his retainer a brief smile. "The symbol. I've never seen it before. Not in all of Ylisse — not in Plegia either, for that matter."
"Nor have I," Frederick agreed, studying it himself. "A most unusual emblem."
"So..." Lissa drifted up beside her brother, tilting her head at the still figures before them. "Are we going to help them?"
The debate, such as it was, lasted only as long as it took for the blue-haired young man by the tree to stir.
---
Odyn heard the voices stop. Then he heard footsteps approaching directly toward him, careful and deliberate. He cracked his eyes open.
A girl about his age crouched in front of him, blonde pigtails falling forward over her shoulders as she leaned in, her blue eyes wide with something caught between concern and unbridled curiosity. She blinked when she saw he was looking at her.
"Hey there," she said softly, with a smile that arrived quickly and seemed to mean it.
Odyn blinked back. His head chose that precise moment to remind him how badly it ached, and he pressed his fingers against his temple with a quiet hiss.
"Can you stand?" A young man's voice now — calm, direct, with an undertone of genuine concern. The blue-haired one, Odyn registered dimly. "Or would you like Lissa here to take a look at you?"
The answer, Odyn decided, was probably *no, not yet* — but lying here and admitting that felt worse than trying. He pressed one palm against the earth and pushed himself upright, jaw set, ignoring the way the world tilted briefly before settling. He got his feet under him. He held up a hand before either of the others could move toward him.
"I'm all right," he said. Then, after a pause, more honestly: "Mostly." He pressed the heel of his hand against his brow. "My head just — *ugh*. What exactly happened to me?"
"We were rather hoping you could tell us that," the tall man in blue armor said evenly, from where he stood a few feet back.
Odyn looked at him. Then at the young man with the cape. Then at the girl again. Three strangers in a field he didn't recognize, standing over him with the careful body language of people who weren't sure yet whether they were looking at a problem or a person.
He straightened the rest of the way and dropped his hand. "Right. I suppose... introductions first, then." He rolled his shoulder once, testing it. "My name is Odyn. Odyn Albanar."
A small silence.
The blue-haired young man raised an eyebrow. Not suspiciously — more the expression of someone who has encountered something genuinely new. "You have a surname?"
Odyn blinked. "Of course. Doesn't everyone?"
The three exchanged a brief look among themselves — something wordless passing between them that suggested the answer was, in their experience, no.
The young man with the cape cleared his throat. "I wouldn't know how to answer that, to be honest. Most people I know go by a single name. I myself have always just been... Chrom."
Odyn turned that over in his mind. Filed it away without comment.
"In that case," the tall armored man said, inclining his head slightly, "perhaps you would care to explain how it is that you came to be here?"
Odyn looked at him again — more closely this time. The man wore his armor like a second nature. His expression was cautious in the measured, professional way of someone whose caution was a duty as much as a habit. Not hostile. But not open, either.
"That's the thing," Odyn admitted, rubbing the back of his neck. "I genuinely cannot tell you. I don't remember how I got here." He met the armored man's eyes squarely. "I'm also not entirely sure where *here* is."
"This is Ylisse," Chrom offered, gesturing broadly to the open countryside around them. "The Halidom."
A beat.
"...Ylisse," Odyn repeated slowly.
"The Halidom of Ylisse," the armored man confirmed. "Which I suspect you have also never heard of, if your expression is any indication."
"No," Odyn said. "I haven't." Then, before the armored man could voice the skepticism already forming on his face: "I know how that sounds, sir—"
"Frederick," the man supplied.
"Sir Frederick. And I understand completely if you find that difficult to accept. I would too, in your place. I can only tell you that it's the truth." Odyn held the man's gaze and didn't look away. "The name Albanar — that, I do know. But Ylisse? The Halidom? I've never encountered either before today."
Chrom looked at the ground for a moment, something moving behind his expression. Then: "One question at a time. But first—" He paused. "You mentioned companions."
"I was about to ask the same thing," Odyn said, and turned to survey the field.
---
They found Khanna first — the black-haired woman with the same dark skin and pointed ears as Odyn, lying in the grass a short distance away. He crossed the distance to her at a jog and crouched beside her, shaking her by the shoulder.
"Khanna. Hey — Khanna, come on."
She came awake with a groan, one hand flying to her head instinctively. Her orange eyes — the same burning, fire-bright color as Odyn's — focused on his face, and something in her settled.
"Odyn." It came out rough with sleep. "What in the world..."
"I know. Take a moment." He helped her sit up. "How do you feel?"
"Terrible." She pressed her fingers against her temples. "What happened to us?"
"Your guess is as good as mine right now." He steadied her as she got her feet under her. "The others — Roy's ahead, Khanna says. Sarai's further up the road."
Khanna turned and took in the three strangers who had followed at a respectful distance. She studied them for a moment — quick, practiced, reading posture and equipment the way her training had taught her — and then inclined her head toward them.
"I should thank you," she said, with the measured courtesy of someone who meant it. "For helping him. And for staying." She paused. "My name is Khanna Andross."
"You're quite welcome," Chrom said. "We couldn't very well walk past."
Lissa grinned. "Besides, Chrom's a hopeless softie when it comes to this sort of thing."
Chrom cleared his throat. Lissa's grin did not diminish.
Khanna wore emerald-green armor with gilded trimming, a forest-deep sheen to the metal that suited her well. A sweeping cape billowed at her back. Slung across her shoulders on a padded cloth was a warhammer of considerable size, secured snugly against travel. She wore her station the same way she wore her armor — like someone who had earned it and didn't need to say so.
---
It was Lissa who found Roy.
She nearly tripped over him, actually — and she caught herself with a small, startled sound, looking down to find a young man in deep blue armor lying face-down in the grass, his breathing slightly labored, his crimson hair vivid against the green.
"Over here!" she called, already kneeling beside him and reaching for her staff.
The others converged. Lissa pressed the head of the staff close and let the magic flow — warm and steady, the pale light of a healing arte washing across him. His breathing eased. His fingers twitched. And then his eyes opened.
He found himself looking up at a blonde girl he had never seen before, who was watching him with wide, relieved eyes and a smile that immediately softened into a sheepish laugh.
"I'm sorry if that startled you," she said.
Roy sat up slowly, taking stock of himself. He was dark-skinned like his siblings, with deep crimson hair and those same striking orange eyes that marked all of them as kin. His armor was blue with silver and white detailing, the colors crisp even through the dishevelment of having been unconscious in a field. A lavender-and-gold headband sat at his brow, and a red-and-gold sheathed sword rested at his hip.
"No," he said honestly. "Don't apologize. I should be thanking you." He stood and offered her his hand. "I do, sincerely."
Lissa took it, shook it, and beamed. "I'm Lissa."
"Roy." He looked past her as the others arrived, and blinked when he found familiar faces among the group. "Brother? Khanna?"
"Good, you're up." Odyn crossed to him and clapped a hand on his shoulder, checking him over with the brisk efficiency of an older sibling. "How are you feeling?"
"Better for it, thanks to — Lissa, was it?" Roy glanced at her. She nodded. He turned back to Odyn. "Where are we? This doesn't look like anywhere from home."
"It isn't." Odyn's expression shifted — something careful in it. "From what Chrom and the others tell me, we're in a land called the Halidom of Ylisse."
"Ylisse," Roy repeated slowly. His brow furrowed. "And Sarai?"
"Down the road," Khanna said. "We're heading there now."
---
The conversation settled into something easier as they walked, the group spreading across the road in loose pairs and clusters. At the back, Frederick fell in beside Chrom and dropped his voice low enough that only the two of them could hear.
"What do you make of them, milord?"
Chrom watched the group ahead — Lissa already chatting at Roy with the full force of her personality, Khanna walking at a measured pace beside Odyn, who was scanning the road with the alert, assessing gaze of someone trained to read terrain.
"I think they're telling the truth," Chrom said quietly.
"And if they aren't?"
"Then I'll deal with that when I know it." He glanced at his retainer. "I'm not asking you to lower your guard, Frederick. I'm asking you to give them a chance to earn your trust before you decide they haven't."
Frederick said nothing for a moment. Then: "As you say, milord."
He did not, notably, say that Chrom was right.
---
They saw Sarai from a distance, and Chrom slowed without quite meaning to.
She lay at the edge of the road where the grass grew thick, still and composed even in unconsciousness in the way that some people carry grace with them regardless of circumstance. The lavender of her armor caught the afternoon light. Gold and blue traced its trim. A silver belt encircled her waist above white-sheathed sword, and at her ears hung delicate owl-feather earrings that stirred faintly in the breeze. Her crimson hair spread across the grass like something painted.
Chrom was aware, distantly, that he had stopped walking.
"That's her," Odyn said from beside him, and Chrom became aware that the observation was directed at him specifically. "Sarai. Our sister."
Lissa had gone quietly wide-eyed. Even she wasn't saying anything, for once.
Chrom moved forward. He knelt beside her carefully, reaching to offer his hand before she woke fully, some instinct toward courtesy catching the motion.
"Ah — I see you're waking. How are y—"
He barely got the syllable out before his world became very sudden and very sharp.
Her eyes snapped open. Her sword cleared its sheath. The edge of it stopped a breath away from his face, held there by a wrist that did not shake.
"*Who are you,*" Sarai said, her voice low and absolutely controlled despite the alarm blazing in her eyes, "*and where am I.*"
Chrom held very still. He raised both hands, open and empty. "Easy. Easy. I was only trying to—"
"*Trying*—" Her teeth pressed together. The blade did not move. "You're going to stand there and tell me you *tried to help me*? While I was unconscious? Is that what you—"
"*Sarai.*"
The voice cut across the field like a thrown stone.
She froze. The sword remained, but her eyes shifted — and found her brother standing a short distance away with an expression that walked a careful line between firm and relieved.
"*Brother?*"
"Don't hurt Chrom." Odyn kept his tone even. "He's the one who helped us. All of us."
A long, suspended moment. Sarai's gaze returned to Chrom — now sweating visibly, which she noted — and then cut back to Odyn. Then back to Chrom.
Slowly, she sheathed the blade.
She took a breath. Stood. And then, with the particular dignity of someone who finds this deeply embarrassing, she inclined her head toward Chrom in a bow.
"I owe you an apology," she said. The words were precise and unhesitating — the apology of someone who, once they've decided to give one, gives it properly. "I panicked. I shouldn't have drawn on you. I'm sorry."
Chrom let out the breath he had been holding. Then he smiled. "Honestly, I was partly at fault for startling you. Think nothing of it."
She straightened and gave him a long, measuring look. "You are... a rather unusual person, aren't you, Chrom?"
"I've been told." He offered his hand.
Her mouth curved. "Just Sarai, please. None of the formality."
"Only if the same applies to me."
She considered this for exactly one second. "Done." She shook his hand. "Though I should warn you — I'm keeping a running account. You still owe me one."
"That's fair," he agreed immediately.
"Then we understand each other." She released his hand and turned toward the others, who had watched all of this with varying degrees of tension and relief. Lissa looked like she wanted to applaud.
---
They continued down the road together — seven of them now, though the number still felt unsteady, the way new things do before they have a chance to settle. The afternoon walked alongside them, unhurried.
Sarai walked between Lissa and Khanna, absorbing everything the other girl said about Ylisse with the focused attention of someone taking careful notes. Roy and Odyn drifted alongside Chrom, and the conversation between the three of them found its way quickly to the one question that could not be answered neatly.
"So you truly have no memory of how you arrived here?" Chrom asked.
"None," Roy said. "And believe me — we've tried. Every time I reach for it, there's just..." He shook his head.
"Nothing," Odyn finished. "Not a gap, exactly. More like the memory was... removed. As though something didn't want us to find it."
Chrom turned that over slowly. "Partial amnesia?"
"Partial." Odyn's jaw was set. "We remember everything else clearly. Just not this."
Ahead on the road, the path curved around a stand of old trees, and in the shade of the largest of them — its roots spreading wide across the earth — sat a young man who hadn't been there before, or at least hadn't been visible until now.
He was slight, silver-haired, and dressed simply: a black tunic, matching trousers, a brown belt, and a deep violet hooded cloak pulled loosely around his shoulders. He was leaning against the trunk with his chin slightly bowed, as though sleeping — but even from a distance there was something in his stillness that read more like collapse than rest. He was holding something close to his chest that they couldn't make out yet.
"Chrom," Lissa said, having spotted him almost simultaneously. "Someone else."
The group converged. Frederick assessed first, as he always did. "Fainted, most likely. No visible cause immediately apparent."
"From what, though?" Roy murmured.
"Could be anything," Sarai said.
"Regardless," Odyn said, "we can't leave him here."
Lissa was already nodding. "Absolutely not."
Chrom crouched in front of the silver-haired stranger, studying him for a moment before reaching to give his shoulder a brief, firm shake.
The man's eyes opened.
He looked at them — all seven of them, which was quite a lot to wake up to — and blinked several times, processing. Lissa crouched with him, offering a small wave.
"Hey there," she said, in exactly the same way she had greeted Odyn.
"There are probably better places to rest than the ground," Chrom said, extending his hand. "Here."
The stranger took it. He got to his feet slowly, steadied himself, and then looked at Chrom with an expression of quiet bewilderment.
"I... thank you," he said. Then: "Chrom."
Chrom's hand stilled slightly. "You know my name?"
"I—" The man blinked. "I do. I'm not... sure how. It simply came to me." He shook his head. "That's strange."
"Rather," Frederick agreed, and the word carried the weight of several unasked questions.
"Can you tell us your name?" Sarai asked. "And perhaps what you're doing out here alone?"
The man opened his mouth. Then he stopped. Something moved behind his eyes — the particular expression of a person groping for a word they are certain exists and finding only air where it should be.
"My name is... my name..." He pressed the heel of his hand against his brow, frustrated. "How is that possible? I can't—" He looked up at them, something almost plaintive in it. "I can't remember."
"Amnesia," Lissa said, with the conviction of someone who has now diagnosed this condition twice in one afternoon.
Frederick made a sound in his throat. "More likely a very well-rehearsed performance. How convenient, I must say, to remember a lord's name and forget your own."
"Frederick," Chrom said.
"I swear it," the stranger said, a faint flush of frustration rising. "I know it sounds—"
"It sounds exactly as strange as it is," Chrom said quietly, cutting short the argument before it could build. "And yet these four told me essentially the same thing an hour ago." He nodded toward Odyn and the others. "What I know is that we can't leave someone confused and alone on an open road. So." He straightened. "Welcome to Ylisse, friend. We'll sort out the rest once we're somewhere safer."
The stranger looked at Odyn, who gave him a small, understanding nod.
"We're in the same situation," Odyn said simply. "Don't worry. You can talk on the way."
"I..." The man hesitated. Then something shifted in his expression — a small, tentative thing, like a door opening inward. "Robin," he said suddenly. "My name is Robin. I just..." He blinked. "That came back on its own. How strange."
"Less strange than nothing," Chrom said, and there was genuine warmth in it. "Robin it is, then. Glad to have you with us."
---
The group had found their rhythm together — eight of them now — moving down the road in the easy pattern of people who have already survived at least one awkward silence together and come out the other side. Introductions passed back and forth. Robin pieced together what he could of himself and offered it willingly. The flame-eyed siblings listened, asked questions, and made it easy not to feel like the odd one out, which Robin found himself grateful for in a way he couldn't quite articulate.
He still didn't know where he was. He still didn't know how he'd gotten there. But somehow, in the middle of a road he didn't recognize, surrounded by people he'd never met, he felt something settle.
He was cataloguing the details of his situation with quiet, instinctive care — the way his eyes moved when he looked at terrain, sorting it into quadrants without thinking about it; the weight of the tome tucked at his side, familiar in his grip even if he couldn't have explained why; the sword at his other hip, there for the moments when words on a page weren't enough — when Chrom, apparently remembering something, turned to look at him.
"About where you're from," Chrom started. "Have you—"
"CHROM!"
Lissa's voice was a different pitch entirely now, and every person in the group turned.
The village lay at the bend of the road ahead of them, half-visible through the trees. Or rather — what was left of it. Smoke climbed in dark columns from somewhere beyond the first row of buildings. Distant shouts carried on the breeze. Something crashed.
Chrom was moving before anyone had finished processing it.
"Curses—" His hand went to his sword. "The brigands again — Frederick! Lissa! Now!"
"And the others?" Frederick had already moved to his horse.
"*Unless they're also on fire, they can wait.*" He was already in motion, cape snapping. "Move!"
The three of them were gone — hoofbeats fading down the road, leaving the group of five standing in the sudden quiet.
Robin stared after them. He took one step forward, then stopped.
"Wait—" he started, reaching. But they were already around the bend.
He looked down. He thought. He could feel the shape of a plan beginning to organize itself in the back of his mind, not yet words, just structure — geometry, positions, the logic of *how many against how many and what does the terrain allow.* It was automatic. He hadn't decided to start doing it.
A hand settled on his shoulder. He turned to find Odyn watching him with the calm, slightly knowing expression of someone who recognized what he was looking at.
"You want to help them," Odyn said.
"Of course," Robin said. "But they're already ahead. We'd never—"
"Then we go after them." Khanna stepped forward, already scanning the horizon where the smoke was rising. Her tone was matter-of-fact. "They're capable — three clearly capable people. But capability has limits when it's three against however many bandits that smoke represents." She looked at the others. "Besides. They helped us. That means something."
Roy crossed his arms and nodded. "We owe them."
"Agreed," Sarai said. "We don't leave allies to manage alone when we can prevent it."
Odyn looked at Robin. "What do you say?"
Robin looked toward the smoke.
"All right," he said. "But if we go, we go with a plan. Running into a burning village with no information is how people get hurt."
Khanna's mouth curved — faint, but genuine. "*That's* what I like to hear." She turned to the group. "Here's how we split."
She laid it out quickly. Odyn and Sarai toward Chrom and Frederick — extra blades at the front, where the fighting would be thickest. Roy to Lissa — the healer needed protection, and Roy's speed made him well-suited for it. That left Khanna and Robin.
"You," she said, looking at Robin, noting the tome at his side and the sword at his other hip with the eye of someone who reads people's choices in what they carry, "are a mage who also keeps a sword. That means you plan for contingencies." She said it without judgment — more like she was confirming a hypothesis. "So: you and I, together. Flexible. We go where we're needed and we fill in the gaps."
Robin blinked. "You determined all of that from—"
"The sword and the tome, yes." She raised an eyebrow. "Was I wrong?"
He considered arguing. He didn't. "No. You weren't."
"Then let's go," Odyn said, and they moved.
---
The village was burning.
Not entirely — not yet. But the brigands who had set the torches were thorough in their enthusiasm, and the thick, bitter smell of smoke had already filled the town square by the time Chrom, Frederick, and Lissa arrived. Citizens scattered at the periphery, pressing into doorways and alleyways, some already calling for help.
At the center of the chaos, a man named Garrick laughed.
He was broad and loud and thoroughly pleased with himself, directing his men with the casual authority of someone who had done this before and expected to do it again.
"Strip it clean and torch the rest!" he bellowed. "Let's remind these Ylissean types what it feels like to be made an *example*!"
More screaming. More laughter.
And then Chrom arrived.
He came in fast and direct, no preamble, blade already drawn, and hit the nearest cluster of bandits with the particular momentum of someone who has decided that speed is the best opening argument. Frederick flanked without being asked, cutting off the escape route with efficient, practiced brutality. Lissa stayed back, close enough to help and far enough to breathe, her staff already moving as the first wounded citizen staggered toward her.
For a minute, the three of them held the line.
Then the numbers started to matter.
"Chrom!" A voice from across the square.
Chrom caught the call between parries, turned in his guard, and saw them streaming in from the south end of the village — not enemies, but Robin and the others, moving fast and already scanning the field.
"Robin?" He dispatched the bandit in front of him with a sharp, efficient blow and stepped back. "You followed us? *Why*—"
"Because three isn't enough." Sarai was already at his side, her sword drawn, her eyes bright. She gave him a look that was warm in about equal measure to being completely done with that question. "Don't *why* me, Chrom. Face the other direction."
He faced the other direction.
The battle shifted.
Odyn moved into the thick of it with an economy of motion that spoke of long training — not showy, just effective, each decision already made before his body needed to commit to it. When a group of five bandits converged on him from different angles, he planted his feet and let the energy gathering in the blade speak for itself.
"*Beast Blade.*"
The wave came out fast and low, hitting the cluster at center mass — some thrown back, some sent into the walls of the buildings behind them, the impact definitive and conclusive. He was already moving before the last one hit the ground.
Sarai caught the axe swing that had been aimed at Chrom's back, the clang of steel on steel cutting sharp through the surrounding noise. She pushed back — hard, leveraging her weight and timing against the bigger man's strength — and then let the fire in her blade say the rest.
"*Incineration Wave.*"
The line of it tore through the remaining cluster ahead, scorching and scattering them, and Sarai pivoted without pausing, extracting her blade from a bandit who had been fool enough to come in from behind.
Across the square, Roy had positioned himself at Lissa's side with the unhurried certainty of someone who had decided that this was where he stood and meant to stay there. When the bandits tried to push through to the healer, he stepped forward and let the lightning answer for him.
"*Lightning Tiger Blade.*"
The crack of it against the cobblestones was enough to stagger the line. He moved through the gap while they were still blinking, precise and controlled, the follow-through clean and complete.
"Thank you," Lissa said, without interrupting her healing.
"Don't thank me yet," Roy said, watching the next group approach. "We're not done."
In the cathedral square, Khanna and Robin worked in the particular harmony of two people who had only just met but whose minds happened to fit neatly together. Khanna watched the terrain. Robin watched the bandits. Between them, they had a fairly complete picture.
"Behind Frederick," Khanna said, and slammed her warhammer into the ground.
"*Earth Fang.*"
The shockwave rolled outward, buckling stone, catching the advancing group at the knees and throwing their formation apart. Before they could recover —
"*Elthunder.*"
Robin's hands moved through the incantation without ceremony, and the lightning came down clean and decisive, scattering the remaining men.
Khanna looked at the aftermath. "Not bad," she said.
Robin exhaled. "No." He turned, already running the next calculation. "Bandits at Chrom's left — Odyn!"
Odyn was already moving.
The moment he heard Robin's voice, he had understood the geometry of it — the angle, the approach vector, the window. He stepped into the gap and took the three axe strikes meant for Chrom across his own blade, absorbing the impact and redirecting it in one motion. Chrom, startled, turned.
"Odyn—"
"Worry about him later," Odyn said, already pivoting. He felt the energy gathering again, clean and certain. "*Demon Fang.*"
The blue wave crossed the ground fast and low, destabilizing the last cluster, and Chrom finished the work with the kind of overhead strike that ends arguments.
Garrick, watching his men fall one after another, found that the situation was no longer as amusing as it had been. He raised his hand axe.
He found it knocked from his grip before he could throw it — a blade of wind from Sarai, precisely placed, that caught the weapon at its peak and sent it spinning wide. He stumbled back, and Odyn was on him from the left, Sarai from the right, and then Chrom came in from above, landing hard, the force of the descent shattering Garrick's weapon entirely and leaving him with nothing between himself and the end.
It didn't take long after that.
---
When the last bandit had been accounted for and the fires were contained — Odyn having had the practical idea of working systematically through the structures before the flames could spread further — the group gathered in the square near the cathedral steps and caught their breath.
Robin looked at his hands for a moment. Then at the others. Something had clicked into place in the last hour that he couldn't quite name — not comfort, exactly, but the sense of having been useful in a way that fit.
"Well," he said. "That's done."
Lissa dissolved into enthusiastic congratulation immediately, gesturing at all of them in turn. "You were *incredible*! All of you! That was — the coordination, and the *attacks*, and — is that magic? Or — what are those? Those techniques?"
"*Artes*," Odyn said. He settled against the cathedral wall, rolling his shoulder. "Combat disciplines developed back home. We've embedded mana crystals in our weapons — they resonate with our own energy and let us channel elemental techniques without an external focus." He nodded toward Robin's tome. "Different from how Robin works, but similar principle."
"Fascinating," Chrom said. He sounded like he meant it.
"Another time," Sarai said, with the tone of someone tabling a conversation that could last hours. "For now — you're all all right?"
"Mostly." Chrom's eyes moved over the group. Something settled in them. "You all fought for Ylissean lives today. Strangers. For people you had no reason to protect." He paused. "I think that tells me what I need to know."
Frederick stood to the side, his expression careful. "Your mind, milord? Will you not—"
"My mind agrees with my heart in this case, Frederick." Chrom looked at Odyn. At Robin. At Khanna, Roy, Sarai. "The Shepherds could use people with your talents. We've brigands on the border, a neighbor who seems determined to push toward war, and more than enough trouble to go around. I would rather face it with capable allies at my side." He let the silence settle for a moment. "So. Will you join us?"
Robin looked at Odyn. Odyn looked at his siblings, at Khanna. Something passed between them without words.
"I would be honored," Robin said.
"As would we," Khanna added. "If you'll have us."
"The Shepherds would be glad of it," Chrom said. And he meant that too.
---
Frederick had one more observation before they left. He delivered it in the low, private register he used when he wanted to inform without alarming.
"The brigands, milord. Plegian accents, if I'm not mistaken."
This gave Chrom pause. He turned it over carefully. "Plegia is pushing harder, then."
"What's Plegia?" Robin asked, quietly enough that it was clear the question was sincere and not rhetorical.
"Ylisse's neighbor to the west," Chrom said. "They've been sending bands across the border — looking to provoke an incident, we think. Testing the Exalt's patience." He kept his tone even. "The people who suffer for it are the ones who live on the border. Like this town."
Lissa had gone quiet. Her expression had moved somewhere between anger and grief, the two of them sitting uneasily together. "Innocent people," she said. "Every time."
"We protect them," Frederick said, not unkindly. "That is what we do. But anger, Lady Lissa, is a poor weapon. It obscures more than it reveals."
"I know." She sighed. "I'll get used to this."
A village elder appeared at the edge of the square, twisting his hat between his hands with the particular energy of someone who has survived something and is still slightly surprised about it. He bowed deeply when he saw Chrom.
"Milord, please — you and your companions must stay the night! We may not have much, but we would feed you well, and—"
"You are very generous," Frederick said, and his tone managed to be genuinely warm and still completely final. "But we must return to Ylisstol without delay."
"What?" Lissa's head snapped around. "Frederick, it's nearly dark!"
"No matter. We'll make camp on the road, as we have before." He looked at her with the faintest trace of something that was almost a smile. "I believe you said you would *get used to this*, my lady."
Lissa stared at him. Then she turned away, puffed out her cheeks, and addressed the nearest wall.
"Frederick," she announced to no one in particular, "I sometimes 'hate' you."
From the back of the group, Odyn bit down on a grin. Beside him, Sarai pressed her fingers briefly against her mouth. Roy coughed. Even Robin's composure slipped for a moment before he recovered it.
"Quite the lieutenant you have there," Robin offered.
"Yes," Chrom agreed, in the tone of a man who has made his peace with this long ago. "He grows on you."
"I am still present," Frederick said, with perfect dignity.
"We know," Chrom said. And despite everything — the smoke still fading in the air, the long road still ahead, the questions that had no answers yet — he was smiling.
---
They turned their faces toward Ylisstol.
The capital wasn't far. The road was open and the evening air was cooling toward something pleasant, and there were eight of them now, walking in a loose and easy group, the weight of the day already becoming the kind of memory that doesn't press as hard once you're moving away from it.
Odyn walked for a while in comfortable silence, listening to the sound of the others talking. Lissa was making Roy describe what his hometown looked like, and Roy was attempting to do it justice. Khanna and Frederick had settled into a surprisingly cordial conversation about tactical logistics that was clearly mutual respect finding its natural language. Sarai was walking a few steps behind Chrom, and from what Odyn could hear, she had resumed her account-keeping and informed Chrom that owing her was "still on the table, don't think I've forgotten."
He couldn't hear Chrom's response. But he heard Sarai laugh.
"Strange," Odyn thought, looking up at the evening sky — the same sky, unmarked and unhurried, that had been above him when he woke in the grass this morning not knowing where he was. *Very strange.*
He still didn't know how they'd gotten here. He still didn't know what had brought them to this particular field in this particular kingdom, unconscious and confused, with no explanation that made any sense.
But they were upright. They were together. And ahead of them lay a city with its lights beginning to kindle against the coming dark, and people beside them who had proven themselves worth trusting, and a tomorrow that, for the first time since he'd opened his eyes in the grass, felt like something he might be able to navigate.
"For now", Odyn thought, "that's enough."
He kept walking.
---
To be continued...
Next Chapter — Chapter 2: Unwelcome Change
Hey guys, I hope you all enjoyed this first chapter of a new story. I had this idea for awhile, so glad i could put it into story format finally. Openings and endings may or may not be introduced next chapter. I had this thought because i thought it could make things interesting if a few of the children had mixed blood from our original characters in the story. Main pairing is of course Odyn x Lucina you'll see why later on in the story. Aside from that one and Chrom's pairing because i already know who he'll be with, who do you want to see the other 2 OC's paired with?
Who should Roy be paired up with?
I. Lissa
II. Cordelia
III. Sumia
IV. Maribelle
V. Say'ri
VI. Cherche
VII. Sully
VIII. Nowi
IX. Tiki
X. Nah
XI. Cynthia
XII. Kjelle
XIII. Severa
XIV. Noire
XV. (F) Morgan
Who should Khanna be paired with?
1. Donnel
2. Robin
3. Lon'qu
4. Stahl
5. Kellam
6. (M) Morgan
7. Gaius
8. Owain
9. Inigo
10. Libra
11. Brady
12. Frederick
13. Priam
14. Henry
15. Basilio
16. Vaike
17. Ricken
18. Gregor
19. Gerome
20. Laurent
Let me know what characters you'd like to see paired aside from the main two pairings. Anyway, that's all for now! Hopefully you guys enjoy the story!