[Challenge 11] Woman King
Title: Woman King
Game: Fire Emblem 6/7
Word Count: 499 according to this
Pairings/Characters: Zephiel, Murdock
Warnings: None.
Notes: FFN mirror here. This is not AU. If you've read this a few times and are confused or if you just want to read my babbling I have lengthy and extensive notes here. But I would actually advise you not to read the notes unless you are thoroughly confused or hold significant objections. Title not for lack of creativity. It really is the best imaginable.
From slips and fades of paralyzed wakings, she regained control of her senses on the seventh day. Red sunlight cast a harsh glow on the walls, leaked in lines around the curtains. Nearby, a familiar presence. She summoned the strength to croak, “Water,” the sound vibrating through her heavy throat, baritone, a sound she hated. Rustling beside her brought a chalice, tipped gently to let water trickle in, cool in her thick fevered mouth. “Thank... you.”
Murdock's fingers tested her forehead. “You need not thank me. Save your strength, milord.”
She blinked twice as the room sharpened, feeling the air traversing through her still immobile body, a stiff encasement of clay. “No... I am... better.” She tested her fingers. They curled weakly against the bedspread. “Have you... been here?”
“I have been keeping watch. Rest easy.”
Murdock still stood by her. Surely treason. Not officially. But they both understood what her sudden illness meant. He must have known the risk he took by siding with the prince.
Prince. A concrete memory floated in, brushing her hazy dream-knowledge aside. Coming-of-age ceremony. They told her on that day she would become a man. With the fire emblem between her fingers, she waited for it to erase and replace her with the man she was supposed to be.
It was just a vapid ceremony. She still wanted to ask Murdock if he would call her by another name. As always, she didn't dare, struggling to give her father no embarrassment. She could never understand how things came to this: assassins at her door and venom in her drink. Did he know? Did he glimpse her beneath Prince Zephiel, his perfect son, adored by the masses? Perhaps she earned his hate because he alone penetrated her deception. She should have earned it from them all.
How she cheated Murdock. She focused her eyes upon him as he attentively scanned the door, the window, her squarish form. Likely he had not slept or ate. Likely he had already diverted a blade from their throats. This was the man she deceived for a decade and more. Would he still be loyal if he knew that he guarded not Prince Zephiel, but a hoyden stealing his skin?
Maybe the poison, like drink, made her bolder. She summoned strength again to her strange rumbling voice: “Murdock... if I... were not - a man?”
His brow furrowed as he responded, “My liege, you are a man. Never let the tongues of others cause you question.”
He could not even comprehend her turmoil, her very own. Her energy receded, curling back to sleep away dismay. As her lids fell, Murdock turned his gaze back to the room, content with allaying nonexistent fears. And so things would proceed. Words forgotten, blamed on fever.
She could sleep forever, misery kept waiting. But something still lingered in her fingers, twitching once as she drifted back into dreams: a sword in hand, driven through the chest of the man who scowled with all the malevolence of humanity.
There was still something she had to do.
Game: Fire Emblem 6/7
Word Count: 499 according to this
Pairings/Characters: Zephiel, Murdock
Warnings: None.
Notes: FFN mirror here. This is not AU. If you've read this a few times and are confused or if you just want to read my babbling I have lengthy and extensive notes here. But I would actually advise you not to read the notes unless you are thoroughly confused or hold significant objections. Title not for lack of creativity. It really is the best imaginable.
From slips and fades of paralyzed wakings, she regained control of her senses on the seventh day. Red sunlight cast a harsh glow on the walls, leaked in lines around the curtains. Nearby, a familiar presence. She summoned the strength to croak, “Water,” the sound vibrating through her heavy throat, baritone, a sound she hated. Rustling beside her brought a chalice, tipped gently to let water trickle in, cool in her thick fevered mouth. “Thank... you.”
Murdock's fingers tested her forehead. “You need not thank me. Save your strength, milord.”
She blinked twice as the room sharpened, feeling the air traversing through her still immobile body, a stiff encasement of clay. “No... I am... better.” She tested her fingers. They curled weakly against the bedspread. “Have you... been here?”
“I have been keeping watch. Rest easy.”
Murdock still stood by her. Surely treason. Not officially. But they both understood what her sudden illness meant. He must have known the risk he took by siding with the prince.
Prince. A concrete memory floated in, brushing her hazy dream-knowledge aside. Coming-of-age ceremony. They told her on that day she would become a man. With the fire emblem between her fingers, she waited for it to erase and replace her with the man she was supposed to be.
It was just a vapid ceremony. She still wanted to ask Murdock if he would call her by another name. As always, she didn't dare, struggling to give her father no embarrassment. She could never understand how things came to this: assassins at her door and venom in her drink. Did he know? Did he glimpse her beneath Prince Zephiel, his perfect son, adored by the masses? Perhaps she earned his hate because he alone penetrated her deception. She should have earned it from them all.
How she cheated Murdock. She focused her eyes upon him as he attentively scanned the door, the window, her squarish form. Likely he had not slept or ate. Likely he had already diverted a blade from their throats. This was the man she deceived for a decade and more. Would he still be loyal if he knew that he guarded not Prince Zephiel, but a hoyden stealing his skin?
Maybe the poison, like drink, made her bolder. She summoned strength again to her strange rumbling voice: “Murdock... if I... were not - a man?”
His brow furrowed as he responded, “My liege, you are a man. Never let the tongues of others cause you question.”
He could not even comprehend her turmoil, her very own. Her energy receded, curling back to sleep away dismay. As her lids fell, Murdock turned his gaze back to the room, content with allaying nonexistent fears. And so things would proceed. Words forgotten, blamed on fever.
She could sleep forever, misery kept waiting. But something still lingered in her fingers, twitching once as she drifted back into dreams: a sword in hand, driven through the chest of the man who scowled with all the malevolence of humanity.
There was still something she had to do.