isleofavalon | xenologue 1 | if you hear the hunter's coming then you hide or keep on running [closed]

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xenologue 1 | if you hear the hunter's coming then you hide or keep on running [closed]

🧙 WHO: byleth eisner and YOU
⚔️️ WHAT: catch-all for may! closed starters, tdm continuations, lots of quests and hangin' around probably.
🕒 WHEN: throughout may
🗺️ WHERE: multiple places
⚠️ WARNINGS: n/a for now
📝 NOTE: feel free to pm this journal or hit me up at

clockworkbrain if you'd like a thread with byleth!

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[ it might have been a simple enough thing for the two of them to just get the rocks and go, but from where byleth was standing, they ought to just make a day of
it. she's dressed simply—a white button-down shirt, dark trousers, boots, a sword hanging at her side—and has prepared all they would need for a picnic. they can put down the blanket near the river, watch the faeries, and when they're ready to go, claim the holographic rocks. simple. as they step through to the bend in the stream, byleth finds her breath catching at the wonder and tranquility of it all. this place keeps finding ways to surprise her. ]

It's better than I'd hoped, El. [ there's a gentle amazement in her tone as she takes it all in. they still need to put everything down, of course, but... ]

Edelgard has likewise opted for more simple traveling attire than her usual Emperor's regalia; a red long-sleeved shirt with white gloves, white trousers and black leather boots, contrasting Byleth's own outfit rather splendidly. She's likewise forgone an axe for a sword, which she does not favour as much but still uses as a back-up weapon when she has to. Edelgard also left the horned Adrestian crown behind in favour of a sidetail that she has designated her standard "casual hair-do" because of course she has; Edelgard takes too much pride in her hair to do nothing with it, at least when going out publicly.

The only person who got to see her hair down completely these days was the woman in who's company she was currently enjoying the day. Those brief private moments of rest they snatch together.

She steps up next to said woman and takes her hand. "It's beautiful." She agrees. "...I never imagined we'd have such a moment of peace so soon." The circumstances aren't exactly ideal of course, but she's not about to let that ruin the day, and she gives Byleth's hand a squeeze. "Shall we make ourselves comfortable, then?"

She would have liked, more than anything, for the first peaceful days they were able to take for themselves to be in the world they were trying to create. Now, that's just one of the worlds they're attempting to save.

"Yes, I think so." Byleth nods, leaning in slightly to press a kiss to the corner of Edelgard's mouth before she steps back to retrieve the folded blanket from her bag and spreads it out, placing down the baskets. She extends a hand to her fiancée as she takes a seat, smiling up towards her. "Come on, then." With her free hand, she opens the baskets and begins to lay out the spread. Among other little accoutrements for the food—butter, jam, honey, and the like—there's a bottle of wine and cups for the both of them, along with a large thermal flask of tea. For the food itself, there's bread and pastries, charcuterie and cheeses, and some fish that Byleth had caught, cleaned and grilled just this morning.

She had really wanted to make this special.

Edelgard leans into this kiss with a chuckle. "My, my General Eisner; quite forward of you." She says teasingly, but she takes the proferred hand and sits, folding her legs neatly as she takes her place on the blanket. "Byleth, this spread...it's delightful. Thank you. You didn't have to go to near this much trouble. Your company on a day like this would have been more than sufficient." Not that she's complaining overly about the lengths her general and former professor went to, of course.

Edelgard looks around, taking in the view once more and the sight of the fairies playing in the river. "I shall have to come back out this way before too long." She muses as Byleth lays out the meal. It all looks delectable especially the fish; Edelgard hadn't been the biggest eater of fish once, but since Byleth came into her life she's learned to appreciate a well-cooked catch. "With my newfound stock of painting supplies." Not long after they'd set up in their hotel room, Byleth had disappeared for a time, coming back laden with an easel, brushes, and paints for Edelgard, much to her surprise and happiness. "This would make for a marvelous landscape." She swallows for a moment, then traces a finger down Byleth's arm. "And you as well, if you were so inclined to wish to model for me." The last time Byleth had caught the sketch of her Edelgard had drawn—one of many that she had drawn in her idle moments over five lonely years—she'd almost died of embarrassment. But the situation between them was much different now, and Byleth would look even lovelier than usual framed by such a gorgeous backdrop.

"Haven't you always known me to be bold, Your Majesty?" Her lips quirk into a slight smile—falling into this sort of banter has always been strangely easy with Edelgard. "And... think nothing of it. I wanted this to be special, for the both of us."

Byleth has the delayed realization that she forgot a corkscrew, and looking at the bottle in consternation for a brief moment, she retrieves a slim knife from her bag and stabs into the cork, twisting hard enough to wrench it free. It's clearly not the first time she's done something like this. With that handled, she pours a cup for the both of them, leaning slightly into Edelgard's touch.

"I would love to model for you, El. I don't like the portraits that have been made of me, but..."

They all tried to capture some false ideal. Whether it was the portrait of the so-called "Enlightened One" that had been unveiled to her, or even the proud official depictions as the Empire's marshal that she'd seen sketches and studies for during the war... it all rang false, even if she was proud of the latter role.

"None of them are me. They're... the saint. Or the general. But you've always seen me instead."

She watches how expertly her general handles the knife as she liberates the corkscrew from the bottle. "Indeed I have. It's one of the qualities about you I've always admired." Edelgard smiles knowingly as she takes the proffered cup, her fingers brushing against Byleth's tenderly. Even if her teacher's propensity towards boldness had sometimes landed her, or almost landed her, in hot water, like that business with Kostas when they first met. Or when she chased after Kronya and nearly got lost in Zahras thanks to Solon. Her will to act was something Edelgard admired, found...familiar. It was a trait they both shared.

Her faces flushes a little when Byleth does not hesitate to model for her. She's trying to move past it now that their relationship has matured, but it's still hard to live down the embarrassment of the sketch and portrait Byleth stumbled upon before they had actually openly admitted their feelings for each other. "Well...I suppose I had plenty of time to look." She admits, before clearing her throat so she can explain.

"I used to work on sketches of you. Not in class, but if I ever saw you pose a certain way, or if the light hit you in a particular spot, I'd do my best to commit it to memory, to be worked on later in my room, usually when sleep was eluding me and the night air wasn't enough. I told myself at the time I was simply trying to improve and you cut such a striking figure it made sense to use you as my subject." Completely made sense to stay up late into the night sketching the professor who had so captivated her. "A silly justification, but for awhile I believed it. I was never trying to capture anything but you." She takes a drink of her wine, savouring it. "Mmm. Those sketches are how I first started to notice you were becoming more expressive, you know. At first I thought I was projecting, but it just caused me to look harder and I saw that it was becoming easier to tell what emotions you were feeling as time went on."

Of course then it turned out that wasn't a sentiment most of her classmates shared, which gave Edelgard pause and the "justification" that it had all solely been for art practice began its swift and final collapse.

Byleth pulls her legs underneath herself and feels her smile widening as Edelgard begins to talk, taking a long sip of her wine. A sweet red, of course. She huffs out a quiet laugh at the admission of her Emperor's self-deception at the time, even as she finds it a deeply touching thought.

"I had no idea, my heart. I noticed you watching me, sometimes, but I never minded it." Her mouth quirks downward a bit, as something occurs to her, and she hastily takes another sip. Some of that initial warmth and brightness falters, but only for a moment. "It was different, from the looks I was used to. Better. Not harsh, just... searching. I could see that you wanted to understand... and I'd wanted to understand you, too. From the beginning."

Edited 2021-06-01 05:05 (UTC)

"Really? Was that why you decided to lead the Black Eagles?" Edelgard asks, bringing a knee up to rest her head against. It's odd they've never really talked about this, but at the time Edelgard was simply just...oddly happy that the strange yet striking mercenary had taken over as head of the Black Eagles. And then she became certain their paths would diverge, and then even when they didn't Byleth was gone for so long, and then the push against Myrddin, and then, and then, and then...so little time to themselves that perhaps in hindsight, it wasn't so strange that this topic had never been broached. Not when Edelgard was in the mood to begin looking towards the future, rather than the past.

"I always wondered what ultimately made you decide to align with our House. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised it was because of me." She looks down into her drink, blushing slightly. "But it's true, you did fascinate me. From the moment we first fought side-by-side against Kostas and you stepped out of Captain Jeralt's shadow. I'd never met anyone like you before, and I was curious to know more. The beginnings of my infatuation, I suppose."

"I remember speaking to Dorothea and some of the others in the dining hall. It was just after one of our many extra-curricular assignments, when Ingrid received that marriage proposal, do you remember? We were talking about it afterwards and I remember Dorothea being quite relieved the lout of a suitor would be out of Ingrid's life, but she was concerned at your lack of reaction. I told her quite simply that wasn't true, that you were in fact, immensely relieved and glad Ingrid was out of it. Everyone stared at me as though I'd grown a second head. And I had to keep going, explaining a particular look in your eyes that I'd come to recognize, the way your body language shifted after we drove off his sellswords at Ailell when he tried to capture Ingrid, the cadence in your voice. All of them were clear indicators that you were in fact pleased at how everything had turned out. Fortunately I don't think Petra entirely understood, Caspar certainly didn't, Lysithea was too involved in her dessert and Linhardt was asleep as I recall, but Dorothea just gave me this look and shook her head at me when I reacted in confusion that nobody else saw it." Edelgard shifts, assuming a not bad facsimile of Dorothea's familiar seating position, miming resting her arm on an invisible table. "'Oh Edie, you really are hopeless, aren't you?'" She mimes Dorothea's light and lilting tones with obvious exasperation. "I felt...so embarrassed afterwards for reasons I couldn't quite articulate. At first. The more I thought about it...the more obvious the answer became."

She shakes her head. Dorothea was absolutely right about her. "And now I'm Emperor of Fódlan. I really do hope I know what I'm doing." She chuckles.

Edited 2021-06-04 03:28 (UTC)

Once again, Byleth listens, just... rapt. Edelgard has always had a bit of a tendency to go on, but she enjoys it—especially when she's telling her about something like this. Without even thinking about it, she scoots a bit closer to sit properly next to her, wanting to enjoy the simple intimacy of all of this.

"I'm told that being oblivious about these things at that age is normal. And it's hardly the same skillset as revolutionizing our society," Byleth notes, lips again quirked into a fond smile. "But... yes. When I chose the Black Eagles, I chose you. I suspect I always will choose you. That day, I... I couldn't understand why I threw myself between you and Kostas. You were a complete stranger, and that... simply wasn't in my nature. I could have died—I would have, if not..." Her eyes flick slightly away from Edelgard, and she reaches for some of the charcuterie. That topic is a separate conversation, and not for a day such as this. Somewhat distracted, she begins to stroke at Edelgard's hair with her free hand.

"So I wanted to understand you. I needed to. I thought that if I could get a better sense of you, I might... understand why I put myself on the line that way. That I might begin to understand myself, if only a bit." There's a slight pause, as she considers. "I never considered the other Houses for a moment. I want you to know that. Claude and I are both outsiders, Dimitri and I were... both struggling with our nature, but both of them were pretending to be something they weren't, and I saw it from the start. But you... the way you looked at me, you just wanted to take my measure. To understand."

"Mmm." As Byleth reaches out to stroke her hair, Edelgard leans into the motion, pressing herself against the older woman fondly. Eyes closed, she listens fondly. "We were both drawn to the other from the start. A promising beginning." A thought then occurs to her, so absurd and yet close enough to the truth that it makes her chuckle. "Though you realize this does mean we owe the entirety of our relationship to the departed Kostas." And not just because Edelgard had hired him in her guise as the Flame Emperor to attack the three young lords on their wilderness survival training in the first place. If in his desperation he'd tried to attack anyone other than Edelgard, if she hadn't lost her axe in the fracas...well. "It almost makes me regret running him down in the Red Canyon." Not a great deal given his long list of other character deficiencies, but it cannot be denied; she and Byleth are together because of that bandit chief.

However, her eyes open. "Byleth...I've never doubted your commitment to the Black Eagles...to me, since you turned the Sword of the Creator on Rhea." She assures the other woman, reaching down for her hand and grasping it tightly. "Finding out about these other worlds where our paths diverged doesn't change that. You are you, and I am me, and we're both where we belong. Put such cares from your mind." That is the privilege and joy of having achieved that understanding Byleth speaks of; their bond is far too strong to suffer even the smallest cracks from the knowledge that Claude and the others of his world brought.

"Those worlds don't trouble me," Byleth says, taking a long sip of her wine, and the assertion is mostly honest. "I hardly think of them. Our path is what I chose... what I have a responsibility to. The others are someone else's burden." Those other worlds are inhospitable thoughts, things she finds utterly unconscionable, but they might as well be bad dreams, from her perspective. And whoever those other Byleths are, they're not her. She doubts that they're even fully themselves.

She doubts they ever will be.

She squeezes Edelgard's hand, idly pressing a kiss to the top of her partner's head as they sit in comfortable silence for a moment. Her eyes shift to watch the fairies. "I'm not sure I would give him the credit. He was... an interchangeable piece. He got on stage, performed his role, said his few lines, but..." There's a pause, then. "I think you and I are together because we refused to play our parts. I don't know what connected us, but... we must have met for a reason. Don't you think so?" It had to be something more than just Edelgard's plan going wrong. There was far too much synchronicity in what had happened—not just that day, but even afterwards.

[ continued from here ]

It would have been hard for us to imagine you doing that, either. Unless you saw something in it for you.

[ it's not accusatory, just... said about as neutrally as ever, like she's pointing it out. it's a different world, and they've had different lives. still, she nods. ]

What's your understanding of Camelot as a state? Will it be more trouble than it's worth? [ if their task is to find a way to restore all worlds, camelot had best either be useful or get out of the way. she's brought down kings for being obstacles before, after all. ]

How would you define "trouble"? So far, their desire to help us appears to be sincere. And I've been to see the end of the worlds myself -- the calamity that's frozen in time for now -- so I can say their story about that much is genuine, too.

[So there's no reason not to cooperate with them, really, when everyone has a shared goal on that front.]

I've also met Arthur. Considering he was dead until just recently, I can't say he's doing a bad job as king, even if a few of his decisions have been questionable. I'm sure he'd be happy to meet with you and Edelgard if you wanted to have a chat with him to make up your own minds.

[ continued from here ]

[ she seems to consider that for a second, before shaking her head. ]

This place is very strange to me. The creatures in the lake, these companions of ours, the technology... I've seen nothing like it. We have magic, and there are unnatural beasts, but this is all something else.

And you?

[ gran takes a moment to think about the differences. his eyes land on his own familiar, the ever so cute robot bell Joy, who seems to be enjoying himself on the ride into the city. ]

Well, back home we have similar technology, but we couldn’t communicate through moving pictures… but the biggest change is being earthbound. I’m used to floating islands in the sky, not… these.

[ he motions towards the entire carriage. it felt so weird to use it to travel instead of an airship. ]

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xenologue 1 | if you hear the hunter's coming then you hide or keep on running [closed]

.edelgard || holo, goodbye

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.claude

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