Chapter Text
After the war, there came a preponderance of ghosts to Enbarr.
They came spilling out of the walls, bursting out of the cobblestones, dribbling through the glass. Some of them were distressingly recognizable shapes: Ladislava strode through the Central Night Market in her armour, blood streaming in diaphanous trains from her shoulders, her hands, her neck. Some of them were cobbled together with no rhyme or reason, but with an excess of the worst sense of humour Hubert could imagine. A tree of clicking bones sprouted in the city centre on the twenty-first of the Red Wolf Moon. Hunters outside the city reported red-eyed rabbits catching their arrows between human teeth, and grinning as they broke them.
Petra was busy preparing for her departure to Brigid but she had enough time to confirm, “Yes, that is weird,” when Hubert spoke to her of this.
A swordswoman darted, always a little out of sight, in the southernmost section of the city. A man could be heard weeping at the gates of the palace. The flying battalions reported disconcerting interruptions to their daily drills: phantom pegasi and wyverns bursting from clouds, feathers rotted, the glitter of foreign stars reflecting off their scales. Fortnightly, an opera singer plunged to her death from atop the Mittelfrank Opera house, always disappearing just before her body hit the ground.
This did not seem to deter opera-goers. Rather the opposite, in fact.
Nevertheless, the new Minister of Culture, a woman of the Oghma Mountains named Rosalie Kondabolu was in Hubert’s office, seeking his support to pass a motion. “We need to declare it a public health crisis,” she said. “And treat it as such.”
Minister Kondabolu had a voice like dry leaves and she looked like she had been carved out of the mountains surrounding her village. It gave every sentence that left her mouth the air of a pronouncement from on high.
Hubert leaned back in his seat. He usually tried to support her in the Council meetings. Minister Kondabolu was not well-liked. Since House Varley was dissolved, the seat of the Minister of Religion had, at Ferdinand’s suggestion, been filled by a representative selected by the region. Count Hevring unkindly called Minister Kondabolu the “Emperor’s Experiment” and the name stuck.
“Sudden cold spots in the day,” Hubert said. “A few phantasms in the marketplaces. I’m sure it’s upsetting to experience but I would hardly call it a crisis.”
She pursed her lips. “Since last month, reports of these sightings have increased at least twofold and their effect is generally more...immediate. These things will take their toll on the people, Minister Vestra.”
“Much less concrete a toll than famine or plague,” argued Hubert. “Both of which we will have to deal with if resources are not directed to Galatea territory first.”
“If we wait, the costs will inevitably be greater,” said Minister Kondabolu impatiently. “The variety of apparition is increasing. That’s troubling in itself. We still don’t know what’s causing it - that’s never good. And to be frank, Minister Vestra, it is hard to quell the murmurs on the streets.”
The Goddess is Dead, Long Live the Emperor. It was a chant that had turned ironic in the mouths of the people, almost menacing; its syllables clanged in Hubert’s nightmares. Hubert pinched the bridge of his nose. “You let me worry about quelling those murmurs, Minister Kondabolu,” he said.
Her brows drew together sharply. The problem was that Minister Kondabolu didn’t particularly like him. The fact that he and Ferdinand were the only two members of the Council she could routinely count on for a fair hearing did nothing to sweeten her feelings. “Would that it were as easy as that, Minister Vestra,” she said as she left. “You cannot solve everything with knives in the dark.”
***
Linhardt and Caspar had been travelling since the war. They provided no one with a travel itinerary. Hubert had promised, on account of Caspar telling him very loudly and repeatedly how fucked it was that he couldn’t respect their reasonable boundaries, not to have them followed. Their arrival at his office was a surprise therefore, though not an unpleasant one.
This was short-lived.
“I don’t know why you’re surprised there are ghosts, Hubert,” Lindhardt said. He lifted the teacup to his mouth and took a genteel sip. “A lot of people died.”
“I know, Linhardt,” said Hubert. He heroically refrained from pointing out that he and Caspar had done their fair share of contributing to the ghostly population of Fodlan at large. “But you might see why I am mildly taken aback when Caspar claims -”
“It happened, Hubert!”
“- claims,” Hubert continued over Caspar, “to have gone fishing in the canals of Enbarr, without a permit, and in the course of that illegal activity -”
“I was fishing!”
Hubert raised his voice over Caspar’s, “- and in the course of that illegal activity, claims to have caught a fish, I repeat, that smiled at him with my father’s face.”
“It wasn’t a nice smile!” cried Caspar.
“They seldom were,” said Hubert coldly. “And then, as you say, it -”
“Flipped itself out of Caspar’s hand, yes,” said Linhardt. His eyelids were drooping even as he poured himself another cup of Southern Fruit Blend, as if this conversation were too dull to stay awake for. “And then it winked at us and disappeared into the canals.”
Hubert looked at Linhardt’s calm face, at Caspar’s wild nodding, and felt his temper spike helplessly. “Are you seriously expecting me to believe this entirely ridiculous tale?”
“You don’t think either Caspar or I would be foolish or cruel enough to come up with something like this on our own,” protested Linhardt.
Hubert thought Caspar about as intelligent as your average pigeon, and Linhardt had never been particularly concerned with anyone’s feelings before. He did not think either were actively suicidal however, and so he was forced to concede, “I am sure you thought you saw a fish with my,” Hubert breathed in through his nose, “father’s face on it that winked at you.”
Caspar swelled up in indignation. He looked like a bullfrog setting up for a truly spectacular croak. Linhardt put a hand over his and Hubert watched in some fascination as Caspar deflated very, very slowly, with a series of low, whistling breaths.
“We just thought you ought to know,” said Linhardt. There might have been an attempt at gentleness there, it was hard to tell underneath the monotone. “Now that the war is over and things have calmed down a bit, maybe there are things you might want to talk about.”
“Indeed,” said Hubert. “When were the two of you leaving again?”
***
Hubert had a standing appointment with Ferdinand for drinks and mid-day refreshments. They always had it in Hubert’s office. Ferdinand never protested this, even though Hubert’s office was a considerable trek from the Prime Minister’s new suite. Ferdinand had taken over the space that used to belong to the Minister of the Imperial Household. It was well-updated, second only to the Emperor’s suite of rooms. But Hubert had refused it and uncharacteristically, neither Ferdinand nor Lady Edelgard fought him on this point. Lady Edelgard almost certainly knew he had sat across the old Marquis Vestra in front of what was now Ferdinand’s fireplace, watching his father’s face turn slowly purple. Hubert did not want to know what Ferdinand thought.
He came in with the pot of coffee that he always overfilled. Ferdinand bit his lip as he walked, very, very slowly across the room. His hair was in a fishtail braid today. It was terrible.
Someone - Hubert was willing to bet it had been Dorothea, in revenge for some slight Hubert couldn’t even remember - had told Ferdinand about haircare. With the war over and trade slowly resuming, Ferdinand had dove straight into oils and soaps and ribbons and every piece of nonsense Hilda Goneril produced. Hubert had not considered it possible that Ferdinand’s hair could get more beautiful, a bright, flickering banner that Hubert would have followed into the screaming dark.
But now, Ferdinand had time to brush oil through it every night, a hundred strokes at least. He had the time to learn how to braid. Hubert felt his sanity fray with every whiff of camellia or bergamot, as Ferdinand pulled his red gold waves up in a simple tail, or tucked it into a bun or braided it away from his face, the rest falling in a coppery sheet over his broad shoulders.
“Is the coffee not to your liking, Hubert?”
Hubert startled from contemplation of just how broad Ferdinand’s shoulders were, in his fine satin waist-coat with the waterlilies done in green and ivory silks. “No, it is excellent, as always,” he said hastily. “You will soon outdo me at this rate.”
“What a ridiculous fabrication,” said Ferdinand, but he smiled so Hubert’s flattery was not pointless after all. He was on the verge of congratulating himself when Ferdinand continued, “But something is clearly the matter, Hubert. Two compliments and no caveats? What is troubling you?”
Hubert scowled over his cup. “It is nothing,” he said. “Nothing important, anyway.”
“It cannot be nothing,” said Ferdinand. “You look like Edelgard just announced her engagement to the Crown Prince of Almyra.”
“Bite your tongue!” hissed Hubert, but Ferdinand only leaned over and placed a hand on Hubert’s forearm.
“What is it?” he said, looking into Hubert’s eyes. “I would help you, if I could.”
To prevent Ferdinand’s warm hand from staying on Hubert’s arm and branding it through several layers of linen and wool, Hubert told him.
Ferdinand sat back with a strange look on his face. “So, to put this in perspective, you are more troubled by a marriage between Edelgard and Cl - uh, Prince Khalid than the appearance of what might be a demonic being wearing your father’s face and a fish’s body?”
“Well, one is probably the result of Caspar eating an ill-advised mushroom,” sulked Hubert. “And the other might one day be a necessity of the geopolitical climate.”
“Caspar has not eaten a mushroom since that unfortunate incident at Gronder,” objected Ferdinand. He was still frowning. He tapped at his lip with the end of his braid. Hubert wanted to reach out and take that shining rope into his hand and pull him gently closer and - strangle Ferdinand for putting this image of red-gold feathering over a soft, pink mouth into his head. “What did you say your father looked like again, Hubert?”
“I didn’t,” Hubert snapped. But Ferdinand only had to look hurt, honeyed eyes rounding at his sharp tone, and Hubert was adding, begrudgingly:
“He - I am told we looked very similar. He was tall. Thin. Small eyes, and the same hollow cheekbones. He - he must have had the same hair texture as mine, but with.” Hubert closed his eyes and let a memory shiver over his skin without actually recalling it. “A white stripe. He always wore his hair combed back, so he looked like a skull’s head.”
Hubert expected something - a look of distaste, a moue of disgust. Instead Ferdinand’s little frown deepened. “That is distinctive. The nervous tapping of his fingers quickened, then stilled as he looked up at Hubert. “I do not think I am mistaken then. The thing is, since moving into my new quarters, Hubert, I believe I have seen him”
For the second time that day, Hubert lost his temper and this time he did it completely. “You what, Ferdinand? And you did not think to tell me until this moment? You have been sleeping in those quarters for a month now!”
Ferdinand reached out to steady the shaking cups. “Hubert, you must calm down! He does not appear every night.”
“He - appears to you - at night -” sputtered Hubert. He had a flash of Ferdinand, bright hair loose around his shoulders, wearing a flowing and low-cut white nightshirt, clutching silken sheets to his chest as something rotted lurched towards him. Then —
—long-fingered hands over Fathers face his shoulders shake the white stripe of hair falling loose she’s gone she’s gone how could she have left us? Father reaches for him he goes an arm crushes his face into black velvet a tear burns down his forehead then his cheek how could she have left me you are all I have now—
—Hubert realized he was staring at Ferdinand, mouth moving soundlessly. He reached out for his cup of coffee but his hand was shaking. Hubert put his hand down, watching his fingers jitter like they belonged to someone else. Then Ferdinand’s hand covered his, very gently.
Hubert let himself feel that, warm skin on skin. It let him also feel the grain of the wooden table under his palm, the mild compression of his leather boots on his legs, the weight of his woollen frock-coat against his shoulders. He took a breath, then another and Ferdinand’s hand lifted off his. It all happened so quickly; Hubert wondered if he imagined it.
“I am going to make sure Minister Kondabolu’s motion passes,” Ferdinand said. “May we count on your support?”
Hubert scowled and looked away. “Ugh,” he said. “I suppose.”
***
It was ratified at the next Council session. Minister Kondabolu hid her surprise well when Hubert stood and seconded her motion. Hubert did not do as good a job of controlling his face when Ferdinand volunteered himself and Hubert for the Committee of Posthumous Interference.
And then, to cap it all off, Byleth Eisner stood up from the back of the room and indicated her interest. No one did a good job of pretending any kind of sangfroid then. In the rush that followed, Minister Kondabolu had to raise her voice to cap the committee at twelve members.
Byleth didn’t have any kind of Council role or official government position, and she frequently disappeared for long periods of time. But when she was back in Enbarr, no door was closed to her and apparently no committee either. That was what came of being the person to stab a great white dragon in the head. Count Hevring looked furious as Minister Kondabolu rose at the end of the meeting and streamed out of the Council Chambers, with the Minister of the Imperial Household, the Prime Minister and the Ashen Demon behind her. Minister Kondabolu, to do her boundless credit, never looked at him at all.
“Right,” she said briskly, once they were all ensconced in her office. “I think it best if we divide up the city.”
Her aide, a round, competent woman named Janina Bessel, had pinned a map to the table. It was stabbed through with pins of different colours. It was clear Minister Kondabolu had been tracking this for a long time. It was not hard to tell where patterns emerged. The opera house and the city entrance was studded with pins of a variety of colours, but mostly gold - “That’s for visitations,” Minister Kondabolu said. She pointed to the red dot at the top of the opera house. “That’s a visitation - regular.”
The palace suffered a similar amount of red and gold pins. Byleth pointed at the black pins that appeared here and there, like spots of mould on the map. “What are those for?” she said.
Minister Kondabolu looked grim. “Activity,” she said. “That is where people have reported visitations that were more…interactive.” She studied the map. “No clear pattern yet but we have not been able to collect information as systematically as we ought to, till now. I propose we divide the city into quadrants -”
Hubert opened his mouth, about to volunteer for the southernmost corner of the city, furthest away from the little golden pin stabbed through what was now the Prime Minister’s office.
“Hubert and I will take the palace and the city centre!” said Ferdinand. Hubert shot him a nasty look. “It is the most natural thing, you are the Minister of the Imperial Household after all, and we are both here constantly. Who better?”
“Very well,” said Minister Kondabolu briefly. “Now, as to the rest of Enbarr -”
“I would like to investigate the palace as well,” interrupted Byleth.
“Professor!” protested Ferdinand. His gaze slid over to Hubert, then back to Byleth again. For some reason, Ferdinand almost looked like he was pouting. “I am sure that is unnecessary. Two people for the palace is more than enough! Why, we will have to spend so much time together and where are you staying while you are back anyway? I would not want your commute to be overly lengthy!”
Byleth stared at Ferdinand, and then she turned to Minister Kondabolu. “I am investigating the palace,” she confirmed.
Minister Kondabolu shrugged and noted it down. The remainder of the city was divided with only a little less squabbling. Ferdinand was definitely pouting, and doing his best not to show it. Hubert looked at the slight jut of his lower lip and forced his thoughts away from biting down on it.
He was not displeased by Byleth’s insistence. Having her along beside them, poking at things with her sword and picking everything up off the street, would serve as an excellent distraction from Ferdinand.
***
“Where is she?” demanded Hubert.
“Who?” said Ferdinand. He wore a black silk drugget coat with tiny diamond motifs running down in golden lines. To accommodate its tall standing collar, his hair was tied back in a tail. His waistcoat was also uncharacteristically restrained, a matte silver weave. By his standards, he was dressed down and looked no less resplendent, Hubert noted with dismay.
“The professor!” hissed Hubert. He could not be alone with Ferdinand like this. It was earlier in the morning than he liked it, he had not yet had his coffee and Ferdinand in the sunrise - no, it did not bear thinking about. He would embarrass himself. “She is late!”
“Oh no,” said Ferdinand easily. “She was early, actually. She met me here at the gates and told me she planned to investigate somewhere else in the palace and that we did not need to come with her.”
“She what!” Hubert did not want to think of how little work was going to be done in the palace if Byleth was wandering leisurely about, asking every housemaid if this ragged piece of velvet belonged to her. “Come, Ferdinand, we need to find her -”
“We are not going to find Byleth,” said Ferdinand cheerfully, tucking his arm through the crook of Hubert’s elbow. “We are going to investigate the reports of the weeping man at the palace gates. Minister Kondabolu said the hawkers at the morning market have heard him more frequently lately, and his cries have been louder as well. Poor man,” Ferdinand added to himself, quietly. Then he tugged at Hubert, and got him walking, unwillingly. “And besides, you have never actually been to the morning markets right at the palace gates, have you? That seems to be a dereliction of duty, Hubert.”
Hubert bristled. “Insulting, Ferdinand. I have multiple agents throughout this sprawl.” He gave a coin to one now, Jocasta Lezhner, who was currently pretending to be a drunken beggar, passed out in a ditch. Ferdinand and Bernadetta, in particular, were in and out of the markets constantly and she was the one assigned to ensure no harm came to them.
“I have no doubt,” said Ferdinand. “But can secondhand reports suffice to keep on top of the mood of the populace? The markets are truly the heart of Enbarr.”
It smelled more like its bladder. The morning markets were old. Older than the opera house, older than even the palace. Before Enbarr, there were the farmers, the bakers, the fishermen, the butchers, the spinners, and all the housewives that accompanied them. A moving, heaving phantom city in itself, with city-blocks of vegetable crates and rivers of silver fish. All of which vanished, like magic, by noon and resurrected itself again in the night markets, raucous with liquor stalls.
Hubert frowned at gaudy advertisements pasted on the walls. “There are much more fortune-tellers about than last month,” he said. Fortune-telling had been severely repressed under the Church of Seiros and in its fall, its practitioners were perhaps the only people blessing the Emperor’s name without caveat.
“A result of our recent hauntings,” said Ferdinand. He had pitched his voice low, leaning into Hubert and speaking into his ear so that they might not be overheard. “For all that the Emperor is popular with the spiritualists now, I suspect Minister Kondabolu will not be. Part of her worry is the rise in fraudulent psychics and she’s cracking down, you know.”
Hubert was aware of this. With the rise of spirits in Enbarr, for every time Lysithea refused to visit, five more people arrived. They were desperate to consult the city’s new spiritualists for news of loved ones lost in Gronder, Myrddin, at Garreg Mach. He did not know who he despised more: those who preyed on their grief, or the grieving themselves, for not understanding that dead meant dead.
“What are we doing here, exactly?” Hubert said, as Ferdinand stopped to buy them buns. Hubert nodded at the baker, another agent, Jurgen Schneider, who looked surprised to see him. As well he might since Hubert was usually behind his desk reviewing his (excessive) field expenses. “Let’s buy from another cart, I have heard these ones are not as fresh.”
Jurgen shrugged at Hubert as they walked off. He was a poisoner, not a pastry chef.
“Investigating, of course!” Ferdinand said. “Surely you’ve investigated before. And when have you been down in the markets often enough to know where the best baked goods are?”
“Do you think your tea just magically appears in my drawers and Her Majesty’s favourite cakes on her desk?” sneered Hubert as he steered them towards another stall, legitimate this time. Bathsheba, the old woman running it had an attitude like curdled milk and the hands of an angel. “And of course, I have investigated but I am usually looking for something more concrete than some bawling phantom.”
“Oh it’s the weeping man you want to hear?” said Coraline, Bathsheba’s rosy-faced grand-daughter “He’s usually by the old stronghold, next to the palace. Miriam’s set up her stall there. If you want your fortune told while you’re at it, she’s good! She got me news of where my dad’s will went.”
“Anyone could have told you he’d hidden it under the second brick of the fireplace,” growled Bathsheba. “It’s where he used to hide all those woodcuttings he thought I didn’t know about.”
“Well, who’d have known he’d carved it onto the back of the woodcuttings?” argued Coraline. This had the air of an old argument. “Here you go, sirs. If you want Miriam, she’s at the market’s end, close to the canals.”
“Well, there you are!” declared Ferdinand as he stopped by another stall run by an old Dagdan woman. Ferdinand produced a tumbler that she filled with hot coffee. “I do not know what the Professor hopes to find in the palace, the market is clearly the place to be for ghost-hunting.”
“Or being swindled,” said Hubert sourly. He had been part of enough strange and true things in his life to not completely dismiss someone who claimed they could speak to the dead, but he certainly didn’t think there were enough of them to fill up an entire street block of the morning market.
They found the woman named Miriam eventually, pushing past banners that promised two for one exorcisms. She had inconsistently dyed red hair and two high circles of rouge on her painted white face. She was pinned over with colourful swathes of clashing fabric. She looked like a Dagdan fox spirit playing at being human. Her little stall had a thin wooden backing and she had covered it in mirror shards that reflected the back of her head, the edges of people’s faces, the heavy stone walls, in disjointed flashes. Hubert had no doubt it was all affectation. That mysterious, lopsided little smile, with one fang popping over her lip, was too rehearsed. She probably practiced in her little collection of mirror shards when business was slow.
Not that it was slow now. It was much easier for a fortune-teller to drum up business at night. Even with Enbarr busily leaking all types of phantom phenomenon, it made for easier believers when the streets were shadowed and the liquor stalls were out. But even in the morning light of a cold winter’s day, Miriam had a little line. Hubert and Ferdinand joined it.
Ferdinand broke apart one of the flaky pastries he had bought and got it all down the front of his waistcoat. Hubert rolled his eyes and brushed him off. Ferdinand smiled at him. “How is the coffee?”
Hubert had almost forgotten he was holding it. “It is not bad,” he said after a moment, in surprise.
“Is it not? I found her last week,” said Ferdinand boastfully as they shuffled forward. “So I knew to bring a tumbler along with me, to make sure you had some since you will not be civilized and eat breakfast without it.”
“Good morning sirs,” said Miriam. “Ah, pastries from Bathsheba’s? Finest in the market.”
Ferdinand took the hint. “May I present you with one?”
“Oh, I’d never say no,” Miriam said, winking at Ferdinand in a way that made Hubert think seriously about revoking her market license. “How may I help you fine gentlemen this morning?”
“He can hardly get out of bed in the morning without knowing whether or not the stars are propitious,” said Ferdinand, nodding at Hubert.
Hubert glared at him.
“Hah! It doesn’t take the spirits to see that you’re a man who likes to have all his pieces in place before he moves, sir,” said Miriam and gave him that practiced little smile. “But a haunted man, nevertheless.”
“I was in the war.”
“And I’m sure you lost too many you cared for,” she replied, and did not take the bait. “But this is something else, from before the war, I think. Something follows you.”
Ferdinand’s eyes widened slightly. Hubert refrained from sighing. It was as good as giving her a sign to continue along this vein.
“But alas, before I can explain further.” Miriam put out her palm and pointed to a little cardboard sign. It said:
fifteen minutes - 500 gold//30 minutes - 800 gold//seances - pls enquire.
ABSOLUTELY NO REFUNDS
Ferdinand looked at Hubert’s face, then sighed. He opened his pouch, clearly overpaying Miriam. As she whisked the coins away, she winked at him and said, “Yours I’ll do for free, sir. You’ve already met the person you’re going to marry.”
Ferdinand went bright red as he nudged Hubert forward. Miriam reached for his hand but stopped short of actually taking it.
“May I?” she said. Unwillingly, Hubert nodded. She took it between her two palms. Nothing happened except that her hands were smeared with buttery pastry and she was getting it on his gloves but Miriam was frowning still. “Feels familiar,” she mumbled, almost to herself. “Very strange. Hmm, okay.”
She looked up at him. Her eyes were so dark it was hard to tell her irises from her pupils, it gave them an uncanny effect. “It is with you still,” she said slowly. “She? He - no, mostly a he, I think. Someone who hurt you - yes, and he hurt the one you loved the most as well.”
Hubert stared down at her. That helpless anger was rising in him again. He stuffed it down ruthlessly. “Actually, we were more interested in the weeping man.”
“That poor fellow?” said Miriam absently. She still held Hubert’s hand too tightly for him to extricate himself without a scene. “Yes, you’ve timed it well. This is about his time.”
Like a perfectly placed period at the end of her sentence, there came the sound of crying. Hubert had rolled his eyes when reports of this particular ghost reached him. As if a tantruming spirit could be heard over the endless clatter of hooves and feet and human chatter. But this shimmering, grey wail brought the city to stillness. It rose slow and shuddering from the cobble stones, echoing off the stone walls —
—a small boy wakes suddenly from sleep it is the third time this week and he is so tired but Father does not like it when he cries this is not like those times big hands shaking him by the collar of his nightshirt there is only a sliver of light the door slightly ajar and urgent voices he needs sleep he needs to learn he is only five then there is a crack and the door explodes open with Mothers head against it the boy sits up he does not cry—
“What you did should have been enough,” continued Miriam over the wailing. “You cannot understand why it isn’t but you are still there, aren’t you? Trapped in a series of moments, with no beginning, no end.”
“Enough!” Hubert wrenched his hand away, snarling. “I have never heard such garbage in my life.”
Miriam shrugged. “I am but a conduit for a greater power,” she said piously. “But obviously not the Goddess, because she is a false construct. Also, I must remind you of my ‘no refund’ policy.”
Hubert took in a deep breath, ready to eviscerate her as the sobs reverberated around them. Ferdinand started to protest but it was the flash at the corner of his eye that stopped Hubert.
He looked up, past Miriam, into her mirrors.
His father looked back at him, in bits and pieces from her mirror-shard wall. Cold eyes creasing above disjointed cheekbones as just off-centre, his thin mouth smirked at Hubert. His hair, lacquered like the shell of a poisonous insect, dark with a white warning streaked down the side —
Ferdinand yelped so he saw it too. Miriam turned her head and her eyes widened. Hubert blinked and then it was chunks of his own face again, reflected back. His eyes wide in horror, his mouth hanging open with a curse half-spoken.
“Huh,” said Miriam. “That’s new.”
She turned back as the wailing died down, the last shudders of it sinking into the ground. “Regarding what I said previously,” she said, as if this was all in a day’s work, which perhaps it was.
“About your ‘no refund’ policy?” said Ferdinand. Hubert was in no state to say anything at all.
“About the thing haunting this gentleman.” Those sharp, uncanny eyes were on Hubert again and there was an expression on her face like she saw something familiar in him and didn’t like it. Hubert wanted to reassure her that the feeling was entirely mutual. “What shapes does not need to define. And I will give you this, for free.”
She rummaged around under her stall and dropped a rusted iron fishhook into Ferdinand’s outstretched hand.
***
Hubert had spent considerable time imagining himself in Ferdinand’s quarters with the light low, the fire banked. Usually, in these daydreams, neither he nor Ferdinand were wearing very much. And they were accompanied by wine and a selection of seasonal fruit, not the entire Black Eagle Strike Force.
Word of Hubert and Ferdinand’s haunting had got around. Ferdinand had told Bernadetta and Petra about what transpired at the market, who told Dorothea, who had told Lady Edelgard, who had stalked into Hubert’s office to have a conversation about the types of things one did or did not tell one’s liege.
“I didn’t want to bother you,” he protested.
“Maybe this is not the kind of thing one confides to the Emperor, Hubert,” flashed Lady Edelgard. “But it is the type of thing you tell your friend! Or do I not count as one!”
And Caspar and Linhardt had told everyone about the fish. Perhaps that was what explained Byleth’s new interest in ghost-hunting. Lady Edelgard was still angry with him. She sat next to Bernadetta, face solemn, but Ferdinand was in his element. His zeal for hosting was not dampened in the slightest by the fact that his quarters were being haunted by Hubert’s malignant father. Food and drink was spread across every surface that did not already hold large flower arrangements: trifles piled tipsily with berries and cream, cream puffs drizzled with chocolate, skewers of roasted meat and vegetables, and incongruently, Hubert’s favourite dish of raw fish, pickled with turnips. Everyone avoided it conspicuously.
Dorothea came to sit by Hubert as Lady Edelgard attacked a peach sorbet like it had personally wronged her. “How are you holding up?” she said.
Hubert crunched into a turnip and watched Ferdinand flit about. He wore his hair loose today, a ripple of red-gold. Hubert’s hands itched. “I am wonderful,” he said irritably. “The rise of the undead is disturbing the populace and threatening the stability of our Emperor’s nascent rule and my dearly beloved father appears to be haunting me. How are you?”
“Doing better than you,” replied Dorothea. “On account of not being haunted by my estranged parent.”
She took a deep sip of her wine. An uncharitable person might have described it as a slug. “Do you want to talk about it? I know something about fathers,” she said.
“I do not wish to talk about it.”
“How out of character! Hubie, you’ve got to stop surprising me like this.” Dorothea laughed as Hubert glared at her. “Ferdinand says your undead sire has been in his bedroom a couple times. Do you think he’s trying to cop a look at some Aegir ass?”
Hubert choked. “Is this you trying to make me feel better about the situation?”
“Sorry, sorry. It’s the kind of thing my father - the man I think was my father - would do,” Dorothea said. She smiled mirthlessly. “Did do, constantly. He was quite the pest at the Mittelfrank. I think he’s running some minor barony in Ochs right now.” Hubert filed that away. “It’s just - unnerving. I’ve spent a lot of energy planning to never ever be in the same room as him again and suddenly I can’t stop thinking that even if he died, it might not be the end of it.”
Dorothea hid it well but there was a little trill of panic in her voice. Her eyes looked at nothing. “He could come back to Enbarr anytime,” she said tightly. “Not that he would try to bother me now. But.”
Hubert didn’t know how to help her but he did his best: “If he does, you let me know.”
Dorothea turned to look at him. Hubert said, “I promise, I will take care of it.”
Dorothea took in a short, sharp breath when he said that. Then she let it out again very slowly. Hubert sat beside her as she consciously evened out her breathing.
“Thank you, Hubert,” she said finally. Because it clearly brought her comfort, Hubert let Dorothea slip her fingers through his. “I can take care of it, I’m sure, but I’m glad I have you to turn to if necessary. I didn’t mean to make it all about me, I’m sorry.”
Hubert shook his head mutely and she squeezed his hand. Perhaps Dorothea knew something about the kind of parenting that woke you in the night, cold with sweat. As Bernadetta did, who had pressed a crocheted flytrap into his hand silently when they met. Against the odds, their strange, shared understanding made something loosen in Hubert’s chest. He glanced at Dorothea’s profile, that straight nose, the rounded chin, the long lashes casting shadows over her smooth cheeks. “Did you,” he started.
Dorothea turned to look at him when he did not continue. “Did I what?”
“Did you look very much like him?” Hubert forced himself to finish. “Is that how you knew he was your father?”
There were no portraits left of the previous Marquis Vestra. Hubert had ordered them all taken down and burnt. It was little use when all he needed to do was look into a mirror and see: those hollow cheekbones, the thin, pursed lips. Dorothea’s bright green eyes were too perceptive. Hubert looked away
“Forget I said anything,” Hubert said, and took his own slug of wine, his first that night.
Dorothea opened her mouth and then closed it with a snap. “I think I know what you need,” she said, letting go of his hand and waving it in the air. “Ferdinand! Hey, Ferdinand!”
“Dorothea, stop it!” hissed Hubert but of course, it was too late. She had attracted Ferdinand’s attention and the attention of everybody else in the room. Hubert scowled as Petra hid her smile behind a meat skewer and Lady Edelgard gave him a sharp, knowing look over her absolutely enormous pile of sweet buns.
It was cowardly but Hubert had been avoiding Ferdinand since their visit to the marketplace a week ago. He pled outrageous busyness as he took over drafting the report of their market visit for Minister Kondabolu. Ferdinand knew, at least, not to fight him on this. Hubert went back and forth and finally settled for noting impersonally that, in addition to the wailing ghost at the palace gates, they’d had an encounter with the previous Minister of the Imperial Household.
Ferdinand came over immediately. Of course he did. He was carrying the Dagdan dish Hubert favoured, the raw fish and turnip. Of course he was. Clearly Hubert was not eating as much as Ferdinand thought he ought to. Dorothea rose from Hubert’s side and gave Ferdinand one of her prettiest smiles. “Take my seat and keep Hubie company, won’t you?”
“With the greatest pleasure!” beamed Ferdinand and sat down next to Hubert immediately. He was much broader than Dorothea and there was no more room to move away, so Hubert had to sit there, thigh pressed against Ferdinand’s.
“And this little soiree is part of the investigation, Ferdinand?” he forced himself to drawl, coolly.
“I do not see why it could not count as such,” replied Ferdinand. “After all, there are at least four people in this room now who have seen the spectre we hunt. Perhaps our combined, ah, etheric attraction will draw it forth? It is an experiment! Very scientific.”
“No, it’s not,” called Linhardt from the other end of the room.
Ferdinand shot Linhardt an extremely uncharitable look and then turned back to Hubert. “You have barely eaten tonight, Hubert! There are some cured meats and terrines in the other room, if that is more to your taste?”
“You better not have spent government funding on this, Ferdinand.”
“Of course not!” Ferdinand protested. “I would never misuse government funds this way!”
Hubert raised his eyebrows. “My invitation to this strongly indicated my presence was imperative for our continued investigation on behalf of the Committee of Posthumous Interference.”
Ferdinand sputtered.
“I - oh alright,” he said. “This is not part of the investigation at all, but I thought - you were upset after the marketplace and I thought a gathering of our friends might make you feel better.” The corners of his mouth drooped. “I know it is an imposition on your schedule. If you would like to escape, I will certainly make your excuses.”
Hubert turned his head to look at him. Ferdinand’s thigh was solid against his. The candlelight sat gently on him, picked up the gold in his hair and eyes. Ferdinand looked back at him, a sunflower who had not realized that the light it followed was a sickly, underwater thing. Ferdinand’s fingers were tapping on his thigh. Hubert wanted, terribly, to reach over and rest his hand over them. Ferdinand was barely ever still but Hubert knew this unsolicited gesture would freeze him, afraid to break whatever mood moved Hubert to touch him. As if Hubert didn’t dream of doing so much more than putting a hand over Ferdinand’s.
“I do not plan on making an escape,” Hubert said. “But perhaps - I do not care for sweets - you said the other room had -”
Ferdinand’s mouth dropped open for just a second. Then, “Yes!” he said, the words tumbling over each other. “Of course, how thoughtless of me, I should have brought some out. Why don’t you come help me with some of the pates?”
“Yes, of course,” said Hubert, mortified as everyone conspicuously looked elsewhere as he rose and followed Ferdinand into the other room.
Ferdinand had clearly planned for this little parlour to be used for the party as well. There were flowers here too, and another little table of food. Matching sets of ornate mirrors, gilt vines twining up their sides, threw the low lighting back and forth. Instead of the wealth of candles gleaming in the parlour, most of the light in the room came from the small fire crackling in the marble fireplace, carved over with a hunting scene.
Hubert stopped at the sight of it.
— the young man focuses on the crackle of wood collapsing into flame intently so intently he almost misses the first cough face purpling one large white hand coming to bulging throat what have you done —
“Nothing you have not taught me before,” Hubert had replied and kept watching as his father choked and spat and cursed and died before him.
Hubert had kept his hands folded tightly in his lap, focused on the mottling moving across his father’s skin, the rise and fall of rattling breath. It was an old lesson of Lord Vestra’s: do not take your eyes off a desperate man. The dying have nothing to lose and some might still have the will for a stab or a spell. Lord Vestra’s hands twitched uselessly towards his hidden knives. Squeamishness has no place in House Vestra. His father’s hands on the side of his head, holding him in place. Watch. The minutes, the multiple livid minutes it had taken for his father to die. Later, Hubert realized he had dug his nails into his hands so tightly they bled.
Afterwards, he had held the little mirror over his father’s gaping mouth to make sure no more breath came. He had closed the staring eyes and wiped clean the foaming lips. There was not much he could do about the colour of Lord Vestra’s face. He had called for his agents to take the body away.
He had not been in this room since. Dimly, Hubert realized he was being helped into a chair. Instead of calling for help, Ferdinand crouched before him. Hubert wanted to smash spell after spell into the fireplace until its marble was blackened and broken. He wanted to throttle Ferdinand. He did neither, focusing instead on the way his body reacted to that wild animal panic. He allowed his arm to twitch upwards, fingers clutching his right breast pocket where he had kept the antidote. He had wanted to reach for it a dozen times that night and scorned it for weakness.
His eyes burned and then started watering, and then Hubert was back in his body again. Ferdinand knelt before him, hands on Hubert’s thighs, looking up at him.
The expression in his eyes made Hubert want to hide. Maybe some of that panic showed in his face because Ferdinand smiled slightly, and reached a hand up to cup Hubert’s cheek.
“I killed my father in this room,” Hubert said, by way of explanation.
Ferdinand’s face did not change, his fingers on Hubert’s skin did not tense. “Oh, I am sorry. I did not know. Would you like to leave?”
He took his hand off Hubert’s face for a moment and Hubert’s heart fell, despite everything. Ferdinand fumbled a handkerchief out of his pocket and then pressed it to Hubert’s damp cheek. Hubert’s handkerchiefs were capacious rough cotton squares, suitable for sopping up blood and chemicals, or working as a makeshift bandage or gag. Ferdinand’s was a little bit of fine linen and lace; it smelled like bergamot and lemon. His kindness stupefied Hubert, as did the look in Ferdinand’s eyes.
“I killed my father,” repeated Hubert, in case Ferdinand had not heard him the first time. “About two feet from where we are sitting now. I sat before his fireplace and served him his tea, and watched him drink it.”
“You took no pleasure in it,” said Ferdinand gently. “And I am sure you had good reason to.”
Ferdinand’s honeyed eyes were soft, believing; this man who argued with Lady Edelgard and who could spend two days poking at a single clause for every potential angle trusted Hubert implicitly. Even on the subject of patricide.
“You are smarter than this, Ferdinand. You should not want this.” Me.
Ferdinand smiled. One hand warm against Hubert’s face, the other grounding on Hubert’s thigh. “But I do.”
Hubert stared at him, despairing. It was a miracle Ferdinand was alive still, with this blithe disregard for self-preservation. He was a miracle. Hubert put a hand over Ferdinand’s, cupping it against his cheek. He watched Ferdinand’s eyes flare bright with hope. And then, because his heart might tear itself out of his chest if he didn’t, Hubert bent down to kiss him.
Ferdinand’s lips parted on a small gasp of surprise as their mouths met. He was so warm, tasting faintly of wine. His fingers flexed against Hubert, and then Ferdinand moaned quietly and deepened the kiss. His hand tightened on Hubert’s thigh and Hubert dared to tangle his other hand in Ferdinand’s hair, skin coming alive at the heavy silken mass curling through his fingers.
“I’ve spent so long dreaming of this,” whispered Ferdinand against him, and it was exactly what Hubert had been thinking. All those lonely nights, thinking of Ferdinand’s mouth, pursed in thought, stretched wide with laughter, smiling softly at Hubert over tea like they shared a secret that was sweet on his tongue. Hubert groaned in agreement and Ferdinand took the opportunity to slip his tongue in deeper. Then Hubert was half-pulling him up and Ferdinand was half-climbing into his lap and Hubert curled his arm around Ferdinand’s waist as he pulled away to press a kiss against Hubert’s jaw and —
Hubert’s father watched them from the mirrors.
— Hubert cursed as the glass exploded with tinkling shrieks. He drew his cloak up instinctively, shielding the both of them against the sharp, silver rain, pieces slicing through the rough fustian material. Ferdinand was trembling against him - with rage as it turned out.
“The void with this!” he snarled, pushing out from under Hubert’s cloak just as the rest of the Black Eagles stampeded in. “I have waited too long for this moment for it to be ruined by your rotted father who does not know when to bloody well stay dead!”
“What happened?” demanded Lady Edelgard. She had burst in, axe first. The doors to the private parlour would never be the same again. She stopped short at the sight of Ferdinand raging in Hubert’s lap.
Petra peered from behind her. “You both are alright?”
Ferdinand turned around, blood streaming from a cut in his cheek. “Where did you two bury Lord Vestra, Edelgard? I am going to dig him up myself and -”
Byleth pushed through. Mirror-shards were heaped on the floor like snow-drifts, the great gilt frames on the wall hanging empty as the room glittered in its wreckage. “We should clean this up,” she said practically. “Edelgard, there is something I have to discuss with you.”
***
Byleth’s theory was laid out as simply as she ever said anything: once upon a time she had carried the Progenitor-Goddess - “She prefers to be called Sothis” - embedded in her heart and her consciousness and she used to be able to control time, which explained a lot.
“I can’t do it now.” She shrugged, like all she had lost was a scarf she had been none too fond of. “But sometimes, I can still remember -”
Other timelines. Hubert shuddered to think of them. Other lives where Bernadetta had been torched alive, and he and Petra and Dorothea died defending Enbarr. Other lives where Lady Edelgard was turned into a monster, weeping for her losses; where Ferdinand died defending Myrddin bridge.
“Rhea was kept in the palace, quite often,” said Byleth. “Sometimes she was more sane than others. When I walked through the palace dungeons -”
She could hear her, the Archbishop, Saint Seiros, whispering through the walls. Mother, come back to me. Mother, I will find you. Mother, I miss you. Mother, I hurt.
“I think while she was in captivity, she cursed the place,” said Byleth. “Probably more than once, across different timelines. The magic that’s running down there, through Enbarr, it feels like when we faced the Immaculate One, dragonish somehow. It feels -”
“Evil,” finished Lady Edelgard grimly.
“No,” corrected Byleth. “Just different.”
“So,” Petra said. “We will dig up the Immaculate One’s grave?”
Ferdinand gave her an approving look.
“I can start researching,” Linhardt said. He sounded thoroughly awake for once, never a good sign. “This is absolutely fascinating! Alternate timelines! Professor, if you have a bit of time later in the day perhaps we could -”
“How long is this going to take?” Hubert broke in finally. He intended to sound impatient, it came out slightly desperate. “I would prefer not to spend my every waking moment wondering when my father is going to appear in a mirror -”
“Or come leaping out of a canal,” added Caspar, shuddering. “Wonder how many fishermen have had their days ruined by that.”
Fortunately, before Hubert could say anything, Byleth stepped in. “Before we waste time running into dead-ends researching this,” Linhardt made a disgruntled sound, “there are two people we could just ask for help. With your permission to guarantee them safety.”
She looked at Lady Edelgard when she said it. Lady Edelgard’s lips tightened and she glanced at Hubert. Perhaps whatever she saw in his face decided her. She nodded.
***
Byleth set out alone. She returned much sooner than anyone expected. Hubert suspected she knew where to look, and that this was probably not her first visit either. He and Lady Edelgard waited by the city’s unofficial entrance, a crumble of overgrown stone that hid a route to Enbarr’s twisting underground. No one could leave or enter without a bloodwork sigil of Hubert’s own devising. Ferdinand and Minister Kondabolu stood with them.
There had been a spirited discussion over her inclusion. Hubert wanted to know where the Ministry of Religion’s mandate indicated that it covered ghosts. Ferdinand pointed out that they had jurisdiction over ‘rituals concerning burials and administrative matters concerning one’s end of life’, which was sort of the same thing.
Lady Edelgard ended the argument. “She prioritized this investigation in the first place,” she said with finality. “The Emperor cannot go behind their ministers’ backs like this if this situation is in their purview.”
Minister Kondabolu had taken it all admirably in stride. Though she had commented, drily, that in future and under less urgent matters, she would like to be consulted before action was taken by members of her committee. It set an unfortunate precedent.
“There is no precedent if no one ever knows,” Hubert said menacingly.
Minister Kondabolu inclined her head. “I take your meaning,” she said.
They waited in uncomfortable silence for Byleth to appear. She did so, two hours late, with Flayn and Seteth walking reluctantly behind her.
“Sorry for the delay,” she said. “We ran into some trouble near the city. Rabbits.”
“The ones with the?” Ferdinand gestured to his teeth. Byleth nodded; Flayn shuddered. Minister Kondabolu wrote it down in her notebook.
Seteth watched this all with a wary, unfriendly look in his eyes. He and Flayn wore thick, rough cloaks but Hubert could tell: they were both thinner. Seteth’s eyes flickered over each of them in turn, and then rested on Lady Edelgard. She drew herself up in response, sticking her chin up defiantly.
“It is wonderful to see you both.” Ferdinand, of course, stepping forward. Byleth stood by easily as he bowed deeply, first to Seteth, then to Flayn. “The rabbits notwithstanding, I hope your trip to Enbarr was mostly uneventful. If I may, Flayn, I have a welcome present for you!”
“For me?” Flayn brightened, then immediately glanced at Seteth. “I mean, thank you, Ferdinand. It is not necessary.”
“A gift is never necessary, of course,” replied Ferdinand. “But in this case, I meant only as a token of how happy I am to be able to meet both of you again.”
“I - of course. That is very thoughtful of you, Ferdinand,” Seteth said unwillingly. Flayn perked up, darting forward and accepted the brightly wrapped package with both hands. Byleth put a hand on his shoulder. Seteth hid his slight flinch well, Hubert noted, but Byleth took her hand off immediately.
“Some food and rest, I think,” she said. Seteth opened his mouth again, to protest perhaps, but Byleth only nodded towards Flayn who was unwrapping Ferdinand’s present with pleasure glowing in her cheeks.
“Oh, scented oils! How kind!”
Hubert followed behind them as they made their way through the tunnels. The tunnels were intimately familiar to Hubert and his agents, and even to Lady Edelgard, even though she hated them and walked besides Minister Kondabolu now, lips pinched. Being underground reminded her of captivity. It was strange to see Ferdinand in this space. Hubert thought him such a creature of sunlight and clean air that he half-expected Ferdinand to shrink and shudder in this dark, dirty place.
Instead Ferdinand strolled along, chattering with Flayn about which scent was best to be used on what pressure point. “Oh, the rose should be applied on the wrist? Perhaps you could demonstrate for me, Ferdinand?”
Seteth and Hubert glared at Flayn at the exact same time. She glared back at Seteth and as Ferdinand caught the tail-end of Hubert’s look, his lips twitched. “I would love to! After dinner, perhaps,” he said, dropping back to walk next to Hubert. Ferdinand bumped their hands together and despite everything, Hubert smiled.
***
They met in Lady Edelgard’s private breakfast rooms the next morning, just the six of them. Seteth sat between Byleth and Flayn, looking a little lost as Byleth tucked an improbable amount of food into her mouth. Hubert and Edelgard exchanged looks. It was hardly the first time they had sat down with people they had faced down during the war but it felt different when they were two of the last survivors of an ancient race and you had killed the third.
“Tell me about this curse,” Seteth said.
“It’s somewhere close to or under the palace dungeons,” Byleth said. “I think Rhea was kept there - not in this time, of course, but some time, somewhere. More than once.”
“Right,” said Seteth. He looked a little sick behind his sip of tea. “You understand that she was vastly more skilled than I when it came to magic but I will see what I can do. She must have been in great pain, or been in a place of great tragedy to be able to cast something like this. To build something of this strength, so that it can crack through linear time itself. ”
Lady Edelgard’s eyes widened slightly and Hubert thought he knew why. She and her siblings had been kept below the palace as well. Hubert shivered at the thought of their dying being woven into the Immaculate One’s mad chanting. All Lady Edelgard said out loud was, “Thank you. Any help you will provide us is appreciated and will be rewarded highly.”
Seteth looked at her sharply. “I am only doing this so you people will leave Flayn and I alone after this. That means you too, Byleth.”
Flayn looked up then, eyes wide. Byleth looked down at her plate of food. “Understood.”
Flayn attempted a protest but a look from Seteth and she shut her mouth with a snap.
“We will go after you are done eating, Byleth,” said Seteth. “Any time now,” he added, under his breath.
“Do you need anything?” Ferdinand asked. “Any kind of tools or - ah - etheric devices or charms? There are the palace vaults of course and there are any number of things in the marketplace though I cannot make any claims to their efficacy.”
Seteth looked at him and smiled. His eyes were very green suddenly, a brief, uncanny, reptilian flash that recalled the beast he might once have been. “No,” he said, taking another genteel sip of his tea. “I do not believe that any such thing will be necessary but thank you for thinking of it, Ferdinand.”
“I will come with you,” said Lady Edelgard.
Hubert was alarmed. “Then, I too,” he started, and of course, Ferdinand was opening his mouth to volunteer as well. But Seteth shook his head.
“The process is dangerous at worst and unpleasant at best,” Seteth said. “And frankly, I will need to be able to concentrate.”
“Well, then Her Majesty cannot go!”
“Her Majesty is going.” Edelgard gave Hubert a flinty look. “And so is her axe.”
Seteth shrugged. “Then, with Byleth, I think our party of three is complete. No, Flayn,” he added. “You are not going with me while I descend into the dark depths of the palace of Enbarr in the company of our previous enemies and attempt to disentangle Rhea’s,” he made a serpentine series of syllables, impossible to replicate. “Please do not fight me on this.”
“I am an adult,” said Flayn, a distinct whine in her voice.
Looking helplessly at Lady Edelgard’s set face, Hubert felt in distinct sympathy with Seteth as he pinched the bridge of his nose and said, “Flayn, please…”
“You never let me do anything!” Flayn leaned back in her chair and crossed her arms. “May I at least go out to the canals? Caspar said he caught a fish that had the face of Hubert’s father on it.”
It had been a mistake to seat Flayn next to Caspar and Linhardt at dinner.
“A what?” Seteth said, looking at Hubert with some alarm. “Oh no, Flayn. When I say keep out of danger, what I also mean is do not go demon-hunting, please.”
Hubert paled. “A demon?”
“Yes, yes,” Seteth waved this aside as an entirely commonplace thing. “I suspect what Rhea cast is spreading, how shall I explain this? A rot through the city and its surrounding environs. It was quite a commonplace thing back in the day. It wears away the boundaries and things get through sometimes and wear faces.”
“Oh,” said Ferdinand faintly.
“Father, please!” cried Flayn. “It is just the one.”
Seteth closed his eyes briefly. “Flayn, may I speak with you a moment please?”
Hubert said, “I do not think this is wise.” At the same time, Ferdinand said, “Where did you say your father was buried again, Hubert?” There was a pause as everyone in the room, excepting Byleth who was still tucking into her bacon, attempted to glare at everyone else.
Seteth stood up. “Flayn, a moment?”
Hubert felt his hands clench automatically on his lap. It was something his father had said to Lady Vestra frequently and it had meant nothing good. Hubert watched as Flayn arose sulkily from the table. Seteth and Flayn stood in a corner of the room and while everyone looked away politely, Hubert could not. Seteth was tall, he seemed to tower over Flayn. If he did not concentrate, it was easy for Hubert’s mind to fill in another long, lean figure towering over a smaller one. Though his father had known enough to keep his true chastisement behind closed doors.
Seteth spoke sternly, his hands behind his back. Flayn ducked her head and kicked at the floor with her foot. Their low murmurs carried on for at least ten more minutes, by which time even Byleth cleaned off every scrap of her plate. Seteth and Flayn came back to the table and Hubert scanned Flayn’s face for - what? What would anyone have found in his mother’s face as she acquiesced to his father, again and again?
Instead:
“Very well, Flayn,” said Seteth tiredly. “Please be careful.”
“I will!” Flayn bounced once in her seat, very pleased with herself.
“If any danger arises, please do not concern yourself with your companions,” continued Seteth, looking over at Hubert and Ferdinand. “Only get yourself to safety, that is all I ask you.”
“Of course!” agreed Flayn cheerfully and settled it all.
***
Flayn insisted on visiting Ferdinand’s rooms first. Hubert tagged along and it was not because Flayn had tucked her arm confidingly through Ferdinand’s and he had let her. Flayn was no longer the rounded, rosy girl she had been at Garreg Mach but she still had those wide eyes and her green curls were as buoyant as ever. She was effervescent and adorable and Hubert would cheerfully have buried her alive except that no one would be pleased with him then, least of all Ferdinand.
“So these are your offices!” Flayn bounced in. “Oh, it is lovely, Ferdinand! You have a real eye for interior decoration! I adore all the horse paintings.”
Ferdinand beamed. “Why, thank you! Those are from Wildfall Court, the Aegir seat that was.They are all my horses since I was eleven. This is my current mount, Astraea -”
Ferdinand’s aide stood up confusedly but Ferdinand waved for him to sit down again. “Do not let us disturb you, Driss. Flayn is an old schoolmate come to visit.” He led Flayn into his private quarters. Hubert trailed behind them, letting their chatter wash over him. Flayn’s eyes were wide as she took in the rich blue carpets covering Ferdinand’s floors, the rose and mahogany chairs. But then, Garreg Mach had only been comfortable, not luxurious, and she and Seteth probably lived a more itinerant, hand-to-mouth lifestyle now. Hubert smothered the guilt that came.
“This is the sitting room where everyone was gathered. Caspar, Linhardt, Hubert and I were all here and we are the four who have seen old Lord Vestra. I thought perhaps that our combined etheric attraction might have -”
Flayn burst out into a peal of laughter. “Oh no, I don’t think that’s how it works! If you don’t mind my saying so, Ferdinand, you, Caspar and Linhardt are the least etherically attractive people I have ever met. This is not where it appeared, was it?”
“It was through here,” Hubert said shortly, and pushed through the shattered parlour door. He avoided looking at the fireplace. The little parlour had been cleaned up but the empty gilt frames still hung on the walls. Flayn stepped in and her eyes widened. “All those mirrors? How dramatic. Who was in here when it happened?”
Ferdinand glanced at him uncertainly and Hubert cleared his throat. “It was, ah, Ferdinand and I.”
“Just the two of you, hm?” Flayn darted towards another closed door. “Now what’s through here?”
“Those are my bedchambers.”
“May I intrude? You have still been sleeping there since the incident? With no problems?”
She opened the door without really waiting for any of Ferdinand’s answers. Ferdinand followed and so did Hubert, reluctantly. He had often dreamed of getting to see Ferdinand’s bedroom but Flayn did not feature in those fantasies. His daydreams had been getting shattered in quick succession over the past few days. But their kiss, at least, had been real. He glanced at Ferdinand and found him looking back.
Flayn looked around. “It is quite different in here,” she said.
“Ah, yes,” Ferdinand said, looking embarrassed as well he might. Flayn delicately stepped around the scatter on the floor. “I ask the maids not to come in here too often so they do not disrupt my papers.”
“Has it tried to manifest here?”
“Not violently. A few weeks before all this, I thought I saw something or other out of the corner of my eye but I was usually, ah, distracted.” Ferdinand was blushing for some reason.
“So nothing as violent as the parlour?”
“We have not yet had the opportunity to test that,” replied Ferdinand and glanced at Hubert. Hubert made a choked sound as he started to put together Ferdinand’s theory for Lord Vestra’s appearances in his private rooms. But Flayn barely glanced at them. She was frowning, looking around the room, as if there was some music only she could hear and she was trying to discover its source. She sniffed the air daintily
“Ah!” Flayn said suddenly and turned towards Ferdinand’s bed. She hurried around it towards his nightstand.
“Flayn!” yelped Ferdinand, leaping forward and almost tripping over a pair of discarded greaves on the floor. “Please do not look in any of those drawers!”
But Flayn only plucked Miriam’s rusted iron fish hook up from beside a scatter of candles. “How wonderful you have one of these!” she said. “That certainly saves me a lot of trouble and you a great deal of umbral steel and the spine of an Albinean herring.”
She cradled it lovingly in her palm. “It has been a long time since I have seen some of mother’s work. She was quite the curse-breaker. She came from a quarrelsome family so she said she got a lot of practice growing up. Now, is there a mirror you can spare?”
Ferdinand, it turned out, had taken his mirror down after the incident. He had put it in his closet, turned to the wall. Flayn made approving noises as he hoisted it out. It was almost as tall as she was. She seemed to be enjoying herself. Hubert had never heard her speak so easily about her family before but then, perhaps Flayn thought the worst had already come and if she was still standing here before them, she might as well be true.
“Now, I think we are ready to go fishing!” declared Flayn after she had thoroughly inspected the mirror. “Do you think Caspar and Linhardt will remember exactly where they were when they saw it?”
It turned out that, probably to avoid anyone asking to see his fishing permit, Caspar and Linhardt had been camped under a bridge. Hubert could find it in himself to be glad about that. There were not many people about but they were getting curious looks regardless. Ferdinand was always recognizable on account of the hair and he was carrying a large mirror. Flayn carried a fishing rod almost as tall as she was, a wicker basket with wide, green palm leaves swinging from her elbow and in it, the rusted fish hook. Hubert trailed behind them and he was scowling.
“I dread to think what rumours I will have to be quashing over the next month,” he grumbled to Ferdinand.
Flayn stopped under the bridge and clapped her hands. “A likely spot! Could you hold this please?”
Hubert took the fishing rod as she bent down and tied Miriam’s hook to the end of it.
“Do you need any bait?” Ferdinand asked.
“Oh, Hubert will do,” said Flayn dismissively, straightening. “There! Now if the two of you wouldn’t mind holding the mirror just in front of me. A little more to the left. No, the right but just the teensiest bit. Perfect!”
Flayn stood in front of the mirror and put her hands together. “Now how did it go,” she mumbled under her breath. “Ah, it’s been too long. I think it was,” and she started to chant in a long hissing string of syllables that twisted through the air and made it hum. The mirror in their hands started to vibrate. Flayn stood like a deep-sea fisherman on stormy waters, legs spread wide, everything braced. Her eyes and hair began to burn unearthly green. “Please do not let go of the mirror! Whatever you do!”
She lifted the rod with both hands and sent the line slashing out. Hubert braced for the crack of glass as the fishhook met the surface of the mirror but it never came. The fishhook sailed through the mirror as easily as if it were not there and their reflections disappeared for a second. Then, Enbarr, at least, was back but it was an Enbarr Hubert had never seen. He hoped, sincerely, to never see it again.
“How delightful!” cried Flayn as the surface of the mirror writhed. “Mother seldom let me watch before the war, you know. She said I was too young and it might rustle my scales too much. And then of course, after, there was a lot more call for curse-casting than breaking.”
Her hands visibly tightened on the rod, knuckles white. “Now, I know it might not be possible to recreate exactly what you were doing the night it broke the mirrors but if you could at least think back on it!”
It was less than ideal circumstances but Hubert found it easy to recall the feel of Ferdinand’s hands on his thigh, cupping his cheek. After all, he had barely been able to think of anything else since. Their eyes met over the mirror. The colour was high in Ferdinand’s face but he looked steadily at Hubert and while one hand was clamped on the mirror still, the other found Hubert’s bicep tightly so the back of the mirror rested on both their arms, well-braced.
Hubert’s heart was thudding in his chest. Ferdinand’s mouth parting under his. The look in Ferdinand’s eyes as he looked up at him. He didn’t know what he was so afraid of. Perhaps that Flayn’s spell would not work. Perhaps that it would, and he would still ruin things with Ferdinand, no assistance from his father necessary.
Flayn gave a fierce little cry of triumph, with some panic mixed in, and dug her heels as her line went taut. The mirror was shaking in their hands, violently. Hubert had a moment of being thankful that he had insisted on Ferdinand wearing a pair of his leather gloves. Then he made the mistake of glancing at the reflection.
The oily black waters of mirror-Enbarr’s canals were writhing, the blistered red brick of its bridges opened their scabbed mouths to scream. Flayn’s fishing line was a tight slash of silver and she shook as it twisted.
“Do - not - let - go!” cried Flayn.
A tail smashed through the black water, then a flash of fin. And then with one short, sharp jerk, Flayn ripped the fish out of the mirror and it landed, flopping and writhing at her feet, very like a real fish except that its head was Hubert’s father’s. The hook was dug into its cheek. Blood - and some other viscous fluid that Hubert could not identify - was trickling out. It made hoarse, gasping noises, eyes rolling in its head.
Flayn let the fishing rod clatter to the ground and knelt by the thrashing creature, taking the hook out from its cheek almost gently. With her small, white hands, she took it by the tail and swung it up and against the ground. Hubert watched as his father’s temple was bloodied, and then the fish was still. His father’s mouth but filled with fish-teeth. His father’s eyes but all pupil. Flayn picked up the fish as she might have a baby, hands under each of its fins as the rest of its body - oily, rainbow-filmed scales - hung. She smiled and Hubert could almost see the beast she had once been, lips lifting over little rows of sharp teeth. And then Flayn opened her mouth wide - too wide, wider than her jaw should have allowed - and bit its head off.
“Well,” said Ferdinand weakly after a while, into the sudden silence. “I can certainly see why your mother wouldn’t let you watch.”
***
The remainder of the fish - his father? - was wrapped up in the palm leaves and placed in Flayn’s wicker basket. Hubert avoided looking at its tail hanging limply off the side. Ferdinand had offered Flayn his handkerchief to dab the oily blood from her mouth. “You may just keep it, if you wish.”
“Oh thank you, Ferdinand!” chirped Flayn. She dabbed daintily at the oily, black blood around her mouth. “Mm, your things always smell so nice!”
Flayn folded Ferdinand’s handkerchief into a small square and tucked it carefully away in her pocket with the fishhook. She carried the basket; Ferdinand carried the mirror, though considerably further from his body this time; Hubert carried the remains of the fishing rod.
He expected to find the palace in shambles but everything looked the same and the household staff weren’t running to and fro on fire, so that was good. Byleth, Seteth and Edelgard were sitting in Edelgard’s private sitting rooms, drinking tea. Hubert recognized it as the blend Seteth favoured. They looked tired but calm. Hubert noticed they had all changed clothes and Seteth had a plaster on his cheek. Hubert saw, with a clutch at his heart, that Lady Edelgard’s eyes were rimmed with red, like she had been crying.
“Father!” Flayn cried, rushing forward. “Are you alright? Look at this!”
“I am alright, Flayn,” replied Seteth and lifted the palm leaves to look. “Oh. Well, my heavens. Sometimes letting it thrash around too much may affect the texture of the flesh but it looks like you did a very good job, Flayn.”
She beamed. Lady Edelgard gave Hubert a questioning look. He just shook his head.
“Is everything…resolved?” said Ferdinand tentatively. He had placed the mirror against the wall, back to the room. “Also, I think I will need to order a new mirror for my chambers, I think. And have that one smashed, and maybe burnt. Then buried.”
“That is very good instinct, Ferdinand,” Flayn said.
“I think things will be calmer now,” said Byleth. “We didn’t really get rid of what’s here but nothing more is coming through.” She glanced at Seteth, who nodded tiredly.
“What happened?” Flayn’s eyes were round. “Did you have to tear apart the doors between this realm and ours and destroy a horde of demonic wildebeests who wore the faces of the Ten Elites?”
It was Lady Edelgard who spoke up. “Another time, Flayn,” she said, with surprising gentleness. “It has been a…draining experience for all of us and I think it would be best if Seteth got some rest.”
Flayn bobbed. “O-oh, of course! I am sorry to have been so thoughtless.” Hubert watched as she perched on the arm of Seteth’s chair, leaning against her father. Seteth closed his eyes, the first time Hubert had seen him let down his guard before them, and submitted to being fussed over by his daughter.
Hubert thought, abruptly, not of his father but of his mother, short and round and green-eyed and the way she laughed and let him climb her skirts. Byleth, Lady Edelgard and Ferdinand watched as Flayn wrapped an arm tenderly around her father’s shoulder and Seteth leaned against her. Hubert wondered what they were remembering.
***
“It was a lot,” admitted Lady Edelgard. She, Hubert and Ferdinand were alone now. Her eyes were no longer rimmed with red; she still looked sad. “I am not sure about the technicalities precisely but ah, I believe Seteth had to find and release,” she attempted to shape the word but could not manage it with her human tongue. “The closest analogue he could give me was memory. The type that your body holds even when your mind cannot.”
“The memories belonged to Lady Rhea?” asked Ferdinand, his eyes wide with fascination.
“Some of them,” said Lady Edelgard. “Some of them belonged to me.”
Ferdinand fell silent. Hubert reached out and found Lady Edelgard’s hand.
“They were laid bare before us,” continued Lady Edelgard. “In flashes. What happened at Zanado, what happened to me, and a lot more between that. Rhea was here in Enbarr, you know. In the beginning, with my ancestor, Wilhelm.
“She blessed the city at his request. ‘May we lay the unquiet things and give them rest’.” Edelgard looked down at her hand, joined tightly in Hubert's. “So we did.”
Lady Edelgard looked at Hubert, fingers curled around his so hard it hurt. It was as if she had forgotten Ferdinand was in the room.
“Minister Kondabolu was right, we should not have waited so long. But I hoped that they would come back,” she blurted out. It was not the well-leashed grief of an Emperor. It was a child’s confession, the way she had once told Hubert of breaking a vase and they had worked to conceal it from Anselma. “All those ghosts... I thought maybe I would get to see my family again, as they were. Not as I remember them.”
Hubert could not speak. He did as Flayn had done for her father, putting an arm around Lady Edelgard’s shoulders. She turned her head onto his chest without saying any more. Ferdinand rose quietly and left them.
***
Hubert was on his hands and knees, in Ferdinand’s parlour, cursing himself. He had been carrying a vase of flowers and turned and —
— very nicely done Hubert the dummy is mangled and melted from Mire Father's friends clap politely Father's hand on his shoulder heavy heavy anyone can see that’s a Vestra yes yes they can Father smiles at him and he smiles back —
Hubert put his hands on his knees and focused on his breath, his heartbeat, until he was back in his body. The flowers were pooled in a fragrant mess around him. For fuck’s sake.
“Hubert? Driss said you were in here - Hubert! Are you alright?”
Void take him. Hubert pushed himself up before Ferdinand could rush over. “I’m fine, Ferdinand, don’t fuss,” he said irritably. “I just slipped.”
“What are you doing back here in the first place?” snapped Ferdinand. “Are you trying to distress yourself? I could barely believe my ears when Driss found me and told me you were in here and had given him the day off. Which you do not have the authority to do by the way and - what is all of this?”
Hubert grimaced. All this was Ferdinand’s favourite tea warm in a new teapot that Hubert had seen in the marketplace and bought, hiding it under his cloak as if he were smuggling a Relic into the palace. It was fine bone china, glazed a deep and even burgundy, stylized sunbeams traced over it in gold ink. It was Ferdinand’s favourite pastries from Bathsheba’s and his favourite flowers in his favourite vases - one of which Hubert had just broken.
“I thought,” he said, feeling stupid, “that we could have tea here for once?”
“Here?” Ferdinand gestured, probably attempting to approximate the rough location where Hubert had watched his agents wrap Lord Vestra’s body in a shroud. “In this room? After everything that has - oh.”
He was looking at the chair Hubert had sat in, where they had first kissed. In the room where Hubert had murdered his father. “Hubert. This is very romantic.”
Hubert felt his cheeks burn. “It was a stupid idea,” he snapped. “I thought. After everything. I thought I could face it. But I still find myself - overwhelmed at times.”
Ferdinand’s voice was gentle. “I think that is to be expected.”
To avoid Ferdinand’s eyes, Hubert bent down to pick up the spill of flowers. The peonies and ranunculus flowers looked vaguely ridiculous in his unpleasantly familiar hands, large, pale, long-fingered. “You do not understand, Ferdinand,” he said. Hubert had gone through his father’s belongings afterwards and ghoulishly tried on a pair of heavy black leather gloves. The fit was perfect. He had stripped them off and ordered everything burnt.
“My father, he taught me everything. All the ways to kill a man, how to make it look like an accident, like a warning. How to replace dust on a desk so no one could tell I had been rifling through it. He was not kind to my mother, and I am my father’s son. I am so afraid -”
“I think I know something about fathers and their unfortunate legacies, Hubert,” Ferdinand said tartly.
That shut Hubert up.
“At least no one could mistake you for your father.” Hubert sounded sulky, even to himself. “The two of you are so differently built. Whereas I - they used to called me his doppelgänger -”
“Hubert, I have never heard anything so silly. Let me find you something else for those flowers.”
Ferdinand started to rifle around in one of the cabinets. It had previously held knives but Ferdinand emerged with a green glass vase. “Doppelgänger indeed! I have spent some time studying your features and I suppose I see some similarities in the cheekbones,” he continued, taking the flowers from Hubert’s hands and starting to rearrange them with very little skill. “But your hair texture is completely different! And his eyes were a totally different colour, certainly not as nice as yours.”
“But,” started Hubert, who was still trying to figure out how to breathe after I have spent some time studying your features.
“And further!” Ferdinand spoke over him. He was clearly building up to a rant. “I do not think you are in any way, shape or form capable of shutting children up in cages and conducting experiments on them for something some might call ambition and that I call selfishness to the point of insanity!”
There was a long moment of silence.
“…that is not a very high bar,” Hubert pointed out, though Ferdinand had rather taken the wind out of his sails.
“Well, you cleared it,” huffed Ferdinand. He turned away, slamming the inexpertly arranged vase of flowers onto the little table, by Hubert’s painstakingly chosen teapot. “Which is certainly more than much of the nobility, and both our fathers, can say.”
He turned to Hubert with that look on his face again, that light in his eyes. In self-defense, Hubert attempted sarcasm. “Well, I’m glad you hold such grand standards when it comes to choosing a partner, Ferdinand.”
“I beg your pardon,” sniffed Ferdinand. “I think I have very high and specific standards for a partner, in fact. For a start, they must be tall, about half a head taller than I.”
He stepped closer to Hubert. “They must have long legs. Broad shoulders,” he continued softly, as his hands glanced over Hubert’s. “Startling green eyes.” Ferdinand’s fingers brushed Hubert’s cheekbones and still he could not move. “A crooked smile that always slips like a dagger between my ribs when I catch sight of it.”
Ferdinand pressed the ghost of a kiss against Hubert’s lips, then stepped back.
“You are nothing like your father, Hubert.” Ferdinand said it with such simple certainty. “He was not a good man and you are. I have had ample opportunity over the years to see how thoughtful you are. How eager you are to shoulder everyone else’s burdens - to the point of idiocy, one might say. How brilliant you are, how loyal, how kind.”
Hubert could not trust himself to speak as Ferdinand took his hand, then lifted them to his lips. “I keep your favourite coffee in my drawers,” he confessed in a soft rush of breath over Hubert’s palm. “The best part about cabinet meetings are your snippy comments afterwards. I love the way your brow furrows when you concentrate and the way you scowl when Byleth beats you at chess. And you are an unfairly good kisser. Tell me you do not want this and I will never bring it up again, but Hubert, I -”
Hubert took in a deep breath, letting his head drop down, resting his forehead against Ferdinand’s. Ferdinand’s skin, the little hopeful breath he let out, was so warm against him. “‘Over the years’, did you say.”
“Oh, Hubert,” sighed Ferdinand, as he tipped his face upwards, angling to kiss him. “Do not pretend like it was any different for you.”
