A Fire Emblem – The Sacred Stones and SNSD Crossover.

Written for amipiai, whose amazing talent and creations always give me a reason to believe that magic, does indeed exist.

Inspired by the following pictures: http://imgur.com/a/W8XIr drawn by amipiai (Twitter – @amipiai )

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The battlefield was a cruel place, Jessica pondered, for fallen friends and for one’s mind. Her armour glittered in the noon sun, shiny and new. Made out of the finest metallic alloys, it was light as a feather, and tough as a wyvern’s hide, yet as it lay on her shoulders, it felt like she couldn’t move a single step. The armour she wore was just that, armour. It held no memories of loss, no scars of battle to make it part of her skin. Her old armour lay discarded in her small room, charred black, rusted and dented in so many places that she was forced to slice off the metal melted onto her skin to remove it from her exhausted body.

~ ~ ~

Jessica skidded to a stop as she reached the throne room. She found the king standing before a raging fireplace, shuffling slowly through some documents, examining each one before tossing it into the flames.

“Jessica.” 

She jumped as the king addressed her without even turning to face her.

“Your majesty.” Jessica’s armour clanked as she dropped to a knee and bowed her head. “We must leave. The south gates will not hold for much longer. My horse has been saddled and my fellow knights are forming a defensive line to buy us time to flee.”

“Come here, Jessica.” There was a note of dire acceptance in the king’s voice that dropped Jessica’s heart into an icy pit of dread.

“Your majesty, we have little time to…“ Jessica’s eyes widened in shock as she saw what was being consumed by the roaring fire. “What are you doing?”

She could only stand and watch as picture after picture of the royal family curled and shriveled in the flames. The king gave one last glance to a particularly large photo before tossing it and the rest of the stack into the fire.

~ ~ ~

It was apparently unacceptable to pay her respects to her fallen companions in the armour that she had worn for so long as she fought beside them. Her skin, once considered amongst the fairest in the land, was marred by burns that had been left too long before being treated, and scars from wounds that had never healed. Truly, looking herself in the mirror, Jessica admitted that never again would another human look upon her and regard her as beautiful.

Now, as the ceremony came to an end, the priest murmured his final words and the few people present threw her sympathetic glances before departing. Jessica lingered, gazing at the headstones with names that would only be remembered by a scant few. As the heavens opened up in cruel irony and droplets plummeted from the sky, Jessica took the moment to walk along side her companions once again, touching their headstones as she bid farewell.

~ ~ ~

“Why?”  So shocked was Jessica by the king’s actions that she was unable to utter another word.  

“It is but a precaution, perhaps one that may prove unnecessary or useless, but I would rather err on the side of caution,” replied the king as he finally turned to face Jessica.”These photos of my family are nothing more than a checklist of who must be slain in order to end my bloodline. I would rather them burn than allow them to serve such a purpose.”

“With all due respect your majesty, your face is well known enough that there is no way…“ The day, it appeared, held only more shocking epiphanies for Jessica. “Your majesty! You cannot do this!”

“You are correct, dear knight. My face would be known wherever I go.”

“My steed is swift.”

“Just as a general falls with his army and a captain, his ship, I will not abandon my home. Perhaps my silvery tongue, which has oft been misinterpreted as offensive, will buy you and your knights some more time to flee.”

“I will fall by your side then, your majesty, if death it shall be.”

“You are the best, Jessica. There lies a more important path before you, albeit a more painful one.”

Jessica never got the chance to respond or refute the king’s praise for in that moment, a soldier garbed in untarnished  armour rushed into the room, interrupting Jessica’s thoughts and immediately capturing the king’s attention.

“I have finished dyeing my hair, your majesty.”

“It suits you, my daughter. As does the garb of a foot soldier.”

Jessica’s eyes widened as she realized that the soldier that stood before them was no other than the king’s last surviving daughter – Tiffany Hwang.

~ ~ ~

The first headstone marked the grave of the youngest of their group, Seohyun. A pacifist into a war she didn’t want to fight, it had been her light magic that had healed countless mortal wounds; Seohyun had never belonged on a battlefield and they all had known it. Truly, it seemed that there had always been a ticking timebomb above Seohyun’s head. Their sole and trusted cleric, her peaceful nature had marked her as an easy target once their assailants learnt of her presence. It was cruel how a single arrow to the chest could wrest the life of such a pure soul so easily from this world. Seohyun had always had the clearest of eyes, eyes that now looked down upon her from the heavens.

The second belonged to Hyoyeon. A long time mercenary for hire, Hyoyeon forsook the coin in favour of justice and honour. Once a hero of Lupin, as the kingdom fell further and further into corruption, Hyoyeon had abandoned her post, refusing to take part in the senseless and unreasoned violence that befouled her lands. Upon learning of the princess’ cause, Hyoyeon had refused all offers of riches and reward, her only desire to see the land she loved returned to how it had been. As Jessica whispered a prayer before the engraved stone slab, she could only wish that the miniscule warrior had lived to see her dreams come to pass.

The third marked the fallen body of the deadliest assassin Jessica had ever seen. Where Jessica marked her status and intentions with armour enclosed flesh, heavy shield and mighty sword, Yoona lay in plain sight with her fairy-like beauty and slender body. A free spirit and prankster by nature, Yoona’s slender frame hid her immense strength and lightning fast mind. Fearless and skillful, Yoona had been their eternal scout, always running ahead alone in spite of any protests, to uncover any traps and ambushes that lay before them and it was Yoona’s vital intelligence that had spared many lives. But not her own.

The fourth grave belonged to Sooyoung. Sooyoung was almost the complete antithesis to Seohyun. Both practiced magic, yet where Seohyun was gentle and healing, Sooyoung rained fiery death upon those who would threaten the princess’ cause. Seohyun was patient and calculated where Sooyoung was fierce and rash. In a war where the balance of magic tilted heavily in favour of their opponents, Sooyoung was a saving grace. Due to the unreasonable hate held by the general population to those who practiced magic, many mages turned and chose to follow the dark mage when she rose to power. Magic had always been a powerful weapon and  their lack of ability to counteract their enemy’s arcane arts had laid heavily on Jessica’s mind when they had only just begun their journey. Sooyoung had been a breath of fresh air, her motivation simply to do what was right for the people who had scorned her and to prove that magic, as like a knife, was but a tool that was only evil in the hands of those who were evil.

The fifth one marked her dear sister and eternal companion. Yuri had been a paladin like herself. They had grown together, trained together and as a duo, they had been armoured death upon their trusted steeds. Yuri had been the braver of the two of them. Whilst Jessica had hesitated as Soshi began to fall, Yuri had charged heedlessly ahead. Any man that stood between Yuri and her destination was nothing more than a wall made of flesh and bone – walls that never had the opportunity to strike back. Where Jessica was the timely rain, Yuri was the storm, the hurricane.

Jessica could still remember Yuri’s ever so arrogant laugh as she charged headlong into countless waves of reanimated corpses. Claws and swords alike glanced off her thick armour like grains of sand tossed at her by the wind. Yuri was invincible, or so had Jessica believed. Upon her mount, the tendrils of dark magic were far too slow to catch her as she raced across the battlefield. That was until the high priest and priestesses had united to summon the dreaded Balrog from the depths of hell. Trapped and exhausted, Yuri had fought the monster alone in order to buy time and safe passage for the group in what had been one of the most devastating battles Jessica had ever lived through.

The sixth and final headstone belonged to the sole reason why so few had shown up to bid farewell to those that had saved their lives. Jessica could easily picture Taeyeon’s serene face as she had lain lifeless upon the bloody field, a far cry from the malice and hate that had graced the woman’s fair features whilst she was blinded by the corruption of magic that should never had been trifled with. The princess’ childhood best friend, Taeyeon had grown up with the heavy weight of expectation of duty from a terrible father who had forced her into studying forbidden arts and dark magic. The lack of proper parental figures had left a young girl with a lack of willpower and constant glumness that clung to the girl like a constant shadow. It was only the princess who could connect to her and when the two had been separated, Taeyeon’s soul had been easy to corrupt. Those childish features had hidden tremendous untapped power that had been unleashed on the world when forbidden magic which had long been sealed away was released into Taeyeon’s body, sweeping away the frail mind they knew and replacing it with something sinister and evil. The princess had always told Jessica stories of Taeyeon’s true nature, of her kindness and compassion yet lack of courage, courage that Taeyeon had found barely in time to force her own mind back to the surface and give Jessica the opportunity she needed to strike down the princess’ best friend.

Jessica had tried to hate the woman who had unwittingly caused so much pain and suffering, but seeing the princess weeping so heavily before her childhood friend’s grave had swayed Jessica’s heart. So as she bid her final farewells to the fallen, Jessica added an extra prayer for Taeyeon. She prayed that people would find understand and forgiveness for a girl who had grown up too soon. It was through Taeyeon that Jessica learnt that the greatest evil lay not in the darkness that she had journeyed to vanquish, but in the hearts of people who wished to rise above others for their own selfish purposes.

~ ~ ~

“Flee far away and regather your strength. Find those who would see justice restored and return this throne to the last of my flesh and blood,” the king had commanded her. The final commands, Jessica knew, that she would ever receive from his majesty. “Know that there is none other I would entrust this task to.”

There was no time to protest, for just as the king gave Jessica his final task for her, the throne doors begun to shake and she could hear the crack and splintering of timber as the frame slowly gave way.

“Fly, Jessica.”

~ ~ ~

There were two more besides Jessica that had been part of their party and played their part, yet did not lay buried beneath the earth’s surface.

Sunny lay heavily wounded and bedridden in a state of unconsciousness that baffled the healers. Mounted on the winged Pegasus of legend, Sunny had forsaken her own cult that believed their place was only to observe and never to trifle with the matters of humans. She would never reveal the lands she had came from or the history of her kind, but the Pegasus knight had arrived as a beacon of light when all seemed lost. Her winged steed provided to be the only tool that Taeyeon hadn’t had access to, and the presence of the airborne warrior had turned the tide of many a battle. Struck down by arrows tainted with dark magic in their final battles, Sunny still yet clung to life but no light magic would affect her wounds, and the girl would not wake from her comatose state.

The final companion to the nine was the princess herself. Naïve yet brave, Jessica had initially found the overly energetic, well-intentioned but inexperienced princess to be a nuisance and a bother. Assigned as the protector to the princess by the king, it had started with just the two of them fleeing from Soshi as the castle, the princess’ home, fell to their assailants.

Now as the princess stood by her side, tears falling like crystal rivers down her porcelain cheeks, Jessica knew that what had started as a tentative friendship between bodyguard and principle had bloomed and grown into much more.

~ ~ ~

The first and only time that Jessica had been caught completely off guard, their foe hadn’t been the Lupin royal guard, nor any assassin sent to slay the sole remaining offspring of the royal bloodline. Instead, they were just simple bandits taking advantage of the  chaos and two female travelers seemed liked easy targets. Jessica too, had simply thought them over-curious travelers. She revealed little, even hinting at the valueless nature of their possessions, but the princess’ brightly gleaming armour and unearthly beauty drew lecherous eyes and all Jessica could do was shield the princess with her own body as their true intentions were revealed. Her armour was of that of the paladin guard, and so it absorbed some of the blow , but the offending sword has a honed edge and it still manage to partially rip through Jessica’s steel plate and leave a deep wound. Yet had it struck the princess, Jessica had no doubts that the wound would have been mortal and so a little spilt blood was a small price to pay in exchange for a life.

Gritting her teeth, she yelled for Tiffany to hold on tight before digging her heels into her horse’s flank and with cry, Saebyuk surged forward leaving the mountless bandits trailing behind in a cloud of dust. Jessica urged Saebyuk onwards, even as each leap forward enflamed the pain from her wound. She could feel her lifeblood gushing from it and she knew she did not have long before the blood loss would cloud her mind. Then, there was a sting of pain and Jessica hissed as the princess pressed something against her wound.  

Jessica spared a moment to glance down to see the princess’ hand pressing the scarf that her father had gifted to her, taken from his own neck. It was the final and only memento of her home that the princess carried.

“A memory is not worth a life. Think nothing of it, for I know that you ride wounded only so that I may remain riding with you. I am sheltered, innocent and untrained but do not think I am lacking in logic and common sense, or that I am a stranger to gratitude.”

There was fire in the way the princess spoke and through the pain and the cloud of exhaustion that began to fog her mind, Jessica managed a wry smile. Indeed, the bandits and the princess’ words reminded of her of an age old lesson never to judge and enemy or foe by the armour they wore on the field of battle, but rather the armour that they wore around their heart.

~ ~ ~

Jessica stiffened as the princess wrapped two arms around her waist, burying her forehead into Jessica’s neck. Unruly hairs tickled Jessica’s skin and she could feel her heart beat rapidly in a way it had never beat before for anyone but the princess when she walked into her life.

“Your majesty, I-“ Jessica began before the princess interrupted her.

“So now there are only three.”

Jessica stiffened at that dead voice, a voice that had always been so cheerful, so positive and full of life. Gently prying the arms off from around her waist, Jessica turned to face the princess who refused to meet her eyes.

“No, your majesty. They may have fallen and they may no longer walk this earth with us, but their memory lives on in us and in the lives they have touched along the way. For this day we stand free as a tribute to the power of nine and in our hearts, we will always be nine. Their strength, their lives that they gave so that we may live – they are part of us now. They live on in us and together, we will always be nine.”

Fearful eyes finally met Jessica’s as she continued.

“Your majesty-“

“Tiffany. You will address me as Tiffany.”

Jessica allowed a small smile to grace her lips.

“Tiffany, it is our duty to return to Soshi and spread the tale of all that has happened, so that history may record what we have done and so that all may learn from what was lost.”

The princess’ eyes dropped again.

“And what tale would that be? A tale of lost friends? A tale of fallen companions?”

Jessica reached and gently lifted Tiffany’s face with her mailed finger. Red pools met hers and in them, Jessica realized she could see all that was to the princess laid bare before her. She saw the deep sadness from the loss of their companions and the fear of judgment from her soon-to-be subjects should she return home to claim her crown. But then, looking deeper into Tiffany’s eyes, Jessica saw the fire that had attracted her like a moth to flame. The will to fight. The stubbornness. The fierce loyalty and the warm heart that the princess had always worn on her sleeve. Then, as the princess blinked, Jessica saw the love that Tiffany had for all their companions, but yet as the princess met her gaze, Jessica saw that hint of affection that went more than a ruler should have for her subject. More than a princess should have for her knight.

So it was then as Jessica closed her eyes and leaned forward, gently pressing her cracked, dry lips against the warm softness of Tiffany’s own, she knew that what she felt was reciprocated and real. A hand came up to cup her cheek and a single finger traced a rough scar. It was quick and sweet, and as Jessica opened her eyes again as she withdrew, she saw the wonder and trembling anticipation she felt mirrored in her princess’ own eyes.

“No Tiffany. We will not tell a tale of loss and death,” Jessica whispered, stealing another brief kiss.

“Then what tale will we tell?” responded Tiffany, breathlessly.

The sound of steel clashing against steel roused Jessica from her slumber. As her body jerked back to awareness, sizzling tendrils of pain swept through her wounded flank and with a groan, she realized that she was in no condition to stand, much less fight. Groping around for her sword, so at least she had some tool to defend herself, Jessica began to panic as she realized that it too was missing.

There was a distinctly male moan of pain and the sound of a body hitting the floor before Jessica heard footsteps approaching her. Moments later, Tiffany stood before her, gasping for breath, her broken rapier in one hand and Jessica’s broadsword in the other. Tiffany was quite a sight, her armour dulled by rust and stained by the blood of her fallen foes, a cut on her forehead leaking more blood into a closed eye – a far cry from the naïve imitation of a soldier that had fearfully held onto Jessica as they had fled from the burning castle. It was in that moment that Jessica knew, as she calmed her racing heart, that she never wanted to be parted from Tiffany’s side.

“A tale of heroes, my princess,” Jessica smiled. “Of heroes.”

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