Chapter Text
Long, slender fingers reached out to touch the surface of the mirror, gently trailing down as crimson eyes, flecked with rosy pink gazed at the reflection.
Silver white tresses tumbling down slim shoulders, lithe build protected by light platinum-coloured armour with patterns of onyx black, only a single thought flickered through the girl’s mind.
It was time.
Taking a deep breath to calm her nerves, she mentally went through her checklist. After so many years, it was finally happening.
Zipping up her bag, the princess looked around the room with a sad, wistful smile before steeling herself.
There was no time for doubts now.
“Milady?”
“Jakob,” acknowledged Rena as she turned to see the face of her butler. He was the only one who knew what she had planned. “Is it time already?”
“Yes.”
It was time to go to the Bottomless Canyon.
She hoped Xander would remember to keep the promise.
24 Hours Ago…
“My kingdom, my honor…All is lost.”
“Big brother, NO!”
“May we see each other…in the next life.”
A scream.
Tears.
Blood.
Rena bolted upright, heart hammering in her chest as she stifled her cries.
Not again…
This wasn’t the first time it had happened. The visions - well, memories - had started years ago. No one but Jakob knew about them. It was as if she had lived through them before, despite having never left Castle Krackenburg.
Then again, it wasn’t as if she was really from here.
Her mind drifted back to the first dream.
[Flashback]
Darkness.
A flash of white.
“I should have known that the merging would have been an issue,” came a murmur.
“Who are you?” Rena demanded, hiding her fear behind a mask. She was not going to let anyone intimidate her, dreams or not.
“I mean you no harm,” placated the voice as a figure stepped out, emerging from the shadows.
Rena’s eyes widened.
It was a perfect mirror image of her. But older, with weary determination in her eyes, hair tied into a braid and attired in platinum white armour with a flowing blue cloak behind.
“Don’t forget me.”
Another figure emerged and her jaw dropped. It was her again, but with the hair high up in a ponytail and dressed in onyx black armour and a tattered dark cloak flowing behind. Features steeled, eyes full of resolve and a wide smirk on her lips.
“W…what’s going on?!”
“We are you. Specifically, we are two different versions of you,” said the white-armoured figure. “And we need you to listen. Can you do that?”
Slowly, Rena nodded.
“First things first: Garon is not your – I mean, our,” she amended. “father. We were kidnapped from Hoshido as a child. Our mother is the Lady Mikoto, our adopted father the late King Sumeragi. Unfortunately, we do not know who our real father is.”
“There will come a time where you will have to choose between Hoshido and Nohr. In my universe, you sided with Hoshido,” spoke the braided female. “We won, but at a price. Xander and Elise were lost.”
“….what?” whispered Rena in disbelief.
Xander and Elise…dead?
“In my world,” started the pony-tailed version of her. “You sided with Nohr. We eventually won, but the cost…was too high. Hundreds of innocents were senselessly cut down, and Ryoma and Takumi were sacrificed.”
She couldn’t help but flinch. Those names…they sounded familiar somehow.
“We also discovered that the real Garon had been long gone. He was possessed by someone called Anankos,” grimly said the black-armoured version of her. “There’s a lot more to this war that we don’t know about. I have a feeling that someone’s behind this.”
“Whatever it is, both of us have been sent here to merge with you to find out the truth. With our combined experiences, we hope to save both Hoshido and Nohr without any of our families dying,” quietly said the braid-haired female.
“Will you let us?”
Silence reigned for several moments.
“When do we start?”
[Flashback end]
The merging had taken several days, the memories almost a month as there were a lot to assimilate. It had been difficult for her to get used to everything, but she had managed. The planning and changes had started then, with Jakob as her sole confidant. Though, the memories had resulted in her having constant nightmares – leading Xander, Leo, Camilla and Elise to worry when she locked herself up in her room for a week. It had also unlocked the gift of Sight within her.
Now here they were, three years later and less than a day left.
Rena sighed.
It seemed like sleep wasn’t going to come tonight.
She tossed off the covers, getting out of bed and walked towards the balcony. The familiar sound of a sword swinging through the air caught her attention, and a small smile instinctively spread across her lips when she saw Xander training. Pondering for a moment, the princess grabbed his gift from her desk drawer and made her way towards the grounds.
A few moments later, she stopped a few feet behind him and spoke.
“Can’t sleep?”
Rena grinned as he whipped his head around, surprise on his face.
“Rena?”
He quickly rearranged his expression into a more neutral one, “You should be sleeping.”
“So should you,” returned the dragon princess with a light poke at his chest. “It’s not like I can sleep anyway, tomorrow being my first mission and all.”
“Ah, yes...the Bottomless Canyon,” murmured the crown prince. “Worried, little princess?”
“Yes,” admitted Rena truthfully. She prayed that everything would go well tomorrow, though not in the way that Xander thought.
The prince ruffled her hair in a rare show of affection, “You will do fine, Rena.”
“You can’t promise me that,” the princess smiled, sad and wistful. “No one can.”
Xander jerked his head in surprise, an almost stricken look coming to his face.
Did she foresee her death?
Oh, he knew. He knew alright. About her gift of Sight.
It had begun three years ago, when she had started having nightmares and often locked herself up in her room. During one of his rare three-day visits along with Elise and the others, they had all been startled by a scream.
Dashing into her room – ignoring Felicia’s protests, the siblings had been both numb in shock and horrified upon seeing her thrash about with her face contorted in pain. Jakob had been grimly attending to her, wiping the sweat off her forehead. Not even bothering to look, he had then promptly requested for her wrists to be held down to prevent her from thrashing about. Him and Leo had been the ones to do so then.
No one had left the room that night.
The next morning, when she had woken up and seen them, her expression had been first pleased, then confused, before settling on resigned. It had taken awhile for everyone to calm down before she started her explanation then.
[Flashback]
“I’ve been having…dreams,” she started slowly. “Of what could be.”
“You’re talking about the future,” Leo said as he caught on. He had always been the quick one. “But that is impossible. No one has ever had the gift of Sight in our family.”
“Perhaps,” shrugged Rena. “But if you doubt me so…” She turned her gaze onto Xander and lifted a finger. “You were supposed to lead a troop through the Forlorn Forest but declined due to circumstances.”
Rena moved the finger towards Leo, “You will receive a mission from Father that requires your retainers, Niles and Odin.”
Silence.
The siblings knew she had never left the castle. So how would she know the names of Leo's retainers?
“Shall I continue?”
[Flashback end]
Suffice to say, it was another few minutes before all of them calmed down. Rena had made them promise to never reveal this to their father. When asked why, she had raised an eyebrow and smiled sadly.
“You saw what happened to me. If he knew…” she trailed off.
Oh, they knew. How they knew. He would use her, force her to abuse and relentlessly use her gift.
And that wasn’t even taking the drain on her health into account.
Forcing himself back to reality, he started to speak.
“Little princess - ”
She placed a finger on his lips, cutting him off as she shook her head.
Please, don’t say a word.
“I need to give you something,” murmured Rena as she pulled out a simple black pendant of the Dusk and Dawn Dragon being entwined from a pocket.
“I know you usually don’t wear jewelry, but I wanted to give you something to remember me by,” she said quietly.
A hundred questions whirled around in his mind as he silently took it, at a loss for words.
“I…I have some things for the others as well,” she said. “The place where the stars are.” A deep breath. “Please, make sure that they receive them.”
He swallowed, before nodding his head.
“Let’s make a promise,” suddenly said Rena, changing the subject.
He quashed down his emotional turmoil for the moment and looked at her questioningly.
“To always trust each other,” the princess clarified.
“I always do,” said Xander after a moment. “Always have, little princess. And always will.”
“...The same goes for me,” smiled Rena softly.
Thank you.
A pause.
If anyone passed by a moment later, they would have seen the proud prince and the sheltered princess locked in an embrace.
If Xander felt the beginning of tears staining his clothes, he said nothing.
I’m sorry.
Present: Bottomless Canyon
“So this is the Bottomless Canyon,” commented Rena as she eyed the imposing cliffs and the fortress amidst the blackened trees.
Inwardly, the princess went over her plan. The situation with Hans would be the first – he would die, one way or the other. The berserker was too dangerous to be let alive. The amount of innocent blood that he willingly and eagerly stained his hands in…
‘Focus, Rena,’ she reminded herself, taking a deep breath.
First things first… She couldn’t afford for him to fall into Valla. Naga knew what would happen if Anankos possessed the murdering dastard, so...the defensive approach it was.
“Who goes there?!” demanded an unfamiliar voice that captured all their attention.
It was a Hoshidan ninja, the fort commander that she had seen in her dream several times. Surrounded by his troops, all of them were poised to strike.
Showtime.
“We’re a group of - ” started the dragon princess and her eyes narrowed as Hans lifted his axe.
Bingo.
“Bah! Less talking, more fighting!” roared the berserker as he made to slam his axe down on one of the Hoshidan soldiers.
Clang.
Rena snarled as she parried the axe and slammed her foot into his stomach, sending him to the ground.
Silence.
“Did I, or did I not give you any orders?” An icy glare etched itself on her face as her soft voice effortlessly cut through the silence, blade pointed at his throat.
“You? I take no orders you, wench,” mocked Hans.
A blur.
Thud.
Crimson started trickling down one of his shoulders, causing the berserker to freeze for the moment.
“My apologies, milady. It seems that I slipped,” came Jakob’s voice calmly, though if one looked closely, they would see fury in his eyes.
Rena merely nodded in acknowledgement, inwardly amused.
“You…the both of you… Disobeying the king? Ha! You’re a fool!” laughed the berserker as he got up, lifting his heavy axe.
“You will not kill innocents on my watch,” hissed the princess as she slid into a battle stance. “I have seen your records. Did you not think that I wouldn’t research you?”
Her smirk widened at his shock.
“Oh yes. I know. Killing children, families – Hoshido, Nohr – wherever they were from, you didn’t care. You murdered them all,” her eyes flashed with repressed rage. “And enjoyed it.”
“You’re a disgrace, Hans, and you know it,” she smiled blandly. “Or should I say…Finn?”
His eyes widened briefly before he let out a howl of rage, and charged.
“Pathetic.”
Her voice rang out in boredom and utter disdain as she ducked under his rage-fuelled swing and slammed her blade into his chest.
Smug satisfaction surged through her veins as she watched him topple onto the ground, blood pooling around him with Ganglari through his heart. Speaking of which, mulled the dragon princess, the sword needed to be disposed of. It couldn’t be left anywhere, seeing the destructive power it held when it had been activated in the Hoshido market.
Should she risk the Ganglari, letting it be returned to the castle or try to permanently get rid of it?
Decisions, decisions.
“Why?”
Snapping back to reality, the princess turned to see a still wary, but confused Hoshidan commander.
“Because it’s the right thing to do,” shrugged Rena, settling for the truth somewhat. Naga knew where Iago and Anankos had ears. “You should evacuate. Someone will be here to check this place eventually and they won’t be as nice as I am.”
The commander eyed her for a moment, studying her for any hint of deception.
“Look, if you really doubt me, you can check it for yourself. But - ”
“Fine,” the blue-haired commander curtly spoke. “But only for my people. If I find out that this is a lie…” he trailed off warningly.
“I expect no less,” acknowledged Rena calmly, ignoring Jakob and Gunter tensing their shoulders.
Was that a hint of respect in his eyes?
“One more thing, if you don’t mind,” Rena said. “Tell Kaze this: the caterpillar has become a butterfly.”
He raised an eyebrow but merely nodded as he turned back to his troops.
Moments later, they were gone.
“Lady Rena,” said Gunter, drawing her attention. “Would you mind giving an explanation?”
Swearing him to secrecy, the dragon princess settled for a variation of the truth – that she had overheard Hans and her, ah, father talking about having her killed for an unknown reason (well, more like witnessed it in one of her previous lives) and took a look at his records. Sure enough, he wouldn’t have had any qualms about killing her.
“So what you said - ” Gunter said.
“Was true, yes,” nodded the princess. “Hoshidans, Nohrians…he simply enjoys killing.” She shook her head in disgust. “He was also responsible for some of the children being beat up in the capital. Quite a few of them had been in need of medical services.”
…Perhaps she shouldn’t have mentioned that.
If looks could kill, Hans would have been dead a thousand times over.
That was how mad both Jakob and Gunter were.
She cleared her throat, “Come on, we don’t have much time.”
Controlling their rage, the two nodded.
After making the “battlefield” look more like a battlefield (thank you, Odin for your crazy experiments and imparting your knowledge) with the help of Odin’s experiments, Dragon Veins and some magic, they were almost done.
“Lilith,” the girl called.
The blue Astral Dragon appeared in a small whirl of wind.
“Yes, mistress?”
“Could you please get rid of this?” Rena gestured towards the Ganglari blade in her hand. The princess did not want it to fall into the wrong hands, nor any of her Nohrian family’s lest it was activated.
“With pleasure,” nodded the dragon as she wrinkled her nose in distaste at seeing the blade. The dragon could feel the evil radiating off it, the destruction it held… Nevertheless, while it was a rare weapon, it was still made by mortals. “If you could just throw it down, I will take care of it. And please distance yourselves.”
They did as she said, backing away once the blade was thrown.
BOOM!
And then there was silence.
Rena couldn’t help but let out a breath of relief and grim satisfaction.
There wouldn’t be any explosions in Hoshido, now.
Now, to find a place to camp and then meet up with Kaze.
Two days later in Nohr...
"What?!”
It was as if the breath had been knocked out of him. It couldn’t be… She couldn’t have…
He had sent a scouting party to look for her after there was no word. The party had only just returned.
The captain almost took a step back at the sight of the uncharacteristic reaction from the crown prince but straightened his back gamely. It was unbecoming of a Nohrian soldier, much less a captain to show fear. He took a deep breath.
“I’m afraid so, sir. The area was reported to be a battlefield. Hans, the mercenary given to protect her is dead. There are no signs of the princess and the rest of her party.”
The soldier hesitated, but continued, “…However, pieces of her blade were found. They were covered in blood.”
Xander nearly staggered back in shock, the blow of the statement hitting hard. It was as if someone had a vice around his heart, squeezing it and refusing to let go.
How was he going to break this to Camilla and the others? Gods, Elise was going to be devastated.
He was supposed to be the older brother, their protector.
And he had failed.
Rationally, he knew that he wasn’t responsible for this – that it was possible that she was still alive.
But the chances were slim, if not there at all.
“Dismissed.”
The word echoed hollowly in the room. Relieved, the soldier nodded and left as quickly as protocol allowed, leaving the crown prince to his thoughts.
Xander took the pendant out from under his armour.
Her last gift.
“Little princess…”
With Rena...
The party had managed to get themselves to Izumo and settle there for the night. Rena had received a message from Kaze that they would meet at a valley settlement in Hoshido, which was fine with her seeing as she needed to warn them anyway. Not to mention, with Garon out for her head, it wasn't as if she was safe in Nohr.
It had taken them until evening to reach the settlement, meeting up with Kaze and Rinkah by crossing the Nohrian border to Hoshido.
There, they had explained their situation: that Hans had been ordered to kill her on the orders of her father so she fled. And now, they were seeking sanctuary elsewhere as well as means to end the war between the two kingdoms. There had been skepticism at first, but when she had called Lilith (much to their shock – it had taken another round of explanations) to confirm the facts, they had believed her.
The word of an Astral Dragon weighed a lot, after all.
Rooms had then been assigned to them for the night before they started off to the Hoshidan capital tomorrow. Rena had requested Jakob for some time alone – she needed to think. Giving her an understanding look, he had acquiesced and wished her good night before disappearing to his own quarters.
Now, the dragon princess lay on her back, staring at the ceiling.
Her mind couldn’t help but drift towards her family in Nohr.
She missed them.