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It was a nightmare, being in Byleth's position, in a patchwork war of watching people die and resurrect and die again until the cards fell just right. When the plan didn’t work, when those precious to her fell and the tides turned in the enemy's favor, it would be undone. She would learn and try again until cries of victory echoed through the battlefield.
This battle wasn’t going well. Already, Annette's battalion of mages folded when sent too close to a phalanx of cavalry units. It took two tries before Byleth could get them in the right position, having Ingrid's squadron of pegasus riders soften up the line before Annette could advance and fry whoever was left. Ashe got picked off by a mage halfway through the battle and Byleth screeched like a madwoman after his perch reformed underneath him and the burns receded to get the man to retreat, saving his life, albeit with singed eyebrows.
“Seteth, we need support in our left flank!” Byleth shouted.
The order tasted like ash and blood, hesitancy to put him in harm’s way in the name of finishing a battle that sluggishly dragged towards its fourth hour. He was their best wyvern rider and wielded his Relic with ferocity.
Warriors like Byleth could start battles with broad sweeps of her sword, but he was an expert at finishing them. She was lucky to have him by her side both in the battlefield and in the war room.
He obeyed without question, diving between a struggling battalion and the Empire's forces.
She should have kept watch, as she did with her students. He always insisted that she didn't need to watch over him. It had taken time for her to coax out stories from the unnamed war Seteth had fought in. This battle was nothing compared to what he had fought through and survived, but still the flame of protectiveness that was unlike what she felt for her students had her glancing over as she slashed through the enemy knights that tried to retake one of the strongholds.
Her eyes strayed for a moment too long and the cry of pain, so strange to her ears, struck like an arrow to the chest. She turned back to see Seteth fall in a tumble of green and silver, hitting the ground with a sound drowned out by the melee of battle and the roaring in her ears.
All of the tactics and strategies, her months of teaching herself to be the leader of an army, fell to dust as her vision smeared into a haze of rage and horrible, trembling panic. She had worn herself thin during the course of the battle, tearing apart time to save her students from certain death again and again to the point of collapse.
“One last time,” she hissed, summoning divine power. She would turn back the hands of time, tell Seteth to hold back just a few minutes longer while the archers softened up the enemy for his advance.
Stars danced in her vision instead and fatigue sank in her stomach like stones. Time did not unwind itself; the current moved forward, deaf to her order. How many times had she used her power, only to finally exhaust it? While she couldn't regret the lives she had saved, she was still stuck in that horrible present, with half a battalion between her and Seteth.
She didn’t hesitate.
The bloody path she carved into the enemy army would be something that would haunt her dreams for weeks to come, but all could be forgotten at the pallor of Seteth’s face and the harsh set of his jaw where he slumped on the ground. One leg bent at an awkward angle and blood streamed from a gash in his side, just under his armpit, staining silver armor to copper.
“You should be fighting,” he gasped as she knelt over him. “You shouldn’t be tending to me.”
She wanted to scream at him, that he was more important than the battle, that there was a trail of bodies behind her that would more than make up for the time spent tending to him. He was right. It would have been easier to send one of the healers after him and rejoin the battle.
He was right, but she didn't care. They had discussed acceptable losses prior to the battle at Gronder Field, but they had promised they would protect each other. It had been out of necessity and practicality, but she knew there had to be something more. There had to be something behind every time Seteth yelled her name in warning when she found herself against one too many enemies at once. There had to be something behind how a chasm had opened in her chest at witnessing her own failure.
She braced one arm across his shoulders and breathed apologies as she dragged him away from the melee into the ruins of a nearby building. Byleth eased Seteth to the ground, out of sight from the warring parties outside. His face had gone slack and pale with weak puffs of air escaping his lips.
“No,” she breathed.
Tears blurred her vision as the very real possibility that she was going to lose him slammed into her. There wasn’t enough time. They didn’t tell each other anything.
She took her dagger and cut through the straps keeping his breastplate together. The axe had carved through the metal and took out a chunk of it. There were dents in the steel from when he fell.
She pulled the top part away and swallowed back a sudden wave of bile. His shirt was blood-soaked and she could immediately see the large gash that ripped into his flesh. She lunged forward and pressed her hand against the wound in his shoulder, trying to staunch the blood flow.
He jerked out of his dazed state as soon as she put pressure on the wound. His mouth gasped, spit-flecked.
“Don’t—don’t,” he rasped.
Seteth weakly batted at her hand as his head lolled against the wall. She staunchly ignored his protests, though she cursed herself for every flinch of pain that wracked his body.
“Please, let me sleep.”
She hushed him, ignoring his prayers and keeping him from slipping under into the cold numbness of shock.
“I can’t let you do that, Seteth. Stay awake for me.”
Fixing wounds was more difficult than what non-magic users made it out to be. It took energy from both the healer and the wounded to stitch flesh and purge impurities. Byleth lacked the same ability as Mercedes or Linhardt, who could fix wounds with little thought. She needed to focus, difficult to do with the melee around them.
Remembering the battle surrounding them, she poked her head through one of the gashes in the retaining wall. Fhirdiad’s banner still waved proudly as the clash of metal on metal and animalistic screaming of the living and the dead filled the air. The battalions held, bringing some relief to her heart.
She turned back to Seteth and saw that his eyes were closed again. She shook him, fear clutching at her throat.
“Please, please stay awake.”
Seteth grunted in response. His green eyes flickered open and shut and Byleth realized that his eyelashes were the same color as his hair, a deep green. They had never been this close, even when they confided in each other. There were so many things she hadn’t noticed about him or given enough thought. It only took the specter of death hanging over their heads for her to stop and think for a moment about what she had been missing.
She inhaled with a shudder as she laid her hands over the wound.
“You know, I really like the way you brew tea,” Byleth murmured.
“Wha—?” Seteth slurred.
He howled and her body pitched forward for a moment as the healing magic began its work. The deepest point of the shoulder wound almost reached the other side into his back. That needed fixing first and she had to use the most powerful and energy-intensive techniques she knew. It was an exchange, a harmony between her body, her energy, and his. His body, in a weakened state, would clamor for more of her, wanting to siphon off what it could for its own use. She had to be careful that she did not cripple herself while trying to fix him.
“Listen to what I'm saying,” she gritted through clenched teeth. “I need you to stay awake, Seteth.”
She babbled at him as she worked, a stream of consciousness about what interesting discussions they had over tea, the meals at the monastery, who of her students she thought would be best fit to help rule Fódlan once the dust settled and the war was at an end.
He stared up at her, wide-eyed and very vulnerable, as if hanging on to every word that left her mouth.
The dumbly optimistic part of her thought that he might be getting better. The pallor was still concerning, not abating as slowly the wound got shallower and shallower. He felt warmer, obvious though the thin shirt.
She pushed on, stitching his wounds together. He would scar, no matter what she did.
The sounds of battle still continued, albeit quieter and farther away, and she kept one eye on the entrance to the ruin. There were faint cries wondering about their whereabouts, but there were louder shouts cheering on the generals and commanders who clashed with Imperial forces.
Finally, finally, the gash sealed up to a pink scar, thin and sensitive, but just enough to close the wound.
Byleth lay a hand on his ribs in an attempt to chase away the bruises. It wouldn’t be a perfect fix and she already was thinking about how long he would have to stay in the infirmary before he would be allowed into battle again.
“Almost done,” Byleth said.
She really had done all that she could. It became clear when she used magic; she found some resistance that tugged at her stomach. He would live, thanks to her efforts. Seteth looked better and better, gaze clearer as he watched her.
“Do you enjoy my tea that much?” he asked softly.
She smiled at that. Of course, the one thing he had gleaned from the whole one-sided conversation was her compliment of him, not of the politics that were sure to tear Fódlan asunder as soon as the war ended.
“Yes, Seteth. I hope to have more of it when we return home,” she replied.
She really meant it and she could only hope that he understood that. These were not empty words to be forgotten when the battle was over.
His eyes drifted closed again for a moment, peaceful instead of pained. It tugged at her heart, how beautiful he looked.
Her hand shook in the dead air between them. She pushed strands of hair out of his face and watched as his eyelids fluttered when her fingers brushed over his cheek.
The dried blood and the pink scars felt like a sacrilege on holy ground, and her hand only seemed to further pollute him. And yet, she found herself unable to pull her hand away.
“Professor!”
Byleth had her sword in hand before she could think, pointing it out towards the speaker who stood in the entryway.
Bernadetta yelped and ducked behind the stone wall.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry! Dimitri sent me to find you.”
Byleth set the sword down, feeling guilty that her immediate instinct was to decapitate the first person who came near them. She had been so distracted that she didn't notice how the sounds of battle had trailed off into nothing. Even the shouts of victory had faded into silence as the dead were counted and the wounded were tended to.
“Thank you, Bernadetta,” Byleth called out. “I will come as soon as possible. Please find a healer or one of the calvary to bring Seteth back to camp.”
The young woman made an incoherent noise that sounded like an affirmative before scurrying away.
Byleth sighed, pulling away from Seteth, only to freeze when a hand caught her wrist. She turned back to Seteth, looking at his face and how his hand perfectly circled her wrist.
Her heart was silent, but surely, he could feel her pulse pound just underneath her skin.
“Thank you.”
Seteth still looked dazed as he regarded her, eyes half-lidded. He pulled her hand closer and she rocked forward as she knelt before him. His grip was so weak that she could break it without any effort.
He raised her hand to his lips, pressing his mouth to the same fingers that healed him.
An understanding passed between them, something to be discussed when the battle ended.
“Rest,” Byleth whispered.
The hand on her wrist fell away and his eyes drooped shut.
Another moment of hesitation had her unmoving, even as she could hear the galloping of a horse approaching the structure.
She ducked back down and watched his chest move up and down in even breaths and the way his face was so relaxed.
Byleth leaned close, warmth in her chest. Her mouth was close to his, enough that her breaths puffed over his lips.
His face twitched.
“Didn’t think you would be one to steal a kiss,” he mumbled.
“You bet,” Byleth whispered.
She lunged forward and pecked his lips, chaste and inelegant, before standing and walking over to meet the calvary escort. Ferdinand smiled jovially, though suspicious at the slightly-unhinged expression that danced across Byleth’s face before she could school it to a cool neutrality.
Seteth didn’t move from his place, but she swore that his face was just as red as hers was.