My eyes slowly open and I find the sun beginning to peek up over the mountains in the near horizon shining on my face faintly through the tree leaves. A light breeze blows through, softly rustling the leaves around me. Lance still sleeps against me, calmly and peacefully. But there are still tear stains on his cheeks. I reach up and touch my cheeks, also finding dried tears still there. I gently get up and set Lance aside, still on the soft bed of leaves beneath us.

We will need to continue running far away from here soon.

I turn and look at Lance sleeping soundly. After he sleeps a bit longer.

If we are going to go into hiding from now on, we will need a disguise. I believe I can find us a hooded cape for each of us. Maybe back at the mercenary fort.

Or... maybe not.

The fort is in ruins. I doubt there are any clothes left there. Or anything left there for that matter. My eyes slide over to the tome lying silently in the grass partially shadowed with leaf silhouettes dancing around in the gentle wind.

Maybe I can learn a spell of disguise. With that spell... we won't have any trouble hiding while I learn to control this spell.

I slide my gaze back up to watch the sunrise. If dark magic is the only way to defeat that demon and his arsenal of powerful dark magic spells, and my dark magic does nothing, then I have to learn a way to win. Either I have to become strong enough to defeat him, or I have to find out a way for Ma to defeat it.

I honestly don't even think Ma survived. I don't think I can revive her either. I have no idea what I am going to do. I guess the first step is getting somewhere safe and looking in that tome. That is my only choice.

We might even need to flee out of Ylisse. Maybe to Ma's friend's Kingdom, Lycia? Was the Prince's name Roy? I believe that might be good. Perhaps I should go collect all of Ma's tomes and books before we leave. There might be other useful notes there that Ma had. I did see her writing in some of them... or perhaps it was a separate notebook she was using.

I take one more glance at Lance sleeping before rushing off in the direction of the mercenary fort. The Knights are gone now, and it is now lit with sunlight, so I can see where I am going. At the pace I am keeping up, the fort appears before me within minutes of travel. I dart in there, immediately finding my way into Ma's old bedroom.

I rush back over to the pile of rubble and pick up every tome I find in the area. Every tome I remember seeing on Ma's shelf and there are even a couple I don't remember. When I get to the bottom of the pile, where the ground peeks through the pile of rock and stone, a battered notebook emerges. It has a red faded cover with nothing written on it anywhere and it is bound with thread that is dirty with soil and damp from the rain.

This must be Ma's notebook. Maybe I can learn from her notes. Maybe she wrote down some spells in there or anything else that can help me.

I stuff it within my cape pocket with the other tomes until they make it too heavy and carry the rest. I spin around to leave and as I pass by our old bedroom I stop in my tracks. I turn and look in the bedroom, memories once again flooding my mind spending time here with Lance before bed. I had the top bunk and I would make shadow shows on the ceiling, using my dark energy where he would not see. He thought it was just a flashlight. I kept one up there, so he would see it, but I never used it. It didn't even have a battery inside.

I slowly approach the remains of the bunk bed, ripped to shreds and falling apart, but still partially standing. Looking at this room again forms another small smile on my lips and I am glad I came here this morning. I turn around and find our old chest still intact. I wander over to the small box and attempt to open it, but it won't budge. So, I force it open with my magic. I focus on the box and flick my hand up. I send a quick little piece of my energy through my hand and the chest lid opens forcefully without busting it.

I peer inside and find some of my old clothing in there. One of which is my old red hood that I used to wear over my cape. When I pick it up, a black cloth is under it, so I pick that up. It is a black hooded cape just like my red one, but I don't remember having this. Maybe Lance did have one from Papa Greil or maybe even Pa. I didn't expect to find these. But our chest is still in good enough condition to protect clothing from weathering away.

I tuck away both pieces of clothing and dash out of the fort, needing to get back to Lance before he wakes. I slip on my red hood, secure it to my cape and slip it over my head. It matches my red cape, the very same one I have always worn. The hood shadows my face away from the sunlight. This should be good enough to hide my identity.

When I arrive back to the hiding den, to my relief, Lance is still sleeping. I place the black hooded cape next to him and begin to organize the tomes I collected nearby. At least there are not too many because I have no knapsack to hold them. I look up at the sky and the sun has risen quite high now. We must leave this place soon. Hopefully Lance will wake soon because I do not wish to wake him. He needs rest with how much travel we need to do today.

But the travelling will have more damage on our emotions than our body. We must leave our home behind. Live in a new place on our own.

~~~

"Merric?"

I spin around from watching the horizon and find my brother's gaze on me. He sleepily rubs his eyes for a moment, looks around and hops up quickly. He approaches me and shoves his face into my chest, my cape surrounding us as I hold him against me.

After a moment, he pulls away and looks up at me, "You're wearing your red hood you used to always wear," He smiles, "Morning, brother,"

I smile down at him, "Morning, brother,"

I turn around and look behind us towards the mountains I have been studying and point in that direction, "There. We must leave right away and head there,"

Lance moves around me and follows my finger, "There? What's over there?"

"Kingdom Lycia. We should be safe there,"

Lance's face falls, "O—Okay... I understand,"

I nod at him and my smile fades away slowly, "Sorry, brother. I do not know what else to do to keep us safe,"

I turn and point to the black clothing on the grass, "Put those on. We must keep ourselves hidden in disguise for now on, okay?"

He nods, turns and goes to get the clothing. I watch him pull the cape and hood over his head and before long, he looks just like me but in black instead. I smile, realizing just now why I smiled. There is one thing I will say to him.

"Your purple eyes look just like Ma's, Lance,"

I watch him smile back at me before turning around to face the mountains looming in the distance, "Come. Let us start. We have a long way to go, little one,"

He appears next to me and looks forwards with me. I pull out one of Ma's tomes. I look down at the name on the deep purple cover and study it.

Mire.

"Forgive me Ma," I whisper softly, "You told me not to, but now I must,"

I pause and look up to face my brother, "There is more going on here than just a simple war between Ylisse and Daein,"

Lance looks at me but doesn't say anything. The look in his eye says it all. I can tell he wishes he understands what is happening, but I cannot tell him. Maybe he can see the hurt in my eyes when I mention anything at all. Maybe he understands I cannot just talk about it yet.

"War causes nothing but pain, Lance," I begin.

I look away, back forwards at the horizon. I can see him looking at me. I try my hardest not to let tears beat me this time. I feel Lance grasp my hand in his, letting me know I don't have to say anything else. He looks forward, where I am looking, and we take our first step together to begin our journey. We dart out of the edge of the forest and down the hill to the road below leading away from our home. I tightly hold his hand in one and the tome in the other as we travel at a quick pace, trying to make as much progress as possible.

"It's okay, Merric," Lance says, slightly behind me, as we run.

"I trust you,"

His words warm my heart as we disappear into the distance along a dirt road heavily travelled by travelers between the Kingdoms.

There it is. The quote on my description of the book! I have been waiting for this moment to finally have Merric say it heh heh.

[ If you read my descriptions, that is :3 ]