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One autumn morning in a tent in the middle of the woods, a little girl, just about four years old, slowly began to stir to wakefulness. She had dark blue hair, which nobody around her had, and big blue eyes. She stretched a little as her vision adjusted to the growing light outside the tent, though she still did not want to move quite yet. After all, her bedroll was soft, a little squishy, and most importantly it was warm, especially on cold nights like the last one. Or maybe it was warm because she slept next to her Papa, who was really warm? She didn’t know. But thankfully it wasn’t too cold on this particular morning, and soon, the little girl— Bylef, as she called herself —poked her sleepy head up.
There were birds chirping all around her, and they sounded nice. The little tent that she shared with her Papa was plenty warm, which was also nice, but instead of laying still to appreciate that (and maybe go back to sleep, something she liked to do so that she could dream), it soon occurred to her that she was hungry. She got up slowly, then proceeded to poke her Papa’s face a couple times with a finger. He grunted, but didn’t wake up. A little frown showed up on her face.
“Papaaaaaaaaa… Wake up. I’m hungry!”
No response.
She briefly considered climbing up on top of him and jumping, but he’d gotten a little mad at her the last time she tried that, and she didn’t like making him mad if she could help it. He was her Papa, after all! Still, her little frown intensified. If she couldn’t poke him awake, and she couldn’t jump on him, what could she do?
Quite stumped, she turned around and asked “Sofie? How do I wake up Papa?”
Another little girl, this one with verdant green hair that cascaded down her back in waves, shining green eyes, and sharp, pointed ears, blinked into view. This didn’t scare Bylef at all, though — that was just how her friend Sofie was. She was nice, even if nobody else could see or hear her.
“Byleth, I have told you, it… Nevermind. Hmm… I am unsure. Waking someone up is hardly my specialty.”
Bylef cocked her head to the side. “What’s ‘special tea’? Does it taste good?”
Her friend Sofie sighed softly, and smiled down at her. She was an older girl, which meant she was a lot smarter than Bylef, and she could float too, which was cool! But she used a lot of words Bylef didn’t understand, which was… Well, not that different from her Papa and her Mama, really. At least Sofie had never said any words that her Mama got upset at hearing her say, like Papa did.
“Not ‘special tea’, Byleth. It is all one word: ‘specialty’, like the word ‘special’. It means ‘something you are really good at’. As for what I meant when I said it… Waking people up is something that I am not good at. You might be better off attempting to get Ethlyn to feed you, instead of bothering Jeralt.”
Bylef’s blue eyes went wide. Of course! Sofie was so smart! Mama would help her!
She smiled at Sofie and tried to give her a hug, only for her arms to pass right through. Sofie got a weird look on her face, but Bylef wouldn’t cry this time! She wouldn’t cry, cause it made Sofie sad when she cried. She could be a big girl, too!
Slipping out of her and Papa’s tent, she moved across the forest floor towards a nearby tent. She caught the eye of one of Papa’s mer… mers… mercy? Mercy-naries! That was them! A lot of them were already up, on patrol around their little camp. There weren’t that many of them, only twelve most days, and they all called her Papa “Boss” and used the bad words Mama told her not to say. The one who spotted her was called… uh…
“Roland”, Sofie supplied. Bylef smiled at her. Roland, that was right!
Roland was nice. He gave her a fish every time he went fishing, and he liked to ruffle her hair. He smoked stuff that smelled funny out of a little pipe he kept in his coat, and even though he wouldn’t let her try it, he was still nice. He had dark hair like her, but his was black, not blue. He had a couple scars on his face, like Papa, and he had seemed really scary at first, but now she knew better. He was just as soft and warm as Papa and Mama sometimes! Even though Papa didn’t let her sleep outside the tent at night, she had taken a nap on Roland one time, so she knew what she was talking about.
Bylef’s tummy growled at her, and she had to stop thinking about Roland. She was on a mission!
Pushing her way into Mama’s tent, Bylef found that she was already awake, putting her hair up into a ponytail. She had pink hair, which didn’t seem fair to Bylef— how come she got such a neat color? —and brown eyes. She must have heard Bylef come in, cause she turned towards the entrance to her tent and smiled.
“Good morning, Byleth. Did you sleep well?”
Bylef nodded a bunch, feeling her hair bounce around her head. Ethlyn laughed softly at the sight, and raised her arm for a hug. Bylef immediately jumped forward into it, staying there for a few moments until Mama straightened up, and started to stand.
“Well, that’s good then”, she said warmly. “What brings you here so early? Is everything alright?” Ethlyn’s eyes got a little smaller as she looked Bylef over.
“I’m hungry, and Papa won’t wake up. Can you help?”
Ethlyn smiled. “Hmm. And by ‘help’, do you mean wake Jeralt up, or find us something to eat?”
“Eat, eat! Papa was tired anyway, and Sofie says it’s important to sleep when you’re tired!”
Ethlyn’s smile faded slightly. Not enough to be completely gone, but enough for Bylef to notice that something was different.
“Ah. Well… Sleep is important. Hmm. Well… Come on then! We’ll rustle up something from the supply cart today.”
Bylef beamed up at her. Mama was so nice!
---
Jeralt’s eyes slowly opened. His head ached, his body ached, and his throat felt as dry as the Sreng desert. He had to stop doing this to himself, regardless of whether or not his men wanted to celebrate a successful job. He had a kid to look after, after all.
Pulling on as pleasant of a smile as he could, he rolled to one side, ready to greet his d—
Where the fuck was Byleth.
He sat up, trying hard not to panic, though it was easier said than done. He stumbled upwards, grabbing blindly for his boots. That’s when he noticed that Byleth’s boots, tiny little things that made him laugh every time he saw how small they were, were gone, as was her little coat. His heart rate slowed down considerably — she had just gotten up before him. Thank the fucking goddess.
He waited a minute or so for the color to come back to his face, then stepped out of his tent. He caught the eye of a few of his mercs that were poking at the fire. “Morning Roland, Wulf. You seen my daughter this morning?”
Roland nodded, and jabbed a thumb behind him. “She went and bothered the doc for food. They’re over at the cart.” Though his choice of words was hard, Jeralt knew from experience that Roland was as soft as they came around kids. He was a good kid himself too, if a bit dumb at times. Jeralt liked him, though.
He nodded in return, and clapped a hand on the young axeman’s shoulder as he passed him.
Sure enough, as he got to the other side of camp, he spotted Ethlyn digging through the supply cart, Byleth standing next to her. She was obviously impatient this morning, given the way she was bouncing around in place. He felt a little smile creep onto his face as he sauntered closer.
“Morning, By. Ethlyn.”
Byleth turned around, a big smile on her face. “Papa!”
She slammed her little four-year-old body into his leg with as much force as she could muster— her favorite way to greet people, for some reason —and looked up at him with eyes that might have been sparkling for all he knew. He smiled wider in return, and put a hand on her head.
“Hey, kid. You sleep alright?”
She nodded emphatically.
“You haven’t given Ethlyn too much trouble this morning, have you?” His eyes moved up towards the pink-haired troubadour, who smiled at him and ducked inside the cart again.
Byleth shook her head frantically, her hair whirling around her. “No way, Papa! I’ve been good! Promise!”
“Jeralt.”
He looked up just in time to spot Ethlyn hurling a waterskin at him. He caught it and drained it eagerly, feeling a little run down into his beard. Nectar of the goddess, right there.
He moved up to rummage around in the supply cart himself as Ethlyn sat down in the grass with Byleth, handing her an apple. She’d more or less devoured it by the time he had grabbed his own breakfast in the form of some hard tack. It certainly wasn’t the best, but he’d rather eat it himself than end up in a situation where Byleth had to.
Byleth was voracious at the best of times, though things had gotten a hell of a lot easier when she started to eat solid food. He and Ethlyn had barely been able to keep themselves going with all the damn goat milk they had to buy for her at first. Not that he would have traded those days for anything he could be doing right now. Not with Sitri gone.
It suddenly occurred to him what day it was. The 20th of the Horsebow Moon. Byleth’s birthday, not that he’d told her that… and the anniversary of Sitri’s death. He cleared his throat, more to keep from tearing up than anything else, but Ethlyn looked up at him anyway. Well, damn.
“Say, uh, isn’t it about time for another check-up on her? Growing girl, and all…”
Ethlyn’s eyes narrowed for a moment, then widened. She had realized what day it was today, too, then.
“Sure thing, Jeralt. I’ll just go get my staff. Wait right here, okay Byleth?”
“Okay!”
Bless her. Ethlyn showing up in the monastery town a few moons before Byleth’s birth was an act of fucking providence, as far as he was concerned. She’d been the one to examine Byleth in secret after Sitri died in childbirth, and had even been the one to help him as he set the fire that destroyed his old life by keeping an eye on his silent newborn. She’d refused to let him charge off into the wilderness alone with a baby, too, and damn if she hadn’t had a good point. There was no way he’d have been able to keep Byleth safe and healthy on his own back then, much less when he fell back into mercenary work to make coin shortly thereafter.
Not that Ethlyn was a slouch in that department, either — she was as good with a sword as she was with her healing magic. He almost envied her, in a way. All his hands could do was kill. He couldn’t even make a damn fireball.
It was as Ethlyn was making her way back that Byleth decided that things had been entirely too quiet thus far this morning, and asked him a big fucking question.
“Hey Papa, how come Mama isn’t my mama?”
The world froze. He looked up, feeling worried and almost betrayed, until he met Ethlyn’s eyes. She looked every bit as bewildered as he did; he knew she had never, ever wanted Byleth to call her “Mama”, since she wasn’t, but they’d settled into a policy of just not bringing it up whenever she did. Letting Byleth assume she had a mother seemed… kinder, in a lot of ways. The look in her eyes told him immediately that she hadn’t told Byleth any of this. So where…?
It was Ethlyn who recovered first.
“What makes you say that, dear?” She held her voice together, ever the professional.
Byleth’s little face scrunched up. “Well… I mean, I call you Mama all the time to Sofie, but she says that you’re not my Mama. But… You’re nice to me, and you brush my hair, and you feed me, and you kiss my booboos, and… It’s all stuff a mama does, right?”
Jeralt’s face settled into a frown before he was able to pull back into neutral. ‘Sofie’ again. Byleth having an imaginary friend had been cute, at first. There were no other kids in their little band, so it only made sense that Byleth would make one for herself. But for an imaginary friend, this ‘Sofie’ of hers sure did like to talk, and to say things that Byleth had no business knowing.
Her vocabulary was leagues past what a normal four-year-old should have, and whenever he’d asked her about it, she just said that ‘Sofie’ taught her words. That was… creepy, but all well and good in a roundabout way. He was an immortal forty-year old who could drink a gallon of rat poison and be more or less fine in the morning, or crush a horse’s skull with his bare hands. Byleth didn’t have a fucking heartbeat. Creepy was downright normal for their little family.
This, though… This was too far.
Ethlyn caught his eye. They didn’t need to speak for him to know that she wanted to know how he wanted to handle this. He sighed.
“Well, By… Your mother, she… She was sick, and had been for as long as I’d known her. And, uh, shortly after you were born, she got sicker, and she had to… Had to, er, go be with the goddess. Ethlyn agreed to help me make sure you were healthy, and so…” He trailed off, feeling utterly overwhelmed.
Byleth just looked at him, obviously completely nonplussed.
“But, er, she’s not your new mother because…”
Because you needed to be married for that? Hardly. Enough of his men had little bastards running around to disprove that theory in a heartbeat.
Because you needed to be in love for that? That would mean about three-fourths of all the little noble brats out there had just spontaneously appeared one day, no mothers in sight.
“Because”, Ethlyn said as she covered for him, “I’m your doctor. I feed you when Jeralt can’t, and I brush your hair to keep it from getting tangled. I’m nice to you because I care about you, but… More kinds of people can care about each other than just parents and children. Does that make sense?”
Byleth’s eyes got big. She nodded, very solemnly this time. “Oh. Okay.”
A beat.
“But what about my booboos?”
Ethlyn sighed, and Jeralt caught a hint of an embarrassed blush on her face. He decided to field this one — he owed Ethlyn for stepping in anyway.
“That falls under caring about you, kid. But… If you’re not comfortable with that, you be sure to let us know, okay? Same goes for literally anyone. If anybody touches you or talks to you in a way you don’t like, you let us know, alright?” It dimly registered in the back of Jeralt’s mind that he’d said “us” a couple times there, but Ethlyn nodded along anyway, so…
“Now then… I think you ought to tell your imaginary friend that it’s rude to talk about people behind their back, Byleth.”
Byleth just looked confused.
“But she’s not imaginary! She’s right here!” She pointed to a spot next to her, albeit about a foot in the air. Jeralt frowned.
“Then I’ll just tell her myself. Listen here, uh, ‘Sofie’. You need to stop telling Byleth stuff like that. We have this arrangement for a reason.”
Ethlyn looked at him like he was crazy, and Jeralt felt like he was crazy, but what the fuck was his life over these past few decades anyway if not absolutely crazy?
Byleth, meanwhile, nodded at nothing, then looked up at him. “Sofie says she’s not sorry, but she’ll be more careful.” She paused, and added more hesitantly, “Did I say something bad, Papa?”
He bent down and scooped Byleth up into his arms, holding her tight as he tried to ignore his building dread at how this whole ‘Sofie’ thing had escalated. Still, he needed to say something to her…
“Nah, kid. It’s never wrong to ask questions. There are times and places where it’s better to wait, but if anybody ever tells you you shouldn’t ask questions, well… Don’t trust them. Okay?”
Byleth nodded dutifully, and Jeralt smiled.
“Attagirl.” He pressed a kiss to the top of her head, and she giggled, before squirming to be let down.
“Now then… I’m gonna go do a sweep of the area before we head out. I’ll be back shortly.”
Ethlyn nodded, and Byleth followed suit right away.
Jeralt left their camp with a smile on his face as he saddled up.
---
Bylef watched Papa walk away, off to his big gray horse. She was called Cricket, though Bylef didn’t know why. It was a funny name for a horse!
She watched Papa go until he was out of sight, then turned back to Mama. She looked like she was thinking hard, but Bylef had a question for her. Sofie nodded at her to go ahead, and so she did.
“Um…”
Mama blinked. “Oh, I’m sorry, Byleth. Did you want something?”
Bylef nodded. “Can I still call you Mama? I don’t know if I can say, um… Ef… Effleen?”
Mama smiled at her, though it was one of the smiles she had when she was feeling sad, and that didn’t sit well with Bylef at all. But before she could say anything, Mama sighed, and put her hand on Bylef’s head. “‘Effleen’, huh? Well, that’s close enough for now, I suppose. We’ll figure out how to get you saying digraphs properly some other time, someday.” She shook her head, and her smile looked a little better now.
“As for your question… Well… I… I don’t suppose you know much about your mother, do you, dear?” Bylef shook her head; the only mama she remembered was Mama.
Mama looked at her for a little without saying anything, then sighed again. “Okay. If it makes you happy, I won’t tell you to stop calling me that… But at the same time, I would never want you to think that I’m trying to replace your actual mother. Sitri was an amazing woman, and it’s the biggest shame in this world that you never got to meet her. She loved you every bit as much as Jeralt does, I can promise you that.”
“A mother’s love for her children is powerful indeed, it would seem…”
Bylef turned to look at Sofie, who had her unhappy thinking face on. Mama watched her for a bit, then surprised Bylef by dropping all the way to her knees, and opening her arms. Well, if Mama wanted a hug, then Bylef was gonna give her one!
They hugged for a little bit, until Mama (who had her unhappy thinking face on now) let her squirm up to stand in front of her. She smiled as soon as she noticed Bylef’s eyes on her, and asked “Well, then… Why don’t you tell me more about this friend of yours, hmm? What’s she look like?”
Bylef smiled wide — of course she’d talk about Sofie! She did at least look over at Sofie to make sure she was okay with it, but Sofie just waved for her to go ahead. “Well, um, okay! So! Sofie is a little taller than I am, but it makes sense cause she’s an older girl.” She nodded matter-of-factly, and Mama nodded along.
“Um… She’s got a weird dress on—” “Excuse you!” “—but she likes it, so it’s okay! It’s pretty I guess; it’s got lots of blue, and lots of gold— oh! She’s gots red and white ribbons in her hair and on her arms, really long ones! She’s also got long, pointy ears, and her hair’s long too, and green… Um, like…” Bylef looked around, trying to find something to compare Sofie’s hair to. She settled on a nearby tree, pointing up to its dark green leaves. Mama followed her finger.
“Tree color! It’s really really long, and I asked her how she doesn’t sit on it, but she never told me. And her eyes are green too! She’s really pretty!”
Sofie turned her face away from Bylef, but somehow Bylef knew that she liked hearing that. She smiled wider. Mama, though, just tilted her head to the side.
“I… see. That’s quite a lot, Byleth. I’m impressed that you were able to describe her so… creatively.” She gave Bylef a small smile, then patted her head and stood up. “Well… You have fun with Sofie for a little bit, okay? I ought to put this staff away…”
Mama walked off, and Sofie clicked her tongue at her. “How irritating! She still does not believe that I am real!” Turning back to face Bylef, Sofie put her hands on her hips. “Well… We shall just have to prove that I am real, then. I am tired of being ignored!”
Bylef nodded emphatically. “Okay! Um… How do we prove it?”
Sofie brought one of her hands to her chin, and closed her eyes while she thought hard. After a few moments, she opened them again, and snapped her fingers. “I have it! I shall just teach you how to cast a tiny little spell — there is no possible way that Ethlyn can ignore that. Now then, Byleth, please pay close attention to what I am going to show you.”
For the next few minutes, Bylef watched Sofie draw circles in the air. They had all kinds of weird shapes in them and around them, and in the middle, Sofie drew a big picture of a fire. After she showed Bylef the circles a few more times, she reached her hand up, and touched Bylef’s forehead. Or, well, she tried to, anyway; sometimes Sofie forgot she couldn’t touch Bylef just like Bylef forgot she couldn’t touch Sofie.
But… Something was different this time. Where Sofie had tried to touch suddenly felt really warm, and that warm feeling spread down through the rest of Bylef’s body. She wiggled her fingers as the warm feeling reached them, and saw little sparks shoot out. Her eyes blew open, and she stared down at her hand in absolute wonder.
“Byleth? Did you get something on your hands, dear?”
Mama came walking over, smiling better than she was a few minutes earlier. She squatted down, coming eye-level to Bylef, and looked down at her hand, checking to see if she’d made a mess on it or something. Bylef just shook her head.
“Nope! I’m not messy! Oh, but, Mama — watch this!”
Sofie floated up behind Mama’s shoulder and nodded at Bylef, which was all the encouragement she needed. She did like Sofie did before, and used the little sparks that came out of her fingers to start drawing the circle with the weird shapes. To her surprise, it was actually a lot easier than she thought it would be, and the fire shape in the middle even drew itself. Suddenly, her right hand got really warm. Sofie shouted “Now, Byleth! Aim for that tree, and act as though you are throwing a rock!”
Bylef pretended like she was throwing a rock at the tree through the circle that hung in the air. Only, it didn’t stay pretend for very long. She really did throw something— a ball made out of fire —and it hit the tree hard. The fire ball made a really loud BOOM when it hit the tree, and fire spread out over it in every direction, including back towards her.
“Shit!”
Before Bylef could feel surprised that Mama had said one of the bad words she wasn’t supposed to say, she pushed Bylef back, crouching in front of her and drawing up a circle of her own. A big, blue ball (or at least half of one) appeared out of nowhere in front of them, and the fire ran back over it, scorching the grass around them.
Once the fire disappeared, Mama fell back onto the grass, panting. Some of Papa’s mercy-naries ran over, shouting and saying bad words. Roland ran faster than the rest, and had his axe out in camp, even! “Ethlyn!”, he shouted. “What the hell happened? Are we under attack?”
She shook her head, then turned around slowly, looking at Bylef and shaking a little. Bylef had had a big smile on her face, since this would prove Sofie was real, but now she got the impression that she might be in trouble. Instead of yelling, though, Mama just scooted towards her, then pulled her into a tight hug. Bylef could hear her heart beating really fast, and she was breathing hard, too.
Bylef heard a horse galloping, and she and Mama both looked up to find Papa riding fast into camp with his big lance out. He raised it up and made Cricket stop just as he got past the supply cart, and looked around frantically.
“What the hell just happened?”, he asked in his serious voice.
Mama, still clutching Bylef to her chest and still kind of shaky, said “I… I think… Byleth cast Fire, Jeralt.”
Papa looked at her hard, not even blinking for a few seconds. Then he closed his eyes, and brought his hand up to pinch the top of his nose. He did that a lot when he was frustrated, which definitely meant she did something wrong. She could tell that Sofie was worried too, even though she wasn’t saying anything.
“Alright… Ethlyn, let’s, uh… Take her on down to the river for a bath, okay? I’m gonna calm the men down. I’ll be along shortly. We’ll talk more about this there.”
Papa got down off his horse, and to her surprise, Mama picked Bylef up. She still seemed a little afraid, but she smiled anyway at her, and said “Okay, then… Let’s go get you a bath, huh?”
Bylef nodded seriously, then smiled. She might still be in trouble, maybe— it was hard to tell sometimes —but at least she was gonna get a bath out of all this. She loved baths!
---
Jeralt stomped through the woods, heading for the river they’d camped near. His men were obviously still spooked (not that he could blame them — he was too), but once they got past the original rush of adrenaline and fear, they’d actually seemed to handle it pretty well. A few of them even cracked jokes with him, that of course his fucking kid would pull something like magic out of nowhere, or that at least they could count on things in the Iron Company never being dull. A few, like Roland, seemed concerned for Byleth, but he told them all to stay in camp. They’d have to answer some questions later, for sure, but for now, they’d behave.
Jeralt reached Byleth and Ethlyn. Ethlyn was in the process of dumping water over Byleth’s head, and the suds flowing away down the river confirmed that he’d already missed most of bathtime calming the men down. He smiled, though; Byleth loved water and bathtime more than just about anything. She let out a squeal of delight as he walked— she must have spotted a fish nearby —and Jeralt smiled wider. It was almost enough to forget that she’d somehow learned and cast combat magic in the middle of their camp at four fucking years old.
‘Damn it, Rhea.’
Byleth noticed him coming closer, shouting “Papa!” up at him. He waved to her, stomping on up to the bank behind Ethlyn.
“Hey, kid. You have a nice bath?”
She nodded at full speed, accidentally splashing Ethlyn in the process. “I saw a fish, Papa!”
“That’s great, By. You wanna swim a little, now that you’re done?”
Byleth’s “swimming” mainly meant that Jeralt would stand halfway in the river and stop her from floating on down the stream while she splashed about, but she always seemed to love it, so he’d take soggy armor any day. She agreed readily, and Ethlyn sat down on the riverbank as Jeralt clambered in.
Byleth “swam” and laughed, and Jeralt let himself have this brief moment of peace for just a bit, before turning to look at Ethlyn.
“So… What happened?”
The troubadour shrugged. “I tried to talk with her a little bit about, uh… ‘Sofie’. She described her in really vivid detail, which I didn’t really know how to handle. I got up to put my staff away and try to think about how to respond, and when I got back, she was staring at her hands. Then she told me ‘watch this’, and she cast Fire, with a Crest. I threw up a Ward as fast as I could, and it’s a damned good thing I was fast enough. Jeralt, that spell had more power than I’ve seen in some of those Academy kids. She’s four. I…”
She dropped her gaze, and her shoulders quaked for just a moment. “What… What if she’s… possessed, or something? What if she has some spirit in her, or something… Rhe—”
“Ethlyn.”
Ethlyn’s eyes opened wide. “Right, sorry. Don’t say her name, I know. But… I mean, come on, Jeralt. This isn’t normal, even for you Eisners.”
Jeralt sighed softly, and pinched the bridge of his nose. “I know. I’ve always known that something wasn’t going to be right, but… Is it so wrong that I’m glad it’s at least giving her a way to defend herself? I worry like hell when she’s in camp and we’re on a mission.”
Byleth splashed water up high enough to get in Jeralt’s face, and he scowled for a moment or two before shaking it off. “I can’t say that I know what this is any more than you, but… I want to try something. You said she cast with a Crest, right?” Ethlyn nodded, and Jeralt stroked his beard. “Might be she got my family’s Crest… Might be she got mine. If she got my family’s, that’d explain how strong her magic is.”
“Your family had a Crest?”
Jeralt grunted noncommittally. “My family had a lot of things. I could be wrong, anyway. Let’s get her dressed first.”
A few minutes later, a now-slightly tired Byleth stood looking up at him expectantly, her damp hair dripping down onto her fresh clothes, which made Jeralt add “towels” to the mental list of things to try to find on their next visit to a city. She kept looking off next to Jeralt every now and again, and he could tell that that was making Ethlyn nervous to see. Hell, it was making him nervous, too.
“Alright, kid… So… Let’s talk about what happened earlier.”
“Am I in trouble, Papa?”
Jeralt sighed, and got down on his good knee to be more at her eye level. “No. You couldn’t have known how big that spell was gonna be. But I want you to listen carefully, okay? Magic is a tool, just like a sword or a lance. You have to be mindful of how you use it, and if you aren’t, you can hurt someone, or get hurt yourself. From now on, I want you to only do magic with one of us watching over you, alright?”
Byleth nodded dutifully. She’d gotten this lecture when Jeralt had given her a dagger— as an absolute last-resort —a few moons ago, so she was at least familiar with the idea of dangerous tools. She looked down at her hand, and made little sparks come out of it before closing it.
“Now then… How’d you learn how to cast Fire, anyway?” He said the words, hoping desperately that she wouldn’t say—
“Oh, Sofie taught me!”
‘Well, shit.’
After exchanging a significant look with Ethlyn, Jeralt sighed softly. “‘Sofie’, huh? And why’d she teach a four-year-old dangerous combat magic?”
To his horror, Byleth looked off to the side again, nodding her head every few seconds. She looked back up at him after a bit, and said “Sofie says she just wanted to, um, prove that she was real to Ma— um… Eff… Effleen. She said she didn’t know the fire would be that po… pow… Oh — big. Um, and she wouldn’t have showed me if she’d knowed. Oh, ‘known’. And…”
Byleth stared hard at a spot of absolutely blank air to Jeralt’s left for a few moments, then smiled wide. “And she says she’s sorry!”
Jeralt’s thoughts whirled around a mile a minute. On the one hand, it was pretty fucking obvious that Byleth had to be talking to something. Even the most talented actor in the world would have a hard time selling this whole thing by themselves, and Byleth was a completely guileless four-year-old girl who’d never even seen an actor before. She cried when she lied, sometimes. So, maybe Ethlyn had a point that she was possessed somehow, and the only way Jeralt knew to get that fixed was to bring her to a church. And that wasn’t something he was comfortable with at all.
On the other hand… This ‘Sofie’ didn’t seem all that malevolent, if she really was some kind of ghost or spirit. She’d only done neutral things up till now, or even good things — expanding Byleth’s vocabulary, keeping her company… Hell, teaching her magic could even be seen in that light, as long as she was responsible with it. And having the gumption to apologize meant that she realized she’d gone too far. As little as Jeralt liked the idea of his daughter having some ghost hanging around her, at least it was a polite ghost.
Jeralt made up his mind, and turned to face the spot of blank air, not even needing to look at her to see Ethlyn’s almost-certain look of betrayal. “I appreciate the apology, then, uh… ‘Sofie’. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but… If you only do good things for Byleth from here out, we won’t try to exorcise you. Do we, uh, have a deal?” He looked back over to Byleth, waiting for her to relay an answer from ‘Sofie’.
Byleth screwed her face up as the silence dragged on, then nodded. “Okay, so — Sofie says she would never hurt me… Um, she said… ‘she and I are one’, but I don’t know what it means. And she said it’s a deal.”
Jeralt refused to touch “she and I are one” for now, and instead tucked it away in his mind for later. He let out an uneasy breath. “Alright then. Glad we understand one another.” He put a hand on Byleth’s shoulder, fighting hard to keep it from shaking.
Ethlyn stared at him like he was crazy, but she’d given him that look for years now. And hell, maybe he was. At least Byleth was happy, healthy, and safe though… and theoretically, Sofie would keep her that way.
After a moment or two, he sighed, then squeezed Byleth’s shoulder lightly. “Alright, enough of that. How about you show me how your spell works here, huh? You can aim it for the river, where it’ll be safe.”
Byleth smiled wide, and ran forward to the riverbank. Jeralt stood up and moved behind her and slightly off to the left so that he could watch her carefully. As she drew a sigil— a perfect fucking sigil —in the air, Jeralt wished that he’d paid more attention to his tutors growing up. Even though he couldn’t cast a spell to save his life, he sure would have liked to know if what Byleth was drawing was proper form or not. It certainly looked proper enough, though… It was a little big, but that wasn’t a problem as far as he knew. Now all that was left was to see if it was the Crest of Seiros that showed up, or the Crest of Macu—
Jeralt’s breath caught in his throat as Byleth finished drawing her sigil. There, in the center of the sigil, sat the Crest of Flames. The fucking goddess’ Crest of Flames.
As Byleth reached her hand forward through the sigil, that same Crest burned in gold above her little hand. A full-size fireball shot out of her hand, dwarfing it for a moment or two before it hit the river. The water it hit flashed to steam, and the river boiled rapidly at the impact site for a few moments before cooling off.
‘The Crest of Flames. Damn you, Rhea - what did you do?!’
Byleth bounced up and down excitedly, and Jeralt forced himself to smile down at her, pushing his worry away from his face and down into his bones. “That was real good, kid. You’re a natural.”
From behind them, Ethlyn added “Absolutely. That sigil construction was very good, as well… I, er, I guess that ‘Sofie’ showed it to you?”
Byleth nodded eagerly. “Sofie showed me the whole thing! She’s really smart.”
Jeralt clenched his jaw. “So she is… So, er… Byleth.” She turned to face him, her questioning face something he’d think was absolutely adorable in any other circumstance.
“I want you to be sure to let me know whenever Sofie teaches you other things, alright? Not that I don’t trust her—” ‘I don’t trust her one single fucking bit, actually’ “—but, y’know… We want to make sure that there are no more things like this that happen and give everyone in camp a little scare. Alright?”
Byleth nodded solemnly. “I didn’t mean to scare anybody…”
Jeralt put a hand on Byleth’s head and rubbed softly. “I know, kid. And we’re not angry. We just want you to be safe.” Byleth leaned into his hand, smiling contentedly. She didn’t have anything to worry about in all this, of course, and that was fine by him. Jeralt could worry about whatever the hell Sofie was himself.
And as long as she was safe, and happy…
Well, maybe that was enough, for now.