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Grima.
It was something out of her worst nightmares; Ylisstol was completely aflame, and the fell dragon was framed by the plumes of smoke. With every movement he made, with every beat of his huge wings, he leveled another building that had weathered storms for countless years. Lucina could hear the stones tumbling to the ground even amid the screams and cries of pain from the ongoing fight in the castle behind her.
She stood alone on the battlements of the castle, the wall behind her broken through by Grima’s attack. All Lucina had was the Falchion and her courage, and that was rapidly diminishing the more she stared at the grisly beast before her.
Grima’s six red, unblinking eyes fixated themselves on her. There was some kind of flicker in them, as if he had just noticed her for the first time, or perhaps it was a sign of recognition. The beast’s maw opened, a guttural roar shaking the land once again. The muscles in his body tensed, and he shot forward.
Fear overtook her, and Lucina screamed aloud, her cry joining with the fell dragon’s roar of grim triumph. The twisted teeth gnashed mere inches from where she stood; she could feel his hot breath on her face like a rancid gust of wind. It smelled of blood and decay, no doubt from his previous victims. Her trembling didn’t subside any when Grima withdrew his heavy head, knocking over more of Ylisstol’s castle as he did.
Lucina released a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding, but it wasn’t out of relief. All Grima was doing was prolonging the inevitable, like a cat toying with its prey.
“Don’t mock me!” Lucina shouted, unsure that Grima could even hear her. Jabbing the Falchion skyward, she issued her challenge. “Falchion will easily pierce your hide! Fight me!”
It was a bold claim, and she knew it was little more than empty words. Grima must have known it, too, for she could hear him chuckle, the bone plates on his neck grinding against each other as he did. The horrible screech set Lucina on edge, and she was sure that Grima had to be done with this game. She steadied herself and took a deep breath, praying that this time, she wouldn’t give Grima the satisfaction of seeing her fear. Worried she might even drop the Falchion, she tensed her grip and braced herself for the second attack.
But Grima didn’t strike again. He held his head high, perhaps surveying the apocalyptic destruction he’d wrought. Lucina cast her eyes around the area, as if there were something around her that could tip the scales – some kind of miracle from the gods that would at least wound Grima before he killed her. However, the only things around her were crushed statues of bygone heroes and fallen walls… and a robed woman lurking in Grima’s shadow.
Lucina stumbled back in alarm. How long had that woman been there? As if in response to Lucina noticing her, the woman turned her head, and Lucina could see that her hood obscured her face. Despite that, she knew at a glance that this stranger wasn’t a Risen. Her skin had a light dusting of ashes, making it seem almost grey, but she was undoubtedly alive. But anyone who could walk so fearlessly around Grima could only be an enemy. What kind of person could swear allegiance to Grima? Even Plegia had been utterly destroyed years ago.
The woman began to walk towards Lucina, her steps so precise and deliberate that the sound of her shoes seemed almost like the methodical ticking of a clock. Dropping into a fighting stance, Lucina held her ground. If this was some kind of scheme to get her to run, she wouldn’t fall for it.
“Stay back,” Lucina commanded. Hearing her voice gave herself a small measure of courage, but the woman didn’t stop her approach. “I won’t warn you again–!”
The woman held a hand to her head. Lucina could see a dark brand of some kind on it. As if injured, she hobbled to the side and finally halted.
“That sword,” murmured the hooded woman. “I remember it… I remember you…”
At the mention of it, Lucina tightened her grip on the Falchion. She watched the woman keenly through narrowed eyes; there was a sheathed sword at her hip, but the clothing she wore somehow reminded Lucina more of Plegia’s cloaked mages. After all, what kind of swordsman would draw their hood in a fight? An enemy could easily sneak up from the side or could grab onto the hem of the robe to go in for the kill.
The woman’s fingers twitched. Sparks started to leap from her hand. Without even a moment’s thought, Lucina lunged forward. Her feet flew across the ruined stones, dodging the debris with almost practiced ease, and in a moment, the Falchion was mere inches away from the woman.
The woman gasped in surprise, a cry that turned into one of pain once the Falchion stabbed through her shoulder. The spell died in her hand before she could launch it. Blood seeped through the dark cloth of the robe – and it may have been Lucina’s imagination, but she could have sworn she heard a growl of pain from the dragon above them.
With the Falchion holding the woman in place, Lucina kicked at the woman’s legs and knocked her to the ground. She withdrew the Falchion, its blade now slick with blood, as the woman fell. Just as she was about to follow through with a final stab, the woman sat up, and the hood fell back. The woman’s gaunt face was framed by messy hair and wrinkles that seemed hardly suited for her age. Her eyes were exhausted and sleepless.
Yet Lucina knew immediately whose face it was.
“You’re..!”
She had seen this woman before. In her mind’s eye, she saw the portraits lining the castle halls. She and her brother had often stared at those portraits together, as if by looking at them long enough they could bring their deceased parents back. The hours they had wasted doing nothing but stitching together hypothetical scenarios where their family wasn’t broken came rushing back to her. Even though time had been cruel to this woman, aging her well past what her years would suggest, Lucina recognized her face as that of her mother.
But she couldn’t bring herself to say it, as if not speaking the word aloud would deny it power over her. Her throat went dry, and the soft drip of the blood dropping from the Falchion and pooling onto the ground seemed loud as thunder in Lucina’s ears.
The woman shook her head, her hair in total disarray. There was an almost panicked look in her eyes, and Lucina couldn’t hold her gaze. She glanced back and forth between the Falchion and the woman’s face, eventually settling on the reflection in the Falchion’s bloodied blade – the woman framed by Grima’s silhouette far above.
“No. Your mother died long ago.”
Her melancholy words jarred Lucina back to reality, but Lucina only felt more bewildered. None of this made sense. How could a woman who looked just like her mother be here? It was like she had said – Robin had died years ago, apparently around the same time as her father, and she had no living relatives. And this woman clearly wasn’t a Risen. Risen had glowing eyes and didn’t bleed when cut through.
“Who are you? Why are–?”
“You need to leave,” pleaded the woman. “I can’t… I can’t hold him back for long.”
Lucina’s eyes flicked up to the dragon. Was that why Grima had stayed his attack? If that was the case, that only begged more questions, not less. How could anybody control Grima? Even if the control wasn’t absolute, that was still ludicrous. Mankind had fought bitterly just to seal Grima away temporarily. Reigning over that god of death was nothing short of impossible.
“Who are you?” Lucina repeated, now unsure if she even wanted to know the answer.
“The… fell dragon,” she said. She swallowed. “Grima… I’m Grima.”
While she hadn’t expected an easy truth, Lucina was taken aback by the audacity of the lie, and she shook her head.
“Grima is looming right over our heads, and you’d claim to be him?”
The woman looked up at the oddly silent monster eclipsing the sky. Lucina didn’t follow her gaze, but instead stared past the woman at the burning capital before them.
“Believe what you want, but you need to leave this place,” she said, more insistent this time. She reached out to grab Lucina; snapping her attention back to the woman, Lucina brandished the Falchion and glared at her. The woman withdrew her arm, but her tone took on more of a stern tone. “It’s what Chrom would want–”
Lucina spat, “Don’t you dare speak his name! What would you know about my father?”
The words held more fury than she intended, but the question still stood. Surely someone in the royal court would have mentioned to Lucina if Chrom had known a doppelgänger of Robin. The lingering doubt about this woman being a fake pranced around in her head again, and she shook herself to clear her mind.
Robin was dead. This was just some kind of trick to get her to lower her guard.
The woman opened her mouth, then closed it and lowered her gaze. So softly that Lucina could barely hear, she responded, her voice shaky but confident.
“You can change the world’s fate… You found a way to open the Outrealm Gate, didn’t you?” Lucina cringed; how could this stranger know about their plan to return to the past? “You have nothing to gain by dying here. Your people, your friends… your brother. They need you.”
“I don’t fear death,” said Lucina automatically, unsettled by the genuine concern in the woman’s voice.
“Gods, martyrdom really does run in your family.” The words were dry and sounded almost rehearsed and weary. The underlying familiarity made the hairs on the back of Lucina’s neck stand on end.
Up above, Grima rumbled, a low growl that shook the world. The woman gasped in pain and clasped her hands against her head. Lucina staggered back in surprise. Belatedly, she realized it could be some kind of trap, and she kept the Falchion raised. Only then did she notice that the woman was quaking even more than she was. Lucina stared, and she instantly regretted that decision when she met the woman’s maddened gaze. Her eyes seemed to be glowing with some kind of otherworldly, demonic power. The glow was similar to the eyes of the Risen, and yet…
It reminded Lucina more of Grima. She shuddered.
“Go… Go!” shrieked the woman. “He’s… He’s..!”
Her words descended into wordless screams of pain, and she curled up on the ground. Her knuckles were turning white as they tore at her hair, sweat beading on her forehead. Her breathing was only comprised of short rasps in between her cries.
Lucina found that she couldn’t tear her gaze away from the sight, and the Falchion’s weight seemed heavier than before as a thought crossed her mind.
Kill her.
All Lucina had to do was raise her sword and run her through. Never before had she seen such an easy target, one who couldn’t even fight back. Whoever she was, she was an ally of some kind to Grima. That was the only explanation for how she knew so much about Lucina’s family and how she was able to survive Grima’s onslaught; perhaps she had been a Grimleal spy within Ylisse just prior to the awakening of Grima.
And yet…
Lucina stared at the tip of the Falchion, pointed at the woman who looked just like her mother. Her hands felt numb; she had broken out into a cold sweat. With great difficulty, she swallowed and took a step forward. Her feet thudded against the ground, and the woman’s cries momentarily ceased. In tense silence, she stared up at Lucina with wild, panicked eyes that flickered from red and back again to their natural color.
“Next time we meet, I won’t stay my blade,” growled Lucina.
The woman looked as though she had something to say, but she merely lowered her head and nodded once. Lucina backed away, still keeping the Falchion out just in case the woman intended to strike the moment her back was turned.
She wouldn’t do that. Lucina wasn’t sure where the thought had come from, but she chased it away the moment she realized it’d entered her mind.
After she was several feet away, the woman slumped over, no longer moving. Lucina faltered and almost reached out for her. Just as her body was poised to return to the woman and make sure she was still alive, Lucina spun around on her heel, turning from the woman and back to the ruined castle.
She hurriedly sheathed the Falchion and bolted away before anything more could damage her resolve. Lucina leapt over the fallen chunks of debris and the tiny chasms that had opened up from Grima’s assault. As she passed through the hole in the wall that would lead her back into the castle, Lucina fought back the urge to look back at the woman and pressed on.
Once past the wall, she grimaced at the sight of the fallen Ylissean soldiers littering the ground. Save for these corpses, the hallway was utterly deserted – judging by the sounds she could hear, the Risen had likely cornered the remaining soldiers in the throne room. There was nowhere for them to run. Clenching her teeth and balling her hands into tight fists, Lucina shot down the hall, following the tattered red carpet to the exit of the castle.
The clamor of the fighting eventually faded into silence, and all Lucina could hear were her own pants for breath along with the occasional roar from Grima. Her vision was starting to fog up, but there were no fires nearby – no smoke to make her eyes sting like this. Roughly, she wiped away the tears.
“Damn me and my sentimentality.”