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1
Absolutely not. This could not be happening. He could not be doing this. Absolutely not.
Felix resolutely fastened his eyes onto the backs of his own hands, which were clutching the reins of his horse. He needed to focus, damn it. He was headed towards his first battle, an event that had been his goal ever since he first picked up a sword. It was a moment to build strength, to test himself, to prove that every hour he’d spent in his training had been worth it. This was his entire purpose. His entire reason for being here. He would not let himself be distracted.
Against his will, his eyes wandered back up and locked directly on Annette Dominic.
Specifically, on the loops of red hair that hung behind her ears.
He did not understand how she kept them in place. That, he decided, must be the reason why he could not stop looking at them. It had nothing to do with the merry way they bounced as she rode, or the way the sunlight turned them copper, or the way they swung when she turned her head to laugh at Mercedes’s joke.
2
“Annette?”
There was no answer from inside the greenhouse. Or, at least, not one that seemed to be directed at Felix.
“Today's dinner is steak and then a cake that's yummy yum,” sang Annette. “Now it's time to fill my tummy tummy tum…”
Felix knew he should probably walk away. Annette could be… touchy, and he suspected she wouldn’t be singing if she knew he was there. But he couldn’t seem to help it. He stood, and listened, and even though he knew extremely little about music every note of her song felt just right.
But he did technically have greenhouse duty, and he was starting to feel like he should probably let her know he was there, so he pushed the door open.
Annette was dancing as she watered the plants, singing half under her breath, completely unaware that someone else had just entered the room.
Felix listened to her sing for a few more notes. Then he cleared his throat. “I hope I’m not interrupting.”
Annette spun around, watering can in hand. Her cheeks drained of blood. “Felix!” she gasped. “You weren’t listening, were you?”
He shrugged. “I heard enough to know you’re hungry.”
“No! I mean… well, yes.” Annette blushed as she set down the watering can. “Um. At least tell me you didn’t see the dance?”
“You have nice footwork,” Felix replied, because he’d never been much good at lying. “Get something to eat. I can take over watering the plants.”
It had sounded like a nice offer in his head. But Annette wrinkled her nose in distaste and her mouth went tight and her fists balled at her sides and suddenly, she was shouting at him. “You’re evil, Felix!”
Several more accusations followed, of spying and villainy and generally being the worst. Felix tried to keep up but he could not quite follow her logic. Then Annette stormed out, leaving Felix staring at the door.
“I’d better water the plants,” he muttered after a long pause. “I wouldn’t want them to start singing too.”
He had completed half his task when he realized he was humming Annette’s song.
3
“I did it! I did it! I really did it!”
Felix did not know what “it” was, exactly. But he looked over towards Annette anyway. Only because she was being so loud about it, and not for any other reason.
“I passed!” his classmate squealed to Mercedes and Ashe, clutching a paper into her fist so tightly it crumpled. “I passed the Professor’s Axes exam! I really passed!”
As if that’s a surprise, Felix grumbled to himself. She’s good with an axe. Don’t see what the fuss is about.
But he did not look away.
Annette spun around on her toes, light as a toy top. Her hair loops bounced and spun with her. She completed the first turn and then laughed and spun another one, radiating sheer joy at her achievement.
And Felix had a horrifying, mortifying, completely impermissible thought. For just a second—less than a second—he imagined himself holding her hand as she danced, twirling her away and then back again in a ballroom, hearing music play as they waltzed, matching his steps with hers as she spun.
Felix shoved himself away from his dinner and left it half uneaten on the table as he stalked away from the dining hall.
4
Four on one.
Felix panted for breath as the bandits approached him, weapons drawn, wolfish grins on their faces. He tried to project an air of indifference as he used the back of his hand to wipe blood from the corner of his mouth. I’ve had worse odds.
Not many, though.
Why in the hell was Garreg Mach crawling with bandits? How had this ridiculous class reunion turned into the toughest battle he’d faced in months? This was the boar’s fault somehow, he was sure of it.
The bandits drew closer. Felix gripped his sword tight and readied himself to parry.
“Felix! Duck!”
He had not heard that voice for five long years.
Felix immediately dropped to one knee.
Magic flew over his head, a familiar wind spell that Felix knew would cut sharper and colder than any blade. Two of the bandits were knocked off their feet; one lay still where he landed, and the second screamed in pain while clutching his shattered arm. The others remained standing but were clearly shaken, their eyes wide as Felix’s savior stepped around the corner of the building.
Annette Dominic held her hands aloft, her eyes blazing with anger. “It’s over, thieves!” she yelled, magic already gathering at her fingertips once more.
It was the perfect moment to strike, to eliminate the distracted bandits and turn the tide of this fight. The trouble was that the only thought Felix could seem to summon was she wears her hair down now.
He had thought her hair loops were fascinating. But right now, they did not hold a candle to the sight of that bright red hair stirring in the breeze left by her spells, free and wild and alive with her power.
5
“Felix! Pay attention!”
Felix jumped in his seat as Ingrid kicked his chair leg—gently, for Ingrid, but still enough to startle him. He had to grab for his pen as it began to roll off the war table. “I am,” he hissed back, though they both knew it was a lie.
For a moment Felix hoped, desperately, that Ingrid had not noticed the reason for his distraction. He had been focusing on something that was not only useless but entirely inappropriate.
Annette had a habit of tapping her finger against her lips as she thought. And Felix had been wondering what it would be like to slide his own thumb over the curve of her mouth. And then Annette had noticed, and he'd been sure that she was about to call him a villain, but instead she blushed bright red and pulled her hand down and refused to meet his eyes.
“You were not paying attention to the Professor and we both know it.” Ingrid arched a meaningful eyebrow in Annette’s direction. Her blush was fading, but her cheeks were still visibly pink. “You’re going to have to do something about that eventually.”
Felix opened his mouth to deny it, but could not shake the sinking feeling that Ingrid might be right.
6
Where did everyone get these ridiculous clothes? Felix grumbled to himself as he watched the Blue Lions mill about the ballroom. Professor Byleth, at least, was still in his usual mercenary’s garb, but everyone else had somehow laid hands on a ballgown or a gold-trimmed suit to celebrate their victory.
Felix hadn’t had time to find anything fancy, so he’d worn his usual blue coat. He told himself he didn’t mind because he did not see much point in celebrating. All right, yes, they’d defeated the Empire and were back in Fhirdiad in more or less one piece, but so what? There was work to be done. A continent to unify. Bandits and stragglers to deal with. A future to plan for.
He said as much to Sylvain, who—of course—chuckled and threw an arm around Felix’s shoulders and did not understand his point at all. “Come on, Felix. Live a little. Yeah, sure, there’s more to do tomorrow, but nothing wrong with using tonight to celebrate. We won. That’s worth a party.”
Felix pulled away from his friend’s casual embrace and prepared to explain why, exactly, this party was so stupid. But a familiar flash of copper in the candlelight pulled his attention away.
Annette was waltzing with Ashe.
Felix felt a surge of pure jealousy, even though he knew he had no reason—Ashe and Dedue had been giving each other ridiculous longing stares ever since Dedue had rejoined the Blue Lions. But he had never seen Annette look so radiant or so happy, not even in those long-ago Academy days before any of them knew what they would face. She had found a vibrant blue dress that left her shoulders bare, and she had pinned her hair up with a sparkling comb, and her footwork was as light and precise and beautiful as it had always been.
Damn it. He was not looking at her shoulders. Or at the curve of her neck. Or at the very tiny vee at the center of her dress’s neckline.
“Ask her to dance, you idiot.”
Felix turned his head back towards Sylvain, who was looking at him with a mixture of pity and mild contempt. “The song is ending. Ask her before someone else does.”
Felix felt his shoulders tense as he bristled in annoyance. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Sylvain acted like he hadn’t heard. “You’re running out of chances, you know. Do me a favor and don’t miss this one.”
Felix felt his upper lip curl in a snarl. “I don’t need your—” he began.
But Sylvain did not wait for him to finish. Annette was walking past them, headed for the refreshments table, and suddenly Felix felt a hard shove between his shoulderblades. He took three stumbling steps before almost crashing into Annette Dominic.
“Felix!” Annette reached out to catch him. “Are you all right?”
“Fine,” Felix said curtly.
“Are you enjoying the party? It’s a very nice party,” Annette said, her cheeks turning a bit pink. “Not that I’ve been to many lately. I think the last time was at Garreg Mach! Isn’t that funny.”
Felix remembered that party. Remembered how he had watched her half the night and done nothing about it, save leave the dance early to go back to the training grounds. At the time he’d told himself that the celebration was stupid, frivolous, a waste of time.
And really, he still thought that. But… he could also see that he had been a coward. He had wondered what she would say if he asked her for a dance, if she would accept cheerfully the way she did with everyone else, or if she would stamp her foot and call him a villain because somehow he’d done it all wrong again. And so he hadn’t even tried.
Pathetic.
Well, he wasn’t going to be pathetic tonight.
Felix took a breath. “Annette. Um. Do you…”
“Felix, would you dance with me?” Annette blurted out in a rush. “I mean, you probably don’t want to. I don’t even know if you dance. Maybe it’s not something you do! Or not something you want to do with me! I… you know what, never mind, I…”
Impulsively, Felix took her arm.
“Come on,” he said impatiently when she blinked at him in confusion. “The music’s starting.”
Annette blinked at him for a moment more. “Oh. Oh! Um. Thank you.”
Arm in arm, they made their way to the dance floor. They were a few measures behind the other couples when they started dancing, but it was not a disaster, and they found the beat easily enough. Felix forced himself to concentrate on his footsteps and not on the fact that Annette’s hand was in his, or the fact that his other hand was lying at her waist.
“You’re nice to do this,” Annette said after a pause. “I wasn’t even sure if you danced. I said that already, didn’t I.”
“You did.”
Silence fell between them. Felix was profoundly aware that he was not doing well at this. If he’d been Sylvain, he would have had something charming and flirtatious to say; if he’d been Ashe, he could have summoned a stream of optimistic chatter. But he was himself, and he always put his foot wrong with other people, and most of the time he didn’t care but right now he really, really did.
“You look nice,” he muttered.
“The party? Yes, it is nice,” Annette agreed cheerfully. “Or… is that what you said? I’m sorry, I didn’t really hear you.” Her cheeks flushed pink.
Felix cleared his throat to try again. Come on. You can say it. “You look nice.” Three words.
But what he said instead was, “What are you doing after this?”
“Not much. I mean, it’s meant to go on past midnight, right? All good balls do. And I’m not much for going to sleep late, so after this I’m just going to bed.” She winced. “Not very interesting, I know.”
Frustration bubbled in Felix’s chest. That hadn’t been what he’d wanted to ask, but he could see why Annette had interpreted it that way, and aaaargh, why was it so damned hard to say what he meant around her?
“Not tonight. After tonight. Now that the war is over,” he clarified, guiding her carefully through a spin as he asked.
“Oh.” Annette’s face grew still, thoughtful. A bit sad. “I… haven’t decided yet. My uncle wants me to come live with him. My cousin Simon apparently isn’t very interested in being a baron, and my uncle…” She chuckled awkwardly. “He has this funny idea that I’d be a good one. A baron. Me. Go ahead, you can laugh.”
“I’m not going to laugh. You would be good at it. Better than most of the idiots who do it, at any rate,” Felix pointed out.
Annette’s mouth quirked in a pleased smile, and Felix’s heart leapt ridiculously at the sight.
“And you’ll go to Fraldarius, I suppose,” she continued, her voice growing a bit unsteady. “You’ll probably be so busy as a Duke. Do you—do you think tonight is the last time we’ll see each other?”
Felix felt his breath leave his chest in a rush. He had not even considered that, but as soon as she said it, he knew that was the worst thing he had ever heard.
“No,” he said shortly. “At least, not if I have anything to do with it.”
Annette looked up at him and blinked. “Really?”
“Really.”
Felix’s feet forgot the steps to the dance; suddenly he and Annette were standing face to face at a corner of the dance floor, and they were looking at each other, still holding hands, unwilling to let go. Her eyes were so bright, and her cheeks were flushed, and her hair was beginning to fall from its pins, and Felix never wanted to look at anything else.
“I don’t want this to be the last time I see you, Annette Dominic,” he said finally, after a long pause. “So… when you do decide, let me know where you go? And maybe I can write to you, or visit. If… you know.”
If you want that. If you don’t hate me. If you don’t really think I’m a villain, even though you yelled it a thousand times.
Annette stared up at him for a beat, and then she smiled at him.
“I’d like that, Felix. A letter from you. Or a visit. I—I don’t want this to be the last time we see each other, either.” She squeezed his hand. “So—do you promise? A letter, at least, when I know where I’ll be?”
“I promise.” Felix wasn’t sure he’d ever meant anything as much as he meant that.
As the music ended, Annette stepped away, moving towards Mercedes and Ingrid at the side of the ballroom, her steps lively and light. As she moved, her hair began to fall, and she reached upwards and pulled out the jeweled comb. Her red locks tumbled free around her shoulders, shining in the candlelight as she walked.
Felix stood on the dance floor and let himself be captivated by the sight.