a way in the wilderness (new Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn fanfic)

[queenlua]

A year after the final unification of the bird tribes, Leanne pays a visit to Naesala.

Set after the events of The Water at the Edge of All Things.

Leanne/Naesala, ~4k words.

Read here on AO3.

Not a ton of notes on this one, but:

This one got stuck for a long time because I was trying to open with a whole Leanne PoV scene where she's hanging out at the Long Dance & Lendris is hitting on her & she's being Diplomatic & Hakna is like "seriously though girl you gotta start talking successors and shit":

"That Len boy's sure taken a shine to you."

"You are telling this to me," Leanne says, with a laugh and a little raise of her brows. I am a heron, aren't I?

Hakna grunts. "You're not acting like you've noticed much."

"Len is very kind," Leanne says. And when Hakna narrows her eyes at that unspoken but, Leanne adds: "I do not think I ought take him for a king."

"Who said king? Plenty else to recommend him." She looks the man over with an appraising eye, and Leanne knows what she's seeing: as solidly built as Muro but a full head taller. Pretty feathers, too; an amber-to-cinnamon ombre unmatched among any hawk.

"I also shouldn't have to tell you that you are presently without an heir," Hakna adds, "but again, you're not acting like you've noticed that much."

This again. "Hakna," Leanne says, "it has been barely a year."

"Which fast becomes two, becomes ten, becomes twenty—believe you me, Leanne, I know how quick they start swooping by [. . .] It's been good, you know. You've been good [. . .]"

I eventually decided that, as-is, it was a lot of throat-clearing where the words were coming really slowly and were mostly unsatisfying, because I knew what I wanted to write, which was "Naesala and Leanne having the Saddest Sex Ever," and why couldn't I just skip to that?

So I did, and I think that was a good choice because I really needed to expunge this fic from my body and just be Done with it oh my god, but, it would be neat if I'd figured out a way to give that potential opening scene more momentum. I liked the idea of illustrating the unique challenges of "making all your neighbors like you & you're Switzerland"-style leadership, calling attention to some of the more beautiful festival/rituals in Serenes, showing some of how Reyson's changed since the ending of TWatEoAT, and so on.

if you caught the UKL reference i'm sorry but you're just as deeply ukl-weeb as i am xoxo