The Nabateans Pre-Fire Emblem: Three Houses

The winter poll brought us here, to the much anticipated meta on the Nabateans before the events of Fire Emblem: Three Houses! Let’s be honest, there’s not enough content out there on the people who lived in Zanado, the Red Canyon. Some of the exclusive content includes my headcanons, which are not included in this preview post. Most of it is directly related to the canon information regarding how the Nabateans might have been. You should naturally expect…

Spoilers for Fire Emblem: Three Houses

This preview includes samples of the meta on these Nabateans:

  • Seiros
  • Sothis
  • Cichol

Become a patron at $1+ for the full meta on the above and following Nabateans:

  • Indech
  • Macuil
  • Cethleann
  • Cichol’s wife/Cethleann’s mother

Seiros (Rhea)

As for how Seiros gradually became Lady Rhea, that came about from her remaining rage at losing everyone in the Red Canyon combined with an unfortunate lack of oversight following the century-long war. There doesn’t appear to be any existing hierarchy in Nabatean culture outside of answering to Sothis, meaning there was no chain of command. Whether the others were permanently a magic beast, living elsewhere, or, in Seteth’s case, grieving a deceased spouse while waiting for his daughter to recover through years of rest, there simply wasn’t anyone else fit to lead following the war—or to realize Seiros was establishing the false church out of misplaced and unfulfilled spite. Killing Nemesis and getting Sothis’ remains pushed her anger to the back of her mind, giving the vague appearance of recovery, but it wasn’t gone by any means.

Sothis

That she chose to descend to Fódlan and walk among the people as one of them suggests she was incredibly trusting and uninterested in ruling with an iron fist (which she very easily could have done at the time). She liked humans, and it’s a safe bet that she traveled to Fódlan because she wanted to start her own family there. In fact, that’s precisely what she started doing once she was settled in. If anything, she was blindly optimistic because she shared her advancements with humanity and didn’t have a plan in place for anyone who might take advantage.

Cichol (Seteth)

His ability to speak against Rhea’s choices without making her hostile (like she is with Catherine, for example) implies that Seiros and Cichol were equals growing up. Once again, his title given to him by humanity as “guardian of the land” backs that up. But a power imbalance grew between them when she assumed the role of leader after Nemesis fell, and Seteth was understandably worried about Flayn more than anything else. Cichol’s absence allowed Seiros to do things without his fair, unbiased perspective to take the place of Sothis’ mocking wisdom.


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FE3H Spoilers: Rhea’s Past in Adrestia

Hello and welcome to my headcanon about Rhea having a romantic relationship with Wilhelm from Adrestia! Here are my crumbs of canon information to back me up.


Spoilers for FE3H Below

Rhea repeatedly references that Edelgard is a descendant of House Hresvelg. She goes so far as to say that Edelgard “humiliated [her] brethren” by standing against the Church of Seiros, and you simply don’t bring up a point like that over and over unless it has special meaning even generations later.

For those who don’t know, Seiros personally persuaded Wilhelm Paul Hresvelg to side with her against Nemesis, giving him her own blood. She’s done this before with a handful of people she deemed worthy, including Jeralt. So it wasn’t something she offered strictly as leverage to persuade him (although it probably played a part) by giving him a Crest of Seiros. She went on to help him found the Adrestian Empire, and the novel called The Feast of Decadence found in the Shadow Library implies it was a very popular rumor that she had a romantic relationship with Wilhelm:

A young man, staring at Emperor Wilhelm as he caught the saint and pulled her into a close embrace, suddenly beckoned me. He pressed his lips to my ear and whispered sweet nothings, mirroring Emperor Wilhelm and Saint Seiros upon the stage…

Given how Seiros consistently mentions Wilhelm around Edelgard after she declares war on the Church, I believe this rumor of their romantic relationship was true. Despite feeling betrayed by humanity for how the Agarthans turned against Sothis and her children, Seiros clearly trusted Wilhelm and elevated him to the role of Emperor.

Obviously, they didn’t have children together, but this history adds an entirely new level of offense to Edelgard’s perceived betrayal of Seiros. (I say perceived because there was human experimentation being carried out by the Agarthans with not a peep from Seiros’ leadership as all of Edelgard’s siblings were wiped out, as well as what happened with Lysithea, so it’s a very tangled situation.)


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