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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