Naneif

"Of course, Lord Leif! I'll be by your side forevermore, wherever your path leads. Even to the very ends of the earth..."

- Nanna to Leif

Naneif is the het ship between Leif and Nanna from the Fire Emblem fandom.

Canon
Leif is the prince of Leonster and orphan of both parents. He is Sepliph's assistant in Fire Emblem: Genealogy of the Holy War and protagonist as main Lord in Fire Emblem: Thracia 776. Nanna is a princess of the Agustrian state of Nordion, and the daughter of Princess Lachesis of Nordion. She fulfills the role of a troubadour, as she usually rides around on horseback, supporting the army with her staffs.

Originally, Leif and Nanna were meant to have different endings in Genealogy of the Holy War, as the player can decide if Leif marries Nanna or someone else (any female unit), especially Jeanne or Tine/Linda. Similarly, Nanna can marry Seliph or Ares. Nanna's existence in Genealogy of the Holy War depends on whether her mother Lachesis has married or not, depending on the player's actions, since if Lachesis dies or has not married in the first generation, Jeanne will take Nanna's role and therefore, Leif would have the option to marry Jeanne instead of her. However, Leif's story ends up adhering to the canon defined by Thracia 776, which dictates that Lachesis did marry (although her husband is unknown, but in Genealogy of the Holy War could be Finn or Beowolf) and had Nanna as a daughter, who ends up marrying Leif.

Fire Emblem: Thracia 776
An infant Leif was left behind in Finn's protection, and some months later he was introduced to Nanna, the daughter of Lachesis, for company around his own age. A year after Leif's parents Quan and Ethlyn died in the Aed Massacre and Arvis executed Sigurd and became the new Grannvale Emperor in the Battle of Belhalla, in Grann 761, Leonster was invaded by the Thracian army along with the rest of the Munster District, which makes Finn, Lachesis, Leif and Nanna escape.

Afterward, both Leif and Nanna grew up as fugitives from both Thracia and the Grannvale Empire, constantly in hiding and being moved from place to place by Finn and Lachesis to avoid capture by the Empire as it seized power in the Munster District. Finn and Lachesis next took Leif and Nanna to Tahra, entering the protection of its duke for five years from 769-773. During their time in Tahra, Lachesis departed from the group to find her estranged son Diarmuid, leaving Nanna with Finn and Leif, but she hasn't returned, implying that she has died somewhere in the Aed desert or from an enemy ambush by the Empire.

A Jungby woman named Brigid, she was with Sigurd's army after escaping from Orgahil's pirates. When Sigurd and his army were executed by Arvis and his Velthomer army, Brigid survived that mishap, but lost all her memories. Adopting the identity of Evyel, she took to travelling as a mercenary and came to the village Fiana in the Thracian Peninsula. Leif tried to convince her to help Finn by offering to give her the Light Brand he inherited from Ethlyn. Eyvel took the three in without demanding a thing, and even took to taking care of Leif and Nanna as if they were her own children instead of Lachesis. Leif and Nanna would later reflect that their years living in Fiana were the best of their lives: they grew up surrounded with new friends like Dagdar and his fellow bandits Osian, Halvan and a myrmidon named Mareeta, under Eyvel's mother-like care.

After three years, Leif's peaceful time in Fiana came to an end in Grann 776. Fiana was invaded and conquered by Baron Raydrik of Munster, who abducted Nanna and Mareeta. Leif returned to find Fiana still occupied by Munster soldiers, and after driving the soldiers out he discovered what happened to Nanna and Mareeta, and resolved to storm Munster and rescue them. Eyvel and Finn resolved to assist him in this cause. But in the way, Leif was ambushed, arrested by Raydrik and taken back to Munster for his imprisonment, along with Eyvel and Lifis, while Finn and the rest of the Freeblades evaded capture.

With the assistance of members of the Magi, Leif escaped the dungeon and emerged into the castle's main halls. He and the Magi fought their way into the castle's main halls to free Eyvel and Nanna, only to find that Eyvel had been petrified by the bishop Veld's dark magic and that Raydrik had used a cursed sword to control Mareeta. He succesfully saves Nanna, then both and the Magi escaped the castle and rejoined with August, then, swearing to someday return and free Eyvel, the band carefully evaded the Munster soldiers in the city's main streets and escaped the city grounds. From then on, Nanna accompanied Leif throughout the rest of this game with her Lands Sword (Earth Sword) she inherited from her mother.

By reclaiming his homeland, Leif, Finn and Nanna were forced to maintain Leonster's defenses against the siege for six months, slowly but surely losing territory to the Empire until Seliph's army finally arrived and defeated the siege army. Later, Leif would manage to fix almost all the damage done to his army, such as undoing Eyvel's pertrification and having Saias purify the cursed sword carried by Mareeta. As a result, Saias entrusted Leif with the Bragi Sword, a weapon that can only be used by the descendants of any Crusader, including himself and Nanna.

In doing so, together they managed to finally finish off Raydrik and then his newly revived Deadlord controlled by Veld. Finally, Veld is defeated by Leif's army, ending Loptrians' grip on the Thracian peninsula. Upon Seliph's arrival, he congratulated Leif on his victory and they vowed that together they would free the rest of the Jugdral continent, with Leif taking Nanna with him.

Fire Emblem: Genealogy of the Holy War
Leif, Nanna and Finn reunite with Seliph to complete the liberation of the entire Leonster territory. They then launch an attack on Thracia and manage to kill Travant, the evil king of Thracia, putting a definitive end to the attacks from Thracia and the Grannvale Empire.

Leif and Nanna continued to fight for Seliph's cause for the remainder of the war after Seliph's conquest of Thracia. He participated in the battles in Miletos, Chalphy (where Seliph manages to avenge his father's death by killing Arvis in his homeland) and in the final showdown against the forces of the Grannvale Empire and its dark prince, Julius and her fiancée Ishtar in the capital Belhalla.

Soon after Seliph's victory at Belhalla, Leif departed with Nanna to assist Ares, Nanna's cousin, in liberating Agustria. Leif later married Nanna and founded the New Kingdom of Thracia, uniting both halves of the peninsula, and ruled as its first king. Working with Nanna, Arion and Altena, he dedicated the rest of his life to building a lasting peace and prosperity for all of Thracia.

Fire Emblem Heroes
Leif and Nanna are two of the heroes that the player can summon via the Breidablik using orbs to help Alfonse and his sister Sharena defending their kingdom Askr from the Emblian Empire. As in their original game, Leif and Nanna can develop a bond, but as support rather than love points. They can raise their level of support in the following ranks: C, B, A and S if they stand together in the gameplay. Each has their variations, the normal, the festive and the legendary.

Fanon
Naneif is one of the popular canonical pairings in the Fire Emblem franchise, despite the option to marry others in Genealogy of the Holy War. Most of the fans who are really invested on this shipping are Japanese though, because the game where its story takes place was distributed only in Japan, more than two decades ago.

While Thracia 776 dictates this as a canonical pairing, in Genealogy of the Holy War the game still encourages Leif to marry Nanna in the second generation, as they both start with 100 love points between each other in the game's internal data and in some chapters both can initiate conversations that further increase said points, while all their other potential lovers start with 0 points and therefore also encourages Lachesis, Nanna's mother, to marry any man in the first generation.

The pairing is very liked due to the fairy tale feeling, even though the western fans criticize them due to their ages. The main rival pairing is Jeanneif, where Jeanne takes Nanna's role if Lachesis died or did not marry in the first generation in Genealogy of the Holy War. The others main rivals are Nanna x Ares and Leif x Miranda.

Fandom
FAN FICTION
 * Leif/Nanna tag on FanFiction.net
 * Leif/Nanna tag on FanFiction.net

Trivia

 * In the manga adaptation of Genealogy of The Holy War by Nea Fuyuki Leif and Nanna are lovers.