Summary: "When DG's parents sit her down and tell her that Wyatt Cain has died, she doesn't believe it at first... Now she's standing in a clearing in the woods, staring at the mound of dirt displaced by Cain's body several feet below."
Rating: M for language
Warnings: Character death, language
Pairings: DG/Wyatt, DG/Jeb
Disclaimer: I do not own Tin Man or its characters and receive no profit from this story.
A/N: It's been quite some time since my last fic, but this has actually been in the works for months. I finally got the inspiration to polish it up and post it. Hope you forgive the twistedness...
When DG's parents sit her down and tell her that Wyatt Cain has died, she doesn't believe it at first. She shakes her head no, a dismissal. It's only when they insist, dead looks on their faces, that she breaks down and asks to be left alone. The next thing she remembers, she's riding out to the no-longer-rebel camp to talk to his men—to hear how it happened.
To see where they buried him.
Now she's standing in a clearing in the woods, staring at the mound of dirt displaced by Cain's body several feet below. She still can't believe that her Tin Man is under there. How could he die when he'd made it through so much? Fighting with the resistance; eight years—annuals, whatever—in that damn tin suit; helping DG find the emerald and restore the O.Z.
But all that didn't stop the Longcoats from shooting him right through the heart.
She shivers in the icy rain.
He was dead in minutes, they told her. No one could have done anything.
DG knows it's a lie even if they don't. She should have been there. To give him every ounce of her magic if he needed it. To give him her own life, even, if there were the slightest chance it might have saved him.
But instead, she was at her goddamn castle, probably laughing her way through a ball while Cain's life was bleeding out through his fingers.
A sudden cry tears itself from DG's throat and she drops to her knees on his grave. It's my fault. She pitches, sobbing, and falls to a fetal position in the cold, rain-drenched dirt. It's my fault. It's my fault. She doesn't care about ruining the fancy gown she's wearing because if she weren't a fucking princess then she'd have been there and he'd still be alive. Clawing her fingers into the rapidly forming mud, DG twists her body closer to him as she heaves in sorrow.
It's his son, Jeb, who finds her this way, hours later. He looks at her with such an expression of emptiness that she cannot help but sob tearlessly. She knows he hates himself for not making it to the funeral.
Jeb crouches and gently touches DG's shoulder. Slowly she sits up to lean against his arm, finds herself clutching it with muddy hands.
So strong, like his father.
DG looks at Jeb and sees her Tin Man. The same eyes: so expressive, so full of pain—though not as blue. The same lips: full and soft-looking. The same blond hair, same smooth skin lightly tanned from the outdoors.
DG does something she knows she'll regret:
She kisses him.
DG needs this, she rationalizes, pulling them to their feet, and by the way Jeb doesn't fight when she draws him closer, she knows he needs this too. She can taste their tears as they mix on her lips, and she clutches at him like a slipping dream, losing herself in a kiss she knows she'll never have. Caught in the made-up memory, she backs him out of the clearing into the woods and slams him against a tree, hard. Jeb bangs his head and bites her bottom lip.
The pain yanks DG back to gray reality, and she staggers backward, eyes wide with horror at what she's done. "I'm sorry," she pleads even as she spins to flee, wiping desperately at her mouth with a filthy velvet sleeve.
Jeb catches her by the elbow after only a few steps, turning her around. Confusion etches the lines of his face.
"He was your father," DG begs forgiveness, bleeding lip trembling in the rain, "and I was just—I don't know what I was."
He releases her arm and stares past her through the trees. DG feels like she's breaking apart as she waits for him to pass judgement.
After a painfully long moment, he meets her gaze directly. "I loved him too."
DG makes no move to deny it, just nods in numb relief that Jeb knows her secret and won't condemn her for it.
After a moment, he wraps his strong arm around her shoulders and leads her back toward camp.
DG knows, though, that she'll never really leave these woods. Not really.
-fin-
A/N: Thanks for reading! Wow, this is much angstier than I normally write, huh? But the muse goes where it will. Please r&r! I will personally respond to every review, and constructive criticism is as welcome as praise! And not to get anyone's hopes up, but I do have a sequel in the works... ;-)