Characters/Pairing: Gawain/Galahad (implied)
Rating: PGish
Disclaimer: The characters herein belong (in this incarnation) to Jerry Bruckheimer and Co...but I've borrowed from the legends as well.
Warning: Angst. Lots of it.
Author's Notes: Written for the "Only the Strong Survive" challenge at the kingarthurfanfiction yahoogroup. I don't claim to be an expert on Sarmatian beliefs; it just seems fitting to me that the Knights might worship the horse goddess who is sometimes known as Epona, although she is not mentioned here by name.
Summary: Gawain is bereaved.
Gawain sat on the slope above the cemetery, staring into space. He was trying to count the birds that wheeled and soared above the trees, in an effort to avoid looking down at the graveyard; in particular at the three fresh graves, close together near the edge of the trees. He was also trying to keep his mind off the events of the past week, without much success. If he thought about it much more he was afraid he would go insane; he thought he could already feel the first tendrils of madness beginning to entangle his mind. And so there he was, counting birds, finding shapes in the clouds, concentrating very hard on the sound of the wind in the leaves and the feel of the grass beneath his hands. Keeping vigil for his three lost brothers.
He had been there for two days and nights now, barely moving and hardly sleeping. Vanora had made sure someone brought him food and drink, sending a serving girl to leave it at a safe distance so that he would not have to speak to her. Everyone else had left him alone, reasoning that he would need time to himself before he would be able to begin to put the last week behind him.
Personally, Gawain doubted that he would ever be able to put it completely behind him. He certainly couldn't imagine ever being able to think about it without the sharp, bitter pain that gripped his heart and filled his mind with images he wanted only to forget.
It had happened so quickly. In the space of just a few days, all his little brothers were gone and he was no longer the eldest, just the only one. Gaheris and Gareth had fallen in battle at the hands of the Woads, fighting back-to-back as had always been their habit, and Agravain, the youngest, had succumbed two days later to the sweating sickness that had already incapacitated half of the garrison and killed a handful of them. Without them to look after Gawain felt oddly purposeless. The eldest brother was all he knew how to be; without them he was not even sure who he was any more.
The clouds drifted peacefully across the sky and the sun began its descent, and Gawain found himself thinking of his childhood, and of his brothers. They had been fairly close in age; Gawain was the eldest by two years, then came Gaheris and Gareth only a year apart, and so close that they might as well have been twins. There had been a little sister who had not lived to see her first birthday, and then Agravain, three years behind Gareth. They had been close, all of them, and the younger ones had all looked up to Gawain. He had felt the responsibility keenly and had done his best to be a good brother to them; it had been he who had taught them to ride and hunt, galloping wildly across the plains of their homeland.
He had missed them dreadfully when the time came for him to leave under the command of the Romans. He had worried for them, and wondered how they would get along without him to look after them. He had not expected to see them again. He had no idea where he would be posted, and did not dare to hope that when their time came, his brothers would be posted to his garrison of all those in Rome's vast empire. His joy when first Gaheris and Gareth, and then a few years later Agravain, had come riding in with the new recruits, had cheered everyone; even sour-tempered Cei, the master-at-arms and Arthur's foster brother, had smiled, and Vanora had sighed maternally (though in truth she was only a few years older than Gawain) and said that it did the heart good to see four brothers who loved each other so, and she hoped that her badly-behaved brood would grow up to be more like Gawain and his brothers than like their father; although she had smiled at Bors as she said it and everyone had known that she had only been teasing.
Gawain had worried about them, of course; happy as he was to have them with him, he was still saddened that they had not escaped his fate, that they too had been forced from their home and brought to this cold, wet place to fight the blue-painted demons who seemed to melt into the trees just before any decisive victory could be scored over them. In his heart Gawain had secretly sympathised with the Woads, for they were as badly treated by the Romans as the Sarmatians were, yet they were given no chance to save themselves for they were of no practical use to Rome, unlike the Sarmatians with their superior horsemanship.
But Gawain felt that way no longer. Not since he had seen his brothers cut down by the savage Britons; not since he had seen what had been done to their bodies. He burned for revenge; it crawled beneath his skin and made his bones itch. He knew it would achieve nothing, which was partly why he had kept himself apart from the other knights until he could dampen his rage; their talk would only have fanned the flames. Gawain did not trust himself in combat at the moment, and he would not trust himself again until he could begin to ignore the pain in his heart. For now it still sang through him every waking moment, and when he slept his dreams were filled with it. Its keening wail was loudest for Agravain, he thought. Little Agravain, still only fourteen, not really a man grown at all. He had always been a slightly sickly child, though no less brave than his brothers, and he had only been in Britain for a year. He was still not used to the climate or the close conditions in the fort, barracked together with more people than had lived in their entire community at home. He had been easy prey for the sickness and had been unwell for a week before that fateful battle; he had not known about Gaheris and Gareth until the very last. Gawain had not wanted to worry him, but when it became clear that Agravain would not live, he had felt he had to tell him. He could not let his youngest brother go to meet his destiny unaware that he would find his brothers there before him. So he had told him the barest bones of the story, whispered it into Agravain's delirium, and the boy had let out a single, anguished sob, the only sign he had given since the sickness took hold that he heard what was said to him. Less than two hours later he had breathed his last and Gawain had come close to breaking.
Yet he refused to break. He was strong, and he owed it to his brothers to remain so. He would honour their memory, and he would avenge their deaths when he could be sure that he would not lose himself in the process.
The sun sank behind the horizon in a blaze of bloodstained colour and deep indigo shadows crept out of the trees, obscuring the graves from Gawain's sight; finally he felt he could look, now that he could not actually see the mounds of earth standing out starkly, obscenely, from the grass. When the moon rose her light would gleam upon the swords at the head of each mound, but by then Gawain would be looking at the sky again, counting stars as he had done the previous two nights.
He heard soft footsteps making their way towards him but he did not turn round; it was probably Vanora's serving girl bringing him food and ale again. She would place them a few feet away and then she would return to the tavern.
But the footsteps did not stop, and their owner sat down carefully upon the grass about an arm's length from Gawain. He did not speak, but Gawain knew without looking that it was Galahad. The younger knight was the only one who would have dared to approach him at the moment, and Gawain had to admit that he was probably the only one who would have thought to do it. He also had to admit that Galahad was the only one whose company he could tolerate tonight; in fact, he thought, he actually welcomed it. Galahad had the sense not to try and cheer him up and his silent companionship was exactly the comfort Gawain had not realised he needed.
After a while Galahad shuffled a little closer and leaned over to place a platter and flagon on the ground in front of Gawain's feet. "Vanora would only let me bring you this if I promised at least to try to get you to eat it," he said quietly. "I won't push you, though."
Gawain nodded, but he did not look at Galahad, and he did not move to pick up the food. Galahad's company comforted him, and his voice warmed him, but he was horribly afraid that if he acknowledged his friend's presence, his fragile composure might break.
They sat in silence for a while longer as night fell and a chill breeze began to blow. Gawain shivered a little despite himself, and at that Galahad shuffled nearer still.
"They are free now," he said softly. "The Horse Mother watches over them, and they roam the plains as Her children. They are safe now."
"I know," Gawain whispered, and his voice broke just a little. "But it doesn't comfort me. Not like it should."
"No, I don't suppose it does," said Galahad. "But it will. Later, when it's not so raw. She will send you comfort, and you will heal."
Gawain nodded again, and found himself having to swallow against the unfamiliar weight of tears in his throat. He had not wept for his brothers, for to weep would be to own himself broken and defeated; indeed, he could not remember the last time he had cried. Probably when he had left his home, he supposed. He took a deep, shuddering breath, and was obscurely comforted by the gentle touch of Galahad's hand on his shoulder. Fighting to regain control of himself, he did not resist when that hand slid across to his other arm, gently pulling him close; he rested his head upon his friend's shoulder and closed his eyes, biting his lip fiercely.
They stayed there through the dark of the night, not speaking, not sleeping; and if Gawain did finally allow himself to weep neither of them ever spoke of it. They were closer after that night, almost inseparable, as if they knew that the one loss that could not be borne would be to lose each other. And in time the pain receded, and Gawain began to heal; he was seen to smile again, although he never truly forgot the loss of his brothers. He avenged their deaths in battle, but as a soldier, not as a vengeance-crazed madman, and for that he was thankful in later years; for that, and for Galahad, for in his friendship with the younger knight he knew that the Horse Mother watched over him, too, and blessed him.