Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters and any writing I use them in is purely for entertainment, not money.
A/N: We're going to go ahead and assume the religious folks of 17th century Paris fasted because I can't find anything at all to prove or disprove that. This was written during Lent but if the potential historical inaccuracy gets to you then don't feel you have to think of it as such. He feels bad and he's fasting, okay? Okay.
Slightly different style to normal and first foray into Musketeer-land (also haven't finished the series yet but hey ho), here we go and please drop me a line to let me know what you thought. T.
Also, this is for Hawkataine who may never read this but who beta-ed for me and to whom I am very grateful - I hit a block on the other one, I'm sorry!
For forty days each year, Aramis – like many others – fasts. He lives in self-inflicted exile from his friends and would-be lovers with whom he has so often allowed himself to be lead into sin. His days pass in silence and solitude but for what is required of him by the regiment. Deprived of all but the most basic of sustenance, he finds strength in his hunger. His face pales; his body wastes. Alone, he walks the godforsaken alleyways and presses food bought with his own coin into the hands of children, the sick, the dying – the forgotten wretches of the Parisian underbelly. Finally, he wends his slow way back into the light, accepting any blow that is dealt him as he goes by those he has missed because even when his purse and his belly are empty it is not enough.
For forty days, Porthos watches. No stumble goes unnoticed; no momentary loss of concentration goes unremarked. In silent outrage – for he has learned long ago what fury his interference unleashes – his heart breaks over the ever-darkening circles around his friend's eyes and the slow but sure decline of his beauty until he seems just another scarecrow vagabond wandering the streets of Paris, searching for the coming of his saviour. Unbeknownst to his quarry, Porthos whiles away the evenings in filthy taverns-come-surgeon-rooms and waits for the man that is a poor echo of his friend to pass by. In the darkness, he holds a knife to the throat of any man who would dare follow his oblivious brother from the depths, because the meek and poor may be blessed but Porthos recalls only too well the savagery that that poverty breeds. When his friend meets daylight once more, Porthos breathes a sigh of relief and returns to the shadows. There, he snatches up the arm of the first over-painted, over-young girl he comes across, presses coins into her hand and points her in the direction of the nearest inn. Her confusion when he refuses to join her is as tragic as it is stomach-turning but it is the same every year. When that is done, he returns to the training yard and meets every opponent until his strength fails him and he is forced to retire – limbs burning and head throbbing – to his rooms. He prays in words that he does not understand, words that he did not know before he met his brothers, and falls onto his bed, knowing that somewhere in the city his brother is offering up the same prayers with a desolate sincerity that Porthos himself cannot bring himself to possess.
For forty nights, Aramis kneels on hard stone floors and bows his head in prayer. He welcomes the pain for it cleanses him and offers hope that he may one day be permitted to atone for his sins. There is a bench near the front of the church where his arms have worn the wood smooth, where the grain is darkened by the tears he has wept - yet still he goes. He makes his way through the streets each evening until he kneels before the Lord with desperately whispered prayers on his tongue until pain or exhaustion overcomes him. He wakes, more often than he can bear to think of, to the ghostly warmth of a hand on his shoulder, but he cannot bring himself to turn, nor to raise his eyes to the Lord in his failure. His rosary is worn smooth, the figure on the crucifix all but gone and still when he reaches the last of his recitations, he brings it to his lips with trembling hands and begins again. He prays. Until his voice is gone, until the visage of Christ blurs before his eyes, until there is only pain and regret and his own voice whispering in his head, he prays. He prays for forgiveness, for guidance, for the Divine to change the very nature of his being and cease his never-ending cycle of licentiousness and penitence. Only when the first of the sun's rays begin to break through the eastern window does he cease his implorations and endure the sweet agony that moving brings him. His fingers are bloodied and his knees feel worn to the very bone, but still it is not enough.
For forty nights, Athos abstains from all but a little of his customary drinking. With each passing night, his mind – and memories – grows clearer. Therefore, it is well that there are three of them in this fierce bond that they have formed, because after his abstinence comes his darkest period wherein there is not enough alcohol in the whole of Paris that can soothe away his sorrow and he cannot ask any one of his friends to shoulder his burden with him. But for forty nights, he is distracted from his own pain, and for that he is grateful - though the form this distraction takes seems to nobody's benefit. Each night, when the sun is just barely beginning to set, he forgoes his evening repast and instead trails his friend to the east of the city. He sits in silent watchfulness, unseen or else unheeded by his charge and listens as the congregation raises its voice to the heavens in song. When there is only one penitent left kneeling at the front of the church, he strains his ears and marvels at the beauty of his friend's words – how every syllable is perfectly formed despite the man's desperation, as if to mispronounce a single syllable would itself be an affront to the God he tries so hard to appease. Athos learns the hard way that, though it goes against his every instinct, it is far kinder to wake his friend from any unintentional sleep as soon as possible lest he berate himself all the more for it later. Whether he is asleep for ten minutes or ten seconds, the poor man is instantly horrified with himself, his prayers resumed with renewed resolution and it pains Athos to know his friend should judge himself so harshly. He listens to every hitching breath, every crack of his friend's voice as his throat begins to fail and Athos wonders how he could ever think Latin a beautiful thing again. He winces with every minute movement his friend makes as he attempts to stand, the hushed moans of pain cutting through him as surely as if the man screamed. In the few minutes it takes for the other man to breathe through his agony, Athos is gone and, if the sound of the door closing behind him is noticed, it is never mentioned. Athos returns to his rooms, closes his eyes for what seems like seconds and is in the training yard by the time his friends arrive.
On the fortieth night, Aramis does not steal away in solitude to the east when his duties for the day are done. He kneels on the flagstone at his own bedside, clutches his rosary in his hands and prays. The room goes dark but still he prays; there is not abjection enough in the world that can grant him absolution for his depravities, for his most craven desires. His voice fails; his body sags against the bed. The bells ring out across the city and rejoice in the coming of the new day.
On the fortieth night, Porthos does not retire to his rooms, bruised and battered. He lingers in the training yard or else bides his time in some inn or other. Athos does not traipse across the city after a man who should sense when he is being followed. Instead, the two meet at the gate to the garrison and wander in silence to the room wherein their other friend now kneels. They do not exchange accounts of his actions as they might have years before but there is a tense anticipation between them that is not broken until they reach their destination. They enter the familiar room unbidden, restore its sleeping occupant to his rightful place and sit in companionable peace until daybreak.
On the forty-first day, Aramis wakes in his own bed to find the sunlight streaming through the gaps in the shutter boards. On the forty-first day, they do not leave Aramis' rooms, though there are bells ringing throughout the city that demand they go. Aramis sighs, fingers caught by the paler ones of another as - without conscious thought - he reaches for his rosary. He stretches and his body moans in contented protest at the righteous pain it brings him. However, his pious determination is at an end and he has no strength left in him; what little he may have had is sapped by the effort of waking his other sentinel. He submits himself to their attentions, meets their unspoken rebukes with mournful affection. At their order, he sits bonelessly against the bedframe and swathed in blankets. Porthos talks of nothing, simply for the joy of doing so. Athos reads aloud, or else dozes but wakes himself with dreams they do not speak of, his own darkness threatening at the outermost edges of his consciousness. Aramis sleeps; he drinks weak meat broth from the spoons proffered towards him, and straight from the bowl when he is able to summon the strength to do so.
On the forty-first night, Aramis lays in contented half-wakefulness and listens to his companions' snores. He scratches murmured songs from his throat and, with one hand, shakes Athos in his chair just hard enough to wake him from a sleep haunted by unknown terrors. He smooths his thumb across the dark circles beneath the eyes that mar Porthos' handsome face and wishes he could believe it was not him who put them there. As the light of the candle begins to flicker and wane, he turns his gaze towards the heavens and thanks God for their sakes that the fast is over. Finally, he turns on his side towards one, reaches out a hand to the other and waits with baited breath for-
"A'mis?" Dark eyes open sleepily, a head of rough curls presses itself more firmly into his hand and a hand reaches out to mirror his hold.
"Mm?"
Behind him, the figure in the chair shifts and the flickering light is put out. Fingers clasp his and he could be forgiven for mistaking the voice that answers him for a breath of wind.
"Please...Enough."