Title: The Mourning (or the Life and Deaths of Marian Fitzwalter)
Characters: Marian, mentions of practically everyone else, slight Marian/Robin and Guy/Marian
Genre: I guess, a little bit of H/C with some angst and drama, but really, this is just something my brain conjured up
Warnings: Spoilers for the two first seasons
Summary: In Acre, Marian reflects on her life and the last time she was dying.
Disclaimer: I own nothing in this.
The Mourning (Or the Life and Deaths of Marian Fitzwalter)
"The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time."
— Mark Twain
It feels weird, the quietness that has taken over, after days of worrying and almost dying and almost marrying the person who almost killed you in the first place.
It feels weirder however, the quietness in her head as Vaisey tells her of Robin's death. Even more so, when Guy betrays her (and she will think about it like that, even if you cannot betray someone you do not trust and God knows that trust was lost a long time ago) and when Vaisey threatens her with death.
When Marian was seven years old and her mother had just died, she dreamed. She dreamed that one day she would find someone to share the love her parents had. That one day, someone would love her just for her and not because they were expected to marry. At the time, Robin seemed like it.
When Marian was sixteen, Robin left and she stopped dreaming of marriage. Not that it still wasn't there, this very human desire to settle down and have a family, but it didn't seem a likely prospect. Robin had chosen glory over her. Had chosen a war that couldn't be won.
Even now, after his return, after admitting – both to herself and to him almost – that she still loves him, she can feel the tendrils of anger gripping her insides and making her teeth clench. Stupid, foolish, idiotic man.
And really, it feels unfair, because she didn't understand him at the time: because when Marian were seven, when she was ten and when she was sixteen, the world was still a good place. Yes, there were still people going hungry, but her father was Sheriff and she prided herself in thinking that he was a just one, a kind and fair man and people where happy.
She would like to blame him really, for the things that has been going on: because the part of her mind that whispers abandonment every time she sees him, connects his departure with the arrival of Vaisey. That part is convinced, that if Robin had stayed, things would have been different from the start. The people would not have endured so much. She would have been happy.
In Acre, it is neither dark nor cold and the scorching hot sun is anything but the heavy rain falling down outside as she was dying the first time. Robin is there with her, they're all there and as she says the vows – which she is surprised she can remember, after all this time – her minder wanders and she isn't in Acre, but in a cave in England almost a year ago and then back at Knighton Hall, with a father who is neither dead nor a shadow of his former self. She's happy, for just a moment, until she realizes what it really is and that Robin has already left.
She doesn't understand his need to leave for war, knows that it was perhaps stupid to lie this way: to tell him that it was alright, when clearly it wasn't. But the immature side of her is thinking that he should have noticed anyway. That he should have never even thought about leaving. She's still angry when he returns, determined to keep going as she always had: she doesn't need his help, doesn't want it. But she recognizes the look in his eyes, know what's going to happen just moments before he pulls out his bow and shoots down Will and Luke and Allan. She's seen that look countless times, in the mirror, in a pair of pale eyes just visible behind a green mask. She has been fighting a war too and the arrogant part of her things that her cause is a more just one, than going to the Holy Land could ever be. It's probably just her anger speaking, but she's loath to admit that.
Before she almost died the first time, in that dark and dirty old cave, Marian was also loath to admit that Robin was doing a difference: a bigger difference than she thinks she could have ever accomplished on her own. She thinks (swearing that she will never tell him this as she does it) that maybe she was fighting a losing battle, trying to fight the Sheriff on not just one, but two fronts. And being only one person to do so.
She supposes she should feel lucky that she hadn't been caught or almost killed sooner: that she could have kept up the charade for so long, without consequences. She would like to think that a part of Guy knew all along, about the Nightwatchman, and didn't do anything because a part of him – just the smallest part, the part she hopes she touches in those quiet moments when it's just them and the world is standing still – agreed with her and wanted to help her, because he loved her and it was the right thing to do.
The shocked look on his face when he removed her mask told her otherwise. Maybe it was naïve to believe so much in someone who burned her house to the ground, but Marian would like to think that even in the darkest of moments, there is hope. She's seen more hope in these last months that ever before in her life. It's in the faces of the people around her, but even more so in the people around Robin. They radiate it, like sunlight and she feels herself gravitate towards it, wanting to have a part in all of that.
Maybe that is Robin's strength: he has Will and Allan, Little John and Djaq and even when all the others have left, he will have Much. They might just be six outlaws in a forest, but to the people of England, they seem – and are – greater than any army and Marian is proud to know them. They are good men: that much she has always known, but it doesn't become apparent to her until Little John carries her inside the cave, settling her down on the stone more gentle than any man his size should be able to. It doesn't really mean anything, until Djaq is hitting her heart, using all the strength in her small body to bring her back, until Much's hand are covered in her blood and Will is crying because she's gone. It doesn't fill her with a warm feeling of content, until Allan's voice cuts through a haze of pain, I'm not being funny, and she can see again and she opens her eyes and they're all there. She has never been more proud to call someone her friends before, even when Allan betrays them and everything just seem to get worse.
She's still proud, and happy, as they're all tied up in the desert, waiting for a slow and painful death. She doesn't want to die, she allows herself that thought, and she really wants to blame Robin, because if he hadn't been so idiotic and idealistic, he wouldn't have gone through all this trouble to save a King who is currently busy killing all of them. But the sun is burning her slowly and she doesn't have the energy to be angry and immature. After all, she is happy that she gets to die with them and not all alone at the end of Vaisey's sword as she'd first thought.
She finishes the vows, her tongue dry in her mouth. She just has enough spirit left to smile when Much's starts crying, because she feels like she should be brave for his sake: he once helped keep her alive and she doesn't want to see him sad.
It's been alright, she thinks and then there's the absolute relief that fills her body, as Carter comes back and she has never felt this free in her entire life: Marian is sure she can do anything, because now she has escaped death twice and she's tired of living her life behind masks. She understands now, the thrill Robin must have felt when he first arrived to this place, because while it was stupid, it was also something he felt that he had to do and God knows Marian has done enough stupid things to last a lifetime. All of the sudden, saving King Richard becomes as important to her as slipping bread into thin children's hands and she's running across the sand, not letting her exhaustion or her lack of a weapon stop her. It'll end here, she's sure of it, it'll all be over now and her people will be free and when the words slip from her lips she doesn't regret them, not even when she recognizes the look on Guy's face as the same look she must have been wearing when Robin left and anger had been burning her from the inside out.
Marian thinks she can hear someone crying, and wonder if it's her attacker and she finds that she's not mad: all she can think is, it's your hell, and she's a bit sad that this time there will be no smiles as she survives, because she won't survive this one. And that's really not fair, an off-hand part of her thinks, but nothing in life really is, and at least she has been doing something instead of sitting at home with her embroidery. It doesn't even take a lot to smile at them as she's dying, because the sand beneath her is actually cool now and the sun is making dots appear before her eyes, so she can pretend that this is England and she's lying in a cave and when she slips away she will wake up again. It might be just a naïve little girl thinking it, but it's good to dream.