Disclaimer: Ain't mine, never gonna be.
Notes: So this is one I wrote a while ago and just reencountered. I can't remember what prompted it, but I do have a tendency to write slightly strange, vaguely out of character oneshots for Gunther. Now that I look at it again, it really isn't anything special. But please review anyways! If you like it, or something really bugged you, I can't take your advice if I don't hear it and I won't know what to keep doing if I don't hear that either. Also you'll get a cookie! Or a cupcake. Always been a cupcake person myself, especially with those cute decorations. Man, sometimes they even have little animals made out of frosting!
(For anyone who's irritated by oneshots when I should by writing my chapter story, it's coming along! Gunther can be a dung-weevil to write sometimes, as I always want to make him more romantic than he really is, but I hope to get some writing done over Thanksgiving Break and finish the chapter.)
He was just a little boy, even a particularly little boy if one felt in the mood to make such specifications. He sat on the steps usually, watching the knights, in each eye a storm brewing of sad grey clouds. The old cook, almost blind, nearing the end of her days, and hunched from years of leaning over pots, thought that this was because of his mother. No one had seen the woman for at least a year, or maybe two – she had been kind, and that was all there was to say of her. The boy had her hair; black, shined as an oiled raven's wing, straighter than a lance. Nobody had bothered to verify if he had her temperament as well, as he really was a tiny thing and not worth concerning over. The cook would have disagreed if she had the time, but it was rather busy trying to feed an entire castle, and besides, she was not so fast as she used to be. The soup took longer than it had when she was a fresh young maid, and in order to finish the day's bread she woke before the sun.
The boy helped her sometimes, standing on a creaky grooved stool and stirring, the wooden spoon longer than his arm. After a while, they got her a lovely little girl, whom everyone was kind enough to call an assistant instead of a replacement. This girl looked rather a lot like the boy, that same hair and so pale too, but her eyes were filled with sunshine. Occasionally she had them both going at the same time on their respective stools, kneading or chopping, mixing and pouring. One such day the boy cut his finger, an angry gash stretching as long as a leech, but he never did cry out and she only noticed when he almost dumped bloodied carrots into her stew. Not a single tear did he shed, even as she scrubbed the wound out, her soap bar filled with sticks. The little girl cried for him instead, her small hand in his, their dirty fingers tangled in a knot.
After that the boy was not permitted to help in the kitchens anymore. Once again he sat by the knights, his scrawny knees pulled up to his chest. Every clash of those swords made him flinch, but he never did look away. He was there when the cook brought out chunks of freshly baked morning bread, and later for the noon meal, and he was still there when she fetched the knights' water pitchers before nightfall. She wondered where his father was, that he let such a little boy out alone.
For really, he always was alone, if one could be surrounded by people and still do so. There were others near his age, a boy with eyes like the sky, another with those like the earth – a girl with hair of fire. But he always sat alone, watching the world pass him by. It made her heart ache in sorrow.
On stormy days he would raise his eyes to look at the clouds, dark and overburdened with rain. His eyes were just as laden, but as far as the cook could remember before she lost all sight and was released from her post, he never let it go in the way the clouds did. Torrents of water streamed from the bruised, grey sky, and yet the little boy just tilted his small chin up and watched.
The day she left the Castle for the last time in her long life, her dear replacement led her across the uneven stone with warm strong hands and described the scene to her. The images, invisible to her eyes, thrived in her mind. There was the boy, as before, on the steps. Grown a little, nearly normal sized for a child now, but silent as ever, and those eyes.
Coming to an unsteady halt by him, she stretched out a hand. She was useless at cutting by then, but one did not need eyes to reach with the heart, and her wrinkled fingers encountered his small fist. Unfurling it, she murmured, "You know, boy, you need not simply watch. You can be a knight, just like them."
He said nothing, as he was wont to do, and the former cook sighed, turning to go – and then she felt the squeeze of his hand in hers. Firm it was, and it brought a thrill to her old bones.
She felt sure, if she could only see that small face, it would be smiling, a storm lifted.