"Brangienne," he said. "Would you like to marry me?"

She nodded. 'Yes. Would you like to marry me?"

Dinadan's mouth opened, and then shut again, silent. He could not bring himself to speak.

Her eyes dropped from his. "I see."

"I'm sorry," Dinadan said, catching her sleeve as she stood, "Brangienne, I'm sorry, wait."

She could not go, not without him explaining–

She sat down, her shoulders stiff. Her eyes were brightening with tears, and Dinadan's heart felt like it was trying to burrow into the ground through the soles in his boots.

"It's just that –" he stopped. Words, words, where had all his words gone? "I care about you, Brangienne. I really do. Never, ever, please never doubt that, you may doubt anything in the world that you wish, but never doubt that. But I'm afraid I care rather too much to marry you."

Brangienne brushed a stray tear away, and frowned at him. It was not a particularly condemning look, he thought. She looked…

…

perplexed?

"Let me get this straight," she said, slowly. "Your argument is that because you care for me, you should not marry me.

Dinadan nodded, his cheeks flushing. "Yes, although I think I haven't put it very well. Do you remember all those years ago, when we spoke about love?"

"I remember."

"And how it made people alternately or simultaneously stupid, cruel and blind to all the damage they did to the people around them?"

"Yes, of course I – oh. Oh." Her brown eyes went very wide. "You think that love turned Tristram and Iseult into terrible people, and it would do the same to us if we married."

He hadn't thought to put it in quite those terms, but yes, that was exactly what he suspected. It was probably more true of him than it was for Brangienne. He was Tristram's brother, and while Dinadan was acutely aware of their differences, there were also similarities that he saw every time that he caught sight of his reflection in clear water.

(They had the same mouth, the same eyes, although Tristram had Meliodas' jawline, and Dinadan had his mother's cheekbones–)

Besides, Dinadan didn't think Brangienne could become blinded to anything, no matter what the circumstances were. Her eyes were always so very clear.

And, at the moment, terribly sad as she looked at him.

"Have you ever seen a happy marriage?"

He blinked, thinking of red-cheeked wives, leaning back against their husbands' bodies, enjoying the way their husbands' arms curled around them. Thought of the terrified gaze of Modron's wife, and the endless, chilling loneliness and terror in her gaze.

"Some people seem to like it well enough," he allowed. "But…"

She nodded. "I know we haven't talked about them before, but – your parents? Were they happy?"

Dinadan swallowed. "I don't know. My mother – she died of sickness when I was still young. Five or sick. I only remember fragments. But from what everyone said about her – kind, gentle, loved music and poetry–"

Brangienne's smile was quietly knowing, and she couldn't quite keep from glancing at his rebec. Dinadan snorted. "Hush," he told her.

"I didn't say a word," she protested, but she smiled back. "So. Your mother was a wonderful woman, and I wish I could have met her. And your father?"

Dinadan looked at the grass. He could not meet her eyes. It was too frightening what he might see there.

"A nightmare," he said, softly. "At best, cold and distant. At worst, shouting, judgemental boor who was prone to thinly-veiled abusive tongue-lashings. And – I don't know what he was like before Mother died. But if she could have ever been happy with him before that point, she would have hated the man he turned into. I have to believe that. Nothing else makes sense."

Brangienne was silent beside him, and the only sound in the garden was the tranquil songs of the birds, and the sounds of their breathing. His eyes were burning, and he wasn't sure when his hand had clenched into a clumsy, badly formed fist.

Gently, Brangienne's fingers plucked his fingers free from the fist, one by one, holding them in her own.

"Turnabout is fair play," she said. "My mother was never a warm woman. But I knew she loved me. She never could say it, but it was in the way she braided my hair, and taught me to knit."

"You knit?" Dinadan asked, unable to suppress a smile. For some reason, he'd never been able to picture fiery Brangienne doing such a domestic task.

"Yes, Dinadan, I knit. I also weave, sew, garden, peel potatoes, and cook. You didn't think all noble women were like Iseult, did you?"

Dinadan laughed. "Not like Iseult, no, but I didn't have any sisters. I didn't know, Brangienne, it's as simple as that. You were saying?"

"My mother was never a warm woman. My father, though. Bright and cheerful and somehow, everything always seemed more hopeful when he was about. He died in one of the battles to reunite the Kingdoms, early in Arthur's reign. And Mother remarried, but she never, ever forgot my father. And – she always said the reason their marriage worked so well because they knew they thought about the world differently, and listened to each other. And it wasn't about winning, and it wasn't about being right when they argued, it was about listening, and trust, and the truest sort of friendship."

Dinadan smiled. "Well, I can't see any woman who raised you believing that it was all about seeing the most beautiful woman in the world and becoming her slave."

Brangienne rolled her eyes. "Oh, men like that. I've met them. Believe me, there's nothing a woman with any sense wants any less. We're proud creatures, but not that proud, and I think most would rather have willing team-mates who listen to them, rather than acolytes who'd put them on pedestals."

"You mean that you would," Dinadan said.

Brangienne's smile turned a little crooked. "I do. What about you, Dinadan?"

"I'd make a very disappointing idol, I think," Dinadan said dryly. "So no acolyte for me, either. But I don't know. I've never thought about marriage in those terms – friendship, team work, working together to build something. Usually, when you build something, you have some idea what you're working on at the beginning. When I write a song, I usually have some idea what I'm working on."

"But surely not all," Brangienne protested. "I've seen you compose. How often have you told me that you were believing it would go one way, when suddenly it turned in the complete opposite direction?"

Dinadan nodded. "True. But I do have some of the parameters fixed at the beginning, so to speak. And with marriage – I do not have the parameters fixed."

"You'd have at least one parameter fixed," Brangienne said. "You'd have me. And me, you know."

Dinadan looked at her, a lump in his throat. "I do," he whispered.

There was silence between them for a moment, as her hand lifted to his cheek and caressed it.

"It's your decision, my love," she said. "I cannot make it for you. I will not manipulate you. And either way, you remain my dearest friend. Nothing can change that. But if we do not try, we will never know."

"That's not an ethos that served either my brother or your friend very well," Dinadan pointed out. Brangienne's hand was cool against his cheek.

Brangienne smiled, withdrawing the hand. "Ah, but we have an advantage. Neither potions nor swords nor faeries feature in our story."

Dinadan chuckled. "There is that." He looked at her. Her eyes were gentle and hopeful, and her cheeks were somewhat pink from the heartfelt conversation, and he knew that in her bravery, she was more wonderful than any other woman he'd ever seen. "I could never do this with anyone else, you know. Speak so frankly, or care so deeply." He hesitated. "You really think we would be good together?"

"I know we would," Brangienne said simply. "I know you, and I know me."

And with those words, his mind calmed. In the end, the question became clear.

Do I trust her?

The question was not one he'd had to ask himself before. The person who'd usually had to take things on faith in their relationship was Brangienne herself, he realised. She'd had to trust that he, and Bedivere and Kai meant her no harm. She had to trust that his words were true, when he came riding in the middle of the night to take her to the convent. And since then, he had been her only link to the news outside of the world. Everything in their relationship, she had had to take on faith.

Maybe it's my turn to trust, he thought.

He nodded. "Alright. We'll do it."

Brangienne's eyes widened. "What?"

He smiled. "I said yes. I'll marry you, Brangienne."

Her jaw dropped, and slowly her lips curved into a wide smile that showed all her teeth, a smile that lit her face up. "You're certain?"

"No. But I trust you," Dinadan said. He squeezed her hands, and she kissed his lips, soft and quick and chaste. "You know I'd never live in the castle, and I don't even know where to begin with planning a wedding, or what's necessary–"

Brangienne put a finger against his lips. "Dinadan, you will ride the length and breadth of the world, singing and playing and finding trouble. And it will be my joy to be there beside you in everything." She grinned. "We might need to get one of your friends from Camelot to teach me how to use a weapon, though. At least one of us should be decent with them."

"You wound me, lady," Dinadan said, with mock-outrage in his voice, and Brangienne laughed.

And so, they began.

Author's Note:

First, let me just say I loved the way Morris ended this in canon. But it did occur to me that love and marriage are portrayed in a very specific way in his book, and it'd probably do Dinadan good to be exposed to the idea that not every marriage is either a sham or ridiculous or ends in adultery and cruelty to other people. It'd also probably do him good to realise that not all love is putting someone on a pedestal, but it's no less real and wonderful for all of that.

Second of all, I just love poking at canon and twisting it. I have no other excuse for this.

Third, if anybody's wondering about the Maid and Her Marshall, no, I probably won't finish it. I wish I could, but my brain, aside from rediscovering its affection for Dinadan and Brangienne, is stubbornly stuck on Marvel and, most recently, the Silmarillion fandom. So...yeah, I wouldn't hold my breath.

Thanks for reading; I hope you enjoyed.

Love,

Clueless