I have been wanting to write a closure for Allan/Djaq, and this is it. It is set during ep 2.13, maybe slightly AU. I do prefer Allan/Djaq over Will/Djaq, but this fic does acknowledge Will/Djaq as well. I don't bash that ship.
Enjoy, and feel free to leave a comment. :)
Wayward Heart
This room was never silent. Even in the middle of the night the birds still moved in their sleep, a hundred feathers brushing together, and in the height of day, the racket could be overwhelming. There was a wall of sound which pressed against your eardrums, the flapping of wings, the cooing and chirping, the sound of claw-like feet tapping against wood. The birds bowed, nodded their dumb heads up and down as they moved across their perches, heads twitching from side to side as beady eyes rested upon the room behind their bars. Their feathers caught the air and circulated it between the honey-coloured clay walls, and because of that, this room was never still.
Yet, in this very moment, the world around Djaq and Allan was unbelievably silent and perfectly still.
The Saracen woman held a cage with a gray-speckled carrier pigeon in her hands, clung to it like a shield or a manifestation of the emotional barrier her decision had put up between them. Her mouth was fixed into a determined line and her posture stiff from gathered courage. Only the watery eyes were soft in a silent plea for understanding. Desperation made her curl her fingers, squashing them into the holes in the cage, since everything in Allan's appearance manifested that he did not understand.
"Wha' do you mean you're staying 'ere?"
Allan had his hands resting defensively on his hips and his mouth had fallen open in wonder, vulnerable like a dog whose master had turned on him. Djaq's stomach churned at the unspoken accusation behind his words.
What do you mean you are abandoning me?
He threw out his arms and the pigeon in Djaq's cage mimicked his gesture by longingly stretching its wings, shaking its portable prison. She tightened her grip and pressed the cage closer to her torso.
"Please," she pleaded.
"But—why?!" Allan shrugged, the frustration tangible as his hands fell down and slapped against his thighs. "I don't get it! Why, Djaq?"
"Please do not ask that."
You already know why.
"Why?!" He spat the word at her, demanding an answer like a sledgehammer demands the hot iron to bend to it. She felt her determination waver, her stance recoiling into a silent excuse.
"Allan," she begged him. "Do you not know why?"
Allan flinched and lowered his eyes to the pigeon in the cage, staring intently at the dumb animal. A nod in bitter dejection, a wincing rush of guilt. The roaring of a hundred feathers rubbing together filled the void which words couldn't touch. Simultaneously both their minds wandered back a week in time, to a marketplace in Acre where the true source of Djaq's decision lay buried in a drunken memory.
It had been a costly mistake.
--
Scents are linked to memory like threads to a puppet. Thus the mixture of spices and warm sand, human bodies crammed together and the sharp tang of salty sea-air made Djaq's mind jerk as she moved through the marketplace. It might as well have been Saffiya who wandered through the crowd, another young woman with her posture slanting from the vessel resting on her softly swaying hip. Yet she was Djaq. She walked rapidly like a man, a short sword dangled where the women carried their baskets and she didn't bother with elegance. As she moved, she pressed her lips together and let her eyes dart between the stalls, patiently searching for the familiar blond head wedged amid the masses of dark strangers. Allan was a fool to get himself lost here, yet it was just like him. The tavern trickster was drawn to crowds like a moth to a flame, brashly undeterred by such minor details as being a stranger to the local customs and language.
A scent of tharāda cooking on a primitive stove caught her attention and Djaq stopped for a while to indulge in the memory of her mother's favourite food. Truth to be told, she didn't mind this little solitary jaunt. They had been in Acre for three days yet this was the first time she really felt like she was in her Acre. In the midst of the scents and the buzzing street life, she felt the winds from her past incarnations, and thus taking it upon herself to find Allan was a sacrifice she had made without complaints. She wasn't particularly worried about him. Generally speaking Allan seemed to have an almost uncanny ability to dodge out of every impossibly sticky situation he put himself in. Even if he forfeit every shred of decency in doing so.
Djaq gazed at the smoke curling up from the stove, carrying the enticing scents with it across the cobbled marketplace, and a thought tugged at her attention. There was a simple kind of tavern behind the stove, shaded by cloth which spanned between the wall and a solid stall belonging to a merchant with a bushy moustache daubed across the grim face. She crossed the street and her ears pricked up when she recognized a familiar voice.
"… e, why is that so bloody hard to understand!? A-l-e, ale, ale. Alright? Ale! Get it?"
A humming voice murmured something inaudible in Arabic in response and Djaq's mouth curled into a crooked smile. Leave it to Allan to try and buy ale from an Islamic merchant!
"No! Ale! I said ale!"
Djaq dodged in between the stove and the stall and caught the first glimpse of Allan's frustrated face, flushing with indignation when the merchant shuffled a cup of steaming tea across the table.
"What is this anyway?" Allan whined staring suspiciously at the hot beverage. "Are you trying to poison a paying customer, you shoddy half-ape?"
"Allan!" Djaq made herself known with a nod at the merchant and pulled up a chair to Allan's table. His distressed features melted instantly into a beaming smile.
"Djaq, am I glad to see you! I've been trying to get a pint of decent ale for 'alf an eternity 'ere. It should be easy enough. Right? I mean, it's ale! But they keep giving me this bloody herb-water instead. Bloody water with bloody leaves in it - what's that all about?! They must be 'aving a laugh—"
"It is tea," Djaq interrupted him with a patient smile. "It is good, you should try it."
"Tea," Allan snorted and stared at the beverage in open contempt, as if he was facing a stubborn enemy. He reminded Djaq of a kitten playing with an apple in a water bowl; hitting it with his paw only to see it bob up to the surface again; complacently unharmed by the cat's efforts. "Not being funny but you couldn't get an English bloke to drink this horsepiss for money."
Djaq raised her eyebrow at Allan's sulky appearance, recognising a challenge when she saw one. "You are just scared that you might like it," she scoffed lovingly, watching the change in Allan's face with restrained amusement. The trickster straightened his back and set his jaw in childish defiance.
"I am not scared of some Saracen brew!" he exclaimed indignantly. "I just don't want to get sick or whatever."
"Trust me Allan, you are far more likely to get sick from some poor English ale."
"Nah a fine quart of Nottingham ale's never hurt nobody," Allan grinned. "Look, who drinks water anyway? I reckon it'd be like chewing the bloody grain instead of baking it into bread, right? You'd 'ave to be a bit daft - that's all I'm saying."
"What are you talking about? We drank water all the time in the camp!"
"Yeah well, we also ate Much's cooking mind you. Beggars can't be choosers. Well, except if you're an A-Dale kind of beggar." He flashed her a mischievous grin.
Djaq shook her head as her mouth twisted sarcastically into a crooked smile. Allan had a strange kind of family pride. The A-Dales may be harlots and thugs, pick-pocketing scoundrels, beggars and tavern tricksters, but they were good at their respective vices. They may be liars but they lied better than most people spoke the truth, they may be cowards but, like the rats that left the sinking ship first, they got out alive, they may be falling but they always landed on their feet. In this staggering lifestyle in the gray areas of society Allan was occasionally boastful like a noble, proud like a master craftsman, sanctimonious like priest. He seemed to think that his name demanded respect simply because it was carried by the best of the worst. It struck her that he must have been like this constantly once upon a time - a slick lad who didn't think twice about morals and infinitely proud of who he was. Survival above everything. Leave it to Robin to swagger into a self-sufficient rogue's life and flip it over, being half a blessing and half a disaster who tore everything down and expected Allan to rebuild it better. New values, new goals, a new family to care for. The other outlaws seemed blatantly unaware of the challenge this would pose to a man who never considered virtues something to strive for. Perhaps Djaq realized this because she was a woman, naturally empathetic to the mindsets of others, or perhaps because she was a Saracen and thus as much a stranger to their way of thinking as he was. Attitudes have to be understood to be learned, and she wasn't sure that Allan always quite comprehended the reasons for acting the way they expected him to act.
"I tell you what," she smirked in a singsong accent that was more pronounced simply by being here. "You drink that cup of tea and I will take you to a place where there is wine. It if formally forbidden by Islamic law but such proscriptions often find themselves evaded."
Allan grinned in hopeful zeal and grabbed the cup, resting his other hand on his knee as if he needed to gather strength for the challenge ahead. With the experience of a man who had participated in a considerable amount of drinking-games, he gulped down the steaming beverage in one steady swig, not stopping even as it burned his tongue, and finished it off by banging the cup into the table. Djaq cocked her eyebrow to his smug grin, feeling her mouth twitch into a smile.
"Somehow, I find myself unimpressed," she said. Allan shrugged, the air of contentment still intact in his face.
"Got the job done though."
"So it did, and I am a woman of my word even to a man of too many words. Come."
Djaq could not recall the fastest way to the area of Acre known as 'the pit', and thus the walk there was a long one. There was nothing to get Allan going quite like the prospect of spending a couple of hours drinking and playing tricks on less clever men, and he was surprisingly patient with the serpentine roads. Djaq noticed, not for the first time, that his nonchalant way of prancing through the alleys wasn't as unwary as it appeared, but rather shaded by a subtle kind of cautiousness. He rarely ventured into open spaces and if there was a shadow then he would choose it over a more brightly-lit part of the street. He moved smoothly, talked softly, albeit without many pauses, and always had one eye on his surroundings. In spite of all this, it was still a surprise to Djaq that it was Allan who finally found 'the pit'. She was dodging into another road when he stopped and tugged her back, gesturing at an alley on the opposite side of a small square.
"I reckon this pit is a dodgy kind of place, right?" he mused, and Djaq nodded in agreement. She looked at the alley for a while before it occurred to her what he was talking about. The modest appearance of the street opening, the shabby houses whose angular facades were flaking, the gloom between the buildings, even the lady who lounged a little bit too long in the street corner. These were all signs of a considerably less affluent part of town.
"Looks like a pit to me," Allan shrugged and Djaq could only agree. A wobbly figure leaned against the wall next to the woman, rummaging though his possessions for coin and sprawling out his legs wider for balance while completing this task "Besides I'm pretty sure that bloke in the turban's had one too many."
"Pleasant-looking man," Djaq smiled sarcastically. The woman looked professionally at the pieces of metal in the drunk's hand, then shook her head and coldly turned her attention to the street again. With his shoulders slumping, the man started to shuffle down the alleyway and Djaq and Allan followed him until they found themselves in a modest bar. Compared to the neighbourhood it wasn't a particularly shabby place, but rather a simple-looking room which was lit by oil-lamps in red clay and comfortably furnished. The white walls were smudged with soot where the flames had been licking against them. Yet it smelled considerably less of smoke than the average English tavern.
Allan dropped down by a corner table, his raised hand forming a couple of swift signs to the waiter, which got them two tin cups and a glass flask with deep red wine without uttering so much as a word. It amazed Djaq how easily he fitted in here, melting as naturally into the crowd of rascals as if he'd been born in this part of Acre. He poured the drink into their cups and shuffled one of them over to her side of the table in one smooth movement, the metal sliding across the wood with treacherous ease. There had been a time when she could have sworn that her tongue never would touch anything as volatile and taboo as wine, but since then her life had altered and her mind with it. The English water carried diseases, or so they insisted, and thus ale became a life insurance for the peasantry, boiling away the harm and the filth. Djaq had broken the Holy Laws of the Hadith and Qur'an so many times that she had developed a lingering hope that Allah would prove less strict than the mujtahids.
Djaq's hand closed around the cup of wine with a click of nails on metal and it occurred to her that if ever their Christian devil decided to roam the earth, he might well take on a skin much like Allan-A-Dale's. The trickster's eyes held an appearance of almost childish innocence, nonchalantly urging her to join him in his version of harmless fun. He raised the cup with a nod and a grin, flashing a set of teeth that might as well have been fangs as far as Djaq was concerned. Many enemies had done her less harm than his saw-toothed friendship - not because he wished her ill but because she wished him well so desperately. Occasionally she had feared that she might consider falling just to keep him company. The sucking depths that surrounded her in Allan's company cast her into a moment of vertigo, yet the fear passed swiftly with the sweet taste of wine upon her tongue and she allowed herself a warm smile.
"It is good? I am no authority on wine," she explained softly. "Wouldn't call myself an expert either," Allan responded, then filled his mouth and started smacking thoughtfully. "Sort of a metallic aftertaste, innit?" "I think that may be the tin in the cup."
He let out a shrill laugh that seemed misplaced in the oddly sombre atmosphere of the bar. For a while they bickered back and forth over the wine, Allan sinking comfortably into the seat and Djaq remaining straight with her elbows resting against the table. After some time a man, dark even for a Saracen, took a few cautious steps towards them, and bent down towards Allan. He murmured a couple of words in Arabic which made Djaq flush with anger and Allan frown.
"What's he saying?"
"He asked you when you would be done with me," Djaq scoffed. "Fool of a man."
"Wha'? No mate, she's no harlot. A'right? So just back off." He shooed away the man who leered longingly at Djaq before grunting and slumping down by the next table.
"Fancy that, 'ey?" Allan grinned. "He wanted to buy you! As if 'e could even afford it. Does it look like I 'ave bloody paid you?" He went silent as a thought hit him. "There was a time though," he continued and looked into Djaq's dark eyes. "You know. When I thought—you know."
"There was a time when you thought? I find that very hard to believe, Allan-A-Dale."
"Look, I'm not being funny! You and me, Djaq, didn't you ever think that maybe—?" he shrugged. "I'm just saying—I just think we'd be good together, like."
"I will be good with Will."
"Yeah, but - I mean-- if I hadn't been an idiot and messed everything up. We had a thing, you and me. Didn't we?"
"No!" There was a strain around Djaq's mouth, a wrinkle between her eyebrows that would set with time and become permanent. Too many troubles for one lifetime to carry. "There is no 'if'," she continued, her voice a bit softer, yet determined still. "There is only this."
Allan watched Djaq from the corner of his eye, noticing that the southern sun had tanned her skin and emphasized the exotic features that he found so tantalizing. Her dark eyes, wistful and unmistakably feminine, squinted in the dusky light from the oil lamps. Now that a bluish darkness had fallen over Acre, it was considerably colder and the Saracen woman pulled her cloak tighter around her chest.
"He's just a boy, Djaq."
"A boy that will grow to be a man." Her sententious words rolled on the r's, hard and soft at the same time. "A good man."
"You are not sure though," Allan continued cautiously, with an air of drunken wisdom and sincerity. "About Will. Mind you, I don't blame you. Hard to resist all that rosy innocence really."
"Why would you think I have doubts?" Djaq instantly regretted the sharp tone of her words, thinking that she had spoken a little bit too fast and sounded a little bit too edgy. The effect was immediate. Allan would not have been such a successful tavern trickster had he not been so good at reading people's moods, constantly having one eye on the details communicated in between the words. He grew brasher and fixed Djaq's eyes with a steady gaze.
"It's the whole 'my love' thing," he explained. "'My love' this, 'my love' that-- every second sentence like. I'm not being funny but it sounds to me like you need to remind yourself."
"I am merely reassuring him," Djaq snapped. "As you said – he is young." She stared back at Allan, trying to give her words impact by not letting her gaze flicker for a moment, yet he merely looked back with a crooked smile on his relaxed face. "I love Will," she assured him. "I really do."
Allan shrugged and dropped the subject, letting his eyes dart over to a table in the opposite side of the room where a lanky man had pulled out a couple of dice. Djaq's body was shaking as she fought the urge to let her emotions show, instead building up a sardonically detached façade. She lifted the cup to her lips and swallowed it down in one big gulp, coughing as she choked on the sweet beverage. She did love Will. She loved him with her heart and mind, a love that would grow in time rather than fade away like some fickle passion. She did not doubt that, and yet somehow there was doubt. It was tiny, a splinter wedged into her heart which made the heartbeats erratic. Yet, in her intoxicated state, it suddenly felt tangible. She watched Allan's profile as he followed the dice game with his eyes, seemingly lost in the sound of the carved bone-cubes rolling across the table, and saw a smile slowly unfold across his face.
"The tall one's cheating," he murmured.
"He is?"
"Yeah, making a pretty penny of it too. Look how annoyed that greasy bloke is, n' he hasn't even turned the game yet. He's letting 'im win one every now and then. All 'e needs to do now is to be patient and play it well."
They sat silently and stared at the dice, saw the greasy man become increasingly frustrated with his bad luck until he tossed a cup into the wall with a loud clang.
"Too fast," Allan grunted at his fellow tavern trickster. "Fool."
"Could he have done better?"
"Yeah, sure he could. Could have skinned 'im right down to the bones."
"Hm."
The tavern trickster collected his dice with a sour look on his face and scowled at the bar's owner who was gesturing wildly at him to leave.
"He is accusing him of driving away his customers," Djaq explained.
"Yeah I figured - seen quite a lot of that in my day. Perhaps I should try my luck," Allan grinned and started to dig in his pouches for his beloved props, pulling out game cards and dice and leaving them in a little heap on the table.
"You carry those around?"
"Sure I do. How did you think I got John to carry my gear 'alfway though France?"
"I just thought he grew weary of your whining. Everyone else did."
"Nah, 'e owes me a village by now, give or take a house or two. Poor sod knows I'm cheating, 'e just can't prove it so he keeps trying. A shred of doubt, that's all it takes really."
A shred of doubt. Djaq's stomach churned and she turned to the cup again, only to find it empty. An echo of something as old as their friendship started to tug on her attention, a restrained anticipation which sparkled like static electricity under her skin. From the very first meal they had shared, she had felt the conflict Allan faced and made a connection because he was an outsider in the gang, just as she was. Djaq understood that joining the gang had been a struggle for him, not only because it was new and confusing, but because in re-learning his ethics he had to give up his pride in who he was. It had fascinated her, the goodness in him slowly blossoming and winning more and more ground while he fought to maintain that roguish quality which held his personality together. She had wished for the day when this rascal became ennobled into the man he could have been, fully reaching the potential that had been spoiled by a flawed life. She had loved that person, the one who he might have become rather than the one he was, like a carpenter can admire a carving inherent in a piece of wood. Thus when he betrayed them she had been struck, not by anger, but by an overwhelming sense of sadness and disappointment to find him weaker than she had hoped. It had taken weeks for her to accept the fact that she was mourning the loss of something that never had gotten a chance to fully bloom, a love that could have been. Djaq had chosen to give up on him. Women have an urge to change the men they love, but there was enough instinct of self-preservation left in Djaq for her to step back and see him for who he was. She could love this man but it would hurt. He would disappoint her time and again, and in time their love would find a bitter end in tears and loathing. For him, it would be frustration over never being enough that would drive him away, a growing weight of boredom and conflict that pushed him down the path of least resistance. She didn't think that it was love that would save Allan-A-Dale, but rather cold patience. Love is far too fickle and demanding, ultimately selfish because one invests so much in that one sensation. In the end, he had to change for himself alone, and not merely to please her. He had been the barrier who prevented her from fully giving her heart to Will. The two of them never got a chance until he was gone, and that was why she found herself in doubt.
"More vino for the lady?"
Djaq flinched and let Allan pour wine into the tin cup with growing unsteadiness. The effects of the alcohol were showing in his demeanour, the lazy accent increasingly slurred and his smile sheepish. In spite of this she realized that he was in perfect control when he handled the cards and the eyes which darted from patron to patron were shrewd. Finally he caught the gaze of a tall man with a bushy beard and staring eyes which seemed disturbingly detached. He didn't move a muscle of his frozen expression but he followed Allan's hands almost hypnotically.
"That bloke will come over in a moment," Allan murmured to Djaq. "I think that stocky lass with the moustache is with 'im as well."
Djaq watched the couple, the man stone-faced but unmistakably captivated and the woman with a cold expression that seemed constantly displeased. After somewhat less than a moment, the man started to move over, the woman following him like a tail. He nodded at Allan before he pulled out some coins and reached for the cards. Djaq watched fascinated as Allan handed them over with a surprisingly eloquent gesture, magnanimously letting his victim check the cards and shuffle them. A couple of rounds went by and coins shifted owners. She had expected Allan to set the stage by letting the Saracen man win the first couple of games, but instead he allowed him to win some and lose others. The man relaxed, became less guarded and hardly noticed his luck changing. Even if Allan hadn't been cheating the man still made mistakes, took risks which gave him away as a man with a prominent gambling problem. The woman stood like a shadow, grim with a sickly scent of citrus and sweat around her, blowing in Djaq's direction in puffs when the woman moved an arm or shifted her weight.
It was the woman who grew edgy when the money balance started to shift to Allan's advantage. The man remained stone-faced, snapped his fingers for more wine and continued checking the cards. Even though Djaq stared intently at Allan's every move, she could only catch the occasional glimpse of something that might be a trick. It was the flip of a wrist while his face beamed in an innocent smile, a hand brushing past his sleeve when he reached up to stroke his beard or scratch his suntanned neck. It struck her that he was good. Just like Will had his carpentry, this was Allan's talent and it only reached its full potential when he was holding all the cards himself. The very essence of Allan-A-Dale was a single player, a man who was in complete control of his own game because his instinct of self-preservation was infinite.
Yet he made a mistake. When he had won most of his victim's money he became smug to the verge of recklessness. He gulped down some more wine and gave Djaq the look of a child searching for approval, eagerly seeking out signs of awe in her face. She raised an eyebrow and kept her lips twisted into a sardonic smile. Blind reverence was not in her nature and to show any sign of it here would be directly disturbing to her. Slightly disappointed by her lack of enthusiasm, Allan proceeded to win the last of his victim's cash in one swoop.
"See," he grinned and shook the heavy pouch so that the money rattled. "That's how it's done."
"I do think a talent like that could be better employed elsewhere," Djaq responded coldly.
"Nah, this is what I do." He looked at the man who was watching the cards with his face still frozen. "What's up mate? Want your money back huh?" he slurred in English, yet the sentiment must have pushed through the language barrier because the woman snapped a couple of well-chosen oaths at him. "Money's like the tower o' Babylon. Builds bridges like naught else that," he grinned at Djaq. "Look, can you tell 'im that he can have 'alf his money back if he stands on one leg and flaps his arms, cooing like a pigeon?"
"I am not telling him that!" Djaq exclaimed. "It will anger him! You already have his money."
"Sure it will. But he'll do it and it will be great fun. I think the poor sod deserves a chance, don't you?"
"Are you serious?"
"Never been this serious in my life." He grinned mischievously.
"It is a mistake," Djaq responded, but she couldn't help but be pulled in. Either it worked or else Allan would learn a lesson - albeit one that he would doubtless forget soon enough. "I will do it," she continued, then turned to the Saracen man and translated the jest into Arabic. His forehead went smooth like ivory and there was a tension in his jaw, a muscle twitching beneath the skin from what Djaq realized was fuming rage. Yet it was the woman who exploded. The cold eyes flared up in uninhibited wrath and a flood of Arabic curses welled out from the tight lips as she moved over to Allan, brushing past Djaq in a cloud of sweat and acrid citrus smell. The sausage-like fingers bent into a claw and dug steadily into Allan's crotch, rolling them into a fist of fury around his precious jewels. Allan's eyes glazed over and he gave out a wailing scream, trying to back off from the female-shaped thunderbolt, yet she followed his every movement. His ears turned red and he grabbed on to the woman's hair to try and push her away, but the gesture only seemed to anger her further. Her oaths rose into a crescendo and she released Allan's manhood in order to claw him over the face, drumming the other tightly knit fist into his chest and stomach.
"Oi! Oi! Oi! Djaq! Djaq, 'elp me! Wha's she's saying?! Oi, stop it!"
"She is doubting your manhood," Djaq responded and tried vainly to cover up the amusement in her voice.
"Wha'?! Wha' d'you men she's bloody doubting my-- oi! Oi, lemme be!!"
"Would you wish for an exact translation or would you prefer for it to stop?"
"Make it stop make it stop!!"
Djaq shouted out a couple of snappy words in Arabic and the woman gave her a suspicious look before moving away from Allan so suddenly that he remained a trembling heap by the wall, still shielding himself from her wrath. The woman spat out some further insults and pointed a finger at Allan's pouch.
"But there's my stuff in there too," he whined as he crawled up with his posture doubled around his abdomen, cautiously rubbing the sore parts. Djaq moved over and grabbed the purse from his belt, tossing it to the man who didn't move a muscle to betray his emotions.
"You had that coming," Djaq pointed out as Allan melancholically watched his money disappear. "No need for the long face. You shouldn't have pushed your luck - let that be a lesson."
Allan groaned as he started to limp towards the door where the bar owner stood with a stern face and waited for the foreign troublemaker to leave. Djaq sneaked an arm around Allan's waist and helped him out into the alleyway which was lit by a vast moon.
"Did she 'ave to do it like that?" Allan moaned, leaning his hand on the cold clay wall. The alley smelled of urine and vomit but the ground was dry rather than the soggy mess of English side roads. "Wha' d'you say to her anyway?"
"I told her you were diseased and if she didn't let go part would start to fall off."
"Wha'?" Allan exclaimed and cringed at the lingering pain in his precious areas. "It won't, will it?" he asked with dread in his slurry voice. "Fall off, I mean? Or be like—damaged?"
"Of course not you fool!"
"You're sure? I mean, I'll wanna 'ave kiddies eventually, right? Can't 'ave my jewels all crushed up, the little Allans might come out all crooked and skewed like."
"You want to have kids?!"
"Sure I do—yeah, the little tapp-tapp-tapping of feet 'n all that," he slurred with an expression that was oddly troubled. "Besides, kids really make excellent pick-pockets you know. Those little hands - and they're the right height 'n all. Mind you, sometimes I think that was why my old man kept us all hanging around the house instead of tossing us out with the waste."
"A father would not do that," Djaq said absently as she let her medically trained eyes dart over Allan's rumpled figure.
"Not being funny but poking his stick into fertile soil doesn't exactly make a bloke decent like. Look, I'm serious! Are you sure they will be alright?"
"I am sorry Allan," Djaq smiled, sympathetically, not so much over the prospects of her friend's future family as at the mention of his old one. "I would not worry. I am sure you have done far worse things to your little men than having them clawed by some Saracen hag."
Djaq could see the shudder multiply though Allan's limbs at the mention of said clawing, twisting awkwardly as if he was trying to shake off the memory.
"Yeah," he reluctantly agreed. "Maybe."
"Will you let me look at those scratches?" Djaq asked, moving her fingers to touch Allan's cheek and neck which were striped by nasty red lines. He tensed at the burning pain from the pressure on fresh abrasions, then leaned into her cautiously probing fingers.
"I think most of the damage is further down," he murmured hoarsely and Djaq cocked her eyebrows.
"That I will not examine."
"It's just anatomy! Pig's 'ave it."
"It is not going to happen Allan! I can ask one of the men to look it over when we get back."
"Nah, I'm sure it will be fine. Feels better already actually," Allan hurried to respond. "So," he continued in a rather husky voice, completely relaxed as he gave in to Djaq's fussing. "You and Will, yeah?"
"Yes."
"Bit of a shame though, mind you."
"Really? Why is that?"
"Well, because-- you're the kind of bird who," the words melted into a slurry mess in his mouth as he tried to blurt them out a bit too fast. "who'd make a bloke wanna be a better man, like. And Will's already good as gold. Too good in fact, 'e needs to grow a pair if you ask me."
"Really?" Djaq snorted sceptically and let the featherlike touches cease.
"Don't stop! Look, more scratches on the other side."
Her mouth twitched into a grin and she continued to tenderly pat the sore skin, trailing her finger along the lines even though she knew it did no good. They were superficial and the only thing she could possibly do for him was apply a soothing ointment back at the camp. "Your flattery would have a bigger impact had you not slurred quite as much, Allan-A-Dale," she murmured absently.
"Well that's alright, and likewise I'd say, your chastising 'd 'ave bigger—such—as well, had you not, you know, smiled when you said it." He lost balance for a moment and bumped ungracefully into the wall, dragging Djaq with him so that she found herself temporarily pressed against his body, his leg wedged in between her shorter ones.
Djaq's initial impulse would have been to move away, yet as the seconds passed she wondered why that reaction remained blatantly absent. Instead she let herself stand, leaning against Allan, her eyes locked into his while the moment grew tense between them. Her mind became woozy and slow, her eyelids drooping as if they were weighed down, her heart hammered against her chest. Then she felt Allan's hands start to move up and down her arms, slowly and intensely as his eyes appeared dimmed, his breathing fast and ragged. When his lips sought hers, she didn't recoil, didn't move away from the spell which her mind kept screaming at her to break, but merely froze and allowed it to happen. He had a soft mouth, warm and demanding, and the initial push of lips upon lips was a question which subdued their eagerness. Yet she could feel it, the hunger which sparked something inside her and made her push back, letting her lips part and open up to his.
Allan's reaction came instantly, almost violently, since her passive acceptance was the only encouragement he needed. His touches were feverish and without Will's caution, the tip of his tongue probing her teeth and the cave of her mouth. She felt herself deepen the kiss as he moved his hands to her head, entwining them in her locks of dark hair. When she broke away with a gasp for air his hands were still cupping her face gingerly. She had expected his fingers to be calloused like Will's, but the thumb which pressed against her cheek felt oddly smooth – no doubt the hands of man who knew more about avoiding a task than completing it. His mouth had fallen open in a question anew, close enough for her to feel the gusts of hot air from his laboured breathing. He inhaled as if he wanted to speak, but the words never came. Instead they disappeared in a sigh, and it occurred to her that she had rarely seen him speechless. In her drunken state it seemed like a bitter form of flattery, to manage stealing the words from Allan-A-Dale, he who always had an excuse ready on the tip of his tongue. Say something! Make a joke! Break the spell!
The full extent of what she had done came to Djaq like a kick in her stomach. Will's face flashed before her, wounded as only the innocent can be, disillusioned in his love for her. With a moaning cry, she moved her hands to Allan's chest and shoved herself away from him, instantly sensing a rush of cold air take the place his body had occupied. The forced distance between them felt like a screaming void, an open wound which cut right through the world. Despair hugged around her chest so tightly that her lunges felt filled with water, and she saw the alley around her as if for the first time. A lingering smell of drunkenness was hanging in the air, and the sound of people making love, loudly and without shame, came in muffled bursts from behind the withered facades. What was she doing here? This part of Acre was for the fallen, the hopeless - people in need of a pit to bury their mistakes in. The disgust over her lack of steadfastness made her feel nauseous, a weakness so much against her nature that it was incomprehensible.
"I am not a harlot," she exclaimed in a voice that was desperate and filled with regret. Her words were sharp and sour from self-loathing, yet she realized with a pang that part of the regret was about Allan. He looked stricken as if she had kicked him. "Will," she whispered, partly an appeal for understanding, partly an accusation. Kind, passionate Will who would never do anything to hurt her. Wonderful Will. Allan's best friend Will. The shadow of her own guilt wandered over Allan's face, a rush of pain as he too remembered the younger man. He tilted his head to the star-speckled sky and murmured an oath under his breath, routinely cursing the world in general rather than himself. Then he threw out his arms and took a step towards her, looking wounded when she shied away as if she feared that he would burn her.
"Look, 'e mustn't know, a'right? Won't hurt 'im if 'e doesn't know will it? We can't tell 'im Djaq? Can't!"
Djaq frowned, her shoulders slumping, and she wondered how he could make it sound as easy as that. Suddenly she felt painfully sober and longed for the mists of alcohol, like the miserable drunks of Nottingham taverns. Was it truly enough to not tell Will about it, when her wayward heart still pulsated in shameful longing for another man's touch? How could she let this happen?! This was greed and she was not a greedy person. This was weakness and filthy desire. This was a mistake that shook her entire world.
"We were drunk," Allan continued, persuading her to see this his way. "People do stuff when they are drunk!"
"This should never have happened!" she snapped at him, channelling the guilt into anger. "Drunk or not!"
"No-- no a'right, that is true. But it did. Look, it was just a kiss! You know that, I know that, but Will—Will won't see it like that, will he?"
Djaq pressed her lips together and made herself emotionally inaccessible, kept him on a distance.
"Never again," she stated and caught Allan's eyes. "You understand that, yes?"
"Yeah sure." Light-hearted words behind a smile of relief, almost nonchalant. For some reason his indifference made her feel heavier, her strength drained from her limbs. She knew this feeling of despair like the back of her hand, how life appeared impossible and futile, but had not expected Allan's flippant attitude to effect her like that.
The door to the bar was thrust open and a man walked into the alleyway. The two English outlaws' eyes became glued to his every movement, savouring the distraction like a blessing, albeit one which was disguised beyond recognition. The man put his palm against the wall some feet away, and fumbled as he started to undo his trousers. He was humming in Arabic, singing a tune which sounded like more like garbled wailing to Allan, and he sighed happily as he began urinating against the building. A rivulet trickled down the alley and Allan moved away from the wall to avoid it. When the man was done he turned to Allan and Djaq and flinched in surprise. His hand went up in an unsteady greeting.
"Not being funny but that bloke needs to get 'imself some dignity," Allan grunted, recognizing the man as the same who had tried to buy Djaq earlier. The man stood wobbling unsteadily for a while, his eyes set on a spot somewhere below Djaq's neckline, before she lost her patience and snapped at him. His drunken grin wavered and the man backed off, his hands lifted as if he tried to calm down a wild animal, or shield himself. When he had left, stumbling and leaning on the walls as if the world was a rocking ship, Djaq caught Allan looking at her. She cocked her eyebrows wearily.
"What?" she sneered.
"Nothing," Allan hurried to respond, throwing out his arms in a disarming gesture. "Just—you're a'right you know? He's just a nobody, that one. Doesn't know a thing about you. Look, he'd probably try to bed a sheep."
The clumsy effort to comfort her took Djaq by surprise, her disgust with the situation temporarily melting into acceptance. What was done was done, it could not be reversed, unless Allah changed the tides of time and made it all into a dream. "Are you calling me a sheep?" she scoffed and curled her lips into a smile.
"Better a sheep than just cheap, mind you," Allan grinned in response, decidedly relieved. Djaq punched him with a lightly knit fist, making him bend double over his stomach. "Oi!"
"Weakling," she smiled at his reaction. "We need to get back. The others will be waiting."
The mention of the others caused Will's ghost hover over them again, an apparition which followed them across the cobbled streets. Their conversation seemed oddly chopped-up, words spaced out by uncomfortable pauses, rather than flowing with its usual ease. When they closed in on the outlaws' temporary lodgings a small square opened up before them, bathing in the bluish light from a full moon. In the middle of the open area a tall man paced, not more than a shape in the dark but unmistakably familiar. Albeit his movements were edgy, they belonged to Will. Djaq moved into the square, one deep breath to give her smile strength, while Allan lingered behind for a moment, hesitating before he followed.
"What are you doing up, my love?" Djaq heard her shaky voice ask as they closed in on Will. My love. How could he not hear the shame and guilt which turned her words sour? She tensed when he pressed his lips to her cheek, wondered if he could sense her crimes, smell another man's touches on her skin. Yet he seemed merely glad that they were back, a childish eagerness playing across his face. He reached out his hand to Allan and grabbed it with a smile which was wide-open in innocence. Once again the guilt went like a shock through Djaq.
"I was worried," he explained. "What has happened to you?" He looked Allan up and down, watching the red scratches on his face and neck. "You look like you have tried to steal a mouse from a stray cat."
"Yeah well, something like that," Allan grinned. Djaq allowed herself to look at him, if only to see how well he covered up the guilt, flinching when his eyes met hers. His frivolous face seemed frozen, his smile awkward and sad. He was the one who broke the gaze as if it burned him, eyes darting restlessly between the surroundings and Will's arm, which he had sneaked possessively around Djaq's waist. It wasn't guilt as much as defeat, and the sudden insight felt like a stone in Djaq's stomach. In this place she was in between them, crushed between two hearts which both beat for her. Because of Allan, her chances with Will risked dying away.
Will was good for her. That was the fact on which she had built her love for him, allowed her defences to melt away. The time she spent with him made the emotional wounds of her past feel distant like a dream. In the faint light his shy smile reminded her of her brother. Djaq pressed her lips together and gazed at the two men while her heart slowly shattered. In her life, she had occasionally been broken because of scarcity, but never before because of abundance. Two of them were one too many, it would only lead to her not truly having either and consequently neither of them truly having her. She loved them both, but her and Allan's love was a disease that would destroy what it strived for. Happiness would forever elude the three of them as long as they remained an emotional threesome.
--
It had been a costly mistake.
Djaq still held the cage almost desperately in her hands, and her eyes filled with tears when Allan raised his face to meet her gaze again. The accusation had turned into bitterness, a crooked smile which told of a man who despised himself for daring to trust in the world. He was disappointed, but he carried it with the infinite patience of a man who expects life to disappoint him.
"Will is my best mate y'know. I'll miss 'im."
Djaq nodded and tried vainly to swallow the lump in her throat.
"He's a good bloke," Allan continued in a ruminative voice. He was silent for a while before he gave out a snorting laughter. "I can't believe he actually likes tea though! Something's definitely off with that lad."
Djaq smiled and nodded at the cage in her hands. "You will have this," she explained and moved over, urging Allan to get the bird. He stared at it for a while as if he didn't quite comprehend what was happening, then gave her a crooked smile.
"I'm no good with pets though," he objected, half-heartedly. Djaq realized that the symbolism of the action didn't pass him by, unnoticed. If he grabbed the cage, it meant accepting that he would lose the woman he loved and the best friend he adored. Robin could not easily have done it. "Birds, sure," he continued with a shrug. "But not the winged kind."
"This is not a pet," Djaq responded intensely, resting on to every word to give it impact. "This is the joker that can turn the game. Trust an A-Dale to keep a back-door open, is that not so?"
Allan swallowed and reached out his hands to grab the cage, their fingers brushing against each other within a single throb of their hearts. "So—how does this stuff work?"
"If you need us—truly need us, then you can release the bird. It will find us. A pigeon always knows the way home."
"Lucky pigeon," Allan murmured under his breath. His forehead had creased again, as if he was struck down by the reality of the situation. "Djaq." The cage seemed silly and misplaced in his hands and he tilted his head at her in wonder. "I want you to tell me why."
"Because," she hesitated. Lies were his territory, not hers. "This is my home. I belong here."
"Home is where the heart is," Allan responded stubbornly. "You said that, remember? I said I ain't got no home or suchlike, and you said that home is where the heart is." He made a pause. "'Have you got a heart, Allan-A-Dale?', you said." He pronounced his own name in a parody of the accent she had when she first joined them; Al-lan-a-del, with weight on the 'lan' and his tongue plastered to the roof of his mouth on every 'l'. Djaq recalled how easily his name had rolled off her tongue back then, sounding almost Arabic in her mouth. D'you think this Allah bloke would be called Allan had he been born 'ere? I reckon 'e would.
The goodbye started to sting Djaq and she took a deep breath to gather her strength. She could not dither. "My heart is here," she said in a determined voice.
…but I am staying behind anyway.
Allan shrugged and started to shake the cage lightly, watching the gray-speckled bird flap its wings to maintain its balance. As if they felt the motion, the pigeons in the other cages started to coo and puff up their chest feathers, bringing the sounds and movements of the room to Djaq's attention. This room was never silent and never still. The birds were one of her many childhood obsessions. One after another, she had pursued her passions with feverish devotion – trying desperately to fill a void she couldn't comprehend. She recognized it now as a longing for freedom, and perhaps that was why the pigeons had spoken to her. Her spirit had been trapped, just like they were, but she could set them free. It had taken her years to realize that freedom is never complete and never easy. Choices are just as likely to cause a void as heal one. If you cut the strings which tied you to the world, you would fall – not fly – and the birds always returned to their cages. For a moment she hated the imprisoned pigeons with their dumb, beady eyes. Whatever did they know about choices? All they knew was that either they were home and wishing for the open skies, or they were out and heading home.
Djaq watched Allan talk to the bird and it struck her that she owed him an excuse. It had been her choice to give in to the impulse, he hadn't forced himself upon her, yet they both had to face the consequences. That was why the mistake was a costly one, the two of them were both victims and perpetrators at the same time. Allan looked lost, infinitely lonely to the very core of his being. He let the pigeon bow and nibble on his fingertip and his lips curled into a smile as the beak tickled him. Djaq felt as though she would choke, the lump in her throat making her breathing erratic and shivery. She wished to comfort him and comfort herself, but could not risk it.
"Allan," she said, and he turned his eyes to her with a strange kind of smile, childish and weary all at once. "Two of us will work," she continued softly, "but three will always be one too many. That is why."
Le fin