"How many of those can you drink?" Merlin laughed. The knights and Merlin were enjoying a rare night off given to them by King Arthur but they all knew his wife, Guinevere was probably the one who persuaded him into letting them have the night off. Either that or she had seduced him into her bed. Ah, young love.

"Plenty enough my friend," Gwaine smirked as he drank another tankard of mead. Merlin laughed joyously and drank one as well, knowing full well that nights like this were rare. Very rare.

A waitress walked past the table of knights and gave Percival a flirtatious look, which didn't go by Gwaine.

"Did you see her Percival! Quite a beauty! If you don't go after her then I will!" he laughed as the other knights joined along with him.

"He's right Percival, Gwaine always snatches the pretty ones," Elyan said.

"I still don't know how he does it," Sir Leon grumbled.

"You're just jealous Leon," Gwaine teased.

"Come now Gwaine," Percival said. "We all know you have your fair share of lovers. Tell us about them all my good friend."

The knights leaned in closer, wanting to hear the story as well.

"If you insist," Gwaine chuckled. "But if that is so then this will be one long night."

Chapter One: Marcella

She was a beauty. Gwaine was only the age of 16 when he met her. He would call her his "first love" but at the time he didn't even think things like that existed. She lived in Caerleon when there was still some "hope" in Gwaine's family, but since his father died there never really was much hope for him.

Marcella was sitting under a tree wearing a light cream colored dress that complimented her sun kissed skin. Her dark waves his her face and she was busying herself with a book. If Gwaine could remember correctly it was a book of poetry written by the King of Caerleon himself for his wife, Queen Annis when he still courted her under his earlier reign. At the time, Gwaine didn't understand how Marcella had even gotten a copy of the book but he didn't bother question it.

Gwaine had seen her around town a few times. She was usually with a bunch of men, which Gwaine assumed to be her love interests or just some big men she seduced from the tavern. They were always the same. Big men with no brains as Gwaine assumed. But he promised himself that he'd be different.

He approached her with an award winning smile. She didn't even look up at hi from her book.

"Hello," Gwaine started.

Finally she looked up at him and when her golden eyes met him, he knew right away that she'd caught him in her trap. Sometimes, he still dreams about that very day they met. Not any other memories or good times they had, but just that moment, just that look.

"Hello," she spoke. Her voice was loud and confident, as if she owned the air they were both breathing.

"You look lonely," Gwaine chuckled.

"And you look bothersome. Go away." And just like that she was back to reading.

"Hey now, who are you to tell me what to do?" Gwaine challenged her.

Marcella looked up from her book again and was just about to say something back but quickly stopped herself. "I-I am sorry good sir. I don't have the authority."

Gwaine smiled. "It's no problem."

"Oh but it is. I've been so disrespectful to another noble."

"Well I can assure you that I am no noble. I used to be but that was a long time ago," Gwaine sighed, memories of his father coming home and telling him great tales and adventures came back to him just briefly.

"You most certainly look like one," she mused.

"Do I now?" Gwaine laughed.

"Yes you do. A sword in hand and ready to go."

"I am dirty milady. Besides this is the only sword I own at the moment. I'm thinking of going away for a while."

For the first time Marcella smiled directly at him and leaned closer to his body. "Well then I guess it is up to me to persuade you to stay, good sir."

Gwaine smirked and shrugged. "Persuade me you may milady but alas it won't change a thing."

"Well luckily for you good sir I am very persuasive."

And after that moment Gwaine knew he would be lost in those golden eyes. They hit off immediately. Just a few minuets after that moment she started reading him poetry. She told him of the book and how rare it was that she got it, though she never did tell him how she did at the moment. Gwaine thought nothing of it though. He was smitten by her. He was almost foolish enough to call it love, but he persuaded himself that it was nothing of the sort.

Marcella was right. She was very persuasive. Gwaine stayed home much to the surprise of his mother and sister. At first, it was all just seduction. She was a little plaything Gwaine liked to flirt with and at the same time Marcella thought herself clever for playing around with Gwaine's mind. Manipulating him. But they both knew that Gwaine had the upper hand at some point in their courtship. After all he was still 16 and so was she.

Marcella flaunted her "men" around in front of Gwaine and in return he would flaunt the woman and mere childish girls their age who he had flirted with.

"Why do you do it?" Marcella asked him one day at the market where they walked down together.

"Do what?"

"Flirt with other girls."

"Well why not? It's not like I'm in a relationship he retorted as he bought an two oranges. One for him and one for her, that was their "ritual."

As he reached out his hand to give her the orange she took it and threw it right back at him.

"HEY!" Gwaine snarled. "What do you think you're doing!?"

"Is there a need to be with others when you have me!?" she sneered. "Pathetic," she spat as she walked away with her "men" suddenly guarded by her side.

"Well is there a need for big men with no brains when you have me!" he yelled after her. In exchange, one of those "big men with no brains" let him bathe with the pigs.

After their fight Gwaine had packed up and moved away. His mother cried for hours as his sister tried comforting him, which also led to her yelling. Things had been bad at home for a long time now and Gwaine was just turning 17 in three days. Finally, in the middle of the night Gwaine's mother accepted his departure and gave him a new sword for his birthday, a golden ring that was his father's, and a dragon scale necklace with his family crest. He said his goodbyes the next day and had a brief little fight with his sister, but they made up eventually and said their goodbyes as well. Then after that, he was off.

Marcella thought about Gwaine the night of their fight. She knew she was out of term. He could do whatever pleased him. After all she never asked for a relationship with Gwaine. She liked playing with his head, even though he had her heart. But it couldn't be. She knew that. But did he? No, of course not. He could never know the truth. She wasn't sure if it would break him but surely her heart would break.

The next day Marcella went out and bought a custom made sword for Gwaine. She asked one of her "men" to make it for her. The day after that she showed up at his house to deliver his present.

Eldya, Gwaine's older sister by five years who Marcella had never met but heard many stories from answered the door. She looked like what Gwaine had told her. Dark brown hair that was straight and short, the length of her neck. She had Gwaine's eyes, and was surprisingly pretty for what Gwaine had described as an old toad.

"Yes? May I help you?" Eldya asked, her face very blank and her voice cold and intimidating. Perhaps Gwaine hadn't told Eldya about her.

"Y-yes. I'm Marcella. Is Gwaine around?"

"No you just missed him."

"Oh," Marcella said, disappointed. "Well can you tell me where I can find him?" She asked with a bit of hope in her eyes.

"I would if I knew," Eldya sighed. "Gwaine's run off to who knows where."

And as Eldya shut the door on Marcella's face, all hope that had reached her eyes once was now gone.

2 years later...

Gwaine's mother had been sick. Eldya tried her best to take care of her, but it just wasn't enough anymore. One day a man came to their house telling them of her brother's debt at a tavern a few kingdoms from where they where. Eldya sighed, but gave the man most of the gold coins they had to pay off Gwaine's debt. In return the man told Gwaine about his mother's illness and he set off for Caerleon immediately.

The next time Eldya opened the door, she saw her brother who upon seeing his face, slapped him hard. "MOTHER IS SICK AND YOU GO AROUND DRINKING! YOU STUPID BOY YOU'RE NOT EVEN AN ADULT YET. STOP TRYING TO GROW UP AND GET OVER YOURSELF GWAINE AND LOOK AT WHAT'S RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU!"

They fought for hours until a crash of a broken vase woke their mother up. She told her children not to worry about her. Gwaine claimed that he would stay as long as he needed her, and so he did. His mother got better with time. Eldya and Gwaine actually seemed to get along after a while.

One day his mother needed water so Gwaine went down to the market to go collect some, and maybe buy them dinner with the coins he earned for helping the town's blacksmith.

As he bought dinner he saw a stack of oranges and smiled at the memory of him and Marcella. As he was about to leave he then saw her. She wasn't dressed in her regular dress, but in a more royal dark blue dress that looked nothing like the Marcella he knew before. Her hair was in tight ringlets around her face, unlike the natural dark waves that Gwaine like to toy around with at his youth. Looking closer he noticed that she didn't have those men around her anymore, but just one man. He was the king and queen's son, Prince Edward.

Prince Edward held her hand and led her around the market, this time with guards following them. Gwaine didn't know how to feel when he saw Marcella, was he sad? Mad? Distressed? He didn't know. To this day he didn't know how he truly felt. It was all just too much for him. He hadn't thought of her in so long. Why now? It was at that moment that Marcella looked at him. Her golden eyes met his and for that brief moment she thought of the day they first met, under that tree and the accomplishment she felt when she knew she has persuaded him to stay in Caerleon. But she was also the reason he left.

She discreetly slipped away from Prince Edward as he spoke to other villagers. She found her way into Gwaine's arms. Immediately upon breathing the same air as him again she ran into his arms. She could smell the water of the river where he bathed on, and he could smell pine and lavender, a smell he wasn't used to on her.

"Meet me at my old town home in my chambers. You know how to get there," she whispered in his ear then forced herself out of her arms and ran back to her prince before anyone could see her.

Gwaine didn't know what he'd do. Should he go see her? Maybe. After all he was acting like a child when he left just because they had fought. But it hurt either way.

He met her at her chambers of her old town house late at night. She was waiting for a while, and her hair was in it's usual dark waves he had seen it in the past.

"Gwaine," she breathed.

"Marcella. Long time no see," he spoke quietly.

"W-where have you been?" she asked, still not moving from the chair she sat in while he stood next to her window.

"Everywhere really. Many taverns."

"So you've been having fun?" she smiled softly.

"Yeah," Gwaine laughed for the first time in a long time. "You can say that."

It happen all too fast for either one of them to grasp it. She was kissing him and he kissed her back. It was the first time they kissed. He had flirted with her in the past and teased her numerously, but never had their lips met until that day.

Wild kisses were left everywhere and that night on her bed, he made love to her. It was pure bliss.

"You aren't a virgin," Gwaine said after their love making, a bit disappointed that he couldn't have her first.

"No," she cried quietly.

"So what are you now? The whore to the prince?"

Marcella jumped out of the bed and covered herself with the sheets, leaving Gwaine naked on the bed.

"HEY!" he yelled.

"He is my husband Gwaine!" she sobbed uncontrollably. "I've been engaged to him since we first met. That is how I got the poetry book, that is why I always had those men around me! They were hired to guard me around Gwaine! That is why!"

"W-why didn't you tell me?" Gwaine's voice was hurt. It was crystal clear that even if he claimed he didn't love her, he was truly hurt.

"I couldn't bring myself to tell you the truth," she cried out. "I loved you so much. I still do." She covered herself in her sheets and stood next to her chair as sobs filled her throat.

Gwaine shook his head in disgust and got dressed quickly. Without a single glance back he walked out of her chambers and out of her life forever.

Marcella never saw Gwaine again. She was the perfect wife to Prince Edward. She was Princess Marcella. Nobody knew of her affair with sir Gwaine. When Gwaine's mother died, she payed her respects but found out by Eldya that Gwaine had already stopped by for her proper burial and left as soon as possible. Years later Marcella bore Edward children, two sons and three girls. The woman of Caerleon envied her. She had the perfect marriage. A doting husband who never took a mistress, five beautiful children who she loved very much, a great home, and a royal family.

Nobody knew what boiled just underneath the surface. She hid her emotions very well for all of these years. One day however, a few months after King Caerleon's death and Queen Annis' truce with king Arthur, the Queen Annis spoke of King Arthur's knights. So brace, so noble, she claimed them to be the best knights in the face of the earth.

There were four she spoke the most fondly of however.

Sir Elyan, Sir Leon, Sir Percival, and Sir Gwaine.

Whew. That was the longest I've written in a long time. Please review they mean a lot to me and keep me going (: I hope you enjoyed it and tell me what you think about the story!