I'm a bit angry at myself for writing this, as it acknowledges the events that took place in THAT episode, one that I haven't watched and never will. I've been steadfastly denying its existence, yet somehow this fic crawled under my fingernails and demanded to be written. Ugh. So I temporarily submitted to the insistent Muse, but am now going back to denial-land to live happily ever after. But for all of you who faced the truth, here's the last goodbye...
The Last Goodbye
It was a good day to be alive.
They had galloped Arabic horses over the dunes, racing each other to the oasis in the desert, and then gulped down the cold water; so cold it made their teeth ache.
They had wandered the bazaar amongst the general uproar of merchants, beggars and customers, quietly detached from all of it, and deriving much amusement from his ongoing attempts at mastering the language, which led to incidents in which he would point at a horse and call it a pig, or ask for a flower and get handed a fish.
They had eaten in the mysterious quiet of the aviary, where servants moved like spirits and the only sounds were the cooing of the pigeons and the gentle plashing of the fountain as they fed each other dates and figs, almonds and slices of cool melon.
And throughout all of it, in everything they did, was the promise of the night to come.
Usually there was work to be done too, otherwise this life of dreamy bliss would have altered them unavoidably and inescapably into beings they had no wish to become. They needed wood and blood, tools and bandages in order to remain their true selves, and so Will had his carpentry commissions to fulfil, and Djaq her patients to tend to. But today she had said: "None of that. Just us today."
She had her reasons.
All day she had kept a strange, secret smile on her face, saying nothing when Will recognised its subtlety and questioned her about it. Finally she told him: "I'll tell you later. When I'm certain."
To say it out loud might break the spell, and Will surrendered to the silence as they curled up together under the sheets, the gauzy bed hangings trailed back and forth languorously by the breeze that shifted in from the desert.
She was not sure whether she slept or not. On the one hand, her excitement was wriggling about her like a living thing, making slumber impossible. Yet on the other, what followed surely must have been a dream.
She recalled that though it was dark, the silver of the moon bathed the bed, the floor and the man beside her in its glow; and that a figure stood in shadow beside the bed, still and indistinctive. But then a hand drifted forward and brushed the veils aside with fingers that were real.
Allan slipped inside the enclosed space of husband and wife with a wicked, delicious smile on his face. She supposed she should feel shocked, or outraged, or stunned, but as was the way with dreams, she just felt disparaging.
"What are you doing here?"
"Just came to say 'hello'… Hello."
His eyes slipped southward.
"Nice nighty."
With an irritated sigh she adjusted the straps of her nightgown that had slipped down over her shoulders.
"I'm…dreaming?"
He shrugged carelessly and sat on the edge of the bed, fingering the sheets.
"This feels expensive."
"I suppose it must be…"
She still felt rather dazed as Allan made himself comfortable, and slid his eyes over to where Will slumbered.
"You two hitched yet?"
She withdrew her hand from under the covers. Her wedding band glinted in the bright glow of the moon and she recognised the familiar distant, veiled look in his eyes as he gazed at it. She knew what she must ask.
"Is there finally a woman in Allan-a-Dale's life?"
He wrinkled his nose.
"I thought there might be. But she wasn't my type in the end. Moanin' and naggin' all the bloody time. Would not shut up."
Djaq raised an eyebrow.
"She fell for Robin, huh?"
"Yeah well, no accountin' for taste."
His eyes fixed on her, so bright they were almost luminescent, their blueness like a living thing that brushed softly against her skin.
"Didn't hold a candle to you anyway."
For a moment silence was all that passed between them; all that could possibly be said was in silence.
"I actually came to ask you a favour," he said at last.
"What?"
"Well, I reckon we're all goin' to be pretty famous someday. You, me and the lads. But I know enough about tellin' stories to know that the facts never stay the same. People change things, twist 'em round. No one will ever know what really happened."
He paused.
"Thing is…I don't know how I'll turn out in those stories. There are some things I don't want remembered, and more than likely I'll end up some prancin' twat with a lute or somethin'. But the thing is…I don't care 'bout any of that. There's no one left on earth to remember me anyway. 'Cept you two. You have to remember me properly. Good and bad."
She tilted her head, quizzically. It seemed strange that he would come all this way just to say that, and though her impulse was to pat the hand on the sheets, lending it some comfort, she didn't dare. He might fade away.
"If it makes you feel better – I doubt I will be remembered either. The story of Robin Hood…it is an English story. There is no place for Saracens in it."
His eyes had dropped from her, their cool touch falling away, and he traced the lining of the sheets that covered her.
"Did you mean what you said…that day?"
He glanced up again, and she knew this couldn't possibly be a dream. Her subconscious could not have imagined a look such as the one he gave her.
She answered him with the heat of her eyes.
He nodded.
"I thought so. That's why I did it."
"Did what?"
"Never mind. You go back to sleep now. And look after him."
He jerked his head toward the dark hair and pale face of Will beside her, and moved as if to leave.
"Oh, just one more thing…."
He leaned forward and kissed her mouth before she had a chance to react.
His kiss was different from Will's. Her husband's could be light like raindrops or as heavy as the heat of the desert; Allan's was soft and searching, and when he found what he was looking for, he withdrew with a smile on his face.
"I didn't want to go without doin' that. Just once. Don't tell Will, but I've actually been dreamin' 'bout doin' it for years."
She was confused now.
"Does that mean…is this my dream or yours?"
He grinned at her in the moonlight.
"Doesn't really matter now, does it?"
"You…you did not come to say hello, did you…"
"Nah. But let's not say the other word."
He stood up.
"Allan's a nice name for a kid, you know. It's a girl's name too, so no excuses."
He was gone.
She slept on.
Will woke slowly.
The sun was creeping across the floor, flooding every shadow. Everything moved slowly here, as slowly as the sun across the sky, and so he stretched and yawned unhurriedly in the growing warm of morning, glancing over at the sleeping form next to him. They had become disentangled in the night, and he shifted over in order to rectify the problem, draping an arm over her and leaning in to take in her familiar redolence…flowers, spices, musk.
But there was something different this morning…a wave of crashing remembrance along with his single breath of her.
Her scent was that of pine forests.
Of rich earth.
Of cool water.
Of Allan.