Disclaimer: Spooks et al are property of Kudos and the BBC.
Lady in Waiting
The Google alert (run through an anonymizer, of course) waiting in her inbox nearly caused her to choke on her (sweet) tea that morning.
Sir Harry Pearce.
She rolled the phrase around on her tongue for a spell. Not your typical knighthood, she thinks. She absentmindedly wonders if Buckingham Palace is having a laugh.
On the other hand, she can think of no one who deserves it more. Knights are no longer dressed in armor, rushing off to save damsels in distress and slay the dragons of the forest, but practical, steadfast, dedicated men willing to sacrifice everything. (Everything.)
The knights she knows are from old romance novels and West End musicals that slay the dragon and get the girl and everyone lives happily ever after.
She smiles when she pictures him in full knight regalia, setting himself before a jousting match and stopping by the grandstand to ask for her handkerchief for luck. He wins (naturally), and she cheers.
In those stories there are no sad good-byes just past dawn on the Thames with Ladies who run off with changed names and disappear into the morning mist.
The more she considers the scenario, the more realistic it seems to be. Their abbreviated liaison—relationship—had all the trappings and social mores associated with medieval courtship. A slow progression, a trusting friendship that became more with each passing glance, discussion, argument and reconciliation, hindered by the self-control and self-denial that paralyzed them until they ultimately ran out of time.
And so they remain the Knight willing to give his life for the Lady, and the Lady who did.
end
Author's Note: This is my first time in this sandbox and I am without a beta, so I apologize for any and all errors. This just simply wouldn't leave my head. Now I'm trying to talk myself out of the AU fic this idea spawned.