Settlement
She knew it wasn't fair.
He loved her – he had always loved her. Before Arthur, before Lancelot, before iMerlin/i; he was there. He had given her flowers and even a chaste kiss, once, when she was ten.
They never talked about it again.
Leon was loyal, and polite, and educated; he would never have done anything that could shame her. He knew he would never be able to marry her, so he walked away. Maybe, this was why she had loved Lancelot so much: she was everything Leon was and, yet, somehow ordinary. He knew what it was like to fight for his own life.
She couldn't explain what she had loved about Arthur – it was just who he was, his presence and his charisma, dragging them all, drowning them all. There was no man, no woman, that wouldn't lay down their life for the prince. Gwen, even when she saw his failures, could never forget this – the awe that he managed to inspire. And when he had wanted her – loved her – how could she refuse?
Now it felt like her life was a long, dark night. Arthur had been the sun shining over Camelot – over her – for so long, that his absence made everything feel hollow, out of focus.
Guinevere was the Queen, she had no time – no right – to lose herself in her the pain that threatened to overwhelm her. She could not – would not – act as Uther had; she wouldn't fail Arthur and all those who had trusted her with the rule of the land.
That also meant that she had no time to be lonely. Camelot couldn't suffer for her heart.
And Leon – he was just ithere/i, his eyes shining with confidence and unmistakable love; the same look he'd give her when they were small, the same one he did his best to hide ever since he grew up enough to understand they could never be.
Gwen had forgotten how to sleep alone, and even when she finally drifted off, her mind insisted on making her dream of things that she could not have – hands and lips, the sweat of her body, the slow burning pain and pleasure of a man's desire inside her. She would wake up even more unsettled than before.
Protocol said she could not marry for months, until they could all be sure that she was not carrying Arthur's heir; but even that sweet comfort had been denied by her dirty sheets not two days after her coronation. He had left her truly alone.
It couldn't go on – she couldn't handle it; she couldn't handle Camelot thinking about it. And Camelot deserved better than an unsteady Queen.
It was easy – a few exchanged words, some specific orders, and it was done.
She smiled at Leon, trying to look eager and passionate, but the way he touched her head and her hair before kissing her were enough proof that she hadn't fooled him. Still, he wasn't backing away, and Gwen was grateful for it.
Gwen tried her best to enjoy it – but everything felt wrong; off. His beard made her shiver when it was against her neck and back, but it burned her face as she moved. Leon felt too eager, too desperate to pleasure her, and it made her weirdly self-conscious of herself. She couldn't lose herself in the moment, as much as she tried to.
He was too big, and even when he moved slowly she could feel her body complaining of the stretch. She tried to move, to incite him, to settle her legs around him in a way that would make her more comfortable; but it didn't matter. It was not what she wanted, it was a mere pantomime.
There was nothing she could do now but wait for it to end – lay there, legs spread and think of Camelot, of how important it was for her to be content with what she got, to accept it graciously; the love and the dedication that she could never reciprocate.
It was not fair – not with herself, and not with Leon; but life had never been fair to any of them, and the only thing they could do was to try and make do with what they had.