Okay, I'm honestly writing this on a whim because my fingers have been itching to write something. That being said, this may turn out to be a bunch of rambling, but if you don't mind reading drivel, I don't mind writing it. It's probably going to diverge quite a bit from the movie with different characters (no slash, despite the first OC being introduced is male) and most of the fic will probably take place outside of Britain. And, umm, yeah, that's about it.
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"Lancelot!" called out the young Seanna as she scrambled through the crowd on her little feet, "Lancelot!"
A wide-eyed boy with dark, curly locks and a sullen face peered down at her from on top of his horse. Seanna reached up and opened her hand to him, revealing a wooden amulet carved into the shape of a bear. She forced a sad smile to spread across her lips as he accepted the gift, but her smile was not returned. Lancelot, her friend and betrothed, was leaving on that day to serve the Roman Empire as a knight, a fate he had neither chosen nor deserved.
"How long shall we be gone?" he asked one of the Roman soldiers.
"Fifteen years," replied the soldier coarsely, "Not counting the months it will take to get to your post."
What post? Where were they taking him? Would it be dangerous? Of course, it would be. Seanna felt tears burning in her eyes out of fear for Lancelot. Though they were only children, she knew their souls would always be tied together.
"Do not be afraid," said Lancelot bravely, "I will return."
A tear rolled down Seanna's cheek as her eyes trailed after Lancelot. The brave boy followed reluctantly after the soldiers and into his fifteen years of servitude. Wherever he went, wherever they took him, he would return to her. He promised.
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Thick, weathered fingers wrapped themselves around yet another mug of ale. They belonged to the hands of a warrior, calloused from the hilt of a sword and the curve of a bow and strong enough to rip life from mortal flesh. At this moment, however, they lifted the mug of ale to the warrior's lips, allowing the alcohol to slide onto his tongue.
He sat alone in the tavern for there was no one to keep him company. What was left of his fellow warriors, those who had not died in battle, had all dispersed now that they had fulfilled their service to Rome and there were no more wars to fight. Galahad had departed back to Sarmatia after he had received word of his mother's death. He would journey to his old village to bury her and then return to Britain, which had become more of a home to him than that other distant land. It seemed only yesterday that they had lost Dagonet, Lancelot, and Tristan during the Saxon invasion, though it had actually been several months. Very little was left, therefore, of the legendary Sarmatian Knights of Hadrian's Wall. The warrior sighed at this and took another sip of ale.
As he set the mug back down on the table, his blue eyes caught glance of a dark, slender man maneuvering his way through the tavern. He wore a cloak with the hood pulled over his head and zigzagged between the tables, studying each person he encountered with a scrutinizing eye. The man stopped abruptly at the warrior's table and narrowed his eyes.
"You're Sarmatian, aren't you?" he asked bluntly, snapping his fingers to get the warrior's attention.
"I am," replied the warrior warily, somewhat put off by the man's rude manner of addressing him.
The strange man studied him for another moment and let out a dejected sigh. "Oh but you're not the right one!" he cried, throwing his hands up in the air, "Goddess have mercy! I have been wandering from Roman post to Roman post searching for the Sarmatian knight named Lancelot. Well, this was my last hope and it isn't even under Roman control anymore."
"Wait a minute," interrupted the warrior, "Did you say Lancelot?"
The man stopped his fretting momentarily and stared at the warrior once again. "You knew this Lancelot, didn't you?" he asked perceptively, "Yes, of course you did, but there is bad news here, very bad news. Go on and tell me. Get it over with, though I could probably guess."
The warrior, dizzied and confused by this man's odd mannerisms, answered as steadily as he could manage, "Lancelot was my friend and brother in arms---"
"Was! Cruel fate! I knew it!"
"---but I am sorry to report he died in battle not but five months past."
"Despicable man! Well, I suppose I have come all this way for nothing."
"I assure you," said the warrior, offended by the man's disregard of his deceased friend, "he cares for the situation no more than you do."
"I would trade places with him in an instant," moaned the stranger, "Life holds no joy for me and now I find I have been squandering the most recent chapter of it in search of a knight dead for five months now. But don't worry for me! It's but another curse on a life full of curses."
"Well," replied the warrior, still utterly confused, "What business did you have with him? And, for that matter, who are you exactly?"
"I am Brome," the man replied with a ceremonious bow, "a poor, failed fortune teller, who cannot even tell the future, fallen to the depravity of messenger at your service, Sir Gawain."
"You know my name?"
"Your intelligence did not earn you your honor, I gather," said Brome with a sigh, "I am a seer and know all, including your name. I have the intelligence of ten wise men and I have nothing but depression and desolation to show for it. Oh, to be dumb and happy!"
"You tell fortunes?" asked Gawain, still completely unsure of what to make of this man.
"Of course not!" spat Brome, "You are a dumb brute, aren't you? I said before that I am cursed with bad luck and have fallen to the lowly profession of messenger. I am supposed to be a fortune teller. In fact, I come from a long line of the most renowned soothsayers in all the land. Unfortunately, my only gift is hindsight. To put it plainly for you, I can only read a person's past."
"But shouldn't a person already know their past?" Gawain inquired, furrowing his eyebrows.
Brome let out an exasperated sigh and pulled out a scroll from his cloak. He then cleared his throat and began to read in the mock enthusiasm of a bartering merchant, "Why ask about your future? Your past determines your present! Ask for the answers to your past and you will find the keys to your future!"
Gawain stared at Brome blankly. "But what could you tell me about my past that I don't already know for myself?" he contended.
Brome frowned. "Obviously," he replied contemptuously, "The business hasn't really been working out for me, hence my current occupation of carrying messages all across the Roman Empire for knights who can't stay alive to receive them!"
"You have a message for Lancelot, then?" asked Gawain, trying hard to ignore Brome's insensitivity towards Lancelot's death.
"Are you really this slow or do you simply enjoy tormenting me?" Brome raved, "Yes! I have a message for Lancelot!"
Gawain stood up to his full height and stared down threateningly at the feeble Brome who laughed nervously, sensing that the knight was losing patience with him. "Perhaps," suggested Brome more cautiously, "I could leave the message with your commander---Arthur, isn't it?"
"Come," ordered Gawain gruffly, "I will take you to him."
Gawain strode through the fort with Brome scrambling after him until they reached the hall of the round table where Arthur sat stooped over a pile of scrolls. The half-Roman, half-Briton commander looked up from his work at the entrance of the two men. "Yes?" he asked with anticipation.
"This man named Brome wishes to speak with you," Gawain announced, "He brings with him a message for Lancelot."
Arthur lifted his eyebrows in surprise at the mention of Lancelot's name. He had mourned greatly for the death of his best friend and now made a priority out of anything concerning he who had been his most trusted knight. "Please," said Arthur eagerly to Brome, "Come forward with the message. I was Lancelot's commander for fifteen years until his death in the battle at Badon Hill. Any dispatches intended for him are safe in my hands."
"Yes, you've always been a man of your word," muttered Brome as he advanced towards where Arthur was seated, "One of those self-righteous types. By the goddess, you have the most unscandalous past I've ever read."
"Brome," explained Gawain, "is a fortune teller or a hindsight teller or some such thing."
"Right," replied Arthur indifferently, figuring it wasn't worth the effort to try to make sense of what Gawain had said. Brome pulled a scroll from his cloak and handed it to Arthur who immediately perused its contents with great interest. Brome stood by his side, sighing with impatience at Arthur's apparently slow reading pace.
"Well," said Arthur finally, scratching his head, "This is very interesting."
"What?" inquired Gawain curiously, "What does it say?"
"It appears Lancelot was betrothed to a girl back in Sarmatia," Arthur reported, "They were to be married upon his return, but because neither his family nor his village was ever informed where Lancelot had been stationed, they have not yet learned of his fate. The correspondence was written by the girl's mother. Regrettably, the girl has been kidnapped by the Navari tribe---do you know of them, Gawain?"
"All Sarmatians do," Gawain replied bitterly, "They are the only tribe to show resistance to our pact with Rome. They hide up in the mountains with their sons, refusing to let them be enslaved. You can't really blame them, but it causes trouble for the rest of us. Not to mention, they are known to take women from other tribes as wives for their sons."
"I suspect that is exactly what happened to this woman of Lancelot's," said Arthur gravely, "The message relates that the Navari tribe has taken her and she will be married to the leader's second born son unless Lancelot returns to make good on his promise to marry her himself. The tribe will honor their engagement up until her twenty-second birthday at which time she will be handed over to the second born son against her will."
"What are we to do?" asked Gawain with concern, "There is no hope for her now that Lancelot is gone."
"Not necessarily," replied Arthur thoughtfully, "The girl's mother wrote that they will know Lancelot by a wooden amulet carved into the shape of a bear."
"Do you know the amulet of which they speak?" Gawain inquired.
"As a matter of fact," said Arthur exultantly, "I think I do."
The commander rose from his seat and headed off to Lancelot's old quarters followed closely behind by Gawain and Brome. Once inside, Arthur strode over to a chest by the window and dug through it until he pulled out the bear shaped carving with a string attached at the end. Arthur held out the amulet for his companions to see while he formulated a plan in his head.
"Gawain," he addressed his knight at last, "You will take the amulet and rescue the girl from her captors."
"You want me to pose as Lancelot?" Gawain asked in disbelief. He wasn't exactly a close likeness.
"They have no means of recognizing you," Arthur assured him, "and no reason to doubt you if you have the amulet. Bring the girl and her mother back to Britain where they will be safe. It is what Lancelot would have wanted."
Gawain could not argue with this nor could he deny honoring the wishes of his deceased friend. Besides, many years had passed since he had laid eyes on the vast, open lands of Sarmatia. It would be a most welcome sight. "I will do it," said Gawain firmly.
Arthur smiled and patted Gawain on the back. "I am glad of this," he said sincerely, "You are doing the right thing, I believe."
"Idealistic rantings!" scoffed Brome, who amazingly had managed to remain silent up until this point, "Who honestly cares who the little village girl marries?"
"Our friend!" answered Gawain resolutely, "Lancelot cared. That's good enough for me."
"You received this message from the girl's mother, did you not?" Arthur asked Brome, "And you met her?"
"Vile woman," replied Brome with a shudder, "A blubbering, hysterical mess."
Arthur and Gawain sighed, exchanging looks of aggravation. "Well," said Arthur to Brome, "Since you are acquainted with her and the village, I will ask that you accompany Gawain on his journey."
"What?" interjected Gawain immediately in protest, "Arthur, that really isn't necessary. I can go on my own." The last thing he wanted was to travel all the way across the breadth of the Roman Empire with this exasperating man.
"I agree with the long-haired one on this issue," added Brome, nodding his head in affirmation.
"Nonsense," replied Arthur, "It makes much more sense for both of you to go together. Now, I'll leave you two to making the necessary arrangements. May God go with you."
Arthur placed the amulet in Gawain's hand and quickly exited the quarters, pleased with the decided course of action. Gawain turned and eyed Brome who grimaced at him in return. This would be a long journey.
