A/N: I made it! I finished this chapter last night, and while I can't really promise to update again this time next week, I am hopeful about two weeks from now, at least ...
Many thanks, as always, to elbcw, FierGascon, Issai, Debbie, Helensg, criminally charmed, Tidia, and Beeblegirl.
Until next time!
ON BROTHERHOOD
10
IF I HAD WINGS
D'Artagnan.
Aramis has never been so sure of anything than he is that this is his brother. Not the body they found lying in the middle of the road, the one they carried home, the one they buried in a beautiful space beside a beautiful forest. This, this young man so thin and covered in blankets, this boy, utterly unresponsive to their efforts to rouse him, this is d'Artagnan. He does not know what happened, but his face, while scratched and bloody, is not that of a tortured person. Even in sleep, a frown creases his brow. When Aramis lays a hand across it to check his temperature, it is icy.
The door bangs open again, bringing a cold draught with it. The room is heating to almost sickening temperatures, and there are so many people crowded around the narrow bed that everyone is feeling slightly claustrophobic. "What's going on?" comes Porthos's voice, and Aramis finds himself shoved to the side. His friend takes one single, disbelieving step forward, shaking his head.
"It can't be - "
His words are meant with resounding silence. Eventually, Aramis says, "It is."
Porthos opens his mouth again, but before he can speak the nurse by the fireplace cries out that the water is boiled. Lemay lurches into action, dragging a large tub half-filled with cold water across the floor so that the nurse can pour all the hot water into it. He puts his arm in to the elbow and, apparently satisfied, gestures to two of his assistants. They peel back the layers of blankets, grab d'Artagnan under his arms and carry him across the room. When they reach the bath, they lower him down into it. He is still wearing his clothes - or what is left of them. His head lolls backwards barely controllably, and Lemay places a steadying hand behind it. "What are you doing?" Porthos asks.
"This is the only way I know to warm him up," Lemay replies. They are scarcely a foot away from the roaring fire. "Here, come and hold him."
Aramis moves to take the doctor's place, but Porthos gets there first, tenderly stroking the stray hair from d'Artagnan's face. "He feels warmer," he observes almost immediately.
"I think so," agrees Lemay.
Satisfied by the surgeon's judgement for the time being, Aramis tears his eyes away from d'Artagnan and moves as if in a dream towards Athos, whom Porthos has deposited neatly onto a bed. He sits bolt upright, eyes wild and unfocused, hair damp with melted snow. It is notable, however, that he appears to be breaking out of his earlier trance - perhaps due to the change in temperature - and now blinks bewilderedly, gazing at Porthos, whose large frame blocks d'Artagnan from view. "How are you?" Aramis murmurs, fearful of shocking him with loud noise.
"Can you see him too?" Athos asks, by way of reply, shifting his focus to Aramis.
"See d'Artagnan?"
"You can see him?"
Thus, Aramis realises what is happening inside his brother's mind, and it feels just as he would expect a sailor to feel as his boat lists sideways and begins to sink, only able to watch the shoreline vanish from view as the ocean swallows him up.
Athos, clearly, has lost track of reality, so fixated was he on d'Artagnan's early death. From the little Aramis knows of the musketeer's past, he understands that Athos had a younger brother, Thomas, about the same age as d'Artagnan is now, who died. This turn of events, he believes, caused Athos to turn away from his home and family and journey to Paris, where he lived for several weeks drunk and in poverty, until Treville found him and took him in. Lord only knows what he saw in that time.
"Can I ... ?" Athos is standing slowly, legs threatening to buckle at any moment.
"You don't have to ask," Aramis whispers, holding out a steadying arm to the musketeer. He ignores the stabbing pain that spikes through his shoulder as the older man added some of his own weight; a fine sheen of sweat begins to appear on his brow, and his whole body feels somewhat cold and shivery, but it will not do to stop now. They work there way slowly towards the steaming bath, where Porthos has begun to tenderly clean the blood and dirt from the lad's face. Lemay has his hands in the water, cutting d'Artagnan's ragged shirt from his body.
Aramis draws in a sharp breath at the bruising across the Gascon's torso. His ribs are dark purple in colour, livid against his unnaturally pale skin. Lemay probes them gently, and at last they see a slight movement, one single indication that he is still alive: his smooth brow furrows slightly in pain, and a tiny groan escapes his throat. "He lives," breathes one of the attendants in shock, and Aramis realises that none of them truly expect him to.
They have clearly never been exposed to d'Artagnan. He has the luck and fire of the Devil himself. He is as untouchable as any man in existence, more so than most. How on Earth he remains breathing at this point is beyond all logical reason - by all rights, he should be dead, should have been dead for a considerable length of time ... and yet, the very same stubborn persistence that had so irritated Aramis when they were first acquainted, and later grew on all of them so much that it had become as much a part of the garrison as Athos's hangovers, has kept him fighting, even now.
"Will he survive?" Athos asks, apparently coming back to his senses, but before anyone can give any sort of doubtful reply d'Artagnan stirs again. Porthos bends down and begins to murmur something unintelligible in his ear.
"D'Artagnan?" says Treville. There is total silence but for the slight splashing of the bath as his weight shifts. His eyes flutter open - how in God's name is he still functioning? - and he stares at them all for a moment.
Then, in a voice that is not quite his own, he says, "There are men coming. More than a hundred. I don't know when. They want to kill ... " he trails off, eyes sliding shut.
"D'Artagnan," Lemay says firmly, the only one in the room not speechless with surprise. He grips the bare, bruised shoulder and d'Artagnan hisses.
"They want to kill the musketeers," he finishes softly, and closes his eyes again.
"Fontaine," declares Aramis, somewhat overly cheerfully, in d'Artagnan's opinion, "will run at the first whiff of law enforcement. You know what that means, gentlemen." He waves his arm in a dramatic, sweeping gesture.
D'Artagnan intervenes before he can go any further. "No, I don't believe I do."
Athos, silent until this point, emits a single, incredibly pained groan. Porthos is clearly trying to arrange his features into an expression of boredom or scorn, but is failing miserably: a broad smile threatens to split his face in half. "Not to worry," says Aramis briskly, with a wicked grin.
"Yeah, you'll pick it up fast," Porthos adds.
"Porthos, you can be the less intelligent fellow slave trader; I'll be your cunning friend - Athos, you can be the - ah, the, er ..."
The lieutenant has fixed his sharpshooter with some a fearsome glare that Aramis appears quite lost for words. (It is, d'Artagnan suspects, mostly show on both of their parts, for this is a well practised routine with which they are all very familiar.)
"The strong, silent traveller drinking alone on a nearby table," Aramis finishes smoothly, and his gaze comes to rest upon d'Artagnan. He has a horrible feeling that he knows where this is going, and an equally certain feeling that he is not going to like it. "D'Artagnan, I'm afraid you will have to be a slave." He does not sound in the least bit sorry.
"Absolutely not." Athos's voice cuts through the blaze of irritation threatening to give Aramis a hard slap to the face. That Gascon fire, as Porthos once put it, is true to form. "The boy's barely been with us three weeks. You cannot ask him to partake in your juvenile games, particularly as such a degrading and humiliating role. He will be my companion." D'Artagnan feels a surge of gratitude towards the older man; assistance against the other two is hard to come by, especially from him. And from the sound of it, Athos is indignant in his name - he begins to take on more complex vocabulary when he is annoyed. Aramis, allegedly, suspects that it is an unconscious mechanism designed to impress higher intelligence upon the individual he is arguing with.
"But it will be so much more realistic," Aramis pleads. "He has the young, innocent look, and I'll bet he couldnt look threatening to save his life. D'Artagnan?"
"I - "
He has reached a dilemma. He cannot decline the role without looking weak, overly proud, or too eager to follow Athos (or quite possibly all three) and yet, at the same time, to accept would be to take an opposing side to his mentor and, simultaneously, take on a role that would be humiliating to play. They have all seen the way the likes of slave traders such as Fontaine treat their "products", as such, with no regard for their wellbeing.
D'Artagnan opens his mouth, still not fully sure what is going to come out of it, when Porthos begins to chuckle. "Your face!" he says, turning towards Aramis, who is grinning. "Of course we wouldn't expect you to do that. You can go with Athos and observe, it being your first time, and all."
Bewildered, he finally gives in and smiles. "Can somebody please explain to me what is going on?"
"Aramis and Porthos find it entertaining from time to time to pretend to be someone else, as such, in order to get close to criminals." Athos's words are cutting, but not, he imagines, untrue. "I have no idea why, but it keeps them entertained, I suppose."
Mind reeling, d'Artagnan thinks for a moment. How is he expected to react in this scenario? However well Aramis and Porthos try to play it off as a joke, he cannot shake the feeling that this has been a test, and one that he has failed spectacularly. But how can he make it up, show them that he is brave enough to be a musketeer, to do whatever it takes to protect the Crown? What can he do, now, after he has shown them a cowardly side of him? Should he hope to prove his worth against Fontaine, or brush it off as nothing and pray that it really was only a joke? Has he done this before, unknowingly? What on Earth must they think of him?
One small thought remains nestled at the back of his mind. Aramis, playful or not, was right. It would look far more realistic if one of them were to own a slave ... no matter how humiliating it may be, if he can prove his worth, it will not have been for nothing.
"D'Artagnan? Did you hear what I just said?"
"I'll do it," he says firmly, forgetting for a moment that they have not been included in his chain of thought.
Athos blinks. "Do what?"
"I'll be a slave. If that's what it takes, I'll be the slave. We can catch him in the act. You'll sell me to him, he'll accept, we'll arrest him."
"Stronger men have fallen into that trap before, d'Artagnan," warns Aramis, voice grave. "The regiment has lost many to slavers like Fontaine. I'll not put you at risk like that."
Pushing down the surge of anger at the implication that he cannot protect himself, he replies shortly. "I can do it. You'll all be there, won't you?"
"Yes, but - "
"You said yourself that it would be more realistic if I did it."
"D'Artagnan," Athos says firmly. "You are with me, and that's the end of it."
It is beginning to look as though he has failed to prove himself yet again, but Porthos stops them in their tracks. "No, d'Artagnan's right. Let him try."
"It can't be that hard," d'Artagnan adds, possibly unnecessarily, because Athos and Aramis are exchanging a look which seems to block out all surrounding noise. He still cannot fully grasp how the three of them are able to convey so much while saying so little; each day, these tiny quirks of theirs that betray their friendship become more and more glaringly obvious, and sometimes he wonders how they will eve accept him as one of their own.
Sometimes he wonders if he'll ever deserve to be accepted as one of them.
"Take your doublet off," Aramis finally (and somewhat reluctantly) agrees. "We'll rehearse, and see how you act. Then we'll decide."
Athos looks uncomfortable, but in a thoroughly protective manner, and something that could be respect flickers in Porthos's eyes. Perhaps he'll never truly be one of them, but for the first time since his father's death, d'Artagnan may have found a home.
"D'Artagnan," someone says. He spins around, wondering who it is, but there is nobody there. He blinks. "D'Artagnan," Come the voice again, this time louder, but muffled by a slowly growing ringing in his ears.
He jolts awake, though his eyes do not open, and his muscles, when they relax, have not contracted very much at all. For a while he is content to simply breathe, painful though it is, and finds himself drifting.
"Athos, you be Fontaine," Aramis says. Athos sighs but, to his credit, does as he is told.
He stands in front of them, silent and stoic as ever.
"Try saying something," Porthos suggests unhelpfully. "Open your eyes."
But that's not right; this isn't how it happened -
"D'Artagnan," says someone who can only be Treville.
Someone has a hand on his shoulder.
And above it all, Porthos's gentle, familiar voice: "Open your eyes. Open your eyes for me. Open your eyes."
"Perfect," says Aramis. "That's perfect."
He forces his eyes open and tries to gasp out all he has to say. Whether he manages it or not remains to be seen: all he knows are the faces of his friends, and as he watches they warp beyond recognition until they are twisted into expressions of shock and disgust. Panicked, he tries to blink away the vision, but they remain staring at him in horror.
He has betrayed them.
Someone's talking again, but d'Artagnan ignores them and watches vacantly until a haze turns into grey, and grey fades to black. He has seen enough. All he wanted was to tell his story; that is done; all he wants now is oblivion.