Author: Triane

Disclaimer: Not. Mine. Except Iona. Everything else belongs to someone else.

Summary: Iona and Dagonet deal with the aftermath, and Iona makes a final decision.

The sentinels saw them coming from a mile away, and shouted to the guards at the gate. Iona stuck her head into the tavern and called for Vanora as she ran towards the wall. Three weeks the knights had been gone, and Iona had been pacing the parapets for almost that entire time, her stomach done up in knots with a worry she couldn't rationalize away. Now, as she shaded her eyes from the sun and looked towards the fast-approaching knights, her heart dropped to her feet. Two empty horses. One lying across his horse instead of sitting. One horse with two riders. Too far away, can't see who's wounded.

The cry of alarm spread down from the wall and across the fort, and a crowd of people gathered instantly to watch the knights thunder through the gates, the fallen warrior surrounded by others with supporting hands to keep him on his horse. They were a flurry of movement when they stopped at the stables, and Iona stayed only long enough to catch a glimpse of Dagonet's grim face as he slid off Agravain's back with Gaheris in his arms before she ran to the infirmary.

He's alright…he's alright…. Her heart pounded her relief against her ribs as she raced up the stairs and down the hall, skidding into the infirmary off-balance. She flew around the room, opening cupboards and pulling supplies out arbitrarily, not knowing what wounds there were and how they would need to be treated. She felt woefully unprepared, cursing herself that she had not gone into medicine. The fort's healer was a drunk, and probably passed out somewhere behind a building, but as long as Dagonet was well, he would be able to heal his brothers. Iona knew, though, that time was of the essence – and the less rummaging Dagonet would have to do, the better.

Iona was hastily stoking the fire when she heard them coming, shouts and rushing feet and someone crying out in pain. Then they were in the room, and everything was total chaos. It seemed like everyone in the fort was now in the infirmary, shouting and tramping around. Small Iona was at a disadvantage, pressed up against the wall and unable to see over the heads of the people, but she took a deep breath and pressed her way towards the middle of the room. As she went, she assessed the people she was passing. If they were not a knight, she ordered them out the door and glared at them until they complied. The number of people in the room dropped by half almost immediately, and Iona was able to see what was happening.

Tristan and Bors were sitting on a cot on one side of the room while Arthur paced in front of them. They were all bleeding from some gash or arrow wound. Gawain was lying, death-like, on a bed on the other wall, but he was still breathing and his pulse was strong. Next to him was Ector, grimacing in pain from a deep cut to his leg, but he assured Iona he could wait for Dagonet for a while longer. It was Gaheris who needed the most attention.

He was thrashing around on a fourth cot, and it was taking the strength of Galahad and Lancelot to hold him down while Dagonet worked. Iona didn't take a close look, but she saw a huge gash across his stomach, a dark wound at the side of his head, and at least three arrows broken off and jutting out from him in various places, as well as countless other cuts and bruises. He was screaming for his brother, Gareth.

Iona swallowed, then gathered some cloths and went to Arthur. He had a slash across his face that just needed cleaning, and another on his arm. Iona's voice was low as she worked.

"The horse belongs to Gareth?" The Roman commander's eyes were dark with regret and pain as he nodded.

"He fell into the river and was washed away." There was a sudden silence from the other side of the room and they looked in alarm, but saw that Dagonet had just given Gaheris a potion to put him to sleep. Lancelot and Galahad slumped to the floor in relief, and Iona turned back to Arthur. She finished bandaging his arm, then moved on to Tristan to clean the arrow wound in his shoulder. Her voice was still quiet.

"What happened?" Arthur's jaw clenched and unclenched, but no sound came for a moment as he thought back to the battle. It was Tristan who spoke, his voice flat.

"Two ambushes. One after another." Bors' voice was a growl from next to Tristan

"The first we saw comin'. The second we didn't." Iona felt the other two knights come up behind her as she moved on to the gash in Bors' forearm. It needed stitches, so she cleaned it and wrapped it to wait for Dagonet. She stepped back to where she could see all the knights who were surrounding her. Her voice was soft, compassionate, knowing that they were so wrapped up in the emotion of everything that they needed something concrete, someone to tell them what to do.

"Go to your horses. Get cleaned up. Get something to eat. I will find you if you are needed." They nodded silently and filed out of the room. Only Bors remained, and he settled back on the cot to wait, nodding to Iona. She patted his shoulder and crossed the room to Ector.

For a few minutes, there was silence as she cleaned Ector's leg. It needed stitches as well, so she wrapped it to stop the bleeding and got him some water when he asked. Gawain was still unconscious from the blow to his head, but it needed nothing more than cleaning.

"Iona." Dagonet's voice was soft, but she was immediately by his side.

"I need you to hold it closed." She nodded, placing her hands on either side of the fearsome wound in Gaheris' stomach and pressing them together so Dagonet could stitch. Even as inexperienced as she was, Iona could see that he was a lost cause – but they closed it and wrapped it anyways. Her heart clenched as she looked at Dagonet's face and the sorrow there, but she said nothing, only held his gaze for a moment when he looked at her. He nodded, his lips trembling for a brief second before he clenched his jaw and straightened. She followed him to Ector, where they went through the same process for his leg, then to Bors, where they stitched his forearm together again.

By this time, Gaheris was breathing heavily and with difficulty, his mouth a red slash in his death-white face. Iona stood by his bed with Dagonet and Bors, watching him fight to live, and felt tears sting her eyes. Her hand found Dagonet's and she met his gaze for a moment. A thought jumped between them and he nodded, bending to press a kiss to her mouth before she slipped silently out of the room.

The rest of the men were in the stables, not having gotten far after Iona sent them from the infirmary. They turned to look at her as she entered, all expression dropping from their faces as she took a breath, her voice low and husky.

"It will not be long." One by one they filed past her, first Arthur and Lancelot, then Tristan and Galahad. Finally it was just Iona and Jols, the knight's squire. They didn't speak, only nodded to each other in passing as they worked to settle the knight's horses and unpack their bags. Jols slipped away when they got word the funeral was happening immediately, but Iona stayed behind to finish.

She found comfort in the repetition of brushing the horses until their coats were soft and glossy, knowing that it was relaxing for the horses as well, and a deserving reward for what they had just been through. She let her mind wander as she worked, and was only half surprised when she realized she was crying.

What kind of a life is this? How can I expect to survive here when the most talented fighting men know that death could be coming for them any day? How do they manage to live, when they can lose their brothers at the blink of an eye?

Iona paused for a moment in her brushing, and the horse she was working on nickered at her. She looked up to see that she had been grooming Natali, Gaheris' horse, and a fresh wave of tears broke over her.

He was so young! They both were…barely older than my first year students, and now their lives are over. What kind of an empire sends children to defend its outer limits? Does Rome even know what kind of a sacrifice these men are making out here? It's not their empire, and yet they die! She stifled an angry yell and stomped out of Natali's stall, walking down the row to slip in beside Ardin. Her beautiful horse whickered at her and Iona pressed her forehead to Ardin's, sighing as she did so, ignoring the equipment displayed in the corner, now, three weeks too late.

"I won't fight for Rome, Ardin. I can't. I can't fight for something I don't agree with." Ardin looked at her with soft brown eyes and whinnied, as if answering her. Iona laughed bitterly under her breath.

"Yeah, yeah. But I can't not fight. Not now that I know the knights, know who they are and know their commander. Not now that I can." She absently patted Ardin's nose and wandered out of the stall, across the square, and up to the barracks. She made her way to the room she now shared with Dagonet and sat in the chair by the window. To wait.

She sat and waited, so that when her lover came into the room, she was there for him; there to unbuckle his armour and pull it from his tired body; there to wash the blood and dirt and gore from him; there to lead him to their bed and pull back the covers; there to take him in her arms and hold him while he cried silent, private tears for the brothers he had lost in a war not of his making.