Title: Mourner's Dawn

Author: Kytten

Pairing: Lucien Lachance/OMC

Rating: PG13

Disclaimer: Don't own.

Author's Note: Immensely pleased with the use of apparent non-words. XD

Lucien, hiding in the shadows waiting for the monks to pass, froze when he saw May nearly skipping down the corridor, grinning ear-to-ear. He lunged out as she passed, clapping a hand over her mouth and dragging her back the way she'd come.

"Ow, ow. Not that arm, you fetcher," she grumbled, mostly muffled. "You nearly tore it off last time. Ouch!"

"Quiet!" he hissed, shoving her through the door, waiting a moment before speaking to see if any of the monks followed. But May had been up and down those halls quite a lot in the last week and as she had a tendency to complain to herself as she trotted along, no one had noticed.

"Where's Sam?" he demanded, turning, a look in his eyes she'd never seen before.

Unfortunately, May was not impressed.

"He's where you left him," she said, Vicente's training keeping her from grinning like an idiot at her own double meaning. "I don't think he's in a position to be moving much."

Strictly speaking, that was true. Ocato had sequestered the boy in his rooms and was not letting him leave. Apparently, while glad he was alive, he was immensely irritated to find he'd been working as a member of the Dark Brotherhood.

Lucien glowered at her, but that strange look was still in his eyes, a sort of fearful desperation, almost hopeful.

"I will ask you again, and this time I expect a proper answer. Where is Sam?"

It didn't make sense though, for Lucien to be afraid. The man knew no fear. Anger, failure, lust, perhaps, but never fear.

"Ocato took him," she said absentmindedly, trying to parse the look on his face. He was angry at her, yes, but there was something else in his eyes.

He knew Sam was alive, she realized. He'd trusted him to come back. Suddenly the bits and pieces she'd heard filtering through the missing ceiling of the Temple of the One made sense.

Lucien had his Bosmer back. He was in love.

"Took him where?" he demanded, face still a mask of hate. But May was grinning wickedly at her realization, her fear of the man in front of her long gone.

"Where does Ocato carry anything off to? Have you seen the inside of his rooms? I swear, everything he picks up eventually ends up back there. Of course, he has a horrible habit of putting things in his pockets without realizing it, but—"

Lucien slapped a gloved hand over her mouth again, glaring.

"Return to the Cheydinhal sanctuary. Inform the others the Listener hasn't died."

"What am I supposed to tell them?" She glared, pulling off his hand. "That he's mute and Ocato doesn't know what's wrong?"

That stopped him in his oh-so-important tracks.

"He's what?"

May smirked.

"Mute. As in, without a voice. Cannot talk. Makes an odd squeaky noise instead."

"Sithis help us," he muttered darkly, swiping away an errant stand of hair.

"Ocato's under the impression it's Sithis' fault, actually."

"Ocato is an idiot," Lucien snapped. "Tell the others Sam has gone into hiding. A death threat from the Imperial Legion that hit close to home."

"But Hieronymus is one of his closest friends. He helped Sam at Bruma."

Lucien took a slow, deep breath, trying not to notice that everything boiled down to the same thing.

Who helped Sam when you were sitting cozy in Farragut? Who was on his side? Who gave a damn whether he lived or died?

"Then tell them there's a traitor in the guild."

"You mean you?"

"What?" Lucien growled, his eyes snapping into hers with what should have been terrifying intensity. "You forget who you're speaking to, girl."

"My mistake," May said, looking totally unamused. "Who are you then? I could have sworn you look just like Lucien Lachance."

"Explain yourself before I strangle you," he ground out, his good humor evaporating.

May only shrugged, half wondering what would have happened if she'd left one of Lucien's more important bits fall off.

"You killed the Listener. That makes you a traitor."

"No more traitor than that pig Altmer. And I mean to make good on my dues."

May shrugged again, inspecting the bruise on her arm to see if it had grown.

"Arquen defeated the Wrath. You on the other hand, have been expelled."

"Only the Listener can expel me, you—"

"This Listener did, you filthy fetcher. And seeing as how you killed him, the Listener likes me better. So if I were you, I'd be a little more careful which murderers you throw around." She stepped aside then, with a toss of her hair and opened the door to the stairwell.

But Lucien grabbed her before she could go, spinning her around to face him.

"Samwane expelled me?"

"Yes." She glared. "I thought I'd made that clear."

"Samwane? My Silencer."

"Listener. Yes."

Lucien glared, suddenly spotting a hole in this logic.

"You said he was mute."

May narrowed her eyes, giving him her own version of Sam's look.

"He has hands. Ocato has paper. Occasionally, they even have ink. Good day, Mr. Lachance."

And with that she was gone, back down the stairs into the blind monks' hall while behind her, Lucien resisted the urge to bash his head against the wall.

"Expelling people, Sam?" Ocato glared, though he didn't turn away from the calcinatory. "You make it sound as though I'm letting you continue in this insane guild of yours."

Sam scribbled something down and threw it at him. Ocato caught it with a stray bolt of telekinesis before it could drop down into the vicious smelling soup.

I'll have you know, I happen to be a very important person.

"Yes," Ocato said, throwing the note back. "The Champion of Cyrodill, recently back from the dead, thank the Nine, but still with the same atrocious handwriting."

I write fine.

Ocato laughed, tossing the note into the bowl he peeling Nirnroot into.

"Yes, I suppose you are a fine scribbler. But I was referring to your penmanship."

Your quills are too big, you giant freak.

"Have you considered that perhaps you're simply too small?"

Sam glared and Ocato had to reach a hand out to keep his mortar and pestle from crawling off the table.

"You know, I'm surprised your telekensis isn't stronger, Sam. The Champion of Cyrodill should be able to throw a grown man across the room." Ocato stopped, a tell tale quiver in the corner of his mouth. "Though I suppose you could throw a Bosmer."

Would you like me to try throwing Altmers?

"I don't think you could pick me up with any method, Sam, let alone magic."

We can't all be fat.

Ocato paused in his work to better glare at Sam, who was currently scrawling innocent doodles along the edges of his stack of parchment.

"I am not fat."

It's all right. Old people are supposed to get paunchy.

Ocato glowered, watching as a moment later, an extremely well aimed carrot had Sam doubled over.

"Neither am I old."

Of course not.

Ocato smirked, and turned back to his work.

"As notes cannot be sarcastic, I will take that exactly the way I want to."

Sam squeaked. And it sounded decidedly like fat. He didn't give the boy the satisfaction of turning around. He only had one carrot left and he needed it.

Expelled from the Dark Brotherhood.

He'd been expelled from the Dark Brotherhood.

He was… nothing. Not a mage, or a scholar. He was a killer. It's what he did. It had been, until now, his profession. And what did this make him?

Nothing. You're nothing. You're homeless, fundless, and alone.

Strictly speaking, that wasn't exactly true. He had money. But considering his situation, it wasn't about to help much.

But then, it was possible Sam was just upset. He had recently been dead. Lucien knew from experience waking up after that wasn't pleasant. And if he had been the one to cause it, the boy certainly had reason to be angry. But if he could just apologize…

Sam watched the door handle move, happily munching on his carrot, thinking it was probably May come back to retrieve the cloak she'd left behind. It wasn't. And upon realizing who it was, Sam threw his carrot with as much force as he could muster at the unfortunate, former Speaker's head.