After the dragons fled the battlefield, Camelot was as a graveyard.
It wasn't quiet, not really. There was a faint breeze and the tattered remains of the crimson flags on the parapets fluttered softly. Many people were crying, but even their screams of grief upon finding a loved one were hushed. It was twilight, and together they stood somewhere between a bloody sunset and a cold, dark night.
Arthur sat at the edge of the clearing between the castle walls and the woods. A couple of knights had come up to him, asking him questions he didn't understand. Are you hurt? they would ask. Can I help? But Arthur couldn't find his voice and so he stared into the trees and waited.
Guinevere found him as the first stars were beginning to emerge from the half-dark. She knew better than to ask him if he was okay. She just sat in the grass next to him and held his hand, and after a while, his head dropped to rest on her shoulder.
"Let's go," she said quietly, and he closed his eyes, ignoring her. "Arthur."
"I need time," he said, and his voice sounded shattered.
"I know, but you don't get any. Not just now. You gave up that right when you let them put that crown on your head." She leaned her cheek against his hair, sighing, her heart breaking for her husband and for her friend and for all the dead lying scattered in the streets. "There will be time for grief later. But right now, the people need a king. They are scared, and they are hurt, and they are alone. They need you."
She had to help him to his feet. He seemed ancient, like the weight of a thousand years was weighing on his bones and on his heart. He was just ahead of her, staring into the trees still, and Gwen watched as the set of his back changed in a moment. Somehow he conjured up a confidence, an authority, like he was about to stride through the Great Hall and receive his subjects. His head was high and his shoulders squared, and she realized with a pang that she was watching an act that Arthur had, by necessity, perfected.
The breeze seemed to die as Arthur reappeared in the courtyard. People grew immediately silent. Those that were crouching rose slowly, unfolding from the ground, their eyes fixed on him as he passed. He surveyed the battlefield, and deep under his facade, his heart fell.
When the shades had retreated into the earth, the soldiers that they had converted appeared from the depths of their inky, melting forms. They were left prostrate where they fell, their faces frozen in death-masks and stained by the shades as they ebbed away. Arthur stared down at one in particular- a girl no older than 6. The blackness seeping from her face was seemingly repelled by twin tracks on her cheeks, like water to wax, and Arthur realized they were tear-stains.
They were waiting for him to speak, but Arthur had no words. The usual reassurances felt hollow. We will rebuild, he could say. Camelot still stands. She is strong. We are strong. But he looked around and saw broken people. They wouldn't believe those words any more than he did, just then. And so he unpinned his cloak, now tattered and stained, and he wrapped it around the dead child like a blanket, and he lifted her gently, as if she were asleep. As he walked the faces of the watching men and women were blurred, and he had eyes only for the face of the girl he carried. He brushed her hair from cheeks and wiped away the tearstains with the pad of his thumb. The record of her suffering thus erased, she looked like she might have been sleeping.
He laid her at the base of the stairs leading to the Great Hall, and he turned to find a small procession behind him. At its head was a woman who seemed to vibrate with the force of the sobs she kept stifled; she was undoubtedly the girl's mother.
"What was her name?" Arthur asked quietly.
"Astrea," the woman said, her face terribly lined. It was unlikely she would ever bear another child.
"That's a beautiful name." Arthur rested his hand on her shoulder and he could feel it shaking now. "She died with honor. She will be remembered that way."
He turned to the rest of the crowd, watching, waiting. Several, following his example, were lifting their fallen brethren.
"They will all be remembered," he shouted. "We will never forget their names!"
People began to chant the names of their dead brothers, sisters, children. It was quiet at first- a whisper, but it grew into a roar. Lillian. Mark. Astrea. Lukan. Hundreds of names, and yet in the din, Arthur could only think of one name.
"Merlin."
A/N: Remember when I thought I could handle regular updates and a full courseload? Yeah, me too.
I'm doing my best, please be patient!