If I don't sleep, I'll never dream
If I could beg, would you do it for me?
Outside my house, down on your knees
How could I know I'd turn you into me?
How could I know I'd turn you into me?
I, I try to be careful one last time
Open wide, take so long to say goodnight
-Sir Chloe
She sees the woman keel over on the lawn, her collapsing figure less like a fallen star than its own pitiful kind-of circus.
Gwen bends at the waist, only pretending to put another scabby potato into her basket, as she watches the guardsmen haul Morgana Le Fay to her feet. Again.
The woman is blubbering, her dress a violet shimmer in the early morning light and her pale arms twisting and banding across her chest as she holds onto something tightly. There are distant shouts and muffled threats from the men, but the noblewoman refuses to give up her prize by intimidation.
Gwen had to squint to see what the precious thing she's clutching at is, and finally gets a glimpse as one guardsmen wrenches it from Morgana's fingers and up, up into the air.
It's a bracelet.
It winks like a jewel in the sun, and even from her distance Gwen can see that it is filigreed and expensive. She drops the pretense of not looking, as the other field workers put their baskets down to openly stare at the spectacle, some already casting bets on how long it'll take to bring the lady inside this time.
Morgana is now heaving hysterically, no longer sobbing, her chest setting a frantic rhythm as one man holds her wrists behind her back, and the other pockets the bracelet. In the next moment she's thrashing in futility, her dark hair making quick circles in the air as she shakes her head, no, no, and they pull her up aggressively to return to the house.
Gwen feels more sympathy for the lady than she usually dares; the woman so clearly distressed about the loss of the item, and the guards soundlessly marching her back.
It's cruel to see the difference.
She lets out a breath she hadn't known she'd been holding, and counts the number of berry bushes and fruit trees in the field, and then how many more upturned potatoes left to collect, before resolutely turning back to the scene.
But the lady is gone.
"...absolutely hysterical! The lordship keeps her nailed to the coffin in her chambers and she still has the audacity to anger him."
"Oh, she is out of her mind! A tempest, not one noble has asked for her hand, and likely, not one will."
The gossip comes loud and fast from around the corner, and Gwen recognizes the participants before she sees them.
The sour look is not out of place on Astor's mouth, but she would not have expected the manservant George to stoop so low. She spots the two men huddled in an ill-lit corner, speaking unashamedly, as if the lady's chambers were not a few doors down.
Two blotches of red brighten on George's sullen face when he sees her walking down the hall towards him, with arms full of dishes. She raises an eyebrow in reproach.
He nods his head to her in acknowledgement, but even before she has taken the polite steps away, turns back to his companion with gravity, as if he cannot stop the spiteful words slipping from his mouth.
"She's a radical!"
The coveted Morgana Le Fay, the city's most eligible nobleblood and sought after young woman, of renowned wit and cutting beauty.
Or at least up until a year ago, when her charm unraveled to a sudden and terrifying hysteria.
Gwen has heard the rumors, a necessary intake of stories before being inducted as servant in the Governor's household. The tales of the woman roaming the halls at night with wild terror, self-inflicted wounds and countless maidservants dismissed for any slight.
She had been hesitant to seek work in the estate, but circumstances had aligned perfectly with misfortune to bring her here, the only employment she could undertake as a young, unmarried woman.
Consequently, she only felt pity that the other woman's unkempt mind had become fodder for the everyday titter of the servants.
She steps through the kitchen doorway, walking carefully to avoid the groups of gossip mongers that always gathered at the end of the day, for the latest word from the estate's servants.
Pushing away a cast-iron pot with her elbow, Gwen estimates the space between her and the sink before heaving the rest of the dishes into the basin for a wash. She sidles by the cook for her next instruction, but finds the usually inexorable woman leaning over the side of the counter languidly, shaking a black pan in one hand as she recalled the morning's events with a like-minded scullery maid.
She was nodding her head solemnly at whatever drivel the maid was repeating, beads of sweat prominent on her face.
"That girl was in real trouble this morning! I could've sworn I heard the bells of coming heaven over her head, when she was standing in the dirt and crying for her precious jewelry."
She shook her head in amusement, "Her father will have her skinned, I'm telling you!"
She wasn't even there, Gwen thought.
"Agatha? Agatha!" Gwen smiled roundly when the cook turned to her, suddenly wishing her duties were already done, and the countless hours in the presence of the others had escaped her in the meanwhile. But alas!
"I think your salmon is burning."
"Oh Gods!" A look of disgust crossed the woman's face, and she flapped a hand at the serving girl dismissively. "I've been completely distracted with all the goings on! Thank you dear."
She placed the pan to the side, and Gwen made a move to leave, when the woman clasped her arm with something to say.
"Now, have you heard-"
"Yes. I was there." Gwen replied, her own voice sounding too short and curt.
But the cook was still caught up, and spoke insistently. "Oh, but you don't really know! The Lady Morgana was caught up in a near scandal today, about her dead sister and all-"
"I think the lady was especially addled today, I agree." Gwen interrupts, a touch too loudly in the hushed kitchen. She now sees the visible annoyance on the woman's face, and feels a perverse comfort in the reaction.
"Let's not presume her illness, and perhaps she'll fare better tomorrow."
"Perhaps." The cook echoes, turning her head away, now that Gwen had proved a poor parrot. She thinks that the older woman has only just come to the realization about her that everyone else seems to conclude much more quickly, her standoffishness clicking into place.
Gwen is now an unrelenting, hard wall of a person. Still wallowing in her grief; all pitiable and no fun.
They shouldn't waste their time in the downpour, while she stands stubbornly still in the rain.
As she steps out of the back entryway, the cool night air comes up to meet her, and her footfalls are swallowed in the quiet of the outside.
She's had more than enough of the day, of all the sniping and callous remarks, and the figure of her small cottage welcomes her as she steps up to the mat.
As always, she hesitates, her bone-tiredness of the day stealing away the memories of loss before she remembers it all over again.
That there's no reason for the candles to be lit inside, and definitely no reason for anyone to be waiting up for her.
Turning the doorknob, embossed with her father's handiwork, she holds her breath as a draft of air caresses her face; the sweet smell of pine, smoke and long ago worked metal hitting her nose.
The broom is her weapon, and she wields it across the room, sweeping away all remnants of stale air and clung-on dust and making quick work of the floors; just a few steps needed for a circuit, and to push away all the scents of forge fire and shavings of silver.
Finally, she takes a seat, her stomach quivering with a familiar grief as she casts her eyes over the table, where a circle of moonlight has so pointedly landed on the extra chairs. And on the cracked quill and ink nub on the desk, which she dares not to disturb in its familiarity.
Father sat in the high-backed chair, and Elyan always took the stool. Her eyes can almost spot the dark and light of figured shadows on the floor, but one look up, always confirms the same.
Here today and gone tomorrow.
Every quiet breath is unbearably loud in the house, every muffled swallow falling back into that ache in her chest that seems to have burrowed far within her. It feels as if a chasm has opened up, between her heart and her mouth, a wide impasse so impossibly deep she could never hope to make it across.
She straightens out the chairs one more time, one, two and three, closes the empty cupboard and smooths out the thin cot once more to ease herself. It does nothing for that empty inside her, just like the first few months after her father had passed from sickness.
Now it's been a year, and she's taken refuge at the lips of the chasm.
She gingerly lays back on the cot, her eyes tracing the familiar shape of a blacksmith's apron hung over the door, before falling shut into a mercifully heavy sleep.
Gwen is glad she does not dream.
The next morning finds her duties in the various chambers of the house, unrolling crisp bed sheets and setting down pillows for guests.
The Governor, Uther, will be having a feast in the upcoming week, and all the servants had been in a frenzy to prepare in time. There were even rumors that the King might pay a visit.
There were other rumors as well, secretly hopeful ones from the maidservants, that Morgana would be finally married off to some nobleman, so that the shared misery of her terror would cease, and they could all stop pretending to care for her outbursts.
Some were more excited for the lower nobles who would come to visit; the women servants leaving in clamorous groups to the only nearby market, hoping a knight would catch their fancy and whisk them away from the dull countryside.
Gwen didn't favor their ignorance, and had no hopes for a knight's attention, even if it was benign. Instead, she knelt by the headboard of the upholstered bed, hidden by the heavy drape of the curtain, reaching for a rag that had fallen, ever so slightly out of reach.
The door opens, and she hears the whisk of fabric and the padding of slippers and shoes as two women stride into the room.
She tries to quiet her breath, her heart in her throat, hoping the two will leave so she can finish before she's caught dawdling.
It had been her own fault; she had fingered the pretty tassels of the curtain for a second too long, wondering, for the first time in a long time, how they would look adorned on a shawl or hemmed around a dress. And now she would be caught.
Gwen tilted her head to the space in the drapes to see none other than Lady Morgana pacing the room, and a maidservant she didn't recognize standing still in the doorway.
Morgana stops pacing to motion to the servant to close the door, which she does so hesitantly. The lady then walks to the bed, so close Gwen can smell the jasmine perfume coming off of her, and delicately places one of the cushions onto the seat of a chair, gesturing to the other woman to sit. The maidservant shakes her head, her braid falling into the thin line of her shoulders as she trembles with nerves. Morgana takes a long breath before speaking.
"Now Fea-"
"It's Fiona, my lady." The servant interrupts, her head still bowed, but her hands pulling at the red and gold fabric of her uniform from where she stands.
"Yes, Fiona! I need your help during tonight's feast." The other woman cut a tall figure in a green gown, billowing sleeves at her wrist, which she twisted in crescents with her other hand. "The plan we discussed in the morning carriage ride." She was wearing no jewelry.
"But my lady-"
"You must not be afraid Fiona." Morgana interrupted in a stern tone, her voice betraying her anxiety.
"I just need your help in… getting back that bracelet. It's very important to me."
She took one step closer to the servant, who still said nothing.
"Please help me. His lordship has taken everything from me. I need this more than anything."
Her voice dropped, and she gestured to the room. "Here, we can talk privately. My father has made me a grave in my chambers, a secure casket, but he never expected me to use it to my advantage."
Her voice lilted in a quiet chuckle and then continued with an edge of worry when there was no response from the other woman. "This evening, I will get Lord Uther drunk as all out-"
"No! I can't do this, my lady."
Fiona stepped back from the wall and lifted her head, her face twisting in anger. "I'm sorry Lady Morgana, but I cannot risk my livelihood, and my life on your ill-gotten plan."
She let out a harsh laugh, "All for some piece of jewelry. I'm sure the way you've dreamt it, it would've all gone perfectly."
Gwen couldn't see Morgana's face from her vantage point, but she supposed it was open-mouthed in shock. Had she really expected the maidservants to help her?
She heard the hard thud of the servant's boots disappearing out the open door, which trembled for a moment, before closing definitively, the sound of whispering immediately rising in the space outside.
It was quiet in the aftermath, and Gwen dared to stretch a foot forward, while Morgana sat down hard on the cushioned seat, no sound audible except her short breaths.
"There's truly no hope for me now." She whispered into her palms.
Gwen wondered if there had ever been a worse time to reveal her presence.
She stepped out of the curtain and into the light, sure that her hair had swept out every dust mote in the small space, and was surprised that Morgana hadn't stirred from her position.
Gwen hoped to walk out the door as quickly as possible when the noblewoman spoke.
"Wait!"
"My lady?" She turned around to see that the other woman was sitting up straight now, hugging her waist.
"Are you one of my father's informants?"
"No…?"
"He hasn't gone to those lengths… yet." Morgana did not look up, but the sharp angles of her face were distrusting. "Why were you hiding in my chambers? You must know, there will be no plan. I will be docile."
"No, I'm not an informant, Lady Morgana… I was just cleaning, and got distracted. If I had known you would be here, I swear I wouldn't have been here too. It was just awkward…" Gwen trailed off, unsure of how the noblewoman would handle this.
Part of her was irrationally afraid, didn't the rumors say she sometimes wildly attacked her friends and servants? Some kind of primal anger coming out of nowhere?
"Alright." The lady ceded after a moment. "I don't trust you, but I can't trust anyone in this hellish house! Just…don't be afraid, I'm not an animal."
"I don't think you are, my lady." Gwen crept a little closer to the woman, fighting the urge to leave the room and move on to her next duties.
"Why do you need your bracelet?"
Morgana looked up, but Gwen thought she was looking through her and off to the distance.
"It's the only thing I have left of my sister." She grabbed at her empty wrist once again. "She was killed by Uther's men a year ago."
Gwen didn't know what to say to that, so she kept quiet.
Morgana shook her head, her words low and rough. "I was such a fool then, thinking I could hide my… abilities. You wouldn't understand, but I'll tell you. I don't have long anyway."
"My sister was a sorceress, and I only found her whereabouts on a trip." She looked over at Gwen, still a few feet away, "I know they all said she was dead, but we exchanged letters and I found out that she had been banished."
"So I went out to meet her, not knowing my father's men had been tracking me all the while. I was so foolish…"
She looked down at her hands again. "She gave me that bracelet, because she knew it kept me sane. I've suffered nightmares since I was a child, sometimes they're more like visions. I'm sure you've heard about how much worse I've gotten these past few months."
"Not really." Gwen swallowed, "I've only been working here recently."
Morgana looked at her appraisingly, "But then…you don't know? It's not as bad as they tell it, but it is frightening. One time, I woke up from a nightmare and it was midday, my father next to me with fear on his face and guards all around restraining me. I had gone under the nightmare for an entire day."
"That sounds awful."
"It is. I go somewhere else when I'm ill like that, and they call it a fever. But I know the truth."
She looked square at Gwen then, her green eyes flashing. "I can see the future."
"Morgause gave me the bracelet to temper my abilities, and…it's sorcery. I was grateful then, and I might've gotten a step closer to normal, until they took it away."
Her hands were shaking, and she held them in front of her. "I've seen the future, and I'm going to do something terrible. And my father will know, and everyone will know. They probably already know…"
The glassy look was back in her eyes, and she spoke coolly as if it was inevitable. "And then I will die."
"You will not!" Gwen said boldly, coming as close as she dared to the lady, who was now lost in her thoughts. "You will not die, and you'll fight this. I…understand."
The words came humorlessly from Morgana, "You have magic too?"
"No…" Gwen hesitated, oh well, "But I know what it feels like to be lost. As if you'll fall into this deep, black hole anytime and no one's around to save you."
"But you don't understand, I know this will happe-"
"Not if you don't change your own future!" Gwen felt a little pit of hopelessness rise as she said the words, what if she was right? But she couldn't, herself, believe that a future could be so set in stone.
"Everyone has a choice, sometimes it's easier to think that you don't."
Morgana tilted her head, and Gwen remembered where she was, and who she was, lecturing the lady of the house in her own chambers.
"I'm sorry, my lady! I didn't mean to overstep, I just.." Gwen put a hand on the back of the chair to steady herself, "I've suffered a loss of late, and I needed to know it would be alright. That I could see past that chasm and cross it one day, even if it wasn't today."
She startled at a hand on her own; long pale fingers entwining over her light brown. Morgana pursed her lips and looked off to the side, but she clutched at Gwen's hand as she spoke, her thumb softly moving across the wrist and around her knuckles.
"Who did you lose?"
Gwen gripped the chair a little more tightly, but gave the other woman a sad smile. "My father, in the spring of last year. There was no remedy for the red thrush fever."
Morgana drew her brows together, "There was-"
"For the nobles, yes, but not for those who couldn't find the funds. Our smithy was struggling."
Gwen remembered how ragged each breath had been for her father, those long nights she'd spent on the cold floor and waking up in a sweat to check his pulse. "It was a mercy when he died, really."
"And my brother…" She hesitated, but forged on after a moment. "He's always had a wild heart, and when he'd run off with the radicals I knew I'd lose him soon."
"A guardsman gave me the news, the notice. That he'd died as a traitor to the crown and they'd promptly fixed him. Then they searched my home for evidence too, leaving boot marks all over the floor."
All in the service of that runaway prince, and his radical friends, whom Elyan had written to in the days before. She and her father had begged him to change his mind, but her stubborn brother had always wanted to make his own way.
Her voice had a mean inflection, and she hated that the words never sounded any less bitter. How dare he leave me all alone! And father had asked for him, in those last hours…
"That was more than four years ago, but I still get caught on it…"
Morgana reached up and rubbed her arm, still staring forward. She was afraid that turning around would break the spell; the maidservant seemed a bit jumpy when she had looked her full on.
"I know. I know." The lady said soothingly, and Gwen was surprised to feel something loosen in her chest.
She felt so tender and exposed here, but it felt alright. When she'd tried to speak of the clutching grief that possessed her, the other servants would nod and smile, nothing behind their eyes.
How ironic that the first person who really understood would be the maligned Lady Morgana?
Gwen looked fondly at the woman in the chair, and at their conjoined hands between them. I'm afraid I'll do something entirely crazy.
She delicately slipped her fingers from the lady's hand and stepped back, feeling like her heart was beating loud enough for both of them to hear. I almost kissed her fingers, right now.
"I better go, my lady." She said into the open air.
The lady stayed still in her chair, her face as smooth as a stone. But Gwen noticed a small pinch of her eyebrows before she spoke.
"Thank you for your words. You've given me a little hope after all this while. Perhaps I should finally consider the marriage proposals my father suggests."
Morgana had always declined them, turning away from Uther with a cold fear in her heart whenever he brought it up. She'd always believed he wanted to be rid of her.
Perhaps… it would be an easy escape, and a chance at freedom. Somewhere far away, with a remedy and a new life. I'll be free of all the nasty rumors and free of all the people who secretly hate me.
Then she thought of the maidservant in the room with her, and the way the warm brown of her eyes softened when she smiled.
Maybe not all of them.
"And…," She turned her face, so the maidservant would not see her blush. "I hope you are not afraid to come speak to me more, and freely…"
"Your voice is very pretty."
Gwen felt the heat rise to her face, but she had enough sense to dip her head in acknowledgment.
"Yes, my lady."
She wasn't sure how she got the rest of the way, out of the lady's chambers and into the hallway, and then through the rest of the day.
Morgana's words kept repeating in her head even when she tried to forget; when the other servants enquired about her mood, and when she tried not to read too much into them.
All nobles speak like that. Flirt like that.
She dropped the pot she was washing in the basin, and felt her face burn for the thousandth time as a manservant looked over curiously. The sensation felt new and painfully present all at once.
Pretty voice. She said I have a pretty voice.
That night she slept soundly, feeling phantom fingers around her wrist all the while,
Gwen stood in the back-fields again; it was another blisteringly hot morning with nary a cloud on the horizon.
She was going about her usually mindless duties, picking potatoes and bringing well-water to the house, when she saw Lady Morgana on the field opposite, escorted by armed guardsmen.
The lady was wearing a thin white shift, as if she'd been pulled hastily from bed, and was being marched at a dizzyingly fast pace by the two men. Who didn't seem to care an ounce for the lady's modesty.
It was strange.
The other servants had stopped as well, but turned their faces away when she came close, as if she'd burned them.
Unlike all those other times, Morgana didn't struggle. Her back was straight as the wind exposed her bare legs to the air, but every now and then her face twitched with a pain suppressed, as her dainty shoes slipped through the rocky ground. Otherwise, she kept her eyes ahead.
Gwen wondered what it had been now, having spent most of the morning outside of the estate with field work to know of the goings on. She supposed Uther had summoned the lady and she'd brought up marriage. Or, more investigations about Morgause had turned up and she was to be ridiculed for her grief.
But from the gentle look in the lady's eyes yesterday, Gwen didn't think so. Morgana would have done everything she could to control her outbursts, to give herself a chance. Something else was going on.
As the group neared, Morgana turned her head very deliberately and made eye contact with Gwen, her gaze reaching across the few feet of upturned soil between them.
Gwen was wearing a wide-brimmed hat, and the uniform of every other servant on the field, yet she knew Morgana had recognized her. She'd felt a sharp jolt in her stomach the moment their eyes met, at the searing emotion in a second's glance.
She stood shock-still, pondering it over, while all the others had returned to work.
It had been a familiar look of fear, mixed with worry and some other emotion; making Morgana walk straight and proud as the guardsmen led her gruffly away. A message she had tried to communicate to the maidservant before she'd been marched away to her fate. There was something more there.
Resolve.
The lady was not afraid of what would happen…because she already knew what would happen.
What was to come.
Gwen dropped the vegetables and basket in her frantic run to the village square.
It had hardly been a few minutes later when Gwen arrived, breathless and panting at her exertion, and her sun-hat having been long abandoned.
Her servant's uniform stuck to her like a second skin, as she strode closer to the noisy crowd that had formed, the square only a short distance from the estate.
The people around her jostled and pushed at each other, and she at them, as she made her way to the front.
"She'll get it now!"
"That little traitor…"
"I hope the Governor locks her up for good. For all our sakes!"
Gwen put her elbow into a chatting manservant and had nearly reached there, when she felt a strong arm grab her by the dress-front and back into the crowd.
Agatha's breath was foul and full in her face as she gripped Gwen's arm, the warning clear in her eyes.
"Don't go any closer girl. The wench has magic."
The older woman let her go quickly, and Gwen stumbled back on her feet, surprised the cook cared enough to stop her. The other woman motioned with her eyes and Gwen finally took notice of the soldier standing a little offside to the Governor, whom she'd never seen in person.
But she knew this other man well.
His gloves matched the rest of his attire, black and form-fitting, a mask hooded over his eyes where they roamed the crowd in an almost searching manner. His eyes made contact with Gwen's and then away again, as she held her breath in fear.
Behind his back was the customary scythe, polished to a silver sheen.
Gwen felt the sweat slide down her back like ice, the humid weather having gone impossibly cold.
She gasped, and looked toward her lady.
Her arms and legs were scratched, as if there'd been an altercation, and now that she was closer, Gwen could clearly see her sport a fresh cut on her face.
She stood next to Uther, who was shaking with outrage or anguish as he spoke, the words barely registering to Gwen as they hardly mattered. It was a death sentence.
"I take no pleasure in calling this event to order. It comes as a great tragedy that..."
The lady's eyes were already glazed over in the sickness of another dream.
It was like separating the chaff from the wheat, predicting visions from reality, horror from real circumstance. And Gwen had a feeling she knew exactly what Morgana was witnessing at that very moment: her coming future.
"My beloved daughter, Morgana, has been corrupted by magic…"
One breath, another breath, and all Gwen could do was count her breaths, and knot her fingers impossibly tight as she willed the lady to look over. It wasn't helping.
"And she is not above the law. I grant her the kindest mercy a father can give a daughter, a cleansing rite for the sake of our fair city…"
So very slowly, those haunted gray-green eyes made a turn around the square and the crowd, the endearing woman Gwen had known yesterday trying her hardest to remember, but unseeing.
Lost in a feverish nightmare in these last moments.
Gwen's heart squeezed painfully, as if to remind her that it still beat, and beat and would go on.
Was this the fight she had urged Morgana to take up yesterday? The choice she urged her to endure?
The voice stopped its scornful monologue to deliver the last lines, "I now sentence you to death. Do you have any last words Morgana Le-"
Uther corrected himself, a small cough to cover his mistake. "-Morgana?" The dull chainlinks on his coat moving loudly in the following silence.
Gwen bit on her lip so hard she tasted blood, but Morgana kept staring forward.
"Very well-"
"Wait!"
Startled, the crowd moved around her, and Gwen was almost too surprised to say the next words.
She took a long look at the mountains behind the square, tall and purple, where somewhere, in between, was a valley, and her cottage; her father's apron hanging behind the door and her brother's quill sitting at the desk, still untouched.
She then let the words tumble out of her.
"Sire! I'd like to confess my part in the heresy as well." Gwen wondered faintly if it had ever been as eerily quiet in her life.
"If you must condemn Lady Morgana, condemn me to the same fate."
The last sentence was a painful rush from her mouth, which had gone so completely dry that she wasn't able to say another word.
She heard a cough from behind her, George?, but the air seemed to reverberate with complete silence. For once, there was no chatter or whisperings from the men and women behind her back.
From the corner of her eye, she could see that most of the servants had given her a wide berth, unfamiliar looks on their faces as they stared at her.
"You…?" For one moment, Uther looked entirely unsure, as this had never happened under any circumstances. But he regained his composure, the lines deepening around his forehead as he looked her over. "You admit to performing sorcery?"
At the small of her back, Gwen felt a light touch. A hope, a pressure, a wish to stay.
But she stepped forward, feeling the cold of the wind ruffle every strand of her hair as she faced the Governor.
"Yes, my lord. My lady had professed her crime so passionately, that I felt I must do the same."
Gwen swallowed hard, knowing by the set line on Uther's mouth that she had already said enough. "I stand by the same trial and the same punishment. I will join her."
He lifted a graying eyebrow, but otherwise his face remained a mask. "Very well… It doesn't matter to me if two or two-thousand magic users confess today. As long as they are completely and wholly exterminated from the earth."
Gwen finally looked over to Morgana, a sudden ironic relief filling her as she saw the lady gape open mouthed, present at last. Her eyes were clear, but she didn't remove her gaze, intent on Gwen, as if she believed that the maidservant would disappear the minute she turned away, like a wisp in the fog.
Gwen didn't dare look away either, her lady's burning gaze keeping her legs collapsing from underneath her, from the gravity of what she'd done.
The lady's lips curled in a shaky smile.
"Very well." Gwen whispered.
Without a moment of warning, she was shoved forward by a guardsman, her arms pressed behind her, and moved to kneel on the hard-packed dirt beside the lady. One surly guard was stationed behind each woman with a firm hand on their wrists, and another on the back of their necks.
Gwen felt an errant nail scratch the back of hers and fought with her wavering resolve, to keep from throwing up at the pricking and dragging of the sensation.
Faintly, she heard a guardsman ask if the Lady Morgana desired a cloth to muffle her scream, and then walk away from her periphery when she whispered '...no.'
The crowd in front of her, standing eerily still as the moments dragged by, and in the corner of her eye, the heavy wood block, stained with the sheen of blood no one had bothered to wipe away.
There was Uther, arguing for a larger, grander wood to be pulled forward. The guardsmen following his orders, the four of them needed to bring it closer, close enough for her to spot the two identical grooves, notched with red-
She turned to the right to see Morgana's eyes tightly shut, her mouth moving in some sort of prayer, or maybe a final spell.
The lady's face was closer to hers than it had ever been, and she saw the exact moment when Morgana realized it was entirely futile, and her eyes widened at Gwen's watching, her mouth then lifting into that tired, sad smile. This is really happening. And I'm here…with her.
As she is with me.
The tears beginning to prick in Morgana's eyes brought her back to reality, small droplets slowly wallowing large as the lady stared back openly, a near reverential look in her eyes.
She was surprised to find the same sliding down her own cheeks. I haven't cried in nearly two years.
I suppose I'll miss this place.
She smiled at her own poor joke, and Morgana smiled wider, her eyes looking curiously into her own.
"What's so funny?"
"I was just thinking," Gwen rasped, turning her head slightly to ease the soreness. "that I'll miss this place. The rules, the well-honored traditions and penalties-"
Morgana laughed softly, the sound like a soothing salve in midst of all the noise.
"and especially the people. I'll miss everyone here for their loyalty and undying friendship!"
The lady quirked her lips, her face crinkling in amusement at Gwen's jest. "Of course! I suppose we'll have to invite them all to make a speech for us after, and lunch-"
Morgana stopped, distracted by something happening a bit behind Gwen, her smile dropping in a quick breath.
"Don't look just yet."
She grimaced at Gwen's words, her eyes turning back and forth in the very small space they were allowed to wander. Her breaths were beginning to take on a frantic pace.
"I-I I'm sorry, I don't know!"
"Breathe Morgana, breathe! I'm here."
"I just- " Her words were cut off as the wood block was finally positioned in front of them, the two women pushed down violently to fit into the tight grooves.
But Gwen kept her eyes still, forcing herself to breathe through her nose and stay present, if only for Morgana's sake. She was strongly aware that she couldn't feel anything below her waist, her knees and legs having gone numb from how long she'd been kneeling.
And of every passing second.
"I don't even know your name!" The words came in a muffled shout and Morgana's eyes had returned to that unsettling glazed state, the gray swallowing the green in a dimming eclipse.
Her face grew paler as a shadow fell over them. "This must be a dream, this is a dream, I know it!-a dream. And then, I'll wake up in my bed again and it'll happen all over again, and again!"
She pleaded with someone only she could see, struggling under the rough grip of their captors. "Please! Please-I don't want to die!"
For a small moment, Gwen wondered if it would be more of a mercy to keep her in the dark, but then she thought of what she would've wanted, herself. And so she pressed forward.
"Morgana?"
The lady turned her tear-streaked face to Gwen, hardly a distance between them.
"Morgana…this is the present. I am in the present, here with you." She said carefully, thinking only of how little time she had left to convince her, to give her the cruel gift of the real truth.
Which is worse? The truth or to be lost in an endless dream?
"You'll never feel pain like this, ever again"
"Pain?" Morgana asked fearfully, her voice rising in pitch. But then there seemed to be a shift, and she choked back one last sob as best as she could, the splinters of wood digging into her white neck.
"Than-Thank you. It shouldn't be reassuring, right? To know for sure, but somehow it is." She shook her head forlornly, "I'm grateful for that…"
Her voice trailed off again as she was caught in the warmth of Gwen's eyes, feeling an outpouring of emotion for this beloved stranger. "...and for you."
"I'm so sorry." She whispered.
Gwen gave her a watery smile, finding it harder to be brave by the second.
It was coming soon.
"Don't be silly! I've made my choice- I have." Her voice cracked, but she managed to finish her thought with a churning fear pushing her to speak. "And now I'll live with it. Die by it even."
Morgana looked at her with awe, something of a brimming wonder at the other woman's surety in the circumstances, yet still tender words.
"Then you are my future."
Gwen felt the pressure on the back of her neck lighten as the guardsmen stepped away, the noise, color and liveliness of the crowd coming back in a wash, and the intonation of some hard-voiced speaker falling over her head.
It all seemed to be meaningless as she looked at Morgana, memorizing her face as she willed herself to keep her eyes open despite how faint she felt.
It wouldn't happen simultaneously, there'd be one and then another. And the minutes in between would be agony for the other, one would suffer more and scream without reprieve while the other braved a dark and endless chasm.
But in this moment, she belonged to Morgana and her lady to her, the last rite a joining as much as a separation.
And so she reached, wishing more than anything that she could feel something soft and tender before the metal cleaved her from the world. She knew it was futile but she tried anyway.
Then in less than a millimeter of a second, came the fast chill and then a hot flash on her neck and then she knew nothing more.
The lady was gone.