Hugh & Fernando

August 1227- May 1229 C.E.

Sixth Crusade

There was no true beginning.

Perhaps there would be no end.

Historians – philosophers – the great thought leaders of the world have often applied dates and names to occurrences such as these. Searching – always searching – for meaning in a linear retelling of events. All creatures alike are inclined to look for the starting point, the catalytic day that declares above all else that it was the beginning of the events which have transpired.

But Hugh de Clermont knew the truth. The truth was that there is no beginning or ending to history. These things that transpire between us now, as we live and breathe, are no different than the ones that transpired before. Back then, those things we have since recorded, were simply what they always were, and later... long after we are gone, they will continue to be what they have always been. It matters little the words we apply to them.

History has no regard for the stories that we tell. It is fluid, capricious and forgetful.

There was no 'Day One,' but the emperor had amassed an army, and that army had been... delayed.

Some would point to the delay and blame pestilence – cholera; others would point and cry out against the many holy warriors who had turned their backs on this crusade. Those who knew too much would eye the de Clermont with no small amount of suspicion. Those who knew too little would look to the emperor and the pope and wonder if this was a blessing or a condemnation from God. The Pope willed this crusade. The emperor had willed it too. Surely, it should have been blessed. And yet... much like the ancient men of another empire in another world, who launched a thousand ships to besiege another city, there was no wind to drive their sails. Emperor Fredrick II, unlike Agamemnon, had no Iphigenia to sacrifice. He had no daughter to kill that would soothe the anger of his God.

There was nothing but delay. And there would be nothing but delay. And the commonfolk worried, but silently were pleased, for their men could stay home and live to fight another day. Their men could stay home rather than go on yet another crusade.

Some days, the cross on Hugh's chest was red, when he fought for the temple.

Others it was green, for he too fought for Lazarus.

If anyone noticed, none cared. He was above their reproach.

If you asked Hugh de Clermont, he would tell you the pursuit of Jerusalem was in no one's best interest. If you asked him, he would say that some places defy all pursuit, all acquisition, all conquest and reason.

If you asked him, he would say that war, and strife, beauty, penitence and rage were all part of the lifeblood of that morbid and captivating city. He would tell you that no holy man, or holy warrior, no matter his creed, could conquer the land which had birthed every one of them in its own way. You could not tame the very essence of holiness. You could not capture, nor control, the feral sanctity of a place such as this. The soil rejects the men who come to claim it. The water drowns the fools for their faith, not in their God, but in themselves. The heat claims all who stand beneath it. And the frost robs you of your wits and addles your mind.

Divinity ruled Jerusalem.

Divinity would always rule Jerusalem.

It mattered not the name you gave it. It mattered not how you supplicated before it – whether you bowed your head to the hot stone ground in the middle of the city, or you bruised your knees kneeling in penitence before an altar in a church or a temple. It mattered little the date the faithful claimed as their beginning. It mattered not the prophet, nor his saints.

There would only ever be one King of Jerusalem, and he was not bound by mortality. He was not of creature make. Nor of creature matter. He had no face, and he had many.

They had been fools to think themselves equal to this power that existed in the sun-soaked stones of the city walls, the vengeful soil, and the water that never quite sated your thirst for more.

They had been fools. On this he and his father could easily agree.

If you asked Hugh, he would tell you that he advised the emperor not to go.

But here they were.

Infantry, ten thousand strong.

Knights, two thousand at the ready.

A coin in his hand, that he turned over and over as he rode into the land of many histories, with his mate by his side and his men at his back. He followed the Holy Roman Emperor onwards toward battle, and he knew what would await them, but he also knew there was a path through this war that did not end in blood.

And he knew, every man could win if they lost a little too.

He and his father had come to an accord. The end of his exile was finally within reach, but for a few trials. A few penitent acts. Now, they just needed to fall back from the holy city, give back the temple and all its glory, retreat into the shadows as only their kind knew how, and convince the new pope to end the church's efforts in the Holy Land. But after so long, the church and the emperor were unlikely to be cowed, not even by the de Clermonts who had begun it all.

And that is why his father sent him.

Not Baldwin. Not Matthew.

This was not a battle of brute strength. Not a battle fought by savagery. They needed not the clenched fist of a general to beat back their enemies at the gates and the altars. They needed not the whisper of an assassin stalking the halls of the city, silently overcoming their enemies in their sleep.

This was a battle for the wits. For diplomacy. This was a crusade of the mind.

Salih Farouq the Younger was very, very old.

In his life, he had been called many things, and answered to many names. He was known as a husband, and a father. And a grandfather too. He was thought to be a wise man, and immortal, a member of the original civilizations of men.

He was remembered by those he met as both formidable and just.

And he was forgotten by many, too, as was common among ancient peoples.

He had seen much and worn many cloaks, many faces.

He once answered only to the name Sharru-ukin, when he was younger and full of ambition and greed. But even then, he had been much older than others could conceive of.

He carried that early version of himself with him still. Sharru-ukin was in his skin. In his bones. He cut his teeth on that name. He sharpened his blade. The once great Egyptian Pharaohs knew him as Narmer, in life, and Menes, in death. And he wore those versions of himself, too, like cloaks to keep out the dark and the light respectively. By then, the man who was now known as Salih Farouq had learned the powerful weapon of the mind. And he had imparted that wisdom on his only son.

But it was not until he had met his mate, his wife Manu, and her three daughters, that he acquired too the name Mithradatha – oathtaker and man of good fortune – granted to him by his new family's ancestral people.

And so, they became one. One unit. One family. One cohesive network of ancients who helped the world turn and strived in some way to make creature life a better one.

Salih and Manu, and their four children, had seen all there was to see. And Salih was ever intrigued by the twists and turns life had yet to take for him.

This moment was one of those twists. The winds had taken a turn.

Across from him, at a table meant for emperors and kings, sultans and emirs, sat the enigmatic Hugh de Clermont. Down the table to their left and right respectively were the leaders of this battle of the wills for a barren piece of holy earth. Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor and King of Sicily, and al-Kamil, Sultan of Egypt and Syria.

This would be the final talk in many months of careful discussion.

This would be the end, or so they proclaimed.

Hugh met his eyes across the table, and Salih felt a lightness overcome him. And a skepticism. They were not fast friends, him and the de Clermont heir. They could hardly consider themselves friends at all. Salih had rarely seen eye to eye with Hugh's father, Philippe de Clermont. And Philippe had made it clear where he stood with Salih.

But all three men could agree that the topic of Jerusalem had become an exhausted one.

All three men could agree that the Holy Land was the only one in these many years of continued conflict that had truly claimed any sort of victory.

The emperor was here only to save face. After all, many men had died trying to take back the holy city during their previous crusade, and this contingent of warriors had sat idly by, safe in their homes, without rising to join them.

The sultan was here much for his own reasons. The crusaders had never been more than a nuisance to the men who reigned in this part of the world. The Ayyubid dynasty was strong, and entirely threatened by forces from within, not without. Who were these so-called holy warriors, who arrived many years too late, sickly and tired of the fight they no longer wanted to win? Who were these warriors to al-Kamil when the al-Mu'azzam loyalists were nipping at his heels from Damascus, and courting his enemies in northern Iraq? Al-Kamil came to them with Jerusalem on the tip of his tongue, and he conceded Nazareth and Bethlehem too. He did it easily. He did it without regret. And Salih had watched carefully for a reaction in Hugh. He watched and waited, but the de Clermont showed no crack in his façade. No sign of relief or skepticism or doubt.

Hugh knew as well as Salih, that this concession was a hollow one. Sure, ten years peace. An agreement among all parties to end this conflict for a decade. But the emperor's forces would be gone long before ten years had ended. And Hugh knew, as well as Salih, that the cities Frederick had won were vulnerable and capricious. None could take and keep these cities.

Not even the Holy Roman Emperor.

Not even al-Kamil.

But Hugh did not react. He simply sat at this table of men with a serene slope to his face and a stern set to his jaw. He met Salih's eyes from across the table and dipped his head in silent acknowledgement. Salih cocked his head to the side in turn. Neither of these two ancient men cared much for the affairs of the self-important humans at the center of the table. Neither of these two men, who had shaped the world, cared much for wounded prides or egos such as those possessed by their mortal leaders.

Far more important to the opposing manjasangs was to understand each other's motives. Far more important to Salih, was to understand what Hugh and Philippe sought to gain by allowing the emperor to enter an agreement that would no doubt end in substantial loss.

Salih had watched for many nights as young boys – young messengers – skirted around the city of Jaffa, barefoot and grubby in appearance. They ran between the de Clermont's private quarters and those of the Sultan's most trusted men in the dark hours of the night when none should have been awake to see them.

Those impoverished boys with bare feet and dirty faces, had never missed a meal in their lives. The dirt on their faces had been rubbed on deliberately. The rags they wore were made of fine wool in the winter months, and breathable muslin in the heat. They were invisible to all who were not looking, but to Salih they were the most visible things in the city.

Hugh de Clermont would not be surprised by how things ended here today. He had played his moment well; he knew the cards he had been dealt.

Salih wouldn't be surprised if it was the de Clermont himself who had dealt the cards.

Fredrick, the excommunicated emperor, would take his cities back, crown himself king of an already established kingdom, and go home. And al-Kamil, sultan surrounded by enemies, would have the promise of Frederick's military aid, should the many adversaries breathing down his neck finally make their moves.

Hugh waited for Salih in an alcove just off the courtyard that centered the great estate where the emperor and the sultan had come to an accord, finally ending another crusade.

There was no need to announce himself.

Salih Farouq the Younger was nearly as old – if not older than – Philippe de Clermont himself.

Both men often claimed an almost filial relationship with Time. A claim that had always fascinated and perplexed Hugh and his siblings, as he was sure it had perplexed and fascinated the children of Salih and Manu as well. Hugh had begun to understand such talk, but even as old and tried as he was, he was nowhere near as old or tried as Philippe and Salih.

Their song and dance were as ancient as the earth itself, or so it sometimes seemed.

Salih noted his presence with ease. He did not look in the direction of Hugh's alcove. He did not slink into the shadows to hide his affairs. Salih simply stopped by a reflecting pool in the center of the courtyard with its faded stone bottom, its lily pads and dragonflies.

"It has been too long, Hugh de Clermont," Salih said, his voice warm and rich, patient, and smooth.

Hugh had known for centuries why humans had gifted Salih with his many names. The other man had the ability to completely disarm whoever he encountered in any moment of every day, but Hugh had learned his own father's lessons well. There was nothing he would ever fully trust about Salih, even if he found the man intriguing.

"It is good to see you, Salih," Hugh murmured as he melted out of the shadows and into the moonlight.

Both men were silent as they looked down on the water in the faded stone pool, their faces and the moon reflected up at them for both to see.

"Tell me," Salih said. "What is the element that I am missing in this crusade of yours?"

Hugh stared at the man's eyes as they glimmered back at him from the water, and the older man returned his steady searching gaze. Both men faced forward, both men looked down in contemplation. Shoulder to shoulder, they had between them all the time in the world, and yet there was not enough of it to go around.

There would never be enough time.

Hugh reached into his pocket and produced a letter. He handed it to Salih.

"Miriam sends her regards," he said. "And Bertand as well."

Salih turned his head to look at the de Clermont, an unreadable expression on his face. Hugh remained still, continuing to stare at his own reflection in the pond. Still holding the letter out for Salih to take.

Salih accepted the letter without affect, and no small amount of grace. Then he looked away, back to the water. Hugh was not surprised by the way Salih had accepted his daughter's letter, but his chest grew heavy for the other man, and for Miriam as well, who had found herself so far away from all that she knew and loved.

"Many thanks," Salih said.

"It was the least I could do," Hugh replied.

"You owe me nothing—"

"She is your youngest," Hugh shrugged. "I have parted with Eric on better terms, and still I am eager for word from my son. I can only imagine how you must—"

Salih looked up at him sharply and Hugh wisely fell silent. The de Clermont nodded once and turned away, back toward the shadows and his chambers and his mate. Before he disappeared, he glanced over his shoulder one last time.

"Please give my regards to Manu," he said. "And Fernando's as well."

"I will," Salih said.

And then both men were gone.

Once, a long time ago, Hugh de Clermont was a child. He could attest to the certain truth in life that no matter how many years you have walked the earth, the first years of your life, as a young thing - innocent and just waking to the world - they stay with you through it all. He remembers the warmth of his mother's embrace at night when he was young and needed comforting to sleep. His father's guiding hand as he planted his first seeds in the ground beneath their feet. He remembered the old gods and their mercurial ways. He remembered trips to the temple with his parents when the harvest was short, and when it was abundant as well. Fields of wheat up to his shoulders as he chased his brothers and sisters through them in times of play. Hugh could see the abundant sky and feel the sun shining bright and eternal on his face, and though now he was older than he ever had a right to be, he could still feel that sweet, terrifying rush of childhood whenever he allowed himself to recall it.

Some nights, though not often, Hugh slept. Most of these nights were passed in the arms of his love, his husband, Fernando. And even on the nights when sleep would not come, for it was not needed, they would find themselves beneath the covers, intertwined tightly and content to exist quietly and peacefully together in the dark of the night, sometimes silent, sometimes whispering sweet nothings, other times sharing their deepest secrets and most haunting fears.

Tonight, Hugh slept. Fernando watched his husband take his rest with a familiar fascination. Eagerly taking in all the ticks, breaths, and movements his husband succumbed to in his slumber. He could reach out and brush a loving finger down the strong bridge of his nose, kiss his eyelids, pull him close and hold him until the sun rose back up into the sky, and even then, hold him longer still. But Hugh was a notoriously light sleeper, and any subtle shift, even from his most trusted lover, would pull him back into consciousness where he would stay alert and hard at work for days or weeks or months on end. So, Fernando held himself still, holding his already sparing breath, willing his slow heart to beat silent. He became more statue than man, keeping watch over his mate while he took what he so desperately needed.

It was a surprisingly common myth that vampires did not dream. Well, not that surprising when you consider vampires were often thought not to sleep at all. How could they dream? Hugh had always felt rather than dreams, vampires lived their memories in their sleep. After so much of eternity, it was a difficult concept to find something new to dream of. He was sure somewhere in the world there was a vampire dreaming up some fantastical vision behind blissfully closed eyes, a vampire who still remained surprised at its own mind and the workings of the world. He was sure this person must exist somewhere, but he was most assuredly not that person.

The sieur of the Gonçalves de Clermont scion, and the eldest son of Philippe de Clermont, spent quite a lot of his time on the receiving end of half-hearted jabs and taunts about his idealism. His hope for a brighter tomorrow and his continued efforts to always err on the side of the just and fair. He was a mediator, a man who preferred philosophy to strategy; a man who preferred the power of the word to the power of the blade. But none of these things made him a dreamer. Not really. Not in the innocent way of which he speaks.

Hugh was a pragmatist, and truthfully not so different from Baldwin on that very front. It was their method that set them on opposite sides of the chessboard. Moves and counter moves for their father's ear - this conflict to end in war, this conflict to end in mediation. It was a game the two brothers found equal parts infuriating and stimulating. And this also made them the most capable of truly understanding the other's thoughts, motivations, and actions. To overcome the master strategist, you must first become him. And vice versa. No matter Hugh's preferences: he was a man of strategy. He was a man of the blade. He was a man who knew that there were moments in life where you simply must do what must be done. He could be Baldwin if he were so required. It was a matter of choice that he was not.

This is all to say, Hugh de Clermont doesn't dream. He's seen too much to dream. So, he remembers instead. When all is well, his sleep brings him memories of his childhood. Memories of time spent in fields of wheat and on the farm. When things are poorly, his mind brings him memories of his past mistakes. His mind supplies his dread of the future and his dismay toward the stressors of the present. Such sentiments of dread and dismay known only to him, never to see the light of day, for, in the waking world, he chose a simpler path. He chose to embrace each day as an opportunity, with hope for curiosity and intrigue.

All was well. That's what he'd told himself for years now. Philippe had blessed his scion without culling him from the de Clermont family in the process, allowing him quite generously to keep a foot in each door so to speak. One small decision – this decision – made by his father, spoke to him of a future where they could one day set this estrangement aside. And though his father kept silently grooming Baldwin, as he had always done, to step up should he change his mind and turn his back on his eldest son... the two eldest de Clermont children understood this for what it was and held no malice toward each other for it. They had spent their very long lives with enough authority to know that whoever was chosen to bear Philippe's burdens, in the end, would be equal parts blessed and cursed for the choosing.

All was well. He reminded himself of this every night for years as his son grew further into himself as a man and as a de Clermont. He watched him flourish and weigh the scales of justice and honor every day with admirable humility. He watched the boy persevere through the heartbreak of once again losing the young woman he loved after far too little time in her company. He watched the pangs of the loss of his son's mate tear at the boy and rebuild him anew - stronger, kinder, more astute. Everything about Eric had sharpened in his grief and Hugh – though he worried as any parent does – found himself truly believing that his son would be okay.

But this brought him to the crux of the problem.

Fernanda.

His son's mate. And, by Hugh's own machinations, his mate's daughter. The strange, sweet girl who had fallen out of the sky one day so many years ago, and yet it was as though she had come to them only yesterday. As though she had been lost to them only yesterday.

Time was a fickle thing. And history cared little for the affairs of men. It mattered little how Hugh remembered her. Or Eric. Or Fernando. It mattered little the slow crawl of time that came with pain, and the rapid passage of that same fickle creature when you looked upon it in reflection.

The young Fernanda was lost somewhere in time and space. They'd no way of knowing where she had ended up though she had assured them all in her oddly spoken Castilian that, after meeting Eric – then named Sorley – she had simply reappeared in her own home, in her own time, somewhere in the future. They'd tried to ask when and where she was from, but the girl had grown nervous. She didn't know what to say about it or how. So, after several failed attempts at understanding her world, he and Fernando decided the questions would come to a stop.

Nearly a decade had passed.

Nine years would soon come to be ten, and not a word, not a sighting, not even the barest hint of her return. A decade was nothing really – a blink in his eyes – but if past circumstances were to be believed, and relied upon, they had forty more years of waiting. Four more decades of waiting for her return, waiting to find out what had become of her.

If she returned, that is. If they ever learned any more about her.

Here was another worry – the worry that Eric would only hold out for the forty years. Hugh worried over what would become of his son if the girl was gone for good. There was a pit in his stomach when he laid down to bed that night, lazily running his fingers up and down Fernando's arm. And when his husband whispered softly to him that he should sleep, Hugh reluctantly closed his eyes.

When he slept, he remembered. That had always been the way. But this time – his body jolted – this time what he saw felt less like a memory and more like a dream.

Hugh was a child again. Running through the wheat fields, this time from his younger brother who called out for him to wait. Called out that he couldn't keep up.

He was laughing.

They both were.

And then the boys were at the mouth of a cave. Just down the hill and through a cropping of trees. Farther away from home than they'd ever gone on their own before. The sun was beating down, hot on their bodies, and Hugh squinted at the glare of it. And then he ducked through the mouth of the cave, and the damp darkness of the space swallowed him whole.

It was quiet there, in the cave. It was as though all the sound had disappeared from the earth. His own breath, which was labored and heavy from running so far, did not exist here either. He looked back for his brother but found only darkness instead. The mouth of the cave had disappeared though he had only taken a couple steps in.

It felt as though he had entered the mouth of the gods, as though he were being consumed by them. And he discovered that – if such were the case – to truly be consumed was to become nothing. To simply float forever in this interminable darkness. If young Hugh could find his feet, he would have run back the way he came, but he couldn't – he couldn't feel them. He let out a distressed cry – it vibrated through his throat and his mouth opened to release it – but no sound truly came.

He wasn't meant to be here. His mind cried out to him, loudly, in alarm. He wasn't meant to be here. This place wasn't for him. He'd been wrong to enter here. He brought his hands up to claw at his throat but even then, he couldn't feel anything. Not on his skin, not in his throat, not beneath his fingertips. The darkness expanded and contracted around him – stretched him out and lifted him up off the ground.

He trembled like a rabbit he once saw, cornered by a fox in the garden.

And then, as though he had been falling but didn't know it, the world rose up to meet him and Hugh met it with equal force, face-first on the ground, nose cracking against the damp stone floor where he lay.

A strong hand hauled him up off the ground and onto his feet. Hugh shook his head, disoriented before taking in the sight of the lady in front of him. She was tall – so tall to the child that he had to crane his neck back to see her face. She was cast in shadow, and her lips were stuck in a grim-looking frown.

"Come child," she said, and her voice was darkness, like it too would swallow him whole.

Hugh looked warily behind him, to the cave entrance which had appeared once more, its bright white light filtering through and reaching him – just barely – where he stood in the widest part of the cave. The woman was already walking away, and he wondered briefly if he could run quickly back home without her noticing that he'd gone.

"There is no running child," She called easily back to him, her figure disappearing into shadow the deeper she went.

He swallowed, nervous, feeling caught in a wholly unpleasant way.

"Come, boy, the gods have spoken. The thread has already been spun."

Hugh was young but he knew enough to know that one does not defy the gods. So, he dusted his hands nervously on the torn fabric of his clothes and shuffled forward. Reluctant, but following the strange woman, nonetheless.

Through the darkness, he walked, and he walked in fear. But he also walked in intrigue. Every young boy in the village wished to be so chosen by the gods for a fate that was grand. Hugh himself had wished this just the other day – to be blessed by the mighty Zeus or the swift messenger Hermes, or even to be a great poet under the guidance of Apollo. All boys thought this way. And there was a slight thrill that he was chosen to be a man of the gods. But the other part of Hugh, the part of him that had always been a bright and considerate boy, had a feeling that whatever awaited him would be far more complicated than greatness. After all, his father had always told him that no blessing was without affliction and that the gods' favor always came with a price. It was the balance of all things.

Beyond the darkness, once he'd journeyed through, was the woman. She waited on the other side of a great fire. It crackled a warm greeting at him, and he was thankful for the light. He told the woman so. She bade him sit before the flames. He did as he was told. Once he was seated, she followed suit. Her voice was still an impossible thing – it was the absence of sound though he heard it clearly. He was once again reminded of the rabbit in the garden.

She spoke then, her eyes black and unseeing, to the flame between them. And she spoke in a language he did not understand. The language of the gods, his child's mind supplied to him. Clear in the face of doubt and uncertainty.

She switched then back and forth between the language of the gods and his own native tongue.

"Child of the serpent. Born of blood's unending seed," her voice took on the demeanor of an old hag. And then she switched back to the language of the gods. She was repeating something, over and over again. In a three-part cycle he couldn't understand. And then—

"Son of the lion. A lion unto thee." She repeated the foreign phrase a bit louder this time.

"Man of sun. Defier of kings." Again, she repeated the phrase, he mouthed it along with her trying to fit the foreign words on his tongue though they would not stick.

"Man, twice risen. By flame, set free." She chanted again, this time louder, her voice cracking under the weight of whatever it was she was saying. "Peregrinus Animus." She heaved and her old hag's voice turned into the voice of a man. "Peregrinus Anima." And then in a shout, her voice shifted to the voice of a child, but not just any child. She shouted in his own voice. "Peregrinus Cor!"

The fire leapt up between them. Hitting the cave ceiling and whipping out around them before roaring back into a small, contained flame in the middle of its bed of stone.

Young Hugh's heart pumped fast in his small chest, and the woman slumped over like she was dead. He did not wait for her to rise, his child's mind no longer supplying him with any reason to stay. He listened to his body and ran. Like the rabbit in the garden who could not escape the wiles of the fox, he ran. His skin jumped as he plunged himself into the darkness of the cave, stumbling through it to get back to the mouth. He cried out in alarm as he collided with something there, in the space between. But whatever he hit made no sound. He looked up and saw a girl, a woman, suspended there. High in the air, caught in the darkness. Her eyes were blown wide with shock, her hair fell down around her, her mouth was open wide in a silent scream. Nothing held her in the air, but the air itself. Hugh cried out in alarm, thinking she was dead. He heard the woman's voice calling out to him from behind, telling him that the fates had more to say, but young Hugh no longer wanted to listen. No longer felt obliged. He was not so important to the gods to incur their wrath. He was the son of a farmer. And he would sacrifice for a good harvest every year for all of eternity if it meant he could leave this place. He ran from the woman, and the floating girl, as fast as his little body could carry him to the mouth of the cave. He'd beg the gods' forgiveness. He would tell his father; his father would know what to do.

Hugh burst out into the warm fresh air, closing his eyes against the harsh glare of the sunlight before blinking a few times to clear them. He felt the itch of the woman's gaze on his back from the dark shadows of the cave. And he deliberately chose not to look behind him. From now on, the child told himself, we must move forward. It would not do to dwell on the past and the mysteries of the gods. He would live. He would sacrifice. And he would do what he must to leave this moment behind him.

He clambered his way back through the trees, resolute in his decision, and scaled the small hill that led to the fields outside of his family's home. His head was on a swivel, looking for his little brother, wherever he'd run off to while Hugh was in the cave. He trudged tiredly through the tall grasses and stocks of wheat, back to the entrance of his home which had fallen quiet.

Too quiet.

He'd never experienced his home without the running and screaming of his siblings, or the steady work of his parents, but now, it was as though the wind had stopped blowing and the sun had paused in its journey across the sky. Hugh stopped, his breath caught in his throat, before darting forward through the front door.

In unison, his parents and siblings all turned their heads in his direction. Tears in their eyes. His mother cried out and rushed over to him, grabbing him tightly in her arms and pulling him to her chest. She held him in a vice grip and seemed physically incapable of letting go. He peeked under her arm to his solemn brothers and sisters. And his grim-faced father. And that was when he noticed the linen laid neatly on the floor. And the tiny body of his brother motionless on top of it. He felt, more than heard, himself let out a cry of surprise. He struggled to tear himself away from his mother, who only held him more tightly in her embrace, as he desperately tried to break free and run to his lost sibling. His baby brother. They'd only just been playing together. What had happened to him while Hugh was in the cave?

Someone was screaming a hoarse, broken sound and he realized a bit later that it was him. Had the gods punished him for running from his fate? Had his brother paid the price for his transgressions?

Hugh did not know the answers. He thought maybe he never would know why or how things had happened the way they did. No one could ever tell him how or why his brother had died. Just that one minute the boy was living, and the next he was dead. He watched his mother and sisters prepare the body. Helped his father collect wood for the burial pyre and stacked it solemnly with his two remaining brothers. They stood back, the family, and sent his brother into eternal peace. The neighboring farmers were there. The priests from the temple, who'd seen the pyre in passing as they traveled by, were there too.

Hugh watched as his brother's body caught and burned. And he witnessed his first burial. He got his first taste of grief and of mourning. He saw the beauty and mercy and violence in the flames that consumed his brother whole. And did not know how to feel as those flames returned his brother to the gods and to the earth.

He never asked his father about the cave. He never mentioned the woman with the voice of darkness. Or the language of the gods. Or whether or not he had defied the fates when he'd chosen to run away. He did not mention the floating girl, though her eyes haunted him for many nights to come. As he lay awake, young Hugh wondered if he had killed his brother with his own cowardice. And he vowed that he would never again be so careless or impulsive with the decisions he made. He would never again disregard that every action, and inaction, of his own, tipped the scales of some measure of himself that the gods were keeping. \

Fernando watched his husband's breathing tick up in an unnatural rhythm. His brow furrowed at the stutter in Hugh's chest. The clenched fist. The hitch in his lungs. He'd never known Hugh to suffer nightmares. At least, not in a very long time. Vampires tended to make their peace with their roles in the life cycle early on, or else succumb to a deep and irrevocable self-loathing for all of eternity. But Hugh was not of the latter variety. And for that reason, a nightmare was...odd.

Fernando shifted as his husband flinched from some memory he couldn't see and felt himself frown. He eyeballed the mark he'd left on his husband's heart vein with no small amount of curiosity and concern. Slowly and gently, he reached out to run his fingers over Hugh's tense face, smoothing over the muscles there and softly whispering his name.

Hugh came awake with the force of a man charging into battle. One minute, he lay there beside Fernando, and the next, he stood across the room. His chest heaved wildly. His hands flexed in agitation.

And then Hugh pushed open the doors to the balcony and stepped outside into the midnight air. A breeze came off the coast and brushed past him, curling through the curtains and winding its way into their chambers. Cautiously, Fernando lifted himself from the bed and pulled on a robe that had been draped over a chair. He held himself just an arm's length away from his husband and studied the way his back twitched and tensed anxiously at what remnants of the nightmare still haunted his mind. When he heard Hugh's heartbeat even, and smelled the fear leaving his body, Fernando spoke.

"What was it about?"

Hugh tilted his head in Fernando's direction but did not turn around. He chose instead to lean forward and brace his arms against the balcony wall, hanging his head in a small form of defeat.

Fernando took that as a sign and moved forward quickly to wrap his arms around his mate from behind. He pressed his face between Hugh's shoulder blades and held him that way for a long time.

"I do not know," Hugh finally supplied. His voice still sounded lost to his own ears. It felt an almost childlike confession, what with the way his mind was reeling. And for the first time in his long life, Hugh felt himself flinching from his memories. Never before had he felt the need to run from that innocent part of his past, but now he would bury it all if he could forget this horrid dream. "If it is a memory that I dreamed, I've never recalled it before."

Fernando pressed a kiss to Hugh's shoulder, encouraging him to say more.

"But it was familiar. What I saw—what I—" Hugh shook his head and brought a fist up to press into his eyes. "As a child, I had an experience. And I believed at the time that I may have upset the gods."

Fernando tensed at his husband's words. He, himself, had always been a man between faiths. He'd become increasingly agnostic as he experienced the many lifetimes of men and the influence they held over which gods were to be followed and when. But a small, ancient part of him still held inexplicable deference to the old ways and beliefs.

To upset the gods was to inevitably pay a price.

Hugh felt his husband tense and brought both of his hands down to Fernando's, holding tightly to his mate who was locked around him in a solid embrace.

"Show me," Fernando said in a whisper. "Show me what you saw."

Hugh shook his head, moving to leave his husband's arms but Fernando held fast.

"Show me," he said. "We will carry it together, or not at all."

Hugh turned in his arms, staring down at his mate, eyes caught in grief and consideration. After a long moment, he nodded his acquiescence and let his man lead him back to their bed.

He laid back, hesitant and prone after all that had transpired there that night. But Fernando hummed out his love to him and pressed kisses to Hugh's face and neck. He nipped lovingly at the taller man's strong shoulder, and once he felt his husband relax, he ducked his head and bit carefully into the space over his heart vein. He lost himself briefly in the taste of his husband's blood and the images it supplied, before pulling back and sealing the wound. He pressed his face lovingly, and fearfully into Hugh's sternum, breathing in his scent and closing his eyes against the onslaught of the newly recalled memory.

This time it was Hugh who comforted Fernando, knowing intimately well how distressing the emotions of the memory could be. Fernando felt everything Hugh felt. He saw everything Hugh had seen as though he himself had lived it, if only briefly. He saw the wheat fields and he shook with laughter as he ran with Hugh's brother from their house and through the trees. And he felt the sense of foreboding roll over him at the mouth of the cave, felt the darkness consume him, and the weight of something ancient pressing in on him from all sides. Fernando lived every moment in that place as though he were Hugh himself, and he succumbed to it just the same as his mate had done. And when the woman spoke that language that had yet to be born – that language Hugh had thought to be of the gods, rather than of Rome – Fernando trembled.

When he ran from her as Hugh had done, he ran face first into a reality that he wished so desperately to make fiction. Fernando saw in Hugh's dream many things he would never unsee. And he reeled against the figure of the girl who hung in the darkness of the cave, strung up by some invisible thread that spooled out of her belly and anchored her in nothingness.

He trembled at the implications Hugh's memories revealed, unable to comprehend. Unable to make sense of it. Wishing wholeheartedly to deny that even one second of that dream had basis in reality. It simply could not be.

His heart throbbed, and every muscle in his body burned with the urge to fight this invisible force that had revealed itself to him now. He burned and raged against the fates, the gods, his lover and himself.

It simply could not be.

The sharing of blood between mates was a sacred and heavy thing. A burden to carry and a privilege hard won, but Hugh loved his husband for asking to hold half the weight of his memories for him. He loved him for taking on his pain. He loved him despite knowing what this dream would reveal to Fernando. He ached for he could not spare his mate this pain.

After long, with Hugh laying on his back lost in contemplation and grief, running his fingers through Fernando's hair while his husband processed what he saw, the sun rose, and the day insisted on beginning anew.

Hugh heard the servants begin to bustle about the estate, waking the house up for yet another day. The soldiers in the keep were being notified that the conflict they were prepared for would not come to pass. He could hear the commanding officers telling them that this crusade they had embarked on was destined to end peacefully. There would be no bloodshed. No war. Just a long journey to end in another journey more. A courier made their way up the path from the lower parts of the city, and would no doubt be at the servants' entrance in an hour to deliver them a missive from Philippe. He could hear the hoofbeats and smell the scent of the horses. He could smell the sweat on the messenger's brow as the young man entered the village at the bottom of the hill. He could hear the rustle of paper in the courtyard, and he wondered idly if Salih would find it in himself to read Miriam's letter before Hugh's company prepared itself to leave.

The time for dreams and memories was swiftly coming to an end, and life would once again demand the attention of the living. A small childish part of him wanted to simply move forward, pay the memory – or the dream – no mind and live his life the best he could with no concern for the gods and their ways.

With no concern for the things he had seen. And what they could mean for his family.

But then Fernando finally lifted his head, his hair ruffled from Hugh's ministrations, his eyes dark and tired.

"Do you really think you saw Fernanda in that cave? Is there any way it could have been a dream rather than a memory?" His voice was husky from lack of use and Hugh reached out to trace the column of Fernando's throat.

"I wish I could call it a dream," Hugh said. "But everything in me says it's a memory that I buried somewhere inside of myself, or, if the woman was right and I did truly run from the gods that day, maybe it was simply a memory they had not yet wanted me to see. Either way, I stumbled into something I was not ready for and now it seems she has been threaded into it as well. I do believe she was there suspended in the darkness. I think I've always known there was something in her that unsettled me. I could feel it in my bones the day we first met, and I have felt it every day since."

Fernando's eyes were haunted. And Hugh felt the wave of pain wash over him as though he had shared his husband's blood too. To lose a child was an unspeakable thing. To have a child disappear left a hole inside of you that would never be filled. There was a wound in his mate that refused to heal, and that little girl – that growing young lady – was at the center of it.

Fernando pressed his lips tightly together and looked away, before stubbornly moving the conversation along. "The language of the gods—" he started.

"Indeed," Hugh agreed. "I always did have a deep hatred for Latin and talk of the soul. I never could quite figure out why, but now..."

"Yes," Fernando sighed. "If that dream is a memory, I can't say that I blame you."

A knock at their door broke them of their ponderings. The men exchanged a silent look and came to an accord that they would later reconvene. A prophecy now existed between them. A secret fear had revealed itself, forced its way into the light of day.

They would rise once more this morning as they had done many mornings before. They would ready themselves for another day in an unforgiving city, surrounded by men who coveted a land born of the immortal and the divine. They would attend their duties, and ready their men for a long journey home. They would promise a safe return for all who had followed them on this path for war.

Neither Hugh nor Fernando could tell you what the future might hold, nor how quickly it would rise to meet them, but `both men knew they would meet that future with force. They would come out ahead of their fate one way or another. This was not a fight they could win, but they would not lose it either. Of that Fernando was certain, judging by the look in Hugh's eyes.

Notes: *Credit goes to MiniM236 who has named Miriam's father, Salih, in several works already, the most recent being The Shepherds. I have embellished it with my own details (such as Sharru-ukin, Menes/Narmer etc), but the inspiration came from her! Thanks so much for letting me borrow it.