The falling leaves drift by my window
The falling leaves of red and gold
I see your lips, the summer kisses
The sunburned hands I used to hold

Since you went away the days grow long
And soon I'll hear old winter's song
But I miss you most of all, my darling
When autumn leaves start to fall

Since you went away the days grow long
And soon I'll hear old winter's song
But I miss you most of all, my darling
When autumn leaves start to fall

I miss you most of all, my darling
When autumn leaves start to fall

"Autumn Leaves" -Eva Cassidy

As Lancelot stepped over the rubble that Dagonet had just made of the wall and doors, he heard the faint echo of chanting. He followed Arthur's flickering torch down the spiral steps. As they stepped out into an underground room, Lancelot resisted the urge to gag. There was the stench of dead bodies everywhere. The chanting abruptly halted – it sounded to be a prayer of some kind.

"Who are these defilers of the Lord's temple!" Cried the lank-haired man that blocked his path. The two cowering men Gawain had brought with him muttered excuses, but Lancelot just brushed past the stinking man.

"Out the way." He snapped, but froze in the middle of the room, disbelief etched onto his features as he looked about. He turned to Arthur. "The work of your God." He spat, the smell of death making his eyes sting. "Is this how he answers your prayers?" Arthur had no answer, but simply moved past him, avoiding his piercing gaze.

"See if there's any alive." The commander instructed. Dagonet moved to the grate-covered pits along the back wall, whilst Lancelot cut the chains from the wall. The bars crashed to the ground as one of the men dashed forwards.

"You should never set foot in this holy place!" He cried. Lancelot, boiling over with fury at the sight of the still bodies around him, thrust his sword into the man's stomach. His face contorted in anger, he watched the dead man fall to the floor.

"There was a man of God." The man, who seemed a twisted parody of a priest, pointed to the body.

"Not my God!" The Sarmatian snarled, pointing his finger accusingly. No, never his God.

Dagonet found a boy, but the rest seemed dead, until Arthur knelt by a cage set into the wall in the corner. As Lancelot knelt and looked, icy claws gripped his chest. As he looked into the eyes of his past. He blinked, the moment gone, as he took the torch from Arthur and stood. He led them all back out – the two remaining men, the Sarmatians, Arthur, and the boy, and the girl. A woad girl… he doused the torch in a drift of snow. It had been gently snowing for a little while, and had settled heavily in the time it had taken them to look in the dungeons below. He raised his eyes to the bruised, grey skies. Oh, what had they done…

He stared out over the thick pine forest below, feeling the chill of the snow around him, and the movements of Solmyr beneath him.

"It is a beautiful country, is it not?" Her voice was so familiar and yet so foreign. He turned to look at her.

"If you say so." This country held no magic for him. It was a lonely, unfriendly place.

"Then where do you come from that compares?" He didn't reply. "The Black Sea?" Her voice dripped sarcasm, but still he didn't answer. "This is heaven for me." Heaven was such a poisonous word.

"I don't believe in heaven. I've been living in this hell." He leant forward in the saddle, looking at her face, trying to decipher her and her magic. "But if you represent what heaven is, then take me there." Oh, he wished it wasn't her to hear those words. They had always been on the edge of his tongue, half-whispered once. A crack of thunder announced the opening of the skies. A soft pitter-patter rattled on his armour, and he held a hand out to feel the icy droplets. "Rain and snow at once." He glanced to her again, eyebrows quirked in an unreadable expression. "A bad omen." And indeed it was, he decided. A thousand bad omens…

Her skin was the pale colour of the moon, her hair as soft as down… Lancelot averted his gaze, trying to suppress the rising feelings he felt stirring from where he had long hidden them. He looked back up, and was startled to catch her eye. Her eyes… hazel eyes… and yet they looked so familiar… He swallowed hard, and turned himself forcefully away. He found a tree and sat against the trunk. He lifted a knee and rested his arm on it, staring into the twilight that filtered through the trees. She scared him. She truly did. She made it flood back, not forgotten, but unwanted, the pain was too deep. He rubbed his face to dispel the memories as soft footfalls announced the arrival of her. He waited for her to speak before he acknowledged her presence.

"What was it like?" He looked up at her. "Your home?" He paused, deep in thought, old words running through his mind.

"We sacrificed goats, drank their blood, danced naked around fires." He chuckled. She waited, looking at him, and he stood to face her on her level. "What I do remember… home… Oceans of grass. From horizon to horizon, further than you can ride… The sky, bigger than you could imagine… No boundaries." There was silence.

"Some people would call that freedom." She replied gently. He looked at her, his heart pounding so loud he was sure she'd hear it. "That's what we fight for. Our land, our people. The right to choose our own destiny." Destiny… whose damned idea had that been? Destiny had laid everything out for him, and just as easily snatched it back. "You see Lancelot, we are much alike you and I." Oh, were they? He had been so alike to Her, not to this woman, who seemed to be put here to take Her place. Well, Guinevere never would. "And when you return home, will you take a wife…" Wife! He almost laughed out loud. "… Have sons?" Oh, the rent of pain inside tore further open. Did she intend to kill him through grief?

"I've killed too many sons." He had killed every son he had laid eyes upon, Lancelot told himself with loathing. "What right do I have of my own?" She smirked at him, and he dreaded her next question, yet felt a thrill of excited anticipation. Speak to me forever! He wanted to cry, and in the same breath, shout: Never speak to me again!

"No family. No religion. Do you believe in anything at all?" She asked, tilting her head, in the same way She always had.

"I would have left you and the boy there to die." He answered coldly, a muscle twitching in his clenched jaw. And so he would have… because he cursed the moment he had set eyes upon her… yet he already felt the stirrings of long-forgotten emotions. He spun on his heel and walked away, feeling the woad's eyes following his steps.

"You look a lot like her, you know." Guinevere turned and looked at Galahad who leant against a tree, arms folded nonchalantly.

"A lot like who?"

"The woman he loved." Guinevere looked surprised, and glanced at Lancelot's retreating back.

"He..?"

"Yes. Very much so."

"Who was she?" She asked curiously, approaching the Sarmatian warily.

"A woad. Like yourself." This time she had to swallow down her shock in case she shouted or laughed.

"What… what happened to her?"

"What do you think?" Galahad retorted, already walking away. "She died."

"Killed?" Guinevere enquired weakly. Galahad looked at her over his shoulder and smirked, giving all the answers she needed. She looked back to where Lancelot had disappeared. Now she was beginning to understand him.

Lancelot hid himself at the base of another tree, out of the light of the fires. He heard a branch break, and looked up, to see Arthur following Guinevere away from the camp – two ghosts in the night. He frowned, and looked back down to the palm of his hand, the pad of his thumb rubbing the talisman that lay there.

Arthur stood against Merlin and Guinevere, glaring furiously.

"If you are so determined to leave us to slaughter, why did you save so many?" She spat at him, though her voice carried an edge of kindness. Arthur's breath caught in his throat. The ghost of words spirited themselves in the wind. Someone, once, had asked him nearly the same thing…

The stone was cold and hard against his back, but Lancelot could almost feel the heat of the Saxon fires. Below the, a crowd of anxious Romans had gathered. Guinevere stared over the parapet as Arthur took a step back and looked at each of his companions.

"Knights." He announced. Lancelot briefly closed his eyes, knowing what was to come. "My journey with you must end here." They were new words told in a familiar way. He looked at Gawain, whose eyes begged him to change his mind. "May God go with you." He turned and headed back down the steps. With a snort of fury, and an angered glance to Guinevere, Lancelot followed.

"Arthur! This is not Rome's fight. This is not your fight! All these long years we've been together, the trials we've faced, the blood we've shed. What was it all for if not for the reward of freedom, and now, when we're so close, when it's finally within our grasp… Look at me!" He grabbed Arthur's arm and turned him round. "Does it all count for nothing?" He hissed vehemently. His commander looked at him through oddly cold eyes.

"You ask me that. You, who know me best of all." He sounded almost disappointed, and brushed past the Sarmatian without another word. Lancelot darted after him.

"Then do not do this. Only certain death awaits you here! Arthur… I beg you, for our friendship's sake, I beg you." He was surprised when his commander snatched his head and snarled:

"You be my friend now and do not dissuade me. Seize the freedom you have earned and live it for the both of us." He took a deep breath. "I cannot follow you, Lancelot. I now know, that all the blood I have shed, all the lives I have taken, have led me to this moment." There was silence between them. Lancelot conceded, saying nothing but looking away. Arthur patted him on his shoulder, and walked away, his hand trailing across his friend's chest. Lancelot wondered if it was the last time he and Arthur would share that sort of moment – of friendship and brotherhood and understanding…

The column led slowly away. Away from Arthur, away from Hadrian's Wall. Away from Guinevere and all the history that had haunted Lancelot those past years. Faintly, drums could be heard, growing in volume and intensity until the horses started, whinnying and trampling this way and that. The knights quickly hushed them, and Lancelot brushed the black neck of Solmyr soothingly. He froze, old memories playing themselves. It couldn't be… He looked up, and Bors stared at him. They felt it too. Lorella, up ahead with a wagon and her children saw it. Tristan moved his hawk closer.

"Hey," it looked at him with gold eyes, "you are free." With that, he released it into the air. Lancelot smiled. Now. This was the battle of his choosing, and he knew that it would be his last – whether live or die. The column was halted as the knights retrieved their armour and weapons. As he prepared himself, he thought to Her. Would She be proud of him? He hoped so. She had once told him that he would know what to do when the time came. As a dam had broken, it flooded into him – the cool freshet that had so long been kept at bay. As he mounted Solmyr and took the flag from a servant, he whispered to Her in his head.

I believe

Lancelot drew the sword up the man's chest and watched him fall. He glanced over the wall of flames, and saw Guinevere crouched, facing her enemy with a light in her eyes and laughter on her lips. He saw the calm in her opponent's face, the surety of killing in his stance. A familiar tingling, cold sensation ran up his spine. No, not again. A voice whispered. Not this time. He turned and battled his way through. Solmyr stood calmly where Lancelot had left him, and snickered into his master's bloodied palm. He mounted, and kicked the stallion into a gallop. Roaring with fury, Lancelot jumped the fire, his eyes burning with bloodlust for the man before him. The Saxon wore fur and leather armour, but was strong. Lancelot's hand stung with the force of the blow that rang down on his sword. Guinevere looked up from the floor where she had fallen, and darted out the way. There was something in the Sarmatians eyes that scared her.

For each thrust and cut, there was a parry and a block. Round and round they went. Lancelot's two swords sang in the air as he spun them this way and that, searching for an opening. He found them, cutting at his legs, arms and stomach, but ever looking for the killing blow, the one that would fell him. His enemy's hand was heavy on the sword, his attacks strong but not as fast or nimble as Lancelot's. The Saxon knocked Lancelot backwards, using a shield, and he stumbled, regaining his footing to ward away two more Saxons who approached him with raised swords. Frustrated at the delay, he roared as he felled the last of the pair easily, and turned to face his opponent again.

Pain seared white-hot through his chest, the breath sucked from his lungs. He looked down to see an arrow shaft embedded through his armour. Looking up, the Saxon had a crossbow in his hand. Anger welled up in him – how dare that man live when he could feel himself die. Screaming with the agony of it, Lancelot threw one of his swords, driving the blade into the Saxon, who registered surprise before dropping to his knees. Lancelot imitated his enemy, and behind him Guinevere felt horror clench her chest. She battled towards the Sarmatian as the knight crawled across the grass towards his enemy. Lifting his arm was a great effort, as blackness began to well in his vision. He pointed the blade at the throat of the bald Saxon, but his enemy grabbed the hilt too, trying to push it away. Lancelot gritted his teeth, stars bursting in front of his eyes. Blood seeped down his chest underneath his armour, his life ebbing away… he plunged his sword into the Saxon's neck, and the body crumpled to the floor. Lancelot managed to shuffle backwards on his knees, before he, too, collapsed. He lay on his side, and he could smell blood and death and ash. With his failing eyes, he thought he saw a woad girl standing before him. Waiting. With the final expulsion of air, Lancelot whispered his final words.