Galahad spent the rest of the night in peaceful slumber, but when he awoke, he found that it wasn't without its just 'rewards'. His back felt stiff and painful, strangely feeling as though perhaps he had curled up and twisted himself around in his sleep – something that was truly impossible, really. He sat up with a drawn-out groan, the sun beating down on him.

"Bloody," he muttered to himself, stretching as best he could. It didn't help. "Stupid, stupid, son of a whore…"

"What's going on?" Gawain awoke slowly, shifting from sleep to alertness in a smooth motion, no gap in between. He rubbed at his eyes and patted his hair down from its newly wild state. "Are you okay?"

"My back," Galahad sputtered, reaching back with his arm and trying his best to work out the knots in his back. "I think someone must have snuck in and twisted my muscles up completely. It's impossibly painful."

"This from a man who just had his chest and leg stitched up," Gawain mildly commented, an amused smirk on his face. "Your definition of pain is increasingly doubtful. Oh, and next time? You let me stitch you up. I bet those stitches came loose at least twice before they were set in properly."

Galahad didn't bother to confirm Gawain's suspicions.

"All right, move over," Gawain got up and tapped lightly at Galahad's back. Galahad looked up, frowning in confusion as Gawain shifted onto his knees behind Galahad, cracking his fingers in a great snapping mess of sound. Galahad winced at all the cracking and moved down closer to the end of the bed, curling forward and reaching for his toes in an effort to stretch out the muscles.

And then, warm breath right by his ear.

"Relax," Gawain instructed quietly.

Galahad closed his eyes and trusted Gawain, leaning back into the touch. He opened his mouth to protest, but Gawain's hands were already pushing under Galahad's sleeping shirt, kneading and pushing at the tight muscles, immediately relaxing them if only slightly. His hands seemed to span the whole breadth of his back, and Galahad gave a contented sigh.

"Better?" Gawain asked, just as softly as before. The sound of bedsheets stirring and Gawain was even closer still to Galahad.

"Don't dare think about stopping," Galahad warned lazily, stretching his hands out and letting them rest on his legs. Gawain's hands traveled up to his shoulders, digging in deep here, thumbs brushing up his neck. They lingered for a moment before running higher, through every curl and sending shivers through Galahad's whole body. "Gawain…" he murmured, pleased.

His hands were moving lower now, spanning the breadth of his shoulders before running the length of his back, easing every muscle on the way. He exhaled slowly, tension releasing itself with his breath and he closed his eyes, feeling content to lose himself in the moment, Gawain's fingertips warm on his body.

This, he could get used to. This, he could trust.

He broke himself out of the haze and pulled away completely, letting his shirt slip over his back and turning to smile at Gawain. "Thank you," he said, the two simple words brimming with sincerity. He stood slowly and stretched himself out, turning away from Gawain to conceal the fact that he had grown quite hard in the process.

"Galahad!"

Galahad frowned, the voice coming from outside his window. He grabbed a pair of breeches and dressed himself as quickly as he could. He stumbled slightly with Gawain following in his shadow. He made it outside to find Tristan standing with a bag in his hands and his sword unsheathed. He blinked in surprise, taking slow steps forward amongst the crowd that was slowly building.

"Tristan, where did you go?" Galahad asked uneasily, watching carefully as Tristan untied the bag and dropped it to the ground, the heads of the Romans piling out in a heap. Galahad looked down, staring at them, into dead eyes. "You…" he began in a flat, faint voice.

"I'm burning them tonight," Tristan said, his focus on cleaning his sword. Galahad couldn't tear his gaze away from the deadened eyes of one of the Romans, recognizing him. That was the one who had grabbed him by the hair, the one who had suggested they shave it all off.

Gawain was by Galahad's side, though Galahad didn't know when that had happened.

"We killed them all in the woods," Gawain said slowly, pointing over and over again at the decapitated Romans. "We killed them there and left them to rot. Did you…"

"Killing them wasn't enough," Tristan said with little emotion in his voice. "We couldn't prevent a horror, so I did the next best thing I knew how to do. I avenged it as best as I could." He crouched down and began to pile the heads back into the burlap bag, one by one. Gawain turned his head away, wrinkling his nose. Galahad stared forward, frozen and fixated.

"Tristan…" Galahad began uneasily, closing his eyes tightly and fighting back the sickness, fighting back the visceral memories.

"I'm burning them tonight," Tristan repeated, tying up the bag in a swift knot. Galahad opened his eyes to find Tristan studying him with narrowed eyes. "You're still free. You know it. It looks like you made a choice."

"I didn't…I…"

"You have," Tristan cut him off swiftly, lifting the bag. "It was the decision I thought you'd make. It just surprises me it didn't come sooner."

Galahad stepped forward, mindful of the crowd watching them. He hushed his voice lower. "Tristan, let's not discuss this here. I'll…we'll talk tonight, over the fire. Over the," he swallowed the sickness once more, "over the burning." He closed his eyes and schooled himself to be strong and when he opened his eyes, it was as though none of the weakness had ever been present.

Every font of strength, every last thought about strength that Galahad thought he might have in him was quickly dispelled the moment the fire was lit and Tristan began to build it up with the human heads. Galahad coughed at the acrid smell, feeling it would get into his clothing and never leave.

He sat with a brimming cup of ale, but he wasn't able to drink a sip of it, not without gagging it back up as the smoke drifted past him, entering his nostrils despite his best efforts not to inhale as it passed in great wafts. Tristan was never still, always moving in quick paces, making his way around the fire, and every so often, his hand would glide past Galahad, touching him briefly as though to verify he was real. Galahad shifted uncomfortably every few moments, completely aware of the shift between them in the past few days.

"Still dreaming?" Tristan asked, tossing a log on the fire.

"If you can call it that," Galahad snorted. "Yes."

"Have you slept with him?"

"What?" Galahad responded with outrage. "Tristan…"

"You haven't, then," Tristan cut him off with a calm smirk. He grabbed his mug from the ground and sat on the ground beside Galahad – slightly lower than him – and relaxed, digging his heels into the ground. "Don't worry, I just wanted to know. Like I said, you're free."

"Why did you go back for the heads?" Galahad quietly asked, watching the flames consume everything in the pile Tristan had created. He turned to watch Tristan in the flickering fire, the shadows and light dancing over a drawn face – no emotion shining through at all. "It could have been over, you should have just stayed."

"It never would have been resolved," Tristan countered. "There's your tidy ending, Galahad." He gestured with his mug. "There they are, burning and already in the depths of all the hells."

Galahad paused, his attention down on the ground.

"I thought I might love you," he said so quietly he didn't know if Tristan had even heard him in the first place. He didn't look at Tristan to confirm this or not, he just clung tighter to the mug and wondered where all those feelings had disappeared to. No matter how he tried, he couldn't get past the panic in him, the lingering terror at having the heads of the Romans burning right in front of him. Whatever infatuation he'd had for Tristan was doing a wonderful job of hiding.

"You didn't," Tristan said. Two words, and the both of them were so sure and confident, Galahad would have had a hard time doubting anything said in that particular tone of voice. Galahad faltered, clearing his throat slightly. "You're eighteen. An infatuation is easy to come by." He shrugged. "I enjoyed our time."

"And you're ready to simply abandon it?" Galahad asked with uneasy confusion.

"There is no fury on earth like Gawain when he is jealous or scorned," Tristan said sagely. "You're an extremely good-looking man and yes, I can understand how a normal person could fall in love."

"You're anything but normal," Galahad said, faintly amused.

"Are any of us?" Tristan argued, laughing quietly. "You'll do well without me. And that, I think you already understand."

They sat there, side by side. Galahad felt his skin twitching and he couldn't quite tear his eyes away from the fire, now growing bigger and bigger. Galahad sighed, the smell of the smoke burning its memory into his brain and every peek at the flesh in the fire brought goosebumps to his arms. Galahad didn't want to speak up, most certainly didn't want to admit that Tristan could be right. He should be in control of his own emotions and have the final say in whether he loved someone or not.

"It was an infatuation, pleasant and enjoyable as it was. It was a short-lived infatuation," Tristan's voice broke into his thoughts. "I enjoyed it to the end."

"You're through with me," Galahad finally said, piecing it together. "That's it, isn't it? There's no more enjoyment to be found?" he couldn't stop that from sounding sick and bitter.

Tristan turned to look at him, no smile on his face, but levity in the expression. "I really don't want to compete with Gawain over you. You were good to me. We're parting on amicable terms. Besides, Gawain is a terribly jealous man who tends to have a streak of violence in him."

"You're violent with the best of them," Galahad accused.

"I never denied that," Tristan replied swiftly, standing up.

He walked away without parting words or even any signal that he was going. Galahad rubbed his arms in an effort to get the goosebumps to disappear, but found that they wouldn't go. He stood slightly, feeling an uneasy faltering in his knees. He steadied himself and looked around, unsure what to do. Surely he should find Gawain and at least tell him about this newest development. He knew one thing was certain. He did not want to stay by the fire.

He began to walk back, but stopped, turning around and marching straight back to the fire, looking down at the melting flesh on the heads, taking a deep breath of the smell and then with great disgust on his face, he spit into the fire.

"You were born to burn," he muttered to the flames.

tbc