Thank you Kaelynn Perth, L J Groundwater, Camreyn, Demus, GaBo0, Shauna, Goody and skinnyrita. I love you all and I'm sorry for taking an unbelievably long time with this chapter. But don't worry! I now have the director's cut King Arthur and am feeling inspired!! On with the story- and the tentative beginnings of the love triangle…

Chapter Seven

Lancelot

It was that deep time of night and the whole world, or so it seemed to Lancelot, was asleep. His room wasn't as black as it had been before thanks to the orange embers of Tristan's fire and the little light they cast but that was small comfort. There were shadows in the room; shadows of men, or rather giants that were coming for him- childish fears, Lancelot knew, but that didn't stop him trembling. He sat upright and drew his blanket up to his chin. He gazed around his room, wide-eyed with huge black pupils.

All this time, Lancelot knew that however terrifying being awake might be, it was nothing compared with falling asleep. Yes, anything was better than facing the nightmares. He had to stay awake. Lancelot counted to one hundred and then back down from one hundred to zero. Then he counted in twos and then in fours, which was marginally more difficult. He lost interest after a while, however, and his eyes fell to dwelling on the room's shadows: the big one he could glimpse out of the corner of hisleft eye, the smaller one straight ahead. The latter resembled Cynric.

A while longer and Lancelot's eyelids began to feel heavy and then to droop. His head gave a violent nod on to his chest and he forced himself awake again. He focused on the pain of his injuries –his pain was surely enough to keep anyone awake- but no, even that had grown dull: the burning turned to an aching heat like the embers ofTristan's fire. Lancelot sighed heavily, knowing what Arthur would say. "Fear won't banish fear, Lancelot. Only comfort can do that."

And so Lancelot's thoughts turned to his commander. He thought of Arthur laughing at one of Bors' crude jokes or the merciless teasing of Galahad: but then, come to think of it, Arthur's laugh had always seemed a little reluctant; a little too reserved. His smile was the same: never too broad, sometimes warm and gentle, sometimes grim. Never carefree- or at least not so for many years. And there had been too many lines etched on Arthur's face as they had rode back to the Wall. He was getting old, perhaps, or just weary. I shall have to ask him how old he is, Lancelot realised. It was a shock to find he did not know.

With images of Arthur swimming before his eyes, Lancelot could ward off sleep no longer.

Arthur

Arthur was also lying awake in bed, although his thoughts were more preoccupied with concern than with fear.

Not to say that Arthur was not afraid because he was. His concern about losing Lancelot was a form of fear in itself. In the past Arthur had worried about losing his best friend in mental terms: becoming estranged from him through their differences in opinion. They'd always argued, of course- mostly about religion but sometimes about Rome too and sometimes about mundane things like battle tactics and where to make camp. This time was different. Never before had Lancelot refused to see him. Never.

It made Arthur think that something serious must be wrong with his friend. He just couldn't imagine what. He'd thought of every torture device he'd ever come across but none could have been used on Lancelot, who only had a few bruises (albeit nasty black ones) to show for his suffering. And what could be so bad about a few bruises, after all? He'd seen Lancelot looking worse in the past. Only last summer he had been forced to lie on his front for a week after incurring an extremely painful sword slash to the lower back. It had required nearly forty stitches and Lancelot had smiled through the whole thing. Even before that, he'd endured the unenviable task of having an arrow removed from deep in his groin by a shaky-handed Galahad.

No, everything indicated that Lancelot was unafraid of pain: physical pain at least. A few bruises –okay, an especially violent beating- would not be enough to invoke a personality change in his friend. Something had to be seriously wrong.

But what?

Arthur climbed out of bed and paced around his room. It was freezing but he paid no heed to the icy air on his bare arms and legs. He couldn't rest until he understood what was going on with Lancelot. If only Tristan would tell-

Arthur stopped his pacing. Almost immediately he began to shiver but he had a feeling this was to do with something more than the cold. Tristan. Tristan knew what was wrong with Lancelot. How did Tristan know?

Lancelot must have told Tristan.

Arthur felt the vague prickling of his throat that heralded the arrival of tears. He swallowed deeply and then blinked several times. The tears faded but some other emotion lingered. Not anger, not really grief.

Lancelot wasn't turning away from Tristan.

The emotionwas jealousy.

And by God, it was the strangest thought that Arthur had ever had but once it came it was stuck in his mind. Something about is screamed the word 'truth' at him and after a while he came to accept it as such.

I'm jealous of Tristan, Arthur realised.

Tristan

"Tristan," Bors had said in one of his more perceptive moments, "never sleeps."

It wasn't exactly true but it wasn't entirely false either. Tristan liked the night. In fact, if he had to choose between living a life in the light and living one in the dark, he would invariably choose the dark every time.

At this moment in time, he was sitting on a hilltop to the south east of the fort, staring up at the full moon and thinking- mostly about the night but also about Lancelot. The man fascinated him, although the reason why was almost indefinable. He thought it could be Lancelot's beauty: beauty that didn't detract from the fact that the man was a killer; deadly like Tristan himself. There was none of the weakness in Lancelot that Tristan had come to expect in women. There was vulnerability, true, but that wasn't about weakness- that was a factor of mortality that belonged to all.

And then there was the passion and the fire that was inherent in everything Lancelot did: Lancelot had the ability to feel in a way that Tristan had never had.

Until now.

Tristan knew he felt something for Lancelot that he'd never felt for anybody before. He'd defined it as love before and maybe it was. Certainly, he felt the desire to protect his fellow knight, coupled with an even greater desire to wrap his arms round him. This was something new for Tristan: something worrying but at the same time exciting. Whatever it was, Tristan knew what he wanted.

He leapt upright and was soon running towards Hadrian's Wall on swift feet.

Lancelot

Soon thoughts of Arthur vanished from Lancelot's dreams and his sleep grew increasingly fitful.

After a time, he dreamt that he was wandering through a deep patch of woodland with Tristan by his side.

"Don't leave me here," he begged Tristan.

Tristan moved closer to him and their shoulders brushed together. "I have to," Tristan said. "One day you'll understand."

"If you leave me now," Lancelot warned him. "I'll never escape from this wood." He grasped Tristan's hand in his own. "If you leave me, I won't survive."

"You will." Tristan pulled his hand away from Lancelot's. "Just remember: follow the path until you reach the crossroads, then turn East."

"You can't leave me. You really can't…" Lancelot reached out again for Tristan's hand but instead grasped at air. He turned and found that Tristan had vanished. "Damn you!" Lancelot was suddenly angry. "DAMN YOU!!" he screamed. His words echoed through the woods, as if to torment him. "Damn you, Tristan," he whispered.

He continued along the woodland path for what seemed like a long time. He gradually became more and more nervous. The trees appeared to be leaning inwards. The air became hotter and somehow thicker until it seemed to Lancelot as if he was not walking but rather wading along the path.

Finally, he arrived at a crossroads. "Turn East," Lancelot told himself. Then he realised he had no idea which way East was.

"TRISTAN"" he screamed. "TRISTAN!!!" There was no reply. Lancelot fell to his knees. "Won't somebody help me?" he asked. "Somebody. Anybody."

Lancelot remained on his knees for many minutes. At last, a voice came to him. It sounded like Arthur. "Follow the path your heart chooses," said the voice. Lancelot, seeing no alternative, climbed to his feet and turned down the left-hand path, which seemed less forboding.

He walked for perhaps two hundred paces, his throat dry and his palms sweating, until the path suddenly turned a corner and he found himself on the edge of a clearing. Before him, in the patch of open ground, was assembled the entire Saxon army.

Lancelot turned to run but found the way blocked by Cynric.

"I see you've come back for more…" Cynric stepped forward. "You always were a little whore…"

Lancelot awoke suddenly. His breath came in fast gasps and he was drenched in sweat but he didn't dare to move any of the blankets that were pulled up to his chin. In fact, he could scarcely find the courage to move an inch of his body, once he noticed that the Cynric-shaped shadow across the room was still there.

"Help me," Lancelot whispered. His terror did not abate because the nightmare had ended. Instead it grew with every passing second. He longed to call out for somebody but feared nobody would come.

He longed for Arthur.

But then he longed for Tristan more. It seemed easier to wish for a saviour than a friend.

"Please come, Tristan."

At that moment there was a dull thump and his door swung open. The lock was broken. Lancelot opened his mouth to scream as a dark figure appeared in the doorway.

"Don't cry out," Tristan said softly.

Lancelot bit back the scream but didn't say anything in greeting because he was too caught up in Tristan's spell. For a moment, there was magic in the air and it glimmered like molten silver. It was only for a second though, and then Lancelot blinked to clear his vision and the silver stars before his eyes disappeared.

"I came," Tristan said. His voice was so low that it took Lancelot a moment to unravel his words.

"Thank you," Lancelot whispered, his own voice catching in his throat. "You always do come," he added, remembering how it had felt to lie all bloody and forlorn in a baggage camp in the middle of the Saxon army. He had thought then that Tristan was the Angel of Death. In retrospect, it seemed rather silly.

"I do." Tristan knelt by Lancelot's bed. He seemed surprised when the younger knight grasped his hand but then he smiled faintly, as if recalling a happy memory. He leant down and touched his lips to Lancelot's own hand and then he pulled the trembling man towards him and took him into his arms.

Tbc…