A/N: No, you didn't skip a chapter. Big time jump. I'm trying to make the encounters in this fic more canon-realistic, and these two could only walk away from so many encounters alive and relatively unharmed. We're jumping to the season 1 finale in this chapter. The final chapter will go beyond the end of season 1.

Nimulot Encounters: Bait

CH4: Sword

Percival. He was not an animal, the boy was not a squirrel. His name was Percival. He was one of the few Sky Folk left, and if he, Lancelot, didn't bleed out on his horse or fall to infection, he would ensure the boy grew up safe and strong.

"Lancelot, pick up your feet! Move!" He remembered his mother's scar—a long diagonal line that stretched downward from the bridge of her nose, running along her left cheekbone, stopping just beyond the outer corner of her left eye—the scar disfigured her Ash Folk markings, making them look more like dark branches than tears, just on the one side. Her eyes had been alight with anger, not fear. Their enemy was close behind, red-robed humans hunting fey, but Lancelot's mother did not fear them; she feared for her son, so the red-robed humans would see her fury as soon as she found a safe place to stash him. "Move!" He didn't understand then why they weren't waiting for his father. He kept dragging his feet, looking back at the pillars of smoke behind them.

"Have you just come to watch me die?" The Green Knight had asked him back in Salt's tent.

"Why didn't you tell them? You could've told them, but you didn't. Why?"

"Because all fey are brothers, even the lost ones."

"Are there more? Are there others with you?" Hours had passed since his mother had ordered him on, claiming she was going to find his father. Even among Ash Folk, his senses were unmatched. Even as a boy, he found the group of survivors in the woods. Many of them were naked, their clothing burned away while they escaped the flames unharmed. It was his fault they were all slain. When arrows rained down upon them, he ran. He didn't know what else to do. He was just a boy.

"Brother—"

"You are not my brother!" The Monk had never spoken to anyone with such heat, but the Green Knight, bruised and bloody from Salt's treatment, nearly smiled. Such a gentle smile…

"They have turned your mind so far inside-out, you don't know the difference between kindness and hate."

When a red-robed man grabbed him, he screamed, kicking and clawing at the man like a wild animal. Where were his people? Where were the Hidden? The Hidden… he could almost hear their whispers. They were trying to reach him, but thoughts of the dead and dying Ash Folk behind him enraged him. Help had come too late. Much too late.

"Hush, child." His captor spoke in what might've passed for a fatherly tone under different circumstances. "You did well today. The Lord must have great plans for you—he placed a young demon-hunter in our path and you led us to victory. I will teach you, my son…"

"Who did this to you?" The Green Knight begged, truly distraught. Carden. Salt.

"We are saving souls. Your soul."

"Tell that to the little ones you burn."

"I don't harm the children." The Monk interjected. He would never harm a child.

"You burn their homes. You slay their mothers and fathers, and you watch your red brothers run them down on horses."

"Hey, wake up!" Lancelot woke with a jolt, nearly falling off Goliath. "I can't pick you up if you fall off, and it's too soon to stop."

"Tell them," the Green Knight had challenged him. "If this is where you belong, then tell them what you are." Only Carden and Salt knew the truth at the time. Of course, when Salt caught the boy trying to free the fey knight… Lancelot's secret would be common knowledge in a fortnight or less, and it was surprisingly easy for him to accept that fact. He had saved Percival, and the brave lad had saved him, refusing to leave him behind. They left the Green Knight behind.

Lancelot's cheeks were burning and sweat gathered on his forehead despite the cool breeze passing through. He tightened his grip on the reins, hearing no complaint from Percival when he jostled the boy slightly. When Lancelot fell asleep again, Percival leaned forward, gripping the saddle horn for balance as he took some of the Ash Folk warrior's weight on his back.

Whispers lulled Lancelot to sleep. These were the comforting whispers of the Hidden, not the malevolent whispers of the Sword of Power, and he welcomed them, surrendering to them entirely. Naturally, they took him to her. Well, they took him back to what might have been her last moment. She was in a Pendragon tent surrounded by guards. Her arresting blue eyes were vacant, the light he'd seen in them extinguished by defeat. She had hidden the sword somewhere, that much Lancelot knew. It was the one bit of leverage she had left, that and the loyalty of her fey and human supporters… Lancelot wondered if she was somehow still alive. The king had decided to keep her as his prisoner indefinitely, but the Red Paladins had stormed the camp to kill her. Moments before he faced the Trinity Guard, Lancelot had seen a burst of what was surely her magic, but had it been her last desperate defense?

"Here's the bag of shit you ordered," Two Pendragon soldiers dragged the Green Knight's body into the tent, dropping him at her feet. The witch… Nimue… Nimue's expression was one of horror and deep despair. Heedless of the soldiers around her, she dropped to her knees by her friend and sobbed openly. She touched his bloodstained brow, shook him, and finally dropped her head to his chest, shrieking in agony. Lancelot flinched. That was doing. He'd encountered the knight in the woods after finding the fey hideout empty, and the Green Knight fought much like he had at the mill, pulling his punches, trying to reason with his fey opponent. The knight had called him brother. The knight had spared him at the mill, as Nimue had spared his life more than once, and he'd left them both to die.

"What do we do?!" The soldiers panicked when the ground started shaking. Nimue was still on her knees, but her arms were limp by her sides, her chin turned upward, her eyes glazed over. Her face was framed with green vine markings, and her body shook like the ground. The paladins would have thought her possessed, and for that reason the image should have horrified Lancelot, but he was mesmerized. The sword was nowhere in sight, so this was her unenhanced, uncorrupted power. She was surrendering to her own power, to the Hidden helping her… In her grief, she had tapped into a pool of power so potent, so pure, it inspired true reverence. In the strange dream, Lancelot fell to his knees.

Nimue collapsed beside the Green Knight as a burst of energy erupted from her, the force of it knocking everyone in the camp to the ground. Curiously, when paladins ran in and grabbed Nimue, the Hidden left him with the Green Knight… the very, very green knight. There were no other witnesses, but Lancelot watched as grass, vines, roots, and flowers rapidly grew around the fallen knight, encasing his body in what could only be called a cocoon. Somewhere outside the tent, he could hear Carden. He could hear Nimue struggling. There was so much going on around him, but Lancelot's weeping eyes were on the Green Knight's chest. Inside the cocoon Nimue had created… he was breathing.

Lancelot toppled off his horse.

"Lancelot, pick up your feet!" Lancelot's mother was pulling him away from the pillars of smoke. Well, it should've been his mother. He was back home, turning back to look for his father, but when he was plucked off the ground and placed on Goliath's back, he looked into Nimue's unmarked eyes.

"Listen to me!" Nimue seized Lancelot's small hands. In the dark, the tears in her eyes were nearly invisible, but her quivering voice gave her away. "Mother asked me to do something right before they killed her. It'll be dangerous, but it was her dying wish. I have to go. I didn't argue with the others because I needed you to go with them, but things got of hand so quickly—I'm so sorry, Lancelot. I trapped you in those cages because I needed to know you were safe, but there's nothing I can do now. Find the other survivors. Lancelot, for me... you have to survive for me."

Born in the dawn…

"No!"

To pass in the twilight…

"No! Nimue!"

They had reached a lake. Lancelot gritted his teeth to keep from crying out in pain as he woke. He heard a splash, swimming… Rolling over, he blinked rapidly as he faced the mid-morning sun. Standing on shaky legs, he saw the body floating in the water. It was her. The Wolf-Blood Witch. The Fey Queen. Lancelot ran into the lake and swam to the Sky Folk girl, ignoring the sting of his own wounds reopening. There were two arrows in Nimue's chest, but it looked like they'd missed her heart.

"Call to the Hidden," Percival insisted as they pulled Nimue's body onto dry land. "Ask them to help us save her." The boy's voice wavered as he fought back tears. Lancelot couldn't remember the last time he'd initiated contact with the Hidden, but it was similar enough to Christian prayer, so he tried. Face flushed with fever, soaking wet and bleeding, he tried.

'I am not worthy,' he thought, 'but she is. I am likely your greatest disappointment, but she is your greatest triumph. If what I saw was real, if you gifted her with the ability to save the Green Knight, you must have greater plans for her. If there is a debt to be paid, if this is a price that must be paid for her intervention… let me pay it. I would see the boy to safety, but my wounds may be too great, and there is no place that would be safe for us both. Save them both. Protect Percival. Spare Nimue. Take what you need from me.'