Title: In These Moments of Madness and Clarity
Fandom: DiR
Genre: Romance/Angst
Pairing: Will/Bran
Summary: Bran has forgotten; Will's going mad; and, together, they may fall.
Will wishes, sometimes, that he could change everything. But he won't, even though he can, so he's left alone among people he cannot allow himself to love. He loved, once, as an innocent child, an Old One newly come into power, on the misty hills of Wales.
The one he loved and loves still is pale as bleached bone. He has hawk's eyes, hunters' eyes, which still haunt Will in his dreams. Those white hands, hands that once drew magic from a golden harp and held a blazing sword, do a thousand different things, all unspeakable for a hundred-thousand reasons, in Will's dreams.
Will is breaking, and no one will ever know all of the shards and pieces, because, clearly, the Old One is alone.
Darkness hides behind his eyelids, and with the oblivion of sleep come weird shadows of memories and fragments of dreams.
A blazing, crystal sword; a shining harp; a king with a brindled beard. All these things, dreams of memories of things that never happened. Bran sees these things in his sleep.
And he sees himself and Will, and he is filled with a sudden, fierce longing. A longing for a boy he hardly even remembers, but, oh, God, how he knows he loves! In this sort of moment, the longing tears down the walls of magic and choice that bound the knowing away.
The walls will return by morning; they always do.
He shouldn't be here. He shouldn't have returned to this place. Too many memories, all threatening to suffocate all that's left of him.
But he is drawn here, like a moth to a bonfire. Drawn like gravity, and hell awaits no matter his response. So he shivers, praying that it's a trap laid by the Dark, and they'll put him out of his misery, oh, how he hopes that's the case.
Because, standing alone, always alone, on the Craig yr Aderyn, Will is dying.
Will's here. The thought thrills Bran like nothing else; Will is here!
He doesn't know why he's having difficulty breathing, why he wants nothing more than to run and find Will now, and to hell with the past and the future.
He climbs the Craig, drawn by something in the deepest recesses of his all-too-human heart that shows him the way. "Will...Will...Will..." is what it whispers, a burning, smoldering need.
And he reaches the peak of the rocky cliff to see Will outlined against a foggy, twilit sky.
Beautiful.
Somehow, Bran is here, as Will feels the chill of the Dark closing in around them. This is the great trap, Will realizes.
Will is not the victim, but the bait.
At that moment, the Dark that Will can feel begins to coalesce, form from the formlessness of the grey Welsh mist.
The wind picks up, that horrible cold wind blowing around Death's feet, and the Grey King makes himself known to Bran as well.
From the corner of his eye, Will can see Bran tense as the binds on the Pendragon's memory snap. The Old One looks at the agent of the Dark, his hands clenching. "This is not his war, fallen one."
"It's in his blood, Sign-seeker."
"But he gave up the power. He didn't want this." Uncertainty, a thousand little spiderweb cracks in the eerie calm that Will's managed to hold to.
"It still remains." The Grey King turns to Bran. "Bran ap Arthur, Pendragon, I challenge you and your place in my lands."
"My father's lands, Brenin Llywd. I may have chosen to forget, but have you any idea just why?" Bran moved closer, placing himself between Will and the Grey King. The cracks in Will's calm go deeper, spread wider. Chasms. "The Lady called them 'loving bonds'. Those same bonds are what drew me here tonight."
Will gasps softly and shatters.
"Leave this place." Bran revels in the memories; the power returned to him is just an afterthought. He orders the Brenin Llywd to leave; he wants to be alone with Will.
Will, his dewin. His wizard, just like his father had had Merlin.
The Old One is turned to him, a million things shining like fractured rays of light in his brown eyes. Love is there, and fear, and a deep desperate longing that neither of them can really understand. It could be the essence of lust, but it's certainly like nothing that either of them has ever felt before.
No words pass between them; beyond all of the clear-crystal madness lies a surety of each other. It is beautiful, so beautiful that it's sheer paradox, ecstasy and misery in each other's presence. Bran wants to cry, to pray, to pull Will into some perfect embrace.
And Will, Bran knows, feels the same. Wordless, the assurance fills Bran with a sudden strange solemnity.
The Old One kneels, pressing his lips to Bran's long, white hands with an almost frightening reverence. The Pendragon stares down at the other boy, his breaths short and hitching.
"W-will."
"My lord Pendragon," Will whispers softly. Sadness overtakes the other emotions in his eyes. He stands, and Bran knows.
"Please, don't go." He can't say any more.
"You weren't meant to remember. I…I have to…" Pain. Agony that neither of them can solace. It flows like blood from their shredded hearts, metaphorical crimson that they cannot staunch.
"No!" The word breaks over them, and Bran crushes Will close to him, burying his face into the nape of Will's neck.
"I'm so sorry, Bran, I'm so sorry." Will repeats the words like some ancient prayer, over and over and over as though he can't stop. He, so gentle, so, so gentle, tries to push Bran away, but neither one of them is strong enough, selfless enough. Not for this.
Tears flow, deep and broken despair wrapping them into her cold embrace. Why can't this be a dream?
No, this is no dream, no more of the nightmares; none could match this.
~end~