AN: Just thought that I would put the disclaimer up again- I don't any of King Arthur. Hope that you guys enjoy this one. You should probably read my story "On the Edge of the Roman Empire" before this one as this might not make a TON of sense without that one for reference.
Felix's first Battle- end of movie +19
Felix kept his eyes on the forest around him. Granted, their primary enemies were the Saxons who didn't melt into the trees like some of their own Pict-ish allies, but not all of the local tribes had united under Arthur all those years ago. He glanced over at his father and older brother and saw that both of them were looking to the trees as well. Soon, his attention was pulled to his horse when it gave a low whiny and reared back slightly for a moment. He leaned over to pat its neck when he heard something whiz over his head. An arrow.
"To arms!" Arthur yelled. Felix looked at the arrow that was now firmly embedded in the ground, in astonishment. If his horse hadn't called his attention like it had, the arrow would've gone right through his head. He gulped and looked over to his father again. Gawain's face was grim. He had never seen his father look so serious except for the day that his mother had died. He nervously looked over at his older brother. But Lucan, who always looked rather serious, had a ferocious look on his face as he glared at the woods.
Felix didn't have any more time to question what was happening. This was what he had been looking forward to all his life, right? This is what he had been training towards for the better part of 5 years. Before he could even blink again, they had started a charge. Felix still wasn't sure where they were charging to or who they were fighting. Was it the Saxons? Or was it one of the splinter Briton tribes? It all became a flash or yells and clash of metal on metal as they met their enemy. He tried to keep track of his father and brother, but was soon lost in fighting for his life. It was so fast. He didn't really have time to think as his sword sunk into the chest of his enemy. All he had time to feel was a slight clenching of his stomach as he took his first human life.
But even that slight pause, that fraction of a second, opened him up to attack as one of the enemy jumped on his back. He could smell his unwashed enemy and feel them clawing at his long blonde hair, trying to reach his eyes and neck. Before he knew what he was doing, he had pulled his attacker over his head and roughly slammed them to the forest floor, stabbing them with his knife before he even registered that it had been a woman attacking him. He felt that clenching feeling again, but was soon drawn back into the battle before he could dwell on anything.
When it seemed like the battle was nearing its end, he looked to his left and saw Lucan take an arrow to his chest. Felix cried out and ran towards his brother, catching him as he hit the ground. Dead. Was this what he wanted? He could almost hear his mother's voice asking him, begging him, not to pursue the life of a knight.
When he started his training she had begged him to become a scholar, a merchant, anything other than a knight. He had always swept aside her concerns. As a highborn Roman lady, what could she possibly know about battle? All his life, people had told Felix he was exactly like Gawain. His father was a knight. So there was never any question what he would choose to do once he came of age. He was a knight born and bred. Wasn't he?
Felix didn't realize that if Gawain had a choice, he would've chosen any life but that of a knight.
As he held his brother's cooling body and thought of his mother's words, it was like she appeared before him. Felix blinked. His mother had died four years before his first patrol.
"Felix!" She called out and, just as he had when he was little, he raised his free hand out to her.
"Mama!" He called, unable to stop the tears from flowing down his face. He was older now. He had grown a scruffy beard and already had the warrior locks of his father's Sarmatian tribe. But right now, Felix just wanted his mother to make everything better.
"My sons..." Valeria said and moved towards where Felix was crouched holding Lucan's dead body. Before she could go more than two steps, a faceless enemy warrior came by and pulled her neck back, slitting her throat before walking casually away.
"NO!" Felix yelled. He felt as though he couldn't believe what he was seeing. His hands were sticky with Lucan's blood and he watched his mother's blood soak into the grass beneath her, her head nearly separated from her body. Where was his father? Why hadn't Gawain been able to stop any of this from happening?
Felix heard a gurgle nearby and saw Gawain with his own axe embedded in his head. Felix didn't know what was happening. The world seemed to grow blurry. All he could do was scream; scream their names and scream in agony as all he could see was blood, destruction, and pain. Pain. He looked down and saw a lance sticking through his chest. He didn't feel anything for a moment, but soon that blissful numbness ended and there was red hot pain searing through even pore of his body. He couldn't move, he couldn't die. All he could do was see his family around him, bloody and dead. He would be trapped in this hell forever.
Until he was jostled in the side and woke up in a dimly lit room.
Felix blinked in confusion. Where was he? He absently touched a hand to his chest where a moment before a spear had been protruding. He was solid. He frowned in thought and blinked as he took in the low lights around him, the light coming from the banked fire in the hearth. The hearth that was in his cottage. Slowly, as though afraid that he would be plunged back into a world of horror and blood with the wrong move, he looked towards the fire. Instead of simmering flames, he saw Aoife. His week-long wife.
She had a worried look in her eyes and in a blink, he realized what had happened. It was a dream. He tried to smile to reassure her, but it must've come out as more of a grimace, because all she did was nudge him to the side and climb in beside him on the couch where he realized he must've drifted off.
"Was it bad?" Felix asked. And from the hoarseness of his voice, she didn't have to answer. He knew that it was bad. He must've really been screaming.
"You were calling for your mother." She answered and he could hear the tremor in her voice. It had been five years since his first patrol; his mother had died over nine years ago. "I was so worried that the fever had gotten ahold of you..." She trailed off and he heard her sniffle. That was the reason he was sleeping out on the couch by the fire. He had gotten a slight fever on the last patrol (damn island and its constant rain) and didn't want to get her sick. But, as they lay on the couch together, her hand over his heart, he figured that they would both probably end up sleeping on the couch tonight.
"Sorry love." He said. Aoife didn't say anything. She merely leaned slightly into his side and kissed his shoulder.
"You scared me." She whispered. He didn't reply except by tightening his grip on her. Felix could feel himself start to drift off again. Aoife was warm and soft next to him and he could hear her humming a lullaby that his mother used to sing to them when they were all children.
Now he understood why his mother hadn't wanted him to be a knight. After these past five years of battle and patrols, that first patrol was still vivid in his mind; made even more horrible by his imagination. Lucan had taken a head wound and Felix had been covered in his brother's blood. But Lucan had survived.
It was then that he finally realized why his mother had begged him not to be a knight. At the time, he had wondered how she had known. How had his sheltered, gentle mother known what horror there was on the battlefield? But as he drifted off with Aoife's hair tickling his nose, he wondered if his own father had nightmares like he now had. Had his mother witnessed his father's sorrow with the life that he had been forced into? It made sense, he supposed.
After all, he was just like his father.
AN: Aoife is Bors and Vanora's daughter Ten, who is Lucia's best friend and was often around Felix when growing up.
Well, this one turned out a little bit more serious than my usual. To be honest, I'm not 100% sure where it came from. I just had a burst of inspiration the other day. I hope that the battle and Felix's nightmare of the battle came off as realistic. Having lived a rather sheltered life myself, that is all from my imagination about how horrible war must be.