Disclaimer: not my characters.

Summary: April of 1625 had been one of the hardest months of Porthos' life. But in a strange way, it had probably been one of the best as well.

Savoy-centric origin story, in which Aramis is grieving, Porthos is a saint, and Athos just kind of shows up, eventually.

Winter, Late in Leaving

Chapter Four [tw: vomit, discussions of fasting/fast-breaking/disordered eating]

"Did I miss Easter?"

Spread out on his bed (not the floor this time), Porthos started; Aramis had all but wept himself to sleep a couple of hours ago, and they had both been dozing ever since. He hadn't realized the man had awoken.

"Did I miss Easter?" Aramis asked again.

"Eh, yeah," Porthos admitted, sitting up. "'s the second of April now. Easter was three days ago."

"They said we'd be home in time for Mass," Aramis murmured.

"We can go this Sunday," Porthos promised. Aramis was calmer now, which was good, but his voice had reacquired its hazy, slightly dazed quality. The man's clarity of thought seemed inconstant, ebbing and swelling like a tide.

"All right," Aramis consented, as Porthos came to his side and sat on the edge of his bed.

He really did look young, Porthos marveled. Aramis' eyes were huge without curtains of hair to disguise them; his chin and jaw were rounder, more boyish without the beard to define them. His appearance tugged at Porthos' heart in a way he didn't fully understand. It was nearly impossible to keep in his mind that this creature before him was a soldier, was a sharpshooter, had taken lives, probably without keeping count. There before him, bruised, betrayed, Aramis looked nothing if not- fragile.

It made Marsac's actions all the more hateful.

They sat silently for a little while. Aramis seemed content- relatively speaking- to simply have someone beside him. But when the man spoke again, he sounded clearer-headed, and angrier for it. "Don't feel well," he grumbled.

"Do you need a bucket?" Porthos tried to keep his voice calm.

Aramis smiled unhappily. "When I say there is nothing in me left to vomit, Porthos, I mean that literally. In fact, I'm about to eat something just so I can be properly sick."

"I dunno about that, but half the problem might be that you're hungry."

"I'm not."

Porthos paused. "Eh- you've got to know that your body is. Even if your mind's not. You know that, right?"

"Of course I know that," Aramis snapped.

"So will you try to eat? Just a bit?"

"I suppose." He paused thoughtfully, and then said, "I melted snow for water, but I don't think I've eaten since- you said it's the second of April?" Porthos nodded. "I haven't eaten since Holy Thursday. What's that, almost six days?"

"Lord. I'm goin' to the kitchens right now. I'll be back, all right?" Aramis nodded.

It seemed like a good sign, that Aramis consented to eating, and consented to being left alone. Porthos was almost hopeful as he made his way to the restaurant. Marie loaded him up with water, bread, and broth; balancing these carefully, he returned to the room.

Aramis was a bit paler than when he'd left. Nevertheless, he seemed to have kept his wits fully about him, and was sitting up with his legs crossed, still covered by a blanket. "That's a deathbed meal," he mused, eying Porthos' wares.

"It's a sickbed meal," Porthos corrected. "Tomorrow you'll be on your feet and we'll get you to the restaurant. Get you some mutton. It was excellent."

Aramis smiled tiredly. "All right."

Porthos set everything down on the table but the bowl of broth, which he carried to Aramis' bed. "Can you, eh-"

"Yes. I can feed myself."

"All right." Not wanting to hover, he passed the bowl to Aramis and returned to his own bed. In the silence, he could hear the spoon scraping. Wondering if perhaps a bit of noise would be less stifling, he forced himself to speak, choosing the first subject that crossed his mind.

"I think Marie is the Captain's former lover," he declared. "She seemed awfully concerned about him, but never said how they knew one another. He'll be joinin' us soon; I think he should court her again. She's obviously still sweet on him, and I'm fairly sure she's a widow. I mean, she wears a ring, but there's no sign of a husband around; and no black, so it's been at least a year-" Suddenly he became aware of Aramis coughing. Porthos bolted from his bed.

There was so little vomit that it took Porthos a moment to realize what had happened. When he did, he tried his best not to let it faze him. "It's all right," he said evenly, taking the bowl from Aramis' hand. "You just need to get used to eating again. This was bound to happen the first time."

Aramis didn't react. He was staring at the puddle in his lap with utter concentration, looked slightly stunned. Porthos stripped away the blanket. He was relieved to see that underneath it, Aramis himself was clean.

Carefully, he carried the blanket to the bathtub and draped it so that the soiled corner fell into the water. "I'm sorry," Aramis rasped, while Porthos' back was still turned.

"Fuck no. You are not going to start apologizin', or this is all gonna be a lot soppier than it needs to be."

Aramis fell silent once more. Then: "Why are you doing this?"

"It's dirty."

"Don't be daft. Why are you looking after me?"

"We're musketeers," Porthos replied airily. "There's a code or something, in'there?"

"Please stop evading," Aramis said evenly. "I may be too fucking weak to take broth but I am not a child. Why are you being so kind to me, Porthos?"

Leaving the blanket, Porthos turned back to him. "You make it sound like I shouldn't be. That's actually pretty fucked, Aramis. You think someone needs a reason to care about you?" Aramis said nothing.

"No," Porthos amended. "You don't think anyone should care about you at all. You think the whole world should have left you in the forest, eh? Well I'm sorry, but I won't."

Aramis was staring at him steadily, appraisingly. At long last he nodded.

The tension eased from Porthos' shoulders. "You needed a friend," he offered, softly. And I did too. "Ready to try again?"

"No."

"You won't be sick this time."

"How do you know that?"

"Because I won't talk about the captain's love life this time. I think that's what did you in."

Aramis laughed, sudden and bright and genuine.

"Poor Captain Treville," he chuckled. "It's in poor taste to joke about a man in his absence."

"Fine- I'll hold off 'til he gets here. But then he's got some points in need of clarifyin'." Porthos went to the table, casually plucked two rolls from it.

"Imagine if she's his cousin or the like, mon ami."

"Nuh-uh. There's no way." He handed a roll to Aramis, bit into his own.

"I'll get the story from her tomorrow. I can get stories from anyone."

"Can you now?" Porthos prompted.

Aramis didn't answer; he waited until he'd chewed and swallowed. "Especially the ladies," he said, once he'd done so.

Porthos nearly missed the beat, so pleased as he was that Aramis was eating casually. "Don't move in on the captain's turf," he said, saving himself quickly, and Aramis feigned offense, smiling with his mouth full.

In that manner, Aramis ate a roll and a half, and drained the entire pitcher of water.

A storm, predictably, followed the calm. Breaking a fast could be more painful than the hunger itself, Porthos knew, and this proved true now. Aramis' body rebelled.

It began soon after he'd finished his scanty meal; one minute he was fine, the next sweating and swallowing fitfully. Aramis sunk back into bed, small and sick and scared. His stomach waged a war against what it saw as an enemy; the cramps were so bad they left him panting, nearly sobbing with pain.

Aramis was curled up tightly on his side. Before long, Porthos fitted behind him and added his own hands against Aramis' belly, miserable at his inability to help.

But Aramis didn't vomit again, and eventually the effects subsided. In his arms, Aramis relaxed into a doze, and Porthos saw no reason not to stay beside him and sleep as well.

The room was dark, the fire only embers, when Porthos woke to the feeling of Aramis wriggling out of his grasp. "What's wrong?" he hissed, breath catching.

"Relax," Aramis told him. "I just need a piss. And please don't hold a festival to congratulate me, all right?"

"All right."

"And get back in your own bed. There's really not room for two."

"Whatever you say," Porthos replied, grinning in the darkness.

The next morning, as promised, Porthos hauled Aramis out of bed and to the restaurant, where Aramis ate a (nearly) full meal. On his part, however, he failed to determine Marie's relationship to the captain. Porthos teased him lightly for this poor display of skills, and laughed when Aramis grumbled about having an off day.

But it wasn't an off day. In fact, it was such a reprieve after the hardships of yesterday that Porthos found himself almost drunk with relief. Still weak, Aramis slept for much of it. But when he was awake, he was in good spirits; they passed the afternoon sitting by the fire in the restaurant, not really conversing with the other guests but enjoying the bustle nevertheless. Even the weather cooperated. Sun streamed in through the windows.

The next day was a bit less charmed; outside it rained sporadically, and inside Aramis sunk into himself once again. The morning was much the same, and they ate breakfast in peace. But when the rain paused and Aramis consented to go for a walk, he changed his mind at the door and said he'd prefer to visit the horses- alone. He returned hours later, eyes and nose an angry pink.

It was a painful reminder of how close to the surface the man's grief remained; and like an infection, it needed to drain from him rather than fester under the appearance of health. Porthos tried to be supportive. He offered his humor and, that failing, he offered his arms; but Aramis slipped away and burrowed into his bed like an animal into its den.

He had fallen asleep by the time Porthos took to bed himself. But it was a fitful sleep, and throughout the night he heard Aramis wake again and again, this time with a gasp, this time with a sob. As though the nightmares were contagious, Porthos succumbed to them as well. He didn't dream of Savoy, nor of Aramis, but of vague and sinister monsters; dark alleyways, dense forests; sick stomachs and uneven cobbles; running and running and running and running and running but never escaping.

Never being found.

The next morning, their fourth in Belley, neither of them were hungry. Rather than sitting in the restaurant, they built up the fire in their own room and covered the hearth with blankets and pillows. It crackled gently as they camped out before it.

Porthos was glad to have Aramis back beside him; yesterday had not only been worrisome, but abjectly lonely as well. Today, though subdued, Aramis seemed ready once more for company. When sitting grew too tiresome, too formal, he stretched himself like a cat and then settled down with his head on Porthos' outstretched legs.

"You didn't sleep well last night," Aramis hummed.

"Neither did you."

"Do you want to tell me about it?"

"Nah."

But the room was dim and cozy and Aramis' body against his was an absurdly comforting thing. Porthos sighed. "It wasn't to do with all of this," he began at last. "The dreams, I mean. I think one day I'll see it all in them. One day my mind's gonna bring that back up- that clearing, how it looked. Counting. The men with me, strong men, goin' t' pieces.

"But I didn't dream about that. I only remember- bein' afraid. Bein' lost, maybe young. Bein' ill, with nobody there to care for me. Just needin' someone to stop and speak to me. But nobody would." Porthos shook himself. He was just beside a merry fire, and tried to remind himself that he was plenty warm. "I think I was runnin'," he added hoarsely. "Dunno if something was chasin' me or not. The fear's all I'm really sure of."

Perhaps he should have forced a smile, but Aramis wasn't looking at him anyway. "What'd you dream about?" he asked.

"Mm. Nothing quite so poetic as yours, mon ami. I hear screaming; I smell blood. I watch him leave, again and again. I always know where my dreams come from." Aramis reached out, pushed a thin branch deeper into the flames.

"When I was sixteen, I fell in love," he continued, gravely. "We conceived a child, and then we lost it and she left me. I was sixteen the first time my heart was broken. That's not half-bad, I suppose. Twenty-four now, and this can only be the third time. Again, likely better than average." He craned his neck up to look at Porthos; the flames were captured starlight against the blackness of his eyes. "You, ami, you have the kindness of a man whose heart broke before he could ever know otherwise."

That broken heart leapt up into Porthos' throat, a story demanding to be told; he held it in as long as he could stand. "Lost my mother very young," he grunted at last. "Never had a father." There was more, there was worlds more, but that was enough for the story to settle back down inside him, enough for Aramis to clasp a hand around his ankle, stroking it with his thumb.

For a while, Porthos let himself feel nothing but Aramis' warmth against his legs, the fire's warmth against his face. But eventually, the trance fell away. "I think we'd better go eat something before we spend the whole day here," he said, gently moving Aramis off himself so that he could stand. Aramis lifted his hands up to be hauled to his feet.

And maybe Porthos pulled him a little too close, maybe he kept him for a minute in a half-embrace- but if he did, Aramis didn't seem to mind.

Notes:

Thanks, as always, for reading!

I did my best to research what Aramis would be going through after five or six days of not eating (but drinking water). By all accounts, he would not be bedridden but would definitely be weak. His hunger pains would have just begun to dissipate, making it easier to continue not eating. After first eating, there would be nausea, but for a "short" fast like this the consensus is that this would not continue. (I have also learned that bread would be a terrible thing to break such a fast with, but I doubt our boys would have known this. Poor Aramis. He's not gonna poop for a while.) I have never done this personally, so if any of this is incorrect, feel free to speak up!

French

(mon) ami = (my) friend