A/N: Just a tiny bit to go after this. Thank you all so incredibly much for reading and especially all you guys who have written such lovely reviews. You guys are the best ever.
Enjoy!
"I'm not working for Maveth," Fitz said as calmly as he could manage.
Jemma backed further away from him, her eyes darting around, looking for an escape.
"Jemma, please, let me explain," Fitz tried. "That was me in the field, but that's because Maveth cursed me, not because I'm working for him."
Jemma shook her head slowly. "Grant and Will told me you were one of Maveth's men. Grant fought some of the others, and Will ran out carrying Bobbi, and when I asked who you were they said you were working for Maveth and we had to leave right away."
"Because they're working for him, Jemma," Fitz explained, finally understanding why his parents and the cavalry had turned home so quickly and left him lying alone in the field. "You know you never trusted Grant."
Jemma narrowed her eyes. "Who said that?"
"Bobbi told me," Fitz lied quickly before pressing on, "but there's a reason you didn't trust him; he's evil Jemma. He's working for Maveth. And Will is too."
Jemma stopped searching for a way to get out of the basement and stared at Fitz, her eyes flashing, angry and defensive. "Will's my fiancé."
Jemma's support of Will cut Fitz like a dagger, but he kept trying. "But do you trust him, Jemma, I mean really trust him?"
"Of course I do," Jemma said reflexively, but almost as soon as the words were out of her mouth she stopped and turned away, apparently not as confident in her assertion as she had thought she was.
Fitz took a cautious half step toward her. "Jemma, please believe me," he pleaded, his voice quieter now. "I know you hate me, but I just want you safe."
"I don't hate you," Jemma said instantly, looking back up at him, but then her eyes grew cloudy. "Or… I don't know…"
It was the curse. It was always the curse. It had taken his Jemma away from him. Even if he could warn her away from Will, she still wasn't the woman who loved him; she was barely a woman who didn't hate him.
"I know, Jemma," Fitz said softly, tears welling up in his eyes. "You feel like you should hate me, and this is just more evidence that you should, but please, if you care even the tiniest amount for me, if you even just appreciate the work we've done together these past two months; just be careful, Jemma. Be safe. That's all I want. That's all I've ever wanted." He left three more words unspoken. He hadn't said them in so long, but he would get nothing from saying them now.
So Fitz turned and left the woman he loved more than anything in the world. He couldn't stay here if Jemma thought he was trying to poison her against Will, but if the men were coming back, Will and Grant would be with them and the entire palace would be in danger. The King could be killed at any moment, and Fitz had no idea how to help him. The only way to kill Maveth was to trap him back inside the monolith, but Fitz still had no idea where it could be. All he could do was try to find it.
Fitz hurried up the stairs and through the corridors and outside through the front entry. The early spring air was perfectly still, cool but not unpleasant, and the sky was dark, though the moonlight was bright enough that it could have been early evening.
No longer worrying about drawing too much suspicion, Fitz ran toward the stables and sheds that stood past the front of the palace. Fitz knew from childhood exploration that there were hidden closets and rooms behind the buildings that could easily house the monolith. He started tearing open doors, finding only empty spaces and piles of surplus supplies, but then a yell stopped him.
Suddenly the air was thick with the approaching sounds of hoof beats, swords clashing, the yells of men: a battle. The cavalry.
Fitz crept out from behind the stables and found himself faced with a group of the cavalry on horseback retreating rapidly toward the palace with cloaked and masked men in pursuit.
"DON'T LET HIM INTO THE COURTYARD!" Fitz heard his father yell to his men. Torchlight illuminated their faces as the moon passed behind a cloud, shrouding the land in darkness.
"HE'S TOO STRONG, YOUR MAJESTY!" Mack's voice boomed over the battle. "WE CAN'T HOLD HIM!"
Cruel, twisted laughter echoed through the air as clearly as if the rest of the world had gone silent. "You can't run from me, Coulson." The wind picked up to a deafening roar as Maveth directed his attention just outside the courtyard. With screams and the sound of clinking metal and clashing wood Fitz watched as the entirety of the blacksmith's forge was sucked up into Maveth's swirling vortex.
Fitz had heard of Maveth taking entire buildings, but he had never seen it for himself. All Fitz could do was stare, frozen, as the forge disappeared from the earth. Fitz had spent afternoons there, picking through old, bent metal as the swordsmith glared at him from the other side of the structure. But in one moment it was gone.
Fitz shuddered as the wind died down and the sounds of the battle again echoed through the night air. Maveth's men had broken through the courtyard in front of Maveth. There were fewer of Maveth's men than there were the King's, but Fitz could see that the group of cavalrymen in the courtyard were only a very small number of the force that the King had. Either the rest of them had been dispersed by Maveth or… Fitz didn't want to think about that. Fitz couldn't make out faces in the pandemonium, but he hoped that Lance and Lincoln had made it too or at least that they were somewhere safe; even from Fitz's position far on the outskirts of the fighting, he could tell that the cavalry was struggling. Maveth was helping his men push the King and the others closer and closer to the palace, and the assistance of the sorcerer was clearly taking its toll on the cavalrymen.
The last time Fitz had seen Maveth had been on a night much like this when Fitz had brought the sorcerer back, along with a whole group of henchmen. Will might have even been one of the men that stepped out of the monolith in the middle of the forest.
Fitz took a deep breath, steeling himself for the task ahead. Fitz had let this more powerful Maveth into the kingdom, so it was Fitz's responsibility to destroy him. Maveth had cursed Fitz because Fitz was supposed to, someday, cause Maveth's downfall. Perhaps Fitz still could be the threat that Maveth had so feared, even without his family or his friends… or his Jemma.
"Where's that stupid monolith?" Fitz muttered under his breath. Fitz could try to kill Maveth all he wanted by himself, but without the monolith, he wouldn't be able to do anything.
But then, through the noise, Fitz's attention was caught by a creaking in front of the palace, close to the rampart on the far side of the entryway. By the torchlight he could see a group of four armored guards pulling a cart that carried a tall object shrouded by a sheet of canvas: the monolith. It had to be.
"What the-" Fitz stopped as he noticed the guards pulling the cart were shorter than the fighting cavalrymen. The Cavalry. Of course! May and the others knew all about the monolith and how to kill Maveth since they had all found the scroll together. And they had Bobbi cursed inside the palace, so of course they would be more prepared to take down the evil sorcerer than anyone else.
Fitz knew what he had to do.
He looked around for a moment and then raced into the action, making a beeline for one of the archers on the edge of the battle who had fallen off his horse.
"GIVE ME YOUR ARROWS!" Fitz shouted at the man through the noise.
"WHAT?" The archer looked back at Fitz as though he was insane.
Fitz decided to ignore proper decorum, and he grabbed the man's bow and a fistful of arrows from the archer's quiver before reaching for the man's waterproof pouch that Fitz and Jemma had designed for the archers so long ago to hold their solution that caused loss of consciousness. The solution was their best hope for defeating Maveth; really it was their only hope.
"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" the archer yelled, yanking his bag away from Fitz.
Fitz clenched his fists. He really didn't have time for this. "I NEED THAT TO DEFEAT MAVETH. DO YOU WANT TO LIVE OR NOT?"
The archer stared at him for a moment, but something in Fitz's eyes must have made the archer believe him because a moment later the other man handed Fitz his pouch and his now almost empty quiver.
Fitz nodded his thanks and ran toward the palace, the archer following for a moment before ducking behind some bushes, clearly afraid of being in the battle without his horse or any weaponry.
Fitz climbed the stairs toward the palace entrance and almost collided with Daisy who was leading Dame Isobel, Lady Mackenzie, Bobbi, and Jemma.
"Fitz, what's going on?" Daisy demanded, her words fearful.
Fitz shook his head and kept moving passed her, headed for the staircase that led up to the ramparts. From there he would be perhaps even higher than Maveth and could possibly have a clear shot at the sorcerer.
"FITZ!"
Fitz stopped for the briefest moment to turn back around.
It was Jemma. Of course.
Fitz kept moving despite Jemma's footsteps following him up the staircase.
"What are you doing, Fitz?" she called after him.
Fitz didn't answer as he reached the top and looked over the wall. He could see the whole battle down below him. Of course it wasn't really big enough to be a battle, by numbers alone it was little more than a skirmish, but the addition of an evil sorcerer who could literally pull buildings off the ground made it seem much larger than it was. Fitz could see his father trying to lead his cavalry right in the middle of the courtyard. Mack was fighting a few cloaked and masked men on the far side of the courtyard, Lance was nearby, and Lincoln was carrying a torch, clearly trying to stay out of trouble and protect a few younger squires off to the left of Mack and Lance.
Fitz scanned the battle for Will and Grant and quickly spotted the shiny, dark hair of the younger king behind a mask fighting for Maveth in the torchlight. If Grant was there, it was more than likely that Will was there too.
"What's going on, Fitz?" Jemma demanded as she reached him, leaning over the rail beside him, her eyes wide at the sight of the fight below them.
"I'm stopping Maveth," he said tonelessly, his eyes not leaving the battlefield below them. "And your fiancé is doing just the opposite." Without another word, he pointed down to the battle below them where Sir John had just cut the mask off of one of Maveth's men. It was Will.
"WILL?" Jemma screamed down at her fiancé, her surprise echoing the surprise of her father, the older man staring, frozen, at the man who was supposed to be his future son-in-law.
"JEMMA, MY LOVE!" Will called up to her, riding away from Sir John and the rest of the fighting. "MAVETH CAN GIVE US ANYTHING WE WANT! WE'LL TAKE THE THRONE, AND I'LL BE ONE OF THE MOST POWERFUL RULERS IN THE LAND WITH YOU AT MY SIDE! I LOVE YOU, JEMMA. COME BE WITH ME!"
"Jemma. Please." Fitz's words were quiet and pleading as he pulled out an arrow from the quiver and dipped it in their solution. Jemma didn't have to be with him, but she certainly couldn't be with Will, regardless of whether or not the other man loved her.
Jemma stared at Fitz and then looked down at Will before turning back to Fitz once more, her face barely visible in the darkness.
She took one step towards him. "Fitz?"
The moon peeked out from behind a cloud shining a pale light down onto the rampart and across the courtyard.
Jemma stepped toward him, her eyes like nothing Fitz had seen in a long time. Her mouth opened slightly as a smile spread across her face. "Bow and arrow, please," she said, her words confident but restrained as she held out her hand.
Fitz stared at her, bewildered. "What?"
"I'm a better shot than you, remember?" Jemma said, her eyes glinting in the moonlight.
Fitz remembered days of archery practice in the fields behind the palace. He remembered being distracted by Jemma's brilliant smile as he fell more and more in love with her. Of course he remembered everything… But Jemma… Jemma had forgotten…
"Jemma?" Fitz said breathlessly, tears welling up in his eyes as he held out the bow and arrows to the love of his life.
Jemma took them from him, squeezing his hand lightly as she did so. "Yeah," she said, her voice as shaky as Fitz's, "it's me."
"WHAT?"
A voice boomed across the sky, silencing the fighting down below them, men dismounting and the forces separating from each other in the face of the wrath of the evil sorcerer.
"YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO HATE HIM?" Maveth screeched. "YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO FORGET HIM AND DESPISE HIM UNTIL THE PAIN ATE HIM ALIVE! HOW DARE YOU DEFY MY CURSE? HOW DARE YOU DEFY ME?"
Maveth flew toward them, the air below him swirling faster and faster in a vortex picking up rocks and dirt from the ground. "YOU WILL DIE NOW JEMMA SIMMONS, AND AFTER YOU WATCH HER DIE, I WILL KILL YOU TOO, PRINCE LEOPOLD. NO ONE MAY DEFY MY CURSES!"
"A curse is no match for true love, Maveth!" Fitz shouted over the wind, using the last words Dame Isobel had spoken to him before he, Jemma, and Bobbi had departed to track down information on Maveth and the monolith.
He saw Jemma grin beside him as she quickly pulled back the bow and fired the solution-soaked arrow into the night air.
At that very moment, the moon emerged fully from behind the cloud, shining down directly onto the courtyard below, and specifically onto the tall, dark monolith that the Cavalry had unloaded onto the ground and uncovered just below where Maveth now hovered.
Jemma's arrow entered just beneath Maveth's hood, right where a face should have been, if Maveth had had a face.
Almost instantly the wind died down, and the swirling stopped, and Maveth's now unconscious body fell through the air just as the monolith liquefied, swallowing Maveth.
As soon as the sorcerer's body fell back through the liquefied rock, Maveth's men, undoubtedly the ones who had been pulled through to the forest originally, began to be pulled after their leader.
Will looked up at Jemma pleadingly, but she just stared down at him, her expression harsh as she pulled off her engagement ring and threw it into the monolith as Will was sucked through the portal himself.
There was a shout as someone ran down the palace steps into the small cluster of Maveth's remaining men.
Fitz quickly realized it was Daisy who had grabbed her brother and ripped off his mask.
"HOW COULD YOU, GRANT?" she screamed. "YOU WERE MY BROTHER! THEY'RE OUR FRIENDS! What would our parents say if they saw you now?" Daisy stared at Grant as though she had never seen him before.
Grant yanked his wrist away from his sister. "YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND!" he yelled back at Daisy. "Our parents were fools! They wanted peace when peace would make them give up so much! Maveth promised me everything; all I had to do was hand over Fitz. I could have ruled the world! I would have ruled the world!" Grant tried to get around Daisy, but she blocked his path. "Get away from me!" He slapped his sister across the face and pushed her to the ground.
"You really shouldn't have done that." The King's words were even, but the threat behind them was obvious. He twisted Grant's arm back and pulled him toward the liquefied stone. "You don't deserve a kingdom." And, with that, he pushed Grant into the portal just as the monolith solidified once more.
The courtyard sat in silence for a moment as though the entire world was adjusting to what had happened. Fitz saw matching looks of confusion on everyone's faces as they looked around. It was as if they had all just remembered something long forgotten.
The King was the first one to turn his eyes toward the ramparts. "MY SON! LEO! HOW COULD I FORGET MY SON?"
"FITZ!" Shouts from his friends down in the courtyard below blended with the cheers from the other cavalrymen he barely knew.
The small handful of Maveth's men that were left tried to sneak into the shadows, but they were quickly caught by the King's men.
May and the other members of the Cavalry covertly covered the monolith and pushed it back onto their cart. The scroll they had found said that as soon as Maveth was back through the portal it wouldn't open again, but Fitz could see why they wouldn't want to take any chances.
Satisfied that everything was okay, Fitz finally turned his attention back to the woman standing next to him.
"You remembered," he said quietly, ignoring the yells from down below them. "You remembered me before you killed Maveth." He stared at Jemma, almost in awe of her, not quite allowing himself to believe that this was real.
Jemma shook her head slowly in disbelief before she launched herself at him, throwing her arms around his neck and pressing her face into his shoulder. "Fitz," she said, her breathing ragged. "Oh my God, Fitz."
"Jemma," Fitz breathed, pressing a kiss into her hair. She was solid in his arms. He could feel her heartbeat against his chest. She was real. This was real.
Jemma moved her head back, tears in her eyes, a brilliant smile across her face, and she finally leaned in and pressed her lips to his.
The first time Fitz had kissed Jemma, they had only had one blissful, perfect moment before his life fell apart, but this time there was nothing to stop them: no curse, no Maveth, just him and Jemma, finally together. Fitz let himself get lost in the feeling of Jemma's lips working against his as he pulled her closer to him, his fingers trailing through her hair as hers worked through his slightly-too-long curls.
"We broke the curse, Jemma," Fitz said as they broke apart, his words delivered with almost a reverence as he rested his forehead against Jemma's. "We broke the curse."
Jemma smiled at him, but it didn't quite reach her eyes. "I'm sorry for forgetting about you," she said softly. "And I was so mean to you. Oh, I'm so sorry, Fitz."
"Jemma," Fitz said, his words filled with adoration as he pressed a quick kiss to her lips, "love, you were cursed just as much as I was, and by all rights you shouldn't have even remembered me at all, but you did. You broke the curse without even killing Maveth." Fitz cradled her face in his hands. "I love you so much, Jemma, and I'm just so grateful to have you back."
Jemma wrapped her arms tightly around his neck, sniffling into his shoulder. "I love you, Fitz. I love you more than anything in the world. And I promise I will never forget you ever again."
Fitz laughed as he lifted her head and wiped away her tears, brushing his hand along her cheek as she leaned into his touch.
Jemma's smile was wider than he had ever seen as they stood there in the moonlight, and Fitz knew that he had certainly never been happier than he was at this moment.
He leaned in to kiss her again, savoring the fact that he actually could kiss Jemma now without worrying that she was going to forget him.
"You know," he said leisurely when they broke apart, "I do really enjoy being able to kiss you whenever I like. I wouldn't mind doing this for the rest of our lives."
Jemma's smile grew even wider as she pressed a quick kiss to Fitz's lips. "I'm rather inclined to agree with you."
"Then marry me, Jemma," Fitz said before he even realized what he was saying. "I mean, will you-" Fitz stopped. This was such a major decision, and he and Jemma had only really been together for a few weeks before everyone had forgotten him, but this was Jemma; Fitz had never been so sure of anything in his entire life. "Jemma, will you marry me?"
Jemma's mouth fell open at Fitz's words, but even in the dim light Fitz could see the utter joy in her eyes. "Yes, Fitz. Of course, yes." She jumped into his arms, and Fitz spun her around, the moon and stars shining down on them as cheers came from the staircase.
The pair stopped spinning and turned in time to be quickly engulfed by a large group of people – Mack and Lady Mackenzie grinning madly at their niece and soon to be nephew-in-law, Lance and Bobbi offering congratulations on the engagement and (from Lance) casual comments that he and Bobbi had trusted Fitz first after everyone had forgotten him so they should get credit for that, Daisy jumping around excitedly talking about a double wedding as Lincoln watched her adoringly, Dame Isobel smiling knowingly at them since she had been right about true love and Maveth all along, and there, at the back of the group, the King supporting the Queen who looked a little pale (which could have just been the moonlight) but otherwise seemed to be entirely healthy and back to normal.
Fitz pressed a kiss to Jemma's temple as he hugged her to his side, a wide smile spreading across his face.
"Love you," Jemma said into his ear, her voice barely a whisper, just before his friends and family pulled Fitz away from her to clap him on the back and welcome him back to their world.
And as he hugged his parents, watching his fiancée's eyes shining brilliantly from over his mother's shoulder, Fitz couldn't help but think that everything was, somehow, finally, perfect.
A/N: Epilogue will be up by this weekend! Thanks for reading! Reviews are so so appreciated!