Thank you to those that reviewed Chapter Two: X4auth0r, Fleuramis, pallysdeeks, Arlothia, Deana, ImaginaryArtist17, twaxer, Alison Kirkham, Jasperslittlesister, Oldenuff2knowbetter, MashiMoshi, UKGuest, yevguine, and IrethOfMirkwood
Chapter Three: I Could Never Take the World Alone
Brotherhood is the very price and condition of man's survival.
Carlos P. Romulo
March 28, 1625
Musketeer Encampment, Savoy
It was instinct that woke Aramis. Pure, battle-bred, soldier's instinct. The weariness of his limbs told him he'd only been sleeping two, perhaps three, hours.
He laid absolutely still, listening intently for whatever had pulled him from his rest. There was nothing, no sound. Not even the rustle of the wind.
"Marsac," he called lowly.
As his friend stirred on the other side of the tent pole, Aramis threw aside his blankets, pulling his main gauche from its place hidden beneath his bedroll and reaching for his pistol. It was likely nothing. It wouldn't be the first time a dream he did not remember had woken him. Having been a soldier since he was 16, his instincts were sometimes over-tuned.
But still, the skin across the back of his neck was prickling, warning him of unseen danger.
He used his dagger to nudge aside the flap to his tent and was met with a lunging blade.
"ATTACK!" he shouted as loud as he could manage, knocking away the blade with the barrel of his pistol. Even as the cry left his lips, an answering scream ripped through the camp. But it was not a scream of battle as his had been. It was of pain.
Marsac was scrambling to his feet and reaching for his sword as the attacker lurched into their tent. Aramis ducked the swinging blade and leapt forward, neatly driving his main gauche into the man's throat.
That hadn't been so hard.
Though he had a feeling the attacker hadn't expected him to be ready with defense. He thanked God above that he always slept in his breeches and boots when making camp. One never knew when a hasty exit might be necessary, and doing battle in one's underclothes was never the most favorable circumstance…as he unfortunately knew from experience.
He had his weapons belt strapped on in seconds and looked across the small tent to see Marsac similarly prepared. They hastily helped each other buckle on their pauldrons and then met gazes.
Marsac gave him a firm nod, grip tightening on his sword hilt.
Aramis slid his dagger into its sheath and drew his sword. With it in one hand and a pistol in the other, he swept the tent flap aside and he and Marsac stepped out into the night together to survey the camp.
There was chaos.
Men, wearing masks to hide their faces, tore through the trees around them. Those of his men who had heard his cry of warning were now fighting valiantly, but he could see half their number lying unmoving on their bedrolls.
Ten, or perhaps less, of them remained against unknown numbers.
He didn't think. He didn't hesitate. He just let his instincts guide him.
Aramis raised his pistol, firing at the man nearest him, not waiting to watch him fall before dropping the pistol and reaching for its match clipped at his back. He fired it as well and tossed it aside, reaching for his main gauche once again.
He and Marsac moved as one. They'd served together for four years now, had fought side by side in numerous skirmishes and battles. They knew each other's moves and rhythms and could act in nearly perfect synchronization.
This may be their day to die, but they would die as Musketeers. They would die fighting with and for their brothers. Aramis knew, without doubt or hesitation, that he would die right here in this frozen forest if it meant any one of his brothers had a chance to live.
It was what their motto stood for, was it not?
All for one, one for all.
He just had to give them their best chance. That meant finding the leader. It was the most fundamental battle strategy, taught to him on his first days in the infantry. If you felled the leader, the followers will falter.
He searched the area quickly with his sharp gaze. It didn't take him long to find the man he sought. He was hard to miss.
As the only man still on horseback, fighting from a position of relative safety, he was prancing through the battle, slashing out at any Musketeer in striking distance of his sword. His position on a horse gave him an advantage that Aramis was looking forward to removing.
"Marsac," he called over his shoulder to his friend. "I'm taking the leader!"
He didn't expect Marsac to follow him, but he needed his brother to know Aramis was no longer at his back. There was an acknowledging shout and then he was moving.
He charged towards the horse and rider, expertly parrying away flying blades as he stalked towards his prey. The masked man saw him a moment too late. He had only the time to snarl a curse before Aramis was neatly slicing through the billet of the saddle and the large man was sent tumbling to the ground.
The horse pranced backwards nervously, but Aramis ignored the animal in favor of the raging enemy scrambling up from the snow to face him.
Their battle was as brutal and bloody as it was swift.
They traded vicious blows, both drawing blood with surface wounds.
The tip of the other man's sword caught him low on his left side, a glancing hit that ripped into the muscle of his abdomen but did not go deep. He returned the blow with a sweeping strike to the leader's chest. It was shallow, would likely not even scar, but it drove the man back.
They both drew in ragged breaths and circled each other.
Then they moved again, a blur of lunging blades and slashing daggers.
Aramis lost his main gauche to an expertly executed attack that he only barely managed to defend.
When he managed to push his own offense again, Aramis was able to get in a stinging blow to the man's face with the handguard of his rapier.
But then Aramis went to one knee with a shout of pain when the enemy's dagger sunk into his thigh. With a growl of anger, Aramis swept his blade up, driving the man back a step. He recklessly pulled the dagger free of his leg and flipped the blade into his hand, throwing it immediately to his left. He heard a shout of pain and then a gurgle as it felled the man who had been coming up to flank him.
He forced himself to ignore the fresh pain, breathing it away and letting adrenaline take over. It was dangerous, he knew, to ignore such an injury, but there was little he could do for it now and it would only slow him down to acknowledge it.
The screams of his men dying around him drove him on and he let go of his restraint, fighting with a wild fury.
He felt the rush of impending victory when his fisted backhand sent his enemy spinning to the ground and Aramis' blade laid the man's back open, hip to shoulder. The masked attacker howled in pain, crumbling under the injury. Aramis stalked forward, forcing his wounded leg to hold his weight. He raised his sword to deliver the killing blow.
Another blade crossed his as he brought it down, a man appearing from his right. He was forced back when the new opponent swung his sword up, bringing Aramis' up with it. He stumbled, his wounded leg faltering as his boot caught on a body sprawled out behind him. He found his footing in time to swing his blade in a wide arc, blocking three different attacks from three different men, the two other men coming out of nowhere.
A shout to his left and the crack of gunfire came a moment before one of his opponents fell.
A second fell to Aramis' blade, but before he could face the third, something hard struck the back of his head. He stumbled, feeling hot blood rush down his neck as the world swam around him. He turned drunkenly to face the threat and was forced to lurch back to avoid a swinging blade. His boot caught the same body as before and this time his footing was nowhere to be found. He hit the cold ground hard, sword jarring from his grip. He heard the faint sound of hooves in the snow and twisted, narrowly avoiding getting trampled. Although he saved his ribs, the sharp hoof of the frantic horse clipped him hard across the side of the head.
He thought he heard someone shout his name even as darkness descended.
Marsac watched Aramis be set upon by three of the attackers. He shouted in fury and raised his freshly loaded pistol, firing into the back of the one nearest him. Aramis swiftly dispatched a second, but Marsac's attention was stolen before he saw the fate of the third when a blade came swinging towards him.
He expertly defended against his newest attacker and drove his sword through the man's heart. Then he turned, eyes searching for his friend.
He watched Aramis stumble, sprawling to the ground. He saw a large man wielding a pistol like a club in one hand with a sword in his other advance towards his friend. Through horrified eyes, he witnessed a horse prance forward in fear. He stared as Aramis tried to twist out of harm's way.
"ARAMIS!" he shouted as the horse's hoof clipped sharply against his friend's head. Then Aramis went still.
Marsac was too far away. He'd never get to him in time if the man decided to finish him off. Marsac fought towards his downed brother anyway. But to his shock, when a sharp nudge with his boot got no response from Aramis, the large attacker moved away, attacking another Musketeer with a shout of fury.
Marsac scurried forward, sheathing his sword and going low. He prayed that the large man's lack of interest did not mean his friend was already dead. He made it to Aramis' side without incident, nearly gagging at the jagged gash on his friend's head, at the blood staining the snow beneath him. With an anguished cry he ripped at his own shirt, using it as a bandage to slow the loss of blood from the wound. That done as well as it could be for the moment, he glanced up. The battle raged around them, but for this brief moment in time no one noticed them. Without hesitating further, he pulled Aramis up, hooking the man's torso over his shoulder and lurched up to standing.
Then, he ran.
It was by some divine mercy that not one soul pursued them.
He'd only just gotten them far enough away for the trees to hide them when a stray root tripped him, sending both he and his precious cargo sprawling to the ground. Marsac scrambled over the cold ground to pull Aramis to him once again. Through it all, his friend did not stir or make a sound.
Pushing aside the worry and fear festering in his gut, Marsac tried to lift Aramis again, but his muscles were shaking with fatigue and it was all he could do to draw Aramis' arm over his shoulder and drag him further away from the fray.
Some distance deeper in the trees, his endurance failed him and he did his best to ease Aramis down against a tree without dropping him completely. Then, with the sound of clashing steel and shouts in the near distance, the reality of what was happening crashed down on him.
He pressed his forehead to Aramis' shoulder, hugging his friend closely to him, and let the fear take hold. They would die here, alone in the snow, struck down by men with no faces. Emotion swelled up in his chest, threatening to choke him. Marsac sat back and looked up at the night sky as hot tears welled in his eyes.
He would die here.
Aramis stirred weakly in his arms, sending energy through Marsac's weary limbs like a jolt of fire. He shifted, resting Aramis more carefully against the tree and looked him over, running a practiced eye over his wounds.
The head wound was worrisome; the bleeding thigh nearly equally so. Then there was the matter of the blood staining his shirt low on his left side.
If he didn't act quickly, Aramis would not survive.
Marsac had been a soldier for many years – since he was eighteen years old. He'd been a Musketeer since he was 21. He had seen many men die from wounds received in battle, even wounds less serious than these.
Infection. That was the greatest worry, as well as loss of blood. Each could kill just as surely as the other.
Marsac checked that Aramis was still soundly unconscious and then started moving through the trees, circling the battle towards where he knew Alain had been sleeping. Alain was the only of them with any formal medical training. He could always be counted on to have bandages and cleansing spirits in his saddle bags.
The forest made moving easy as the natural cover of the trees hid him from sight.
He spotted Alain's saddle bags – Alain himself sprawled next to them, dead – and scurried forward, keeping low. He could barely let himself glance at Alain as he snatched up his saddle bag. He swung it over his shoulder and turned away, only to flatten himself against the ground when a sword cut through the air over his head.
Scrambling back, Marsac fumbled for his own blade, freeing it from its scabbard in time to deflect the next attack. He fought ferociously, one hand on his sword and the other gripping the saddle bag as if his life depended on it. But his didn't. Aramis' did.
Finally, he broke through the man's defenses, driving his rapier up through the attacker's chest. Frantic to get back to Aramis before anyone else tried to stop him, Marsac abandoned his blade in the dead man's ribs and ran back into the cover of the trees, saddle bag clutched to his chest.
He barely remembered the journey back to Aramis' side. The long minutes it took were counted only in the stumbled steps through the trees and the harsh breaths bursting from his heaving chest.
When he finally saw familiar brown boots sprawled against the forest floor, Marsac put on an extra burst of speed. He nearly collapsed at Aramis' side, tearing into the saddle bag even as his friend started to stubbornly stir next to him.
"No, no, no…just stay unconscious," Marsac pleaded quietly as he fumbled with the flask of spirits and used his dagger to cut away the fabric covering the wound on Aramis' leg.
As if just to spite him, dazedly unfocused pain-filled brown eyes were suddenly fluttering open.
"M…Mars'c…" Aramis mumbled in confusion.
"Quiet, mon ami," Marsac whispered. "I must clean your wounds and you cannot make a sound."
Marsac was all too aware of the battle still waging far too near for comfort.
Aramis' brow furrowed in confusion and his eyes rolled away, skirting the area around them in a fashion that suggested he was not really seeing anything. It was obvious Marsac's words had not been comprehended.
"I'm sorry," he apologized quietly before clamping a hand over Aramis' mouth and upending the flask over the leg wound.
Aramis' scream was muffled by his hand, but still Marsac cast a panicked look back towards the direction of the battle.
"Shhhh," he hissed, clamping down harder. "Shhhh, I'm sorry, but you must be quiet," he pleaded.
Satisfied the wound was as clean as he could make it, Marsac slowly removed his hand.
"Dios mio…me duele…" (My God…it hurts…)
"I know," Marsac comforted. Having been friends with Aramis for so many years, Marsac had learned quite a bit of Spanish. He wasn't sure where Aramis had picked up the language or why he'd bothered to learn it to fluency. But he did know that in times of distress – or in this case debilitating injury – Aramis tended to blend languages, switching back and forth between Spanish and French without warning. It could be confusing if you didn't know to expect it. Marsac, though, was well prepared.
"My head…me duele…" Aramis' fingers fumbled up to touch the hastily applied bandage against his temple. "Me Duele…"
"I know," Marsac repeated. "Please, Aramis, you must be quiet."
He quickly doused the shallow wound on his side with the spirits, brandy by the scent. He had to slap a hand over Aramis' mouth when a scream immediately erupted once again. The head wound, it seemed, had lowered Aramis' usual stoic defenses. He'd known his friend to endure cleaning and stitching of a wound worse than this with nothing but a clenched jaw and muttered curses.
He sent up a silent prayer of thanks when Aramis' eyes suddenly rolled back and he went limp. Though unconsciousness was not a state he liked to see his friend in, right now it was a blessing.
It only took him minutes to finish cleaning and bandaging the wounds. It took even less time to clean the gash on his head and wrap a fresh bandage around it. But still it bled, soaking through the new bandage and trailing down the side of Aramis' face.
He'd done all he could for now. He didn't trust his hands to try and stitch the wound and he didn't have the time. There were still sounds of fighting just out of sight.
Marsac drew in a breath and prepared to rejoin the battle.
He had made it just within sight of the fighting when a scream of pain, abruptly silenced, had him freezing on the spot.
His eyes rose to the fading battle and he watched as the masked attackers swept through the camp, falling upon the remaining Musketeers.
Only four remained.
How were there were so few of his brothers left?
He watched Eric fall with a cry of pain. Then Michel be overwhelmed by sheer numbers.
They were all going to die.
He wanted to move. He screamed at himself to defend those brothers who remained until his last breath; to defend Aramis, wounded and alone behind him. It was his duty as a soldier and a Musketeer.
But he found no muscle in his body willing to obey his command
Instead, he stumbled back, retreating to where he'd left Aramis. He slid down to sit next to his friend, pressing his forehead to Aramis' shoulder and concealing himself from sight. One thought repeated like a mantra in his head.
I don't want to die.
He squeezed his eyes closed and laid there, trembling. He listened around his own shaking breaths, to the screams of his brothers dying without him. He remained, silent as a ghost until long after the last sounds of fighting had faded. He stayed, unmoving, until the sound of their attackers' retreat had long since given way to the groans and cries of the dying.
Still, even when he was certain that the danger had fully passed, Marsac did not rise. It wasn't until the darkness gave way to dawn that he found it in him to move. As he rose, his limbs felt as if they were no longer attached to his body. They felt foreign and cumbersome. It took stubborn will to force them to obey his command.
He wandered away from Aramis, who had not stirred in hours, towards the field of battle. His feet stumbled beneath him as he stepped through the blood stained snow. His boots caught on sprawled limbs and he barely kept his feet.
He turned slowly in a circle, the sounds of men dying around him filling his mind until it was all he could hear. The groans, the cries, the gasps.
There was nothing else.
His legs collapsed beneath him, leaving him on his rear on the cold ground.
He could not move.
He wasn't sure how long he sat there, a living man amongst the dead, before movement in the trees drew his attention.
He watched, through clouded eyes as Aramis stumbled towards him.
He saw his friend's mouth move, forming his name, but the call was too quiet to reach him. Or perhaps the sounds of death still ringing in his head were too loud.
Aramis staggered forward, leg nearly giving way beneath him time and again, but still he stubbornly continued on, using trees to support his progress.
Aramis' mouth moved again, his name once more on his friend's lips.
But Marsac could not hear him.
He tore his gaze from Aramis' and looked around him.
The ground was littered with the dead.
And he was not among them.
My God, what have I become?
Had he really hidden in the trees like a coward and waited for the danger to pass? Had he betrayed his brothers to death?
Their motto echoed mockingly through his mind.
All for one, one for all.
He had betrayed all he had claimed to stand for.
He was a coward.
He was weak.
He did not deserve the friendship and brotherhood of the king's elite.
He was not worthy of the pauldron resting on his shoulder.
He was no Musketeer.
Not anymore. Perhaps had never been. No true Musketeer would have cowered in the shadows and let his brothers die.
He met Aramis' disoriented gaze. He saw the pain and the confusion swirling in the dark depths of his eyes.
All at once, the world rushed back into focus and Aramis' shaking voice reached his ears.
"Mars'c…what h'pp'ned?" Aramis slurred, swaying precariously and sinking to one knee as he braced himself against a tree. "M's'c?"
Aramis' brow creased in pain, his right hand reaching to touch his head.
"¿Que p'só?" (What happened?) he mumbled, clutching at the tree as his body swayed again.
"I failed you," Marsac answered blankly. He knew he should move to help his friend, his last living brother in the forest. But he was numb, his limbs no longer obeying his commands. "I failed them."
Aramis blinked, brow drawn together in confusion, and tried to straighten. The effort cost him and he paled, doubling over and retching on the ground.
Marsac watched him, but made no move to help. He couldn't. What use would he be anyway?
"I failed them," he repeated.
Aramis drew himself back up on shaking arms, clinging to the tree next to him as he fought his way back to his feet.
"¿C...cómo?" (H...how?) Aramis asked, limping forward again, only to gasp and clutch at his head, reaching back blindly for the support of the tree he'd just left.
Marsac's hand twitched as if to reach out for him, but that was all. Why could he not move? Why could he not muster the will to help his brother?
We're going to die here. The poisonous thought whispered through his mind.
"Mars'c?" Aramis forced his eyes open and looked at him again, eyes pleading, questioning.
"I'm not fit to be a Musketeer," Marsac told him vacantly, feeling none of the emotion that should be tied to such a confession. He felt nothing, perhaps never would again. "I abandoned my brothers to die. I failed them."
Aramis stared at him, brown eyes narrowed in pain and confusion.
For a long moment Marsac just stared back.
Then, rising up from some buried part of his soul, his limbs found the strength to move. He knew now what he had to do. The path became so painfully clear.
With hands steadier than they'd been in hours, he reached up and pulled at his pauldron, ripping it from his shoulder and letting it fall, abandoned, to the forest floor.
"Marsac?" Aramis stated again, voice the strongest it had been since he'd appeared through the trees.
Marsac met his friend, his brother's, gaze and tried to convey everything he could not say.
I failed.
I'm not worthy.
I'm a coward.
I'm sorry.
Something of the unspoken confession must have translated through the space between them because Aramis' bewildered gaze sparked with a brief moment of clarity.
"Mars'c…" He was slurring again. "Don't…"
The plea, Marsac thought, should inspire something in him. It should make him feel something. But instead, he felt nothing at all.
It was easier than it should have been to turn his back on Aramis.
His steps were steadier than they should have been as he walked away.
"Marsac?" There was clarity ringing in Aramis' voice again, and a healthy dose of fear and panic.
The memory of the battle, the battle he had not fought, rose once again in his mind, overtaking everything else as he walked away.
If Aramis called out for him again, he did not hear it.
"Marsac?" Aramis questioned, so terribly confused as his friend turned and walked away.
His mind was a jumbled mess, nothing but disjointed thoughts and echoing sounds. But through all the confusion and the ever-present haze of pain, he was excruciatingly certain of one thing.
Marsac had cast off his pauldron. Marsac had abandoned his duty.
"Marsac!" he called as his brother drew farther away.
Aramis pushed away from the tree that was supporting him, stumbling forward. He made it barely a step before his legs betrayed him, sending him crashing to his knees. His head throbbed mercilessly and his leg screamed out in agony, but he pushed the pain aside.
"MARSAC!" he shouted, reaching out a hand towards his brother's retreating back.
Marsac did not turn, did not even seem to hear him.
He didn't understand. Why would Marsac leave him here, wounded on the battlefield? He tried to stand, to follow him. But the pain in his leg prevented him from rising. He looked down at the stained bandage. Then, beyond the bloody rag, he saw the snow beneath his knees. Snow stained red.
He raised his head slowly, eyes moving to take in the scene around him.
He remembered then, what he'd forgotten in his confusion, pain, and panic at Marsac's retreat.
The attack. The masked men.
His brothers.
His breathing turned ragged as he looked around.
Death. There was nothing but death around him.
Death and Marsac. Marsac had survived.
He remembered then, the look he'd seen on Marsac's face. Shame and devastation.
"I failed them," he had said. "I abandoned my brothers to death."
And all at once, he knew what Marsac had done.
He raised his gaze once again, seeing Marsac's form growing farther and farther away.
Panic gripped him, pushing aside his horror at this new revelation.
"Don't leave me here!" he begged, shouting as loud as he could manage. "MARSAC!"
But now Marsac was gone, vanished into the trees.
"Don't leave me here…" he repeated breathlessly.
Aramis stared after him with panting breaths, his abused head unable to comprehend the true depth of what was happening.
His heart pounded, his head throbbing in time with the rapid beat.
He couldn't think. He could barely breathe.
The world around him spun, a dizzying swirl of white and red dancing before his wavering vision.
Only one thought remained, ringing clearly in his mind.
Marsac.
Marsac had abandoned him.
Marsac had left him alone to die in a field of their murdered brothers.
"Marsac…" The whispered call was carried on the back of a shaky breath as consciousness betrayed him and his body collapsed back to the snowy forest floor.
End of Chapter Three
And so the tragedy of Savoy has found us. Ever since we saw Aramis' stilted flashbacks to this in show, I wanted to put the massacre into a story. That episode is what spawned this whole universe! So we are only 3 chapters in and we've seen the massacre - now we get to see the aftermath and the winding, troubled path to recovery. More to come tomorrow!
Please drop me a line if you feel so inclined :)
Next time on In the Darkness Is Born the Dawn
Porthos was startled from his thoughts when a horse came through the gate at a fast canter, coming to an abrupt stop as the rider vaulted from the saddle.
"Captain!" the man shouted as he ran up the steps to Treville's office.
He made it to the door just as Treville opened it.
Porthos watched, wide eyed as they both disappeared inside.
Something sour settled in his stomach.
Something had gone terribly wrong somewhere. He could feel it.