A/N: I should clarify, Aislinn is older than Mordred by six months, her birthday being May 19th and Mordred's being November 3rd. Yes and my total GoT reference, I'm so not sorry. Any who I am so sorry about my slow updates. Exams are coming up this week and I need to study.
~Ryan.
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Chapter seventeen.
"Ready to go?" Mordred asks as he reaches the bottom on the staircase out into the citadel. Aislinn is tightening the strap on her saddle before she looks up at him "yeah almost" she mumbles feeding it through the latch her voice low, she places her hand on the side of her horse. Mordred looks at her for a moment, sensing her sorrow before he places his hand on her shoulder caressing it with his thumb "whenever you're ready" he says staring at her. She sighs a little before positioning her hands and pulling herself up onto the horse "come on, I would like to at least be there tomorrow morning" she says flicking her hair over her shoulder.
Mordred drags himself up onto his horse pulling his cloak out from under him so he doesn't sit on it. Today, if it is even possible Aislinn looks more pale than normal, all of the colour she had has drained from her face and her hair contrasts against her skin like when she is cold and there is no colour in her face. They reach the trail that leads into the forest, in the direction of the White Mountains and Aislinn begins to speed up a little. It's considerably warmer than the days past, it's meant to be spring but the reminders of winter still hangs around and so does the descending layers of snow.
He wouldn't dare admit that he is a little bit cold and that his face is freezing as the wind skims against his flesh. It's an hour of hard riding before he is tired of the silence and wants to try cheer her up "did you know that on my first ride with the knights Gwaine convinced me to ride backwards" he says glancing over at her. Aislinn looks at him for a moment "he what?" she asks looking over him "he convinced me to ride backwards on my saddle saying it was a tradition and every knight had to do it" she rolls her eyes.
"I can't believe you were stupid enough to believe them" she scoffs and he smiles at her "hey, I was eager to please" he says not taking her eyes off her. Aislinn stars at him for a moment before the corners of her mouth begins to twitch and she begins to laugh – she was her gorgeous self again. "I remember once, I was in Caerleon – It was just after my eleventh birthday and Devon had convinced me to attempt to steal a cake from a bakers" she says "it's not really funny but it was nice to be able to make another person smile."
Mordred looks at her "you stole?" he asks and she glances away "Mordred I did a lot of things I'm not proud of, I did a lot of things I'm not proud of but they kept me and the people around me alive."
By the time the sun goes down they are around two hours out from the white mountains. Aislinn wanted to push on but Mordred had convinced her to stop for the night, she needed sleep and it was clear she hadn't slept in a while. Aislinn hands him a bowl and takes a seat around a foot from him "thank you" he says with a smile as he watches her "so what was this about you turning to a life of crime?" he asks. She smiles combing her spoon through her stew "I hate to disappoint you sir, but it isn't all that interesting" Aislinn tells him her smile fading.
"Mine isn't either" he admits "I spent some time in Camelote" he begins "A trader sold my father and I out to the king who caught my father...he sacrificed himself to save me." Mordred stares into the fire "Merlin, Arthur and Morgana got me out of Camelot and back to Iseldir, back to the druids" he pauses again "I then spent my time with them until our camp was attacked and just like you I was alone." Aislinn's heart skips a beat and for some reason she can't help feel responsible although she knows it wasn't her fault. "I began moving around until I ended up collecting slaves for money, I learnt a great deal, a great deal about what people are like and what the world was like."
He smiles a little but his eyes don't share the joy he tries to fake in his smile "I believe if you told that story properly it would be more exciting than you believe" Aislinn says chewing on the end of her spoon. Mordred smirks "maybe, maybe not but I lived life day to day – I didn't really care where I went" he shrugs "now it's your turn princess" he says winking at her. Aislinn takes a deep breath trying to muster up some memory. How could you put eight years worth of experiences into a short explanation? An entire lifetime could be spent explaining everything she'd done and it wouldn't be enough.
"I spent a good couple of weeks wandering around, everything seemed different we had spent all our time in places like that and it was as if I'd forgotten everything" she says eying her bowl. "I ended up running into a group of smugglers, there was a woman...she patched up my leg" she trails off "I believe her name was Isolde" Aislinn bites her lip. "I spent some time with them until we got to the border of Caerleon and Camelot where I left them" she tells him "I made my living by stealing until I met Devon who offered me a place and for a kid who'd lost everything she knew it sounded great."
Aislinn stares off into the distance "they taught me everything I needed to know, they helped me to improve my hunting skills, my fighting skills and general life skills" she pauses and doesn't continue for a while. "As I got older – a lot older they began using me more, I killed people to get cargo, I escaped numerous brushes with the law, I used people to get what I wanted." she trails off trying to search for the right words "I became callous and bitter – a lot like Morgana" Aislinn's gaze then meets his "I don't think so" he says and from what she can see a tear rolls down his cheek.
"I was, I regret a lot of things I've done Mordred, they aren't things I would ever tell my children" she says her voice cracking mid sentence Mordred pulls himself to his feet appearing in front of her seconds later. He holds his hand out to her and she stares at it for a moment before setting her bowl aside taking his hand. "You're not that person anymore but those things made you who you are now and I wouldn't have you any other way" he whispers kissing her on the tip of her nose. Aislinn scrunches up her nose smiles a little at him "you're crazy" she chuckles "you only just noticed?" he asks frowning at her.
She shakes her head "no, I had my suspicions for a long time but you just confirmed them" Mordred scowls at her before he cracks and laughs resting his forehead against her shoulder. "I have something for you" he mumbles moving his head so he can see her, Aislinn watches him as he walks over to his horse and pulls out a small box which he hands to her "happy birthday" he says with a smile. "You didn't have to get me anything and besides it isn't until tomorrow" she says observing the small box in her palm. Mordred shrugs and purses his lips "sorry, couldn't help myself I'm a compulsive shopper" he tells her looking quite pleased with himself.
Aislinn glances up at him before opening the box, just like when he gave her the necklace there is purple cloth wrapped around the object but it's a darker purple. Carefully she takes the cloth from the box and removes it revealing a hand weaved bracelet out of different types of threads and a smile crosses her lips. "My mother used to make these" she says softly observing the bracelet and Mordred nods "yeah, I remember your mother showed us how to make them onetime" he smiles. "Each colour represented different things" Aislinn says running her fingers over the different coloured threads.
"Red: love and passion, blue: dependability and knowledge, Purple: creativity and pink was joy and happiness" she says another smile forming on her lips. Mordred can't help but smile himself, he loved it when she smiled "that's right" he says confirming all she has just said to him. Aislinn raises her gaze to meet his own "thank you" she says "it's gorgeous, I love it" Mordred takes it from her and turns her wrist over, doing the bracelet up "there now it looks even better" he then proceeds to lift her hand up to his lips and kiss her palm. In the last few minutes Mordred has managed to pull her out of her bad mood and into a somewhat satisfactory mood.
Despite that he knew it wouldn't be the same tomorrow, tomorrow she wouldn't even smile. It had been a battle to get her to smile today but he knew it would be a war to attempt such a feat tomorrow and he could understand completely. "Do you remember the times we used to dance around the fires as children?" he asks lowering her hand for his cheek, placing it on his shoulder. Aislinn scoffs "I wouldn't really call that dancing" she says as he grabs her other hand "more uncoordinated movements" Mordred laughs "I don't know from what I can remember you were pretty coordinated."
She shakes her head "I don't think so" she says as he twirls her under his arm "whatever you say" he shrugs "if you were uncoordinated you've gotten a lot better" he tells her as she twirls back into his chest. "Well I've had a great teacher" she says turning her head to look back at him Mordred smiles, repositioning his arm around her waist. "I'm not that good" he admits smirking a little, they stop and he rests his head against the back of her neck closing his eyes. "Comfortable?" she asks placing her hand over his at her stomach "very" he mumbles before lifting his head up "what would have happened if nothing that happened to us had happened?" he asks.
Aislinn frowns "I don't understand your question" she says staring off into the darkness between the trees. "If nothing had ever happened, our camp being raided, our parents dying, do you think we'd be like this?" he asks rephrasing it for her Aislinn takes a few seconds to answer and her answer is short and to the point "no" she says. He'd be lying if he said he wasn't hurt by her response "why?" he asks placing his chin on her shoulder so he can see her face "all those things brought us to this point" she says "if they didn't happen we wouldn't be like this" she tells him.
"I think" she begins "we'd still be practicing Druidry, living with our people, teaching others what we were taught" she says. Mordred's kind of taken aback by her brutal honesty and she can sense it so she continues on further "just think about it, it's what our parents and their parent's before them did, so naturally I figure it's what we would do too." Aislinn falls silent and resumes to staring off into the distance until shapes begins to swirl around and contrast with the darkness "do you think you would have married?" he asks out of curiosity, Aislinn looks back at him "I would have liked to" she says "why do you ask?"
Mordred shrugs lifting his head up from her shoulder "I was just thinking of how different our lives would have been without everything" he says moving away from her and goes to pull out some blankets. Aislinn follows him and sighs as little when she feels the heat from the fire against her skin "I think I might just stand here for the rest of my life" she jokes Mordred holds the blankets out to her "so without these?" he asks.
Aislinn bites her lip then lunges forward and in a quick motion goes to take some blankets from him but before she pulls them he grips onto one part "what's the magic word?" he asks smirking at her. She sighs "please?" she asks but he shakes his head "nope, try again" a smirk forms on Aislinn's lips "hnát hine ofer" she whispers and her eyes flicker gold before he is knocked off his feet and flat onto his back. "That wasn't the magic words I meant" he groans rubbing his eyes Aislinn wraps the blankets around her shoulders and sets herself down on the ground.
He doesn't move, he just lays there with his hand over his eyes "that wasn't even fair" he complains "you're far better than me at everything" Aislinn scoffs "that's not true Mordred, you know that." Mordred without getting off the ground swings himself around so he can see her "alright go on, what am I better than you at?" he asks. "You're a better horseman, you're better at rational thinking, you're better at retaining you're anger, you're better at structuring your words, you're better at making friends and you're a better lover than I am" she says.
Mordred's frown softens "if anything there are a lot of things you're better than me at" she smiles avoiding his gaze, Mordred pushes himself into a sitting position and moves over to her. "No, you're a better sorcerer, a better fighter, you're a brilliant healer" he says searching her face Aislinn looks up at him then reaches up and removes a few dead leaves from his hair "but those aren't things that will get me too far in life" she whispers. Aislinn crushes the dead leaves in her palm and blows the shreds from her palm and she watches as the light breeze carries them into the fire.
"Besides men want a girl who is an excellent home maker, an obedient wife and one who will bend to their will" she says "I'm not that type of person" Mordred laughs a little "is that what you're worried about?" he asks flicking his hair out of his face. "For the record I think obedient wives are boring, I'd much rather ones with fire in their veins" Aislinn doesn't respond she just remains quiet. Mordred slowly brushes her hair from her face "when I was travelling a few years ago I came across a tribe" he explains "they believed that people who had red hair had been kissed by fire" Aislinn glances up at him.
If he isn't mistaken he's pretty sure she smiled a little "it would explain a few things" she says laughing dryly. Mordred smiles at her "come on, we should get some sleep" he says passing her a pillow and she takes it from him "that would be a good idea" Aislinn says yawning when he mentions the word sleep. Aislinn lays back and closes her eyes only seconds later to reopen them when she feels Mordred slide down next to her. "Good night, Aislinn" he murmurs and she watches him close his eyes and fall into sleep moments later, she turns her eyes to the sky knowing that sleep will be something she may not get tonight.