The day was cold, and had King Bruce not been wrapped in a menagerie's worth of furs, the wind would have cut him to the bone; his face remained pale, these four days later, and his eyes were haunted. Beside him stood Selina, slim and red-eyed and wearing a lady's pearls in her hair, and at his other hand Bane, tall and silent and massive as ever, a man disguised as a weapon.
Beyond Bane stood Sir John of the Robin, clad in brocade and linen rather than steel—for his wound still ached too much for the weight—and trying not to recall the last time he had stood thus at his king's side, displayed for an event. The speeches went on forever, and John found his eyes pulled to the side, examining the others on the dais.
Selina—she was, of course, one of the great heroes of the court now, and her grace and honor had half the kingdom whispering that she would make a perfect wife for their magically-resurrected king. Commander Gordon, however, seemed to be watching her closely, and John knew that he mistrusted her even with Alfred's commendations, not understanding that her hunger for solitude was bereavement rather than subterfuge.
John could not look at her without seeing her face as it had been in the throne room, white as a doll's, unseeing with the shock of her lover's presumed death. His eyes slipped away from her, wretched with unease; he knew the agony of seeing a lover faced with death, and though Talia had been the one to pull the knife, he doubted now that it would have found its mark; and if he wished true death upon Talia, what did he wish upon Selina, who had given so much to find his king?
He could not dwell upon it. His gaze wandered, seeking safety, and caught upon King Bruce, standing as if the effort cost him nothing. In his heart, John probed the old wound, the place where his love had once festered; and he found it aching still, but in the way of a scar in the winter, the memory of pain rather than pain itself. Even now, pale and worn, Bruce remained the same: the well of charisma, the set of his brow, the angle of his regretful smile. Now, though, the fact of his existence no longer hurt. He was a man, a brilliant resilient man, a king who even now found healing in the love and admiration of his people; but John did not love him, and the absence of that love felt much like hope.
And closest to him: Bane, whose love had so undone him, whose warmth even from a pace away felt sweet as sunlight—Bane, who had tried to profess his love, who had untangled at last the bindings of his heart, who had not been the one to profane their touches with shame.
They were both broken men, John realized, neither of them truthful, neither of them honorable. But if Bane could stay his hand for compassion, could shed the aching lost loves of his past, could take off his mask and be kissed—then who was John to be bitter, jealous, guarded?
The ceremony ended, and to great fanfare the king stood and raised his hands in benediction. Then Bruce turned and embraced them each in turn. Gordon returned the embrace stiffly; Selina gave a perfunctory but polite kiss upon each of his cheeks; Bane clasped his hand and drew him up to thump lightly on his back; and John let himself be held, let Bruce press his cheek to John's own, let the king's whisper enter his ear – you have been my truest companion—and then released him. The lingering form of Bruce against his body lasted a moment and faded, and John let it go like a pleasant memory, a distant dream.
For as they turned to be escorted back to the palace, the golden heat of Bane at his side was more potent and intoxicating than any twinge of the skin, the brush of Bane's arm against his own at once comforting and exhilarating, the knowledge of things to come like a heap of coals in his belly. And as the royal cohort passed through the arches of the colonnade at the great door, and the shadow of the King's rule fell upon them and concealed them, John drew Bane aside and, unable to find words to express his feelings, pressed his face into Bane's neck and wept.
Bane's arms came around him, enfolding him; the metal of his mask pressed into John's scalp, and Bane breathed into his hair while John shuddered. When at last John recovered himself, Bane murmured, low and muffled in his ear: "Will you have a cot for me in your new quarters, Sir John?"
"Don't be ridiculous," said John, pulling back to wipe his face with a tentative smile. "You'll sleep on the floor."
If they missed most of the feast, no-one was foolish enough to comment; and if Bane's billet was empty and scoured by sunset, and John's old cot set up in his antechamber and then never used, well—they were, after all, the closest of friends, knights who had tempered their bond in blood, and were not men of war allowed certain follies? And were they not heroes, and honorable men?
There came a knock on the door of the hovel. Inside, the old woman left off her stirring and lifted the latch. A cloaked figure entered, low words were exchanged, a pouch traded hands. Then the cloaked figure swept to the narrow bed, where a slumbering shape lay buried in old linens; a careful touch, a hurried whisper, and the figure rose from its sleep and dressed with alacrity, hesitating as if still sore from a beating.
Thus arrayed, the two left the hovel, one with long dark hair streaming from under her hood as she bent to pick up a heavy bundle which glittered at the seams, and the other with the demeanor of a noblewoman, tall and dignified despite a faint limp, still stiff from a period of healing under the old woman's care.
"I cleaned out half the silver in the second parlor," said the first figure, shouldering the bundle. "Should get us a berth on a decent ship."
"You should have stayed," whispered the second figure. "What if we're caught? You could be safe here."
"I could be miserable here," retorted the first, setting off between the hummocks of the twilit field. "I would have to be good."
The second figure sighed, giving in as she followed. "You could have married the king," she said, and the first figure shrugged.
"I hear it's not all it's cracked up to be," she replied, and after a brief shocked silence her companion laughed, sweet and rueful, and followed her away into the dark.