A/N: OC POV. No main characters named, you'll just have to recognize them… And, this story contains the premise that if/when Merlin uses magic to save Camelot from a very great threat, and maybe suffers life-threatening injuries doing so, that would prompt Arthur's forgiveness-acceptance-etc (squint and you'll see that too). But that is not the point of the story… And, I'm kinda sorry the h/c is only hinted at, too…
The Most Beautiful Man In Camelot
…Said my younger sister, teasing.
I heard it in her voice, but there was no temptation to look up from the washboard, and Papa's workshirt. My knees ached from kneeling and my back ached from bending and scrubbing, and my wet fingers ached in the chill of the fall air. The constant noise of the town, which I was not accustomed to, made my ears ache.
My heart, most of all. I don't want to be here, why don't they leave me alone?
"The most beautiful man in Camelot," my sister repeated, with an indicative jut of her chin. The other girls scrubbing laundry with us shifted and craned, their hands stilling in their washtubs, murmuring approval and agreement.
"Pass the soap," I said to my sister's neighbor.
She ignored me. "Look, quick – you're going to miss him. He's walking, today."
Men walked all the time. And I used to be able to recognize one man's gait, out of the crowd…
I sighed, sitting back on my heels to wait til the fellow passed and the other girls could focus on their work again.
The man in question was undoubtedly a knight – silver chainmail and crimson cape – paused at the end of our courtyard, maybe ten or twelve paces distant. Crisp wavy hair of a rich deep brown, firm jaw, dark serious eyes. If the old gods, as they said, ever took human form to walk among mortals, they might choose to look like this. Broad chest, strong shoulders, quiet hands – confidence in his bearing, compassion in his expression.
As we watched, Gerta from the next alley over appeared in the cross-street, laundry basket in her hands. Not expecting two men blocking her path, she startled to a stop and turned beet red under her cap.
The human god's companion shifted, and noticed Gerta – and instead of stepping aside to continue their conversation or rejecting her as beneath their notice and remaining in place, the companion reached for the handles of the wicker basket, heavy under the mound of clothing Gerta was carrying. For a moment she resisted, her face brighter than the yellow of her braid, her eyes almost disappearing in the squint of her self-conscious smile.
"Oh, my," my sister murmured suggestively, and the other girls snickered.
Twelve paces away, Gerta relented to his insistence, and began to lead him toward the rest of us, gathered in the courtyard around the pump. She glanced apologetically over her shoulder, and he shifted to answer her, and I could see him more clearly.
Eyes and nose above Gerta, who was built like her stonemason father. Broader than Gerta's father – he wore chainmail but no cape, and no sleeves, even in the autumn chill, though it didn't make sense that the armor was hot to wear. He wasn't sweating, otherwise – the muscles bulged and he smiled, no long hair to hide any part of his face. Square jaw and innocent eyes that made him look like Ouan, my oldest sister's oldest.
"Thank you, Sir Knight," Gerta said, indicating that he should set the basket down in a clear space, just next to me.
As he did so, my younger sister called out, "Good morning, Sir Knight! It's a beautiful day!"
"Good morning, ladies," he returned, color touching his ears and his boyish eyes bashful under the collection of ours. "It is, at that."
Gerta knelt and leaned close to whisper into my ears, "The most beautiful man in Camelot…"
"How go the repairs?" my sister added, addressing him.
"I'm told they're going well," the big knight said. He gave Gerta a smile, beginning to back away. "The wall should be repaired by the week's end – no reason to doubt your safety."
"The wall is rising like the sun in the morning!" proclaimed another male voice.
A wave of gasps and giggles rippled its way around the collection of my female neighbors. I didn't look up, reaching out of my way instead to grab the dish of laundry soap we were sharing. Soft and strong-smelling, but as the sound of boots approached and passed us from the opposite end of the courtyard, I could smell something else, too – a wave of the yeasty warmth of beer and the tang of ale.
"Speaking of rising in the morning," the big knight said to him reprovingly. "You really shouldn't-"
I missed his added comment in the surprise of my cousin's arrival in a flurry of skirts embroidered at the hem. The top button of her bodice was loose, and Gerta made a reproachful noise, but my cousin grinned, all flyaway blonde curls and dimples, hiding from the work and my mother who was supervising us from the houses behind me.
She nudged me, nodding upward at the new arrival next to the big knight, above and behind us, and whispered to me, "The most beautiful man in Camelot..."
All the men in Camelot were beautiful, it seemed. I sat back on my heels, twisting to get a glimpse of this third wonder-
Just as he glanced down at my young cousin. Lively dark eyes, full lips in the scruff of a dark beard, a rakish grin and a daring wink. My cousin giggled again, and then he noticed my attention and shifted his grin to include me.
I ducked away, heart thumping at the possibility of being observed and addressed.
"Joena," said the new man suggestively to my cousin, and his voice was like velvet-covered gravel. "Why don't you introduce me to-"
That wasn't going to happen. I lurched up from my knees and stumbled forward, abandoning wash-tub and laundry basket alike, just trying to cross our small courtyard without stepping on or tripping over one of the other girls – or her work.
"Joena!" my mother called from underneath the overhang of our house's roof – startling me, I hadn't realized she'd come outside. "Laundry!"
I reached and passed her, but didn't go inside – my oldest sister and all the littlest children were within, and it was noisy - only leaned on the outer wall of my parents' home.
"That girl," my mother said darkly. "If she paid half as much attention to her responsibilities as she does to interested men, she'd actually have some serious offers to consider."
I didn't want to think about it. About my cousin and my younger sister, unmarried and dreaming of all the wide-open possibilities of love. About my older sister, serenely expecting another child in the proof of the love of my brother-by-law. About Gerta, contentedly married and still blushing under the attention of the big muscular knight, if only for a moment.
"Come on," my mother said suddenly. "Walk with me a little. It's nearly noon and your sister's just finishing preparing the meal, but the boys aren't back yet from the blacksmith's."
I didn't have a reason to decline. Joena was frowning over my share of the laundry and the two red-caped knights were sauntering away with the dashing third, who was dressed plainly but acted like he was their familiar friend.
The air was cool and the sun was warm and my mother didn't say anything, either to address my emotions or to distract with innocuous gossip. We just… ambled, and felt the breeze, and listened to the town. Beyond the courtyard, the streets were busy. Commerce and trade spilled out of the shops at storefronts and booths, buyers and traders mingled, children and animals weaving in and out. The recent upheaval and violence hadn't slowed Camelot's productivity by much, it seemed.
I paused, uncertain and unwilling to push my way into the crush and hurry of the crowd, and my mother lingered at my side. Very perceptive, is my mother, even when I had rather she not be.
"You could go sit by the well," she leaned to say clearly in my ear, and gestured to supplement her suggestion. "Fewer people, there. I'll get the boys from the blacksmith."
I nodded agreement enough, and my mother plunged confidently into the varying currents of people. I edged along the building walls – no damage here from the battle, nothing to be repaired – and looked across and ahead to the blacksmith's forge, as one of the busier destinations in town, lately.
There were two knights there, also – they always caught the eye away from the muted colors of commoners' cloth – standing by one of the posts supporting the roof overhanging the open forge area. And, after noting them, it wasn't hard to realize how other females in their vicinity were noticing and watching, leaning to whisper contemplations and confidences to each other concerning the oblivious men.
One was quite tall, with wide shoulders – his face was broad and honest, his hair red-gold and long enough around his jaw to notice the curl. He had the air of a knight, too – noble and aloof – though he did shift out of the cobbler's way before the cobbler noticed him to step around.
The other was markedly shorter, and very dark of skin, serious-looking, focused and attentive. He was watching the blacksmith, and even as I made my way along the side of the street, he waved for the smith to halt his work. Unclasping his cloak, he handed it to his curly-haired companion – who took it composedly – and claimed the smith's tools himself, beginning to wield them with what looked to me like confident skill.
The knights here were different than I'd expected. More… ordinary. Most beautiful men, not just living ideals, moving statues, breathing paragons of virtue and violence aloof from common concerns.
I reached and turned the corner toward the well, grateful for another small courtyard with space to breathe and hear myself think… and then I remembered why I didn't want that, after all. My stomach lurched and bumped, and I headed for the bench against the citadel wall, just a few paces from the pump, without worrying about its sole occupant – a crippled beggar storytelling to a group of rapt children gathered on the packed dirt before him.
"And just when we thought all was lost, and the enemy soldiers were pouring through the breach in the wall-"
Hoping to be allowed to slide onto the edge of the bench unnoticed and rest with my eyes closed til the bout of nausea passed, I was surprised and dismayed to hear one of the young voices pipe up with recognition.
"Auntie? What are you doing here?" It was Ouan, and his next-youngest brother Connr.
"Just, resting a minute." I frowned at the two of them. "Gran is looking for you at the smith's."
Ouan ducked his head in a mischievous sort of contrition, acknowledging the giggles of his companions. Connr smiled at me, a serene and unwitting accomplice.
"Don't be upset – it seems boys can't get enough talk of battles, even when they're old enough to participate in them," the crippled beggar said to me, with humor in his tone.
The humor caught my attention. And the fact that his cadence and enunciation weren't adopted for the story, but his regular speaking voice sounded fairly well-educated – and he spoke to me not to beg, to offer his disfigurement as a cause for pity leading to aid.
So I looked at him. Carefully, so as not to stare.
His garments were finer cloth than mine. One sleeve of the dark blue shirt was bound in a sling, and the hand that was visible at the end was wrapped in a clean bandage that did not hide the fact that part of it was missing – the last two or three fingers at least, and some of the palm also. His other hand supported a staff he clearly needed to walk, as one of the boots, new enough to remark on, rested at an awkward angle on the ground. Evidently the leg was twisted disproportionately; under dark well-cut trousers it lacked the muscle definition of the other. He hunched over his grip on the staff as if it hurt him to pull straight, and his breathing was noticeably labored.
Black hair worn long, but washed. Scarring of the sort that made me think of burns rather than cuts pulled the skin of a quarter of his face – forehead to cheekbone, down and sideways. His right eye was milky-blind, the brow-ridge twisted and bare, the flesh sagging to obscure a cheekbone that should have matched the other. And it was only because I sat on that side that I noticed no part of his right ear showed like the other one. The scarring disappeared under the fall of black hair let grow – perhaps for the purpose, though it looked snarled and roughened and blistered – and made me wonder if the ear was missing, in part or in its entirety, like the fingers and hand.
Not a beggar. A knight, then, someone who'd seen the worst of the battle last month? Whose warrior days were over now?
"Are you all right?" he said to me, concern in the rough tremble of his voice, and indicated my own also-obvious condition.
I tried to say, I'm fine. I almost choked on an incredulous laugh, that someone still recovering and adjusting to such horrible wounds, crippling and disfiguring, would even think about the feelings of someone whole and strong. Only I wasn't. Scars on the inside, it felt like, where someone had been ripped away.
"Auntie's husband died," Ouan volunteered, ever-so-helpfully. "In the battle. So she lives with us now."
Pity in the one blue eye – no, not pity, but sympathy.
"I'm sorry," he said, with amazing sincerity, as if he felt he owned some of the blame.
I rejected that. Unless he'd been fighting for our enemies, he didn't. "Please don't let me interrupt," I said. "You were telling the children a story."
When he smiled, only the half of his mouth on the undamaged side of his face responded correctly, turning the expression into something wry but not unpleasant. "Perhaps I should start a different story," he said – and above the reactive clamor of the children told them, "Any battle tale might be temporarily unwelcome to our fair company."
"Auntie, go away so he can tell us how the king won the battle," Ouan said immediately.
I didn't even have time to feel hurt – the crippled not-beggar made a noise of instant and unmistakable disapproval. "That was rude, young man."
"Sorry Auntie," Ouan pouted.
"Not much to tell anyway," the man said.
"It were magic, though," one of the other children claimed. "My cousin lives close to the wall and he said his neighbor told his old grandda that if the wall hadn't been held with magic, all the stones would have fallen down and the fire would have spread and all the enemies run straight into Camelot."
The stranger gave me a flick of a sideways glance – perceptible because he had to turn his head far enough to see me with a good eye.
But magic was allowed now – the Ban another thing changed in the aftermath of the battle.
"Could magic work for you?" Ouan said with a child's callous curiosity. "Could it fix your eye, and your hand?"
"Ouan," I said, ready to reprimand him for rudeness, in turn.
The man was amused, not offended. "Magic already tried," he said lightly to his audience. "Just think how much worse I might look without magical healing."
The children's expressions screwed in imaginative distaste. I shuddered, thinking of the mangled and blackened bodies they'd brought home after the Saxon army razed our village. On their way to batter themselves to defeat on the king's walls, thanks to the king's sorcerer.
"Were you a knight?" I said softly. Of course after such injuries he wouldn't wear armor, and they didn't always wear the scarlet cloak, either.
"No," he said, with the same tone of amusement. "Just someone who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Or, maybe the right place at the right time… depends on your perspective." He coughed as he finished, a helpless, careful sort of thing that spoke of adjustment and habit. Maybe lingering internal weakness or injury.
"Wish I'd seen magic," Ouan said discontentedly, and several others echoed the sentiment in a murmur. "That would be better than the battle."
"Magic is allowed now," the man said breathlessly, leaning on the staff. "Maybe you will see it, before long."
Grumble, grumble – maybe wasn't soon enough for the youngsters.
The man began to speak – interrupted himself to cough, and I couldn't help trying to brace him a little with my hand on his shoulder. He bobbed his head in thanks, and finally caught his breath.
"Would some water help?" I asked, ready to delegate the task to Ouan or Connr.
"No," he managed, recovering some strength. "Thank you anyway. But I can tell you," he said to all of us. "A little, if you like? About magic?"
What a silly question. I had to smile at the eager response, children too young to have caught the seriousness of their parents' fear of previous decades. And the village where I'd lived was just far enough from the citadel to scoff at the foolishness of the superstition, at least. Sacrificing black cats and dancing naked in the moonlight, indeed.
"There are spells to conjure flowers," the stranger said huskily, glancing at me as if making sure of my approval for the topic. "Spells to splash water in your friend's face – spells to clean spills so your mother won't scold. To remove a stain from your clothing…"
"Oh," I said, involuntarily.
He looked at me, again sideways but with the extra twist of needing his good eye, and I wished I hadn't interrupted. "Sorry – it's laundry day." Conscious of the children and the tenor of his storytelling, I added to them, "Imagine how much easier laundry day could be, if you could conjure water and remove stains with magic."
The boys in the little circle of gathered children scoffed, but the three little girls wore interested expressions under the kerchiefs over their hair.
The man was staring, and I could feel my face heat. If he'd lived in Camelot, he would better understand the fear and hatred we'd dismissed, in my village. Though maybe that magical healing had been enough to change his mind. "I mean… just to imagine. Perhaps."
His smile stretched at the scars again, and the depth of emotion in his one blue eye was arresting. He murmured whimsically, "Perhaps…"
"More, more!" the children clamored. "Tell more – can magic hatch eggs?"
"Yes," said the man, with certainty.
"Can it put donkey ears on my little brother?" That was Ouan, and Connr scowled.
"Now why would you want to do that?" the man asked, obvious exasperation nearly hiding a twinkle of amusement.
"Can it wash the dishes? Can it chop firewood? Can it make my sister's baby's leg straight?"
The man paused, and I carefully did not look down at his own leg. "Yes," he said. "And yes. And tell your sister to bring her baby to Gaius, the king's physician."
"She already did that last year, when it was borned crooked!"
Pause, so the man could breathe, and breathe. "Tell her to bring it again, and we'll try…"
His throat and lungs rasped like carpenter's sand, and I wanted to say, Enough. "Ahem," I managed. "Who here has got chores they're supposed to be doing right now? Without the benefit of magic?"
Ducked head, guilty glances. The man managed a noise of disappointment, in spite of his exhaustion.
"Ouan," I said. "There's Gran at the corner." My mother stood sideways to us, aware and yet watching some commotion out to the street.
"Oh," he said, disgust and regret and longing in three syllables of the word, before relenting. "Come on, Connr." They both scrambled to their feet and trotted to her.
I raised an eyebrow to the others, who rolled or shifted to find their feet, and began to move off. They moved faster when another man rounded the corner opposite my mother – glanced at us, then strode purposefully toward the well.
"Do please let me get you some water to drink?" I said to my crippled companion. That was a lot of talking if he was still recovering from wounds on the inside.
"Thank you, no. Healing takes time," he told me, with another scar-twisted smile.
It felt like my heart was doing the same thing inside my chest. A different sort of healing, to be sure – but I knew he was speaking of my loss, too. And optimism in the face of that – felt nearly impossible.
Though, if he could do it…
The man who approached us was dressed in clothing that was fine quality also, if rather ordinary-looking. His golden-brown hair was wind-tousled and he hadn't shaved for several days, and his shirt-cuffs were rolled and smudged like he'd been working. He rested his hand on the hilt of a sword in his belt – naturally and unself-consciously as if it were not just an affectation of his wardrobe – and gave me a glance. Blue eyes my cousin and sister would sigh over, intelligent and canny – and here might be the form a god would take if he was marginally more concerned about his activities than his appearance.
But his attention was all for the man who shared his bench with me – and he was scowling.
I rose to my feet before I thought, intending to place myself between them and intercede for the cripple against the inexplicable ire of this citizen.
"It's fine," my new acquaintance said immediately – to me, or to him? "It's fine."
The newcomer's pique died by slow degrees. "What are you doing outside?" he demanded. "You're supposed to be resting. You almost died."
The two of them were friends, then. Relatives?
I wasn't sure if that was an exaggeration, but the cripple snorted derisively – and almost set himself coughing again. "I'm tired of resting. I'm recovering," he defended. "Fresh air and exercise are good for that."
He leaned heavily on his staff, struggling to balance his weight in preparation to rise. My hands wanted to assist, providing a pull for him to work with, but I wasn't sure if the injury spread up under his sleeve – it seemed likely.
The newcomer had no such hesitation, grabbing the cripple's opposite elbow behind the staff and hauling him up – though he didn't seem to cause any additional discomfort, and maybe he was familiar enough with his friend's injuries to know. "Enough fresh air for today," he ordered. "And if you feel well enough to chat with townspeople, you can bloody well chat with me for a bit, too."
The cripple grimaced like a pain had flashed suddenly through him, and I touched his shoulder again to brace him. He would be taller than me when he straightened, I thought. If he straightened.
"Thank you," he said to me. "If you haven't seen a midwife here in Camelot yet, come visit Gaius – he can recommend someone." His blond companion snorted rudely – before I could try to figure out what that meant, the dark-haired cripple added swiftly, "Her husband was killed by the Saxons."
That changed everything.
The fair-haired newcomer turned as if really seeing me for the first time. "I'm so very sorry to hear," he said, his sincerity as complete as his sarcasm had been a moment earlier. "That is a debt Camelot owes you that can never be repaid, but if you need anything-"
Tears started to my eyes but I wouldn't let them fall, wouldn't let a stranger see them. "Thank you – but no. My family took me in, that's enough."
"Please remember the offer, though?"
I nodded, unable to say more.
He encouraged the cripple to begin to move, slowly, an exaggerated limp clearly compensating for the unseen damage done to muscle and bone. I didn't want to stride past them in leaving the courtyard, so I hovered a bit awkwardly at his other side as he leaned on his companion's strength and patience in contrast to his earlier swiftness of movement.
"It was very nice meeting you," he told me, his voice raspy from coughing but his smile pure – reaching one clear eye and the untwisted side of his mouth.
"You as well," I told him honestly, and a smile in return wasn't hard. "Thank you for your… stories, the children clearly love you. And maybe we will see magic soon."
The citizen jerked like I'd poked him with a sewing needle, but the crippled man didn't even pause, his smile pulling deeper.
And since that was my leave-taking, I veered away from their course back in the direction the blond man had come, to join my mother – who probably had sent Ouan and Connr home and waited to walk with me.
To my astonishment, she made a curtsy to the two men – and then said two words I never thought to hear from her.
"Your Majesty."
My first thought was that she was teasing the man, the strong light-haired man, because she knew him somehow, and… my mother wasn't the sort to tease. My father was the one with the sense of humor, and my mother gentled his wit. My second thought was that she'd made an honest mistake with the man's identity – and I turned to see if he was offended, if apology was appropriate.
But he smiled, charming and confident, nodding to accept the greeting as naturally as if he'd been doing it for years, without taking one bit of the focused attention from the cripple; he looked ready to catch or carry, if need be.
Your Majesty. King Arthur.
And I was just…
"That," my mother said privately to me, watching the two turn and begin to make progress back to the citadel, and her voice carried the authority of experience and wisdom. "Is the most beautiful man in Camelot."
"Yes," I said.
And then realized, she meant the king.
Maybe I should visit Gaius one of these days, dare the citadel myself, and ask for a second opinion on the midwife my mother had suggested. If my crippled friend knew Gaius, surely Gaius knew him, and… maybe I could sit with him again.
Maybe we could heal together. A bit.