The Exile, Part II,Chapter VII: The Air In Camelot Continued

[a_g_doren]

Title: The Exile

Chapter: The Air In Camelot
Author: AGDoren
Rating: Teen
Genre: Romance-Fantasy, cannon until 4x9, AU on all events after 4x9
Spoilers: up to season 4x9, Lancelot du' Lac
Characters/Pairings: Sir Elyan, Sir Gwaine, King Arthur, Sir Leon, Sir Percival, OC as needed, pairing Arthur and Gwen
Summary:  Chapter 7 brings us back to Camelot. Elyan, Gwaine, Bedivere and Gareth are dispatched to deal with a bear that has been harassing villagers near Waymeet. Elyan makes a discovery that will lead him to question his loyalties and confront the king himself.

Betaed: by myself and my roommate

Artwork: None this week.



When Guinevere fled Camelot she encountered hatred and hostility, bears and bandits but also a new friend in Tilda of Bayberry. Now Elyan unknowingly retraces his sister's steps.

Chapter VII is longer than LJ likes so I've split it into two. Please read the first half of The Air in Camelot.

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The Exile

Part II, Chapter VII Continued

The Air in Camelot

He found Tilda in her home preparing her evening meal. Her dark hair in one long braid, youngest children running about. She took one look at him and blanched.

"Elise, Tommy go outside."

"But-" the boy protested and Tilda fixed both children with such a stern look that they hurried outside without another a word. "Sir Elyan sit down please."

He did.

"What has happened?"

Elyan sucked at his bottom lip a moment, his heart wanted only to mourn his sister, but he was not willing to give into that, not yet.

"I found Gwen's things," he swallowed "personal things, things she would never give up, never sell on the corpse of a bandit."

Tilda's gasped and Elyan saw the glimmer of tears in her eyes as she started to massage her forehead.

"Elyan I am so sorry- I had hoped-" She pressed a trembling hand to her lips.

Elyan swept his eyes over her thin trembling form.

"I should not have come to you with this, I am sorry."

She took a breath long and deep then, her spine straightened.

"No I want to help." She looked at him, "tell me what you need."

He studied her for a moment.

"I have not given up my sister for dead."

The older woman took a deep breath. "You are going to look for her?"

"Yes."

"How can I help?"

"When you saw my sister did she have those items?"

"I do not recall seeing a ring, but I saw her with that knife."

"Damn!" He slapped the table with an open fist. He had cherished the hope that Gwen's meeting with Tilda would have come after the bandit.

"Do not think the worst, anything could have happened." She sat on the stool beside him and gave his hand a gentle squeeze. "Are you going to look for her?"

"I cannot do anything else."

There was a flash of something in her expression and she nodded.

"She told me she was making for Ealdor. I suggested she shelter in the old waystations since the villages had become so hostile." The older woman got to her feet. "You'll be needing some supplies."

"You shouldn't-"

"I want to." Her stern tone brooked no argument.

"As you wish."

"I'm doing it for your sister as much as my own."

Half-an hour later in addition to his own supplies Elyan had several days worth of dried grain and fish, and some dried fruit, a chunk of lye soap, a sewing kit, and a few oil soaked rags for the making of torches."

"Thank you Tilda thank you for everything."

"You're welcome and god bless. I shall pray for you and Gwen."

Elyan mounted his horse and continued south.  Each time he looked back Tilda was there and he knew she was sorry for both of them.

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Elyan stared at the river Cadmus. Signs of recent flooding were everywhere. He had found a man that claimed to have spoken to Gwen. Bryn, a tall fellow, light brown hair threaded with grey and pale blue eyes. He reminded Elyan of their Uncle John.  Gwen would have accepted this man's advice. Bryn told him that Gwen had passed that way perhaps a month ago. She seemed well, sad, but well.  He couldn't say whether or not she had a ring, he was certain she'd had a knife. Bryn went on to explain that he'd advised Guinevere to ford the river at shallow point about three day's walk east. He couldn't say with any certainty what she had chosen, but he'd seen her start east before he himself had turned around. Elyan thanked the older man and started on the road immediately.

If she'd gone east at the river then there her trail would grow cold. Still a month ago there would have been few hours of daylight. Heaving a heavy cart across the forest floor would have been slow work.  He could probably cover her three day's foot travel in a day and half, two at the most.  Elyan made up his mind that he would look for any trail to follow.  He reached the river the next day and then headed east into the woods. Elyan kept his eyes open for any sign of her passing but he was not hopeful. Any physical trace of her journey would have been obliterated over the course of a month. Again he considered heading straight for Ealdor. If she were there then his search would be over, but if she'd been lost somewhere between Waymet and Ealdor then he needed to follow that path and where it led.

The woods were in full bloom when Elyan, Tom's son, knight of Camelot entered them. Entering the forest in the morning with the sun at full height was like crossing into a twilight world. The forest canopy blocked most the daylight and absorbed much of sun's warmth. The ground was cool and largely bare as new trees and growth got very little sun.  Travel by horse was easy. The forest floor was as clear as any road and Elyan made good time.  From time-to-time he thought of his fellow knights, worried that he was being irresponsible again. It couldn't be helped. He had to do this. His thoughts were filled with Gwen and their mother.  Was it as so many said? Did their mother's spirit watch over them? Was she disappointed in Elyan, in Gwen? Time drilled on as he rode and the deeper into the woods he traveled the more the outer world fell away as the closeness of the inner world grew.

He thought on it, thought of Tacita and came to understand one thing. No matter what everyone else thought or expected, Gwen had failed their family and he in turn had failed her…

Night descended and Elyan made his camp, near the river. The day had been long and draining. In spite of his worries he slept easily. Slept and dreamt about Gwen and how she might be suffering, dreamed again of failing his parents and woke to the disappointing dimness of false dawn. He could not sleep again, but could not get on the road. He waited quietly, calmly wishing for some activity to fill his mind and time. Instead his thoughts wound the well worn paths of where Gwen might be. For the first time since finding the ring Elyan let himself cry for his sister.

He ate a cold breakfast when there was light enough and was in the saddle as soon he could see.

In the middle of his second day of travel -as if cued- Elyan spied fluttering on the breeze, trapped amongst the growth along river something bright orange and green and yellow. He brought his horse to a stop and dismounted quickly. It took but a tug to pluck his grandmother Ngimbe's kente cloth from amidst the prickly shrubbery growing at the riverside. Something else Gwen would never give up willingly. Had she perhaps drowned trying to cross the river? Had her cart been smashed her things scattered everywhere to simply be found by the bandits?

Elyan stared at the Cadmus. According to Bryn it had been flooded when Gwen had tried to cross. Here the signs of that were far less. In fact there was no sign of Gwen or her passage save the family's Kente Cloth. While he was glad to have found it, in truth it told him nothing about where Gwen might be. Elyan wrapped the ring and the knife in the Kente cloth and remounted.

He let his horse take him across the river. Elyan searched for any sign of her anything of hers left behind. It was much too late for the telltale signs of trail, a narrow footprint or broken blade of grass. He found no other clues such as the kente cloth and if there were any to find. Where in all the world could he begin to look for her? He should have just gone straight to Ealdor if she had made it there safe then his search was over. If not- He surveyed the woods…would he ever know what had become of her?

It was another three days before he crossed the border into Ealdor. He knew Merlin's mother by name if not by sight and found her easily enough. Unhappily she reported that Guinevere had never come there. He had come late to Ealdor late in the day. The people there were generous enough to share their evening meal with him and give space on the floor of the headman's cottage. He slept poor and troubled that night waking several times from nightmares. He was on the road with the dawn heading north.

He had failed. No one would fault himself, nor Tilda for her choices. If Gwen had met her fate at the hands of some bandit, if even now she slaved in some strange land there were many who would say it was her just dessert. But she was his sister and he could not stop loving her. Like Tilda, Elyan could not now convince himself to consign her to the fates and pretend that she never existed. However it was not only his lack of action that had led him to this place. There was one other that would share this burden with him.

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A ring thunked onto the king's desk.

Merlin watched the change come over Arthur, saw the king leave them all behind for world inhabited by only himself and one other.

"It was found-," Elyan's words broke the silence.

"-Found-" Arthur repeated the last word.

"On the body of a bandit."

"The body-"

The last time Merlin had seen Elyan he had been as a man divided. A man torn by family loyalty and the oath of loyalty he'd sworn as a knight, haunted, burdened by grief, guilt, anger and shame. He carried none of that today, today he was righteous.

"This was also found," Elyan held up a knife still in it's sheath and Merlin tensed.

"My sister would not give up these things, she would not sell them; she loves too well..." The knight's voice was heavy and husky.

The two men stared at each other. The meaning of Elyan's words sunk in, the accusation in his eyes evident. Finally the king was forced to look away.

"You must accept my resignation sire."

"Elyan-"

"-Your father killed my father,"

-Arthur winced and everyone knew what must come next-

"-and now you've killed my sister."

A shudder passed through the king and he looked as if Elyan had struck him. What happened then no one expected. Arthur turned his head and threw up.

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"Again?" The guard said.

The stocks were clapped round Joseph's head. He and Afon had come to blows about Anne. At least Afon was standing in the stocks beside him.

"Yup, brawling over a woman," another guard replied."What is this, the twelfth man now put in the stocks for this?"

When the first one had been brought down people had found it fun to come and throw food at the people in the stocks. But when the stories started come out and there was someone there week after week, sometimes the husbands, sometimes the wives. The people had begun to feel nervous. Husbands did not trust their wives, wives did not trust themselves and the people now hurried past the stocks, gaze averted, praying and crossing themselves. It was beginning to feel as if some plague had settled over Camelot.

"Ya' know that Gwen was arrested a time or two for witchery and there was her father and that friends of theirs all condemned on charges of sorcery. Maybe she was a witch; put a curse on the city when she left."

"You're an idiot.If she was a witch why let herself get banished?"

"Maybe but something ain't right."

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Sarah Goode was the baker's daughter. At thirteen years of age she'd found her true love. But he was fifteen and disinclined to take note of a thirteen year old girl, much less fall in love with her. Still they were force to spend time together and at the close of a year when Sarah Goode was fourteen her true love was returned.

While fourteen was considered an acceptable age for marriage Sarah's parents would have none. Everyone knew stories of girls wedded and bedded too soon and therefore killed by it. Rolfe the young man who loved her so understood this and waited patiently while she aged into healthy adulthood. Fifteen and sixteen, two years passed and Sarah's parents told them to wait one more.

The lovers satisfied themselves with stolen kisses and survived the horrors that often seemed to descend on Camelot.

Questing beast, gargoyles, dragons, sorcerers returned from the dead, armies of undead, witch-Queen Morgana. They survived it all keeping each other and their families safe.

Everyday Sarah walked past the adulteress's house and everyday she thought the same thought. How could she?

When it had come to be known that Prince Arthur loved a handmaid, the former maid of his sister Morgana, the peasants of Camelot were confused and worried. They knew Gwen and many of them liked or loved her but they knew noblemen too. They'd promise a lower class girl anything, take what they wanted and go. Or if his feelings were true the best the girl might hope for was to be his mistress. When it came to be known that Arthur and Guinevere had, like she and Rolfe loved each for years, Sarah felt tied them. And when she wished for happiness she wished it for the four of them. The king had loved Guinevere for only little longer then she had loved her Rolfe.

When the story of the adultery spread Sarah had taken it personally. She worried that somehow all the comparisons she had drawn between Arthur and Guinevere and herself and Rolfe now doomed her love too.

Sarah's finger traced the interior of the bracelet. The metal was surprisingly warm against her fingertip as if it pulsed with its own life. It gleamed in a way she'd never seen before. She knew she should take it to the magistrate. Clearly it was the property of some lady and if it was seen on the wrist of peasant maid she'd be arrested. Yet Sarah did not do that. Instead she thought about how lovely the band of silver would be on her wrist; in her mind's eye she could see it as she wore her wedding dress.

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A/N- I've said it before I was rather iffy about Elyan after 4x9. But he is Gwen's brother and I couldn't write this story without writing about him. I've actually built the character a complete back story, so while he is still irresponsible and somewhat unreliable I also see him as trying to do better than he has done in the past. Camelot under Uther was a horrible place to live in many ways. Someone besides Morgana should hate it.

Gwaine- While Gwaine is a flirt he is also described as being a champion of women. In the old legends he spoke for Guinevere when she actually did have an affair. It seemed to me that he would definitely view the men of Tilda's village in a negative light.