Fic: Geese, Benedicte--Queen Anne's Lace
Title: Geese, Benedicte--Queen Anne's Lace
Author: Soujin
Characters/Pairings: Peredur/Galahad/Heliabel
Rating: G
Archive: Yes.
Disclaimer: Copyright has presumably expired.
Summary: The Grailkids need each other.
When Percy finds Galahad and Heli again, he's smiling at them both, smiling with an impossible gladness. His eyes are smiling. The thing about Percy that's always so shocking is that the smile never leaves his eyes, no matter what, no matter how sad he is. In the middle of everything falling on everyone's heads, Percy will still be smiling at you with his big brown eyes, loving you and glad you're there. Even when the world's fallen on his head, it won't show up in his eyes, even if the rest of him is tired and limping.
Galahad and Heliabel are connected to him and to one another in a strange beautiful three-way catch of hands. Galahad came to court only a little while after Percy, and in their innocence and sweetness they liked to be around each other. Each of them liked the way the other one talked, walked, smiled, spoke. They went hunting together for deer but never shot them--got off their horses and held out their hands when they saw some. The deer came to them like unicorns to maidens.
Percy had his country way of talking and his habit of comparing things to vegetables. Galahad's voice and language was smooth and sometimes naive, and he cried even at killing dragons, though he killed them as a knight should. It was because of him that Percy started talking to them, carefully, just to see if they'd listen to him and go away without having to be stabbed. It was because of Percy that Galahad met Heli and fell in love with her as deeply as he loved her brother.
Heli and Percy had always been together until one morning she woke up and their mother told her Percy had left the forest. Heli had not wept--she had danced. Her brother had wanted his whole life to be a knight, to be honourable and brave and everything he imagined he was meant to be. She danced because he was going into his dream now, and it was wonderful. After their mother died, Heli left the forest and went looking for Percy. She missed his silliness, his smiling eyes, his love and bravery and she missed him. A wise fool, some knight from Camelot told her gravely. Her brother was a wise fool. He had gone away on the Grail quest some years ago.
So Heli went off to find him and she found Galahad instead. She became his page--that's what she called herself. She dressed in white and forest green and rode alongside him. They searched for two holy things, for the cup of Christ, and for her brother, Galahad's other love, the boy she hadn't seen for ten years and Galahad hadn't seen in three.
And then one day Percy found them again, and he was smiling.
"Percy! Goose!" Heli shouts, leaping down off the horse, giving her a pat on the nose to soothe her, and running toward him. He runs right back, although it's a stiff, painful run, and they crash together near the middle and fall down in a hug. "Percy! Where you been? We been lookin' everywhere!"
He holds on tight, tight, tight, eyes lit up with pleasure. "I been looking for you."
Then Galahad adds himself to the pile, his white tunic splashed with mud from the ground and rust, blood, and dirt from Percy's worn clothes. "Benedicte, Percy," he whispers, his fingers wandering over Percy's cheeks with reverent joy.
"Hi," Percy says.
"You've been away so long."
"I know. I'm sorry."
Heli helps her boys sit up, laughs at them both, pets Percy. "Are you all right?"
"I'm okay."
Galahad, perhaps because he's known Percy years when Heli hasn't, notices what's wrong. "You've hurt yourself. Let us see. We'll do something and fix it."
Percy rolls down his linen hose, then, although they're so torn they hardly need that to show the wound. It's a long cut on his thigh, made with a dagger or small sword, badly healed, sticky and swelling, the wrong colours around the edges.
"What've you gone an' done?" Heli asks, making a face.
"I got myself cut. I didn't mean to."
"It's all right. I'll do it up again. You're such a goose," she adds over her shoulder as she trots over to the horses to retrieve supplies from the saddlebags. "You can't just let cuts sit out. They go bad."
"I won't do it again."
"You better not!" mock-angry.
Meanwhile Galahad is looking at the wound tenderly, his eyes sorrowing, Percy knows, just because he hates to see other creatures hurt. "Does it pain you very much?"
"Oh, no. I got used to it. It's kind of annoying when I'm walking around, but you stop minding after a while."
"Your horse--"
"She got shot. There were a bunch of other knights, and they kind of jumped me, and then you came--"
Galahad's face lights up. "That was me! They were hurting you, and I defeated them, and then I left because I didn't want to shame you."
"Silly!" laughing. "I didn't mind. I was real glad you came. Anyway, my horse died, so I ended up walking, and then there was this lion, and for a minute I was real scared, I thought sure he was gonna jump on me and eat me up, and then I saw he was getting squeezed by a snake, so I killed the snake," he says hurriedly, passing over it for Galahad's sake, "and the lion was all purring and happy and stuff, so I went along with him for a bit, and he was awful good to have. Kept me warm, and we got out of a lot of scrapes together, but then I found Bors for a while, and the lion went home. I don't think he liked Bors. But then Bors thought he knew this good place to go, and I was gonna follow him, but some--anyway, some stuff happened, and I ended up getting a little stuck for a couple of years. Then I went looking for you guys, and I found you, and I'm real glad, too."
"We missed you. Heliabel was looking for you, but she found me instead, and she asked to be my page. I didn't want her to be, because it's not right for a lady," Galahad says earnestly. "But she wanted to very much, and she insisted, and she said she would follow me whether or not I agreed. She came with me, and I went on with my Grail Quest, and I am sure I'm coming upon the right place. We will all be able to travel together now, won't we? It will be the three of us."
"'Course it will."
Softly, "She's very beautiful."
"Heli?" Percy smiles. "I know. She likes you."
At that moment, however, she returns with bandages and salve, and plunks herself down beside him. "Hones'ly. Lessee, we'll clean it first. You got dirt in it."
"Plants like the dirt just fine," he protests.
"Well, your leg's not a plant, is it? Here, I'm goin' to wipe it off, so if you want ta bite a stick--"
"I'll be okay."
So she swipes the white sleeve of her dress quick and hard across the wound, taking away blood, dirt, and scab, and leaving the hurt raw. Before it has time to bleed she covers it in the salve, and then begins wrapping the bandage around it. It can't be too tight, it can't be too loose. Galahad watches closely, and it's funny, because you can see in him all sorts of things, relief that it covers up so easily, admiration of Heli's quick firm hands, a studious interest in how things are healed, a beautiful innocence that shines because even though he knows the healing is uncertain and never always true, he's still sure that it's going to work. Maybe he's sure just because it's Heli doing the doctoring and Percy she's fixing up.
"There! That's good. Now we'll just let it be for a while. Don't pick it."
"I won't. I don't pick."
"Well, you use' ta. All the time. Ma didn't like it."
Percy sticks out his tongue.
Later that night, when they've built a little fire that by then is dying, and the three of them sit around it, leaning together, Percy in the middle because they've missed him so much that they both need to feel him and be sure he's there, somebody yawns and somebody laughs, sleepily. Somebody holds hands with somebody else, and in the end they lie curled up together, someone's head on someone's lap and someone's arm tucked around someone else, and all of them warm and safe. They sleep so deeply that they don't wake until late morning, so deeply that none of them dream. Heli stirs first, and kisses Percy's cheek.
"Wake up, sleepyhead." He rolls over into Galahad's arms and groans, and she sits back on her heels to watch them both and laugh. "Goose."
They're beautiful together, and it could be the hard part. If she didn't love them both so much, if she didn't believe in them both so much, if she weren't so ready to take them both, maybe she'd be sad. Maybe she is a little sad, but not for that reason. She loves Galahad, and has since she first met him. Galahad loves her. Heli's practical, and she doesn't deny that fact. His every look shows it. And Heli--it makes her go warm and soft inside every time he talks to her, and she'd be his page or his servant, but not his slave. She respects herself, too. You can't really love somebody right if you don't respect yourself too. So they love each other. Then Percy loves him, too, and you can see that easy. Percy's so happy around him, and she can tell something happened while Percy was away, something that has to do with that long, awful cut, but now that they're all together again the raggedness is almost gone. She knows Percy--she knows it'll always be there, whatever happened. He won't forget, and it's made his face change, and that won't go back the way it was. But here, with Galahad (and with her), the change softens and he's happy. He loves it when Galahad touches him, but in such a silly Percy way that maybe he doesn't really realise.
Or maybe, she thinks, he knows perfectly well, but he just does things different, being Percy. He loves differently. Anyway he loves Galahad, and Galahad loves him right back. It's almost like brothers, especially because they're both so rolled up in that purity that she hardly noticed in Galahad because she was so used to it in Percy. They both do that thing where they blush and their ears go red if anybody mentions what maids and men do together. But it's not like brothers, not quite, even if they wouldn't dream of doing what maids and men do together.
And she loves Percy, and he loves her, and it's all right. You might think she'd get left out of it, or Percy would, but somehow they make it work the three of them. They all love each other, and it works out. She isn't afraid to love Galahad when Percy loves him, and doesn't mind it if they both love him together. It's safer. If there's only two, there's nobody to fall back on if one goes. Three's a better number. If she were to die, Percy and Galahad would have each other; if Galahad were to die, she and Percy could hold together tight when it hurt the most. If Percy died--if they lost Percy again so soon after they'd found him, she'd go with Galahad to the end of the world and they wouldn't have to be alone.
So it's all right. It's better like this, even.
But it's time to get up, so she pokes him again. "Percy. C'mon, Percy, both of you lumps. We got ta get up and get going."
~~~
Percy's never kept a secret from his sister or his mother or anybody before, just because he's never had anything that needs to be a secret. His quests and his family and his vegetables and his friendship with Galahad and worship of King Arthur--none of it ever needed hiding. Nothing ever has.
So this new secret is strange to him, uncertain under his fingers. It wobbles like cluster of frogs' eggs in his hands. He wants to tell--he doesn't want to tell. He needs Heli to hug him--he doesn't want her to know. He wishes Galahad would bless him and tell him he hasn't sinned--he can't ask for that. It's all upside down and shaky, and he just doesn't know what he should do with it. A secret. What should he do with a secret?
Maybe it will go away--that makes sense. Sometimes things just go away if you leave them alone, the way briar scratches heal up. Sometimes things will grow in and get ordinary, like grafts in apple trees.
He does try, he leaves it, he goes with Galahad and Heli and is heart-in-his-mouth happy, like he's always tasting the joy that's bubbled up inside him. They're his family that's more than a family, his warm and his happy and the people he loves. He'll be all right with them, anyway. Maybe the last two years will fade away and stop mattering, now that he's back with them, now that he's with the right love and Galahad's holy smile and Heli's flat made-in-the-middle-of-the-woods Host that doesn't have any taste but fills him up always. On Sundays they have Communion wherever they are, and Heli, who doesn't believe the Bible that animals don't have souls, gives Host to their horses as well. Percy still hasn't got one, so he rides with Heli, arms around her waist, like he was a baby again and clinging to her while she carried him across the stream. He used to be afraid of the stream by their home in the woods, but Heli always carried him across. Now he holds on and imagines she's carrying him across the current of his secret, to the other side where she and Galahad are waiting for him.
But then Heli dies.
The choice of telling her his secret is gone. Heli is gone. She saves a whole town with her blood, healing the funny zigzaggy scars that are left by the sick lady and all the people who have suffered with her. Now the lady isn't sick, and the town's children aren't in danger, and it seems like the river that flows through everything, the bridge over it leading into the town, is clearer and brighter and--
Heli is gone. Percy and Galahad quietly wrap her in white cloth and put her in the boat she asked for. She promised them she'd be waiting for them later, somewhere she was meant to be buried. She promised them they'd find her just like always. Galahad touches Percy's shoulder and asks if they should do something besides the white cloth. Heli needs more colour, and they both know it.
They look for her favourite flowers. Galahad comes back with arms full of goldenrod, as much as he could find and dig up; and Percy's filled up his tunic with the fuzzy blue ones she likes, the one that look like millions of little poofs at the ends of their stems. They arrange them all around her in the boat, putting them in her hands and in her hair and around her feet, because she liked having flowers between her toes. Then they sing for her, a few hymns that she loved and a lullaby she used to sing Percy, and they cut the mooring on the boat and watch her sail away from them.
By then Percy is shaking, although he doesn't notice, shaking inside his chest, and he doesn't notice that he's crying, and Galahad's crying too, of course, because Galahad cries so easily when things go to God. Slowly they hold on to each other, and Percy makes a little wounded noise that shakes them both so hard they can't stand.
When the townspeople find them the next morning, they're clutched together on the riverbank like children.
Soon they go again, and now there's a horse for each of them. They stop for the night, and Percy draws Galahad close.
"She's not mad," Percy says. "I know people like to tell you she'd be mad if she knew how sad we are, but we're her boys, you know that and so do I. We're her boys, and she knows we're sad. She's just sorry she can't give us hugs to cheer us up. She knows we can't help bein' sad without her."
"Benedicte, Heliabel," Galahad says, and Percy rocks him. "Benedicte. Dona animo nostri pacem. Perciv--Percy--"
"I know. I know. It's okay."
The wound on Percy's leg is healed now, but there's a big white scar, and sometimes he walks with a limp. He and Galahad ride on and on, and they keep their Communion without her, and give the Host to their horses, and maybe if they stay clean and dry and bandaged right they'll heal too. Percy thinks--hopes--that maybe when they find the Grail, it will heal them up right. Or maybe like Jesus--the holes and cuts will still be there, but they won't hurt.
They go riding on and on, until one day they find the castle. By then they've healed themselves. They've had to. You can't hold off and leave everything raw and open until you find the doctor you think is right. Sometimes the hurts have to be fixed up sooner than that, or they'll never get well. Percy and Galahad sleep curled up close to each other, arms around each other, and in the morning they wake up stiff, stretch themselves out, wash in ice-cold streams that have to come from the mountains, because only mountain water is that cold. They laugh and sometimes they even wander a little in the mornings or evenings, looking for deer that come to their outstretched hands.
"We'll be all right," Percy says. "Just keep going till we find it."
"That's right," says Galahad softly. "We'll find it."
And then one day the castle is there in front of them, and they both know it. Percy's never told his secret to Galahad, but--he doesn't think he's the one who's supposed to find the Grail. Maybe he knows. Maybe he knows it's for Galahad. He smiles and hugs him like Heli would, and says,--
"You go on in. I'll wait for you, okay? I'll wait right out here for you."
He sits down outside with the horses and waits.
That's where Galahad finds him later, asleep, and Galahad shakes him gently.
"Percy. Percy, wake up."
"Huh?" He rubs sleep out of his eyes. "You're back! Was it--?"
"Yes. I have found it."
"I knew you would."
"The King who kept it is healed, and now--all will be well now, Percy? Isn't that so? And I've found where Heliabel is waiting for us. Do you see the river here, behind the castle?" He points, pulling Percy eagerly to show him. "The Grail told me. There's a little house twelve miles away--for each of the twelve apostles. It's a holy place. Her boat is on the shore there. She's waiting for us. I want--"
Suddenly his breath catches like it shouldn't, and Percy has a hand at his back quick. "Are you okay?"
"Please put me next to her? If you go back to Camelot, I don't want to be alone. I know it isn't pure of heart, I know, may God forgive me, but I don't want to be alone."
"You've got me," Percy says. "I'm sure not going anywhere."
"Not with me. I am going to God." Quietly he leans forward and kisses Percy's forehead, and then he dies.
Percy stands stiffly, like an old man with arthritis in his legs and back and body, and lifts Galahad up in his arms. He rests him as carefully as he can on the back of his horse, but Galahad won't stay still or put or dignified, so Percy gets up too and sits behind him, one arm around his waist to hold him, and the other on the reins. His horse and Galahad's behind him start off slow, following the river.
~~~
"Benedicte. Benedicte." The word sounds strange and lost and funny in Percy's mouth, but he sits between the two new graves and whispers it. There are flowers on both of them, and instead of headstones two new trees. A cherry for Heli and an apple tree for Galahad.
This is where they are after four years of searching.
It isn't a bad place. Percy's going to plough the field with the two horses and start corn and beans there. The house was full of little earthen jars filled with seeds that he recognised immediately. He tells himself God put them there, because He knew Percy would need them. It is the Grail's way of healing this new loss: with little earthen jars filled with things to gain. So he'll plant corn and beans and potatoes, some nice tomato plants (but in the house, because they need to be babied along at first). He'll put lettuces in a raised bed, along with carrots and onions and asparagus. He can do broccoli and cucumbers and squash in a small house garden, where the tomatoes will go, too, when they're ready. The wild woods around the house are full of fruit trees, peach and pear and apple and cherry. There are wild blueberry and raspberry and blackberry canes on the south side of the house.
He decides there should be an herb garden on the east side, with basil and parsley and oregano, with sage and rosemary. Pepper plants can go in a row along the front side, breaking for the door.
He'll keep it growing, growing. They'd like that. Heli would like it. She'd say it was just like him; and Galahad would admire it. Galahad would be glad it was something growing. He liked things that gave birth to new life. It eased the passing of the old lives.
Percy sits between the two graves.
"I have a secret to tell you. I don't really know how to tell, only I wanted to for a long time and didn't really ever do it, and now it's finally my chance, even though maybe it's too late. See, when Bors left me I found this house, and I was so cold and hungry and all that I went up and knocked. And there was this lady living there, and I don't really know--I really--I just."
He stirs the dirt.
"Maybe I shoulda known--I guess it's cheating to say that I--I--" Deep breath. It's okay to tell Heli and Galahad. They won't be angry, and they won't think he's been stupid. Heli will think he's silly, but he doesn't mind that. Galahad will tell him it's all right. Galahad will say God has forgiven him. "I really loved her. I dunno--I do know why. She was smart and funny and nice, and she had eyes that were all green like lettuce and she smiled so nice. She helped me plant Queen Anne's lace out behind her house, and we lived together for two years, we did, and I never touched her or anything. We grew our carrots and all. And then after two years she asked me could I just--since we'd been living together so long, and I loved her and she loved me, could we maybe just--sleep--together--just because it wasn't so bad, and people who loved each other did it, and it was okay. She said it was something you do when you really love someone, when you think they're beautiful, and I said okay. And then--then." It's okay, he reminds himself. They're listening. "She took off her clothes, you know, and I started to, and I was hanging my tunic up where my sword was and I saw my sword and it was glowing, and I touched it and it burned me, and I was real scared, so I--I crossed myself. And I guess I hadn't done it once in two years while I was with her. I just forgot. And when I crossed myself, all of a sudden she started screaming and screaming and everything was all dizzy and weird and shaky, and I guess I fainted, kind of."
His fingers sift through the dirt, and he breathes just as steadily as he has this whole time, but things aren't--really--the same.
"When I woke up, it was just me all by myself, and the house was gone and she was gone--she was gone. And I guess it shouldn't have mattered, because she wasn't--real, you know? She wasn't real. But I missed her so much. Our Queen Anne's lace was gone, and there wasn't anything, and I--I just didn't know what to do. And I was so--angry, I guess, so angry and mixed up and scared and all, and I got my sword out and I cut myself. That cut that you got so annoyed about, Heli. I did it because I thought then maybe I'd remember not to--not to do anything so dumb again. And later I thought it was dumb just to make the cut, 'cause it wouldn't heal up and I didn't think I'd ever forget what had happened. And the thing is--I think that's why I couldn't find the Grail, though. I think maybe that's even why I'm still alive. I mean, I'm not saying it's bad still to be alive, but--you were both so good. So I think maybe you get to go to Heaven sooner, that's all. Maybe I need to be better for a while longer, and learn better, so that I can be good enough to get to be with you--that's what I'm thinking maybe. Anyway, I'm gonna try real hard to be good."
Now he stands.
"And I'm gonna go start planting. But I'll come back all the time, to talk and spend time with you. I told you, I'm not going anywhere, and I'm not. Maybe we can have--picnics. In the fall. When all my things grow. Or maybe I can come by and read. So I'm gonna get started now, but I'll always be here, okay? I'll always be here. Thanks so much for listening. You prob'ly both think I'm really silly, that I was so scared to tell you all about my secret for so long. I feel a lot better now. I love you." His eyes are smiling; his mouth is quirked a little, uncertainly, but his eyes are smiling big and bright. "I love you."
Author: Soujin
Characters/Pairings: Peredur/Galahad/Heliabel
Rating: G
Archive: Yes.
Disclaimer: Copyright has presumably expired.
Summary: The Grailkids need each other.
When Percy finds Galahad and Heli again, he's smiling at them both, smiling with an impossible gladness. His eyes are smiling. The thing about Percy that's always so shocking is that the smile never leaves his eyes, no matter what, no matter how sad he is. In the middle of everything falling on everyone's heads, Percy will still be smiling at you with his big brown eyes, loving you and glad you're there. Even when the world's fallen on his head, it won't show up in his eyes, even if the rest of him is tired and limping.
Galahad and Heliabel are connected to him and to one another in a strange beautiful three-way catch of hands. Galahad came to court only a little while after Percy, and in their innocence and sweetness they liked to be around each other. Each of them liked the way the other one talked, walked, smiled, spoke. They went hunting together for deer but never shot them--got off their horses and held out their hands when they saw some. The deer came to them like unicorns to maidens.
Percy had his country way of talking and his habit of comparing things to vegetables. Galahad's voice and language was smooth and sometimes naive, and he cried even at killing dragons, though he killed them as a knight should. It was because of him that Percy started talking to them, carefully, just to see if they'd listen to him and go away without having to be stabbed. It was because of Percy that Galahad met Heli and fell in love with her as deeply as he loved her brother.
Heli and Percy had always been together until one morning she woke up and their mother told her Percy had left the forest. Heli had not wept--she had danced. Her brother had wanted his whole life to be a knight, to be honourable and brave and everything he imagined he was meant to be. She danced because he was going into his dream now, and it was wonderful. After their mother died, Heli left the forest and went looking for Percy. She missed his silliness, his smiling eyes, his love and bravery and she missed him. A wise fool, some knight from Camelot told her gravely. Her brother was a wise fool. He had gone away on the Grail quest some years ago.
So Heli went off to find him and she found Galahad instead. She became his page--that's what she called herself. She dressed in white and forest green and rode alongside him. They searched for two holy things, for the cup of Christ, and for her brother, Galahad's other love, the boy she hadn't seen for ten years and Galahad hadn't seen in three.
And then one day Percy found them again, and he was smiling.
"Percy! Goose!" Heli shouts, leaping down off the horse, giving her a pat on the nose to soothe her, and running toward him. He runs right back, although it's a stiff, painful run, and they crash together near the middle and fall down in a hug. "Percy! Where you been? We been lookin' everywhere!"
He holds on tight, tight, tight, eyes lit up with pleasure. "I been looking for you."
Then Galahad adds himself to the pile, his white tunic splashed with mud from the ground and rust, blood, and dirt from Percy's worn clothes. "Benedicte, Percy," he whispers, his fingers wandering over Percy's cheeks with reverent joy.
"Hi," Percy says.
"You've been away so long."
"I know. I'm sorry."
Heli helps her boys sit up, laughs at them both, pets Percy. "Are you all right?"
"I'm okay."
Galahad, perhaps because he's known Percy years when Heli hasn't, notices what's wrong. "You've hurt yourself. Let us see. We'll do something and fix it."
Percy rolls down his linen hose, then, although they're so torn they hardly need that to show the wound. It's a long cut on his thigh, made with a dagger or small sword, badly healed, sticky and swelling, the wrong colours around the edges.
"What've you gone an' done?" Heli asks, making a face.
"I got myself cut. I didn't mean to."
"It's all right. I'll do it up again. You're such a goose," she adds over her shoulder as she trots over to the horses to retrieve supplies from the saddlebags. "You can't just let cuts sit out. They go bad."
"I won't do it again."
"You better not!" mock-angry.
Meanwhile Galahad is looking at the wound tenderly, his eyes sorrowing, Percy knows, just because he hates to see other creatures hurt. "Does it pain you very much?"
"Oh, no. I got used to it. It's kind of annoying when I'm walking around, but you stop minding after a while."
"Your horse--"
"She got shot. There were a bunch of other knights, and they kind of jumped me, and then you came--"
Galahad's face lights up. "That was me! They were hurting you, and I defeated them, and then I left because I didn't want to shame you."
"Silly!" laughing. "I didn't mind. I was real glad you came. Anyway, my horse died, so I ended up walking, and then there was this lion, and for a minute I was real scared, I thought sure he was gonna jump on me and eat me up, and then I saw he was getting squeezed by a snake, so I killed the snake," he says hurriedly, passing over it for Galahad's sake, "and the lion was all purring and happy and stuff, so I went along with him for a bit, and he was awful good to have. Kept me warm, and we got out of a lot of scrapes together, but then I found Bors for a while, and the lion went home. I don't think he liked Bors. But then Bors thought he knew this good place to go, and I was gonna follow him, but some--anyway, some stuff happened, and I ended up getting a little stuck for a couple of years. Then I went looking for you guys, and I found you, and I'm real glad, too."
"We missed you. Heliabel was looking for you, but she found me instead, and she asked to be my page. I didn't want her to be, because it's not right for a lady," Galahad says earnestly. "But she wanted to very much, and she insisted, and she said she would follow me whether or not I agreed. She came with me, and I went on with my Grail Quest, and I am sure I'm coming upon the right place. We will all be able to travel together now, won't we? It will be the three of us."
"'Course it will."
Softly, "She's very beautiful."
"Heli?" Percy smiles. "I know. She likes you."
At that moment, however, she returns with bandages and salve, and plunks herself down beside him. "Hones'ly. Lessee, we'll clean it first. You got dirt in it."
"Plants like the dirt just fine," he protests.
"Well, your leg's not a plant, is it? Here, I'm goin' to wipe it off, so if you want ta bite a stick--"
"I'll be okay."
So she swipes the white sleeve of her dress quick and hard across the wound, taking away blood, dirt, and scab, and leaving the hurt raw. Before it has time to bleed she covers it in the salve, and then begins wrapping the bandage around it. It can't be too tight, it can't be too loose. Galahad watches closely, and it's funny, because you can see in him all sorts of things, relief that it covers up so easily, admiration of Heli's quick firm hands, a studious interest in how things are healed, a beautiful innocence that shines because even though he knows the healing is uncertain and never always true, he's still sure that it's going to work. Maybe he's sure just because it's Heli doing the doctoring and Percy she's fixing up.
"There! That's good. Now we'll just let it be for a while. Don't pick it."
"I won't. I don't pick."
"Well, you use' ta. All the time. Ma didn't like it."
Percy sticks out his tongue.
Later that night, when they've built a little fire that by then is dying, and the three of them sit around it, leaning together, Percy in the middle because they've missed him so much that they both need to feel him and be sure he's there, somebody yawns and somebody laughs, sleepily. Somebody holds hands with somebody else, and in the end they lie curled up together, someone's head on someone's lap and someone's arm tucked around someone else, and all of them warm and safe. They sleep so deeply that they don't wake until late morning, so deeply that none of them dream. Heli stirs first, and kisses Percy's cheek.
"Wake up, sleepyhead." He rolls over into Galahad's arms and groans, and she sits back on her heels to watch them both and laugh. "Goose."
They're beautiful together, and it could be the hard part. If she didn't love them both so much, if she didn't believe in them both so much, if she weren't so ready to take them both, maybe she'd be sad. Maybe she is a little sad, but not for that reason. She loves Galahad, and has since she first met him. Galahad loves her. Heli's practical, and she doesn't deny that fact. His every look shows it. And Heli--it makes her go warm and soft inside every time he talks to her, and she'd be his page or his servant, but not his slave. She respects herself, too. You can't really love somebody right if you don't respect yourself too. So they love each other. Then Percy loves him, too, and you can see that easy. Percy's so happy around him, and she can tell something happened while Percy was away, something that has to do with that long, awful cut, but now that they're all together again the raggedness is almost gone. She knows Percy--she knows it'll always be there, whatever happened. He won't forget, and it's made his face change, and that won't go back the way it was. But here, with Galahad (and with her), the change softens and he's happy. He loves it when Galahad touches him, but in such a silly Percy way that maybe he doesn't really realise.
Or maybe, she thinks, he knows perfectly well, but he just does things different, being Percy. He loves differently. Anyway he loves Galahad, and Galahad loves him right back. It's almost like brothers, especially because they're both so rolled up in that purity that she hardly noticed in Galahad because she was so used to it in Percy. They both do that thing where they blush and their ears go red if anybody mentions what maids and men do together. But it's not like brothers, not quite, even if they wouldn't dream of doing what maids and men do together.
And she loves Percy, and he loves her, and it's all right. You might think she'd get left out of it, or Percy would, but somehow they make it work the three of them. They all love each other, and it works out. She isn't afraid to love Galahad when Percy loves him, and doesn't mind it if they both love him together. It's safer. If there's only two, there's nobody to fall back on if one goes. Three's a better number. If she were to die, Percy and Galahad would have each other; if Galahad were to die, she and Percy could hold together tight when it hurt the most. If Percy died--if they lost Percy again so soon after they'd found him, she'd go with Galahad to the end of the world and they wouldn't have to be alone.
So it's all right. It's better like this, even.
But it's time to get up, so she pokes him again. "Percy. C'mon, Percy, both of you lumps. We got ta get up and get going."
~~~
Percy's never kept a secret from his sister or his mother or anybody before, just because he's never had anything that needs to be a secret. His quests and his family and his vegetables and his friendship with Galahad and worship of King Arthur--none of it ever needed hiding. Nothing ever has.
So this new secret is strange to him, uncertain under his fingers. It wobbles like cluster of frogs' eggs in his hands. He wants to tell--he doesn't want to tell. He needs Heli to hug him--he doesn't want her to know. He wishes Galahad would bless him and tell him he hasn't sinned--he can't ask for that. It's all upside down and shaky, and he just doesn't know what he should do with it. A secret. What should he do with a secret?
Maybe it will go away--that makes sense. Sometimes things just go away if you leave them alone, the way briar scratches heal up. Sometimes things will grow in and get ordinary, like grafts in apple trees.
He does try, he leaves it, he goes with Galahad and Heli and is heart-in-his-mouth happy, like he's always tasting the joy that's bubbled up inside him. They're his family that's more than a family, his warm and his happy and the people he loves. He'll be all right with them, anyway. Maybe the last two years will fade away and stop mattering, now that he's back with them, now that he's with the right love and Galahad's holy smile and Heli's flat made-in-the-middle-of-the-woods Host that doesn't have any taste but fills him up always. On Sundays they have Communion wherever they are, and Heli, who doesn't believe the Bible that animals don't have souls, gives Host to their horses as well. Percy still hasn't got one, so he rides with Heli, arms around her waist, like he was a baby again and clinging to her while she carried him across the stream. He used to be afraid of the stream by their home in the woods, but Heli always carried him across. Now he holds on and imagines she's carrying him across the current of his secret, to the other side where she and Galahad are waiting for him.
But then Heli dies.
The choice of telling her his secret is gone. Heli is gone. She saves a whole town with her blood, healing the funny zigzaggy scars that are left by the sick lady and all the people who have suffered with her. Now the lady isn't sick, and the town's children aren't in danger, and it seems like the river that flows through everything, the bridge over it leading into the town, is clearer and brighter and--
Heli is gone. Percy and Galahad quietly wrap her in white cloth and put her in the boat she asked for. She promised them she'd be waiting for them later, somewhere she was meant to be buried. She promised them they'd find her just like always. Galahad touches Percy's shoulder and asks if they should do something besides the white cloth. Heli needs more colour, and they both know it.
They look for her favourite flowers. Galahad comes back with arms full of goldenrod, as much as he could find and dig up; and Percy's filled up his tunic with the fuzzy blue ones she likes, the one that look like millions of little poofs at the ends of their stems. They arrange them all around her in the boat, putting them in her hands and in her hair and around her feet, because she liked having flowers between her toes. Then they sing for her, a few hymns that she loved and a lullaby she used to sing Percy, and they cut the mooring on the boat and watch her sail away from them.
By then Percy is shaking, although he doesn't notice, shaking inside his chest, and he doesn't notice that he's crying, and Galahad's crying too, of course, because Galahad cries so easily when things go to God. Slowly they hold on to each other, and Percy makes a little wounded noise that shakes them both so hard they can't stand.
When the townspeople find them the next morning, they're clutched together on the riverbank like children.
Soon they go again, and now there's a horse for each of them. They stop for the night, and Percy draws Galahad close.
"She's not mad," Percy says. "I know people like to tell you she'd be mad if she knew how sad we are, but we're her boys, you know that and so do I. We're her boys, and she knows we're sad. She's just sorry she can't give us hugs to cheer us up. She knows we can't help bein' sad without her."
"Benedicte, Heliabel," Galahad says, and Percy rocks him. "Benedicte. Dona animo nostri pacem. Perciv--Percy--"
"I know. I know. It's okay."
The wound on Percy's leg is healed now, but there's a big white scar, and sometimes he walks with a limp. He and Galahad ride on and on, and they keep their Communion without her, and give the Host to their horses, and maybe if they stay clean and dry and bandaged right they'll heal too. Percy thinks--hopes--that maybe when they find the Grail, it will heal them up right. Or maybe like Jesus--the holes and cuts will still be there, but they won't hurt.
They go riding on and on, until one day they find the castle. By then they've healed themselves. They've had to. You can't hold off and leave everything raw and open until you find the doctor you think is right. Sometimes the hurts have to be fixed up sooner than that, or they'll never get well. Percy and Galahad sleep curled up close to each other, arms around each other, and in the morning they wake up stiff, stretch themselves out, wash in ice-cold streams that have to come from the mountains, because only mountain water is that cold. They laugh and sometimes they even wander a little in the mornings or evenings, looking for deer that come to their outstretched hands.
"We'll be all right," Percy says. "Just keep going till we find it."
"That's right," says Galahad softly. "We'll find it."
And then one day the castle is there in front of them, and they both know it. Percy's never told his secret to Galahad, but--he doesn't think he's the one who's supposed to find the Grail. Maybe he knows. Maybe he knows it's for Galahad. He smiles and hugs him like Heli would, and says,--
"You go on in. I'll wait for you, okay? I'll wait right out here for you."
He sits down outside with the horses and waits.
That's where Galahad finds him later, asleep, and Galahad shakes him gently.
"Percy. Percy, wake up."
"Huh?" He rubs sleep out of his eyes. "You're back! Was it--?"
"Yes. I have found it."
"I knew you would."
"The King who kept it is healed, and now--all will be well now, Percy? Isn't that so? And I've found where Heliabel is waiting for us. Do you see the river here, behind the castle?" He points, pulling Percy eagerly to show him. "The Grail told me. There's a little house twelve miles away--for each of the twelve apostles. It's a holy place. Her boat is on the shore there. She's waiting for us. I want--"
Suddenly his breath catches like it shouldn't, and Percy has a hand at his back quick. "Are you okay?"
"Please put me next to her? If you go back to Camelot, I don't want to be alone. I know it isn't pure of heart, I know, may God forgive me, but I don't want to be alone."
"You've got me," Percy says. "I'm sure not going anywhere."
"Not with me. I am going to God." Quietly he leans forward and kisses Percy's forehead, and then he dies.
Percy stands stiffly, like an old man with arthritis in his legs and back and body, and lifts Galahad up in his arms. He rests him as carefully as he can on the back of his horse, but Galahad won't stay still or put or dignified, so Percy gets up too and sits behind him, one arm around his waist to hold him, and the other on the reins. His horse and Galahad's behind him start off slow, following the river.
~~~
"Benedicte. Benedicte." The word sounds strange and lost and funny in Percy's mouth, but he sits between the two new graves and whispers it. There are flowers on both of them, and instead of headstones two new trees. A cherry for Heli and an apple tree for Galahad.
This is where they are after four years of searching.
It isn't a bad place. Percy's going to plough the field with the two horses and start corn and beans there. The house was full of little earthen jars filled with seeds that he recognised immediately. He tells himself God put them there, because He knew Percy would need them. It is the Grail's way of healing this new loss: with little earthen jars filled with things to gain. So he'll plant corn and beans and potatoes, some nice tomato plants (but in the house, because they need to be babied along at first). He'll put lettuces in a raised bed, along with carrots and onions and asparagus. He can do broccoli and cucumbers and squash in a small house garden, where the tomatoes will go, too, when they're ready. The wild woods around the house are full of fruit trees, peach and pear and apple and cherry. There are wild blueberry and raspberry and blackberry canes on the south side of the house.
He decides there should be an herb garden on the east side, with basil and parsley and oregano, with sage and rosemary. Pepper plants can go in a row along the front side, breaking for the door.
He'll keep it growing, growing. They'd like that. Heli would like it. She'd say it was just like him; and Galahad would admire it. Galahad would be glad it was something growing. He liked things that gave birth to new life. It eased the passing of the old lives.
Percy sits between the two graves.
"I have a secret to tell you. I don't really know how to tell, only I wanted to for a long time and didn't really ever do it, and now it's finally my chance, even though maybe it's too late. See, when Bors left me I found this house, and I was so cold and hungry and all that I went up and knocked. And there was this lady living there, and I don't really know--I really--I just."
He stirs the dirt.
"Maybe I shoulda known--I guess it's cheating to say that I--I--" Deep breath. It's okay to tell Heli and Galahad. They won't be angry, and they won't think he's been stupid. Heli will think he's silly, but he doesn't mind that. Galahad will tell him it's all right. Galahad will say God has forgiven him. "I really loved her. I dunno--I do know why. She was smart and funny and nice, and she had eyes that were all green like lettuce and she smiled so nice. She helped me plant Queen Anne's lace out behind her house, and we lived together for two years, we did, and I never touched her or anything. We grew our carrots and all. And then after two years she asked me could I just--since we'd been living together so long, and I loved her and she loved me, could we maybe just--sleep--together--just because it wasn't so bad, and people who loved each other did it, and it was okay. She said it was something you do when you really love someone, when you think they're beautiful, and I said okay. And then--then." It's okay, he reminds himself. They're listening. "She took off her clothes, you know, and I started to, and I was hanging my tunic up where my sword was and I saw my sword and it was glowing, and I touched it and it burned me, and I was real scared, so I--I crossed myself. And I guess I hadn't done it once in two years while I was with her. I just forgot. And when I crossed myself, all of a sudden she started screaming and screaming and everything was all dizzy and weird and shaky, and I guess I fainted, kind of."
His fingers sift through the dirt, and he breathes just as steadily as he has this whole time, but things aren't--really--the same.
"When I woke up, it was just me all by myself, and the house was gone and she was gone--she was gone. And I guess it shouldn't have mattered, because she wasn't--real, you know? She wasn't real. But I missed her so much. Our Queen Anne's lace was gone, and there wasn't anything, and I--I just didn't know what to do. And I was so--angry, I guess, so angry and mixed up and scared and all, and I got my sword out and I cut myself. That cut that you got so annoyed about, Heli. I did it because I thought then maybe I'd remember not to--not to do anything so dumb again. And later I thought it was dumb just to make the cut, 'cause it wouldn't heal up and I didn't think I'd ever forget what had happened. And the thing is--I think that's why I couldn't find the Grail, though. I think maybe that's even why I'm still alive. I mean, I'm not saying it's bad still to be alive, but--you were both so good. So I think maybe you get to go to Heaven sooner, that's all. Maybe I need to be better for a while longer, and learn better, so that I can be good enough to get to be with you--that's what I'm thinking maybe. Anyway, I'm gonna try real hard to be good."
Now he stands.
"And I'm gonna go start planting. But I'll come back all the time, to talk and spend time with you. I told you, I'm not going anywhere, and I'm not. Maybe we can have--picnics. In the fall. When all my things grow. Or maybe I can come by and read. So I'm gonna get started now, but I'll always be here, okay? I'll always be here. Thanks so much for listening. You prob'ly both think I'm really silly, that I was so scared to tell you all about my secret for so long. I feel a lot better now. I love you." His eyes are smiling; his mouth is quirked a little, uncertainly, but his eyes are smiling big and bright. "I love you."