[snapshot]

[illgotten]

It's like a cloud lifting. His face still shows signs of the strain that's present in his stance, his movements; but in a different, less grim light.

And he walks a different way this afternoon, up the path that leads past Melehan's cabin and eventually, by a roundabout way, to the Mansion; the way Cywyllog so often walks.

typist: yes, this

Comments

[littlebetter]

"--Mordred."

(He's still wet, although he's had time to wring out his clothes; but still wet and he ought to be shivering but he's not, he's a little too sharp.)

[illgotten]

"Who else?" He's still a little shaky and defensive, having left Cywyllog further up the path. "What in God's name have you been doing with yourself, you'll freeze."

[littlebetter]

Gaheris ignores this. "The Lady told me--damn you, why didn't you tell me? I trusted you."

[illgotten]

"Do I have to run messages between everybody around here? It's her business. She only just told me, if you hadn't noticed, I'm not exactly her confidant."

[littlebetter]

And that shocks him again. "She didn't say she'd told you. I thought you knew."

[illgotten]

"The husband is always the last to know," sourly. "I could have figured it would happen, as soon as he got home, but I thought I could patch it, I thought we were adults around here--"

[littlebetter]

"What the hell are you talking about?"

[illgotten]

"Cywyllog and her damned-- what did you think I was talking about?"

[littlebetter]

"Uncle. What happened after I died."

[illgotten]

It stops him; the color leaves his face as it sinks in. He stares at Gaheris a moment with widened eyes, and then his face shutters, goes hard and unforgiving. "Helpful of her."

[littlebetter]

"Why in hell didn't you tell me? I told you. I told you."

[illgotten]

"I should have just dropped it into the conversation over breakfast, I suppose."

[littlebetter]

"Don't start with me. Maybe you could've told me one of those times you were telling me I was dead, or behaving so understanding about Mother. Made me feel as though I were all right and you could condescend not to hate, even if I had done something so horrible I didn't know how to--you didn't tell me you'd done it too." He flushes.

[illgotten]

"Did you one better, in fact, didn't I? Patricide and regicide, very neat. And all this time you could have been feeling superior to someone." Mordred moves to push past him.

[littlebetter]

He catches hold of Mordred's shoulder, not really strong enough to hold him but trying. "Hell with you. Tell me what happened. I don't want half-truths and finding things out from your wife, having people explain to me ever so gently that my brother's a murderer. Tell me what happened."

[illgotten]

Mordred shoves him off with a strangled sound, rounds on him with all his bitter composure gone. "They killed you! God damn you to hell, you hear me? you trusted Arthur and you trusted Lancelot, and he left you in pieces. Then he was sorry, oh yes, that got through to him, that sent him off to the fucking Continent and left me there, but it didn't get me my brothers back. There was nothing left, not Mother, not any of you, and I knew then I'd never get Gawain back either, because Arthur needed him then, he needed both of us then. Kill all my family with his fucking favouritism and then ask me to patch up the mess -- you're damned right I killed him. It wasn't right and it wasn't fair. Nothing was ever fair. Nothing fixes it, nothing!"

He breaks off, shaking, breathing in hard gasps.