TM #169: Fragile
They wouldn't open, of course. So Agravain, with his usual subtlety, broke down the door. From time to time I can still hear the crash, echoing in my bones.
It's been maybe a fortnight since then. I was out of things awhile -- thank you, Lancelot, careless sod, in too damned much of a hurry to finish me off decently. May you live just long enough to regret it.
They saw I'd mend finally, and let me up, but it does no good. The whole court is like a sickroom, steeped in the same anxious hush. I'd like to break a few doors myself, just to relieve the tension. But I'm not the man my brother was, and anyway I'm already in disgrace. Nobody likes a tale-bearer, you see.
I had it from my brothers almost first of all. Little Gareth, half in tears, asking what Lancelot had ever done to me -- "Besides put this bloody great hole in me?"
"You know what I mean, damn you."
"Damn yourself. I can't believe you're weeping for that arrogant ass and not for your brother."
"Shut up." Gareth looks at me with eyes clear and heartbroken as a child's. "It's both."
Later comes Gaheris, angry, resentful: "Well, you've got what you asked for. If the two of you hadn't gone stirring up trouble--"
"Christ, Gaheris. The trouble was there. It wasn't going to go away!"
"You could have left well enough alone."
"Well enough?" God, I hate him when he's like this, all self-righteous petulance. "You listen to me, little brother. That affair was a fester. It stank. It bid fair to cripple us all and it may yet. Because our uncle, God save him, didn't want to deal with it."
"It was his to do. Not yours."
"And that stopped you, didn't it, the last time it was a question of sordid affairs?"
I didn't have to say that. Gaheris goes white. Then the color rushes back to his face all at once like the memory of Mother's blood, and he strikes down my hand and walks out. Flees. In my mind I hear again the sound of shattering.
* * *
Last comes Gawain, after a space. As if, without knowing it, they're leaving room for Agravain to have his say. He would have, too; he'd have cursed my interference, found some way to blame me for the whole disaster. I know my brothers.
Instead there's only Gawain, with that look in his eyes like a worried dog.
"Now comes the lecture," I say.
But he only sinks into a chair, with a quiet sigh. "I don't think you need one. Do you?"
"Not especially."
"Why'd you go?"
It's like Gawain to put that question, the one thing that no one else bothered to ask. "To keep it from turning into a bloodbath, what do you think?" It hurts to laugh. "I didn't reckon on friend Lancelot's temper. You'd almost think he had a guilty conscience."
He says nothing.
"Five men. Five men dead, for God's sake -- most of them fools, but they were honest fools. They didn't deserve this."
"They aren't the only ones."
"Oh, damn it, don't you defend him too!" Somehow that's more bitter than all the rest. If I bore him any active grudge, it was for Gawain's sake; Gawain, who's his equal and better, and too decent to be jealous. Gawain, dismissed as a good-natured dolt by the same people who fawned over that self-righteous--
"No," he says, soberly. "I don't. I'm thinking of Guinevere."
That, too, is like him. I'd half forgotten her, though she brought us to this as surely as her lover did, he and my damned fool brother. I didn't see her, just a flash of ruddy hair in the confusion. She only cried out the once, half-heard, amid the splintering of timber. Say that for my lady aunt; whatever else she is, she has nerve.
"The hell with her," I say.
"Mordred!"
"No." Again and again that crash. I've begun to shake with it. "It's started and it may as well finish. I can't care, I can't make excuses. Can't. Someone has to be hard."
"Hard? She'll burn, brother."
"When she's dead, I'll pity her."
Gawain stands. He knows as well as I do; I don't need to read him lessons in justice. But he's a simple soul. He doesn't see what I see: that if she'd hardened her heart either to Lancelot or to shame, if Arthur had been hard on either of them, if someone had done the presumptuous, discourteous thing and forced him to it before this -- if anyone had brought themselves to be half as callous as you think me now, brother, we'd be better off. The walls are falling down about our ears. I will save what I can, if I break my own heart in doing it.
His stricken eyes meet mine. I don't flinch. Can't. "She knew what she was doing," I say.
After a moment he looks away. His face is still troubled. He doesn't agree with me, that look says, doesn't hear what I'm trying to tell him, but he isn't going to pursue it. He trusts me, as he always has.
"I have to go," he says.
"All right. Shut the door, will you?"
Gawain hesitates, leans down to hug me briefly, the one proof we both understand. Then he goes out. Behind him the door closes gently.
Mordred
Arthurian legend
942 words
It's been maybe a fortnight since then. I was out of things awhile -- thank you, Lancelot, careless sod, in too damned much of a hurry to finish me off decently. May you live just long enough to regret it.
They saw I'd mend finally, and let me up, but it does no good. The whole court is like a sickroom, steeped in the same anxious hush. I'd like to break a few doors myself, just to relieve the tension. But I'm not the man my brother was, and anyway I'm already in disgrace. Nobody likes a tale-bearer, you see.
I had it from my brothers almost first of all. Little Gareth, half in tears, asking what Lancelot had ever done to me -- "Besides put this bloody great hole in me?"
"You know what I mean, damn you."
"Damn yourself. I can't believe you're weeping for that arrogant ass and not for your brother."
"Shut up." Gareth looks at me with eyes clear and heartbroken as a child's. "It's both."
Later comes Gaheris, angry, resentful: "Well, you've got what you asked for. If the two of you hadn't gone stirring up trouble--"
"Christ, Gaheris. The trouble was there. It wasn't going to go away!"
"You could have left well enough alone."
"Well enough?" God, I hate him when he's like this, all self-righteous petulance. "You listen to me, little brother. That affair was a fester. It stank. It bid fair to cripple us all and it may yet. Because our uncle, God save him, didn't want to deal with it."
"It was his to do. Not yours."
"And that stopped you, didn't it, the last time it was a question of sordid affairs?"
I didn't have to say that. Gaheris goes white. Then the color rushes back to his face all at once like the memory of Mother's blood, and he strikes down my hand and walks out. Flees. In my mind I hear again the sound of shattering.
* * *
Last comes Gawain, after a space. As if, without knowing it, they're leaving room for Agravain to have his say. He would have, too; he'd have cursed my interference, found some way to blame me for the whole disaster. I know my brothers.
Instead there's only Gawain, with that look in his eyes like a worried dog.
"Now comes the lecture," I say.
But he only sinks into a chair, with a quiet sigh. "I don't think you need one. Do you?"
"Not especially."
"Why'd you go?"
It's like Gawain to put that question, the one thing that no one else bothered to ask. "To keep it from turning into a bloodbath, what do you think?" It hurts to laugh. "I didn't reckon on friend Lancelot's temper. You'd almost think he had a guilty conscience."
He says nothing.
"Five men. Five men dead, for God's sake -- most of them fools, but they were honest fools. They didn't deserve this."
"They aren't the only ones."
"Oh, damn it, don't you defend him too!" Somehow that's more bitter than all the rest. If I bore him any active grudge, it was for Gawain's sake; Gawain, who's his equal and better, and too decent to be jealous. Gawain, dismissed as a good-natured dolt by the same people who fawned over that self-righteous--
"No," he says, soberly. "I don't. I'm thinking of Guinevere."
That, too, is like him. I'd half forgotten her, though she brought us to this as surely as her lover did, he and my damned fool brother. I didn't see her, just a flash of ruddy hair in the confusion. She only cried out the once, half-heard, amid the splintering of timber. Say that for my lady aunt; whatever else she is, she has nerve.
"The hell with her," I say.
"Mordred!"
"No." Again and again that crash. I've begun to shake with it. "It's started and it may as well finish. I can't care, I can't make excuses. Can't. Someone has to be hard."
"Hard? She'll burn, brother."
"When she's dead, I'll pity her."
Gawain stands. He knows as well as I do; I don't need to read him lessons in justice. But he's a simple soul. He doesn't see what I see: that if she'd hardened her heart either to Lancelot or to shame, if Arthur had been hard on either of them, if someone had done the presumptuous, discourteous thing and forced him to it before this -- if anyone had brought themselves to be half as callous as you think me now, brother, we'd be better off. The walls are falling down about our ears. I will save what I can, if I break my own heart in doing it.
His stricken eyes meet mine. I don't flinch. Can't. "She knew what she was doing," I say.
After a moment he looks away. His face is still troubled. He doesn't agree with me, that look says, doesn't hear what I'm trying to tell him, but he isn't going to pursue it. He trusts me, as he always has.
"I have to go," he says.
"All right. Shut the door, will you?"
Gawain hesitates, leans down to hug me briefly, the one proof we both understand. Then he goes out. Behind him the door closes gently.
Mordred
Arthurian legend
942 words