Six Swans: A Frakked-Up Fairy Tale
Title: Six Swans (3/3)
Author: innibis
Rating: R
Word Count: 7,792
Pairing: Kara/Lee, Karl/Sharon
Genre: Completely AU
Disclaimer: I am not RDM. Nor am I a brother of the Grimms.
A/N: Many thanks to my beta, workerbee73, smoother of ruffled feathers.
Part I
Part II
In the months that followed, Karl noticed that there were moments, hour stretches, where he could almost believe that things were good; where he didn’t think about his daughter or the fact that he and his wife were exiled from both of their countries or that his sister-in-law wouldn’t speak and was struggling with a mission known only to herself or that Lee was playing a dangerous game with a willfully blind enemy. Sometimes. Times when Sharon would smile at him over dinner or he watched her laughing as she sparred with her sister on the beach. Times when he saw Kara standing perfectly still along the bank of the river, lip caught between her teeth and roughly hewn spear upraised as she stalked the fat fish or when she'd punch Lee in the shoulder for telling a bad joke, fighting down a smile. Times when he and Lee would be sent out to the garden to do their fair share of the weeding and grumble about the women in their lives or when he'd see his cousin just looking at Kara, as if she were the answer to every prayer he would never make.
But as the mild winter turned to warm spring, and then to hot summer, he couldn’t avoid thinking about what his baby would look like, how she wouldn't know who he was or recognize Sharon. He couldn't help but notice Kara's increasing frustration at not being able to speak to her sister or her lover. And Lee. Karl found himself apologizing every damn day to the memory of Zak for letting Lee get to the point where even Kara dragging him away and into her cave didn't erase all of the starkness in his eyes. He smiled so rarely.
Still, life went on, as it was wont to do and they planted and hunted and practiced with their swords for the inevitable day when they were discovered, and he and Sharon wrapped themselves around each other every night in their bed, not talking about Hera, while Kara sat up, slowly sewing ugly shirts made from flowers and, miles away, Lee paced the floors in thought.
* * *
"I don’t have a choice," Lee said stubbornly, and Kara felt a sense of déjà vu as the cousins squared off again. She and Sharon had walked into the cabin from their hunting expedition and smack into the middle of this one, so she had no idea what was going on. She did know that she hadn’t seen Lee in a couple of weeks and that she'd like to at least kiss him before Karl beat him up.
"There is always a choice! Why don't you repeat what you just told me to Kara?" Karl asked nastily and Kara's well honed sense of foreboding kicked in. She moved to stand in front of Lee, who's aggravatingly calm expression flickered a little in the face of her tight lips and folded arms.
"I have to move back to the capital," Lee said flatly. "I won’t be around as often-" He faltered as the anger and hurt that Kara didn’t have the inclination to hide filled her eyes. He stepped in close, speaking quickly and quietly. "Kara, you know if there was any other way I wouldn't. You know that I'd never leave if I didn’t have to-at least, not until you kicked me out because you were so sick of me,” he said with a small smile that faded as he continued. “But people are disappearing and I can’t get my hands around what is happening from far away and I know that it's the queen and my father won’t stand up to her and-" he pressed his hands hard into his tired face, "There's no one else," he finished with bleak certainty. And he was probably right.
Kara looked over to where Sharon was looking at her sympathetically and Karl was staring at Lee with an expression of abject misery and helplessness. This was Lee. They all knew that there was nothing else to be said on the matter. She took Lee by the elbow and guided him toward the door, stopping long enough for Karl to hug him fiercely and whisper something in his ear that made Lee shake his head and smile sadly. Sharon took both of Lee's hands in her own and kissed his cheek.
"I'll be back," he said to the unhappy couple standing in front of him. "I'll find out what's going on, and I'll find out more about Hera and I'll come back," and he followed Kara as she tugged him out into the dusk.
* * *
Lee lay in Kara's bed with Kara sprawled half on top of him. He breathed in deeply, taking in the smell of her skin and the salt in the air. Everything felt so . . . final. He ran a hand up and down her smooth back, trying to memorize the feel of her against him. She stirred and he pulled her even closer, willing himself not to notice how late it truly was, how he had to leave soon so as to not arouse suspicion. The night was warm and sultry, and only the reflection of the moon off the water illuminated their tangled limbs. Pieces of time were all they had. Fragmented moments grabbed greedily and clung to in memory to keep him strong, keep him fighting, to keep him from drowning in the storm. And suddenly Lee wanted more than stolen hours and absconded minutes. He at least wanted Kara to know that, while he had always had something that he would die for, with her in his arms he now also had a reason to live.
"Kara," he spoke softly, the hushed words barely rising over the rush of the sea. She raised her drowsy head to rest a chin on his chest, looking at him with sad eyes and Lee realized that she had been waiting for the moment that always came, where he would tell her he had to go, had to leave her alone in a cave again. Lee traced his fingers lightly down her face. He never had wanted to put that look on her face and in that moment, he nearly backed out so as not to add to her burden. There were some words though that he needed to be say out loud in order to give them power.
"I love you."
Her breath caught and she looked as though she might speak, so Lee gently put his hand over mouth. Whatever journey Kara was on, it demanded silence and he would not let her stumble if he could help it. She kissed his palm and he removed it, sliding his hand into the heaviness of her hair. "I love you," he repeated and she closed her eyes, a heat-breaking smile spreading across her face. Lee wriggled so that he was lying fully underneath her and she stared down at him. "I love you," he insisted.
Kara kissed him softly, lips playing against his, before pulling back to tug the ring she always wore off her thumb. She sat up, sitting cross legged at the end of the bed and contemplated him gravely, figuring out a puzzle, before she abruptly crawled down onto the throw rug. "What are you doing?" Lee asked, bemused as she pushed at his shoulder until he sat up and swung his feet to the ground. She shuffled until she was kneeling between his thighs. She held up her thumb ring to eye level and placed her other hand over her heart, staring at him intently.
Lee's mouth went dry. He didn’t know what to say. Didn't know if it was real. She moved her hand from her heart to lightly touch his forehead, his lips and the center of his chest, a gesture he recognized from her morning prayers, before she took his left hand and slid her ring onto his finger. Kara tilted her head and smiled hopefully, at him and he saw that she was staking her own claim at a life. And, as he was learning more and more with this remarkable woman, there were other times when words were superfluous. He laced his fingers with hers, and gently touched her forehead, her lips and her chest and the leant in and traced the same path with his lips, pressing kisses reverently.
Kara pulled his head up and grinned, nodding exaggeratedly with both eyebrows raised. Lee laughed and hauled her in and up onto his lap. And suddenly it didn’t matter, not the logistics, not the distance, not the in-laws, not even the fact that he was leaving soon and wouldn't be back for some time. "Yes," he said as her arms encircled his neck and tears unexpectedly stung his eyes. "Yes, I'll marry you."
In the end, despite the danger, he stayed until dawn, finding it oddly comforting to see her standing in the mouth of the cave as the sun made its way into the sky as he took one last long look at her before crossing the border to Galactica.
* * *
At Sharon's insistence, two years to the day after Kara had first swung a sword at Lee, they were married on their beach by the same unflappable priest who had married Karl and Sharon. It was a surreal experience for Kara, her fiancé having run out of the trees about fifteen minutes after they were supposed to start, panting and apologizing, but at least alive and safe and holding her hand. She had been unable to do anything but nod and touch Lee in response to his vows and declarations, which left her nearly ill with anxiety that it might not be real when it wasn't spoken out loud. But Lee was real. The sweat still running down his face despite the coolness of the day was real, salty and slippery against her lips as she went through the ritual of kissing his forehead and both cheeks. The stunned happiness in his eyes was real as the priest declared them bound. The love in her heart was real. So real. And blazing. And burning her up from the inside out.
Karl and Sharon offered their congratulations and took the priest with them to their cabin for lunch, leaving the newly wed couple standing alone on the sand, hands clasped. Kara tugged Lee in and put her arms around his waist, bowing her neck to rest her forehead against his chest. His fingers untangled from hers to stroke down her hair, over her ears and shoulders, skimming down her back and then up over and over again. She waited for the words, his unending litanies of good-byes that should have warned them both off, but instead had brought them together. Kara forcibly pushed that thought aside. It was well traveled territory and something she and Lee had both decided to deal with. This marriage was the only thing in their lives that was just for them and she would protect it as fiercely she guarded her silence.
* * *
Viper galloped through the trees, the whippy green branches of spring scratching at his flanks in the dark. Lee lay low over his horse's back, clutching his prize close to his chest, hoping that he wasn't seen, wasn't followed as he burst out onto the beach. The horse chose that moment to be theatrical, raising up on his hind legs and trumpeting his presence. Kara burst out of the cave half dressed and fully armed. She gasped at the sight of Viper and ran forward to soothe him as Lee slid off his back. She raised a startled hand to her throat when she saw what Lee was carrying. "Hera," he confirmed and Kara's eyes filled as she took in a miniature replica of her sister.
"Here," Lee thrust the child into her arms and quickly stripped the saddle off Viper, talking as he worked. "We need to get off this beach, just in case I was followed." He paused to stroke a grateful hand down his horse's neck. "Can you carry her and I'll walk him with us? Cool him down a little. He's had a rough night." Kara nodded, cuddling her niece, who was, surprisingly, not crying. Lee jogged up to the cave and threw his saddle in. He took Viper's lead in one hand and Kara's elbow in the other and started to walk up the path to Sharon and Karl's, but Kara stopped. Lee looked back at her, urgency coloring every thought in his head until he met her expectant and irritated eyes. He hadn’t seen his wife in over a month. He dropped Viper's lead and wrapped his arms around Kara and Hera, pressing his open mouth against Kara' neck, nearly weeping in relief to have her so close. She sighed and melted into him for a moment before pulling back to kiss him warmly on the mouth. "I'm sorry," Lee said. "My head's just all over the place." She kissed him again. "Gods, I missed you," he said against her mouth, breaking in to a rueful laugh when Hera started pulling his hair. "Guess that's our cue."
Kara shifted Hera to her hip and offered her free hand to Lee. He took it, kissed her knuckles and laced his fingers through hers. He scooped up Viper's reins in his other hand and they made their careful way through the dark toward Sharon and Karl's. Lee's stomach churned the closer they came to the cabin. Acid swishing at the risk he had taken on the behalf of his family. He untangled his hand from Kara's when they got to the door, tending to Viper as she knocked. Kara then went over and pulled Lee to stand at the door next to her. He unthinkingly put his arm around her shoulders and she leaned into him, offering strength as the door opened.
* * *
"I'm too tired to go back tonight," Lee said as they trudged down to the cave, Viper trailing behind. "I don’t care about anything but getting you naked and into bed." Kara squeezed his hand hard and pulled her stumblingly exhausted husband along. She doubted he'd be awake two seconds after his head hit the pillow, but she was more than willing to give it a shot. She pushed him into the cave and brought fresh water out in a bucket for Viper, lavishing attention on the big horse she had missed. Maybe she could take him for a quick run before Lee left in the morning.
As she had suspected, when Kara walked back into the cave, Lee was already curled up and asleep under the sheets of their bed. She stripped slowly, feeling aged by the events of the day. The things that could have gone wrong with Lee's little rescue mission were too numerous to count. She could hit him for not telling her the plan, for going in without backup, for having possibly put himself in an even worse position with the queen. She might still hit him, actually. Kara had been saving up a list of times he had scared her to death with half told tales of court intrigue, the worse for being partially left to her imagination. When the six years were over and she and her siblings were reunited and human and Cavil overthrown, and she and Lee and Sharon and Karl and Hera all living in her childhood home, together and safe, Kara was going to beat the hell out of Lee everyday for a month for all the worrying he had put her through.
She sat on the edge of the bed and ran her hand slowly up his side. This was not her kind of mission, but she was doing at anyway; for her country, her brothers and sisters. For him. It all hinged on her, it's just that nobody knew it. Lee stirred and opened his eyes, blinking at her. Kara pulled down the sheets and snuggled in tight beside him, shaking her head with a smile as he sleepily rolled her over and onto her back. He threw a leg and an arm across her body and tucked his head onto her chest and fell right back to sleep. Kara rested her lips against his forehead and wrapped both arms around him as she drifted into unremarkable dreams.
* * *
They lived their lives apart, three shirts, four shirts, five shirts done, the sixth one started, stalling legislation with endless word games, carrying the weight of the world and the fates of two nations day after day until they could meet again, the long stretches of solitude filled with the grey solace of duty, honor, country. The plodding routine punctuated by short stabs of color and joy sharp enough to wound.
They dwelled in the in-betweens, existing on a border of two kingdoms, two worlds, thriving in the leftover spaces. It was not enough, but more than either ever expected. They knew their time was finite, that they could not go on, unnoticed forever. As the months passed, they collected moments as intently as Hera gathered the tumbled and worn seashells from the shore.
* * *
Lee felt the arrow pierce his thigh right as he stumbled onto the beach and cursed at his stupidity, hoping against hope that Kara was at Karl's and hadn’t heard his startled shout. It had finally happened after years of worrying about it and coming anyway. He had led the Queen's guards right over the border and straight to his wife. He cursed himself, trying to pick himself up, but the man was already on top of him, arrow pointed at his chest and malice in his eyes. "Where are you going, my prince?" He sneered out the title.
"Out for a run on the beach," Lee replied, trying to keep the soldier's attention as he saw his wife creep out of the cave with her bow and arrow in hand.
"The queen commands your presence."
"As her Majesty wishes," Lee said levelly. "Let me just take care of the arrow sticking out of my leg and I will be along shortly."
The guard didn't have a chance to respond because Kara had put an arrow in the base of his skull. Her face was white as she ran toward him. "Kara, get out of here," Lee gritted out. "These guards never travel alone. They do everything in groups of ten or so." She ignored him and pushed him face first into the sand, running her hands gently over where the arrow had sunk deeply into the muscle. She smoothed an apologetic palm over his back before grasping the shaft and wrenching it free from his leg. He bit his hand to keep back a noise. He heard tearing cloth over the pounding of fast approaching hooves and a makeshift bandage was suddenly being efficiently wrapped around his thigh.
He forced himself to roll over, "Go" Lee said quietly. "If you love me, you will get the hell out of here." Kara smacked his face sharply and he put his hand on his cheek in shock. She linked their left hands, letting their wedding rings clink together and stared at him, daring him to make that suggestion again. The sound of the approaching enemy, muffled by loose sand filled the air. "I love you," Lee said and Kara kissed him like there was no one else in the world. The hooves got louder and louder until the last minute when Kara spun in front of Lee with an arrow notched in her bow while Lee drew his sword.
* * *
"So you are the reason our Leland has been disappearing so regularly these past few years. Another lost Cylon royal." The queen stood outside Kara's cell. "I had no idea how many of you there were wandering around our border." Kara had no idea how long she'd been imprisoned, it seemed like an eternity, but was probably only a few days. She hadn't seen Lee since the fight on the beach, when they had been surrounded by fifteen Galactica soldiers on horseback. She had killed every one of her targets, but had been limited by the five arrows she carried. Lee had gone down first when he took another precise arrow, sinking into his already serious wound. He had thrown her his sword as his leg collapsed underneath him, but one of the queen's guards had ridden up close behind her and, before she could turn, had knocked her on the head and everything had gone black.
Kara was sick with worry but kept it buried. From everything Lee had ever told her about this woman, she knew that any emotion, any weakness would be used against her. "Lee says that you don't talk," Laura mused. "He says that he was running along the beach and came across you; that he helped you because he was concerned about a person living alone, unable to speak. He said that he fell in love with you, married you, and you have never said a word in all that time." Kara didn’t move.
"I suggest you find your tongue, Cylon," Laura said lightly. "It will be difficult to stand trial if you have nothing to say." Queen Laura departed without another word. Kara did rapid calculations in her mind, trying to figure out the exact date, but it was impossible in this cell. She had mere days left in this miserable mission, and now she was going to stand trial and the shirts were in the cave, all but the sleeve of one finished. Despair wrapped around her. So close. So frakking close. Surely God would not have taken her so far, brought her a lost sister, a lost niece, a good natured brother-in-law and a husband she didn’t want to survive without only to take it all away so close to the end. She sank to her knees and prayed for a miracle.
* * *
"A joint trial?" Lee asked Laura, his spirit rising a little. "Then you will allow me to speak for Kara."
"I will do nothing of the kind," Laura said. "She is perfectly capable of speaking for herself. If she is not inclined to comment, that is her business. This is for the sake of expediency. I don’t want your father to have to deal with this."
"You don't want my father to know about this," Lee corrected coldly. This was a farce, for he was guilty of everything that he was accused of, aiding and abetting a Cylon and a known traitor, colluding with the enemy, kidnapping a child. There was no proof, but the circumstantial evidence, down to being married to the sister of the escaped Cylon prisoner was enough to convict him. Not to mention the person deciding his fate, hearing his case, was the queen. The only thing helping him was that Karl, Sharon and Hera had not been found. He didn’t know where they were, but it brought him comfort to think of the little family, tucked away from this mess.
"Last chance Lee," Laura said softly, with all the contrived charm that had sucked him in when she had first married his father. "You can still do the smart thing."
"You know, Laura, that's your problem," Lee said. "You're always so concerned about doing the smart thing that you often forget to do the right thing."
She reared back. "I see that there is nothing more to say to you, Prince Leland."
"There really isn’t, Your Majesty," Lee agreed. "Send in my attorney, assuming I'm still afforded one." He took one last, disgusted look at his stepmother from behind his bars before turning his back on the angry queen. He limped over to his cot and sat down, and turned his attention back to the book he had been pretending to read when she had first come in. Laura's heels clicked as she walked out. He doubted he'd see her again until trial. The dull ache in his chest expanded as he thought of Kara, alone in her own cell somewhere in this dungeon. He hoped that she forgave him for bringing the soldiers to her, for bringing the certainty of execution down around her ears. In the end, he hoped she thought that his love and sporadic presence had been worth it.
* * *
The morning of the trial dawned clear and bright, something Kara noticed as she was marched from the dungeon to the throne room where the trial was being held, it was crowded, nobles milling about in expectation of a good show. She looked around as best she could for Lee. They pushed her forcibly into a chair at a table, next to the enigmatic man who was her lawyer and Lee's friend, Romo Lampkin, whom she had met a couple of times, bearing messages from her husband that she received with a stabbing sense of gratefulness mixed in with grief. She had also received more invaluable information from Lampkinthe date.
Today was the final day. At sunset she had to give the shirts to her brothers and sisters to turn them into humans. So close and now snatched away. For a moment she resented Lee for the intrusion. If he has never come into her life and turned it inside out and sideways, she would have been sitting in the cave this very day with her siblings come sunset. But it would be her brothers and sisters minus Sharon, and minus Karl, who was now as much brother as any of her feathered ones. She would never have known her niece. She would never have made love against a tree in a storm to a man with a will to match her own. She would never have cared so much, her heart nearly breaking from it. No. She wouldn’t, couldn’t regret Lee. No matter where there road had taken them.
Just as Kara came to that conclusion, Lee sat next to her and she inhaled sharply at the sight. He looked at her solemnly, clearly awaiting her condemnation. She tried to smile at him but it got stuck somewhere in the middle, so she bit her lip to stop its trembling and put her hand on his leg. She hadn’t seen him come in, so she didn’t know if he was limping badly or not. Lee's hand moved convulsively and grasped hers too tightly, but she gripped right back. His beautiful eyes searched hers and she cursed her own stubborn refusal to speak, even on the cusp of failure. He leaned in despite the location and kissed her cheek, touching her forehead, lips and chest with the tips of his fingers in mirror of the day she had proposed to him, in imitation of the blessing on their wedding day. "I love you," he whispered against her ear and Kara nodded, squeezing his fingers and turning her head to catch his mouth with her own.
Their lips caught and clung until Lampkin interrupted. "Touching as this all is, and far be it for me to intrude on lovers reuniting, but we now have to rise for the queen." Kara clambered to her feet and noted Lee moving more slowly, pulling on her hand a little to gain extra leverage. She refused to let go of him and was relieved that he wasn't trying to make her.
Laura swept in, regal in her stark black robes, red hair streaming over her shoulders. "You may be seated," her voice rang out across the room and they all sat and the trial began.
Witness after witness stepped up for the prosecution. Lampkin managed to skewer them on cross examination, but it didn’t really matter. All that mattered was Laura's opinion, and she had made up her mind years ago about Cylons and her living stepson. Finally, the prosecution rested and Lampkin turned to call Lee to the stand, but Laura interceded. "Mr. Lampkin, I would like to hear from the other defendant, the Cylon." Kara froze and she heard Lee's breathing quicken beside her
"Your Majesty," Lampkin said, "You know that she can’t speak.”
"No, I know that she won’t speak. There's a difference."
"Madame, it is highly irregular, not to mention illegal, for the judge to tell me what witnesses I must call."
"I make the laws, Mr. Lampkin. I am the law. This woman is not a citizen of my kingdom, she is not afforded the same rights. I want her on the stand now." One of her guards step forward, and Kara would be damned if she was going to be dragged, so she stood, pulling away from Lee, and walked to the stand. "Has this defendant been sworn in?" The bailiff nodded. "Very well, proceed Mr. Lampkin."
Lampkin looked at Kara, and then briefly back at Lee before stating, "I have no questions for this witness." He sat down.
The prosecutor stood and strode forward. "Is it true that you are a Cylon royal?" Kara nodded. "Your Majesty, please direct the witness to answer the question."
"You will speak, Cylon," Laura said, lips curling. "No sign language in my court." There went her last hope. She looked at Lee, who had closed his eyes and turned his head briefly before opening them to meet hers.
The prosecutor began again. "Is it true that you are a Cylon royal?" Kara looked straight ahead, saw Lee whispering in Lampkin's war. Saw Lampkin jerking back and staring before insistently whispering back to his client.
"Do you know the Cylon prisoner that was known as Sharon?" She said nothing, and on they went. Questions flew around her about Sharon, Karl, Lee, Hera, her parents, her missing siblings, the Galactican soldiers she had killed fighting to save her and Lee's lives. Lee kept his eyes locked on hers. Steady and still in the flurry of voices and accusations around flying around her. She was finally dismissed from the stand by a triumphant sounding queen.
"I call to the stand Prince Leland of Galactica." Lampkin's voice was flat and defeated but Kara had to ignore it, had to make the most of the brief moment of contact between when she sat down and Lee limped heavily to the stand; the brushing of their hands against each other to give him the strength to possibly save himself. "Your Highness, how long have you known the Cylon prisoner known as Sharon." Lee did not answer and Kara was suddenly filled with dawning, horrific knowledge. "Prince Leland, please answer the question." It wasn't a lawyer's tone but a pleading from one friend to another to save himself.
The queen's sharp voice rang out, "Prince Leland, I command you to answer the question." Lee said nothing. There was an edge of panic in Laura's voice, and Kara knew what Lee did not; that the queen had never intended on killing him, she just wanted to break him to her will. She had set a ball in motion that she was very unwilling to follow through on, but now she was trapped by her own game. Trapped into executing her husband's only remaining son.
Lampkin sat back down, and the prosecutor attempted to get Lee to talk but to no avail. He just looked at Kara, ignoring her pleading eyes. She couldn’t stand watching him throw himself away like that. Big jagged holes tore into her heart with every question he refused to answer. He was going to die. Kara knew. He was going to die right along with her. The lawyer finally gave up and Lee limped back to her. She looked at him, shaking her head in mute plea. He merely took her hand and kissed each knuckle, not bothering to hide it from the prying eyes of his own court. She didn't hear the closing argument, didn’t really hear the sentencing, although that managed to drift into her brain, even as she stared at Lee in disbelief at his pointless sacrifice. They would be burned at the stake together at sunset. All rose to let Laura out of the courtroom and suddenly Kara was afraid that they'd be parted again, but Lampkin took care of it, exchanging their last meals for the right for them to await their deaths together.
The moment the cell door closed, Kara punched Lee in the face, tears rolling freely from her eyes. "I had to," Lee said, rubbing his jaw. Kara swung at him again without her normal precision and control and he caught her wrist. "You can’t make me," he said a little wildly. "You can’t make me live without you." And Kara broke, wrapping herself around him and weeping silently into his shoulder. He pressed kisses all over her hair, face, everywhere he could reach.
She buried her face in his shoulder, too sad and sick to move. "Hey, Kara. What are you doing? Listen to me." He pried her face off him and held it both his hands. "I'm here. You're here. This is all that matters. Not the cell, not tonight. Just us."
Kara nodded at his words, full to the brim with love and regret and just an enormous, selfish sense of gratefulness that he'd be with her at the end warring with an enormous, selfish sense of betrayal that he would put his death so squarely on her shoulders. She'd never asked for this kind of responsibility but she had gotten it anyway, and her life had been the richer for it.
Kara walked backwards, pulling him with her as she tumbled onto the cot in the cell. He landed on top of her and she wrapped her legs and arms around his body and arched up into him, opening her mouth to his lips and clutching him as tight a she could for as long as they had left.
* * *
At ten minutes to sunset, Lee and Kara were marched out of their cell, their hands tied behind their backs, not close enough to touch each other any more, and Lee's whole body clenched at that loss; the loss of her skin against his and the breathy catches that passed for moans in his silent wife's vocabulary were almost too much to bear. Her smile, her eyes, her determination and love and just the life that surrounded her, that glowed in her brighter than anyone else, all to be extinguished. All because of him.
"Kara," he called out as they were being tied back to back to the stake in the middle of a pile of dry branches, in the middle of the town square. "Do you remember when you tried to teach me how to fish with your spear and I fell in and speared my toe instead?"
He didn’t know if he was doing any good, but he wanted to try to give her some peace at the end, maybe only a portion of what she had given him, but still. "Do you know that the first time I saw you running out of that cave to skewer me I nearly lost my breath at how beautiful you were?" the ropes were firmly tied and he could feel Kara straining against them, his brave girl, still fighting. Until he realized that she had just been trying to twist her hands around so that their fingers could link around the post. "Thank you," he whispered, feeling her fingers tighten on his. "I have always loved you," he said steadily as the sun hit the horizon. "I will always love you." A rusting of wings distracted him from the men lighting the fire around them. "And if there is a God or gods or anything after this, I will find you again," he vowed as all hell broke loose.
* * *
A figure leaped into the fire. Sharon, with sword raised high, cutting the ropes binding her. She shoved the six shirts into Kara's hands and moved to free Lee. The swans that had been circling swooped down one by one and Kara threw the shirts over their heads as they flew past, landing gently as humans. D'Anna, Galen, Simon, Caprica, Doral all transformed back in their entirety and Leoben back mostly, but with a wing instead of a left arm because of the shirt Kara could not finish. She didn’t dwell on the guilt as Karl rushed by, throwing her a sword and then tossing one to Lee as well. "Best diversion in the history of diversions!" Karl yelled to them as they tumbled out of the fire, "Now let's get the hell out of here!"
Kara swung around, assessing the situation, noticing Lee doing the same. "Lee!" she croaked out, grimacing when her voice stuck and didn’t carry. Clearly she needed more practice, but God did it feel good to say her husband's name for the first time, even if he hadn’t heard it.
"Incoming!" Lee yelled and he and Kara engaged with the few guards who had been surrounding what was to be their funeral pyre. They kept backing up into the crowd, hearing the soldiers standing outside of the masses trying to push in as the people murmured in amazement at the miracle that had occurred in front of them.
"This way!" Caprica yelled, and Lee looked at Kara who nodded reassurance before fighting in the direction of her voice. She made him go first so that she was the one guarding him from the advancing guard from the rear and her seven warrior brothers and sisters and his cousin guarded his front. He was simply moving too slow on that leg to be able to keep up a sustained attack. She cut a soldier's nose off who got to close to Lee, making them back up a little at her ferocious defense. Swords ahead and behind, a fire still roaring in the middleKara laughed in delight. This was her kind of fight.
She caught Lee looking up in surprise at the sound and she grinned fully at him while she fended off yet another ungainly blow to the head. "You know, if I hadn’t seen you and Karl fight before, I would be having serious doubts about the prowess of the Galactican army," she said. It was hoarse and ugly, but it was still her voice and he had still heard it. She spun around to swing at her new opponent's knees and Lee's sword arced over her head to slice across the soldier's chest. He hauled her up, pulling her as fast as the crowd and his leg allowed. "Don't worry about me, Lee," Kara said. "It's gonna take a lot to drag me away from you."
"Those are the first words you speak after all these years? Commenting on soldier skill levels?" He was trying to sound incredulous, but Kara could hear the fine trembling underneath. It had been a long day for all of them.
"They weren't my first words," Kara panted as they finally broke through the crowd to find that the soldiers in front of them were already dead or incapacitated and a bunch of horses, including Viper, waiting for them.
"Who?" Lee asked as he accepted his cousin's help up into the saddle before Karl ran for a different horse.
"Lampkin," Karl yelled back. "Now move!"
Kara had already swung herself in front of Lee and was urging Viper out of the town. She did a quick head count, finding everyone she loved, with the exception of Hera who she'd worry about later, all present and accounted for before she gave Viper his head and followed them. Lee wrapped his arms around her, leaning with the movements of her body, as in synch as always. "So what were you first words, Kara?" he asked close to her ear and she shivered.
"The first thing I said was Lee," she said, laying her hand briefly over his as they clasped around her middle. He kissed her neck once before tucking down into her again, trying to make the ride easier for Viper as they raced toward the Cylon border.
* * *
They stopped briefly to pick up Hera who was staying with the priest who had married Karl and Sharon and Kara and Lee, and an argument commenced among the Cylons about how and when they were going to overthrow Cavil and try to rescue their mother's sanity. Karl, Lee and Hera looked on for a couple of minutes in bemused silence before they shrugged and walked a small distance away where they could hear themselves think.
Hera held out her arms to Lee and he picked her up obligingly, hugging the little girl to his chest as he talked to her father. "So . . . what exactly happened back there?"
Karl scratched his head. "Hell if I know. One minute we're sitting there at dinner, the next minute swans are sitting at our doorstep, and transform into Kara and Sharon's brothers and sisters, they tell some crazy story about being turned into birds and Kara's vow of silence and how you two have been captured, where you are, bring the shirts, etc. And then they turned back into birds and flew away and Sharon was running to your cave for shirts made out of flowers and telling me to bring Hera to the priest." He made a face at his daughter and ruffled her curls.
"Oh," Lee said, nodding. "Wait-what?"
"I don’t know, man. Ask Sharon or Kara. Or Simon or Doral-"
"Stop."
"Or D'Anna or Galen or Leoben or Caprica," Karl finished.
Lee felt a little stunned. "Wow. In-laws."
Karl nodded sagely, "We're lucky we have each other."
"Right," Lee said.
"Right," Hera agreed and they laughed as they walked back to their squabbling new family.
* * *
They rode all night, much to Kara's annoyance. She had voted to slow down because of Lee's leg, but Leoben and flapped his wing and made everyone feel bad for him so he had gotten his way. "You okay?" she asked as they approached the home she hadn’t seen in six years.
"Yeah," Lee said, but she could tell he was in a lot of pain.
"Did anyone look at that properly?"
"Well enough," he said.
"Well enough to fight a crowd of soldiers and then ride two days straight?"
"No, not well enough for that, but Viper's getting the worst of this bargain," he said leaning forward to pat his horse's sweaty neck.
Kara leaned back into Lee but slid her hands along Viper's neck. "Not long now," she crooned.
"I always knew you liked the horse better then me." Kara laughed, enjoying letting her emotions bubble up and out. The confrontation ahead wasn't going to be fun, but it wasn't going to be a fight. Not with all the witnesses and the law and the return of the royals. "You and Karl and Hera better stand back a little until we explain things."
"No way," Lee said.
"This is just going to be a political thing," Kara assured him. "No bloodshed, as long as you and Karl don’t get in the way."
"I'm pretty good at politics," Lee said. Kara looked at him in disbelief. "Seriously," he insisted, "Laura's myopic and paranoid and suffers from delusions of grandeur. That isn't my fault."
They clattered through the town, silence falling over the crowd at the sight of the presumed dead royals. They gathered quite a following of people as they made their slow way to the center of the city to the palace.
A glowering Cavil and a weeping Ellen were waiting for them in the courtyard. Before either of them could speak, Caprica started the process, witnessed by what seemed like most of the city's citizens. "We move to remove our mother, Ellen and our cousin, Cavil from the circle of governance."
"We agree," intoned Doral and on down the line until it reached Kara.
"We agree," she said.
"We disagree," Cavil snapped with anger.
"We-agree," said Ellen. Her mother's answer made Kara's heart jump. Maybe there was some hope left. She started hesitantly forward and that was all Ellen needed to run forward into her children's arms.
* * *
They lay in their bed. Their first bed that wasn't a makeshift cot where they were forced to sleep crushed together. Kara hung onto Lee tightly anyway. It had been too damn close. "That was intense," Lee sighed into her hair. "Who knew you were such a moaner?"
"I did," Kara said sleepily. "Drove me crazy not to make any noise with you." Lee hummed happily and pushed her over so he could kiss down her body. "Again?" Kara asked with such dismay in her voice that Lee rolled onto his back and laughed.
"I was just kissing you," he said when he got his breath back. "I have a lot of making up to do in that department."
"We've got the rest of our lives for that," Kara assured him.
"Yeah we do," Lee answered and they grinned unabashedly at each other before Kara shuffled in close and draped herself over his side again.
"What are we going to do about Galactica?" she asked.
"I'll start moving to open peace negotiations tomorrow, if that's alright with the clan," he said. "One of the conditions will be that we speak only to my father. I can’t imagine he was pleased when he came back to find out that his wife tried to kill me. We may not be close, but I'm still his son."
"Think anything will come of it?" Kara asked, tracing a finger along his collarbone.
"I don't know," Lee admitted a little sadly. "I still want to try though." Kara nodded and continued to draw patterns along his skin. A sudden yawn cracked her jaw and prompted her to stretch out further along him, wiggling her toes against his. "I can't believe I can actually wake up with you tomorrow without having to run off somewhere," he said gleefully and she smiled at him before closing her eyes. "Good-night, Kara. Love you," he said softly.
Kara's eyes shot open when she realized that this was a gift she hadn't given him yet, even if he already knew. She propped herself up, looking into those blue eyes. She kissed his nose and smiled. "I love you too." And he pulled her down flush against his chest and they fell asleep, finally home.
fin
Author: innibis
Rating: R
Word Count: 7,792
Pairing: Kara/Lee, Karl/Sharon
Genre: Completely AU
Disclaimer: I am not RDM. Nor am I a brother of the Grimms.
A/N: Many thanks to my beta, workerbee73, smoother of ruffled feathers.
Part I
Part II
In the months that followed, Karl noticed that there were moments, hour stretches, where he could almost believe that things were good; where he didn’t think about his daughter or the fact that he and his wife were exiled from both of their countries or that his sister-in-law wouldn’t speak and was struggling with a mission known only to herself or that Lee was playing a dangerous game with a willfully blind enemy. Sometimes. Times when Sharon would smile at him over dinner or he watched her laughing as she sparred with her sister on the beach. Times when he saw Kara standing perfectly still along the bank of the river, lip caught between her teeth and roughly hewn spear upraised as she stalked the fat fish or when she'd punch Lee in the shoulder for telling a bad joke, fighting down a smile. Times when he and Lee would be sent out to the garden to do their fair share of the weeding and grumble about the women in their lives or when he'd see his cousin just looking at Kara, as if she were the answer to every prayer he would never make.
But as the mild winter turned to warm spring, and then to hot summer, he couldn’t avoid thinking about what his baby would look like, how she wouldn't know who he was or recognize Sharon. He couldn't help but notice Kara's increasing frustration at not being able to speak to her sister or her lover. And Lee. Karl found himself apologizing every damn day to the memory of Zak for letting Lee get to the point where even Kara dragging him away and into her cave didn't erase all of the starkness in his eyes. He smiled so rarely.
Still, life went on, as it was wont to do and they planted and hunted and practiced with their swords for the inevitable day when they were discovered, and he and Sharon wrapped themselves around each other every night in their bed, not talking about Hera, while Kara sat up, slowly sewing ugly shirts made from flowers and, miles away, Lee paced the floors in thought.
* * *
"I don’t have a choice," Lee said stubbornly, and Kara felt a sense of déjà vu as the cousins squared off again. She and Sharon had walked into the cabin from their hunting expedition and smack into the middle of this one, so she had no idea what was going on. She did know that she hadn’t seen Lee in a couple of weeks and that she'd like to at least kiss him before Karl beat him up.
"There is always a choice! Why don't you repeat what you just told me to Kara?" Karl asked nastily and Kara's well honed sense of foreboding kicked in. She moved to stand in front of Lee, who's aggravatingly calm expression flickered a little in the face of her tight lips and folded arms.
"I have to move back to the capital," Lee said flatly. "I won’t be around as often-" He faltered as the anger and hurt that Kara didn’t have the inclination to hide filled her eyes. He stepped in close, speaking quickly and quietly. "Kara, you know if there was any other way I wouldn't. You know that I'd never leave if I didn’t have to-at least, not until you kicked me out because you were so sick of me,” he said with a small smile that faded as he continued. “But people are disappearing and I can’t get my hands around what is happening from far away and I know that it's the queen and my father won’t stand up to her and-" he pressed his hands hard into his tired face, "There's no one else," he finished with bleak certainty. And he was probably right.
Kara looked over to where Sharon was looking at her sympathetically and Karl was staring at Lee with an expression of abject misery and helplessness. This was Lee. They all knew that there was nothing else to be said on the matter. She took Lee by the elbow and guided him toward the door, stopping long enough for Karl to hug him fiercely and whisper something in his ear that made Lee shake his head and smile sadly. Sharon took both of Lee's hands in her own and kissed his cheek.
"I'll be back," he said to the unhappy couple standing in front of him. "I'll find out what's going on, and I'll find out more about Hera and I'll come back," and he followed Kara as she tugged him out into the dusk.
* * *
Lee lay in Kara's bed with Kara sprawled half on top of him. He breathed in deeply, taking in the smell of her skin and the salt in the air. Everything felt so . . . final. He ran a hand up and down her smooth back, trying to memorize the feel of her against him. She stirred and he pulled her even closer, willing himself not to notice how late it truly was, how he had to leave soon so as to not arouse suspicion. The night was warm and sultry, and only the reflection of the moon off the water illuminated their tangled limbs. Pieces of time were all they had. Fragmented moments grabbed greedily and clung to in memory to keep him strong, keep him fighting, to keep him from drowning in the storm. And suddenly Lee wanted more than stolen hours and absconded minutes. He at least wanted Kara to know that, while he had always had something that he would die for, with her in his arms he now also had a reason to live.
"Kara," he spoke softly, the hushed words barely rising over the rush of the sea. She raised her drowsy head to rest a chin on his chest, looking at him with sad eyes and Lee realized that she had been waiting for the moment that always came, where he would tell her he had to go, had to leave her alone in a cave again. Lee traced his fingers lightly down her face. He never had wanted to put that look on her face and in that moment, he nearly backed out so as not to add to her burden. There were some words though that he needed to be say out loud in order to give them power.
"I love you."
Her breath caught and she looked as though she might speak, so Lee gently put his hand over mouth. Whatever journey Kara was on, it demanded silence and he would not let her stumble if he could help it. She kissed his palm and he removed it, sliding his hand into the heaviness of her hair. "I love you," he repeated and she closed her eyes, a heat-breaking smile spreading across her face. Lee wriggled so that he was lying fully underneath her and she stared down at him. "I love you," he insisted.
Kara kissed him softly, lips playing against his, before pulling back to tug the ring she always wore off her thumb. She sat up, sitting cross legged at the end of the bed and contemplated him gravely, figuring out a puzzle, before she abruptly crawled down onto the throw rug. "What are you doing?" Lee asked, bemused as she pushed at his shoulder until he sat up and swung his feet to the ground. She shuffled until she was kneeling between his thighs. She held up her thumb ring to eye level and placed her other hand over her heart, staring at him intently.
Lee's mouth went dry. He didn’t know what to say. Didn't know if it was real. She moved her hand from her heart to lightly touch his forehead, his lips and the center of his chest, a gesture he recognized from her morning prayers, before she took his left hand and slid her ring onto his finger. Kara tilted her head and smiled hopefully, at him and he saw that she was staking her own claim at a life. And, as he was learning more and more with this remarkable woman, there were other times when words were superfluous. He laced his fingers with hers, and gently touched her forehead, her lips and her chest and the leant in and traced the same path with his lips, pressing kisses reverently.
Kara pulled his head up and grinned, nodding exaggeratedly with both eyebrows raised. Lee laughed and hauled her in and up onto his lap. And suddenly it didn’t matter, not the logistics, not the distance, not the in-laws, not even the fact that he was leaving soon and wouldn't be back for some time. "Yes," he said as her arms encircled his neck and tears unexpectedly stung his eyes. "Yes, I'll marry you."
In the end, despite the danger, he stayed until dawn, finding it oddly comforting to see her standing in the mouth of the cave as the sun made its way into the sky as he took one last long look at her before crossing the border to Galactica.
* * *
At Sharon's insistence, two years to the day after Kara had first swung a sword at Lee, they were married on their beach by the same unflappable priest who had married Karl and Sharon. It was a surreal experience for Kara, her fiancé having run out of the trees about fifteen minutes after they were supposed to start, panting and apologizing, but at least alive and safe and holding her hand. She had been unable to do anything but nod and touch Lee in response to his vows and declarations, which left her nearly ill with anxiety that it might not be real when it wasn't spoken out loud. But Lee was real. The sweat still running down his face despite the coolness of the day was real, salty and slippery against her lips as she went through the ritual of kissing his forehead and both cheeks. The stunned happiness in his eyes was real as the priest declared them bound. The love in her heart was real. So real. And blazing. And burning her up from the inside out.
Karl and Sharon offered their congratulations and took the priest with them to their cabin for lunch, leaving the newly wed couple standing alone on the sand, hands clasped. Kara tugged Lee in and put her arms around his waist, bowing her neck to rest her forehead against his chest. His fingers untangled from hers to stroke down her hair, over her ears and shoulders, skimming down her back and then up over and over again. She waited for the words, his unending litanies of good-byes that should have warned them both off, but instead had brought them together. Kara forcibly pushed that thought aside. It was well traveled territory and something she and Lee had both decided to deal with. This marriage was the only thing in their lives that was just for them and she would protect it as fiercely she guarded her silence.
* * *
Viper galloped through the trees, the whippy green branches of spring scratching at his flanks in the dark. Lee lay low over his horse's back, clutching his prize close to his chest, hoping that he wasn't seen, wasn't followed as he burst out onto the beach. The horse chose that moment to be theatrical, raising up on his hind legs and trumpeting his presence. Kara burst out of the cave half dressed and fully armed. She gasped at the sight of Viper and ran forward to soothe him as Lee slid off his back. She raised a startled hand to her throat when she saw what Lee was carrying. "Hera," he confirmed and Kara's eyes filled as she took in a miniature replica of her sister.
"Here," Lee thrust the child into her arms and quickly stripped the saddle off Viper, talking as he worked. "We need to get off this beach, just in case I was followed." He paused to stroke a grateful hand down his horse's neck. "Can you carry her and I'll walk him with us? Cool him down a little. He's had a rough night." Kara nodded, cuddling her niece, who was, surprisingly, not crying. Lee jogged up to the cave and threw his saddle in. He took Viper's lead in one hand and Kara's elbow in the other and started to walk up the path to Sharon and Karl's, but Kara stopped. Lee looked back at her, urgency coloring every thought in his head until he met her expectant and irritated eyes. He hadn’t seen his wife in over a month. He dropped Viper's lead and wrapped his arms around Kara and Hera, pressing his open mouth against Kara' neck, nearly weeping in relief to have her so close. She sighed and melted into him for a moment before pulling back to kiss him warmly on the mouth. "I'm sorry," Lee said. "My head's just all over the place." She kissed him again. "Gods, I missed you," he said against her mouth, breaking in to a rueful laugh when Hera started pulling his hair. "Guess that's our cue."
Kara shifted Hera to her hip and offered her free hand to Lee. He took it, kissed her knuckles and laced his fingers through hers. He scooped up Viper's reins in his other hand and they made their careful way through the dark toward Sharon and Karl's. Lee's stomach churned the closer they came to the cabin. Acid swishing at the risk he had taken on the behalf of his family. He untangled his hand from Kara's when they got to the door, tending to Viper as she knocked. Kara then went over and pulled Lee to stand at the door next to her. He unthinkingly put his arm around her shoulders and she leaned into him, offering strength as the door opened.
* * *
"I'm too tired to go back tonight," Lee said as they trudged down to the cave, Viper trailing behind. "I don’t care about anything but getting you naked and into bed." Kara squeezed his hand hard and pulled her stumblingly exhausted husband along. She doubted he'd be awake two seconds after his head hit the pillow, but she was more than willing to give it a shot. She pushed him into the cave and brought fresh water out in a bucket for Viper, lavishing attention on the big horse she had missed. Maybe she could take him for a quick run before Lee left in the morning.
As she had suspected, when Kara walked back into the cave, Lee was already curled up and asleep under the sheets of their bed. She stripped slowly, feeling aged by the events of the day. The things that could have gone wrong with Lee's little rescue mission were too numerous to count. She could hit him for not telling her the plan, for going in without backup, for having possibly put himself in an even worse position with the queen. She might still hit him, actually. Kara had been saving up a list of times he had scared her to death with half told tales of court intrigue, the worse for being partially left to her imagination. When the six years were over and she and her siblings were reunited and human and Cavil overthrown, and she and Lee and Sharon and Karl and Hera all living in her childhood home, together and safe, Kara was going to beat the hell out of Lee everyday for a month for all the worrying he had put her through.
She sat on the edge of the bed and ran her hand slowly up his side. This was not her kind of mission, but she was doing at anyway; for her country, her brothers and sisters. For him. It all hinged on her, it's just that nobody knew it. Lee stirred and opened his eyes, blinking at her. Kara pulled down the sheets and snuggled in tight beside him, shaking her head with a smile as he sleepily rolled her over and onto her back. He threw a leg and an arm across her body and tucked his head onto her chest and fell right back to sleep. Kara rested her lips against his forehead and wrapped both arms around him as she drifted into unremarkable dreams.
* * *
They lived their lives apart, three shirts, four shirts, five shirts done, the sixth one started, stalling legislation with endless word games, carrying the weight of the world and the fates of two nations day after day until they could meet again, the long stretches of solitude filled with the grey solace of duty, honor, country. The plodding routine punctuated by short stabs of color and joy sharp enough to wound.
They dwelled in the in-betweens, existing on a border of two kingdoms, two worlds, thriving in the leftover spaces. It was not enough, but more than either ever expected. They knew their time was finite, that they could not go on, unnoticed forever. As the months passed, they collected moments as intently as Hera gathered the tumbled and worn seashells from the shore.
* * *
Lee felt the arrow pierce his thigh right as he stumbled onto the beach and cursed at his stupidity, hoping against hope that Kara was at Karl's and hadn’t heard his startled shout. It had finally happened after years of worrying about it and coming anyway. He had led the Queen's guards right over the border and straight to his wife. He cursed himself, trying to pick himself up, but the man was already on top of him, arrow pointed at his chest and malice in his eyes. "Where are you going, my prince?" He sneered out the title.
"Out for a run on the beach," Lee replied, trying to keep the soldier's attention as he saw his wife creep out of the cave with her bow and arrow in hand.
"The queen commands your presence."
"As her Majesty wishes," Lee said levelly. "Let me just take care of the arrow sticking out of my leg and I will be along shortly."
The guard didn't have a chance to respond because Kara had put an arrow in the base of his skull. Her face was white as she ran toward him. "Kara, get out of here," Lee gritted out. "These guards never travel alone. They do everything in groups of ten or so." She ignored him and pushed him face first into the sand, running her hands gently over where the arrow had sunk deeply into the muscle. She smoothed an apologetic palm over his back before grasping the shaft and wrenching it free from his leg. He bit his hand to keep back a noise. He heard tearing cloth over the pounding of fast approaching hooves and a makeshift bandage was suddenly being efficiently wrapped around his thigh.
He forced himself to roll over, "Go" Lee said quietly. "If you love me, you will get the hell out of here." Kara smacked his face sharply and he put his hand on his cheek in shock. She linked their left hands, letting their wedding rings clink together and stared at him, daring him to make that suggestion again. The sound of the approaching enemy, muffled by loose sand filled the air. "I love you," Lee said and Kara kissed him like there was no one else in the world. The hooves got louder and louder until the last minute when Kara spun in front of Lee with an arrow notched in her bow while Lee drew his sword.
* * *
"So you are the reason our Leland has been disappearing so regularly these past few years. Another lost Cylon royal." The queen stood outside Kara's cell. "I had no idea how many of you there were wandering around our border." Kara had no idea how long she'd been imprisoned, it seemed like an eternity, but was probably only a few days. She hadn't seen Lee since the fight on the beach, when they had been surrounded by fifteen Galactica soldiers on horseback. She had killed every one of her targets, but had been limited by the five arrows she carried. Lee had gone down first when he took another precise arrow, sinking into his already serious wound. He had thrown her his sword as his leg collapsed underneath him, but one of the queen's guards had ridden up close behind her and, before she could turn, had knocked her on the head and everything had gone black.
Kara was sick with worry but kept it buried. From everything Lee had ever told her about this woman, she knew that any emotion, any weakness would be used against her. "Lee says that you don't talk," Laura mused. "He says that he was running along the beach and came across you; that he helped you because he was concerned about a person living alone, unable to speak. He said that he fell in love with you, married you, and you have never said a word in all that time." Kara didn’t move.
"I suggest you find your tongue, Cylon," Laura said lightly. "It will be difficult to stand trial if you have nothing to say." Queen Laura departed without another word. Kara did rapid calculations in her mind, trying to figure out the exact date, but it was impossible in this cell. She had mere days left in this miserable mission, and now she was going to stand trial and the shirts were in the cave, all but the sleeve of one finished. Despair wrapped around her. So close. So frakking close. Surely God would not have taken her so far, brought her a lost sister, a lost niece, a good natured brother-in-law and a husband she didn’t want to survive without only to take it all away so close to the end. She sank to her knees and prayed for a miracle.
* * *
"A joint trial?" Lee asked Laura, his spirit rising a little. "Then you will allow me to speak for Kara."
"I will do nothing of the kind," Laura said. "She is perfectly capable of speaking for herself. If she is not inclined to comment, that is her business. This is for the sake of expediency. I don’t want your father to have to deal with this."
"You don't want my father to know about this," Lee corrected coldly. This was a farce, for he was guilty of everything that he was accused of, aiding and abetting a Cylon and a known traitor, colluding with the enemy, kidnapping a child. There was no proof, but the circumstantial evidence, down to being married to the sister of the escaped Cylon prisoner was enough to convict him. Not to mention the person deciding his fate, hearing his case, was the queen. The only thing helping him was that Karl, Sharon and Hera had not been found. He didn’t know where they were, but it brought him comfort to think of the little family, tucked away from this mess.
"Last chance Lee," Laura said softly, with all the contrived charm that had sucked him in when she had first married his father. "You can still do the smart thing."
"You know, Laura, that's your problem," Lee said. "You're always so concerned about doing the smart thing that you often forget to do the right thing."
She reared back. "I see that there is nothing more to say to you, Prince Leland."
"There really isn’t, Your Majesty," Lee agreed. "Send in my attorney, assuming I'm still afforded one." He took one last, disgusted look at his stepmother from behind his bars before turning his back on the angry queen. He limped over to his cot and sat down, and turned his attention back to the book he had been pretending to read when she had first come in. Laura's heels clicked as she walked out. He doubted he'd see her again until trial. The dull ache in his chest expanded as he thought of Kara, alone in her own cell somewhere in this dungeon. He hoped that she forgave him for bringing the soldiers to her, for bringing the certainty of execution down around her ears. In the end, he hoped she thought that his love and sporadic presence had been worth it.
* * *
The morning of the trial dawned clear and bright, something Kara noticed as she was marched from the dungeon to the throne room where the trial was being held, it was crowded, nobles milling about in expectation of a good show. She looked around as best she could for Lee. They pushed her forcibly into a chair at a table, next to the enigmatic man who was her lawyer and Lee's friend, Romo Lampkin, whom she had met a couple of times, bearing messages from her husband that she received with a stabbing sense of gratefulness mixed in with grief. She had also received more invaluable information from Lampkinthe date.
Today was the final day. At sunset she had to give the shirts to her brothers and sisters to turn them into humans. So close and now snatched away. For a moment she resented Lee for the intrusion. If he has never come into her life and turned it inside out and sideways, she would have been sitting in the cave this very day with her siblings come sunset. But it would be her brothers and sisters minus Sharon, and minus Karl, who was now as much brother as any of her feathered ones. She would never have known her niece. She would never have made love against a tree in a storm to a man with a will to match her own. She would never have cared so much, her heart nearly breaking from it. No. She wouldn’t, couldn’t regret Lee. No matter where there road had taken them.
Just as Kara came to that conclusion, Lee sat next to her and she inhaled sharply at the sight. He looked at her solemnly, clearly awaiting her condemnation. She tried to smile at him but it got stuck somewhere in the middle, so she bit her lip to stop its trembling and put her hand on his leg. She hadn’t seen him come in, so she didn’t know if he was limping badly or not. Lee's hand moved convulsively and grasped hers too tightly, but she gripped right back. His beautiful eyes searched hers and she cursed her own stubborn refusal to speak, even on the cusp of failure. He leaned in despite the location and kissed her cheek, touching her forehead, lips and chest with the tips of his fingers in mirror of the day she had proposed to him, in imitation of the blessing on their wedding day. "I love you," he whispered against her ear and Kara nodded, squeezing his fingers and turning her head to catch his mouth with her own.
Their lips caught and clung until Lampkin interrupted. "Touching as this all is, and far be it for me to intrude on lovers reuniting, but we now have to rise for the queen." Kara clambered to her feet and noted Lee moving more slowly, pulling on her hand a little to gain extra leverage. She refused to let go of him and was relieved that he wasn't trying to make her.
Laura swept in, regal in her stark black robes, red hair streaming over her shoulders. "You may be seated," her voice rang out across the room and they all sat and the trial began.
Witness after witness stepped up for the prosecution. Lampkin managed to skewer them on cross examination, but it didn’t really matter. All that mattered was Laura's opinion, and she had made up her mind years ago about Cylons and her living stepson. Finally, the prosecution rested and Lampkin turned to call Lee to the stand, but Laura interceded. "Mr. Lampkin, I would like to hear from the other defendant, the Cylon." Kara froze and she heard Lee's breathing quicken beside her
"Your Majesty," Lampkin said, "You know that she can’t speak.”
"No, I know that she won’t speak. There's a difference."
"Madame, it is highly irregular, not to mention illegal, for the judge to tell me what witnesses I must call."
"I make the laws, Mr. Lampkin. I am the law. This woman is not a citizen of my kingdom, she is not afforded the same rights. I want her on the stand now." One of her guards step forward, and Kara would be damned if she was going to be dragged, so she stood, pulling away from Lee, and walked to the stand. "Has this defendant been sworn in?" The bailiff nodded. "Very well, proceed Mr. Lampkin."
Lampkin looked at Kara, and then briefly back at Lee before stating, "I have no questions for this witness." He sat down.
The prosecutor stood and strode forward. "Is it true that you are a Cylon royal?" Kara nodded. "Your Majesty, please direct the witness to answer the question."
"You will speak, Cylon," Laura said, lips curling. "No sign language in my court." There went her last hope. She looked at Lee, who had closed his eyes and turned his head briefly before opening them to meet hers.
The prosecutor began again. "Is it true that you are a Cylon royal?" Kara looked straight ahead, saw Lee whispering in Lampkin's war. Saw Lampkin jerking back and staring before insistently whispering back to his client.
"Do you know the Cylon prisoner that was known as Sharon?" She said nothing, and on they went. Questions flew around her about Sharon, Karl, Lee, Hera, her parents, her missing siblings, the Galactican soldiers she had killed fighting to save her and Lee's lives. Lee kept his eyes locked on hers. Steady and still in the flurry of voices and accusations around flying around her. She was finally dismissed from the stand by a triumphant sounding queen.
"I call to the stand Prince Leland of Galactica." Lampkin's voice was flat and defeated but Kara had to ignore it, had to make the most of the brief moment of contact between when she sat down and Lee limped heavily to the stand; the brushing of their hands against each other to give him the strength to possibly save himself. "Your Highness, how long have you known the Cylon prisoner known as Sharon." Lee did not answer and Kara was suddenly filled with dawning, horrific knowledge. "Prince Leland, please answer the question." It wasn't a lawyer's tone but a pleading from one friend to another to save himself.
The queen's sharp voice rang out, "Prince Leland, I command you to answer the question." Lee said nothing. There was an edge of panic in Laura's voice, and Kara knew what Lee did not; that the queen had never intended on killing him, she just wanted to break him to her will. She had set a ball in motion that she was very unwilling to follow through on, but now she was trapped by her own game. Trapped into executing her husband's only remaining son.
Lampkin sat back down, and the prosecutor attempted to get Lee to talk but to no avail. He just looked at Kara, ignoring her pleading eyes. She couldn’t stand watching him throw himself away like that. Big jagged holes tore into her heart with every question he refused to answer. He was going to die. Kara knew. He was going to die right along with her. The lawyer finally gave up and Lee limped back to her. She looked at him, shaking her head in mute plea. He merely took her hand and kissed each knuckle, not bothering to hide it from the prying eyes of his own court. She didn't hear the closing argument, didn’t really hear the sentencing, although that managed to drift into her brain, even as she stared at Lee in disbelief at his pointless sacrifice. They would be burned at the stake together at sunset. All rose to let Laura out of the courtroom and suddenly Kara was afraid that they'd be parted again, but Lampkin took care of it, exchanging their last meals for the right for them to await their deaths together.
The moment the cell door closed, Kara punched Lee in the face, tears rolling freely from her eyes. "I had to," Lee said, rubbing his jaw. Kara swung at him again without her normal precision and control and he caught her wrist. "You can’t make me," he said a little wildly. "You can’t make me live without you." And Kara broke, wrapping herself around him and weeping silently into his shoulder. He pressed kisses all over her hair, face, everywhere he could reach.
She buried her face in his shoulder, too sad and sick to move. "Hey, Kara. What are you doing? Listen to me." He pried her face off him and held it both his hands. "I'm here. You're here. This is all that matters. Not the cell, not tonight. Just us."
Kara nodded at his words, full to the brim with love and regret and just an enormous, selfish sense of gratefulness that he'd be with her at the end warring with an enormous, selfish sense of betrayal that he would put his death so squarely on her shoulders. She'd never asked for this kind of responsibility but she had gotten it anyway, and her life had been the richer for it.
Kara walked backwards, pulling him with her as she tumbled onto the cot in the cell. He landed on top of her and she wrapped her legs and arms around his body and arched up into him, opening her mouth to his lips and clutching him as tight a she could for as long as they had left.
* * *
At ten minutes to sunset, Lee and Kara were marched out of their cell, their hands tied behind their backs, not close enough to touch each other any more, and Lee's whole body clenched at that loss; the loss of her skin against his and the breathy catches that passed for moans in his silent wife's vocabulary were almost too much to bear. Her smile, her eyes, her determination and love and just the life that surrounded her, that glowed in her brighter than anyone else, all to be extinguished. All because of him.
"Kara," he called out as they were being tied back to back to the stake in the middle of a pile of dry branches, in the middle of the town square. "Do you remember when you tried to teach me how to fish with your spear and I fell in and speared my toe instead?"
He didn’t know if he was doing any good, but he wanted to try to give her some peace at the end, maybe only a portion of what she had given him, but still. "Do you know that the first time I saw you running out of that cave to skewer me I nearly lost my breath at how beautiful you were?" the ropes were firmly tied and he could feel Kara straining against them, his brave girl, still fighting. Until he realized that she had just been trying to twist her hands around so that their fingers could link around the post. "Thank you," he whispered, feeling her fingers tighten on his. "I have always loved you," he said steadily as the sun hit the horizon. "I will always love you." A rusting of wings distracted him from the men lighting the fire around them. "And if there is a God or gods or anything after this, I will find you again," he vowed as all hell broke loose.
* * *
A figure leaped into the fire. Sharon, with sword raised high, cutting the ropes binding her. She shoved the six shirts into Kara's hands and moved to free Lee. The swans that had been circling swooped down one by one and Kara threw the shirts over their heads as they flew past, landing gently as humans. D'Anna, Galen, Simon, Caprica, Doral all transformed back in their entirety and Leoben back mostly, but with a wing instead of a left arm because of the shirt Kara could not finish. She didn’t dwell on the guilt as Karl rushed by, throwing her a sword and then tossing one to Lee as well. "Best diversion in the history of diversions!" Karl yelled to them as they tumbled out of the fire, "Now let's get the hell out of here!"
Kara swung around, assessing the situation, noticing Lee doing the same. "Lee!" she croaked out, grimacing when her voice stuck and didn’t carry. Clearly she needed more practice, but God did it feel good to say her husband's name for the first time, even if he hadn’t heard it.
"Incoming!" Lee yelled and he and Kara engaged with the few guards who had been surrounding what was to be their funeral pyre. They kept backing up into the crowd, hearing the soldiers standing outside of the masses trying to push in as the people murmured in amazement at the miracle that had occurred in front of them.
"This way!" Caprica yelled, and Lee looked at Kara who nodded reassurance before fighting in the direction of her voice. She made him go first so that she was the one guarding him from the advancing guard from the rear and her seven warrior brothers and sisters and his cousin guarded his front. He was simply moving too slow on that leg to be able to keep up a sustained attack. She cut a soldier's nose off who got to close to Lee, making them back up a little at her ferocious defense. Swords ahead and behind, a fire still roaring in the middleKara laughed in delight. This was her kind of fight.
She caught Lee looking up in surprise at the sound and she grinned fully at him while she fended off yet another ungainly blow to the head. "You know, if I hadn’t seen you and Karl fight before, I would be having serious doubts about the prowess of the Galactican army," she said. It was hoarse and ugly, but it was still her voice and he had still heard it. She spun around to swing at her new opponent's knees and Lee's sword arced over her head to slice across the soldier's chest. He hauled her up, pulling her as fast as the crowd and his leg allowed. "Don't worry about me, Lee," Kara said. "It's gonna take a lot to drag me away from you."
"Those are the first words you speak after all these years? Commenting on soldier skill levels?" He was trying to sound incredulous, but Kara could hear the fine trembling underneath. It had been a long day for all of them.
"They weren't my first words," Kara panted as they finally broke through the crowd to find that the soldiers in front of them were already dead or incapacitated and a bunch of horses, including Viper, waiting for them.
"Who?" Lee asked as he accepted his cousin's help up into the saddle before Karl ran for a different horse.
"Lampkin," Karl yelled back. "Now move!"
Kara had already swung herself in front of Lee and was urging Viper out of the town. She did a quick head count, finding everyone she loved, with the exception of Hera who she'd worry about later, all present and accounted for before she gave Viper his head and followed them. Lee wrapped his arms around her, leaning with the movements of her body, as in synch as always. "So what were you first words, Kara?" he asked close to her ear and she shivered.
"The first thing I said was Lee," she said, laying her hand briefly over his as they clasped around her middle. He kissed her neck once before tucking down into her again, trying to make the ride easier for Viper as they raced toward the Cylon border.
* * *
They stopped briefly to pick up Hera who was staying with the priest who had married Karl and Sharon and Kara and Lee, and an argument commenced among the Cylons about how and when they were going to overthrow Cavil and try to rescue their mother's sanity. Karl, Lee and Hera looked on for a couple of minutes in bemused silence before they shrugged and walked a small distance away where they could hear themselves think.
Hera held out her arms to Lee and he picked her up obligingly, hugging the little girl to his chest as he talked to her father. "So . . . what exactly happened back there?"
Karl scratched his head. "Hell if I know. One minute we're sitting there at dinner, the next minute swans are sitting at our doorstep, and transform into Kara and Sharon's brothers and sisters, they tell some crazy story about being turned into birds and Kara's vow of silence and how you two have been captured, where you are, bring the shirts, etc. And then they turned back into birds and flew away and Sharon was running to your cave for shirts made out of flowers and telling me to bring Hera to the priest." He made a face at his daughter and ruffled her curls.
"Oh," Lee said, nodding. "Wait-what?"
"I don’t know, man. Ask Sharon or Kara. Or Simon or Doral-"
"Stop."
"Or D'Anna or Galen or Leoben or Caprica," Karl finished.
Lee felt a little stunned. "Wow. In-laws."
Karl nodded sagely, "We're lucky we have each other."
"Right," Lee said.
"Right," Hera agreed and they laughed as they walked back to their squabbling new family.
* * *
They rode all night, much to Kara's annoyance. She had voted to slow down because of Lee's leg, but Leoben and flapped his wing and made everyone feel bad for him so he had gotten his way. "You okay?" she asked as they approached the home she hadn’t seen in six years.
"Yeah," Lee said, but she could tell he was in a lot of pain.
"Did anyone look at that properly?"
"Well enough," he said.
"Well enough to fight a crowd of soldiers and then ride two days straight?"
"No, not well enough for that, but Viper's getting the worst of this bargain," he said leaning forward to pat his horse's sweaty neck.
Kara leaned back into Lee but slid her hands along Viper's neck. "Not long now," she crooned.
"I always knew you liked the horse better then me." Kara laughed, enjoying letting her emotions bubble up and out. The confrontation ahead wasn't going to be fun, but it wasn't going to be a fight. Not with all the witnesses and the law and the return of the royals. "You and Karl and Hera better stand back a little until we explain things."
"No way," Lee said.
"This is just going to be a political thing," Kara assured him. "No bloodshed, as long as you and Karl don’t get in the way."
"I'm pretty good at politics," Lee said. Kara looked at him in disbelief. "Seriously," he insisted, "Laura's myopic and paranoid and suffers from delusions of grandeur. That isn't my fault."
They clattered through the town, silence falling over the crowd at the sight of the presumed dead royals. They gathered quite a following of people as they made their slow way to the center of the city to the palace.
A glowering Cavil and a weeping Ellen were waiting for them in the courtyard. Before either of them could speak, Caprica started the process, witnessed by what seemed like most of the city's citizens. "We move to remove our mother, Ellen and our cousin, Cavil from the circle of governance."
"We agree," intoned Doral and on down the line until it reached Kara.
"We agree," she said.
"We disagree," Cavil snapped with anger.
"We-agree," said Ellen. Her mother's answer made Kara's heart jump. Maybe there was some hope left. She started hesitantly forward and that was all Ellen needed to run forward into her children's arms.
* * *
They lay in their bed. Their first bed that wasn't a makeshift cot where they were forced to sleep crushed together. Kara hung onto Lee tightly anyway. It had been too damn close. "That was intense," Lee sighed into her hair. "Who knew you were such a moaner?"
"I did," Kara said sleepily. "Drove me crazy not to make any noise with you." Lee hummed happily and pushed her over so he could kiss down her body. "Again?" Kara asked with such dismay in her voice that Lee rolled onto his back and laughed.
"I was just kissing you," he said when he got his breath back. "I have a lot of making up to do in that department."
"We've got the rest of our lives for that," Kara assured him.
"Yeah we do," Lee answered and they grinned unabashedly at each other before Kara shuffled in close and draped herself over his side again.
"What are we going to do about Galactica?" she asked.
"I'll start moving to open peace negotiations tomorrow, if that's alright with the clan," he said. "One of the conditions will be that we speak only to my father. I can’t imagine he was pleased when he came back to find out that his wife tried to kill me. We may not be close, but I'm still his son."
"Think anything will come of it?" Kara asked, tracing a finger along his collarbone.
"I don't know," Lee admitted a little sadly. "I still want to try though." Kara nodded and continued to draw patterns along his skin. A sudden yawn cracked her jaw and prompted her to stretch out further along him, wiggling her toes against his. "I can't believe I can actually wake up with you tomorrow without having to run off somewhere," he said gleefully and she smiled at him before closing her eyes. "Good-night, Kara. Love you," he said softly.
Kara's eyes shot open when she realized that this was a gift she hadn't given him yet, even if he already knew. She propped herself up, looking into those blue eyes. She kissed his nose and smiled. "I love you too." And he pulled her down flush against his chest and they fell asleep, finally home.
fin