(no subject)
This is fact: Mordred vanishes from Cywyllog’s room, and appears in the greenhouse. That sounds so civilised, doesn’t it? Just a simple case of scientific teleportation, a murder site calling to murdered ghost.
What it doesn’t mention is that he is gasping, and falls to his knees. It doesn’t mention that one arm reaches out and grips a table so he doesn’t topple over. If a person is watching, and they don’t know his mind, then they might assume that it is emotion that is affecting him like this.
And, partly, they’d be right.
But more then that, though. It’s that as he looked at the sleeping boys, warm and safe and with their dark heads close together, something tugged at his senses. Familiar, so familiar - he’d thought he’d done with visions after the last. That last one…that had been his death. But, no. It feels the same, that wrenching deep inside as if whatever truth that will come forward has to be pulled…
Mordred gasps, and the world spins and fractures into a thousand
glittering
pieces
before coming back together skewed and murky and he’s
walking, stumbling over bodies; some still, some groaning, others screaming for mercy but the blood rushes in his ears and he can’t hear, only he can and it’s someone saying ‘Mordred…’ A choked gasp and then he’s running
falling
to his knees in the blood-drenched mud and snow and slowly lifting the broken helmet from Col’s face and Col
is
dyingdrowningpleading
‘Finish me, ‘Red, I can’t…’ So he bows his head and slides out the knife, cutting the wrist of his only friend left alive so the blood gushes and splurts and it’s tootoobright red for this scene. Body racked by a sob as the light fades from Col’s blueblue eyes in his youngerolder face and then another voice sounds.
‘Mordred.’
Cold voice, stern and
Jesu he
hates
HIMfather. Gets to his feet, slowly, head bare because his helmet was lost hours ago with his horse and slowly he turns and
staggers as the
spear
is thrust through his chest. Eyes widen, the breath is knocked out of him and shocked golden eyes met coldiceskyblue and he opens his mouth because
(he can’t believe that his father actually killed him)
he can’t breathe as Arthur just stares at him and then shoves the spear even more. That spurs his dying self on, a rush of hate-fuelled energy to his arm so he gasps
‘fuck you’ and sends his sword into his father’s
head and
Mordred throws his head back, trying to breathe, trying to, trying to forget the feeling of solid wood piercing his skin and flesh and bone, trying to forget the blood in his lungs. But that’s impossible, as it never ever goes away. Not ever, so he chokes and gasps and tries not to
be pulled to the ground as Arthur topples, sword still in his skull because he lacks the strength or desire to pull it away. On the ground, in the mud and snow and blood and his fingers are stuck the blade and the spear is still through his lung, can’t
breathe
around it. Images flash as he gasps and chokes, motherfatherGwennie and Galahad, leaving he’s leaving he failed and he’s dying only as the light grows bright and dark and his soul is being pulled he sees something that makes it
something that makes it
something that makes him stay and stare. Two little boys, toddlers and identical, calling out ‘tada!’ before they see him and run over, falling into puddles of blood that stains their tunics. He could always tell them apart, his sons but not nevermarriednosons but they are his and Melehan’s frowning as he reaches out with tiny fingers to tug at his father’s sword as Mordred tries to speak, tries to scream, ‘No!’ but the blood is in his throat and mouth and he can’t so he just watches watches as Melehan picks the sword up and then stares down at him, a grave-faced twelve-year-old and Melou’s still crying in background, but both say
‘Father’ and both say
‘We will avenge you’
and their fate is sealed in blood and hatred and love
“No.” Mordred’s voice is choked, and he coughs blood. “No, no, no, no!” He shakes his head, letting go of the table to clutch at his savagely beating temples as he shouts,
“No!”
But he never sees false, never. Dream, sometimes yes, but never a vision. He coughs blood and then sobs, once, harsh and broken as the world spins again. He has no support this time, so he sways and falls; one hand flailing out and landing on the
(place where his small blonde ballerina’s head had fallen as she crumpled)
ground as his body falls heavily back and once again his awareness fragments into
the two boys stand in the great hall, one at his father’s head and the other at his feet, their identical dark eyes meeting over his body
same boys, older by a little, grimly training and both fighting an older, taller man who has their dark eyes only
they are seventeen and pouring over books, speaking in their own tongue to confuse the spy watching through the hole in the wall, a spy who will report to his master who
is dressed as a bishop, striding through a chapel with his sword raised and the two boys are standing by an alter, standing? No, falling and slipping in their blood as one screams
“MELEHAN!” Mordred’s voice is hoarse and ragged, but it is still a father’s scream. The sound echoes against the glass panes and he curls up on himself, drawing his long limbs close and burying his head in his arms.
And it is like that, curled up and huddled like a child, that Mordred Pendragon, bane of the Good King Arthur’s reign, begins to weep for the murder of two boys barely older then himself.
What it doesn’t mention is that he is gasping, and falls to his knees. It doesn’t mention that one arm reaches out and grips a table so he doesn’t topple over. If a person is watching, and they don’t know his mind, then they might assume that it is emotion that is affecting him like this.
And, partly, they’d be right.
But more then that, though. It’s that as he looked at the sleeping boys, warm and safe and with their dark heads close together, something tugged at his senses. Familiar, so familiar - he’d thought he’d done with visions after the last. That last one…that had been his death. But, no. It feels the same, that wrenching deep inside as if whatever truth that will come forward has to be pulled…
Mordred gasps, and the world spins and fractures into a thousand
glittering
pieces
before coming back together skewed and murky and he’s
walking, stumbling over bodies; some still, some groaning, others screaming for mercy but the blood rushes in his ears and he can’t hear, only he can and it’s someone saying ‘Mordred…’ A choked gasp and then he’s running
falling
to his knees in the blood-drenched mud and snow and slowly lifting the broken helmet from Col’s face and Col
is
dyingdrowningpleading
‘Finish me, ‘Red, I can’t…’ So he bows his head and slides out the knife, cutting the wrist of his only friend left alive so the blood gushes and splurts and it’s tootoobright red for this scene. Body racked by a sob as the light fades from Col’s blueblue eyes in his youngerolder face and then another voice sounds.
‘Mordred.’
Cold voice, stern and
Jesu he
hates
HIMfather. Gets to his feet, slowly, head bare because his helmet was lost hours ago with his horse and slowly he turns and
staggers as the
spear
is thrust through his chest. Eyes widen, the breath is knocked out of him and shocked golden eyes met coldiceskyblue and he opens his mouth because
(he can’t believe that his father actually killed him)
he can’t breathe as Arthur just stares at him and then shoves the spear even more. That spurs his dying self on, a rush of hate-fuelled energy to his arm so he gasps
‘fuck you’ and sends his sword into his father’s
head and
Mordred throws his head back, trying to breathe, trying to, trying to forget the feeling of solid wood piercing his skin and flesh and bone, trying to forget the blood in his lungs. But that’s impossible, as it never ever goes away. Not ever, so he chokes and gasps and tries not to
be pulled to the ground as Arthur topples, sword still in his skull because he lacks the strength or desire to pull it away. On the ground, in the mud and snow and blood and his fingers are stuck the blade and the spear is still through his lung, can’t
breathe
around it. Images flash as he gasps and chokes, motherfatherGwennie and Galahad, leaving he’s leaving he failed and he’s dying only as the light grows bright and dark and his soul is being pulled he sees something that makes it
something that makes it
something that makes him stay and stare. Two little boys, toddlers and identical, calling out ‘tada!’ before they see him and run over, falling into puddles of blood that stains their tunics. He could always tell them apart, his sons but not nevermarriednosons but they are his and Melehan’s frowning as he reaches out with tiny fingers to tug at his father’s sword as Mordred tries to speak, tries to scream, ‘No!’ but the blood is in his throat and mouth and he can’t so he just watches watches as Melehan picks the sword up and then stares down at him, a grave-faced twelve-year-old and Melou’s still crying in background, but both say
‘Father’ and both say
‘We will avenge you’
and their fate is sealed in blood and hatred and love
“No.” Mordred’s voice is choked, and he coughs blood. “No, no, no, no!” He shakes his head, letting go of the table to clutch at his savagely beating temples as he shouts,
“No!”
But he never sees false, never. Dream, sometimes yes, but never a vision. He coughs blood and then sobs, once, harsh and broken as the world spins again. He has no support this time, so he sways and falls; one hand flailing out and landing on the
(place where his small blonde ballerina’s head had fallen as she crumpled)
ground as his body falls heavily back and once again his awareness fragments into
the two boys stand in the great hall, one at his father’s head and the other at his feet, their identical dark eyes meeting over his body
same boys, older by a little, grimly training and both fighting an older, taller man who has their dark eyes only
they are seventeen and pouring over books, speaking in their own tongue to confuse the spy watching through the hole in the wall, a spy who will report to his master who
is dressed as a bishop, striding through a chapel with his sword raised and the two boys are standing by an alter, standing? No, falling and slipping in their blood as one screams
“MELEHAN!” Mordred’s voice is hoarse and ragged, but it is still a father’s scream. The sound echoes against the glass panes and he curls up on himself, drawing his long limbs close and burying his head in his arms.
And it is like that, curled up and huddled like a child, that Mordred Pendragon, bane of the Good King Arthur’s reign, begins to weep for the murder of two boys barely older then himself.