Shared Chambers: Indulgences
Title Shared Chambers: Indulgences
Rating PG
Characters/Pairing Arthur/Gwen
Word Count 3,046
Warnings/Spoilers spoilers for series 5, episodes 5.01-5.10 / lots of speculation though too
Author’s Note This is another chambers series fics, inspired by the episode to fill in missing pieces. By the way, 5.11 Shared Chambers is coming. It's longer and written, but needs more editing. Following will be 5.12 and 5.13, plus a possible surprise. // Inspired to starry--eyed who brought up some important points about the after-effects of Gwen's time under Morgana's spell//helped me write this with a little more observance
Shared Chambers:Indulgences
Morning comes to which he wakes early, but she still slumbers and he feels no rush to get her to join him. It has been a little more than a week since the cleansing ritual, the Dolma ending Morgana’s spell. When they first returned home there were for sure bits of confusion. The loving moments, the truest moments that were produced by the depths of her fighting heart, his wife could remember with more clarity. It was those moments of puppet control, of Morgana’s dreadful influence to cause harm, even death, that his wife had little to no recall of.
She wanted him to tell her everything, but he had no ease with that at all. So she went to Merlin and got the gist of what she wanted to know most. Arthur couldn’t help but be angry at Merlin for a bit before his wife showed him why it was so important that she understand more about what happened during that time. With her good heart she did her best to make amends for anything that needed it and in that way was able to personally move past the horror.
Not everything was remedied though, which is why now he lets her sleep. Sometimes in the middle of the night she has awful dreams, or when waking quietly complains about disturbing thoughts when trying to sleep. They are the aftertaste of the spell and at times can be wretched and cause bits of insomnia. They anger him often as even her horrid experience in the darktower becomes a little more vivid. Within all that is her not loud, but solid grief of losing her brother. During the time of the spell she was not really able to properly mourn his loss so it is only now she can feel it honestly. And yet as is the norm for his wife, it is quiet and almost properly humble, her pain of loss.
The past week especially, during a time of not so many kingdom issues, Arthur has done his best to spend the bulk of it with his wife, treating her lovingly to different experiences of pleasure for both of them. A picnic in the wood, with Merlin attending, but then making himself scarce when romance grew to its ultimate height between him and his wife. Meals in bed. Walks along the coastline or maybe a ride to the ocean’s beachfront.
Sometimes he almost forgets how beautiful a place Camelot is. With its surrounding evergreen forest, its bordering rivers and its beauty of architecture, it is a true sight to behold. One to enjoy with love at your side.
After he sends Merlin off, he studies his wife more. As she is in everything, Guinevere has rare kind of beauty.
Something unknown, he noticed it actually when they were growing up. Guinevere had always lived in Camelot, but it was her father’s expertise in sword making that brought them to the center, where the most exciting things happened.
Just a year past that he imagined it was that Guinevere became Morgana’s handmaiden. She was different in that too from the others. It wasn’t rare for the handmaidens to go into the depths of the castle to gossip without being found. Arthur sometimes listened in as he frequented there too secretly when he wanted to get away from one useless servant after another. And to get away from his father’s anger when another foolish servant ran running for the hills because Arthur Pendragon was so *scary*. Ha ha.
Never once though when he would go down there did he find Guinevere joining in with them. Actually, never did he hear her whisper a contrary thing about Morgana. Her faithfulness to her lady was so heart driven that it was something to be admired. Maybe even feel a bit jealousy at. None of his servants regarded him that way…not as a friend anyway.
Guinevere too liked flowers and that was the way he found her years ago, picking flowers in the middle of the wood, the first time they actually talked more than the formal greetings conducted within the castle.
She had so many bunches that she was dropping them, her face pinching with unhappiness before she calmly let some go and stooped down to rearrange the fallen ones. Getting an idea quickly it seemed, she gathered them within her red and white dress’s apron quietly.
“Need some help?”
The quiet blew up. His presence and what he thought was his muting voice strongly alarmed her, making her drop every single flower. Then she abruptly moved down to her knee. “My Lord.”
He shook his head, giving a wry smile. “Do you…need some?” He couldn’t help it, making his voice sound insistent. From the time he could speak his father taught him to never sound shaky or irresolute, always give voice like one in command, for one day he would be.
As his voice got that bit of grating edge he could see, even though she hid it quite well, that she was a bit put off by it. “No need my Lord.”
She moved down to two knees, saying nothing more as she gathered the flowers, but he could tell her hands were now shaking.
A few of the gillyflowers seemed to leap out of her trembling hands, falling to the ground once more. He took a step forward, his fourteen year old body just a bit taller than her equally aged one. “You don’t always have to call me that. Especially since I’m not even close to being crown prince yet. You can refer to me as Arthur. I don’t mind.”
Now she looked up and he smiled as he could see that her dark curls, although bound back, many were betraying the ribbon tie, and falling forward freely, tickling at her nose. He gave a slight gasp as she pushed them back suddenly, harshly, away.
“Guinevere?”
“It’s Gwen.”
He handed her some of the flowers, noticing how she kept her hand far away from his as she took them into her grasp.
“But I thought you were first announced as Guinevere?”
She looked up at him again, a pinch to her face. She probably was thinking about how even though he had seen her many times in the hallway he never bothered to call her by name. Not until…now. No bother ever before. He was always like that. But her disapproval didn’t quite feel so right. She was a servant girl, really nothing more, but still…something different.
“It is my given name Prince Arthur. But I am Gwen. It is what everyone calls me.”
“Oh.” So he’d just call her Gwen from now on. Yeah.
Hmmm. Guinevere fit better. Taking a look again at her face, he was sure of it.
She nodded and then oddly enough started to spout it out. “These are gillyflowers, my favorite really. The Lady Morgana loves them too. They’re as gleaming as your armor.”
His eyes widened. She continued in a rush.
“Well not your armor specifically. I didn’t mean that of course. I just meant armor…because it gleams…shines like…lightning.” Her nose scrunched up, her eyebrows pitching with uncertainty. It was a burst of nervousness and then it was gone, her face falling back down to concentrate on her task.
He helped her gather more, feeling a bit of nature’s presence and her quiet not really disturbing, but more calming on his busy mind and always ready for action body. Just sitting with her, collecting the flowers, he could almost hear his breathing. Relax in it. They got to the last of them and she started to get up, but he grasped her wrist.
“Gwen?”
She peered down at him, biting her lip some with more uncertainty. It once again didn’t sound quite right, and yet he let it go.”Remember…you can call me Arthur. Like if you need something sometime or whatnot. You can call me…Arthur.”
She stared down at him for a moment and he gently let her wrist go. Then after giving a slight, almost not there, nod, with her gillyflowers clutched in her apron, she left him, alone.
It was maybe a year later he was being bullish with one of his many annoying servants. He was using him for target practice while she was outside too, tending to the launderings. An unhappy look crossed her face, and it must have bordered on disapproving, because one of his friends noticed with a sneer.
“What are you looking at Servant girl? Put your nose back in your work.”
She frowned at his friend, but then turned away.
“You shouldn’t talk to her like that.”
“What, she’s a servant Arthur!”
“She’s Morgana’s handmaiden, and also a girl and she’s just trying to do her work.”
“Yeah, and looking at you like what you’re doing is wrong. As she isn’t an inch of royalty, she has no call to do that.”
Arthur didn’t say anything more, changing the way of the conversation and actually ending the display with his hapless servant. Then when it all was done and his friend excused himself to take care of some tasks for his father, Arthur walked over to Guinevere. She was scrubbing at a dress, her attention totally upon it.
“Hello Gwen.”
He couldn’t help notice how she didn’t look up right away. It took a few moments before she faced him, giving a somewhat curtsy, as awkward it was while she was centered on her work.
“My Lord.”
He studied her for a moment, noticing how in the hot summer sun she was sweating some, having to wipe at her brow a lot and her dress one of her thinner ones to ward off some of the awful muggy heat. “Was my friend right? You didn’t really approve of what was going on there?”
She faced him now with surprise, her hand stilling on the clothes, before she regained her composure and shook her head, letting it fall back down again as once more her task was of utmost importance. “My Lord I have been busy doing my work, as you can see.”
“But you were watching us.” Arthur stated, no question about it.
She lifted her head, giving a slight nod. “I saw some…yes.”
“And you don’t approve?”
She seemed to be quarreling with herself before she gave a frown. “I don’t like bullish behavior.”
“You’re calling me bullish then?”
She frowned, those eyebrows uncomfortably pitching. “I didn’t say that. I said that I don’t like it. When boys who are bigger than other boys act like bulls. Not that I’m calling you one. But when you see a bull…it can be nothing more than a…bull. Not that you’re one. My Lord.”
“But I’m bullish.”
He didn’t ask, didn’t need to. She raised her head again, giving another one of those disapproving frowns. And he knew she saw him that way for sure. It bothered him, for whatever reason then he wasn’t sure why. But another year passed and the girls started to be a big part of Camelot banquets. Girls of nobility, of perfect beauty and all that.
And yet still years later when Merlin was his servant finally and she was accused of sorcery, she called out his name. His first name without any protocol before it. She screamed to him, Arthur, and it started then, a wonder again to her unique natural beauty. To the girl who called herself Gwen and yet the fitting title for him was Guinevere.
His remembrance of the past is broken as Merlin comes in, of course forgetting the precious Gillyflowers. And of course beyond that his wife realizes that even if his intentions are good, it is Merlin who has done much of the work. She gives him that smiling and knowing look as Arthur tries his best to protest that at least it was his idea.
Then they enjoy the meal together. When it is done, Arthur snuggles up against her, kicking away the plates and tray. She giggles as they crash down to the floor before exuding her responsible tone.
“Arthur, that will need to be cleaned up. You shouldn’t make such a mess for the servants.”
He tickles at the edge of her ear with his finger. “Always so considerate Guinevere.”
She sighs some under his touch, reminding him, “I used to be one of those servants. Tending to messes that sometimes were the result of nothing more than indulgence.”
Okay. He likes how she phrases that last word. Adds a bit of naughtiness. “Well indulgence within private chambers isn’t always bad. See my Queen, we have a curtain around this bed and all for such private indulgences.”
She presses her lips desiringly against his. “We do indeed my King.” They kiss some more, but then he asks, fingers tendering at her curls of hair to bring some stray ones away from her face. “How did you sleep?”
She smiles at his concern that edges just slightly into his voice. He tries to be cavalier about it, but he worries regularly since the end of Morgana’s control. “I had no more dreams if that’s what you mean. Just that one when we first lay to sleep. They are rarer now, so that is good.”
“Yes, very good.” He sighs and taking her more strongly into his arms lies down with her upon the bed.
She frowns as his intention becomes clear. “Do you not have court business Arthur? Knighting matters to attend to? I must have some too, obligations of being Queen that is.”
She starts to lift from the bed, but he shakes his head, pulls her in closer. “No. To have such a strong Round Table Court and Council means that there are times I do not have to be there. If there are any emergencies they know to consult me. As for the knights, they too tend to their business quite well and should do fine without me for at least a day. And as for your obligations, you’ve been relieved of them this day. Everyone needs some time off. So hence, we get ours.”
She laughs softly, snuggling in against him. “Well I shall no longer argue against your will then…for this day that is. Whatever will we do with ourselves Arthur?”
He moves up to his knees and pulls the opening part of the curtain tightly closed, grinning back at her after he’s done. “Oh I have a few chivalrous and yet indulgent intentions in mind.”
“Chivalrous you say?” She asks with a wink to her eye as his hands grasp underneath her arms, pressing intimately into her back.
“Yes. What can be more chivalrous than a man attending to his wife?”
“Mmm…” She murmurs as his lips wetly find her neck. “Nothing I suppose.”
And within those concealed curtains they indulgently enjoy their day off.
***
The time of lightness is not meant to last however. Days later she finds him within their private chambers, a tight look upon his face.
“Arthur, what is it?”
He says nothing and so she closes the door and steps forward, wrapping her arms around his waist from behind. “Arthur?”
He holds at her hands, bringing one to his lips, his look still troubled, but her presence a pleasure to his heart. “Morgana has declared war on Camelot.”
She lets out a sigh, but it’s not one of surprise at all as she moves around him to stand in front. “And you are surprised? I can’t believe that you would be. She took me and tried to bend me to her will of ending your life.”
She whispers is with quiet passion against his face, a brush of her lips. “Thankfully she failed. But Morgana has proved it. She is determined to have her way. She wants Camelot’s fall.”
Arthur stares at Guinevere for a moment. There is cold truth in her words. It is what Morgana’s capture of her has done. Oh, by all understandings of heart, his wife is still the beautiful, peaceful, humble, yet strong woman he has always loved, but now too she is even firmer of purpose. Morgana, with her capture, with her setup to kill Elyan, has unwittingly made a stronger foe.
“She does.”
Gwen lifts her hands, touching her husband’s cold cheeks. He is tired and weary of the hatred, of the cold heartless pursuit. She has little doubt he will not sleep much tonight, mapping out courses of war into the latest hours. They will be ones that he will travel with his knights because Arthur rarely stands back from the strongest battles. He is always at the front, a warrior king.
Only in his white tunic, she frowns at the coldness she feels upon his face, and goes to their dressing wardrobe, bringing it out. She wraps it around his shoulders, bringing his hands and arms into the sleeves of his long warm coat for cold evenings. “Here…there is a chill tonight. I will go make up some cider too. Keep your heart warm.”
She goes to leave, but he catches at her hand, love in his eyes because even though he knows sometimes she does not like it, that he is this way, she understands him well. She knows the duty they both agreed to when he became king and she became queen respectfully. “Thank you. Guinevere, my Heart. You keep me warm.”
His lips press intimately to hers, his tongue rolling inside to connect indulgently with her. For just a moment. A bit of intimacy, before he lets go and she gives a slow smile.
Perhaps reluctance? Maybe a bit of want to fight? But he gets none. And beyond love and physical pleasure and desire it is why he is so entirely glad he married her years ago.
She is not so selfish to quarrel, to hold jealousies or ugly disagreement when he must think of the kingdom.
For she thinks of it too.
She leaves the room and Arthur presses his hand to his heart, where hers just touched for a second. Feeling that lingering warmth, helping him to move to the desk and begin it.
A plotting of war that he darkly wonders…
If Morgana has her way…
Could it be his last?