a continuation of 1 2 3 4 5
Ygraine had wanted children. She'd imagined a great big family, raising the prince and princesses of Camelot to be warriors and scholars, entertained the thought that she might even give birth to a sorcerer, someone for Nimueh and Gaius to argue over and train. She imagined a Camelot where the highest offices in the land where held by brothers and sisters, united in the love she would instill in them that the petty fights over power would not tear at the next king like it did Uther.
An optimistic view, perhaps, but she'd grown up so close with her brothers that it had seemed not only possible, but probable. She had chosen Uther and her brothers had groaned and complained and picked up their swords and fought for Uther, fought at her side and at his and had never looked back. Because a choice made by one was a choice made by all, so united and determined they were to be more than the parents that had raised them.
She had not considered how that love could sour, how that devotion could bring ruin rather than salvation.
“Tristan is dead,” she repeats, as if that will make it more real and less horrible. Her own death is sad, and Arthur growing up motherless is its own special kind of grief, but her eldest, beloved brother dead not a week behind her is a hell that she’d hoped to never have to endure.
She blames Uther for much, but she can’t blame him for this. If Tristan had really believed her death his fault, when he’d never liked Uther much himself, he would not have stopped until he had Uther’s head. She believes that Uther tried to calm him, to stay his hand, if for no other reason than their shared love of her. But as terrible as Tristan’s death is, as her death will be, leaving Arthur an orphan would be a far greater crime. He should have known that.
“I’m sorry, your majesty,” Gaius says softly.
She pushes down the pain. She will see Tristan again, of course. She will return to her own time, to have the next king of Camelot, to give birth to a boy with her eyes and hair and her skill with a blade, and she will see her brother alive again.
Changes cannot be made. Must not be made. Have not. What has happened shall happen and any attempt to change that will only mire the last few, short years of her life in misery. She will embrace her brother and kiss Nimueh’s cheek and must say nothing of their devastation that awaits them.
“I must speak to Agravaine,” she says.
Agravaine’s devotion had been quieter, his actions sly and his humor dry, but his love no less powerful.
Gaius hesitates. “Your majesty, that may not be the best idea. Losing you once was difficult for him. To lose you twice-”
“I must speak with him,” she says, sharpening her voice to a tone that Gaius has always known better than to question.
Uther is in danger. Perhaps even Arthur is too.
Tristan believed that Uther was responsible for her death and that his life must be forfeit because of it.
A choice made by one of them is a choice made by all.
