There was no telling what tomorrow might bring. For all that they’d lost—for Gawain, who was likely enduring horrors, for their dear friend, the protector who could not protect his beloved, for a kingdom which teetered on the edge of disaster—and for a love that might fall apart and betray them both as pawns in the mages’ game. It all hung in a horrible balance.

But today, tiny dots of yellow flowers waved in the tall grass under a clear sky. The sun shone. The three of them were safe. Arthur and Vera loved one another.

They were alive.

And for now, that was enough.

Meeting Vera

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ONUS

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RTHUR

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When Guinevere left for her respite in the countryside, Arthur had been relieved—accompanied by a wash of guilt. He was used to being able to fix things. If he showed up to a task with integrity, with humility, with the inevitable power that once only came from his gift and was now magnified by his throne, he could find a way to win the unwinnable.

Except with Guinevere.

It all started so well. She arrived in Camelot (with her awful father) and right away it was clear that she and Arthur were a well-suited pair. She every bit the poised and noble queen to help establish their new kingdom, he with his raw gift for the leading of a nation—and both sharing the vision to build something new, something better than what had been.

It was all but decided before she’d arrived, and it solidified with Guinevere and Arthur’s meeting: they’d be married. But the wars were not all won yet. They didn’t know it, but there was a year yet to go of battle—and the fiercest they’d face. On the precipice of losing it all, when all truly seemed hopeless, Guinevere had been the one to find a way to win.

And then she stood on the smoldering battlefield and saw the wreckage of her designs.

And slowly (so slowly at first that Arthur could convince himself it was her ordinary poise), she grew sad. It was the beginning of the melancholy. If he’d not ignored it then … if he’d stopped everything then to care for her, he still wondered: would it have made a difference?

She was the one to finally tell him. On a rainy morning when Arthur had been awake since before sunrise preparing for audiences with lords and then having the audiences with said lords, he returned to their quarters for a treaty draft he’d left lying on his desk and hardly noticed her sitting there.

He’d done a double take when he realized she was there—perched on the edge of the bed with her feet on the floor and eyes cast down between them. It was only when she looked up that he could see her eyes were red-rimmed from a good long while of crying. She insisted there was no direct cause of her sadness, that it was just a general feeling, though he knew the devastation she’d wrought to end the wars had ignited it—and it took off like a wildfire within her, sadness devouring everything it could reach.

For a while, Arthur dropped many of his duties. Delegated tasks and audiences and kingdom responsibilities to others so he could try to help Guinevere—with the full expectation that he could help her. That care would be enough.

It was not, no matter what Arthur did, said, or offered. She assured him she just needed time. Slowly, he slipped back to the things he could make better, back to the kingdom building.

And then her sadness changed. She stopped sharing it with him, instead becoming hyper critical and angry about … about everything. That was harder. Like the sadness, he couldn’t fix it. Unlike the sadness, she seemed to come to abhor his very presence.

Then it changed again. She retreated into herself. He’d thought (hoped, really) that it was the beginning of her getting better, but it was worse. She stayed in bed for days at a time. Merlin was able to cheer her some … she’d rouse herself for regular sessions with him. But he travelled often, especially in those early days. So it was back to bed for Guinevere.

The alarms screamed within Arthur, a very correct instinct that something terrible was on the horizon (though he never in a million years would have guessed what was coming). He cared for Guinevere very much. He loved her—not in any sort of nonsense way, but grounded and real care.

And it went far deeper than any sense of possession. Arthur knew that she’d loved someone before … in all the ways. Grounded and real—and the stunning nonsense of great stories. He’d taken her from Tristan. Of course, she’d come willingly. But maybe that was it. Maybe she was sinking into sorrow for the love she’d lost.

She could have him.

Arthur would turn a blind eye to an affair at this point. Hell, he sent for the man across the far reaches of the damn nation, put Tristan in his room with his wife, offered the plea, “Help her. However you can, please help her,” and left. That wasn’t turning a blind eye, that was facilitating an affair. It didn’t matter if it would work to help her.

It didn’t, though. And Tristan went back to the north.

Arthur couldn’t remember how the plan came about that Guinevere should spend some time in the countryside, only that he learned of it and immediately felt like a weight was lifting. She could go, be away, get whatever it was she needed—and he, without seeing her daily deepening despair, would feel like less of a failure. And he could do the thing he was actually decent at. He could work.

God, what sort of a man had he become?

So, yes. He was relieved when she was gone to the country, and he could believe it would all be well soon.

She was gone for nearly a month before she returned. Arthur hadn’t even known that Guinevere was back in Camelot until it all went wrong. He hadn’t so much heard the scream as he … felt something. Like a shockwave blasting through his blood.

He began running without direction, just a guttural pull. Down the stairs from his chamber—their chamber—through the room with the enormous fireplace, out into the back courtyard that they hardly used, and there was Guinevere, decimated on the flag-stoned ground at the center.

Decimated.

Hers wasn’t the only body there. Viviane lay nearby with her hands in front of her, cuffed with beams of glowing cord, eyes open and frozen—magically still—on her side facing the horror. There was no time. No time to wonder at what the fuck was happening.

The only movement came from Merlin, who knelt at Guinevere’s side, his hands working feverishly around her body, centered at her chest where her blood was spurting—where the wound must have been.

Guinevere was hardly recognizable, but in the same way Arthur had been pulled here, he was certain it was her. And he had caught sight of the light blue and gold of her dress’s hem—the same one she’d worn on the very day they met. He thought it might be her favorite and realized now that he’d never asked her. Now … now, most of the gown was ruined by her blood, drenching the entirety of the bodice and midway down the skirt. And she lay in a pool of it. More blood lost than could possibly be survivable. And her face—oh God.

It was like her features were … were melting away, blurring before Arthur’s eyes. But that couldn’t be. It was all wrong, and surely his mind just couldn’t handle what he was seeing. He must have cried out though he didn’t hear any sound, just a heavy thrumming in his own ears. But Merlin jolted and turned toward Arthur barely long enough to see him there.