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It was a terrible day for a battle. The rising sun warmed the cool spring morning, and song birds chirped in new green leaves. The breeze lifted Kili’s hair off his neck. A butterfly flitted over a riot of hyacinth, tulip, and saxifrage. It would be crushed before midday.
The wind didn’t move Fili’s hair, its honey highlights barely catching the sun’s rays since he had chopped it off in a fit of despair and rage. Nothing Kili did, not his most intense glares nor sexiest cajoling, convinced Fili to grow it back out. Fili said only freedom would allow it. Kili thought he missed braiding Fili’s hair more than he missed their freedom.
The Roman armor did glint in the sun as its battalion crested the horizon. Kili squinted. Huge. Though corrupt and decadent, their politicians feeble and indolent, he had to admit the oppressors could assemble an army. ‘Barbarians’ could not or did not. So Rome won. And won.
Not today. Surely not under this clear sapphire sky. His love for Fili would not die today.
But Kili might. Die. Even when taken concussed and broken to the gladiator ludus he didn’t worry for his or Fili’s life. He simply survived.
The army kept coming. It stretched all the way across his field of vision. Neither the slave rebellion leaders nor their soothsayers had predicted a response this large at this time. At most, this was to be a scuffle to distract from raids, certainly not the war, with the bulk of the Roman legions understood to be deployed far to the west.
Kili turned toward Fili when he felt eyes on him. Silent, they held each other’s gaze. Kili hoped his eyes displayed as much unguarded love as Fili’s unusually soft blue eyes did, even though the sight of that took his breath. Kili choked, looking down for just a moment. It was going to be worse than he thought if Fili was showing that much emotion.
They never touched before a battle; they took the time to focus. They didn’t need to anyway - they would be together after. Fili reached for Kili’s hand. Kili glanced at the enemy, at the red flourishes over unyielding armor, and down at Fili’s shoulders. Though beautifully broad and thickly muscled, they were only covered in leather. Kili squeezed Fili’s hand harder than he had since he’d suffered from nightmares as a child.
“It begins,” Fili said, eyes hard again, focused ahead, back straight.
The Romans’ barritus rumbled across the field. It wouldn’t build to a roar until the forces clashed. Kili almost laughed. Such a thing could not intimidate an army who had heard - and employed - the angriest battle cries and horns in their world.
Kili took a long breath and let go of his thoughts. He raised his shield, reached for his spear, and exhaled. Time to fight. A clamor on their right wing rippled toward their cohort. Kili turned his head toward the sound while keeping an eye on the enemy’s slow advance.
“Deception.” “Trickery.” “Take heart.” Whispers. Disjointed words on the breeze. Kili glanced at Fili. His eyes were narrowed on the enemy. A horse thundered behind and then another. “Nori returns,” Thorin thundered. “The line is thin.”
“Thin,” Kili breathed. It still looked impossibly long, with more troops than they had with half of the rebels raiding further south. A Gallic war horn sounded, and the rebels raised their spears as one. Kili smashed sword against shield, again and again. Charge.
No thought. Kili swept aside one sword with his shield, another with his sword, knocked a man out of the way with a mailed fist, slashed through the neck of the next one. The one behind him aimed at Kili’s head; he ducked, and Fili took the man’s arm and then his head. Fili spun, and Kili ripped his sword through a leg, his bellows louder than the screams of the dying.
They hit a gap in the action, and Kili planted his feet wide, Fili at his side. He sucked in heated air, nodded, and fought.
They’d survive, they’d kiss each other clean, they could do this. He must see Fili -
He couldn’t see Fili. “Fee!” he bellowed. “Fili!”
“Hush and fight,” the beloved voice, hoarse from exertion, said from behind. Fili pressed his back against Kili’s for a moment and then all Kili heard was the ring of metal on metal.
Kili’s rapid breathing was harsh, his sword heavy as he blocked a spear thrust aimed at his gut. “Too close,” he rasped, no longer able to yell.
He had finally lost Fili. Of course it had to happen sometimes in the chaos of battle, but Kili needed his partner like he never had before. The spearman tried to distract Kili with a thrust at his face. The enemy must’ve been tired, too. Kili knocked it aside with his shield, sure he was at half speed, and stabbed the Roman. Arm and mind numb, Kili kicked the falling man off his sword and kept moving.
Block, duck, hammer, thrust. A flash of gold. Fili’s hair shone after all. It couldn’t have been Fili’s hair. But it was Fili. Surrounded. Covered in blood and mud that was sprinkled with crushed flower petals.
With tunnel vision, Kili bashed his way through the melee, unheeding of who he knocked aside. His legs were too heavy, he moved through a swamp, his chest hurt, he wouldn’t make it. Fili had switched to his dual swords and looked like the gladiator he had too recently been.
A bloody form blocked Kili’s view. He leaned sideways as he parried and screamed as Fili went down. In fury, Kili threw his useless shield at his attacker’s face and bashed the man’s head with his sword as if it were a hammer, until a mailed fist took away the pain.
Kili staggered through bodies and groans, wind and fading light, his head spinning and heart pounding. He refused to look at the dead. He forced his blurring eyes to focus on the living. A blond gasping through crushed ribs stopped Kili’s breath, but he wasn’t Fili. Broad shoulders bent over a fallen soldier sent his pulse galloping, but he wasn’t Fili either.
Through a line of former gladiators seeking survivors, Kili’s eyes caught on bloody white petals on shuffling bare legs. He told himself it wasn’t Fili. A muddy arm shoved a former house slave aside, and then Kili was sure it couldn’t be Fili. But the limping apparition apologized as it kept moving. Cold eyes caught Kili’s. It was Fili.
It was Fili. Kili sank to his knees. “Get up,” he muttered. His body ignored him, as it did the order not to cry like a babe. “Fili.”
Fili’s face lit up, and Kili’s heart stuttered to watch Fili try and fail to increase his speed. Fili staggered forward and dropped to his knees. And finally, Kili was wrapped in Fili’s arms.
“I failed you,” they said into each other’s ears.
Kili pulled back, hands on Fili’s shoulders. Nothing existed in that moment but the two of them, caught in their gaze. Fili actually cracked first. He smirked. Kili grinned. “No, I failed you,” they said together.
Kili snorted and pushed himself to his feet, wobbled, then pulled Fili up. They supported each other back to the rebel camp. Like the wildflowers, they would heal. They would survive. Together. Kili let the pain escape with giddy, relieved laughter.