Chapter Text
She waits for a lifetime and feels as though the anticipation might kill her. Every noise makes her heart leap, and every disappointment leaves her pained. It was a childish hope to begin with, she thinks, and cringes as she remembers their last conversation in the garrison. You will never see me again.
“Let’s go,” she says, her voice steady.
There are tears in her eyes as the carriage moves off. She refuses to let them fall.
----
Le Havre is a bustle of people and chatter and trade, and Anne can’t stand it. The next ship to England won’t leave until morning, so she pays for a cheap room close to the port and crawls into bed.
She hates how vulnerable she feels, hates how Athos still has this hold over her. Working with him to bring down Rochefort was a risk, she knew, but the way he looked at her in Treville’s office… for a brief second or two, the pure disgust in her husband’s eyes made her want to fall to her knees and beg his forgiveness. Of course, that was something she would never do. Why should she give her information freely? Not one of those Musketeers knew what it was to be a woman in a man’s world. They would never understand her fear of the streets, not even Porthos, because Porthos got out. Someone had cared enough to help him carve out a life where he didn’t have to worry where his next meal came from. Anne de Breuil had no-one.
Enough, she thought to herself. No more self-pity. She was not Anne de Breuil any longer, and she had never truly been Anne de la Fere. She was Milady de Winter, and she made her own path. No man would make her feel guilty for that again, not even Athos.
He had not come. Did she truly believe he would? For a time, yes. With all her heart yes, because he had kissed her with such passion that for a second, she found herself back in their marriage bed in Pinon, carefree and young, and so, so in love. After, as she drank him in, that handsome face and messy hair and lips plump from kissing, she saw Olivier, her husband. It sent a jolt of pain through her that she hadn’t expected, and she suddenly wanted nothing more than to pull him to her once again, to tear away that ridiculous uniform, and have him right there in Rochefort’s office. On the desk, maybe, the same place that Rochefort had dared to put his hands around her neck. It wouldn’t quite be justice, but it would have made her smile all the same. But then Olivier was gone, and Athos the Musketeer was back, his attention focused on the screams in the palace hall.
Let him show his hand, and then we will strike. And as Rochefort did just that, the two of them walked back to the garrison in somewhat uncomfortable silence. In her too hot room in Le Havre, Anne lifts her skirts and slides her hand under the lace of her underwear, and remembers how they came together again that night, furious and loving and frantic and so overdue, and thinks if that is her last memory of Athos, then so be it.
---
He gets to the crossroads, and he knows he’s late.
He’s late, but she left early. Goddamn her, Athos thinks, but there’s no malice in it. She is infuriating, and he loves her. After all this time, after everything she did and every insult that he threw her way, he loves her.
Athos stares at the glove in his hand. He knows that even if he managed to ride to Le Havre before she boarded the ship, he could not go with her. The King just declared war, for God’s sake, and he would not forsake his brothers to indulge in a romantic whim. And yet… he had abandoned D’Artagnan’s wedding celebrations to meet her here. Why? He does not know. Anne made her terms perfectly clear – sail with her to England, or never see her again. Athos remembers the way her voice cracked when she said it. I want to be as I once was with you.
It cannot be, he knows. Olivier d’Athos and Anne de Breuil both perished the moment he sentenced her to die. He thinks of the two of them, innocent and young and carefree, and he thinks of her now, cold and broken and still there, somewhere.
Athos climbs atop his horse, and rides for Le Havre.
---
It was not the most comfortable bed Anne had slept in, but it certainly wasn’t the worst. After all, a street urchin like her learned early not to take a warm bed for granted. In the months after her failed execution, she would sometimes find herself longing for the comfort of her marriage bed. Rainy days in Pinon were her favourite. They would sleep late, a mess of tangled limbs and sheets, until Athos would insist that he must get up and go over the accounts, collect the rents.
“The rents can wait, my love,” she would say, peppering him with gentle kisses until he relented. He did not take a lot of convincing.
It was not until Anne pulled herself out of her childish reminiscing that she realised someone was knocking at her door. It is still dark out, she thought to herself, hand instinctively going to the knife under her pillow. She lit a candle and stepped toward the door.
“Who is it?”
“Open the door, Anne.”
It was as though the air had been ripped from her lungs. That voice, she would know it anywhere. Athos. She did not drop the knife. Instead, she gripped it even tighter, and opened the door.
He looked exhausted.
Neither spoke for a moment, just stared, and Anne was glad that there was no-one around, because what a pair they must look.
In the end, she cracked first. She always did. “What the hell are you doing here, Athos?”
“Hello to you too, Anne."
That drawl... God, it was almost indecent. She wanted to punch him. She wanted to kiss him. She did neither. Instead, Anne slowly lowered the knife, and moved away from the door. “I suppose I should invite you in, then.”
A small smile tugged at his lips. “I would like that.”