Chapter Text
"I'm leaving." Mordred forced the words out, just as he forced himself to look his brother in the eye as he said them.
Gawain was barely thirty years old, but he looked as though he had aged a decade overnight. Mordred thought he could see hints of silver in his thick, red beard where there were none before, and exhaustion in his normally bright blue eyes. He saw these things, and knew they were his doing. Guilt did battle in the pit of his stomach with desperation.
"You can’t mean that," Gawain said, his tone weary rather than angry, which somehow made everything worse. "You took an oath, Mordred, to serve the King, to serve the realm -"
"And if the two cannot coexist? When serving the King means helping to drive the realm to ruin, which do I choose? The rest of them are content to turn a blind eye to his pride, but I’m not - and I know that you aren’t, either. We have to do something." Mordred rubbed agitatedly at the long scar that ran the length of his face’s right side, from temple to unbearded jaw. When the wound was struck, Gawain had told him once that it made him look fierce rather than hideous, and while he knew it wasn’t true, he had appreciated the effort.
"And what do you propose we do?"
"Speak with Cynric. Treat with him, and make an ally of him before he decides to take up where his father left off." Both Mordred and Gawain had been born after Badon Hill, where the Saxon king Cerdic had been defeated, slain by Arthur himself, but they had both heard plenty of stories from men who had been there. It was that battle, some said, more than any magical sword or mysterious prophecy, that had made Arthur a king. If only that young king were with them now, Mordred thought grimly.
"Absolutely not." Gawain sounded horrified, and Mordred looked up from his thoughts. "Arthur has already refused the envoy. Going behind his back would be treason." There it was. That word again. It made his stomach turn, every time it was bandied about. He crossed his arms over his chest and arched a brow, trying his best to look cavalier rather than furious.
"Is that all? I thought we had decided that treason was quite alright. You know, when the good Sir Lancelot had his way with the Queen, broke his oaths, and murdered our brothers. Do you remember that, or is stroking my father’s ego more important to you than the fact that he declined to let us seek justice against the man who cuckolded him before the entire court?"
He regretted the words as soon as they flew from his mouth, but it was too late now to take them back. He watched Gawain’s expression morph, bypassing fury and settling into despair. In his life, he had seen Gawain truly angry only a handful of times. Not one of those occasions had been directed at him or any of their brothers: not even at Gaheris, who murdered their mother. Perhaps he was incapable of it.
For the second time, he caught himself thinking that anger would be preferable.
"If you do this, Mordred, you must know that you’ll be making an enemy of everyone. Even me." The finality with which Gawain delivered his decision resonated with a gravity most regal. Arthur had chosen his heir well: his second-eldest nephew could make a pronouncement feel like the falling of an axe, and for the first time, Mordred questioned whether he was really doing the right thing. But he had come too far to turn back now. He would see this farce through to the bitter end, even if it meant such a loss.
"Perhaps my treason will be taken more seriously. Is that vanity, do you think? To hope that it is my betrayal, and not Lancelot’s, that opens his eyes at last?" There was no more ferocity left in him, all of it draining away in an instant. Gawain’s arms closed around him, dragging him close in a familiar, ursine embrace. This, too, possessed a finality against which he could not argue. He had no choice but to return it and will his courage not to break.
By dawn the next morning, Mordred had fled the city, and with him half the Round Table and the soldiers they commanded. Of the ones that stayed behind, only Gawain knew the reason why, and he prayed that his silence - his own small treason - would keep his brother safe.