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Lancelot knelt on the cool stone before the alter and prayed that judgement day would be kind to Father Carden—that he would see and understand his mistakes. This was a false hope and Lancelot knew it in his gut but still he prayed. Carden had raised him, even if he had also orphaned him. He deserved at least a funeral prayer and a passing of rights.
Before he could finish, a firm hand gripped and then squeezed his shoulder painfully. Lancelot startled and spun around, stumbling gracelessly to his feet.
Gawain stood there looking over him like a great, furious oak.
“What are you doing here?” The knight hissed, seething. His face was red and the vein that tracked across his temple only when he was very angry pulsed threateningly.
Lancelot took a step back, shaking his head though he did not know at what. Was he denying his being found out?
Gawain took one step forward and then he was before the younger man, so close their noses would touch if they took a deep breath. The hand was back on his shoulder.
“Gods be damned, boy, why are you here in this place? If the others found out…”
“I-I’m sorry.”
“You ought to be.” Gawain shook him, gripping his shirt.
“I wanted…” he trailed off.
“You wanted what?” Shouted Gawain.
Lancelot startled once more. He stepped back but could not escape, not with the knights hand gripping his shirt.
“To…to say a prayer for Father Carden,” he finished, barely above a whisper.
Gawain’s eyes grew dark.
“You what?” The older man’s voice shook.
Lancelot swallowed and again tried to escape but Gawain would not release him.
“I’m sorry.”
And then Gawain was releasing him none to gently. With a shove of uncontrolled anger Lancelot stumbled backward into the chair and desk behind him. The younger man hunched his shoulders and dropped his gaze instinctively.
Gawain was fuming. He paced several times along the short length of the bed, a hand at his mouth.
Suddenly he stopped and pointed a finger at Lancelot. His eyes were dark as they were before but now a flicker of fire glinted in them.
“Why did you feel the need to pray for that…man?” Gawain’s voice was a shaking grumble that only served to hike Lancelot’s shoulders up higher and tighter. The younger was visibly trembling now.
Lancelot whispered something but Gawain could not make it out.
“What was that?” He demanded.
“I-I wanted him to… to have his last rites so that-that…so that he might go to heaven,” came Lancelot’s broken and fearful reply.
It would have been better had he said nothing.
There was a a lapse in time where everything was deafeningly quiet and neither man moved. And then it was one man, trembling, who did not move, and the other man, seething, who moved swiftly to close the distance between them.
The knuckles of the knight’s hand struck Lancelot’s cheek so hard it snapped his head to the side, his chin cracking into his shoulder. Lancelot was startled and unbalanced, leaning against the chair and wall for support. Still he did not look up at the knight.
“I have sacrificed much for you you to be here amongst the Fey. Do you understand?” Gawain’s voice was like thunder.
Lancelot trembled and sniffed and nodded once, a small, timid nod.
Gawain reached out quick like a viper and snatched the younger man’s chin in his hand, lifting it so that they may look at one another or so that he might observe the emotions in the other mans eyes. But Lancelot kept his eyes downcast and refused to look at him. Gawain could sense very easily that he was afraid.
The knight roughly shoved the man’s jaw to the side dismissively, letting go of it.
“I understand now why Carden struggled with you. You are too broken. You tremble and shake at every altercation. You never do the right thing. Always you choose the wrong—you do wrong every single gods forsaken time. Every fucking time, Lancelot.” Gawain grit his teeth. “How he put up for so long is beyond me.”
Lancelot grit his teeth so hard they squeaked. His stomach churned violently. He did not know how to fix this, how to do better. Unlike Carden, Gawain seldom gave him clear instructions, and the other Fey gave him no instructions—they wouldn’t even talk to him or look at him.
“Stop your fucking crying!” Gawain hissed, palming Lancelot’s face and shoving his head backward violently.
Lancelot had not realized he was crying, but sure enough his eyes were stinging and blurry. He thought to apologize again but feared speaking would only make it worse.
Suddenly Gawain’s demeanor shifted.
“Turn around.”
Lancelot swallowed hard and looked up at the knight.
“What?”
Gawain shook his head, eyes dark, and stalked toward him, grabbing him roughly by the hips and flipping him around, pressing the sharp bones of his hips against the wooden desk.
Before Lancelot could protest, though he was not sure he would, his breeches were unlaced and yanked down to his knees.
Gawain laid a hand on Lancelot’s back. The younger tensed beneath him. This would be very little fun if the man would not relax. Though maybe not. Perhaps it did not matter. While his thoughts circled in his mind he spat in his hand and pressed his wetted fingers against Lancelot’s entrance. The slighter man, at a vulnerable disadvantage, tensed and attempted to move his hips forward, away from Gawain, a hand shooting back to press at the knight’s hip.
Gawain chuckled darkly and twisted the arm back so that it was pinned behind Lancelot’s back and with this advantage Gawain shoved Lancelot down against the desk top.
“Bite your arm if you must. There is more than you in this village and none need to know the deeds you soil yourself with.” With that, two damp fingers were pushed relentlessly into Lancelot’s resisting hole. The boy shook so hard it jostled the desk, and whimpered behind his tightly closed lips, strangling the noise in his throat.
Gawain, encouraged by the small pained sounds, pushed the fingers in until they could go no further. He curled them and opened them to loosen the man’s entrance and with every movement Lancelot whimpered and trembled.
“Relax or I will not be able to get inside.” Gawain added a third finger as he spoke, earning himself a louder, open mouthed pained protest from Lancelot. Gawain fucked the three fingers in and out of his hole until the trembling lessened.
Gawain ripped his fingers from the loosened hole, Lancelot yelped and tried to move away but Gawain settled a vice grip on his shoulder, pressing him down. He pushed his own breeches down now and released his heavy, hard cock. He jerked it several times with his hand before lining up with Lancelot’s right entrance.
Lancelot let out a suffocated sob when he felt the member press against him, and a strangled sob when Gawain forced the head inside.
Lancelot’s hips moved forward as if to escape but there was no where to go. Gawain crooked a smile at that and with one hand on the younger s shoulder and the other holding his arm behind his back, he drove his thick cock into the slighter body in one foul motion until it was buried there.
Lancelot’s mouth was open but no noise came out. His face was strained and blushing. His legs shook so violently Gawain knew if he let him go he would fall to the ground.
Having calmed from the earlier events some, Gawain decided to attempt a salvage mission on this escapade. He leaned over and gently but the man’s shoulder, and then kissed his neck slowly.
“You feel so good. You want to be good for me, right?” Gawain asked, pulling his cock out and pressing it back in slowly.
Lancelot was breathing again, reprieved briefly by the cock leaving his ass for a moment. He nodded and whimpered.
“Good boy,” Gawain breathed as he picked up his pace, hauling his dick out quickly and slamming it back in again and again. Lancelot once more flattened his hips against the desk in an attempt to escape the invasion and the pain. Gawain grabbed his hips now, freeing his shoulder and arm, and used this position to build momentum.
Holding Lancelot’s hips in a bruising grip he slammed his dick in and out in a brutal pace that had Lancelot crying out and sobbing into his arms.
At first the path into his searing hit body was tacky and difficult but now it was smooth as oil. Gawain leaned back and looked down at his cock entering the body at a brutal pace and saw his dick covered in the other man’s blood. Lancelot’s thighs were also coated in blood.
The site of it made Gawain groan and grip harder and slam deeper into the unyielding body. Lancelot yelped and shot a hand back to press desperately against the knight’s hip but it was in vain and stopped nothing.
“It is painful now but you will want this again,” announced Gawain slamming his blood slick cock into the Ashman’s body without temperance. “You’re such a good boy, Lance.”
Lancelot whimpered.
Gawain’s stomach twisted with need and when he was about to cum he pulled out of the now pliant body and threw the man to the ground. Lancelot startled and his eyes, usually a blank mask, were afraid, but he did not move from the floor where he now lay.
Gawain groaned and jerked his blood covered cock until he came a pink tinged cum all over Lancelot’s chest and face. The younger man averted his gaze and flinched every time the bodily fluid landed on him.
Gawain jostled his pants back up with a sigh and settled a boot between Lancelot’s legs.
“You will not go back there. You will forget about Carden. You will obey me,” instructed Gawain harshly while he shoved the tip of his leather boot into the sore abused hole he had just pulled out of.
Lancelot yelped and squirmed but did not try to get away. Just the sound of the younger man struggling had Gawain’s dick at half mast.
“Do you understand?”
Gawain looked down at at the Ashman darkly.
Lancelot averted his eyes and nodded once curtly, still breathing hard, small noises of pain suffocating in his throat.
“I-I…yes.”
Lancelot was slowly curling in on himself but he held back as if waiting for Gawain to leave him to his own miserable company so that he could shrink to nothing and disappear.
Gawain scoffed dismissively at his behavior in disgust. He sucked his lip against his teeth and turned away from the monk.
“Find Beilda and Sull, they have many chores. It will occupy you,” instructed Gawain as he left the bedroom. Leaving Lancelot to slowly pull his breeches up, lace them with fumbling trembling fingers, and curl in on him, his shaking arms cover his head protectively.
The monk swallowed convulsively but the sins still came, silent as they were.
***
Lancelot lumbered stiffly to the barn, his arms crossed over his chest, and his hands gripping stiffly the fabric at his ribs. It was the beginning of autumn season and the nip on the wind allowed Lancelot to once again wear his dark woolen cloak and cowl, something he had not been able to wear in many months. He loathed being without it, it was his crutch and comfort; it shielded him from the world around him. From their hatred and apathy. From their cruel words and manipulations. He had missed it dearly.
Beilda ignored him when he arrived and ignored him when he announced just above a whisper that the Green Knight had sent him to help with the chores.
If he did nothing he would surely meet the wrath and disappointment of Gawain, but neither could he help because Beilda would not instruct him. He stood by the door wringing his hands, his cowl pulled over his head. Beilda and Sull would not even raise their eyes to look at the monk. They walked around in front of him as though he was not there.
Lancelot cleared his throat.
“Gawain sent me…?” He said without any confidence at all. “Gawain sent me,” he repeated.
He could see Sull cringe and grit his teeth, and still yet pointedly ignore Lancelot’s presence. Beilda, at the mention of the Green Knight’s name, reluctantly raised her head from her chore and looked at the monk, though it was still with disgruntled disgust.
“What worth does he reckon you have to us?” Demanded Beilda.
The monk’s stomach plummeted and his skin ran cold.
“I-I couldn’t… I don’t know. To help… I guess.”
Beilda scoffed at that. She straightened her back and dropped the curved knife she’d been using onto the tack bench.
“Oh yes, do you have any experience in going back in time and unkilling the thousands you killed? No? How about you kill yourself then—that would help us a great deal.” She had picked the blade back up and her dark humored smile was gone now and replaced by anger which seethed through her gritted teeth.
Lancelot’s shoulder shot up and he lowered his head, dropping his eyes to the ground. Beilda took one step toward him and quickly he took one step back. She laughed at this, at his caution.
“Afraid of us now that you’re alone, eh?”
Beilda advanced and now Sull did as well. He looked angry.
Lancelot stumbled back until he hit the barn door and slid against it trying to make his way outside. Sull was on him before he could, grabbing him by the seem of his cloak where it met his cowl and hauling him forward. Lancelot stumbled against him and Sull made a sound of disgust before tossing the man onto the ground.
He would without a doubt in his mind win this fight if he was free to, but he wasn’t. If he fought these Fey, Gawain would execute him himself.
The first strike came as a boot to his ribs and when he covered his stomach with his arms, the second boot stomped down on his face. Something crunched audibly and he could feel warm blood coat his face like a woolen blanket.
***
Lancelot crouched at the river bank where the water was low and slowly moving. He had slunk away after the altercation in the barn. He was not supposed to be alone but he didn’t want to go through the town, or go to Gawain covered in blood.
His stomach churned thinking about someone finding him out by the water alone. Vulnerable.
With proficient speed he washed away the blood with shockingly cold water. Though it was startling, the chill of it had a cleansing quality, staunching the flow of blood, washing away the mire. Soon he found the blood was gone but he continued splashing his face with water and scrubbing his arms and neck and face with the dampened coarse fabric of his tunic.
He felt unclean. He always felt unclean.
Now his skin was clean and he only washed away the angry tears that pricked his eyes, that couldn’t be controlled, that fell against his will.
“You regret bringing the boy back.”
Lancelot swung around wildly, stumbling to his feet. His hand instinctively came to his belt for his sword but of course it was not there.
Merlin stood before him, surcoat open, bare chest exposed to the chill. He had something in his hands, picking at it, a blade of reed, or wheat, Lancelot did not know. The magician occupied an aloof expression at all times that Lancelot felt was off-putting.
The monk did not answer him. He watched him closely for a moment but dropped his eyes soon after. Keeping peoples gaze was unbearable.
The magician stepped closer.
“Or perhaps you don’t regret saving him, but you regret being here.”
Lancelot thought he could hear a smirk on the man’s voice.
Marlin was only a couple feet away from him now.
“I don’t blame you,” said the older man, running his hand over the tall riverbank grass. “You escaped an oppressor only to find your saviors were meaner and more violent and more oppressive than the Father ever was. It’s disappointing. I’m disappointed for you.”
Lancelot’s stomach tightened irritably at the words, his throat closing off. He wanted to leave. Could he leave? Would Merlin let him? He did not know, and he wasn’t sure he had the fortitude or gall to try it.
“You can come to me if you have need of it.” Merlin’s tone was low and serious now, all aloofness and mysterious disposition gone.
This was a trick, surely.
A hand was at his elbow. He forced himself not to startle but he couldn’t help the way his body stiffened.
“I won’t hurt you. And I’m sorry others do.”
Then he was gone. The hand from his elbow left him, and when he looked up there was no one there. Had he imagined it?
“Lancelot!”
This time he did startle. The voice was not Merlin’s, but Gawain’s harsh, disapproving one. Lancelot stumbled back into the water until his boots were emerged to the ankle. He hadn’t oiled them in some time and already felt the dampness of the water in them.
Gawain was rushing down the hill. His brow furrowed, jaw visibly flexed in vexation.
“What are you doing down here?”
Lancelot felt ill.
“I had to…”
The hand struck him so hard and so quickly across the face he hadn’t seen it lift from the warrior’s side, hadn’t seen it coming his way at all. His head snapped to the side so violently that his jaw cracked against his shoulder violently.
“Beilda said you scoffed at their work, called it menial, beneath you, and stormed off like some sort of spoilt prince.” Gawain looked at him with such disgust that Lancelot could feel it without looking up at all.
A hand was at the scruff of his neck, dragging him forward by the back of his tunic.
“Curse the day we found you,” said Gawain, throwing Lancelot to the wet earth at his feet.
Lancelot’s arms came over his head instinctively. Father never beat him like this. Darden had his own issues, of course. He had sinned against God when he raised an army against the Fey. Lancelot had been told they were mindless monsters who raped and murdered indiscriminately. But that had been a lie, he’d promptly realized that when they’d arrived in Christendom from Normandy. But Carden had never treated him like this. He had never beaten him, or starved him, or… or raped him.
Gawain’s hand was in his hair, yanking him upward, only to strike him again and again in the face. Lancelot held onto the wrist above him but did not try to get free.
Time was lost.
There was pressure behind his left eye, he didn’t know why. He had a headache. And it was cold. But he could make sense of nothing else. He was mostly certain he wasn’t being beaten any longer, or at least he could not feel it.
He woke in the dark, chained to the floor as he had been the night before and all the nights before that. He assumed he was in the storeroom beside Gawain’s own room, but it was too dark to tell. Exhausted, he fell asleep again, thinking about what Gawain might be like if he could manage to endear himself to the man.
Lancelot lay unmoving, curled up against the cold, willing himself to dream of a kinder Green Knight. He knew it was pathetic, he felt ashamed of himself inside his own mind where no one could see him or judge him, but he couldn’t help it. He wanted the small comfort even if it was not real, and never would be.