False alarm, Mace thought, his eyes traveling over the Prince’s weary posture. He looked so young, standing there with a sword that was still too big for him, made for broader, older shoulders. Not just that, Mace realized; he was thin, rawboned with grief, shadows welling in his cheeks and under his eyes. Mourning was unmaking him. And like a sick little boy he was petty, and fragile.
“I was going to suggest we work on your guard forms, not cross swords,” he answered evenly, “Seeing as we’re unarmored. But if taking shots at me will clear your head, maybe that’s not such a bad idea.” There was irritation in his words, but no heat. Mace was familiar with the blame Tristan placed on him – he’d had to leave people behind before, given orders that meant people died before, made hard choices. The boy was quick to judge him and quicker to forget what he’d sacrificed to be here for him, and Mace was used to that, too. Maybe someday he’d know what all of that felt like. If he ever picked himself up and moved forward.
It did not look like that was going to happen, today – not unless Mace did something, found some way to reach the boy drifting further and further from his reach. He felt a stab of frustration as Tristan turned, dropping Excalibur carelessly, like a child growing tired of a toy. But he resisted the urge to storm over and pick it up. He took a deep breath, and reminded himself that he could not treat the Prince like some soldier in his regiment. He couldn’t bark at him to pick it up and take watch for the next fortnight, or give him fifty pushups, or clean a hundred toilets, or peel a thousand potatoes…even if he did think the kid would benefit from doing all of those things. Tristan was resourceful and adventurous, but he’d still grown up with a silver spoon. What he needed now was to realize he would survive this; the loss of his family, and his comforts, and the easy future that had seemed all but guaranteed.
But it would take work.
“Walk away from me if you want, but don’t leave your father’s sword in the dirt. You’re better than that,” he called after him. “If you’re going to leave it somewhere, clean it and oil it and put it somewhere safe. But I’d rather see you pick it up and train…get back into a routine that doesn’t involve running away to your pain and guilt and anger until they are the only things you recognize.”
He moved through a few forms of his own as he spoke, casual movements that belied their precision, the careful balance of weight. It had taken him decades to feel his weapon as an extension of himself, and now the practice was a meditation. He returned to training, every day, because in it he could center himself, process those feelings he recognized in Tristan. Then he stopped, looking down the blade, testing its weight in his offhand.
“Ultimately it’s your choice, Tristan. I can’t tell you what to do. Nobody can force you to use that sword, or sit on that throne. But you are stronger and braver than you think you are, and you have it in you to be the King these people need. And you don’t have to do it alone.”
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