GawaiN

It was quiet, and sun spilled in through the stained glass casting colour across the stone floor.

“O my Jesus, forgive us of our sins.” Gawain muttered, closing his eyes, “Save us from the fires of hell. Lead all souls into heaven, especially those in most need of thy mercy. Amen.”

The sound of footsteps gave him pause, and he opened his eyes again slowly. A shadow fell across him, but it was a familiar one. He held still, as if he’d just tracked down a deer in the woods and was worried it might bolt. Patiently, he waited.

Tristan knelt down beside him, a necklace of his own clutched between his fingers. But this was no rosary. A wooden cross with a silver Christ, flanked on one side by a golden sun and on the other the stark ivory of a predator’s tooth. Gawain had seen them before, but always around his brother’s neck. Close-up, he noticed a new addition, a globe of clear resin, with a small leaf encased inside. This was faith of another kind; the pillar’s Tristan had built his life on. It was something wilder than their father’s god, than his god, something pagan, something more intrinsically Shaman. As the trinkets danced between Tristan’s fingers and Gawain met his eye, they both knew that Tristan’s cross had nothing to do with the Christ upon it. It was as much Arthur as the old ring which had found its way onto Tristan’s finger. Gawain smiled. Would he have had a similar collection had he been allowed to stay on Shaman? Would his rosary have been gathering dust somewhere in a castle draw? Alone and afraid on a planet he hadn’t known, his father’s faith had been the only thing he’d had to hang onto.

“You find peace here?” Tristan asked, his voice echoing despite its softness.

Gawain inclined his head. There was always peace in churches for him. They were places of calm and contemplation where he might go to sort through his thoughts and correct his errors. And since coming to Shaman, there’d been a significant stream of those.

“I hoped I might,” Tris continued, lowering his head, “when I first came back. I thought he’d be here, waiting for me in the stones.”

Gawain suppressed a smile; he, not He.

“It didn’t work?” he pressed. His brother sighed.

“I can’t seem to find it anywhere,” Tristan confessed, still not looking at him. “Or in anything.”

Gawain nodded again, allowing the silence, hoping Tris might feel compelled to fill it. Pushing rarely worked, he’d learned that when they were children. He shuffled the beads between his fingers again.

“We need to get you new ones of those,” Tristan said, nodding down at the rosary where Gawain’s fingers had worn away the paint. Perhaps he was right. He hadn’t noticed before.

“Have you...” Tristan ventured cautiously. He hesitated, shook his head and then slowly turned his head. Their eyes met. Gawain looked back steadily, keeping his gaze free of judgement or sympathy.

“Have you ever killed anyone?” his brother, his little brother, asked him, his green eyes widening. Just for a moment the little boy he’d left behind all those years ago stared up at him.

“Yes,” Gawain replied simply, his shortened fingers twitching against the cross in his hands. “When I had to.”

Tristan grunted, dropping his head again, the boy gone.

“Tris...” Gawain ventured, resting a hand on his brother’s arm. Not for the first time, Tristan shook him off.

“Nevermind...” Tristan said, shaking his head as he climbed to his feet, “don’t worry about it.”

And with that he was gone, and Gawain found himself alone again.

---

The messenger had found him just as he was leaving the chapel, and had told him his help was needed with the refugees again. He took the east staircase, keeping tight to the inside so he didn’t bump into any of the courtiers coming the other way. The guise of Guy had served him well so far. Few of them spared him a second glance, a fact for which he remained eternally grateful. He needed to do something about Tristan. They’d settled into a routine and in public everything seemed to be going well. Most of the time his brother seemed content, happy, full of life and completely himself. But sometimes, sometimes there were looks which sat uncomfortably, and locked doors, even when he was alone.

He made the final landing and took a sharp right, trading wood for carpet and hurried towards the office which had been set-up for refugee affairs. Who would be best to talk to? Thoth? Or...

Someone grabbed hold of the front of his jacket, a woman, he realised a moment later as she shook him, jolting him from his thoughts. Her words took a moment to percolate, and before he could stop himself he glanced downwards at bare legs.

“Oh,” he managed, glancing back up again sharply. She held his eye, her own still tinged with ill-humour. And she was wearing an infirmary gown.

“Urm...” he said, gently closing his hands around hers in order to ease their grip on him,
“I’m sure we can work something out for you.” There was a box of clothes in the refugee office. She could take what she needed from there. “I’m sorry...” Gawain continued, “but are you alright?”