Kin Twisted Fate

Two Bracelets, a Button and a Doll

Many days of healing and nights tortured with dreams had passed since Luna had first arrived in Camelot. She'd been inhabiting the extra cot in Gaius and Merlin's chamber for exactly a week now. Gaius  had refused each of her attempts to pay him for his generosity, she was on bed arrest. And although it was nice to take a bit of a load off, it was getting irritating.
Her bruises had began to fade and, thanks to Gaius, her muscles and bones were on the mend.
She had made friends with many of the inhabitants in the castle walls and life in Camelot was quiet or at least as quiet as it would ever be. 

"Merlin!" Arthur hollered as he ran into Gaius' chambers. 

Luna giggled softly at the disheveled looking king as he frantically looked around for his manservant.

"Luna, tell me Merlin is in here." Arthur pleaded. 

"Sorry, Sire." Luna giggle

"For goodness sake!" Arthur cried throwing his hands over his head "Where on earth could that idiot be! It's almost curfew!"

He turned around exasperated and started to leave the room before he paused and without turning back to Luna, said. "And it's just Arthur to you, none of this Sire business amongst friends." And he was gone.

Luna sighed softly as she looked around the chambers that were once again empty.

The candle that had once lit the room had burned down to a stub that barely gave off any light, leaving her dependent on the moonlight to illuminated the room.

Slowly, Luna slipped her hand under her pillow and felt the rigid fabric of her old dress brush against her finger tips. She drew it out from under the pillow as she had for the past few nights. Her hand inched into the dresses pocket as she tried to keep the ruffling noise of the dress to the bare minimum. From the pocket she drew out two small leather bands (one torn), a button and a small straw doll. 

The leather bands each had a small, dented copper button on the end. They were crinkled and wrinkled and the shimmer of fresh leather had long since shone. The button was simple. It too was a dented copper button slightly larger and thicker than the buttons attached to the leather bands.The doll was crafted with the same simplicity of the buttons and bands. It's straw arms and legs where shaped with thin faded red twine. It's dress and hair were both fashioned from an old burlap sack and it's faded blue eyes were just little knots if twine. It's red twine smile had been lost somewhere on its epic journey to Camelot and almost seemed to mock the happiness that Luna hadn't felt in a long time. 

Tears began to prickle against the back of Luna's eye lids as she rubbed her thumb along the rough leather band; suppressed emotions began to claw up her throat. Luna squeezed her eyes shut, willing the tears that had begun to well up, not to fall. But against her will, they began to trickle down her cheeks. Shaking with sobs and whimpers, she lowered herself back onto her pillows, wrapping her arms around her body in attempt to fill what felt like a hole filling her chest. 

The next morning, she awoke to empty chambers and a bowl of porridge, that was now cold, left for her on the table. She sat up slowly, rubbing the dried tears from her eyes and cheeks with the back of her hand. She stretched groggily as she reached over to remove the doll from her bed so she could pull up the blankets and fluff up the pillows. She grabbed the leather band and button and threw them onto the stool next to her bed and reached for the second band-

It wasn't there.

Frantically she leapt of the bed, ignoring her screaming muscles, and tore off the blankets in a desperate attempt to find the band. Not seeing it, she dropped to her knees to check under the bed. She blindly felt around under the bed, panic coursing through her body.