[1] WEEPING MONK // you're not what I was looking for

6| The Druid's Flame

═ 𝙏𝙝𝙚 𝘿𝙧𝙪𝙞𝙙'𝙨 𝙁𝙡𝙖𝙢𝙚 ═

[TW// internal conflict and referenced childhood trauma]

Lancelot is thrown into the fires of his past and Ari receives some conflicting advice from an old friend.

"Where are we going?" Squirrel asked with interest from where he sat in front of the queen in the saddle of her golden horse.

"To see a friend," Ari responded simply, offering nothing else.

The Monk did not appreciate the diversion but remained silent from atop of Goliath as their horses walked parallel to each other along the trail. They had been on the path since dawn, stopping only once to let the boy go about his business. Removing his feet from his stirrups, Lancelot let his long legs hang loose whilst they waited for the boy. He glanced at Ari occasionally as she turned her horse to watch the forest. 

They were still within Fey territory and were safe enough, but Ari has learnt that you can never be too careful, for you never know who or what will charge into your life. She caught him staring once while they sat atop of their mounts in silence and he broke his eyes away instantly and felt an unusual flush creep away from his nose, not understanding what it was. The queen didn't catch him staring again after that.

As they continued on the path, the pair of adults were given no chances to think as the boy muttered on amusingly about a Fey girl, Nimue, and her sword, and eventually how he saved the Monk's rear end from certain death.

"And then the guard pulled back his hood and- you looked like hell Lancelot, you still do," Squirrel chided him, smugly flicking his eyes across to the hooded one.

Ari involuntarily chucked and the Monk cast an icy look in her direction in return. 

"That's when I ran in," the boy continued, enthusiastic with his retelling, "and I picked up a sword and I threatened them. They were so scared, I could tell." Ari hummed in approval and she guessed that the boy was exaggerating when out of the corner of her eye she saw the Monk roll his, shaking his head from side to side subtly. "I was so ready to kill one of them ugly freaks, wasn't I Lance?" The young one looked to the man beside them.

Since when did he call me Lance? The Monk hadn't been called Lance since he was a child. "You were brave," Lancelot admitted, keeping his eyes on the forest around them. 

His voice was lighter than Ari had ever heard it before, not that he said much in the first place. The noises that came from him were mostly warnings to the boy and grunts of displeasure, but even these were few and far between. Ari wondered for a moment if he even knew how to hold a conversation with someone else.

When the sun started falling in the sky Ari stopped her golden horse abruptly, jolting the boy before her. 

The Monk halted Goliath a few paces ahead when he heard the scuffing of hooves in the dirt. He didn't know why they'd stopped. When he turned to ask her, she'd rotated her mount and was just staring out to the distance at the trees like she was bewitched. Lancelot followed her eye-line but couldn't see any cause for alarm, nor could he sense anything untoward either.