[2] WEEPING MONK║you're not what I was looking for

66| Queen of All - 𝐈𝐈

One evening gives Lancelot and Ari a chance to be free. Old secrets come to light.

Daylight seemed to last for longer today. With spring breaking, flowers rose from the grasses and the nights drew in far more slowly. Lancelot spent the last bleak hours of light ensuring the Ash who had come here to escape the battle were settling, but Squirrel remained his first priority.

Tomas, too full of old bones to fight in a young man's war, found a place with the castle's baker and was going to keep Squirrel with him. Hopefully the child would keep out of trouble that way. It was one less worry on Lancelot's mind to know that he could trust the people looking out for the boy. His heart broke enough as it was to be willingly separating parents from children, for him to allow leaving Squirrel behind to make cracks.

Sunset faded in a gloomy grey when Lancelot returned to his room to clean himself off before this banquet tonight. Sconces in the castle's stone corridors lit his way, passing servants with food platters and jugs of what his nose thought were honey meads, watered down wines and ales. The fruity scents were hard to miss as the maids hurried by.

His boots echoed and his cloak brushed along the tiles.

In this far corner of the castle, a few Fey had been given tiny rooms usually reserved for the aids and help of visiting Lords and Ladies. Each chamber extending from these narrow walkways were packed to the ceilings with those escorting their masters for the night.

Lancelot didn't think it right for there to be a feast, though Lord Hubert had promised in person when the Fey arrived this afternoon that it would not be a bounty too large. That resource would not be wasted and as much as could be provided for the united army of Fey and humans would be put aside first.

Ari had looked uncomfortable with hearing that there would be a banquet at all, until Hubert had added that the entire of the south lands were going to fight for her. She needed to show her face to those ready to surrender their lives— hold her head high to those Lords and Ladies who held power within the king's court; people who were committing treason by bolstering the numbers of this resistance.

In the flickering half-darkness, a shadow darkened Lancelot's doorway. His alertness prickled. Slowing his stride, Lancelot silently placed a hand over his sword. His will alone was not powerful enough to dampen the click from the heels of his boots, and the shadow turned.

"Ah! Ash man."

The breezy voice was one that Lancelot knew, and the face of the shadow cleared when the owner stepped out into the warm candle light.

Lancelot dropped his hand from his sword and tucked it beneath the cover of his cloak. "Lord." He bowed his head briefly in the last few steps of his approach.

In their forests, he had held the upper hand; but here Lancelot reminded himself to be curt. Even if he did not care for the man's overfamiliarity entirely...