Lancelot laughed, almost crying."Aye."
"What in the fuck!"
They both turned toward the panicked shout of Merlin's friend, and followed his gaze to…
An enormous knight in dark gold armor and a green and gold surcoat.For the barest moment, Lancelot thought of Bertilak, the famed Green Knight who'd won the heart of frosty, impenetrable Gawain.
But Bertilak had worn a very different green, and while large, he wasn't this large.He wasn'tgiant.
Lancelot's heart seized.It couldn't be.Itcouldn't.Galehaut had never truly been his enemy.There was no way he could be now.This was just an oversized game creation.
Except that as the knight drew closer, the crest emblazoned on his chest was as clear as day: a green lion against a white background strewn with gold stars.
Around the knight's throat was a black collar gleaming with purple-red sigils, marks of Maleagant's foul magic.Maleagant had stolen Galehaut.No, no,no.
"What's wrong?"Merlin's reincarnation asked."You look like someone just died."
"It would be better if he had," Lancelot said on a sob.
"Is there anything I can do?Uh, my name is Martin.Who are you?"
"Lance.I'm trying to find a special sword that's supposed to be hidden somewhere around here."
Martin's friend laughed."What, like Excalibur?This game is riff as hell, but it's notthatlame."
"There's nothing wrong with King Arthur," Martin muttered."Look out!"
Lancelot moved just as he screamed, avoiding the new surge of slimy water monsters that came up on them suddenly, the captured Galehaut and a horde of knights in black armor right behind him.
"Stand down!"Lancelot bellowed, throwing out his magic, sending the black knights back with a wave of bone-breaking water.Then he turned his attention to the water creatures, cutting them down one after the other.
Until only Galehaut, his beloved turned enemy, remained.This was not the fight he'd been expecting.Tears streamed down his cheeks beneath his helm, but Lancelot stood his ground—and then almost started laughing hysterically when he saw what Galehaut—no, this Imprisoned Knight, for he would believe nothing else—held.
Excalibur.Maleagant had somehow gotten to Excalibur first.He could not wake Merlin without that sword, and he could not get the sword without besting the man he loved most in all the world.
Why was life socruel.
Pushing his anguish away to face later, Lancelot called up his magic and faced his opponent.His enemy.
The Imprisoned Knight lunged at him, which wasn't surprising at all.Galehaut had always been the direct sort, always the one to make the first move.Lancelot had always loved that about him.
He met the swing with his shield and a blast of water from the lake, sending the Imprisoned Knight back, unable to keep his feet against such an onslaught.
Unfortunately, Galehaut had once possessed fierce powers of his own, the winds of the Distant Isles he had given away for a single night.A single knight.
Water and wind were a dangerous combination.Together he and Galehaut had been invincible, until that tragic day at Camlann.
If Galehaut was aware of himself, if he was trapped inside this monster he was forced to be, he would not want to continue thus.Rallying his strength and will, Lancelot threw himself into the fight with all the strength of his knighthood and all the ferocity of his mother.
He could do this.He was the son of the Lady of the Lake.Son of the Waters.The Black Knight.The White Knight.The Mad Knight.Beloved—
Lancelot closed his eyes against the ache of longing that swept through him.
Beloved of Galehaut.In whose arms he had not been able to die.Whose body he'd had to abandon to find Merlin.
Taken from him again before they could be reunited.It wasn't fuckingfair.
Pouring all his rage and anguish out, he threw himself at the Imprisoned Knight.Dangerous, to let his temper out, because that way literally lay madness for him, but he could not attack his beloved with his sanity wholly intact.
