Pack Mentality pt 4.3
Long . . .
It gets dark so soon now that the days never truly seem to start. Athos trudges back to the garrison through the dusk, side by side with Porthos, their four reduced to a two. That their duties now are only ever performed by the two of them is his permanent reminder of their current situation and he'd have thought it would make him angry, but all it ever truly makes him feel is sad. Another day of duty he can't make feel important, not when all he really wants right now, fearful and needier than he could ever know how to admit to, is to be beside Aramis. Aramis is in danger, is pregnant, and frustrated and frightened himself. And isolated, trapped and lonely never leaving a garrison where he can't trust all the men inside it, and missing his son like he's hollow on the inside, and leaving him in a morning feels almost unbearable. Athos remembers how contemptibly easy he found avoiding Aramis when he was pregnant with Jean-Armand. Now he would give away everything his last name has ever given him, without concern, just for a little longer each day beside his husband, before the waiting is over.
None of them know what they're waiting for. As yet, it's unfixed; a child, a husband, or nothing at all, Athos doesn't know what he'll be left with at the end of this. But Aramis' presence is something Athos wants to inhale while he can, in case it's the last breath of him he'll ever be allowed.
The garrison has a low hum of activity when they arrive, still early in the evening even if the sky's largely dark. Men are gathered for dinner outside the kitchens, huddled around the brazier for warmth, but there's no familiar hat cocked on any head present. Porthos nods to one of Aramis' recruits who stands from the kitchen bench with a jolt of the table, and yanks his own hat off in respect. "He went to lie down monsieur -"
"Right," Porthos says, waving for him to sit down again. "Thanks."
Athos pulls his own hat off as he passes through the doorway into the dormitories underneath Treville's office. It's warmer as soon as they're undercover, and from habit he knocks before he opens the door to the room he and Aramis were assigned but it's empty, the candles not only unlit but stiff and cold; not lit for hours. He turns and opens the door to Porthos' assigned room - he doesn't know what foolish pining might have sent Aramis into there to nap, but it would be a very Aramis thing to do - but that room's equally cold and dark.
At his back Porthos says, "What?"
"He's not there."
Porthos looks at him as if too tired to deal with Aramis' unpredictability right now - the one upside of his being trapped in the garrison has at least been that they've known where he is recently, even if that never has been quite the problem it was before marriage and fatherhood - and looks back up the short corridor. "Maybe he went for somethin' to eat."
"I didn't see him out there."
"Might be in the kitchens. Let's go have a look, fuck, he couldn't've done this after we'd eaten, I'm staving."
He's not in the kitchens. He's not in the infirmary, or the armoury. He's not, when Athos goes upstairs giving no outward sign of it and yet frightened, in the captain's office, though Treville looks curious and not in the slightest pleased that they apparently don't know where he is. But he's vanished. The man who can't leave the garrison has completely disappeared from it.
Downstairs Porthos emerges from the dormitories where, welcome or not, he's been knocking on every single door, and shakes his head. But one of Aramis' recruits, Jacques, is hurrying over, gives a stiff boy's bow and holds out a note towards Athos; "A lady just left it for you, monsieur."
"A lady?" Athos says, snapping the wax seal and unfolding it. Ester has visited but Aramis is nervous of her doing so in case the danger at his back should begin to loom over hers, and he doubts a boy of Jacques' family would think of an immigrant girl like Ester as a 'lady' anyway.
Then he opens the paper, and recognises the handwriting.
"She spoke with your husband earlier," Jacques says helpfully. "He said he'd give you the message but she must have-"
Athos looks up at Porthos because he needs help and Porthos reads the horror on his face far too clearly, grabs the paper and squints in the dim light -
There is no signature. It says, I believe your husband has gone for an interview with my former employer, after I informed him of who paid the priests to switch their definition of 'sin'. I only notify you of this so that you don't lay the blame for any of his foolishness on me.
Porthos looks up at him, hoping for understanding - Porthos doesn't know her handwriting clear as his own - but he understands Athos' face, and says, "Where's he gone?"
The recruit says, "Can I help, monsi-?"
"Tell Treville we've gone to the palace." Athos sprints for the stables and Porthos follows without question, because the only thing he knows is that this is about wherever the hell Aramis is.
"You- yes sir," Question swallowed, he knows when not to interrupt, and Athos thinks, the boy will do well; differently to any of us, but well.
"Where is he?" Porthos says, as Athos is throwing the tack onto his horse, fingers fumbling in his hurry. "Who sent that note?"
"My wife." His hands aren't over-hasty, they're shaking. "And it's Richelieu. Richelieu controls the priests, Richelieu sent the assassins -"
"- oh, fuck," in the smallest, most helpless voice, because Porthos knows Aramis as well as Athos does, and they both know that Aramis has gone to kill the Cardinal. He threatened his children. He threatened his children. And Aramis is simply not culpable . . .
"Horse is still here," Porthos says grimly, lurching at the straps on his own saddle to get his horse ready. "We c'n beat 'im there."
"He'll have been trying to travel undercover. God damn it Aramis -"
"Save that for when we see 'im." Porthos begins leading his horse in a hurry out of the stables. "Hell - hell -"
They can't travel fast, they learn early enough as the horses' hooves skid in snow. The mercy is that Aramis probably couldn't travel very fast either, except that that's no mercy because Aramis on the street could be in terrible danger and the less time he's on the streets the better, though the sooner he reaches Richelieu is by far the worst. As fast as they dare they travel for the palace, eyes alert to every movement on the street, searching out his shape, if they've overtaken him -
It's wishful thinking. Aramis has very long been a soldier; he's resourceful, adaptable, stealthy if he has to be, and determined like no man Athos has ever known. If his husband meant to arrive at the palace in as little time as possible, his husband will have achieved that, and every moment lost is one more moment in which Aramis might have slit Richelieu's throat and strung his own life up for the gallows and the stubborn idiot won't even care -
The horses they abandon in the grounds at the closest entrance to Richelieu's offices, and Athos barks at the Red Guard outside, "Has another musketeer come ahead of us?"
"What?" the Guard says, and Porthos rolls his eyes with his teeth clenched and barges past him, because it would require very little of Aramis' resourcefulness to get past these fools unseen, even expanded to twice his usual girth; the boy could get past these fools unseen, giant dog in tow and all.
There are candles lit but the dusk is all but dark now, and they hurry through shadows. They don't dare call out. Two musketeers may very well be bringing a message from Treville, and if they can stop Aramis before he's done the deed, no-one needs to know what he came here intending to do. But there's no sign of him. Damn him his skills and his determination, damn him every which way, if Athos' husband has already all but hanged himself -
There's an unconscious Guard on the floor beside the door to Richelieu's inner office, which barges on its hinges but doesn't come open. Athos throws his shoulder into it again and moves it enough to see that there's a desk pushed in front of it, it's not locked. Porthos says, "Shift." in that stony voice of his that means Athos needs to have moved before it's said; he kicks the door inwards in one massive blow, and with the second kick there's enough space to shove the desk aside and get inside.
Richelieu is backed to the opposite wall, neck craned upwards, entire body trying to curve itself away from the pistol Aramis has under his jaw and the dagger pressing to neatly flick in for a kidney at his side. Athos quickly shoves the door closed behind them before any shouting can travel, and Richelieu whispers, "God help me he's gone mad, help me-"
"No." Aramis says without moving so much as a flicker. "Either of you touch me and I'll kill him. Leave the room. Neither of you know about this. This cannot be blamed on either of you. And you, don't you dare start screaming now, I swear to God I will still have your eyes out before I kill you and anyone who interrupts will only see the two of them trying to stop me."
Richelieu's fingers scrabble at the wall, not for anything, a spasm of sheer terror. Athos steps forwards but slowly, holding his hands up, saying and he feels so weak with it, "Aramis . . ."
"I want to know why." Aramis hisses, eyes black in the candlelight on Richelieu's drained white face. "I want to know what the hell could ever mean enough to you for you to kill my child for. And I want you to understand, I want you to understand -"
The door scrapes and bangs behind him as Porthos leaves the room, and Athos doesn't have the time to worry about that. "Aramis," he says. "Put him down. This is doing no good to the child, and if you kill him they will hang you -"
"After my baby is born. They understand decency. After my baby is born they will hang me. They would never threaten my child, no human being threatens an unborn child, he wanted to kill my baby-"
"You will not leave Jean-Armand half-orphaned. You will not leave me a widower. You love us too much to subject either of us to that, so put him down, Aramis."
"He wanted me to miscarry. Do you understand? He wanted my child dead before it lived just to break us. He can't live." Aramis' eyes have never left Richelieu's, and the hands holding his weapons are steady as stone, and he sounds so sure. "He can't live. The world is worse for having him in it. If I've to go to Hell to ensure he goes there first before he can hurt anybody else, it's worth it to me."
"To your son? To the boy, Aramis he loves you, he will never, never recover from the loss of-"
"Shut up. You'll look after him."
"Do you think any of us could replace you to him? Put him down. He can pay, we can make him pay, but not like this -"
"Listen to him," Richelieu breathes. "We can come to an arrangement, you can walk away from this to your son-"
"Stop your poisonous lying tongue," Aramis spits, "because I can't go home to him, because I had to send him away because of you. How can you hate me this much, how can anything be worth - how can you bring my children into this, they've hurt no-one, they're children, why couldn't you have the decency to just kill me like a normal person -"
"Aramis," Athos says, because that dagger hand is straining at Richelieu's side. "Fuck, I'll kill him, give me that gun, I'll kill him, then you can go home-"
"D-" Aramis actually turns his head to stare at Athos. "You bloody idiot, what good would that do? You can't kill him."
"I certainly can't raise the children without you, you're much better with them. Particularly when they're pre-linguistic. It seems a much more practical solution in every way if I'm hanged rather than you."
"I really don't appreciate you mocking me right now."
Richelieu gasps in a breath against the metal mouth of the gun dug to his throat, gasps out, "Your son - I could arrange an - an incredible career in the Church -"
Aramis looks back at him and looks confused in his fury. "Go to hell," he says. "I want grandchildren."
It's the only bargaining chip Richelieu might have had for his life, he knows they're not interested in money or influence, but unfortunately for him, neither is Aramis more interested in piety than he is in his family. "You want to live to see them," Athos says. "Aramis, you want to live for that."
He can see the brightness of tears in Aramis' eyes, and the impotent fury, more than he can manage, scouring his face with pain. "All I wanted was my family," he croaks, voice dropped to that deep growl of too much for him to bear. "How could you try to hurt them, they're my children, how . . ."
The door opens behind them, and the table is pushed hurriedly fully aside. Athos glances back and freezes, as Porthos gets the table out of the way for the Queen, who walks in and takes the three of them in with the alarm freezing on her face, and says, "What is happening?"
Aramis' body has hesitated, but he doesn't back away from Richelieu, who whimpers, "Your Majesty, mother of mercy-"
Aramis breathes, very softly, "Shut your mouth."
"Aramis? What is happening?"
Athos knows Aramis probably has little in the way of sense to offer someone new to the situation, and says, "Over a series of months Richelieu has attempted to damage our regiment by turning half of them against us and trying repeatedly to either injure Aramis to miscarriage or else to outright kill him, which Aramis has taken against quite strongly."
"Would you please not mock me now, Athos -"
"Richelieu," the Queen says, eyes wide and body very small but somehow very central, somehow the focal point of the room now even more than Aramis holding the Cardinal to the wall with two weapons. "Is this true?"
"He'll lie." Aramis says bluntly, eyes flicking back to Richelieu's, such little distance away. "It's better for all of France that I stop his tongue now."
"You will do no such thing." she says, very hard. "Stand down, Aramis. Riche-"
"He tried to kill my baby."
"Stand down."
In the second of silence afterwards, Athos realises that he's come to attention. Treville would have roared it, the King would have shrieked it; from the Queen it comes in a low snarl like a she-wolf, anger barely contained in her small fisting hands, and Aramis is still, blade and pistol all but breaking into Richelieu's body, for one second more. Then he steps back, and slightly to the side, and offers a small, stiff and very slightly sullen bow to the Queen.
She ignores him, because she's still staring at the Cardinal, and her eyes look lost and young. "Richelieu," she says quietly. "His child. This isn't true. Tell me this isn't true."
"Aramis is at least right in this, your Majesty," Athos says. "He will lie. But we could probably find the evidence in this room, if you require it. Someone paid an assassin to shoot Aramis outside the garrison, and killed another soldier instead. Someone paid for a street preacher to incite a riot, and probably paid some of the mob as well. And someone has arranged for the priests to claim that Aramis' very existence is sinful, even though they spoke against all Scripture, and there are few men in Paris with the power to do that."
"He wanted everyone against 'im," Porthos says quietly by the door. "So if anythin' did happen to him, we'd all go to pieces. That was why he did it. He wants Aramis' baby dead so the King'll like him more than Treville."
"Your Majesty," Richelieu says, "perhaps we ought to talk -"
"Perhaps we ought to." she says, voice clipped and dangerous. She's a mother, Athos remembers. She's a mother - fuck; she's a mother who's lost a child herself, and is unlikely to be capable of much in the way of mercy towards this.
Athos looks at Aramis, who's still glaring blackly at Richelieu, and steps close enough to touch his arm. "Put your pistol away," he says, low, because he doesn't trust Aramis as long as it's in his hand.
"No. He'll get away with it. He always gets away with it."
"The Cardinal and I will talk." the Queen says. "We will come to an arrangement."
She says it like an arrangement might be a brutal and terrible thing to exact upon a deserving foe. Aramis says, "He needs no arrangement, he needs to pay. He meant to kill my baby -"
Athos grips his arm and hisses by his ear, "And you came here and tried to kill him, you fool. If this goes to trial now you will end up facing one yourself for the attempted murder of a Cardinal, the only reason he has to keep quiet and allow you to return to your family is if we all play nice-"
"Nice-"
Porthos pads carefully around the Queen, still standing straight-backed and hands clenched and head raised so she looks so imperiously at Richelieu, who sags against the wall without Aramis pinning him there, massaging at his throat where the pistol dug in. Porthos takes Aramis' other arm; that makes it easier to gently force the weapons from his hands, before he can do something horribly predictable with them.
"We will come to an arrangement," the Queen says. "So that Richelieu can undo some of the mischief he has made, and atone for his sins." Her eyes are a narrowed lethal blue. "They are not easily forgotten sins."
"I live at the mercy of your endless grace, your Majesty -"
"You'll burn in Hell." Aramis says, as with one arm each Athos and Porthos begin forcing him for the doorway. "And I'll make sure I come after you just to be certain of how much you suffer."
The Queen says, "I believe that Aramis needs to go lie down. Richelieu will bring me a chair for this interview."
"Of course, your Majesty -"
"Why didn't you let me kill him," Aramis hisses as they leave them, and manoeuvre him around the doorway and down the corridor, past the muzzily shifting Red Guard on the floor. "I could have killed him, he'd never hurt any of us again -"
"For the price of your neck, you idiot -"
"For his life that's cheap."
Athos grabs the collar of his shirt at that, twisting him to hiss at his face, "Don't you ever, don't you ever say that to me again."
He can see how tight Porthos has Aramis' wrist, and an arm around his waist for support. Aramis just stares back at Athos, wild and incomprehending in the eyes, until something begins to settle back, some sort of thought process beyond his need to kill Richelieu reawakens, and something, something softens on his face. "I'm sorry," he says. "That was crass of me. I'd be - it would hurt me immeasurably to hear you say that. I'm sorry."
"Idiot," Porthos mutters, palming the back of his neck to press him into moving again. "Need to get you back to the garrison before anyone sees you."
"This is what you're like without the boy around to keep you calm," Athos snaps. "You're impossible. You can't be sensible for both of us and that child inside you."
"Don't. Please, don't. I haven't done any of this to put it in danger, I only did it -"
"Alright," Athos says, because he feels in Aramis' breath how frantic he could become over this. "Alright, alright. I just wish you could remember that the child needs its father, Aramis. I know you'd die to protect your children but what they need the most is for you to live for them."
"I am alive." He walks with them, head lifting. "No thanks to that bastard. I am alive."
"Good," Porthos says quietly, and Athos sees his thumb stroke at Aramis' back where it supports his waist. "Good."
And then Aramis' face stops dead, and his step lurches to stop. They all stop, all three of them, silent in the corridor, and Athos says, "Aramis?"
He blinks, and his breath comes quick out of him. "Nothing," he says, and starts walking again, faster. "We need to get back to the garrison. The captain is going t-"
This time his body wrenches, and he makes a sharp half-swallowed sound, and his step falters sideways into Porthos, who stops him. "Aramis-"
Aramis grabs both of their arms tight. "We have to get back," he gasps. "We have to-"
"What are you -"
"Ah - please, quickly, quickly, we have to get-"
This time he staggers fully sideways, banging the three of them into the wall, puts his head low and makes a growled groaning noise he can't contain, eyes squeezed tight shut. Athos says, "Aramis-"
Porthos says, "Fuck."
He's looking behind him, at the floor. Athos looks around Aramis' shoulder and sees - fluid. The backs of his trousers are soaked through, and the liquid is running to the polished floor of the corridor. And his heart -
- stops.
(Frost on the ground, and Aramis grips his hand so tight.)
And Aramis puts his head back to heave his breath in at the ceiling, and Athos' heart kicks in to beat again with a bang. "We have to get back," Aramis gasps. "Oh God. Quickly, please, we have to get back -"
"We can't - get you back, you're already -"
Aramis makes a high tight noise, arms wrenching to wrap around his belly as if to press the pain back in and contain it. "We have to! Before it -"
Porthos says, "It's already too late, Aramis-"
"But I can't here! I can't give - birth in the palace and oh God oh God I can't I can't it's too early it's not time it's too early -"
Porthos says, "We need to get 'im down somewhere, we need to-"
"- I can't I can't do it again Mary Mother of God I can't I can't -"
Athos grabs an arm around Aramis' back, hikes his weight to him, says battlefield-fast to Porthos, "Go back to the Queen, we need somewhere he can give birth, then ride back into Paris for the midwife. Aramis, hold my hand, breathe."
Aramis tries to snatch after Porthos' shirt as he turns back the way they came, but he's forced to hunch in on himself again with something far too close to a whimper. "Athos I can't -"
"I know. It's alright. We're here, it's alright."
"I can't, I can't -"
Aramis is heavy - never exactly a featherweight even when not pregnant - and scrabbling at Athos as if he really can't get enough grip on him, voice desperate and tears only half held in, "Athos I can't not here not in the palace I can't and I can't I can't -"
"It's alright, it is going to be alright -"
Aramis starts, Athos thinks, to say 'no', but it comes out on a moan, strangled and tight, his body angling itself towards the floor, bent around the pivot point of his heavy belly. Athos strains to keep his grip on him, to keep his knees holding his weight. He doesn't remember this; Aramis lacked the coherency to argue with Athos on the roadside, and lacked all evident panic when Jean-Armand was born. Athos and Porthos panicked, then. Aramis relaxed himself, everything simply out of his hands, and waited with a steadied, almost amused curiosity for what would happen next.
"Do you need to sit down," Athos says, rubbing his back, "or do you need to stand, Aramis? What would help?"
"I - walk. Keep moving. I can't stop. I don't dare stop." He turns to pace the corridor and Athos can only move with him, holding his arm, his waist, turning as he does back the way they came. Aramis' step isn't always steady and his eyes are focused on nothing, but he walks, walks, the width of the corridor and back. He whispers, eyes staring through the air, "Ave Maria, gratia plena -"
"Alright," Athos murmurs, and walks with him. "Alright."
His own legs feel unsteady but he makes them sturdy. Porthos has to run, Porthos has to fetch help: Athos is the one who can't leave his husband, because no other man can in decency be with him in this state, and Aramis needs him. Aramis whispers, "Dominus tecum, benedicta tu in-" and staggers backwards, making a noise almost like cattle, a low bellow, as his arms squeeze his belly in and he chokes, "No no not yet please please no -"
Footsteps are coming quick back towards them, Athos looks up and Porthos is flat-out running, right past them and away down the corridor. Behind him the Queen is hurrying in her daintier shoes, eyes alarmed on Aramis not even upright in Athos' arm. "The closest bedchamber," she says. "Can he walk?"
Aramis says, "Your Majesty," and he sounds absolutely terrified.
"Yes." Athos says, and all he means by it is that he will get Aramis to the nearest safe bed on his own two feet if he has to. "Which way, your Majesty?"
He pulls Aramis' arm around his neck, hikes his side close in an arm to support him. Aramis does manage to walk in a shambling sort of way but Athos can hear in his breath when it's getting bad, breaths running into each other quicker in panic, little wheezing pained sounds in them. All that stoicism when Jean-Armand was born, he hardly made a sound; now he's outright terrified and can't contain it. Halfway down the corridor a door at its further end bursts to allow a maid to dash in, who scrambles half to a halt seeing them - sent by Porthos as he ran past, presumably - and the Queen barks at her, "Make the next bedchamber ready, the cream one. And fetch water!"
The maid bobs her curtsey, eyes wide on Aramis who tightens his jaw and stops walking to bend his body and contain a scream behind his teeth in Athos' arms, and Athos only grips him tight, his own jaw held grim and shaking, until enough of the pain seems to have passed for him to force Aramis' body on. He can rest when they're there. He can rest when they're there but they have to get there -
The Queen points the door out to him and walks right on past them, shouting for servants. Athos fumbles the handle and pushes Aramis into the room - candles and the fire have been lit, there's more than light enough to see how grand the chamber is, the gilding looks true gold with the flames glancing off it - and drag Aramis, staggering and making a continuous pained whining noise, to the bed. When he can finally sling Aramis' weight sideways onto it he can tell how bad it is even before Aramis grabs his wrist too tight and gets out through his panting, "It's too fast, it's too fast -"
"Alright, hold on to me, it's alright." Athos holds his hands tight, doesn't dare look away from his eyes. "I'm here. It's going to be alright."
"Where's Porthos-?"
"He went for the midwife. She'll be here as soon as she possibly can be, Aramis, you trust Porthos for that."
"Yes," he says, but it comes out choked, and his head drops back, eyes and mouth pressing tight closed, to some fresh pain blossoming with a twist inside. "It's too soon," he hacks out at the ceiling. "Mother of God it's too soon, it's not - I can't do this again, I can't -"
"Stay with me, Aramis, don't panic, it will be al-"
"- and I did this, it's my fault, it's my fault, isn't it? Because I -"
"No, no Aramis -"
"- came out here and - oh God please not my baby please not my-"
"Aramis, Aramis please-"
"I don't care if I die I don't care if I die but please please Jesus not my baby please -"
There's a sharp knock at the door and a man opens it, walks in saying, "Good evening, messieurs, the Queen sent me, I'm the King's physic-"
The ornate clock beside the bed that Athos hadn't even noticed explodes into a thousand pieces exactly where the physician's head just was; "Get out," Aramis spits, hand scrabbling on the bedside table for more to throw. "Out, out-"
Athos has to drops his hands to rush for the physician before Aramis finds the bedside table empty and reaches for his weapons belt instead; at least Aramis won't shoot the man through Athos. "If you could please leave, monsieur, thank you for coming," he says in a rapid hurry, pushing the man back through the open door, "but my husband won't have a man see him through this, it offends his modesty appallingly as I'm sure you can tell. The midwife has been sent for. Thank you."
Aramis won't have a man touch him when he's pregnant, won't have a physician near him, will gut any that come close enough to try; the last man who tried to aid in Aramis' labour nearly killed him and the child, and it may not be the fault of the next physician to attempt it but if any man besides Athos or Porthos ever tries to put his hands between Aramis' legs, Aramis will kill him. The doctor looks glazed in the eyes with sheer shock at his skull almost being put in by a man in labour, too surprised yet for what's just happened to really sink in, and says, falteringly, "Can I - may he - can I supply anything for the pain at least . . . ?"
Athos sticks his head back into the bedroom, where Aramis is clutching his stomach with both hands and breathing, quick-out-quick-out-quick-out. Athos says, "What are your feelings towards poppy?"
Aramis snarls, "No."
"I believe he would rather keep his wits and bear it," Athos says to the doctor. "Thank you, monsieur."
He closes the door on him. He hopes the man has the sense not to try anything else; Athos crunches pieces of clockwork and porcelain underfoot as he hurries back to Aramis' side to take his hand again.
"What do you need. Tell me what you need."
"I don't - I can't - I need to have not come here and put myself into labour, Athos it's too early -"
"It's alright. Your midwife is coming, it's going to be alright."
"It's too soon and it's my fault."
"No. No. The hell with that. And the child is large enough, it moves enough in you, if it has even half of your stubbornness it will live, early or not -"
"It's coming too fast, I can feel it, it shouldn't be like this -"
"It's going to be alright. You're panicking, it makes it worse." Athos strokes his hands, desperately, with his thumbs. "Look at me, Aramis, be calm for me, look at me, it's going to be alright. I'm here. I'm not going anywhere. I'm here and we're going to be alright."
Aramis looks at him and tears would be better, he looks so far beyond the point of simple crying. He whispers, and his voice is low and shaking, "I'm so sorry."
"No." Athos pulls him forwards by the back of the head to kiss his forehead. "No. You will not apologise. No. We will get through this. There will be nothing to apologise for."
Aramis moans into Athos' shoulder, "Holy Mary, Mother of God, I can't do this again, Athos, I can't, I can't -"
"It's going to be alright." Athos strokes his fingers through Aramis' hair, trying to comb through the tangles, as Aramis grinds his forehead to Athos' shoulder. "It's going to be alright."
"It -" Aramis stops, and Athos hears the spiking of his breath before Aramis takes the edge of Athos' pauldron in his teeth and bites. He holds on there, silent and taut-muscled like an animal, before he lets go and pants in great rocking shakes of the body again, chanting brokenly, "Holy Mary, blessed among women, please have pity on my child, please save my-"
Athos hushes him, softly, draws his fingers through his hair, sits on the bed beside him and draws his cheek to his shoulder again so he can kiss the side of his brow, already clammy with sweat. "It's alright, love. It's going to be alright."
"I'm so sorry, Athos, I'm so, so sorry, I didn't mean to do this to you again -"
"It's alright." There's no point in arguing with him when he gets fixated like this. Even as it makes Athos' stomach squeeze queasy to hear him believe it so utterly, all he can do is try to soothe. "It's alright. Everything's going to be alright."
Aramis grips back at him tight, both hands on his arm, all composure shot and far, far too coherent in the most awful way Athos can imagine. "I'm sorry," he chokes. "I'm sorry I'm sorry. If it goes the worst way -"
"Aramis, please -"
"Tell Porthos I love him, I love him, and you know I do, Athos, I love you, I have loved being married to you." Aramis grabs his hand up to kiss it, eyes too bright. "And look after my little wolf, you will, you'll tell him how much I love him every day and you'll love him too, Athos -"
"You will tell him that. You tell him it every time you chance a glance at him, it's inconceivable you'll never say it to him again, you'll never be able to keep it to yourself. So you will tell him, yourself, the very next time you see him. And I love being married to you too, you bloody idiot, so you will not deprive me of it now. You will not make me face the rest of my life missing you, though that would be far too bloody you a thing to do, to make me never able to concentrate on anything but you again. So you damn well better had live, because I don't want a moment of the alternative. And I am your legal husband and you swore obedience at the altar, Aramis, so you will live, damn you."
Aramis blinks and blinks at him, bewildered, he looks too young like this, as if he's never been through this before and knows no way to face it when he's lived through it twice before - lived through both outcomes of it - when Athos has seen him walk battlefields and duck under gunfire with his expression only alert, when he could face anything but this with unthinking courage, courage seems to cost him nothing until this . . .
Aramis holds his hand, and whispers, voice raw and afraid, "You won't leave me. If they try to make you -"
Athos squeezes his hand. "No. I'll be here. I'm going nowhere, I won't leave you, not for a moment. The midwife won't be able to move me, no-one will move me, I'm not leaving."
"I'm sorry," he whispers. "To do this to you twice -"
"This is not then. We can do this. You can do this. It is going to be fine."
Aramis looks at him like he so, so wants to believe him. There's a tap at the door, and it's opened by a maid who steps in saying, "I've brought water mes-" She stops and looks under the basin at the clockwork she's treading on, then hurries on to put the bowl on the bedside table. "-messieurs. May I help you with anything else?"
Aramis puts a hand over his eyes, then lifts his head and casts a frail smile for her, something he never seems unable to manage for a lady. "If we might trouble for some towels to protect the sheets," he says. "And is there any sign of the midwife?"
She bobs her curtsey. "Not yet, monsieur. I'll bring towels."
As soon as she's gone Aramis swallows, and holds his head up higher, and says trying to keep his voice steady, "Will you help me with my boots? I need to get these trousers off before I can't."
"Your weapons." Athos says, and starts on the belt himself. "You're going to be alright."
"I'm going to ruin these sheets. The King's sheets. I can't . . . Athos, love, I don't know how to tell you this, it's not just blood -"
"It's going to be alright."
"You can't stop the - the piss and - I don't know how you'd ever want me again anyway after seeing it it's all so -"
Athos props Aramis' sword and pistols by the bed. "Aramis, Christ, you don't care about whether the act of giving birth is unattractive to me right now."
"Now is the best time to care about it," Aramis says, as Athos starts heaving his damn great heavy stupid boot off by the ankle. "It's a disgusting thing to- ow, mind my ankle, Athos-"
Aramis holds him by the shoulder to get some purchase as Athos jerks the boot loose. "If you didn't wear such ridiculous boots -"
"You've always been jealous of my boots."
"Left one."
"Try not to look," Aramis says, voice more pleading now as he raises his ankle for him and Athos begins trying to remove the second boot. "Please, promise me, try not to look -"
"I will do what the midwife needs of me, and I'll be right beside you. And it will be alright."
"It - fuck, ah fuck Holy Virgin please - it's coming too fast, it's coming on too fast -"
"What do I do?" Athos says urgently, unfastening Aramis' belts now in a jerking hurry to get his ruined trousers off him. "What did the midwife do, with Jean-Armand, what do we do?"
"Can't push," Aramis says, fingers gripping like claws into the bedding, body jerking like it's trying to rock up off the bed as if that would hurt less, voice strangled between his spiking breaths. "Can't push, too soon, have to be - be dilated enough -"
"Dil- alright. So don't push. Hold on for me, love, and don't push."
"No. But ahhhh Athos ow ow ow-"
Athos has to stop trying to pull Aramis' trousers off one ankle because he can't hold his leg out in that position while the rest of his body lurches inwards on another rising pain. When his muscles relax back into his panicked panting again Athos can finally tug the trousers free, and then begin on the lacing of his soiled underwear, while Aramis holds his head down and closes his eyes and Athos can see the humiliation on his face.
"In the palace," he croaks. "Of all places. I had to, didn't I. I bloody had to -"
A knock at the door and Aramis immediately lurches his own coat around himself, mortified to be walked in on almost naked and halfway to birth; it's the maid again, with a friend, carrying towels for them. "Thank you," Athos says. "On the foot of the bed, please. Thank you."
"Can we bring anything else, monsieur?"
About half the contents of your wine cellar, Athos thinks. That may make this survivable.
"No, thank you," he says. "But the midwife may need something from you when she arrives."
"We'll be outside, monsieur."
"Thank you," Aramis whispers, because manners matter even when he's sitting there in sopping underwear and more pain than his body knows what to do with.
Athos pulls the quilts back, shakes out towels and lays them over the bed, and helps Aramis to lose his coat, shuffle back and lie on them. He pulls some quilts back over him; it's winter, and Athos is warm enough fully clothed but Aramis is half-naked and wet and Athos knows the air may prickle. "It's alright," he says, holding his hand tight - Aramis won't let go - and stroking his hair back. "Love, it's alright."
Aramis swallows, and squeezes his eyes closed tight. Athos can see in the deep lines of his brow, in the flat, hard press of his mouth, that Aramis' entire universe has shrunk down to the single thought of I can't do this.
"You're going to be alright." Athos keeps running his hair back with his thumb. "We're going to be alright. We're all going to be alright, Aramis, it's going to be alright."
His knees remember the frost on the ground, the bones of his hand remember the way he squeezed. And Aramis' body gives another squeezing contortion from the hips, his lips press and eyes open and he makes no sound, staring at the ceiling dumb now in his silent hell where it's happening again, it's happening again, and this time, nothing could convince him that he's not the one to blame.
"It's going to be alright." Athos lifts his hand, kisses it, rubs it in his fingers. "It's going to be alright. It's going to be alright."
He's come beyond the fear. There is too much to subsume the fear under; fear feels so small in the immediacy of this. Athos feels - little, almost nothing, which is close enough to being calm. He cherishes that calm, breathes it deep, because he knows he needs it for what lies ahead. And what he feels then when he looks at Aramis' face is a sudden deep and rising tide, coming up his lungs to choke him, of love; of what they've had, what he's been able to have, because he's had Aramis. He didn't know what he wanted his life to be, never thought about it, didn't know how inadequate he found the world until he found that Aramis had already given him more than he knew could exist and, somehow, it had become a joy as simple as Jean-Armand's laughter merely to live.
The thought of losing it, losing Aramis and everything with him, grabs him. The thought of the cold dark plain Aramis stands on alone dries his throat, that look in Aramis' eyes like he's already in Hell and knows what he did to put himself there. Athos has to help. Athos has to do something.
"I love you," he says, he doesn't know how to break the weight of blame Aramis feels. "I'll always love you. I'll never leave you. I'll never look at you with anything but love, Aramis -"
Aramis' lips move soundlessly on, Ave Maria, gratia plena.
"You're my husband. I won't leave you."
Dominus tecum, benedicta tu in . . .
"We're together," Athos says, voice lowering over Aramis' hand held tight underneath his own nose, almost against his mouth. "You and I and Porthos, and the boy. All our children. All of our children, Aramis."
Aramis closes his eyes and Athos sees the pain ingrain the lines around them as his lips move silently on, Et benedictus fructus ventris tui Iesus . . .
"We're together," Athos whispers. "You can't send yourself to Hell, Aramis, because we will have to come with you. So stay with me, love. Look at me, Aramis, please. Stay with me."
Aramis' breath pulls in, shakes, lets go, shakes. He turns his head to look at Athos, eyes too dark and blinking too bright, and he whispers, and Athos has never seen Aramis as brutally sincere, as defeated as this, "There's never been a man alive as stupid as I am."
"There's never been a man alive as loved as you are." Athos slides his fingers into his hair to hold his gaze to his. He says, and tries to keep his voice steady, "Stay with me."
"You can't forgive me."
"I'm not having this fucking argument with you right now. Stay with me. You can't leave me. Porthos might manage for the boy but Christ, Aramis, you know I'm too weak."
"Don't be stupid." Aramis' eyes blink into something more aware at that. "Don't be stupid, you -"
"I don't believe the most stupid man who's ever lived would get to call anyone else stupid," Athos says. "So you must not be. Unless you think that I am."
"I've never known anyone who's . . . thought for me more."
"Then let me do the thinking now, while you've enough to work through." Athos says, lowering his head closer to hold his eyes. "Live, Aramis. Do as the midwife bid you when the boy was born, and live, for us. Whatever chances the child has, you have to live to give it its best hope."
Aramis squeezes his hand, and clearly can't speak. Athos kisses him, once and then twice, and doesn't raise his head; just rests brow to brow with him, feeling the odd spasms and clenches of all of Aramis' muscles as the pain takes hold of his body, comes and fades back in its unpredictable cruelty, like the waves of an ice-black sea.
Then Aramis swallows, and when Athos raises his face he's smiling, if it looks too tight in his skin. "The palace, of all places." Aramis says, voice rough but almost light. "I bet even you weren't born on silk sheets, were you?"
Athos whispers to him, "Live."
He's never known a person seem so every moment of his life so all-consumingly alive as Aramis is. Aramis says, "I made vows." and swallows again, shifts his grip on Athos' hand, and his jaw clenches tight as another roll of pain runs up through him, the tide of his body turning against him, and Athos hears, under his breath, the building of the moan.
Continued
It gets dark so soon now that the days never truly seem to start. Athos trudges back to the garrison through the dusk, side by side with Porthos, their four reduced to a two. That their duties now are only ever performed by the two of them is his permanent reminder of their current situation and he'd have thought it would make him angry, but all it ever truly makes him feel is sad. Another day of duty he can't make feel important, not when all he really wants right now, fearful and needier than he could ever know how to admit to, is to be beside Aramis. Aramis is in danger, is pregnant, and frustrated and frightened himself. And isolated, trapped and lonely never leaving a garrison where he can't trust all the men inside it, and missing his son like he's hollow on the inside, and leaving him in a morning feels almost unbearable. Athos remembers how contemptibly easy he found avoiding Aramis when he was pregnant with Jean-Armand. Now he would give away everything his last name has ever given him, without concern, just for a little longer each day beside his husband, before the waiting is over.
None of them know what they're waiting for. As yet, it's unfixed; a child, a husband, or nothing at all, Athos doesn't know what he'll be left with at the end of this. But Aramis' presence is something Athos wants to inhale while he can, in case it's the last breath of him he'll ever be allowed.
The garrison has a low hum of activity when they arrive, still early in the evening even if the sky's largely dark. Men are gathered for dinner outside the kitchens, huddled around the brazier for warmth, but there's no familiar hat cocked on any head present. Porthos nods to one of Aramis' recruits who stands from the kitchen bench with a jolt of the table, and yanks his own hat off in respect. "He went to lie down monsieur -"
"Right," Porthos says, waving for him to sit down again. "Thanks."
Athos pulls his own hat off as he passes through the doorway into the dormitories underneath Treville's office. It's warmer as soon as they're undercover, and from habit he knocks before he opens the door to the room he and Aramis were assigned but it's empty, the candles not only unlit but stiff and cold; not lit for hours. He turns and opens the door to Porthos' assigned room - he doesn't know what foolish pining might have sent Aramis into there to nap, but it would be a very Aramis thing to do - but that room's equally cold and dark.
At his back Porthos says, "What?"
"He's not there."
Porthos looks at him as if too tired to deal with Aramis' unpredictability right now - the one upside of his being trapped in the garrison has at least been that they've known where he is recently, even if that never has been quite the problem it was before marriage and fatherhood - and looks back up the short corridor. "Maybe he went for somethin' to eat."
"I didn't see him out there."
"Might be in the kitchens. Let's go have a look, fuck, he couldn't've done this after we'd eaten, I'm staving."
He's not in the kitchens. He's not in the infirmary, or the armoury. He's not, when Athos goes upstairs giving no outward sign of it and yet frightened, in the captain's office, though Treville looks curious and not in the slightest pleased that they apparently don't know where he is. But he's vanished. The man who can't leave the garrison has completely disappeared from it.
Downstairs Porthos emerges from the dormitories where, welcome or not, he's been knocking on every single door, and shakes his head. But one of Aramis' recruits, Jacques, is hurrying over, gives a stiff boy's bow and holds out a note towards Athos; "A lady just left it for you, monsieur."
"A lady?" Athos says, snapping the wax seal and unfolding it. Ester has visited but Aramis is nervous of her doing so in case the danger at his back should begin to loom over hers, and he doubts a boy of Jacques' family would think of an immigrant girl like Ester as a 'lady' anyway.
Then he opens the paper, and recognises the handwriting.
"She spoke with your husband earlier," Jacques says helpfully. "He said he'd give you the message but she must have-"
Athos looks up at Porthos because he needs help and Porthos reads the horror on his face far too clearly, grabs the paper and squints in the dim light -
There is no signature. It says, I believe your husband has gone for an interview with my former employer, after I informed him of who paid the priests to switch their definition of 'sin'. I only notify you of this so that you don't lay the blame for any of his foolishness on me.
Porthos looks up at him, hoping for understanding - Porthos doesn't know her handwriting clear as his own - but he understands Athos' face, and says, "Where's he gone?"
The recruit says, "Can I help, monsi-?"
"Tell Treville we've gone to the palace." Athos sprints for the stables and Porthos follows without question, because the only thing he knows is that this is about wherever the hell Aramis is.
"You- yes sir," Question swallowed, he knows when not to interrupt, and Athos thinks, the boy will do well; differently to any of us, but well.
"Where is he?" Porthos says, as Athos is throwing the tack onto his horse, fingers fumbling in his hurry. "Who sent that note?"
"My wife." His hands aren't over-hasty, they're shaking. "And it's Richelieu. Richelieu controls the priests, Richelieu sent the assassins -"
"- oh, fuck," in the smallest, most helpless voice, because Porthos knows Aramis as well as Athos does, and they both know that Aramis has gone to kill the Cardinal. He threatened his children. He threatened his children. And Aramis is simply not culpable . . .
"Horse is still here," Porthos says grimly, lurching at the straps on his own saddle to get his horse ready. "We c'n beat 'im there."
"He'll have been trying to travel undercover. God damn it Aramis -"
"Save that for when we see 'im." Porthos begins leading his horse in a hurry out of the stables. "Hell - hell -"
They can't travel fast, they learn early enough as the horses' hooves skid in snow. The mercy is that Aramis probably couldn't travel very fast either, except that that's no mercy because Aramis on the street could be in terrible danger and the less time he's on the streets the better, though the sooner he reaches Richelieu is by far the worst. As fast as they dare they travel for the palace, eyes alert to every movement on the street, searching out his shape, if they've overtaken him -
It's wishful thinking. Aramis has very long been a soldier; he's resourceful, adaptable, stealthy if he has to be, and determined like no man Athos has ever known. If his husband meant to arrive at the palace in as little time as possible, his husband will have achieved that, and every moment lost is one more moment in which Aramis might have slit Richelieu's throat and strung his own life up for the gallows and the stubborn idiot won't even care -
The horses they abandon in the grounds at the closest entrance to Richelieu's offices, and Athos barks at the Red Guard outside, "Has another musketeer come ahead of us?"
"What?" the Guard says, and Porthos rolls his eyes with his teeth clenched and barges past him, because it would require very little of Aramis' resourcefulness to get past these fools unseen, even expanded to twice his usual girth; the boy could get past these fools unseen, giant dog in tow and all.
There are candles lit but the dusk is all but dark now, and they hurry through shadows. They don't dare call out. Two musketeers may very well be bringing a message from Treville, and if they can stop Aramis before he's done the deed, no-one needs to know what he came here intending to do. But there's no sign of him. Damn him his skills and his determination, damn him every which way, if Athos' husband has already all but hanged himself -
There's an unconscious Guard on the floor beside the door to Richelieu's inner office, which barges on its hinges but doesn't come open. Athos throws his shoulder into it again and moves it enough to see that there's a desk pushed in front of it, it's not locked. Porthos says, "Shift." in that stony voice of his that means Athos needs to have moved before it's said; he kicks the door inwards in one massive blow, and with the second kick there's enough space to shove the desk aside and get inside.
Richelieu is backed to the opposite wall, neck craned upwards, entire body trying to curve itself away from the pistol Aramis has under his jaw and the dagger pressing to neatly flick in for a kidney at his side. Athos quickly shoves the door closed behind them before any shouting can travel, and Richelieu whispers, "God help me he's gone mad, help me-"
"No." Aramis says without moving so much as a flicker. "Either of you touch me and I'll kill him. Leave the room. Neither of you know about this. This cannot be blamed on either of you. And you, don't you dare start screaming now, I swear to God I will still have your eyes out before I kill you and anyone who interrupts will only see the two of them trying to stop me."
Richelieu's fingers scrabble at the wall, not for anything, a spasm of sheer terror. Athos steps forwards but slowly, holding his hands up, saying and he feels so weak with it, "Aramis . . ."
"I want to know why." Aramis hisses, eyes black in the candlelight on Richelieu's drained white face. "I want to know what the hell could ever mean enough to you for you to kill my child for. And I want you to understand, I want you to understand -"
The door scrapes and bangs behind him as Porthos leaves the room, and Athos doesn't have the time to worry about that. "Aramis," he says. "Put him down. This is doing no good to the child, and if you kill him they will hang you -"
"After my baby is born. They understand decency. After my baby is born they will hang me. They would never threaten my child, no human being threatens an unborn child, he wanted to kill my baby-"
"You will not leave Jean-Armand half-orphaned. You will not leave me a widower. You love us too much to subject either of us to that, so put him down, Aramis."
"He wanted me to miscarry. Do you understand? He wanted my child dead before it lived just to break us. He can't live." Aramis' eyes have never left Richelieu's, and the hands holding his weapons are steady as stone, and he sounds so sure. "He can't live. The world is worse for having him in it. If I've to go to Hell to ensure he goes there first before he can hurt anybody else, it's worth it to me."
"To your son? To the boy, Aramis he loves you, he will never, never recover from the loss of-"
"Shut up. You'll look after him."
"Do you think any of us could replace you to him? Put him down. He can pay, we can make him pay, but not like this -"
"Listen to him," Richelieu breathes. "We can come to an arrangement, you can walk away from this to your son-"
"Stop your poisonous lying tongue," Aramis spits, "because I can't go home to him, because I had to send him away because of you. How can you hate me this much, how can anything be worth - how can you bring my children into this, they've hurt no-one, they're children, why couldn't you have the decency to just kill me like a normal person -"
"Aramis," Athos says, because that dagger hand is straining at Richelieu's side. "Fuck, I'll kill him, give me that gun, I'll kill him, then you can go home-"
"D-" Aramis actually turns his head to stare at Athos. "You bloody idiot, what good would that do? You can't kill him."
"I certainly can't raise the children without you, you're much better with them. Particularly when they're pre-linguistic. It seems a much more practical solution in every way if I'm hanged rather than you."
"I really don't appreciate you mocking me right now."
Richelieu gasps in a breath against the metal mouth of the gun dug to his throat, gasps out, "Your son - I could arrange an - an incredible career in the Church -"
Aramis looks back at him and looks confused in his fury. "Go to hell," he says. "I want grandchildren."
It's the only bargaining chip Richelieu might have had for his life, he knows they're not interested in money or influence, but unfortunately for him, neither is Aramis more interested in piety than he is in his family. "You want to live to see them," Athos says. "Aramis, you want to live for that."
He can see the brightness of tears in Aramis' eyes, and the impotent fury, more than he can manage, scouring his face with pain. "All I wanted was my family," he croaks, voice dropped to that deep growl of too much for him to bear. "How could you try to hurt them, they're my children, how . . ."
The door opens behind them, and the table is pushed hurriedly fully aside. Athos glances back and freezes, as Porthos gets the table out of the way for the Queen, who walks in and takes the three of them in with the alarm freezing on her face, and says, "What is happening?"
Aramis' body has hesitated, but he doesn't back away from Richelieu, who whimpers, "Your Majesty, mother of mercy-"
Aramis breathes, very softly, "Shut your mouth."
"Aramis? What is happening?"
Athos knows Aramis probably has little in the way of sense to offer someone new to the situation, and says, "Over a series of months Richelieu has attempted to damage our regiment by turning half of them against us and trying repeatedly to either injure Aramis to miscarriage or else to outright kill him, which Aramis has taken against quite strongly."
"Would you please not mock me now, Athos -"
"Richelieu," the Queen says, eyes wide and body very small but somehow very central, somehow the focal point of the room now even more than Aramis holding the Cardinal to the wall with two weapons. "Is this true?"
"He'll lie." Aramis says bluntly, eyes flicking back to Richelieu's, such little distance away. "It's better for all of France that I stop his tongue now."
"You will do no such thing." she says, very hard. "Stand down, Aramis. Riche-"
"He tried to kill my baby."
"Stand down."
In the second of silence afterwards, Athos realises that he's come to attention. Treville would have roared it, the King would have shrieked it; from the Queen it comes in a low snarl like a she-wolf, anger barely contained in her small fisting hands, and Aramis is still, blade and pistol all but breaking into Richelieu's body, for one second more. Then he steps back, and slightly to the side, and offers a small, stiff and very slightly sullen bow to the Queen.
She ignores him, because she's still staring at the Cardinal, and her eyes look lost and young. "Richelieu," she says quietly. "His child. This isn't true. Tell me this isn't true."
"Aramis is at least right in this, your Majesty," Athos says. "He will lie. But we could probably find the evidence in this room, if you require it. Someone paid an assassin to shoot Aramis outside the garrison, and killed another soldier instead. Someone paid for a street preacher to incite a riot, and probably paid some of the mob as well. And someone has arranged for the priests to claim that Aramis' very existence is sinful, even though they spoke against all Scripture, and there are few men in Paris with the power to do that."
"He wanted everyone against 'im," Porthos says quietly by the door. "So if anythin' did happen to him, we'd all go to pieces. That was why he did it. He wants Aramis' baby dead so the King'll like him more than Treville."
"Your Majesty," Richelieu says, "perhaps we ought to talk -"
"Perhaps we ought to." she says, voice clipped and dangerous. She's a mother, Athos remembers. She's a mother - fuck; she's a mother who's lost a child herself, and is unlikely to be capable of much in the way of mercy towards this.
Athos looks at Aramis, who's still glaring blackly at Richelieu, and steps close enough to touch his arm. "Put your pistol away," he says, low, because he doesn't trust Aramis as long as it's in his hand.
"No. He'll get away with it. He always gets away with it."
"The Cardinal and I will talk." the Queen says. "We will come to an arrangement."
She says it like an arrangement might be a brutal and terrible thing to exact upon a deserving foe. Aramis says, "He needs no arrangement, he needs to pay. He meant to kill my baby -"
Athos grips his arm and hisses by his ear, "And you came here and tried to kill him, you fool. If this goes to trial now you will end up facing one yourself for the attempted murder of a Cardinal, the only reason he has to keep quiet and allow you to return to your family is if we all play nice-"
"Nice-"
Porthos pads carefully around the Queen, still standing straight-backed and hands clenched and head raised so she looks so imperiously at Richelieu, who sags against the wall without Aramis pinning him there, massaging at his throat where the pistol dug in. Porthos takes Aramis' other arm; that makes it easier to gently force the weapons from his hands, before he can do something horribly predictable with them.
"We will come to an arrangement," the Queen says. "So that Richelieu can undo some of the mischief he has made, and atone for his sins." Her eyes are a narrowed lethal blue. "They are not easily forgotten sins."
"I live at the mercy of your endless grace, your Majesty -"
"You'll burn in Hell." Aramis says, as with one arm each Athos and Porthos begin forcing him for the doorway. "And I'll make sure I come after you just to be certain of how much you suffer."
The Queen says, "I believe that Aramis needs to go lie down. Richelieu will bring me a chair for this interview."
"Of course, your Majesty -"
"Why didn't you let me kill him," Aramis hisses as they leave them, and manoeuvre him around the doorway and down the corridor, past the muzzily shifting Red Guard on the floor. "I could have killed him, he'd never hurt any of us again -"
"For the price of your neck, you idiot -"
"For his life that's cheap."
Athos grabs the collar of his shirt at that, twisting him to hiss at his face, "Don't you ever, don't you ever say that to me again."
He can see how tight Porthos has Aramis' wrist, and an arm around his waist for support. Aramis just stares back at Athos, wild and incomprehending in the eyes, until something begins to settle back, some sort of thought process beyond his need to kill Richelieu reawakens, and something, something softens on his face. "I'm sorry," he says. "That was crass of me. I'd be - it would hurt me immeasurably to hear you say that. I'm sorry."
"Idiot," Porthos mutters, palming the back of his neck to press him into moving again. "Need to get you back to the garrison before anyone sees you."
"This is what you're like without the boy around to keep you calm," Athos snaps. "You're impossible. You can't be sensible for both of us and that child inside you."
"Don't. Please, don't. I haven't done any of this to put it in danger, I only did it -"
"Alright," Athos says, because he feels in Aramis' breath how frantic he could become over this. "Alright, alright. I just wish you could remember that the child needs its father, Aramis. I know you'd die to protect your children but what they need the most is for you to live for them."
"I am alive." He walks with them, head lifting. "No thanks to that bastard. I am alive."
"Good," Porthos says quietly, and Athos sees his thumb stroke at Aramis' back where it supports his waist. "Good."
And then Aramis' face stops dead, and his step lurches to stop. They all stop, all three of them, silent in the corridor, and Athos says, "Aramis?"
He blinks, and his breath comes quick out of him. "Nothing," he says, and starts walking again, faster. "We need to get back to the garrison. The captain is going t-"
This time his body wrenches, and he makes a sharp half-swallowed sound, and his step falters sideways into Porthos, who stops him. "Aramis-"
Aramis grabs both of their arms tight. "We have to get back," he gasps. "We have to-"
"What are you -"
"Ah - please, quickly, quickly, we have to get-"
This time he staggers fully sideways, banging the three of them into the wall, puts his head low and makes a growled groaning noise he can't contain, eyes squeezed tight shut. Athos says, "Aramis-"
Porthos says, "Fuck."
He's looking behind him, at the floor. Athos looks around Aramis' shoulder and sees - fluid. The backs of his trousers are soaked through, and the liquid is running to the polished floor of the corridor. And his heart -
- stops.
(Frost on the ground, and Aramis grips his hand so tight.)
And Aramis puts his head back to heave his breath in at the ceiling, and Athos' heart kicks in to beat again with a bang. "We have to get back," Aramis gasps. "Oh God. Quickly, please, we have to get back -"
"We can't - get you back, you're already -"
Aramis makes a high tight noise, arms wrenching to wrap around his belly as if to press the pain back in and contain it. "We have to! Before it -"
Porthos says, "It's already too late, Aramis-"
"But I can't here! I can't give - birth in the palace and oh God oh God I can't I can't it's too early it's not time it's too early -"
Porthos says, "We need to get 'im down somewhere, we need to-"
"- I can't I can't do it again Mary Mother of God I can't I can't -"
Athos grabs an arm around Aramis' back, hikes his weight to him, says battlefield-fast to Porthos, "Go back to the Queen, we need somewhere he can give birth, then ride back into Paris for the midwife. Aramis, hold my hand, breathe."
Aramis tries to snatch after Porthos' shirt as he turns back the way they came, but he's forced to hunch in on himself again with something far too close to a whimper. "Athos I can't -"
"I know. It's alright. We're here, it's alright."
"I can't, I can't -"
Aramis is heavy - never exactly a featherweight even when not pregnant - and scrabbling at Athos as if he really can't get enough grip on him, voice desperate and tears only half held in, "Athos I can't not here not in the palace I can't and I can't I can't -"
"It's alright, it is going to be alright -"
Aramis starts, Athos thinks, to say 'no', but it comes out on a moan, strangled and tight, his body angling itself towards the floor, bent around the pivot point of his heavy belly. Athos strains to keep his grip on him, to keep his knees holding his weight. He doesn't remember this; Aramis lacked the coherency to argue with Athos on the roadside, and lacked all evident panic when Jean-Armand was born. Athos and Porthos panicked, then. Aramis relaxed himself, everything simply out of his hands, and waited with a steadied, almost amused curiosity for what would happen next.
"Do you need to sit down," Athos says, rubbing his back, "or do you need to stand, Aramis? What would help?"
"I - walk. Keep moving. I can't stop. I don't dare stop." He turns to pace the corridor and Athos can only move with him, holding his arm, his waist, turning as he does back the way they came. Aramis' step isn't always steady and his eyes are focused on nothing, but he walks, walks, the width of the corridor and back. He whispers, eyes staring through the air, "Ave Maria, gratia plena -"
"Alright," Athos murmurs, and walks with him. "Alright."
His own legs feel unsteady but he makes them sturdy. Porthos has to run, Porthos has to fetch help: Athos is the one who can't leave his husband, because no other man can in decency be with him in this state, and Aramis needs him. Aramis whispers, "Dominus tecum, benedicta tu in-" and staggers backwards, making a noise almost like cattle, a low bellow, as his arms squeeze his belly in and he chokes, "No no not yet please please no -"
Footsteps are coming quick back towards them, Athos looks up and Porthos is flat-out running, right past them and away down the corridor. Behind him the Queen is hurrying in her daintier shoes, eyes alarmed on Aramis not even upright in Athos' arm. "The closest bedchamber," she says. "Can he walk?"
Aramis says, "Your Majesty," and he sounds absolutely terrified.
"Yes." Athos says, and all he means by it is that he will get Aramis to the nearest safe bed on his own two feet if he has to. "Which way, your Majesty?"
He pulls Aramis' arm around his neck, hikes his side close in an arm to support him. Aramis does manage to walk in a shambling sort of way but Athos can hear in his breath when it's getting bad, breaths running into each other quicker in panic, little wheezing pained sounds in them. All that stoicism when Jean-Armand was born, he hardly made a sound; now he's outright terrified and can't contain it. Halfway down the corridor a door at its further end bursts to allow a maid to dash in, who scrambles half to a halt seeing them - sent by Porthos as he ran past, presumably - and the Queen barks at her, "Make the next bedchamber ready, the cream one. And fetch water!"
The maid bobs her curtsey, eyes wide on Aramis who tightens his jaw and stops walking to bend his body and contain a scream behind his teeth in Athos' arms, and Athos only grips him tight, his own jaw held grim and shaking, until enough of the pain seems to have passed for him to force Aramis' body on. He can rest when they're there. He can rest when they're there but they have to get there -
The Queen points the door out to him and walks right on past them, shouting for servants. Athos fumbles the handle and pushes Aramis into the room - candles and the fire have been lit, there's more than light enough to see how grand the chamber is, the gilding looks true gold with the flames glancing off it - and drag Aramis, staggering and making a continuous pained whining noise, to the bed. When he can finally sling Aramis' weight sideways onto it he can tell how bad it is even before Aramis grabs his wrist too tight and gets out through his panting, "It's too fast, it's too fast -"
"Alright, hold on to me, it's alright." Athos holds his hands tight, doesn't dare look away from his eyes. "I'm here. It's going to be alright."
"Where's Porthos-?"
"He went for the midwife. She'll be here as soon as she possibly can be, Aramis, you trust Porthos for that."
"Yes," he says, but it comes out choked, and his head drops back, eyes and mouth pressing tight closed, to some fresh pain blossoming with a twist inside. "It's too soon," he hacks out at the ceiling. "Mother of God it's too soon, it's not - I can't do this again, I can't -"
"Stay with me, Aramis, don't panic, it will be al-"
"- and I did this, it's my fault, it's my fault, isn't it? Because I -"
"No, no Aramis -"
"- came out here and - oh God please not my baby please not my-"
"Aramis, Aramis please-"
"I don't care if I die I don't care if I die but please please Jesus not my baby please -"
There's a sharp knock at the door and a man opens it, walks in saying, "Good evening, messieurs, the Queen sent me, I'm the King's physic-"
The ornate clock beside the bed that Athos hadn't even noticed explodes into a thousand pieces exactly where the physician's head just was; "Get out," Aramis spits, hand scrabbling on the bedside table for more to throw. "Out, out-"
Athos has to drops his hands to rush for the physician before Aramis finds the bedside table empty and reaches for his weapons belt instead; at least Aramis won't shoot the man through Athos. "If you could please leave, monsieur, thank you for coming," he says in a rapid hurry, pushing the man back through the open door, "but my husband won't have a man see him through this, it offends his modesty appallingly as I'm sure you can tell. The midwife has been sent for. Thank you."
Aramis won't have a man touch him when he's pregnant, won't have a physician near him, will gut any that come close enough to try; the last man who tried to aid in Aramis' labour nearly killed him and the child, and it may not be the fault of the next physician to attempt it but if any man besides Athos or Porthos ever tries to put his hands between Aramis' legs, Aramis will kill him. The doctor looks glazed in the eyes with sheer shock at his skull almost being put in by a man in labour, too surprised yet for what's just happened to really sink in, and says, falteringly, "Can I - may he - can I supply anything for the pain at least . . . ?"
Athos sticks his head back into the bedroom, where Aramis is clutching his stomach with both hands and breathing, quick-out-quick-out-quick-out. Athos says, "What are your feelings towards poppy?"
Aramis snarls, "No."
"I believe he would rather keep his wits and bear it," Athos says to the doctor. "Thank you, monsieur."
He closes the door on him. He hopes the man has the sense not to try anything else; Athos crunches pieces of clockwork and porcelain underfoot as he hurries back to Aramis' side to take his hand again.
"What do you need. Tell me what you need."
"I don't - I can't - I need to have not come here and put myself into labour, Athos it's too early -"
"It's alright. Your midwife is coming, it's going to be alright."
"It's too soon and it's my fault."
"No. No. The hell with that. And the child is large enough, it moves enough in you, if it has even half of your stubbornness it will live, early or not -"
"It's coming too fast, I can feel it, it shouldn't be like this -"
"It's going to be alright. You're panicking, it makes it worse." Athos strokes his hands, desperately, with his thumbs. "Look at me, Aramis, be calm for me, look at me, it's going to be alright. I'm here. I'm not going anywhere. I'm here and we're going to be alright."
Aramis looks at him and tears would be better, he looks so far beyond the point of simple crying. He whispers, and his voice is low and shaking, "I'm so sorry."
"No." Athos pulls him forwards by the back of the head to kiss his forehead. "No. You will not apologise. No. We will get through this. There will be nothing to apologise for."
Aramis moans into Athos' shoulder, "Holy Mary, Mother of God, I can't do this again, Athos, I can't, I can't -"
"It's going to be alright." Athos strokes his fingers through Aramis' hair, trying to comb through the tangles, as Aramis grinds his forehead to Athos' shoulder. "It's going to be alright."
"It -" Aramis stops, and Athos hears the spiking of his breath before Aramis takes the edge of Athos' pauldron in his teeth and bites. He holds on there, silent and taut-muscled like an animal, before he lets go and pants in great rocking shakes of the body again, chanting brokenly, "Holy Mary, blessed among women, please have pity on my child, please save my-"
Athos hushes him, softly, draws his fingers through his hair, sits on the bed beside him and draws his cheek to his shoulder again so he can kiss the side of his brow, already clammy with sweat. "It's alright, love. It's going to be alright."
"I'm so sorry, Athos, I'm so, so sorry, I didn't mean to do this to you again -"
"It's alright." There's no point in arguing with him when he gets fixated like this. Even as it makes Athos' stomach squeeze queasy to hear him believe it so utterly, all he can do is try to soothe. "It's alright. Everything's going to be alright."
Aramis grips back at him tight, both hands on his arm, all composure shot and far, far too coherent in the most awful way Athos can imagine. "I'm sorry," he chokes. "I'm sorry I'm sorry. If it goes the worst way -"
"Aramis, please -"
"Tell Porthos I love him, I love him, and you know I do, Athos, I love you, I have loved being married to you." Aramis grabs his hand up to kiss it, eyes too bright. "And look after my little wolf, you will, you'll tell him how much I love him every day and you'll love him too, Athos -"
"You will tell him that. You tell him it every time you chance a glance at him, it's inconceivable you'll never say it to him again, you'll never be able to keep it to yourself. So you will tell him, yourself, the very next time you see him. And I love being married to you too, you bloody idiot, so you will not deprive me of it now. You will not make me face the rest of my life missing you, though that would be far too bloody you a thing to do, to make me never able to concentrate on anything but you again. So you damn well better had live, because I don't want a moment of the alternative. And I am your legal husband and you swore obedience at the altar, Aramis, so you will live, damn you."
Aramis blinks and blinks at him, bewildered, he looks too young like this, as if he's never been through this before and knows no way to face it when he's lived through it twice before - lived through both outcomes of it - when Athos has seen him walk battlefields and duck under gunfire with his expression only alert, when he could face anything but this with unthinking courage, courage seems to cost him nothing until this . . .
Aramis holds his hand, and whispers, voice raw and afraid, "You won't leave me. If they try to make you -"
Athos squeezes his hand. "No. I'll be here. I'm going nowhere, I won't leave you, not for a moment. The midwife won't be able to move me, no-one will move me, I'm not leaving."
"I'm sorry," he whispers. "To do this to you twice -"
"This is not then. We can do this. You can do this. It is going to be fine."
Aramis looks at him like he so, so wants to believe him. There's a tap at the door, and it's opened by a maid who steps in saying, "I've brought water mes-" She stops and looks under the basin at the clockwork she's treading on, then hurries on to put the bowl on the bedside table. "-messieurs. May I help you with anything else?"
Aramis puts a hand over his eyes, then lifts his head and casts a frail smile for her, something he never seems unable to manage for a lady. "If we might trouble for some towels to protect the sheets," he says. "And is there any sign of the midwife?"
She bobs her curtsey. "Not yet, monsieur. I'll bring towels."
As soon as she's gone Aramis swallows, and holds his head up higher, and says trying to keep his voice steady, "Will you help me with my boots? I need to get these trousers off before I can't."
"Your weapons." Athos says, and starts on the belt himself. "You're going to be alright."
"I'm going to ruin these sheets. The King's sheets. I can't . . . Athos, love, I don't know how to tell you this, it's not just blood -"
"It's going to be alright."
"You can't stop the - the piss and - I don't know how you'd ever want me again anyway after seeing it it's all so -"
Athos props Aramis' sword and pistols by the bed. "Aramis, Christ, you don't care about whether the act of giving birth is unattractive to me right now."
"Now is the best time to care about it," Aramis says, as Athos starts heaving his damn great heavy stupid boot off by the ankle. "It's a disgusting thing to- ow, mind my ankle, Athos-"
Aramis holds him by the shoulder to get some purchase as Athos jerks the boot loose. "If you didn't wear such ridiculous boots -"
"You've always been jealous of my boots."
"Left one."
"Try not to look," Aramis says, voice more pleading now as he raises his ankle for him and Athos begins trying to remove the second boot. "Please, promise me, try not to look -"
"I will do what the midwife needs of me, and I'll be right beside you. And it will be alright."
"It - fuck, ah fuck Holy Virgin please - it's coming too fast, it's coming on too fast -"
"What do I do?" Athos says urgently, unfastening Aramis' belts now in a jerking hurry to get his ruined trousers off him. "What did the midwife do, with Jean-Armand, what do we do?"
"Can't push," Aramis says, fingers gripping like claws into the bedding, body jerking like it's trying to rock up off the bed as if that would hurt less, voice strangled between his spiking breaths. "Can't push, too soon, have to be - be dilated enough -"
"Dil- alright. So don't push. Hold on for me, love, and don't push."
"No. But ahhhh Athos ow ow ow-"
Athos has to stop trying to pull Aramis' trousers off one ankle because he can't hold his leg out in that position while the rest of his body lurches inwards on another rising pain. When his muscles relax back into his panicked panting again Athos can finally tug the trousers free, and then begin on the lacing of his soiled underwear, while Aramis holds his head down and closes his eyes and Athos can see the humiliation on his face.
"In the palace," he croaks. "Of all places. I had to, didn't I. I bloody had to -"
A knock at the door and Aramis immediately lurches his own coat around himself, mortified to be walked in on almost naked and halfway to birth; it's the maid again, with a friend, carrying towels for them. "Thank you," Athos says. "On the foot of the bed, please. Thank you."
"Can we bring anything else, monsieur?"
About half the contents of your wine cellar, Athos thinks. That may make this survivable.
"No, thank you," he says. "But the midwife may need something from you when she arrives."
"We'll be outside, monsieur."
"Thank you," Aramis whispers, because manners matter even when he's sitting there in sopping underwear and more pain than his body knows what to do with.
Athos pulls the quilts back, shakes out towels and lays them over the bed, and helps Aramis to lose his coat, shuffle back and lie on them. He pulls some quilts back over him; it's winter, and Athos is warm enough fully clothed but Aramis is half-naked and wet and Athos knows the air may prickle. "It's alright," he says, holding his hand tight - Aramis won't let go - and stroking his hair back. "Love, it's alright."
Aramis swallows, and squeezes his eyes closed tight. Athos can see in the deep lines of his brow, in the flat, hard press of his mouth, that Aramis' entire universe has shrunk down to the single thought of I can't do this.
"You're going to be alright." Athos keeps running his hair back with his thumb. "We're going to be alright. We're all going to be alright, Aramis, it's going to be alright."
His knees remember the frost on the ground, the bones of his hand remember the way he squeezed. And Aramis' body gives another squeezing contortion from the hips, his lips press and eyes open and he makes no sound, staring at the ceiling dumb now in his silent hell where it's happening again, it's happening again, and this time, nothing could convince him that he's not the one to blame.
"It's going to be alright." Athos lifts his hand, kisses it, rubs it in his fingers. "It's going to be alright. It's going to be alright."
He's come beyond the fear. There is too much to subsume the fear under; fear feels so small in the immediacy of this. Athos feels - little, almost nothing, which is close enough to being calm. He cherishes that calm, breathes it deep, because he knows he needs it for what lies ahead. And what he feels then when he looks at Aramis' face is a sudden deep and rising tide, coming up his lungs to choke him, of love; of what they've had, what he's been able to have, because he's had Aramis. He didn't know what he wanted his life to be, never thought about it, didn't know how inadequate he found the world until he found that Aramis had already given him more than he knew could exist and, somehow, it had become a joy as simple as Jean-Armand's laughter merely to live.
The thought of losing it, losing Aramis and everything with him, grabs him. The thought of the cold dark plain Aramis stands on alone dries his throat, that look in Aramis' eyes like he's already in Hell and knows what he did to put himself there. Athos has to help. Athos has to do something.
"I love you," he says, he doesn't know how to break the weight of blame Aramis feels. "I'll always love you. I'll never leave you. I'll never look at you with anything but love, Aramis -"
Aramis' lips move soundlessly on, Ave Maria, gratia plena.
"You're my husband. I won't leave you."
Dominus tecum, benedicta tu in . . .
"We're together," Athos says, voice lowering over Aramis' hand held tight underneath his own nose, almost against his mouth. "You and I and Porthos, and the boy. All our children. All of our children, Aramis."
Aramis closes his eyes and Athos sees the pain ingrain the lines around them as his lips move silently on, Et benedictus fructus ventris tui Iesus . . .
"We're together," Athos whispers. "You can't send yourself to Hell, Aramis, because we will have to come with you. So stay with me, love. Look at me, Aramis, please. Stay with me."
Aramis' breath pulls in, shakes, lets go, shakes. He turns his head to look at Athos, eyes too dark and blinking too bright, and he whispers, and Athos has never seen Aramis as brutally sincere, as defeated as this, "There's never been a man alive as stupid as I am."
"There's never been a man alive as loved as you are." Athos slides his fingers into his hair to hold his gaze to his. He says, and tries to keep his voice steady, "Stay with me."
"You can't forgive me."
"I'm not having this fucking argument with you right now. Stay with me. You can't leave me. Porthos might manage for the boy but Christ, Aramis, you know I'm too weak."
"Don't be stupid." Aramis' eyes blink into something more aware at that. "Don't be stupid, you -"
"I don't believe the most stupid man who's ever lived would get to call anyone else stupid," Athos says. "So you must not be. Unless you think that I am."
"I've never known anyone who's . . . thought for me more."
"Then let me do the thinking now, while you've enough to work through." Athos says, lowering his head closer to hold his eyes. "Live, Aramis. Do as the midwife bid you when the boy was born, and live, for us. Whatever chances the child has, you have to live to give it its best hope."
Aramis squeezes his hand, and clearly can't speak. Athos kisses him, once and then twice, and doesn't raise his head; just rests brow to brow with him, feeling the odd spasms and clenches of all of Aramis' muscles as the pain takes hold of his body, comes and fades back in its unpredictable cruelty, like the waves of an ice-black sea.
Then Aramis swallows, and when Athos raises his face he's smiling, if it looks too tight in his skin. "The palace, of all places." Aramis says, voice rough but almost light. "I bet even you weren't born on silk sheets, were you?"
Athos whispers to him, "Live."
He's never known a person seem so every moment of his life so all-consumingly alive as Aramis is. Aramis says, "I made vows." and swallows again, shifts his grip on Athos' hand, and his jaw clenches tight as another roll of pain runs up through him, the tide of his body turning against him, and Athos hears, under his breath, the building of the moan.
Continued