FIC - First Knight (17/19)
Title: First Knight (17/19)
Author: wheelie47
Artist: hollyoaks1021
Rating: NC17 (not for every chapter)
Pairing: Luke and Noah.
Word count: 2,487
Disclaimer: Don’t own characters, am not associated in any way with ATWT, Van and Jake. No offence intended.
Warnings: Character death
Summary: Set in the fictional land of feudal Western Atlantia, King Damian has been overthrown and has fled the Kingdom of Oakdale. But his evil influence has spread across all eight Kingdoms. Lord Luke Snyder leads his army in an effort to bring peace and justice to a troubled time, aided in his quest by a certain dark-haired young Knight…
Chapter 1, Chapter 2,Chapter 3 Chapter 4, Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9, Chapter 10, Chapter 11, Chapter 12, Chapter 13, Chapter 14, Chapter 15, Chapter 16
Noah watched on as Luke paced with increasing anxiety and impatience in front of the tent’s opening. His whole body ached with the need to take Luke in his arms and put an end to his incessant movement. But he was aware of the other Knights and soldiers milling around, watching them intently.
Although these men had fought on their side and now knew of their relationship, Noah felt the uncertainty and distrust that lingered just below the surface emanating from the onlookers. He did not want to antagonize the feeling so he stood to one side, his fists clenching and unclenching as he stared at the tent flap… willing it to open as he wondered if he would ever be able to feel confident and sure enough to display his feelings for Luke openly in the company of others.
The tent flap was jerked open, stilling Luke’s repetitive motion and interrupting Noah’s musings.
They both watched intently as Reid Oliver appeared from inside the canvas walls. The physician looked tired and drawn with dark shadows under his eyes, the sunlight making him blink rapidly.
“Well?” Luke asked in trepidation.
Oliver shook his head slowly and his shoulders sagged in defeat. “I can do no more,” he sighed and he had difficulty in meeting both men’s questioning gaze. “His wounds are too deep and he has lost too much blood.”
“But it cannot be so!” Luke was distraught and he strode up to stand in front of the older man, grasping him by the arms as he tried to ignore the blood on his hands and on his shirt front. Gone was the borrowed chain mail and he was a man of medicine once more. “You have to be able to help him.”
“Surely there must be something further you can do?” Noah was instantly standing behind Luke’s right shoulder. He appeared outwardly calmer than the blonde but the quaver was clear in his voice and emotion swirled deep in the blue of his eyes.
Instinctively Luke’s body sought out the comfort of his lover and he found himself leaning almost imperceptively back against Noah’s broad chest.
The physician shook his head again as he brought his gaze up to meet the two sets of eyes staring back at him. “He is beyond any man’s aid now… even mine. I am sorry.”
Luke’s hands slipped from Oliver’s arms and dropped loosely by his sides as helplessness and a desperate sadness washed over him.
“He is asking for you…both of you,” Reid looked from Luke to Noah and back again before he sidestepped out of the way.
As both men moved to walk past the physician, he gripped Luke’s shoulder, stopping him in his tracks.
Oliver waited until the other man had turned to face him. “I am aware we have not always seen eye to eye but I wanted to tell you that your words out there on the battlefield today touched many men. And you spoke out on behalf of others… more than you know. For that I thank you.” He smiled as a man who was unused to giving such compliments before his face quickly resumed its usual dour expression.
Luke stared at him as his distracted mind attempted to retrieve the kernel of meaning hidden in the man’s words. His mouth dropped open and the green flecked hazel widened, finally showing signs of surprised understanding. “You… you are…”
Reid silenced him with a curt nod and a quick almost imperceptible smile.
Luke observed the other man for several long moments as, despite the gravity of what awaited them in the tent, he felt his heart lift a little at the thought that there were others like he and Noah… that they were not alone in the world. He had believed in his heart that there must have been others that had the same feelings flowing through their veins and in their hearts but to have it confirmed meant so much.
He resolved to have a long talk with the enigmatic physician when time allowed.
But not now. Now he and Noah had a more urgent matter pulling on their hearts.
Oliver nodded gravely toward the tent flap, letting his hand fall from the blonde’s shoulder. “You should not linger out here; time is of the essence.”
Luke turned back to face the tent and both he and Noah walked forward with grief heavy in their hearts.
Once inside the tent, their eyes blinked as they adjusted to the gloom and registered the scene before them.
The injured had been carried to where ever there was sufficient room to treat them once the encampment’s hospital tent had reached its capacity. Oliver, and Bashir’s physician, had moved amongst the tents, treating the men as best they could whilst leaving Calderon’s physician and his staff to work in the hospital tent.
Of the two cots before them, one had a blood-spotted sheet already pulled up covering the body of the man that lay beneath.
The other held the prone figure of Kevin Davis.
Both men gasped at the waxen countenance that was covered in a thin sheen of sweat. Kevin’s eyes were closed and he had an almost other worldly appearance that had them fearing they were already too late.
As they took a step closer to the cot, their eyes scanned Kevin’s bloodied-sheet covered torso for signs of breathing.
Detecting a shallow rise and fall, Luke quickly drew the tent’s single wooden stool to the side of the cot and placed his hand on Kevin’s forearm as Noah stood next to him, his own hand coming up to rest soothingly between Luke’s shoulder blades.
“Kevin,” Luke murmured into the eerie silence of the tent, almost not wanting to disturb the man’s final moments.
Luke and Noah seemed to wait an interminable amount of time as Davis’s breathing appeared to grow yet more shallow and Luke tried to ignore the clammy feel of the man’s skin against his palm.
Just as Luke was considering if he should call Kevin’s name again, his friend’s breath hitched in his throat and his eyelids fluttered open. With great effort, Kevin turned his head to face them and, with out-of- focus eyes, he seemed to have difficulty in recognizing them.
A ghost of a smile briefly touched his lips as he finally identified them before pain wracked his body and he coughed violently, specks of blood flying from his lips.
“Rest easy, Kevin,” Luke spoke in horror as he witnessed the man’s suffering.
Noah moved to dip a cloth in the bowl of water on the washstand next to the cot. He returned and gently wiped Davis’s lips before turning the cloth over and cleansing his sweaty face.
“Thank you,” Kevin managed to breathe out in a voice that sounded as if it were stretched painfully over a thousand shards of sharpened glass.
He turned to Luke with eyes that had watered from the effort of coughing. “Were… were we victorious?”
Luke smiled briefly and nodded. “We were… thanks to you. Your action gave us the impetus. Once Aiden was killed and Damian captured, most of their hired forces surrendered and we overpowered the rest.” He tried not to dwell on the thought that some of those men had once fought for the House of Snyder.
“Good,” Kevin murmured and closed his eyes.
Eventually, after several struggling breaths, he opened his eyes again and gazed at both Luke and Noah. “But… but I do not deserve your thanks. I betrayed you… both of you. I should be begging for your forgiveness.”
Luke squeezed Kevin’s arm gently. “Hush. Do not waste your energies on such thoughts. None of that matters now.”
Noah knelt by the cot side and covered Luke’s hand with his own where it rested on Kevin’s arm. “You need not ask for our forgiveness… there is nothing to forgive. You helped us escape.”
“Thank you… your words… they sooth my troubled soul.” Kevin’s voice sounded feebler with each passing moment as if his last remaining strength was ebbing away.
He was silenced once again by an even more violent coughing fit and when his eyes opened once more they appeared as if they already looked upon another sky.
When Kevin was finally able to speak again, his voice was barely audible and both Luke and Noah had to lean close to hear the words. “I… I am sadden…” he gasped as a tear escaped his eye and ran down the side of his face, “… that I will never again see Oakdale. Think…think of me when you return there and… uh… ride out over its hills and plains once more.”
He closed his eyes - never to open them again as he shuddered his final ragged breaths.
Tears rolled unhindered down Luke’s face as he reached out with a shaking hand and tenderly brushed his fingers across Kevin’s brow, his heart breaking at the memories of their shared childhood and everything that had come to pass. “Rest well, my dear friend. I will remember,” he managed in between sobs.
Noah nibbled away at his bottom lip, trying to stop the tears brimming in his eyes from falling but he could not and with a strangled gasp he let his emotion flood over him at the final sacrifice of his fellow Knight. Kevin had been brave and true at the last when it mattered most.
He lost track of the length of time they stayed by Kevin’s side in death, holding hands in comfort of each other. His muscles screamed at him to move from the cramped position as he knelt but he could not - would not - leave yet.
So engrossed in his own thoughts of Davis was Noah that Luke’s sudden movement as he knocked over the stool when he stood startled him.
“Luke?” Noah questioned, concerned at the sudden change in his lover’s features. Gone were the distraught tears to be replaced by a fierce determination.
Luke ignored him and turned, striding toward tent flap as he gripped his sword hilt. “This is not right!”
“Hold!” Noah scrambled to his feet and reached Luke in two long strides, gripping the blonde by the shoulder and turning him.
“Release me, Noah!” Luke commanded as he struggled against the firm hold. “It is not fitting that a man such as Grimaldi lives while he dies,” he yanked his arm free and gestured wildly toward the cot.
He made to turn again but Noah arrested his movement once more by gripping both shoulders this time.
“No, it is not,” Noah agreed as he held Luke’s gaze, trying to make him understand. “But neither is it fitting that you should kill him in retaliation like some cold bloodied executioner.”
Luke’s features twisted into disbelief. “How can you say such things? Think on what he has done!”
Noah struggled to hold Luke firm as his lover increased his efforts to free himself. He had to keep Luke from doing this. For the same reasons he had stayed Luke’s hand on the battlefield, he knew it was important to do so again; this was not his Luke. “Think on what your father would have done in your stead!”
“I am not my father, Noah!” Luke tried to block out thoughts of failing to measure up to the good man he knew his father had been and, instead, was consumed by the desire for vengeance. “Ask yourself what you would do if it were me lying there!”
Noah gasped and he blinked hard against the unbidden and horrifying image in his mind’s eye of Luke lying prone there on the cot, growing cold, instead of Kevin. “You should not say such things, Luke… should not even think them,” he whispered hoarsely. In truth, he did not know what he was capable of if Luke was wrenched violently from him in such a manner. The black void of such a loss where he could not foretell his own actions scared him more than he cared to admit and he shivered at the thought, despite the cloying warmth of the tent.
Luke witnessed the shock and the hurt on his lover’s countenance and realized, with a start, that he had said too much and spoke too harshly.
Thoughts of vengeance were pushed from his mind as he broke Noah’s loosened hold and pulled the taller man into an embrace, his hands sub-consciously moving to tangle in the brunette tresses.
“Forgive me… forgive me, my love,” Luke murmured over and over, his lips brushing the long lines of Noah’s neck with butterfly kisses, feeling him shudder at the touch.
For long moments, they stood, clinging to one another as the realization that they had both survived and were together rolled over them like an unstoppable wave which had them both shivering and gasping for breath.
Without moving from their embrace, Noah was the first to speak, his low baritone resonating against the skin of Luke’s neck. “We should escort Grimaldi back to Oakdale. He must be brought to task for his crimes there.”
Luke nodded, his blonde locks tickling the side of Noah’s face as he, calmer now, accepted the truth of the other man’s words. “It is what my father would have wanted.”
Pulling back, the green flecked hazel met crystal blue and Luke hesitantly asked the question that had been at the back of his mind for a long time now. “And what then for you?”
He held his breath, waiting for a response.
Noah did not balk from the question. He knew what Luke was asking of him; it had crossed his own mind more than once. “My place is with you.”
Luke had to be sure. “Your father will not want you to return home? Or to pledge your sword to another quest?” He knew that the Mayer Clan’s coffers were greatly diminished; the spoils of war being the reason Sir Winston Mayer had pledged the Clan’s allegiance to the House of Snyder in the beginning.
What if the next quest Sir Winston selected for Noah sent his lover to some far flung kingdom… possibly even across the seas? He did not think he could bear to be parted from Noah now that they had found each other and had already been through so much together.
Noah shook his head as a slow smile spread across his lips. “It matters not what he wants. My home is with you now.” He sealed his words with a kiss that spoke of the promise of their future together.
He knew his father would be furious when he learned of Noah’s decision to make his home in Oakdale, especially when he discovered the reasonings behind it.
But Noah pushed that thought to the back of his mind, knowing it was in the future as they lost themselves in the moment of the kiss before their thoughts turned toward the long journey home…
Chapter 18
Back to fic master post
Author: wheelie47
Artist: hollyoaks1021
Rating: NC17 (not for every chapter)
Pairing: Luke and Noah.
Word count: 2,487
Disclaimer: Don’t own characters, am not associated in any way with ATWT, Van and Jake. No offence intended.
Warnings: Character death
Summary: Set in the fictional land of feudal Western Atlantia, King Damian has been overthrown and has fled the Kingdom of Oakdale. But his evil influence has spread across all eight Kingdoms. Lord Luke Snyder leads his army in an effort to bring peace and justice to a troubled time, aided in his quest by a certain dark-haired young Knight…
Chapter 1, Chapter 2,Chapter 3 Chapter 4, Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9, Chapter 10, Chapter 11, Chapter 12, Chapter 13, Chapter 14, Chapter 15, Chapter 16
Noah watched on as Luke paced with increasing anxiety and impatience in front of the tent’s opening. His whole body ached with the need to take Luke in his arms and put an end to his incessant movement. But he was aware of the other Knights and soldiers milling around, watching them intently.
Although these men had fought on their side and now knew of their relationship, Noah felt the uncertainty and distrust that lingered just below the surface emanating from the onlookers. He did not want to antagonize the feeling so he stood to one side, his fists clenching and unclenching as he stared at the tent flap… willing it to open as he wondered if he would ever be able to feel confident and sure enough to display his feelings for Luke openly in the company of others.
The tent flap was jerked open, stilling Luke’s repetitive motion and interrupting Noah’s musings.
They both watched intently as Reid Oliver appeared from inside the canvas walls. The physician looked tired and drawn with dark shadows under his eyes, the sunlight making him blink rapidly.
“Well?” Luke asked in trepidation.
Oliver shook his head slowly and his shoulders sagged in defeat. “I can do no more,” he sighed and he had difficulty in meeting both men’s questioning gaze. “His wounds are too deep and he has lost too much blood.”
“But it cannot be so!” Luke was distraught and he strode up to stand in front of the older man, grasping him by the arms as he tried to ignore the blood on his hands and on his shirt front. Gone was the borrowed chain mail and he was a man of medicine once more. “You have to be able to help him.”
“Surely there must be something further you can do?” Noah was instantly standing behind Luke’s right shoulder. He appeared outwardly calmer than the blonde but the quaver was clear in his voice and emotion swirled deep in the blue of his eyes.
Instinctively Luke’s body sought out the comfort of his lover and he found himself leaning almost imperceptively back against Noah’s broad chest.
The physician shook his head again as he brought his gaze up to meet the two sets of eyes staring back at him. “He is beyond any man’s aid now… even mine. I am sorry.”
Luke’s hands slipped from Oliver’s arms and dropped loosely by his sides as helplessness and a desperate sadness washed over him.
“He is asking for you…both of you,” Reid looked from Luke to Noah and back again before he sidestepped out of the way.
As both men moved to walk past the physician, he gripped Luke’s shoulder, stopping him in his tracks.
Oliver waited until the other man had turned to face him. “I am aware we have not always seen eye to eye but I wanted to tell you that your words out there on the battlefield today touched many men. And you spoke out on behalf of others… more than you know. For that I thank you.” He smiled as a man who was unused to giving such compliments before his face quickly resumed its usual dour expression.
Luke stared at him as his distracted mind attempted to retrieve the kernel of meaning hidden in the man’s words. His mouth dropped open and the green flecked hazel widened, finally showing signs of surprised understanding. “You… you are…”
Reid silenced him with a curt nod and a quick almost imperceptible smile.
Luke observed the other man for several long moments as, despite the gravity of what awaited them in the tent, he felt his heart lift a little at the thought that there were others like he and Noah… that they were not alone in the world. He had believed in his heart that there must have been others that had the same feelings flowing through their veins and in their hearts but to have it confirmed meant so much.
He resolved to have a long talk with the enigmatic physician when time allowed.
But not now. Now he and Noah had a more urgent matter pulling on their hearts.
Oliver nodded gravely toward the tent flap, letting his hand fall from the blonde’s shoulder. “You should not linger out here; time is of the essence.”
Luke turned back to face the tent and both he and Noah walked forward with grief heavy in their hearts.
Once inside the tent, their eyes blinked as they adjusted to the gloom and registered the scene before them.
The injured had been carried to where ever there was sufficient room to treat them once the encampment’s hospital tent had reached its capacity. Oliver, and Bashir’s physician, had moved amongst the tents, treating the men as best they could whilst leaving Calderon’s physician and his staff to work in the hospital tent.
Of the two cots before them, one had a blood-spotted sheet already pulled up covering the body of the man that lay beneath.
The other held the prone figure of Kevin Davis.
Both men gasped at the waxen countenance that was covered in a thin sheen of sweat. Kevin’s eyes were closed and he had an almost other worldly appearance that had them fearing they were already too late.
As they took a step closer to the cot, their eyes scanned Kevin’s bloodied-sheet covered torso for signs of breathing.
Detecting a shallow rise and fall, Luke quickly drew the tent’s single wooden stool to the side of the cot and placed his hand on Kevin’s forearm as Noah stood next to him, his own hand coming up to rest soothingly between Luke’s shoulder blades.
“Kevin,” Luke murmured into the eerie silence of the tent, almost not wanting to disturb the man’s final moments.
Luke and Noah seemed to wait an interminable amount of time as Davis’s breathing appeared to grow yet more shallow and Luke tried to ignore the clammy feel of the man’s skin against his palm.
Just as Luke was considering if he should call Kevin’s name again, his friend’s breath hitched in his throat and his eyelids fluttered open. With great effort, Kevin turned his head to face them and, with out-of- focus eyes, he seemed to have difficulty in recognizing them.
A ghost of a smile briefly touched his lips as he finally identified them before pain wracked his body and he coughed violently, specks of blood flying from his lips.
“Rest easy, Kevin,” Luke spoke in horror as he witnessed the man’s suffering.
Noah moved to dip a cloth in the bowl of water on the washstand next to the cot. He returned and gently wiped Davis’s lips before turning the cloth over and cleansing his sweaty face.
“Thank you,” Kevin managed to breathe out in a voice that sounded as if it were stretched painfully over a thousand shards of sharpened glass.
He turned to Luke with eyes that had watered from the effort of coughing. “Were… were we victorious?”
Luke smiled briefly and nodded. “We were… thanks to you. Your action gave us the impetus. Once Aiden was killed and Damian captured, most of their hired forces surrendered and we overpowered the rest.” He tried not to dwell on the thought that some of those men had once fought for the House of Snyder.
“Good,” Kevin murmured and closed his eyes.
Eventually, after several struggling breaths, he opened his eyes again and gazed at both Luke and Noah. “But… but I do not deserve your thanks. I betrayed you… both of you. I should be begging for your forgiveness.”
Luke squeezed Kevin’s arm gently. “Hush. Do not waste your energies on such thoughts. None of that matters now.”
Noah knelt by the cot side and covered Luke’s hand with his own where it rested on Kevin’s arm. “You need not ask for our forgiveness… there is nothing to forgive. You helped us escape.”
“Thank you… your words… they sooth my troubled soul.” Kevin’s voice sounded feebler with each passing moment as if his last remaining strength was ebbing away.
He was silenced once again by an even more violent coughing fit and when his eyes opened once more they appeared as if they already looked upon another sky.
When Kevin was finally able to speak again, his voice was barely audible and both Luke and Noah had to lean close to hear the words. “I… I am sadden…” he gasped as a tear escaped his eye and ran down the side of his face, “… that I will never again see Oakdale. Think…think of me when you return there and… uh… ride out over its hills and plains once more.”
He closed his eyes - never to open them again as he shuddered his final ragged breaths.
Tears rolled unhindered down Luke’s face as he reached out with a shaking hand and tenderly brushed his fingers across Kevin’s brow, his heart breaking at the memories of their shared childhood and everything that had come to pass. “Rest well, my dear friend. I will remember,” he managed in between sobs.
Noah nibbled away at his bottom lip, trying to stop the tears brimming in his eyes from falling but he could not and with a strangled gasp he let his emotion flood over him at the final sacrifice of his fellow Knight. Kevin had been brave and true at the last when it mattered most.
He lost track of the length of time they stayed by Kevin’s side in death, holding hands in comfort of each other. His muscles screamed at him to move from the cramped position as he knelt but he could not - would not - leave yet.
So engrossed in his own thoughts of Davis was Noah that Luke’s sudden movement as he knocked over the stool when he stood startled him.
“Luke?” Noah questioned, concerned at the sudden change in his lover’s features. Gone were the distraught tears to be replaced by a fierce determination.
Luke ignored him and turned, striding toward tent flap as he gripped his sword hilt. “This is not right!”
“Hold!” Noah scrambled to his feet and reached Luke in two long strides, gripping the blonde by the shoulder and turning him.
“Release me, Noah!” Luke commanded as he struggled against the firm hold. “It is not fitting that a man such as Grimaldi lives while he dies,” he yanked his arm free and gestured wildly toward the cot.
He made to turn again but Noah arrested his movement once more by gripping both shoulders this time.
“No, it is not,” Noah agreed as he held Luke’s gaze, trying to make him understand. “But neither is it fitting that you should kill him in retaliation like some cold bloodied executioner.”
Luke’s features twisted into disbelief. “How can you say such things? Think on what he has done!”
Noah struggled to hold Luke firm as his lover increased his efforts to free himself. He had to keep Luke from doing this. For the same reasons he had stayed Luke’s hand on the battlefield, he knew it was important to do so again; this was not his Luke. “Think on what your father would have done in your stead!”
“I am not my father, Noah!” Luke tried to block out thoughts of failing to measure up to the good man he knew his father had been and, instead, was consumed by the desire for vengeance. “Ask yourself what you would do if it were me lying there!”
Noah gasped and he blinked hard against the unbidden and horrifying image in his mind’s eye of Luke lying prone there on the cot, growing cold, instead of Kevin. “You should not say such things, Luke… should not even think them,” he whispered hoarsely. In truth, he did not know what he was capable of if Luke was wrenched violently from him in such a manner. The black void of such a loss where he could not foretell his own actions scared him more than he cared to admit and he shivered at the thought, despite the cloying warmth of the tent.
Luke witnessed the shock and the hurt on his lover’s countenance and realized, with a start, that he had said too much and spoke too harshly.
Thoughts of vengeance were pushed from his mind as he broke Noah’s loosened hold and pulled the taller man into an embrace, his hands sub-consciously moving to tangle in the brunette tresses.
“Forgive me… forgive me, my love,” Luke murmured over and over, his lips brushing the long lines of Noah’s neck with butterfly kisses, feeling him shudder at the touch.
For long moments, they stood, clinging to one another as the realization that they had both survived and were together rolled over them like an unstoppable wave which had them both shivering and gasping for breath.
Without moving from their embrace, Noah was the first to speak, his low baritone resonating against the skin of Luke’s neck. “We should escort Grimaldi back to Oakdale. He must be brought to task for his crimes there.”
Luke nodded, his blonde locks tickling the side of Noah’s face as he, calmer now, accepted the truth of the other man’s words. “It is what my father would have wanted.”
Pulling back, the green flecked hazel met crystal blue and Luke hesitantly asked the question that had been at the back of his mind for a long time now. “And what then for you?”
He held his breath, waiting for a response.
Noah did not balk from the question. He knew what Luke was asking of him; it had crossed his own mind more than once. “My place is with you.”
Luke had to be sure. “Your father will not want you to return home? Or to pledge your sword to another quest?” He knew that the Mayer Clan’s coffers were greatly diminished; the spoils of war being the reason Sir Winston Mayer had pledged the Clan’s allegiance to the House of Snyder in the beginning.
What if the next quest Sir Winston selected for Noah sent his lover to some far flung kingdom… possibly even across the seas? He did not think he could bear to be parted from Noah now that they had found each other and had already been through so much together.
Noah shook his head as a slow smile spread across his lips. “It matters not what he wants. My home is with you now.” He sealed his words with a kiss that spoke of the promise of their future together.
He knew his father would be furious when he learned of Noah’s decision to make his home in Oakdale, especially when he discovered the reasonings behind it.
But Noah pushed that thought to the back of his mind, knowing it was in the future as they lost themselves in the moment of the kiss before their thoughts turned toward the long journey home…
Chapter 18
Back to fic master post