Mhari's Fic

Title: Counterspell
Author: Mhari
Fandom: Arthurian
Pairing: Gaheris/Morvydd, sort of
Rating: PG
Words: 200
Disclaimer: The words are mine, the characters are everyone's.
Summary: Morvydd finds and heals a wandering madman.
Notes/Warnings: For rainbowjehan, with apologies and many hearts.


He comes to her out of the forest like a wounded animal, with no expression but terror in his eyes. Morvydd coaxes him inside, winding spells of trust about him. She washes him, picks the burrs out of his matted hair, and only then recognizes him as her cousin. Then she wonders that he should have come here, of all places, to her mother's keep.

Slowly he begins to speak, in fragments too small to make sense. She listens as she steeps the herbs for his tea, thoughtfully.

In the night he begins to weep. Morvydd rises from her seat by the fire, and bends over him. He wakes as her dark hair brushes him, but the dream does not leave him; he shrinks from her, pleading, and at last she realizes what ails him. "Nay," she whispers, "be still, Gaheris, it is well. It is well," and when he still whimpers, she lies down on the bed and embraces him. "See, thou hast done me no harm. Hush." She kisses him, and he weeps again, but this time for sorrow and not for fear. Finally he sleeps, as one whose fever has broken, in the circle of her arms.