[interlude -- daily prayers]
Oct. 30th, 2023 01:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
onthewillowsthereGalahad quietly moves his things back into Claudius' rooms. The clothes Claudius chose for Laurel he can't quite bring himself to wear, so he folds his white tunics in a drawer and hangs the Sword with the Red Hilt by the wardrobe. He has very little, in truth: not the psalter with the gold edges, which is back somewhere in another world at a campsite where Percival is alone, and not the silver cross the abbess gave him when he left the nunnery. Aside from clothes and sword, he only has Claudius' letter.
And things are still hard. He still wakes in the morning and can't rise, too weighted down to gather himself out of bed. He still doesn't know why he's here. He still can't ask for what he wants. But it's different, to sleep in the same bed as someone he trusts. He sometimes sits at Claudius' desk and just looks at Claudius' things, not daring to touch, but drinking in everything he can with his eyes. The smell of herbs and perfume, the warmth in the sheets after Claudius has left. He holds it to him the way he holds Percival's laugh and his Welsh brogue.
He keeps the canonical hours, waking himself for matins, lauds and prime (but he does it quietly, for himself), because it's how he's always measured the days. He fasts on Fridays; he makes a mass for himself on Saturday nights and Sundays by reciting the liturgy in his head. He remembers the saints on their feast days. It keeps everything even. It allows him something to hold onto, something normal, something easy. Things are still hard. Sometimes he feels as if everything is made from glass, and it would be so easy to break, like a cruet slipped from an acolyte's hand smashed on the tile floor of the sacristy. Shattered crystal and wine that's blood. Sometimes he feels as if the cruet is in his hands, and his hands are always shaking.
But he's trying. He's trying. He lies in bed and imagines it getting better, imagines that it could get better. He imagines a grain of wheat, a single grain, full of possibility, and sometimes he's able to hold it and keep it from being crushed. Sometimes there's still a grain of wheat when he gets up.
He has very little, in truth, but now he has more.
And things are still hard. He still wakes in the morning and can't rise, too weighted down to gather himself out of bed. He still doesn't know why he's here. He still can't ask for what he wants. But it's different, to sleep in the same bed as someone he trusts. He sometimes sits at Claudius' desk and just looks at Claudius' things, not daring to touch, but drinking in everything he can with his eyes. The smell of herbs and perfume, the warmth in the sheets after Claudius has left. He holds it to him the way he holds Percival's laugh and his Welsh brogue.
He keeps the canonical hours, waking himself for matins, lauds and prime (but he does it quietly, for himself), because it's how he's always measured the days. He fasts on Fridays; he makes a mass for himself on Saturday nights and Sundays by reciting the liturgy in his head. He remembers the saints on their feast days. It keeps everything even. It allows him something to hold onto, something normal, something easy. Things are still hard. Sometimes he feels as if everything is made from glass, and it would be so easy to break, like a cruet slipped from an acolyte's hand smashed on the tile floor of the sacristy. Shattered crystal and wine that's blood. Sometimes he feels as if the cruet is in his hands, and his hands are always shaking.
But he's trying. He's trying. He lies in bed and imagines it getting better, imagines that it could get better. He imagines a grain of wheat, a single grain, full of possibility, and sometimes he's able to hold it and keep it from being crushed. Sometimes there's still a grain of wheat when he gets up.
He has very little, in truth, but now he has more.
