She did. Knees tucked under her. The cloak pooled around her like blood.
Lancelot knelt behind her. His fingers were careful as he undid the braid, unraveling it slowly. Her hair fell like a curtain across her back, crimson and tangled, threaded with pine needles from the night before.
He combed through it with his fingers, reverent.
“I love your hair,” he murmured, winding a curl around his finger. “It was the first thing I noticed about you that night.” She felt his hand pull through her locks. “I love when you wear it wild. It matches your spirit.”
“I know,” she said, not quite smiling.
“I’ll make it quick.”
She nodded.
The blade made a quiet sound as it sliced through the air. The tension in the strands resisted, then gave. A soft, final sound. Like something being severed.
A quiet sob crept up her throat, soft and unbidden.
When it was done, he gathered the cut length in both hands, weighing it like something sacred.
Guinevere couldn’t speak. But with him — she didn’t have to.
Lancelot wrapped her hair in cloth, tucking it deep into his satchel. A relic. A secret.
Behind him, she reached for the small pot Lunete had tucked into her bundle. The concoction inside smelled sharp and herbal, bitter with sage and walnut bark.
“We don’t have to use this.” His breath was warm against her skin, a welcome sensation. The breeze of the morning brushed over her shoulders and across her neck…
“Yes, we do.” She whispered through tears, running her hands through her hair. It fell just above her shoulders now. “How manywomen have you met with hair like this?”
“No one could hold a flame to you, Guinevere.” Lancelot dipped his fingers into it and worked it through her hair, darkening it strand by strand, until the red was lost in dusk-brown shadow.
By the time they were done, she didn’t look like a queen.
She looked like a ghost of herself. A wraith in the wild.
Her knight moved behind her. She heard him cleaning his hands on something before the warmth of his body returned to her back. He caressed her shoulders gently. “They said to let it dry on your hair,mon amour.” His voice was almost indiscernible from the crackle of the small fire in front of them.
They sat in silence for a while longer, watching as the flames licked across their clothes, the remainderandreminder of who they were yesterday.
When they mounted the horse a while later, Guinevere couldn’t help but feel that something final had happened in this clearing.
Something monumental.
But something good.
50
They made camp late, deep in the hush of the woods. The fire crackled low, throwing light across their cloaks and the tangled brush beneath them. Guinevere sat with her knees drawn up, eyes flicking toward the stars through the canopy above. Lancelot lay stretched beside her, one hand behind his head, the other lazily turning his dagger in the dirt.
Both of them rested a little easier today. They hadn’t seen even a hint of Camelot’s guards since they had escaped.
“We’ll need names,” Gwen said after a while.
Lancelot turned his head, brow arching. “Names?”
“For when we reach the villages. When they ask who we are.”
He rolled to face her, resting his cheek on one hand. “Fine then. Let’s get married.”
