22. memorial

[badass_tiger]

Prompt: Any, any, carving pumpkins
Word Count: 2k
Author/Team: badass_tiger
Title: memorial
Fandom/Original: Original (Wreath of Gladiolus)
Rating: Gen
Triggers: NA
Summary: Garland and Aurel light candles on All Hallows' Eve.
ConCrit: Y

Notes: yes this counts as carving pumpkins bye

The day of All Hallows’ Eve was bustling, and even Aurel found himself busy in attending court at Garland’s side. All three days of Allhallowtide were a holiday in the kingdom, so there were many things to settle before everyone was free to go home and begin their preparations for the triduum. As evening approached and the stream of affairs being brought to Garland’s attention finally dwindled away, Garland yawned and slumped back in his throne to the amusement of his clerks and courtiers. Aurel beckoned to a servant, who stepped forward with a cup of tea.

‘I fear that this display of how taxing our duties occasionally are will put you off of them,’ Garland said, giving Aurel a slightly mournful smile.

‘Hardly. All I did was sit and look politely interested in the things people said. I barely understood half of them.’

‘Oh, but you were so astute in giving me advice whenever I asked for it.’

‘Once you had explained things.’

‘You do not deserve less credit for needing things explained to you beforehand,’ Garland beamed, and Aurel gave up with a half-exasperated, half-affectionate smile.

‘Just one final matter before we allow you to retire, Your Majesty,’ Hansen said, coming forward with a servant who held a basket of candles. Garland nodded, and extending his hand to Aurel, stood up.

‘Will you come with me to light the candles for Allhallowtide?’ Garland said.

‘Of course.’ Aurel took his hand, and they left the room together. ‘I have people I want to light candles for too. I did not know, however, that you lit any candles yourself.’

‘It would not be right if I asked a servant to light candles for people I wish to remember.’ Garland gave Aurel a guilty sideways glance, and Aurel raised an eyebrow. ‘Although I do actually, er, ask servants to carve the pumpkins I wish to light.’

‘Fair enough,’ Aurel laughed. ‘It is late in the day - will they have carved your pumpkins already?’

‘Yes.’

‘You should have told me so I could ask for help with my pumpkins too. I have never done it alone myself.’

‘Forgive me, it escaped my memory to do so. The servants know the names of the people I wish to light candles for, and I only need to inform them whenever I wish to add another name to the list. Although this year, there is an additional pumpkin I would like to put a candle in, with your permission.’

‘Ah … for Constance?’ Garland nodded mutely, his expression tightly closed. Aurel squeezed his arm. ‘Of course. You do not need my permission for that.’

Garland looked at him for so long with shining eyes that Aurel had to pull him aside to allow a servant going the other way to pass through.

‘Thank you, my dear,’ he said softly. ‘Even after how terribly I wronged you, you do not resent her.’

‘Well, it was not she who wronged me,’ Aurel said, raising an eyebrow. Garland blushed.

‘Indeed. I - well - thank you.’

Garland led him to a room situated at the front of the castle. Rows and rows of tables had been set out, pumpkins neatly arranged on them all. Every resident of the castle was allowed to light pumpkins here, the courtiers and servants alike. The window would glow with light at night. Aurel approved of the reason the room had been reserved for this occasion. A few servants were inside, cleaning the pumpkins and placing candles inside them.

'How many pumpkins would you like?' Garland said, showing him to the table directly by the window, where more than a dozen pumpkins stood.

'Just two,' Aurel said. 'Tell me who each of these pumpkins are for, first.'

'My mother, my father, my sister,' Garland began, pointing them out. Each pumpkin had elegant initials carved out on its surface. The people Garland had chosen to honour varied amongst his family and friends. One of the pumpkins was even for the personal assistant he'd had before Hansen.

When Garland finished speaking, Aurel stood in silent thought for several moments. Garland had at times spoken of his departed friends with pain, and it had always squeezed at Aurel's insides to listen to him. It often seemed to him that Garland had a much heavier burden than any man of his age should have to bear.

'I hope,' Aurel said quietly, frowning at the pumpkins, 'that you will never have to light a candle in my honour.'

'I hope so too,' Garland said. Aurel turned to look at his gently serious smile. 'But even if I someday had to, I would do so with a gladness to think of the time you have given me.'

'Is that the way you see it with all the people you have candles for here?'

'Yes.'

'You are braver than I am. I have much to learn from you yet.' Aurel took Garland's hand in his own, and relaxed into an answering smile. 'The people I wish to light candles for are not even people I have personally lost myself. They are for my grandparents, who I never knew. I loved my father's stories about them though, and he always lit pumpkins for them himself, impressing upon Nathaniel and I what good people they were whenever he did so. I ...' Aurel swallowed, arranging the thoughts he had always had but never before formed into real words, 'When I die, I want to know that there is someone who will remember me the way my father always remembers his parents.'

'There will be,' Garland said, so much more confidently than Aurel expected to that he was surprised. 'Amongst our peers, you have already made so many friends, and the people are already beginning to understand what an excellent royal consort you make. You will not be easily forgotten, Aurel.'

'And neither will you.' Aurel moved to kiss him on the lips, thought better of it in a room for remembering the dead, and pressed a kiss to his knuckles instead. 'You are an excellent ruler, one who will be remembered for a long time.'

'Thank you.' Garland squeezed his fingers, then turned and beckoned to one of the servants in the room. 'Please prepare two pumpkins for Prince Aurel. Would you like to carve them yourself, my dear?' Aurel shook his head ruefully. He had never mastered the art, and always had to have help from his mother or Nathaniel. 'Would you like their full names on the pumpkins?'

'Oh, no,' Aurel said with a glance at Garland's pumpkins. They all had only initials, probably to save the servants the excessive labour. 'Just initials will be sufficient. EH and SH.'

'It will be done, Your Highness,' the servant said, bowing. 'You may wish to return in a few hours to light them.'

They returned after dinner, having left Garland's pumpkins unlit so they could light them all together. By then, the room was devoid of servants but occupied by several courtiers and members of staff. Garland and Aurel nodded at and greeted them all as they made their way to the window. Two new pumpkins, freshly carved, had been placed on the table slightly apart from the others to distinguish them. Aurel gazed down at them with a slight, pensive frown.

'Are they not to your satisfaction, my dear?' Garland said, watching his face closely. Aurel hurriedly blinked his expression away.

'They're perfect,' he said, offering up a smile, and it was true. They had been carved by an expert hand, with many a flair and flourish. 'I was just thinking of my grandparents ... and you.'

'My dear?'

'What we spoke of earlier ... I stand by my sentiment that I hope you will never have to light a candle in my honour. But I ... I dread the likelier event that I will have to start lighting a candle in your honour.'

'Does it not seem so strange and cruel, that in this world, we love only to lose?' Garland said. 'But that is the nature of this world. It is not eternal, and the things we experience on this Earth are all the more precious for it.'

'I suppose so.' Aurel reached out and touched the cool surface of a pumpkin. 'Even when life is as short as it is, people adopt the tendency to take the things and people that are precious to them for granted.'

'It is important to mourn, and remember the people we have loved in the past, but it is even more important to continue living.' Garland picked up a long lamp lighter and handed it to Aurel. 'That is the lesson that death teaches us.'

'Big words coming from you, my love,' Aurel said in a lighter tone. 'Considering the reason you proposed marriage to me.'

Garland laughed guiltily. 'It is what my time with you and Constance has taught me, Aurel.'

'Good.' Aurel touched the end of his stick to a candle that had been set aside on the table and began to light his pumpkins. 'You are right, of course. The best thing one can do for the people one has lost is to continue living with the memories and lessons they have left behind. Shall I help to light some of yours, as well?'

'Certainly, if you wish.'

'The people precious to you are precious to me, too. We should consider all the pumpkins on this table as belonging to us, rather than to you and I.'

'An excellent suggestion, my dear.'

For several moments after they finished, they stood side by side in silent contemplation.

'I just want to know,' Aurel said as they left the room, 'what will happen to me after your death?'

'You may take over my position, if you wish.'

'As king?' Aurel was taken aback.

'Indeed.'

'I could never do that.'

'Then you need not,' Garland smiled. 'The next in line after you is my first cousin once removed, currently the son of the Duke of Sinclair.'

'And what would happen to me then?'

'You could continue to live here in whatever capacity you will. As you are what is commonly called a second consort -' Aurel tried not to wince at this description. He disliked it so. '- your obligations begin and end with me. Naturally, I have arranged matters that you are free to do as you wish after my death, whether it be to stay in the castle, or to return to your family, or anything in between. What do you think?'

'Will you ever have a first consort?' Aurel asked.

'Never, as you well know,' Garland said, pinching Aurel's cheek just a little too sharply. Aurel laughed and batted his hand away.

'I would stay,' Aurel said, catching his hand. 'I would stay and help your successor in any way I can.'

'I am very glad to hear that. Do you think you might find another after me?'

'It is easy to say no, when you are here with me right now,' Aurel said with a grin.

'Then you do feel the answer to be no,' Garland said brightly.

'Would you have an objection to it if I did have another, long after you?'

Garland was silent until they reached their suite. Only when the door was closed, and they both stretched out on the sofa in a warm, comfortable heap, did he say, 'I would surely not object to you finding love again after my death, Aurel. I should naturally always wish for your happiness. At this current moment, however ...' He raised a hand to Aurel's face and drew him in for a kiss. 'I do not wish to think of any such thing.'

'Then you need not,' Aurel laughed against his lips. 'Right now, you must think of nothing but me,' he said, and Garland happily obliged.