Do you ever think about how Elyan was fighting off his father’s trade in The Dark Tower? He’d been doing that for ages before of course, It’s been four years since you left and not much as a word, but it wasn’t until that duel, a defeat and closure all once, that he realized how much he’d wanted to pick up his chosen trade, the sword, and cross it against his father’s, in one last battle of wills. Gwen had said he never settles down, never thinks about the future, but the stilted words of their conversation in that cell, years prior, invited in another reason for his sudden departure. Elyan had left because of Tom.
The morning of his father’s death anniversary, and a few days before he, himself, would die, Elyan made the graveside visit, with Gwen comfortably wrapped around one arm. So, when our father died, wasn't that the right moment either? He’d spent many moments righting the wrong, in order to get to this one. On his return to Camelot, he took up his father’s forge and trade. When his sister ascended the throne, he took the oath instead. The right moment is always now.
But when Gwen is kidnapped under his protection, all those old feelings rise to the surface. Consequently, he fights to reach her by becoming his old self again, the one she’d loved in frustration. None of us would even be here if it wasn’t for me. Words that echo his quiet confession to Arthur the night before. Gwen had raised him, brought him up. I don't know what I'd be if it wasn't for her. And so he never looks back, barreling ahead into danger despite the others calling out to him. Dropping his sword onto trip-wired flagstones, an imperfect metaphor for the demands of responsibility him and his father might’ve argued about long ago. But now, he runs recklessly and fearlessly ahead, unheeding the calls to stop. No one else matters now. He follows his heart wherever it leads him.
It leads him to something his father might’ve forged. A sword Morgana has enchanted to be indefatigable; the past resonating into the present once again. After all, it was Tom who forged a sword of impeccable quality to be magicked for greater purposes. It’s a terrible irony that another would end him.
Yet the thing is, he fights this sword and wins. Elyan banishes the past out of a window, brute-forcing it from their lives despite Gwen’s warning that it cannot be defeated. That it always comes back. You cannot overcome it. He defeats it. But not before it had dealt him a fatal wound on its way out. She holds him then, the wrong place at the wrong time, and tells him she only thing she thinks would reassure him. Father would be proud of you.
It must’ve felt like another blow. But he loves Gwen more in that moment to tell her that she’s the one he came back for. Settled in camelot for. Returned to old form for. And of you. So proud. A reference to their shared childhood, fraught with disagreements and a deep affection, in equal measure. And of a father who drove them apart only to be the reason they’ve reunited again, one last time. It’s his last act as a brother to echo her words, without revealing all the effort it takes to do so. It hurts to admit, to give the sword, his father, the final say. But he’d rather that, than hurt her. It’s what you do when you love someone, isn’t it?
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