City of Fear

Chaporer tWelbw

Good, the bartender's turning around towards me. ...She's almost upon me now, and I can see... there're rainbows on her face. My God, there're rainbows everywhere!

Gwaine backed up in terror, as the colors continued to creep from the corner of his vision until all he could see was a sheet of churning hues. Gwaine was desperate to run, but he knew deep down that he couldn't escape the oncoming storm of colors. Gwaine blinked hard, and shook his head.

When he opened his eyes again, Gwaine was relieved. The rainbows had retreated, and a dimly lit tavern replaced the colors that covered Gwaine's vision, even if it was a bit fuzzy. He squinted to see the bartender watching him as she bobbed in and out of focus.

Just to make sure that the danger was truly gone, the knight staggered to a standing position and scanned the pub for any unnaturally bright colors. However, all was rather normal; side conversations went on beside him, as if the only care these people had were how well their vegetables were growing in their gardens. Speaking of cares. . . It occurred to Gwaine that maybe he should care about his missing out on some knight meeting that Arthur had called.

Eh.

The thought was gone as quickly as it had come. Gwaine huffed and lifted his ale to his lips before his eye caught something else.

Two—were they men or women? In any case, two people sat next to each other, and had just started conversing. Gwaine frowned. They both wore long clothing which went past their knees, and it appeared to be a cross between a rather bland dress and a coat. One dress-coat was a light brown, however, while the other was more of a tan.

It took about five seconds for Gwaine to decide to introduce himself and determine their genders.

"Hey," he said right as he sauntered over to the seat next to the light brown dress-coated man. Oh. They were both men. Gwaine frowned. "You are not ladies," Gwaine slurred, looking them both over.

"And you are not sober."

That was tan dress-coat man. Gwaine raised an eyebrow at him. His voice was almost unnaturally deep, and his clothes and accent both supported the towards the theory that he was foreign. He was wearing—wait, is that a blue ribbon around his neck?—a white shirt and black pants, and Gwaine managed to notice his very blue eyes. His hair was messy, as if he'd forgotten to comb out his bed head. Gwaine decided to mentally dub him Scruffy.

"Yeah, well. . ." Gwaine scratched the back of head. "Neither is your mother."

"I never had a mother."

"Yeah, cause she's probably your bloody sister." Gwaine paused to rethink his statement, furrowing his brow, then shrugged internally.

"I can understand why you may think that. Royal lines are very inbred these days."

The other, light brown dress-coated man's eyes widened at their exchange, but he said nothing. His hair was brown and all sticky-uppy, a gravity-defying feat that puzzled Gwaine, but he was still too loopy to care. He wore a blue shirt and pants, and his shoes were a strange combination of red and white.

"Oi, there," Gwaine warned unconvincingly, "You're talking to the son of a knight, here. I'd watch what you say." He squinted his eyes in an unsuccessful attempt to look threatening.

The other man—not Scruffy—perked up at this. "Really?" he wondered, staring at Gwaine closely. Huh. His accent sounded more native. "What's your name?"

"I'm-" Gwaine hiccuped "-I'm Gwaine."  

The man pursed his lips in an almost impressed sort of way. "Gwaine? Sir Gwaine?"

Gwaine winked. "The one and only. Why? You heard of me? Who are you, anyway? Are you an evil murdering magical beast? Or better yet, is your name Keemera?" He'd been trying to figure out who she was every since he'd heard her name.