I do not own Merlin. I apologize in advance for any errors, in this story that I may have overlooked.
CHAPTER ONE: SIGIL
A message arrived in the dark of night, waking Alice from her sleep. Rousing at the furtive scratching at her door, she cracked the door open cautiously. A youth in a dark cloak clumsily thrust the paper at her, turning away before she could even ask what was happening. The feeling of doom that had arisen as she opened the door, grew deeper. In the uneven candlelight, she recognized her own name, written in Gaius' hand. As her fingers touched the seal that closed the message, she realized it was imprinted with the sigil of the dead Queen, Ygraine. It was a hawk in flight.
Her eyes sparked gold as the sigil's mark found it's way into her magical consciousness. Gaius was speaking through the spell on the sigil, his voice both familiar and filled with anxiety. Their magic bridged the distance between them, as if he stood next to her. "Come at once, my love. Prince Arthur is gravely ill. I would not ask this if I could think of another way, but the child is growing weaker."
There was more beyond the magical content of the message. On the paper, Gaius had simply written, 'postern gate- midnight'.
Her heart sank further. Something terrible must be affecting the young Prince. In the two years since Ygraine's death, the life of the Prince had been Gaius' reason for remaining with Uther. As the Purge began, Gaius had striven to walk the fine line between loyal physician and sorcerer, knowing that if he remained close to Arthur, he might prevent the young heir from being corrupted by the unending vendetta against magic, unleashed by the King's broken heart. Only she understood how Gaius strove, but could never succeed, in hiding the deep affection he bore for his half-orphaned charge. Knowing the danger inherent in a healer of her kind entering the castle, she knew her lover must have been desperate to ask for her help.
She had entered the castle through the postern gate as instructed in the letter, quietly cloaked in gray and carrying a basket of herbs. The physician had been there to greet her. Gaius' eyes were dark with worry, but lit up as he caught his first glimpse of her. As he folded her into his embrace, she felt the sudden trembling of unshed tears shake him. He took a deep breath, as if her embrace was like air, flooding into his burning lungs.
"Prince Arthur is very ill," he said softly, hardly daring to look at her. "It was nothing unusual, a typical catarrh. But his fever has not abated and it seems like pneumonia has settled in firmly. Alice…. " Here his voice broke and his arms tightened around her. Unspoken fear swirled around them.
"The King?"
The physician sighed.
"Uther sees the tyranny of magic everywhere. He believes Arthur's illness is caused by enchantment." His voice sank lower in tone, sadness in every line of his face. "Since I told him of the gravity of Arthur's condition, he has been pacing and raging in the Great Hall. He may start arresting people by the morning."
He paused, letting his fingers trail across her cheek tenderly, as he gazed at her. His voice sank to a tone of bitterness that was unfamiliar to her.
"But he will not come see his only son. He has only seen Arthur a handful of times, since he was born …" He stopped himself, not wanting to say more. He took the basket of herbs from her hand gently and led her into the castle. It had only been two years since Ygraine died, but the Purge had begun only recently, after the death of Tristan DuBois. The halls of Camelot were an echoing ghost of what they had once had been. The tension was palpable. The power of Uther's grief and rage had changed Camelot.
As they moved quietly through the corridors, the occasional servant swept by them, eyes averted, once they realized it was Gaius who guided her through the keep. To her surprise, one of the kitchen workers, her long dark braid touched with silver, timidly reached out to gently touch Alice's cloak as they passed by.
"Bless you, my lady, " the woman whispered. "Please save our little Prince," she added, looking around her, as if she half expected someone to seize her at any moment. "He's all the hope we got since the Queen died."
Alice's heart grew cold, and she shivered as she followed Gaius through the dark corridors. As they entered the royal nursery, the young woman who was the wet nurse looked up at them. Tears stained her face. She cuddled the young Prince Arthur in her arms, but the little boy was pale and limp.
"He's worse, Gaius. I can't get him to take anything. He wakes a bit when I put him to the breast, and he tries to nurse, but he's can't. He hasn't enough strength."
She raised the child to kiss his brow, almost shyly, her affection for the young Prince plain in her sweet voice.
"Come now, wake up, Arthur, you lazy daisy. Open your eyes, my bonny boy, come on." She gently tapped on the toddler's cheek." He stirred slightly at the sound of her voice, his eyelids trembling for a moment. Alice could see the child was working for every breath. His lips twitched as if to nurse but he was suddenly seized by a paroxysm of coughing, his diaphragm visibly working as he choked and gasped for air. His little fists flailed, his legs kicked weakly. By Gaius' instruction, the Prince was not wrapped in blankets as his fever was dangerously high. As his coughing became worse, he vomited. A trail of thick mucous slipped down his chest and into his smallclothes.
The wet nurse and Gaius worked to position and clean him, trying to make him more comfortable until, at last, his breathing eased a little. The toddler lay quiet, in his nurse's arms once more; his mouth was half open, his perfectly shaped lips, pale and cracked from his unrelenting fever.
"Come on, my sweet boy," whispered the wet nurse as she began to rock him tenderly, her fingers caressing strands of his hair as she spoke. "It's me, Joanna,..." Her voice drifted into heartfelt incomprehensible murmurings, as Gaius and Alice looked at each other for a long moment.
"Let me examine him," she said softly to Joanna. The girl nodded, looking at her with hope as she settled the child on the healer's lap. He was burning with fever. His pale golden lashes lay lightly along the curve of his cheek. She felt his diaper, but it was no dampness from urine.
The nurse spoke up before Alice could ask anything.
"He hasn't been making water, my lady."
That was a bad sign. Alice could hear the boy's inhalation stridor without even nearing his chest. There was a blush of blue tainting his fingernails. His pulse was fast, his heartbeat weak. Worse and worse.
She knew it was pointless to ask what Gaius had tried to help the boy. He would have tried everything he knew by now.
As she looked up at Gaius, she used her magical voice to communicate her assessment. Gaius closed his eyes in despair. She had only reinforced his own dire assessment of the condition of the little Prince.
"I must strengthen the decoction that I brought," she sent to Gaius, who only nodded imperceptibly.
"Joanna," she said in a steady tone, ignoring the emotions that roiled around the heir of Camelot. "I will need the coldest, cleanest spring water you can obtain. Hurry, child! There is little time."
The young woman almost bolted from the room.
"I will be using an extraction of lungwort and elecampane," she said quietly to her lover. Her hand dipped into her basket of herbs, bringing out a vial with a thick greenish brown liquid and a jar containing the decoction of the named herbs. "Oil of oregano," she stated before Gaius could inquire. Her eyes flared gold for a long moment, as she poured the oregano oil into the prepared medication that she had brought with her. She chanted the spell that would strengthen the decoction. Gaius eyes flared gold as well, as they repeated the spell. Golden motes swirled around the jar, the liquid sparking and glimmering with their twined magic.
"You must teach me the spell," whispered Gaius, and she smiled for a moment, because she knew he had already memorized it.
Alice looked down at the ailing toddler. His fair skin was now ash pale, his hair disheveled as it lolled against her knee.
Alice had never met the Queen, the beautiful, ill-fated Ygraine. But she was familiar with the deep regret in Gaius' voice whenever he spoke of her. It told her volumes about the grace and hope that had been lost with her death. Of course, Alice had glimpsed the Queen from afar, as she stood next to Uther during public events. It was clear, even to her unfamiliar eye that Prince Arthur's resemblance to his mother was unmistakable. The very thought tugged at her heart in a way she could not truly explain.
Joanna rushed into the room, closing the door quietly, despite her agitation. Alice smiled at the girl as she took the water from her hand and poured a portion of it into the now ordinary looking medicine.
They positioned the young Prince more upright, cuddled securely in Joanna's arms, as Alice used a dropper to administer the medicine. Alice gently carded her hand through the Arthur's pale, golden-white hair and smiled up at Gaius.
"We must have hope," she said steadily.
Joanna nodded, as tears fell from her eyes. She took her charge's small hand in her own, as he lay quiescent, propped up on pillows to ease his breathing. Steam coiled from a pot nearby, strong with the scent of eucalyptus and rosemary. The firelight made shadows and sparks in the dim light.
"Arthur is all the hope we have," the girl whispered.
The thought echoed in Alice's heart throughout the remainder of the night and the hours until dawn, were long.
