Prologue

"I swear, she had two of them! Merlin, you should have seen it."

"I'm rather glad I didn't..."

"I'm rather glad he didn't, too." Arthur interrupted before Gwaine could continue on his ridiculous - and likely entirely false - story of scantily dressed barmaids. "He's got enough nonsense in his idiot head already. We'd better dismount here. It wouldn't do to have one of the horses spook and throw someone over the edge."

There had been a steady drizzle for the past three days and a steady monsoon the past four nights, so the ground under the group's feet was soft and slippery. Until now the cliff had been wide enough that it wasn't much of an issue, but just ahead the trail narrowed drastically. They would have to make their way single file, practically pressed against the steep stone wall of the mountain to avoid falling into the raging current twenty meters below. That is, if they were very, very lucky. Chances were if someone was to fall they'd hit one of the many rocks below and be shattered into a mess of blood and broken bone...

"Oh, just lovely, Arthur," the young king thought to himself with a grimace as he dismounted, hearing his knights and servant doing the same behind him. "Think about something else...Guinevere..."

Arthur's grimace turned to a smile as he thought of his beautiful wife. He hadn't seen her in nearly three weeks now. There had been a spot of trouble with bandits attacking villages in Camelot's name in Queen Annis's land, and she had requested a meeting to sort it out. It had all ended well, fortunately, with the bandits in Annis's dungeon and Camelot's name cleared.

To be honest, it hadn't been a wholly unpleasant trip, until this blasted spring rain had started up. He'd be glad to get back to his bed...and his queen. Possibly at the same time...

"Are you sure we shouldn't wait until the rain stops?" A voice broke Arthur out of his thoughts and he turned, glaring, to face his servant.

"Don't be such a girl, Merlin."

"I've just got a funny feeling about this."

"If we listened to every one of your 'funny feelings' we'd never get anything done. Get a move on; I want to be past this ledge before dark."

He turned back towards the ledge and took a step forward, only to whip around again when the sound of an arrow cut through the air, followed immediately by a soft grunt of pain.

Leon clutched his right arm for just a moment before releasing it to draw his sword and face their attackers instead. Arthur felt a surge of pride at the strength of his knights as he drew Excalibur and charged towards the trees on the wider part of the clifftop. "To me!"

Retreat was not an option here, with the cliff on one side and the enemy on the other, but Arthur wouldn't have it any other way. He had eight of his finest knights at his side and Excalibur in his hand; combine that with the adrenaline coursing through him, and he felt invincible.

He cut the first bandit down with ease and could hear the others falling to his knights' blades around him. The second fell just as quickly but the third blocked his blow with his own sword and pushed the king back, a feral grin on his face. A couple of blows later made it clear that this wasn't a mere bandit; or at least, hadn't begun his life that way. He had training and a decent amount of natural talent.

He matched several of Arthur's blows and even managed to put a shallow cut on his left bicep before the king shoved past his defences and landed a fatal blow to his opponent's gut. The man dropped with a muffled scream and Arthur stepped back, taking a second to check his men. Sir Bors had fallen and Gwaine had blood running down his face from a cut on his brow, but was still fighting with a ferocity only Gwaine possessed. Merlin, as usual, was nowhere to be seen. Probably hiding behind a tree or something.

Arthur smiled grimly, seeing that his men were making short work of the bandits. A few, like his last opponent, seemed to be trained, but not to the level of his knights and soon, they too fell. "Camelot's finest..."

After merely a moment there were few bandits left and Arthur was just thinking the battle won when an unseen force lifted him off his feet and flung him towards the cliffside. His body slammed into the trunk of a tree, then fell to the ground where he lay, gasping for breath as another twenty men ran from the forest.

"Reinforcements...where did they come from?" He thought dizzily as he forced himself to his knees, then to his feet, using the tree for support. His ears rang, but he could still hear the harsh sounds of battle. Swords clashing, men screaming, sorcerers incanting...wait, what?

"Arthur!" Merlin's shout of alarm effectively cut through the fog in Arthur's brain and he turned around just in time to duck out of the way of a fist-sized fireball aimed at his chest.

Before he could figure out where the magical attack had come from another bandit was charging him and he realized for the first time that he'd lost his sword. He stepped back to avoid the bandit's first clumsy swing and the bandit slipped in the mud and fell on his face with a shout of surprise, dropping his sword along the way.

"That was lucky..." Still dizzy, Arthur snatched up the sword and quickly dispatched the bandit.

"Arthur, you're bleeding." Merlin gasped out as he ran to his master's side. He'd gotten a sword somewhere, Arthur noticed...probably from one of the bandits.

"What?"

"Your head."

"I'll be fine. Watch yourself!" Arthur snapped out the last two words in a rush, grabbing his manservant and wrenching him behind him and stepping forward to block a blow that had been aimed directly at Merlin's neck.

The bandit stepped back, spun his sword expertly and took a swing at Arthur's side. Arthur blocked it again and shoved him back. Once again, Arthur watched as his opponent slipped in the mud and fell to the ground, however, this time before he could impale the man there was a wet, crunching thud from directly behind him and a scream of agony.

Time seemed to slow and his heart stop as he spun around, sword raised as Arthur saw a sight he knew then he would never forget.

A large, armored man stood over Merlin, holding a huge hammer in one hand and wearing a sadistic grin on his face. Merlin was on his knees at the man's feet, slumped against the tree and clutching his right arm tightly against his side. A large purple stain was rapidly growing on the shoulder of his blue tunic.

Forgetting about the man behind him, Arthur let out a scream of rage and shoved his stolen sword through Merlin's attacker, straight through to the hilt.

For one brief moment, all he could see was the shocked expression in the brute's eyes and the trickle of blood slowly flowing into his scruffy beard. All he could hear were Merlin's pained gasps beside him.

Then a fiery pain exploded against his back and he staggered away from the man, letting out his own cry of pain as the corpse fell to the ground. He turned just enough to see a robed, expressionless man he could only assume to be the source of the fireballs before another pain struck him, this time in his leg as his previous fallen attacker drove a dagger into the back of his right calf and dragged it down, tearing through muscle and scraping against bone.

The king screamed in pain and fell onto his side as his leg gave out beneath him. "Get up, protect yourself, protect Merlin," he thought to himself furiously as he tried and failed to get back up, grab a sword, anything. "Come on, you're supposed to be Camelot's champion, her king, you can do better than this!"

But no matter how hard Arthur tried, he could do nothing but look up through the haze of pain and a concussion as the sorcerer stepped forward and held his hand out over Arthur, palm down, and began to incant.

This is it, I'm going to die. Killed by a sorcerer like my father. I'm sorry, Guinevere. I'm sorry, Merlin...

As the sorcerer's eyes began to glow and Arthur's world began to darken, he heard a gasping, pained voice from beside him.

"Arthur!" Then a blue and red blur slammed into the sorcerer and instantly his vision started to clear again.

"Merlin," He moaned, managing to get one arm underneath him and half propped himself up despite the burning pain in his back.

His manservant, barely able to keep himself on his feet, was somehow managing to wrestle the sorcerer away from the king and towards the cliff. Arthur, his mind clouded by pain, decided right then and there that, if they survived this, he would never call his servant a coward again.

Merlin wrapped his left arm around the sorcerer's neck and held on tightly, his right hanging limply at his side as he shoved obstinately at the enemy. The sorcerer tried to push Merlin off of him, failed, then growled in anger and gripped Merlin's injured shoulder.

Merlin screamed and his legs buckled, but he still managed to stay upright through pure stubbornness. Barely hanging onto consciousness, his blue eyes met Arthur's briefly and in that one glance, Arthur knew what Merlin's last ditch effort would be.

"Merlin, no!"

Arthur had thought he'd never forget the sight of Merlin kneeling injured on the forest floor, but that was nothing compared to the moment Merlin took one more step towards the cliff's edge and the dirt crumbled beneath him.