Morgana walked through the forest with her head low and the need of thirst clenching at her every move. She could barely see in the darkness, even though her eyes should have grown adjusted, and every couple of steps she tripped over something, creating yet another bloody bruise. She cried as she walked, thinking of everything she'd done and what she knows she could do now.
"You need some help?" She heard a voice say.
She turned around and saw a shape near her, carrying something. She squinted and looked into the light, and saw who it was.
Merlin. And he was carrying a pouch of water.
"I thought you would be thirsty." He said, giving her the pouch. "There's no stream in this forest."
She looked at him. "How would you know that?"
He laughed. "No one can say a Prince's servant has the easy job. Arthur once left me here on a hunting trip."
She looked back at the pouch of water. She was so thirsty, but she didn't know what to do. This seemed strangely familiar to her.
"Aren't you going to drink?" Merlin asked. "You look faint."
"I'm fine!" She snapped.
"Well you should still drink up. It won't do you any good to get dehydrated."
She stared at the pouch. He saw her hesitation.
He sighed. "Morgana, you don't really think I poisoned it, do you?"
She didn't look up.
"Morgana, it's not poisoned, I swear. Please drink some."
Still she stared. He sighed.
Taking the pouch from her, he took one small sip.
"There, are you satisfied now?"
She shrugged and took a sip. The water ran down her throat like the pure waters of heaven.
"Thank you," She said, against herself.
"You're welcome."
After a moment, she looked at him strangely and asked, "What are you doing here anyway?"
"What do you mean?"
"Well, it's not like you came all the way out here to deliver water, especially to your enemy."
"Morgana, you aren't my enemy."
"Oh really? So, you'd poison a friend? You'd try to kill your friend? If I am not an enemy, what am I?" Her voice was bitter.
"You are the King's daughter." He said slowly.
She laughed, and an edge crept into her voice. "I am no daughter of a King. I am the daughter of a coward, a traitor to my kind, an enemy of all."
"Well I suppose the apple has to fall somewhere, and it didn't fall to Arthur!" He said in exasperation.
"Well I couldn't have just stood there, acting like his sweet, loving ward while he persecuted my kin! And it's not my fault that he is so caught up in Ygraine's death that he would kill to relive himself! And it's also not my fault he's this way, my choice was for myself!"
"Morgana, this all goes back to you. He would prize you even more than Arthur, in many ways. I've seen what he's done for you, but you have not. Please, just give him a chance to explain-"
"Explain what, Merlin? That he hates as I do and that we're exactly alike? We aren't. His evil has corrupted his entire self. Mine has not. I am still the same as I was before-"
He snorted. "Really, Morgana?" Suddenly he looked straight into her face and his eyes searched it, as if looking for something.
"What are you doing?" She asked.
"Searching,"
"Searching for what?"
"Morgana, I am searching for the beautiful, kind, generous, willful, purposeful, and magnificent Morgana that once stood before me, and that I served with pride. She was once a girl who was sure of herself, and that I had to help more than once, but never minded. Now she's you, someone lost and alone, and I cannot help her."
He backed away from her, and then he turned and walked into the shadows.
She let go the breath she had been holding. His words echoed in her mind, in that same tiny place, but she ignored the chanting of his last words to her, "I cannot help her."