The sky was beginning to lighten when he finally gave up trying to sleep. The apprehension, the knowledge that he must not fail, that too much was at stake, drove all thoughts of rest from his mind. He considered the mission directives over and over again, thinking of how it would be received when he finally talked to Arthur and his council about a treaty between their peoples.

Would Arthur rage or turn stone-silent, stare at him with disgust in his eyes as he had only hours ago? Would he even allow Merlin to plead his case? The old Arthur, pompous and arrogant at times, had been surprisingly compassionate, with hidden depths of honour and duty that went beyond just the words. He'd always put the needs of the people of Camelot first, even above his own life.

Now, he wasn't sure. Arthur had treated him like an enemy, had tried only to destroy. There had been no compassion there, not even a wish for it. Would he be able to break through Arthur's hatred, at least long enough to help their people? Or would this turn into a calamity of epic proportions?

Too many questions remained unanswered and it was driving him mad with worry.

Finally, he got up and started pacing, hoping to rid himself of nervous energy, to calm himself with mindless wanderings. It wasn't as if he could go anywhere. The cell door was no obstacle but if he tried to leave, he knew Arthur would not hesitate to order him killed. And that would only signal those at the Isle that the new king was too much his father's son and the deluge would begin. Disaster for them all.

From one end of the cell to the other and back again, chewing on his nails as he used to do when he was younger and far more naïve. He never did have much patience; much as they tried, his teachers at the Isle could never train it out of him.

Oh, he could fake stillness and calm with the best of them but on his own, he saw no need of it. It was against his nature to pretend. Lying had always been hard, more so when he had wanted so much to tell Arthur everything. Hopefully, once he was free of his destiny, he'd never have to lie again.

Frowning, worrying about the future, he didn't watch where he was going, didn't even think about it. So, of course, he found the one flagstone in the cell that was slightly off-level and stumbled over it.

How a sorcerer with his powers could be so damnably clumsy with ordinary things was beyond his comprehension. There wasn't even a spell to correct the problem. He'd spent days trying and frankly, it wasn't funny any more. It was a good thing that he seemed to lose the uncoordinated gracelessness that had plagued him all his life whenever he was performing magic. Otherwise, he'd have killed himself off years ago tripping over his own feet.

He slumped, and sat down on the stairs next to the cell door. Arthur had always had something to say about his inept hunting skills. The snide remarks had hurt at first but he'd come to realize that Arthur's comments were more teasing than mockery, almost as if Merlin had been welcomed to a place at his side. He thought he'd be there forever.

How foolish he'd been.

Leaning against the wall, he stared up, looking at the stone blocks, following quarry mark lines and glint of quartz crystals, half-listening to the noise of early morning: guards talking, the rhythmic punch of marching feet high above in the courtyard, the growing call of birdsong, people beginning to bustle with their daily lives. Below it, hardly noticeable, there was a faint sound echoing from outside the cell - off to the left and down toward the lower dungeons, the same place he'd heard crying a few hours before.

"Ei, this night is long..." It was the whisper of a lullaby, the girl's voice, soft and sad and low, half-cracking with grief and he could hear her struggling to fight back tears. "And I am much wronged, Sorrow and mourn and …." The song died off and there were muffled weeping again, as if her heart were breaking.

Merlin could never stand to hear anyone cry.

As quietly as he could so the guards would not come to investigate, he murmured, "Are you alright?"

"I…" A slight gasp and the sound of misery died. A few moments passed and Merlin was about to ask again when the girl whispered back, "Sorry, sorry. I didn't mean…"

Poor girl. It was clear that she was mourning something or someone. There were a thousand reasons why she might be imprisoned but she sounded so young. Surely, her offence would be minor enough that she'd be out of the cell by the end of the day. Usually when a new king was crowned, they'd review the cases and pardon the lesser crimes and let the prisoners go with just a warning. "Is there anything I can do?"

"No, nothing." Her voice was breaking again and she sounded like she was struggling to breathe, that she was on the verge of weeping and only holding back by the merest of threads. "I'm… I'm going to die tomorrow and I'm… I'm afraid." A hint of sound, of desolation. "So afraid."

"Perhaps I could get the king to reconsider? Maybe if…" Merlin wasn't sure he'd see Arthur before then but the guards could take a message, have someone plead her case. She sounded little more than a child. Surely her crime, whatever it was, couldn't have been bad enough for a death sentence. Unless it was murder or... sorcery.

But there was no one in Camelot who could use magic, except for Merlin. Uther Pendragon had seen to that.

"Doesn't matter. They won't listen. They kill people like me." Her voice lowered; she seemed exhausted, faint with breathless desperation. "One wrong word or someone doesn't like you and it's... it's too late." The girl paused for a moment, almost as if she were trying to make some sense of it. "I didn't... I didn't do anything but they won't listen. The king hates..." She stopped.

Perhaps she was afraid of further punishment, of facing charges of treason on top of whatever else she had done. But Merlin had to be certain. He pushed her for answers. "Hates what?"

"Hates magic," she blurted out and then, obviously hoping to make him understand, she stammered, "I never… I never did anything. I'm not what they say I am but no one will believe me. No one has even come to say good… good-bye." Another tremulous breath full of misery, staggering loss that seemed to destroy her. "They are too afraid. Talking to a witch or even knowing one can get you killed."

It was possible that she was newly come into her powers; Merlin could not feel any trace of magical talents from her and surely the others would have gotten her out of Camelot before now if she had the gift but he had to be sure. "Are you? A witch?"

"No!" She sounded horrified at the very idea and then began weeping again. "I want to go home."

"Please, don't cry. I believe you." He ached to comfort her but remained where he was. He couldn't leave the cell – Arthur would only use it as an excuse to claim treachery, but it was hard, so hard to sit by and do nothing. "What's your name?"

"Bronwyn." The girl sounded exhausted, wrung out from grief. "Thank you for listening. I've been so alone." There was a moment's pause and then she said softly, timidly, "I don't even know your name."

"You probably don't remember me. I worked here a few years ago." Most of the staff in the castle and quite a few of the townspeople had known who he was and it would be good for both of them to talk about happier times. "I'm Merlin. I was once Prince Arthur's servant."

"The traitor?" She seemed unsure, almost as if she didn't know what to believe.

It hurt to hear her call him that. He'd never been a traitor. Never. "I know that the king has called for my execution, called me a traitor. But it's not true. I would never betray him."

There must have been something in his voice, pain or the knowledge that he'd lost everything that day.

"Oh, Merlin, I'm so sorry." There was sympathy there and a kind of kinship between them. "Then why would the king want you dead?"

"Same reason as you, only in my case, it's true." He looked up toward the window; the morning light was edged in hard stone and iron bars - truly a prison in so many ways. "I use magic or perhaps magic uses me. Sometimes I don't know."

"Oh gods, a sorcerer!" There was a horrified gasp and he could hear her scrambling back, her voice getting fainter and further away. She must have retreated to the far end of her cell. Grief had disappeared and there was terror in the way she begged him, "Oh, please, please don't hurt me. I won't tell them anything."

"Bronwyn, I'm not like that, no matter what you've been told. Magic can be used for good, too. I've done so many times." But she refused to talk, tried to muffle her cries, obviously frightened beyond measure to be trapped in a dungeon with a sorcerer so close and no hope of rescue. "Bronwyn?" But there was no answer.

Merlin leaned against the cell wall, feeling abruptly helpless. He was furious, furious enough to shatter stone and steel and show them all just how powerful he truly was. He thought she would understand. After all, she was facing death for witchcraft, innocent or not, and they were both hated for it. But she could not see beyond the lies she'd been taught.

The poison the old king had spread was well and truly entrenched in the hearts of Camelot.

Sometimes he hated Uther Pendragon.


After a while, after a few futile attempts at reassuring the girl, he gave up, put aside thinking about what was past and what was to come and settled back on his mat. He didn't remember falling asleep. Exhaustion must have taken hold but there were no more nightmares.

He slept fitfully, tossing and turning and came suddenly awake to faces watching him.

Not Arthur, much as he longed to see him. A half-dozen guards hovered outside the open door, all of them with hands on their naked swords. One inside the cell, standing near the entrance, tall, a face he'd known long ago and now spearheading the group staring at him. Sir Geraint.

Merlin got to his feet, brushing off a few pieces of straw, and stood there, waiting to find out what they wanted. It didn't look good, though. The men were nervous, skittish and the blades unsteady. They kept glancing at him and then away again, the torchlight playing off troubled frowns or grim mouths. Dread perhaps or the beginnings of panic. They were afraid and fearful men were always trouble. And the door was open.

If they rushed him, it might be difficult to escape injury without hurting them. And that would only make things worse. But it didn't look as if they planned on killing him, at least not right away. So he decided to play the harmless envoy.

Slumping his shoulders a bit to look less threatening, folding his hands in front of him to let them see that he was unarmed, he nodded toward them all. "Sir Geraint, welcome. I trust his Majesty is well and that soon I will be able to speak with him about a treaty between our people."

Perhaps they were expecting spells or him on his knees begging for mercy or a litany of demands. But by appearing meek and somewhat vulnerable, he seemed to throw them off-balance. A flurry of exchanged looks among the guards and some of the swords began to lower.

However, not unexpectedly, Geraint wasn't so easily fooled. He stepped forward, daggers in his voice."He does not wish to see you, sorcerer."

Again, not unexpected. What he's wanted, wished for, longed for, was a sign, any sign, that Arthur was reconsidering his decisions about Merlin, that maybe he'd accept him back and they could regain what they'd lost four years ago but it was absurd really. Impossible on every level and yet his heart kept betraying him.

Taking a deep breath, facing the reality of his situation, Merlin looked at Sir Geraint, assessed his options. When he'd been Arthur's servant, the knights had been straightforward, on the field and off. This man was as clear as glass about his loyalties, protecting his king with words and perhaps more, as once he had been. And Merlin would not have let any sorcerer near Arthur, either.

He decided to meet Geraint truth for truth. "Is that why you've come with a sword in your hand? To make sure he doesn't see me again?"

"He has not ordered your execution as yet, if that is what you are asking." The man was nothing if not direct. In many ways, it was a relief. At least with Geraint, he could be honest.

"Then why are you here?" Merlin stood there, hands still folded. It was possible that Geraint was acting on his own. If he thought he was doing his duty by killing Merlin, to save Arthur the trouble of ordering it – there were political implications and personal ones, too. It could turn deadly very fast.

"I want to know what you are doing here. To return knowing that sorcery is forbidden and the penalty is death, are you that much of a fool?" Sharp, bitter, probing for weakness. He clearly didn't believe Merlin was there to negotiate a peace treaty.

"Apparently so." He'd been a fool to stay in Camelot after that first execution, knowing he could be put to death at any time; he'd been a fool to listen to a dragon trapped beneath the stony earth lecturing about destiny and coins; he'd been a fool to think Arthur would ever accept him for who he was.

Knowing that he was still a fool, Merlin couldn't keep the sting out of his voice. "And do you need so many guards behind you to lecture a fool?"

"Apparently so." Geraint echoed him, contemptuous and then, bringing his sword up into the ready position, renewed his verbal attack. "Why are you here? To cause trouble for the king? To sow unrest? To kill him?"

Outside the cell, there was an urgent sound of booted feet and Geraint turned just as Arthur said sharply, "Yes, I would like to know the answer to that as well."

His once-friend had discarded the ceremonial robes of the previous evening for hunting gear; a dragon, embossed and heavily worked in gold, blazed across the red jacket and there were buttons studded at shoulder and chest, a glint of vambrace steel peering out from beneath leather cuffs and chased gold edging wrists and throat. A dagger was sheathed on his belt.

Arthur looked every inch a warrior.

In a wild, fiercely possessive moment, Merlin had to wonder who took care of Arthur now. He'd never been a good manservant but he had tried. Now jealous of that faceless man - his replacement, someone who took care of the prat, kept him company, fed him and clothed him and watched his back, a boot-licker who never argued and never laughed - it threatened to destroy what little equilibrium he had left. Ignoring a throat growing tight with loss, knowing that he needed to pretend indifference for the sake of his mission, he deliberately schooled his face into emptiness and waited.

As the guards parted and Arthur stepped down into the cell, Sir Geraint hurried over to him. "Your Majesty, I was checking on the prisoner."

"I don't need your protection, Geraint, much as you might think otherwise." Arthur glared at the knight and his flat tone spoke volumes. Obviously, someone had overstepped their boundaries.

He had to give the man credit. He didn't retreat at the first sign of royal displeasure; instead he stood his ground. Sword steady in his hand, he nodded toward Merlin. "Sire, he's a known danger to you."

"Yes, I am well aware of his treachery but it is my decision, not yours, to interrogate him or torture him or kill him or let him go. Mine!" The look Arthur sent Geraint could have melted cold steel and he held that intense gaze for several seconds, until the knight nodded reluctantly and stepped back.

"I wish to talk with Merlin alone."

That did not go well with Geraint. Drawing himself up, towering over Arthur, he began to argue furiously with him. "Your people would never forgive me if anything happened to you, my lord."

With the exception of his father, the king was never one to let anyone tell him what to do and Merlin could see him getting more and more mulish with every word out of Geraint's mouth.

This time, the knight refused to give way. "I will not neglect my duty, sire, even for you."

Arthur stood there for a moment, eyes narrowed, mouth set in a grim line as though he was keeping in his anger by sheer willpower alone. Then frowning sharply enough to cut through any argument, he nodded toward the door. "Stay then but clear the corridor. I don't need an army at my back to talk with a traitor."

Geraint looked thoroughly relieved. Motioning the others to disperse – which, Merlin noted, they did with all haste, the knight moved to the open cell door and stood there, sword at the ready, guarding it.

Not even looking at the man, obviously assuming that his commands would be carried out without further protest, Arthur stared at Merlin. There was revulsion in his eyes and the clench of his jaw; it hurt Merlin to know that he had put it there.

The silence echoed a kind of torment, a breathless dread of waiting for a beginning or an end. Then Arthur stepped forward, within arm's reach, close enough to be able to clasp their hands in renewed friendship or sink a dagger into Merlin's waiting heart.

But there was more than one way to wield a knife and Arthur had certainly learned over the years how to hurt him. "Are you here alone? Or are your friends hiding in the dark like the cowards they are?"

"I am alone. They did not want to risk too many of the others in case you... reacted badly." He had been a willing sacrifice; more than one sorcerer had argued against it, said that they should have gone in force, not sent him alone into danger but Merlin knew Arthur. Any large group would have just led to war and the wholesale slaughter of their peoples.

"I'm surprised your friend, Nimueh, didn't come along. You seemed so close." Scathing, cold, almost cruel and Arthur's smile was mocking as he said it.

That cut too close to the bone. He was suddenly fuming, reacting not with diplomacy but heat. "Nimueh was never my friend!"

Arthur shot back, "That's not how it appeared to me."

"Then you should have looked closer. She manipulated you, lied to you and you fell for it." How Merlin wanted to shake the man and make him see reason. "You should have looked beyond appearances."

And for a moment, he thought he had gotten through. There was the briefest flash of pain in Arthur's eyes but he only said sharply, "Appearances as in a sorcerer pretending to be a friend?"

"Or a friend who would not see past his anger and realize the truth."

Arthur jerked back, looking as if Merlin had struck him and then real fury, bloody and dangerous, flushed his skin. "What was I to think, Merlin? You were leaving with her. What other truth is there?"

Blinking back frustration, trying to clear his head of sorrow and anger and abject misery and a thousand other emotions that threatened to crowd into his throat and silence him, Merlin took a long, deep breath and let it out again.

"Nimueh threatened me, threatened to tell your father of my magic if I didn't go with her, threatened my friends. And when I still refused, she swore to kill you unless I changed my mind. I couldn't stand it if anything..." Better not to think of what she would have done had he not agreed. "I had no choice but to go with her."

Watching Arthur, hoping that when his prince, his king, understood the truth of that day, he'd finally come to accept Merlin for what he was. As he listened, however, Arthur's face was still full of hard edges. His eyes were opaque, unreadable, cold as a winter's day. There was no affection, no welcoming looks, nothing but weight and decisions.

When Merlin stumbled his way to a stop and the silence lengthened, Arthur looked at him and then around the cell and finally toward Sir Geraint, the king's man patiently waiting for orders. And then back to Merlin. His mouth twisted into contempt. "A well-crafted story. How long did you practice that speech before it sounded almost like the truth?"

Merlin was wrung out and it made him careless. "It is the truth, you stupid prat."

Arthur didn't even blink at the insult but there was a hint of loss in the slump of shoulders as he turned away. Looking up toward the window, watching the play of light across the iron bars and stonework, his voice was flat, frosted with ice. "Let's talk truth, shall we, Merlin? Nimueh called you friend, insisted that you were in it together. You denied it, of course, but when she attacked me with fire and rain and power, there was fire in your hand as well."

Arthur sent him a look of absolute scorn, the ache of betrayal clear in his cold eyes. "I don't know why you didn't kill me, gratitude for the times I saved you life, perhaps. But that is the only reason you are alive now."

Merlin was appalled. That wasn't how it had been. He had tried to take her down with fire but Nimueh had been too clever, too experienced in sorcery for him. How could Arthur have believed this of him all these years?

"Arthur, I was defending you. How could you not see that?"

"If that were true, if you had been honest with me, even once, I could have forgiven you the lies." Arthur turned away, glared at the dusty stone beneath his feet as if he'd find the answers there and then looked up at him, once more the hardened king. "But you used me and that I cannot forgive."

"What was I supposed to do? Sorcery was a death sentence and your father the executioner. Did you expect me to trust you with that? Think that you'd help me hide my magic from your father? That you'd commit treason for the sake of friendship?"

Voice rising with every word, Merlin reached out, frustrated beyond measure, wanting to shake Arthur hard enough to knock some sense into him but the king jerked away, hand on his knife, battle-wary, staring at him with alarm. Sir Geraint started down the stairs, sword gleaming in the light, promising sharp death if he dared approach the king.

The anger was beating against his chest, the pressure to do something pounding at him, to show Arthur somehow that Merlin's life had been destroyed that day and how dare he think otherwise. "You nearly took my head off when you found out."

Arthur stood there, impassive, a wall of stubborn stone, watching him, judging him, finding him unworthy. No understanding, no compassion, nothing but a stranger's flat stare.

It hurt to see him there, looking at Merlin as if he were nothing, less than nothing. The fury leached away, poured out into the stones beneath his feet, leaving him swaying with loss. Arthur would never believe him, no matter how much he protested. Lowering his hands, hunching down with weary finality, Merlin said, "It no longer matters. What's done is done. But please don't let what happened between us affect any negotiations for a treaty between our two peoples. It's too important to dismiss just because it's me presenting it."

"I will do what is best for my people. And if you have forgotten that, you never knew me at all."A moment's pause, eyes filled with anger, disgust, loss, longing, resignation, so many emotions flying behind the blue gaze that it was dizzying, a chaotic jumble, and then it all flattened again, turned opaque as hardened steel.

When Arthur turned to leave, much as he wanted to sink down to his knees and beg him to understand, Merlin knew it would be useless.

But there was one thing he could do. He'd made a promise to a frightened girl, alone and waiting execution by fire; at the very least, he had to try and fulfil his pledge to help. "Sire, there's... I have a favour to ask. If you will allow it."

Twisting around, Arthur snapped, "You should tread carefully. You are on thin ice as it is."

"It isn't for me." Merlin took a deep breath, trying to sound calm, trying to get it right so that one person would go free in this whole debacle. "There's a girl, further down in the dungeons. I was talking with her last night. She says she's going to be executed tomorrow for sorcery."

"Yes, what of it?" Arms folded across his chest, looking as coolly remote as carved marble, Arthur stood there, waiting for Merlin to get to the point.

"She's innocent." Simply said but he knew Arthur would not accept it, could not accept it.

"That's what they all claim. She was given a trial and found guilty." Flat, pitiless, unyielding. "Sorcery is punished by death, either beheading or burning. The law hasn't changed just because I am now king."

"She's innocent," Merlin repeated. "She has no magic in her. I would have sensed it if she had." When Arthur only looked sceptical, looked as if he refused to think it was his problem, looked as if he had already distanced himself from it and would do nothing more, Merlin tried again. "All I ask is that you investigate further, look at her accusers and the evidence. The Arthur I knew wouldn't let an innocent girl die because of his pride."

It must have hit a nerve. Eyes sharp with rebuke, Arthur growled out, "Have a care what you say, sorcerer."

"Arthur, I know it's hard to listen to someone you no longer trust but…."

"Sorcery is forbidden in Camelot, on pain of death. There is no place that those with magical powers can hide. No place we will not find. And when we capture them, we kill them. Simple enough even for an idiot like you."

His voice was rising, growing harder and more strident as he shouted at Merlin. Scathing too and dripping with sarcasm. A thousand ways to insult him, a thousand ways to hide from the truth. Arthur must have understood more than he was letting on, perhaps lying to himself about the destruction of sorcery in the kingdom under Uther's hand.

"Not so simple."

Merlin would have to be the one to break through the façade of righteous indignation. He hadn't planned on telling him so soon, had thought to bring it up amidst negotiations on the treaty between their peoples when Arthur might have been more likely to accept what had happened these last years. But now there was no way to soften the blow.

"Arthur, we've been smuggling them out for some time. There is no man, woman or child left in Camelot with magical abilities, hasn't been for over two years."

"What?" Arthur stood stock-still, his face draining of blood. He looked ill.

"Your father won. He got rid of all sorcerers in the kingdom." His friend had prided himself on his compassion for the people of Camelot, had thought of them as his responsibility, had been willing to die for them. Merlin knew how much this news must have pained Arthur. "It was decided that, much as it unbalances the world, the continued destruction of our own people was too much. We've been getting them out of Camelot ever since."

"What?" Arthur's voice deepened into anger, and there were frowns and hatred lingering in his eyes and the beginnings of denial.

"There are no sorcerers in Camelot, no wizards, no witches, no magic users at all. We remove them from your reach as soon as we can, long before their powers begin to emerge, long before your guards can come for them." Merlin didn't want there to be any misunderstandings. He said carefully. "The girl, Bronwyn, is not one of ours. She has no magic."

"Are you saying that we've been killing…?" Arthur turned white as a shroud and then lashed out, lightning-fast, slamming a fist across Merlin's mouth.

He stumbled back, pain a white-fire blaze down his face and across lips already blossoming with blood. Arthur followed, raised his clenched fists, fingers slick with red, ready to strike again and he did, knuckles slamming his chin, the armoured vambrace at Arthur's wrist cutting into his cheek, a sharp biting line. Merlin fell backwards, onto the hard stone, covering his face with hands and elbows and protection, waiting for the next blow. It didn't even occur to him to fight back.

"Liar! To be spreading such filth is beyond belief. I should kill you now and be done with it." Arthur's eyes were wild, fierce with contempt. He stood there, breathing heavily, mouth grimacing with effort, his hands opening and closing as if he wanted to strangle Merlin where he lay. Then he straightened, stared down at him one last time, turned, shoved past Geraint and stalked out of the cell. He did not look back.

The knight took a step forward, pointing his sword toward Merlin. "This better not be true, sorcerer."

"But you will investigate." It was not a question.

Geraint grunted agreement, nodding reluctantly. "Yes, for all our sakes." Then he turned away, going up the steps and locking the cell door behind him.

Merlin dabbed at his swollen mouth with one corner of his sleeve, soaking it with blood and saliva and he could feel a trickle of something down the side of his face. The injury flaring as he tried to wipe it clean. He hadn't used magic to avoid Arthur's fury - he would have sensed if his life had been in danger, but still he accepted the pain, felt in the deepest corner of his heart that, in a way, he'd deserved it. And the hurt flashing across his skin was nothing to what he felt at the loss of Arthur's affection.

Geraint gave him a final, long assessing look. "I hope you are lying." And without waiting for a reply, he strode away, leaving Merlin to his wounds.

All Merlin could do was whisper into the silence. "I wish I were."