After Camelot had been retaken Arthur had retrieved the table from the old castle and had it moved to Camelot. He had placed it in one of the lower rooms in the Northern tower. It was not a council room in the official sense, and only certain people were ever called to this council. In this case, it was the people who had retaken Camelot.
All eyes were on Arthur as they settled down around the table. Not everybody could fit round it, on Arthur's right was Uther, with Gwen next to him. On Arthur's left sat Merlin, nervously fidgeting, with Gaius next to him, then Gwaine, and Lancelot. The last viable space was taken up by Jonas, as a representative of the five knights who had known about Merlin. The rest of them, plus Leon, Percival and Elyan were lingering around the room, standing up. It seemed only fair to Arthur to include everyone in this discussion. He had never called all of them together into the room before.
They were all confused about the summons, to varying degrees, and all of them noticed Merlin's twitchy behaviour. Gwaine frowned as he watched Merlin's unsettled antics, wondering what the hell was going on. Things had been fairly peaceful over the last few months. Despite the trouble the kingdom had been through, Camelot had proven it's strength.
"The reason I brought you here is quite simple, there are issues that need to be resolved. One in particular," Arthur said.
"What?" Gwaine asked, getting bored, and worried about Merlin.
"Morgana," Merlin said quietly, before Arthur could answer. "He means Morgana."
"What makes you say that?" Arthur demanded, sounding irritable and concerned.
"I think it counts as the only unresolved issue we have," Merlin said. "And it concerns everybody."
"Mainly you, Merlin," Gwaine pointed out. Merlin flinched and looked a little uncomfortable. Arthur felt sympathy for him. It had been Merlin's actions in the throne room, his decisions, which had brought the situation to the point it was at now. He had killed Morgause, he had encased Morgana in the crystal. Arthur knew it still plagued Merlin, he could see the moments when it surfaced in his memory. Merlin tried not to show it, but Arthur just knew Merlin to well to miss it.
"True," Arthur conceded to Gwaine. "And I don't think this is going to be easy for him, which it why everyone else gets a say in what happens. The responsibility doesn't need to be Merlin's."
"I am here you know," Merlin said.
"Yes, Merlin, you're very hard to miss most of the time," Arthur said causing a few people to smile a little. "But you understand my point. You don't have to take responsibility for this."
"I do," Merlin said quietly, looking down at the table top. Arthur reached out to take Merlin's shoulder, squeezing lightly. Then he turned back to the others.
"It's been over a year since the coup, we can safely say the kingdom is stable."
"And you think it's time we release Morgana?" Gaius said. "You are aware that could lead to a new set of problems."
"We can't leave her like that forever," Arthur said.
"Why not?" Gwaine asked. Everyone stared at him, and the knight shrugged. "I mean it, why not? She took the throne, killed innocent people, destroyed …" Gwaine paused, looking at Uther warily. Uther was saying nothing, and was holding Gwen's hand tightly. Gwaine managed to rein in his tactlessness and instead said. "Hurt others. We have no idea how strong her magic is. I know it takes a lot to measure up to Merlin, but we don't know what Morgause taught her."
"We know that," Arthur said. "But Morgause was the one with most of the magical ability, without her Morgana might be controllable. She's been sleeping in the crystal for a year. I presume she won't be aware of any time passing?"
Merlin shook his head. "No, if she wakes up, she will be at the same point when I contained her."
"Therefore we can't risk leaving it too long, if we revive her."
"I'm going to ask the same thing as Gwaine," Percival said in a low tone. "Why do we need to revive her?"
"She's not some valuable relic, Morgana is a person, still living and breathing."
"She's my daughter," Uther said quietly.
"And my sister," Arthur added. "Merlin did what he did because he didn't want to kill her."
Merlin twitched, finding the table surface highly interesting. Arthur decided to get past that fact quickly. Merlin hadn't wanted to poison her when he had been left no other option and it was probably why he hadn't killed her when he had killed Morgause.
"Is there a way, if we wake her up, that we can contain her powers?"
"I think so, Sire," Gaius said. "There may even be some information in the archives, but her healing bracelet worked on that principle. It suppressed her powers as a seer."
"The only thing is, she could take that off," Gwen said. "This will have to be something she can't remove."
"That's her only natural power, the dreams. For the rest she has to incant and prepare," Gaius said. "She's only had a year of training, we may be able to limit her without doing too much."
"But she can lose control, we witnessed that when she saw what I had done to Morgause," Merlin said quietly. "She might react the same way when she sees me."
"Or me," Arthur said with a shrug.
"Couldn't we just leave it for now, and think about it," Lancelot said.
"And then what, we'll probably decide to think about it some more," Arthur said. "We could go on like that until it becomes too late. As much as I feel angry with her, about what she did, I don't want to just leave her there, sitting in limbo."
"Technically, she's lying in limbo."
"Gwaine!" Merlin snapped, his eyes still fixed on the table top. Gwen winced as Uther's hand tightened on hers. She used her other hand to rub his knuckles until he realised what he was doing and relaxed his grip.
"I don't want her to stay there," Uther said, his voice thick with emotion. Arthur gritted his teeth and glanced at his father, who also seemed to find the tabletop as fascinating as Merlin did.
"Neither do I," Arthur said. "And whether or not I can also try and think that Morgause corrupted her, and led her into this, I'm not that naïve. Morgana has enough of a will of her own."
"So do you, but Morgause led you around by the nose as well," Merlin said. Arthur's jaw tensed momentarily. "Just for a shorter period of time."
"She's clever, I'll give her that. Maybe she made Morgana believe whatever her version of the truth is, but I'm not sure. What Morgana became, it was a shock to all of us, that she could be so…."
"Cruel, vindictive, brutal, cold-hearted…" Gwaine said. He was glared at from several directions.
"She wasn't like that," Leon said. "Not before Morgause."
"You were stuck on the front line when she took over," Gwaine pointed out. "Are you seriously going to tell me that you couldn't see Morgana in there, when you looked at her?"
There was a very long pause, and a significant silence as Leon retracted the step forward he had taken towards Gwaine. It was never going to come to anything, since Percival was strategically in the way and Olwen had already grabbed Leon's arm. He moved back away, looking around at the group.
"Yes, I could," Leon eventually conceded. "She could get so angry at times, especially at the king, for some of the things he did. I hate to say it but..."
Leon paused at that, since Gwen had produced a handkerchief and was trying to wipe Uther's face. He kept his head down, making it difficult for her.
"Gwen, maybe you should take my father out of here."
Uther shook his head, and then found his voice. His head rose, just enough to let Gwen wipe at his face, but lowered enough that he didn't need to worry about meeting anyone's gaze.
"What happened to her was my fault," Uther said. Gwen dabbed at his face and then glared at Leon.
"Finish what you were saying."
"But… I think she enjoyed it. Once she could let her anger out, and she took it out on everyone. I could have understood it maybe, if she had just let people be, allowed people to use magic, but she killed innocent people just to make us submit, and had we done that, then everything would have been lost. Part of me wants to agree with Gwaine."
"I made her like this, it was because she hated me. She told me so," Uther said.
"I don't think it's a simple as that," Merlin said. "Kilgharrah warned me that I should never let Morgana learn of her power. Power corrupts."
He risked a glance at Uther as he said it, which was the same moment the king looked up. Both of them looked away, back down to the table top.
"I know," Arthur said, and then looked at Merlin. "In the end, neither of us will allow it to happen to the other."
"That's the both sides of the same coin that the dragon talked about," Jonas said.
"Maybe," Arthur said. "Now, let's just decide. Those who think we should release Morgana, raise your hands."
Arthur looked about expectantly. Gwen very hesitantly raised her hand, looking around, no one else had moved.
"Shouldn't you vote first?" Lancelot asked Arthur.
"I'm not voting," Arthur said. "Make your own decision."
"Without you there are fourteen of us, we could end up an even split," Rupert said.
"If that happens, we'll think of something else. I just want to do what's right, I don't want to give Merlin full responsibility, he doesn't even need to vote if he doesn't want to."
Merlin glanced at Arthur and smiled, then slowly raised his hand; then so did Uther, which surprised no one, and then Gaius. Olwen followed along, as did the rest of his comrades. Percival followed after that.
"I'm all for giving people second chances," he said.
Lancelot followed after that comment. Elyan looked at his sister and then did the same. Gwaine looked around.
"Do I get to say I told you so if this goes horribly wrong?"
"No," Arthur said.
Gwaine shrugged, and then raised his hand.
