I'm concious that the last chapter only got two reviews, and some people thought the previous chapters were a bit boring, so I'm debating whether or not to do a rewrite - although, it was needed for plot purposes. I'm on the fence about it at the moment - I'll see how things go.
Anyway, here's the next chapter.
Review and enjoy~
Arthur stared out the window, watching without seeing as the first tendrils of morning light began stretching out across the horizon. The 'conversation' with his father still was ringing in ears – Arthur had tried to bring up the situation of Morgana using magic against them and how they would cope, but Uther had shouted him down and told him that they'd coped just fine before.
What Arthur really wanted to do was to shake his stubborn father, make him see sense. That was different – she hadn't declared war so openly then, skulking in the shadows instead of confronting them face-to-face as she was now. He couldn't shake the feeling that Morgana was convinced that she had a fail-safe plan – and, he recalled with a sinking feeling, when she was convinced of something she was usually right.
He let out a long breath, composing himself. Today was not a day for doubts.
A small crash and a shuffle, followed by a breathless "sorry!" pulled him out of his thoughts, as the lanky form of Merlin staggered into Arthur's line of vision, his arms laden with what the Prince assumed must be his breakfast. Not that he really had the stomach to eat today.
"You're dressed!" Merlin exclaimed, his eyes wide.
"Yes Merlin," Arthur retorted, "No matter how incompetent you seem to think I am, I'll have you know that I grasped the concept of dressing myself a long time ago."
"This is different," the servant said quietly, placing the food on the table and stepping towards the Prince with a serious expression on his face, "I thought it was my job to help you into your armour?"
Seeing Merlin so sombre, it made Arthur uneasy.
"Wipe that ridiculous expression off your face, Merlin, we're not going to a funeral. Serious doesn't suit you."
Arthur suddenly realised what was missing, mentally kicking himself for not noticing it before.
"Are you not wearing armour?"
Merlin looked down at himself too, as if checking that what Arthur said was true – no, no armour was to be found. He glanced up again and shrugged.
"I can't move in that stuff."
The Prince ran a critical eye down the boy's frame.
"Do you even have a sword? I'm assuming that you do still remember how to use one?"
Merlin scowled.
"I thought we were using crossbows today? I can't use them both at the same time, you know – I only have two arms. Besides, who needs a sword when you have a crossbow that does all the work for you?"
They were positioned on the battlements, Arthur leading from the centre and shouting the orders to the archers around him. Leon was leading the rest of the knights from below, and if Merlin really strained his eyes he could just make out the dark hair of Gwaine, apple in hand. He had to suppress a smile at that – Gwaine was never one to keep to protocol. To be honest, it was a credit to Arthur for keeping the knight in line as much as he had.
They were not the only ones with archers today. As Arthur roared the order to fire, they were met in kind with a volley of flaming arrows that soared out of nowhere, scarring the sky with burning arcs. As soon as the bolts had been released, every single man ducked against the wall, flattening themselves as much as they could against it.
There was a small grunt of surprise from Merlin's elbow, and the man beside him fell, an arrow in his shoulder. Startled, Merlin looked directly upwards, and to his surprise he found that he could pinpoint another flaming dot in the sky, a few meters above his head and falling. Fast. Towards him.
He flung out an arm automatically, instinctively trying to conjure a shield, willing his magic to do something. His already pounding heart began to beat wildly against his ribcage, trying to break free, and when nothing happened to halt the arrow's flight he found himself simply watching it fall, unable to look away. All he could think of was that he was wrong, and that his magic wasn't able to protect him in his greatest need, and that he had failed Arthur.
And then suddenly the world was sideways, a large weight on his right side, pinning him down uncomfortably on the cold stone. If Merlin tilted his head slightly he could just make out a mop of dirty blonde hair half hidden behind a mess of chainmail and smoke.
"Thanks," he muttered, scraping his knees on the broken stone as he rushed to scramble back to the relative safety of the wall.
"Anytime."
"Change!"
As the command was given for the fourth time that day, Arthur watched with a grim satisfaction as the two groups of knights swapped places so smoothly you'd think that they'd been born into battle. The swapping action was a rather ingenious idea of his, providing each group with that few minutes of rest that they so desperately needed, sacrificing number for effectiveness. After all, a man can only run on pure adrenaline for so long.
They'd run out of arrows hours ago, now simply providing cover for those down below by throwing whatever items they could lay their hands on over the edge of the battlements and into the fray. The prince looked over to Merlin, the boy's movements slowed by fatigue but his eyes as alert as ever, completely focussed on the task at hand. If you ignored the slight hint of terror that lay behind that determination, and the lack of armour, you could almost take him for one of the knights of the realm. Almost. If it wasn't for those ridiculous ears.
Down below he heard Leon echo his order, the man's hair slicked red with blood and plastered to his face. The men down below were getting weary – the number of losses they were sustaining was rising again, and as he watched the men fight and fall Arthur couldn't stop himself from wondering how Morgana could have so much hate inside of her that it drove her to do this. It was inhuman.
When day turned to night and Morgana's forces disappeared, nobody had the energy to even ask where they had gone.
"Can we get no reinforcements?"
Merlin heard the angry shout emanate from behind the closed doors of the council chambers and he stepped away rapidly, the hand that he was about to use to announce his presence dropping quickly to his side.
When the answer came, it echoed what he had thought all along, Uther's voice weary and edged with a hint of regret that sounded so out of character for one so cold.
"We have no one to call upon."
The dragon called to him that night.
"You're late, young warlock."
Merlin let out a small noise of indignation.
"What did you expect me to do, waltz straight out of the castle gates? We're in the middle of a war right now, if it's escaped your notice, and 'outside Camelot's borders' is actually a pretty long way to ride in the middle of the night when you don't have a horse."
The great dragon inclined his head slightly. "I see everything, young Warlock, nothing escapes my notice."
There was a pause, as if he expected Merlin to say something, and in that silence the boy's magic reacted before his brain did. Or, what should have been his magic. The dull ache Merlin's chest swelled as he felt the dragon's magic around him, reminding him of what he'd lost, and suddenly he found that he was struggling find a coherent way of voicing what he needed to say.
"My magic." The words came out almost as a choked sob. "I've lost my magic and I don't know why."
"What?" The single word rumbled in all directions, reverberating across the trees and making the very earth beneath their feet shake. If dragons could shout – well, he was pretty sure that Kilgharrah was close. "Why did you not tell me this before – the moment you knew?"
Merlin looked away, a lump in his throat.
"I couldn't, could I? I didn't have any magic with which to call you."
Making that admission hurt more than anything else – he'd been learning to cope with the limited resources that he had, but now, surrounded by this power, everything was coming undone.
"I thought that if I truly had lost my magic then you would know, and you'd call to me or something – that's what Gaius said anyway, that it's a phase that I'm going through and that my body's working to replenish it or something – and anyway, it's coming back now, slowly."
He knew he was rambling, but he just wanted the dragon to say something, to reassure him that everything would be fine, that indeed his magic was returning and it was all just some kind of blip.
"There is some truth in the old man's words." The dragon conceded, his eyes fixed on Merlin as if he could actually see the magic inside him. Which, to be honest, he probably could. "Do you really believe that destiny can be thwarted that easily – you, the all-powerful Emrys?"
He scrutinised the boy for a few moments more, Merlin shifting uncomfortably under the intensity of the gaze.
"There is a reason why I asked to meet you here, outside of Camelot's borders. There is an enchantment over Camelot – a very old, very strong enchantment. It stops any magic inside Camelot functioning. I've known of it for some time now, but I simply thought that with your power you would overcome it."
Merlin was having trouble processing the information, still stuck on the part where Kilgharrah told him that he had known about this all along.
"But then, Morgana –"
"It only stops magic with an attachment to Camelot, magic working for the kingdom rather than against it. Like yours," the beast added helpfully.
"So I'm supposed to just wait around until my magic overcomes this enchantment?" The hole in his chest was fast filling with an anger that rose out of the embers of his despair like some kind of revenge-seeking ghost. "Why didn't you tell me this before – why did you just assume that I'd be okay?"
He was close to shouting himself now, his eyes filling with hot tears that he was adamant not to spill.
"I've been going out of my mind! I thought I'd failed – failed Arthur, failed destiny, everything, and yet you knew all along!"
The dragon just stood there with that stare of his, those dark eyes not giving anything away, and Merlin felt his anger begin to fade away as quickly as it came. It wasn't worth it – getting angry with the dragon was like trying to provoke a reaction from a brick wall, and he simply didn't have the energy.
"Can you break it? The enchantment?"
He already knew the answer.
"I cannot interfere, Merlin. It is fate for Morgana and Arthur to wage war, and win it he must. It is the way it works. The magic is of a different sort to mine."
The beast turned his head slightly, a curious glint in his eye.
"After all, her forces are human, are they not?"
There was something ominous in his words, something not quite right, but Merlin was too tired to care.
"Why did you call me here, Kilgharrah? Just to tell me that I haven't lived up to your expectations? Just to tell me that Camelot is going to have to fight this war on its own? Because, without using magic, really it's just a matter of time before we cave – Morgana's going to use magic at some point, and when she does we don't stand a chance."
There was a moment of silence, but when the dragon finally spoke his voice was tinged with real regret, the regret of someone who has seen too much.
"I am sorry, but there is nothing that I can do. Believe me, if there was some way for ensure Arthur's victory then I would – I do not wish to see the kingdom fall, but I even I cannot enter Camelot's borders now. You must break this enchantment."
"But surely if Arthur is destined to unite the kingdom of Albion, then it is fated that he wins this battle? That Camelot survives?"
The dragon fixed him with a long stare.
"Destiny can be changed, young warlock. Surely you of all people know that."
By the end of the third day they had to retreat to the citadel, pulling back their forces and going into 'siege' mode. They simply didn't have the numbers or the energy to keep on fighting in the way they had been.
Morgana sent another message that night, in the form of a knight long dead, his dark hair matted with blood and a long gash running down the front of his chest, staining his grey tunic the colour of rust. A colour that Merlin never wanted to see again. The body managed to stumble through the doors somehow, and stood, dripping, in the middle of the hall, addressing knight and peasant alike.
When it spoke, it was with her voice.
"I grow tired of this – as I'm sure you do – so I'll speed things up a bit. One more day, that's all you have. One more day until the sorcerers arrive and the new age begins. I give you this warning out of the goodness of my heart – I advise you prepare."
A strangled sob came from a corner of the room as the body crashed to the ground, its limbs splayed grotesquely over the flagstones. All hell broke loose then, people crying and screaming in terror, shouting for order, shouting curses. Merlin was sure that somewhere he could hear a voice louder than the others , probably Arthur's, roaring commands and asking for calm, but it was all just a wave of sound to him.
Amidst the chaos the boy just stood there, the words of the dragon echoing in his head until he couldn't distinguish one thing from another anymore.
This was it, the final declaration of war. And in the few days since learning of Morgana's enchantment he hadn't worked out a way to overcome it – he'd searched through the entire contents of the library, interrogated Gaius, looked in every book that he could think of, but it everything had proved fruitless. He couldn't use his magic.
Merlin couldn't see a way out of this. He just couldn't. He turned on his heel and managed to make it one of the back corridors between the council chambers and the great hall before he broke, the tears sliding silently down his face as he pressed his head to the wall in the darkness and wished that he could somehow make everything right.
All he could see in his mind was the horrified look on Gwen's face when Elyan had been carried in from the battlefield with a wound large enough to make even Gaius grimace, and the way that Arthur scrunched his eyes against the pain every time he put on his armour, when he thought nobody could see.
So much for destiny.
"We have instructions to go and call upon the Druids for help."
Merlin looked at the Prince as if he'd sprouted an extra head, dropping the sword he'd been cleaning – Arthur's sword – to the ground with a clatter, not noticing when it skittered under the table and out of arm's reach.
"Uther," he said slowly, sure that he'd missed some important detail here or that Arthur was just making a misguided joke, "has asked us – you – his only son – to leave the battle and go and find the druids, known magic users."
"As we have no magic of our own."
Merlin spluttered. "And whose fault is that? May be if someone hadn't had every single person with a hint of magic executed then we would! Why this sudden change of heart now?"
"Merlin," Arthur warned, his voice dangerously low, as his servant carried on obliviously.
"Surely it can't be his own idea! I mean, let's be honest, Uther would rather boil in his own blood and let Camelot fall than call on the magic he hates to come and save him –"
"Never talk about my father in that way." It came out as a low growl, and Merlin knew he had overstepped the mark.
"I'm sorry," he hastily backtracked, arms up in way of apology, "I just meant –"
Arthur shot him a dirty look, and Merlin stopped talking.
"It was my idea."
Gwaine and Lancelot were waiting for them by the castle gates, horses fully saddled – no words were exchanged, they simply mounted and left, riding as fast as they could under the cover of the night. Merlin guessed that Arthur hadn't told them the real reason behind their expedition, but he also knew that they didn't need one – if Arthur needed them, they would go.
They had never rode so fast before – there was not talk, no cheerful banter, just the sound of the horses' hooves chopping up the ground below them as they flew across it.
Arthur knew what a risk this was – the druids didn't stay in one place, they simply roamed the land settling in one place or another when they felt like it. All he had to go on were a few sightings, a couple of rumours, his own intuition. Heck, there wasn't even any guarantee that they'd agree to see him, let alone help him, considering his father's reputation.
There was a small nagging voice in the back of his mind telling him that he was stupid and that they were magic users and not to be trusted, that he should turn back and help protect the kingdom instead of running off on a wild goose chase, but he did his best to ignore it. It was going against everything that he'd ever been taught, everything that his father had ever drilled into him, but there was a time and a place for tradition and this was not one of them.
He had to face up to the facts – Morgana using magic against them, and when she did they would have absolutely no way of stopping her.
"Are you alright?"
Merlin had given up on sleep hours ago. It was impossible, with so many thoughts clamouring for his attention, like the fact that even if they could find the druids, the magic wouldn't work because it was magic for Camelot and Morgana's enchantment rendered anything of that vein completely useless. Or the way that the druids would turn on Arthur in an instant if they realised that Emrys had no magic, closing the Prince's heart towards it forever. Or the way that he was so tired and just didn't know what to do.
"Yeah," he murmured, managing a small smile. Lancelot wasn't fooled.
"Could you not just – ?" The man waved his hand in the air to illustrate Merlin's magic, smiling slightly as he did so. The smile fell when Merlin's expression momentarily morphed into pure despair, and the knight suddenly realised his mistake.
"I'm sorry," Lancelot whispered, "I didn't realise that you still couldn't – you know –"
"I still can't."
The words were accompanied by such a heart-wrenching sigh that Lancelot was surprised that Merlin didn't sink into the ground with the weight of it. When the boy rolled over and fell silent, his mind full of druids and steel and 'emrys', Lancelot simply didn't have the heart to push him further.