"I've been framed."

Of course those would be the first words out of his mouth. Arthur rolled his eyes and stepped into the large containment cell. The door shut ominously behind him. "I'm sure you were."

Kilgarrah didn't seem to pick up on Arthur's tone. "Yeah, but I can prove it. I always do. Just like I predicted that you'd play the fool."

Arthur was annoyed. He wanted answers, he wanted to find The Horsemen, and Kilgarrah Drake was making that all very difficult. "Let's just drop the theatricality, alright? The cameras aren't rolling in here." He glanced at the guards. "Fellas, could I have a few minutes with my friend here alone, please?"

The guards left, and then they were alone. Kilgarrah wasted no time. "All right. I've got information to trade. I believe that's how it's done."

Arthur hummed and glanced around the cell. "If it's of some value."

"These bars give a man time to think," the old man began. "And I'm pretty sure I know how they did it."

Arthur glanced at him, only slightly interested.

"Remember the rabbit trick in the second show? The box was never empty, it was just a mirror. The vault wasn't either. After gaining access to the warehouse, The Horsemen left the real safe and transformed the whole room into a giant rabbit box. You go charging in there, thinking the safe was already gone, missing the trick. Again. Which was to make you think the safe had already been stolen, so you'd drop your guard and leave."

Arthur was begrudgingly impressed, if not a bit embarrassed.

"Now, while you were busy playing with balloon animals, someone was breaking into the warehouse."

"Who?"

"Mordred Clarent."

Arthur felt like he was hit with a frying pan. "No. No way. He died right in front of me."

"Unless, of course, he didn't." Kilgarrah grinned. "He escaped in a standard FBI vehicle, right? Led you to the bridge, where the other Horsemen were waiting with an identical replacement car. It only took a split second for you to lose contact with it-"

Arthur was vividly reminded of the bus that had cut in front of him.

"-and make the switch. When you crawled into that burning car, quite heroically, I might add, you almost died trying to rescue what I assume was a cadaver from the morgue."

Arthur shook his head, trying to understand. "Why go through such an elaborate and dangerous plan just to frame one guy?"

Kilgarrah sighed. "I don't know."

"They never kept any of the money they took."

"Yeah, that's the part I haven't been able to figure out yet." Kilgarrah looked frustrated, either with himself or his situation. "But I just gave you information that is substantially more important."

Arthur shook his head. "No, not really."

The old man looked up in surprise. "What?"

"I finally got a chance to really look into Thomas Smith," Arthur informed him. "His comeback attempt. His accident. The insurer who denied the family's claim? Priest Insurance. The bank that carried the note?" Arthur could see Kilgarrah was beginning to understand. "Credit Republicain de Paris. What do you make of that?"

Kilgarrah looked down. "A sucker is born every minute," he muttered, astonished.

Arthur took that as a sign to move on. "So here's my new theory. The legend is that the 'Eye' is everywhere. Waiting for the truly great magicians to distinguish themselves from the mediocre ones. Maybe that was you," he pointed to the old man. "Deep down inside, you wanted nothing more than to be part of the 'Eye', but you were never invited. So you try to destroy them. But instead what happens? You pissed them off."

"The Eye isn't real," Kilgarrah scoffed.

Arthur shrugged. "Okay, then, explain. Who's behind all this?"

"Somebody with an obsession." Kilgarrah was grasping at straws now. "Meticulous."

"Who?"

"Somebody prepared to sacrifice everything. Somebody so prepared to lose that they wouldn't even be a suspect until the trick was done."

"I don't want a profile, I need a name." Arthur snapped his fingers in Kilgarrah's face. "Who? Who?"

"I don't know who. But they had to have access to the warehouse to plant the mirrors." He began to pace. "Always a step ahead of me. And the FBI. Got past them not once, not twice, but consistently. Almost as if they were on the..."

Kilgarrah stared at Arthur, stunned. It took a second, but his words finally connected in Arthur's brain. "Are you saying there was someone-"

"On the inside."

Kilgarrah and Arthur spun. There, just outside the cell, stood Leon.

The redhead nodded. "Hello Arthur."

"You?" Kilgarrah whispered.

Leon hummed.

Events were starting to piece together in Arthur's head, and he thought he might understand, but he still asked, "Why?"

"That is the question, isn't it?" Leon stepped closer. "You're right. I can't tell you how long I've waited to see that look on your face."

"Who are you?" Kilgarrah demanded. "What do you want from me?"

"What do I want?" Leon had a look on his face that was completely foreign to Arthur. "I want you to spend the rest of your life in this cell, staring at four walls and wondering how you missed it. How you let yourself be so blinded by your ego that you convinced yourself that you were one step ahead when you were always two steps behind."

"Leon?" Arthur asked as his friend let him out of the cell. The redhead turned and walked away, and Arthur hurriedly followed.

"Wait a minute. Pendragon! How did this happen?"

They ignored Kilgarrah's calls and disappeared into the shadows.

Merlin, Freya, and Alator trekked to the gate, hiding in the shadows and using their flashlights to guide them. They reached the gate to Central Park and Alator tried to push it open. "It's locked," he said.

"Weren't you listening?" Out of the shadows swaggered Mordred. The young man grinned smugly. "Nothing's ever locked."

His teammates cheered. Merlin grinned and waved happily.

"Well done, Mr. Clarent!" Freya smiled as Mordred unlocked the gate. "Good work!"

Alator smirked. "You're a big boy now, Mordred."

They hurried through their reunion, trading hugs and shoulder punches, then stepped into the shadows.

"What if all this was just leading up to us getting mugged in Central Park at 2:00 a.m.?"

"No," Merlin shook his head, waving his flashlight on the trees. "I'm telling you, we're right were he need to be. We just need to find..."

"That?" Freya's light landed on a plaque.

Merlin was filled with an emotion he couldn't name. He had lived in New York his whole life, and yet he had never been able to find this before. He had strolled through Central Park hundreds of times, so how had he missed this? "The Thomas Smith tree," he breathed.

"And the card encased in glass." Freya said reverently.

They stared for a moment, drinking in the sight.

"What do we do now?"

Freya contemplatively pulled her tarot card out of her pocket. The others did the same, pondering. Suddenly, the cards pulled themselves out of The Horsemen's grips and jumped towards each other as if they were strong magnets. They stacked themselves, and then only one card rested in Freya's hand. She shared a startled look with Merlin, then waved the card over the one in the tree. The second card lit up, it's glass case shining.

As if a switch had been pulled, the carousel lit up behind them.

The Horsemen froze, trading startled glances. Then as one, they headed to the carousel. They rounded the corner and stopped.

"Oh, my God," Alator chuckled.

In front of the carousel, silhouetted from behind, stood Leon de Grance.

"I did not see that coming!" Mordred grinned.

Merlin muttered, "That's impossible."

"No way."

Leon grinned at them, never saying a word.

Alator came to his senses first. "That was actually pretty good."

The redhead nodded. "Thank you."

Merlin scrambled for an explanation. "When I said 'Always be the smartest guy in the room'..."

Leon grinned, accepting his feeble apology. "We were in agreement."

"Okay. Right." Merlin nodded numbly, then turned to his best friend. "Freya?"

The brunette was tongue-tied. She looked at Merlin and shook her head, opting not to speak.

Merlin laughed weakly. "I've never seen her speechless."

"I'll take that as a compliment," Leon smiled.

Mordred stepped forward, looking a bit worried. "Hey man, I'm so sorry for kicking your ass. Really."

Leon raised an eyebrow, and Mordred fell back.

Alator took his place. "Hey, listen, for the record, I have always been a 100% believer. And the amount of energy I have expended to keep these infidels on point..."

Freya laughed, slightly hysterical.

Leon waved the bald man down. "Alator, you're in."

"God bless," Alator sighed.

The redhead smiled again, and turned back to the carousel. "Come." He led them to the metal horses. "The real magic is taking four strong solo acts and making them all work together. And that's exactly what you did." He stepped onto the platform and gripped a pole as the carousel began to turn. "So welcome. Welcome to the Eye." And then he disappeared into thin air.

The Horsemen gasped and traded excited glances, then jumped on the carousel.

"It was all connected." Arthur plopped down on the bench. Morgana jumped, then spun. She seemed startled to see him, which Arthur supposed was reasonable. He had shown up at a bridge in Paris with no warning, after all. "Credit Republicain. Priest Insurance." He smiled at his sister. "Bonjour."

Morgana raised an eyebrow. "Bonjour. And Elkhorn? What's the connection to Smith?"

"Elkhorn started as a safe manufacturer." Arthur explained. "They used cheap steel, they cut corners. When he got to the bottom of the river, the safe warped. And he was trapped."

Morgana nodded. "I looked him up. He was Gwen's father."

Arthur nodded. Gwen was a family friend, and past fling. Her mother had worked for Leon's father until her death in Gwen's senior year of college. Before all this, Arthur had never known what happened to Gwen's father. He knew, of course, that Gwen and her brother were very close to Leon. In fact, the redhead had once said that he thought of Gwen as a sister.

So, really, Arthur wasn't surprised that he'd gone so far to avenge her.

Arthur explained this all to Morgana, who didn't seem surprised. "So you weren't the mole... Are you now?"

Arthur considered. "...yes."

Morgana nodded. "Why are you telling me all this?" She looked out over the river.

"I know that the logical conclusion for you is to take this case to it's resolution," Arthur said warily, "and for you to turn in me and Leon."

Morgana was silent for a minute. She shrugged. "Yeah. But you know how I feel about resolution and logic." She grinned at her brother. "And you also know that I think some things are best left unexplained."

Arthur felt a part of their relationship piece itself back together. He smiled. "One more secret to lock away."

And together they put a lock on the rail of the bridge, and tossed the key into the Seine.

Well! Finally finished, and just in time for the new year! Thanks for sticking with me, though I know this certainly isn't the best story out there. I've already got a vague outline of the rewrite, which is more inspired by NYSM than a copy of it. I don't expect it to be anywhere near ready to publish until about midsummer at the earliest, however. Sorry in advance.

Once again, thank you all! This is my first completed (published) story, and all the encouragement was incredibly helpful.

I hope everyone has an amazing 2019! Take care of yourselves, and I'll see you soon!