Only one, maybe two, chapters left after this! Unless I get a really good idea and decide to extend the story a bit but I probably won't. Thank you for all the amazing reviews, they honestly make my day! Also, big thank you to SunnySmile2413 for the big inspiration for this chapter! It's a bit longer than the last and I hope it's okay.
It starts straight off from the last chapter, a bit fluffy and cheesy in some points, but hey.
I would've updated sooner but I had flu :(
Disclaimer: I do not own Merlin.
"It doesn't matter," Morgana says quickly, trying to get off the topic.
"Well, it must be important if you came all the way out here to risk meeting with the druids. So please, tell me what it was. Did you get chance to find out?"
"Just about," she glares at him.
"And what was the answer," Arthur asks.
"Yes."
He sighs. "Alright, what was the question, then?"
"I can't say," she tells him, after a long pause.
"Why not?"
"It's a secret." It sounds childish, but she doesn't care.
"I'm good at keeping-"
"And you'll hate me." She cuts him off.
His face softens and his voice fills with sadness. "I'd never hate you. How could you ever think that I would? You're like a sister to me remember?"
"Of course I do," she reassures him. "I just don't think that that memory will be enough to stop you from hating me."
"Well, now you have to tell me. Please Morgana, what did you ask them?" He takes her hands in his in a small attempt to coax the information out of her. She'd known Arthur for as long as she could remember. If she could trust anyone, she could trust him. She takes a deep breath.
"Does Merlin know?" He questions her suddenly. "The secret, I mean."
"Um, yes, he does. But Arthur, before I tell you, you must promise not to tell anyone, do you understand? Not a single soul." Her face is so serious he almost laughs, but manages to hold himself together.
"Whose life do you want me to swear on? Mine? Yours?"
"Gwen's."
He looks at her in shock and then in suspicion.
"Guinevere? Why do you want me to swear on your maid's life?"
"Because you like her."
His cheeks turn red. "I do not, for-"
"Just swear on her life!" She hisses at him.
"Okay, okay," he huffs, holding his hands up as a surrender. "I swear on Guinevere's life not to tell anyone your secret. Happy?"
She nods slowly. "Okay. Right. You know about the nightmares I keep having?"
"No."
She rolls her eyes. "Well, I do. And in the dreams I see things and then those things happen in the future."
"What sort of things?" He asks in a disbelieving tone.
She racks her brains, trying to think of something fairly recent.
"Do you remember Sofia?"
"Yes." He says bluntly.
"Well, I saw her in a dream once. Except I had the dream the day before she came to Camelot." She explains, although leaving out the bit about her trying to drown him. Merlin had reassured her that hadn't happened and that Sofia had just tried to elope with Arthur, but she had never really believed him.
"Oh, Morgana, that was probably just your mind playing tricks on you!" Arthur smirks.
"It wasn't! I know what I saw, Arthur! And that wasn't the only time either! I've had dreams about Cornelius Sigan, where I saw a crow, and about your fight with Valiant and-"
"Alright, alright! I believe you!" He says loudly and Morgana hisses at him to be quiet before she actually takes in what he says.
"Y-you believe me?" She stammers, if she can get Arthur to listen to her, then she might just have a chance with Uther and even in saving Merlin.
Arthur shrugs. "Well, if you say it's true.
"Yes! Yes, it is the truth, I swear!" She says exciteedly, confidence suddenly filling her. "Anyway, the point is, it turns out that the dreams are visions." She watches Arthur's unchanging expression. "I'm a seer."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Arthur frowns.
"I have magic," she says softly.
He blinks. He laughs. She feels her shoulders sag.
"Come on Morgana," Arthur chuckles, turning around to walk back to the knights. "I think we need to get you back home. You're obviously very... upset."
She stays rooted to the spot. "Is this just some big joke to you?"
His brow crumples. "Well, that's what this is isn't it? A joke?"
Morgana shakes her head. "No," she whispers, "this is real."
His eyes harden and bore straight into hers. There is no escaping them. "You're a witch?"
Tears trail down her cheeks at what he has just called her, but she nods, silently.
"My father would kill you if he found out," he states, knowing Uther's hatred for magic better than anyone else.
"I know." She says sadly. "You mustn't tell him, Arthur, please."
He says nothing.
"Arthur?"
He turns his back and ignores her. "The knights will be wondering where we are," he says coldly and starts walking. She runs to try and catch up with him, to get him to understand, but he just brushes her off or walks faster everytime she comes into contact with him.
Merlin watches as they come back into view, with Arthur storming ahead and Morgana trailing weakly behind. They had been gone for over half an hour and he was beginning to get worried. Morgana's eyes are red... from crying? His mind reels with possibilities of what they may or may not have talked about. They mount their horses again and Arthur gallops ahead, seperate from the rest of the group. The knights take this as their signal to continue the journey and Merlin is pulled to his feet again, the pain in his arms starting once more.
It turns out that they do not walk for long, as Arthur demands that they stop for rest, as it is getting dark. Merlin hasn't seen him make any attempt of communication with Morgana since they set out to "fill up the water pouch." He seems to be avoiding her, or is trying to, and sleeps on his own, as if it is only him and the knights in the forest.
Merlin's hands are starting to go numb. They are still bound together and the rope has been wrapped several times around a tree, the bark digging into the backs of his hands. He lies there in the dark and the silence consumes him. He starts to hear the steady breathing and frequent snores of the knights as they fall asleep, their swords still held in their gloved hands. And he waits. Waits for the next day, when he will almost certainly be hung for the crimes Uther thinks he has comitted.
He does not worry for himself, but for Morgana and how she will cope with everything once he is gone. With her nightmares becoming more and more powerful, he wonders how long she will be able to keep her secret from the King. He wonders whether she will be lonely, with no-one else to know or understand who she really is. He has let her down and he knows it. He will happily admit it to everyone and anyone he meets. She would always unknowingly deny that he had failed her, but he knows that in just a few minutes and with just a few words, this whole thing could've been sorted.
If only he had told her. Then perhaps all of this could've been avoided. And now, because of his cowardice - and the bad advice he was given - he has gotten himself and maybe even the woman he secretly loves, killed. He smiles at the thought of her. Morgana. Her laugh, her green eyes, her smile- the real one, not the fake ones she reserves for Uther and his many feasts. He thinks of her long, dark hair and how it falls perfectly around her pale face. And of all her beautiful dresses, the green one, the white one - the red one she wore when he first saw her properly, not when she was hiding up by her window at the execution, or when she had undressed behind her screen because she thought he was Gwen. His memories of her soothe his frantic mind and after a while he manages to fall asleep.
Someone shifts beside him and something cool splashes onto his cheek. Merlin stays silent as his name is whispered close to his face. Soft hands loosen the ropes around his wrists and release him from the tree. He sits up slowly.
"Hello?"
"Merlin." He can just about make out her slim figure as she kneels next to him.
"Morgana, what are you doing?" They whisper to eachother in the fear that Arthur or the knights will wake.
"Helping you escape," she says, frowning at he fingers as they pick at the knots in the rope.
"Escape?"
"Yes. If you go back to Camelot Uther will kill you. I don't want him to kill you."
The ties come undone and he cups her cheek. "Why are you crying?"
She sniffs hard. "I'm not."
"Really?" He asks with a slight smile she can't see. "Because your eyes are wet."
"I'm just worried about you," she lies. Well, it's partly the truth but it isn't the only thing upsetting her.
"I'm sure there's more to it than that?"
"I told Arthur I have magic," she sighs and Merlin's eyes widen.
"And? What did he say?" He whispers urgently to her.
"Nothing. Well, at first he thought it was a joke and started laughing, but then I told him I was serious-"
"And?"
"And then he asked me if I was a witch and I said yes."
Merlin feels more tears come into contact with his thumb and he brushes them away gently, pulling her into a hug as they lean back against the tree.
"You're not a witch," he sighs as she rests her head into his chest, "you shouln't listen to him."
"I made him swear not to tell anyone, so as long as Uther doesn't find out for himself, I should be okay. Arthur knows you didn't kidnapp me, too, but I doubt Uther will listen." She pauses. "Which is why you have to get out of here."
"No." He disagrees. "No, I'm not-"
"Promise me?" She looks up at him with desperation in her eyes.
"Okay," he breathes.
"You have to promise."
"Promise," he agrees and kisses her forehead.
It is still a shock when she finds him gone in the morning and she realises that now she will have no idea where he is and how long he will be there. She won't know if he is hurt or wounded.
Arthur wakes and says nothing once he notices, just prolongs the silence between them. He tells the knights, who look thoroughly disappointed in the fact that they won't have someone to drag back on a rope, that it would be best to get her back to Camelot first and then send out patrols.
"You must be glad he is gone, Morgana." Arthur isn't looking at her, just speaking to thin air. Does this count as talking to eachother? She knows they must keep up with Uther's story in front of the knights.
"Yes," she says loudly. "At least I won't have to worry about him anymore."
Tada! Probably my longest chapter... not that I count... obviously. I hope you liked it because i didn't. Do you think I wrote Arthur's reaction okay? Because i don't know.
Please review! I'm trying to get this story to 50 before I finish, hint-hint ;)
Any ideas and ways to improve would be FABulous haha.