Isildur was exhausted. Without Aine, or even the young ones to relieve him on night watches, he had barely slept, and he was required to use stronger wards. The false trail had been distressingly simple to set, leaving bodies in the open had felt unnatural and twisted something deep in him, but to treat them with the respect normally shown for the dead would as much as sign a confession, and keep the knights coming. He had to trust that their spirits would find rest in the next world without guidance.

He had been shocked to see his friend in the fray, but time was not on their side, and when it ended they hadn't spoken, for what could one say at such a time? Balinor had to go to protect Emrys, he understood that, and he was needed to remain and take the those remaining a different way at a slower pace. After so many seasons of familiarity, he could trace Aine's magical signature with ease, a fact that made following such vague directions much easier. He suspected that without it he would have to stop several times a day to attempt scrying to have any hope of meeting them at their destination, which was beyond impractical, even if it had been legal. With more than one injury between them but none were life threatening, no one had been willing to be treated at the site of the ambush. He hadn't insisted.

They had walked until it was almost dark, finally finding shelter in a small cave, far further from Aine and Merlin than he could explain or feel comfortable with, and he'd coaxed a healthy fire to life. They needed help. One woman had a badly broken wrist, and he needed a second healer to properly set it, though by the grace of the gods it hadn't pierced the skin. In the circumstances he had been forced to settle for immobilising it as much as he could given the swelling, taking more of her load on, and giving strong birch-bark tea.

The first night no one spoke.

Isildur searched, but everyone had closed down tightly. The world's magic felt tense, not the way it usually did, it did not soothe him, and he got the distinct impression of being near the epicentre of some catastrophe. Strangely the disturbance settled without anything visibly being damaged, subsiding, not doing anything to ease his perturbed mind.

That night sleep did not come for the druid man.

Nor the next.

Despite leaving earlier that morning than on previous days, everyone having been afflicted with nightmares, it was slower going, all of them battered and bruised, despite the almost miraculous escape. The moved quietly until the sun was high. Isildur was skilled in many things, but motivating the dejected refugees and being the one they take their cue from was not one of them. It was just as as one of the injured began to whimper a bit, her inadequate pain relief having worn off that a young woman, hood concealing her identity stepped out from the shadows. Instantly on guard Isildur had stepped forward, she looked unarmed, but he was no green knight out on their first patrol. Not all weapons were obvious.

"Speak. We are peaceful travellers and wish only to pass peacefully though these lands."

The woman clicked her tongue and a dark horse emerged from the shadows behind her.

"She said you'd be stiff. I am not here at my own whim, but on My Lady's orders. She is unable to travel out so, and her movements too closely scrutinised. You have not far to go until you meet with your companions. My Lady knows her time is short, and wishes to aid the companion of Emrys on their way, I bring some fresh food, bandages, and something for the pain. Anything more would have been noticed and drawn attention." She bowed slightly to them and turned her attention to unpacking the saddlebags.

Isildur tested her words and found no lies, and signalled his conclusion to the others, who instantly relaxed.

"Who are you?"

"No-one important."

"I have learned that there is no such thing as an unimportant person. I will not trust someone who claims it as their identity. Who are you?"

The woman sighed, as though exasperated, a twinkle in her eyes betraying the truth of it, "I am the servant of my Lady Vivienne. She has long expected your party, and wishes you success in all endeavours. I am Agnes, and I have known my own end for as long. Already the mad king plots against my mistress, I must ride hard to Tintagel if her daughters are to stand a chance without their mother."

The druid was surprised, his own experience had kept him aware of Uther's most loyal servants, and Lady Vivienne's husband was among them. "Will Gorlois not defend them."

Agnes shoved the contents of the first bag at him, briefly making eye contact. "Gorlois is dead. My Lady has her own reasons for wishing an end to Uther's tyranny. More complex than the orchestrated death of a husband in battle. She will not falter at the end."

"Tintagel is a long way from Camelot, further surely than he would come."

Agnes scowled. "Would that it were so. For my Lady he will. Whether she wishes it or no."

Isildur's hand clenched into a fist, he knew exactly what the sellswords and witch hunters had been given license to do, what Uther was capable of.

"Then thank your mistress for her aid, and should you reach her in time, give her our own wishes for success in any of her own endeavours. Emrys will live. We will ensure it."

Agnes took out tightly packed blankets and two vials of medicine from the second saddle bag.

"See that you do. My Lady also sends word to him, for when he knows, that she is truly sorry. I do not know why, and I do not wish to. We will not meet again. May the triple goddess bless your steps and light your path. If you go now, and don't look back, the red-cloaks won't find you, I swear it. My Lady is never wrong."

The woman bowed, and Isildur acknowledged it, swung herself up, and kicked her mare into a canter, disappearing the way she had come.

The tired group looked longingly at the supplies left to them.

"Can we trust her?" Asked the woman anxious to reach her son, face pinched in pain.

"Yes. Yes, I think we can, if only for her dedication to her mistress." It had been many years now, but Isildur remembered a Lady Vivienne who danced with Nimue at a festival, she had been a Seer, though had chosen a life outside the priestesshood, Camelot had never been her home, or she'd have burned already, but Uther's reach grew further as he removed those with power enough to challenge him, and there were still plenty of nobles loyal to him for clearing their way.

"We keep moving, find shelter, and then we can take sup." He looked carefully at the vials, set the other goods down, and uncorked it, sniffing cautiously. Deciding to take a risk he turned his body to obscure it, and whispered a spell. Reassured he recorked it to give to the woman, "Drink half of this, it will help. Keep the rest for later, you will need it, and the faster we reach them, the sooner I can fix this." He hoped the swelling would reduce before then. Isildur could heal, but he didn't know how to deal with this without using magic, and to do so would drain him too much to lead anyone to safety. They had come to far to turn back, even if they weren't running from oppression.

"It's safe." He nodded to the tonic. "No enhancements, but a simple painkiller." The last word was enough for her to be willing to take the drug.

One of them stepped forward to pick up one of the bags. "Let's go then." He smiled tightly, "I don't know about you but I'm starving, and a beautiful woman just handed us food, so either I'm hallucinating, or we need to move." He gripped Isildur's shoulder. "Come on. No looking back. Show us the way forward."

Nodding, he took the other and after helping the woman drink, he stood forward, found his guide and was gratified by their closeness, and finally with mere hours between them he began to lead the group properly towards the others.

Aine had walked toward the sacred grove with a turbulent mind, chaos not quite quenched as she wished it to be, but as she removed her sandals and went through the familiar motions of preparing herself before she stepped onto holy ground her mind began to calm.

Satisfied, she crossed the threshold, and immediately the atmosphere was different, the magic in the air thicker. The night before there was much she had not noticed, like the fragrance around her. Little light fully penetrated the canopy, and the ground was dappled, though there were some young trees, several were ancient things, must have stood for centuries before her own birth, and none unguarded. "Come speak with me please. I wish to talk to the elder of this place, and seek wisdom."

Creaking loudly a gnarled face formed from what had been the thick trunk of an oak, and slowly, as if stiff, old bones slowed him the man climbed out, regarding Aine curiously. "You were here before. With Emrys."

She smiled. "I was. He does not know yet who he is, and yet you do. How is it that you recognise him so easily?"

She could have sworn that the rumble was laughter. "We are puzzled that anyone doesn't. He is not hidden from us, he is one of us. A creature of magic, and Magic itself. How can we fail to recognise the essence of what sustains us? He shines. His father does not recognise him yet, but he will. He has seen inside the heart of Emrys and he fears for him. No one could touch his mind last night, the shield around him is the Dragonlord's. Only Emrys can reach through it."

"Then you have not been speaking to him. Or any of your kin." She was confident of her conclusion.

"The goddess has forbidden it, even if we could. We would not challenge them."

Well, that was less than reassuring. "Who has forbidden it, is there one I must thank?"

The dryad elder looked shrewdly at her, "I do not believe your motives for asking are pure. This is between Emrys and his k- the gods. When he learns about this Old world he will know. When it is time, so will you. Remember Lady Aine, love does not lead only to good acts, it leads where you are willing to walk. He will need to know this."

"I swore to mine to keep living."

"And Uther swore a perverse vengeance."

"I will remember. Does The Great Dragon know of Merlin?"

"The heir of his dragonlord? Of course." Aine had expected that, so carried on,

"Does he know of Emrys?"

The not-oak rolled his eyes. "The creature of pure magic felt the birth of Emrys, child of Magic, yes."

She nodded her acknowledgement. "Does he know they are one an the same?"

The dryad was confused "Why does that matter?"

"To you it doesn't, I can't explain it in a way you will understand."

He looked as though he was considering it, "I do not know. It has never occurred before."

She breathed deeply, feeling the magic in the air, it was like waking up, as though everything was muffled before, she had almost forgotten what it was like to breathe and feel renewed. Such pockets were becoming rarer.

Poor Merlin, if this was how she felt, when so much less of her soul was defined by magic. Losing it might break her, but for active magic, she did have an element of choice. Her son would be a shell of himself without it, and even now she could see how much of himself had been lost from before the massacre.

Merlin… she doubted Merlin would survive the loss. Perhaps he would last a few days, wasting away, but there would be nothing of him left, and every second would be excruciating.

When he was less fearful she or Balinor would have to warn him of certain dark creatures and how to deal with them. Nimue wouldn't tolerate a rival, and Uther was quite capable of keeping a few of the darkest things in his vaults if it suited him, she suspected there were many dangerous things improperly stored down there. If he thought he could contain Kilgarrah forever, his idea of 'safely kept' was skewed heavily towards madness already. She almost hoped that he truly was mad, it was less horrific than a man choosing with intact faculties to enact a genocide. She had served him baked apples as a boy, laughed at terrible jokes, as one did with children, and he had slaughtered her family, grown into a monster. Biting her lip and preventing any more than one tear from escaping. No. That would not be Merlin's fate.

She wasn't a fool, she knew he'd killed with magic already, of course he had. She suspected that he had called help without even realising it long before his self preservation would work as it had days ago. In a world where battles were common, and many lived on the edge of starvation or slavery, it wasn't uncommon to find survivors who had killed young. Usually accidentally.

It was important that he knew how to do fun magic, beautiful magic, wasn't primed to become someone's weapon.

She knew the prophecies. In all of them he would have plenty of battles ahead of him, but she suspected that the were some paths to fate less brutal than others. Aine hoped that the title was metaphorical, but she had lost much of her natural optimism in the last few years, so if he was trapped here, she intended to try and ensure he was as whole as possible.

Part of her wanted to ask if they knew the definitive answer to that, but she didn't, deciding that she wasn't ready to know the answer for certain. Just on case she was right.

Calmly she relaxed her muscles, letting the magic seep into her, not that she could actually capture magic that way, or use it if she had, it was the magic of the Earth, not her own, and she hated twisting such, let alone doing so in a sacred place.

"You are leaking." Rumbled the old dryad. She had almost forgotten he was watching her,"

"Tears. Humans shed them. Sometimes it's dust in their eyes, or cold, and most it's emotion."

"Huh. I did not know humans leaked."

A smile spread over her face, "We do not enjoy others seeing. I do not think you, nor the goddess will share mine, you carry many secrets, what's one more eh?"

He creaked, "It depends on what the secret is."
She grimaced, he had to go and point it out. "Some knowledge is difficult enough to carry without knowing all things rest on your shoulders. I just want them to be a little wider before placing this on him."

The dryad couldn't judge age. All the humans and dragonlords were just counted as 'young' for him, but he assumed this meant the boy was very young for humans. Years were hard to keep track of in such small numbers. After a century or so one winter rather blended into another. "Then you must keep your promise to your mate to live, lest another tell him in a negative way."

"Indeed. I've no intention of dying inconveniently, but I take your point." Accepting it the dryad began to recede into his ancient oak, his voice almost lost as a whisper on the wind as he disappeared.

"Trust them, all is as it should be."

She wanted to ask them if Kilgarrah might reach out to Merlin despite his age on the basis that he was Emrys, but that would raise questions from the woodland spirits. Really, if Kilgarrah had been anywhere near Merlin with Balinor's shield, it ought to have caused an instant reaction. Those pair had the least sense of fear of all the dragon pairs, and were intimately familiar after the crazier stunts they had pulled. She had torn into Balinor after he came home naked, every stitch of clothing incinerated having decided to test whether or not dragonfire was safe for him. Not a mark on the man, but she was sure it had taken five years off her life. After that he promised to hold back a little, not to leave her entirely alone in the world.

Kilgarrah had frequently insisted he wasn't a horse, and Balinor had suggested he find an amenable pegasus to fly with instead and compare. The Great dragon had carried the boy off on more than one occasion in a snit, dropping him on top of a mountain, or in a lake. Aine would shake her head and tell them they were too old for water fights and 'catch', never really meaning it. Those days were long gone, and she missed them. More than anyone knew. She had been left with nothing after Uther's Purge grew worse.

Now suddenly she had more than she had ever expected to again, a family, a purpose, and it was one she could never have expected.

That last day with her mate, she had been busy, and he had refused to leave until they had said goodbye properly. He had told her he loved her more every day he had had with her, to never forget it, and whatever happened to live. For him. That one day she'd understand. He knew she realised after, he had known he was going to his death, and had gone anyway. Now she was certain he had known about Merlin too. Which meant at least one of the dragons had.

She wished she could remember more of the last conversation between them, but all that she could recall was something about coins and kings. There was a council of Dragonlords mere days before the massacre, and somehow Uther appeared not to have garnered many magical relics or objects from them, one or two, but not what she'd have expected. At the time she was too crushed by grief to make the connections, but now it made her feel sick, they weren't stupid. You didn't get stupid dragonlords, or how could they be trusted with control of a dragon. Idiots or the notably self serving simply didn't inherit. It did not tend to go down well, but safer than arming them with control of dragons. They met Uther's trap for a reason. Aine now believed that Emrys and Albion were that reason, and for whatever reason, they had trusted her to help protect that path. It had been close. She had promised him at the end she would live, but after she was captured she almost failed, the torture had almost broken her, when she escaped she was running a fever, and the druids who found her hadn't expected her recovery. She remembered the shocked gasp of one when she finally healed enough to be recognisable as their Elder. It had served as a lesson for them that peacemakers were no longer safe, Aine already bore their tattoo. One had caved and used magic as she slept to heal her face, the rest took longer and was mostly left to nature, but her ordeal would not be obvious at a glance for the rest of her life, and she would forever be grateful for that. Once she had wondered if she deserved it for surviving when so many did not, but her goddess had lifted her from the mire, reminding her that no one deserved any of it, and she had decided from that moment not to merely exist, but to find it in herself to truly live as she had promised her mate. Her throat ached, but she had spilled far too many tears already for what could not be undone. She had been careful, trying to hide the scars, but she knew it couldn't last forever. They all had some, she reminded herself. Inside and out. She suspected someone had used magic to set the bones in her hands and join ligaments knowing her to be a healer. Healers could do little without use of those.

She had honoured their risk by using them to heal as many as she could in her time, though she had avoided using her magic openly for a long time, despite the nausea and pain it left her with. Until Isildur and Kara had called her on it, long before they left together for Ealdor. Both recognised that the difference in their Elder was not only due to her trauma and loss, and both believed using her magic naturally as before would help her to feel like the same person she had always been and regain her true sense of self. They had on that occasion been correct, and it had only been then that she felt right acting as an Elder again and performing rites.

There was a fork where she ended she knew. One where she was never found in time. Perhaps there was a branch where she was never caught. This was why she hated destiny. It could be so specific and at the same time so damn vague.

Her mental walls were like a damn Hill fort's defences not for her own protection but others.

Trust.

She could do that. She could do that a little longer. It had brought them this far already. The peace of the grove was a restorative to her soul, enough to keep giving freely without running dry.

Before she left, Aine very carefully left her offering to Arianrhod in the place an altar would be placed were the Old Religion still legal to practice, and thanked Maiden, Mother, and Crone.

Leaving that place was like returning to a different world, the new world. It was a world now that had her family in, and had hope. It was enough.