Written for:
200 Characters in 200 Days: Merlin.
Ultimate Chocolate Frog Cards Challenge: Gregory the Smarmy - Write about someone who may have used ulterior magical means to worm their way into the royal family, either for love or to make a fortune.
371 words.
Fools
Merlin didn't like to think of his childhood. As a Druid boy, his family and people had been persecuted wherever they went. Chased from wilderness to wilderness, through towns and villages, always hungry, always surviving. Never living. He had his mother, of course, and his friends, but it was not a happy time. It wasn't for any Druids. The world was too afraid of magic, of what it could be used for, that it refused to see any good in it.
But Merlin was good at magic. When it came to playing tricks on the elders, the other children were caught as soon as the thought of the act crossed their minds. Merlin was never once caught. He was too good for them, too quick, too subtle. He learned that with practice and patience, he could be really good. When Merlin's mother grew sick, she asked Merlin to take him to her old friend in Camelot.
Camelot, the place of courts and knights, the place little boys dreamed about, was now within Merlin's grasp. He refused to let it go. While his mother recovered under the supervision of a wizened medical man, a former Druid, Merlin snuck around parts of the city he wasn't supposed to be in, and found things out he wasn't supposed to know. He worked out who he'd have to trick. An old man with a long beard and many large golden chains advised the King. He believed in the Druid ways, and studied prophecies and beliefs of the people religiously. That was Merlin's chance.
It wasn't that Merlin wasn't prophesized to be the aide of the future King Arthur, the Once and Future King, the current King's son. It was simply that Merlin wrote the prophecy. It looked authentic enough that it fooled the Adviser. It certainly said the right things about Arthur being the best possible King who would unite the warring kingdoms under one crown. Merlin was right in his childish beliefs. All men were fools.
All it took were words that sounded right and looked right, and he was no longer poor and persecuted. He was living in the lap of luxury. Sometimes, you only needed ambition for things to work out alright.