Chapter Twenty-One: The Mark of Nimueh
This is a part of airships I did not miss, Arthur thought grimly as he was unceremoniously tossed into a dark, metal holding cell. The two red- and black-clad guards dragged his arms behind him to chain him to the wall. He gave them both a fierce glare, and was met, not with angry expressions, but something akin to curiosity.
"It's been a long time, Prince Arthur," one of the guards commented as he latched the manacle tightly around Arthur's wrist. "We wondered when you would come back to us."
Arthur stared at him. Where did he think Arthur had been, vacationing on the beaches of Ember Island? Did he not know that the prince had been forced to flee for his life? The other, younger, guard looked at his companion with raised eyebrows.
"Well, excuse me for wishing I had come back to the Fire Nation on my own terms," Arthur responded, trying and failing to keep sarcasm from his voice.
"I thought you were so eager to come back, Arthur," Nimueh crooned, swanning into the cell as the guards finished their work. They backed away, heads bowed; the younger one watched Nimueh nervously. "You've been gathering an army so quickly against us. Weren't you planning on coming anyway?"
"I'd hoped to come to the Fire Nation over your dead body," he snarled.
She tsked, then gestured at the guards. "Leave us." They did, but slowly, glancing over their shoulders as they went.
"You've regained your old fire, Arthur," she purred as she came closer. He watched her through narrow eyes, hatred burning through him. "I remember how you used to be, before your father died. Before Morgana threw you in jail and let me at you."
He did not shiver. He did not.
"Why don't I see if I can . . . shock that out of you, hmmm?" Lightning was playing on her fingertips, and he braced himself.
He hoped his friends were alright. That was Arthur's last thought before the lightning tickled him, light piercing his eyes, digging across his skin and then under, pricking his heart and filling his brain with needles, contorting his muscles like bloodbending. The only thing that kept him still were the chains around his arms.
He wasn't sure how long it went on. She could not electrocute him steadily, lest she stop his heart, but Arthur felt sure the torture continued for hours and hours. The airship grew hazy, dim, and then disappeared.
Arthur wasn't even sure he was on the airship anymore. His brain felt like mush. Perhaps he had dreamed it all? Did he ever really escape at all?
It had been days, weeks, perhaps months since he had last seen the sun. Nimueh had consigned him to the deepest, darkest, dampest cell in the Fire Nation prison. She had, at one point, visited him every day, but her visits came more infrequently now. She stood over him, pursed lips red like she had been drinking the blood of her enemies, sparks playing on her fingertips.
"Don't fight me, Arthur," she cooed. "You'll only make it worse for yourself. Just accept it: you are not the Fire Prince. You are not the Firelord."
Arthur opened his eyes, forcing himself back to the airship. Nimueh stood over him. Her dress was still as red, still as tattered, but there was nothing but satisfaction in her eyes as she looked down on him. "Are you still going to fight me, Arthur?" she said. "So be it."
More pain.
Had the last five years even happened, or had they been a product of his fever-ridden, tortured mind? Who was Gwen? Who was Merlin? He had ever really escaped the Fire Nation?
Morgana came down to see him every once in a while. At first, he had yelled, pleaded, cajoled, tried to reason, but she was unmoving. "I wish I could trust you, Arthur," she said often. "You've always been so kind to me. But I know, in the end, you're going to follow right in your father's footsteps." As the months passed, he grew quieter, stopped fighting back. It was when he stopped talking that she started. She talked to him like how she had done when they were small. Before Morgause had found her.
Nimueh made it clear to him that the Fire Nation was welcoming to Morgana and her reign. They welcomed the relaxed laws; benders danced on the streets. People from other nations were visiting like they hadn't in twenty years.
"You're not even a bender!" Nimueh taunted. "How could you ever be Firelord? How could you ever give them what they wanted?"
How true, he thought vaguely. The Fire Nation doesn't want a non-bender as a Firelord; that's why they killed my mother. This is best. This is best.
In the dark, cold cell, his mind dwelt endlessly on a litany of images that flickered over and over in his mind like lightning. All the executions, the thousands of firebenders and others that had died in the courtyard, sinking beneath the waves in that small, dark pool. He thought about his father's last, desperate look before Morgana killed him. His half-sister's hard, sorrowful look as he was dragged down to the dungeons.
"That's right, Arthur. It pains me to have to re-teach you like this, but it seems you've finally learned what happens when you cross me. You're not the Fire Prince: you never were. You were just a usurper taking Morgana's throne."
He could not tell where he was. He was not even sure what his name was anymore. Who was Arthur? He thought about fighting back against Nimueh, telling her what he really thought, but he had been fighting for so long. He let his eyes slip closed.
He felt a hand touch his shoulder. "Arthur?"
The voice was not familiar. He flinched away from the touch.
"Arthur, wake up."
Who was Arthur? Why were they bothering him? He was tired, so tired . . .
"Arthur. Wake up."
His eyes snapped open. Two hazy figures loomed over him, one of them dark-skinned, the other pale. He squinted trying to see their faces, but everything was blurry. The pale one grabbed his shoulder to ground him.
"Who . . ." he whispered, hardly able to speak. He was trying to ask who they were, but what came out was, "Who am I?"
The dark-skinned blur said, "You're our Fire Prince. Don't you remember?"
He thought about that.
And then, Arthur remembered.
He had escaped. He had gotten out. He had gone to the Earth Kingdom, and lived another life, one he had been forced to leave behind because-
Merlin turned around and regarded his would-be murderer with an almost proud look. "You're the Fire Prince. Prince Arthur. The heir to the throne of the Fire Nation."
Yes, that was his name, wasn't it? Arthur. Nimueh had tried to convince him he wasn't the Fire Prince, again. She had succeeded.
The two figures over him came slowing into focus. Arthur saw that is was the two guards from before. Nimueh was nowhere to be seen.
"Your Highness?" one of them murmured, tightening his grip on Arthur's shoulder. "Stay with us."
The darker one passed a hand over his eyes. "We almost lost you there. Nimueh went too far." He looked disgusted.
Arthur digested this. "Why are you helping me?" he croaked. His throat hurt abominably; now he knew how Merlin felt after his almost-strangulation.
The two guards looked uncomfortable. "You're the Fire Prince. You'll always be our Fire Prince, whether you come back to the throne or not."
Arthur stared between them. All the thoughts he had had about the Fire Nation citizens abandoning him flitted through his mind again. "Okay," he said awkwardly.
"Not everyone in the Fire Nation Army is against you, Prince Arthur," one of the guards assured him.
Something Gwen said came back to him. "Whether they accept you or not, whether they want you to be Firelord, you at least owe it to them to try. You owe it to them to fight. That's the Arthur I know, someone who fights for the people he loves. That's-that's the man I fell in love with."
Arthur was still in the cell on the airship, the stench of oil and smoke roiling around him, the rumble of the engines moving through him, but somehow, this is did not disappoint him. He knew who he was: Prince Arthur.
The two guards turned at a commotion in the corridors beyond. "What's going on?" the younger one murmured.
Nimueh's voice echoed towards them through the metal airship. "Prepare to be boarded!" It sounded like the Fire Nation guards were preparing for a fight, Arthur thought. He smirked.
His friends were coming for him.
The four fleeing airships, heading almost directly south to the Fire Nation, were not hard to find, even at night. The three airbenders-Lancelot, Mordred, and Alator-carried Merlin, Elyan, and Gwaine on their gliders, while Percival skimmed across the water below with Gwen. The group wanting to go rescue Arthur had been much bigger, but Alator had put his foot down. He didn't want the mission to turn into a battle. "We are rescuing, not fighting," he insisted.
Mordred looked mutinous as the head monk said this. Lancelot, personally, doubted the wisdom of taking the boy with them even if he was the Avatar. He looked ready to avenge his father's gruesome death at the first opportunity.
Lancelot looked mournfully over their group, which had become more rag-tag as time went on. Elyan was healed, but still was not in peak condition; he insisted on coming on the grounds that he was their only metalbender. Merlin had been torn between rescuing the Fire Prince and staying to help Freya heal emotionally and physically.
As the airships came into sight, Lancelot tried to remain positive. They were a skilled group. Perhaps they might even be able to get Arthur out without incident.
Merlin reached down a hand to touch his shoulder. "That one!" he yelled over the wind. "The second one to the right-that's Nimueh's ship. That's where we're headed."
Lancelot wasn't sure how he could tell in the dark, but tilted to head towards it. There was only one guard on the catwalks, and Lancelot swept him off into the ocean before any alarm could be sounded.
"A little understaffed?" the airbender asked worriedly. "Where are all the guards?"
Merlin shook his head, but he looked concerned. The other airbenders landed lightly on the catwalks, then Alator flew down to the ocean to fetch Percival and Gwen. "Remember the plan," Lancelot urged them. "We need to do this as quickly and quietly as possible." The others nodded. Gwen looked both close to tears and resolute as she nodded at Percival.
"Elyan, with me," Mordred said, his pale eyes flickering strangely in the dim lights from the airship. "We'll go up top, get ready to take this airship out once they have Arthur." Elyan looked a little queasy at the thought of more flying, but he nodded.
"We don't know where Arthur is being held," Merlin fretted, his eyebrows drawn together. "Alator, Gwaine, you two find the cells in the front of the ship; Lancelot and I will go to to the back."
"Got it,, split," Alator said sharply, and they divided to their duties. Gwen and Percival stayed on the catwalks to keep a lookout, Lancelot and Merlin went up the aft ladder, while Alator and Gwaine climbed to the fore of the ship.
It was eerie inside the airship in a way it had not been in the airship stolen from Ba Sing Se. Lancelot and Merlin slunk from corner to corner, peering around, but did not see many people. "Are they usually this empty?" Lancelot breathed as they came closer to the cells.
Merlin shrugged, looking troubled. "I really hope it's not a trap," he muttered. "We can't afford to lose anyone else." Lancelot inwardly agreed.
At one point, they peeked around a corner to see two Fire Nation soldiers conversing. Merlin stiffened and sucked in a sharp breath. Looking at one of the soldiers, Lancelot thought it might have been the firebender who showed up at the Water Tribe. Thomas? He and Merlin had been friends, if Lancelot remembered correctly.
"-such a shame we had to retreat," the other soldier was saying. "If we were there for the Avatar, why'd we settle for the Fire Prince? We could have blasted that temple off the cliffside!"
Merlin's hands curled into fists.
Thomas shook his head. His arm was still bandaged, but no longer in a sling. Lancelot thought he looked tired. "We didn't come to slaughter the Air Nomads, or to lose all our ships to a whirlwind. Failing the Avatar's capture, Prince Arthur will be prize enough for Firelord Morgana."
Lancelot and Merlin exchanged glances. Merlin's eyes were wide.
The other soldier scoffed. "For now."
They moved on, boots clunking against the metal grating of the airship. Merlin didn't move for a moment, his breath unnaturally loud in the enclosed space.
"Merlin?" Lancelot breathed once Thomas' footsteps had faded from even his sensitive ears.
The firebender nodded and jerked forward, stumbling down the corridor towards where the cells were. They did not have to walk for long.
"Almost there," Merlin whispered, just as they turned a corner-
A woman stood in the corridor, short, fair-skinned. White-haired, but she looked young. Her feet did not touch the ground. A spirit.
Lancelot and Merlin froze as she turned to them. "Well, well, well," she said, her voice soft as a whisper. "What have we here? An airbender, and . . . ?"
She tilted her head at Merlin, considering. The two friends exchanged nervous glances.
"We, er, we got lost," Merlin said quickly. "I'm a Fire Nation soldier-see? I have a uniform. And he's . . . a spy. We sent him to infiltrate the Air Nomads. Gave us some pretty good information."
Her smile grew. "You can't lie to me, boy. Do you know who I am?"
Lancelot swallowed. "Uh, no. And we'd just like to get past if it's all the same to you."
"You've come to rescue the prince," she mused. "I see. Very well. I don't care about him-Nimueh was a fool to leave the Air Temple before we had gained our real prize. I'll let you pass if you tell me where the Avatar is."
A pause.
"How would we know that?" Lancelot asked. "The Avatar isn't known to us."
"Lying again," the spirit mused. She seemed to grow taller, her shadow filling the corridor. "Let me enlighten you on who you are dealing with. I am Mab, the queen of the Spirit World."
Merlin gulped. Lancelot thought, We just have the best luck, don't we?
"That's wonderful," Merlin squeaked. "It's wonderful to meet you, Your Majesty. But, that doesn't change the fact that we can't tell you where the Avatar is."
Mab showed her teeth-long, dripping fangs. "So be it," she whispered, and attacked.
This was not like fighting the weaker, smaller spirits at the Air Temple, or even the Lamia. This was different. She blasted Merlin and Lancelot apart before they could even get their fists up, then swirled around immediately for another pass. Her eyes had turned black, and she had definitely grown.
They were almost ready the second time. Merlin planted his feet and punched out, refusing to be moved. She dodged his fireblast and Lancelot was forced to leap straight upwards to avoid her; Mab's head passed less than an inch under his tucked-in feet. Lancelot frantically searched his memories for what Merlin had taught him about attacking, but all he could think about was how to making an airball.
So he did. As Mab smashed towards them again, he barreled at her on an invisible whirlwind.
"Lance, no-!"
He managed to knock her off course, but the collision also smashed him into the wall and knocked all the breath out of him.
Merlin got off another shot, but Mab grabbed him by the throat and slammed him against the wall. Lancelot gasped, spots jumping in front of his eyes. Merlin's feet scrabbled at the wall, reaching for the floor, and he grasped Mab's arms as he struggled to breathe.
Queen Mab gave a delighted chuckle as Merlin struggled to free himself from her grip. "How funny! I knew you were lying." Merlin could see himself reflected in her shiny black eyes she got right into his face. "I sense the Spirit of Raava in you."
"The what?" Merlin rasped, then punched her in the face with a fireball. She shrieked and whirled away from the flames, dancing along the other side of the metal corridor as he limped to his feet.
Mab bared her sharp teeth. "You have some fight in you, boy!"
"Merlin! Are you alright?" Lancelot cried. Gathering his strength, he threw a whooooosh of air towards the queen, but it did little more than ruffle her clothes. He wondered what Mab's eerie statement had meant: spirit of who?
Mab stalked closer, and Merlin raised his fists. "Why don't you go into the Avatar State and destroy me, boy?" she hissed.
Merlin turned, impossibly, even paler. "What?" he breathed.
If Lancelot had been a lesser man, he might have yelled, "I told you so!" He restrained himself-somehow-as Mab came closer. "Don't you know? Don't you realize what you are? I'm the Queen of the Spirit World; I know a spirit when I see it."
Merlin gulped and stumbled back from her approach. Even he could not argue with that.
Mab had grown even taller, and the hallway was filled with the stench of rot coming from her leafy clothing. "Show yourself," she said, spiraling ever closer. Lancelot was backed against the wall now.
"No," Merlin said.
"Show yourself!" Mab cried, suddenly furious. "Show yourself! Fight me!"
Merlin somehow missed her blow, pushing the queen back with a roar of flames. It was a wonder, Lancelot thought, that no one else had found them yet. They were not exactly being quiet or subtle.
"Show yourself, Raava!" Mab yelled, and Merlin ducked.
"What do you want!?" he gasped. "I don't know who-"
Mab caught him by the neckerchief and threw him. He landed heavily at the end of the corridor and rolled to an abrupt stop at the wall. Panting, he tried to stand and fell back with a cry. His leg was bleeding.
Mab watched his efforts with a twisted but disappointed stare. "Fine," she said, almost too softly for Lancelot to hear. "I suppose we'll just have to do this the hard way."
Without warning she whipped around and charged at Lancelot. He frantically raised his staff to block her, but she shoved him roughly against the wall. His head banged against the metal. "Lancelot!" Merlin yelled, finally struggling to his feet, but his bleeding leg would not carry him; he fell again.
Mab bared her teeth in Lancelot's face. "Never forget," she said, head turned so that Merlin could hear. "This was the day you failed to save your friend."
She raised her arm to finish Lancelot off. Merlin was struggling in the corner, his breath coming his pants as he struggled to get up. Lancelot was looking under Mab's arm at his friend, willing Merlin to know that he had done everything he could.
Then, Merlin's whole body stiffened. His hands curled into claws on the floor, and Lancelot heard the metal squeal and bend. Merlin's head went up in one sharp movement.
Lancelot froze.
Merlin's eyes weren't blue anymore.
Happy Memorial Day! Hope you enjoyed.