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Merlin and his men returned to the base with as little fuss as they had left it. The sentries barely had time to shout an alarm before the group were at the gates, and more than one soldier who had thought himself alert wondered whether Merlin had somehow managed to materialise back home like something out of Star Trek.
Guinevere, who had been keeping an eye out for her father's return, had raced into his arms as soon they reached the main building before hurrying off to wake Arthur, but, Lancelot noticed as he watched the weary men dump their provision bags on the floor, none of the other men looked particularly happy to be back at the base.
Struggling up from the table where he had been stripping and cleaning his rifle, he limped over to man who looked to be in his early twenties with dreadlocks down to his shoulders. The man was obviously tired, slumping down at a table and looking towards the kitchen hopefully, but like most of Merlin's men he seemed to have a sixth sense when it came to knowing when he was being watched. He'd looked round and clocked Lancelot approaching before he was anywhere near him.
"Alright, mate?" Lancelot went for the cheery - we're all blokes together - approach before sitting down on the opposite side of the table. He needn't have bothered trying to ingratiate himself with the young man however. Merlin's soldier gave a grin that showed off a lot of white teeth against his dark skin and nodded respectfully.
"You're one of Arthur's lot, aren't you?" When Lancelot nodded in the affirmative, he held out a hand. "Good to meet you, I'm Alex. Wasn't sure about having a load of Samartian convicts shoved into the mix, but we were bloody glad of you the other day. I mean don't get me wrong - us lot fight like mad bastards, but we're not trained like your boys, and that's what swings things more times than not I reckon."
"I guess so." Lancelot shrugged. In truth he hadn't really thought about it, but then it wasn't exactly a coincidence that since he had arrived at the Wall most of the surviving soldiers were the lucky ones who were led by men who knew what they were doing and made sure that their men did too. Chalk another thing to be grateful to Arthur for, Lancelot thought with considerably less irritation than he would have felt a few days ago.
"Do you reckon the boss, Castus I mean, 'll train us?" Something flickered in Alex's eyes and he dropped his gaze. "Judging by what I saw last night, we're going to need all the help we can get."
Seeing Tristan walk through the door, Lancelot waved him over.
"Tristan, Alex." Lancelot introduced the two and stifled a smile when the young soldier gave the scout a smile that looked a lot warier than the one he'd given him. Tristan for his part gave an almost imperceptible nod that presumably meant "hello" and carried on munching the apple that he must have purloined from the kitchens.
"You were saying?" Lancelot prompted.
"Yeah, er right." Alex scrubbed a hand through his dreadlocks. "Like I said, my lot are gonna need more training. Whatever the Saxons have got going on it's some seriously messed up shit, and they are getting way too close to comfort."
"How close?" Tristan's voice was low, but Alex shot him an unnerved look as though he'd shouted at him. Grooving his thumbnail into the weathered surface of the table, it took a moment for him to answer.
"Closest bodies we found were a little over three miles away."
"From Greenhead base?" Lancelot asked. At Alex's nod, he frowned. "That's a hell of a way to go to dump bodies - why bother?"
The younger man gave a laugh wholly devoid of humour. "Oh they're not dumping them. This is like, I don't know, post apocalyptic modern art or something. Remember that guy who got paid like crazy money for chopping a cow in half and they put it in a gallery so everyone could tell him he was the dog's 'nads?"
"Damien Hurst," Lancelot said, remembering being dragged to the aforementioned gallery by a girlfriend. Tristan's slight smirk was more eloquent than a dozen diatribes about spoilt rich kids poncing around art galleries, and suppressing his irritation and a little embarrassment, Lancelot hurried on. "What are they doing?"
"They're making a point," Alex said quietly. "Ramming stakes through the soldiers and leaving them to die in formation. Don't ask me how that military rank stuff goes, but the more coloured stripes on your shirt, the higher up you are, right?" Lancelot nodded. "Yeah well, there's twenty or so dead soldiers stuck out there like puppets all nice and tidy in rank and file. The one in front was a general - recognise the uniform from one of Steven Seagal's films. They had the most fun with him I reckon."
Nauseated, Lancelot looked at Tristan, his stomach doing a slow roll as the scout bit off the last piece of his apple and dropped the core on the table.
"What do you reckon?" He asked when he was sure that he could open his mouth without throwing up.
Tristan shrugged. "Could be that they're just sadistic fucks who like torture."
"But you don't think it is." Tristan was hard to read, but the narrowing of his eyes suggested that something had occurred to him, and whatever it was wasn't good.
"Were there any other bodies there?" the scout asked. "Any of the refugees or non combat staff?"
Alex shook his head. "Not that I saw. Nearer Greenhill, yeah, but not messed about with like that."
"Simple then." Amber eyes flicked over to where a dozen or so off duty soldiers were playing cards. "What's the one thing holding this place together?"
"I don't know." Lancelot shrugged. "Fortifications?"
"Strength in numbers?" Alex offered.
Tristan gave them both an irritated look. "It's belief in an established system. People like to be told what to do - most of them anyway," he added when Lancelot made to protest. "The refugees need food and water and that comes because the soldiers bring it to them. The soldiers need a purpose, orders to keep running as a unit, and that comes because they trust the person in charge to make the right decisions and see the bigger picture. Take out the leader, in this situation Arthur, and you've got chaos, at least until a new leader can be found, and in this case that'd be fucking difficult."
"What's that got to do with what we found in the forest?" Alex asked, perplexed.
"We took out their General and his army, this is what's waiting for you, " Lancelot said sickly.
Tristan nodded. "You're learning. I knew a bloke once, fought in the second world war - used to talk about it after a few pints. Told me about when he was down in Salerno in forty three. He was just a kid then, but he remembered everything clear as a bell. Watched a whole platoon lose it after their sergeant was killed - they just went to pieces, and these were good soldiers mind. The men out there burying the bodies - that's shit work, and it'll haunt them, but it they see what's out there in the forest then that's what'll keep them up at night, and that's what'll make them panic in combat."
Lancelot groaned and dropped his head into his hands. Shifting slightly, he regarded Tristan through a veil of dark curls. "You know, Tris," he said finally. "I've known you what, six, seven months? That's the longest conversation you've had in my company, and I wish to God I hadn't heard it."
Tristan shrugged. "You asked."
"I did." Lancelot brightened, as a thought occurred to him. "At least we've got a bit of an edge that Honorius didn't have. Arthur doesn't go for all that fancy uniform stuff - he's doesn't exactly stick out amongst the other soldiers. The Saxon's probably don't even know who he is."
Alex winced, and Lancelot's enthusiasm vanished as swiftly as it had appeared.
"What?"
"There was a note," Alex said reluctantly. "It was pinned on the General's chest. Addressed to Commander Castus."
"Shit," Tristan murmured.
Yeah, Lancelot silently agreed. That pretty much summed things up didn't it?
"Things will turn out as fate wills it so, " Merlin said quietly. Guinevere was walking several steps ahead of him as they headed towards the dinning hall to regroup with the men, but she made no effort to slow down. "Zara has prophesised…"
"Oh fuck Zara's prophecies!" Guinevere snarled, turning as swiftly as a wildcat. "She doesn't know what's going to happen, you don't know what's going to happen, and what gives you the right to pin everything on Arthur like he's some sort of trophy? This is all wrong!"
"So it's "Arthur" now, is it?" Merlin asked mildly. If he had thought that the attempt at humour would calm his daughter down, he was very much mistaken. Fists clenched, eyes blazing, she reminded him of her mother for one brief bittersweet moment. But no, she was blood of his blood, and as such he could see beyond the anger and sense her terror both for himself, her adopted "family", and now Arthur, he thought uneasily.
"You read the letter," she said, close to tears. "You know what they'll do to him, they've got no honour whatever they promise, and you're trying to persuade him to go out there alone!"
Merlin sighed. He hadn't opened the letter they had found in the forest, but he had had a fair idea what the contents would be. Turned out even he had underestimated Saxon. The man himself wanted to meet Castus - both of them unescorted and unarmed in the interests of a "mutual understanding". As a sign of good faith twenty refugees from the Greenhill base would be brought to The Wall within the week with a promise of the release of further hostages if Arthur agreed to the meeting. If he refused, Saxon promised to make a funeral pyre of everyone still left alive at Greenhill not allied to his gangs. Madness really, Merlin thought wearily. The way the letter had been written had been almost polite, but manner of its delivery was an open threat as to what would happen if the Commander did not comply, and Arthur was trapped between two impossible choices.
Castus hadn't shown much emotion after reading it, which was more than he could say for his daughter who had at least had the sense to hold her tongue while in the meeting.
"If they bring the refugees he'll do what Saxon says," Guinevere said a little more quietly. "He's stupid when it comes to honour - if he thinks he'll save the people here or the refugees out there by meeting with that… man, he will."
"It is the mark of a compassionate leader," Merlin replied.
"It's the mark of an idiot!" Guinevere said despairingly. "Even if Saxon lets some of the refugees go, there's no reason why he'll set the rest free just because Arthur meets him. And Arthur won't agree to anything Saxon wants so there's no reason why Saxon should keep him alive."
Merlin flexed his fingers wearily. His arthritis was playing up again, and suddenly he felt very old and very tired. "There's more to it than that," he said quietly. "So far all of the military bases have fallen without much of a fight. The battle two days ago gave all of the Saxons something to think about, and they know now that our men have joined forces with the men here at the base. They have to wonder why. I believe Saxon is curious - he wants to know what, or who he's facing."
Guinevere absorbed that piece of information, but even as her mind ran through a dozen different scenarios of how the meeting could go, cold fear kept throwing up one horrible scenario after another. "Tell him not to go," Guinevere said softly. She was one step away from begging, and knowing that even in Honorious's dungeon's she had kept what was left of her pride, Merlin felt his heart clench. "Please father, for me. Promise me you'll tell him not to go."
Merlin reached out and brushed a strand of Guinevere's dark hair from her pale cheek. "Oh daughter mine," he said regretfully. "I'd give you the world, and yet you ask the one promise I can't keep." Kissing her forehead he walked away without another word.
Guinevere watched silently as her father crossed the expanse of tarmac and opened the door to the mess hall. Light from inside flared brightly, as did a muted cacophony of voices, but the door shut and she was alone. In the darkness she could see the lights of the border patrols, the watchtowers stark against the moonlight, and beyond that…the black of the forest that waited malevolently to reclaim this last little outpost of order. Shivering slightly, and not just from the cold, Guinevere tucked her hands around her waist and headed back to the barracks. She glanced at the door to her room briefly, but had no desire to enter, instead she fished the key Arthur had given her from her pocket and unlocked his chamber. Everything was very neat, she thought. Books stood orderly as soldiers on the shelves, all his clothes were hidden away in the closet, where they were arranged by colour and occasion. Undressing, she knew that when she reached for the soap and shampoo they would be lined up nice and tidy by the sink. Feeling a little perverse, she draped her bra over the back of his desk chair, and just for good measure dropped the rest of her clothing down without folding it. Showering quickly, she dried off her hair as well as she could before slipping beneath the covers.
The bed seemed very big and the sheets too cool, but the pillows smelled of Arthur, and for the moment it was the only place she could go where she could find some comfort without having to talk to anyone. When he returned hours later, she pretended to be asleep and watched him undress through slitted eyes. He picked up her clothes and carefully put them on the chair, but he smiled at the bra and left it where it was. Sliding into bed, it seemed that he was too wary of waking her to get too close, so she snuggled over to him and let him wrap an arm around her so that she could rest upon his chest. Sleep when it came was deep and mercifully dreamless.
A/N: First up, thanks to everyone who responded to last chapter's Author's note. To be honest I hated writing it because I didn't want to sound like a whiny little (insert suitable word here). It was very reassuring to know that people are still enjoying the story though - I was honestly thinking of packing it in. Anyway thanks for the feedback and the concrit. As a couple of you pointed out the story has gotten a bit oc romance heavy lately - I'll try and balance things out a bit better in future (hopefully!).
On a completely unrelated note, I know some of you have slogged through the insanely long Llynya's Song/Faithless/Fragile trilogy. A very clever person called Symphonia - Angel - Luna asked if she could make some banners for the stories, so if you were curious as to who I had in mind when writing Llynya, Lucy and Rowan the links to the pics are on my profile page.