Merlin slowly blinked awake as dawn was breaking the following morning. For a few seconds he was confused to be sitting against a rock wall with hair tickling his nostrils, an arm draped around his waist and the heat from another's body radiating all along his left side. He lifted his head and scratched his nose and squinted at the golden head resting on his shoulder and the memory of the night before came back to him. Arthur was still deeply asleep and snoring quietly, the warm air from his exhalations puffing against Merlin's neck and making him shiver a little.
Despite their current predicament stuck at the bottom of a narrow gully with no way up that he could see (which, mused Merlin, was entirely Arthur's fault), the manservant could not help but smile down fondly at his King. Although his Master drove him to distraction sometimes and treated him appallingly most of the time, Merlin could not imagine a life without him. He quietly watched Arthur sleep on and fought an overwhelming urge to stroke back the golden hair from the royal forehead and to wrap his arms around his waist and cosy up. Arthur was obviously still drugged by the laudenam and to take advantage of the situation would be very wrong.
Merlin was suddenly shaken from these thoughts when he heard a twig snap somewhere overhead. He swiftly pulled the fern fronds up to completely cover himself and Arthur and anxiously peeped through a gap in the leaves to see who or what was approaching. He held his breath and suddenly Arthur's light snoring sounded very loud in his ear. After long tense seconds Merlin heard another twig snap and a gentle fall of stones into the gully as whoever was above came close enough to the edge to dislodge small rocks and earth.
Merlin braced himself to use his magic to repel the unknown person if he should turn out to be one of Cendred's henchmen. He hoped to all the gods that Arthur would not wake up and catch him at it. He tensed himself for action as a mop of black hair came into view from the top of the gully...and then relaxed when the face of a small boy appeared.
The boy peered into the gully, his curiosity aroused after noticing scuffed grass and broken branches near it's top. His large intelligent blue eyes swept the gully bottom and quickly focused on the fern fronds piled unnaturally against the cliff wall. He frowned and looked alarmed and began to move back, fearful of what might be hidden there.
Before he withdrew completely, Merlin moved the fern camouflage from off his face and looked up. The boy was obviously a druid child. With his unruly mop of black hair and big eyes, Merlin was struck by just how much he resembled Mordred at the same age and wondered if they may perhaps be related. Anxious not to awaken Arthur, he reached out to speak to the boy with his mind.
*Don't be frightened, we mean you no harm*, he 'said', looking up earnestly at the child. *My friend is injured and we cannot move*.
The boy's eyes grew wide and he looked down at Merlin in surprise and then to the blond head resting on his shoulder. He made no other answer.
*Can you hear me?*, asked Merlin, wondering if he'd made a mistake and if the child wasn't a druid after all but some passing peasant child.
The boy nodded and leaned a little further over the cliff top, *Emrys?* he 'asked' in a soft quavering thought.
It was Merlin's turn to be surprised. He would never get used to being recognised as Emrys by people (and creatures) that he had never before met. He nodded once and 'said'. *I am he. My friend and I came to speak to your clan leaders but we fell into this gully last night and he has broken his ankle. Could you bring help?*
The boy's eyes grew even wider. *The mighty Emrys wishes to speak with our clan?*, he 'asked' wonderingly. He stood upright and looked less alarmed and more determined. *We are camped a mile from here. I shall come back with the Elders within the half hour, I swear it.*
Merlin gave him a broad smile and mouthed a silent "Thank You" up to him. The boy smiled back and dashed off.
Once the boy had gone, Merlin endeavoured to wake Arthur up. He gently (and somewhat reluctantly) shifted the King's head from his shoulder and unwrapped the arm from around his waist and sat Arthur against the cliff wall and pushed thier makeshift fern bedding aside. He grabbed his Master's shoulders and shook firmly and said in a loud voice, "Arthur! Come on now - time to wake up!".
"Guh?" replied Arthur intelligently, his head lolling around as Merlin shook him. He attempted to open his eyes but his lids felt heavy and he could not focus anyway. "G'roff me, Merlin", he slurred, "s' not even light yet."
Merlin tutted and shook him again. "Come on dollophead", he said, "Pull yourself together; the Druids will be here soon and we don't want them thinking you're a drunken idiot."
"D'rids?", slurred Arthur, his eyes still closed but a frown creasing his brow, "What d'you mean D'rids? Jus' let me sleep and shut the curtains again on your way out."
Merlin leaned back on his haunches and regarded his King and wondered if he'd given him a little too much of the sedative the previous evening. He decided that drastic action was needed and hoped that Arthur would forgive him and not hit him again. He took his water skin from his bag and promptly emptied it's contents over the King's head then swiftly moved back out of kicking or punching range.
"Gaaaah!", announced Arthur in a voice several octaves higher than his usual. "What the hell?" He opened his eyes and with his uninjured foot kicked out at the spot where Merlin had been moments before.
"Sorry Sire", said Merlin from several feet away and holding up his hands, "I tried everything else and you just wouldn't wake up and you have to be awake and..."
"Count yourself lucky I can't move because of this ankle", growled Arthur dangerously, wiping the water from his hair and eyes, "Because if I could get hold of you right now, so help me I'll..."
"Arthur", said Merlin with authority in his voice, "Whilst you were still asleep a Druid child discovered us. He will return in a few minutes with the Clan Elders. I thought that you would prefer to be awake and alert rather than drooling into my shoulder when they got here."
The King blinked at him indignantly, "I do not drool", he announced regally, rapidly wiping at his mouth just in case. He sat up as best he could and said. "In that case, I will not put you in the stocks for trying to drown me as I slept."
Merlin huffed a laugh. "Well that's a relief", he said smiling and daring to sit down next to the King, "Here", he said as he threw his kerchief to Arthur, "wipe your face and hair on this so you look less like a drowned rat when they get here."
Arthur caught the kerchief and mopped himself down.
"How's the ankle?" asked Merlin conversationally as the King tidied himself up.
Arthur glanced down at it and paled a little upon seeing the unnatural angle that his foot sat at. "Hurt's but not as much as it should given what it looks like", he said. "How much of that laudenham did you give me last night, anyway - I still feel a little numb and woozy."
"Well I didn't tell you to drink the entire bottle, you just downed the lot!" said Merlin indignantly, "Though perhaps it's best you did - you would've been unbearable if you had been awake all night."
His cheekyness earned him a lightening quick slap across the back of the head.
"Bloody ow!", he grumbled, rubbing the spot on the back of his head which was sore from having been hit far too often by his master.
"I might still be woozy but my reflexes are better than yours", said Arthur smugly, "Now less of your cheek - I would rather the Druid Elders did not see you acting so insubordinately to your King."
Merlin looked at Arthur thoughtfully as he carried on rubbing at the sore spot on his head. After a while he asked, "You do remember why the Dolma wants you to meet the Druids, don't you?"
Arthur looked back at him frowning. "Yes", he replied, "She wants me to show my willingless to learn their ways and to ask forgiveness for the wrongs I have done their people in the past."
Merlin nodded, glad to hear that Arthur had remembered so well. "Don't you think", he suggested carefully, "that they would be more willing to believe you if you treated your manservant as your equal rather than as your punching bag?"
Arthur thought for a few moments before conceding, "You may have a point Merlin."
Merlin smiled at his small victory.
"Even so", continued Arthur, raising his hand to emphasise the point, "Best let me do the talking when they get here. I quite sure they'd want to listen to someone wise and authoritative rather than some blathering idiot."
"I'm quite sure they would, Sire", said Merlin with a broad grin and laughter twinkling in his eyes.
Before Arthur could ask Merlin why he seemed so amused at being addressed as a 'blathering idiot' there was a sound of many footsteps approaching the edge of the gully above them. Both men held thier breaths and looked upward, Arthur's hand went automatically to his sword hilt worried that the footsteps might belong to a Patrol rather than to the Druids they were expecting. Both men sighed in relief when the first men came into view and it was obvious from thier clothing that they were indeed Druid Elders.
Arthur was just thinking about what he should say by way of greeting when he was rendered speechless . The twelve Elders lined up along the edge of the gully and as one dropped to one knee and bowed thier heads.
"Welcome to our Forest, oh Mighty One", said the eldest amongst them, not raising his head, "We have long awaited your coming and are honoured to have you amongst us and wish only to serve you."
Arthur was utterly confused as he looked between the kneeling Druids and Merlin who was staring back at him with impossibly wide and rather panicked eyes.