A/N: I am incredibly guilty of the charges that I face of spending more time reading fanfiction than I do uploading. The jury's still out on the writing side. Anyway, I realise that Leon might be a little OOC in this chapter, what with him having kept a secret from Arthur and all that jazz but *shrugs* it had to be done for this chapter. Hope you're all having great days wherever you are!


Elaina coughed as the toes of Cenred's boot collided with her ribs. She glared up at him, spitting some blood onto the floor. The quartz cut into her wrists and made her blood burn boil inside her veins.

'Here's a suggestion – go to hell!' For her answer, the boot was once again directed at her ribs and this time she felt a rib crack. She merely laughed, shaking her head. 'It tickles – you do know that if I die, you'll have declared war on my kingdom?' She laughed again.

'How will they know?' Cenred looked down at the princess who was lying on the floor, her arms held out in front of her. 'You can't use magic to signal them – I have been a king for many years and not once have I heard of Vayle.'

'I have been a princess for much longer than you have been alive,' Elaina spat, mashing her lips together when Cenred practically jumped on her arms. 'Are you trying to make me angry, Cenred? Because now that I know that, I'll be in a brilliant mood for the next two months.' She grinned up at Cenred, spitting some more blood onto the floor.

'You're not going to get out of this dungeon – you'll die in this place,' Cenred promised her, crouching down next to her, leering at her.

Elaina laughed in Cenred's face.


Arthur looked up as the door to his chambers was opened. He expected to see Merlin standing in front of him – he even thought, for one foolish moment, that it might've been Elaina. He had not expected to see Gwen standing in his room, Leon standing beside her.
'Guinevere. Leon.' He gave Leon a curt nod, frowning. 'What brings you two here?'

'Lady Elaina does, my lord,' Leon answered as he bowed. 'I know that you probably do not wish to hear of her, especially after her betrayal, but please listen to me. It is essential that you do so.'

'Why?' Arthur asked suspiciously, setting down a long piece of parchment on the middle of his desk. 'Why should I listen to anything about her?'

'Because,' Leon said slowly, choosing his words carefully, 'if you do not listen to me, Elaina will die.'

'How tragic –'

All of a sudden, a fire seemed to take hold of Gwen and she snapped,
'Oh, stop acting as if you don't care about Elaina! We all know you love her, despite her magic!' At Arthur's wide, surprised eyes, she nodded, her arms folded. 'Yes, I knew about her magic, Arthur – she told me a few days after her return from "death". She confessed to Morgana and Merlin already knew.'

'So my own manservant knew about Elaina's magic? And one of my own, most trusted knights kept it from me – I can't trust anybody!' Arthur was outraged, throwing scrolls of parchment off his desk in fury. 'How could you all have hidden something so terrible from me?'

'Because she's never used her magic for anything but the good of people!' Leon seemed rather exasperated, which was rather unusual for him. Coupled with his impatience, it was almost as if it wasn't really Leon speaking. 'Arthur, now you're persecuting her for trying to save another man's life.' Leon shook his head, saying quietly, 'I'm sorry for speaking out of turn, my lord.'

'I'm not persecuting her for that – I'm persecuting her for being a sorceress,' Arthur corrected Leon, feeling Gwen's gaze burning into his skull. 'And you're forgiven, Leon - you can speak freely to me.'

'It's the same thing from your point of view – anyway, will you listen to me about what I have to say about Elaina's current situation or will you act as if you never loved her? You still do,' Leon murmured quietly, a knowing smile upon his face.

Arthur motioned towards a seat.
'Explain,' he said.

Sir Leon gave a sigh of relief and placed himself in the chair, putting his feet on the table.
'Finally!' he cried. 'I thought I'd never be able to get a word in edgeways – you really do speak too much.'

Arthur raised his eyebrows at Gwen, who shook her head, a small smile upon her face.
'Leon?' he asked warily.

'You're such a prat.' A pair of laughter filled, indigo eyes stared up at Arthur from Leon's face – it really was quite disconcerting. 'Did you miss me?'

'Elaina.' It took Arthur several attempts to make the word come out of his mouth.

Leon clapped his hands together in a slow, sarcastic manner.
'Well done, Arthur – nice to know that I always go for men with intelligence.' Leon's body jerked slightly and his eyes returned to normal. 'This may take a while to explain – she has no control over when she comes and goes.'

Arthur nodded silently, sitting down slowly. It was never simple with Elaina. His hands clasped in front of him, he pointed an index finger towards Leon's feet, saying quietly,
'Feet.' He closed his eyes, somehow feeling that he would understand this situation with a little more ease if he had his eyes closed.

'No.'

Arthur raised an eyebrow, his eyes still closed.
'Elaina.' He opened his eyes when he gained no response; he met the indigo eyes with a weary look that he had given Elaina many times before. 'Don't push me – you're lucky I'm even listening to you.'

Leon shrugged.
'You don't have a choice –' He gave another little jerk and Leon's own, darker eyes appeared. He looked around, a little dazed. 'What was I saying? Oh yes, Elaina has no control over when she takes over; however, there does seem to be a great deal of resistance in her mind as if she's disturbed by this idea.'

'She's not the only one,' Arthur assured Leon darkly, looking at Gwen and motioning towards a chair next to him.

A wry smile appeared on Leon's face; he glanced over at Gwen before he said to Arthur,
'The funny thing is that it's Elaina's idea.'


A few hours later – which had consisted of a very disjointed explanation from Leon, who explained what he knew of the situation, and a very long argument with Elaina (it had probably only lasted fifteen minutes altogether but with Elaina slipping out of Leon's body at the most inconvenient times (when Arthur had been about to make a very good and witty argument), it had ended up lasting at least two hours. Gwen had had to excuse herself from the room on more than one occasion after laughing so much from Elaina's insults.) – Arthur finally knew most of the events that had lead up to Gwen and Leon sitting in his room, with Leon sitting in a chair with his feet up on the table.
'So, you're saying that you went back to Nathan and you were talking with him and then were attacked?' Arthur frowned as Leon nodded his head, back under the control of Elaina once more. 'I assume that this person has a name?'

'No,' came the withering answer – Arthur could almost hear Elaina's voice as she manipulated Leon's mouth into speaking; it would've been much more cutting if she had actually been saying it in her own voice, 'his parents didn't have the imagination to name him. They couldn't even name him a normal, boring name like… Bob.' There was a brief pause. Then – 'Have you ever met anybody called Bob, Arthur? I've met plenty of people called Robert but never one called Bob –'

'Elaina.' Arthur had to rein Elaina in before she went off on a tangent. 'Could you please tell me who attacked you?'

'Attacking, Arthur, he's still doing it. With quite a bit of effort as well.' A quiet chuckle came from Leon now. The gaze of the indigo eyes shifted from where they had been studying a coat of arms to focus on Arthur. 'It's Cenred –'

'Cenred?' Arthur sat up sharply, staring into those eyes which now gazed at him.

'No, a man named Bob.'

Arthur only must managed to stop himself from glaring at Leon – he was constantly having to remind himself that Leon probably had no idea what was going on or what he was being made to say.
'You're infuriating me, Elaina – I might just leave you to his mercy.'

'It's not just him – well, it is at the moment. He's working with Morgause –'

'Morgause?'

'No, a man called Bob.' This was accompanied with an arched eyebrow. 'Yes, he's working with Morgause, Arthur, and we both know that you'd never leave me here.'

'And you can't break out using your magic?' Arthur asked wearily, yawning. He hadn't moved from his seat in hours. 'You seem to be using your magic fairly well at the moment.'

'Oh, because I'd be so obviously doing this –' A hand was motioned towards Leon's body. '- if I could use my magic to break out. No, Arthur, I have no idea how to break out and in all honesty, I need your help. To get out. And I don't even know I'm doing this or using this sort of magic.' A long sigh was let out.

Arthur was quiet for a few moments. He looked at Gwen and then at Lancelot.
'If my father were to find out –'

'Raise your hand if you know how to keep secrets.' Leon's body raised two hands. The index finger of one hand pointed at the other. 'This is for Leon – he'd want me to do it.'

Arthur nodded, now convinced that he'd spent just under six months of his life with a lunatic. A very lovable, noble, strong and magical lunatic but a lunatic nonetheless. He grumbled something beneath his breath as he saw Gwen had raised her own hand.

'Three against one. Now will you help me?'

'Fine.'


'Day three of solitary confinement: equally as boring as day two and almost as bad as day one; still hungry; still have a headache; still stuck with the most unsociable person in the world; have considered taking up knitting but there are no sheep here nor any wool – sadly, this means no knitting –'

'I'd kill you with the needles,' Emilie muttered beneath her breath, looking darkly at Gwaine.

'- the most unsociable person in the world has deigned to speak – however, she has become violent –'

'I've always been violent where you've been concerned!' Emilie reminded him in venomous tones.

'- cellmate has finally admitted to being a violent person –' Gwaine looked up as Emilie let out a cry of rage and raised his eyebrows. 'Something bothering you?'

Emilie could no longer take it. She lunged at him, pushing him onto the floor and hitting him repeatedly in the chest.
'I hate you, Gwaine – oh, I just hate you! You and your accent and that stupid fringe and the way that you almost died and how you're so offhand about everything. Just…' Emilie swiped at Gwaine's face.

And broke his nose.

'My nothe!' Gwaine cried, trying to get his arms out from beneath Emilie's legs. 'You broke my nothe.'

'What the hell's your "nothe"?' Emilie asked, frowning in confusion.

'My… Argh!' With an angry bellow, Gwaine pushed Emilie off him and made it so that he was kneeling on top of her, her arms trapped beneath his knees. 'You're a thycopath!'

Emilie glared up at Gwaine, struggling uselessly. In spite of everything, she was impressed by his strength. This continued for three more, very angry minutes until Emilie whispered quietly,
'Your nose is dripping blood on my face.'

'Well, get uthed to it.' As he said this, Gwaine wiped away the blood, glaring down at Emilie. 'Because I have abtholutely no intenthion of moving.'

'Fine. Because I'm not uncomfortable in the slightest,' Emilie informed him with a smug smile on her face. She raised an eyebrow as Gwaine frowned. 'I could this all night.'

'Good.'

'So, how do you reckon Nathan's doing? Wherever he may be,' Emilie added quietly upon realising that she actually had no idea where Nathan was. Like Elaina and Nathan, she and Gwaine had both been knocked out by Cenred and Morgause and had not seen either Elaina or Nathan. In fact, much to their annoyance, they had only seen each other.

'He'll be fine, Emilie – he's a fighter.' The torrent of blood seemed to have stopped for now and Gwaine sighed. 'I remember a time – only about last week, now I think of it – when my nose would've already healed.' When Emilie glowered at him from the floor, he quickly apologised. 'I know, not a good thing.'

'No, it was not a good thing,' Emilie reminded him grumpily. Somebody sitting on top of her was seriously restricting her lung capacity. 'But at least you've stopped dripping on me for now. I'm sure Nathan's fine though – he's probably giving Cenred and Morgause hell for everything and, if he's anything like I think he still is, probably tearing the place apart looking for Elaina.'

Gwaine nodded.
'Probably.' He relaxed slightly, placing even more of his weight onto Emilie's body. 'He's probably kicking and screaming right now.'


However, they were both wrong. Nathan was sat in his own cell, his eyes closed and his head resting against a wall. He had no cellmate to sit on top of him or to argue with. In fact, he had only himself and his thoughts. Very occasionally a visitor but that was never anything special – it would only ever be either Morgause or Cenred, usually the former. He knew that the latter was "preoccupied". He thought about how everything had happened to lead them up to such a point where Elaina was being kicked around a room, Gwaine and Emilie were nowhere to be seen and Nathan was in solitary confinement. There had been the war and E.V.'s arrival – a blessing to some, a curse to others – and, of course, his capture by those animals. But there had also been all the things in between – such as the long nights spent with Elaina beneath the stars, looking for refugees and killing the murderers. Or when they'd finally believed that they had all been safe and some sense of safety and normality had begun to sweep over them all – that had lasted all of one night. Surely there was something, somewhere, that had meant that this would happen. The answer jumped out at Nathan five minutes later but he frowned – he didn't like that answer.

'Something bothering you, my friend?' Cenred stepped into the doorway of the cell, his footsteps sounding slightly wet.

Nathan opened his eyes, looking at Cenred. There were no puddles in his cell, there was nothing remotely damp at all. So why did Cenred's footsteps sound like he'd been wading through a river?

Cenred followed Nathan's gaze and smirked.
'You know, she's quite a lot stronger than I thought she would be without her magic,' he remarked, taking another few steps forward as he now said, 'Normally I'd let somebody else do this – the real dirty work – but I'm rather enjoying doing all of this. I mean, she said that titles carry no weight with her but my boots obviously do.'

Nathan flinched involuntarily, not wanting to think about what Cenred so obviously meant. He should be saving Elaina right now – that's how it had happened back home; that's what Elaina had done. She'd found him and saved him, even if she had believed him dead – surely she deserved the same from him?

Cenred laughed as he saw Nathan's reaction.
'You're weak, Nathan, and you really shouldn't be. I mean, of course it's your fault –'

'How'd you figure that one out, genius?' Nathan spat from where he still sat on his bed.

'You obviously didn't close the way you came to this place well enough and you saw how in love Elaina and Pendragon are and, still being in love with her yourself, allied yourself with us without even knowing what you were signing yourself up for; you tried to show her how much you love her but…' Cenred shook his head, a cruel smile on his face. 'You just signed her death warrant, my friend. This is your fault and you can't fix it.'

'How dare you even accuse me of harming E.V. in the slightest! I would never do that!' Nathan stood up, towering over Cenred. He looked even taller when he was angry. 'And you're going to go to hell for doing what you've done to her.'

Cenred raised an eyebrow.
'I wonder… You do know you're infected, don't you?' he asked in such a casual tone that he might as well have been discussing the weather.

Nathan blinked, a bewildered expression upon his face.
'Excuse me?'

'You're infected – I can see it in your eyes, the way you act and how you speak. You're changing – a darker side – an alien side – is taking over; I'm genuinely surprised that you managed to resist it for so long. You're a bit like your beloved E.V. in that sense though – full of surprises. Maybe you'll change together.' Cenred was thoughtful. 'Then again, maybe she'll change before you – she does have two of those things inside her, after all. What do you call them again?'

'Stonecriers.' Nathan's mouth twisted around the word – he wanted nothing more than to rip Cenred's head from his shoulders, pull each limb from each socket and then throw what was left into the mountains. But something was telling him to stop and to wait, that Cenred would know pain soon enough. And that satisfied him more than any bloodshed could.

'Stonecriers. It's creative – oh well, things to be doing now. I'll see how E.V.'s doing – she's really putting up quite well with the torture.' Cenred closed the door behind him.

Nathan collapsed back onto his bed, resting his head against his knees. He now knew exactly what had brought them to this sickening turn of events. Karma – what goes around comes around. He'd never really been a great believer of it – he was a scientist, he pushed the boundaries of what was acceptable to make progress – until now. All of this for something he had done a long time ago. And now he was paying for it tenfold.


Uther stirred as he saw a pale figure standing by his bed. He opened his eyes and only just managed to stop himself from screaming. His eyes were, however, wide with fear. In front of his very eyes stood his wife – obviously a ghost but she stood there nonetheless.

'Ygraine,' he whispered, his voice trembling in the night.

She stared at him with white eyes and held out of pallid grey finger, pointing it straight at him.
'You killed me, Uther Pendragon – you killed me!' Her voice sounded like a thousand gargoyles shrieking and her hair whipped about her in a wild sort of way, like she was trapped in a hurricane that only she could feel. 'You killed me and soon you will also die. Mark my words, Uther Pendragon: you will join me in Hell!'


A/N: I hope you enjoyed that chapter; as for the thing with Gwaine's nose, I've never broken my nose so I have no idea how he'd be speaking, it's just how I imagine it would sound. On another note, do any of you know a person called Bob? I can't say I do. I hope you all enjoyed this chapter!
Grace x