On to Guinevere, and back to our regular four-a-day schedule! Although why I give you guys four chapters a day, I'll never know...
This set will take place in a much more compressed time period-a course of hours, maybe a day, rather than the days and weeks of the previous sets. Closer perhaps to the time flow of Gwaine's secret. And don't expect to see dear Gwen until the very end. And as always, enjoy!
Although explaining the situation while hiding the whole magical sanctuary bit was another nightmare all its own, Arthur learned more on that one trip into Westmorland than he ever cared to learn, and gained more than he expected, too. Westmorland became a province of Camelot and Prince Garis ap Gwyar of Orkney became its lord—and King Lot still warred against Camelot. Although that already petty war fell flat when Garis declared that his loyalty lay with Arthur. The border towns quickly learned that Orkney's armies' loyalties lay with Garis, and rather than fighting, the invading armies struck up an unlikely friendship with the townsfolk. An Orkney army in Camelot meant a week of feasting, bartering, displays of craftsmanship, lessons in self-defense, irate fathers locking their daughters indoors, and general merrymaking, followed by the army limping home to report false victories and losses to a powerless king and irate fathers going to Arthur to complain. Soon the only person truly worried about war with Orkney was Agravaine.
Time passed. Arthur made his first major mistake as a king by killing Carleon's ruler, then ended the resulting war with no bloodshed. His people loved him more than ever. Merlin was injured, then vanished, then returned, then spent two days in the tavern, but didn't seem to have a single hangover.
Gaius was abducted. Gwaine began to doubt Agravaine's loyalties. Arthur was thoroughly humiliated by the whole business, although the speech Gaius gave him about people who did things for him when he didn't know about it didn't surprise him nearly as much as it should have. He thought back to the Great Dragon, declaring its loyalty, and to the dead Fisher King, swearing that magic loved him, and on all the land that seemed to come to him. It seemed obvious something was looking out for him.
The knights fought a lamia and survived, and Gwen saved Merlin's life. Merlin had smelled rotten apples and bitter wood smoke on the lamia from the first, although it hadn't clicked until later on. And it had been very hard to smell, too. Identifying magicals by their scent was the most sure method, but perhaps not the most practical, since the smell was so faint. He'd been rather interested in what other creatures of magic he would run into now that Avalon was open again—the good and the bad. Having met his first one face to face, however, he decided he'd just as soon not meet another.
And then Lancelot had returned, and it was the very light, even-harder-to-smell scent of rotten apples hanging around the knight that told Merlin from the beginning not all was as it seemed.
And then he'd kissed Gwen.
No one knew all the details, and as Gwen had been banished shortly afterward, no one was in much of a position to ask. Merlin suffered perhaps more than Arthur, as he'd lost his two oldest friends (one all over again) in just a matter of days. Elyan was furious, but he wasn't sure who at—Arthur for banishing his sister before properly hearing her side, Gwen for kissing Lancelot, or Lancelot for coming back at all. He couldn't take that anger out on anyone but Arthur, and he couldn't even do that properly as the king looked like a kicked puppy every time someone brought Gwen up. It was very hard to be mad at a kicked puppy.
Then came that business with the drippy druid boy. Elyan was possessed, then saved, and Arthur repeated the gesture he'd made with Westmorland and all but said the druids were free in Camelot once more. All thoughts of Gwen were driven from nearly everyone's mind.
Until the caravans came, a few weeks later.
For one wild moment, Merlin thought Garis had sent his friends to Camelot to give them the Cup of Life. Then they saw the unfamiliar standard on the side of the wagons. No one had ever seen it before—no one except Elyan, who took one look and went to his chambers and locked the door behind him.
That was curious. The other Round Table men, minus Arthur who was in too dark a funk to care, took it upon themselves to figure out just who was coming to town, what their connection to Elyan was, and if any fun could be had of the whole business.