"I don't understand. What are you trying to say without actually saying it?" Merlin asked.

"He finds out that I said anything and I'll be dead the second we're out of Camelot." Cara protested slightly.

"You tell me, and my friends and I won't let that happen." Merlin gripped her arms for a moment. "What could be so bad that he would kill you?"

"That was a tall promise to just throw out like that." Gwaine mused, offering Jaya a small flower from a short bush as they walked past.

Jaya took the flower with a small smile and sniffed it with a small smile. She tucked it into her hair behind a small braid that wrapped around the crown of her head. "That aside, it was terrible bold for a servant to say. Even if it was Merlin."

Gwaine snorted and rolled his eyes. "That's not something that I would know."

Jaya hummed slightly. "Right. I suppose you wouldn't. Well...not in this lifetime anyway."

Gwaine shrugged. "So he basically promised her something that he couldn't actually follow through on."

"Not without his magic, and not in a way that she would think." Jaya agreed.

"What did Freya say that happened next?"

"Cara was...skeptical."

"Understandable…"

"He wants Camelot for himself. He's not even the least bit interested in a peace treaty."

"Cara...the goblet. What happened to the goblet?" Merlin asked, doing his best to keep from sounding frustrated.

"He is trying to break Uther by killing Arthur in front of him." Cara whispered, looking around like she was worried that someone would be listening.

"She didn't honestly believe that would convince Merlin...I've never met Uther, just heard about him over the last twenty-four hours to be honest, and even I know that he wouldn't be broken by something like that. It would mean war for sure."

Jaya looked at him and tapped her nose. "That it would. But you're getting ahead of me."

Freya suddenly got the distinct impression that Merlin was being lead on. Her eyes popped open. Jaya was right. She could feel the twinges of the dark magic tickling the very edge of her magic.

"Cara. The goblet?" Merlin demanded.

"He put something in it when he thought that I couldn't see." Cara sounded scared.

"What?"

"I shouldn't. He'll kill me!"

"What if I guess?" Merlin tried. "Is it some sort of poison?"

Cara nodded.

Freya risked a glance around the column just in time to see Cara smirk as Merlin rushed away back to the hall. She waited for a moment and then gathered up her skirts in one hand and ran back the way she came from, praying that she could get there in time to at least warn Jaya.

"...And may the differences of our past remain there. Uther, your health." Bayard smiled widly.

Jaya stood up with everyone else in the room, scooping up her goblet as she stood.

"Arthur." Bayard held up his goblet.

Arthur mimicked the move and then started to bring his goblet to his lips.

"The Lady Morgana."

Morgana nodded with a brilliant smile, Arthur pulled the goblet away from his mouth, managing to not roll his eyes.

"The people of Camelot." Bayard looked around the room after a pause just long enough that everyone had thought they were going to be allowed to drink. "The Princess Jaya."

Jaya gestured to him slightly with the goblet and smiled tightly.

"And to the fallen warriors on both sides. May we…"

Jaya turned her head automatically as she felt Freya walk up to her. She raised her eyebrows slightly and waited.

"Tá cupán Artúr nimh ann." Freya said quickly, hoping that no one would understand. She watched Jaya mouth 'poison' and her eyes widen.

Jaya turned around to see everyone starting to lift their goblets to their mouths. She did the same, her mind frantically racing to come up with a plan.

"Stop!" Merlin's voice echoed through the hall as he ran into the middle of the room, past Bayard. "Arthur don't! That's been poisoned." Merlin skittered up to Arthur's seat at the end of the high table and all but ripped the goblet out of Arthur's hand.

Jaya closed her eyes for a moment and wished, she was sure for not the last time, that she had foreseen this coming.

"Just...right out loud like that." Gwaine looked at her skeptically.

Jaya swung her hands and flared her eyes. "He did that a lot. You'll see."

Gwaine groaned. "Why do I feel like I'm going to get an ulcer listening to this?"

Jaya snorted. "Well. Try not to stress yourself out too much yet."

"What?" Uther demanded, watching Merlin take the goblet from Arthur.

"Merlin!?" Arthur ground.

"It's been poisoned." Merlin explained to Uther, clutching the goblet to himself.

"I have done no such thing!" Bayard protested, pulling his sword from its sheath, his knights doing the same.

Every knight clothed in red pulled their swords at the same time.

Jaya, not to be left unarmed in the middle of a situation much like what had suddenly presented itself, quickly caught up the dinner knife that she had been playing with sooner. She caught Morgana doing the same out of the corner of her eye.

"A dinner knife, Daffodil?" Gwaine wondered, his tone confused.

"For cutting? It wasn't a butter knife." Jaya tilted her head at him.

"Like a steak knife?"

"More like a fillet knife."

"All right. Proceed."

"Put. Down. Your. Swords." Uther demanded, his voice menacing.

Guards that had previously been outside the hall, rushed in, swords drawn, looking around in surprise.

"Take a look around the room." Uther continued, looking at Bayard like he was both disappointed and angry all at the same time. "What exactly is your plan?"

"This is an outrageous insult!" Bayard raged.

"Explain yourself. How did you learn this?" Uther demanded of Merlin.

"Father. Allow me." Arthur intercepted.

Jaya had everything she could do to keep from saying something or mentally berating Merlin. This was not going well at all.

Arthur skirted around the edge of the table and walked up to Merlin. "Merlin, you pod head. What have I told you about the slow gin?" he wondered as he grabbed Merlin's shoulder and pulled the goblet away from Merlin.

"Unless you want to be ripped to shreds by my dogs you will tell me what I want to know." Uther warned.

"He poisoned it." Merlin answered simply.

Jaya closed her eyes again. Not well at all, especially judging by the look on Bayard's face.

"He would be? Uther demanded.

"Bayard." Merlin shrugged.

"And you came to this revelation how?" Uther looked at him darkly.

"A friend." Merlin hedged.

"I won't listen to this anymore." Bayard snapped, glaring at Uther, as if it was the King's fault that this had all happened.

"Give it to me." Uther ordered, wiggling his fingers in a gesture that indicated he wanted it.

Arthur did so, while looking back at Merlin tightly.

"If you're telling the truth…" Uther started.

"I am." Bayard interrupted hotly.

"Then perhaps you should start acting like you have nothing to fear." Uther looked at him like he was being an insolent child.

Bayard looked like he understood after a moment and sheathed his sword, his men following his lead. He stepped forward and reached for the goblet.

"No. If this little information outburst is correct, I fully intend to kill you in the way that I choose." Uther didn't look amused.

Bayard snorted, and didn't look much amused either.

Gwaine scoffed and half shook his head. "Wow."

Jaya grunted.

"That's a special kind of cold."

Uther held the goblet out towards Merlin. "He interrupted everything. The servant will drink it."

"But...he'll die!" Arthur protested.

"It is a simple way to find out what the truth is." Uther shrugged it off.

Jaya felt Freya stiffen behind her, and did her best to keep the panic that was rising in her to a minimum.

"And if he's wrong?" Bayard asked, his eyes narrowed slightly.

"Then you have my apologies, and you may do with him what you will." Uther shrugged like it was something that should have been an easy leap.

"Uther, please! He's just a boy!" Gaius protested from halfway down one of the long tables.

"Then you should have taught him better!" Uther snapped, glaring at the physician.

Jaya looked over the room and felt the corners of her eyes twitch before she could help it. Cara. Hiding in the shadows of one of the pillars. She was smirking. It suddenly all dawned on Jaya as she listened with half an ear to Arthur telling Merlin to apologize, and that it was all a big mistake, and that he would drink it. This wasn't about Arthur at all. It was about Merlin. What if the sorcerer that had brought the Afanc to Camelot had somehow found out that Merlin had been part of the reason that Afanc was taken care of?

"No, no, no, no, no. It's all right." Merlin assured as Jaya tuned back into the conversation.

Jaya watched him toast Arthur and then Bayard and watched the moment that he mentally steeled himself. She looked back over to where she had seen Cara and felt herself go cold. She was grinning. It was her plan all along. The small gasp from Freya told Jaya that Merlin had started drinking the poison. For a moment Jaya didn't know what to do, she caught sight of Gwen stepping out of the crowd slightly with worry written all over her face.

"All that aside. It's a brilliant way to kill someone."

Jaya smirked and nodded slowly. "He's mentioned it himself a couple of times. Always claims that it's his personal favorite brush with lethal drinks."

Gwaine looked at her and tilted his head slowly.

Jaya shrugged. "It's happened a lot."

"How many times is a lot?"

"I think….hundred times?"

"Hundred times."

"It's been over a thousand years. Not like it was in the last ten years." Jaya shrugged.

"So he averages a pensioning a century."

"If you average it out."

"That makes it sound like-"

"Like there was one decade that he was poisoned four times?" Jaya smirked. "Yeah. It got so bad that Arthur and his family came to live here was us for a bit while Merlin sorted out the problem."

"Four times."

"Mmmhm."

"Came to live with us?" Gwaine gestured between them.

"It's a big castle." Jaya shrugged. "And they came here in secret. Only Merlin, Leon, Percival and you and I knew about it."

Gwaine made a thoughtfully surprised noise and nodded slowly. "Right. So his favorite poisoning…"

The silence stretched a little too long after Merlin finished the last bit of Arthur's drink.

"I...uh.." He cleared his throat. "I feel fine." Merlin's voice suddenly caught through the thick silence.

"Looks like you get the boy as promised." Uther informed Bayard.

Jaya risked a quick glance, his face suddenly grew pale. Her head snapped back toward where Cara had been. Her eyes frantically started searching when she heard Merlin starting to choke. She didn't need to watch him fall to know that he did. Freya's gasp told her that.

"It's poisoned! Guards! Do not let him get away!" Uther called, suddenly very angry.

Freya hurried around the table and kneeled down next to Merlin along with Arthur, Gwen and Gaius.

Jaya was around the table and cutting through the ranks of Camelot's knights and guards as they quickly began rounding up Lord Bayard's men, heading for the dark shadow where she had seen Cara last. She knew that she was the only one that had suddenly figured out the plan and the reason that all of it was going on, but she didn't have time to stop and explain, and there was no way that Uther would believe her when she told him it was about Merlin. She had to find 'Cara'.

Jaya ran through the halls of the castle, her skirts caught up in both hands, not pausing when she passed people, she didn't have time to explain. She was halfway down the steps into the courtyard where she had said goodbye to her father and Finnian a few months before when she realized that she was never going to catch 'Cara'. She was gone. There was nothing for it. Jaya turned and rushed back the way she had come from, quickly heading for the physician's chambers, where she knew that they would have brought Merlin. As soon as she was out of everyone's gaze she quickly did a bit of magic and reappeared two hallways over from Gaius' rooms. She gathered up her skirts and ran burst into the room almost right on Freya's heels, who was behind Arthur and Gwen.

Arthur carefully laid Merlin down on the cot that was in the middle of the room. He winced slightly as Merlin's breath wheezed slightly.

"His breathing is labored." Gaius informed. "Someone get me a towel and some water."

Gwen and Freya nearly tripped over each other in their effort to get the things that Gaius had asked for.

"Is he going to be all right?" Arthur asked, looking down at Merlin like he wasn't sure if he was grateful or livid that Merlin had done something so...crazy.

"He's burning up." Jaya mentioned, feeling Merlin's forehead.

"You can cure him, can't you, Gaius?" Gwen asked, sitting down next to the cot and dipping the cloth she had found into the bucket of water that Freya set down next to her.

"I won't know until I can identify the poison. Pass me the goblet." He instructed.

Jaya scooped up the goblet from where it was near her and handed it off to him.

"Ah, there's something stuck inside." Gaius muttered as he quickly picked up a set of tweezers to carefully pull what he had noticed out.

"What is it?" Jaya asked the same time Arthur did. They paused a moment from their concern about Merlin's well-being and looked at each other in confusion.

Gaius looked at them over what he was doing and raised an eyebrow for a moment. "It appears to be a flower petal of some kind."

"His brow's on fire." Gwen interrupted, having hardly heard what was going on above her head.

"Try to keep him cool. It will keep the fever in check." Gaius instructed.

Gwen dipped the cloth in the bucket of water and wrung it out slightly before laying across Merlin's forehead again.

Freya started to pull at the strings that tied the front of Merlin's get-up shut, trying to get some air flow to the rest of him.

"Jaya, hand me that book. No not that one, the one with the brown binding."

Jaya pulled the third book down out of a stack of about ten and handed it over to him quickly.

Gaius flipped through the book, looking through the pictures and then back at the petal that was gripped between the pincer of the tweezers. "Ah. The Mortaeus flower. It says here that someone poisoned by the Mortaeus can only be saved by a potion made from the leaf of the very same flower. It can only be found in the caves deep beneath the Forest of Balor. The flowers grow on the root of the Mortaeus tree."

Jaya stood still for for a split second longer than Arthur before she rushed forward to look over Gaius' shoulder at the picture that Gaius was looking at in the book.

"That doesn't look particularly friendly." Arthur mumbled looking at the great lizard-like creature.

"A Cockatrice?" Jaya asked, her voice's pitch matching her raised eyebrows.

"A Cockatrice. It guards the forest. It's venom is potent. A single drop would mean certain death. Few who have crossed the Mountains of Isgaard in search of the Mortaeus flower have made it back alive." Gaius looked over his shoulder at the young Royals sternly.

Gwaine looked at her and raised an eyebrow. "Why do I get the feeling that you're one of the few to pull it off?"

Jaya glanced up at him and smirked.